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I linger by the Sarawak River, its waters flowing in a quiet hush. |
The Sarawak River drifts through Kuching with a composure that feels deliberate, almost reflective. Along its banks, the Waterfront unfolds in careful symmetry. Shops stand in quiet rows, softened by gardens where ashoka trees and bougainvillea blaze in saturated reds, deep as carmine.
The colors do not shout; they glow. The park feels less like a civic space and more like a remnant of an old dream, a palace once imagined for celestial beings. It is pleasing to the eye, immaculate, and composed with an instinctive sense of artistry.
I linger, fully absorbed by the panorama. Sarawak feels unlike my own homeland. There is a palpable difference in rhythm and order, perhaps shaped by the long shadow of British colonial rule. Cleanliness here seems not enforced but internalized, as though discipline has become a quiet habit rather than an obligation.
A towering tapang tree spreads its vast canopy nearby, anchoring the landscape in something older than governance or architecture. The name Sarawak itself comes from this river, which begins its long, winding journey from the Penrissen range, meandering through wide alluvial plains before surrendering itself to the southern sea. The river is not merely a geographic feature; it is the spine of memory and movement, carrying with it the accumulated stories of those who have lived along its edges.
Across the water stands the Astana, the palace built in 1870 by Rajah Charles Brooke as a wedding gift for Margaret de Windt. Set apart by the river, it feels both intimate and distant. Three spacious bungalows frame the main structure, creating an exotic silhouette that blends European ambition with tropical restraint. In 1931, the palace was renovated, and master craftsmen from Hong Kong were brought in to shape ornate plaster ceilings inside the grand hall. Even unseen, those details seem to linger in the air, like a refinement sensed rather than observed.
Since Malaysia Day, the Astana has served as the official residence of the Governor of Sarawak. It is no longer open to the public. I am allowed only onto the grounds, not inside. There is a certain irony in historical sites like this: they invite contemplation but withhold intimacy. That afternoon, preparations for a major event sealed the palace off entirely. Entry was forbidden.
Yet exclusion does not diminish experience. I sit on the grass beneath the tapang tree, letting time slow to the pace of the river. This is the kind of historical tourism I cherish, where presence matters more than access. One does not need to cross every threshold to feel the weight of a place.
In that quiet interval, words begin to surface. Not the measured sentences of an essayist cataloging facts, but something looser, more inward. I realize I am not writing about the scene as an object to be described. I am responding to it as a living encounter. Prose becomes a vessel for feeling, not explanation. Philosophy slips naturally into description, and description carries emotion without naming it.
Here, along the Sarawak River, beauty resists being captured through analysis alone. It demands attentiveness, a willingness to sit, to watch, to listen. In that stillness, history, memory, and imagination converge. And for a moment, that is enough.
Along the Sarawak River
(I)
along the sarawak river, flowing quietly
the first sun is nowhere to be seen
as if struck silent,
a thousand unsaid words
settling in the murky water
that corners the glow of lamps
in the astana garden
and you are still standing
across the river
that divides our gaze
along the path
only an iban woman appears
walking slowly, almost reluctant,
yet her feet keep moving
steadily eastward
“we will reach the jetty,” she says
“we will arrive there
before darkness falls
and the sun
breaks into golden refractions
upon the turbid waters of the sarawak.”
and that afternoon,
at the james brooke café,
iban music and songs
still drifted into my ears
“enti suba tua dara betemu
sigi nuan dambi aku ke sulu….”
i once dreamed,
back when morning was still too young
and my mother would wake me from sleep
“iban is not your mother tongue!
do not go there,
it is too dangerous for a small child!”
and then the first sun collapsed
falling, dissolving into prismatic hues
colors scattering
across the murky water
of the sarawak river, unmoving
hoarse voices rise,
perhaps the murmurs of unknown wanderers
(II)
ripples chase one another like waves
carrying circular echoes
like imagination itself
at the river’s edge, turning to foam
white, falling, scattering
flattened upon the altar of the Waterfront
along the banks of the Sarawak River
I hum softly
amid the colors of seven flowers
my chant drifting into the night
stiffened by half-light
perhaps at the far end
another incantation waits
I will stop
at the jetty
of your heart
