ocr: enormous wooden structure -it stretched for 50 yards or So- propped up on rickety eight- foot-high stilts above the riverbank. This was a longhouse, the communal home that has been the center of life for the Iban for centuries. This one was essentiallya along apart- ment house with a big open deck facing the river, a wide enclosed porch behind that, and then some two. dozen individual bilik, or apart- ments, leading off from the porch. A crowd of Iban who were washing dishes, clothes, and Huddleds masses of babies in the river grected me with friendly floating homes bloat waves and warm smiles ...
