The Random Work Post

A typical work day in Bario for me was something like this: waking up at 6.45 AM and getting ready, helping tepuq a little bit in the kitchen, having breakfast, and walking to Arur Dalan with Xueh Wei and Shu Anne. The three of us were assigned to ladies who lived in a different village from where we stayed (Bario Asal), unlike the other volunteers. One thing worth mentioning about our walk to Arur Dalan is everytime, without fail, a flock of white chickens trailed behind us! At first, it scared us because we thought we were about to be attacked by the chickens. After three weeks of the same thing happening, we got used to it.

The walk took around 15 minutes and the scenery we took in was absolutely gorgeous.

The lady I was assigned to was Sina Mayda Pitan. She is the youngest Bario woman to participate in Project WHEE!. An advantage of being paired with her is that she is very considerate and accommodating towards her assigned volunteers. She does not overwork them and makes sure that they are very well fed. However,  this advantage worked against me. Many times, I felt that she thought I was a city kid incapable of helping her. I spent quite some time convincing her that I am in fact able to work in the paddy field, get dirty and muddy, and sweat it out. Sometimes, it is really funny how things work out.

January is harvesting season in Bario. Hence, aside from brushing up Sina's English, most of the work I did was drying (midang) and harvesting (ranih) paddy.

The field Sina works in in Arur Dalan is very, very beautiful. The walk to the field was somewhat an adventure for me. First, we entered a house, walked through the backyard of the house, and ended up at a river. Next, we crossed the river using a bamboo bridge and passed by somebody else's paddy field. After that, we walked through a narrow trail with bushy ferns on both sides. Oh, did I mention, we went up and down a hill before finally reaching her field? The entire journey took about 10 minutes.

Crossing the first paddy field

The narrow trail with bushy ferns on both sides

Reaching the destination after walking over a hill

For a few times, I tried role playing with Sina Mayda. I played the tourist, while she played the guide. I made her guide me to the paddy field, name the different kinds of jungle vegetables we saw on the way and explain their uses, and point out Prayer Mountain from where we were. I also taught her simple sentences to caution tourists, such as "Be careful, the road is very muddy and slippery". However, the challenge I faced was she kept speaking to me in Malay instead of English. This is because I can speak Malay moderately well (I hope I didn't disappoint all of you too much, my BM teachers!) and language wasn't really a barrier for us. Therefore she always slipped back to speaking in Malay. Actually, she understands English quite well, but lacks the confidence to converse in it.

Hut

In Bario, for every paddy field, there is a hut. This hut functions as a storage space to keep harvested paddy, tools, sawah clothes... As for Sina's hut, it is mainly used as a place to chill and have lunch after working. There is also a fireplace for cooking. 

Inside the hut

The story behind this chair: On my first day at the sawah (paddy field), Tama Ricky, Sina's husband, decided to build a chair from scratch out of the blue. He sawed the wood, assembled and nailed them together. It was a really random little DIY project. 

A blowpipe (sumpit)

The one on the right is padi adan, the famous Bario rice whereas the one on the left is padi hitam.

Winnowing paddy

Removing the stalks from the paddy 

Spreading out the paddy with a rake for optimum drying

Harvesting paddy together

There is one thing I really appreciate about Sina: she took the initiative to work close by me in the paddy field, so that I was able to chat with her and work on improving her English. It was the little things like these that she did that touched my heart a lot.

:D

Some Instagram-worthy shots:

Sunglasses embedded in the ground.

Normally, if we went to the field on day one, Sina preferred to stay at home on day two. When we stayed at home, the things we did were drying paddy and cleaning the house. I always looked forward to days when we would go to the field, because I got to be more physical.

The official time for the volunteers to end work is 4 PM. Around this time, I walked back to Bario Asal together with Shu Anne and Xueh Wei. 

Shu Anne walking back to Arur Dalan from the field. On the left is the solar farm that supplies electricity to Arur Dalan.

Xueh Wei washing her socks after work

Werk it, gurl.