Drop by like a stranger

Kampung Penan is certainly not ready for visitors or so-called tourists. This is my first thought when a row of us drop by the little village for a quick visit before entering those magnificent caves of Mulu. Yes they do have those stalls selling handcrafts and also groceries house-shops that intended to serve tourists, but still, the village is too pure and innocent to receive any visit by people from outer world.

I was baffled to see the face of three Penan kids while looking at us. Their faces were full of confusion, as if we were just a gang of Alien that flew by and parked our spaceship somewhere in their village, then came down from the spaceship to take some fresh air.

I believe we were not the first group of visitors they met, but the way they look at us really made me felt guilty -- we're just a bunch of strangers that interfered their peaceful and quiet life.

See the stupid fact here? We dropped by to have a tour in their life. Things that we felt amazed and curious about, were just their daily life, more ordinary than of ordinary for them. Huh, how pathetic we are, monkeys from the city.

A quick visit to Kg. Penan might not bear any significances for each of us, I believe. We dropped by as visitors, to buy Penan's handcrafts, to capture the beautiful scenery of the village; we dropped by as strangers, to witness strange things like playing flute with nose and big hole on earlobes; .. and for some, dropping-by is just to look for toilets...

Nobody sighed or trying to be a poet when we left. For a visit not more than 30minutes, only the calm and the quiet of the village reminded us what a nature life means..