Traditionally the Sama-Bajau or Bajau-Laut (normally referred to as ‘sea gypsies’) were one of the major maritime communities of island South-East Asia. Living on sea-going boats they migrated between the islands of the southern Philippines, eastern Borneo and the Indonesian island of Sulawesi. Today, the Bajau and Bajau Laut populations of Sabah make up the second largest ethnic group, after the Kadazandusuns. The majority of Bajau in Sabah have become sedentary, living in houses inland or on the islands, whilst others have a lifestyle somewhere between sedentary and transitory, moving their temporary houses from island to island. However a few still live as their ancestors did, on a houseboat migrating from island to island, following the winds and tides, only coming on land for water, firewood and to bury their dead.

Despite their intriguing and fast-disappearing way of life, there has been little documentation, let alone footage, of the Bajau and Bajau Laut peoples of Sabah. In February 2006 Scubazoo and Tigress Productions were commissioned by Channel 5 (UK) and Discovery Channel to make a documentary with presenter Donal Macintyre for the series, ‘Edge of Existence’, to reveal to what extent the Bajau and Bajau Laut communities of eastern Sabah have maintained their traditional sea-faring lifestyle, while adapting to the ever-developing surroundings in which they live.

Finding suitable characters and locations for the production was no mean feat as the Bajau people do use not modern forms of communication nor do they follow western concepts of time or time keeping. As a result Scubazoo's fixers, Helen Brunt and Terence Lim, had to make 3 separate recce visits to the Semporna area in order to built up a level of trust and friendship with the individuals and communities we hoped would agree to help with the production. To ease the cultural divide and assist with translation and liaison, Scubazoo enlisted Encik Walli Tubanin, a local man from Semporna, who has family connections with the Bajau of Omadal Island and speaks Bajau, Malay and English.

During the course of the second recce visit, Helen and Terence identified a suitable host family on Omadal Island. This was the family of the ‘Imam’ (village spiritual advisor) and after a full explanation about the objectives of the production, Imam Walu and his family agreed to host Donal and the crew for 5 days, before he moved on to live with a family of Bajau Laut aboard their house boat. This family were that of Pilarhati bin Sarani and they live, along with 2 other families, on a 100-foot traditional wooden houseboat.

The filming started at dawn on the 29th June in the Semporna fish market - the presence of so many ‘orang putih’ (white people!), not to mention video and still cameras, sound recording equipment and even a crane, created a lot of attention and the crew soon had an audience of about 50 people! From the Semporna fish market, Donal left by speedboat and headed out to sea to Omadal Island. As Donal approached, the island’s carpenter, along with his entourage of dancers and musicians, sailed his Lepa-Lepa (the traditional Bajau wooden sailing boat) out to greet Donal and bring him to shore. Once Donal had been introduced to Imam Walu, a ceremony was performed by the men of the village to ask permission from their ancestral spirits to share their traditional Bajau customs and stories with outsiders. Fortunately for all concerned, permission was granted and the production could go ahead.

During the 5 days and nights at Omadal island, the crew filmed Donal being taught how to free-dive for clams and abalone, making a spear gun for fishing, washing from a bucket with sea water and eating cassava, sea anemone and porcupine fish. The cameramen followed Donal day and night, both topside and underwater as he was put through his training in preparation for his time with the Bajau Laut on their houseboat.

As the time on Omadal Island came to an end, all had to prepare for the shift from terra firma to life afloat and all that entailed - lack of electricity and fresh water, torrential downpours in the middle of the night and seasickness were just some of the challenges that faced the crew as they documented the daily lives of the Bajau Laut. It soon became apparent just how unique the lifestyle and culture of the Bajau Laut still is and how difficult their lives are.

Ben Wallis of Tigress had this to say about the shoot...

Tigress Productions had another chance to work with SCUBAZOO, this time on a unique anthropology documentary about the Sea Gypsies of the Celebes Sea. It was a subject that had never been filmed before and required the expert knowledge and underwater camera skills of SCUBAZOO.

Working with SCUBAZOO is almost like having an extension to your production company. Before filming they organized trips to meet the sea gypsies (not an easy task I can assure you!) and recced locations. The feedback from these trips was excellent and gave us a really firm idea about what was going to be possible to document even before we started shooting. Once we were on the ground together, everything went as smoothly as we could have hoped for. I had to marshall a large team and all was made much easier by the endless support and dedication of the SCUBAZOO team. Their knowledge of the area is first class and they have forged an underwater camera team which are surely one of the best in the world. Their experience with working with many documentary film crews means that they are always understanding and co-operative no matter what the demands of the Director!

I have been lucky to work with SCUBAZOO on a wide range of documentaries and would entirely recommend them for any shoot a production team is planning in Asia.
Here’s to the next one!

Take a look at some behind the scenes images taken during the 'Edge of Existence' shoot. more