More than a year after beginning the first mapping in Cali, here I am again – armed with my GPS unit and yellow notebook – ready to commence mapping. We are adding three new villages because the 10 that we completed last year are mostly muslim/Melayu – I’m hoping to see some differences between Dayak and Melayu land use.
My assignment today is oil palm. This village has just a little bit of oil palm – less than 4% of the entire village area. I’m going to map the edges of planted oil palm, of cleared oil palm, and the area that is planned for clearing in the near future. Oil palm plantations are not particularly nice places to do field work – although they offer easy access (lots of roads) they are hot and boring. After 2 hours of work, the motorbike I was riding on broke, and I had to wait in the middle of the plantation for about an hour while my guide found another motorbike. The day ended at the canteen in the oil palm plantation, eating spicy noodles and trying to explain to the security guard why I was puttering around the plantation.
As we work, my guide tells me about previous researchers who have worked in Baya. One woman in particular worked in the region for about 5 years, and was fluent in the local language as well as Indonesian. Amazing! I enjoy the fact that people here are used to westerners, because they pay less attention to me and that at least gives me the illusion of having a bit of privacy.
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