Tours and Tourists

I got the chance to follow Tepuq Bulan on her “Walk With Me” trail three times. The first time I went there was with the rest of the Project WHEE! participants. Her trail starts from her house in Bario Asal and we would walk along the road surrounded by the lush greenery from the paddy fields. 

We walked for about half an hour before going off-road and walked on the allocated pathway through the paddy fields. Our walk was accompanied by Bario’s hornbill, Turo! She followed us while we walked on Tepuq’s trail as she loves being around people.

Turo the hornbill!

Tepuq has a seven acre paddy field which we would pass by, where she would explain to us that she engaged Ceria (a mechanized farming company) to help her plant on her field using machines. Ceria would then take 70% of the rice produced from her field while she only gets to keep 30%! No wonder she prefers to plant paddy herself.

Jacky, me, Tepuq Bulan, Tepuq Ribet, David and Shannon with Tepuq Bulan’s paddy field at the back.

Then she took us to her tapioca farm that was just next to her paddy field. In the tapioca farm she grows tapioca plants obviously, along with some pineapple plants and durian trees. 

Tepuq demonstrated to us how to uproot tapioca and she just made it look so easy! She uprooted quite a bit to bring home to cook her favourite tapioca dish. She also picked some ripped pineapples to bring home. She would put them in her “uyut” which is a woven bag made of rattan that she carries on her back. In the uyut was where she would also keep her water bottle and parang, which she used to cut the tapioca plants.

Tepuq picking pineapples from her tapioca farm with an "uyut" on her back

Going back, we used a different route from where we came from. We passed by more paddy fields before coming across a plane wreck.

The plane had crashed on the paddy field during the Indonesian-Malaysian confrontation in 1964. Tepuq was in school nearby when it happened so she told us all about it. Its really engaging to hear her stories of when she was younger because I get to hear how her life was like growing up in a simple place like Bario where a plane crash was probably the most dramatic incident that happened.

I went on the trail again a few days later when Tepuq Bulan brought five tourists from KL on her Walk With Me trail.  Things didn’t go as expected because Tepuq Bulan’s husband insisted that she took the motorbike while I walked with the tourist to the tapioca farm. It was quite funny because for half of the Walk With Me trail with the tourists, “Me” wasn’t there. But thankfully, she joined us later to give the tourist the tour of her paddy field and her tapioca garden. I eventually had to sit down with her to point out how she can improve her trail and to suggested to her not to let her tourist walk without her. Although it was stressful for me at that time when she left the tourist to walk with me on her trail, Tepuq and I had a good laugh about it later.

 Tepuq taking the tourists from KL on her Walk With Me trail

To great relief, I later found out that she took in all my advice and suggestions on how she can improve as a community guide when she took two German tourists on her trail. She did almost everything right as a community guide this time around. I felt really proud of her when I watched her engaging with the tourist and explaining all the highlights along the trail clearly. 

Tepuq explaining to the tourist how she can tell when the pineapples are ripe

Another tour that Tepuq can do is the “Jungle Vegetable Collection”. She brought David and I on that tour twice and it was pretty fun. It was like going for a brief jungle trek and coming back with vegetables that we could cook for lunch! While walking towards the jungle, Tepuq taught us a Kelabit working song and we were singing it the whole journey and while plucking the vegetables.

Tepuq crossing a small river in the jungle

First, we collected Isip leaves that are used for Nuba Layaq, where sticky steamed rice is wrapped in Isip leaves. The leaves would then act as a plate to hold the rice and other side dishes.

David and Tepuq Bulan plucking Isip leaves

Besides Isip leaves, we also collected Tengayan leaves which makes a really delicious vegetable dish! While having fun plucking the leaves and singing the Kelabit song Tepuq taught us,  David and I got competitive and challenged each other on who could collect the most Tengayan leaves. We thought we were collecting a decent amount of leaves until we saw the handful of leaves that Tepuq collected. It was easily three times the amount of what we each collected! She really collects the leaves fast. It is probably because that was her version of grocery shopping for fresh vegetables. 

The leave packets in the picture are the Nuba Layaq wrapped in Isip leaves like the one we collected from the jungle and the green dish is made of Tengayan leaves that we also collected from the jungle.

For lunch, we had what we collected from the jungle in the morning. Knowing that we handpicked those vegetables straight from the jungle, it tasted a lot better. I was really blessed to be able to enjoy Tepuq’s cooking for lunch every weekday for three weeks straight. The Kelabit food generally would definitely be under my top five reasons of why I love and miss Bario. And I couldn’t have asked for a better Tepuq to cook me lunch.

Tepuq cooking for our last lunch together in her home.

Nurul Iman