Rashid Kabod Berita Sabah: Wartawan Bebas Penganalisis Politik: Perayaan Tahunan Regatta Lepa Di Semporna Sabah

SEMPORNA, SABAH :

Perayaan Regatta Lepa Di Semporna, Sabah Tahun ini ( 2010 ) telah berlangsung pada 23hb, 24hb dab 25hb April, 2010. Lokasi 1 : Di Kawasan Seafest Hotel Semporna - Pertandingan Ratu Lepa, Lepa Cantik dan Sukan Laut. Lokasi 2 : Di Stadium Bandar Semporna - Acara Perasmian / Pelancaran / Penutupan dan Persembahan Kebudayan Tradisonal dan Hiburan ( Datuk Sitti Nurhalizah Tarudin / Adam - Akademi Fantasia / Den Bisa / Rash / syirah / Dyana / Ramlah Ram ... Dll...... Lokasi 3 : Pameran - Di Jati Semporna / Bandar Tepi Laut Semporna.

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Regatta Lepa 14	Regatta Lepa 15	Regatta Lepa 16	Regatta Lepa 17
2007	2008	2009	2010

Regatta Lepa 2010
17th Regatta Lepa, Semporna

April 24, 2010 - April 25, 2010

Sambulayang sails

Decoration

Dances

Tapis-tapis flags

The Bajau community on the East Coast of Sabah have a very unique lifestyle – They live on Lepa and only come ashore for food, water supply and during this LEPA festival.

LEPA : In Sabah East Coast Bajau community dialect, lepa means "boat". The lepa boat is a cultural legacy inherited by Bajau people from many generations ago. The existence of lepa is believed to originate from the fishing community who live in Bum Bum Island and used by the Pa'alau people along the coast of Semporna.

One can see the Sea Bajau (Bajau Laut) fish on the clear and shallow water of Semporna. The live in their boats on the sea most of their life. Present day, some groups have settled on tiny islands.

From an event observed only by the sea gypsies of Sabah, the Regatta Lepa Semporna is now an official state festival; an important agenda in the national tourism calendar.

The Regatta Lepa has been celebrated every year since 1994 to commemorate the Bajau tradition of building these splendid boats.
The lepa regatta was first held in 1994 as a district-level event before being upgraded into a state festival. Since 2003, Regatta LEPA became an national event in the Malaysia water festival.
The Bajau seafarers' proud maritime heritage came alive recently in this annual festival of Regatta LEPA, featuring their boats, the LEPA with participants dancing at the helm of their boats, decorated in full color. The event attracted thousands each year.
Judging the most beautiful LEPA Every one is excited as the colorful sails take to the sea to compete for the prize of the most beautiful lepa. This is judged based on its decoration, local ethnic music and dances performed on board, sambulayang (sails) and tapis-tapis (small flags). Points are awarded based on decorations, the intricacies of the carvings and designs, ethic music, regalia and traditional dances performed on board.

Highlight of LEPA : The high light of LEPA event is to choose the most dazzling Lepa from the beautifully, colorfully adorned boats which are lined up at the waterfront.
On the decks are smiling dancers and musicians dressed in equally colorful traditional attires.
Other attractions in Regatta LEPA : include sea sports such as rowboat, sailing and kelleh-kelleh (small dugout boat) competitions, lepa tug of war, and duck catching competition. Colorful cultural night performance.

Each boat a beauty dancerEvery LEPA family has they own beautiful girl welcoming visitors with graceful igal-igal dance.

During the Regatta Lepa, the boats are decorated with brightly colored sails known as sambulayang and tapis (small triangular flags).
The highlight of the event is the sail-past of the lepa, each boat decked with smiling dancers and lively musicians, hoping to be crowned ‘Most Beautiful Lepa’ – the grand prize of this much-anticipated water festival.
More on igal-igal Bajau dance.

Each Boat an artistic masterpiece with elaborate carvings
The LEPA Boat is sleek and typically made of ubar suluk (red seraya) wood. An artistic masterpiece with elaborate carvings depicting the sea and animistic designs. Other sea-themed motifs include fishes, mermaids, sea horses and waves. These intricate carvings normally cover the stern to the bow, side to roof and mast.
More about elaborate carvings of LEPA LEPA

PHOTO : Traditional Lipa-Lipa Boat displayed at Sabah Museum Heritage VillagePhoto courtesy Sabah Museum, Kota Kinabalu

One can view a traditional LEPA boat at Sabah Museum in Kota Kinabalu City.
In the museum's Heritage Village displays a Lepa house boat. This boat was used as an abode by a local community in the Semporna.
The Sabah Museum Heritage Village is situated within the Ethnobotanical Gardens in the Sabah Museum Complex. Formally, the Sabah Museum Heritage Village was known as The Sabah Museum Traditional Houses.

People with a Proud Heritage
The annual Regatta Lepa held every April in Semporna. During the event, the waterfront of Semporna town is decked with a colorful line-up of boats, each one more brilliantly decorated.
These LEPA boats are the proud heritage of the Sea Bajau of Malaysia.
PHOTO above : 15th Regatta Lepa, 18–20 April, 2008

The Sea Gipsy of Malaysia
They live their lives on their elaborately carved Lepa, which in the Bajau language refers to a single-mast sailing boat. It can only be made using the Red Seraya wood (Shorea plagata).

For generations, these nomadic people lived on these boats.
The Bajaus who live most of their lives out in the sea have inherited peerless skills in making intricate wooden boats.
Once true nomads of the seas, the Bajaus would only come ashore occasionally on land to collect fresh water, firewood and to bury their dead.

17th Regatta Lepa, Semporna
24 - 25 April 2010 (Saturday and Sunday)

Semporna Town comes to life with the unique Regatta Lepa, a competition held for the Bajau seafarers to crown the most beautiful traditional sailboat.

Don’t miss a variety of interesting events, including the boat-tug-of-war and rowing competition. The annual Regatta Lepa is held in conjunction with the Malaysian Water Festival.
Lepa-lepa Festival in Semporna popularized by Dandai for tourist attraction.
Sakaran (bin) Dandai, Tun (Datuk Seri Panglima Haji) (b. April 15, 1930, Semporna, North Borneo [now Sabah]), chief minister (1994) and head of state (1995-2002) of Sabah. In 2000 he was awarded Sabah's highest award, the Seri Panglima Darjah Kinabalu, which carries the title Datuk Seri Panglima. (http://www.fortunecity.com/athena/pearl/29/indexs1.html ). He improved Semporna from island to center of tourism.

Nowadays, the practice of this traditional lifestyle is slowly dispersing with modernity. Few modern Bajaus use the Lepa today as many of them migrated to the mainland. Nonetheless, Lepa remains a symbol of tradition and a precious legacy for the Semporna Bajau community.

According to the Lepa Secretariat office, the regatta was inaugurated in 1994 to commemorate the Bajau tradition of building these splendid boats, the festival begins with the arrival of the Lepa from different villages, headed by the respective village leader.

Tranquil turquoise waters and the rich bio-diversity of its colourful reef have attracted seafarers and fisher folk to Semporna and its surrounding islands.

Semporna is also home to the Bajau Laut, the second largest ethnic group in Sabah and one of the major maritime communities in South-east Asia.

Also known as the sea gypsies of Sabah, the Bajau Laut once lived their entire lives aboard their traditional 5m long and 1.5m wide single-mast sailboat called lepa made from tropical hard wood.

In these inconspicuous vessels, they inexorably rode the highest waves and brazenly conquered the fiercest storm as they migrated between the islands of the Southern Philippines, eastern Borneo and Sulawesi.

Lepa Boat is a Malaysian heritage that is slowly disappearing. The new generation are moving on land where they turn their interest to modern vehicle of steel. This art of traditional wooden boat building of their grand fathers has to be nurtured as a national treasure.
In appreciating the importance of the Lepa, the Lepa Regatta in this fishing town of Semporna is a premier event for Malaysia.

The most beautiful lepa : REGATTA LEPA is to choose the most dazzling boat from the beautifully built, brightly adorned LEPAs lining up at the waterfront.
On the decks of the boat lepas are smiling dancers and musicians dressed in equally colorful traditional attires of the Sea Bajau.
In the lepa's they also have a group of musicians and a couple dancer and the lepa's will make a round infront of the VIP's and the judge's stage. In this competition the judges will give a point for their performence related to beautiful lepa's and the best dancer's.
This dramatic cultural event held every April Semporna town of Sabah. This festival is to celebrates the Bajau tradition for their craftsmanship skilled in ‘Lepa’ -- a ‘boat that hand-made crafted’ in Bajau Semporna language
During the Regatta festivals is a competition of decorative Lepa boats, a time to show off which Lepa boats are the best.
The most beautiful traditional sailboat judged base on its decoration, local ethnic music and dances performed on board, sambulayang (sails) and tapis-tapis (small flags).
Thousands sail into town in all kinds of boats including the gaily-decorated lepa and traditional jungkong to compete for prizes.
The flotilla of colorful banners ridden lepas in the upper background makes quite an introduction before you see the paddler in the foreground.

It was a beautiful sight to see the silhouettes of sambulayang sails from various Lepa-lepa boats as they skimmed across the sea water.
A typical Lepa boat measuring 5 meters in length and 1.5 meters wide.
These boats were used in almost every aspect of Bajau life - their floating homes, their fishing boats and their transport vehicle.
Those you saw in in competitions are vary in size, some were build for this annual competition.

The body of the Lepa consists 4 main parts :
1) the pointed bow (tujjah),
2) its boat body (lepa),
3) the walled-house structure (tapi) and
4) the sago palm leaves-made roofing (kajang).

Indigenous wooden boats that brought the Sea Bajau increasingly to settle in Sabah's shores since the 1970s drawn by Malaysia's better economy and security. They speak their own dialect, and are fluent in the ways of the sea. This is their mobile home on the water.

Traditional Festival Costume of Bajau Laut tribes (sea gypsy people) of Malaysia.Not only good in costume, the Bajau Laut people also skilled at making large mats for use at home.
See more about Sea Bajau of Semporna...



	Tawau Cultural Carnival 2007

Bajau Dancers in Tawau Cultural Festival 24-25 March 2007

See more photographs in our photo gallery...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bajau

How to get to Semporna...

Express Bus
From Kota Kinabalu to Semporna Fares: RM58 Duration: 9 hours
Daily Flights
MAS - from KK to Tawau Fares: *check with the nearest travel agents Duration: 45 mins
Taxi
From Tawau to Semporna Fares: RM80 - RM100 Duration: 1hr 45mins
Mini Bus
From Tawau to Semporna Fares: RM12 - RM20 Duration: 1hr 45mins

Bum-Bum Islands - Lepa origin :
Lepa is Bajau for single masted sailing boat made of Ubar Suluk or Red Seraya Wood. Lepa boat serves as home of the gipsy people
LEPA boat is believed to be originated from the Pa'alau Bajau people who live in Bum Bum Island and used by fishermen along the coast of Semporna. The unique lifestyle and festival is a cultural legacy inherited by many generations.