Last month I was invited to a wedding celebration. It was a Malay style ceremony. Kind of special, so I took some photos and share them here. I forgot about the cultural terms and procedures, so I just try my best to describe. At first, the groom and his friends / relatives gathered and formed a parade to come to the house of bride, where they were welcome by the bride’s family and guests. You can Click Here to see the video. Click Here to see more photos of the wedding >>
Then bride and groom, both dressed in Malay traditional costume, had a “Majlis Bersanding” (Seating Ceremony) inside the house. The married couple would sit side-by-side to symbolise the bond between them. Their guests would congratulate them and took group photo with the couple. After that, the food feast started. Everyone had fun eating, chating, singing, dancing… Click Here to see more photos of the wedding >>
Near the end, there was a cake cutting ceremony, like what we usually see in Western and Chinese wedding too. Due to the multi-culture environment in Malaysia, you would see a mix of different culture elements in a wedding. Their flower boys and girls even dressed in Kadazan costume. BTW, the groom is also known as “Raja Sehari” (One Day King). Hehe… you may guess the meaning. Click Here to see more photos of the wedding >>
Photos taken in Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Malaysia Borneo
It has been a long time I don’t blog. When I looked at all my unpublished photos yesterday, I was surprised how weak my memory is. Even though I can’t blog in regular basis, I think it is still a good idea to keep a record of what I photograph before I forget all the story behind. Another reason is that I still see many traffic generated from my old blog. If this site serves the online community well, probably I can spend minimal time to inject new content occassionally.
I went to the traditional Dance Carnival held on August 12 in Papar. The show was performed from 8PM to 11PM. Usually I am very reluctant to take pictures at night. The main reason is that the maximum light sensitivity of my camera is ISO400 (SLR can handle ISO800, 1600… with minimum noise). If the pictures are taken under low light and far distance, 70% will turn out blur, underexposed and grainy. Rather than disappointed by the outcome, might be better sleep at home. Well, I went anyway. You say “Buy a SLR lah”? Talk2 easy lah. Camera + len kits may cost around RM3,000. Don’t forget the extra batteries, charger, memory cards, filter lens, flash, bag… easily another 2K already.
What excited me was that I got the photos of indigenous groups from East Coast (Sukau / Kinabatangan / Tawau districts), namely, Orang Sungai and Orang Tidung. I also watched the performance of KadazanDusun, Bajau, Murut, Dusun Segama, Bisaya, Dusun Tatana, Orang Brunei, Lundayeh… What impressed me was the headgear of Murut Nabai from Keningau, as the picture below:
Besides Gong, Kulintangan is one of the most important traditional musical instrument in Sabah, commonly used by Bajau and KadazanDusun communities. It was first introduced to Sabah by Bruneis.
Kulintangan consists of a set of 8 to 9 small brass kettle gongs. Now you have a chance to try it online and see how it sounds. Or you can watch the video clip to see how others play it.
Gambus is one of the oldest traditional musical instruments played by the Brunei-Malay community. You can play it with other musical instruments such as violin, rebana, flute… There was a Gambus Festival in Papar on last Saturday and Sunday.
On the first day, they have Gulingtangan and Gambus Solo competition. As you know, “my girl” won the first place in Gambus Solo. I got a few more photos of her in the photo album. 🙂 Click Here to see more photos of Pesta Gambus >>
The second day is a lot more interesting. They musicians played the Gambus in group, with all the dancers dressed colourfully, performing on the stage. I was wondering if playing Gambus can make us happy, coz everyone looked so enjoyable and danced happily together (the tourists were also invited to join). Quite pleased with my photos as all the dancers and players got smile on their faces.
Sago is the name of a palm tree, which is planted around Kuala Penyu, Beaufort, and Sipitang area. People also call Sago “The tree of a thousand use” coz you can use different part of the tree for making various items, for example, the leave as roof, branch as building material, trunk as food for human and livestock.
Therefore, every year Kuala Penyu organises a Sago Festival (Pesta Rumbia) at Sawangan Beach. I joined the one in last year too. I didn’t blog about it coz I didn’t have a blog that time. This year they also had the event at the same place from July 7 to 9.
The programme was quite similar to last year. The scale of the festival is slightly bigger than last year coz this time they celebrated it in Kuala Penyu, Sarawak and Labuan district level. The two most important highlight were the (1) Sago Buffet, and (2) Sago Beauty Queen Pageant. The “quality” of the contestants for the pageant improved a lot if compared to last year. Hope you will enjoy the photos.
Besides, there were a lot of cultural dance performance by Bisaya, Dusun Tatana, Orang Brunei, Murut, and Suluk. You also could walk around to look at the exhibition of fruits, vegetables, handicraft, local products, etc.
“What is the Nunuk Ragang function about?”, my Ranau friends asked and waited for me to satisfy their curiosity. Actually I was the one who started this question, then ended up I answered it myself. Based on what I knew (which was not much), I only could tell them that according to the legend, Nunuk Ragang was the place where KadazanDusun civilization began. Every year they will visit Nunuk Ragang as a remembrance of their origin and ancestors.
Nunuk Ragang is about one-hour drive from Ranau, through the Ranau-Telupid-Sandakan highway. After you reach KM 54, you will cross a 100 Meters long Liwogu Bridge. Shortly you will see a big Nunuk Ragang sign board at your left, follow the sign to turn right, moving on a gravel road for 0.7 KM. Some told me I would see a beautiful BIG TREE when I reached there, some said BIG HOUSE. I was confused, Tree or House?… until I saw the 3-floor-high Nunuk Ragang Heritage Building.
The Nunuk Ragang Ceremony is fixed on the first weekend of July every year. I was there on Friday (Jun 30), so there were only a few workers busy preparing the site. The Nunuk Ragang Heritage Building looked like a building made from a super-big tree. I must say this is one of the most creative and interesting building in Sabah. You can see more photos of it in the photo gallery.
Nunuk Ragang is also a famous fishing spot among the locals. The surrounding view of Nunuk Ragang is magnificient. From there, you can see the confluence of two rivers, namely Kogibangan (left) and Kawananan (right), to form a greater river, Liwogu River. A long time ago, this place was a fertile land covered with paddy field.
The highlight was on second day, Jul 1. Besides the 11th Annual Visit by KDCA, that day was also the installation of Huguan Siou, the Paramount Leader of the Kadazandusuns. FYI, YB Datuk Seri Panglima Joseph Pairin Datuk Kitingan is the Huguan Siou. He arrived Nunuk Ragang around 10:30AM, then he was escorted to the Heritage Building, for a 1-hour installation and blessing ceremony, which was performed by the Bobolians (traditional priests / priestesses). After the ceremony, there were a series of cultural performances and merry making activities.
This was a comfortable mission coz the weather in Ranau and Nunuk Ragang was cooling and refreshing. Ya, forgot to tell you the meaning of Nunuk Ragang. Based on the documentary from KDCA, Nunuk Ragang means “Red Banyan Tree” in English (Ragang = Red). This was the name of a very HUGE tree which grew next to Liwogu River in the past. Many people loved to rest on / under this tree. So from a far distance, the tree looked like in red color. Another version is – this tree produced a reddish latex which could cure skin diseases. That’s why the heritage building got a tree shape design.
There were 49 teams joined the Dragon Boat Race at Likas Bay (of Kota Kinabalu city) last Sunday. Japan, Brunei and China also competed, and China won two trophies. For details on the result, please read the newspaper. I am not a reporter, so I am not obligated to report ok.
Same as last year, all the dragon boats were racing on a 800 Meter racing lane that needed about 4 minutes to finish. Last time I was taking picture with my 3x optical zoom camera. This time my 12x optical zoom camera allowed me to get closer shoots. The team spirit they showed in the competition was something really interesting.
I hope next year the organiser will have more exciting programme. The one-hour breaktime in between, which had no show running, really bored me to death.
This morning I read the news about a team who complained a boat, which was hired by an unregistered photographer, blocking their lane and caused them to lose. They even plan to suit that photographer. I think they have the good reason to get mad. I also noticed the stupid boat that “invaded” the racing lane to take photos. The pictures below show clearly that he was disturbing the race. If they want these pictures as “evidence”, I will be pleased to help. I am angry too coz the presence of his boat “spoiled” some of my good takes.
Traditional costumes of Sabah indigenous people are always one of my favourite photography targets. So far I never see an “expert” in such area. Coz most people, even those from tourism or cultural sector, cannot name more than 10 indigenous groups in Sabah. Many say Sabah is a melting pot for so many cultures and ethnics, but how many of us really know what are inside the pot? I found that even newspapers got the name of the ethnic group wrong sometimes.
There are more than 30 indigenous groups in Sabah. Each indigenous group can have over 10 sub-ethnics / sub-groups, which might use different languages and costumes. For example, Suluk and Iranun are the sub-ethnic of Bajau. Getting the photos for 100+ groups seems like a Mission Impossible.
In the past one year of travelling around Sabah, I have been trying my best to “collect” the photos of indigenous people in different district. Their photos are scattered around in my 50+ photo galleries here, so I decide to categorise them for easy viewing below (most photos may look familiar to you). I know my collection is far from complete, but it is one of the best sources to see the people of Sabah online. You can even find the photos of minority such as Iban and Ulu of Sabah. Anyway, this is just a draft verion. In the future, I will add more photos and write-up. If there is any mistake, please correct me.
