Anthropological Notebook

Climbing trees

2012-01-13T04:39:00.000+08:00

Batek children at Taman Negara, Malaysia, 1/1/12. Climbing trees is fun, beloved of children everywhere, and these children develop their skills early. Later, there will be many a discouraging shout from the adults when they try to climb trees that are too big for them.

Fieldwork with the Batek, 1995-96 (video)

2012-01-12T13:54:00.003+08:00

Before my Google Earth Pro trial version expires, I've made a video of the old Batek campsites from 1995-96. The narrative is chronological. It's good to see that many of the areas remain under forest cover of some sort.

Batek fieldwork 1995-96: maps and movements from tp Lye on Vimeo.

Learning to walk in the forest

2012-01-08T20:06:00.005+08:00

His mother (na'Cangap) is supporting him with just one finger. She could have lifted him, grabbed him, or heaved him over the log, of course, but then he wouldn't have had the adventure of trying to climb over by himself, or the experience of learning to do so. He used his toy digging stick for support and tried about three or four times before he made it. He's about 2-3 years old. Taman Negara, Malaysia, 1/1/12.

Batek portraits: Then and now (II)

2012-01-08T08:29:00.020+08:00

Once were children.... Continuing my photo series of Batek friends as they were "then" (left), and as they are today (right). All the "now" photos were shot in Taman Negara national park, Pahang, Malaysia, between 31/12/11 and 5/1/12. I told a couple of amusing stories about their childhood antics to people; they seemed delighted to hear them and asked for repeated viewings of the old photos "when we were naughty children."

na'Jamol in 1999 at Tabung camp (left) and in 2012 with her son in Taman Negara (right). I never knew her as a child. Her family are from Atok and I almost never went there; neither did they leave Atok much. That week in Tabung was my only previous encounter with her.

eyKameng making blowpipe darts in 1996 (left) and with his son in 2012 (right). It's the beard that does it for me. I had known him as a laid-back youth, the adored baby brother who was raised by his father and older sisters after their mother was killed in a tiger-attack. To see him now, as a devoted and responsible father and husband... it tickles me.

eyJamol (far left) as a muddy kid with his brothers and their late mother in Was Tener, Taman Negara, 30/1/96 (left), and with ey Kinwen at Tom Dari' on 2/1/12 (right). He is the husband of na'Jamol in the first photo couplet above.

With Batek in Taman Negara (video)

2012-01-07T23:04:00.005+08:00

A montage, really, rather than a proper video, combining audio, a few stills, and video from this week's return visit to Batek friends at Taman Negara (my first videos of Batek, using an iPad -- I don't own a videocam). It was a splendid few days... walking in the forest, digging for yams, fishing, and we got meat from the hunt as well. I took a boat and surveyed groups along the Tembeling, caught up on the news and kinship and saw some people who I hadn't seen in 15 years. Children were adorable. The importance of making such visits was really brought home to me when I heard that old ta'Kangkong (aka eyTenhel) died just three days after my visit to his camp in 2010 (recounted here and here).

Back with Batek

2012-01-06T09:31:00.002+08:00

I just got back from spending the new year with the Batek at Taman Negara. While I get settled, here's a photo from the trip. More postings to come, I'm sure. In due course. Photoset here.

Finding books on Malaysian anthropology

2011-12-16T00:34:00.001+08:00

An exchange student asked me where to find books on Malaysian ethnic groups and anthropology (to buy). And since this is a topic close to my heart (and purse), I think it's a very good question. Some places and sites that come to mind:

In Penang, you might find titles of interest at the Penang Heritage Trust. You should visit their office, located in a restored building in the heritage area.

There is also Areca Bookstore in Armenian Street (on my to-visit list)

Kinokuniya bookstore in KL occasionally carries relevant titles; they have an online ordering service (but they've never stocked my books that I've seen, sigh)

Ditto MPH Bookstores but, like Kinokukiya, their stock is highly variable and location-dependent, so it's best to use their online ordering service.

Universiti Malaya Coop Bookstore has a Malaysiana collection. When it's good, it's great, but it's not always well-stocked either.

The Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society (MBRAS) publishes or reprints some excellent works, mainly on history.

Gerakbudaya in KL (my publisher, yes)

Select Bookstore in Singapore (probably has the widest range of books on Southeast Asia available close to here, and they will order for you)

For Orang Asli stuff, a few titles are available from the Center for Orang Asli Concerns. They could always do with publication funds so, if the Christmas spirit is upon you, consider making a donation!

For books on Sabah and Sarawak, there is also Borneo Books, based out of Kota Kinabalu, Sabah and the US-based Borneo Research Council.

Any suggestions, anyone?

At a logpond

2011-12-12T13:51:00.004+08:00

New publication: reviewing research on Orang Asli

2011-12-02T23:47:00.003+08:00

Just out and available for download:

Lye Tuck-Po. 2011. A history of Orang Asli studies: Landmarks and generations. Kajian Malaysia 29(supp. 1):23–52.

To view the whole issue, which also contains Lin Idrus' article on Orang Asli and the "discourse of protection," click here.

The sun! The sea!

2011-11-25T02:31:00.003+08:00

More signs of sentient life from this end....

Sunrise viewed from my front door, 11/11/11

Sunset from my verandah

2011-11-12T00:36:00.002+08:00

Sunset from my verandah (again), a photo by Lye Tuck-Po on Flickr.

Photo shot three weeks after I'd moved into my new apartment in Penang, July 2010.

USM School of Social Sciences: new website

2011-10-05T11:29:00.004+08:00

After a long hiatus, Universiti Sains Malaysia's (USM) School of Social Sciences finally has a functioning website. Do visit us.

If you want to go straight to my USM profile, click here. If you're a prospective student, click here. If you're looking to make research contacts, try here.

Batek portraits: Then and now

2011-07-31T00:57:00.011+08:00

I'd like to complete this project... some day soon: a short photo series of Batek friends as they were "then" (left), and as they were in 2010 (right). All photos were shot in Taman Negara national park, Pahang, Malaysia.

Siblings Ayok and naAmit, 1996 and 2010 (blog on these photos here)

eyKesok, applying poison to hunting darts in 1996, and surrounded by his
family in 2010 (he's next to the green-shirted boy)

Ken, with nephew in 1996, and with baby in 2010

eyHusin with baby, 1998, and with his eldest boy (far left) in 2010

naKsok, 1996 and 2010

At play among the trees

2011-07-25T13:24:00.039+08:00

Here are a couple more of Batek kids from last year's visit to Taman Negara.

Left: a young trapeze artist walks a tight root (can't resist the pun). What else is a kid to do with such a ready-made jungle gym in front of him?

Right: a baby enjoys the company of his big brother, while their mother looks on. Paul Schebesta, whose Among the forest dwarfs of Malaya (1928) I finished reading recently, wrote of Semang peoples generally: "Fathers and mothers are very devoted to their children... I have often seen, with astonishment and pleasure, how tenderly the dwarf [!] mothers kiss their children, dangle them on their knees, and prattle to them, laughing...one often saw fathers caressing their children" (pp. 111–112). I would concur (except with the "dwarf" part).

On Lake Chi-kay

2011-07-18T01:40:00.000+08:00

A girl in Kampong Thom province, Cambodia, sorts through a harvest of water lilies, 29 October 2005. Everyday she and her siblings would boat out to the lake, collect the lilies, remove the flowerheads, and sell the edible stems to market vendors in the village. Her elder sister is shown on left. Lake Chi-kay is one of several seasonal lakes in the village. Besides providing a range of subsidiary foods (which included richer stocks of fish in earlier years), it is useful in other ways. Annually, as the floodwaters recede, they leave behind fertile alluvium that is a natural bounty for growing rice. By this time of the year, it is nearly time to harvest the wet season rice. Barriers are lifted, and access ways opened. As the photo shows, the tops of submerged bushes are already showing. The water flows out into the Stueng Saen (Saen River); in a month, the lake will be drained, and the rice will be harvested. When the wet season comes again the following year, the cycle will start all over again. This is a common phenomenon throughout lowland Cambodia.

Sugar palm trees of Cambodia

2011-07-06T13:39:00.005+08:00

Here's a mosaic of some sugar palm photos from my Cambodia collection. The sugar palm is thefavorite tree of many Cambodians, and an indelible feature of rural landscapes. For me, these trees add to the sense of a place. Most sugar palms probably have owners, individual or families who tend to them. For owners, particular trees and groves are symbols of familial continuity:grown by an ancestor, inherited from parents, or reserved for the next generation. Owners also have economic investments in their trees: from the sap can be made wine, sugar or juice, all of which can be consumed at home, sold for cash, or shared around socially. And the trunk of a mature tree makes sturdytimber, such as for building traditional boats. I doubt that people who are looking ahead to their children's inheritance are likely to cut down the trees for timber, except perhaps under exigent circumstances.

Harvesting a sugar palm tree

The photos above show the palms in the background of ricefields, jutting up from the treeline of protected mounds, shading paths and roads, or as boundary and fence markers. I hoped to take photos of people collecting the sap and processing sugar, but didn't have much success. The photo on the left, showing a man scaling the trunk to collect sap for making wine, is the best of the lot. For some reason (people blamed weather conditions that year for the trees not producing the right kind of sap), they didn't make any sugar while I was around. But I sure encountered people resting from work in the fields, drinking palm wine in the shade. Sometimes non-alcoholic juice was also shared around, and this I enjoyed.

** Geek note: the mosaic was created using Photoshop's fast and easy "Contact sheets" tool (File > Automate > Contact sheet 11).

Elegy for an old campsite

2011-06-24T02:43:00.001+08:00

A view from Bumekel ridge, 1996

In lieu of something new, here's an old piece that I originally posted on this blog... well, quite some time back.

We moved to Bumekel ridge on January 8, 1996. Our new camp was located on a hnadang, a high ridge. It was not the most desirable of locations: there was no water source close by as at most other forest camps. The nearest one, barely more than a rivulet, was somewhat lower down the hill. Farther down the slope, this stream, the Bumekel, would feed into the Tekel, itself a minor tributary of the Kechau, one of the rivers flowing through Lipis district in Pahang. The Kechau too will drain into yet another river, the Jelai, which in turn is a tributary of the Tembeling, and that is a tributary of the Pahang, at 500 KM (312.5 miles) the longest river in Peninsular Malaysia and the river after which the state is named. The Pahang finally drains into the South China Sea on the east coast of the Peninsula.

Up here on Bumekel ridge, these broader drainage patterns seemed very remote. For us the main everyday problem was to find enough flowing water to wash with. We made do with springs gushing out of scarred, logged-over slopes on our way back from forest expeditions. Few people liked descending to the Bumekel stream; it was a long way down from our campsite. Cutting a gully between two hillocks, it was exquisitely serene if I could clamber down to it, but the uphill struggle back to camp would leave me pierced and scarred by thorns, and bleeding from leech bites, not to say muddied and panting from the exertion. I did not think it worthwhile to go down there for my baths.

Leaving Bumekel with a haul of rattan

Our main purpose for living at Bumekel was to collect rattan (left). Most people in the group had never been there before. For me, bathing problems aside, one aesthetic advantage of Bumekel was the altitude. We could walk out of the protected dell where we had set up camp, emerge into the ridge cresting the hill (part of an old logging road), and look across the forest at the far-off hills to the north-east. Until then I had never seen the forest canopy from above; this was my first and, as it turned out, my only‚ "bird's-eye" view of‚ "my field site" (see photo above).

Once, indeed, against all habit I rose before anyone else and sped out to the ridge just to look at the dawning sky. A rare luxury indeed. Under the forest canopy, morning light filters down slowly. The colours are often diluted by mist and hearth-fire smoke to put a bluish texture on the damp green vegetation. I rarely had a clear sense of dawn arriving, the night shades softly into the morning.

The Batek, like many rural peoples around the world, have an extensive repertoire of words to mark the stages of the day (some of which they share with their neighbours, the Malays), all apparently with reference to the changes in quality of light. Generally, visibility is not great in the forest. I realised this with the greatest dismay whenever I went outside the forest, to look down on myself and find many more scratches and bite-marks pocking my skin than I had hitherto realised!

The quality of light will vary by time of day, as weather changes, and with depth of shade. Such changes posed a problem for me in moving about the forest for, lacking long familiarity with the landscape, I was forced to rely on my sight for wayfinding purposes (rather than intuition and knowledge). I also have little talent for dead reckoning, the skill of being able to estimate where some place is in relation to one's present position. But the shapes, colours, and textures of the vegetation and topography would look different with changes of weather and time so I would often fail to recognise the route markers. I envied my Batek friends' confident ability to find their way in the forest, only to be reassured that they, too, have moments of lostness and disorientation. They have to keep their hearts focused on the route, they said, distractions are a-plenty in the forest.

na'Payol (bottom right) and a view of an old logpond in the background

The choreography of light and color‚ its evanescence‚ remains an elusive quality to capture in words. Knowing the Batek words helps to some extent, to understand how they order their time and what they associate with different parts of the day. But they too see and appreciate and find ineffable the possibilities of poetry in their world. I got so used to this world‚ to its fickleness‚ and then I would encounter a surprise. I remember moments of stopping still, of knowing that I was looking at something that would be seen only once, and my utter frustration later at lacking words to describe the experience in my notes. Expecting the last, I would try to commit the entire scene to memory and remember it forever. I have always been an insatiable reader of novels but, that year, I began to read for mood and description.

The remoteness of Bumekel was an ideal setting for dreamy introspection. It was atypical of most Batek camps that I lived in. In most camps, communication with other places has to be made on foot. Visitors or new arrivals will come from other places in other parts of the forest, bringing news and messages, or the members of a group may move elsewhere. In some camps, the membership may change by the day while in others, like Bumekel, they change not at all. When the Malay villages and shops are close by, as our previous camp had been, then the people will go out to shop quite often and the villagers may drop by to see what the locals have to sell. Sometimes more than one camp is located within visiting distance (one walking hour) of one another, and then the visiting is struck up with frenzy. Bumekel wasn't that sort of camp. In the week that we lived there, we had only one visitor, a Malay trader come to buy gaharu (aromatic wood).

Still, our remoteness only made our missing friends more present in mind. With the altitude and the newness came a fresh perspective from which to recollect old stories. Every evening after work, children would come out to the ridge to play while their mothers would sit on the ground, reminiscing while keeping a casual eye on the kids. Occasionally someone would ask another person in which direction a certain river lay. Fingers would point, lips would purse, or jaws would jut in that direction. The stories would unfold. Where I could see nothing but an expanse of forest and a distant line of low hills, they could reach back to images of past travels, past campsites, past adventures, favourite rivers, former landscapes.

Under their tutelage, I picked up some of this lore. Note the smooth line of those distant hills, they said, the forest there has been cut down and replaced with a single commercial species, oil palm. In a true tropical forest, the tree line would not be so clean, there would be emergents pushing up from the middle storey of the canopy, thus creating a jagged horizon. Our logged-over hills and those ones over there formed, therefore, two boundaries hedging in the secondary forest in the valley below us. Between two of the farther hills lay a route to the east, a historical passageway connecting distant river valleys. To the right, beyond our view, was a river where they once had good times. I heard about youthful romances, marital separations, parental disapproval, and the ubiquitous, endless days of hunting, fishing, gathering, moving camp. Those heady days were a long time ago now.

Addendum, 2008: I scribbled these impressions several years after fieldwork. I'm glad I did. Bumekel camp lasted just two weeks. As far as I know, my Batek friends never went back there. Nobody much liked the campsite location. And almost all the adults who shared those days with me are now dead. In my recent review of the topography, it looks like the entire area is now converted to an oil palm plantation, which makes it unlikely that Batek will ever make camp there again.

In a Batek forest camp (slideshow)

2011-06-21T08:56:00.001+08:00

Here's a slideshow I made a while back, using photos shot at Keciw camp in July 1995. This was the first camp I stayed in during my dissertation year. A busy camp, with people collecting fruits and honey, rattan, fishing, hunting.

Recent work on the Orang Asli

2011-06-11T08:37:00.001+08:00

I've just submitted a review of Orang Asli studies, to be published in Kajian Malaysia (June 2011). The bibliography has 204 items. I'll post details of this article when it becomes available. For the moment, here is an extract from the review's bibliography, that lists works published on the Orang Asli in the past ten years. It's not a comprehensive list by any means; these studies are just the ones I cited in my review.

[NB for newcomers: Orang Asli is the official name for the 20+ indigenous ethnic minorities of Peninsular Malaysia. The Batek, with whom I work, are one of these minority peoples. The Penan of Sarawak are not, as the indigenes of Sarawak and Sabah, the East Malaysian states, are classified differently from the Orang Asli.]

Akiya. 2001. Tuntut: Kumpulan cerpen Orang Asli. Kuala Lumpur: Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka.

—. 2008. Perang Sangkil. Kuala Lumpur: PTS Fortuna.

Andaya, Leonard Y. 2008. Leaves of the same tree: Trade and ethnicity in the Straits of Melaka. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press.

Bedford, K. Juliet A. 2007. Gombak and its patients: Provision of healthcare to the Orang Asli (indigenous minority) of Peninsular Malaysia. Ph.D. thesis, Oxford University, Oxford.

—. 2009. Gombak Hospital, the Orang Asli hospital. Indonesia and the Malay World 37:23–44.

Benjamin, Geoffrey. 2011a. Egalitarianism and ranking in the Malay World. In Anarchic solidarity: Autonomy, equality, and fellowship in Southeast Asia, eds. Thomas Gibson and Kenneth Sillander, 170–201. New Haven: Yale University Southeast Asia Studies.

—. 2011b. The current situation of the Aslian languages. Unpublished manuscript.

Burenhult, Niclas. 2002. A grammar of Jahai. Doctoral dissertation, Lund University, Lund, Sweden.

—. 2004. Spatial deixis in Jahai. In Papers from the Eleventh Annual Meeting of the Southeast Asian Linguistics Society 2001, ed. Somsonge Burusphat, 87–100. Arizona State University: Program for Southeast Asian Studies.

—. 2005. Landscape terms and toponyms in Jahai: a field report. In Working Papers 51, 17–29. Lund University: Department of Linguistics.

—. 2008. Streams of words: Hydrological lexicon in Jahai. Language Sciences 30:182–199.

Burenhult, Niclas, Nicole Kruspe, and Michael Dunn. in press. Language history and culture groups among Austroasiatic-speaking foragers of the Malay Peninsula. In Dynamics of human diversity: The case of Mainland Southeast Asia, eds. Nick J. Enfield and Joyce White. Canberra: Pacific Linguistics.

Burenhult, Niclas, and Claudia Wegener. 2009. Preliminary notes on the phonology, orthography and vocabulary of Semnam (Austroasiatic, Malay Peninsula). JSEALS: Journal of the Southeast Asian Linguistics Society 1:283–312.

Dallos, Csilla. 2011. From equality to inequality: Social change among newly sedentary Lanoh hunter-gatherer traders of Peninsular Malaysia. Toronto, Canada: University of Toronto Press.

Dentan, Robert K. 2008. Overwhelming terror: Love, fear, peace, and violence among Semai of Malaysia. Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield.

—. 2011. Childhood, familiarity, and social life among East Semai. In Anarchic solidarity: Autonomy, equality, and fellowship in Southeast Asia, eds. Thomas Gibson and Kenneth Sillander, 88–118. New Haven: Yale University Southeast Asia Studies.

Domhoff, G. William. 2003. Senoi Dream Theory: Myth, scientific method, and the Dreamwork Movement. Retrieved from the World Wide Web: http://dreamresearch.net/Library/senoi.html.

Endicott, Kirk. 2011. Cooperative autonomy: Social solidarity among the Batek of Malaysia. In Anarchic solidarity: Autonomy, equality, and fellowship in Southeast Asia, eds. Thomas Gibson and Kenneth Sillander, 62–87. New Haven: Yale University Southeast Asia Studies.

Endicott, Kirk, and Karen L. Endicott. 2008. The headman was a woman: The gender egalitarian Batek of Malaysia. Long Grove, Illinois: Waveland Press.

Fung, Jojo M. 2003. Ripples on the water: Believers in the indigenous struggle for a society of equals. Plentong, Malaysia: Diocesan Communication Center.

Gomes, Alberto G. 2007. Modernity and Malaysia: Settling the Menraq forest nomads. Oxford: Routledge.

Howell, Colleen James. 2006. Non-timber forest product collection as a livelihood strategy for rural indigenous households: A case study of the Jah Hut of Peninsular Malaysia. Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Riverside.

Howell, Signe. 2011. Sources of sociality in a cosmological frame: Chewong, Peninsular Malaysia. In Anarchic solidarity: Autonomy, equality, and fellowship in Southeast Asia, eds. Thomas Gibson and Kenneth Sillander, 40–61. New Haven: Yale University Southeast Asia Studies.

Idrus, Rusaslina. 2008. The politics of inclusion: Law, history and indigenous rights in Malaysia. Ph.D. dissertation, Harvard University, Cambridge.

Lai Wan Teng. 2008. Indigenous women and livelihoods on palm oil plantations: The case of the Mah Meri in Carey Island, Malaysia. M.Sc. thesis, School of Environment and Resources Development, Asian Institute of Technology, Pathumthani, Thailand.

Lim Chan Ing. 2010. The sociocultural significance of Semaq Beri food classification. M.A. thesis, University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur.

Lye Tuck-Po. 2004. Changing pathways: Forest degradation and the Batek of Pahang, Malaysia. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.

—. 2005. The road to equality? Landscape transformation and the Batek of Pahang, Malaysia. In Property and equality, vol. 2: Encapsulation, commercialisation, discrimination, eds. Thomas Widlok and Wolde Gossa Tadesse, 90–103. Oxford: Berghann.

—. 2011. The wild and the tame in protected areas management, Peninsular Malaysia. In Complicating conservation in Southeast Asia: Beyond the sacred forest, Ecologies for the 21st Century, eds. Michael R. Dove, et al. , 37–61. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

Nah, Alice M. 2003. Negotiating indigenous identity in postcolonial Malaysia: Beyond being ‘not quite/not Malay’. Social Identities 9:511–534.

—. 2006. (Re)mapping indigenous ‘race’/place in postcolonial Peninsular Malaysia. Geographiska Annaler 88 B:285–297.

Nicholas, Colin. 2003. The Orang Asli: First on the land, last in the plan. Kajian Malaysia 21:315–329.

Nobuta, Toshihiro. 2009. Living on the periphery: Development and Islamization of the Orang Asli. Subang Jaya, Malaysia: Center for Orang Asli Concerns.

Rahim, Reita. Editor. 2007. Chita’ Hae: Culture, crafts and customs of the Hma’ Meri in Kampung Sungai Bumbon, Pulau Carey. Subang Jaya: Center for Orang Asli Concerns and Tompoq Topoh.

Yong, Carol Ooi Lin. 2006. Dam-based development in Malaysia: the Temenggor and Sungai Selangor dams and the resettlement of the Orang Asli. D.Phil. thesis, University of Sussex, Brighton.

18 Penan portraits

2011-05-30T11:34:00.027+08:00

Click on the thumbs to view images on Flickr.

Ball games

2011-05-25T15:40:00.003+08:00

I'm no good at sports photography. I've shot a few games just for practice -- very tricky, controlling for speed in the waning light of the day. As these results show, I'm still learning.
Sarawak (Penan) Kuala Kubu Baru Penang Kuala Kubu Baru

New publication: "The wild and the tame in protected areas management, Peninsular Malaysia"

2011-05-21T16:07:00.001+08:00

Just published:

Lye Tuck-Po. 2011. "The wild and the tame in protected areas management, Peninsular Malaysia," in Complicating conservation in Southeast Asia: Beyond the sacred forest. Ecologies for the 21st Century series. Edited by Michael R. Dove, et al., pp. 37-61. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.

More about the book here.

Writing fieldnotes

2011-05-10T18:38:00.106+08:00

Field notebooks, a photo by Lye Tuck-Po on Flickr

The one on top is from 1993. The bottom one c. late 1990s. The rest are from 1995-1996. Almost everything in these books has been digitized or typed up, but I still keep the originals. Why, I don't know.

My original note-taking practices were slightly complicated. I carried cheap jotting pads in my pockets continuously throughout fieldwork. At night, I'd write up from these jottings. Those notes went into several books sized like the ones above: 6.5" x 8" (or 16.5cm x 20.5cm). The paper quality isn't high, but weight is negligible, the size is right for backpack-based fieldwork, and the books are easily obtained from Chinese stationery stores in the small towns near where I spent most of my Batek fieldwork hours. I had several categories of books:

(1) A logbook for maintaining task lists (tasks completed today and tasks for tomorrow)
(2) An alphabetical book for vocab (language)
(3) An overall notebook for everything else (topical notes)
(4) A personal journal / diary

A page from the vocabulary book

Cambodian fieldnotes

I also had notebooks with detachable pages (same size as the above) for "special" topics like my mobility and kinship records. I didn't use pre-printed questionaires or forms; as data on each of these topics came in I'd sort and then clip them together. Whenever I reached electricity and/or my laptop, I'd type up stuff. I threw away most of the jottings once they'd been transcribed and then typed.

Later, from 1998 onwards, after I went to Japan, I fell in love with 2"x4" Kokuyo bound notebooks, and I've used these ever since. I write everything in them — jottings, tasks, fieldnotes, personal ruminations. Since then I've almost always been near a power outlet or, when I haven't been, I've used portable solar power (PV) systems, first in Cambodia and then in Sarawak. No more the nightly transcription of jottings into progressively larger and neater notebooks. Now I transfer notes directly from bound notebooks to MacBook Air.

In Batek rainforest I used ziplock bags to protect the notes from the elements, and I continue to do so. I've taken these notebooks up and down forest paths, swift-flowing rivers, and logging roads, across lakes, into air-conditioned rooms, through clouds of dust, water sprays, and painful raindrops. Plastic becomes one's best friend under such conditions. But nothing can protect my notes from my own forgetfulness. Once, upon returning to Cambodia after a mid-year break at home, I discovered that I'd left two of the books in the plane's seat pockets. I didn't discover this potentially jailable offence until several hours later, in the hotel. My one redeeming grace was that I had scrawled my name and tel number on the covers of the books. A frantic call to the airport, and a welcome response from the Malaysian Airlines people: "Yes, the cleaner found your books and we have been trying to call you to come and get them." ("Trying".. because I had, of course, forgotten to switch on my phone.) I leapt onto the back of a motodop (motorbike taxi), rushed back to the airport, and, sure enough, the notebooks were waiting for me in the Malaysian Airlines office, rather than stuffed among random gloves and socks in some Lost-and-Found jumble.

Batek fieldnotes: a sketch of me writing

What stands out in my memories of the old days was how firmly the Batek protected my fieldnotes. Sometimes while writing in the lean-to I'd be distracted or called out to see or photograph something or speak to somebody. I'd drop the notes and rush out. Inevitably somebody would call me back to put away my papers — not because I was untidy, but to keep the notes safe from infant or toddler hands. Other times I'd be engrossed in writing and some older kid would warn me if one of the babies was moving too closely to the papers and books spread out around me. If a toddler attempted to play with my writing materials, he/she would be scolded by the older kids.

I never asked anybody to do this — I think possibly the Batek invest paper-based work with high status, and possibly they cared about my work as much as I did. And all of this seemed to have a lasting effect, in a cultural-transmission kind of way. In 1999 whenever I'd sit down to write, a bunch of six-year-olds (who would have been among the first set of babies trained to treat my notes and books with care) would troop over and ask to look at my manuals of plants and animals. They'd huddle up, pore over my books, point out stuff of interest to each other (it was always the same books every time). I kept an ear out, but mainly I was busy with my own work. After an hour or so their parents would call them back for dinner. Before rushing off, they'd carefully close and pile up the books in the middle of the lean-to. Not a single page was ever torn off and all those manuals remain firmly attached to their covers.

In another blog maybe I'll write some notes on photography and software in the field.

Penang traffic

2011-05-05T10:19:00.002+08:00

Photo by Lye Tuck-Po on Flickr.

I rarely look front when travelling on the bus, and this is the reason. Penang is a lovely place but the traffic is horrible. I'm glad I do not drive and don't have a car.

USM School of Social Sciences

2011-04-27T00:07:00.003+08:00

USM School of Social Sciences, a photo by Lye Tuck-Po on Flickr.

Via Flickr:
Well, part of it, anyway. And where are the students? Busy taking their exams this week... And the lecturers? Busy marking exams....

Universiti Sains Malaysia, Penang, Malaysia

Books and stuff

2011-04-22T19:50:00.003+08:00

Books and stuff, a photo by Lye Tuck-Po on Flickr

Moonlight

2011-04-19T00:21:00.001+08:00

Breadcrumbs

2011-04-12T10:20:00.003+08:00

So I was checking the stats for this blog, and found that I had been "tweeted" this week. I don't tweet (and I don't have Facebook) but I'm always interested in social networking tools and how they can be used to popularise anthropology. Off I went to check the Twitter site.

A quick search led me to tweeter Anthroworks, which in turn led me to the Anthroworks blog, a project of the Culture in Global Affairs (CIGA) research and policy program of the Elliott School of International Affairs of the George Washington University in Washington, D.C. This blog aims to, among other objectives, "provide an important place for highlighting what is new and important in anthropology and how anthropology connects to important current affairs" -- a worthy goal indeed. The blogger is Barbara Miller, a fellow anthropologist. Scrolling down her tweets, I discovered Popular Anthropology magazine, which I'd never heard of before. And now I'm thinking I might have an article to submit to that magazine.

With thanks to Barbara Miller!

Sentries

2011-04-12T00:42:00.000+08:00

Walk to Stop Sexual Crimes

2011-04-10T10:28:00.002+08:00

Photos from the 19th March 2011 Walk to Stop Sexual Crimes, Queensbay, Penang, Malaysia. Click over to my Flickr site to view more photos.

More details about the walk here
dirogol = raped; didera = whipped; dipukul = beaten; diraba = molested

Conversations

2011-04-05T02:31:00.003+08:00

Here's a bunch of old photos shot in Malaysia (Kuala Kubu Baru, Kuching, Kuala Lumpur) and Japan (Kyoto) between 2005 and 2009:

Penang Bridge

2011-04-03T12:46:00.000+08:00

Prasat Sambor

2011-03-31T22:09:00.003+08:00

Prasat Sambor, a photo by Lye Tuck-Po on Flickr

Sambor Prey Kuk monument complex, Kampong Thom, Cambodia

Flowers in the rainforest

2011-03-27T11:09:00.032+08:00

This was one of the most popular posts in the first version of my blog. So, here it is again:

Father and son collecting flowers, 1999

The visual world under the forest canopy is dominated by the greens and browns of vegetation. In the main, the forest lacks brilliant colors. Flowers bring an all-too-brief flash of welcome color to the forest ambience. ...flowers are relatively rare in time and space; when there are flowers everywhere, they evoke great joy and moments of playfulness. People will collect them for bodily ornamentation (some are tabooed from such use). A common scene is of a hunter returning to camp with a flower in his hair, and the flower confiscated within minutes (moments?) by his female relatives or children. I certainly appreciated the arrival of these bright colors in early 1996, after spending weeks on end in the damp and darkened forest. (Adapted from Changing pathways: Forest degradation and the Batek of Pahang, Malaysia)

What clunking prose! I wish I had the words to describe what it felt like: to be walking down a forest trail, in the middle of the rainy season when everything smelt and felt damp, and it seemed like sunlight—pure unfiltered light and warmth from the sun—would never come. Then to round a bend, look up at a gap in the canopy, and see: colours! Reds, oranges, yellows, high up on the treetops. And around you people are stopping to look, craning their necks, sighing, smiling, chattering, admiring, evaluating. No economic logic here: just plain ol' desire to see, to touch, to take, and later, to wear.

Women seemed to have the upper hand. Men liked to wear flowers too, but they never got to keep them long. Sooner or later, their wives and sisters and children would have confiscated the flowers from them. Too quick for me: I never got a picture of a man with a flower in his hair. Not that I recall.

Kyoto nights

2011-03-27T10:17:00.000+08:00

Some more old photos from my 2007 trip; at the time I was learning night photography and revelled in the buzz of the city. Lately, of course, Japan has been a lot on my mind. This trip down memory lane is a small show of my affection for the country and my friends there.

Leaving Cape Ashizuri

2011-03-26T23:19:00.004+08:00

A little memory from Japan:

The driver stopped the bus and called to me. What on earth... I thought. I don't want to stop here; I want to go to Nakamura to catch the train for Kochi... But he insisted. When he saw my bewilderment, he opened the backdoor. I turned, looked out. Comprehension.

He was presenting me with this magnificent view -- me, the only passenger on the bus from Cape Ashizuri. I grinned, grabbed my camera, jumped off the bus, and took a few shots.

Then came the impatient honk, honk!, and it was time to hop back in. Shikoku, Japan, 17/6/2007

Penan carpentry

2011-03-22T02:27:00.001+08:00

Penan are well-known for many things, but their carpentry and blacksmithing skills get very little press in the broader media. On the day I shot these photos, the forge was a hive of activity, with several men hard at work on their individual projects, children scampering around, and people dropping in and out.

This man is (obviously) making a boat.

Making a mortar: to be used for pounding rice (shown here)

Photos taken in Lg Singu, Belaga, Sarawak, 20/1/10

Danum palms

2011-03-21T07:17:00.004+08:00

Danum palms a photo by Lye Tuck-Po on Flickr.
Enormous palm trees on the Penan's Danum River, Belaga, Sarawak, 15/1/10

Tourism and the Batek

2011-03-10T20:26:00.005+08:00

The students in one of my classes have been running a blog and I've been too busy catching up with them, and other teacher-like things, to attend to my own blog.But I do want to show signs of life... so herewith a couple of Batek photos.

Tourism has become a cash-generating sideline for them and other Orang Asli ("original people") of Malaysia, but the income it brings is minuscule compared to that enjoyed by operators at higher levels of the industry—such as the tour guides who bring tourists in, and the hotels and service industries. The photo on top shows a table laid out with tourist wares, while a Malay tourist guide hovers in the background (1999). The second photo shows a bunch of European youths posing with eyKinwen (2010).

More photos of the Orang Sungai

2011-02-21T09:58:00.004+08:00

Women this time... During my study, I conducted house-to-house interviews, which is where these photos come from.

Orang Sungai of the lower Sugut, Sabah

2011-02-20T16:44:00.006+08:00

In 1998 I conducted a brief assessment of some Orang Sungai villages on the lower Sugut River of Sabah. Orang Sungai means, literally, "River People". I've posted some photos from that study on my Flickr site; a small sample follows below. The quality is pretty bad, and the scanning makes it worse. I haven't been back to the Sugut since; these photos may have some historical value.
Boys pounding what looks like tapioca flour

Riverside village. Each of those river bends has a name that marks some event or person in local history. Following the pattern of swidden cultivators, communities historically moved up and down the river, making farmland in old fallows

You can tell these kids don't trust me yet

Happy New Year!

2010-12-29T20:23:00.002+08:00

Teluk Bahang, Penang, Malaysia, November 2010

Women of the forest

2010-11-27T12:03:00.002+08:00

Penan women returning from the forest with baskets of useful materials. Note the paddles in their hands; they use boats to move up and down the river, sometimes with husbands and children, sometimes with other women. Lg Wat, Sarawak, 2009

Boats of Penang

2010-11-24T23:52:00.000+08:00

At Teluk Kumbar, Penang, Malaysia

Walking in the forest

2010-11-16T00:58:00.007+08:00

Batek boys along the trail to Tom Tempan camp, Taman Negara national park, Malaysia, 7/2/10. We had lost our way. We were looking for the Tom Tempan group but discovered on arrival that they had moved camp since news was last received. We then went to look for their new campsite. We crested this hill, discovered that we were lost, and doubled back. eyHusin then went off to look for the correct way to the new camp while the rest of us lingered on the slopes and waited. We didn't wait long.

Before, using point-and-shoot cameras (film), I never got good photos of Batek walking in the forest. I'm making up for that gap now. Expect more photos to come.

In memoriam

2010-11-15T13:46:00.009+08:00

In memoriam
Originally uploaded by Lye Tuck-Po

Batek camp at Tom Tempan, Taman Negara national park, Malaysia, 7/2/10: Earlier I posted a photo of eyTenhel with his brother eyBegok (here). Recently I heard that he, eyTenhel, died in August this year. Sad as I am not to have seen him again, I can't say that I'm surprised -- you can see his decline in this photo.

I remember the first time I met eyTenhel, back in 1995. I had started dissertation fieldwork about six weeks earlier and was in the process of locating and visiting as many Batek camps and communities in Pahang as I could. At that point, I had left the Kechau river valleys where my closest friends lived, and was exploring Taman Negara, especially the area around the Tahan-Tembeling confluence (near the headquarters of the national park). Many people there knew me from my 1993 visits. But I did not yet know eyTenhel, his wife na'Tenhel, or any of their children and grandchildren. They were said to be living in a forest camp "up there," somewhere on the Trenggan River or its tributaries. Because I was eager to meet as many people as possible, I waited for a chance to visit them.

One of their cousins was going up and invited me along. We arrived in the late evening after a two- or three-hour trek, me and three Batek guys. Dusk was coming on and daylight was fading fast. I remember gloom; there was a lot of rainfall at the time and the vegetation was dark with damp. The guys walked into the campsite area first and walked straight through to the other side. I, on the other hand, had no family to visit and no intended stopping point. The lean-tos were arranged in a semi-circle and all were filled with people. They went silent when they saw me. As always, I felt shy. Since no one was going to tell me what to do, I shoved my backpack against a tree, sat down on a log in the middle of camp so that everyone could get a good look at me, took out my cigarettes, and smoked my way through the awkwardness.

Soon, the people in the lean-tos were chatting back and forth. Darkness came on and I was still sitting there. Eventually, I hailed Anuk, one of the men who had brought me there, and asked him what I should do. An older couple called out from their lean-to... "sleep here...backpack there... eat what...drink tea..." Later I came to know them as Ladiy and Serameh, or na'Tenhel and eyTenhel, parents of most of the other adults, and two of the most engaging Batek people I ever met.

Kid

2010-11-09T22:32:00.023+08:00

Batek boy, Taman Negara national park, Malaysia, 5/2/10

Off-grid

2010-11-04T21:25:00.000+08:00

Photos of Penan working at night: making an oar, stripping rattan, weaving, and socialising... Electricity, when it's available, is from generators.

All grown up

2010-11-03T00:15:00.004+08:00

Come here, I called to Ayok. I want to take a picture of you with your sister just like in the old photo.

Their mother added, yes, like when she was carrying you on her back (1996; left). I watched Ayok grow from newborn to walking and talking one-and-a-half-year old. I saw him again when he was three (below; defurring and roasting a forest rat) and briefly when he was nine.

He's now a 15-year-old teenager. I didn't want to embarrass the young man but wanted to indicate in some way that we once had a special bond. Perhaps he shared my awkwardness. He solved the problem on my last night by getting together his little gang of friends (all of whom were infants in my most vivid memories of them) to sleepover in my house with me.

His sister na'Amit was seven or eight when I first met her. A delightful child, very verbal, and always up to some imaginative game or other. By the time I completed my dissertation fieldwork at the end of 1996, she was approaching puberty. She is now married, and a mother of four. Which makes me a delighted grandmother.

I'm unashamedly romantic and nostalgic when I write about this family. After all, I spent so much time with them that they've become kin. Not fictive kin ("pretend family"), but kin.

Sharing

2010-10-31T21:27:00.005+08:00

Sharing and reciprocity are key ingredients of social life for Batek, Penan, and many indigenous peoples.

Penan of Sarawak

Two pigs were brought in by young hunters. The hunters dropped the carcasses on the verandah, then other men came by and butchered the meat to share with the community. I think Lg Jek custom is that the hunter gets the head; all other shares are distributed to households (one share per household). This was of course a festive occasion—wildlife populations have declined and hunting prospects are usually gloomy. I got my share of meat many other times but this was the only occasion where I was present and alert when the game was brought in.

Batek of Pahang

eyKadoy (back to camera in top photo) bagged the turtles. EyKesok then butchers and sections the meat and in turn hands it over to his daughters Lep (aged 3) and Braket (aged 9) to deliver shares to different families in camp. The top photo shows eyKesok resting while the meat is cooking.

Penan baskets

2010-10-24T00:34:00.009+08:00

Here are examples of Penan baskets, photographed wherever I found them: lying around the apartments, hanging up, tucked away in the corners, etc. I don't have much to say about basketry as craftwork (not being a craft specialist), but the documentation did make me want to find out more about this valuable domain of traditional knowledge and its significance to the local economy.

Penan blacksmiths

2010-10-22T13:58:00.015+08:00

Click on the photos for brief notes

On Penan waters

2010-10-22T13:54:00.018+08:00

Click on the photos for brief notes

Running into the photo

2010-10-20T18:19:00.001+08:00

Penan children running into the picture, Lg Wat, Sarawak, 2009. Posted for comparison with this.

Children on the verandah

2010-10-08T22:15:00.001+08:00

Village on the Tonle Sap

2010-10-05T03:30:00.005+08:00

For contrast with the previous post, here's a crowded village on the Tonle Sap (Great Lake), Cambodia, on the Siem Reap side of the lake. Between the months of May and November, the lake may expand tenfold to an area of approx. 25,000 sq KM. I shot this image on September 6, 2005—had I returned to this spot a few months later, I'd have been staring at a strip of dryland.

More boats in Cambodia

2010-09-29T09:24:00.002+08:00

Continuing in the spirit of nostalgia (see previous post), this is what the riverside of Kampong Chheuteul (Kampong Thom province, Cambodia) used to look like. These women ran the cross-river ferries (or water taxis) during the rainy season, when water levels were too high for bridges (see photo below). Here they're shown waiting for customers, at their usual spot beneath the market. The village had (may still have) the only substantial marketplace for about 40 KM in any direction; the market attracted patrons and traders from up and down the river.

These women ran a brisk business ferrying the "market people" across the river in the mornings, but they were basically on call from dawn to dusk. One family of three sisters took turns running the boat, so that the youngest sister could go to school in the mornings. When she came home from school, she took over the boat, and her sisters could then help their mother in the ricefields or vegetable gardens. It was a hard life, but the boat business did provide an independent source of income for young women in the village.

Another boat in Cambodia

2010-09-28T23:04:00.004+08:00

I posted this photo before, in the "first version" of this blog. It seems to be a crowd-pleaser, so I'm posting it again. I think (but hope I'm wrong) that I may have photographed some of the last water taxis across the Stueng Saen in that village, Kampong Chheuteul in Kampong Thom province, Cambodia.

During my fieldwork the government authorities built a series of Bailey bridges across the river (right), thus making the commercial ferries redundant. I shot this photo in October 2005; the Bailey bridge became operational in April 2006. I haven't been back to the village since; I don't know whether the ferries have become obsolete.

Bikes of Kyoto

2010-09-26T20:18:00.005+08:00

Another nostalgic posting: this one from my most recent visit to
Kyoto, Japan, in April 2007.

Kuay elders

2010-09-26T19:40:00.004+08:00

Two Kuay elders from the village of Wiel Weng, Kampong Thom province, Cambodia, 17th April 2006. Kuay are an indigenous ethnic minority group, found in Thailand and Cambodia. In Cambodia, they are renowned for their metalcrafts.

Houses in the rainforest

2010-09-22T20:27:00.007+08:00

Here are two views of the Batek's Tabung camp, which I visited in 1999. It was located outside Taman Negara national park, at the confluence of Tabung stream and the Tembeling River. It was more of a "tourism camp" than anything else -- i.e., a place for tourists to visit.

No birds were harmed

2010-09-20T20:34:00.008+08:00

Batek man aiming a catapult at birds, watched by the boy from whom he had confiscated the catapult moments earlier. Forest camp near Kuala Tahan, on the banks of the Tembeling River, Taman Negara national park, Malaysia, 2005.

I wasn't really doing fieldwork on that visit. It was just an overnight visit. The previous day I brought a cache of catapult elastics as presents for the kids, dumping them on the ground with my usual call "whoever wants them, take". Later I returned with my sleeping bag and stayed the night. The next morning boys were wandering around camp with the finished catapults (they, or their fathers, carved the wooden bits by hand, then attached the elastic). The teenager on the right was playing by himself when ta'Kaw (his uncle or some such relation) walked by and took the catapult from him. I must say, though, that no birds were harmed in the making of this photo.

This image is embarrassingly bad; it was the first time I took a digital camera to the Batek. The light was dim, the action fast, and my fingers slow. I post it out of affectionate memory of ta'Kaw, who died sometime between 2005 and 2008. This is virtually my final photo of him. I miss him so much.

Moving camp

2010-09-16T22:59:00.008+08:00

Batek group at Tenor River crossing the river during the rainy season. We had camped at the river confluence for some days, and moved to camps along the Tahan River. Note the children riding on their fathers' shoulders. The river doesn't look very deep, but the current was swift. This photo was shot by one of the Batek men, from the other side of the river. Tahan River, Taman Negara national park, Malaysia, c. 2nd February 1996.

Penan baskets: kitong

2010-09-16T12:54:00.004+08:00

Penan at Lg Jek around a type of lidded basket known as kitong, used for storing (I think) dry foodstuffs. In the centre is a sketch of the basket drawn by one of the men. Belaga, Sarawak, Malaysia, 9/10/9. Utility baskets like this one are not generally made for commercial sale.

Batek men in the city

2010-09-10T13:09:00.008+08:00

Here's a photo from 1999 showing Batek men in Kuala Lumpur. I had collected botanical samples when I visited their camp outside Taman Negara national park, and I needed help getting the samples to KL for identification by a botanist at the Forest Research Institute there (FRIM). It took a lot of "discussion" before I could persuade these guys to come to KL with me. They didn't stay long. We arrived late on an afternoon, went to the zoo, had dinner, wandered around the shops, and the next day they took the bus back to Taman Negara. I shot this photo as we were waiting for the bus that morning.

The young man on the far right turned out to be a superb botanist, who knew far more about plants, their names and locations, and their uses, than any of his peers in camp. He was a revelation.

Penan weavers

2010-08-29T21:38:00.010+08:00

I took a lot of photos of Penan weavers: they make baskets and mats for home use and for sale. Among Western Penan (Belaga, Sarawak, Malaysia), weaving is women's work, and metalcraft is men's work. These are not absolute rules, but are normative.

The collection of the raw supplies -- rattans -- is often done by men, especially when the rattan stands are located far away from the settlements. Women do collect rattan, especially the thin-diameter varieties that are located near the longhouses. Once the rattans are brought in, the work of processing the stems (splitting, bending, shaving, etc.) and weaving is done by the women. As men acknowledge, their household incomes are dependent on the labour of the women.

More weaving and material culture photos here. I'll post photos of finished products later.

Confused identities

2010-08-27T14:27:00.004+08:00

I've been doing some online research and catching up with my reading. I couldn't resist researching myself (well, don't you want to know who's reading and citing your work?)... and was disappointed to find almost no hits... until I realised that my name is always mangled in the bibliographies and indexes.

I often appear in bibliographies (even in works by people who know me) as L. Tuck-Po and am referred to as Tuck-Po, e.g. "Tuck-Po 2004".

Sorry, that's incorrect.

For the record, I insist on using Chinese naming styles, where surname comes first, followed by personal name. So:

My full name is Lye Tuck-Po

Lye is my family or surname.

Tuck-Po is my personal name.

The citation should read "Lye 2004," not "Tuck-Po 2004."

Just for the record.

View from my verandah

2010-08-17T14:40:00.005+08:00

View from my verandah
Originally uploaded by Lye Tuck-Po

I know it's been a while since the last post: I've moved to Penang and taken up a new job. I'm now lecturing at Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM). Here's the view from my new home. Photo below shows the view from my old home in Kuala Kubu Baru: quite a change!

Memories of a Batek family

2010-06-26T01:50:00.012+08:00

When you've been with one community long enough, you become a repository of people's family memories. And yes, I'm very aware that these are my memories, not the Batek's. I was able to photograph them at various points in their lives, I've flitted in and out and observed changes over time, but obviously their memories are far richer than mine.
The smiling woman in the centre is Ip. Two of her sisters are on the left (one is hidden behind the man, her husband). Their brother is on right (wearing black). In the centre, holding blue cup, is eyKesok, their "father's sister's daugher's husband" (cousin-in-law). Batek group, Taman Negara national park, Malaysia, 9/2/10.

Left is the same sibling set in 1996. Ip, then aged 3, is the little girl in front. The tall boy at the back is the man in black in the photo above (because everybody is now grown-up, cultural norms dictate that I can't broadcast people's original names -- the names I know them best by -- so we'll just have to do the pointing and he-on-right-she-on-left thing).

And here is Ip again, that same year, riding on her father's shoulders as the family moved from Kuala Yong to the forest for the fruit season; her mother (front) was pregnant at the time with Tanyong, who's now 13.

Finally, this is Tanyong, the baby of the family, playing with his toy digging stick when he was two years old (1999, Taman Negara).

Not yet bacon

2010-06-13T20:14:00.002+08:00

And, for fun, here's a man walking a pig along a main street in a village in Cambodia:

In the woods

2010-06-13T20:06:00.003+08:00

For a change, I thought I'd throw in some photos from the Cambodian woods:

Prasat Cerey, Sambor Prei Kuk monument complex, 1/12/2005

Ta Phrom temple, Angkor monument complex, 30/5/2006

The Mebon in Bakan monument complex, Preah Vihear, 11/1/2006

Studying the forest

2010-06-04T03:06:00.004+08:00

Batek child apparently intent on studying the plants around her. Photographed through a screen of leaves, Taman Negara national park, Malaysia, 6/2/10

Something useful this way lies

2010-06-04T02:25:00.009+08:00

Left: a portrait of na'Kabat, photographed through a screen of leaves. One of her children is cuddling up to her. Right: na'Kabat harvesting something, maybe a leaf or flower, for the children, while we were walking in the forest. I like the children's eager looks. Both photos shot in Taman Negara national park, Malaysia, 7/2/2010.

Below: na'Kabat as a child in 1996, posing with her brother and cousins (na'Kabat is standing, right). All are now married with children, I believe. I haven't seen them all in one place since 1996.

Running from the camera

2010-06-02T06:05:00.005+08:00

Batek children, Taman Negara national park, Pahang, Malaysia, 8/2/10

This game is called anthropologist-baiting. It is much enjoyed by generations of Batek children, and is played whenever the resident anthropologist produces a camera. The rule is that the player must run quickly into the anthropologist's field of vision, and then shoot off before the anthropologist is able to raise the camera to her face. It is desirable to shift the position of the body so that only a posterior or a portion of neck is revealed to the camera, and the more concealed by ambient objects, the better. Not all players achieve this level of expertise and some are defeated by the anthropologist's determination. Failure often leads to giggles and, less often, tantrums.

The anthropologist may intiate the game by scowling and squinting at the children with camera in hand. Once eye contact is made, there is tacit agreement to play, and the children will perform to script. The game will begin with a simple dash-and-disappear by the children, and conclude with the anthropologist swinging round and round in circles panning the children with the camera. This game is best played by a young anthropologist. An anthropologist who has photographed at least two generations of children may find that her knees require emergency surgery.

Playing in the river

2010-06-01T23:08:00.005+08:00

Batek children playing in the Yong River, Taman Negara national park, Malaysia, 5/2/10. I found myself enjoying these kids as much as I once enjoyed their siblings and parents. And here below are their grandmother with their aunt and uncles in 1996:

Walking in the forest

2010-05-29T17:28:00.004+08:00

I have some thoughts about photographing people in the forest, but I'll let them brew for a while.

eyBegok and eyTenhel

2010-05-27T02:36:00.007+08:00

They are twin brothers. eyTenhel (right) is clearly on his last legs. His wife died several years ago and he carries on, camping and moving with his children and grandchildren. He was weak, and did not stand up during my visit, but his voice is still as I remember it. And his comments showed that he's still keeping up with the news. After arriving at the camp, I rushed to see him. As I approached his lean-to, he gave my legs a sideways glance and then looked away. "Don't you remember me, your old friend?" I said as I sat down. "Yes, I remember you," he said. But I couldn't look at him either: I sat with my back to him and we both looked out at the forest as we glossed over old times and new people. I looked him in the eye only once, to share an old joke. That's the Batek (Orang Asli) way to show (or not show) your emotions.

I saw them at Tom Tempan in Taman Negara, Malaysia, 8th February 2010

My only other photo of eyTenhel and eyBegok together, in the same place, is this one below, shot along the Tenor in Taman Negara in 1995. In the picture, they are the two older men at the back of the group (facing the camera; eyBegok still has the same hairstyle). Apparently everyone in the photo is still alive, except for na'Tenhel, wife of ey Tenhel. She is the one in the foreground shouldering the white sack, looking at the camera. I last saw her in 2004.

NB 20/10/10: Ey Tenhel died in August 2010. So my instincts were right: I never did see him again.

Walking in the forest

2010-05-25T02:19:00.007+08:00

Batek walking in Taman Negara national park, Malaysia, 5/2/10. This is a tourist trail and, therefore, wide open and easy to walk in. The tall figure in the rear is Thomas Widlok.

Cavorting in the forest

2010-05-21T03:51:00.008+08:00

Their mothers were hard at work digging for yams. The kids wandered from one place to another, found plenty to amuse themselves with. The girl is chewing on a ginger root that she had torn off on her own. The boy on the right is hacking away with a small machete. None of them is older than six or seven, I reckon.

We had just arrived, and I found the kids as absorbing as, no doubt, they found me. I might have seen them when they were babies, but I had no prior memory of them as defined personalities.

They looked at me with eyes wide open. To get a conversation going, I sang snatches of songs that I had learnt from their relatives years ago. It was the perfect ice-breaker.

Batek children in Taman Negara, off the Yong River, 5/2/10.

New photos of the Batek

2010-05-21T00:26:00.009+08:00

Here's eyKapok. I've known him since 1995 or thereabouts. He's rolling a cigarette, resting by the fireplace. Photographed at Tom Tempan camp, Taman Negara national park, Peninsular Malaysia 9 Feb 2010.

I first met the Batek, a hunter-gatherer, indigenous ethnic minority people of Malaysia, in 1993. In 1995, I returned for my dissertation fieldwork. My fondest memories are from that year. Every year or two after that, I returned for brief social visits, most recently in 2005. The trip this year (February 2010, in the company of Thomas Widlok) was really the first time I've seen this particular configuration of people for 12 years.

Since I've returned home, I've had several phone calls from Batek friends so our relationship is reaching a nearly virtual level. In the mid-90s we had no phones in the field (and while we're on that theme, broadband internet connection was still a far-off dream for the average consumer). Now there are mobile phones. The Batek have a few; I have one too. The phone connection used to be awful, from where I am to the edge of the Batek's forest. Now it's improved, and we can chat with ease.

Up again

2010-05-21T00:24:00.001+08:00

Not much to say about it, really. This blog ran for a while, got a few visitors, I got busy, took it down, and now I'm posting again.

Slowly, and not consistently.

I think I'll use this mainly for posting photography.

Welcome.