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Sumatra trip delayed
Submitted by jneilson on Wed, 17/09/2008 - 19:36
Unfortunately, my planned visit to Muara Dua and Lobo Raman in South Sumatra last week was cancelled when I came down with the Rubella virus, and I’ve had to stay put in Singapore for the moment. Rubella! I’m sure I was a vaccinated as a child. Perhaps this just goes to show the ‘tyranny of vaccination laws” as being ‘utterly powerless for good’ (borrowed from ARW’s submission to parliament on the matter in 1885). OK, so I admit that the small, but sometimes vocal, anti-vaccination lobby is now widely perceived as a crackpot fringe, but I couldn’t resist the link.
One colleague in the expedition however, Richard Geddes, was already waiting in North Lampung when I cancelled and made a short, forgettable visit to Muara Dua on Friday night. Muara Dua is now the capital of a newly formed Administrative District in South Sumatra and apparently quite a frontier town. With few western tourists visiting the area, the novelty of Richard staying in a local hotel was enough to raise the suspicions of the local constabulary, with 6 policemen knocking on his door late at night asking to see ID and to find out why he would even want to stay in Muara Dua. Apart from the disturbed sleep and high annoyance factor, nothing came of it. Richard left town the next morning. No one seemed to have heard of ‘Lobo Raman’ either, where Wallace actually did his brief Sumatran collecting, and that endeavour will have to wait for another time.
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Location of Lobo Raman
I can see why locating Lobo Raman might have been troublesome since Wallace himself suggested it may have been merely "a guard house...situated quite by itself in the forest nearly a mile from each of three villages". Colonial-era maps available from the Koninklijke Instituut voor de Tropiks in Amsterdam [www.kit.nl] show that the locales mentioned by Wallace in the Malay Archipelago are all along the highway between Palembang and Lahat.
The first place Wallace stopped after Palembang was the small riverside [on the Lematang tributary of the Musi R.] village of Lorok [104º35'E 3º10' S]. It may now be known by Pajakboeng [=Pajakbung] or Parit today, as these were villages nearby. Wallace found this area without forest, and entirely under cultivation. An informant suggested he go to Rembang District, about 25-30 miles on, where there was forest.
The Dutch had established a series of passangrahan, or "government stations" along the road to Lahat, and then on to the West Coast port of Bencoolen. Each was about 10-12 miles distant, which enabled pedestrians/riders to easily attain them in a day. At each there were accomodations, a cook-house, and stables. Coolies were available for hire at a fixed rate at each, and security was undertaken by 6-8 guards.
Moera-dua [now the Muara Dua mentioned above] was his first potential collecting station, which he reached in three days [i.e. @30 miles]. This village today is located at a major road junction south to Tanjung Raman. It was part of a group of three villages which included Praboempelih [= Prabumpilih] and Soekoeradja [=Suka Raja]. The collections he made here were not "different from the common species of Malacca".
Thus he moved to Lobo Raman [aka Loebok Raman, now Lubuk Raman]. This is located NE of Moera Enim [=Moera Enam]. It is @ 104º 10' E/ 3º 30' S. It's actually on a small stream, the Air Niroe [=Air Niru]. The three villages that Wallace mentions nearby are likely the Moera Niroe, Tebatagoeng, and Kasihdoea [=Kasih Dua]. On the map I examined there was a designation of something abbreviated as "Beort. Limau" designated near Lobo Raman. Amongst mammals, Wallace saw two different species of Semnopithecus, gibbons, colugo, and the spoor of the Sumatran rhino. Of the latter he obtained a cranium and several teeth, which should be locatable in collections, I would suspect.
Wallace in Sumatra.
Any tips about trip planning appreciated. My guess is that he followed a very old route. If the route can be identified LR might turn up of its own accord. I may be in Palembang and Sumatra in mid-November 09 if anyone else is looking for him then.
lobo raman
i believe wallace' lobo raman is lubuk raman
regards,
cy