Kota Kinabalu and Mari Mari Cultural Village Here I Come!!! Hmmm… yes, now that reminds me, I think I did go for a company trip to Kota Kinabalu in Sabah. Wait when was it? 2010? I remembered I was there during the year 2008 and 2009. What about 2010? Yes, I think I did.
It is all coming back to me now, the memories of visiting Kota Kinabalu, Sabah with my beloved colleagues (ex-colleagues). Then I was still a young and adventurous guy who loves doing crazy and weird things, now I am just a wanderer who goes wandering without all those extremes.
Amazing that sometimes we do not go to certain places when we are traveling on our own, but when we travel with a group in a tour, we will be visiting areas like the mosque on water depicted above.
It was just a short stop before we carry on our next journey to a temple in Kota Kinabalu. Well, for the Malay guys in our group, it was a first time for them to visit a temple and what better way to do that by joining a tour.
Here you can see, I took my wide lens to get this photo of the Goddess of Mercy. It was a hassle to find a time when no one would be walking to and fro this area but at last I nailed it. Where is this? Somewhere in Kota Kinabalu town. I guessed the locals would know.
The temple we visited does have a lot of statues and designs which makes it unique. There was also the giant sleeping buddha which I did not have a shot of due to some restrictions but as you can see the concept with the dragon, tower, garden and the tree makes it a perfect place to pray (for Buddhist) and to take fine photos at perfect weather (too bad it was sunny when I took this).
Before I carry on, who were the people who joined this trip? Well, time to introduce the group who were great friends and still are. Though I am not with them in the same company right now, I do keep in touch through Facebook, email and Whatsapp.
The group and also their family members. Like always a different pose from me once again.
One of the places to visit this time which I did not get to visit previously was a visit to the Sabah Muzium. Hold your horses, wait, I think I did visit this place, it was 2 years back then during the year 2008 before this outing.
So let’s get on with it. Nothing over here, only a young looking Daniel Takeshi Chew.
The only thing I did different this time compared to the previous years was a visit to the Mari Mari Cultural Village. In other words, it is a place to show us the cultures that exist in Sabah. It was also a refreshing experience since I get to understand some of the cultures here rather than just reading books and watching them on television.
For starters we were told about the safety measures and the dos and don’ts before entering the village. Finally something I really look forward to visit. I guessed it must be strange as usually not many people loves to visit these places when they go traveling but it is good to understand the culture about the place you are visiting and Mari Mari Cultural Village is a great place. Though something unexpected did happen there too.
Like always there is always the group photo to be taken when visiting a place and what better place than to take a picture using my trusty Nikon D300. It was worth it bringing my DSLR so that we have great memories of our trip over there.
In the cultural village, we got a view of a man lighting up fire by using sticks or rather some kind of traditional way without using matches or any fire starter.
Sexy right? Recognize this guy? Yes, this is the same guy which is in the middle of our group photo. Note that he has earrings. Cool.
What other things can be done there?
We had a blowpipe test and what better way to test a real proper blowpipe that is like more than a meter long. The blowpipe that I usually get to blow are usually shorter and this was awesome. A real life size and it really was fun with a balloon as a target. Ah Bong here had a chance with the blowpipe.
We also had a chance to try something call Kuih Jala and some rice wine. The only difference this time is that instead of a man manning the place, it was a lovely Kadazan girl.
This is the shot of the rice wine.
The ingredients required to make this rice wine consist of the following products.
Amazing how rice wine was created with these few items and all of them were just natural products, unlike the rice wine nowadays.
Finally after all the tour and understanding of the cultures and playing some other activities like the jumping game (I might have to find a time to explain this next time as if I am not mistaken it is a ritual to whoever that could jump high enough to reach the basket, that person would be good enough to marry), all of us were treated to the next event which is a cultural dance.
Like all cultural villages, we will get to see half naked man dancing on the stage.
The warrior throws his gaze to the crowd as he danced the warrior rituals dance. I was basically video recording a part of the dance (too bad we would not get to witness this as the camera got lost soon after that) and also doing some long distance photo shoot with the built in flash unit on the Nikon D300.
Okay, one thing that I was thrust into by the rest of the group was that there was this Kadazan girl who kept looking at me and kept smiling at me. Then my senior colleague said, “Daniel, she likes you la… go talk to her”. As always I was very shy. Though with the help of my colleagues, finally bailed out to them and just ask her for a photo.
Now this was the unexpected thing that I mentioned earlier. A lovely Kadazan girl that took photo with the blogger himself. I looked like I was in shock. Damn…….. but anyhow I guessed I spoilt the photo.
Well at least there were some memories over there with the rest of the gang.
Note: Blogging juice is back, I should keep it up.
I love this post…look like enjoyable trip! I am saving up cash and stamina to clim mount KK next year!
It was and there are actually a lot of photos to be showcased. Do climb the mountain earlier, the trip up there is getting more and more expensive as time goes by