IT'S GREAT TO BE IN SABAH

I started my day as early as 04:00 hrs to go for work in Bonggaya Forest. The highway is still engulfed by morning mist. As the sun rise scenic view appear before my eyes. I can see the dark green woods and blue hills around. Here are some picture to illustrate the serenity of our Borneo.


Upon reaching workplace I greeted loudly by an eagle and some children playing with their wooden lorries. I talk to them sometimes. This time I asked them what they going to be when they grow up. They said, "we wan to be a lorry driver." Simple ambition but they were happy.

I arrive in the office usually around 07:00hrs and immediately run the spatial data analysis.

A DAY SO WONDERFUL

Early morning I started my journey from Ranau Town to Kota Belud. Along the highway I noticed yellow wildflower blooming. It is so beautiful, so I took close-up.
Once I reach Kota Belud my wife requested to stop a while in "Tamu." As usual, there are lots of people. We went into one of the exhibitor stall. The Iranun's stall.
Then to the toilet of Kota Belud "Tamu" .
Then we go to my mother's house, which invited us to visit aunt Unai in Rampayan Laut. We also took a walk on the pier in front of aunt Unai's house.

Then, we went to paddy field in Tamau. My children are excited and they ride the combine harvester.
Before we call it a day, some visitors from Department of Defense came. We are happy to entertain them.

What a wonderful day.

BUGGER OFF BUGS!

These bugs are nocturnal and come with various size. They always come at night and just bug you. Usually when their number is so overwhelming, I shut down my machines and quit refining the spatial data which just arrive around 20:00 hours.

What else they do to you besides bugging. I'll show you later after I check what is inside my water tank. I can see the water discolored and stink.

OIL PALM CROWN DISEASE

Today 23 July 2009 at 17:00 hours, I and Senior Manager M. Jumiran, went to the field to investigate the causal of bending and snapping of fronds in immature area aged less than two years. According to him the materials was obtained from Borneo Samudera.

In the photo below the SM is showing the symptoms of the disease. We can see that the new fronds is unaffected. That is a good omen. Hopefully this tree will recover.

These photographs show another palm with bended fronds symptom and a closeup at the bended point that eventually snapped. Also visible a Valanga nigricornis near the snapped point (this insect is not the culprit of this disease).

Another disease I notice is the rotting crown, where, in the following photo you can see the youngest shoot develop necrosis midway of young frond. I pretty sure it is caused by a fungus yet to identify (please help).

During the field visit, old Coleoptera attack was noticed. However there is no fresh damage on young leaves. This does not need to be controlled at the time but a surveillance team should be formed and do the census and determine the economic threshold.


Anyone who have the experience with these problem please advise. Thanks.

THIS CREATURE IS PROTECTED?

Ah, its July again, time for turtles to lay eggs usually until October. Green turtles and Hawksbill turtles are protected. But in Sandakan you still can buy some, illegally I guess.

The answer for the question above, I think not because the turtles nesting has increased steadily since 1991 after 30 years of conservation.

(The photo above was taken by me and our surveyor M. Clarance in Kapalai)

ACCIDENT AT THE KB JUNCTION

Today's afternoon I visited my ailing auntie Limbuan in Kg. Tamau together with my mother and children. Since mother want to stay longer, I take the children first before it gets dark. Around 16:15 I reach the junction of Kota Bungan-KK highway where I saw the accident as in these pictures.

The black Perodua Kenari belongs to someone I do not know (I regret I did not ask), and the black Nissan Frontier belongs to Masbak. Ketua Kampung Kota Bungan also present. Luckily there is no one injured. From my observation theres not much damages on both cars.

The Kenari rammed from behind the Frontier which spun 180 degrees. This straight highway has a lot of junctions from both sides because the Highway was built across many small lot paddy fields and many roads connecting to these fields. However the signboard is not sufficient to remind drivers to slow down. Not only cars are crossing the roads, but also pedesterian, and domestic animals.

This is "KAMPUNG AREA" but those going in and out of the junction PLEASE be careful, SIGNAL of where are you going with ample time.

EXAMPLE OF PERSUASION

Persuasion is an influence strategy used to lead those who formally not reporting to you (e.g. contractors' workers and colleagues) and even to whom we report. There are three other influence strategies namely negotiation, involvement, and direction. Manager or leader uses this according to situation and who to influence. These all are needed to lead under many different conditions.

I notice that these two girls, Sarinah and Aziah, successfully use the persuasion strategy to get what they want. How they do it? They just give reasons. Any relevant reason, sometimes funny reasons that made people laugh. But they usually get the objective.

In plantation management, persuasion is important in making people to MOVE because, nowadays, everyone wants to know why you want them to take a certain action. Giving reasons why an ORDER IS GIVEN has an important fringe benefit. when the situation changes and you are not around to give new instructions, the workers know what you are trying to do and alter their actions based on WHY you want the to do the move.

(The guy at the back is our Surveyor)

TIGER IN PLANTATION

When I saw the footprint I thought it was a tiger. M Clarance, our surveyor, took this picture after sending the workers in the field.
In my previous estates it is routine to see brown medium sized cats. Here, the size of the footprints is as big as our palm. So I do some research about it, and i found its name: Clouded Leopard.

Vilagers' Attack!

As the senior manager(SM) sat in the office, a lorry loaded with villagers stop in front of the office. Their leaders come in to talk with SM. They look so fierce like a leopard at first, but hospitable SM turns hostility into cordiality.

The villagers is claiming the land licensed to our company. They said if they do not have any land to cultivate crops they will become good mannered "robbers." This kind of robber, according to the villagers' head, can not be prosecuted by law.

The villagers' head said they will eventually become poor if the land to cultivates is inadequate to cater big family. So they plan to stay in the staffs' house by being a guest forever.

Here I see the example of putting off a rage by simply being COOL and CORDIAL.

TALES FROM O.P. NURSERY

Developing a land is full with uncertainty. It is difficult to precisely predict the weather pattern these days, even more the people. The vehicles breakdown, sometimes for unknown reason. Some people blame it to the Unseen, spirit of the jungle, etc.

Direction from "top-gun" is no more shooting in the jungle, even the wild boar can not be shot with hope the rainy weather halt so the machines can continue land works.

Seedlings in nursery become overgrown because they grow according to plan. The rain carried silts and sands from the bare hill and bury low lying nursery area. When the time for planting come the workers have to dig each seedling out like shown in the picture below. This tasks is time consuming and laborious.


Luckily there are people willing to do it. These people will do whatever instructed by their manager with no questions asked. The pay is according to plantation standards. Their future in plantation is bright if they learn and seek for advancement.

FERTILIZER SUBSIDY SCANDAL

I would like to comment what HAJIN write in his blog entitled "BAJA SABSIDI KOTA BELUD."

Most of paddy planters realize the importance of fertilizer in improving their yield. Nevertheless, due to hard living they have to "sell" the fertilizer for survival and not as a mean of easy life or money. Easy life is merely a dream for them with that small piece of land.

Most of paddy farmer are poor. They can not even pay for transportation cost of a Ringgit plus another couple of Ringgit for loading and unloading of the small fertilizer bag. It is not that they are lazy, but I think there is a scandal.

Once I asks a farmer when the fertilizer consignment arrive at his hut, "This fertilizer isn't heavy, I can lift it single handed, why you hire people to do the loading and unloading?"

"For survival," he said, "I have no vehicle to fetch the fertilizer. And it is the condition imposed by the transporter if I want to use his service. They don't want people to know how they do the business."

I am not satisfied with the answer and gestured for him to elaborate. He said, " Even if I have a chance for transport, the Fertilizer Store is always OUT OF STOCK when I come there. Not once but every time. These transporter is THE ONLY WAY we can take a glimpse at this fertilizer with the total transportation cost of RM3 per bags inclusive loading and unloading. Usually they prefer goods(fertilizers) rather than money. If you in my shoe, you might do the same. Don't you?"

Cat caught my tongue.

SOME CONSIDERATION ON O.P. NURSERY

Raising almost one million seedling is not easy. There are numerous literature, guide-books, and handbooks, and extensive research on this matters. The skills, know-how, and especially commonsense were critically challenged during this time.

To avoid the difficulties of finding sufficient labor and providing basic necessities, management usually will contract it out. But this will pose another problem: less direct control on workers. The workers need to be continuously guided and educated because they drift easily away from nursery objective thus producing high quality seedling at the time of planting.



Contractors with get-rich-quick mentality usually neglect the welfare of their workers. Contractors will cut cost like crazy, workers often underpaid, and sometime oppressed. That is the reasons why locals reluctant to venture into O.P. plantation company. The foreign workers, usually 99% of workers population, turn rebellious and won't listen to their manager. Some time the manager will end up dead.

With that kind of workers we can't expect getting our objective. Management will impose penalty to main contractor which eventually pass it to their workers. The situations really intriguing and challenging. The nursery is maintained nice from far, upon closer examination it is far from nice. I think we have to re-engineer the system, but it is even trickier.

WHY INSECTS PUT OFF FIRE?!

I am living in the jungle somewhere near N 6° 4'46.07" E117°20'59.36" . Far from civilization. I usually read book at night before I sleep. I never bothered by the insects jumping into fire before.

Last night was different. It was so dark and quite outside the mess, after I lit a candle an army of jungle creatures from the class of Insecta, subclass of Pterygota relentlessly attacking my candle. Among the order attacking were Hymenoptera, Coleoptera, Homoptera, Orthoptera, and finally Lepidoptera which knock off my candle and I resign from reading.

Why these insect jump into fire?

Mantis of Orthoptera staring at me.

Hymenoptera fell in improvised can candle stand.

MACHINE IN ACTION

Machines in action. Perhaps more accurately tool-using-creatures at work using machines. Here are how tool-using-creatures savagely murdering trees as well as numerous inhabitants of the jungle. Maybe the smell of fresh trees' blood, the smell of fresh soil's flesh torn apart, and the smell of cool jungle atmosphere invigorate these savage creatures.

For me, once I sit in the office and put it on map, I want them to finish it quickly.

WITH RIGHT TOOLS WE CAN DO

These machines are some of our tools. We can make a hill flat and ravine disappear. As a planter, I have tried all of these machinery but the most tricky to operate is the motor grader. It is interesting how these machine work ( I'll post it later).

MOVING TO FRONTIER

Developing a piece of land is like having war. Once we have conquered a territory we move to another. My team have completed phase one and almost done with phase two. Now, it's time to move. Here are some picture of how we move.... I like to move it, move it... I like to.