We drove up from the lowland plains in the usual van but had to avoid a continuous stream of what looked like Fonterra milk tankers. Our driver explained that they were taking the cool air to KK's floating gas storage facility for transshipment to KL, Bangkok, and Jakarta. Apparently piped cool air is cheaper than air-conditioning. There is a downside though: they use raw unprocessed cool air in their malls, risking hypothermia. Certainly that was our experience at Avenue K and Suria KLCC.
As we neared the village we were issued with canisters of cheap warm air, just in case. Fortunately we haven't needed them, the local oxygen supplies were sufficient. The cool air mine has decades of ore left.
A blowback at the main mine many years ago scattered the village amongst the valley walls. The effect is quite pleasant and no effort has been made to rearrange the homes. However a new law, the "Kansas Act", introduced safety regulations to prevent a repeat. A good thing too: some houses were hurled as far as Ozzie.
The mining industry seems to have brought low level prosperity with it. The markets are full of excellent vegetables and the accommodation is lovely. People seem wealthy and there is complementary Wi-Fi in the hotel.
That's the most astonishing thing about Kundasang: free Wi-Fi. To hear all the Kiwis talk, Sabah is unchanged since Conan got shipwrecked at Kota Marudu. In reality it is cosmopolitan, educated, engaged, and savvy. Our laundry lady, who was lovely, wanted to help people in "the third world". She was completely oblivious to the common opinion of her home island. This out of date attitude is maintained by the existence of exotic tropical diseases, and yet the only disease we've heard a local complain about was flu. We need to update our attitude and engage with Borneo.
Hell, the cool air mine hardly ever gets attacked by flying monkeys anymore!
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