The Tale of the Unfilial Son

[Note: An edited version of this article was published in The Golden Legacy column in Brunei's national newspaper, The Brunei Times dated 31st March 2007.]There was this tale of a local boy, who went away to better his and his family’s lot in life. After many years, he achieved success and wealth, married a a noblewoman and became the owner of a huge ship, forgetting his humble roots in the

Circumcision in Old Brunei

In Brunei and in Indonesia, circumcision is known as bersunat but in Malaysia, berkhatan. In the earlier days, bersunat is considered as the mark of a true Muslim. Immediately just before the circumcision, the boy would be asked to recite the ‘kalimah sahadat’ which is the recitation every Muslims or would be Muslims undertake to declare themselves as Muslims – thus by saying it just before the

Brunei in the 2nd World War

I didn't realise there was a lot of interest in the WWII photographs I posted recently. I have a number of articles about the war and the invasion of Brunei. The one I found interesting was in the Time Magazine issue of June 25th, 1945, where an article entitled "Walkover on Borneo" described how the Allied Forces liberated the island of Borneo from the Japanese. The most interesting bit is the

Memukun - Brunei's Unique Tradition

I was staring at the computer last night raking my brain for today's topic when I heard someone being interviewed about 'memukun' on Rangkaian Nasional. Rangkaian Nasional has a program where people can actually sing through their telephones - a duet with another singer in the studio. I remembered in the 1980s when 'memukun' first appeared on national radio. A number of people who were trading at

Padians of Brunei's Kampung Ayer

I was having a chat with my mother the other day talking about our visit to the floating market in Thailand when my father was in the diplomatic service. My mother told me that the floating market is strictly more for the tourists coming to Thailand. She said that usually by about 11 when all the tourists have left, the floating market traders would disappear too. There was hardly any local which

Tales of a Village

Imagine about a hundred years back when 'padians' were still selling wares among the houses in the water village. Among the goods and wares that the padians would be selling would be food and fruits. With Bruneians living on the water, someone somewhere would have to plant the food and fruits and someone would have to get them from somewhere. This was the job of 'pengalu' and not 'padians'.

Kampung Sungai Bunga

There are three modern Kampung Ayer resettlement villages - Kampung Sungai Bunga, Kampung Bolkiah A and Kampung Bolkiah B. These three resettlement villages are the ideal (by today's standards at least) of what the houses should look like. No doubt, aesthetically there is much to be desired as the houses each looking like the other becomes rather characterless and aesthetically challenged but at

Main Mosques in Brunei through the Ages

Brunei has been a Muslim country for about 500 years now. You would have thought that there would be lots of old mosques in Brunei. But the oldest I think are no more than 50 years old and most of the older ones have been demolished. Even then the older ones are not much older than say 80 or 90 years old. This is because practically all our older mosques are constructed out of timber so none has