Bewildered In Brunei

I wrote this a couple of weeks ago, but have only just got around to adding it here.

During our end of term holiday, we all went off to Singapore.  It was a choice between the bright city lights of Singapore or the golden beaches and relaxation of Kota Kinabalu (up in Sabah).  Singapore won because, a) we were in desperate need of seeing bright lights after three months in Brunei, and b) visiting KK will be more fun (for me at least) after I’ve got my scuba-diving qualification.

 

Singapore is quite an expensive place.  Bear in mind that our notions of “expensive” are now firmly rooted in Asian standards.  Singapore is probably quite a lot cheaper than any similar sized city in Europe, but within the region it is expensive.  So instead of opting for the Le Meridien hotel (which looked really nice and, at SG$240 per room per night (or £80) was also not badly priced for a 5* hotel), we went for the YMCA!  This was substantially cheaper ($145, or £48) and was also dead central.  Thankfully, YMCA’s are not what I imagined and it was just like a normal hotel.  Nothing fancy, but in a great location.  (Breakfast, however, was rubbish on the first morning, so we ate out for breakfast after that.  Also the wall’s were paper thin, and the shower was rubbish.  Apart from that, it was adequate.)

 

What did we do?  Spent a lot of time on the MRT (Singapore’s super-clean, efficient underground system) Wandered up and down Orchard Road, which is Singapore’s equivalent of the Champs Elysees, Oxford Street and 5^th Avenue.  Got measured up for a tailor-made tuxedo.  Had dinner in a Japanese noodle bar (Ellie loves noodles!), and shopped in wonderful shops like Marks and Spencer and Carrefour.  Had the novelty of drinking beer in a pub (wow!), eating pork (hurrah!) and buying nice wine and cheese in a supermarket!  This was just the afternoon and evening of the first day.

 

On the second day, we went to the Singapore Zoo, somewhere I’d heard about from back in my Zoo days, and a place with a great reputation.  We weren’t let down, and we all enjoyed it.  I spent a lot of time at the primate area (no surprises), Becca loved the elephants, and Ellie was asleep when we went past the giraffes, which are her favourites.  We got caught in an immensely fierce (but brief) tropical storm whilst at the big cat enclosures, which meant that we had to sit and wait for 20 minutes while it passed, and had a chat with an Indian family that were over on holiday as well.

 

Day three started quite early, as we wanted to get to the Botanic Gardens for breakfast.  After a long walk (during which we all built up an appetite) we arrived, and had one of the best breakfasts of recent memory.  Sausages, proper scrambled egg, bacon, wonderful!  The gardens themselves are also beautiful, free(!) and, as you’d expect, packed full of lush tropical vegetation.  There’s an Orchid garden there too, but we didn’t get to see this, as it was already getting too hot by 9.00am.  We’ll have to save that for next time.  See the photo section for pictures of Ellie at the gardens.

 

After the gardens, we went to sample the sights and sounds of Little India.  It really is an all-out assault on the senses, with loud Indian music playing, the smell of spices and incense, colour everywhere.  We saw a couple of Hindu temples, and went into one just as some service or other was in full flow (Becca tells me it was the daily puja or worship).  Immense, brightly coloured, even gaudy statues of the various deities, demons and so on are visible from all the surrounding streets, and once inside, the bright colours and potent smells continue.  There was someone playing some type of wooden trumpet – affair as part of the service we saw (very loud).  As I said, all senses were engaged.  Becca was, of course, in her element, as Hinduism was the main thrust of her degree.  We also had a wonderful curry in Little India, and saw a Buddhist temple with the most enormous Buddha in it (easily 25-30 feet high) with absurdly large nostrils.

 

For dinner that evening we fancied something European, as there is virtually nothing by way of European cuisine in Brunei (very little anyway).  So we found a nice Spanish place, and had tapas, red wine and all was well with the world again!

 

The following day we flew back to Brunei, but not before picking up my dinner suit, and visiting Chinatown.  We were going to pop into Raffles for a bite to eat for breakfast, but the King of Cambodia was staying there on a state visit, and the place was swarming with security.  Apparently, he’s an excellent ballet dancer!

 

After all the manic energy of Singapore, it was actually quite pleasant to return to sleepy Brunei.  The two countries may be next door neighbours, share currency and so on, but they are worlds apart.  It was a shame that Singapore has been so developed that, when walking down Orchard Road, you could be walking down the main shopping street of any major city in the world.  There wasn’t much that you could describe as “typically Singaporean”.  I think our next trip will take us somewhere a bit less manic.  RBA have recently started flying to Ho Chi Minh, and I’d love to go, but I’m not so sure about taking Ellie while she’s as young as she is.  There’s also Bali (which is cheap) and, most likely, Kota Kinabalu up in Sabah, which is apparently a very nice place to stay, see Orangutans and go diving.  Who knows!

Just a quick message now.  I've recently started scuba diving, which is great fun.  So far, I'm very much a beginner, and it's strange being on the receiving end of teaching!  I've got a textbook, homework, and even an exam this weekend!  So far, I've spent a day doing the confined water dives (in a swimming pool), just getting used to how all the gear works, how to get “neutrally buoyant” (so that I neither float, not sink like a stone - not easy!) and so on.  I've also spent one day at sea, and did my first open water dives last Sunday.  This was just off a small rocky island, about fifteen minutes boat ride from shore.  The sea is shallow, so we only dived to about 9 metres (about 25 feet).  Nonetheless, it was wonderful to see corals, anemones, clown fish, sea cucmbers and so on.  Plenty of other fish that I couldn't identify.  It was very much like being on the film set of Finding Nemo!  It was really, really good fun.  (Unfortuately, for the first time in my life, I also got sea sick, and spent part of the afternoon being quite ill, but never mind!).  Next weekend is the exam, the weekend after will be another set of diving at sea, and that's it!  I'll then be a PADI certified Open Water diver.  Very exciting!  Am looking forward to doing more of this in the future.

Apologies for not having updated more recently.  We still only have internet access at school, and so updates are only possible during quiet moments.  There haven't been many of these recently.  Nonetheless, I have been getting criticism from several quarters and shall make amends.  The blog has a shiny new look to underline my new approach.

Since the last Linggi's post, lots has been happening.  We've been back to Linggi's (but only once!), we now have a telephone, school has been busy, but still very enjoyable, and we're feeling settled in to life in Brunei so that it no longer feels like we're on a strange exotic job placement.  Most excitingly of all, we've been over to Singapore for three days, which was great fun, if a little manic after three months of Brunei.

Ellie is going from strength to strength, and her language and chatty-ness reach new levels all the time.  Most days she come up with some phrase or other that makes Becca and I laugh out loud, or just look at each other in amazement.  Although she's still reluctant to speak on the phone (sorry!), she will have proper conversations face to face.  Maybe I'm just the proud father, but I'm still very impressed!  She swims in the swimming pool in our street most days, and is becoming very confident in the water.  With her armbands on, she doesn't like anyone helping her.  “No Daddy, I'm a big girl, don't help” is a commonly heard phrase.  She hasn't quite mastered doggy-paddle yet, but has invented a bizarre shaky kind of style of movement that somehow moves her (slowly) in the right direction.  There is no toddler group for her at the moment, due to the Hand, Foot and Mouth outbreak in Brunei and Malaysia at the moment.  Ellie hasn't caught it (yet) even though several children in the street have.  It's a fairly minor illness, but can have unpleasant complications.  So, with me back in school, Becca and Ellie are playing at home, at the neighbours, or at the Jungle Gym playground in Kiulap about 2 miles from home.

Becca is well and increasingly comfortable with life at home with Ellie.  She has a good circle of friends in the street, and because two of the women in the street have just had babies by caesarian, she is now the nominated taxi driver.

I'm much the same as ever, except that I've started scuba diving.  I'm one session into the PADI Open Water qualification, and will hopefully be doing my first open water dives in the next week or so.  Great fun!

We still have no TV.  There is one channel that we can receive, the national RTB station.  It's not the most exciting channel, and is almost entirely in Malay, making it of limited use.  Ellie calls it “rubbish telly” and frequently asks to watch it!  We have signed up for the satellite service, Astro, but Brunei is without any decoders or dishes.  As a result, they're unable to tell me when we might get connected.  All very frustrating, but living in Brunei you get used to things operating on a different timescale.

Will write a separate note about our trip to Singapore, and will also put some new pictures up.

My passport is already beginning to be filled up with stamps.  Most people here have become very blasé about stamps in their passport, and even see stamps as a nuisance.  Zoe, a friend and colleague of mine, has now reached the stage of asking immigration officials to stamp over previous stamps, just so her passport will last a little longer.  On closer examination, most people’s passports contain the same stamps:  Brunei entry stamps, the odd Singapore one maybe, but overwhelmingly, stamps that say, “Malaysia Immigration, Tedungan, Sarawak, Social/Business visit pass”.  Tedungan is the nearest part of Malaysia to us, about a half hour’s drive away.  In itself it is nothing special – it is surrounded by quite a lot of secondary growth forest and looks like a tiny shanty-town.  It’s not even on the way to anywhere in particular.  The reason why people flock there is because, being Malaysia, it’s the nearest place to have a drink!

 

Tedungan is the Malaysian equivalent to Calais.  The only reason for going to either place is to fill up with cheaper alcohol than you can get at home.  (Yes, you can buy alcohol in Brunei.  To do so, send a text message Mr Lim, the “milkman”, say what you’d like, and a black plastic bag will appear on your doorstep a few hours later.  Very convenient, but he charges above the odds for his quite illicit services.)

 

A trip to the border goes something like this.  Drive to within 600m of the Brunei border post (any closer and you get a parking fine!  And driving over the border is too much time and hassle with paperwork).  Walk along the side of the road towards the border, feeling very refugee like.  The serious professionals take an empty rucksack with them.  Get to the border post, overtaking the queuing and increasingly irate cars and their drivers.  Get a Brunei exit stamp.  Walk across the 50 yards of no man’s land.  Get to the Malaysian border post (passing more cars!), and get the aforementioned Malaysian entry stamp.  Just over the border into Malaysia, there are several hawker stalls, all grilling food of various origins – chicken feet are a favourite with the locals, but there are other, more appetizing options on offer.  Turn left up a dirt track, 50m past the border, and you get to Linggi’s.

 

Linggi (I don’t know whether Linggi is his first, last, only or even real name) is the owner of the most unusual drinking hole I’ve visited.  It’s an enormous, open-sided shed with corrugated metal roof, and countless fans that just about keep the place bearably cool.  It reminds me of the “Cantina” scene in Star Wars, where Luke first meets Han Solo.  Becca thinks it has more of a Mad Max feel to it!  Ellie loved it, and spent the entire evening eating noodles.

 

There is no bar.  Instead, someone (it was Linggi himself on Friday) comes over and takes your order.  As you’re enjoying the most refreshing beer you’ve ever had (I did have to wait four weeks for my first trip over the border), a menu will appear with a notebook, Brunei customs declaration form and pen.  The menu lists all the beers, wines, spirits, champagnes, etc that Linggi has in stock.  Being very mindful of the alcohol allowance that all non-Muslims are allowed to take into Brunei (2 bottles of wine / spirits and 12 cans of beer), you take your pick from the menu, write it all down and, at some later point, it will be taken away and your order put together.  If you’re buying enough “take away”, they may not charge for any of the beers you drink on site (or they’ll give a hefty discount).  Very subtly, black plastic bags appear at the side of your chair, and you’re ready to go.  Back through the various border checkpoints (more stamps), past customs and a 600m hike to the car for the journey home.

 

On Friday, Becca, Ellie and I, accompanied by Zoe, made a quick dash across.  We got to Linggi’s at about five o’clock, stayed a couple of hours and were home by well before eight, duty free laden.  In addition to the alcohol, we had the most delicious chicken wings and noodles that we’ve had in this part of the world.  For the first time I can remember, the wine rack is full, and there are enough cans of beer at home to make another border trip unlikely for some time to come.  So, I’ve got more alcohol in the house in one of the “driest” countries in the world than I ever had at home.  And a trip to the “local” is much more adventurous than a walk to the “Rose and Crown”!  (Just a shame that the beer isn’t as good.  Plenty of lager here, but no real beer.  I beg anyone coming out this way to bring me some Cumberland Ale!)

 

See the “Linggi’s” photo section for a flavour of the place.

We've got a digital camera now, so you'll start to see some more of where we are and what we're doing.

See the “New house pictures” section.

Hope you all like the new look to the page.

Brunei is not the place to get things done in a hurry.

We wanted to buy a mobile phone for Becca.  There's no problem getting hold of a handset, but SIM cards are another matter.  There are no new mobile SIM cards in Brunei until February at the earliest.  They've run out of numbers.

We were planning to get satellite tv.  The local tv is one channel, in Malay, and mostly consists of public information films and prayers (as if we don't get enough of that from the nearby mosque!).  So we went to the satellite tv place and asked for one of their systems.  They've run out.  There are no new satellite subscriptions available until February.

We wanted to get our landline connected.  We've been told that this should happen by February.

So time goes by . . .

On Saturday, bright and early (7.30), we all set off on our first Brunei adventure.  We had seen information about Brunei's largest lake, and the natural park around it, and on the island in it, and thought it was worth a visit.  In addition, I'm going to a lecture at the university about it's flora and fauna, so it was a bit of a research trip too.  The lake is called “Tasek Merimbun“.

We left the urban sprawl where we live, and set out along the coast road, south, towards the Tutong district.  The coast road is beautiful, not the smoothest of road surfaces, but not bad (considering the weather these roads have to deal with, they're excellent), and the central reservation is as beautifully planted and maintained as any formal garden I've seen.  There are small groups of men in big straw hats always pruning, clipping, sweeping, from dawn till dusk.  How they cope in the heat is beyond me, but the results of their labours are wonderful.

Town and concrete soon gave way to forest, with occasional glimpses of the sea to our right.  After half an hour we had reached Tutong, a small, unremarkable town, with a few “supermarkets” (shacks), local shops and a gleaming HSBC.  It's here that the Tutong river, which rises down in Sarawak (Malaysian Borneo) reaches the sea.  We turned left, south, and followed a small road upriver.  Again, it amazes me how good the roads are.  They have to deal with 30+ temperatures every day, and tropical downpours most nights, and most of the time, they're perfectly good.  The road we were on led from nowhere to nowhere, but was fine.

After a while of meandering, and passing many typical Brunei houses (look ancient, built on stilts), we picked up signs for Tasek Merimbun and followed them, mostly through forested areas.  When we got there, we saw a sign that gave us quite a surprise.  Firstly it was in English (all roadsigns here are in Malay and/or Arabic), and secondly it warned of the lake being inhabited by crocodiles.  At this point, I'm getting quite excited and Becca's getting quite concerned.  Getting out of the car, the heat hit us (again).  It was only 8.30 by now, but a cloudless sky meant that the temperature was heading up into the 30s.

One of the features of Tasek Merimbun is the wooden walkway that takes you all the way out over the lake and across to the island in the middle.  We'd seen pictures (see the galleries section on the left of this page), and I was lookig forward to going over.

(Try imagining Indiana Jones music here.)  The bridge was, ahem, rustic.  It had, no doubt, once been a stunning piece of bridge building.  There were shelters along the way, with benches upon which to rest and escape the heat, and admire the (truely wonderful) views.  Alas, maintenance was not good.  The planks creaked underfoot with every step, and quite a few were flexible enough to inject a bit of bounce into one's step.  Every now and then, we passed the remains of a plank that had falled victim to rot and / or termites.  Progress was slow.  By this stage we were about 20 metres from the shoreline!  Becca, thankfully, had her sensible thinking hat on, and refused point blank to go any further.  I gladly agreed that we should go back, as being on a rickety, semi-rotten bridge over crocodile infested waters was not my idea of a great Saturday out for all the family.

We got back to the shore (alive!), had a little wander around the shoreline, and set off back home.  We found a quicker, less pretty route to take us back, and were home within three-quarters of an hour.

Whatever does live on the island, it's perfectly safe from us!

Being a teacher, I can't resist this. . .

Question 1.  Dominic had a car.  It's petrol tank was virtually empty, so he decided to go to the petrol station to fill up.  From the comfort of his air-conditioned car, he asked the petrol pump attendant to “Fill her up”.  After a while, the tank was full and Dominic was asked to pay for his fuel.  The bill came to BN$20.

Your task:  Go to http://uk.finance.yahoo.com/currency-converter and find out how much BN$20 is in GBP.

Then listen very carefully, in case you hear me laughing all the way from over here . .

Another update of our exploits in Brunei Darussalam.

 

Day 10.  We’ve been here just over a week already, and our feet are beginning to touch the ground after the excitement / upheaval of the first few days.  I’m now in school, which is a nice return to some kind of routine.

 

The school is, from a UK perspective, an amazing place.  Firstly, it is a huge site, housing facilities for children from age 2 upwards (and even younger children, such as Ellie, can go to the toddler group three times a week).  It also has boarders, and thus, boarding houses.  It’s a very new place, as the school only opened about eight or nine years ago.  I’ve already heard many stories about the founding of the school, some of which may even be true.  It was built by the playboy brother of the Sultan, Price Jefri (they’ve since fallen out, ever since Prince Jefri nearly ruined the country economically – he liked to spend money!).  When not frittering money away, he built a university and the school, and a few other things around Brunei.  He no longer controls it, since all his assets were seized!  There are a few clues around the school to the freedom with which money was spent during its construction.  The 50m Olympic-sized swimming pool is wonderful, and very pleasant to dip into after a day at school.  Attached to the main pool is a toddler pool, with an Italian mosaic base – it’s beautiful, and was placed one stone at a time by hand.  It cost many thousands of dollars.  What is now the Science department office was used for the grand opening of the school by the royal family, and consequently, all the fixtures and fittings in the toilets in the office are gold.  Real, proper gold.  Money might not be flowing around school as liberally now as it did then, but it is still a better resourced school than I have ever worked in.  It is, clearly, the most prestigious school in the country, and there are various royal children enrolled.  Most of the pupils are from well-to-do Bruneian families, children of doctors, lawyers, CEOs, diplomats, etc.  The vast majority seem to be excellent pupils.  It seems that many of them, especially the Chinese students, are under enormous pressure to do either medicine or engineering at university.  The students themselves don’t seem to get much of a say in this, so some are a little despondent and resigned to their fate.  Anyway, it’s early days, and I’ll see how things go over the next few weeks.

 

(One fringe benefit of being in a mixed-ethnic place like Brunei is that you benefit from lots of feasts and holidays.  This Wednesday is a holiday because it is some Islamic festival (one of the Eid’s, I think), and in a couple of weeks we get two days off for Chinese New Year.  There are several other holidays lined up after that as well!)

 

Found the church today.  Unfortunately, we got lost first, and arrived 5 mins late for the 9.30 mass.  Normally this wouldn’t be a problem, but I’ve never seen a congregation like this before.  As we approached the entrance to the church, we saw a lot of people outside standing in a line near the entrance.  I was trying to think if it was some procession or other, when we realized there were seats around them.  As we got closer to the door, we saw a sign, “Church is full, please find a seat outside”.  Moving around the church, we passed many, many people before finding a seat, somewhere down the left side of the church building, in front of a window so we could see what was happening.  There was closed-circuit tv of the mass relayed to the congregation outside on 10 or so screens.  Most of the congregation was Filpino or Chinese, with a few white faces in the crowd.  I think there were probably as many people outside the church as in it, if not more.  And it’s not a small church.  The moral of the story: don’t be late for church (or go to the 5.30pm mass)!

 

As far as life in Brunei itself is concerned, things are going well.  We’re coping with the heat and humidity, and are getting quite used to it.  A few nights ago, we had the air-con in the bedroom set to 23°C and I had to get up in the night to turn it off, as I was too cold!  The pool opposite the house is a godsend, and we use it more than almost anyone else in the street.  It is literally only 15 steps from the front gates, and Ellie especially loves it.  We’ve met almost everyone in the street, and they’ve all been generous and kind to a fault.  There is a pregnancy epidemic in the street, with three women (all neighbours) pregnant at the moment.  There are also several children of Ellie’s age who are often round in our playroom, and Ellie’s often in theirs.  A colleague of mine, Barny, and his French wife, Gwendoline, have a son, Théo, a little younger than Ellie.  We’re already becoming good friends and mutual baby-sitters.

 

Brunei is a funny place, a mix of gleaming new and tatty concrete less-new.  There isn’t much old architecture that we’ve seen.  They seem less bothered about architectural heritage than the British and will quite happily demolish old buildings to build a new shopping mall or whatever.  There are not nearly as many ex-pats as I’d imagined, to the extent that you notice them when you see one.  The Bruneians we’ve encountered so far are very polite people and very bad drivers (not fast, just bad!).  To be honest, though, we’ve not met many.  Life is still very much focused around school for all of us.  The ones we do meet when out shopping, universally adore Ellie.  Her curls tend to win ooohh’s of approval, and Malays seem far less reserved than westerners when it comes to touching, picking up, etc other people’s children.  Ellie is not quite so tactile, and gets a little annoyed by the mauling she receives when we’re out (although she does love the attention).

 

We’ve not been out and about much yet.  Today we went to a little forest recreation park which has a nice walk and big waterfall.  Saw a monkey, squirrel, stunning red dragonflies, giant ants, lots of butterflies.  Am really keen to get into rainforest proper, and we may do this in a weekend or twos time.

 

Our home address is:  House A8, Simpang 163-12-20, Jalan Kiarong, Gadong, Brunei Darussalam.  There is an impeccable logic to the address / road system here, which I quite like.  House A8 simply means the 8^th house on the left hand side of the road.  “Simpang” means “street” and “Jalan” means “Drive”. The 163-12-20 tells you which turnings to take.  So, our house is the 8^th house on the left on the 20^th turning off the 12^th turning, off the 163^rd turning off the road to Kiarong!  Who needs SatNav?  Anyway, the postal service here is as inefficient as everything else, so don’t use this address for mail.  Use the school one instead (which I think you already have).

 

I’ll sign off now as I have got lots of work to be getting on with.  Phone line will happen sooner or (more likely) later, but in the meantime, the mobile is 00 673 889 3594.  Go to www.budgetcom.co.uk and find out what the cheap number to a Brunei mobile is, and give us a call (or text!).  We have no mobile signal in the house, and I don’t know anything about voicemail here (all the voice menus you hear are in Malay!), so it’s best not to leave a message – I won’t be able to get it.  The dombriffa@hotmail.com email always works.  I have a work email, dominic.briffa@jis.edu.bn, for urgent messages, as this is always on my computer.  Try to use the hotmail one, though, as the school one fills up at the rate of 20 or 30 a day.

 

More soon. . .

Sorry for the delay in getting this updated since we got here.  I've only just got a laptop, and internet access is only at school, where, as you can imagine, it's a little bit busy at the moment.

So, in brief:

House is wonderful, although very white and very empty at the moment.  Three living areas downstairs: a living room, dining area and a third room we've converted to Ellie's playroom.  Three bedrooms on first floor, including the main one which is cavernous, and has ensuite dressing room, bathroom and a walk in wardrobe.  Upstairs, there's an open plan area that we haven't a clue what to do with.  Answers on a postcard please!

Weather is HOT, although we're already getting used to it.  Above 30 most days, and it doesn't come down much at night.  Humidity is also very high, and saps energy from us quickly.  That said, most of the time we're in air-conditioned space, so it's lovely and cool.  Ellie seems to be coping perfectly well with it.

School is great.  They have a 50m olympic swimming pool!  Lots of facilities and wonderful kids.  I've had one day so far, but it seems like a good place to be.  It's the leading school in Brunei, so there are quite a few royal kids knocking about.  I have to be careful with my gestures (no pointing!  If this sounds trivial, try teaching a day without pointing.  Not easy!).

I'll update much more over the next few days.  Right now, it's Thursday 5th January ,4.09pm, school finished nearly two hours ago, and I'm off home to splash in the pool (which is precisely 15 paces from my front gate!).  Outside, it's clouded over a little, but is still very warm.

Hope the English weather is holding up!  Hee Hee Hee!