Foreign Adventures

Mahnaz’s Reflections

With the last few days of Ramadan, Eid, Niepi and Anisa’s school holidays on the horizon, we decided to leave Bali to immerse ourselves into a different space. We live in a Kingdom in the UK and I wanted to explore a Sultanate (the equivalent of a kingdom, the only difference being a Muslim ruler) in the global South. So we headed to Brunei.

NB : While writing this – I wanted to share that I have a huge “Carbon footprint” guilt. Every flight I take, I make an apology and pray for more wisdom, guidance and courage. Even when offsetting the cost – it is still there. Personally I have found travelling to be part of my healing process. It is liberating, educational, insightful and I have met some extraordinary people along the way who have contributed to my healing – mostly by showing some form of kindness. I honour the ground on which I walk – no matter where I am. While praying (when I do) and touching my forehead to the ground I feel like I am honouring this piece of the earth. Having said this, I am also conscious of our deeper connection – where we are all connected to everything. My awareness of our climates predicament and our impending crisis makes it difficult. I know some of you may be thinking this is a little over the top, but have a read of this. Change has to start with us and this move to Bali has been predominantly about Anisa and her future – which will be very very different to our collective past.

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Brunei

I had been told by numerous people that Brunei was boring and there was very little to do. Especially during Ramadan – except in the evenings (like most Islamic countries) when people venture out to break their fast. But we wanted to go somewhere where there actually WAS little to do and for Ramadan and Eid to be a quiet and moreover peaceful affair.

I have to give a dear friend, Colette a shout out here. Her husband, Nick worked in Brunei for years and gave us some hints and tips on what to do. I have always been in awe of how Nick worked in such a tiny country as an expert in his field, and loved hearing Colette’s stories about her experiences as a woman and mother visiting Brunei, living in Scotland, abroad and even her current experiences in Battle, East Sussex. So much richness from just being a caring, Earth loving human being. If you are reading this – thank you for your recommendations and showing up in my life! Nothing is a coincidence.

Suleiman has provided a pretty thorough synopsis of our trip to both countries below, so I won’t go into too much detail. But here are some photos of our travels and personal highlights of our trip.

The concierge at our hotel encouraged us to visit the Palace as His Majesty – the Sultan – was hosting the public for an Eid meal and a meet and greet, over 2 days after Eid itself. No tickets or booking required. Just show up and join the queue. So we did. On arrival, we were turned away as Anisa and I had open footwear and Suleiman’s trousers were inappropriate, so the taxi driver took us to a local shop where we brought the necessary gear and joined the queue again. We had a lovely meal and sadly didn’t have the time to do a meet and greet but were grateful for the invitation and experience.

I was left wondering if I would give up my freedom to join a just Kingdom where royalty took great care of their citizens? Would you? Is it even possible or sustainable knowing change is inevitable.

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Borneo

There is so much to say about this Island. Other worldly, raw, natural, beautiful & extraordinary.

Sadly the Turtle Islands are shrinking and there will come a time when the Turtles will no longer be able to come back to lay their eggs. The experts are doing their best to preserve the Island, but only have a short term solution. While strolling alone on the Island I also noticed rubbish washed up where few people went. Plastic is everywhere and it is a desperately sad state of affairs.

Anisa’s Experience

I don’t know where to start so I will start with Brunei. Brunei was quite hot and i got told off by a policeman when we got to the airport because i went under the queue barrier – which is stupid because there was no one in front of me. When we got to the taxi place there was a lady in a headscarf who said she would escort us to the hotel so we got in a car and drove there which only took about 15 minutes. OH MY GOSH when we got there it was SO big with a big sculpture of a mosque inside and massive chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. It was pretty kewl.

On the way to KK from Borneo we stayed in this little motel and i started to feel a bit sick in my stomach so I shut my eyes and tried to get to sleep, but i just couldn’t. At one point i felt so sick i had to go to the bathroom and vomit and it was lumpy and came out of my nose. For the next half hour i was sneezing acidy cheeseburger lumps.

I love monkeys and turtles. It’s sad that their habitats are slowly getting smaller and soon they will become extinct.
Crocodiles are scary.

I was going to put a cat blog in here about all the cats I’ve seen here but that might be boring so ill leave that for today but if you do want to read it then just tell me in the comments i guess.

Bye

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Suleiman’s Reflections

We had never previously celebrated the end of Ramadan and Eid in a Muslim country. A week of school holidays presented the opportunity and Brunei was our chosen location as it meant we could also go to Borneo. 

The little I thought I knew about Brunei before going there was hopelessly wrong:

1. The Sultan of Brunei is the world’s second richest person. REALITY: He remains one of the richest royals but is no longer one of the world’s richest people. His net worth is now dwarfed by that of the tech company supremos behind X, Meta, Amazon and Google.
2. Brunei must be a desert nation because it made its fortune through oil reserves. REALITY: There are no deserts in Brunei at all. It is a tiny country that is located on the island of Borneo, and therefore shares the same lush tropical rainforest landscape. It did make its fortune via oil, though.

The Empire Hotel at which we stayed was recommended by Mahnaz’s friend, Collette, whose husband Nick had worked and lived there. It is sometimes described as a six or seven-star hotel, and was apparently the personal project of the Sultan. It is certainly the plushest and biggest hotel I have ever been to, with marble and gold in the foyer and golf buggies to transport us to our rooms and the other onsite facilities (bowling alley, cinemas, spas, golf course). Fortunately, it was half-empty and relatively cheap due to it being Ramadan.

It was a good location to rest and recuperate, but the downside for me was the amount of food that was available. Homer Simpson once said that the two sweetest words in the English language were “dee” and “fault” – personally, I would go with “buffet breakfast”, closely followed by “buffet dinner”. We actually only had the dinner buffet once, but we could immediately see our bellies expanding and undoing the good work of the previous four weeks. The hotel ran two breakfast services: one from 3-5am for those of us who were fasting, and the customary service from 6am for those that weren’t. Plus, there was an ice-cream shop onsite … we didn’t stand a chance, did we?

None of the hotel food was cheap, though, so after the first night we went into town for dinner, focusing on the night markets where the locals get their evening meals during Ramadan. Brunei’s food culture tends to be more Malay with bits of Indian and Chinese, but there was also no shortage of burgers, pizza and tacos too. The nearest thing to a Brunei speciality dish was ambuyat, which Mahnaz sampled at the hotel buffet. The waiter said that it was THE staple Bruneian dish before the country came into money, and it still has huge cultural significance. It is made from the interior trunk of the sago palm tree, is a little gloopy and translucent (for consistency and appearance think of wallpaper paste but more pliable) and is served with V-shaped sticks called candas. For added je ne sais quoi it is served with a variety of different dips, including fermented durian sauce (because sometimes durian just isn’t strong enough a flavour).

Anyway, a highpoint of our time there was a boat trip on the river running through the capital city, Bandar Seri Bagawan. We navigated through a dramatic water village, Kampong Ayer, that has been continually inhabited for over a thousand years and once housed over half the population of the country. It houses a vibrant local community numbering ten thousand, although the population is diminishing as their youngsters are increasingly attracted to living on terra firma. The village encompasses shops, a mosque, a school and a police station, and people travel via wooden walkways and water taxis. Further down the river, the guide – who lives in one of the water villages himself – took us to see some proboscis monkeys. There was no guarantee they would show, but there they were by the side of the river swinging through the trees as happy as can be.

And then a few minutes later as the sun was setting, we ventured further upstream to see if we could find any crocodiles. It was a long shot, but we were lucky:

We went to Friday prayers at the huge Hasasanil Bolkiah mosque (named after the Sultan) and also saw the stunning floating SOAS mosque during our evenings out.

And we celebrated Eid by going with one of the hotel employees to his local mosque, a smaller but beautiful one in the North African style (picture of us in Mahnaz’s post).

And on our final day, we went along to see the Sultan. He throws open the gates of the palace for the two days after Eid, granting audiences to his subjects (population of Brunei: 450k) and serving up huge amounts of food. It was the first time he had done this for a few years, apparently, since pre-COVID. We queued in searing heat at the palace but were initially turned away by security as my black combat trousers and the crocs Mahnaz and Anisa were wearing were deemed inadequately respectful. Luckily, our taxi driver was able to take us to a nearby shopping mall to dress more appropriately and drop us back before the gates shut. That shop must do a roaring trade!

This video from a Bruneian YouTuber shows you what it was like. I think we visited a day before him and it was way busier than this video – so busy in fact that we were not able to meet the Sultan for fear we would miss our flight.

We did each get a card and a mysterious yellow box which contained … a whole orange cake (we gifted two of our three to hotel staff).

All in all, an interesting country. The river trip and the city at night were fun, and the hotel was great. 4 days is more than sufficient to get a feel of the place if you are pressed for time.  

Word of the week in Brunei (and Malaysia and Indonesia): Hari Raya – it means literally ‘day of greatness’ or ‘great day’ and is how people wish each other ‘Eid Mubarak’. I struggled badly to remember this simple phrase, as I kept thinking of ‘hara-kiri’, ‘hiya’ and ‘hari rama’. Football came to the rescue, though:

England captain Harry Kane + Arsenal goalkeeper David Raya = Hari Raya!

Then it was on to Borneo …

Borneo is the third largest-island in the world with a population of 25m people, and is known for its unique wildlife, rainforests, indigenous cultures and biodiversity. It is also the only island in the world divided between three nations:

• Indonesia – nearly ¾ of the island is theirs, they call it Kalimatan
• Malaysia – 23% is under Malaysian jurisdiction, including the tourist hotspots of Sabah and Sarawak
• Brunei – a sliver (literally 1%) of the island’s land mass in the North, yet it is the only country wholly on the island

We flew from Brunei to the state capital of Sabah, Kota Kinabalu (a very pleasant city to say out loud) and then to Sandakan. Flying in these areas is always a difficult choice environmentally, but given the flight from KK to Sandakan was 45 minutes compared to a 7-hour bus journey, our limited time meant it was the prudent option. In Sandakan, we then joined other travellers as part of a tour group headed to Selingan (aka Turtle Island) where the plan was to watch a turtle lay her eggs, see those eggs safely placed into the sand at their conservation area, and see other hatched baby turtles released into the sea.

The 1-hour boat trip to Turtle Island was a real highlight for Anisa, who normally gets a bit seasick but was joyously unaffected this time – she enjoyed watching some of the discomfort of the adults, in fact! After lunch we spent the afternoon in the warm waters of an island that is fairly large and sparsely-peopled, so at times it felt like what a desert island would feel like. Truly idyllic. We then went to the ideal spot to watch the sun set fire to the sea, and then over to the canteen to have dinner with the other travellers. Our excellent tour guides told us the high tide meant that the turtles would likely wait some time for the tides to recede before venturing onto the sands to lay their eggs. So we knew we might be in for a very long night.

It was nearly 11pm (as we were falling asleep over games of Uno and chess) when we got the call. We rushed out to the sands where the conservation team stationed on the island had carefully arranged for us to view a green turtle laying her eggs. Turtles mate in the sea and after fertilisation the female comes ashore to lay her eggs – usually back to the same place she was hatched. If she lays them in closed or shaded areas of the sand, a higher proportion of male hatchlings is likely. Warmer temperatures are more likely to produce females, a phenomenon known as temperature-dependent sex determination (TSD). The guide had a funny way of remembering it … which I don’t remember. Something like “Hot Girl” and “Cool Dude”!

Cleverly, many of the turtles lay dummy tunnels or nests in the sand containing no eggs in order to deter predators (usually monitor lizards, birds, crabs, snakes). We were only allowed to watch a turtle who had previously visited the island (as identified by a tag they had placed when she had last laid eggs there two years previously). To ensure she was comfortable and unstressed, they removed barnacles that had accumulated on her from her years in the sea. Green turtles can sometimes lay 80-100 eggs, and this mother turtle laid 57 in total when we were there (we were only allowed to watch the last 20 or so eggs being laid, again to ensure her wellbeing). Witnessing this was a poignant experience.

We were then taken to their hatchery where we watched the staff bury her 57 eggs in marked plots in the sand. They are safe from predators there and the baby turtles will typically hatch within 60 days, and then be released into the water.

The final part of the evening saw us run back to the beach to watch as a bucket of eggs that had now all hatched were released onto the sands under the cover of darkness (to give them the best chance of survival). The baby turtles made their way into the sea for the very first time. Some of them skidded into the water in a way that was just too cute for words. It was a privilege to be there, and despite the exhaustion we went to bed exhilarated.

These are the stats for the night from Selingan and two neighbouring Turtle conservation islands:

6 hours later we boarded the boat back to Sandakan again, from where we transferred onto a coach that took us a short journey to the world-famous jungle park at Sepilok, whose orang-utangs are the focal point for many visitors to Borneo.

We were fortunate that March and April are generally good months to spot the Bornean orang-utangs. The fruit trees provide a bountiful supply which they are unable to resist. The orang-utangs at Sepilok are often found injured and orphaned, and they are rehabilitated here so they can be sent back out into the wild where they belong.

Our first port of call was the viewing area where we watched in awe as hordes of orang-utangs swung from trees, fed their young, carried their young on their backs, or just plain put terror into the hearts of the macaques who were trying to eat their bananas.

We had half an hour watching this from behind glass, and then ventured out to a feeding station in the open air so we could see the orang-utangs without encumbrance. Sadly, their feeding platform was fully populated by those damned macaques, and the only orang-utang who came by had a baby on their back and decided not to expose the little one to any aggro and walked away. Regardless, seeing the orang-utangs was just magical in a way I can’t quite explain.

We then walked over to the Sun Bear Conservation centre, where we saw a number of Bornean sun bears, the smallest bears in the world. They are typically between 120-150cm, and males rarely top 60kg. They have gold or orange coloured marking on their chest (hence the name), and notably long tongues (25cm) that have adapted from licking honey inside trees to eating ants and termites. They keep termite populations at bay, and create cavities in trees where hornbills and flying squirrels nest. They eat a variety of forest fruits, dispersing the seeds throughout the forest. The further away the seeds are from the ‘parent’ tree, the better their survival rate. Isn’t nature amazing? Sadly, the bears in the wild are continually poached for a variety of reasons: their claws for decoration; their flesh for exotic meat; their body parts (mostly bile from the gall bladder) for traditional Asian medicine; and they are even stolen to order to be kept as pets (which sadly means killing the mother bear). At Sepilok, all the sun bears are ex-pets who are being taught to regain the forest skills they need to survive when they are placed back out in the wild.

We then took a walk around the overhead jungle walkways that represent a canopy over the rainforest, and the views were spectacular. We saw black squirrels and were told to watch out for snakes that occasionally leap from the trees (do vipers leap?) and land on the hand-rails. There were three tall towers of ascending height in the park and we walked up the tallest one to experience views of the rainforest at its most majestic.

Our guide then took us down to the rainforest floor, and we trekked for half an hour in search of the biggest tree in the whole forest. Being down at that level really did give us a feel of what life might be like in the jungle. I use the terms ‘jungle’ and ‘rainforest’ interchangeably, but I think it is technically the latter as rainforests generally have more covering that restricts sunlight reaching the ground, whereas jungles have thicker undergrowth and more light. It was a truly wondrous experience being in that environment, kit didn’t feel like anywhere else in the world that I have visited.

Others in the party who had more time planned in Borneo then ventured to the Kinabatangan River to view the crocodiles at night, but it was now time for us to head to the airport and fly back to Kola Kinabatu.

We finished our trip with two days at a great hotel recommended by my friend David. It ended up being some way away from Kota Kinabalu so although we ventured out once to go to Friday prayers at another beautiful mosque (Masjid Bandaraya), we barely explored this exciting city. But I hope we can return there one day. For now, we loved being on the huge beach and in the sea at sunset, the hotel pools at night-time (although the mozzies were awful), while Anisa proved herself to be a bit of a demon at table-tennis.

We spent 5 days in total in Brunei and 4 days in Borneo. Ideally it would have been the other way round, but circumstance (Nyepi, school holidays, the desire to spend Eid in Brunei, and wanting to be back in Bali in good time for starting school) necessitated doing things in that order. A fantastic holiday, all in all.

A final joyful memory: Almost exactly 25 years ago, I was in my first-ever IT role, a placement at a hospice in Hackney (walking distance from the Trust where I work today). One afternoon, I was singing along to a song on the radio, and a colleague – who had trained as an opera singer and still travelled the country at weekends performing light opera – listened and made the following observations:

• “Suleiman, you are so out of key.”
• “You literally cannot hold a note.”
• “You should never sing out loud, certainly not in public!”

This is the reason I have never sung karaoke. I’d always assumed that I would eventually break my karaoke duck with my work colleagues as we have regularly talked about doing it at a leaving do or some other celebration. But it’s just never happened. However, there was a short rain shower on our penultimate day, and whilst walking around the hotel Mahnaz spotted that there were some private karaoke rooms. It was too good an opportunity to pass up. We went straight in, and what followed was an hour of great fun.

The lack of preparation time – it was literally 10 minutes from seeing the sign to sorting through songs in the room – meant we didn’t think to seek out some obvious karaoke classics. How could we have not chosen something from Grease? Or Don’t You Want Me by The Human League? Or anything by Abba? A work colleague believes Gimme Gimme Gimme is the greatest song of all time as it always elicits a positive reaction (you will either sing, dance, move, smile, or say: “Wow, what an amazing song!”) That would have been ideal. In retrospect, Mahnaz wished she had picked Black Velvet by Alannah Myles, while I should have gone for songs that can be talked as much as sung (e.g. Ring of Fire and King of the Road) to showcase my vocal … erm … range. 

But there were some stellar performances during the hour, notably Mahnaz singing The Seed and our family duet of APT. The full karaoke playlist is below:

Isn’t it incredible what you hear – or think you hear – when you are singing? At times, I genuinely thought when I sang My Way that I sounded exactly like Frank Sinatra. Like literally note-for-note as per the recorded song or as he would have been when singing at Vegas or the Albert Hall in his prime.

There is some mobile phone footage of my performance, and it has been viewed by Mahnaz, Anisa and my dear friend Kimmy only (and it will stay that way).

Let’s just say the video evidence doesn’t exactly support my argument …

Word of the week in Borneo: Orang utang – We knew orang meant ‘person’ in Bahasa. Hutan means forest, hence orang utang is ‘person dwelling in the forest’.

P.S. Zakariyya, I hope you enjoyed the animal and nature chat!

17/04/25

Feel free to comment or ask any questions! Happy to respond x