Malaysia vol. 2 - Jungle Boogie

Anyone who knows me, knows that I like monkeys. I mean, what’s not to like? Aside from the smell, their tendency to steal things, and the fact that they carry a lot of diseases, they’re awesome in every way. So, what could be better than monkeys? Apes, of course, which are just like monkeys except much bigger and stronger*. So you imagine how excited I was at the prospect of seeing orangutans in the wild in Borneo, although I was trying to temper my enthusiasm by reminding myself that they were elusive, shy, active very early in the morning when I tend to be in bed, etc. So I planned on hedging my bets by staying in a resort next to the Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Center, which rescues orphaned and injured orangutans, tried to teach them necessary survival skills, and then reintroduces them to the wild. I figured this would be a half-step between seeing them in the wild and in zoos.

The orangutan who showed up behind my hotel room in Sepilok

He certainly gave the housekeeping staff a shock

My last post left off with me on the bus back to Sepilok from the dive town of Semporna, but there was one part of the bus ride to Semporna that I left out: the palm oil plantations. For the last decade or so, Borneo has been in the midst of a palm oil boom, similar to the ethanol boom in the American midwest, and huge swathes of the native rainforest has been cleared to plant palms. So I began to have my first pangs about seeing orangutans, or anything else, “in the wild” on the trip to Semporna. From what I saw, most of the countryside was nothing but rows and rows of palms as far as the eye could see, and in talking to other travelers, it sounded like some of the nature camps were not much more that attempts to realize some revenue on from areas that couldn’t be converted to palm. This proved to be a sadly recurring theme in traveling around Sabah. Sabah markets itself as a wild place, where the tourist can immerse himself into nature, except the locals seem interested in nature only to the extent it can realize a profit. I’m aware of how arrogant this perspective might sound, but the fact is there is a fundamental difference between working to protect a species because it returns a profit, and working to protect an ecosystem, because an important species lives there, and that species can return a profit if managed properly. One results in sad animals trapped in a strip of land bordered by development, and the other (hopefully) results in an area where the animals can live with minimal interference/interaction with people. Unfortunately, I saw many cases of the former in Borneo, and Sipadan was probably the only example of the latter.

Gomantong Cave

Something like one million bats and three million swiftlet birds live in this cave system

Recognizing this, I checked into my hotel, which was located next to the Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Center, and surrounded by a fair amount of residential development - not a great sign for my seeing anything “in the wild.” That afternoon, I walked over to the orangutan center and took their nature walk to the center of the center where the orangutans can come in for feedings if they want to. It’s a sign of success that most of the orangutans they’ve worked with no longer come back for food, preferring to live in the jungle, but I still got to see 4 orangutans for about a half-hour at the feeding. Although not exactly “natural”, it was a nice relaxed environment and a good introduction to the Sepilok area.

How many other states would you guess have a "management of edible bird's nest" system?

The next day, as I was getting ready in the morning, I heard the housekeeping staff shouting outside my window, and when I looked out, there was an orangutan walking across the back lawn and into the trees behind the resort. He was obviously pretty unconcerned by people, and probably spent some time at the rehabilitation center, but an orangutan in the backyard has to be a good sign for being in the jungle, right? I upped my game by booking a full-day excursion to the Kinabatangan River area, for a cave tour and river trip, hoping to see something unusual. The first stop was Gomantong Cave, where locals have been harvesting swiftlet nests for hundreds of years as an ingredient in a soup the Chinese love (don’t ask me why, I’ve never been interested in trying bird’s nest soup). On the walk to the caves however, what should we see but a mother orangutan and her child! A good start to the morning, especially when a few maroon leaf monkeys put in an appearance. Then, as we approached the cave itself, I had the strongest sense of deja vu, except I’ve never been to Borneo before. As the guide started telling me about the bats and swallows in the cave, how deep their guano gets and how many cockroaches live in it, how the locals harvest the swiftlets’ nests, the feeling just kept growing until I finally put it together - I had seen this featured in the “Caves” episode of BBC’s Planet Earth series. I was standing somewhere that was in BBC’s Planet Earth….nerd overload!!

To prevent poaching of the swiftlets' nests in Gomantong Cave, two park rangers spend 10 hours a night here, with the spiders, centipedes, bats, snakes, cockroaches, and probably other things I wouldn't want anywhere near my bed

Long-tailed macaque

After getting over the excitement of caves, documentaries, and bat poop, it was off to the river lodge for lunch and some downtime before the late afternoon river tour started. The Kinabatangan River is the second longest river in Malaysia and winds through some very beautiful lowland jungle and mangrove habitat, and now that I had seen 3 orangutans, I was turning my attention to the possibility of seeing proboscis monkeys, a hysterically silly-looking monkey known to frequent the area. Well, to cut to the chase, my final tally for the river cruise was 3 more orangutans, proboscis monkeys, silver leaf monkeys, pig-tailed macaques, and long-tailed macaques, bringing my final primate tally for the week to 6 different species, not to mention the kingfishers, eagles, pythons, and hornbills. At the end of the day, all I could think was if it looks like this in 2013, what did this island look like 200 years ago?

Sabah definitely had its ups and downs, and they are going to lose a lot of the island’s attractions if they keep converting everything to palm oil plantations, but it’s still an incredible place with a lot of reasons to visit. I didn’t even make it to the western side of Sabah, where Mt. Kinabalu stands (the highest peak in Malaysia), so I would definitely consider a trip back in the future and recommend it as a great option for anyone looking for a wild vacation.

Sunset on the river cuise

*Side note: if you ever want to see a truly memorable TV moment, track down a nature documentary that Julia Roberts did on orangutans, in which a large male grabs her and puts her in a headlock. Can you imagine what the headlines would have been like if America’s Sweetheart had been killed by an orangutan? Obviously, I’ve given it some thought. My top contender for the New York Post “PRETTY WOMAN KILLED BY DAMNED DIRTY APE!”