Written by Eddie LeShure – This is the first part of a three part series and was written in April 2003. Exchange rate: $1 = about 9,000 Rupiahs.
Borneo! Since childhood, whenever I had heard of Borneo, my mind had instantly filled with vivid images of deep dark jungles, headhunters with blowguns loaded with poison darts, cannibals, and most of all: The Wild Man of Borneo. Did I think I would ever actually get there? Not a chance. But here I was on Star Airlines flight 361, flying over the Java Sea, headed from my home in Malang on java towards the fulfillment of another life-long fantasy. I would have nine days there.
The world’s third-largest island, after Greenland and New Guinea, Borneo is comprised of the Malaysian states of Sarawak and Sabah, the tiny oil-rich sultanate of Brunei, and in the southern two-thirds of the island: the region of Indonesian known as Kalimantan. The latter has 20% of Indonesia’s territory (bigger than France), yet only 5% of its population of 210,000,000 – most of whom live in coastal cities that thrive on the oil and timber industries.
After my plane touched down in Balikpapan I caught a bus north to Samarinda, and then a second bus west, arriving in Kota Bangun around dusk amid a furious thunderstorm – almost exactly twelve hours after departing from my home in Malang on Java. Kota Bangun is a scruffy little town perched on the banks of the lower Mahakam River. Rivers are the primary highways of Kalimantan and the Sungai Mahakam is the biggest and busiest. Draining into the Makasar Strait at Samarinda, riverboats journey on it 325 miles upstream. And if conditions are right, smaller crafts thread their way even farther, deep into the remote interior. I would spend three-and-a-half days on or near it.
After a restful night at the basic but adequate Penmapan Muzirat, I spent considerable time the next morning in sustained and brutal bargaining, negotiating a ride upriver on a “ces” – a narrow motorized canoe I would charter on two consecutive days. Patiently competing boatmen against each other, I finally managed to get the initial asking price of 300,000R down to 185,000R, and I was soon on my way to Tanjung Isuy.
The typical ces is about six meters long, less than a meter wide and is mostly covered by a wooden roof. It’s powered by an outboard motor which sounds a lot like a Harley-Davidson motorcycle, and has a long propeller shaft angling out of the rear at a 45-degree angle. I crawled in, tossed my backpack on the floor, and stretched out to savor the journey as we skimmed along the river surface.
This section of the Mahakam is massive, sometimes hundreds of meters wide, and our tiny boat passed enormous barges and riverboats, various smaller boats, plus logs and other miscellaneous flotsam floating towards the sea. Here and there along the mangrove-jammed shore were scanty villages or isolated residences, all drab unpainted shacks atop platforms on stilts. But no matter how rundown the clusters of dwellings were, there was always an impressive mosque, topped by its glittering dome. Waterfowl were plentiful, especially the white, long-legged ibis.
After about two peaceful hours we veered off the main river and navigated through shallow wetlands, the pathways sometimes so narrow that reeds and grass brushed both sides of our craft. It was then that I fully grasped how brilliantly the ces is designed and operated. Drafting but a few inches of water, we could go pretty much anywhere, even if our way was partially blocked by thick vegetation or even half submerged logs. If we encountered such an obstacle the boatman would gun the motor, shooting over or through it, simultaneously lifting the propeller out of harm’s way, sometimes scattering hordes of startled waterfowl screaming discontent at our sudden intrusion. It was brilliant!
About three hours after leaving Kota Bangun we pulled up to the dock in Tanjung Isuy – we had entered Dayak territory. Dayaks are the indigenous people of Kalimantan and actually Dayak is what others call them – they prefer to use their tribal name, in this case: Banuaq. Of some two hundred distinct Dayak tribes, virtually all of them had been river dwelling headhunters until recent times. From as early as the 16th Century, they started retreating inland as the result of the arrival of Islamic and Chinese trading settlements. Then the Dutch and British moved in, creating plantations for rubber and coffee crops, plus copra oil, produced from coconut.
During the 20th Century the encroachment of corporations “harvesting” oil, minerals and timber have heavily damaged their homeland, pushing them even farther inland. Pressure from the corrupt government in Jakarta, increased development, and intense Christian missionary work have also all taken its toll on their culture. Mining and logging have decimated their formerly pristine environment. They’ve been tricked, lied to and sometimes brutally slaughtered in droves by the military. Sound familiar? Now, just like most native peoples in the world, their way of life has been dramatically altered forever.
But the Dayak have not given up without a fight. When massive transmigration schemes have brought in busload upon uncountable busload of willing workers from Sulawesi, Madura and Java, Dayaks have frequently swept into the settlement areas with unbridled vengeance, usually leaving behind hundreds of decapitated corpses! This has happened even recently, and there are still men who proudly wear the special tattoo signifying that they’ve personally taken a head, if not many. They are deeply spiritual people – but not to be messed with.
If you go to Tanjung Isuy, by all means stay at the Taman Jamrot Lamin, a converted Manuaq longhouse where I got a clean, comfortable room (with mosquito net) and shared mandi (primitive bathroom) for 20,000R. Having arrived shortly after noon, I spent the duration of the day wandering around the town and surrounding area, occasionally interacting with amiable locals. There were very few people I met in Kalimantan who spoke English and during this trip my Indonesian improved by leaps and bounds. There is nothing better than acute necessity for dramatically spiking one’s learning curve! I actually became fairly conversant while there.
Breakfast, lunch or dinner, I usually ate in local warungs (food stalls) and my meals there were always the same: tempeh or tofu, vegetables, noodles with chili, all stir-fried in a wok and served over rice. The cost was normally about 5,000R (only $.60!) and, strangely enough, I never got bored with the food on my trip.
That night as I was nearing my lodging, the town’s power generator went down and I stood in the dirt road in absolute pitch-black darkness. A few moments later, a hand gently touched my elbow and a soft voice asked, “Kemanakah?” (literally: “where to”, but used to ask, “Where are you going?”). When I responded, I was led down the road by a man whose face I never saw until I spotted a few candles glowing in the doorway of my accommodation. As quickly and as quietly as he’d appeared, my “guide” vaporized into the night.
The next morning I climbed into another ces, this time owned and operated by a young man named Surni who I’d met the prior day at the dock upon arriving. For 100,000R he would take me farther upriver to Melak. Already jammed into the vessel were a couple of cardboard boxes, a suitcase and a Honda – plus two men. They kindly and insistently offered me the prime seat mid-ship. As we pulled away from the dock, an older woman wrapped in a sarong urgently beckoned Surni to an adjacent platform. Once there, a man (presumably her husband) stepped forth and what ensued was a profusely tearful farewell to one of the young men in the boat, the three of them sobbing a bucket-full. I even got a little misty.
As we initiated our three-hour journey to Melak, every cell in my being was filled with exhilaration. The sky was a deep lucid blue and a gentle breeze stirred the vividly green grass of the marsh. The air was clean, I was well rested and content, and the day would prove to be epic!
First we passed through additional marshland, but we then darted into a tiny tributary that snaked through immensely thick jungle. The vegetation was forbiddingly dense and mysterious-looking. Magnificent flowers exploded out of verdant undergrowth. Beside me and above me were towering trees, draped with tangled vines, threatening to hide venomous snakes that might suddenly drop into our slowly moving boat. I made a mental note of where my Swiss Army Knife was packed.
And when I thought things just couldn’t get any better, we came upon a pair of proboscis monkeys clinging to low-hanging branches, barely over the water. The proboscis is characterized by an unusually long, pink snout that gives it a uniquely strange and silly appearance. The Indonesians call them “belanda” – meaning “white man”. They wasted no time in beating a hasty retreat, but not before I got a good look at them.
Occasionally we passed dugout canoes with locals checking their fish traps or collecting plants for cooking. At times we encountered fallen trees, barely submerged or partially blocking our path – but Surni expertly skimmed over or zipped around them, being ever so careful as he maneuvered. Damaging, or worse yet, snapping off our prop where we were would be no laughing matter. On one occasion, a huge deadfall lay in our path and he gunned the motor once again to slide over it. Damn – stuck!
First, Surni vigorously pushed with his oar as the rest of us tugged at the tree limbs, but we barely budged. Then, the other three lads climbed out and while balancing themselves precariously, huffed and puffed, pushed and pulled – meanwhile insisting that I stay put in the boat. But it soon became clear to me (if not to them) that we were doomed to remain exactly where we were as long as my 185 pounds were still in that boat. These Indonesians might be wiry little dudes, but they’re still really little dudes – without a whole lot of ass in their pants. So I lumbered out (first stashing my wallet in my pack) and somehow managed to find a foothold on the slippery branches, while at the same time recalling that crocodiles inhabited these waters. But I thought, “If this is the way I reach the end of the road…well, what a way to go!”
It was a sticky situation, as not only did we have to shove the ces out, but also athletically leap on to the boat once we’d done so. No worries. Lightened by my absence, with my additional ass pushing and pulling on it, the boat was soon freed and we all performed our niftiest acrobatic maneuvers to board. We were quickly on our way, each of us laughing hysterically. I was tempted to initiate them in the “high five” ritual, but resisted the urge – they certainly didn’t need any further cultural contamination. After about an hour of weaving through the jungle we came back to the main channel at a community called Muarapahn, where we paused for a while at a dockside toko (shop) to celebrate our male bonding with hot tea and cookies.
Weepy Boy arranged a photo session, one snapshot of me with each of my diminutive buddies. From there, we settled back and rode onwards – Surni and I chatting over the roar of the engine – the other two guys nestled down for a snooze. To my left I watched a soaring Brahming Kite, a raptor with a four-meter wide wingspan that looks remarkably similar to the Bald Eagle of the western U.S and Canada. I also viewed several animals hanging from horizontal tree limbs, as if asleep. Unfortunately, Surni was unaware of what they were called in English and I failed to jot down what he said in Indonesian. From a distance they sure looked to me like sloths. I was later told by a Forest Ranger they “might be” gibbons, but I’m still not sure what the hell they were.
At 12:30 pm we reached Melak and I was invited by Surni to join him while he visited his family. We entered the local market and at one stall we carefully stepped past the wares and entered a back room behind the family business. This is where a family of four lived. Mom, dad and their two children slept on rattan mats on the floor; personal belongings hung from the walls or were neatly stacked in the corners, and the “kitchen” at one end of the room consisted of a small gas burner. It was clean and cozy. There was an adjoining room that probably had some kind of toilet arrangement that undoubtedly emptied directly into the river.
Surni and I joined the family on the floor and we were all served a simple but delicious meal of veggies and rice, along with grilled fish, no doubt a former denizen of the waters that flowed past us. In Indonesia it’s impolite to talk while eating, but after we had finished, my hosts being more than curious about me, asked me the usual questions: where I was from, where I’d been, where I was going, how old I was, and about any possible family.
As usual, they were surprised that I was traveling alone and were absolutely shocked that a man of my age was unmarried. Usually when I tell people here that I do not have a wife, they say something like, “That’s too bad!” and cannot fathom how I get through day-to-day life without one. If I am speaking with men only, they automatically assume I regularly utilize the services of prostitutes and probably do not believe me when I tell them that I never do.
I spent the balance of the day roaming around – first up a hill and out of town where I found a comfy and serene spot on a promontory overlooking the rolling river and the canopy of trees that spread out as far as I could see. Later I walked in the opposite direction along the river, past the typical mixed bag of shops, warungs and ramshackle houses one finds in most places here. There was activity of one kind or another all along the river. For these people, the Mahakam is the perpetual centerpiece of their lives: they travel on it, they obtain some of their food and apparently their drinking water from it, they bathe daily in it, and their toilets hover over it. In one location, I observed within a 15 foot parameter a man changing the oil in his motorbike, another man gutting and plucking a chicken, a young boy washing his hair, and a woman brushing her teeth.
To say I was a focus of curiosity and attention is to put it very mildly. The community was surely buzzing about “the bule (white foreigner) in town”. Greetings constantly rang out as I strolled along and when I stopped for some hot tea, people gathered to gawk and query. Pulling out my journal and pen elicited an even larger mob of onlookers, huddled around me, peering intently at what I was scribbling – as if they could actually make any sense out of it. There was no rest from it, “Mister, can I practice my English with you?”
“Sure, why not, most of the other 219,999,999 Indonesians already have!” I thought.
What is always foremost on people’s minds here is where I’m from. Two days before I left on this trip, the war in Iraq had begun and with local satellite dishes bringing in images on TV of buildings burning in Baghdad, children lying in hospital beds or graves being dug, hostile feelings towards the United States and George W. Bush were running high – as you might expect. Sometimes the question was a direct, “Are you American?”
In my situation, there could only be one sane response, “Bukan American, saya Canadian.” (“Not American, I am Canadian”).
They would then usually say, “Saya tidak suka Bush!” (I don’t like Bush!), or something along those lines.
My response was usually, “Saya tidak suka Bush dan saya tidak suka perang!” (I don’t like Bush and I don’t like war!”). Not only did that endear me to them, but it’s also absolutely the truth!
If you have not noticed, anti-American sentiment around the globe is at an all-time high right now, thanks to Bush’s disregard for international law and worldwide public opinion. Most people in the world do not at all buy into the U.S. government’s story justifying why they have invaded a sovereign nation and a whole lot of them are plenty pissed off about it – especially in countries with large Muslim populations! Later on my trip, as I wearily stepped off of a bus in one city I was abruptly greeted by, “Are you American? If so, fuck you!” Is it any wonder I would want to impersonate a Canuck?
And I make absolutely no apologies to anyone about having done so, especially since where I was traveling, I could’ve easily been rubbed out and disposed of without a trace. And the simple truth is that although I carry a U.S. passport and enjoy certain privileges as a result of that, these days I am far from being a “proud American”. Saya tidak suka Bush dan saya tidak suka perang!
(To be continued………………..)
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Eddie LeShure is an insight meditation teacher and substance abuse counselor whose primary passion is bringing mindfulness practice into the realms of addiction recovery, trauma relief, and self-care. He teaches and leads groups in various treatment and recovery settings, as well as in series classes, workshops, retreats, conferences and conventions. Eddie began meditating in the early ‘80s, regularly teaches at Asheville Insight Meditation, is a NAMI Family Support Group Facilitator, and is co-founder of A Mindful Emergence, LLC (amindfulemergence.com).
These days, Eddie’s writing centers around his teaching and presentations, but in the past it was quite different. He chronicled and displayed his adventures around the world for several years under the banner, “On the Road With Fast Eddie”, and in more recent times numerous articles on the local jazz scene were published in Rapid River Arts & Culture as “WNC Jazz Profiles”. Eddie is now co-authoring a manual for treatment centers which focuses on integrating mindfulness practices with stages of addiction recovery.
