Tom’s Note: The fable is from the Bidayuh living around Bau. It tells who owns the caves in the area and why. Enjoy!
A Land Dayak Girl Explorer
Many years ago, there lived two land dayak children. They were brother and sister, and the boy was the elder. They were orphans; their father and mother died when they were still quite small. They lived with relatives in a village at Krokong, the Bau district. Although there were many people in this village yet, none of them cared for the two orphans. They did their work and earned their living. Fortunately, they at least had a home (room) to live in. Their parents built it before their death.
The long-house where they lived was very old, beyond repair. One day the village people had a meeting in which they decided to pull down their old homes and build new ones. After harvest, they began to get busy collecting materials for their new homes. When everything was ready, they dismantled their old ones and built new ones. The two children, inexperienced and still very young, could not build a house like others. So they went to their hut on their rice farm. This hut was far from the village but close to the vast jungle.
One day the girl told her brother that she wanted to collect some wild vegetables and firewood in the jungle. Early next morning, she took a spear and a knife and left the hut. The deeper she went into the jungle, the more vegetables she found until finally, she came to the foot of a big mountain.
The day was getting late. She felt thirsty and hungry and went to look for water. She saw a clear, cool stream flowing out from a cave in the mountainside. She went down to this stream and drank the water. When she was satisfied, she saw some ripe bananas lying on the ground near her feet. Thinking these were left there by someone out hunting, she picked them up and ate.
The bananas were put there by some devil as a trap. As soon as the girl had eaten, she was surprised to see a huge, tall person standing in front of her. He was half-naked, and his body was covered with coarse hair. She was dumbfounded to see such a person. She had never seen such a strange, funny man in her life. The more she looked at the man, the more she felt frightened of him. She felt her body trembling and remembered a story that there were devils inhabiting part of the forest. These devils would kill and eat anybody who came near the mountain.
She began to think this was the same devil standing before her. But she tried to be brave—and pleasant to him.
The devil knew she was hungry, so he invited her to follow him to his home to eat and enjoy herself. The girl was very hungry, for she had only taken her food early in the morning, and the day was now late. She was very willing to follow him to eat, but she was afraid he might deceive her; in fact, he intended. She told him that she was not hungry, and as it was very late, she must return home. The devil then told them they would have a big festival the next night and he would like her to attend it. After telling her this, he disappeared.
The girl now felt more afraid than ever. She ran home as fast as her feet could carry her. When she reached the hut, she was panting for breath and fainted. Her brother ran out of the hut to meet her. He tried to speak to her and ask what the matter was. But the girl could not speak.
He brought her to the house and gave her some water to drink. Presently she told him she went out to find vegetables and firewood. She told her brother that the devil would come again to fetch her the next night. When her brother heard all this, he was very unhappy and worried, for he knew that the devil she had met was none other than the devil who used to kill and eat the village people. He said that she was very lucky not to be killed immediately by this devil in the jungle.
He told her not to go out anymore, to stay in the house. The boy then tried to think about how he could save his sister.
The next morning, he went into the jungle and took the bark of a tree. He brought it home and stitched it with a piece of rattan into a round shape like a drum. When it was ready, in the evening time, he put his sister inside the hole of the bark drum and covered the top and bottom with grass. He armed himself with a sword and a spear to protect his sister from the devil.
Finally, he could not stay awake anymore. He lay down and suddenly fell into a deep sleep. It was daylight when he woke up.
When he looked around, he discovered that the tree’s bark and his sister were gone. He ran down and saw huge footprints deep in the ground. He quickly took up his sword and a spear and followed the prints. They were easy to follow, being broad and deep. To his amazement, he entered the cave and saw several huge people sitting in a group. There was a girl in their midst.
They invited him to join them in their feast when they saw him. They were eating raw meat from various animals. He saw that his sister (the girl) was in danger. Very soon, they would kill and eat her. Although they had all sorts of food to eat, they had no wine to drink. He told them he would fetch some for them. As they were all anxious to drink, they told him to do so without delay. He promised to but asked them not to finish the feast before returning.
He ran home and asked for a jar of wine. He.gave them one full jar. Then he took some betel-palm root and squeezed this extract into the juice. He mixed this juice with the wine and brought it to the cave. Those devils were still waiting for him.
He took the wine and offered it around to all of them. After they had each taken it, all got dead drunk. He took out his sword and cut off all their heads, and they died.
But there was one very old devil who did not get drunk. When the boy wanted to kill him, he begged the boy to spare his life. This old devil promised to disclose the cave’s secret if the boy let him alone. The boy promised.
The old devil told him that the cave held edible bird nests and fetched plenty of money when sold to distant lands. These could be eaten or used for medicine. The old devil gave him the inheritance of this cave and all its bird nests. The boy collected some bird nests and brought them to the village. He gave some to the village people and taught them how to prepare these as medicine. They were not only good as medicine but also delicious as ordinary food.
As time passed, the nests became more popular and widely known. Whenever Malay and Chinese traders came to the village, they bought the nests. The boy and the girl became prosperous. They need no longer to work so hard. Once every three or four days, they went to collect the nests and sold them to get what they needed. Eventually, other village people would- follow them to collect the nests. More years went by. The two children grew married and had children, and their children got married and had large families. Finally, the cave and its nests became the property of the whole village, down until this day. The heirs of the two children still have the rights and claims over the cave. Not even the government could claim the cave as public property.
From
A Land Dayak Girl Explorer (and the first edible bird’s nests) by Bigar anak Deboi Sarawak Museum Journal 1955
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