Monkeying Around in Bako

Mention ‘Borneo’ and images of age-old rainforests and rich wildlife come to mind. Unless you have plenty of time to traipse the entire island, the easiest way to experience a snapshot of it is to head to Bako National Park in Sarawak, located at the northwestern tip of Borneo.

GETTING THERE
Located close to Sarawak’s capital of Kuching, Bako is easily accessible by bus or on an organised tour. The thing about Bako is that even though it’s on a peninsula, it’s only accessible by boat.

When the tide is low, this can get tricky – and the locals always have a way of scaring visitors by telling them that saltwater crocs patrol the area (this is the truth), especially when the boat is chugging agonizingly slow in the low waters and you see movement in the banks. However, the presence of locals frolicking in the water indicates that it’s not as scary as the boatmen make it out to be.

Boat to the HQ

WHEN YOU’RE THERE…
The only creature that most visitors come here to see is the male proboscis monkey – a wheat-coloured, pot-bellied primate which is easily distinguished by the dangly appendage that is its nose. There are several troupes in the park, and they can be found pretty near the park headquarters and the lodging sites.

Juvenile Proboscis Monkey

Other groups can be found within a short hike along the park’s many hiking trails. If you hear rustling in the trees, it’s either proboscis monkeys, silver langurs (graceful monkeys with grey fur and starburst-looking faces), or annoying macaques, which are known to be pests.

If you’re lucky, you may get to see a few proboscis monkey troupes, which vary from a handful of monkeys to about 20 members (especially later in the year after their breeding season). Seeing a fully-grown male with a large schnoz can be rare, but juveniles are pretty prolific as they’re less shy and more playful. Their idea of ‘play’ is spraying their pee on passers by below, of course. Curiously, their pee smells like sandalwood, in case you’re wondering.

A monkey leaping between trees

OTHER CREATURES
While looking up at trees to find flying monkeys, most people tend to miss the other attraction the park has: snakes, which tend to settle on the lower branches of trees (read: crotch height), so be careful when foraying off the established paths. Most of the snakes here are harmless, and are usually green in colour. However, green is also the colour of the poisonous Wagler’s Pit Viper, which has a distinctive triangular head. But, seriously, who has the time to check for the shape of the head when you see a green thing slithering at you?

Waglers Pit Viper

Another creature that’s prolific in the park are the wild boars – large, hairy black pigs with tusks and creepy yellow eyes. They can be found constantly foraging on the ground, and as long as you don’t get in their way, you’re fine. If you spend the night here, you can see even more critters, like the tiny mousedeer, pangolin and flying lemur (don’t forget to bring mosquito repellent).

The park has many beaches, as well as interesting offshore rock formations – you can hike to these along marked trails, and head back to where you started on a boat for an alternative view of the park.

Hong Kong: Past Tense

Hong Kong is known to many as a city that never sleeps. While modernity and skyscrapers have a firm hold here, there are plenty of pockets where the past still lingers. This is our journey into the Hong Kong that once was, and still is.

GETTING AROUND
The Star Ferry has changed little since it began ferrying folks between Tsim Sha Tsui and Central (and Wanchai) in 1888. As you sit in their reversible wooden seats, enjoy the scenic ride which beats taking the MTR or bus. When on Hong Kong island, take an incredibly cheap ride on the tram, the original carriages of which ply the same routes that remain unchanged since 1904.

Hong Kong from the Star Ferry at Tsim Sha Tsui

Hong Kong’s trams have been in operation since 1904

BEHIND THE SCENES
While Central is a bustling modern commercial district, take to the back alleys and streets, and you’ll find a Hong Kong that has persevered since the old days. From traditional butchers (with garish meat displays not for the faint-hearted) to flower vendors and ancient sundry shops, you’ll find almost anything in these hilly streets.

A street vendor in Central’s hilly streets

A very old-fashioned sundry shop

OLD PRACTICES
In Hong Kong, you need not head far to catch a glimpse of people doing things the way they have for hundreds of years. Here and there, you can see people praying in centuries’ old temples, playing the age-old game of checkers or getting their hair cut at an alley barber.

Playing Chinese Checkers at a park in Wanchai

A woman prays at Man Mo Temple

Traditional barber behind Hollywood Road

FAR FLUNG
Away from the city, a visit to Hong Kong’s outlying islands and villages is a trip back in time (and possibly another realm). Here, villagers still catch and dry their own food, and live in villages that are far removed from a city lifestyle. In Tai O, there’s even a ‘silver city’ – so named because every surface of every house of this small village is painted in silver (including their bicycles!).

Old fishing boats at Tai O

Drying fish at a fishing village

Traditional stilted village in Tai O

Dried fish hanging in the “Silver City” of Tai O

Vietnam: Village People

Northern Vietnam has only truly opened up to tourism in the 90s, but the speed of development in this country means that even though small villages are tucked in remote mountain area accessible only on foot, it doesn’t mean they have to live without electricity or cable TV.

Women in the terraced rice fields

Those who come to Vietnam can experience a traditional way of life in some of these far flung villages. Homestays are so common these days that outhouse latrines have been replaced by flushing toilets to make visitors feel more ‘at home’. Yet, it isn’t difficult to find a home where you’d have to take a torchlight to do your nightly business outdoors if you prefer.

At other places, visitors sleep on the floor that’s literally right above where their cows and pigs (and chickens) are kept. You can even see them through the cracks in the floorboards. As the houses are mostly built on stilts and raised off the ground, the common practice is to house their livestock on the ground floor, while the family live upstairs. This is how the locals have lived for centuries, so you’ll just have to get used to the idea (and the smell).

Village home where livestock live under the house

Those who do get to visit these villages will be offered a window into their lives – drop in on any house, and you’ll be plied with tea (a standard custom) or some homemade rice wine with the village elder.

Many hill tribes – like the Black H’Mong, Red Dzao, Zai and Tai – call this area home, and if you’re into colourful tribal costumes and customs, this is a great place to be. Depending on how long you can spend on the ground, there are a number of interesting villages to spend the night in.

MAI CHAU
The closest village to Hanoi (at 135km), the White Tai village of Mai Chau is surrounded by a sea of verdant green rice fields as far as the eye can see. Tucked within the mountain range, it’s a picturesque location and plenty of tour buses come here for a homestay experience. But, take a short hike just beyond the village and you can have the fields all to yourself, and the villagers.

Mai Chau’s village

Because this village is used to the relatively high volume of tourists, expect flushing toilets and modern showers. But take a walk to the nearby fields, and you can still witness a traditional way of life: villagers still harvest by hand and plough the land with water buffaloes. At night, there’s even a song and dance performance by the locals specifically for tourists.

TU LE
If you’re looking for a village that’s off the beaten track, the Tai village of Tu Le is a great place to spend the night. Located within a pretty valley, Tu Le is surrounded by terraced electric green rice fields that seem to form green stairways to the mountains. The area is criss-crossed with a network of trails used by the locals to get from the mountains to the market, and these trails are great for hiking and meeting the locals.

Terraced fields near Tu Le

Around the village, you can see cute little black pigs with triangular wooden collars – designed to prevent them from running to places they’re not supposed to.

As this is a relatively isolated village, you’ll get to sleep on the floor next to the family and right above their livestock. As there are no walls for the kitchen/living/bedroom, bedtime can be tricky when other family members are watching TV, cooking or chatting at the same time. Plus, the toilet is about 50m away.

SAPA
Sapa, near the Chinese border, is a former French hill resort built in 1922. Visitors are drawn here for its cool weather, as well as its rich tribal culture thanks to the area’s diversity of hill tribes.

A village in Sapa

While you can see plenty of hill tribe people at Sapa’s market, take a hike around the nearby valleys to see where they live. The hike is generally downhill and can get really muddy during rainy season (May-Sept).

Villages here are so used to foreign visitors that most children can speak a few languages – and indeed, they will pester you along your entire hike until you’ve bought something from them.

You can spend the night the Zai village of Ta Van – most have flushing toilets and modern showers, thanks to the influx of foreign influence here. Zai houses are large compared to the Tai’s, and are mostly double-storied.

At Sapa’s tribal market

GOING?
If you’re interested in a village homestay, it’s more convenient to go with an organised group, or hire your own transport and cook.

Even if you can’t communicate with the locals, there’s always rice wine to be shared as everyone invites you to gather around the TV watch a Western programme dubbed in Vietnamese. Such is the pace of progress – and the way of modern life – in these mountain villages of Vietnam.

Uzbekistan: Ulugh Beg and beyond

Registan Square

From Alexander the Great to Genghis Khan and Tamerlane, Uzbekistan has long been ruled by mighty generals who conquered vast lands that stretched from Asia to Africa and Europe.

The last great conqueror was Tamerlane (Timur), who died suddenly during a military campaign to China – at a ripe age of 69 – before he could appoint his successor. Needless to say, his military-minded sons fought for control and it was his grandson, Ulugh Beg, who brought power back to Samarkand. He was only a teenager at the time.

Tilya-Kori madrassah, Registan

ULUGH BEG
Ulugh Beg succeeded Timur, but unlike the great conqueror, Ulugh wasn’t a military man. He was a math genius, and a rare combination of a ruler who was also a teacher, astronomer and mathematician.

It’s thanks to him that Samarkand became a capital of learning. He built – and sometimes lectured at – the Ulugh Beg Madrassah (or ‘school’), which was a centre for astronomy and maths. Today, the madrassah stands in the restored Registan Square, and houses numerous souvenir and craft shops that occupy the former students’ dorm rooms. These days, the only maths you’ll practice is in honing your bartering skills.

Ulugh Beg madrassah

As an astute astronomer, he also built the Ulugh Beg Observatory – one of the finest observatories in the Islamic world at the time – and compiled one of the greatest star catalogues. He also determined the length of the year, which remains the most accurate measurement to date.

Unfortunately, geniuses don’t make great rulers, and in the end, he was beheaded by order of his own son. Today, you can still see Ulugh Beg’s tomb, buried at the foot of his granddad, Timur, in the Gur-e Emir mausoleum.

The iconic Hotel Uzbekistan

It wasn’t until the early 19th century that some semblance of a unified rule came over Central Asia, this time in the form of the Russian Empire.

TIME OF THE SOVIETS
By the Russian era in the late 19th century, plenty of Western-influenced buildings mushroomed around Uzbekistan. A new style – the Turkestan Colonial – was born, featuring bricked frontage, stucco mouldings and iron ornaments.

Tashkent replaced Samarkand as the capital, and in addition to vodka and the Russian language, iconic buildings like the Men and Women Gymnasiums, the Navoi Theatre and the Hotel Uzbekistan dominate the ‘new town’ area. If you like architecture with lots of geometric ornaments and concrete colours, Tashkent won’t disappoint.

Russian-styled

Another Russian influence is the construction of subways – until a few years ago, Tashkent is the only city in Central Asia with a subway network, the stations of which are all lavishly and thematically decorated (one of the stations is designed after a local cosmonaut).

Even after their independence in 1991, Uzbekistan still retains much of its beloved architecture.

PRESENT COMPANY
With this much history, one of the best places to experience Uzbekistan’s diversity is at Chorsu bazaar – the largest and oldest in the region. This spot has been a trading post since the time of the Silk Road, and today is a hodgepodge of cultures, foods and peoples over the centuries.

Vendors at Chorsu bazaar

People from neighbouring countries – Tajikistan, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan – settled here. Perhaps the strangest addition to the cultural heritage are the Koreans, who arrived here in the early 20th century and are more at home in Russian than Korean. Even their traditional foods – like kimchi – has been adapted into local Uzbek cuisine.

No matter who you meet – from Koreans to gold-teethed Uzbek ladies or blond Russians – a simple “Assalomu alaykum” is the universal greeting, a sign that while the people are varied in their backgrounds, their identity remains unanimously Uzbekistan.

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WANT MORE STORIES ON UZBEKISTAN? READ OUR “UZBEKISTAN: FROM GENGHIS KHAN TO TAMERLANE” STORY HERE.

Minakami: Wet and Wild

Ski slopes at Tanigawa

Located just north of Tokyo, Gunma prefecture is largely known for its mountainous scenery and plentiful hot spring. While Kusatsu (also in Gunma) may be one of Japan’s most famous hot spring towns, head further north to Minakami Onsen if you prefer add outdoor adventure to your usual soak.

MINAKAMI ONSEN’S OUTDOOR BUFFET
Minakami has, in recent years, invented itself as more than just another hot spring destination. In winter, hot spring visitor arrivals peak, and the ski slopes nearby fill up with skiers of every level of ability. When the snow melts, springtime brings with it more than just the cherry blossom season.

Sliding down a waterfall

Thanks to its rugged mountains,  deep canyons and fast flowing rivers, you can add whitewater rafting, canyoning and caving to the list of activities. A number of adventure operators offer these tours in spring and summer, with the level of excitement peaking in spring when the meltwater turns up the notch on the thrill quotient.

Plenty of gorges are carved through this mountainous terrain, creating perfect environments for canyoning. Fox Canyons is perhaps the most popular itinerary, where you get to slip, jump and slide on natural waterfalls and long water chutes. It’s like a water theme park without the screaming kids and long queues.

Raging rapids at Tonegawa River

Classic whitewater rafting trips are also possible, with Class IV rapids happening in early spring, mellowing out by late summer.

Caving trips take you into the bowels of Minakami’s mountains, where you negotiate narrow tunnels and crevices via fixed ropes or by crawling on your belly, giving a new meaning to the word ‘claustrophobia’.

Of course, there are limitless hiking opportunities in the mountains. Mt. Tanigawa is one of Japan’s top 100 famous peaks, and plenty of hikers come here to tick it off their lists. The climb can essentially start from the Doai Railway Station: at 70m underground (which is a feat of engineering in itself), it takes about 10 minutes to negotiate the 486 steps.

Dam (replica) Curries

POST ADVENTURE
If all that climbing, sliding, paddling and swimming gets you all achy, just take your pick at one of dozens of hot spring resorts that line the Tonegawa river. There is even a pet-friendly hot spring hotel that has a bath specially for dogs!

To replenish your energy, take a walk around the quaint small town and sample a number of desserts. An unofficial ‘dessert trail’ takes you past a number of sweet offerings, whether you’re into western desserts (ie. custard pudding) or Japanese classics (ie. red-bean buns).

For a quirky main meal, try the ‘Dam Curry’ – which is basically rice served with curry sauce. The secret, however, is not in the sauce – it’s in the presentation.