Sarawak’s Bidayuh and Malay communities owe much to Tondong and Buso, two Chinese bazaars who over the last 100 years has played a key role developing the Bidayuh hinterland in upper Sarawak.
History shows that both these bazaars, which are about four miles apart, provided food, amenities, employment and income for the locals since the days of the White Rajahs.
Through the era of the White Rajahs Chinese bazaars of Upper Sarawak the White Rajah’s Borneo Company who had to travel to Buso — the last outpost, to collect precious antimony and gold mines for export out of the country.
The growth of the bazaars were hindered following the Chinese insurrection of 1857 where the community had to flee from Sarawak back to original homes in Dutch Borneo (Kalimantan).
But after peace was declared in 1860, Reverend William Chalmers from the Anglican Church started missionary work among the Bidayuh of Mount Serembu and persuaded the people to settle at the foothills.
In 1881 the second Rajah Sir Charles Brooke invited the first of the Mill Hill Fathers to Sarawak and by 1885 the Roman Catholic Mission started preaching among the Bidayuh of Mount Singai.
Father Felix Westerwoudt settled among the Bidayuh of Kampung Daun — one of eight village longhouses on the 1,800ft high Singai Mountain Complex — where he built a chapel-cum-house which has now become a shrine.
They too followed suit and settled in the foothills of Singai. By the time the Ancestral worshippers of Singai had become Catholics, education through the establishment of schools had opened the native mindset.
Professional photographer and retired Batu Lintang school lecturer Joseph Aloysius Kuek painted a picture of the burgeoning years of Tondong and Buso and how the bazaars transformed the region.
Kuek who first frequented the Tondong and Buso region 70 years ago, said Tondong was a busy business community even though it was remote and hardly accessible.
In December 1950, Kuek took 30 Batu Lintang mainly native students from various parts of Sarawak, by bicycle from Kuching to Tondong on their way to visit the Bidayuhs of Singai.
During the three-day journey he photographed their adventure which entailed crossing two rivers to get to their destination; his pictures have been encapsulated in a coffee table book entitled “Bau — A Pictorial Record (1948-2010).
Reminiscing, Kueh, 90, said: “The first leg from Kuching to Bau took us more than four hours over very rough and unpaved road where we had to often dismount and carry our bicycles over the muddy stretches.
“When we arrived at Bau at 12.30p.m. we had lunch with two Bidayuhs from Singai, Joseph Bitin and Dominic Barin and then pushed by for another hour over a pebbled road before reaching Sebuku bazaar which was on the opposite side of the river from Tondong.”
After parking their bicycles at Sekubu, they each forked out five cents to be ferried across the 50-yard stretch to Tondong.
From there the group trekked to the jungle, over a jungle path with many bamboo-bridge crossings then up-hill to Kampung Atas which was perched about 1,000ft above sea level.
Kuek said it was an excursion of a lifetime because the students were able to sample the lifestyle of the one of the last hill tribes before they settled for life in the foothills in the 1950s.
Unlike the Bidayuh from Serembu, the Singai hill tribes were among the last Land Dayaks to come down their mountain abodes which was, for decades, their cocoon of protection from the marauding Sea Dayak headhunters.
It was a momentous time for Kuek and his group of native students who returned to their various villages and longhouses in remote locations like Baram, Belaga, Kapit, Julau, Lubok Antu as “messengers” of change.
Kuek added, “As we trudged through swamps and then struggled up the slippery mountain slope to get to our destination where we enjoyed Bidayuh hospitality which included ceremonial slaughter of a pig and a “Dayung Boris” performance where women sat on a swing and chanted out songs to their ancestral spirits.”
Today Tondong and the Bidayuh hinterland has been transformed and poised for greater changes; Singai is in the heart of Bidayuh homeland which is experiencing a tourism boom with its rich culture and pristine environment.
Bau with a population of about 60,000 can thank the old guard who established the foundations since the formation of Malaysia namely; Michael Sadin, Stephen Sinyum, Patrick Anek Uren, Dr Patau Rubis, Wilfred Rata Nissom, Peter Nansian and members of parliament Dr Tiki Lafe and Anthony Nogeh.
In the last state election, two new faces have emerged, Miro Simuh from Serembu and Henry Harry Jinep from Singai representing the State’s Gabungan Parti Sarawak (GPS, which was formely Barisan Nasional Sarawak) and Mordi Bimol, a member of the current Pakatan Harapan (PH) Federal government.
In his two years as assemblyman for Tasik Biru Henry, 50, has been able to persuade Chief Minister Datuk Patinggi Abang Johari Tun Openg to gazette almost 1,000 acres of native land as a Bidayuh communal reserve.
In the midst of the Gunung Singai Communal Reserve is a Catholic Memorial Pilgrimage centre which has been developed as a prayer mountain as well as tourist attraction.
The seed of Christianity was first planted by Mill Hill Brothers Fr Felix Westerwoudt in 1885 and has now taken root in the Bidayuh hinterland which has a population of 40,000 — a quarter of the total of almost 160,000 Bidayuh in Sarawak.
Henry’s 99-year-old father John was also one of the pioneers who was a role model for the Bidayuh. In the words of the writer Patrick Rigep Nuek who wrote: “John Jinep—For the Love of my Family” came from a long lineage of traditional Bidauh leaders called “Raja Bisingai” and served as “Penghulu” for 26 years, a position now inherited by a new man Petrus Tiwi Kutee.
To honour his father, Henry built a small township named “1Singai Tondong”on the opposite side of the highway about 200 yards away from Tondong bazaar.
Henry said, “We have rented out at least a dozen shops at 1Singai to the Bidayuh who now have their own business center. We are proud to be able to compete with the other Bau communities especially the Chinese (population about 10,000 people).”
Today, Tondong is the “gateway” to the Bidayuh heartland of Gunung Singai mountain complex which has now been returned to the original inhabitants.
On January 19, 2019, Chief Minister Datuk Patinggi Abang Johari bin Tun Openg declared that the 369ha (1,000 acre) Gunung Singai mountain complex will be gazetted as a Native Communal Reserve (Heritage). Henry said this was a unique gift which the community has been dreaming of for decades.
In the meantime Tondong’s sister village Buso, which has a large Malay population of under 1,000, living on both banks of the Sarawak River, went through a difficult time under the British after the bazaar was destroyed in a fire.
Kuek said: “Buso was an important and busy riverine town during the Rajah’s era because all import of goods and food essentials had to go through this little town.
“During the peak period of antimony production, the Borneo Company also built a mercury melting plant near this town. Excess antinomy ore from Tegora and several other mines from around the Jambusan area was sent to Buso in wagons via a horse-drawn tram line which met at a junction called “Simpang Kuda” (horse junction).”
After the Borneo Company’s mining business closed down in 1921, it continued to be an important transit point for Bau town.
“However, fire destroyed the town in early 1950 wiping out the old shop houses. It was rebuilt with a row of 10 shops which until today is almost deserted,” added Kuek.
Eighty-seven year old Mawi bin Pawi who is the religious leader of the Malay quarter of Buso at Kampung Buso Seberang Sungei, said they have been cut off since the days of the Brookes.
“We occupied the village about 100 years ago and named it Buso after the Bidayuh chief who were here before us. Now there are 14 Malay families living on our side of the river while Malays have built their homes around the Buso bazaar.
“Since the early years the people from our village and nearby Chinese farmers from Musi have had to face many problems as they have to pass through our village using the ‘tambang’ boat ferry to attend school at Buso town,” said Mawi who is the village’s sole ferry boatman.
He said that Buso which was the “last outpost” along the Sarawak River before reaching the administrative town of Bau, has also seen some of the worst floods during his time.
In one event of flood back in the day, the river rose several hundred feet and inundated the Malay village and Chinese bazaar across river which was under 10 feet of water.
But the good news is that the Sarawak government under its new chief minister Abang Johari has plans to build a bridge to connect both sides of the river.
“We were told that the bridge will be built before Hari Raya and we are looking forward to connecting with our families on the other side of town.”
With the new bridge and the Pan Borneo Highway which is eight kilometres away from the crossing, Buso will hopefully regain its past glory!
