Borneo Part 1

Have you ever heard the expression “you can't get there from here.” Try flying into Borneo, it's true, you can't get there from here or any where for that matter. Being from Cincinnati, it is an on going joke, to get to heaven you have to go through Atlanta. Well getting to the country of Brunei Darussalam (I hope I spelled that right so you can find it on the map) on the island of Borneo is worse than going through Atlanta to get to your final destination.


Believe it or not, because I didn't, Borneo is the third largest island in the world. It is lies in two continents, Malaysia and Indonesia. And it is divided into three countries. While I was there it was part of the United Kingdom and ruled by a sultan which changed in the mid to late 1980's, they are now under their own government.

After completing a test facility for Creole International in Houston and Lafayette, Louisiana, Rick Carruth asked if I would be available to build the same facility in Brunei Darussalam on the South China Sea. The company agreed and I was off. Not really, we had to convert our drawings from British measure to Metric. This was before CAD and personnel computers every thing had to be done by hand and double checked. Waiting for the drawings took an extra month.

Karen Green, my personal assistant, actually her title was secretary to several project managers but she took really good care of us so personal assistant is a good fit for her, made the arrangements. I would fly from Houston to Dallas, Dallas to San Francisco, San Francisco to Sidney, Sidney to Melbourne, Melbourne to Singapore, Singapore to Kuching, Kuching to Bandar Seri Begawan. In all, about thirty eight hours with layovers in every city except Dallas.

Karen apologized several times for the flight arrangements. Leaving at 10:00am on Monday arriving in Bandar Seri Begawan at 6:00pm on Tuesday, Houston time. In reality it was 2:00pm on Wednesday Borneo time. Needless to say this was one of those jobs I would be missing a lot of those Monday morning meetings that required project managers to be in.

Meeting me at the airport was John Calvin Williams, Luther Borgeston was my superintendent on this project but John Calvin would get it started so Luther could take a well deserved vacation. He looked like a good Texan in most peoples mind, six foot two, slim, wore cowboy boots that made him taller and a cowboy hat when he was not in his hard hat and always in need of a shave even an hour after he shaved. When those hard hats came out shaped like cowboy hats in the ninety's, I always imagined him in one.
John Calvin was borrowed from a project in Kuwait, he and his wife had arrived in country two days before me. While driving up the coast to Maura Town I noticed how dense the forest was in mangroves and nipah palms. It was beautiful. As usual in the rain forest, no mammals are visible except for an occasional squirrel scurrying along a low branch and quick flashes of birds.

The sounds of unseen creatures surrounded us as we drove. I found out over my off and on three month stay, the Bornean rain forest is rarely silent. The forest sounds seem random at first, however, the background drone is an incessant almost irritating whine of cicadas set against the endless "ttok-took-tarook-took-took" up high in the canopy. Punctuating the bird songs are mysterious grunts, roars and barks: monkeys, orangutan, barking deer?
I'll describe the job and the girls of Borneo in future blogs.