Kuching, Sarawak

Overview

Let's start with some facts about the city.

You need a visa for Sarawak since 1963. Many Malay people don't know this. I had to go through immigration at Miri airport.

Apparently, Sarawak has Chinese people in the government, who want to become more independent of the rest of Malaysia. Malays wouldn't go this way, they are quite chill and don't look for altercation. Even Iban, Sarawakian language, is quite different to the standard Malay the speak in west Malaysia and Sabah.

As soon as I got to the city, I went for some quick lunch, and waited for the check-in time of my hostel. After leaving my stuff in the room, I went to explore the city. It gives the same vibes as Penang, in terms of architecture and how colourful the buildings are, as well as the amount of street art that you can find everywhere. 

I could also notice that Kuching is very influenced by Chinese culture. There are taoist temples everywhere, and there's a Chinatown in the city. My hostel was in the middle of it.

Kuching is known for being the city of cats, they have the world's first cat museum and cat related statues in the roundabouts. They are also represented in some of the street art, and you can definitely find lots of actual cats wandering around the city.

I didn't go to the museum because it closes too early, but I went to a cat store to see if I could learn some more about the cats in Kuching. I went to one called CAT'S POINT, where I ended up spending the whole afternoon talking with a lovely girl who was working there. We talked about many things.

She wasn't too sure about which was the origin of cats being the symbol of the city. Apparently, the connection between the city and our four legged meowing friends comes from the colonial era, where the British adventurer James Brooke spoke with an indigenous tribesman to try to find the name of that place. He, in his attempt to indicate how did the natives called that land, pointed his finger to a cat, to which the tribesman responded "kucing", Malay word for cat. 

Doing a bit of research about this, it doesn't seem so clear that this was the true origin, although I hope it was. A more realistic explanation suggests that the name Kuching is a variation developed from the word "Cochin", a term used by British after the Indian port city to refer to any trading port. Quite boring for my liking.

We also talked about a cat show in July, where you can promote your cat shop. Some judges test your cat, it's physical features. If the cat is obese, rejected; if the cat leaves hair, rejected; if the cat is aggressive, rejected. Many requirements. And then, they do a beauty competition to see which is the best cat. They test if they are pure breed or mixed also.

Some other topics brought into the conversation were how you can find crocodiles in the Kuching roads that are close to the river trying to have some tasty human bites. Nah, I'm joking. But they do eat some small birds when they're hungry. And also, there used to be a night market where they offered crocodile meat as well as monkey meat. Now that's illegal.

I feel amazed by the slow-pace of Kuching. People actually stop and talk to you. The conversations I've had with strangers have been much longer.

Semenggoh Rehabilitation Center 

The sound of loud drums and gongs woke me up, probably coming from the taoist temple in the corner of the street.

That day I wanted to check out Semenggoh Rehabilitation Center. For that issue, you need to take public bus K6, which has the last stop at Semenggoh. There's no bus station. All the buses stop at the street in front of the Electra House building, the first mall built in Kuching (designed by Singaporean architects), where they have a small counter, but you pay once you're inside the bus. There are some places around that open quite early, so you can grab some food there for breakfast. The bus departs at 7:15 and takes 45 min to get to the final destination. Grab is 20 times more expensive than the bus from my hostel, which is only 1RM.

The center only opens from 8am to 10am, and from 2pm to 4pm, with feeding times for the orangutans at 9am and 3pm. I decided to go to the morning feeding because if I didn't get to see any in the morning time, I would still have the afternoon.

I was the only person who took the bus. I asked the driver and he told me it was usual, not many people take the bus when going to Semenggoh. I don't understand why. It's so cheap. Maybe not many people know that there's a public bus that takes you directly to Semenggoh.

Once you get to the counter, you need to self-register online and pay 10RM. Then, you can either take a buggy, which I refused to pay for, or take a 15 min walk up the road to the center.

Doing the walk is so nice, as you get to listen to the sounds of the rare birds inhabiting the area and take your time to enjoy the view of the forest.

There are also plenty of entrances to hiking routes at the sides of the road, unfortunately closed. I still don't know the reason why.

You can see posters of the orangutans living in the center and their respective names at the sides of the road when approaching the center.

When I got to the center, I heard people shouting. The sounds came from the inside of the jungle and from different directions. Probably they were rangers from the center, doing some kind of interaction with the orangutans. I later asked one of the rangers. They were calling the orangutans for feeding time, because the orangutans are able to recognize their voices. They tell visitors not to make noises because it could scare them.

I kept talking with the ranger, and he explained many things to me about the orangutan world.

First, in case you don't know, orangutan is a composite word from Malay. "Orang" means man or people, and "utan" means forest, so "people from the forest". Orangutans live in nests they make with branches and leaves on top of the trees, like birds do. They make a new nest almost everyday, and they build them not too low because of dangers like people or vipers, and not too high because of eagles. By that time it wasn't fruit season, so the center provided food for them.

There are currently 29 orangutans in the center, and there's a very cool poster inside the center showing the family tree of the orangutans, as well as giving a short description of each one, its story and where its name comes from.

Currently, there are two big males ruling over the community. Annuar and Edwin. They are the new contestants to the throne, after Ritchie's (aka The Big Boss) reign, a huge orangutan so heavy that he has to stay on ground instead of in the trees, because he could brake the branches. There have been no news about Ritchie since 4 or 5 years. The rangers think that he is free already and left the center. 

The development of big cheek pads is a sign that the individual will become a dominant male. Annuar and Edwin are almost the same age and size, so at some point in the future, they will have to enroll in a fight for the throne of the family. I wish I could watch that. It will certainly be more epic than a war between the VI'Hurgs and the G'Gugvuntts if you offend the VI'Hurgs Commander's mother by a freak wormhole carrying your words "I seem to be having this tremendous difficulty with my lifestyle" into the midst of their negotiations.

The center serves as a training for the orangutans to be able to survive in the wild. Now they are semi-wild.

The orangutans do not necessarily go to the feeding area at the feeding time, not even everyday. They follow their own timings, so it all depends on luck whether you see them or not. They can show up at any place of the center.

The people from the center don't know the father of the children, they only know who the mother is, cause they see the children in her arms. DNA tests are so expensive for them.

I wasn't able to see any orangutans during the morning feeding time, which was disappointing but understandable. So, I waited until the afternoon. 

The waiting was totally worth it, cause nine of them showed up for food during afternoon. They came to the main feeding area from the high tree branches, with their characteristic swing, one after the other. It was spectacular. Even a mother with her child came to take some food. 

They were coming from every direction, and stayed as close as 5 meters from me. The rangers warn you about them, because they could attack you if you try to provoke them, and they are also surprisingly silent in their movements. Some stayed there for longer as they wanted more food, and some only took one banana or one coconut and went back to the forest. One of the orangutans grabbed a coconut and started smashing it against a tree in order to crack it open.

They were extremely agile and fast in their movements. Super long and strong orange arms to be able to hold their whole body while hanging from a branch. What an amazing creature of nature. 

It was so stunning to be present in such an event. Definitely a must-go if you happen to be in Kuching.

Bako National Park 

In order to go to Bako National Park, there are two ways. By taxi or by bus. The taxi (Grab) is about 30 times more expensive than the bus, which is only 1RM. The bus departs at 7am from the city, and takes about an hour to arrive at Bako boat jetty. From there, you need to take a 20min boat ride to get to the actual headquarters of the park. 

Here's where it gets a bit tricky. Renting a boat is freaking 100RM for one way, so you need to find people to split the price with. The problem is that they don't have another counter at the park, so you need to book the return in advance, and you need to book it with people that are going to stay the same amount of days as you. This system is so fucked up, because not many people choose to stay overnight inside the park (which was my case), so waiting for people that are going to stay the same amount of days can take so long. For that reason, the lady at the counter decided to make an exception and make me pay only the one way ticket. That way I myself would have to find people at the day of return to split the price with.

At the jetty, you can find a sign warning you about the saltwater crocodiles that live in the area, which is the largest species of crocodiles in the world. I asked one of the guides that were around about these creatures, and he told me that at 1993, due to industrial activities that were taking place in the area, the river got so infested by crocodiles that the fishermans could not even pass through it.

And at the park jetty you're reminded again about the dangerous crocs. From there, you can walk your way to the headquarters, where they give you a map of all the trails you can hike and the location of the houses for overnight staying.

I happened to share the room with one of the visitors who I also shared the boat with, a lovely English middle-aged man going by the name of Jason. 

After leaving our stuff in the room, we decided to go hike some of the routes. We went for number 5 and 6 first, as they both share the same start. 

It took us about 3-4 hours to complete both trails, but it can be done in less time if you don't want to make stops, the sun isn't particularly annoying that day, or you don't want to spend time discussing why Shakespeare used the word "trash" instead of "rubbish" in Hamlet, or the difference between bogon and vogon, and how their level of poetry may not be too different.

Trail 6 ends at the top of a cliff with very pleasing views to the sea landscape. From the top you can also spot a natural beach which you can access by following a small and steep path.

For trail 5 you just need to go back (volver sobre tus pasos) for a few minutes and turn left. It gets you to another top view of the national park, but not as open as the previous one. Still, beautiful view. They even put a little wooden bench for you to rest while enjoying the views.

A fun fact I got from Jason that I didn't know was that Bako was set up by British people in 1957. First national park in Borneo. Many things the British did around the world.

After arriving to the headquarters and having taken a shower, we went for lunch. They have a good variety of local food in their menu. But, and here comes my seconds and last complain about the park, they don't have any water dispenser. Their source of water is through plastic water bottles worth 5RM each. I don't know how this fits with them promoting they are going ecological, eco-friendly or however you want to call it.

Anyways, something happened unexpectedly in the park while we were having lunch. Some people spotted a proboscis monkey in the branch of a tree very close to the headquarters. Everyone who was around gathered under the tree to take some pictures. What a funny looking monkey. It can only be found in Borneo.

I wanted to try some other trail before sunset (around 6:30pm), so, after asking for advice to the park rangers, I decided to go for trail 2. It's a very short route but still has a high probability of spotting wildlife.

Shortly after starting the jungle trail, I was able to hear some branch noises. The noises kept repeating. They came from different places. After a few second, I spotted one macaque, high in a branch, staring at me. Subsequently, two more showed up. At that point I started to feel some fear. The rangers from the center warned us about the macaques, they can get quite aggressive. The three of them started to slowly go towards my position, going from branch to branch and approaching the ground. I armed myself with a decently sized stick I found on the ground, and silently and slowly walked forward in the path, it looked safer than going backwards. Luckily, they seemed to come to the conclusion that it wasn't worth it to come after me. I don't know why, cause I looked damn scared. If I was in their position, I would have attacked that slim defenseless human, no doubt.

After a few minutes further in the trail, I heard some more branch noises coming from the jungle. I really thought that the previous macaques reconsidered their success chances of attacking me. But, they weren't macaques, they were proboscis monkeys, swinging from branch to branch with surprising ease and agility. However, they were so far that it was hard to see their body completely, and even harder for the camera.

The trail ends in a small beach surrounded by mangrove. It isn't particularly beautiful, but it's cool that the sand is full of small holes were crazily coloured one-armed crabs live.

The water was so muddy and unclear that I took a look at it every 20 seconds or so to check if any giant saltwater crocodile showed up. The trail, as you can see, happened to be full of posible dangers or death situations. Perfect.

On my way back to the center, I saw the entrance to trail 4, and after checking that I still had time before sunset, I went for it. This trail takes you to a viewpoint located at 128 meters above sea level. It's an energy demanding hike with very steep paths, but it's good that they tied some ropes at the sides of the most challenging sections.

The view from the top is quite worth it, so I would recommend to do it if you have time.

I arrived to the center about half an hour before sunset. The view of the sunset from the beach was breathtaking.

How calmed is everything after all the one day tourists are gone after 15. You have the beach all for you.

I have to make an emphasis in my recommendation of staying overnight inside Bako. The feeling of being alone, surrounded by nature, with an amazing beach in the front, listening only to the sounds of nature, ... It's one of the best feelings I've had in my trip to Borneo.

You can also sign up for a night walk, in which one of the rangers, or more if the group is big, will lead a walk through some of the trails of Bako, but at night. My group was only me and a french couple, so only one ranger was needed. 

Monkeys sleep at night, so it's much harder to find them, because the technique the rangers use to spot wildlife at night is to look for the reflect of the flashlight on the eyes and skin.

We were able to see lots of wildlife during our hour and a half walk. Flying lemurs, poisonous vipers, fireflies, freaking big and scary looking spiders, catfishes, sleeping birds,...

If you want to explore the nature at night, I would definitely recommend to pay 15RM to go with a guide instead of going alone. He knows how to spot animals much better. Their skill is almost magical.

Nature at night it's a whole different world.

I woke up at 6am the next day to see if I could spot some more wildlife, as the rangers told me that the monkeys are more active during sunrise. But as soon as I opened the door of my room I saw the rain... And not heavy rain, but light rain, which means that it won't go away quickly. It was the first time it rained in three weeks.

I waited for an hour or so, staring at the rain, until my roommates woke up. We decided to go for breakfast together. The food options for breakfast are not that bad, but quite expensive compared to what you can find in the city. Makes sense I guess, Bako is quite isolated from everything.

After having the breakfast we chilled for a bit. Although it was raining, the feeling of the cold morning breeze felt so nice and comforting, specially after a day of excessive heat.

I still wanted to hike some more to see if I could find anything else. The three of us agreed to try trail 3, it's also said to have high chance of spotting monkeys. And in deed, we found some silver-leaf monkeys, in our way to the starting point of the trail. Their fur is silver colored at the tips, and their eyes black, also long fingers and tail. There's a family of more than 30 of them in that side of the park. After saying goodbye to the monkeys, we proceeded with the trail. Trail 3 is quite beautiful, specially after rain, as it enhances the colors of the leaves and roots. However, we weren't able to find anything else. 

After that, my other roommate, Karolina, and I, went for trail 2 again, because she hadn't seen any proboscis monkeys yet. While doing the trail, we were able to see one sleeping up in a tall tree branch with the help of a private guide that we found in on the way.

I definitely recommend doing overnight in Bako to whoever happens to make a stop at Kuching.

Food Break

Little break for talking about traditional Sarawakian food. There are two main fishes, Kolo Mee and Laksa. 

Kolo Mee

Kolo means the action of lifting, and Mee is noodles. The way to cook this meal is to boil the noodles in hot water, then "kolo" the "mee" and put them in cold water for a few seconds, and finally "kolo" again the "mee" and put them in hot water just to serve them hot. Then you can add whatever you want, egg, meat, veggies,... The whole "kolo" process achieves more elastic and resistant noodles, and some other great properties. Kuching is the first place to use this technique. People are starting to copy it in Singapore and the rest of Malaysia.

Laksa

Laksa literally means curry, so the meal is a bowl of noddles in curry soup. Each region has its own way of preparing it as well as which toppings to add.

Kubah National Park

The last stop of my trip to Kuching was Kubah National Park. It is known for having good trails through the jungle as well as some outstanding point views. Many locals come here for some good morning walks. In order to get there, I took the public bus again. The bad thing about this option is that the public buses are slowly disappearing in Kuching, because almost everyone has a car. So, they have shortened the number of stops in some lines, including the one to Kubah. But a funny thing I'm remembering is that an old lady hopped on the bus for a few stops, and when she was going to walk out of the bus I was able to see that she was wearing CUGGI flip-flops. The bus will leave you 50min of walking away from Kubah, and it's very hard to find Grab or Maxim taxis there, so I had to walk on the road side.

Once you arrive at the ticket counter you need to pay 20RM. I asked the staff girls there about which trails would they recommend me to do, and they told me that the famous waterfall trail was closed due to maintenance because there had been some landslides and the bridges are quite old. So I went for the summit trail (911m, highest peak in Kuching area). It's supposed to take 3.5 hours one way, but I did it in an hour at a good rhythm. While doing the trail, you can appreciate how tall the trees area in that area. The trail is just following a road up to the peak. It isn't as natural as other trails in that way, but being alone I was able to still enjoy the surrounding nature. Almost no one does this trail. However, once at the peak, after spending some minutes chilling in front of the amazing views from the top, I found another hiker, and started to chat with him. His name was Max, a Kuching native who has spent his last 20 years working in Singapore. Even though he was middle aged, he told me he run quarter marathons every week, so he was more than used to hike. He also did the summit trail in an hour. 

After enjoying the views for a bit more, we decided to make a move. It was a fun conversation on our way down. 

Before arriving back to the center, there's another short trail you can do, Selang trail. The park closes at 3pm, so we still had some time. This one goes through the forest and has a very nice view of the city.

After finishing, Max offered himself to take me back to my hostel in his car, and I couldn't be more pleased, because the bus service was already over.