The zero latitude line of the Earth’s equator passes almost through the middle of our third largest island, Kalimantan. When viewed on a Mercator projection map, some people might even imagine the equator looks a bit like a tight belt slung crudely around the belly of a rather rotund person, as it almost dissects the island in two.
The island itself is actually part of the Greater Sunda Archipelago and has the large Indonesian province of Borneo in its lower half. As a result of its proximity to the centre of the planet, Borneo enjoys a range of interesting natural phenomena. For instance, the days and nights are roughly of equal length right throughout the year. There are definitely no mid-summer parties held in that part of the world. Temperatures near the equator are also consistently warm; you can almost set your clock on the maximum temperature reaching around 32 degrees Celsius on any day of the year.
Because of the monsoonal heat it experiences; and the fact Borneo is largely surrounded by ocean, the island as a whole experiences plentiful rain and dense humidity on an almost constant basis. The tropical climate, combined with a sparse population, general remoteness and lofty hills enables Borneo to host relatively large tracts of unspoiled rainforest. The primordial jungle areas are rich with lavish vegetation and among the very few places left on earth where rhino, tigers, elephants and orangutan can be still be found living together in their natural environment. Apart from those larger beasts, many other exotic animals, such as the proboscis monkey, sun bear and clouded leopard, also enjoy a happy residence under the thick canopy of trees.
On the musky and muddy floor of the jungle terrain slither and slide one of Asia’s largest reptiles, the reticulated python. These beautiful animals, decorated in colourful geometric patterns, can range in sizes up to 6.5 metres long; and weigh in excess of 75 kilograms. While the pythons aren’t poisonous, they can still be very dangerous to the rare humans who might happen to chance upon one unexpectedly. The threat comes mainly from the python’s ability to coil itself around their prey and exert an immense crushing force. Fortunately the snakes aren’t usually interested in any rare human visitations. There are more than ample alternative options of small mammals and birds for them to dine upon.
With over seven and a half billion people on the planet at this point in our history, even the planet’s more remote and non-human friendly regions, including the dark rainforests of Borneo, are not too distant from some form of human habitation.
Amat and his brother Yani are in fact two men who prove this point. They both live in a small community just on the outskirts of one of Borneo’s largest rain forests. The little pocket of bamboo and thatch shelters which the brothers and their extended family call home are crowded around a patchwork of muddy crop fields. Those fields have only recently been slashed and burned in order to extract some arable crop land from the adjacent rain forest. The ethnic Dayak community to which Amat and Yani belong grow bananas, taro and other fast maturing food crops on their newly acquired land and will continue living on their current plot until the low levels of fertility expire. It’ll then be time for the clan to uproot and move on once again.
At the present moment though, chickens and pigs run freely around the small village, which is at the end of a long, pot holed, red dirt road that winds its way through hundreds of kilometres of denuded former forest and recently planted palm oil plantations, until it connects with more developed forms of urban civilization.
Amat and Yani’s descendants have lived a similar basic subsistence life style on the edge of the rain forest for many centuries. As a result of their accumulated cultural history, both brothers are well versed in the secrets and traditions of how to hunt and trap the many animal species that live in the nearby jungle. Wild animals had long been an important source of protein and traditional medicine for the Dayaks. More recently, however, men have travelled from the outside world and offered what seems like good money for the large snake skins belonging to the giant reptiles of the forest.
To boost their incomes, mainly in order to buy more productive forms of farm machinery, the two brothers would regularly venture into the depths of the jungle to search for the serpents. They’d recently spent three days and nights in the forest to that end. Aided only by kerosene lamps to shed some light on the black darkness, they’d set lairs and traps next to running waterways, a favourite haunt of the pythons. The pair had been lucky enough to snare four unsuspecting victims during their latest hunting foray, two of which had been caught by hand in the middle of the dark night. The captured pythons had all been swiftly decapitated with the razor sharp machetes each brother carried with him at all times. Once the snakes stopped writhing, they’d been allowed to bleed before having their skin removed on the spot. The brothers had also sliced off some fatty pieces of flesh for their own consumption, but the residual carcasses had been left to either rot on the jungle floor or more likely, provide sustenance to some of the other forest carnivores.
Once the brother’s maximum carry load had been achieved, the heavy skins had been dragged along dark forest trails, back out to the open daylight. After arriving back at the brother’s farm the skins were stretched onto bamboo frames and left to dry for many days in the hot sun. Each morning the brothers would scrape residual dried flesh from the skin, using the same machete’s that had ended the reptile’s life. Pig fat was also rubbed lightly onto the decorative side of the skin each day, giving it lustre and acting as a preservative. By the end of the curing process the skins had transformed into a taut and beautiful leather. The finished products had then been rolled up and stored in a dry place, waiting until the man from the outside world paid his next visit to the tiny village.
A battered old Toyota four wheel drive, driven by an ethnic Chinese man, surely enough puttered into the village at the end of the same month in which the pythons had been caught. The visitor inspected the new skins on offer and being happy with the quality and size, handed over four crisp fifty American dollar bills, the same price he’d haggled hard for during his last visit.
It took the trader, Mr Yip, a full thirty hours to complete the 800 kilometre round trip out to the Dayak village and then back home again. Upon his return Mr Yip had a short sleep and then drove down to his shop-house business premises, located on what was the main street of the ramshackle town where he lived. Moving quickly he wrapped the four new snake skins in thin paper, then covered it again with plastic bubble wrap before placing the package securely into a large and sturdy cardboard box. After finishing that task Mr Yip sent an email to the next contact in the supply chain, requesting a bank transfer of 1,000 US dollars to his account in payment for the skins. Mr Yip then carried the box a short way down the street to a freight handling company, They arranged for it to be sent via the afternoon Garuda flight to his contact in Jakarta, Indonesia’s capital situated to the south, on the island of Java.
The airline service was efficient and the box containing the skins was duly delivered the following day to a Jakarta businessman who dealt in hides extracted from all manner of exotic animals found throughout Indonesia. When the box arrived, the manager had opened it and gave the snake skins a thorough inspection. Satisfied there were no flaws; and that the skins were in impeccable condition, he resealed the box and placed a new address label over the one Mr Yip had stuck on the box less than 24 hours earlier. The box was then put into the hands of yet another freight company, who after paying a small bribe to have the skins customs cleared, air freighted the box away to an international hide dealer located in Milan, Italy. Remarkably, each skin’s price had once again quadrupled, this time to USD 1,000 apiece. Not a bad profit for such a brief stay.
The company in Milan who ultimately received the recently prepared snake skins were in the business of procuring and selling exotic and unusual hides sourced from all over the world. Because of their unique and high quality holdings, the businesses show rooms were frequented by a regular throng of international designers and manufacturers, all of whom had travelled across the globe in search of something different and unusual to distinguish their individually designed fashion and furniture products. Two days after the Bornean python skins had arrived and been put on display in Milan, a London clothing designer who was on a buying trip to Italy snapped up two of the skins at USD 2,500 apiece. It was a high price to pay, but the designer had been immediately impressed by the distinctive colour and pattern of the skins. They’d set his creative impulses instantly into overdrive.
After returning to England with the snake skins accompanying him as personal baggage, the much sought after and popular designer set straight to work in drawing up patterns and cutting the newly purchased skins into useable pieces. Within a week of his return from Milan the designer managed to produce, aided by a talented production team, twenty pairs of the beautiful snake skin retro style gym shoes he’d envisioned while still in the Milanese leather dealer’s showroom. The finished product was of course a glorious and absurdist extravagance, but my word what a colourful and original fashion statement they were. The distinctive boots would naturally also have a price tag that matched their originality.
As the designer had hoped, his newly produced footwear were all eagerly accepted and showcased by a group of willing clothing and footwear outlets, mostly in the trendy and upmarket suburb of London’s Chelsea. The first pair of exotic gym boots to be snapped up on the first day they went on sale fetched a handsome price of 800 English pounds. That lofty price had been willingly paid by a young woman in her late 20’s. Her name was Clarissa and her purchase at that extreme price was possible because she happened to have an outrageous amount of disposable cash to spend at her leisure. The reason she was so fortunate to be rolling in money was mainly because Clarissa was what is euphemistically known in Britain as a “trust brat”. Her father, a now deceased investment banker, had gone to great and devious lengths to ensure his only child was well catered for on the money side of things. As a result of her coming into such easy wealth, Clarissa had in recent years developed extravagant and hedonistic tastes for booze, drugs and of course clothing. She was at the time of her python boot purchase one of the darlings of London’s vibrant clubbing society; and she couldn’t wait to paint the town red, shod in her new and novel sneakers, which in her mind were a fashion statement par excellence.
The in-crowd and especially all the it-girls at the new club opening she attended that evening all air kissed and ooooooh’d and aaaaah’d appropriately when they saw Clarissa’s lavish new footwear. The night of over the top binging which followed left Clarissa wiped out. Her new shoes were carelessly kicked off into a corner before she dived exhausted into bed after her early morning return home. The booze covered snake skin sneakers were left to dry and shrink for a few weeks in the same place they’d landed that morning. The gym shoes, which for the sake of this story we shall personify by naming Peter Python Boots, were in fact only to be worn by Clarissa on two more occasions. Her lifestyle at the point she’d made the Peter Python Boot purchase was one of constantly searching for what she hoped might be the new big thing. That of course meant many of the expensive things she purchased very quickly became redundant.
Almost a year to the day after she’d brought them, Clarissa was found loading Peter Python Boots, along with a whole range of other extravagant but rarely worn clothing purchases, into ten big black plastic garbage bags. It transpired that Clarissa had ultimately grown tired of her wild and rootless lifestyle and had made a decision to settle down and marry one of the conservative young investment bankers from her father’s old firm.
The inner London charity shop where Clarissa dropped off her bags was already full of pre-loved clothing and other exotic paraphernalia. As a consequence the shop was well known and a frequent haunt for bargain hunters and also those with an eye for the eclectic and eccentric.
A young and free spirited Polish woman by the name of Agnes was first to spot the snake skin sneakers, only minutes after they’d been placed on display. The freshly cleaned sneakers looked spectacular and had been priced at a modest, but healthy by charity shop standards, forty pounds. Agnes had no qualms at all about parting with her money. The instant she’d seen Peter Python Boots she knew she wanted them more than anything else on the planet.
Agnes at the time of her serendipitous purchase had been living in London for a little over five years. She’d originally moved there in order to try and make some money working as an au pair girl after having recently graduated with a degree in psychology from a Warsaw University. Her hosts, employers really, had been immediately taken by Agnes’s joie de vie, intelligence and willingness to work hard. They happily helped her to make additional contacts in order that she could improve her money making prospects. As it turned out Agnes also proved to have outstanding entrepreneurial skills and was prepared to take risks and work as many hours as it took to get a task completed. She initially extended her working hours by doing the cleaning at some nearby neighbour’s homes. Word about her ethical and efficient services soon spread and before long she had several other cleaning jobs in addition to an ever increasing number of people clamouring for her services in cash rich but time poor London. To help meet the growing demand, Agnes arranged for several of her Warsaw University friends to come to London. Together they expanded the newly formed cleaning business very rapidly. Within months of getting her select cleaning team together, Agnes had negotiated to clean 30 houses, 10 business premises and several factories. It kept her very busy, but she was happy with that as large amounts of money were also rolling in. Aside from being a good and fair businessperson, Agnes was extremely assiduous with her savings. Using frugal cooking skills she’d learned from her mother in Poland, Agnes managed to live quite cheaply in the exorbitantly priced city of London.
It was her mother’s grave illness which had recently forced Agnes to sell her share of the business to her partners in order that she could return home to care for her ailing parent. She’d prepared herself well for her return though. Over the years of her business she managed to purchase three small apartments in the heart of Warsaw. In the weeks prior to her buying Peter Python Boots Agnes had also been busy procuring washing machines, fridges and all sorts of pre-loved but now redundant household paraphernalia from charity shops, EBay and Gumtree to fit out her apartments. All had been tightly packed into the small covered truck she’d brought to take both herself and her new consumer goods back home to Warsaw.
One of the things Agnes had greatly taken to when she first arrived in London, and was spending a lot of time looking after the small children of her host family, was watching nature programs on television. Her favourite had been all of David Attenborough’s series, which were shown regularly on the BBC. The natural beauty and the ever mounting plight of animals losing their natural habitat had played straight and strong to Agnes’s empathetic nature. She developed a resolve to one day do whatever she could to help stop the decline in animal habitats.
After Agnes returned to Warsaw, apart from helping her sister look after their mother, she also became increasingly involved in a variety of local and international animal rights projects, in particular the World Wildlife Fund. The local arm of that organization, which she’d joined as a full member, were quick to identify Agnes’s bubbly but serene personality, her clarity of thought and her well-developed people skills. They in fact quickly appointed Agnes as the main spokesperson for all WWF announcements and protestations in Poland. With a touch of both irony and poignancy, the dynamic young Polish woman would hence forth always wear Peter Python Boots to the many public and television engagements she made both in Poland and throughout the European Union.
In her mind, the wearing of her Peter Python Boots would always be a strong and potent symbol for her cause. She was always sure to point out that her wearing of the snake skin boots was meant not as a fashion statement, but more as a sign of hope. By not wasting the sacrifice, she wanted to ensure that the lives of the slithering pythons from the Borneo jungle floor, and all their jungle cousins, were not lost in vain – or forever.