35th Anniversary RBA's First Flight

[Tomorrow is RBA's 35th Anniversary of its first official flight. I wrote this article and it was published yesterday in my column, The Golden Legacy, in Brunei Times]Royal Brunei Airlines in Brunei Aviation HistoryIn two days time, Brunei’s own national airlines, the Royal Brunei Airlines will be celebrating its 35th Anniversary of its first historic flight. Royal Brunei Airlines was officially

Echoes from the Minaret

Sometime in October 1968, if you have been a regular reader of Borneo Bullein, you would have come aross this page 19. An interesting page as it listed all the movies playing in the cinemas in Brunei Town then:-Interesting movies. There are even auctions and lucky draw numbers etc. But look closely to the movie on the top right hand of the page... It's an advertisement for the first and one and

Malacca's Serkam Pantai Mosque

[I read this on a forum I subscribed to called the Sunna-Principles and thought this was worthwhile sharing.]When Melaka fell into the hand of the Portuguese in 1511, it became the first city in South East Asia to have a cross, erected on top of the Melaka Hill. Christianization of the city took place afterwards, with European forts and churches being built as old Malay graveyards, palaces and

Fantastic Services

I have been going back to RIPAS Hospital lately. I was supposed to undergo this minor operation ... let me digress ... I am always worried when doctors say minor and it involves cutting me up, since when is that minor ... anyway, I am supposed to go for this minor procedure and the doctor said I cannot have it done until I sort out my coughs.In February, I had this really crazy non stop coughs.

Once Upon A Time

You learn new things all the time. Yesterday, I was at UBD listening to my minister deliver a paper entitled MIB in Development. He delivered a paper almost similar last year MIB in Environment. It was a difficult topic but as usual my minister with his many anecdotes along the way was able to deliver it in his easy manner.I knew most of the the things he wanted to say. Though during the Q&A,

Converse, the Nike brand

A few years ago, I was attending a seminar in Jakarta, something on the legal aspects of accountancy or something similar. Anyway, I was there with one of our young lawyers. In the evening, while going out for dinner with him, we stopped at a shoe shop and he was eyeing this shoes made out of canvas and rubber. At that time, I was ignorant to know that what he was buying was probably one of the

Trees the Origin of Brunei's Place Names

[I wrote the following article for publication in my Golden Legacy column on The Brunei Times, 5th April 2010. I did not write any article during my trip to England and Brazil over the last two weeks before this.]+++++ In Brunei, any toponym hobbyists would have plenty to do. Toponymists are people who study place names. According to Wikipedia, toponymy is the scientific study of place names (