Brunei and Malaysia

My first trip to a Muslim country was interesting. Right from the start, I could feel a strange tension in the air. Mind you, not from the locals, but emanating from me. I was tense, particularly around men. You see, although everyone was extremely pleasant in Brunei, most of the men would not look me in the eye. I tried not to take it personally, but it was difficult. So after getting a cab to take us to the hostel (it was after 6 p.m. when we landed and thus extremely difficult to commandeer a taxi after sunset) we headed to the open market on the blocked off street right outside where we were staying. The only thing we bought was a head scarf for me, so I could visit the mosques. Its black, which most Muslim women wear during the daytime. Don't ask me why this is the chosen color, considering its extremely hot, while the men get to wear white, but then again it seems like women endure more discomfort than men in general. Anyway, the woman at the market was extremely nice and I had a lot of fun trying on various kinds, in the end I opted for a very easy one piece head scarf, so that I can just pull it over and not worry about it coming undone and exposing my hair.

Here it is, beautiful eh?


The next day we got up and headed to the large open air market where fruit, vegetables, and fish of all sorts were sold. The fish was by far the most fascinating item, with dried fish of all sizes, live eel, and pickled fish and many more being sold. I tried to take many pictures of all the colors, as I tried to be respectful. It was a bit difficult too to maneuver around the stands and umbrellas, particularly when they are at a height suitable for a 5 foot 2 inch populous!

We then headed to the large Mosque in town. It was under construction, but we went inside and took many photos around the moat outside. We then wondered over a bridge to a separate area of the city where homes were high on stilts. It was beautiful and sad at the same time. From one vantage point I could see the enormous golden Mosque in the background while the foreground was full of decaying and dilapidated homes. I had always heard that the King of Brunei was until recently the wealthiest man in the world, so I was disappointed to see the level of poverty in such an oil rich nation. Clearly the oil money does not reach the citizens.



I however, did benefit from the oil in an indirect way. At Immigration in the airport Jack and I were waved through as US citizens while citizens of other countries had to wait in a really long line. We figured it must be because of trade relations and oil importation. It was a refreshing outcome, considering right now Americans do not get many perks abroad (bad exchange rate, etc.).

We then took a public bus out to the Palace, so we could walk around the enormous structure and gape (at the parts we could see at least) at its grandiosity. The trip did not produce the desired affect. We ended up just talking about his harem of women inside and how all that money could be given to his people.

Anyway we wondered to a small cafeteria style place for lunch, where Jack nicely pointed out that I was the only woman, other than the servers, in the place. (So that's why there were so many men staring!) I chose not to notice, I was too engrossed in the Patriots game on the t.v. - it’s about the only one I've seen this season too, although we didn't stay for the whole thing. We left to visit a second and larger Mosque away from downtown. This Mosque was simply stunning, getting better and better as we made our way upstairs (after dutifully removing shoes and donning a black robe).

It is gorgeous.


Then, just as prayers were about to begin, which we had to leave for, we realized we probably missed our only bus back. You see it was 6:00 and things just don't run past then. So we booked it to an intersection where we waited and waited, then caught sight of the magnificent sunset before running again for the small purple bus we saw coming from the other side of the road. It was madness.

The next day we were off for Kuala Lumpur and another Muslim country, but by then I was excited and my nerves had gone. Brunei and Bandar Seri Begawan turned out to be one of my favorite spots.

Kuala Lumpur, however, turned out to be my least favorite. Right from the start our trip was dirty, smoggy and hectic. We booked the cheapest option from the airport to the city, a bus called the Star Shuttle, direct to Chinatown. We were dropped off just as it was starting to pour! With my rain coat safely in the hotel in Darwin, I broke out the poncho. We had a run for it, but ended up sitting in a dingy restaurant, happily eating some curry and rice, waiting for the rain to stop.

We checked into Westover Lodge (sounds Western doesn't it? Ha-ha.) and cursing at the fact that the air-con rooms were really only air-con in the hallway from 10 pm until 8 am., mind our room did come with a tiny hole in the upper wall where a fan, conspicuously placed, blew any cool air into it, we headed out to buy a phone card. You could say that this is where our troubles began.

We bought a phone card for 10 ringgits and tried to use it on the payphones. There were about 50 payphones in the mile or two around our hotel, and I could swear we tried them all. But the problem was that the phones required some change to work, and when they didn't, and they all didn't, they took our change. We then realized the phone card had been eaten up by one of the pay phones and decided to buy another. Another 10 ringgits. Here's where we got genius. We went to a 7/11 (they are all over the place there, sort of like a third world Starbucks) and tried to use the free phone for calling cards. This worked, at first. Then the phone system wouldn't unregister our card, so that any number of calls made on that phone would take credit off our card! I was upset. This is where genius turned into true idiocy. I argued with the people in 7/11 for an hour, a whole hour!, before Jack mentioned that we were arguing about 3.50 USD. Wow. So this is what being stingy really means. Yikes!

We sadly left the 7/11, feeling really embarrassed and got food in the Chinatown market. I was tired and really really hungry. My food of some sort of vegetables, rice and unappetizing meat did not make me feel much better. But the atmosphere did. I was happy to be there, sipping my watermelon smoothie and taking in the crowd. As we walked back to the hostel and took photos of the mosque a block away I was optimistic.

The next day we headed to the National Mosque, where we could not go in because it was prayer time, and really happy not to don the black headpiece, we took a short jaunt up the hill to the Museum of Islamic Art. The building was impressive alone, not to mention the array of the Qura'an and script work. Islamic writing is striking, especially when placed on golden pages with meticulous care and craft. Beyond the Qura'an, jewels and cloth displayed was a room with models of famous Islamic buildings. It made me excited for the day when we can visit Damascus and Uzbekistan, not to mention the Taj Mahal. The buildings are certainly impressive, and it made me wonder if they are a sort of idol themselves, like great Catholic Cathedrals or Buddhist Wats. I left thinking that it’s such a shame most Muslims and Christian and Jews do not have more respect for one another. In the end we are all suppose to live in similar manners when you cut out all the cultural traditions. The lessons in the Qura'an, the Bible and the Torah are similar. Peace. Love. Respect. Humility.

Our discovery after a long walk up a further hill that the National Planetarium was closed was disappointing, so we explored the Orchid and Hibiscus Garden instead. Quaint is the word I'm looking for here to describe it. Because it was hot, extremely hot, we sat in the garden and talked about the roses and lavender at our wedding while we planned a garden in our heads (well I did most of the planning) for the future. It was relaxing. Then a popsicle and a large bottle of water later, we headed back to the city for a night of madness attempting to find an internet cafe.

The next day we traipsed around the city, taking photos of their Twin Towers and gawking at the masses of high-end stores. I was really unimpressed with the city, it seemed crowded, loud and really dirty. Combine this with all the hair wrenching, nail biting traffic scenarios, mainly because of what Jack and I deemed the biker mafia (everyone there seemed to ride either that or a scooter), and the fact that I really hadn't slept because of bugs in the bed, and I just wanted to go home. Or at least to a clean hotel.

But alas, that was not in the cards. Instead we wondered around a street looking for the Laos Embassy. They had moved locations, apparently without informing anyone or updating their website. We did have word that they had stayed on the same street, so we wandered in the rain, after a taxi driver ripped us off, before we discovered it was closed. The street became our haunt the next morning before our flight out in the afternoon.

The highlight of the day, and indeed our time in Kuala Lumpur, was seeing Jack's former roommate Anthony. He's from Kuala Lumpur and was able to show us around a bit that night. It really was a shame he was out of town for the first few days of our visit. We ate some funky, puckery, horribly smelly, yet oddly yummy fruit and another type that was smaller, more delicate and delicious, named the King Fruit and Queen Fruit respectively. We caught up on all of our travels and left marveling about all the wonders that lay in Borneo. When we go back to Malaysia, who knows when that will be, scuba diving will most certainly take precedence on our list of activities.

Our trip the next morning to both the US Embassy and Lao Embassy went smoothly, geeze was it nice to be in US territory again for about a second, and we finally made it to the small airport which would take us to Koh Samui in Thailand after a subway, train, and taxi ride - oh the wonders of travel. We were thrilled to leave.

Next up: Thailand!