Days 108-109: Happy 59th!
After a long day of snorkelling in the only clothes we hadn’t turned in to be laundered, we arrived back at the hotel salty and wet and in need of a shower. We tried to pick up our laundry only to be told that it wouldn’t be available until the next day. Trouble was, we had tickets for a boat to Brunei that left early.
After a few frantic calls to the laundry place, they promised to deliver our clothes by 7am the next morning. So at 7am we went down to collect our stuff and were asked by reception, “Is 8:30 okay?”
“No, our boat out of the country leaves at 8am…”
Helpful receptionist makes more phone calls and hears back “it’s on the way.” A while later, “it’ll be here in 10 minutes.” Twenty minutes later, with our bags packed and dirty clothes on, we anxiously wait in the lobby. The clothes arrive at 7.33am. We pay and literaly run to the ferry terminal. We made it! “Sorry, you need a ferry jetty fee ticket.” Mad dash by Marcus to pay the ferry jetty fee and we’re on the boat at last. But try changing into your clean clothes in a bathroom no bigger than a typical airplane bathroom that’s rocking from the waves and flooded.
We’re really glad we didn’t have to do a blog entry that we were unable to leave a country due to dirty laundry.
Got to Brunei and were given the 3rd degree by the immigration officer. We took a bus to the capital of Bandar Seri Begawan (BSB). One of the first things we noticed were pictures of the sultan and the queen in every store. In fact, the stores seem to be trying to out-do each other for how prominently they can wish the sultan a Happy 59th Birthday (which isn’t until July 15th, but they’re already decorating the central arena). Every – and we mean every – store has a yellow banner wishing his majesty a happy 59th. They’ve decorated the streets with celebratory lights. And they apparently do this every year. But some of the corporate offices have perhaps gone a bit overboard.
We checked into the hotel and went for a wander around this compact capital city, and almost immediately we ran into it’s famous citizen (well, most famous amongst travellers): Danny, aka Hardini Awang Adi. Every travel guidebook covering Brunei has a little blurb on him. Danny helps out lost (or seemingly lost) travellers with a tremendous amount of useful information for free. He just wants people to enjoy his country as much as he does.
Danny took us on a tour of the water villages of BSB. There are something like 30,000 people living on houses built on stilts set in the Brunei River. The sweet part of this deal is that you don’t have to pay for the “land.” There are 3 firehouses each with multiple fireboats, a bunch of mosques, and 14 schools. Here’s what some of them look like from the outside: fairly non-descript in appearance.
But on the inside, they are quite posh. Every house has satellite TV and internet access. Each room has a TV. All of the families have a second house on land as well as at least two cars (one for each side of the river). Here’s a picture of the inside of one of the houses. Note the framed pictures of the sultan and queen high above the TV.
One of the occupants of this house makes boats by hand. He doesn’t go to the land to do this. He has a shop under the house accessed by a trap door where he builds the boats.
In the center of BSB is the White Mosque (Omar Ali Saifuddien Mosque) situated in a tranquil lagoon. During the call to prayer, this particular muezzin has an interesting style of filling in the dead air with random grunts.
The Jame’Asr Hassanal Bolkiah Mosque was donated by the sultan to the people to commemorate the 25th anniversary of his reign. No pics allowed inside, but it was impressive. We’ll admit that we shamelessly ripped off this picture angle from a brochure.
After visiting the mosque, we went to the Brunei Museum. The museum had the sultan’s collection on Islamic Arts (lots of beautiful Qu’rans, swords, pottery, and of course an astrolabe), a section was devoted to gas and oil (Brunei’s principle export), and a cultural section. In the last section we found out that males are circumsized when they reach puberty with a sharpened bamboo splinter. Yikes! The painting illustrating this blessed event did a good job conveying the feelings of the young man undergoing this ceremony.
Tags: Brunei
Kelly & Marcus
June 29th, 2005 at 5:45 am
So glad you were able to get clean clothes one way or the other!
Great pictures – as usual 🙂
Hugs xoxox
June 29th, 2005 at 6:53 am
Ok, how do you get 3 people in a self portrait shot? When I did my self portraits, I can barely fit our two heads in the photo, let alone 3 people and half their bodies. Either Marcus has really long arms or a wicked wide angle lens, I’m going for the lens, do share the secret.
June 29th, 2005 at 7:09 am
Marcus, when the good people of Brunei heard that you would be visiting over your birthday, they immediately set about installing “Happy Birthday Your Majesty” signs in your honor…they’ll put out new signs before the sultans’s b-day on the 15th. Trust me.
Happy Birthday Bro! After this trip, I’m not sure what you’ve got left to wish for when blowing out the candles…perhaps better luck in the upcoming Uncle Fatboy rematch? 😉
July 1st, 2005 at 2:07 pm
Hi Marc and Kelly Happy Birthday to Marc and Happy belated Birthday greetings to Kelly. I have been enjoying your comments and your pictures very much. Got a new atlas so I can follow you better, my old one was aout 40 years old and sort of out of date! Soundds like all is going well for you on your trip. Keep up the gpod work.
love to you both Grandma Peggy
July 2nd, 2005 at 1:05 am
Hey Mike – yeah, we picked a camera with a wide lens (a Canon S60). It’s wide enough that it fits my big head in the frame with no problems. 🙂 Nice not to have to walk a few blocks away to get cool buildings in the frame too.
Jonny – that was really kind of the fine people of Brunei (we never figured out if they call themselves Bruneians or Brunesians or what). And I don’t think I’ll need to waste a birthday wish on any Uncle Fatboy competitions. Oh yeah, I’ll probably be out of the country for your 30th and will have to postpone.
Hey Grandma! – Thanks for the birthday wishes from both of us. I’m sure that updated atlas will come in handy when we get to Vietnam.