Tuesday 3/22/11 Sakau to Abai

The luggage went out the door at 7 am (almost). Around 8am we went for breakfast where they served us orange juice, scrambled eggs, hotdogs (!), baked beans and fried noodles. They also provided us with white bread for toast and of course coffee or tea and tropical fruits for dessert.

After breakfast Anne-Marie from SWEA Rome gave us a lesson in laughter yoga. She is a certified teacher of this type of yoga. As we all have heard, laughter is good for you in many ways. Some Indian guy realized this and first tried to make people laugh by telling jokes. It really didn’t work that well in the long run because the reactions to jokes can be quite different – someone thinks it is funny and laughs, someone else gets offended, a third has heard it before and someone else doesn’t even get it! Therefore he started laugh yoga where you laugh a lot and also learn how to breathe properly. So for 20 minutes we had laughter yoga on the dock. Our guide got very enthusiastic and joined in and the local people also laughed – probably AT us. It is actually hard work to keep laughing hard for 20 minutes. I might check out if there are any classes back home. They have “chapters” in 80 countries all over the world and on the first Sunday in May is world laugh day when they all go out in public places, like parks, and have laughing sessions! They are doing it for World Peace and think by doing that they can get the whole world to shake with laughter!

When we finished laughing we boarded our boats and headed for Abai – a one hour plus ride. About half ways there it started to pour. Luckily this ride was in a semi-covered boat, but we still got wet. We waited for the rain to stop, but it didn’t so we once again boarded the boats to cross the river to the Abai village. It is a very small village with only about 140 people. They do have a primary school that we visited and we spoke to one of the teachers. Then we took part in a tree planting project. We all got to plant a tree, it was a flowering tree and they all had numbers. Later we can e-mail them to find out how our trees are doing. We were supposed to have lunch with one of the families, but we were too many so we crossed the river again to the lodge where we had our lunch. A short session of laughter yoga followed the meal.

After lunch we went on a walk through the rainforest but on a boardwalk. Because of all the rain the ground is too wet to walk on. It was sprinkling just a little.

Now the rain was coming down in buckets – torrential rain. You rarely see such a lot of rain at home and at least not for this long. At 3.30 we once again boarded our boats (in the rain). Oh, by the way, down here there are no roads – the only way to gain access to our lodge or to Abai village is going on the river. There is also no access for our cell phones – at least not with AT&T. The local people do have cell phones though. So anyway, now we were going to search for elephants. Here in Borneo they have pygmy elephants – much smaller than both the African and Asian elephants. The boat ride was almost 2 hrs against the current and it was still raining like crazy. Half ways there some of the girls wanted to go back to the lodge, so one boat turned back. The rest of us, in 2 boats, carried on. And boy, were we happy when we came upon a herd of 13 pygmy elephants by the riverside eating, drinking and bathing! There were adults and several babies. Unbelievable! The trip back in the rain was faster as we were going with the current.

Back at the lodge we did our best to dry out. Our fingertips looked like raisins and we were totally soaked – 100%. Sufficiently dry (you cannot get totally dry here because it is 100% humidity even if it doesn’t rain!) we went for dinner. Once again rice, chicken chop, beef balls, veggies and shrimp. You could also have soup for a starter.

Erik - our terrific Borneo guide

Next on the program was the fireflies which are not of thefly family buta beetle. It had stopped raining and we went out on the boats again into the totally black tropical night. Not very far from the lodge we found an area with lots of fireflies – looked like an American Christmas tree. We learned that the LED light was developed from learning from the fireflies. Their light is very efficient – 100%, whereas a yellow light bulb only produces 20% light and 80% is heat i.e. wasted energy. Both the male and female fireflies produce light but the female’s light is pulsing faster than the males. After pairing the females eat the male. Then the eggs are laid and turn into larvae that already then produce light.


We finished off the evening with coffee (and/or wine) and conversation – and – the sky opened up again. It has rained torrentially almost all day today and evening. Tomorrow we are heading back to Kuala Lumpur and a final night at the Marriott.