Bukit Batu Lawi

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Bukit Batu Lawi

Batu Lawi from Gunung Murud.jpg

Batu Lawi, seen from the peak of Mount Murud on 4 September 1998
Highest point
Elevation 2,046 m (6,713 ft)
Geography
Location Sarawak, Borneo
Parent range Kelabit Highlands

Batu Lawi is a twin-peaked mountain in the Kelabit Highlands of Sarawak, Malaysia (Borneo) that has played important roles in both ancient mythology and modern history. The taller 'male' peak is 2046 metres above sea level, while the female summit is at 1850 metres. It is one of the highest mountains in the state of Sarawak.

The Kelabit Highlands are a mountain range located in the northernmost part of Sarawak, on the island of Borneo. The highest mountains in this range are Mount Murud at 2,423 metres (7,949 ft), Bukit Batu Buli at 2,082 metres (6,831 ft), and Bukit Batu Lawi at 2,046 metres (6,713 ft).

Sarawak State of Malaysia

Sarawak is a state of Malaysia. Being the largest among 13 other states with the size almost equal to West Malaysia, Sarawak is located in northwest Borneo Island, and is bordered by the Malaysian state of Sabah to the northeast, Kalimantan to the south, and Brunei in the north. The capital city, Kuching, is the largest city in Sarawak, the economic centre of the state, and the seat of the Sarawak state government. Other cities and towns in Sarawak include Miri, Sibu, and Bintulu. As of the 2015 census, the population of Sarawak was 2,636,000. Sarawak has an equatorial climate with tropical rainforests and abundant animal and plant species. It has several prominent cave systems at Gunung Mulu National Park. Rajang River is the longest river in Malaysia; Bakun Dam, one of the largest dams in Southeast Asia, is located on one of its tributaries, the Balui River. Mount Murud is the highest point in Sarawak.

Malaysia Federal constitutional monarchy in Southeast Asia

Malaysia is a country in Southeast Asia. The federal constitutional monarchy consists of 13 states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two similarly sized regions, Peninsular Malaysia and East Malaysia. Peninsular Malaysia shares a land and maritime border with Thailand in the north and maritime borders with Singapore in the south, Vietnam in the northeast, and Indonesia in the west. East Malaysia shares land and maritime borders with Brunei and Indonesia and a maritime border with the Philippines and Vietnam. Kuala Lumpur is the national capital and largest city while Putrajaya is the seat of federal government. With a population of over 30 million, Malaysia is the world's 44th most populous country. The southernmost point of continental Eurasia, Tanjung Piai, is in Malaysia. In the tropics, Malaysia is one of 17 megadiverse countries, with large numbers of endemic species.

Contents

History

Batu Lawi is sacred to many of the people who live in the region, such as the Kelabit and the Penan. According to the legends of the Kelabit people, the mountain's peaks are a husband and wife—a pair of protector gods that are the parents of all highland peoples. There was a time when a mountain of fire called Batu Apoi tried to burn all living things. But then Batu Lawi fought back to defeat it and Batu Apoi's flames died out. Kelabit people would traditionally visit Batu Lawi on pilgrimages from settlements such as Bario or Ba Kelalan—about a two-day walk through forest that is now part of Pulong Tau National Park. According to their customs, from the moment they first set eyes on the mountain to the moment they stand at its base, they must not utter the mountain's name for fear of antagonising the spirits on the summits. There have been regular sightings of flames bursting out spontaneously on the male peak, where Charles Hose, a naturalist and an administrator served under Brooke regime also witnessed this phenomenon. He reasoned that the bleached surface of the limestone acted as a magnifying glass, causing dry grass to catch fire. [1]

Kelabit people ethnic group

The Kelabit are an indigenous Dayak people of the Sarawak/North Kalimantan highlands of Borneo with a minority in the neighbouring state of Brunei. They have close ties to the Lun Bawang. The elevation there is slightly over 1,200 meters. In the past, because there were few roads and because the area was largely inaccessible by river because of rapids, the highlands and the Kelabit were relatively untouched by modern western influences. Now, however, there is a relatively permanent road route on which it is possible to reach Bario by car from Miri. The road is marked but driving without a local guide is not advisable, as it takes over 11 hours of driving to reach Bario from Miri through many logging trail junctions and river crossings.

Bario Town in Sarawak, Malaysia

Bario is a community of 13 to 16 villages located on the Kelabit Highlands in Miri Division, Sarawak, Malaysia, lying at an altitude of 1000 m (3280 ft) above sea level. It is located close to the Sarawak-Kalimantan border, 178 km to the east of Miri. It is the main settlement for the indigenous Kelabit tribe. There are regular flights between the Bario, Miri and Marudi.

Pulong Tau National Park

The Pulong Tau National Park is a national park in the Kelabit Highlands of Sarawak, Malaysia, on the island of Borneo.

Japanese occupation

In World War Two, the twin peaks of Batu Lawi served as an important landmark to pilots in the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), during Allied missions to help recapture northern Borneo from Japan, which had invaded and occupied the region in 1941. The Allied response was to send commandos behind the Japanese lines to train the indigenous communities as part of the Z Special Unit to resist the Japanese invasion. One of those to parachute in was Tom Harrisson, the British scientist, journalist and founder of Mass Observation, who was then a second lieutenant in the British Army.

Royal Australian Air Force Air warfare branch of Australias armed forces

The Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF), formed March 1921, is the aerial warfare branch of the Australian Defence Force (ADF). It operates the majority of the ADF's fixed wing aircraft, although both the Australian Army and Royal Australian Navy also operate aircraft in various roles. It directly continues the traditions of the Australian Flying Corps (AFC), formed on 22 October 1912. The RAAF provides support across a spectrum of operations such as air superiority, precision strikes, intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, air mobility, space surveillance, and humanitarian support.

Allies of World War II Grouping of the victorious countries of World War II

The Allies of World War II, called the United Nations from the 1 January 1942 declaration, were the countries that together opposed the Axis powers during the Second World War (1939–1945). The Allies promoted the alliance as a means to control German, Japanese and Italian aggression.

Japanese occupation of British Borneo British Borneo (Sarawak, Brunei, Labuan (island), and British North Borneo) under Japanese occupation

Before the outbreak of World War II in the Pacific, the island of Borneo was divided into five territories. Four of the territories were in the north and under British control – Sarawak, Brunei, Labuan, an island, and British North Borneo; while the remainder, and bulk, of the island was under the jurisdiction of the Dutch East Indies.

In those days, the maps of Borneo were of a very poor quality. [2] The pilot Squadron Leader Graham Pockley dfc and bar was leader of the expedition and of the RAAF Consolidated Liberator that carried Harrisson and seven other Z Force operatives behind the Japanese lines would have seen a thick green blanket of tropical forest for miles around. However, the pale sandstone peaks of Batu Lawi stood out like a lighthouse and allowed the commandos to be sure they would land somewhere close to the settlement of Bario, and the Kelabit people they sought. The jump was a success but the plane was shot down on its return to the airbase at Morotai in the Dutch East Indies. Squadron Leader Graham Pockley died after making the successful drop. [2]

Morotai island in North Maluku Province, Indonesia

Morotai Island is an island in the Halmahera group of eastern Indonesia's Maluku Islands (Moluccas). It is one of Indonesia's northernmost islands.

Dutch East Indies Dutch possession in Southeast Asia between 1810-1945

The Dutch East Indies was a Dutch colony consisting of what is now Indonesia. It was formed from the nationalised colonies of the Dutch East India Company, which came under the administration of the Dutch government in 1800.

Climbing attempts

Saddened by the loss of the plane, Tom Harrisson took part in the first successful ascent of the female peak, with Lejau Unad Doolinih and five other Kelabits in 1946. [3] He then placed a commemorative board just below the summit in memory of the lost crew that was shot down on the way back to Morotai. [4] It takes another 40 years before British and Australian soldiers from the 14th/20th King’s Hussars, led by Jonny Beardsall, made the first successful ascent of the male peak in 1986. [1]

Among those who have attempted to climb Batu Lawi was Bruno Manser, a Swiss national who lived for several years among the nomadic Penan people in Sarawak. He attempted to climb the mountain in 1988 but failed. In May 2000, he entered Sarawak illegally and told his Penan companions that he planned to climb Batu Lawi for the second time but went missing since then. He was declared legally dead on 10 March 2005. [5] [6]

Bruno Manser Swiss environmentalist

Bruno Manser was a Swiss environmental activist. From 1984 to 1990, he stayed with the Penan tribe in Sarawak, Malaysia, organising several blockades against timber companies. After he emerged from the forests in 1990, he engaged in public activism for rainforest preservation and the human rights of indigenous peoples, especially the Penan, which brought him into conflict with the Malaysian government. He also founded the Swiss non-governmental organization (NGO) Bruno Manser Fonds in 1991. He disappeared during his last journey to Sarawak in May 2000 and is presumed dead.

In 2007, the first Malaysian climbers from Multimedia University (MMU), Cyberjaya reached the summit of the male peak during 50th Independence Day. [3]

Biodiversity

The vegetation on the female peak of Batu Lawi is classed as mountain heath, with low shrubs of Rhododendron and Callophyllum, ground herbs, ferns, orchids and carnivorous pitcher plants (Nepenthes species) that include Nepenthes lowii . [1] Many of the species present are also found on the summit of Gunung Murud, [7] Sarawak's highest mountain, but are endemic to Borneo—that is, found nowhere else on the planet. Immediately below the female peak is a band of mossy elfin forest and, below that, oak-laurel forest. [1]

A 1998 expedition by members of the Miri branch of the Malaysian Nature Society recorded 67 species of bird, including helmeted hornbill, and 20 species of mammal, including Bornean gibbon and sun bear, in the forest that surrounds Batu Lawi, but the only birds recorded from the summit of Batu Lawi itself were ochraceous bulbul and mountain blackeye. [1] In 1946, Tom Harrisson saw a peregrine falcon on the male peak. [2]

In May 2008 the authorities in Sarawak approved the area around Batu Lawi as an extension to Pulong Tau National Park. This meant all logging there should have ceased, but satellite images taken in May 2009 indicated extensive logging within the Batu Lawi reserve area. The images appeared in a report [8] that the Council on Ethics of Norway’s State Pension Fund published in August 2010.

Related Research Articles

Major Tom Harnett Harrisson, DSO OBE was a British polymath. In the course of his life he was an ornithologist, explorer, journalist, broadcaster, soldier, guerrilla, ethnologist, museum curator, archaeologist, documentarian, film-maker, conservationist and writer. Although often described as an anthropologist, and sometimes referred to as the "Barefoot Anthropologist", his degree studies at University of Cambridge, before he left to live in Oxford, were in natural sciences. He was a founder of the social observation organisation Mass-Observation. He conducted ornithological and anthropological research in Sarawak (1932) and the New Hebrides (1933–35), spent much of his life in Borneo and finished up in the US, the UK and France, before dying in a road accident in Thailand.

Penan people

The Penan are a nomadic indigenous people living in Sarawak and Brunei, although there is only one small community in Brunei; among those in Brunei half have been converted to Islam, even if only superficially. Penan are one of the last such peoples remaining as hunters and gatherers. The Penan are noted for their practice of 'molong' which means never taking more than necessary. Most Penan were nomadic hunter-gatherers until the post-World War II missionaries settled many of the Penan, mainly in the Ulu-Baram district but also in the Limbang district. They eat plants, which are also used as medicines, and animals and use the hides, skin, fur, and other parts for clothing and shelter.

Gunung Mulu National Park national park

The Gunung Mulu National Park is a national park in Miri Division, Sarawak, Malaysia. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site that encompasses caves and karst formations in a mountainous equatorial rainforest setting. The park is famous for its caves and the expeditions that have been mounted to explore them and their surrounding rainforest, most notably the Royal Geographical Society Expedition of 1977–1978, which saw over 100 scientists in the field for 15 months. This initiated a series of over 20 expeditions now named the Mulu Caves Project.

Ulu Baram is a remote area of Sarawak in Malaysia. It is an encased alluvial plain, created in part by the Baram River.

<i>Nepenthes lowii</i> species of plant

Nepenthes lowii, or Low's pitcher-plant, is a tropical pitcher plant endemic to Borneo. It is named after Hugh Low, who discovered it on Mount Kinabalu. This species is perhaps the most unusual in the genus, being characterised by its strongly constricted upper pitchers, which bear a greatly reduced peristome and a reflexed lid with numerous bristles on its lower surface.

Mount Murud mountain

Mount Murud or Muru is a sandstone mountain located in Limbang Division, Sarawak, Malaysia At 2,424 m (7,946 ft), it is the highest mountain in Sarawak.

Niah National Park National Park in Malaysia

Niah National Park, located within Miri Division, Sarawak, Malaysia, is the site of the Niah Caves limestone cave and archeological site.

<i>Nepenthes murudensis</i> species of plant

Nepenthes murudensis, or the Murud pitcher-plant, is a tropical pitcher plant endemic to Mount Murud in Borneo, after which it is named. It is of putative hybrid origin: its two original parent species are thought to be N. reinwardtiana and N. tentaculata.

<i>Nepenthes muluensis</i> species of plant

Nepenthes muluensis, or the Mulu pitcher-plant, is a tropical pitcher plant endemic to Borneo. It grows in highland habitats at elevations of 1700 to 2400 m above sea level.

Bakelalan Town in Sarawak, Malaysia

Ba'kelalan is a group of nine villages at Maligan Highlands of Limbang Division, Sarawak, Malaysia about 3,000 feet (910 m) above sea level and 4 km from the border with Indonesian Kalimantan and 150 km from the nearest town of Lawas. There are nine villages in Ba'kelalan. The villagers here belong to the Lun Bawang tribe.

Mount Mulu mountain

Mount Mulu is a sandstone and shale mountain. At 2376 m, it is the second highest mountain in the state of Sarawak, after Mount Murud. It is located within the boundaries of Gunung Mulu National Park, which is named after it.

Long Rapung Place in Sarawak, Malaysia

Long Rapung is a former settlement in the Marudi division of Sarawak, Malaysia. It lies approximately 634.8 kilometres (394 mi) east-north-east of the state capital Kuching. Long Rapung lies in the Dapur River floodplain. It was formerly a village but was evacuated during the Confrontation. Now the shelters provide overnight accommodation hunters and for visitors walking to Ba Kelalan or climbing Gunung Murud.

Long Napir Place in Sarawak, Malaysia

Long Napir is a cluster of four settlements of Penan and Kelabit people in the Limbang division of Sarawak, Malaysia. It lies approximately 606 kilometres (377 mi) east-north-east of the state capital Kuching.

Sarawak's population is very diverse, comprising many races and ethnic groups. Sarawak has more than 40 sub-ethnic groups, each with its own distinct language, culture and lifestyle. This makes Sarawak demography very distinct and unique compared to its Peninsular counterpart.

Ansonia vidua is a species of toads in the family Bufonidae. It is endemic to Sarawak, Borneo. Common names Murud black slender toad and widow slender toad have been coined for this little known species. The latter name refers to the black colouration of this species and the fact that no male individuals are known.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Malaysian Nature Society 1998 Expedition of the proposed Pulong Tau National Park (PDF). Sarawak, Malaysia: Malaysian Nature Society, Miri branch. 1998. p. 69. Archived from the original (PDF) on 10 November 2017. Retrieved 10 November 2017.
  2. 1 2 3 Harrisson , T. 1949. Explorations in Central Borneo" Geographical Journal.Volume 114:129-149
  3. 1 2 "Gunung Tama Abu - Sarawak - Borneo - Malaysia". Gunung Tama Abu. Archived from the original on 18 August 2017. Retrieved 30 December 2017.
  4. ↑ Judith M, Heimann (1998). The Most Offending Soul Alive: Tom Harrisson and His Remarkable Life. University of Hawaii Press. p. 228. ISBN   9780824821999 . Retrieved 30 December 2017.
  5. ↑ Elegant, Simon (3 September 2001). "Without a Trace". Time magazine Asia. Archived from the original on 13 January 2015. Retrieved 14 August 2014.
  6. ↑ "Bruno Manser's biography". Bruno Manser Fonds-for the people of the rainforest. Bruno Manser Fonds. Archived from the original on 9 May 2014. Retrieved 11 August 2014.
  7. ↑ Beaman, J. H. (1998). Preliminary enumeration of the summit flora, Mount Murud, Kelabit Highlands, Sarawak. In: Ghazally Ismail & Laily Bin Din (Eds.). A Scientific Journey through Borneo. Bario. The Kelabit Highlands of Sarawak. IBEC, UNIMAS. Pelanduk Publications.
  8. ↑ http://www.regjeringen.no/upload/FIN/etikk/Recommendation_Samling.pdf

Further reading

Coordinates: 3°52′N115°23′E / 3.867°N 115.383°E / 3.867; 115.383

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