A Birthday Celebration like no other

Evening.

I'm behind. It's very simple. I am about 3 days behind in writing about my trip and while I wished to be on top of things I'm actually quite surprised that I'm as caught up as I am.

On the morning of March 31, I woke up and jumped out of bed and headed to what can only be called a stadium (it resembled a stadium in several respects but in others was quite different). As I arrived thousands of others were poring into the stadium to celebrate the Prophet Mohammed's birthday. This was a treat. I didn't realize that this was going to happen until I arrived in Brunei and to be in a predominantly Muslim country for this celebration was just a wonderful coincidence. I arrived and found the most colorful gathering of people I've ever seen. The stadium was mostly full of men and boys - there were few women to be seen and I don't know where they went and why they were not there. The men were dressed in their more traditional dress with long flowing clothes of various colors with a sash tied around their waist. Only pictures can do it justice as I'm not a master of description so again you'll have to wait for those. The Sultan of Brunei was present as were many members of the government and royal family and they led them in several religious chats and rituals and then the Sultan led the group in a 4 km long walk around the city. While the ceremony was occurring there were large breaks and there were many people milling around and it proved to be an excellent time to meet people. I met an older gentleman and we chatted about the holiday, it's meaning, what was happening and other assorted things. I then ran into a group of kids and had a blast with them. We just chatted and talked about soccer, sports, school, life and just laughed. This group had to run and get ready for the parade, but they opened the flood gates and I was then bombarded by group after group of kids wanting to chat and take their picture with me. This lasted until we heard a tremendous explosion - it was the cannons being fired. We stopped horsing around and went to watch the cannons being fired. Pretty neat. Then the march got into high gear and I peeled off and headed back towards the hotel to catch it as it passed. There isn't much to describe except that it was just a massive wave of people matching along the road. I then headed into the hotel to beat the heat and emerged later in the day to go to a shopping mall outside of town. Now, this is an interesting transition. Prior to living in Thailand, I would have avoided malls while traveling for the simple reason that malls and malls and don't tend to fall into the category of new and exciting cultural adventures. And while they aren't new and exciting cultural adventures, they do provide insight into the culture. My time in Thailand and my going into malls has allowed me to begin to create an understanding of this relationship and so I'm trying to extended that in Brunei and Malaysia. Plus it's the only place where you can walk around in air-con. I bought some DVD's which will be a treat to watch when I get home (The Pursuit of Happyness, Click and Happy Feet). I then wandered over to the second famous mosque in town (again, I stopped at the mall because it was near the mosque and gave me something to do during the heat of the day). Getting to the mosque proved a bit tricky as it involved crossing many lanes of traffic during rush hour with no pedestrian crossings, but again, my time in Thailand has prepared me for such a task. The mosque was beautiful - very different from the other one (much larger and more ornate, but less visually stunning). Getting back into the city I grabbed dinner and called it a night - but not before I took a dip in the pool.

The next day I headed into the jungle. Well, not really, but that's what I like to tell people. Brunei is steps above other SE Asia countries in preserving their forests and one of their states, Temburong, is considered by many people to be wholly covered by jungle. While that's not true, it's not too far from the truth. The best way to get there is by boat (which adds to it's appeal and remoteness) which winds through mangrove forests. The ride was the highlight of the day. There is a national park in Temburong that attracts many tourists, but it involves several methods of transportation and is quite expensive. So I headed to a park just outside of town and went for a hike and came to a lookout where one could see off in the distance a tiny peak standing above the rest - that small, tiny, insignificant mountain is the 4,100 m peak that I'm climbing tomorrow. It doesn't seem that small any more. I made my way back into town and while I was buying my ticket I met a man. We met and spoke English. We chatted and found out about each other and once he found out that I was living in Thailand he started to speak in Thai. So for the next hour or so we spoke in Thai. Now, this man isn't Thai. He is Malay who grew up in west Malaysia and has since learned to speak Malay, English, Chinese and Thai (and he speaks all fluently). We just chatted about lots of different things switching between English and Thai. We got back to the town and he offered me a ride back into town and I accepted. He found out that I was going to Malaysia the next day and insisted on stopping at the bus station and finding out everything I needed to know about catching the bus to the ferry and so we did that and he dropped me off. He was a very nice and very impressive guy and I'm glad I met him. I hit the hotel and then the Royal Regalia Museum which needs no explanation and that was my night. I packed and watched a movie and hit the sack.

And that wrapped up my time in Brunei. It was a good stay - not what I expected but it was good. The vacation part of this trip dominated my time there but since I was staying in the Sheraton I felt that was okay. It's been interesting balancing traveling and being on vacation as they sometime contradict each other, however, I feel like I'm done a decent job. I've got to catch you up on my journey to Malaysia and my day today, but I'm running out of time. As I alluded, I'm climbing a mountain tomorrow (Mount Kinabalu - the highest peak in SE Asia) which should take two days and should be a blast. I'll report in when I get back.

Later,

Ryan