Tribal Essence Borneo

Moving to a new address!!

2009-03-14T09:17:00.000-07:00

Dear friends..I have decided to stop posting on this site and have move on to a new one.. its still in the making so visits me at www.benduncanangkee.blogspot.com See you there.

Miki's Survival Camp

2008-09-03T20:44:00.000-07:00

I recently got the opportunity to visit Miki's Survival camp again in Kiau, if you are wondering where that is it is at the foothill of the world famous Kinabalu Mountain. Mt.Kinabalu standing at the height of 4095.2 meters above sea level, making it the highest mountain between the Himalayan and the Papua New Guinea. A Glimpse of Mt.Kinabalu

The adventure began with a spectacular view, walking on a side of a hill, fill with crops such as hills rice and pineapples on both sides. The walk or hiking will take you about 2 to 3 hours depending on your physical condition and camp location, passing trough rivers with bamboo bridges is an experience very few have encountered.

Bamboo or locally known as "Poring" is abundant here, Useful in every way.Just to name a few bamboo is made into drinking cups, floor, walls, roofs and its a very good fire wood.

Just in case you are in need drinking
water bamboo does provide you
with that as well.
Simply chipping the side of the bamboo and using one
of its branch as a straw.

Lunch is served on arrival at the campsite, you don't have to do your own cooking here, its simple food and yet very appetizing. Some visitors have commented that, back in the U.K people will pay good money in a good restaurant for the type of food we had at the campsite, yet here it was cook using firewood not even with a proper stove. I think Miki should open a restaurant in the U.K, just a thought. Haha.

After recovering from a good meal, there quite a few activities to be done here. Remember i mention about the uses of bamboo just now, we'll teach you how to make them and a few more. Ever fancy blowing a traditional blowpipe, that's here too. You need to be careful walking around the outer campsite area, the well camouflage traps is set up to catch anything from rats to Wild Boar, you'll just have to see it to believe it, its ingenious how these traps was made and set ups, everything they need, they just use from the forest.

After dinner we did a night walk around the camp grounds, we saw quite a few Frogs, insects and illumines mushroom. Here are some photos. But what interest me the most is......

This Little guy, I've seen some small frogs in my time but this one is ridiculously tiny. We found it by accident, well actually my friend found it. His name is Martin Boakes, was with me visiting Miki Survival Camp. While looking for insects and such he notice this odd looking piece of leaves stuck to another bigger greener leaf, and said "whats that, oh its a piece of leave?" i replied "yeah a piece of leave!! Oh......hang on........ it a FROG!!!" The tiniest, littlest frog i ever did see..here it is..

Thats Martin's pinky set right next to it as camparison.

Here a front profile of the Frog

Here's a side profile of the frog

We have identify it as a tree frog, which tree frog you say? i do not know.. I've done some looking up, ask a bunch of friend no one have ever seen this type before, some claim they've seen it but not with that pattern on its back. Its so tiny its almost impossible to take a good photo of it. I could be wrong but have we found a new species of frog? I told martin, Now, you found it so we'll call it "Martinii Kiauinssis" and I laugh...Ha ha.., Now I ask if there is anyone out there that know this frog proper name???? Please, please tell me..

After that interesting discovery, we chatted away the night in front of a burning campfire and had ourselves a good bottle of rice wine.

No postings!

2008-08-10T23:17:00.000-07:00

Hi All,
I've been quite busy for the last few month on my guiding trips that i didn't do any tattoo work.
So i have yet to post anything, rest assured that, i will post something, not soon, at lest something.. LOL, catch ya later alligator!

The Making of the Tattoo

2008-04-19T20:58:00.000-07:00

There are many ways of creating a tattoo. Some of the practices in olden days were risky, causing infections and maybe even death, but in the end the principle in making a tattoo in sterile environments is still the same: the skin is lightly pierced with one or several needles, and while the piercing takes place some type of ink is applied to the wound.

The piercing is done along the lines of the desired design, and it depends much the skills of the tattoo artist how the final result looks. In olden days the instrument to pierce was made from sharp bones, bamboo, rattan or shell, attached to a handle(woodden stick). The piercing was done using a mallet to fast and sharply hit the ‘needle’ at one end of the handle, and the simplest ink can be made very easily from soot and oil. Another local recipe (Rungus, northern Sabah) suggests pounding charcoal, mixing it with sugar cane water and straining it. A more sophisticated ink is made from boiled guava tree wood and the bark of mango tree in coconut water until black and thick. The mixture can be kept in a jar, and a few shards of iron, and tobacco may be added. This mixture is also applied to blacken teeth (Rungus, northern Sabah).

Once the design is completed, which may be anything from a few minutes to a few hours, the wound is left to heal. Generally this should be within a few days: the skin peels off like after sunburn, and under the new skin personal body art appears…

The picture on your right is a sample of modern day tattoo machine (gun). The on the left is the usual commercial instruments whereby the one on the right is a home made machine. To Be Continued...

St Michael...

2008-03-09T22:57:00.000-07:00

Click on Pic for a Larger View

This is a work in progress, the person requested a light black an gray work of St.Michael. Due to its size, I estimated that it'll take about 4 or 5 tattoo session. Two session has passed, It'll be much faster actually, if he wasn't being such a big baby about the pain...hahahah....Derrick, that's his name, is a good friend of mine. We grew up together in the village, going to school together, play in the field, collecting rubber seed in the forrest, basically he is one of or was my best childhood friend. I moved away and after...mmmm.. i think 15-18 years, I'm back to the village, and got reunited back with my old friend..and hence he requested this of me...

Tattoos in Borneo

2008-03-09T19:33:00.000-07:00

Borneo has been inhabited by modern man for at least the past 40,000 years, maybe even longer and may have played a yet to ascertain but crucial role in the development of modern man. As with many parts of the Austronesian world, the people of Borneo have taken the tattoo to aesthetic heights, and they played always a very important role in social and religious life.

Well preserved for thousands of years, Borneo tattoos are testimony of living traditions, proud cultures and a turbulent history intercepted by fierce tribal wars and headhunting. Though being the third largest island in the world, little was know of Borneo until the Second World War. And it is only now that certain states – Borneo is divided into Kalimantan (Indonesia, ca 73% of the island), Sabah and Sarawak (Malaysian Borneo, ca 26% of the island) and Brunei Darussalam (less than one percent of the island) – undertake serious efforts to conserve its ancient and ever so rich and diverse heritage. Because even 50 years ago many tribes in the hilly and rather inhospitable terrain of Borneo lived so far away from what is called the civilised world that they could maintain, almost in self-sufficiency, their age old traditional life, centred around rice and an intricate animistic belief system. It is only with the rapid development of the jungle – the generous logging by state and private firms for short term profits dislocating entire tribes from their ancestral land and subsequently pushing them hard into a consumer society so alien to them – that many aspects of the traditional life are getting lost. Like forest, animals and so much wisdom, tattooing was certainly also about to disappear. But then, in Sarawak, undaunted artist-explorers found the most outstanding tattoos, and their designs soared to world fame. This has entailed more detailed studies in traditional tribal design, and even the local people in Sarawak are now proud of their cultural heritage and preserve it where they can. It may not be continued for the same reasons as it has been in their way of life of old, but the tradition is maintained, and time honoured. ....TO BE CONTINUED!!

ITS BEEN A WHILE!

2007-11-20T06:34:00.002-08:00

Many month have passed since i last updated my blog, nuthing much out of the ordinary happend to me tho..well not from my point of view anyway.. I have done some tattoo work but not much..

For some of you that dont know..i'm getting married soon, so i'm kinda cracking my head here to find fundings for my big day..my heart was shattered today when i found out that my loan was not approved by the bank..now i'm really down in d pits. Fuck, money can be such a pain in the ass. Cant live with it cant live without it, this is the only time i really need $$ that i dont have, money was never really important to me as long as i have enuf to survive day by day, i can always find more.. but this is the time i really need lots..money is not everything but you are nobody without money.
Sure make you wonder about the good old days when you dont need money, just harvest your surrounding for food, but then again there were no computers n internet line either..LOL

Sandakan Visit...

2007-07-25T07:16:00.000-07:00

Just before my Danum Visit i was at Sandakan, the east coast of Sabah, iI was there to visit my Brother and in the same time to tattoo...i made my mark on a few people..here they are:- the fairy is a cover up...

ANYONE KNOWS WHAT THIS IS????

2007-07-25T06:12:00.000-07:00

Here goes......we found a unidentified spider. It has a very strange appearance, it has a cup like thing on its back..it is only active at night and during the day it close up concealing itself like a dead leaf. At first we saw it i could not believe my eyes. If anyone knows the answer please inform us...if not we might be on the verge of discovering a new species of spider...we nickname him or she "transformer" hahahaha...

Danum Valley Relived

2007-07-25T00:09:00.000-07:00

At the extended canopy walkway

Its been many years since I've sat foot at Borneo Rain forest Lodge at Danum Valley..I was there recently on a working trip, its so good to be back there again. Danum valley is a class one protected forest, lush with green vegetation and abundances of wildlife. I've encounter many interesting things on my resent visit.

Just to list a few things i have encounter

Orang Utan
Borneon Gibbons
Red leaf monkey
pigtail macques
western tarsier
Rhino hornbill
wrinkled hornbill
black hornbill
pied hornbill
Pacific swallow
whiskered tree swifts
black backed kingfisher
brown wood owl
crested fireback pheasant
reticulated phyton
Wallace flying tree frog
Harleyqueen's flying tree frog ( if i'm not wrong)
parachuting gecko
many bul-buls n many bablers
many spiders
redsided water snake
slug eating snake
asian paradise flycatcher
malayian blue flycatcher
pied fantail
bearded pig
Tons of leaches
brown wood frog
spotted rock frog
mouse deer
and theres a few things i forgot i think

I think i might go there again soon, maybe.....until then...enjoy

White Man Return!!!

2007-07-08T23:39:00.001-07:00

It been one year and seven month since Daniel Kabubby left Kota Kinabalu. He was here reccentlly dropping by saying "Hi & Helloes" and left his mark once again in KK. Daniel Kabubby is a tattoo artist originally from Rome and had a Tattoo shop called " As tradition Die". He shut it down and began travelling and tattooing everywhere, He does amazing work. i've attached some of his work here.. 1st photo is Franky on Joe's tights and 2nd Photo Bio-Mechanical Actually he was here for the 2nd International Tattoo Convention held in Sibu Sarawak for 3 days from the 30th 0f Jun to 1st of July. I my self did not manage to attend the convention but was happy enough to have meet up with Daniel again. Daniel Kabubby was in in KK for 7 days i think spending most of his time with the "Black Ink Industry" boys...tatooing and partying.. They had fun. For my self..i manage to get this amazing artist to work his magic on me..

Click to view Larger

Its not finish yet...i still have to do another session of it, when Daniel comes back again next time.. it took him or us 5 hours and 30 minutus until he calls it quits. cause we've been working too much on the skin and its getting stress and when that happens the skin breaks and the tattoo wont be so nice anymore. And it was pretty late...oh sorry its was early morning to be exact. Daniel Kabubby went back home today and promised to be back in December. I am already looking forward to his return.
You can check out his website for more of his amazing work at www.kabubbytattoo.com

A brief history of tattoos

2007-06-07T09:12:00.000-07:00

The word tattoo is said to has two major derivations- fromthe polynesian word ‘ta’ which means striking something and the tahitian word ‘tatau’ which means ‘to mark something’. the history of tattoo began over 5000 years ago and is as diverse as the people who wear them. tattoos are created by inserting colored materials beneath the skins surface. the first tattoos probably were created by accident. someone had a small wound, and rubbed it with a hand that was dirty with soot and ashes from the fire. once the wound had healed, they saw that a mark stayed permanently. despite the social sciences' growing fascination with tattooing,and the immense popularity of tattoos themselves,the practice has not left much of a historical record.

Bronze age in 1991, a five thousand year old tattooed man ‘ötzi the ice man’ made the headlines of newspapers all over the world when his frozen body was discovered on a mountain between austria and italy. this is the best preserved corpse of that period ever found. the skin bears 57 tattoos: a cross on the inside of the left knee, six straight lines 15 centimeters long above the kidneys and numerous parallel lines on the ankles. the position of the tattoo marks suggests that they were probably applied for therapeutic reasons (treatment of arthritis).

Borneo is one of the few places in the world where traditional tribal tattooing is still practiced today just as it has been for thousands of years. until recently many of the inland tribes had little contact with the outside world. as a result, they have preserved many aspects of their traditional way of life, including tattooing.borneo designs have gone all around the world to form the basis of what the western people call ‘tribal’.

more info and credits

http://www.exn.ca/mummies/story.asp?id=1999041653

http://www.tattoos.com

http://www.tattoo.dk

http://lyletuttle.com/flash.htm

MY humble beginning!

2007-05-14T08:26:00.000-07:00

Hi My name is Ben Duncan and I am a Tattoo Artist..( I fell like Ami from Miami Ink..ha ha ) As far as i can remember, drawing has always been an interest of mine, drawing on walls or any surface i can find when I was a little boy. I remember during my primary school, at the end of each year our teacher would ask us, " What would like to be when you grow up?" My first answer would be, "An artist!" I never failed to answer that question, year after year after year. I guest i develop that interest from my family, especially my two elder brothers, whom I love dearly. We always gets good results in arts class, top three at worst. On Our spare time we design and prints Our own t-shits just for fun. As We grow up, interest towards arts faded, as We need to make a living to support our family.My Elder brother turn to music and my other brother works with a Agricultural company. Me?! I turn to Tourism. I'm a Licence Tour Guide by Profession, Its been 10 year ( dam that a long time) and I'm still doing it. But My true passion is Tattooing. It started 4 to 3 years ago when i was exposed to Tattoo by a Swedish friend, and i got my 1st tattoo on My right thigh, it was a picture of a sea dragon, its because i love water, I do a lot of swimming before, and the dragon symbolise strengths.As the years past I tend to get more and more tattoo. Until one day I decided to be a Tattoo Artist. With the help of modern facilities ( internet ) and purchasing my very own tattoo equipments, I began my journey towards tattoing.