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| A Long Walk To Kalimantan |
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| (collection date: July 12, 2004) |
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| My very first trip to the Indonesia border was on March 16,2003 with my cousin. That day, we did not bring any nets. We just "surveying" the area near Serikin town. We were hiking around the bordering area and we were shocked to see a school of tiger barb swimming in a stream flowing toward the Kalimantan border. Later, I found out that stream is the waterhead of upper Sungai Sambas of Kalimantan! |
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| July 12, 2004. Monday morning. We decided to revisit that area. This time Zhou joined us to collect the fish in the bordering area. First we went to a village not far away from Serikin. According to a map which I found in the library, there is a river flowing to the direction of Kalimantan. When we reached there, we decided to go deep into the border. A local villager told me the road to a town in Kalimantan when I asked for direction. After half an hour driving in the terrible road, I decided to turn back as the road is getting unsuitable to a normal car to drive on. I was so regret that I didn't buy 4WD car. |
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One of the roads to Kalimantan. |
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Then, we stopped at a village where there is a river about 10 meter wide flowing to the direction of Indonesia. Three of us heading to different direction to collect fish. At first, we only found the common species of fish and started to feel doubt this is the upper Sg. Sambas. |
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| About half an hour later, my cousin found a rasbora which looks like Rasbora brittani. This is our first time to see this rasbora. We're getting excited and continue to "hunt" for unknown species of fish. I set up a gill net in the deeper part of the river and caught a beautiful Rasbora caudimaculata which got orange colored spots on the caudal fins. |
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I never seen a orange colored caudal fins of Rasbora caudimaculata before! |
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One of the tributary of Sg. Sambas of Kalimantan. |
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Picture above is Rasbora kalbarensis. On the left is the road to Kalimantan. Every Sunday, Indonesians will travel this road to Serikin town to sell cheap Indonesian product in the market there. |
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| At the meantime, Zhou was going deep into the upper part of the river found Hampala bimaculata, an unknown species of catfish and the rasbora looks like Rasbora brittani. When Zhou's foot nail was hurt, we had to turn back to the Bau town. I wanted to continue to collect fish but since we're coming in a group, I should not be too selfish. Before we left, I pulled off my gill net and found two 26cm long Apollo sharks!!! Gosh! This is my first time saw such a beautiful Apollo shark! |
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Apollo shark, Luciosoma setigerum |
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| When we finished our lunch in Bau town, we went to Serikin town which is so close to the border. I parked my car at the town, then we hiked to the border. We came across this army guard post and we asked the permission to go to the border to collect fish. The permission was granted and we continued to hike for 15 minutes and we saw the stream where we found tiger barbs in previous year. |
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| After taking the biotope picture, we continued to hike. We stopped at a small town where we saw a few motor bikers resting under the hut and trees. All the plate number of motor bike are registered in Kalimantan Barat. I was so curious and asked a local. He told me that we're stepping on the soil of Kalimantan. I couldn't believe it and started to look for something which can prove me that local is not lying. I saw this triangle shaped pole which got a few line of words written : "Indonesia (Kalimantan Barat)". All of us wanted to jump up when we saw the words "Kalimantan Barat ". Zhou has a pair of sharp eyes. He saw a local carrying a small basket and asked him to show us what is inside. Oh no! That basket is full of fish collected in the nearby stream. We're shocked to see Betta cf pugnax!!!And a few unknown species of catfish and eel. The most interesting species is Puntius kuchingensis. This species supposed to be endemic to Sarawak but we found it inside the Kalimantan! |
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The local gave us that betta since he was so surprised to see us smiling at that fish like insane people. We took some picture and then left the town happily. |
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A town near the border. Everyone is curious that we're taking the picture of the wild fish. |
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Zhou is taking out the fish one by one from the basket. A local joked at us " Are you looking for flower horn cichlid ?" |
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A triangle shaped pole marks the territory of Kalimantan. |
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Betta cf pugnax "Upper Sg. sambas" |
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| We're hiking back to Malaysia border and looking for unknown species of fish in this waterhead of Sg. Sambas. We found Rasbora Volzii for the first time. Later, we went to that stream where we saw tiger barb. I caught a beautiful loach. (Nemachilus sp.) After spending almost one hour there, we decided to go home. It was a wonderful trip although we're totally exhausted. |
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| My cousin had to walk across the border in bare foots as his slipper was spoiled. I hurt my left leg while crossing a drain and got difficulty to hike. And, Zhou was suffering as he hurt his foot nail while collecting fish in the river we visited that morning. All of us were paying a price to explore this bordering area. After seeing the fish we collected for the whole day, we're already forgotten our pain. In our mind, we know we will come back to Kalimantan again. |
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| "Kalimantan! We shall be back!" |
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A school of tiger barb. |
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A guard post near the border. (Malaysia) We are not allowed to take the picture of military personnel or military facilities but we still managed to take the picture from a distance..... |
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