Indonesian Gold (2 page)

****

Baird's survey party had left the provincial capital,
Samarinda, a week before where he had made final arrangements for the expedition, sending Mardidi
on errands to purchase supplies from the city's well-stocked stores. They had flown from Jakarta
to Balikpapan, and then traveled by minibus between these two coastal cities, which served as
communications and business centers for the wealthy province.

Borneo
's diverse cultures and
local economies were well known to Eric Baird. East Kalimantan exports exceeded four billion
American dollars annually, ninety percent of which being generated from oil and natural gas
products. Huge plywood factories, owned and operated by presidential palace cronies, dotted the
landscape, while diminishing forests were grave evidence of their success. Baird, who had
conducted surveys across the greater part of Central and East Kalimantan, had trudged through
snake-filled swamps, found Samarinda's crossroads environment, a city where Chinese millionaires
conducted business on mobile phones and carpetbaggers lined the streets, dull and
uninviting.

Founded by
Bugis
warrior-merchants who had sailed
their
perahus
across the straits from southern Sulawesi in the early 18th Century,
Samarinda's isolated population had since exploded as a result of oil and gas discoveries,
exceeding a quarter of a million by the 1990s. As the point of departure for all river travel
inland, the city's merchants maintained a generous flow of goods, their small stores boasting the
latest in electrical equipment smuggled from neighboring Singapore and Hong Kong. Here, where the
Mahakam River Bridge splits the capital in half, huge log rafts heading for nearby mills
exacerbate conditions amongst the dangerously congested river traffic as ships of all sizes
maneuver their way through precarious lanes. Fiberglass, aluminum and timber speedboats crashed
over each other's wakes as they streaked across the brown, choppy waters, their overpowered
outboard engines screaming warning of approach. Downstream, where the river opened into a wide
delta before flowing into the strait of Makasar, smaller craft hauled huge, succulent
river-shrimp from nets strung across the myriad of channels crisscrossing the delta
area.

Baird has been sent out to reconnoiter an area identified
by airborne geological surveys as promising, an area yet to be taken up by any mining interests.
His mission was to walk over the target area taking samples for analysis, make a general
assessment of the geology and attempt to establish dialogue with local tribesmen regarding their
concessions. His brief included identifying properties with gold potential, both alluvial and
hard rock deposits – areas that could easily be acquired from traditional owners, and would
withstand an independent geological survey inspection. The expatriate geologist's knowledge of
Indonesia's mineral opportunities was unique, having spent almost twenty years plodding across
the country's fields, valleys and swamps, checking terrain and examining deposits as a freelance
geologist. With the surge in general exploration over recent years, his services had remained in
demand, his fortunes improving beyond expectation until he had become involved with Alexander
Kremenchug, a flamboyant expatriate would-be-mining entrepreneur. Now, as he approached his
fortieth birthday, Baird was desperate to recover from his financial slump, determined now to
rebuild the fortune lost through his association with Kremenchug.

Being
au fait
with the methodology devised by many
of these investors, Baird had been closely associated in a number of speculative arrangements
with Canadian and Australian interests. A plethora of less viable, foreign mining companies had
swamped Indonesia over the past decade, eager to participate in the country's growing mineral
boom. Baird had acted as consulting geologist to a number of these entities many of which, he
discovered, could barely pay for his services let alone establish a
bona fide
mining
operation. Nevertheless, he needed to recover his losses, and accepted whatever work came his
way.

His role as geologist often required his participation in
negotiating with all levels of Indonesia's mining fraternity, from village peasant to senior
government bureaucrats. He would venture into relatively unknown areas believed to bear
significant gold or other precious mineral deposits, conduct a general survey, and then submit
his report to the client. Practice dictated that in the event Baird's report was in any way
promising, negotiations with the traditional rights' owners would be concluded, followed by a
formal application being processed with the Department of Mines. The foreign participant would
then make announcements to their own Exchanges hoping that the Indonesian gold frenzy would drive
their shares up and beyond par value. Depending on the viability of the find, Baird would often
instruct his stockbroker to buy into the relevant miner's stock before any announcement could be
made, selling whenever he acquired advance information relating to drilling results.

In 1988, the year following his disastrous losses,
desperate, Baird had agreed to support Alexander Kremenchug's proposal to acquire a number of
local, Kalimantan gold leases, and offer these as equity in future, Canadian public company
floats. Apart from identifying prospects based on geological formations, Baird was also
responsible for convincing the traditional owners to surrender their concessions in exchange for
future payment, once mining had commenced.

Baird had set out, surveying available areas around
Palangkaraya in Indonesian-Borneo's southernmost province and, after some months, having secured
a number of interesting sites for future investigation, moved around the east coast to the
Mahakam River. He rested for two weeks in Samarinda, the sores on his arms and legs the result of
mosquitoes, leeches and rashes that inevitably accompanied surveys into such remote parts, not
yet healed from incessant scratching. When his companion and assistant, Mardidi, had suffered a
reoccurring malaria attack, Baird had been tempted to postpone the Mahakam survey and return to
Jakarta for a number of months, to recuperate. But the urgency in Kremenchug's voice when Baird
had phoned from Samarinda suggesting the delay had put an end to that.

****

The Australian geologist had taken a room in the river
port's Mesra Hotel, an oasis by Borneo standards and one that could never have survived without
expatriates and Indonesia's timber tycoons. In contrast, Mardidi's accommodations in the local
losmen
were, however, far from luxurious. Although Baird insisted that they share his tent
when out in the field, the geologist remained distant, even aloof towards the younger man when in
the presence of other foreigners. Baird had explained the social parameters that required their
relationship remain covert, and Mardidi abided by these.

After a number of days resting, Mardidi had been able to
rejoin Baird. Provisions and equipment loaded, the two men had boarded a speedboat before sunrise
and headed upstream at speed, the powerful outboard engines weaving through the perilous path,
blocked at many points by half-submerged logs.

This first leg of their journey lasted until dusk, leaving
the men with tired, and aching bodies. Their arrival at the Long Bagun,
losmen
-styled rest
station had been expected, the staff there had been alerted by radio. Here, the river's
conditions required a change in carrier and, as it would have been foolhardy to attempt the
rapids in darkness, the group remained overnight, retiring early in preparation of yet another
pre-dawn start. The following morning the two men watched as their provisions and other precious
cargo were loaded into a cigar shaped longboat, Baird satisfied that the two-hundredhorsepower
outboards hanging over the stern, would get them to Tiong Ohang before nightfall.

Following the river's meandering course throughout another
monotonous day, they reached the river station and Mardidi suffered another relapse. Baird
decided to leave him there to recuperate – electing to complete the survey alone, promising to
return within the week. He left sufficient supplies and cash with the villagers to cover
Mardidi's needs, then addressed the problem of whether to retain the
Modang
boatmen, or
call for others from further upstream.

He was now in a quandary. Changing crews, which also meant
vessels, without his assistant to oversee the transition might result in equipment essential for
the survey either being damaged, or even disappearing altogether. He decided to continue with the
longboat-men already on hand, and offered them bonuses to transport him to where he intended
establishing the isolated base camp. The
Modang
crewmen had reluctantly agreed. Baird
spoke to the headman and, assured of their commitment to care for Mardidi, left his companion and
his first aid kit, in their care. Now, alone with the disgruntled crew, his concerns grew as
their mood became openly aggressive, and he regretted his hasty decision to move ahead without
his Javanese assistant.

****

Leaving the Mahakam, they ventured deeper into the reaches
of the secondary tributary system, and the
Modang
crew became increasingly agitated, as
they were reminded of the
Penehing-Dayak's
past penchant for taking heads. Many
downstream-river dwellers maintained that the practice was still evident amongst the more
isolated groups that dwelled in the Mount Batubrok foothills, not far from where Baird was
determined to visit.

Needles of dancing sunlight pierced the heavy-foliaged
jungle canopy whilst unfamiliar sounds tricked their ears. Swept with fear, the lead boatman
whispered in his own dialect to the crewman aft, possibly suggesting they abandon the foreigner,
and leave this dark place. Baird sensed a change in the air – a chill touched his spine as he
caught a glimpse of the navigating crewman's stony features when he turned and signaled his
co-conspirator. The longboat's engines were immediately stifled in response to the navigator's
gesture. Alarmed by the sudden quiet and the guide's obvious concern, Eric Baird fought familiar
bowel-tugging dread of the unknown, the jungle rushed to envelop their surrounds and his mind
raced, and conjured up non-existent dangers. A shrill call permeated the choking stillness and
all reared back as a low-flying, black, rhinoceros hornbill struck out from a nearby bank,
startled by their presence. Baird heard a loud grunt followed by movement along the muddy
riverbank as camouflaged predators rose in readiness, then something slid from the shadows into
the water nearby.

‘
Ada apa, sih?
' – ‘What is it?' Baird asked, his
voice a hoarse whisper, a raised palm in response, silencing him immediately. He tucked his arms
inside the boat's hull, and his nervousness grew when the forward crewman's hand went to the
sheathed, razor-sharp
parang
hanging at his waist.

‘
Babi
,' the man announced, and turned with a wide
grin across his face. A wild pig broke through the thick undergrowth, raised its snout, sniffed,
then turned and fled.

The Australian's eyes raced along the shadowy riverbank
reaches, every log a frame in his mind depicting a crocodile waiting to feast on his carcass. He
shivered, reached up to brush aside hanging vines partially blocking his vision and froze; a
well-camouflaged but deadly poisonous snake coiled within inches of his outstretched fingers.
Baird was momentarily lost in the screaming quiet that only a jungle environment can deliver; he
recovered from his lapse once the danger had passed. Shaken, he reached for a cigarette, fumbled
when he attempted to open the silver cigarette case which then slipped from his hands into the
partially, water-filled, and now drifting longboat. Soon, he would be all out of cigarettes and
he looked at the intimidating navigator, wondering where the man had secreted the dozen or more
cartons that had so mysteriously disappeared during the previous night's camp.

Mutely, Baird observed as both men extracted paddles,
secured inside the hull, and guided the long, wooden vessel on a course parallel to the
embankment, bending low to avoid being snared by the thick, clinging vines. Drawn by the current
the longboat continued to drift, entering a much narrower flow, separated now from the larger
stream by a series of broken mud banks. Less than ten meters to either side decaying jungle
growth blanketed the forest floor. The dank surrounds were spotted with wild, and highly toxic
mushrooms, spawned under intermittent sunlight, and offering instant death to the foolish. Baird
checked his compass then squinted up through the canopy at the fading light, anxious to reach his
destination and establish camp before nightfall.

Before he embarked on this expedition Baird had examined
Mines Department data and Dutch records covering the Upper Mahakam reaches. He decided to survey
a relatively un-charted area where a number of minor tributaries entered the main river
system.

‘
Start the engines,
' Baird ordered in
Bahasa
Indonesia
, the national
lingua franca
. His voice carried more bravado than he felt.
The boatmen glanced at each other, their unspoken words clearly understood.

‘
Come on
,' he urged, ‘
we need to find somewhere
to camp, before dark
.'

‘
Tidak mau terus, Tuan
,' the man crouched forward
announced, refusing to go on. ‘
Kami mau pulang
,' he added, suggesting that they return to
their village downstream.