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Tuesday 6th & Wednesday 7th April 2011
Matang Wildlife Centre - a re-habilitaion centre for endangered spieces. The animals are housed in areas designed to recreate their natural living conditions.
The Orangutans I met were
Aman - Huge alpha male (the one with the floppy face)
Pete - Next in line to be alpha male (the one with lots of hair)
George - Male who usually shares with Doris
Doris - Female who likes to think shes human (medium one with mat on her head)
Ali - Baby (the cute one)
Cham - Female no longer resident in the enclosures but stalks and attacks visitors on the trails around the centre. (scary - attacked a keeper last week)
I stayed in a wooden lodge at the centre which was very comfortable (not luxurious but still great). Cold showers, flush toilets, edible food and a shop which sold beer.
I had the pleasure of hosing out orangutan poop from their night cages then cleaning them ready for the evening. The orangutans were outside at the time (obviously) but I still had to be careful when passing the gates as they have such a long reach they can easily grab you! Believe it or not the mask I had to wear during the cleaning was to protect the orangutans from any germs I may of had and not to protect me from them.
The most disgusting thing was cleaning out the sun bears night cages. Their poop didn't even look like poop - more like fruit that hade been liquidised and place all around the floor of their cages - nice!
Despite being nearly as cute (but dangerous) as the orangutans the sun bears had massive claws and sounded extremely vicious. I prepared fruit & rice treats which were stuffed into pieces of bamboo which were placed in the sun bears night cages. This was to encourage them to return for the evening. The treats only lasted 5 minutes as they were instantly torn appart which did remind you that they ARE wild animals and NOT cute furry bears.
Other events included a very naughty monkey who stole my bracelet, luckily it only cost £1 and looked better on me than the monkey. Live baby chickens being fed to snakes. Watching cat bears, which like the name suggest, cats the size of bears but with big fluffly tails (I want one of those as well to go with my orangutan, tiger, elephant and penguin).
I do bear the scars of what I am calling my orangutan injury. I could say that one grabbed me whilst cleaning out his cage but the real story is that I had a wellie boot malfunction and I slipped. My skinny leg went through one of the gaps in the sun bears feeding platform. Even I didn't think my legs were thin enough to go through the slats in the platform. I guess I should either get fatter legs to stay safe or get thinner legs so they go through more easily to cause less bruising. Photos added for the colouring process of my 'orangutan injury'.
Thursday 7th April
Went treking in Bako National Park and was rewarded with a refreshing swim in the warm sea. Got a lovely photo of a green snake which looked so pretty that it was difficult to comprehend that it was real and could do me some serious damage. Returned to the hostel and stayed in the bestest room in the hostel with ensuite facilities and supper deluxe shower.
Friday 8th & Saturday 9th April
Visited Sarawak Cultural Village which showed the usual village life type stuff and a singing and dancing show - snore. Then had a relaxing day/night at Damai Beach Resort and a swim in the warm sea which is the closest thing to a bath that I have come to in the last month. Our tour guide didn't show up the next day to collect us he just phoned me at reception and I was in charge of getting our team back to Kuching. For a split second I thought about upgrading us all to a 5* all inclusive resort instead of going back to the hostel but I did the right thing and we went back. That night there was a massive thunder storm. There was so much lightning the sky lit up lie a high tech laser show
Sunday 10th April
Visited more orangutans at Semenggoh Wildlife Rehabilitation Center. These are semi wild orangutans get in their natural conditions. More photos - obivously.
A 5 hour drive followed by a 1.5 hour long boat ride took us to our home for the next 5 days - a longhouse in Batang Ai. Arriving with the windswept and interesting look I settled in to my shared room (1 other traveller and some cockroaches - At least the cockroaches didn't snore). My luxury was having electricity between 6.30 - 10.30pm each day and cold showers. (good job I had already got used to having no electricity in Koh Samui!). The family from the longhouse just up the river sold us some beer and moonshine which of course helped to turn the primitive stay into a holiday.
Monday 11th April
2 hour trek in the rain forrest in search of WILD orangutans. Unfortunately the closest we came was spotting a relatively new orangutan nest in the trees and some really fresh orangutan poop (but I didn't have to clear it up this time). Putting glamour aside to wear leech socks is definately recommended. Leechs may start off small but soon grow into fat sucky things once they are full of your blood.
The afternoon was spent carving my name in a wooden plaque which was to be used to identify MY mango tree which was to be planted on Wednesday.
Tuesday 12th April
Took a short long boat ride to the family across the river. The extremely patient women tried to teach us how to weave mats from reeds. All I had to do was count two over, two under, two over, two under etc etc but it was amazing how difficult this was due to the orangutan injured leg, sitting on the floor and the extreme humidity.
Relaxing afternoon swimming in the river and finishing off carving and painting my tree sign .
Wednesday 13th April
After a short trek (wearing the leech socks again) we arrived at the place I was to leave my little mango tree all by itself. With only my beautifully decorate ID sign and a few thousand other trees for company I emotionally said good bye. I must return in 6 years as this is when my tree will actually bear fruit. I think it would probably take me 6 years to locate where I planted it.
Thursday 14th April
The whole day was spent making a basket in the morning and another mat in the afternoon. I wonder which one of you lucky lucky people will recieve my handcrafts as their holiday present. I can honestly there were no tears shed but certainly a lot of sweat went into making these items and I will never frown upon woven items for sale in shops ever ever again.
Friday 15th April
1.5 hour long boat ride - forgot to say there are ony little plastic chairs with the legs cut off to sit on and as you can imagine a rather numb bum is experienced by all. Back in our minibus for 5 hours back to Kuching for the last nights stay in the hostel and farewell dinner in a fabulous seafood food court.
Saturday 16th April
Checked into a modern hotel to wash my hair, paint my nails, catch up on emails and facebook and use my hair straightners. All back to normal and ready to travel again looking half normal. Desperately need a hair cut and colour.
Sunday 17th April
Early start to catch a plane from Kuching to Singapore followed by flight to Darwin. 1 days rest then off on the Oz trip for 21 days (I think)
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