Sunday, September 30, 2012

Fishing Village 6 (9in by 11in, watercolour) - Sungai Besar
I revisited this place today, along the west coast of the country. This is in Sungai Besar, a Chinese fishing village. This is a typical coastal trawler owned by the fishermen in this area. I did purposely left out the registration numbers of the boats because if you have seen the Chinese owned fishing boats along the west coast o the country, you wil...
l know that they all look the same - even in colour scheme of red and blue. Here, I was trying to capture the feel of the morning. And yes, the water is brown - due to siltation from development upstream that is making the river bottom shallow. Soon, these fishermen may find trouble going out to sea. The house far back double are also fish landing bases that have now become seafood restaurants.
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Fishing Village 5 (watercolour, 9in by 11in)  Sekoci, the wave splitter.
Fisherfolk in Terengganu have been conquering the waves for centuries. Malay fishermen used a small skiff known as the sekoci. The boat is about 8ft long, some even shorter, seats only two persons. It has a deep hull and can slice through waves like hot knife through butter. The boatman uses a spade shaped oar to paddle this very versatile skiff.

Thursday, September 20, 2012

Fishing Village 4 - Red Boat (Watercolour, 9in by 11in)
This is a picture of a typical fishing post in Sepang. A modern fiberglass fishing boat in red points to a fishermen's shack. Fishing posts are set up within river estuaries, safe from the elements. In this picture is a strip of green which is actually a mangrove swamp fronting the river, beyond which is the sea. Not many such mangroves are left because of development. Not many fishermen posts are around for the same reason, too.