In Borneo, the artwork of bubu (fish lure) making is greater than a necessary ability – it’s centuries of cultural heritage handed down via generations. From 2025, you may hear extra about it and get hands-on with a brand new bubu-making cultural expertise on the Sabah Journey.
If you develop up with the Kinabatangan, the biggest river within the Sabah, as your yard, you will have a narrative or two in your pocket. Nelson Deocampo has lots. The river stretches over 560 kilometres (348 miles) and is a lifeline for wildlife and communities. Its ever-changing rhythms and moods depart an indelible mark on those that name its banks residence.
Initially from Tawau, Nelson moved to the riverside village of Bilit, simply 2.5 hours from Sandakan, when he was 17. He began working in tourism together with his uncle. Collectively, they hosted travellers at a small, distant lodge within the jungle.
‘Once I arrived, there was no highway to Bilit, so we needed to stroll from the junction and carry our stuff. Me and my uncle hosted visitors at a small place within the jungle, nevertheless it was very fundamental. We had no electrical energy – we simply used a kerosine lamp,’ he says.
Nowadays, Nelson is a wildlife warden and supervisor of Bilit Journey Lodge – a special lodge near the place he first began working together with his uncle.
Nelson has been a long-time good friend of Intrepid because of the corporate’s small group adventures to Bilit Journey Lodge through the years. He tells me he has been buddies with a frontrunner, Felix, since Felix’s very first Intrepid journey over ten years in the past.
Nelson’s tales date again over 30 years earlier than tourism in Sabah was as established as it’s at the moment. Again then, Nelson says travellers had been few and much between, and the river supplied a supply of earnings between visits.
‘When there’s no travellers, we go fishing. We do the casting internet, we make the bubu traps after which we get the earnings, and that’s the way in which we get meals,’ he says. ‘We go to the jungle, discover the massive rattan, then discover the small rattan to make the fish lure,’ he explains. To make bubu traps, you will need to first discover the proper of rattan. Completely different measurement vines serve totally different functions for setting up the lure, relying on their energy and suppleness.
Nelson provides that it’s a neighborhood expertise and households dotted alongside the river every have their very own bubu and boat. ‘We simply see one another upstream, and we at all times say hello. Everyone knows one another, and I do know the waters just like the again of my fingers.’
However how does a bubu truly work?
Every bubu lure, roughly 1.5 metres (5 ft) lengthy, is rigorously crafted and woven to lure and seize fish utilizing the river’s present. When you’re taking a look at a giant bubu, the one Nelson describes because the ‘rocket-style’ one, the key is all about utilizing the present to get the fish.
Nelson holds the massive bubu with outstretched arms and strikes his complete physique back and forth as he describes the present’s motion and explains how the present must movement into the bubu’s mouth. To assist with this, a bamboo display is positioned subsequent to the lure and acts like a fin to information the fish proper into it. ‘As soon as they go in, they will’t come out. As a result of we’ve got a particular door for them within the bubu once they go in, they’re in there for good,’ he says.
As for the key to creating the right bubu? Preserve it straight. Nelson laughs as he holds up a current bubu he made – it seems sturdy and straight to me, however he’s being self-deprecating about it. He says straightness is the key to accurately utilizing the present and river movement. Properly, that and expert fingers to bend and manipulate the stiff rattan to create the appropriate form.
A change in supplies over time
Nelson reveals me the distinction in supplies between the traps – a towering wood construction for fish and a smaller, plastic one for prawns. The smaller prawn traps historically required the pores and skin of bushes to cowl the outer body however this has since been changed with a sturdy plastic netting, a change Nelson says was a shift locally’s method to conserving and caring for the atmosphere.
‘If you take the tree down and take the pores and skin off, you kill the tree, so we don’t wish to try this anymore. However we love the bushes, and we modified to make use of a plastic internet and a plastic pores and skin to place bait inside,’ he says. ‘It’s good for the bushes and us not making on a regular basis.’
As he factors up and down the riverbank, he explains how every household has an space for fishing. ‘Usually, every household has over ten fish traps, and we’ve got our personal territory. That nook is mine, and one other one is my associates, and usually, we’re all fishing all night time.’
The necessity for bubus through the years
Sabah’s inhabitants is made up of 33 ethnic teams, and the Orang Sungai – which suggests River Folks in Malay – is without doubt one of the ethnic teams that reside on the Kinabatangan River. Immediately, Nelson tells me that River Folks is a collective time period for these residing alongside the inside river valleys and is an identification to which Nelson is culturally linked.
In years previous, life in Bilit revolved across the river. Utilizing hand-crafted bubu traps, fishermen like Nelson thrived off the river’s bounty, promoting their catch to consumers who navigated the just about non-existent roads from Sandakan twice weekly to buy recent fish and prawns.
The folks of Bilit at the moment nonetheless embrace bubu-making to protect their cultural identification and historical past. As soon as the mainstay of their livelihoods earlier than tourism, these intricately woven traps are important instruments for fishing and prawn catching alongside the Kinabatangan.
As we cruise up and down the river, I can see tall sticks standing upright within the water alongside the financial institution – marking the situation of the traps with a recycled plastic bottle tied to the highest. Immediately, it’s simply as a lot a method to make sure traditions endure as it’s a method of offering livelihood on the facet.
Weaving tales
Nelson was 19 when his family taught him learn how to make his first bubu. He says he nonetheless can’t compete with the standard of their bubus as a result of theirs are greater, straighter and taller, however he’s proudly been a river fisherman for many of his life.
I ask Nelson about his earliest reminiscences of creating bubus in his teenagers, and he instantly factors to his foot to point out a giant scar. ‘I nonetheless have this minimize on my foot, see right here, from one in all my first bubus. A giant knife fell on my foot, and I assumed it was going to be broken. However now, I’m very skilled in making bubus,’ he laughs.
Connection to tradition is every part to Nelson. In 2025, Intrepid travellers on the Sabah Journey could have the possibility to listen to extra of Nelson’s tales whereas studying about bubu making and the traditions behind it.
Nelson says, ‘I’m actually prepared for it. I’ll inform them: I really feel this, I’ve felt this tradition for years, and I’m a fisherman of the Kinabatangan River. I’ll educate my folks and youngsters, too, they’re all river fishermen like me, to allow them to do it.’
Uncover this new expertise on Intrepid’s Sabah Journey in 2025. Discover out what else is new for 2025 with The Items.
