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You don’t expect to find places like this

I wasn’t looking for it.

I was just walking through Balikpapan, following a path between houses, when the city began to thin out. Concrete gave way to timber, the air felt wetter, and almost without realising it, I had stepped into something quieter.

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The first glimpse

The water sat low and still, green beneath the trees, with mangrove roots pushing out of the mud on both sides.

A narrow wooden crossing stretched over the channel, rough and uneven, built simply because it needed to be there. Beneath it, a small boat waited in the shallows.

Nothing about it felt abandoned. It just felt like the tide had stepped away for a while.

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Reading the waterline

A little further on, the rhythm of the place became clearer.

Boats lay grounded in the mud, some still solid, others slowly falling apart. The tide had gone out and left its marks behind — on the banks, on the roots, and on everything waiting for the water to return.

Here, movement depends on timing. When the water rises, the channel opens. When it falls, everything pauses.

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Where land and water trade places

The path continued along the edge, marked by worn yellow posts.

On one side, mudflats spread out beneath the mangroves. On the other, houses stood above the ground on stilts, built with the changing water in mind.

There wasn’t a hard boundary between land and water here. They seemed to take turns.

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Deeper into the mangrove

Further in, the channel narrowed and the trees closed around it.

Two boats sat quietly in the water beneath the canopy, surrounded by roots and soft green reflections. It felt calm, but not empty — more like a place working to its own timetable.

What struck me most was how hidden it felt. Balikpapan was still all around it, but in here the mangrove and the tide were still setting the pace.

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And then came the boys

Before I could properly take in the scene, I was spotted.

Five boys stood on the walkway smiling straight at the camera, relaxed and completely at ease. A couple gave a thumbs up. One leaned in. Another played to the moment.

It lasted only a few seconds, but it changed the feel of the whole walk. What had seemed hidden and quiet suddenly felt welcoming too.

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A place shaped by the tide

This wasn’t just a quiet backwater tucked behind a neighbourhood.

It was a place shaped by movement — water coming and going, mud settling, roots holding the banks together, boats waiting for enough depth to move again.

People weren’t separate from that system. They were living within it, adjusting to it in small practical ways that had probably been repeated here for years.

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What stayed with me

Places like this rarely announce themselves.

You find them by turning off the main street, following a narrow path, and staying curious a little longer than usual.

What stayed with me was not just the mangrove or the boats, but the way everything felt connected — the houses, the walkways, the water, the children, the tide.

For a short walk in Balikpapan, it opened up an entire way of living with water rather than pushing against it.