| Popis: |
Donald Brown, upon arrival in Brunei in 1966, insisted on living in Kampong Ayer, the traditional centre and settlement of the Brunei Malays. Many attempts have been made to resettle the local population on the mainland, but contrary to expectation, Kampong Ayer is still a flourishing water settlement, supported partly by local pride and sentiment and partly by tourist groups in line with heritage areas in Georgetown, Penang or China Town in Singapore. Water settlements were and are still common along the rivers and coasts of Borneo, but as the following study shows, the water settlements along the Brunei River are by far the largest in extent and in number of inhabitants throughout the Indonesian, Malaysian and Brunei districts and provinces. Using remote sensing data we measured the extent of water villages in Borneo and estimated their number of households and inhabitants. In 2012 water villages (kampung [kampong] air[ayer]) cover an area of approximately 25 square kilometres, housing 215,000 inhabitants. Though water villages are closely routed in Malay customs and traditions, other communities have also moved in, making use of relatively cheap accommodations. An earlier version of this chapter was published as Hans-Dieter Evers, 2015. “Kampung Air: Water Settlements on the Island of Borneo”. JMBRAS, Journal Malaysian Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society 88 (1):79–86. |
