Finding Eden

October 30, 2017
In this straightforward account, British explorer Hanbury-Tenison (Land of Eagles) recalls an expedition he led four decades ago to Gunung Mulu National Park in Sarawak, Borneo, which would eventually help to launch the global rainforest-protection movement. Describing Mulu as “one of the most diverse and interesting places on earth,” Hanbury-Tenison bemoans the destruction that has occurred in places like it over the years. He shares details of his experiences in Borneo, where, for example, among bats in darkened caves, he stood “still in absolute pitch blackness, listening to the sounds of the underworld.” Hanbury-Tenison meets Nyapun, an indigenous Penan nomadic hunter-gatherer, and makes a lasting connection. Revisiting excerpts from diaries he kept in the field, Hanbury-Tenison finds depictions of “the excitement and passion we all felt at the time.” He concedes that other entries are little more than a “boring chronicle of the logistics of the day.” Hanbury-Tenison concludes with a look at ways in which Mulu has changed since he first visited: trees have been “ripped out over vast tracts of country, leaving behind logging roads,” and rivers that were once filled with fish have turned brown. Celebrating Borneo’s biodiversity and cautioning against its degradation, Hanbury-Tenison captures some of the beauty before its almost certain disappearance.