Seventeen Years Among the Sea Dyaks of Borneo: A Record of Intimate Association with the Natives of the Bornean JunglesGomes, Edwin Herbert
History
Seventeen Years Among the Sea Dyaks of Borneo: A Record of Intimate Association with the Natives of the Bornean Jungles
Gomes, Edwin Herbert
Iban (Bornean people); Sarawak (Malaysia) -- Description and travel
In the rapids up the rivers travelling is done in a “dug-out,” because
that draws little water. The boat has a long cane or creeper tied to the
bows, and when it has to be pulled over the rapids some of the men drag
at this, while the others remain in the boat and work with their poles
or small paddles. The skill with which the Dyaks pole the boat along, as
they stand up in it, is beautiful to see. With a skilful turn of the pole
they will guide the boat past some huge boulder which it seems impossible
to avoid. The sensation to one sitting in a boat going over the rapids,
either up or down stream, is not particularly pleasant. The boat is
bumped and jerked about, and the water often splashes in. At times the
boat will be propelled by poles; then, when the water is too shallow, the
men jump out and walk by the side, pulling the boat along. When they get
to deeper water, they jump in again.
The Dyaks are most excellent companions when travelling has to be done.
They are hard-working and good-tempered, and most resourceful. When one
is travelling in small “dug-outs” in the upper reaches of the river, it
often happens that he has to spend some nights on the journey. If any
Dyak house be near, the travellers make for it, knowing well that the
hospitable inmates will gladly give them shelter. But sometimes they
have to camp out on the river-bank. It is quite remarkable how well the
Dyaks manage under such circumstances. I have always admired the way in
which in a very short time wood and creepers are got from the jungle,
and a little hut put up for me on a cleared spot on the river-bank. The
creepers are used for tying the wood together; the _kadjang_ from the
boat is fastened up for the roof of the little hut; a flooring, two or
three feet off the ground, is made of laths of wood tied together with
creepers; my small cork boat mattress and curtain are fixed up; and
in about an hour’s time I am safely lodged for the night. The Dyaks
themselves are very hardy. They will wrap themselves up in their _puah_,
or sheet, and sleep in the open air, sometimes on mats; but if there are
no mats, they will make for themselves a bed of leaves on the ground, and
think it no great hardship to sleep on this.
When travelling has to be done on foot, one has to walk on a Dyak jungle
path, which consists of the trunks of the giants of the forest placed in
a line. No attempt is made to hew the round trunks into an even upper
surface, so one must walk carefully lest he slip off; for in some parts
the bark on these tree-trunks is rotten, and in others there is a growth
of wet slippery moss. Over the jungle streams there are Dyak bridges
made, like the path, of the trunk of a tree, sometimes with a light
hand-rail tied to it, sometimes not.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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