The End
It is hard to believe that the internship has already finished. Not surprisingly, it went by fast. I am sad that its over, but I am so grateful that it happened. There was so much anticipation, I had known I was coming for over a year, and the experience here was better than I could have imagined. There may not have been a ton of biology and conservation work, but the variety of things that I was able to experience was amazing. From getting to live at control posts with enforcement crews at Bayayo, to getting to meet locals deep in the jungle at the ginger farm. Getting to attempt to climb the tallest mountain on Borneo and also getting to work on an island and see how marine research and enforcement is done. I got to see Orangutans, and endemic frogs and snakes. I enjoyed foods that I never would have guessed I would like, and strengthened my Malay language skills. Before I came here, I had said I wanted to make a point to take full advantage of all the opportunities that were presented to me, and I can confidently say that I did. Of course there were some things I wish I did differently or better, but that’s kind of always how it goes I think.
The people of Sabah are some of the most kind and welcoming people that I have ever met. They are relaxed, hard workers. They are stress free and do not worry about small inconveniences. They face problems with a smile, the same way that they face good news. Although my time with many of the people here was brief, I feel like I have made lifetime friends. I have their contacts and hope to see them again soon. I have learned a lot from them about conservation, but I also learned about how to have fun every day and live a rewarding lifestyle. This was not just an important experience for my career, but more importantly a great life experience. The perspectives that I’ve gained here only could have come from here, and now I feel even more strongly about the importance of doing new things. I missed home sometimes, and there were days that could be a little tough, but its important to make yourself a little uncomfortable.
I was hoping that this internship would leave me with more of a plan for what I would like to do after I graduate, but you know, I’m not so sure that it has. I enjoyed all of the things here. The people, the food, the plants, animals, and landscapes. If I was able to come back here and do field work or research here I would absolutely do it. But there are also so many other places and people and things to see. In terms of the type of work that I would like to do, I really enjoy fieldwork. I also learned how important policy is. Research is important for determining health of species and environments, but policy is what leads to the actual protection of things. I saw how tailoring policy to the needs of the environment, but also to the local communities can lead to the most effective results, and I am interested to learn more about this side of conservation. This is all for the future though, I still have a month in Indonesia before I head home.
Although I am spending more time here in Southeast Asia, my internship is over, and because this was a university blog for the internship, it too has come to end. I am writing this last post from a train on Java, heading from Jakarta to Semarang. This past week, Andy and I got our open water scuba diving certification in Kota Kinabalu, and then flew to Jakarta, Indonesia. Once we get to Semarang we meet up with Pak Arif, our Indonesian Professor at OU from the last two semesters. We are there for a week before continuing down Java, then Bali, and Lombok. We will then come home on August third. For whoever read this blog, I hope that you enjoyed it. I tried to paint as good of picture as I could for life in Sabah. This was an experience that I will never forget, and I am glad that I got to share it with you.
Sunday 6/29
This morning we got up early and left Molunggung by 8:00. Paul wanted to take us to Kinabalu Park one more time to show us the Visitor Center and Museum before he took us to our hotel in Kota Kinabalu. We stopped for breakfast in Tambunan, then drove back to the Kinabalu Park Visitor Center where we walked around and learned more about the UNESCO Geopark Status. While walking around, there were many animal specimens and even some pictures that Paul pointed out and said that he took. He said this exhibit is newer, so a lot of his things were not there anymore, but it still seemed like he had a lot. After that, we walked upstairs in the same building to go look at the museum of specimens that are not open to the public. Much like when we first arrived in Sabah and went to the museum in Kota Kinabalu, there were rows of huge shelves with tons of specimens. The room that we spent the most time in was for Fish, Reptiles, Amphibians, and a few small Mammals. This was Paul’s room. When he started, many years ago, there was no organization, and he said probably less than 100 specimens. Now, there are over 1300 specimens, all organized very carefully. Before he switched roles to current job, this is what he did. He was proud to show us the room and we really enjoyed looking around. Eventually it was time to head out, but we had one more stop.



Before we left Kinabalu Park, we went to walk around in the Botanical Garden. There was probably a little under 2 km of trails through the Garden and it was filled with beautiful plants. There were signs for orchids, medicinal plants, rare plants, and common ones as well. We took or time, enjoying the cooler weather, which we probably won’t get for a long time. Unfortunately it was cloudy, so we were not able to get a last, up close look of mountain, but that’s alright. On the way back to Kota Kinabalu, Paul brought us to one last roadside sinalau place since we won’t be able to get it in KK. We could see the meat smoking when we got there, then watched them slice it up and roast it briefly over the coals for us. Paul made his own sauce with chilis, lime, and a kind of soy sauce, and this might have been the best sinalau I had all trip. We hung out and ate for about an hour, and then it was time for Paul to go drop us off at our hotel. We are staying at the same place we stayed for the presentation. It is a good location and it was pretty cheap. When Paul dropped us off it was kind of sad moment. When we were getting close we started to thank him and tell him how much we appreciated everything he had done for us, and of course he acted like it was no big deal, and told us that he hopes that we return to do research at some point. When we got out of the truck he handed Andy and I each a book that he had authored about the Amphibians of Sabah, with a nice note inside. Then, because it was a no parking zone, he got out of there. Andy and I checked into our room, got some dinner, and then just relaxed at the hotel.




Saturday 6/28
Today was similar to the day before. We slept in, and then just hung out in Molunggung all day, doing various things to pass the time. At one point Andy and I hiked up another creek and saw a couple small waterfalls, but other than that we were just hanging out. We were hoping to meet back up with Dr. Sheridan again, but they were doing a different kind of task tonight, and 3 extra people who don’t know their system I don’t think would have really helped. Instead, Paul said that he would take us out to look for more stuff along the stream that we had hiked on earlier that day.
Around 7:00 we headed back out. After searching the night before, Andy and I had become much better at spotting the eyeshine of the frogs and we started tonight off strong. Not too far into the hike, Paul also spotted a small snake. He said he thinks we had probably seen it before and when I asked him if I could grab it he told me to go ahead. I kind of had lean off of a big fallen tree and balance to grab it, so I knew I was going to get bit, but oh well. I leaned out, grabbed it, almost fell off the log, and sure enough, got bit. When I looked it I didn’t recognize, then showed Andy and he also wasn’t sure. When we showed Paul, it turns out it was not what he initially thought it was, and he also wasn’t sure what it was. This made things interesting. There are quite a few venomous snakes here to the point where most locals don’t mess with any snakes in the first place. Andy grabbed his snake book and we flipped through it for a while trying to figure out what it was. I thought that it kind of looked like the Common Mock Viper, a snake that I had given a presentation on in my Herpetology class last semester, which is not venomous. But we also thought that it could be some kind of Keelback. We weren’t sure, but decided we would figure it out later. We kept looking, and as time went on I felt fine and was pretty confident that it was not venomous. We found many frogs, and a cool lizard, and finished up our walk around 10:00. When we got back, we looked in the book some more and confirmed that the snake was the Mock Viper. I was pretty excited because 1: it was not venomous, and 2: this was a snake I did a presentation on before and was hoping to see, so it was a successful night. Andy and I made some noodles for dinner after that, and went to bed by 11:00.




Friday 6/27
The Internship is technically over, but we still have one more activity left to do. Paul told us about a researcher who has been coming to Sabah for years to study frogs, and said that he could take us to meet her in Molunggung, where we had previously spent a day with Lee. The researchers name is Jennifer Sheridan, and she is currently the Associate Curator of Amphibians and Reptiles at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History in Pittsburgh. We took our time getting to Molunggung. We left Inobong around 10:00 and stopped a couple times for food and groceries, and then we arrived around 3:00. We got set up in the same room that we did last time, and just kind of hung out the rest of the afternoon. Paul cooked some food for us and we spent some time sitting down by the creek. There was also a big group of campers that came, set up their tents, and wasted no time in beginning to cook some of the best smelling food I have ever experienced. They were even kind enough to bring us over some of the chicken wings that they were smoking.
Eventually, Jennifer Sheridan arrived at 6:30 with her field assistants Pablo, and Rohan. Rohan was an undergraduate student from a tiny school outside of Philadelphia, I’m not positive but I believe it was Swarthmore College. He had found the internship with Dr. Sheridan by reaching out online after one of his professors had mentioned it to him. That whole crew would spend three months in Sabah, exploring a couple different areas. We talked with them for a little while before it got dark, and it was amazing to hear about all of her past research and the things that she is doing now. She is a tropical ecologist, so she studies more on the effects of climate and land use change on frogs, rather than the individual frogs. She then uses that data to look at ecosystems as a whole.
The plan for the night was to a trail along a stream on the way out, and then back through the stream on the way back. They had brought microphones and wanted to record the frog calls, but also collect the exact frog that they got recordings of. So they would collect the call, specimen, and have DNA for each frog. Rohan and Pablo were especially focused on this all night, but Jennifer was really making an effort to explain everything to Andy and I. All the species, how to identify them, where they are typically found and their life cycle. She knew so much, and lucky for us she was eager to share this knowledge with us. We found so many more species than we had found the last time that we were here, but also found a lot of similar species as well. We found 8 species of frogs in total, but by far, the coolest one for me was the Bornean Horned frog. It is hard to spot because it looks like a leaf, and has three horns on its head. One above each eye, and one above the nose. We searched for about 5 hours, and getting to experience their process, and have Jennifer answer our questions and tell us facts we wouldn’t even know to ask about was amazing. It’s incredible to see the passion that people like this work with. She has been coming to Sabah for years, doing intensive field work almost every night, every summer, and she was still psyched to be doing it. This is not the kind of work that people do for money or fame, they do it because they love it. Around 11:30 they were about finished, just getting a couple more calls on the way back to the car, and the rest of us went to bed.




Thursday 6/26
Today was another rest day for Andy and I. The internship is technically over now, which is crazy to say, although we do still have a couple more things to do with Paul. He had meetings today, but tomorrow and over the weekend we will go and meet with a researcher in Tambunan, and do a little bit more looking for frogs and snakes in the jungle. But for today, we really just hung out at Inobong. I did a lot of reading, and Andy and I just hung out around the rest house. It rained for a majority of the afternoon so there was not much to do anyway. After we ate dinner around 8:00, we wanted to go and look for some snakes and frogs. The rain earlier today makes it more likely that we will find stuff, and we felt lazy after not doing much. We walked around for a while but really didn’t see much other than a tiny little frog. Today was a lazy day.
Wednesday 6/25
We got up this morning around 7:00, and immediately went to the café next door to finish the presentation before we had to give it to Sabah Parks people at 2:30. The Wi-Fi in the café was way better than in the hotel, and we were able to work much faster. We were in the café all morning, only leaving to go check out from our hotel before coming right back. We really wanted to do a good job, and we had a lot to cover about our time here. We included a lot of pictures, that were a little bit of a pain to upload, and were also slowed down by the fact that we only had one laptop to work with. Andy’s laptop had stopped working a couple days ago. Perfect timing. Luckily we were able to use our phones to upload all of our pictures onto a PowerPoint, and then use my laptop to make it look nice and add words. Our final product was almost 60 slides and included pictures, summaries, conclusions, and advice for the future with the program. By 2:30 we were feeling pretty good about it.
We made the short walk over to the office and met Paul outside before heading up to the big conference room on the fifth floor. We were early and sat in there with Paul for 20 minutes before people started to show up. Joining us for the meeting was Paul, Assistant Park Manager of Crocker Range Park, Billie, and Rangers Pius, Silver, and Jus who we had spent a lot of time with firm our time in Crocker Range, especially at Bayayo. We were also joined by a number of various directors from the Parks Headquarters whose names I wish I could remember. I really enjoyed meeting them all though as we talked briefly before we began. I also really enjoyed talking to our friends who we had not seen since our first two weeks of our internship. We started our presentation a little after 2:30 and went for about an hour and a half total, with discussion at the end. I think that they enjoyed hearing about all of our various experiences and opinions, and were very happy with our thoughts for how the program might be improved in the future. We were the first group of students to come here from Ohio University, and really the first students to do a program like this at all here. Most of the internships the park offers are for local students working to complete a thesis. So this was a first for everyone and I really think they did a great job with us. We talked a lot about how we enjoyed getting to experience a little bit of everything here. Different parks, different focuses and activities, and different people all allowed us to experience Sabah in what felt like a more complete sense. We also made it a point to say that although the biodiversity and wild landscapes were the initial draw, the people are really what made this experience special for us. Everyone here treated us like family, and that is not an exaggeration. But we also told them that sometimes it felt like they were helping us more than we were helping them, and in the future we think it would be good to lay out goals for ways that interns can contribute and help Sabah Parks achieve their mission. We also talked about ways that interns could perhaps get more involved with active research, and learn more about the different wildlife management strategies in the different parks. I feel confident that it was a productive meeting for all parties, and it seems as though Sabah Parks is eager to create a strong program for interns from Ohio University for many years to come.


After the meeting, we hung out for a while talking with some of our old friends from Crocker Range, before we began the drive back to Inobong with Paul. When we got back we ate a quick dinner, dropped our things, then drove down right outside the park gate at a small little restaurant at someone’s house to hang out. There was Pius, Paul, Billie, his driver Alice, as well as a new employee at Crocker Range who just started two weeks ago named El. We sat a table across from the local guys who I believe owned the place. We enjoyed some snacks and beverages, and it wasn’t long before people started singing karaoke, a real staple over here. We were there for hours and by the end of the night I had sang 4 songs, more than I have sang my whole time at OU. We had a lot to talk about with everyone and it made me think how much I am going to miss this place and these people. Around 11:00 things started to wind down, Billie and his crew had over an hour drive ahead of them, and the rest of us were getting tired so we also headed back up the rest house and headed to bed.

Tuesday 6/24
Andy and I got up around 7:30, and added a couple more things to our presentation before heading down to meet Paul for the hotel breakfast. The food was good and we hung out for maybe an hour, making plans for the day. We would need to end up back in Kota Kinabalu tonight, which is about a 6 hour drive, so we didn’t have a ton of time. We asked Paul about what he thought we should see in Sandakan before we left and one thing he mentioned was a large Buddhist Temple, up on a nearby hill. It was only about a 20 minute drive from the hotel and honestly it was amazing. There were a couple different large temples, the biggest one still being under construction. We did not see many people there, and did not enter any of the temples, but we walked around and got a couple looks inside. The architecture and art throughout the whole property was amazing. One thing that did shock me was the abundance of swastikas throughout the whole property. They were all left facing rather than right facing, but they were worked into the architecture, on statues, and bushes were even carved into the shape. I knew that before the symbol had been used by the Nazis that it was a Buddhist symbol, but I didn’t realize how much it was used. We explored for a little while but went back to the truck pretty quickly to start our long drive back to Kota Kinabalu.




The drive was going by pretty fast, and we didn’t really hit too much traffic so I can’t complain. When we were getting close to Ranau and Kinabalu Park, we pulled off onto the road that leads to the Sabah Tea plantation. Paul had mentioned that we could stop there the other day and I had completely forgotten. We drove up the road, surrounded by tea trees, and parked at the top of a hill where the factory is, along with a restaurant and shop. It was cloudy, but usually there is a great view of Mount Kinabalu here as well. It was beautiful, and reminded me of a winery. We sat down to have a quick lunch, and I was excited to drink tea here as well, but I guess I was the only one. Paul and Andy both got coffee. In their defense, Sabah Tea is everywhere here and we have had it many times, but it’s delicious and I had to order it. After lunch we walked around a little bit, and Paul showed us how there are different event spaces that can be rented there as well, but we had to hit the road again, stopping shortly after at Paul’s office in Kinabalu Park so he good grab a few things.


We quickly got back on the road and travelled the last two hours into Kota Kinabalu where Andy and I booked a hotel for the night. We needed Wi-Fi again so that we could finish our presentation for tomorrow, and luckily we were able to book a hotel right next to the Sabah Parks Headquarters where we would be giving the presentation. Paul dropped us off and we got checked in and then went to go eat dinner. We were staying right in Kota Kinabalu Times Square, so there were plenty of places to choose from. Surprisingly, our hotel was pretty nice, and even cheaper than our Sandakan hotel, despite its location. We had a quick dinner and then went back to the room to get to work. We couldn’t help turning on the TV while we worked though, and there was one channel out of the five that was just playing American Movies. We watched Drillbit Taylor with Owen Wilson, as well as Collateral Damage with Arnold Schwarzenegger. It slowed down productivity but we were still able to get a good amount of work done.