End of the Year

It's the last day of the year. The year 2009 has been a memorable year for our family. The year when we say good bye to Holland and moved back to Bumi Bertuah to start another chapter in our life.

The final year in Holland was about travelling to places where we have not been before as a family. First was the Catalan city of Barcelona, then the Viking land of Iceland, followed by the homeland of the Umayyad Empire (Damascus) and finally the city of the future (Dubai). Now that we are in Bumi Bertuah, it is a time for deep reflection, settling down in my new job and trying to finish the renovation on our house. The work has been ongoing for nine months. Just now a few crates of new stuff for the kitchen had just arrived. The house is definitely a major construction site with constant noises from drills and hammers echoing the whole house. Hopefully the end of the tunnel is near and the kitchen is the final piece on the renovation work.

Canopy Walk

After about 15 minutes riding on the longboat, we reached a spot by the riverbank where the real hard work would began. From there we walked up along a slippery jungle track, climbing slowly up the hill until we reached a point where wooden steps have been built to help the climb. From there on, the guide mentioned it would a mega climb - a total of 630 steps to climb. Wow!

Once we reached the top, it was an appropriate moment to recover our breath, took a good break before ascending the tall scaffolding structure to experience a canopy view from top of the trees. This time it was something like another 150 steps to climb. Once at the top, it was quite scary as the structure felt to be swaying a bit. Nonetheless the view was amazing.

It was good to see the kids took the challenge and enjoyed the whole experience.

Our National Park

From Bangar, a bus picked us up to to Batang Duri where the road ended. At Batang Duri we went on a ride on a longboat going further upstream. This is the most exciting part of the journey. The Temburong river is no doubt the most amazing river in Bumi Bertuah. This is the only river that has very fast water flow, that is laced with rocky beds and has lots of rapids. The quick change in the overall elevation also makes the water cold and refreshing.

This is my third time here. Previous trips were to the UBD research centre further upstream and to the waterfall or the wasai location. This time around we went for the canopy walkway.

There I met a chap who also works as a tour guide but for another company. He said that this park is no doubt a real beauty and that many foreign tourists were thrilled by the trip and the jungle experience. However he said unfortunately there are hardly many locals who wanted to go here. It seems that the locals twinge on the idea that they have to pay a small amount to visit their own national park. Like today there must have only been about 30 locals who visited the park.

When everything are free in the country - education, health, land, housing, Ramadan dates and an endless list of other things, the idea of paying when in-country is really something hard to swallow. It is as if everyone are expecting that a trip to our own National Park is also to be made free as well.

And the chap said that surprisingly these very people will not even blink an eye when they have to pay for entrance fee to national parks outside the country. At this moment, someone was saying that about 20,000 of our countrymen are holidaying in Sabah, visiting all sort of places. That number is really hard to believe but imagine that right now every hotels and apartments are full and that the "B" licence plates are causing traffic jams over there.

Our Journey on the Boat

I really felt obliged to help with the KNK or Kenali Negara Kita programme. So today I brought the kids and their cousins on a package tour to the last bastion of pristine jungle in Bumi Bertuah or for that matter Borneo! It is so ironic that the kids have been to variety of places during our travel but never to our own backyard - Temburong.

I could recall that the first 'Visit Brunei' campaign programme was back in 2001 and was expecting a lot has been done especially with Temburong being the jewel of the eco-tourism. I am happy to say that a lot has been done although they should also look at those little details as well. For example, the jetty and waiting area for the boat to Temburong were quite basic. The ticket booths look like cardboard boxes and the waiting area was small. And there were no information sign showing the boat schedule or the price. This might be acceptable for the locals but would be quite an inconvenient for tourists who need to be guided by easily visible information.

The outward trip was on the standard speed boat which took 45 minutes to reach Bangar. That was fun. Although the return trip was much better, on a bigger and faster boat. That one only took 30 minutes. I asked the driver what was his maximum speed. I could hardly believe it when he showed me the speedometer - 42 km/hr.

For those like us who seldom go on a boat, the river scenery was breathtaking. First was when passing through the brackish water territory and seeing a never ending sight of mangrove trees lining up the river banks. Then as soon as the tidal influence reached its limit further up the Temburong river, we could see the mangrove trees started to disappear and to be dominated by normal trees.

Foot Therapy

Today is what they called boxing day. It's do with Christmas. The only thing I always associate it with is football - one of the key date in the English Premiership schedule where the half point of the season is reached. It is a public holiday for most here but amazingly all banks were opened for business today. I really pity all those bank workers, they don't really have many days off.

For start of the day today we went to Bukit Shahbandar. The place was not at its busiest. Brought the girls for their first outing there and left them to decide how many hills they wanted to do. At the end they did seven hills in total. Amazing.

At the entrance of the park there is a stretch of walkway containing nicely arranged pebbles. I always wonder what are they for until someone walked through it barefoot. It was a walkway for foot therapy. Of course.

Walking on it was actually quite painful especially if you have soft foot - such is part of modern living where we all now hardly ever walk barefoot.

The Old Village

After Friday prayer yesterday, there was a doa gathering at grandma's house at the old village by the river. This is always a place of many fond memories. Things hardly changed here. Except for the people. Everyone of course are getting older and aging

Sometimes in the busy and bustle of our work life and modern living, being in places like this does take us back to real senses. Life can be quite simple.

We always consider modern living is equal to a high quality of life and standard of living. But, with the entrapment of modern living and increasing work responsibility, we now spend a huge part of our life in the sterile place called the office. Once we are at home, we need to be soothed by all sort of modern gadgets and a never ending variety of food to stay entertained and pacified.

If these are what we considered as high quality of life, then they do not jive with the high cases of health problems that 'modern' people face nowadays. Reading the news a few days back, I was quite surprised that about 2000 people amongst our small population require regular chemo-therapy treatment. Thousands more are suffering from all sort of health problems. These are all probably inevitable as we live in a competitive and pampered world. So going back and spending times in the simple old village is really refreshing, that life after all can be simple, not much stress and pressure around you.

Going to the Mountain

I just heard that a good friend of mine, a mountaineer, had recently made a trip to Nepal and reached the Everest base camp. I really envy his trip. Imagine what it would be like up there on the roof of the world, even if not properly scaling any of the mountains. That would be my dream - to go to Nepal to see the Everest or the Swat Valley in Pakistan to be on the foot of K2. Nowadays however, the Swat Valley is a no go area. It recently fell under the Taliban hands.

Being in the mountain is a real humbling experience. It does bring to the reality of how insignificant we all are. Whilst trolling my old photos, I saw this photo I took showing the picture of a mountain range whilst the plane was taking off from Salt Lake City. Those were the days of travelling easy. Pity that Bumi Bertuah hasn't got a proper mountain. The nearest is KK. That's where currently thousands of fellow citizens are camping, filling every single apartments and hotel rooms available. If one is to go out and about in Bumi Bertuah at this momment, it is eerily very quiet. It seems most people have left the country for holiday.

Tranquility by the River

Such calmness, peacefulness and serenity. The photoshot of the Belait river I took just after sunrise. Our land, Bumi Bertuah, actually has a lot to offer in terms of recreation, tourism and activities along its many unique and unspoilt rivers. But alas, we are still very far from realizing the river's true potentials.

Melangkah KeTahun Baru

A tad late on New Year greeting. Every man has his own price and standing. Whilst thousands, in their best attire and frame of mind were invited to the Hijrah New Year celebration at the Jame' Mosque, yours truly went on a simpler celebration at our local mosque. Rather than a night that is nowadays becoming unfortunately more of a ceremonial ocassion, the function at our mosque consisted of a more down-to-earth lecture on what awaits us all - death.

Every day is a ticking clock. We don't know when the calling will be. Our age is increasing and each day can only be ever closer to the moment when we are finally being called. So things like these always make ones to think of own current priorities and destiny.

One Dollar World

Saw this one in the shop, VCDs selling at $1! The other day we wanted to buy an original PS game and surprisingly the only shop selling that is at the Mall by the cinema. All the others were selling only the 'pirate' types and they cost $2 each! For that cost one only had to buy an adapter costing about 40 dollar to enjoy the latest games out there in the market.

One would say.....the big companies and the artists are already mega rich any where and they can't be that bothered to dig the pockets of poor souls in this far flung country.

This is one of life's dilemmas. The good and bad things are separated by a thin line. In most cases emotions or bias reasoning dictate the decision. In other cases it is already ingrained in our everyday actions. In this case it is clearly a case of stealing the proprietary rights of a company or a person. There are also many instances we see in our daily life for the decisions as who gets what such as jobs, privileges and so on. Indeed the separating line is easily clouded, ever so thinner and difficult to see. At the end everyone is responsible for their own actions.

Not on Holiday

The school holiday is on. The roads and towns are noticeably a lot quieter and the office has also started to be deserted. Most people are already on holiday either heading to KK or KL. So everyone seems to deserve a break. It seems. For us we are staying put. Your truly is not even taking a day off.

Nonetheless it is quite ironic that if we think about it actually our country 'Bumi Bertuah' has a lot to offer in terms of places to visit or for relaxation. There are so many unique locations and sights across the land but in most cases are poorly developed or promoted. So it is really sad to see that everyday large crowd of people are queueing for hours heading to the nearest towns across the border and hoarding what ever they could get their wallets on.

Dangerous Business

There has been maintenance works going on along the highway for sometimes now. This is good as the highway is in real need of some serious repairs. There are many spots with potholes or too bumpy. Some notorious spots are easily transformed into water puddles during rain period. And they have caused many accidents especially to those who were not aware of such spots.

With the road work though, one constant issue that have been highlighted again and again including in the local newspaper is the lack of safety awareness of the contractors. It is as if there is no system at all in terms of supervision or standard. One constant danger faced by road users is the lack of ample warning signs when half of the road is closed.

We took these photos this morning. The first sign says danger 500 m ahead which actually was less than 200m. Then the road suddenly turned into one lane!

Busy Sunday

Today was a day for attending four functions - a wedding, a doa kesyukuran, a hajj welcoming and a tahlil.

First was the wedding at noon. It was at Lambak Kanan and from the look of the signboards at the main junction there must have been five weddings going on in that very place.

There I met one of my former mentor in my workplace who have retired and I have not seen for some five years now. It was good to re-connect again.

Didn't eat much though as the next function would be serving lamb grill. That was for a doa kesyukuran for a close relative who was honoured with an exemplary award during the recent national teacher day celebration. There I was asked to join the dikir, it has been a while since I used my vocal chord for that purpose!

Then the lamb grill. It is becoming a trend now to order lamb grill either for barbecue or family function. Nowadays there are a number of restaurants offering that service but apparently the cheapest one is from Mulaut Abattoir.

Jogging at Tasek

An early start to the morning as we headed to Bukit Shahbandar but alas the place was closed for a major running event. Cars were parked along the highway and the police were not really interested to let mere mortals like us to enter the place. So we went straight to Tasek in Bandar.

It was our first time there and we were quite impressed with how the place has been developed. Apparently the place has some important clients to appease.

Today was quite crowded. Saw a few friends and relatives. Most people we saw were in heavy attire (it can't be that cold) and were just walking.

We challenged ourselves to run through the scenic trail passing the waterfall before running on the hill top track passing the water reservoir. Then we did it again running up towards the water reservoir.

Tasek is definitely a unique place especially to have a beautiful waterfall just a walk away from the heart of the capital town. Indeed one does not need to go deep into the jungle to marvel one of nature's gift.

Suffering in Silence

Sungai Liang Roadblock Irks Motorists

Written by Liza Mohd Friday, 04 December 2009 07:52

Kuala Belait - A police roadblock mounted at Sungai Liang road from 6am to 6pm for the past two days has caused major traffic jams with commuters complaining of being stuck in the snarl for over two hours.

A traffic police noted that the routine roadblock aimed to reduce the rate of accidents in view of the school holidays. However, some people said the roadblock had caused unnecessary traffic congestion and expressed anger and frustration at being stuck in the traffic jam for such a long time.

A big increase in the number of commuters on the road has been recorded in the past two days since the return of Haj pilgrims to the country.

A motorist who drove to the airport to fetch her parents returning from the Haj expressed her anger and frustration as she was caught in the traffic for over two hours and was not able to reach the airport on time to officially welcome them.
Another commuter said the journey from home to his work place usually takes about 40 minutes but now has turned into a two-hour ordeal which was frustrating.

"It is depressing because you are helpless and sitting in the car when you can be doing something productive elsewhere," said a frustrated commuter.

Police noted that the routine roadblock is scheduled to take place for a week.-- Courtesy of Borneo Bulletin

New Moon

Yesterday was the first time we watched a movie since coming back. The movie was New Moon, adopted from the second book in the Twilight series. It was courtesy of Volvo to celebrate the launching of the new XC60 model. So why New Moon? I am guessing here....Edward Cullen the vampire was driving an XC60 in the movie! Good for Volvo.

Today is the third day of the Eid. Outside it is now full moon being the 15th day in the month of Zulhijjah. With the current korban functions still in full swing in villagers, government offices and private sectors, there are now a lot meat being passed around. Hopefully the needy will get their much needed share.

On completely separate topic, I was reading regarding 'Kiasu' in Singapore and the bad lights associated with it. 'Kiasuism' also seems to become more prevalent nowadays in Bumi Bertuah. Kiasu meaning ‘the fear of losing out’ and is associated with a kind of ‘me-first’ attitude. It is not a behaviour to be proud of especially when people start to take all sort of advantages for the benefit of themselves only.

21 times

I have been looking for my yellow book for sometimes now. In the end after weeks of searching, I decided to go ahead without it. This must be my 21st time donating blood, all the records were in the yellow book. I know the book is somewhere. I am sure that I will manage to find it one of these days - it must be still in one of our boxes.

The blood donation procedure nowadays is slightly different from the past. I was told the changes were made after a recent visit by some American doctors to the hospital!

A form containing a long list of questionnaires had to be filled in beforehand. The form, apparently more suitable for blood donors in the States, contains a lot of questions that touches on one's sexual behaviours and lifestyle! There is also now more restriction on who are eligible to donate. Those who are taking light medicine such as panadol are not even allowed to donate.

The blood unit at RIPAS is quite an efficient one. The whole process took just over half an hour today. At the end I left RIPAS with a punctured arm and 400 ml less blood.

Time to get some refreshment!
Amazingly Bandar was a busy place today. There were traffic jams everywhere. The school holidays should have made people to spend more time in the office, but alas, banks and coffee shops seemed to be the focus instead.

The Last Hill

The long weekend was about doing serious work-out at the Bukit Shahbandar. It has been a steady progress. Last week I covered five hills. On Sunday morning together with our youngest, we challenged ourselves to run over seven hills. We were totally exhausted at the end. At the last stretch we could only managed to walk and lo and behold P. Sarah with her bodyguards overtook us!

This morning, a holiday for those in private sector, I went the whole lengths covering all nine hills. By the last hill I thought I have spent all my energy. The last climb was a real agony, quite excruciating.

The Rites

As always the korban almost started soon after the morning Eid prayer. This year six buffaloes were sacrificed in the compound of our mosque. The best thing about the whole rites is the communion effort of the villagers. About a hundred turned up to carry out all sort of tasks. Basically it was like a well-machined army, everyone knows what to do and carried out their tasks diligently.

It is amazing to see such community work is still very much alive in our country.

It did take quite an effort to prepare the meat distribution out of six buffaloes. Normally the whole thing takes about 6 to 7 hours to finish including the distribution ceremony.

Welcoming Aidil Adha

Time flies very quickly. It was only just a while ago that we celebrated the Aidil Fitri now come the other Eid. This Eid is probably the better of the two as there are no pompous preparation required and spiritually more meaningful.

I was late reaching the mosque today. As I sat, luckily the microphone was handed to me. And there I was given the chance to led the Takbir just before the Iman made the final ones.
The sermon was a standard one that is always delivered every year. First touching on how lucky we are to see another year and another Eid. And then on our duty to do the korban and reminding us on the sacrifice made by our Prophet Ibrahim. It all may sounds so monotonous. But really we humans are very forgetful and weak beings, we always needed to be reminded on simple things like this.

The Friday's sermon delivered yesterday touched on a topic that has been the common theme over the last 3 weeks or so - Zakat. It must have been the after-effect of the confusion and surprises with the zakat distributions last month where some 4000 received the Zakat. The figure was a real shock to everyone. It begs a question - sampai bila 'Bumi Bertuah' akan bertahan.

Jamrah Pillars

'Bumi Bertuah' is probably the only country that is celebrating tomorrow. Today as the world is celebrating the first day of the Eid, it was quite a sobering day to spend almost the whole day attending meetings. By the time I reached home in the dark, I saw the live TV pictures of the millions of pilgrims converging in Mina, a beautiful and moving sight. It reminded us of our own journey to the holy land in 2003 where in Mina that year saw one of the biggest disaster seen in the pilgrimage season.

Nowadays the place is a lot safer. The Jamaraat has been extended and capable of accommodating the flow of 2 millions pilgrims. The whole hajj experience is safer and more comfortable. The place is still very crowded though.

Broken Table

Amongst the 475 boxes or items that were packed in our container, this one didn't survive the journey. But otherwise the rest were okay.

It's now two weeks since we moved in to the house and still lots of things to do. But hopefully give a month or two most of the boxes will be completely opened. Hopefully.

We are now looking forward to the weekend. It's the Eid as well as an extended weekend. It will be another busy weekend though!

Steep Climb

It has been quite a while since I have been to Bukit Shahbandar. The place is definitely quite popular with the Bandar folks. Today I followed that popular trail, challenging myself by running over five out of the nine known hills. The heavy downpour last night though has made the trail quite slippery making running only possible over the flat and gentle slopes.

The whole place is definitely beautiful, with lots of green everywhere. The morning dew also made the place a really refreshing place to be today.

Having said that there is one thing I don't like about this place and wish it wasn't necessary. There are a huge number of concrete steps built all over the place. It is something that is inevitable as most of the steep climbs would be almost impossible to maintained and climb. Nonetheless there are still some steep climb especially those on the back trail that still have muddy tracks. These are the more challenging part of the whole Bukit Shahbandar trail.

Beautiful Game

Our youngest did a football marathon today joining his team in the inter-schools football tournament. With a group of friends they formed a team calling themselves the "Nerds in Red". They were doing and organising things themselves, apparently were without a coach. So I offered myself to be their manager but then I have to skipped early!

They were against real competitions, amongst the best school teams in the land. They lost all their five matches, even thrashed 5-0 in one game. But then there were no sign of resignation or regret, they were just having fun. Good for them.

A Normal Weekend

It was another normal weekend again, another round of wedding functions to attend. In our closely knitted society, hardly a week passed by without a wedding or two to attend. Indeed it is a huge social commitment but one that is unique in terms of scale and pompousness and helps to bind families and friends together.

The weather has been in general quite wet lately. Luckily not a single rain drop during the main function today even though many dark clouds were lingering all day long.

As in yesteryear during the monsoon season, it is expected that there will be flooding here and there. Hopefully the big flood that took the capital by surprise early this year will not happen again.