3rd and 4th February - Iban Longhouse

After arriving in Kuching we went out for a nice meal, it is quite a big town and had all the things I desperately needed; hot shower, internet, pharmacy and laundry!

The following morning we headed out to the Iban longhouses it was a 5 hour mini van ride then a 1 hour long boat ride. We were lucky due to the heavy rain the boat could get through normally people have to get out and push! Upon arrival we were introduced to the chief of the longhouse and his family. The chief was a really lovely kind man who thankfully had learnt English and was pretty fluent. He told us all about the way they lived, the values they held and also asked us a lot about our home countries.

The group we were with had to bring offerings to pay for our stay; we gave them a pigs head and other essentials that they needed!! We got to eat in our own area which was good as we could relax a bit more. Whilst staying in the longhouse we have to uphold there traditions so the girls had to wear things that covered their knees and shoulders. Everyone had to sit cross legged you were allowed your feet in front of you - which got pretty uncomfortable over two days (especially as I have real difficultly crossing that gammy knee of mine!!). The food was okay but they kept making us fish so I just stuck to the rice. There was no proper facilites there either so I just stayed dirty for 2 days!!

We were supposed to go out on a long walk the following morning but it was raining again so we just hung around for the day basically reading (except again I ran out of book) and napping. They showed us how they weaved and how they carved they also makes baskets which were really great. It was very relaxed and it was interesting to see them going about there everyday tasks. At the end of that day we had dinner then the people lay out all there craft items so that we could buy what we wanted. Obviously they noticed we were foreign so the prices were rather inflated and also we did feel a bit like we had to buy somethings as there were around 12 families laying out all there goods just for us in a little market style arrangement! All the products were really nice though.

We headed out early the next morning for the long trip back to Kuching where we stayed for one last night. We had our fairwell dinner and I wasn't due to fly till 9pm on the Saturday so I had the day to myself to catch up before flying to New Zealand to meet Charlie.

Everything was fine till I got to the airport to find they had cancelled my flight and just put me on the next nights flight. Obviously by then my connecting flights would have departed. So I had a mad panic and had to try and get hold of the bloody airline to sort it out. I got there eventually with a representive of the airline have to drive from Kuching to the airport to meet me!! I ended up flying to Kuala Lumpa, then to Singapore then to Sydney and then on to Auckland!! That was one long day which was slightly worse due to one airline not serving alcohol!! The Sydney flight also got delayed! After 24 hours of travelling I was releaved to get to NZ!!