langkau fiction

I don’t think people are supposed to work in December. Why, you ask? I don’t know. It just doesn’t sound right, working in December.

I’ve just finished what I’m supposed to finish this year. I am referring to my work. What I can’t finish this year, I will consider it as ‘finished’. Off. Cukup. Life is more important. My vulnerable physical condition which primarily lies in my fingers does not permit me to work beyond what my brain is capable of doing within a certain time frame. That explains my constant need for beers. *cough cough*

Next Tuesday, I’m going to hitch a ride to Miri. By this time next week, I’ll be on the airplane flying off to Lawas. I just can’t wait! My initial plan this year was to walk from Bario to Ba Kelalan and end up in Long Pasia, Sabah. I estimated the whole trip to be around 7-8 days. But due to some unforeseen circumstances — procrastination in planning, not enough money, don’t fancy the prospect of meeting gergasi bermata lapan belas along the way — that plan was shelved.

Instead, I have opted to do a much shorter route next week: Ba Kelalan to Bario in two nights. The important aspects of planning have been sorted out i.e. transportation to Ba Kelalan from Lawas, accommodation in Buduk Nur, hired a guide with a girl’s name, enough money to pay the guide with a girl’s name, arranging some cousins to fly the bottles of Label 5 to Bario saving me from carrying it on foot from Ba Kelalan, and last but definitely not the least, cotton buds for ear wax extraction. Done!

Below is the map I took from Periplus Editions Ltd., scale of 1 : 1 000 000.

The yellow line indicates the route from the Lun Bawang settlement of Buduk Nur in Ba Kelalan to Bario. The initial plan was to walk from Ba Kelalan to the Lun Dayeh settlement of Pa Rupai (in Kalimantan) and stay there for the night. From Ba Kelalan, one can either walk (around 45 mins to 1 hour) to Pa Rupai or take an ojek, which would take around 20 minutes.

However, after a lengthy discussion with Stella I decided that it’s better to proceed to Long Rebpun (in Sarawak) from Pa Rupai instead of staying for the night in Pa Rupai. Long Rebpun, which is wrongly spelt in map, used to be a Kelabit settlement before they moved south to Pa Lungan. I was told that the walk – uphill – from Pa Rupai to Long Rebpun takes around 4-6 hours. The plan is to make camp at Long Rebpun and then, leave for Pa Lungan the next day. The walk would take around 4-5 hours.

My friend, who’s been there and very familiar with the place, drew me a map to “avoid getting lost” especially on the Pa Rupai – Pa Lungan route. I looked at the map and told my friend “Thanks very much, man! I’m sure this is way more accurate than the GPS!” He smiled and said “Thanks!” His map isn’t even according to scale!

The red dotted line is the route to use. Fortunately, in terms of village settlements, his map is more detailed even though we won’t go to most of the villages he drew. The orange-colored squares on the map are the village settlements that we will pass or camp along the way. The ‘X’ is Long Rebpun (Mouth of the Smoke River).

Oh well, at least this trip is going to be a trizillion times better than sitting in my office every day and wonder if the last Mohican was really THE last Mohican. Or if I can use my ear wax to glue the postcards on my wall…hhm…

In conjunction with the COP15 (UN Convention on Climate Change), I propose that we should reduce water wastage by flushing the toilet only once after every 10 pees. How? Ada cun ka?