On the road in Manila

In the last blog post Tash mentioned our uncomfortable 7 hour drive to one of TONIBUNG'S sites at Long Telingan in Sarawak. This week we've had another experience on the roads in South East Asia that I would definitely say was even more uncomfortable!

We've travelled to the Phillipines to visit another EWB-UK partner organisation, SIBAT. TONIBUNG have several aligned interests with SIBAT so we're hoping that this visit will be useful for our placement projects and we'll be able to work with the other EWB-UK volunteers who are based here over our placements.

Last night we finally arrived at the flat where the two other EWB-UK volunteers are based in Manila after a day of travelling. They are living just 23 km from Ninoy Aquino International Airport but it took us over 5 hours to travel that distance by car because of the congested traffic along the entire distance. I did some sums to keep me entertained on the drive and we travelled at an average speed of less than 5km an hour... That's walking speed!

The view from the flat this morning 

Although it might have been a particularly bad day for traffic because of the upcoming All-Saints Day (a family oriented occasion in the Philippines) we were told that it wasn't that unusual. It sounds crazy but this article suggests the cost of the congestion and loss in productivity on the Philippino economy is estimated at around 57 million USD per day. The bad congestion also has negative effects on health for Manila residents, not to mention the environmental implications... The only winners must be those in the oil industry!

After about 3 hours on the road we finally managed to pull into a petrol station for a much-needed rest stop. The car engine was given a chance to cool down before it overheated while we enjoyed a cool beer and 7-eleven ready meal. It was good to be in the air conditioning away from the traffic fumes and hot engine.

7-eleven fine dining

We had fun seeing what dubious food was on offer in 7-eleven. This spread is made from real beef... 

The traffic moved a lot faster after the break and we finally arrived at about 10:15 pm having left the CREATE centre in Sabah at about 9:30 am in the morning. We spent about two hours on a plane, 5 hours in airports (while our driver, Shen, was trying to get to us) and about 5.5 hours on the road! 5.5 hours is not far off how long most people would consider to be a full day's work in an office. It's also about long enough to run a marathon (more than once if you're a good runner), drive from Birmingham to Edinburgh or make a show-stopper in the final for the Great British Bake-Off.

We definitely owe something to Shen yesterday who drove for most of the day to collect us from the airport but was cheerful and friendly all day. Shen has been working with SIBAT for over 15 years so I think this is a positive sign for our visit and I'm sure we're going to get a lot from the trip.

Hello! My name is Tash and I recently joined the TONIBUNG team out in Penampang, Malaysian Borneo. I also worked for Rolls-Royce back in the UK, and left in May to spend a few months volunteering in the Makwanpur region of Nepal. It was excellent preparation as I arrived in Sabah already acclimatised to the Asian heat, humidity and squat toilets!

I’ll be looking into productive end uses for the electricity generated by TONIBUNG’s systems. The first concept that I’m investigating is rice milling. The preliminary research and business modelling was completed by Julian, one of last year’s EWB volunteers, and his work has been a great platform to start from. My job is to shape this into a formal business plan and (hopefully) to pilot it too.

Long Telingan in Sarawak has been identified as the village that TONIBUNG would like to implement this in, and on Friday we embarked on the long and bumpy journey to get there.

                                                       Logging on the road to Long Telingan

                                                                       A rather excellent lunch

My first impressions of Long Telingan were very positive. It’s beautifully located and I was surprised by the houses, which appeared as affluent as any in Penampang. Our host family spoke good English, which was really useful as they were able to answer some of my questions about the village. They were incredibly hospitable and the food was amazing! At dinner we feasted on wild pig from the surrounding jungle and freshly caught fish from the river.

                                                                            Long Semadoh

Long Telingan is part of a cluster of 3 villages (the other two are Long Semadoh and Long Airport) located in an area native to a particularly valuable type of rice, Beras Bario. At present, around 50% of households have their own petrol-driven rice mills. These machines are cheap, but they mill to a low quality, meaning that farmers are unable to achieve the profit margins that they could with better equipment. In our proposal such a mill would be mechanically driven from Long Telingan’s 20 kW micro hydro turbine. It would be owned and operated by a cooperative comprising members from all 3 villages, and the rice would be sold at premium prices to a company in Kuala Lumpur. It’s estimated that the price the locals sell their crops at could be raised from 25 MR / gantang to 40 MR / gantang under such a scheme (1 gantang = 3.4 kg). A cut of the profits would go to TONIBUNG to pay for the initial instalment of the micro hydro system.

A petrol driven rice mill

We stayed in Long Telingan for just one night, and it was really helpful to get to know the layout of the village, to verify the assumptions behind the business model and to talk to some of the locals about the project feasibility. I will be returning for a longer visit in a month’s time to properly engage the community and to finalise the details of how the project would operate. In the meantime, I’ll be heading out to the Philippines with Jenny to visit SIBAT, another EWB project partner. SIBAT have successfully set up several rice milling social enterprises so I’m hoping to learn from their past experiences.

                                                              A paddy field in Long Telingan

                                                                           Catching dinner

Hari Sukan Negara

Last Saturday was Hari Sukan Negara (National Sports Day). Hari Sukan Negara is an initiative by the Malaysian Ministry of Youth and Sports aiming to encourage people to live more healthy and active lifestyles, and participate in sports. Some areas organised running races but the pace in Kg. Nampasan was a little slower!

Unfortunately you have to get up very early in Sabah if you want to do anything before it gets really hot. At 6am the music was turned up to full volume to get us all out of bed. It definitely worked for me but the guy sleeping in the room connected to mine managed to snore through it all!

These clips were recorded from my bed at 6 am!

Village residents were gathered at the centre by 7 am for registration, a welcoming talk from a local doctor, and a briefing about our walk. The plan was to have a short circular walk around Kg. Nampasan and collect litter along the way. We had a bit of group stretching and then we were off.

Being briefed by the doctor

My group of walkers were a bit too enthusiastic about the litter collection initially which meant that we had heavy bin bags to carry around the route and we were scolded for not keeping up! There was just too much litter along the way to collect it all in one go. I think this is partly because most households burn their waste in piles at the side of the house which can easily spread, but it is also the case that littering isn't so taboo as back in the UK.

There was a lot of litter along the main road, including discarded flip flops, food packaging, bottles, cigarette packets and car parts

Sadly there are no pictures from us working as a group to make stepping stones across a small stream but you can see below that the route was quite adventurous - we had to get around several building sites and areas where the way had been left obstructed by developers and new residents.

There were a few building sites along the route which we needed to skirt around

Returning to CREATE we were treated to a healthy breakfast of 'Singapore style' noodles which (unlike a lot of food in Malaysia) were not fried. There were also veggies with fish sauce or taramasalata 'Malay style', as I like to think of it. Everyone also had a health check where volunteers measured our weight, height, waist measurement, blood pressure and sugar levels. I'm pleased to report that I'm relatively healthy by all these measures but my waistline has definitely taken a hit (deep fried bananas are on offer way too often)!

Health screening and taking measurements for the 'Biggest Loser' competition

Our healthy breakfast (left) and some deep fried bananas (Kueh Pisang, right) which were breakfast the other week

Everybody who took part in the walk was eligible to win a prize in a lucky draw and I was one of the lucky many! Confusingly, the prizes for taking part in a day all about healthy living were bags full of sweets and chocolates...

No skill required to win in this draw

A ladies' darts competition was the other activity for the morning. I can't remember ever having played a game of darts before so I had some quick last minute training from my team mate and a few practice throws. Unfortunately the competition was tough and we got knocked out in the first round. The doctor had left by this point so we were able to commiserate with a beer and watch the finalists compete.

Just what the doctor ordered?