Adrift in a Storm (Kalimantan Part VI)

My guide, Agus, just looked at me, astonished. Sayid, who had acted as my guide to orangutan sanctuaries, had recommended this guy to take me up river to visit Dayak villages. I know this word is junior high, but I've got to say that Agus was the only dorky Indonesian I had ever met up that time. Heavy-set, black glasses, clothes that approximiated that of the worst stereotype of a programmer and an amazing affinity for finding boring topics to rattle on about in one of the most interesting areas of the world. Anyway, Agus could not believe what I was saying as we stood on the dock in Kumai.

I glared at Agus, at the small, battered motorboat boat and at the boatmen, and I repeated myself. "I am not getting into that boat!"

"But we have to go, I have already paid them!"

"Agus, he can't even get the thing started!"

"But, yes! See, it is running now!"

After about 57 tries to start the motor, efforts that required the efforts of three young men, the little motorboat finally emitted feeble "putt-putt" noises.

Agus looked at me pathetically, envisioning his rupiah going the way of the ever-shrinking rain forest. Finally, I bowed to the pressure, and, against my better judgment, I climbed into the boat. Agus breathed a sigh of relief, and the young boatmen all but cheered.

We started off up the river. I had decided to stay in Kalimantan for a couple extra days. The plan was to visit some villages, meet some people and see first-hand the devastation caused by gold mining along the river's banks. The river was wide and muddy and real. Very real. This was not the forgiving kind of body of water we used to cross in our little boat at home to go on picnics. It was a major thoroughfare. We headed out to the middle of it, Augus, me and two boatmen. As we reached the choppiest part of the river, the motor chugged twice, whined and sputtered to a stop. I would have glared again at everyone involved, but I was too busy hanging on to sides of the boat as the current tossed us about. There were the usual desperate, futile attempts to get the motor started, and in the middle of it all, it began to rain. Heavily.

Suddenly the river was all but deserted, as craft scurried for the shelter of the shore. I remembered all the news reports about sinking ferries in Indonesia. Well, I figured, drowning while heading for an out-of-the-way village in Indonesian Borneo was as good an epitaph as any; that is, if word ever got back to anybody I knew in the world as to what had happened to me. I could see the fear in the boatmen's face as one of them tried to fight the river with a tiny paddle. It was no use, and the river tossed us about more and more maliciously.

Since I am here to write about this, you will not be surprised to learn that another motorboat saw us and came to our aid. I clambered aboard, soaked through and thanking the gods I hadn't thought I had believed in. When we got back to Kumai, Agus said these guys would fix the boat and we would go the next day. I laughed, turned my back on him and walked back to my hotel. I did go the next day, but in a different boat and with different crew.

PHOTO is of some kids along a dock on the river on a different day.