Our second stop in Borneo was Kota Kinabula. We sailed in from the South China Sea to check out what is a small new city. The original was almost completely flattened during the Second World war.

We were welcomed ashore by two girls in costume and two groups of musicians and dancers.  They certainly wanted our custom. The first was a set of dancers in costume supported by a tradition band with gongs. The second were dancers representing the native Indian population. The guys were dressed in skimpy bare-chested costume with wooden swords, shields and tall feathered headdresses. The girls wore brightly embroidered tunics and dresses with a little fetching headband with a single feather. They did a fearsome dance that was meant to be menacing but I couldn’t help noticing one of the guys vacillating between embarrassment and finding it very amusing.

The irony was that most of the…