We have travelled from Dunedin to Poland, stopping at Brunei for eleven hours. After going through immigration checks we embarked on a three hour tour with a driver/tour guide. He drove very fast, and erratically, and was often looking back at us or in his rear view mirror talking to us, when I was hoping he would be paying more attention to the road. He showed us elaborate mosques worth millions of dollars. He took us to the national gallery and we saw more gold and expensive items. He was full of enthusiasm for his king and the monarchy system there. (Though I thought I would be asking serious questions maybe if I were him.) We visited the water village... 20,000 people live in houses on poles in the river. But the best experiences of the whole tour were the people we got to talk to. There was a gently spoken water taxi driver who talked briefly about life in Brunei when we asked questions. Then our tour man took us to visit his small apartment and meet his family. I think it was quite unexpected for his wife, but she spoke great english and was a real delight to meet and talk with. We sat in this small room perched on wooden stools (Oprah was on TV) and really enjoyed sharing with this woman who talked very openly of their courtship, their marriage and family life under the moslem and Brunei way of living. It was like she was giving us of herself and that felt very precious.
As we were waiting to leave Brunei a woman entered in a full faced Burka. This loud mouthed Australian woman (I love Australians but when a plane load of them arrived you noticed quite a bit of extra arrogant and ignorant behaviour.... We met, joked and chatted with some lovely Australians, but the more vocal ones were not good advertisements for their country.) said of Moslem women in Australia who wear veils or the burka... "Lose it or go home! That should be the rule!" and the three women she was talking to each expressed similar sentiments.
We called in at Dubai and did a lap of the airport. It was so interesting from a high balcony looking down at all these men who were dressed as if they were acting in a nativity play.... and realising that .... no.... this is how they dress. It was a good for me to experience the variety, even though intellectually I knew about it.
We are spending time talking with Magda's dad. We have no Polish and he has virtually no English. Magda who had been translating for us left for the shops and we had breakfast, chatted and walked to visit his wife's grave. He told us a lot of stuff about the history of Poland, the impact of the war on his family and showed us his garden and property. We laughed, we gestured, we tried out words. We played with the electronic translator. We thumbed through the English to Polish dictionary, learn't words and to our surprise communicated... it was so interesting.... and again very special.
People are good and bad, but you will always find delightful people and lovely and loving families trying to do their thing in their way.
Photos: (should be in the opposite order)
- in the water taxi with houses of the water village behind.
- Our walk to the graveyard this morning chatting along the way. At 43 degrees Celsius that creek was yelling at me to jump in and soak.
- Magda's mum's grave. The graves at the grave yard were adorned with fresh flowers and candles burning in containers. Magda's dad lit two candles and he and my son renewed the water in the flowers.
- The VERY elaborate and expensive mosque built by the present king of Brunei.
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