We recently ran a school trip for the British School of Nanjing, China, to our camps in Borneo.  The lead teacher, Richard, worked hard with our team to pull the trip together and then accompanied his students on their Borneo experience.  Here are a few words and some incredible pictures which Richard has pulled together after his trip which i think give a really good summary of some of the sights, sounds and experiences his team of students had.  Thanks Richard, and thanks to the team for their hard work on the projects and look forward to seeing a team from BSN next year.

In the past 3 months, Safuan, our architect intern from Arkitrek have been working on our long term plans for a more sustainable and environmental friendly /green building project by continuing bio-crete brick mix experiment on site apart from working on the final phases of the Community Centre at Camp Bongkud. At the final stage [...]

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Dubai International Academy’s (DIA) trip of Tanzania!

From the sand dunes of sunny United Arab Emirates to the muddy foothills of rainy Kilimanjaro.

I have never witnessed a group so excited about rain like DIA. We have been hosting many School expeditions over the years and one almost expects them to ask “where is the sun” when they arrive and the skies are grey. Well, it all came clear that this lot do not experience much rain, if at all any. It was great to see them celebrating with a little rain dance.

Immediately after exchanging pleasantries and the group had settled in, we took them on a familiarization tour of Mbokomu village and the school that they’ d be working at.
As the Swahili saying goes “Be a good host to your visitor on their first day, the next day give them a hoe to plough”. And so we did. Honeymoon was over, the Team was taken to Kiboriloni School to literally get their hands, shorts, t-shirts and faces dirty. They painted and drew murals on two classrooms in two days. With the short trips, students realize that they have very little time on projects and have targets to meet so what they tend to do is work their socks off on every activity that is thrown their way.

We changed the pace and engaged them in a typical Chagga (local tribe) cultural tour. The tour included helping a local lady with her daily chores such as; tending to her goats, fetching  water from the stream, and farming. Basically the students get to experience a day to day life of the locals. The tour is not considered complete unless everyone is wrapped in kanga’s (sarongs) and put in the mama’s smoky little kitchen to prepare lunch for themselves. Nothing could stop them from their cookery lesson, they were brave enough to stick around the kitchen despite smoke from burning firewood causing tears and sweat dripping from their eyes and faces!  Once in the village, you are considered one of them and you are expected to do what local people do including having your food while seated on a mat and using your hands to eat.

As we still had a bit of time left on our schedule, we  organized a football match with a group of local boys. Although the locals are used to playing all boys teams, they did not mind playing a mixed school and it was awesome to see boys and girls sharing the same playing field, which is a rarity in these parts of the world.

The day that needed everyone to be well prepared was here. The Kidia waterfall trek. It had rained through out the night and morning so the Team woke up thinking they had got away with it. You should have seen their faces when I announced to them that the trek was still on. Whilst we waited it off, they enjoyed a trip into town and spoiled themselves with Pizza’s at Indoitaliano restaurant followed by a supermarket run to get a few goodies before heading off to Kidia. In the meantime, the staff, and especially the local guide, were doing some Chagga rituals to the gods so that they could blow away the grey cloud that was hanging  over Moshi town. All the prayers and traditional chants worked. By the time the students had finished munching on their Pizza’s, the skies had cleared up and the sun was shinning.

The adventure ensued. The team had to take it slow and easy as the ground was still a bit wet and slippery and the trek was steep. With the help of the local guides, the entire Team managed to get down to the falls. Such an achievement and great feeling for the students as it was both fun and a challenge as some of them used their bottoms to climb down and the heavy rains made the waterfalls drop with such force. It was not just the trek down to the falls that took their breath away but the gauges, little farms, the beautiful, plentiful flora and fauna, greenery and the ever friendly locals who smiled and waved at the students whilst going about their daily chores.

   
The next day the group left bright and early to go to Tarangire National park for their safari. They saw loads of wildlife and enjoyed the game drives in their entirety.

On their return to camp, we had prepared a barbecue dinner for everyone as their last meal in Camp Tanzania. The group appreciated it very much as it was a great way to end their expedition. After dinner, the speeches ensued and we had a chance to ask the volunteers to sum up their entire trip in just one word. This is what they had to say;

It was great to see all the activities that we’d organized completed and the students and Teachers taking on all the tasks with a positive attitude and enthusiasm.

We were honored to host you and thank you for a great effort!

I wanted to post a few pictures from the recent IB Conference in Kuala Lumpur.  We normally have a stand at these sorts of conferences, once or twice a year, and gives us a chance to speak with a wide range of International Schools from across the world.  Ann our International Sales guru was running the stand this time around and did a fantastic job of making it appealing and snazzy.  The star of the show were the amazing bracelets made by the women of Mantanani out of plastic washed up on the beach – they are now the must have item in all IB schools around the globe! 

Recently, GEMS World Academy from Dubai, visited Borneo on a service project trip, staying for a week, working hard and seeing lots of interesting things.  They spent the majority of their time in our camp at Tinangol which is in the north of Borneo, where they stayed in our traditional style longhouse, conducted worthwhile service project work as well as gaining an understanding of local culture and issues.  The team had a great time and really got stuck into the work which was based around our kindergarten project in the village of Tinangol.  They also visited the Tip of Borneo, tried their hand at some traditional dancing and some basic English lessons with the local pre-school.  Thanks for all your efforts guys and hope to see you out here again soon.

Team shot after the dancing

The girls showing how its done!

Team shot at the northern most tip of Borneo

Making traditional style bracelets and necklaces, Rungus style

With the children who will benefit from the completed kindergarten

Working on the entrance area to the new kindergarten

Putting the finishing touches to the bannister leading up into the kindergarten

Last week we were lucky enough to host a group of students from Dubai American Academy in Borneo for a service project trip.  They were with us for a week and got stuck into some hard work at our camp at Bongkud.  The project work centred around the community hall which we are in the process of re-building and is now starting to near completion.  The team were kept busy with mixing cement for the walls and floor, learning new skills from our onsite foreman and all the time working in very hot and humid conditions.  It wasn’t all work and no play – the team had the opportunity to watch a cultural performance of dance and music from the local youth of the village before having the chance to try it for themselves, as well as trying their hand at some traditional cooking techniques.  Thanks to the team for their hard work on the project site and of course your enthusiasm during all the other activities and visits.

Trying out the Bamboo dance

The professional cement mixing team, happy in their work !

Hard graft

Working on an imaginative traditional cake design

Jungle Trek in Borneo. 

We have finally finished our jungle trek after 5 long hard days of walking, and with very few mishaps along the way!  The start of our trek began at a new camp in Bongkud and there we organised our kit as well as the food we had to carry.  The food included mash potato mixture and lots of cereal, noodles and biscuits!  We set off around 3 and soon got to our first camp which was a basic long house, mosquito nets and beds were quickly assembled and a nice meal of beans and mash was consumed.

The second day of the jungle trek i saw us actually enter the jungle and it was also the hardest day of the trek.  We started early in the morning and ended up trekking for around 9 hours!  The jungle trek started off along paths and then saw us wade through rivers before entering the jungle.  Walking in the jungle was an amazing experience but also very hard work, kit was shared out among the team as individuals began to suffer, notable contributions from “they call me 2 hammock Sam” as well as the girls who all took turns to carry kit, which was massively appreciated.  The day ended as we finally arrived at our camp for the night, an open field with climbing frames dotted around and a nice river at the bottom.  Hammocks were slowly assembled and then we descended on to the river for a wash, which was much needed!  Another meal of mash and beans followed before everyone headed to their hammocks, thoroughly shattered after a hard days walking.

Day 3 saw a new approach to the trek from our team, we split into a fast and a slow group and this saw a much improved morale among both teams who could go at their own pace rather than having to go too quick or too slow.  Despite leaving an hour and a half later than the slow group, the fast group showed fantastic strength to be first up the 2000 meter hill which was the basis of the days walk.  The descent down the other side of the hill saw things start to go slightly off plan however,  Mrs Langley was first up, taking a tumble and breaking a tooth.  I (Chris) decided to follow this up with a fall of my own, which left me unable to put any weight on my left leg, not my best idea!  Whilst the rest of the group stormed ahead to the camp, by now well into their rhythm and walking well as a team, I was stretchered back to camp by the team of guides.  At the camp, everyone seemed to be in much improved spirits despite two very hard days of trekking and we moved on to a dinner of instant noodles, which made a nice change! Hammocks were once again assembled, most people took a dip in the small stream below the camp and an evacuation plan was made for Mrs Langley and myself for the morning.

Day 4 of the trek began early for Mrs Langley and I as we set off out of the jungle, after an hour or so of walking we reached our pick up point and were picked up and taken back to Bongkud for a couple of days of rest and to sort out our injuries.  The rest of the group had a shorter walk than in the previous two days, around 2-3 hours, but still rather tough with many hills and slippery tracks encountered along the way. The trek concluded at the next of our sites, which were seemingly becoming ever more basic in terms of size and conditions. The hammocks were set up on a very steep hill, which made for a very interesting night’s sleep for many!

Day 5 was the final day, with the promised land of the Sabah Tea Long House being our destination. The first group were woken at 4:00 for a 6:00 leave from camp, whilst the second group had the luxury of a lie in until 6:00 for a 7:30 departure. Having been told that the walk would take a minimum of 5-6 hours, and potentially up to 8, we were all very pleasantly surprised when we arrived at Sabah Tea within 4 hours. We emerged from the dense jungle around an hour into the walk and then followed the track to the tea plantation, taking in the stunning views of the jungle through which we had just walked, as well as the impressive Mount Kinabalu. At Sabah Tea, we were treated to a wonderful BBQ, which was one of the highlights of a very enjoyable evening – everyone was very relaxed and particularly enjoying proper toilets and showers!

Today we are having an R&R day, having just visited the Death March Memorial, and currently in the town of Ranau for a little shopping. This afternoon we are heading for the Springs at Poring for a relaxing swim and ice cream!

We are proud to share this with you on press release of our recently launched Community Learning Centre (CLC), one of our projects on Mantanani island on a few major Malaysian newspapers today.  Below are an article publicised on New Straits Times.

News on the newly built CLC also appeared on Daily Express and featured on The Star online today as well!

From the east coast to the north west coast of Sabah, Eva’s Gap Year programmes in Borneo brings you to the lovely paradise island that is Mantanani!

Hope you are all well! We’re all great here (and very tanned). Hope you’ve not been worrying these last ten days; Mantanani Island, whilst beautiful, was devoid of both wi-fi and phone reception. Warning: prepare to be extremely jealous after reading this blog entry…

This week’s new and exciting location was Mantanani Island, just off Borneo’s north-western coast. Camp Mantanani (Camp Mosquito Bite would also be an accurate name) is arranged much the same way as Tinangol, with a squat toilet/shower block and communal living/dining area, surrounded by greenery.

The sleeping quarters are basically dorms of fifteen bunk beds in a three-walled room (privacy, what is this privacy you speak of?). Small villages lie about a kilometer on each side of the camp. Then, there’s the addition of an amazingly blue stretch of beach just outside the gate. In short, an amazing place.

The weekends were spent in a truly ‘tropical island holiday’ style – a mix of swimming in pristine blue waters, exploring the (fairly small) island, tanning, watching sunsets and lounging in hammocks.

The week’s project work was once again construction; this time we were putting the finishing touches on a learning centre that has been under construction since 2010. This included painting signs, lacquering wall panels and testing our skill at landscaping.

Our stay at Mantanani also had a particular focus on environmental conservation. Our camp manager Aida taught us about the biodiversity around Mantanani (did you know the South China Sea holds a third of the entire world’s biodiversity?), why it’s threatened and what can be done to decrease human impact on marine ecosystems. These lessons we attempted to pass on to the local village primary school children in two hour-long classes, which we had to plan for and teach in small groups (without outside help!). Honestly it was a bit daunting, but the kids proved attentive for the most part – as long as we interspersed the teaching with lots of games!

We also undertook a beach clean up. On a 320m stretch of beach we collected 200kg of rubbish. This included a whopping 700 plastic bottles. By the end of the clean-up everyone was fairly disgusted with humanity, with good reason. However, we still live in hope that this beautiful island will one day be rubbish-free. The camp itself was living proof of the benefits of recycling, with a beach hut made and decorated with almost entirely recycled materials such as driftwood, plastic bottles, dried coral and shells.

Apart from project work we were always kept busy and learning new things, participating in evening activities such as palm weaving, hammock making, night walks, creating eco-purses out of plastic wrappers, and even coconut tree climbing (which Tom got particularly good at, while others preferred NOT being precariously perched ten metres above ground)… Long walks on the beach, morning swims, jumping off jetties, building sandcastles, beach bonfires, star-gazing, listening to the crash of waves: these were the kinds of simple pleasures life was made up of for ten days on the beautiful Mantanani Island. I, for one, was quite sorry to be leaving.

Well, I’ll take my leave now – the group’s got to rest up properly before the next stage of our big adventure: climbing the 4km giant, Mt Kinabalu!

Hugs and kisses to all!

This is Eva Reda signing off for Blog 5
Team Borneo 2012

Mantanani Community Learning Centre (CLC) has been officially handed over to the community on 18^th October 2012. Following Rory’s blog today on Wow! Completing Borneo Project Work  , I would like to share some photos documented from when it all first started building  in June 2010 to October 2012 feeling how amazing it is to get very committed and hardworking volunteers getting stuck  in every part of the built. We have had many challenges throughout the completion of this building but it is one that we had great experience with everyone involved and are really proud of.

Earlier during the start of this project we have blogged about what you will be doing as volunteers coming to Camp Mantanani.

We also shared the day we raised the roof on the CLC. One of our biggest challenges!

In February this year, we had our Camps Directors visit and Stu blogged about his trip and the progress on tough day at the island office.

Summer this year, we had more hands to help complete this project and Anna Nicholls, one of our Arkitrek interns who stayed as long as 5 months on the project this year, sums up perfectly the end of the CLC summer progress report.

How it all started by the seashore…

More photos on the soft opening day here and handover to community here.