Malaysia – Taman Negara 2

I had to rest. My cold cleared in a day but, I was left with aching joints and particularly my pelvis and legs. It came in waves and stopped me sleeping. It was the weirdest thing because in myself I felt fine just not comfortable walking, bending, squatting and god forbid I run across a road. So our time in Taman Negara was spent sitting about mostly.

There are a lot of cats in Kuala Tahan and many have a genetic tail defect, making it look as though their tails have been bitten off. The owner of Scary Hall husband had a soft spot for strays.

The other odd thing was that there were not to many biting insects so it was possible to eat outside. This I found peculiar as there was laying water.

One notable event was at dinner on the last evening we sat in a restaurant above the jetty looking down on the Floating Restaurants when Tatjana noticed a group of boys were swimming in the river fully clothed. Then a bit later a family were having a wash in the water, she watched the children as the father soaped their hair and backs. They were all clothed and Tatjana took a few pictures. We were quite a distance so she zoomed in on one of the pictures and realised she had captured the chap washing his genitals! Timing is everything! We couldn’t stop laughing.

I just wanted to say a few words about the Orang Asli. Tatjana explains Orang means people or person so Orang hutan (orangutan) is forest people. Orang Asli are local people, therefore the original people.

Two tribes live in Taman Negara living a nomadic lifestyle, the Batek and Semokberi they are ethnic groups. The Batek typically have dark skin, black tresses in tight curls(almost black African in appearance) and shorter hair, while the Semokberi have wavy hair. Their homes are constructed from palm thatch and house many families among riverbanks and pathways. They arrived on the Malaysian Peninsula about 25,000 years ago.

I think we got a glimpse of the Orang Asli but, I was too unwell to visit the village upriver. Tatjana had read somewhere that the villages seemed rather sad affairs. Having read up a bit on this it seems the Batek do not have the concept of land ownership and they share food with all the people in their society. I would say they are hunter gatherers. As you can imagine this lifestyle comes into conflict with officialdom and with deforestation this limits where the Asli people’s can go.

Next moving onto Penang via a brief stop in the Cameron Highlands.