Second Day at the Nanga Sumpa longhouse

  Bantang Ai, Malaysia
Friday, August 17, 2007

The nights in the lodge were incredibly noisy with the deafening hum of the cicadas and the kissing sound of the small pale lizard that was to be our bedfellow. I made sure that my mosquito net was tucking in under the mattress all the way around not because of mosquitoes but to prevent anything else getting into my bed. I slept reasonable heavily till about 4am when we were all awoken by the sounds of the village cockerels crowing loudly. 
 
Today we were to go further up river to the beautiful Enseluai Waterfall. The river was to prove difficult to navigate and at times the boys and the boatmen all had to get out and push the boat along. Thankfully I sat in the boat realising I would be more of a hindrance. Once more I was amazed at how good the boatmen were skirting large pieces of driftwood and other rocks in the river. They also had the busy job of continuing to bail out the boat as it appeared that you could not help taking on water how ever hard you tried. We watched as they caught fish in their nets and joked with each other. Our boatmen was nicknamed Romeo as he was already on his third wife although he didn't look more than about seventeen. 
 
Once at the waterfall we stopped and set up camp. Tommy and the boatmen cooked up a lovely Iban style lunch of chicken, rice cooked in bamboo, pumpkin, eggplant, beans with Soya sauce, garlic and chillies. It was superb. This was followed by juicy pieces of water melon. 
 
The boys swam in the plunge pool at the bottom of the waterfall while I gazed around at the surroundings and swatted at the large wasps that were unfortunately attracted to me.  Tommy assured me that these type of wasp didn't usually sting and that I should be more worried about the brown wasps that really did hurt! It was a truly beautiful place and I wondered at the different trees with their thick buttresses wrapped in lianas. Overhead large eagles flew and I hoped that we might see an orang-utan but it was not to be.
 
Back down stream we stopped part of the way to walk the last part to the lodge through the forest. Tommy showed us the different trees and their uses including ones for high blood pressure, HIV, boils and even injuries. The walk wasn't too arduous but as it was the middle of the afternoon it was incredibly hot and humid. We walked past areas that had been burnt to grow rice and isolated huts that were used by the farmers. Back at the lodge it became apparent that we would have to cross the river by foot but luckily Romeo came to the rescue and bought one of the longboats across.
 
That afternoon as it wasn't a school day many of the boys of the village were in evidence and a large cannon type structure made from bamboo was being lit. They appeared to be blowing into it then lighting it and the result was a huge sound as the air was forced out in a steamy explosion. They began shooting plastic bottles and anything else they could find into the river and even  invited Sam to have a go which he did to his delight. Then to our surprise one of the women stepped out of the lodge picked up the bamboo cannon and tossed it into the river. It seemed she had had enough and the noisy game was over.
 
Later we visited the longhouse once more and looked around the crafts that they made. We bought several bamboo pictures and some jewellery with each purchase we shook hands.
 
That night a huge storm came in and the rain lashed down outside and the lightening flashed incessantly. I began to wonder what the boat journey back would be like if the weather didn't clear for the next day.  There appeared to be a lot of noise going on outside and we found out later that some of the men had caught a wild pig and that it had been cooked and shared around. Tommy also told us that one of the boys had caught a large python that had wrapped itself around him until he had cut of its head and that this had been eaten also. I wished that we had seen this as it must have been an amazing spectacle.