The story behind the walk

Though relatively short, Sarawak’s fascinating history reads like pages from the books of Rudyard Kipling, Joseph Conrad and Somerset Maugham all rolled into one. There are romance and adventure, pirates, headhunters, gold prospectors, sultans and a very enterprising Englishman, James Brooke, whose opportune arrival in 1841 changed the course of Sarawak’s history in a way only English people know how. With a single gunboat, The Royalist, this intrepid adventurer was able to quell a long standing rebellion in Sarawak, then a far-flung possession of the Brunei Sultanate. For his trouble, this little corner of Borneo was awarded to him, and thus the Brooke dynasty was born.

Sarawak in the 19th century was as wild a country as one can get. Sparsely populated with various war-like Dayak tribes whose culture included the collection (and display) of enemies’ skulls as spoils of war, this wilderness of tropical jungles was the most unlikely place to risk one’s neck and start an empire. Yet James Brooke quickly got down to organise some semblance of a government with a bureaucracy of recruited fellow Englishmen and established his seat of government at the present day old quarters of Kuching. He effectively became the world’s first White Rajah, a de facto king or sultan with absolute power of all that he surveyed.

Even in the glory days of British India and Far East, Brooke’s little kingdom in the mystic island of Borneo drew much brickbats from the British populace and their Parliament, being the only swath of real estate ruled in completeness not by the Crown but a self-appointed autocrat, a lucky soldier of fortune who struck it rich. Jealousy tainted claims of despotic rule and questions of legitimacy were hurled at the ruling family, and the famous eccentricity of the second Rajah, Charles Brooke did not mitigate these accusations. It is most likely that the widespread perception of Borneo as a land of romance, wild adventures, fierce natives and all that has connotation with the exotic sprang from this colourful chapter of Sarawak’s history and continued well into this very day.

The Brooke’s rule lasted only three generations until the outbreak of Second World War with the invasion of Kuching by the Japanese in 1941. At the end of the war, the last Rajah, Vyner Brooke ceded the much enlarged Sarawak to the British Crown. During their reign, the Brookes’ astute immigration policy saw waves of Chinese mainlanders settled down in the state to work the gold mines, farmland and rubber estates to generally expand the economy. Thus, buildings, shophouses, markets, schools, roads and even railways were constructed, many surviving until today. The present day old quarter of Kuching encompassing Main Bazaar, Gambier Street, India Street and Carpenter Street was built in the early days of the first and second White Rajah, thus a walk along this area is treading on the footsteps of these three remarkable Englishmen.

( Part 1) The trail begins

From the Tua Pek Kong Temple, cross the street to the Main Bazaar, where a long row of old shophouses are now selling tourist trinkets and bric-a-bracs. Opposite this is the glitzy new Kuching Waterfront, totally unrecognisable from the riverside landing jetties for trading vessels of the early days.