Charcoal Factory and Flying Foxes

Jacky, our very adventurous friend, had been to an Island recently and had discovered a Charcoal Factory that the locals had built and thought it would be a good day out for some of the newbies (and oldies!) so we tagged along with her. We got a boat from Bandar to one of the islands for an hours trek through the rainforest. It was very scenic and quite steep in places, but the view was beautiful.

We went past the water village and stopped outside one. I was very surprised at how big the the houses were. Its very decieving from the outsdie but inside it seemed to go on forever. The house was also well furnished. I had this view that the people weren't that well off in the water village but they seemed to be doing just fine!

(Inside one of the houses. How does it all fit??!!)

After the jungle trek, we got back onto the boat and went to another island where they had a board walk through the mangrove trees.

After this, we went to another island to look at the charcoal factory. As you can see it was all hand made and not what I expected! The island itself was a bit strange and the animals were in a horrible state. It just seemed to me it was all money money money. I think the man who owns the factory did everything at minimum cost and this was reflected in the conditions the men were working and living in.

This was supposed to be our last stop but Jacky had mentioned to the boat driver that she had been told there were some flying foxes nearby. The driver did say he didn't think there would be any at all because he's never seen any, but he would take us. The boat through the narrow river was sooo creepy!! We know that there are crocodiles in this part of the world and we were so close to the bank, I was terrified! It was like being in Jurassic Park! But what made it seem more real was when we turned the corner and saw this:

All them blobs on the trees are bats! To be exact- the large flying fox of South East Asia, Pteropus Vampyrus (I know, Vampire!! Edward?) I was so excited! They were making so much noise and there were literally hundreds of them. The were 4 other trees full of these bats. It was amazing!

The day ended very much on a high and we were exhausted. But it was all thanks to Jacky for organising it all. One of the many adventures of Brunei!

An Update for the month of September

I have been quite lazy in updating my blog (sorry!) but there were so many pictures to go through that I kept putting it off. But enough is enough! I am going to do a quick post on what we have been up to- mainly because I am getting a lot of pictures for October which I am going to have to post about eventually and I need to get this over and done with before I can move on (OCD of some sort!).

Anyways, this month there were a lot of birthdays and different styles of parties. A close friend of ours turned 30 and had an Irish themed bday party which was a lot of fun!

Priya, Simis daughter, turned 8 and had a river cruise bday party with pizzas. The kids loved it and even managed to catch some fireflies. The full moon was also out and the whole river looked magical. It was beautiful.

Some other friends of ours had a beach firework party with hot dogs and burgers. The sun set as usual was spectacular and the fireworks were pretty impressive. They had these sparklers that changed colour as they burned which were really cool.

At school, Yusuf has joined the Football ASA and is loving it. It was a very proud moment for Zaheer to see Yusuf on the field and he may or may not have cried a little. I think he's trying to fulfil his lifelong dream of becoming a footballer through Yusuf........

(Yusuf is in the red cap and white t shirt)

It was also Yusuf's turn to bring home Barnaby the Bear (last year it was Pablo the bear). All he could think to do with Barnaby was play Ben 10. So here he is blowing him up. His teacher was quite amused.

(Poor fluffy being squashed)

And here he is introducing him to Fluffy (which is a boy bear apparently.........)

And finally, for those of you interested in the local insects, Zaheer took this picture of a centipede that was found on the school grounds which was also poisonous! It was huge!!

We also went to one of the islands near Brunei for a day trek with our good friend Jacky and to see a charcoal factory. We also saw LOADS of flying foxes (really big bats) but I took so many pictures that it will be a post in itself. I will try and post that this week sometime.