With that headline, you know you’re in store for quite an adventure. Buckle up! It was an early start to our day at 7am. We both managed to get around five hours of sleep. A driver met us in the lobby to take us to the Brunei River to hopefully see more proboscis monkeys. It was about a twenty minute drive to the river from the gaudy and ostentatious Empire Hotel and we were soon on a small boat cruising up the river.
One thing we did not anticipate was the level of humidity seeping into our telephoto zoom lenses. It fogged up the outer glass which is not unusual nor unexpected, but after clearing away that condensation, we both discovered that the humidity had somehow gotten inside our lenses and was making them appear cloudy. So unfortunately, when we first spotted some proboscis monkeys with especially long schnozes, our cameras were virtually unusable. Once we get back home and can load the actual RAW files onto a computer, we may be able to salvage something, but it’s not ideal.
Luckily, our lenses did eventually acclimate, but the best sightings of the day were already behind us. The male proboscis monkeys have the larger schnozes to attract a mate. This, in fact, is how I initially attracted Nicole as well. My nose is in a business all for itself. But as far as the male proboscis monkey is concerned, they are a bit cagier and don’t like to see humans nearby and will often retreat. The females with smaller noses aren’t as jumpy as their male counterparts, so we saw more females on our way back down the river.
Nicole actually had eyes like a hawk and was able to spot them even before the guide. Most impressive. We loitered for a bit watching multiple females enjoying a breakfast before going back to the dock. Brunei’s mangrove trees along the river are quite a bit lower to ground level when compared to what we saw in Bako National Park. Thus, we were able to see them much closer than before. Alas, our cameras didn’t really see it the same as we did.
On our way back to the hotel, we made a brief stop at an ATM followed by an even briefer stop at the Sultan’s palace. You really couldn’t see anything from outside the gates and was a completely wasted stop. When we got back to the hotel, I discovered that a building that I wanted to see that I thought was the palace, is in fact the Omar Ali Saifuddien Mosque. We caught a Dart back into the city having just come from the same area.
It was a little bit of a race against the clock because the midday prayers were also about to begin and they could shut down the mosque to the likes of us. Luckily we got there just in time to explore the exterior and take some pictures. It was at that moment that my camera simply said, “Nope.” I got an error message that basically bricked my camera. Since midday today, my Sony camera that I purchased just a couple months ago ceased to function. It is very upsetting to say the least. It’s under warranty, but one typically wants a functioning camera when they still have five more days of traveling and adventuring ahead of them. I will have to try and fill the void with my point-and-shoot and my cellphone like some kind of commoner.
We returned to the Empire Hotel feeling a bit somber. The hotel features a large amount of various games at the connected country club. We first played some table tennis followed shortly thereafter by an intense game of basketball. The grounds of this hotel are absolutely massive, and yet very few people appear to be staying here. We have seen some, but again the ratio of workers to guests is heavily skewed in favor of the workers.
After our game of basketball, we returned to change and get some dinner. Only one of the restaurants was open, so we ate there. I had a chicken makhani with naan. Nicole had samosas, naan, and basmati rice. Whoa! And to wash it all down, I had an iced Milo drink. In alcohol-free Brunei, Milo is about as fancy and wild as it gets. After regrouping after dinner, we had one more activity we wanted to try.
There’s an 8-lane bowling alley at the hotel and I don’t know why. It was a truly surreal feeling to be by ourselves in a bowling alley in Brunei. The amount of excess to this place is a little eerie. None of this should exist. As we discovered this morning on the short drive to and from the river, a lot of this excess is due to Crown Prince Jefri’s exploits over the years. He is the Sultan’s younger brother and became known as the Playboy Prince. He essentially laid the groundwork for this over-the-top hotel that no one asked for. His other assets or properties include various upscale hotels around the world, eight private planes including a 747, one of the largest collections of cars in the world — one evidently being THE Batmobile from Batman Forever, a vast collection of famous artworks, and a yacht named “Tits.” Crown Prince Jefri was also Brunei’s Finance Minister, and it didn’t take much to arouse suspicions. Things went tits up for Jefri when Brunei launched an investigation into his embezzling of $15 billion from oil revenues.
But thanks to Jefri’s fiscal irresponsibility and freewheeling spending, we now have things like the Empire with an 8-lane bowling alley, a golf course, and a 3-screen movie theater showing all the latest movies (or at least the ones that are ok to screen in Brunei). Oh, and in any case, Nicole and I were the only ones ever using them. When we were escorted to our room last night after the flight, the guy showing us to the room apologized that there was a small gap along the walkway that wasn’t as well lit. He said, “Sorry it’s so dark. They are trying to save on energy costs.” Looking back at that comment, it’s laughable. They’ve got the air conditioning running in these massive cavernous buildings so that the temperature is permanently at 16ºc, but now they’re pinching pennies with that one light. It’s like the scene in Christmas Story when the mom turns off the leg lamp, but leaves every other light in the house on and exclaims, “I didn’t want to waste electricity.”
Despite the camera woes and other setbacks today, Nicole and I had a good time and are trying to make the best of things. But wow, is this place weird. It almost gives off a North Korea vibe where everything is just for show, and nothing serves a real purpose. Tomorrow we head off to Thailand and ultimately Koh Samui. It’s another travel day, which aren’t always the most exciting, but once we’re out of Brunei airspace, there may be a lot more thoughts about what we experienced in the last 24 hours.
passports & pepto bismol 