[SINGING] Brunei the oil rich guy~
[SINGING] Bru! Bru! Bru! Bru! Bru! Bru!
[SINGING IN LOW TONE] Brunei the oil rich guy
Ahh '90s references, you kids today have no idea what you've missed out on
[PIANO INTRODUCTION]
"It's time to learn Geography NOW!"
Hey everybody, I'm your host Barby
Brunei is kind of like the master of being quietly rich
That's all I got
Let's dissect the flag!
The flag of Brunei is one of the most misleading flags in the world
because when looking at it from a distance you could swear it was an anchor on a flag
but if you look closer it's not.
First of all, the flag has a yellow field with two diagonal black and white stripes
as the white stripe is a little thicker than the black
and then you have the national crest in the center.
The yellow represents the Sultan of Brunei
and traditionally means royalty in many Southeast Asian regions
The white and black refers to the Chief Ministers
the Pengiran Bendahara, or the First Minister
and the Pengiran Pemancha, the Second Minister who deals with foreign affairs
In the middle is a parasol representing royalty
On the sides are two hands signifying benevolence of the government
Underneath is a crescent with the national motto written in Arabic
"Render Service to God's Guidance"
and below it, is another banner with the inscription "Brunei Darussalam"
which means Brunei, the Abode of Peace
Nope seriously, go look at the flag
it looks like there's an anchor on it when you look at it from a distance!
Oh Brunei, you and your confusion menatics
Oh Brunei, Brunei...
WHERE ARE YOU?!
No but seriously, Brunei is pretty good at playing global hide-and-seek
almost as good as East Timor
and don't forget little Liechtenstein!
So anyway
Brunei is located on the island of Borneo
the only island in the world owned and inhabited by three separate independently sovereign nations
the other two being Malaysia and Indonesia
I mean, technically Cyprus is under three separate people groups
however the north part isn't a complete state
as it's only recognised by Turkey
and then you have the UN Buffer Zone
which technically makes four different people groups
but that's a whole another different story
Anyway, back to Brunei
Now, here's the funny thing about Brunei
Brunei sits on top of the island of Borneo
on the mid-north shore
completely surrounded by Malaysia's Sarawak state
right under the South China Sea
below that madhouse of sovereignty limbo, nautical chaotic atolls
known as the Spratly Islands
Oh Spratly Islands...
You're like the last sugar-glazed doughnut in a doughnut shop
full of obese children.
People don't hate you for yourself
but you sure make them hate and fight each other.
Brunei is interesting in that if you look at the map
it's actually split into two non-contiguous segments
the larger and more heavily populated western side made up of three districts:
Belait,
Tutong,
and Brunei Muara,
where over 95% of the population lives.
Then there's the eastern part
also known as the Temburong district, where only about 10,000 people live.
The reason why Brunei is split up into two parts is because
Back in 1890, the Limbang district was ceded to Sarawak
which is now part of Malaysia
by the Raja of Sarawak
who was actually a white British guy
That's right, Malaysia had this weird lapse in time called the White Raja period
but that's for another episode –
back to Brunei!
This means the only way you can get over from the western side of Brunei
to the Temburong district in the east
is to either take a boat across the bay
and go through the Labu river
or drive on the Jalan Kuala Lurah road into Malaysia
until you reach the border along the Kibi River
When you reach Limbang you can either park your car and take a boat ride across the river
but if you want to keep driving you have to go about 5 miles or 8 kilometers further south
on the AH150 highway
and take the bridge that enters into the towns of Puni and Bangar, Brunei.
This is the only bridge that crosses the Kibi river into Brunei.
The capital is Bandar Seri Begawan
in the western segment in the Brunei Muara district
on the Brunei river
which dumps into the Brunei Bay.
As the largest city, as well as the cultural and economic hub of all Brunei
Bandar Seri Begawan's entire metropolitan region hosts nearly half of the entire population of Brunei.
In Bandar Seri Begawan you can see an array of mosques
including Brunei's number one country-defining landmark
the Sultan Omar Ali Saifudden Mosque
built on an artificial lagoon
with a dome that is plated with pure gold
and a bridge that connects to the Sultan Bolkiah Mahligali Barge
a replica of the original barge owned by the former Sultan
adorned with intricately crafted designs and details.
Across from the mosque, you reach the Kampong Ayer
also known as "the Venice of the Southeast"
Kampong Ayer is the world's largest water village
in which it's a town with over 30,000 people
who all live and work in stilt structures on the Brunei river.
Everything from houses, restaurants, hospitals and schools can be found here
all intertwined with a refined network of bridges, walkways and docks that connect the buildings
as well as water taxis that zip around transporting the locals
Otherwise, the other districts are intriguing in that they each kinda have their own designated function
Tutong is kind of known as being the middleman, transporting district
everything passes through here
and Belait is known for being the center hub for the oil and gas district
They even built a monument to the billionth barrel of oil produced in Seria.
So yeah, as you can probably guess, oil makes up a huge factor of the economic development sector of Brunei
that's also a resource we'll discuss in...
Here's where things get a little fun:
For such a small country, Brunei is actually kind of jam-packed with a lot of physical contrast.
Now, like mentioned before, Brunei is located on the powerfully botanically rich island of Borneo
If you don't know anything about Borneo, the one thing you should know is that
pretty much everything on this island flies.
Besides birds, you have flying foxes, flying geckos, flying lemurs, flying snakes
flying frogs, flying Bear Sharktopus, flying Bob Sagets, and so on!
For Brunei, most of the parts of the country that are close to the coast are in a low-lying rainforest ecoregion
and further inland you reach the mountains and rainforests with more mountains and hills
in the Temburong district in the east. Now the country has an equatorial tropical climate
which means typically year around you're gonna get hot humid weather.
However generally there are two seasons – dry and wet.
The wettest months being between October and December
On the coast you can find some amazing beaches
but when you get to Jerudong, you'll find these strange-looking mushroom-shaped beaches
and a large egg-shaped harbor
deliberately constructed that way to combat highly erosive beaches
from the strong tides that come in regularly.
Now here's the thing: despite the abundance of untouched wilderness
less than 2% of land is arable and used for agriculture
forest reserves and national parks make up about half of the entire country's area.
The production of timber as an internal resource actually accounts for more revenue than agriculture in the country
which is weird because Brunei actually has amazing fertile soil.
This means that the majority of food actually has to be imported into Brunei from various neighbouring nations
like Japan, South Korea and China
Once again, even though they have very fertile soil.
Brunei's government even owns a cattle ranch in Australia larger than the size of their entire country
which supplies most of the country's beef products.
Why isn't Brunei interested in cultivating all that potential harvest land?
Ta-da-ta-na! You guessed it – oil.
Over 95% of Brunei's entire economy is dependent off of their oil and liquefied hydrocarbon production.
The Royal Dutch Shell company operates the country's only and, quite frankly, very profitable oil refinery.
This is the reason why many Dutch and European expats typically can be found working in Brunei
especially in the coast by Seria in the Belait district
where oil was discovered in 1929.
"Why won't you grow food for yourself Brunei? You have the perfect soil!"
"Ehh. We've got oil, plus we're like helping the rainforest and stuff. Um, yeah."
Of course, that means that Brunei has a lot of offshore oil reserves
that the majority of people depend on their economic output.
Now let's talk about the people that depend on that.
Now I'm not saying that Brunei is like the Monaco of Southeast Asia...
...but, ehh, I guess I kind of am.
But it has Sharia law.
The country has about 417,000 people
and ethnically, about 66% of the people in Brunei identify as Malay
as in, just like the people from Malaysia – Malay
except they have a distinct Bruneian Malay culture.
About 11% are Chinese, 4% indigenous
as in people coming from tribes like the Kedayan and the Bisaya
and to a small extent even the Sama-Bijau
which sometimes are referred to as sea gypsies.
2% Indian, and the remaining 17% comes from a wide range of other nationalities
like Filipinos, Arabs and even whites, most of whom are expats working for the oil industry.
Language-wise Brunei is kind of funny because
although Malay, or more specifically Bruneian Malay, is the official language
and to some degree, the Kedayan language, which is kind of similar to Malay
most people speak English as a second language
even though many signs are posted in Malay and Arabic.
Furthermore, a large portion of the country speaks Mandarin as a second language
even though English is more widely taught
even though there's a huge Dutch expat community
but then again most Dutch people speak English anyway.
[DUTCH]
"Just speak English here and you'll be fine"
[DUTCH]
This all has to do with Brunei being a British protectorate, yada yada yada
the linguistic impact left a mark.
Brunei is also considered as one of the richest countries per capita in the world
with the average income surpassing $50,000.
Culture wise, Brunei has its distinctions.
You'd notice a lot of women wearing the tudung, or the traditional head covering
and a lot of men wearing the songkok or the Malay cap.
Now here's where things get a little, ehh, squinty eyes shruggy.
In 2014 Brunei became the first country in Southeast Asia to introduce a Sharia law –
penal code on a nationalistic level.
This institution is still being carried out in legislative phases
but essentially it's caused a lot of controversy.
The ruling was instituted by the Sultan of Brunei, Hassanal Bolkiah.
First of all, let's talk about this guy.
Although getting an exact estimate is kind of tricky
Forbes speculates that about $20 billion sits within the net worth of the Sultan
and here's a small list of things that he owns:
a palace with over 1,700 rooms, 250 bathrooms,
five swimming pools,
a banquet hall that holds over 5,000 people,
a private zoo,
over 9,000 cars in a collection with several vintage and custom-made cars.
He even built a stadium on his 50th birthday
and paid Michael Jackson $17 million to perform three concerts there
and let's not even mention all those yachts.
That's to say that you can kind of conclude that
the Sultan lives in a very lavish and opulent lifestyle.
People have complained that the Sultan's controversial, over-the-top escapades and personal actions
have made he himself, a violator of the very Sharia law that he has instituted.
This is also a concerned many of the non-Muslim residents of Brunei
as it's kind of unclear how this new law will affect them.
Nonetheless, despite the shaky political disposition
people in the country are generally happy with their high standard of living and welfare
and generally enjoy the overall trajectory that the country is headed in.
Let's see what other countries think about that trajectory.
[SHIMMERING SOUND EFFECT]
To make this simple, Brunei's relations have a lot to do with history and money.
As a member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)
Brunei has bilateral agreements with generally all their immediate neighbor nations
and enjoys good trade and business transactions with each of them to some extent.
You would think Malaysia would be the best friend of Brunei and they are pretty close.
They both speak relatively the same language and have a deep cultural resignation with each other.
However some Bruneians would actually consider Singapore and the Philippines their best friends.
Brunei and the Philippines signed a Memorandum of Understanding
that sought to strengthen the bilateral cooperations of the two countries
in the fields of agriculture
and farm-related trade and investments.
Basically, the Philippines gives them a lot of food.
For Singapore, they agree to allow Singapore to join them and train its armed forces with Brunei.
Brunei and Singapore have a currency exchange agreement in that both currencies in both countries
can be used interchangeably in both nations.
The Brunei dollar and the Singapore dollar are maintained at par.
In conclusion, it's interesting to see where Brunei will head with the juxtaposition of high revenue output
and disputedly strict legislation
but either way you see it, Brunei is one small place with one huge story.
Stay tuned, Bulgaria is coming up next!
Hey Geograpeeps, say hi to this guy, Peadar
I'll let him explain
Peadar: Hello! How's it going?
I'm Peadar, I live in Stockholm
I've been helping Barby with the videos, the animations, the infographics this week.
I said to him over e-mail
"Great videos and all, really good videos...
...but one thing that's missing, one thing...
...is explosions."
Okay, explosions, we need more explosions
That's why I'm here.