A fishy tale

I was at the Lido market earlier today and my jaw just about dropped to the very wet and dirty floor when I came across this scene. It must be the season of the giant grouper fish locally known as karatong.
This one according to a fish monger tipped the scales at about 120kgs and came with a hefty price tag as well - RM4,000.
Believe or not this fish was already taken.


Earlier on, another fish monger cleaned a smaller karatong that weighed about 92kgs and cut it up and selling its filleted flesh at about RM58 per kg.

And this is the head. I wonder how many servings of fish head curry can be had from this one.


As I returned home I recalled the first fish monger's remark that this type of fish is becoming more difficult to come by. I wonder if pictures like these will one day be the only evidence that creatures this size swam in our seas.

In my element

A laptop and a cup of coffee are tools of the trade.

A man and his toys

Sabah's Tourism, Culture and Environment Minister Datuk
Masidi Manjum has become among the first members of the state cabinet to
tap into the online social network Facebook.

Masidi who signed up for a Facebook account just over a week ago has so
far 200 “friends” in the network that he said was a way
for him to keep tabs on what ordinary folk were thinking or talking about.

“This is a way for me to keep my feet firmly planted on the
ground. There is a danger of losing touch because positions we hold could
isolate us from the man on the street,” Masidi told The Star here
yesterday.

He said Facebook was thus a forum for him to discuss various issues even
petty ones with his “friends” in the network.

“Sometimes it is these trivial matters that could have great
implications,” said Masidi who prefers to update his Facebook
account via his Blackberry mobile phone.

He said his youngest daughter Farhana, 17, encouraged to sign up for
Facebook which has also become a showcase of his amateur photography skills.

Masidi who has eight digital cameras, the latest being a Nikon D5000 said
his travels around Sabah as a minister had presented numerous
opportunities to photograph the state picturesque locations and its people.

“Nothing gives me greater pleasure than showing tourists the
pictures I’ve taken as way of promoting Sabah,” he said in
adding that his favourite subject was Mount Kinabalu in whose shadows he
grew up in his native Kampung Karanaan in Ranau district.

“There is something about the mountain that is almost magical.
Each time I take a picture of it, there seems to be a different facet of
it,” said Masidi in noting that his camera equipped Blackberry
phone contained more than 50 pictures of the mountain.

Old faithful

Plying through the remote back roads of Sabah travellers are likely to come across Land Rover four wheel drive vehicles like this one.

First introduced to North Borneo by the British colonial administration more than half a century ago when paved roads were too few and far in-between major towns, these vehicles definately proved their worth transporting people and goods into Sabah's moutainous interior.

With Sabah becoming a partner in the Malaysian federation, the Land Rover continued to be used extensively. Rural folk realised how dependable the vehicles were and many bought them in used or second hand condition.

So fond are rural folk of the Land Rover that they have given these vehicles unique monikers, one of which "garabak (wagon) Siam." I absolutely no idea still as to how the Thai component got into that name.

Rural rhythms

I came across this lady and her brood of four while on an overnight camping trip at the upper reaches of the Kiulu River along the Crocker Range. 

This Kadazandusun ethnic family were just returning home from harvesting fruits including bambangan (a type of mango, usually to be pickled or used for cooking) and naturally growing vegetables such as wild ferns locally known as pakis.

After carrying the heavy load for more than a kilometre to the family simple wooden house, she would carefully pack the produce and hitch a one hour ride in a van or four-wheel-drive vehicle to sell them at the weekly tamu or traditional farmers' market at Donggongon town in Penampang district. Just like what her parents had done.

For some of Sabah's rural folk, their rhythm of life remains unchanged.

Into the sunset

The sun broke through the clouds as I was about to board a flight from my east coast hometown of Sandakan to Kota Kinabalu revealing this glorious scene.

The scene, I suppose, also serves as visual metaphor for the Fokker 50 aircraft which is flying into the sunset as it is being replaced by the ATR72-500 turbo prop aircraft after about 20 years of service in Malaysia Airlines' domestic air services particularly in Sabah and Sarawak.

Whenever I look at a Fokker 50, I reminded about how one crashed into a squatter colony near the old Tawau airport in Sept 1995.  It is something that I hope never to write about again.

Under threat

I've always believed that any appendage to a wild animal is almost certainly a death sentence to it, as in an elephant and its tusks, a rhino and its horn or a deer and its antlers.

When I took the picture of this rhino hornbill at the Lok Kawi zoo, I recalled what a friend told me. Apparently some people believe that the eye catching horn on this bird has "medicinal" properties.

It is supposed to be a cure all for everything from asthma to stomach ailments. With such a perverse belief, it will be no wonder if this creature could eventually face the same predicament as its four-legged namesake. Wildlife experts reckon there are no more than 50 Sumatran rhinos left in the wilds of Borneo.