Kuching, Sarawak
Borneo is possibly one of the cradles of civilisation; cave paintings dated to 40,000 years ago were found in Niah cave. The Chinese were in parts of Borneo from the 11th Cent and traders stopped in Sarawak regularly but it was in the 1841 when the first White Rajah (James Brooke) developed the country. The indigenous people being river and jungle people, did not want to farm or live in cities, so many Chinese immigrants came at Brooke's invitation. Kuching is situated on the Sarawak River, several miles in from the China Sea. It has a lot of modern buildings, but there are a sufficient number of Colonial buildings and Chinese shophouses to gain some impresion of what it must have been like. I found it one of the most pleasant cities in Malaysia .. clean, orderly and with good fresh air. It is well landcaped and there are several pleasant gardens.
Interesting Colonial buildings include the Court House, the Post Office and an infirmary which is now the Sarawak Textile Museum. The small Textile Museum includes indigenous items made from bark and plants, Chinese embroidery work and Muslim embroidery and beaded clothing). All types of plants and trees were used by the indigenous people - bamboo, palm, rattan, ferns and vines. Natural dyes were made from plants, roots and ginger. Items were decorated with shells, Hornbill feathers and fur. Beads were highly prized and were imported from both West Asia and Europe. This is a small high quality museum. There is also a Chinese Museum in what was once the Chinese Chamber of Commerce, and Sarawak Museum.which was built by the Second White Rajah in the 1890s.
Sarawak Museum
The new wing of the museum (once government offices) has a temporary exhibition about Chinese ceramics from the 9th Cent onwards and how they got to Sarawak through Chinese traders (who had been plying these ports since the 6th Cent). They traded ceramics for local goods (spices, some obscure aphrodisiacs - the Chinese do not change - . The ceramics were highly valued by the indigenous people who often carted them back into the hills.
The ceramics were used to store rice and food, folk medicine materials, as a dowry in marriage (in one tribe only women could own and inherit ceramics) and in death rites (bodies were often buried in large jars). Perhaps this explains how these ancient jars, dishes and vessels survived all these centuries. The interest in ceramics continued into Victorian times.
There are several objects in the grounds outside the new wing which were fascinating .. the most striking is a burial platform (bones of revered ancestors were stored on these).
It consists of two high carved poles (like totem poles) with an intricately carved platform some 40 feet in the air. There was also a replica of a pre-historic rock formation which resembled a section of Stonehenge.
The old part of the museum is in a classic Victorian building, but not in the English style. The designer (not an architect) was a Frenchman working for the White Rajah who based the design on a château in Normandy; it is a very plain handsome building. The collection is a bit of a mess .. railway memorabilia and printing presses are crammed right next to Palaeozoic and Mesozoic fossils. There is an impressive collection of basketry (as they call it) .. baskets and containers, mats, even clothing and some examples that it was not easy to understand what they might have been used for. A full scale model of a longhouse interior is interesting and the sack of skulls hanging from the ceiling adds an authentic note
I was about to be critical of the museum but then I thought of that ghastly new ethnology museum in Paris which is all flash and interior design with almost no content. The content is here (and well labelled) and although the display is a bit dated, it is best to see this museum as a exhibition in and of itself. That is, it reflects museums of a certain era and thus has its own curiosity value. The adjacent Museum Gardens are well landscaped and have some interesting trees and plants. .
Photo Gallery. Click here if the photos in the window to the right are not displayed.
The fine print
Date of travel : December 2008
Country information (includes a map) : CIA Handbook
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