Kota Kinabalu, known fondly as KK by its residents, is the capital of Malyasia's Sabah State in Northern Borneo. Because the ship was stopping in the port for only six hours, we signed up what seemed to be the best of the ship's organized tours--Legends of Borneo: The Skull House. With a name like that, how could we lose. We made a big mistake and now refer to this country as Boring Borneo. To be fair we should recommend that rather than being a three-hour tour, the Skull House should be a 20-minute stop on a tour with other attractions. The distance from the city may make this difficult. Seeing the actual skulls is chilling. Spending time with fellow travelers Neilly and Ron from Toronto and our China trip, and Lauren and Craig, the young couple from Pittsburgh who are conducting their consulting business while on board, was great.
Our guide Danson told us the village that we would visit was the home of Monsopaid, the Kadazan warrior with superhuman powers who could jump over houses. In Borneo, before Christianity was introduced more than 300 years ago, a warrior's greatness was judged by how many skulls of his enemies he had collected. Today, these great warriors would be termed mass murderers. Only a few people in the village knew how to perform the ceremony of preparing the skull while appeasing the owner of the skull. The skulls in the Skull House were hung among dry leaves that preserved the skulls from insects. We saw photographs of the Last Magavail Ceremony in honor of the Geindohing Dousia, the keeper of the skulls, that was held in April 2002. It was led by the last high priestess of the Kadazan, the fifth descendant of Monsopaid, when she was 75. It will never be held again.
To pad the tour, the villagers added three dances by the Monsopaid Culture Troop, the tasting and making of rice wine that had three strengths and tasted like sherry, temporary tattoos and the walk across a suspension rope bridge. As for the dances, the person who introduced them was a beautifully made-up native whom we could not tell was a male or female until he appeared in the first dance in a man's costume because he had a prettier face than most women. The best thing about the first dance was when Craig and Ken doubled dared each other when the dancers asked for volunteers to learn the dance. ("If you go up, I'll go up.") And, yes, their arms were really flapping. After the second dance, Ken asked, "What? They don't want us to go up?" He and Craig were now so experienced as dancers. In the long intermission between the second and third dance, the chief warrior stared at us and took a dart from his blow gun that he used to break a balloon above the stage. Then he walked among us and took the wrist of Norrine, Sara's sudoku buddy, in a death grip and led her to the stage where he drew a blow gun across her throat ("I need an apple.") He aimed the blow gun at her, and she turned around. Then he motioned for her to shoot the blow gun at the audience but turned her to the remaining balloon that she broke, which earned her a shield. In the third dance, the dancers used long poles that they danced over without injuring their ankles. This was obviously their signature dance. Then the dancers asked for audience participation and promised that nobody would lose a leg but may lose their toes.
After that we climbed up the open, wood log stairs to look at the giant rice pot for the making of rice wine and crossed the rope suspension bridge with a sign that stated only six people at a time, in honor of MaryAnn from Cruise Critic who told Marcos, the officer in charge of tours, that it would be humiliating for a woman to crawl across the bridge on her hands and knees while crying so that she could cancel this tour. Mark, Norrine's husband said he would jump up and down at the entrance of the bridge to make it swing. Norrine told him that not everyone shared his sense of humor so Norrine and Sara bonded again over what their husbands thought was funny. (To be fair, Ken did not think Sara was funny on the ship when she pulled up her capri pants to show her knee to the men--women's knees and shoulders must be covered in KK in the mosques--and asked them if they wanted to swoon at the sight of her gorgeous knee.) The time that we spent in the gift shop was wonderful because the store was air-conditioned.
On the way back to the ship, our tour guide Danson informed us that rice is the main crop in KK but the government still needs to import rice. In the past, the country grew cocoa, which was very expensive, so now they grow palm trees for the palm oil that is used in cooking, soap and machinery. We passed the State Mosque but Danson told us that the mosques in Brunei were more impressive. Next to shanties were new construction. One section, that was very beautiful with beige buildings with red-tile roofs reminded us of the Riviera Dunes section of Palmetto, the town north of Bradenton.
During World War II, KK was totally destroyed by the Allied force that was trying to liberate the island from the Japanese that had held it for almost four years. So most of the buildings were fairly new construction. From 1945 to 1963, KK was a British colony until it became independent. Almost 85 percent of KK is on reclaimed land but now the government has decided that there will be no more reclaimed land to protect the marine life and low land forest. Danson said that most of the people live outside KK so that by 9 p.m., the city is dead--exactly our opinion of KK.
Here's the disclaimer. Faithful Readers, if you ever go to Kota Kinablua, take a city tour or hire a guide to show you around the city. Joyce and Bob, our former table mates at the late seating, took a self-directed tour with the Australian couple who replaced us and had already been to KK. They loved the city, pronouncing it as very clean and the people as very friendly. Attractions that are must-sees are the Sabah Foundation Building, the Sabah Museum and the Cultural Heritage Village.
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