Borneo, Twice Over
All right, I didn’t know that the majority of Borneo is in fact part of Indonesia. And, aside from being the third largest island in the world (after Greenland and New Guinea), Borneo is the home of reformed headhunters (I knew that part) and is big enough to house two other countries: ‘The Nation of Brunei, Abode of Peace’ and half of Malaysia, the state called Sabah. The other half of Malaysia is across the South China Sea and, in another 3+ weeks, we will return to Malaysia to visit Kuala Lumpur. But, for this post, we were in Brunei.
Immediately upon leaving the port, we saw many large houses of obviously prosperous families. A sharp contrast to Indonesia. Multiple generations live together, so the houses are big. There are modest homes as well, but it was clear right away, this country is well off.
Brunei, and its capital city of Bandar Seri Begawan, is famous — at least to me — as the home of the Sultan of Brunei, one of the richest men in the world. I think he might have been the richest at one point, before Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos started duking it out.
You can see the gold dome of the Sultan’s palace in the photo at the top — the bow of the water taxi is pointing straight at it. The Sultan owns 165 Rolls Royces, custom-made Ferraris, and 200 polo ponies who reside in air-conditioned stables. His house, the Istana Nurul Iman, is the largest residential palace in the world: 1,788 rooms, 257 bathrooms (at least one gold toilet), 110-car garage (where do the remaining Rollses live?) and a banquet hall that seats 5,000. No, he did not invite us in. For three days each year, right after Ramadan, he does invite his subjects to visit, and the line stretches on forever. Brunei’s wealth — and its only exports — are gas and oil, which was discovered in 1929. It imports everything else. But due to its great wealth — big time player Shell Oil (a Dutch company, who knew?) gets 49% of the oil and gas revenue, and the Sultan gets the other 51% — it can afford to treat its people well. Free health care, free education, free prescriptions, subsidized food, subsidized housing, etc.
Though a strictly Muslim country, women drive and work. In fact, one woman highly placed in government bears the title Minister of Corruption. I believe she is rooting it out, not promoting it. She’d be useful in D.C.
There are mosques everywhere.
Brunei had been a protectorate of the U.K., and there is still British military stationed here, along with Brunei’s 3,000-person army. In 1984 they became independent from Britain. We started with a visit to the Malay Technology Museum, an odd name for a three-story building of reconstructions of the dwellings in the nearby Water Village showing how they fished, built boats, smithed silver and forged other metals. Locals began building these houses on stilts above the Brunei River 1300 years ago, around 700 CE. We shared the premises with a group of little kids from the International School. As we left, dozens of teenage students from a Muslim school arrived, the girls in white hijabs and long navy skirts, the boys in white and black with black hats.
After the museum, we drove back into the city... the red building is not a Chinese restaurant, though one back home might look like this. It is a temple, with convenient parking.
Nearby was a local market: The little square pouches below are for cooking rice. The woman in the red head scarf is selling dried fish... the piles in the photo below it are also dried fish. The turtles are undoubtedly not going to be pets.
On to the Water Village, accessed by a walking bridge from the mainland.
We went into this home for tea and sweets. While I overheard one of our Vikings say it was the best tea he had had this trip, it was plain tea, and the sweets were interesting to look at but didn’t have much taste. However, the decor sure was interesting.
As were the colors and patterns...
We were taken by large water taxi back to our bus in the city center, passing this resplendent mosque along the way. The Sultan — he is their King — built it for the Water Village residents. It has 29 gold domes, one for each year of his reign, and holds 5,000. As you might imagine, men and women do not worship together, in the same space. The boat in front is the Sultan’s ceremonial barge.
Arthur, our guide, said Brunei has a high standard of living and a low cost of living. There is much Chinese investment here and throughout Oceania and the parts of Southeast Asia we have seen so far. Arthur again:
‘China cannot conquer the world... but they can conquer the economy.’
