{"id":1439,"date":"2010-12-27T22:22:34","date_gmt":"2010-12-27T14:22:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bumisepi.com\/?p=1439"},"modified":"2010-12-27T22:44:51","modified_gmt":"2010-12-27T14:44:51","slug":"kampung-ayer-a-village-on-water-in-brunei","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bumisepi.com\/?p=1439","title":{"rendered":"Kampung Ayer (“a village on water”) in Brunei"},"content":{"rendered":"

If there is only one place you have time to\u00a0visit in Bandar Seri Begawan (BSB), it must be Kampung Ayer (loosely translated as a village on water).\u00a0People live,\u00a0work and travel\u00a0on the\u00a0water, which is actually a river, a huge river leading to South China Sea. \u00a0There are houses, schools, grocery stores, offices, police station, mosques,\u00a0gas station\u00a0and everything else\u00a0a society needs to lead a common life. Yes their daily activities and transaction are done on the water. They travel from houses to house and other place in the motorized boats.\u00a0 Kampung Ayer\u00a0reminds me of my trips to Venezia, Italy (2006) and also Inle Lake in Myanmar <\/a>(2009). Unlike Inle Lake, they don’t grow vegetables and fruits on the water — they must have bought it at the supermarkets along\u00a0the river banks. I was told that the number of families\u00a0making\u00a0Kampung Ayer their home are getting smaller and smaller as many move to the river banks.\u00a0 But it is really a refreshing\u00a0experience for\u00a0big city boys and girls to cruise around the Kampung Ayer on water taxi with nominal fees. Bring along the camera to shoot at waving kids. Water taxis available at the jettty at negotiable rate. We paid only B$10 per boat to\u00a0the young boatman\u00a0for a 20-minute boat ride. He had no passengers at that time and he just obliged. Beware that\u00a0safety jackets may not be available on all boats. Have fun at own risk, so I said. Some photos below.<\/p>\n\n\t\t