One great advantage of kayaking downstream in a river – as opposed to cycling on a road or jogging on a track – is that the current carries you forward even if you do nothing.  You can literally rest all of your muscles, even close your eyes for a long moment, and know that progress is being made.

The downside is that once you hear the sound of inevitably approaching rapids, you have to quickly plot your course and execute it accordingly.  A small misjudgement of the route or a failure to paddle as intended can lead to capsizing, causing delay, injury and loss of equipment (especially eyewear, footwear or even one’s kayak).

Thankfully, my expedition down the Kenaboi and Triang rivers in Jelebu on the penultimate day of 2017 was smooth, as it was on previous occasions.  This was my fifth such trip after participating in the Kenaboi International River Challenge in 2010, 2011, 2012 and 2014.  The event has now been rebranded as the Jelebu Kayak Eco Challenge, organised by the Negeri Sembilan Tourism Board.

In the past, the journey’s length was 32 kilometres, but flooding in the recent years has altered the river’s course, adding eight kilometres to the route.  Nevertheless, I bested my previous speed, averaging nearly 13 kilometres per hour.  I would be glad if this quick and steady progress is a sign of what is to come in 2018.

Seeing rural Malaysia from a river – as opposed to from a car or hiking trail – provides a magical perspective.  Around the meanders you can see gorgeous walls of rainforest, and in parts the foliage protrudes to form a canopy over the water, requiring some negotiation to avoid being hit by dangling leaves or drooping branches.  When alone on a stretch, the relative silence makes the activities of insects and possibly reptiles discernible.  Be still enough, and you might get flying visitors to your vessel, before paddling becomes necessary and they depart more hurriedly than they landed.

As the land gets flatter, human influence becomes more evident: rainforest morphs into palm oil plantations, the din of chirping suggests the presence of nearby factories producing birds’ nests, and unfortunately there are increasing numbers of empty plastic water bottles floating towards the existing vast seas of waste (unless they get scooped up by authorities or volunteers such as the Rotaractors I joined in Langkawi, where even a small stretch of rocks could accumulate a shocking amount of rubbish).

A century ago these rivers were still mighty obstacles to cross on road journeys across the peninsula.  My older east coast relatives remember the several ferries required to travel from Kuala Terengganu to Kuala Lumpur: unthinkable to the budget airline generation, though perhaps the East Coast Rail Line might evoke images of a once arduous journey.

For most of human habitation of the peninsula before that, rivers were the roads, and so much more.  They were the venue of everyday scenes of life, from bathing to fishing to recreation.  They formed the arteries of domestic and international trade, the conduits for the development of language and culture, and unsurprisingly they became logical basis for government and politics.  So much so, in fact, that the biggest rivers gave their names to all the states in the peninsula with the sole exception of Negeri Sembilan, where the adat institutions took primacy as nine territories federated together.

These are riverine aspects that are forgotten to urban Malaysians today, which is why efforts to promote ecotourism such as through kayaking are important steps to raise awareness.  In our capital itself the River of Life project will hopefully elevate the Klang and Gombak in the minds of KLites, through better access and opportunities to interact with the rivers – though we have a long way to go before we appreciate our rivers as much as the residents of Singapore, Bangkok, London or Kyoto appreciate theirs.  Indeed, in those cities, the role of the river in being a scene for great historical events and the development of national institutions is profound.

As I cleared another set of rapids where others had capsized, I again expressed my thanks to God’s life-giving creation, and realised that despite the lack of opportunities for many Malaysians to experience rivers in the same way, we also have our metaphorical rivers that affect our daily lives.  Things happen just as currents move forward.  Sometimes they carry us into extraordinary beauty, sometimes within sight or earshot of less pleasant things, and sometimes they carry us into rapids.  And whether we like it or not, we have to do our utmost to avoid crashing and capsizing.

Well, here’s to some skilful metaphorical kayaking in 2018!

First published in Conservatively Speaking Freely, theborneopost.com and themalaymailonline.com, 5 January 2018.
YAM Tunku Zain Al-‘Abidin ibni Tuanku Muhriz is the Founding President of the Institute for Democracy and Economic Affairs and a Trustee Jeffrey Cheah Foundation.