Sarawak Cultural Village

The first thing we did after arriving at our hotel was to book 2 taxis to take us to the cultural village. We heard a lot about it and it sounds interesting. Each taxi cost us RM100 and they promised to take us to the Cultural Village, the Damai beach and the Cat Museum.

One of the taxi drivers told us that if we were to purchased the entrance ticket at the Cultural Village itself, it would cost us RM60. He took us to a tour agency where we purchased the tickets at RM45 for adults and RM28 for children below 12.

It took us about 40minutes to get from our hotel (which is in the heart of Kuching city) to the Cultural Village.

This is the entrance of the place. Like what the taxi driver said, it cost more to get the tickets from here.

It was a hot and humid day and I knew I was going to get sun burned judging from the map of this place.

Some carved wooden statues right after the entrance.

It was almost 11.30am and everyone was rushing to watch the cultural show. We were on time... or probably, a few minutes early but we couldn't get a decent place to sit. Many of us had to stand.

Performances by the locals.


Performances by the locals and they include the Ibans, Bidayuh, Melanau and Melayu.

The cultural show lasted for 45 minutes. It was really hot and boy was I glad the show ended. Esther said the last time they performed in a big hall with air-conditioner. The hall was under renovation and I guess this was the alternative place to have the cultural show.

There was a commotion even before the show started and everyone was looking up at the trees trying to spot this snake. It was only after the show that we managed to catch a glimpse of the snake. My dad said that it probably ate a bird and was too full too move.

I have never seen this kind tree bearing this kind of fruit before in my life. What are they actually? My mom asked to take pictures of them. I did as instructed. :)

We weren't interested in this Penan house till my dad said that we could stamp our cultural village passports here to say that we have been to this house. At the entrance where we presented our tickets, each of us were given a Sarawak Cultural Village passport where they explained a little bit about the Sarawakian people. There was also a page where we could stamp on for each "village" we visited.

Next we went to the Iban longhouse. It seems that the Iban people built their longhouse to last for 15-20 years or until the farm land in the surrounding area is exhausted. Then they move on to another spot. Hmm... interesting.

Next, we visited the Orang Ulu longhouse. It was built on tall stilts. Unlike the Ibans, the Orang Ulu houses were made to last.

We had to climb so many stairs to reach the common area. The kids loved it, especially if the stairs were made out of only 1 piece of log (top right picture).

Yup, we get to stamp our passports again. :)


So many steps and so steep. Esther was terrified by the stairs.

This is the Melanau house. They built massive houses, forty feet above the ground. I really like this concept because it was so cooling underneath the house.

There were 2 kinds of stairs to go up the house. The kids chose the log stairs and Esther preferred the proper stairs. I prefer the log stairs too. :)

Inside the Melanau house. There were at least 3 flights of stairs up to the top. The house is really huge.

Some of the log stairs were quite dangerous too. The log was so small and the steps weren't deep enough for my whole foot to step on them. And it's not that my feet were big. My shoe size were the same as Brian's. He turned 11 last month.

This is the Orang Melayu house. Nothing special about the house. Probably because we have these kind of houses in the Peninsula.

Rumah Cina or Chinese House. The doorway was lined with a red cloth or paper and like all devoted Buddhist/Taoist, the altar was place facing the doorway or the entrance of the house. There was a well at the back of the house but I'm not sure whether it was a real well, or made purposely along with this house. The water was not clear enough to see how deep the well was.

This is the Rumah Bidayuh. I didn't enter this house because the kids wanted to go and walk on the bamboo bridge. Esther took all our passports and had them stamped.

The bamboo bridge. Kinda fun, but not fun enough for the kids because they only went across once and didn't want to go the 2nd time.

It was nearly 2pm when we had our lunch. I was beginning to get hungry. I had... um mee rebus I think. It was so-so. My mom had mixed rice and she said it wasn't good. Aunt Chris had rice with asam fish and something else and she strongly recommended that. I didn't feel like eating rice and since Aunt Annie said that the mee rebus was good, I ordered that.

Our next stop was the Damai beach. We heard it was very clean and beautiful.