Kinabalu is special because it is still growing. The mountain pushes up by about 5 millimetres every year - that is roughly the width of a pencil tip. The push comes from the slow movement of pieces of the Earth's surface, deep below. Over thousands of years those tiny pushes add up to many metres.
The mountain is divided into bands of life like a layer cake. At the bottom are warm rainforests with orangutans and birds. Higher up are cooler 'cloud forests', where trees are short and gnarled and dripping with mist. Higher still are tough plants that don't mind cold and wind. At the very top is bare grey rock, scratched by old glaciers from long ago.
Mount Kinabalu is sacred to the Kadazan-Dusun people of Sabah, who have lived around its slopes for many hundreds of years. In their tradition, the mountain is the resting place of the spirits of their ancestors. Climbers are asked to be respectful, and a small ceremony is sometimes held to thank the mountain.
Climbing Kinabalu takes two days. You sleep at a mountain hut halfway up, then start walking again at 2 a.m. to reach the top before dawn. From the bare granite top, you watch the sun rise over Borneo's clouds, with the sea of forest spreading out below you in every direction.