The Sibu Chinese are Foochow because, from 1901, 1,118 Methodist farmers from the Fuzhou region were brought up the Rajang River in three ship-loads, under a deal between their leader, Wong Nai Siong, and Charles Brooke, the second White Rajah of Sarawak. Their descendants are most of the town’s Chinese majority, which is why Sibu’s noodle stalls sell kampua instead of kolo mee and why its Chinese speak a Fuzhou dialect that most of Kuching’s Chinese do not.
I live in Kuching, where the noodle-stall talk I hear is Hokkien and Hakka, and the contrast with Sibu is what sent me looking for the reason. The answer is one migration, one pastor and one loan from a Rajah, and it is easiest to tell in order.
What Is Sibu, and What Does the Name Mean?
Sibu is Sarawak’s third-largest urban centre, a river port and timber town about 60 km up the Rajang. Before 1873 the settlement was called Maling, after Tanjung Maling, a bend in the river opposite today’s town. The name Sibu dates from 1 June 1873, when the Brookes created the Third Division, and it comes from sibau, a wild rambutan-like fruit the Iban know.
“Swan City” is newer. The municipal council adopted the swan as the town’s symbol between 1999 and 2004, and the Rajang has no swans, so the explanations are stories: one legend has a famine ending when swans flew over, and another says the settlers saw the Rajang as a stand-in for Fuzhou’s own river. The settlers’ own name for the town was “New Foochow”. The town sits a five to six hour drive north-east of Kuching. The express boats still dock at the wharf opposite the Central Market, so arriving on the Rajang by boat remains the way the story began.
Who Was Wong Nai Siong?
Wong Nai Siong was born in 1849 in the Fuzhou region, a Methodist convert baptised in November 1866 and later a reformer who admired Kang You Wei. By September 1899 he was a newspaper editor in Singapore, and he visited Sarawak that year. He had reason to look for land overseas: after the Boxer Rebellion, Chinese Christians in Fujian were under pressure, and his own congregation needed somewhere to go. He died on 22 September 1924.
What Was the Deal With the Rajah?
The deal was signed on 9 July 1900 in Kuching: Wong would bring 1,000 settlers to farm an agricultural colony on the Rajang, and Charles Brooke would lend $30,000 to pay their passages. The settlers repaid the loan over five years with a share of the harvest, and Wong was appointed kang choo, the port master. Brooke wanted farmers who would clear land and grow rice for the state, which is why the pitch was an agricultural colony and not a trading post.
1901 and 1902: Three Ships and 1,118 People
The first batch of 72 settlers landed at Sungai Merah in January 1901, though sources split on the day: 12 January, 21 January and 20 February all appear. A ship of 535 followed on 16 March 1901, now marked as New Foochow Resettlement Day, and a third of 511 followed on 7 June 1902. Most came from Minqing, Gutian and the Fuzhou counties, and most were Methodists.
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1899 | Wong Nai Siong, now a newspaper editor in Singapore, visits Sarawak |
| 9 July 1900 | Agreement with Charles Brooke signed in Kuching |
| January 1901 | First 72 settlers land at Sungai Merah |
| 16 March 1901 | 535 settlers arrive |
| 7 June 1902 | Third ship brings 511 |
| 1903 | James Hoover arrives |
| June 1904 | Wong leaves; Hoover takes over |
| 1910 | Hoover opens the Bukit Lan agriculture centre; Foochow families reach Sarikei |
| 1928 | Fire destroys the old town |
| 1935 | Hoover dies; 41 churches and 40 schools stand |
Rice was the plan, and the soil would not grow it. Settlers moved to pepper and gambier, and then rubber, which is what finally made the colony pay. The settlers chose the land themselves and arrived with almost nothing, so the colony’s survival owed more to the church that organised them than to the farming.
How Did Methodism and James Hoover Shape the Colony?
The Methodist mission carried the colony after the money ran out. Bishop Francis Warne’s mission sent Rev. Ling Ching Mi from Malaya and then James Hoover in 1903, and Wong left in June 1904, owing about $40,000. Rumours said he left over poor health or a refusal to deal in opium, but none is confirmed. Hoover ran the colony for three decades. He founded a church in 1905 that became Masland Methodist Church in 1925, opened the 384-acre Bukit Lan agriculture centre in 1910 and brought in rubber seeds. By his death from malaria in 1935 he had helped build 41 churches and 40 schools.
Where other Chinese communities in Sarawak built a temple first, the Foochow built a church, and it ran their schools, their welfare and much of their social life. Those mission schools explain a lot of what came after: they produced literate generations who moved into commerce, law, medicine and politics. That is also why Sibu is the centre of Methodism in Malaysia, with Masland’s RM20 million complex, opened in 2009, on Jalan Pulau.
How Did the Foochow Spread From Sibu?
Two towns downriver carry the Sibu story forward. Sarawak’s other Foochow communities start in Sarikei from about 1910, when Minqing families came from Sibu to buy boats and plant rubber, and later pepper. Binatang, now Bintangor, followed from about 1921 and 1922, when three pioneers led a rubber programme and Foochow families from Sibu and China settled there. Foochow families in Kuching, Miri and Bintulu mostly trace themselves back to this stretch of the Rajang too. Kuching’s Chinese arrived piecemeal as traders over a longer span, which is part of why Sarawak’s communities differ so much from one another.
What Does Foochow Sibu Mean Today?
The 2020 census puts the Chinese share of the Sibu parliamentary seat at 53 percent of 141,574 people, and Foochow is the largest group within that share. Three things mark the town as Foochow today: the food, the churches and the swan. Older Foochow still speak the Fuzhou dialect in the market, and Mandarin is the common tongue across groups. The food is the part you can taste at once: kampua at RM3 to RM5 and kompia at RM1 to RM2, plus red-wine mee sua made with ang chao, the Foochow wine fermented from glutinous rice and red yeast. The Methodist churches are the other visible mark: on a walk through the centre you pass Masland’s towers well before you pass a temple, and the nearest temple, Tua Pek Kong, is a Hokkien-era building that predates the settlers. The swan is the third mark, and it is on the town’s statues instead of in any river.
Where Can You See the Foochow Story in Sibu?
Almost nothing physical from 1901 survives. The 1928 fire and the damage of the Second World War took the old town. Foochow heritage in Sibu is therefore something you hear and eat more than something you walk through. The honest downside is that a day spent chasing the history is a thin one: the two places built to tell the settlers’ story are a small memorial and a museum with unreliable hours, and a visitor who comes for it will spend most of the day in kopitiams. Eight stops hold part of the story, and a few of them need a phone call first.
- Sibu Heritage Centre, Jalan Central, in the circular former council building. Entry is free, and visitors mention near-empty galleries and uneven upkeep. Opening hours conflict (checked October 2026): Google Maps lists Monday to Thursday 8am to 1pm and 2pm to 5pm, Friday 8am to 11:45am and 2:15pm to 5pm, closed Saturday and Sunday. Other listings give 9am to 5pm daily, 8am to 5pm Tuesday to Sunday, 9am to 5pm Tuesday to Sunday, or 9am to 4pm Monday to Friday, so they do not even agree on which days it is shut. Ring 019-868 4139 before going.
- Wong Nai Siong Memorial Park and the Sungai Merah Heritage Walk, about 10 minutes from the centre, on the site where the first settlers landed. The park is a small bronze bust, a larger memorial to Hoover sits at the end of the walk, and most visitors call both poorly kept. The plaques are mostly in Chinese. The walk is outdoors and no fee or hours are listed, and it pairs with the evening food stalls along Sungai Merah.
- Masland Methodist Church, Jalan Pulau, a large complex that visitors reach by walking from the market. No visiting hours are listed, so look in between services; Sunday morning services start early.
- Tua Pek Kong temple, Jalan Temple, open 5am to 7pm daily (checked October 2026), free, with the pagoda key available from the counter and a view of the Rajang from the top. It is the oldest Chinese building in town and predates the Foochow by decades, so it belongs to the Hokkien-era Sibu, not the settlers’ one. The climb is covered in what to do in Sibu beyond the pagoda.
- The swan statues, on the Rejang Esplanade, open all hours. Visitors say they are poorly kept and need repainting, and they look best in the evening.
- Lau King Howe Hospital Memorial Museum, Jalan Lau King Howe, in the 1936 hospital building. Entry is free, it is air-conditioned, and visits run 30 to 90 minutes. No hours appear on its listing, and one older visitor account says it closes Mondays, so ring 084-338 070.
- Liang Yew Cafe, 5 Jalan Pulau, open 6am to 4pm daily (checked October 2026): a long-running family kopitiam that visitors rate for al dente kampua with fried shallots, plain or with soy, and for its flat wontons. One reviewer still preferred Kuching’s kolo mee. – Yuan Ju Cafe, near Medan Mall, which several Sibu residents name when asked where to eat kampua.
Most of the town-centre stops sit within walking distance of the Central Market, which makes one night in a hotel near the market a workable base, while Sungai Merah is the one stop that needs a ride.
So, Why Does It Matter That Sibu Is Foochow?
Because one arrival explains the town. In Kuching the Chinese came as traders, in different decades and from different counties, and Sibu came as a colony, on three ships, with a pastor in front. That is why the dialect, the noodle, the red wine and the Methodist churches all point at Fuzhou. The best place to see it is the downstairs market at eight in the morning, where an Iban woman sells ferns and tiny river fish next to a Foochow uncle weighing out kompia, both of them speaking over a counter in a town that exists because a river runs through it.
For the plate, start with the Sibu food guide, and for a day plan, the Sibu travel guide. More places across the state are in the Explore hub.