We had one day of respite in KK where we mainly bought work
clothes, did internety things and drank lots of beer.
Then we were off again on the coach to the Kinabatangan
where we will be spending the next few weeks volunteering. We will be spending
our time here working with an organisation called KOPEL.
This is a
multi-village co-operative that was set up in the 90s to come up with a way of
preserving the local environment, regenerating forest where possible, and
creating an income for local people through eco-tourism and a homestay
initiative. They have now developed their own Eco Camp which is only accessible
via a short boat ride up the river from the village of Mengaris (Kampung
Mengaris). It has no electricity, very basic amenities and water used is
collected rainwater. This is home for the next few weeks.
So far we’ve been at the Eco Camp for 3 days and have started
our work doing Silviculture. Basically this is where there is an area of forest that was
destroyed by a fire a number of years ago. Regeneration tree growth is
currently stunted by an abundance of vines which have overtaken in a
Jumanji-esque way, and these vines have become so numerous that many of them
are strangling the new trees, blocking out the light, and often becoming so
heavy on the treetops that they are causing trees to topple. To combat this,
the Forestry Commission have provided funding for local people to manage the
area of forest by chopping down any vines. It is this that we joined in with.
Bro and I were teamed up with a group of about 6 locals, under the guidance of
‘Captain’-a rather intimidating older guy with one eye who basically is in
charge. This was a pretty gruelling couple of days. On the first day we walked
for 2km through the jungle, then spent the day hacking at vines with machetes.
On the second day we had to walk 6km through the thick jungle putting signposts
up and cutting vines wherever
necessary. This was absolutely knackering. These men are machines and we had to
keep up with them! I think they were bit aghast that a skinny white boy and an
absurdly sweaty white girl was coming along to help so we both felt like we had to super
pull our weight-bro to prove he's not a weedy white guy, and me to prove that I
was an asset rather than a liability and can keep up. It was a great start then
when 10 minutes in I got stung by a maniac wasp who then refused to leave me
alone! It bloody hurt (I can still feel it 2 days later!) but I didn’t want to
make a fuss for fear of confirming any suspicions they might have had.
So we
ploughed on the whole two days and think we did ourselves proud! It almost
killed us though! They think Bro's hilarious as his trousers split on the first
day, so on the second day he wore shorts underneath as he didn’t have any
spare…and then they split too so his pants were just poking out! It was so
funny!! We didn’t understand a word each other were saying, but it appears taking the piss out of someone for looking ridiculous breaches any language barrier! :) He's now had to buy some local trousers and
the only ones they had were these camo khaki ones that are shiny and
ridiculous! Perfect for day three! J So funny!
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