One night in Brunei….Hmmm… its actually three nights in brunei though, just that One night in Brunei sounds like both song tittles ” One night In beijing” and “One night in Bangkok”…Ha! I was there just about two days ago when i was invited to host an appreciation dinner for HSBC Brunei over at the convention centre there. It was quite a memorable trip though..
The trip started off in a rather small A320 and lasted for about an hour and forty minutes. While I was way up in the sky, i started to recall the first virgin trip there, when i was still in my very very early twenties when i was rumaging in the Temburong Jungle, all geared up in army fatigues and struggling with topography.Interestingly, i don’t recall any much except dense forest and having a heat stroke…. Bad experience though, because when you kana heat stroke, the one way that the medics take your temperature when you are in a fit is literally up yours….(if you do get what i mean). I was shaken out of my reverie when the pilot announced that we are now descending and would be landing in 30 mins time. I looked out of the minisule windows and was welcomed by the sight of tropical rainforest with winding teh tarik coloured river..Geez… never quite withhold this sight before as my previous trip there was in the dark….
Interestingly, there isn’t much of tall buildings there, just sparsely doted landed properties with a rather comfortable distance between each other, surrounded by vast greeneries with winding roads almost at its perimeters..very much different from home, where hdb rules big time…
Upon arrival, my manager and i was received by this lovely petite lady from the bank who became our chaperon for the next couple of days, where i started to learn more about life in general. Had my first lesson when upon her, i asked..” Hmmm..so…how often do you go back?” A pair of huge innocent eye starred back at me as the mouth broke into a big smile as she asked”Go back WHERE?” i stammered” Well, like ..Hmm….”Almost with a laugh, she cut me off with ” Like Hong Kong? Singapore? I am a local, so i guess i go home everyday.Only locals are hired to work in the bank you see..unless you are top management la…”
I was very much surprised, she sounded just so un local like..but then again…how do the locals sound like? i realised immediately how little i know of Brunei and its people and this trip, i learnt some very interesting stuffs that i would now share with you.
Amazingly, citizens of brunei are entittled to free education and free medical benefits, which means that if you are a local ,you are entilled to study in a government school for free and when you are sick, the government hospital would provide you with medical care for next to nothing!
Additional perks are there are no income tax( only corporate taxes) and cars there are really cheap( the latest 3 series is just only about $60,000) and if i got the info correctly, there isn’t any road tax as well( or is it just very minimal) And check this out, the petrol is only 0.53cents per litre ! wow wow wow wow wow!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!but then again, any foreign plates will only be able to top up $10 worth of petrol. there is only one pump that caters to foreign plates and it only dispenses $10 worth of petrol.Flat. Rather ingenous!
No alcohol is permitted..No Clubbing..No congregation of more then ten people and if so, a permit must be applied..But the thing that really got my attention was that there is actually a censorship board that governs the rules of performance and dress code for any performing events.Now, just to give you a clearer picture.. lets look at the photos below..
Ha! thats moi of course in the superbly huge hall over at the convention centre and believe me, its huge and really grand( the dinner was for about thousand plus people)
by now you would probably have a good idea about the size of the place and let me now introduce you to the panel of officials from the censorship board.
There they are.. all the censors of the round tables..where the ladies are more personable and the gentlemens more sombre..The thing is that before you stage any performance you have to go through this round, where you need to run through the whole programme of the evening with them, whereby they would access and decide if what you say, the performance contents, the songs, the skits and everything else are aptly acceptable before they sign the letter of approval.And so, i have to churn out the whole programme starting off with the opening line and ending with ” Thank you and Good night, we’ll see you next year!!”
So when i was done with the whole run thru, i came downstage to answer whatever queries that they have ranging from the meaning of the lyrics of the song that i was singing to the exact meaning of the chinese greetings that i did..
I also have to show them my outfit for the evening( just in case i decided on a raunchy outfit which would probably be rejected) and after quite a thorough and detailed Q&A session, we passed the bar with flying colours and we are good to go. The Show will go on! Getting the nod of approval from the censorship board was a major piece of good news for the organising committee ,whose smiles could have lighted up the entire hall. This has been such a memorable moment for my career in show biz. Never have i ever been in such a close scruntiny and though foreign in nature to me, i enjoyed it profusely as it was just so refreshingly different! And the night couldn’t be any better!!!!
This is the magnificent team that organised the event , who were really nice to me, making my brief stay a very much wonderful chapter of my somewhat mundane life. Thank you guys for having me there and kudos to a jobwell done!
Another chapter of my life completed..
And the next chapter unfolds..where would it lead me?
Only time will tell..
only then we will know.
