Sea Gypsies | Life By The Seas | Sabah Malaysia North Borneo

© 2011 Wazari Wazir | Sea Gypsies | Sabah Malaysia North Borneo

“You will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life.”

– Albert Camus –

These sea gypsies kids seems to be so happy playing around when I met them here in the island o Maiga, not very far away from Semporna Sabah. They are a little bit shy actually, I did try to get closer to them but the close I try to get to them, they try to move further and further away but still, I manage to get this shot before they move on.

Semporna is the gateway of the beautiful island of Sabah East Coast, nowadays these place are becoming favorite place for photographers especially from peninsular Malaysia, some of them called it a photographers paradise, with a crystal clear water and deep blue sky (if you are lucky), the island around Semporna offers plenty of photographic opportunity. There is  lot of human interest here on the island of Maiga, Sibuan, Kalapuan and Mabul, just to name a few.

Despite their happiness, these “Bajau Laut” or sea gypsy kids are stateless, most of them don’t have any proper education, there is no school in some of the island, especially the small island. Sometimes we think that they are so lucky to be born here, in the beautiful island, where everyday is a holiday but knowing the truth, it might hurt but nevertheless most of the kids that I met along the way are very happy, enjoying their life. Maybe we think that they do’t have a life but who are we to judge them, our “Life” definition might be different than theirs.

They are a great subject for a photographers, maybe most of us wanted them to stay the same so that we can photograph them over and over again, but we doesn’t know their hope and desire, maybe they wanted a better life, their families wanted a better future for their kids, to give them a proper education so they can move out from this tiny little island to the big island and roam the world just like we do. I wish I can help them but I’m just a photographer and I hope when more and more photographers come and share this kind of a pictures, things will change for the better, for a better world for all of us.