IN THE NEWS

Forest Trump

The brigadier's eyebrows went up and a smile crept across his face when I told him I was thinking of visiting the Langkawi archipelago, a group of more than 100 mainly uninhabited islands off the north western coast of the Malaysian peninsula. He said he'd just had his best‑ever holiday there, and advised me to stay at the Datai on Pulau Langkawi: "As a rest cure for the jaded it's a sure‑fire winner." We were talking in Hong Kong and as my advisor was Brigadier Christopher Hammerbeck CB, a tank commander in Gulf War and now executive director of the British Chamber of Commerce in Hong Kong, I reckoned that if he recommended somewhere I was ready and willing to obey.

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Banking on Eco Tourism

Irshad is fast becoming a local naturalist icon based on his experience of working with almost all the resorts here and his detailed knowledge. He strongly believes in the preservation of our eco‑system and lives by the principle that man should co-exist with and not dominate nature.

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Malaysian Eco Warrior

The Malaysian island of Langkawi needs all the eco help it can get, as new hotels spring up along the coastline and the mass tourism descends. Enter Irshad Mobarak, 39 a sort of one man band in the cause of conservation on Langkawi.His small company leads guided rainforest tours. Good humoured and articulate. Irshad first function, he says is damage limitation. “We can’t stop new hotels going up. But if we can keep them on the coast, we can save the interior”.

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Edge of Darkness

It came from an unexpected quarter. Joining the hotel's free tour of the local rainforest, I was struck by the eloquence of our guide, a tall Indian Malaysian named Irshad Mobarak, as his electric torch unerringly lit up birds, glowing mushroom and creatures that crept through the dripping forest. Suddenly a jagged shape dripping through the beam, Irshad slipped into commentary mode: “Bats are precision fliers aerodynamically more manoeuvrable than flies.

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My Very Own Swamp

0n the Malaysian island of Langkawi, there is some corner of a foreign field that is forever ‑ mine. Early one morning I set out with a naturalist, Irshad Mobarak, to replant some of the local flora. We skimmed up the Kilim river by boat, heading deep into the rainforest, with limestone cliffs towering above, and a riot of green vegetation reaching down to the banks.

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Reserve Psychology

These days, Langkawi has been given the green light for some dramatic restructuring of the environment. In the corner of the island, however, Sina Maran Tadun finds that it is still possible to take a walk on the wild side.

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Forest Hideaway

A fusion of eco‘tourism and luxury make The Datai Resort, situated in 1800 acres of primary rain forest on North‘west Langkawi, the most talked about resort development in Southeast Asia. Sceptical of the developer's claims I joined six other guests on an early morning forest walk led by the Datai's resident naturalist, Irshad.

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Bond with Nature

Irshad Mobarak doesn't look quite like what an “evangelist" should. Tall, tanned and hunky, he would probably be more at home in a Steven Seagal type movie than waxing lyrical about the lush greenery which surrounds The Datai.

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