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Published: August 29th 2017
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Geo: 5.97267, 116.071
Edit: I was going to include this in a blog post of Bandar Seri Begawan (the capital of Brunei) but this turned into such an adventure that I feel it deserves it's own post.
Getting from Brunei to Kota Kinabalu (where I now am) looked like being an adventure and part of the reason I decided to go to Brunei. Research online threw up some options on how to travel from KK to Brunei but nothing for the opposite direction. Never mind, I thought. I'll figure it out in Brunei. Well, apparently Bruneians don't use public transport. Every time I asked about a local bus I got told to take a taxi and every time I asked someone how to get to KK they told me to fly. I could find no one in that city who knew how I could get to KK; indeed they all looked at me like I was crazy for suggesting it.
So I did a bit more research online, on years old websites and government sites with broken links that only focused on KK to Brunei, and cobbled together plans A to F. I was prepared, or so I thought. I arrived at
the local bus station at 7:30am to be told I'd missed the bus and the next one was at 9am. Oh dear. Waiting this long meant missing the boat to KK and spending a random night somewhere - plan F. In Brunei, the hotel/ government workers speak English but everyone else only speaks Malay. The Chinese people are regarded as second class citizens so only live in the the rural areas. Trying to figure anything out in this bus station involved a lot of charades and guess work. Anyway, about 20 minutes later I noticed a bus that research had told me would take me closer to the port. I jumped on it, got off an hour later and got on the bus next door to go to the port. Things were working out.
I arrived at the port at 9:15 am thinking I could take the 10am boat. Turns out the only boat of the day left at 9:15am - it looked like I could be spending another day in Brunei. Deciding to try me luck, I walked through a small gate into a security area, found the boat, the man agreed to hold the boat whilst I bought
a ticket, got my ticket, had my passport stamped, boarded the boat and away we went. Only 10 minutes behind schedule. The mans last words to me - 'you are very lucky' - yep, I agree! For this 1.5 hour journey I hung out outside on the top deck with a bunch of Malaysian truck drivers who do this return journey every day and one of the ship's captains- their lives are so interesting. The scenery was beautiful - palm islands with sandy beaches and tropical rainforest in the distance. There were clear blue skies and no breeze so it was a hot journey- I've never been so hot on a boat before; it's usually the opposite problem!
So we arrived in Labuan on the island of Borneo and in the Malaysian state of Sabah. More passport stamping later and I followed my new friends advice and dashed to the KK ferry terminal. I then found out that the one ferry to KK was sold. Haha, I just laughed and said 'ok, where can I go that will get me closer?'. It was at this point that I realized I also had no Malaysian money having changed it all to
Brunei dollars- no sleep me is rather silly. So I had to forget about the boat and run around this tiny town trying to find a money changer. Everyone I asked gave a rough point with their elbow and said 'over there'. I eventually found out what 'over there' meant and back to the ferry terminal it was. They told me to take a speedboat to Menumbok and from there find a way to KK. A speedboat sounded like fun and I was already on plan Z by now so was very happy to have an adventure and see what would happen. At best, I would get to KK; and at worst, I wouldn't- but I would have fun finding out and it would be an adventure. 10 minutes later me and my backpack are on this speedboat with a bunch of business people and the driver is very kindly letting me sit out back with my feet in these water. We pass more tropical islands and fishermen in wooden canoes before arriving at Menumbok 25 minutes later.
I met a guy on the boat who was also going to KK so we went to find a bus, just to
be told it had already left and there was a 4 hour wait for the next one with no guarantee that there would be seats. I then met a group of Hakka men (the Chinese minority group) and figured that I could spend the next 4 hours speaking Chinese in the sun and remembering all the things I've forgotten over the last few weeks. They, however, told me about an (il)legal taxi that would be going to KK when it had enough passengers so I hung around and took this for the 2 hour drive to KK. This was something I wanted to do anyway - do half the journey by land and the other by sea so all worked out. On this journey we passed traditional single story wooden houses, mangroves, empty highways and banana plantations. On the bus I met a guy who works in the oil/gas industry who gave me a list of things to do in the city so all worked out.
One of my best adventures so far! Highly recommend this route out of Brunei!
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