Newsletter

written by Naomi //** On the 25/7/08 13 students, 2 teachers and Paul (Antipodeans Abroad leader) travelled to the island of Borneo. This group consisted of students and teachers from the Lara Secondary College Social Justice Group and Indonesian students from year 10 and 11. The aim of the expedition was to make ourselves aware of Social Justice Issues throughout the world and particularly Malaysia. The 16 day trip would also increase our language skills by being immersed in Malaysia culture. The language Bahasa Indonesia (we study this at Lara S.C) is based on Bahasa Melayu which we spoke in Borneo, so it was a very good experience in many ways. For our community Project we worked in Brunei. On the 27/7/08 we left Miri to travel to a village called Kampung Melilas (Kampung in Malaysian means Village) we had to go through the boarder via bus and to Kampung Pengkalan, Sungai Mau where we were met by the Brunei News. They interviewed us and expressed many thanks for the help we would do in the community. Afterwards we caught a 3 hour boat ride to Kampung Melilas and walked over the long boardwalk to the longhouse. This is a house with 12 doors, a small community of approximately 35 people live there. Kampung Melilas was originally quite large, but over the years families have moved from Kampung Melilas to Kuala Belait, which is the city where the work and jobs are better. Once introduced to Hermi our- coordinator we learnt how to use a squat toilet, listened to a few guidelines and met Hjh Nuraliyah Abdullah Talit who was allowing us to use her home. She’s a very kind lady, she was very happy that we stayed. She explained to us that it is very lonely sometimes when people don’t come to visit because the community is so small and it is about half-hour drive from the city. We slept in the veranda section of the longhouse where the community met. We slept here underneath Mosquito nets on sleeping mats. It was so hot that you didn’t need a sleeping bag, just a sheet. After the introduction, we headed out in boats to see if the traps had caught any animals; only fish were caught. The local man Mai and another man from Seria taught us how to set the traps. Here they catch boar and anything which steps into the trap. Afterwards they will kill it and eat it. These two men, plus Hermi were the locals which travelled with us every day and helped with the manual labour. This night the locals also performed a local dance and played music for us. We were able to learn traditional dancing from them. On the 28th June, we toured around the area to see the springs and waterfalls which are tourist attractions. This is a reason why we worked in Kampung Melilas; to help improve the tourism industry surrounding it, nearby is the Ingai Hot Springs and a waterfall. Everywhere we travelled was by boat, but the logs which cut the river off had to be moved before we could travel along the river. On 29st June we went to a cleared land where another group had previously made a dock to reach the land from the water. Here we built a pondok (platform). On the platform tourists can put their tent so that they don’t have to sleep on the Borneo Jungle floor, there are possibilities of being bitten by leeches and bears also live there. The more platforms which are built can help to increase infrastructure and tourism; this will bring more money into the community resulting in a better lifestyle for the people. To build the pondok we carried trees, put them onto the ground, and laid them across each other on top of the four thick trees. This was the decking for sleeping on, then we lashed it u with rotam (plant cut in half). On 30th June we visited Sekolah Rendah Kampung Melilas (Melilas Primary School) and gave those students books and pencils which they could use for schooling. Many students can’t afford to buy new books and stationary frequently so the school was very thankful for our gifts. The school in Kampung Melilas is the smallest throughout Brunei, with only 4 current students. The school has a blue walkway to the school so we sanded it with machete knives and painted it blue again because it needed repainting. This let the school feel fresher and not as old. On 31st June we went walking to discover the trails which locals could walk on beside the river. It was very muddy and took about four hours. Along here we saw a few abandoned houses. When the jungle will be less dense, the locals and workers will build a track through the jungle to attractions and walks. On our last night, we gave a presentation to the Rumah Panjang (longhouse); we performed the Nutbush, Chicken Dance and Macarena. We also gave them money for the longhouse and school, their faces and thankfulness were unexplainable, it was very amazing to see how the work we did through fundraising for Borneo and working in the village was able to change the lives of so many people in another country! Every day at 4pm it would rain it Kampung Melilas and we were ‘kehujanan’ (overcome by rain) at least two times. After swimming in the river and going on a walk to the Vegetable patch (very different to Australia’s patches). One vegetable which we collected in the pouring rain was inside a spiky tree, so the locals used machetes to chop them. They did taste nice though. During our spare time in the longhouse we could play with the very energetic loving children, cook, talk with the locals, watch Brunei Television or do weaving. We helped to create a basket from plants which could be sold to make money for the longhouse. The children loved to play with us they always joined in our card games and we gave them piggyback rides. They played card games with us and it was very uplifting to teach the children Australian songs and phrases. We shared pictures from home and they learnt about our lives in Australia. The children loved the little koalas which we brought them. On the 1st August when we left Kampung Melilas, the locals said ‘return again’ as we journeyed once again down the river. We stopped at another school in Kampung Sukang. This school had 17 students and we toured the school, and then played with the children. We brought footballs, cricket sets, soccer balls and koala keyrings for the children. They loved everything we brought them and had a lot of fun playing sport with us. Later we played drawing and taught some Grade 2 &3 students. The children were very delightful to speak with. The school will continue to keep in contact with us because they want to bring more English into the school’s curriculum. Our Community Project in Mukim Melilas (Melilas Sub-District) was done, and as we left there was a feeling of satisfaction and happiness that we had just made the future of Kampung Melilas a little better and we were able to bring help, hope and love into a little community. We all experienced so many new things and have learnt things which have changed us and will continue to change us throughout our lives. Photos: http://lara-social-justice.wikispaces.com/Brunei
 * // LSC Borneo Expedition Service- Kampung Melilas, Brunei 2008