Next Stop: Unknown

Pop quiz:  What do you think of when you hear Brunei?

If you are like Jenn and I, you think of a hot place with lots of oil.  Naturally, we thought it was in the middle east.  Turns out, Brunei is a steamy rain-forest jungle smack in the middle of Malaysia.  We were pretty close, so we couldn’t resist dropping in to get a new stamp on our passport.  Brunei is not at all what I imagined.  It’s a Muslim community, but everyone is from Asian heritage… Chinese, Filipino, Malaysian, etc.  There is no alcohol here, and nothing to do at night, so when the sun goes down, the place just turns off. 

As it turns out, the day we got here, was the day they declared Ramadan, so there was a higher than average energy in the air.  We were walking down the street between some playing fields and the mosque, when a police man ran out to us and said STOP, go away!  We didn’t know what was the problem until he pointed about 10 feet in front of us where they had lined up a whole row of cannons and were about to set them off to announce the start of the Ramadan fasting period.  We were literally at ground zero, and when the cannons when off, it was so loud we almost went deaf before we could cover our ears for the next 5 minutes of explosions!

We wandered around the city and got caught in the poring rain… The rain here gave a whole new meaning to raining “cats and dogs”… I think pandas could have been falling out of the sky and you wouldn’t know the difference.  While we were taking cover under a canopy, the road flooded, and all the cars coming through would hit it, sending a spray of water 10 feet into the air.  It was pretty funning watching them!

We also took a boat trip into the forest to do a “night safari” and check out the wildlife.  We saw 8 or 9 families of proboscis monkeys, with about 20 to 30 per family… needless to say, we were a bit monkeyed out.  During the trip, our guide told us a whole ton of information about Brunei, and the Muslim community.  Evidently, during Ramadan, the palace opens up, and everyone can come in for food and gifts.  The men get to meet the Sultan, and the women the Queen.  All of the children get an envelope, which might have $5 or $10 sealed inside.  The palace dining hall holds 25,000 people and the kitchen  is the size of 4 football fields.  How cool is that?  Take that Iron Chef!  Our guide laughed and told us that all of the cooks for the feast were from the Philippines though, no locals!    We wanted to stay and check out the palace and score some free food, but unfortunately, you have to be Muslim to get in… I don’t think I would have passed the entrance exam.

All things considered, our brief trip to Brunei was very cool and informative.  While it was only two days, it was a learning experience, and a new stamp on our passport!

These are the canons we almost walked through during the Ramadan announcement!

Water filling the streets from the rain!  (Rob, looks like they need someone with your experience here to help out!)

One of the mosques at night… reflecting on the pond.  Pretty!

Daytime shot of the Mosque, with gold domes.

This is the Mangrove snake… supposedly if you are bitten, you have about 1 hour to live.  If you are lucky.  If you happen to get a bite while with a guide, they will wrap a tourniquet around just above the bite, and then cut off the appendage at the joint.  From there, they will take you to a hospital, where you can get an anti-venom injection, and then stitch the appendage back on.  Cool eh?

A baby crocodile we spotted along the way.  We saw many eyes poking out, but never saw any “monster crocs”.  Evidently, there is a 6 meter croc they see occasionally.  I think the guide was trying to pass one over on us… a 6 meter croc?  He’d just eat the whole boat!