Highway Man
I spent three hours per day, five days per week on the road. So that is 15 hours per week. It is exhausting. Me and a friend recently talked about one day that Brunei will have a railroad network.
We both think it is an excellent idea. Bruneians are sad to say, spoiled. Spoiled citizen of the world. Everybody is so used to the idea of living of luxury as the norm and anything lower or common than that is considered of an embarrassment to themselves.
Why would I say such a thing? Okay, my fault here, is probably generalising everybody. But this is not the case, I'm saying this generally, not applicable to some people. So don't come back to me and be defensive about it. Besides the more defensive one gets, only means the deeper the denial.
Just because it makes my life easier to commute doesn't necessarily means that it is a good idea. C'mon, open up your mind and think how 'close' we could be. Brunei being already a small country, takes an hour to get from one end to the other end (if you exclude Temburong District that is, that you'd have to go via Limbang, Sarawak or by boat - don't penalise me). And still certain people think that is too far. My relatives when visiting my parents which is only in Tutong District already felt that it is such an effort. Ridiculous! So anyway, my point is, if there is a railway that connects one end of Brunei to the other end, it will benefit more than just Bruneians. Very often we see car from Miri, Sarawak passing by our roads to get to Limbang, even to get to the ferries at Muara port.
See the decrease in commuters. I believe, commuters rather sleep than driving at the early dawn of the day. You'd be surprise to see cars that commute from KB, Tutong to the capital. And most of the commuter cars, do not have passengers. That is one person per car. Car pooling is still an alien idea for most of us. Most of us think it is much of a hassle to car pool, because everybody have their own agendas to run. Think about reduction in pollution. Think about low fatalities or casualties on our roads. Think of the reduction of traffic jams. If say, imagine there is a MRT (Mass Rapid Transit) in our capital that runs through many of our busy commercial areas. Everybody will be in time to return to work after lunch. Imagine if some of the stations also runs through schools and rural areas, parents wouldn't have to rush to their school to drive them home and back to school in the afternoon. Only if, huh?
It is easy to say. Of course it would really need a good thought out and imagination to come up with something like that.
I may hear you say, "Nah, it wouldn't work", most of us are too accustom to having their nice cars in air condition, free to leave or go anywhere, when they want to", in case of so called emergencies (or real ones). "It will be full of (smelly) foreigners just like our bus system". "It is such a hassle to walk, wasting precious time".
All of that are just excuses. I believe, given a solid and reliable public transport, I am sure, demand will always be there. Always. Some may say, they won't be demand for such, as our population is not enough to support the public transport. But I say, supply is not there, thus demand is not there. One may question me about buses in Brunei, why is the demand so little? Like I said, solid and reliable public transport. I have actually drove few tourists from Jame' Asr' Hassanil Bolkiah back to their hotel for a couple of times. Why? Because it is not reliable. They were told the last bus that passes by Jame' will be at 6pm. The couple of tourist that I drove, told me they have been waiting for an hour since 4pm. I try my best to show Brunei having a responsive and courteous citizen. I want them to go back to their country and tell their friends and relatives that they had met a helpful person and had a wonderful time in Brunei. Despite of it being a 'dry' country.
Our Visit Brunei 2009 is coming up soon, and we don't even have a decent reliable public transport. The taxis are expensive, the buses are unreliable. Logistic will be a problem. We can't expect people to come to Brunei on package tours. Would you go to Singapore or KL only on package tours? Come on, don't lie now.
I know our tourism (section/department) is doing as much as they can do. But seriously if they want Visit Brunei 2009 to work. Work on the logistic.
We both think it is an excellent idea. Bruneians are sad to say, spoiled. Spoiled citizen of the world. Everybody is so used to the idea of living of luxury as the norm and anything lower or common than that is considered of an embarrassment to themselves.
Why would I say such a thing? Okay, my fault here, is probably generalising everybody. But this is not the case, I'm saying this generally, not applicable to some people. So don't come back to me and be defensive about it. Besides the more defensive one gets, only means the deeper the denial.
Just because it makes my life easier to commute doesn't necessarily means that it is a good idea. C'mon, open up your mind and think how 'close' we could be. Brunei being already a small country, takes an hour to get from one end to the other end (if you exclude Temburong District that is, that you'd have to go via Limbang, Sarawak or by boat - don't penalise me). And still certain people think that is too far. My relatives when visiting my parents which is only in Tutong District already felt that it is such an effort. Ridiculous! So anyway, my point is, if there is a railway that connects one end of Brunei to the other end, it will benefit more than just Bruneians. Very often we see car from Miri, Sarawak passing by our roads to get to Limbang, even to get to the ferries at Muara port.
See the decrease in commuters. I believe, commuters rather sleep than driving at the early dawn of the day. You'd be surprise to see cars that commute from KB, Tutong to the capital. And most of the commuter cars, do not have passengers. That is one person per car. Car pooling is still an alien idea for most of us. Most of us think it is much of a hassle to car pool, because everybody have their own agendas to run. Think about reduction in pollution. Think about low fatalities or casualties on our roads. Think of the reduction of traffic jams. If say, imagine there is a MRT (Mass Rapid Transit) in our capital that runs through many of our busy commercial areas. Everybody will be in time to return to work after lunch. Imagine if some of the stations also runs through schools and rural areas, parents wouldn't have to rush to their school to drive them home and back to school in the afternoon. Only if, huh?
It is easy to say. Of course it would really need a good thought out and imagination to come up with something like that.
I may hear you say, "Nah, it wouldn't work", most of us are too accustom to having their nice cars in air condition, free to leave or go anywhere, when they want to", in case of so called emergencies (or real ones). "It will be full of (smelly) foreigners just like our bus system". "It is such a hassle to walk, wasting precious time".
All of that are just excuses. I believe, given a solid and reliable public transport, I am sure, demand will always be there. Always. Some may say, they won't be demand for such, as our population is not enough to support the public transport. But I say, supply is not there, thus demand is not there. One may question me about buses in Brunei, why is the demand so little? Like I said, solid and reliable public transport. I have actually drove few tourists from Jame' Asr' Hassanil Bolkiah back to their hotel for a couple of times. Why? Because it is not reliable. They were told the last bus that passes by Jame' will be at 6pm. The couple of tourist that I drove, told me they have been waiting for an hour since 4pm. I try my best to show Brunei having a responsive and courteous citizen. I want them to go back to their country and tell their friends and relatives that they had met a helpful person and had a wonderful time in Brunei. Despite of it being a 'dry' country.
Our Visit Brunei 2009 is coming up soon, and we don't even have a decent reliable public transport. The taxis are expensive, the buses are unreliable. Logistic will be a problem. We can't expect people to come to Brunei on package tours. Would you go to Singapore or KL only on package tours? Come on, don't lie now.
I know our tourism (section/department) is doing as much as they can do. But seriously if they want Visit Brunei 2009 to work. Work on the logistic.
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