Today I woke up just after noon. I still felt like I hadn’t slept enough. Even though I’d slept eight hours, I wondered why I still felt this way.
Exchanging into Brunei dollars
I woke up and decided to work today. Before that, since the day after tomorrow would be the day I go to Brunei, I thought I’d exchange Malaysian ringgit for Brunei dollars and walked to an exchange. When I asked there, they said they only had Singapore dollars and were out of Brunei dollars.
So I decided to think it over and had lunch at a nearby restaurant. I had steamed chicken and rice again today. Consistently delicious.
It was tasty, but I couldn’t say it was good for my body. They used plenty of sweet sauce—definitely delicious, but I don’t think I could eat it all the time.
I walked to another exchange. It was in a shopping mall near the hotel. When I got there there were a few customers, and I asked them to change my money into Brunei dollars.
They said they did have Brunei dollars. I handed over some money—not a 100 ringgit note—and they gave back some bills, saying they didn’t have small notes so only large denominations were possible. I converted 163 MYR into 50 Brunei dollars. The rate didn’t feel bad at all. Still, I could only change into 50 dollars, which made me a little sad (lol). But since I’m staying two days, I wondered if I’d even use that much.
First new country, first overland border crossing
I’ve heard Brunei is a very expensive country, so I’m curious how expensive it will be. I’m really looking forward to it. It’s my first overland border crossing and my first new country. Even though I said I was doing a world trip, about five months have passed and I still haven’t been to a new country. I guess that’s a real problem, right?
Probably because I’m traveling while working, I’m not used to constantly packing every day’s plans, so I tend to stay in cities longer. Other backpackers just take buses, move, arrive in a city, enjoy it, and then go to another city. That’s their lifestyle.
But I have no deadlines and I’m busy with work every day. So I can’t live like that. Also I always need breaks; without them my health quickly goes downhill.
So I’m really excited to be able to go to a "new country" after a long time. I wonder what kind of country it will be. The hotel is booked and paid for, so I’m relieved.
My seat was taken at Starbucks
After exchanging money I decided to go to a nearby Starbucks. There weren’t many seats available, so I put my bag down to reserve a seat before ordering, but while I was in line a group sat down without caring. I got angry, grabbed my bag, and left Starbucks. They ruined my mood so I didn’t want to stay.
There was another Starbucks nearby, so I went there. When I said "Kota" the staff immediately realized I was Japanese and asked, "Which is the best season to travel to Japan?"—we had a short friendly chat.
I probably stayed at that Starbucks for about four hours. There were code problems and cloud issues that stopped me from downloading code, so I worked on resolving those while moving the project forward.
There are as many as four sushi restaurants
For dinner I decided to go for sushi. I thought I’d go to the sushi place I missed yesterday, but it seems there are about four sushi restaurants in the same mall, which surprised me. I compared various menus and finally chose a restaurant on the first floor.
I ordered oyakodon and a spicy salmon roll. The taste was pretty good. The only thing I didn’t like was that the oyakodon had a lot of mushrooms. After that I still wanted to eat more, so I ordered a salmon salad gunkan and an egg gunkan. All were very cheap.
I wonder why I’m so stingy with food even though I actually have money to spare. Is it because of my parents’ influence? Or because I know what rock bottom feels like and want to avoid wasting money? Or because once I’m back in Japan I can eat salmon very cheaply, so I don’t need to have it here? Any of those could be true.
Short-term pleasure leads to long-term suffering
On the way back there was a BR. Seeing the ice cream made me want some for the first time in a while—everything looked delicious. But the voice that popped into my head said, "Short-term pleasure is long-term suffering; short-term suffering is long-term pleasure," so I refrained from eating it. I told myself giving in to sweets would be a bit dangerous.
After that I went to the cafe I’d been to yesterday. I wrote in my diary and resumed work I had left unfinished. That’s how I spent the day.
I actually wanted to go on a tour—I had planned to go to Mount Kinabalu and to a ranch with lots of cows—but it had been raining continuously and I thought it wouldn’t be fun in that weather, so I canceled. But today it didn’t seem to be raining much, and I thought, "Ah, I should have gone." So that was another lesson: "Weather forecasts aren’t always reliable."
