John on Tour: More jungle, more kampongs, and a whole lot of Montfort.

It's only just occurred to me that another month has flown past without a blog, and honestly I just don't know where the time has gone. This month has been spent largely with my boys at the hostel, and in these closing stages of my project here (just 7 weeks left!) I want nothing more. But April also saw the arrival of two fellow Londoners in the area, two friends of mine from home, Rob and Lucy, who I had the pleasure of hosting for a weekend at my project. They provided the perfect excuse to finally check out a zip wire centre that's based just 10 minutes from our project, which proved to be a brief but pleasant day out. Always good to have some London folk around, there's only so much Scottish banter one man can take... (I'm joking it's not that bad).

Some cool kids ready to have lots and lots of fun!

As scenic as a zip wire can be

The following weekend, we had a 6 hour jungle expedition. It was a long old slog uphill, crossing countless rivers along the way, all the way up to the kampung of Borombon where one of our staff members, Cornelius, resides. Jungle trekking is a cracking passtime. As you walk, you can be deep in thought and reflection, or simply thinking about nothing else except where your next step is going to be, and both prove to be delightfully therapeutic. This, all supplemented by the sheer beauty of your surroundings- the free-flowing rivers that carve through the dense jungle landscape, coupled with the cacophony of sound produced by just the smallest insects- makes for good walking. Add my boys into the equation and you've got yourself a fine day indeed!

The morning mist as it meets the great, rolling hills.

A cloudy but beautiful morning

An exodus of boys making their way to the next kampung.

Lads at the kampung

The Raptor Crew!

See if you can spot the nutty white man

Loving life

Happy hikers

I love Sabah

The dense jungle

Kampung Borombon, our destination.

All the boys and the view from Borombon, looking out onto the Crocker Range.

Me and Weldy and the Crocker range.

The descent was largely spent with this man right here, Benddy. A tad slower than the rest, but you never leave a man behind..

That Crocker Range again!

Onto Montfort week! St Louis Marie de Montfort was the founder of the Brothers of St Gabriel, for whom I work for. Thus, his feast day is quite a big deal in the Montfort calendar. For the previous two weeks I had been doing my best to teach the boys the story of Montfort, as well as preparing some volunteers for a story telling competition about.. well, guess who. Monday was the quiz night, Tuesday was the story telling, and Wednesday was a Feast Day for which me and Hugo provided an abundance of flapjacks. They were crumbly, some were burnt, but my Montfort they were good! They were the first item of food to disappear, always a good sign! It was lucky I kept back a tray in reserve; that secret stash kept me going for the remainder of the week. A feast day at the Montfort centre was also observed. No flapjacks but there was some stunning food and pleasant company.

Monday night quizzing

Three markers not taking their job seriously at all

Tuesday night- last minute story telling preparation

Some riveting story telling from Lol here

But it was a tough crowd.

Hugo eyeing up the vast array of splendid food

All the lads after a successful Feast night!

Montfort Feast day sing-song

Montfort LADS

On Friday, while Hugo went off to Montfort, I went back to one of the boy's villages with one other boy. The three of us were supposed to be picked up by his brother but he was a no show, so it was a bus ride and a 2 hour hike some up rocky jungle roads. After the jungle trek a couple of weeks back, we conquered this walk with ease, although there were some interesting obstacles, like over flowing rivers with a strong current and no other way round. But we soon reached his kampung (village), and in true kampung style, we kicked back, ate bakas (wild boar soup), drank tapai (a local brew made from tapioca), and watched a collection of shows on his HD TV, ranging from local Dusun karaoke to Charlie Chaplin. A couple of years ago, if someone had told me I would be watching Charlie Chaplin in a village in the middle of the jungle, I would've given them the 'cool story bro' treatment and ignored them completely. But here I am, living the dream (a slightly surreal and deranged dream it has to be said, but a dream nonetheless). We were fed impressively for the entire weekend, so on Saturday morning I was pleased to hear that I could be of service to the family. A new house was being built by the brother, and some bricks needed transporting, so the traditional bamboo baskets came out and me, Marcellus, and Alvetus slaved away all morning carrying a load of bricks from one place to the other. Despite the ever increasing heat of the sun, we made light work of it, and my word the rewards were great. To my sheer delight, when we returned to the house, Marcellus revealed his very own PS3 console. And then, to my unbounded joy, FIFA 12 was lying before my eyes. I couldn't quite believe it, and it was perhaps this disbelief that put me off my game at the start, 3-0 down after just 10 virtual minutes. Like the pro I am, I regained composure, and began to fight back with some style. 4-4 at half time. The second half didn't prove to be quite as spectacular, and one goal was enough to carry me to my first Fifa victory of the year! I ended up playing 4 games that day, and won all 4 like a boss, making me the undisputed champion in Kampung Ruminding ( now that's not something many people can say).

The rest of our time was spent playing a bit of football, swimming in the river, eating local food, watching more football and drinking some lychee liqeur. To sum up Kampung life in a word, it's relaxed. These people don't aspire to go out of their way, earn lots of money, travel, or anything like that. Simplicity is the name of the game. This is the third kampung I've been to now and I've had a good taste of what it's like now. In many ways I admire their approach to life and its humble nature, but as a city boy it would need some spicing up for me live there permanently. Nintendo Wii maybe?