Old Brunei Wharf

I guess I don't update this blogsite often enough. Anyway, I found this interesting old photographs of the Brunei Wharf. I am guessing that was the original wharf on the right hand side of the photo. What do you think?

APEC at Mount Coolum, Australia

Greetings from Hyatt Regency at Mount Coolum, Queensland, Australia. I had photographs but apparently I did not have the most important USB link to my camera so no uploads. The photo up there is that of Mount Coolum Golf Course - home of the Australian PGA Tour. Played there yesterday with my colleague and we found it to be an easy course. Nearly got a couple of pars but my colleague got 6. Later on we found other people who played there and says that the course is challenging. Huh? My colleague figured that we have played too much golf at RBAGC and Empire which are more challenging that even Australian PGA Tour course is not challenging anymore.

Coolum is one of the many small beach towns along the Sunshine Coast which runs from Colundra up to Noosa. Coolum is somewhere halfway. There are three counties - Colundrashire, Maroochyshire and Noosashire and Coolum is in Marcoochy. The nearest town to Hyatt Regency is either Coolum Beach or Mudjimba but the biggest is in Maroochydore. The stretch of the beaches of these three shires make up the Sunshine Coast which is to differentiat from the Gold Coast further south. The Sunshine Coast looked at the moment not as crowded as the Gold Coast and there isn't as much entertainment. But I guess it's worthwhile to have a holiday here.

Two of our meetings are over - the drafting committee and the deputies. Tomorrow will be the start of the ministers. Friday evening, we would be on the flight back to Brunei.

Kampong Ayer Photographs

Every now and then a new old photograph of the Kampong Ayer appears. These two are fairly new and I don't think have been seen here or in any of the entries I have written over the last year. The top one is taken sometime in the early 1960s and the lower one sometime in the early 1950s.

PS. My wife says "the 1st pic looks to me more like Kg Masjid Lama in Muara and the houses really reminds me of that area where I used to walk there to buy fish, crabs and dry food like belacan and etc. The 2nd pic definitely reflects kampong ayer in Bandar!" So, I stand corrected. The first picture is not Kampong Ayer.

Our Brunei Language

I found this really interesting site/post about the Brunei language. This is a good read especially those of you who are curious about the fast and weird slang we Bruneians have.

Do you ever notice that Brunei is always pronounced as Brun-ai?

Please check at the sound of vowel "a" at this webpage if you are unsure of what I meant, grrrr!

Only three vowel soudns are available in Bruneian Malay -- a, i, u. Wan's little head starts to experiment -- Brun-a-i, Brun-i-i or Brun-u-i...of course, Brun-a-i sounds better for the oil-rich kingdom that once ruled the whole of Borneo island.

Eh, then what happen to imbuhan such as "me" and "ber" ? Well, they become "man" and "bar".

That is to say, "memasak" becomes "mamasak" and "berjalan" is theoretically " bar + jalan" then evolves into "bajalan". No...I didn't make a typing mistake...it's "bajalan" alright as omission of the letter r is a characteristic.

"Ber...i" is an extinct imbuhan for standard Malay but very much alive in the form of "Bar...i". Examples: " basirai" which is the equivalent of "dibubuh garam" and, "babaki" which is " dibaiki".

Here's one imbuhan that I'm fond of...imbuhan sisipan "-la-" ( imbuhan sisipan is infix ). Nowadays schools teach you that armpit is "ketiak" but we kids love to joke about " kalatiyak". In fact, we prefer "kalatiyak" to "ketiak".

By now you should know that I didn't accidentally type an extra "y" for kalatiyak. Yeap, a letter is inserted to smoothen the pronunciation of words such as ..."katiak". Another example is "tiyang" for "tiang".

The most popular export word of Bruneian Malay is "-bah". Bruneians use "bah" a lot to invite, agree, get attention and prohibit. Apparently their neighbours the Sabahans love the usefulness of "bah" so much to the extent of adopting "bah" to their Malay.

When a Bruneian asks: " Siapa nama kita?" He is asking to know YOUR name. They use " kita" instead of "awak" as a gesture of respect. Would you like to hear how they say it? Go to this website to hear the sound files.

Bruneians also add prefixes to personal pronouns, such as "kadi-", therefore you see kadiaku, kadikita, kadikamu and kadidia. To denote plurality, they add "bis-" such as for "biskita" and "bisdia".

Bruneian Malay is abundant in expressions of kata ganda. "Merisik" ritual in a Malay wedding is " berjarum-jarum" for them. They call their fish "pila-pila", "aur-aur", "alu-alu", "kurisi-kurisi" and "tingkur-tingkur". Their insects are "sambah-sambah","suruk-suruk" and "budu-budu". Their plants are " ungguh-ungguh", "uduk-uduk" and "saga-saga". If you come to a village called "Patau-patau", then you knowlah its origin!

From the ancient cradle in Kampung Ayer at today's Bandar Sri Begawan, Bruneian Malay extends its influence to the neighbouring borders of Sabah and Sarawak. That's why in these areas you hear "Kamu tuli!" instead of " Kamu pekak!". I hope nobody calls you "palui" because it means "bodoh". Ha ha...

Don't worry if you think you cannot speak Bruneian Malay. Apart from the few aspects of differences mentioned above, it is very much like standard Malay.

Source: http://www.bahasa-malaysia-simple-fun.com/brunei.html

Royal Wedding - Perdana Wazir

A colleague of mine was telling me a story about how someone came over asking for money. He told him that he will not give money but he is willing to give him money for something. So this guy came back with a bag full of 'ayats' and a few photographs. I asked him about the photographs and there were three of them, two on the wedding of Duli Pengiran Perdana Wazir and the other on the wedding of Princess Masna.

The Princess Masna one was interesting but it is a photo of a wedding she does not want to remember. So I will just post the two about Perdana Wazir's weddings. I asked my colleague where he thinks that guy gets the photographs from. He said he doesn't know. Anyway, I thought I will share DPPW's wedding photographs for you all to compare with today's grand weddings.