KOTA BELUD REVISITED

Whenever the town Kota Belud is mentioned, one would think of the colorful Tamus, the horses, the padi fields with Mt. Kinabalu in the background...... My friend Rumba (SIB) invited me to accompany her Kota Belud to visit some of the pre-schools she had set up. This lovely and energetic lady, an ex- lecturer, took early retirement to help the rural churches to set up pre-schools so that children in those areas would not be disadvantaged when they enter primary one. From one pre-school, the project soon expanded to 70 schools, as more and more rural folks realized the advantages of sending their children to these pre-schools. She was hoping that Basel churches would also take up similar initiatives.

 First stop was breakfast at some back alley. The 'Kon-lou' mee wasn't too bad. Chinese tea was free - a rarity these days.
We visited 'Tadika Kasih' in Kampung Souk. It was the first rural pre-school set up by the SIB church. There were 18 children and 6 of them were graduating. For a rural pre-school, I must commend the teachers' effort in teaching literacy and numeracy to these children. The children put up a lively presentation of songs and dances at their graduation ceremony.

The graduans all excited. Malina our volunteer driver in the background.

Other pre-school children waiting to perform

Rumba(second from right) together with the Chairman and the teachers and the graduans

Children singing "Give me oil in my lamp"

Children singing ""Every move I make" Nathan's favourite song

Ribbon and Flag dance

After that we went to Kampung Tinatut to visit a proposed new pre-school. The leaders of the church had asked Rumba to help set up this new pre-school. How rural is the church? "Tidak jauh dari Kampung Souk." was the reply. Now, when rural folks say "Tidak jauh", take it with a pinch of salt.It's 'tidak jauh' for them, but for us who are not used to the terrain, it's miles miles and miles of unpaved and pot-holed tracks. Don't take your Merc or Camry - nothing less than a Hilux. (If dad thinks the Pahang safari was bad, this is even 5 times worse). 

This not the road - just a shot I took when we stopped to ask for directions

We got lost at some point and had to retrace our route. Many times we had to get down from our Hilux to direct the driver so as to avoid some of the more treacherous sections of the terrain. Kudos to Ms Malina, our brave driver. We finally reached Kampung Tinatut. We asked the villagers where the church was. "Sana," pointing to a general direction. "OK, they said 'sana', said Rumba optimistically. "At least they didn't say "Saa..nn....aa" so it can't be very far." Oh, the "Sana" was another mile or so. Finally we had to   take the last bit of the route by foot.

The church was situated on top of a small hill. 

The church on top of the hill commands a panoramic view of the village

The parsonage was built by gotong royong

 The view was breath taking.

The lady pastor was pleased to see us. She had prepared some banana dessert for us. Yummy. But we had to share the table with the cat.

 Some young men were engaged in painting a 'Selamat Datang' sign for the church. I talked to them and asked them what they did for a living. Most of them were jobless and some tapped rubber to earn a living or kerja kebun as they were not able to find any job in town.

 Everywhere I looked, there were tarap trees - loaded with tarap fruit.Tarap fruit has a sweetish sickening smell. I wondered why the villagers don't plant fruits that have more value added such as durians. Tarap become soft and squissy when ripe, and thus cannot endure long distances. The villagers could not market the the tarap fruits due to the distance from the town and also the bad condition of the roads. 
So much arable land and such a waste of resources.

 

The trip had been very interesting as well as an eye opener for me. I can understand why the Bumiputera pastors are often so discouraged when they talk of their mission fields. I feel the richer urban churches could do more to help these rural churches so that they can rise up to help their own people.