Brunei

I was recently in Brunei. There was literally nothing in the port town but we heard there was a beach nearby. There is a very strong cab union there so they didn't have a free shuttle bus like they normally do, not that there was anywhere for a shuttle to take us. We paid the cab $10 to take us to the beach and it turned out the beach was only about a quarter of a mile away. That was pretty annoying considering we could've walked and instead paid $10. So he drops us at the beach and we walk down to the shore and see giant signs that read, "Beach closed due to Red Tide until further notice." So this cabby knowingly dropped us at a closed beach and then had then nerve to come back 10 minutes later and ask if we wanted a ride back to the port for another $10. We respectfully declined using a few choice words and a couple hand gestures. Once we made it back to the port with the help of a nice man driving by we agreed to pay another nice cab driver into the big city. I guess there is a sultan of Brunei and he is one of the richest men in the world. We saw one of his mosques and a gallery he keeps of all the gifts he receives. We didn't have a lot of time to see the entire city but it was pretty nice and the people were really happy.