21st.Dec.2007 found us, a group of 36 city folks, trudging through mud on our way to a fish farm. We were in Long Beluyu, on the highlands near Lawas, quite near Ba Kelalan.
My husband, my youngest son, my daughter and I have joined our good friend's family - his own family plus all his brothers and sisters and nephews and nieces - on a visit to his Lun Bawang roots. When we trudged through mud for 2-3 hours, we were told that my friend and his siblings used to walk like that for 3 days just to get to school. And they did it, starting at the tender age of 6 plus, without any adult supervision but under the guidance of older school-mates.

After the first 15 min of walking bare-foot through the very muddy path, I nearly gave up because I was never this dirty in my life before. My feet were sore from cuts and bruises and I really did not like the idea of stepping into a muddy puddle, not knowing what is at the bottom of it. Sometimes, there were sharp thorns or sharp pieces of wood. Sometimes it was simply so slippery that I fell on my bottoms and was covered with mud. Often we had to step on buffalo shit which we nicknamed "Hongkong Pau" because it was all over the place. When we finally reached the fish pond we were rewarded with freshly-cut sugar cane to quench our thirst. The view was beautiful - 2 big fish ponds and padi fields with their golden grains nearby. We had a lot of fun catching fish with nets - 2 pails of fresh water fish for our dinner that day. But we had to trudge through mud again on our way home. I was so glad to see the village again. The ordeal was over! The feeling of great satisfaction that I was able to complete that journey was wonderful! It goes to show that often we are capable of doing much more than we think we can! Let us not be limited by what we think we can do. Let us look for opportunities to test our limits - physical, mental, spiritual - to try to go beyond what we know we can do!