I could tell you a lie and say I hacked my way through the jungle to see the largest flower on the planet. I could write that I slept in a hammock fighting off vipers, leeches and hordes of mosquitoes just to witness the flower before it faded into a rumpled mass.
It would have been a great story with further embellishments as the years passed. And everybody would have believed it, including those in the scientific community.
The above are the trials that many people go through in their quest to view the Rafflesia tuan-mudae in other parts of Southeast Asia. However, we drove two hours in a comfortable car, leisurely ate lunch and had a lazy walk in the forest. Then, it was back home to a warm shower, dinner at KFC and ‘Mamma Mia’ (again) courtesy of a US$1.38 pirated DVD.
Seeing this very rare flower, which blossoms for only three days, was on my ‘to do’ list. I knew it was expected to open in mid-April and then another one would follow suit in October. I figured I could wait until then, not wanting a long jungle trek so soon after my leech experiences looking for apes.
We drove to the entrance of Gunung Gading National Park and, as I looked out the car window, my heart sank. There was a tall, steep hill and the park station was located at the base. I shook my head. “Not another climb,” I thought.
We stopped and registered at the park office where I was informed we would need a guide and it would only take 30 minutes to arrive at the scene. When informed of how long something takes getting somewhere in the jungle, I always multiply by three. And we needed a guide? This was going to be the hike from hell!
Reluctantly, I smeared myself with cream to combat the mosquitoes. My friends put on their boots, tucked their pant legs into their long socks to prevent leeches and carried an ocean of water in bottles. I prefer to wear shorts because then I can see the little bloodsuckers and pull them off. They have the uncanny ability to worm their way through clothes regardless of how well protected one tries to be.
Carrying my camera I followed, last in a single file, to the flower. We trooped up a very mild gradient hill, through a stream bed, onto a narrow path through the forest and suddenly, about 15 minutes later, we were there.
Three meters high, on the edge of a flattened section of a huge granite boulder, was the weirdest, strangest thing I had ever seen. It looked like the eye of some monster in a B grade 1950s horror film. I envisioned it was a window into the world of a slime creature housed inside the rock. It was horrible looking.
It took a while to comprehend the sight and to take in the image; my mind refusing to believe it actually existed. It was a hideous meat color with five petals that flopped over the sides. They had dime- sized off-white puckers that looked like blisters from a severe burn. Small carrion flies buzzed around what I would call a mouth. The huge thing was 75 centimeters across.
I had heard that the flower was supposed to produce a stench that would bring you to your knees and require gas masks. Mercifully, this one had very little odor. Saints be praised.
My scientific friends spent the next two hours taking pictures from every conceivable angle while effusing on the beauty of it. They kept on about how lucky everyone was to see it in such perfect condition. They climbed up the stone face to examine it more closely, but I had a very real fear it would suddenly come alive and attack. All I could do was stand and stare.
I was looking at the Rafflesia, the largest flower in the world, named after Stamford Raffles, the founder of Singapore. The local people told me they call it Ibu Bapa, mother and father. They boil parts of it in water and drink it to cause vomiting. Just looking at it can cause that!
Who would have believed that it starts out as a seed the size of a fine grain of sand and grows as a parasite on the Tetrastigma vitaceae vine, the one I usually always trip over. Unreal!