Siniawan is an old town popular with Kuching people for a weekend getaway or just a night out.
The population of little Siniawan town stands at about 3,600 people with Bidayuh Dayak (750 families) majority, followed by Chinese (700 families), and Malay (100 families). The Chinese are mostly Hakka.
People visit Siniawan on weekends for the restaurants, bars and street side food & craft stalls.
We have eaten at The Post restaurant in Siniawan twice and enjoyed the food, drinks and hospitality here.
Siniawan is very accessible from Kuching - just around 40 minutes by car southwest from the heart of Cat City.
Chapter One • Birth of Siniawan from 1840
Founded in 1840, little Siniawan town is neither as old nor large as say Rome or Beijing. But, it has a fascinating history and has been through a lot in its short 185 years of existence.
Siniawan is located south of Sungai Sarawak Kanan river about 25 km from Kuching city.
Siniawan was a trading post established in 1840 to serve the gold mining town of Bau Lama (known in Chinese as Maw San 帽山).
帽山 literally means Hat Mountain in Chinese as the hill looked like a man's hat.
Maw San township was founded by a mining corporation known as The Twelve Kongsi (Companies) led by Liu Shan Bang. Liu and his followers arrived at Maw San in the 1820s from the mines of Sambas in West Kalimantan. Rivalries and conflicts among the Chinese mining corporations in Sambas and with the Dutch colonial authorities led Liu and his followers to seek greener pastures in Sarawak.
At Maw San, Liu found gold and antimony. The mining town of Maw San quickly prospered. The riverine trading post of Siniawan was established in 1840 to serve the needs of booming Maw San.
The Siniawan trading post consisted of one jetty, a single main road lined with 24 wooden shop houses, twelve on each side. Before the days of highways and tarred roads, rivers were the main transport links in Sarawak.
There were sundry shops, restaurants, gambling dens, opium dens, brothels, all the necessary accoutrements of a happening frontier or "cowboy" town.
In 1841, Rajah James Brooke became the White Rajah of Sarawak. He began to introduce taxes and controls on export of the Twelve Kongsi's gold as well as its manpower and activities such as gambling. Naturally, this "interference" led to tensions between Rajah Brooke and Liu's Twelve Kongsi.
In 1857, Liu Shan Bang led 600 miners in a rebellion. They sailed up Sungai Sarawak river at night to Rajah Brooke's palace Astana in Kuching and attempted to kill him.
They failed and also could not get the support of locals. Liu and his men retreated back to Maw San with Rajah Brooke's forces in pursuit. Almost all of the miners, including Liu died in the fighting.
The Twelve Kongsi settlement at Bau Lama or Maw San was razed and its inhabitants fled. This meant the closure of the Maw San mines and also the end of the first chapter of Siniawan's story.
Chapter Two • The Rebirth of Siniawan from 1880
In the 1870 - 80s, Rajah Brooke reactivated the abandoned gold and antimony mines of Maw San. He recruited Hakka Chinese miners directly from China who also built a new township known as Pekan Bau or simply Bau.
The gold and antimony mines were mostly depleted by the 1940s and finally closed in the 1990s.
The Maw San mines were repurposed into a resort known as Tasik Biru or Blue Lake. It is a popular holiday playground for families from Kuching.
Bau town remained to this day. (I need to revisit and explore Bau town more.)
Back in the 1870s to 1880s, the return of mining and Hakka Chinese miners, and the rise of Pekan Bau, also led to the revival of Siniawan.
The same single main street, 24 wooden shops twelve on each side were built.
The wooden shops we see today in Siniawan are from the second chapter of Siniawan's history - built to serve the Hakka miners from China who came to Maw San in the 1870s - 1880s.
The single jetty in Siniawan also came back to life with the revival of Siniawan.
Again, the good times didn't last long in Siniawan. When mining wound down in the 1940s, so did Siniawan declined in tandem.
The Kingdom of Sarawak was ceded to the United Kingdom in 1946, after the Second World War.
The travails of Siniawan were not only man made. Nature was also unkind to Siniawan on a few occasions.
A few times, Sungai Sarawak river flooded its banks and inundated Siniawan town. The flood damaged the shops and homes, forcing many residents to resettle and leave Siniawan.
New road networks and bridges spanning Sungai Sarawak river also made Siniawan jetty and town less relevant as a transport node.
Chapter Three • Modern Siniawan from 2009
Siniawan urgently needed to reinvent itself, if it was not to crumble to dust and return to the forest.
After the disastrous flood of 2009, community leaders formed Siniawan Heritage Conservation Committee 新尧湾遗产保护委员会. One of the ideas to bring commercial life back to Siniawan was the weekend pasar malam or night market, and entertainment / dining hub (reminiscent of its cowboy town heyday).
It's been 16 years (2025 today). Countless weekend night markets and many mega events later, Siniawan is still here 🙏
It has been a long and not an easy road for Siniawan.
When you visit Kuching (it's only 1 hour flight from Singapore!), do include Siniawan in your itinerary.
Marvel at the living museum of original century old wooden shop houses,
experience the festive vibes of a typical Malaysian open air night market and street side al fresco dining,
enjoy diverse cuisine including unique Dayak dishes,
and chill with friends over drinks in the bars and restaurants.
Your visit makes your Kuching trip more memorable and contributes to keeping the amazing story of Siniawan alive, since 1840.
You become part of the Siniawan story and the story of Siniawan becomes part of you.
Siniawan Weekend Night Market 新堯湾夜市
Address: Jalan Siniawan, Siniawan, 94000 Bau, Sarawak, Malaysia
Hours: 6pm - 12 midnight (Fri, Sat, Sun)
Written by Tony Boey on 14 Oct 2025
Who is Tony Johor Kaki?
Tony, your write up evoked a long forgotten memory.
ReplyDeleteWe remember that unforgettable evening in Sarawak at this market. We’d taken a Grab to the market — everything went perfectly: a good bit of jalan-jalan, a lovely dinner, the works. Then came the plot twist — not a single Grab would take us back.
There we were, stranded by the roadside like two hopeful hitchhikers, staring at our phones as if sheer optimism could conjure a driver.
Out of options, we decided to ask a few locals for help. Let’s just say… most of them weren’t too keen, especially after they noticed Gobal is Indian — their polite smiles turned into quick excuses faster than we could say “terima kasih.” 🤣
Eventually, though, one kind soul took pity on us and drove us to the airport — apparently the only beacon of hope for stranded travellers. Quite the episode, really — part travel story, part comedy of errors.
A lovely, fascinating post and such beautiful photos! Thank you so much for sharing! Warm greetings from Montreal, Canada.
ReplyDelete