The Parody of Conquest in the Rainforest of Borneo: A Tale of Two Explorers

Darwin once said that entering the tropics was akin to entering a whole new planet and many adventurous travellers to Southeast Asia echoed that sentiment: Isabella Bird in the nineteenth century and Eric Hansen and Redmond O'Hanlon in the late twentieth. Nevertheless, it is an indisputable fact that the concept of terra incognita is never more forcefully manifested than in that other planet within the planet: that ecological marvel known as the rainforest. Borneo, third largest island in the world, is the site of one of the world's remaining primary jungle, eighty percent covered in 'steaming tropical rainforest' as Hansen himself enthuses in his book. Stranger in the Forest (1990).