Brunei

Brunei is a tiny little country nestled in the northern coast of Borneo Malaysia. It is two little nuggets of land cut down from the coast surrounded on three sides by Malaysia and on one side by the South China Sea. It is one of the few sultanates remaining in the world today, meaning it is run by a Muslim king. Because of this there are very strict laws, for example no alcohol is allowed in the country, and littering is a serious offense with jail time as a possible consequence.
While the Sultan used to rule a large piece of land including all of Malaysia and the Philippines, it is now a tiny country with less than 400,000 people. It is oil rich and so the Sultan has tons of money, but the oil is supposed to run out in the next few decades. The capital of Brunei is Bandar Seri Begawan which is quite a mouthful. It is abbreviate to BSB, which every time I said made me want to break into Backstreet Boys songs.

Here is a shot of the Sultans palace from the river behind it.
Because of the strict Muslim rule, Brunei is a very orderly nation. It was almost strange because at times it felt really empty and way too quiet. The streets at 6pm felt like it was 4am, and there didn't seem to be too much of a social scene. Even the night market was very clean and calm, but there were some amazing foods and drinks. We went to a morning market that was also cleaner than I was used to and had some nice looking fresh food.

This guy was shaving out the insides of the coconut meat.

Brunei is a very expensive country in backpacker terms, so to make it affordable we stayed at what was kind of like a local YMCA. They had very strict boys and girls dorms, but it was cheap so we were happy.
The main sites in BSB include a few extravagant and gorgeous mosques, the palace and nearby park, and a museum dedicated to the life of the Sultan. It is a pretty small place, and you can see the main sites in about a day.
A large percentage of the population also live in a stilt village along the river. Here they have their homes, their schools, their mosques, their stores, really anything they need. We took a boat taxi on a tour of the village to see the houses.

Our driver

Stilt mosque

Stilt house

Apparently the Sultans little brother is not so responsible with his money and ended up spending tons on crazy extravagant things like million dollar houses and cars. He got in lots of trouble with his family and some signs of his impulse buys are still seen around the country.

Prince Jefri
Empire Hotel