It is one of the few countries with an absolute monarchy (de facto the property of the sultan), but local people are happy. Residents don´t pay taxes and have free education and healthcare.
Its entire territory is surrounded by the Malaysian state of Sarawak. The territory of Brunei consists of two mutually separate parts and Sarawak is between them. The next year, however, will be completed a bridge linking both territories.
Our journey to Brunei
The journey to Brunei began on Saturday, October 20, 2018, departing from Langkawi Island to Kuala Lumpur in the morning. We had about 2 hours here, so we went looking for a place to snack. Eventually, we went to the McDonald because we were getting a taste for their new offer. After an infinite amount of time, they offered McFlurry ice cream instead of a durian flavor, with a salty caramel. After then we flew from Kuala Lumpur to the Borneo Island to the capital city of Brunei – Bandar Seri Begawan (BSB).
The journey from the airport
In the arrival hall, we found the local operator with a tourist sim card. As I studied all the important practical information about Brunei, I learned that airport taxis are very expensive like everywhere. But they have their Uber (Dart) at a more favorable price, so we bought a tourist sim card with 1GB of the internet for 10 Brunei dollars per week. In the end, their Uber had a price for 19 BND and taxis had for 20 BND, so both of these options were unimaginable for us and we went to try the third option.
I read that there is also a local bus service for 1 BND per person, but you don´t know when it will arrive and if it arrives. Even stops are only indicative, as drivers stop where they want. In the end, we were lucky. After about 20 minutes of waiting, a mini green bus with number 23 arrived. Before the trip, I found a map of their bus transport and when the driver asked, I showed up a map and said BUS TERMINAL. He understood and for 2 people it was 2 BND. At that moment, I was glad that we tried the last option too and that we didn´t take a more comfortable taxi.
At the BUS TERMINAL, we had to take another bus, but because they had only one parking lot for all the bus lines, it wasn´t hard to find the correct number. Before I checked the way and our bus stop with the driver with their map and after then we could continue. Everything was great and the hostel was about 500m from the stop.
(I found some information about their bus service from 2008, but I can already say that we traveled by buses all the time and we had no problem with it. The intervals are after 30 minutes. And when you want to go to the monument and it is near the bus stop, the driver stops right in front of the monument. The same situation is with local people. They go home and the driver stops in front of the house. On the internet, you can find their bus map and the traveling will be easier and you will know exactly, where to go.)
A local restaurant
Because our accommodation was in the area with a lot of shops and local restaurants, hunger drifted us first into a local restaurant where it was quite funny. We can confirm that we didn´t meet people like us in Brunei, so when we sat down and began to read the menu in the restaurant, the locals looked at us with a smile because it was in the Malay language. But they didn´t know that we spent 9 months in Malaysia and we understand basic Malay words, so we didn´t have the problem to order in their language. With surprise in their eyes and open mouth, they probably didn´t expect people from Europe to start talking in their language 😀
Accommodation and surprise at the end of the day
As far as accommodation is concerned, it wasn´t easy at first to get anything into our budget. But thanks to an increasing number of backpackers, countries change and we could settle in the newly opened AE Backpackers Hostel. We don´t have a problem with shared rooms. Sometimes it happens that we sleep in a room where air conditioning is at 20 ° C and I wear long trousers, sweatshirt, socks and a scarf around my neck, but you can also meet a lot of interesting people from the world. This time we met David (from the Czech Republic). He is studying at the University but this semester is in Singapore. And this weekend, he made a trip to Brunei with his friends. We talked together (after a long time in Czech) and went to bed at 2 a.m. And although he was leaving on Sunday morning, he put his a phone number for us at the reception because we never know where we can meet again 🙂
In the second part about Brunei, you will find out what places we visited here.
Look forward to next time! M & N
