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Published: March 3rd 2006
(Kev)
Brunei is unique from the other countries we have visited in South East Asia. The only comparable country in my mind is Singapore, which is also incredibly clean. Brunei however shows its wealth. The sultan is supposedly the third richest man in the world…though his actual rank is debatable. The display of wealth is remarkable and it is evident through the various fountains, parks, and mosques that make up Brunei.
The mosques were an amazing sight and experience. The first mosque we visited was Bandar Mosque. We entered through the wrong door, it was ok though we were politely corrected and given long black robes to cover up our legs. We were not allowed to take pictures inside the mosque, but were able to depict some of their grandeur nonetheless. On the Sultans 25th anniversary he built the Jame'Asr Hassanal Bolkiah Mosque for the people. I think it may have been the most opulent building I have ever been in. Hassanal Bolkiah, is the name of the Sultan, he created the mosque in part to symbolize his standing as the 29th Sultan of Brunei. The number 29 is represented through the number of pillars, stairs, and chandeliers
etc that make up the mosque. We were not allowed to take pictures inside here either, but we were able to ware the robes out side, and take pictures around the mosque in them. I especially like the picture of Dustin that I took from above (Titled...."The Walk"). The most bizarre picture though is probally of Dust in the parking lot a top the post with the mosque in the background...
There is more to Brunei than just mosques though, the first day we met a guy named Danny. This man truly is a traveler’s best friend, he was the first person I saw when I stepped of the bus and he was nothing but help from their on out. Danny asked what guidebook I was traveling with so I showed him “Lets Go South East Asia”Danny opened the section to Brunei and pointed to the section where his name was listed. He is also mentioned in "Lonely Planet". Danny then took us to a great hostel, showed us the places to eat, and took us on an amazing river tour. Danny is not a rip off artist, he just genuinely enjoys meeting people and as such is the
perfect man for his job. We were very fortunate to run into him and he is now on the list for this travelblog.
The river tour Danny took us enabled us to see a floating villige which consists of 30,000 plus people (the largest of its kind in the world). The village is framed in the background by the infrastructure of the city. The tour also gave us a glimpse of the Sultans palace, (it is the largest palace in the world, that is currently lived in) unfortunately it is only open to the public once a year. The reason I went on the tour however was to see proboscis monkeys, and I was not let down. We ventured into some mangrove swamps and began our quest. The first thing we saw was a very large monitor lizard (very fitting in the mangrove setting)but it went underwater before I could get the camera on him. Before to long we heard crashing noises in the trees which ment the proboscis monkeeys were near. Sure enough we saw them, and did some of our own crashing through the trees to get a better picture. I didn't get as close as
i would have liked, but collectively we managed to get some decent pictures. Well I am thirsty, and looking forward to guzzling a litter or so of orange juice that we just purchased.
Talk to you again soon
~Love Kev
(Matthew) hey guys. like kev said, Brunei is a very individualistic country. the history, as was explained to us by our good friend James from Bintulu, is that all of the malaysian part of borneo used to belong to the Sultan (former of course). but as Borneo became more and more populated and individualized (and unrest) there wasn't enough means to control all the sections of the territory so some of the land (like the Kuching area) was given over to Charles Brooke (British "privateer" or something) so that control could be maintained and in turn to the British governors. eventuallyafter a bunch of land changing hands all that was left was the small area of Brunei, which eventually became it's own country. but the amazing thing is that there are huge, and i mean huuuuuge oil deposits off the coast of Brunei. the country is swimming in oil. in fact, the government has so much money
that they people are completely tax free. it's pretty amazing.
as soon as we arrived, i realized that things were going to be quite different from what we had come to expect. for one thing, the streets were strangely empty. i thought this must be because the people were on a holiday or something. but it turns out that it's always that way. even in the capitol city, there were way fewer people than anywhere we'd been so far. the city was also amazingly clean. but because of the country's economic stability, things tended to cost a lot.
we were lucky to meet Danny, a "travel guru" as Kev's book calls him. that's right. he's in the book. he even signed it for us, he ended up being a really cool guy. At first i didn't really trust him because we've had our fair share of people trying to take advantage of us in our travels. He ended up being awsome and showing us the town in a way we never would have seen it on our own. He even took us out on a water tour where we got to see the village that has been built
Hey Swena.......
You know the drill Kris......on the water. it's truely amazing how there can be hundreds of people living in buildings that are all connected over the river. there are also schools, firestations (a lot of these have been made since the had a huge fire that destroyed a large part of the village a while back), even small hospitols designed specifically for pregnant women. Danny also told us that the people in these water villages have a great deal of trust for each other. they don't even bother to lock their doors when they leave. they also help themselves to whatever they need from each other's house. apparently everyone does it so no one get taken advantage of.
after showing us the water village, Danny took us to the mangrove forest by boat. it was awsome. it felt so neat to be going in and out of these little passage ways in the trees. we saw a huge monitor lizard (around 5-6 ft long) that was sleeping in a tree. but he ran away before we could take any pictures of him. and then, there were the monkeys....i had wanted to see proboscis monkeys for so long and we got a great look
The wrong door
You may not think it but this is the side door, I think we were supposed to go through the front but it all worked out. at them. there must have been around 20 or more. they were hopping around from tree to tree and eating the leaves. it turns out that mangrove leaves are poisonous but the monkeys have bloated stomachs that can disolve the poison. all three of us climbed up in the trees to get better pictures. Danny, the boat driver, and some people in another tour group were all laughing at us and asking if we weren't the real monkeys. Danny said we were one of the funnest (yes i know it's not a word but it should be) groups he'd ever taken out on the river. the pictures were worth it but i found out first hand how poisonous the mangroves are. just from brushing up against them, i broke out in a rash on my legs that took almost a week to go away.
well, kevin already talked about the mosques so i don't need to. we were only in Brunei for two days but it was a great experience and a must visit for anyone who is traveling through Borneo. Danny, if you're reading this, thanks for everything. love all you guys.
Matthew
(Dust)
Well Brunei
was pretty cool, what was nice is that aside from food and a place to stay all the museums and attractions seem to be free. We went to 2-3 museums and a couple really interesting mosques. It was pretty cool because they even had beautiful mosques for the river city.
Well I suppose I get the short end of the stick after you've already been told about the monkeys and mangroves and well.....swena's rash. We did have fun with the money situation because we didn't want to pull out extra considering how long we were going to be in the country and because we didn't want to have to change the money back outside the country. So by the second day there (which we really weren't planning on spending there in the first place) we were nickel and diming it just to try not to have to go to a bank or money changer. We had about 22 brunei dollars each and we needed 15 for the ferry and 2 to get the bus out there.....so after a bus out to a museum and back we had 3 dollars each for food and were really hoping that we could
squeak by. Well turns out we made it through even though the poor guy at the ferry terminal had to take 50 cents Malaysian to finish off the tax or something that we weren't ready for but it worked out. Oh and you'd be amazed how many cans of beans with tomato sauce, packs of noodles and bread you can get for 3 Brunei dollars. I admit, I was a little scared when I thought of how potentially hungry I was going to be.
Once we realized the money situation kev and I decided that we'd better walk across town instead of catching the bus to the Hassanal Bolkiah Mosque, it was on the way there that we saw the fountain that is in the pictures. That mosque was incredible though, it was pretty neat looking at the pictures after the fact. We haven't had a chance to get a picture of us in the robes until then so it was cool. I must admit though that its alot like putting on a doctors coat though because for some reason you are tempted to assume the role and posture of someone who SHOULD be wearing it. Just like when
we were at LLU med center and everyone started holding their hands behind their backs and pretending to be thinking about something important.
Oh and you see that picture of me sitting on whats left of that tree AHAHA well that was for all you. Now you see how much we want to get good pictures for you. It was actually pretty fun and I had to laugh a little at how weird it looks to have a kid sitting on the top of a pole in the parking lot of a Mosque just to see if there was a good angle up there. Anyway, we had some fun and if you're ever in the area its worth a look, even if just to escape mopeds and large groups of people for a while (although there are better reasons than those).
Hope you like the pictures, we had fun taking them
Dust
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Ashleigh
non-member comment
Simply Amazing
Oh Guys..Those pictures are breath-taking. I especially like the one titled Pillars. I'm blown away as to how beautiful it is there. You must have enjoyed every minute of it. Take care and thanks Dustin for the great view from the top! You guys do an exellent job with your blogs. Thanks!