So I have been obsessed with returning home since August maybe (hence this post is gonna be long, warning), when I have all the work-induced, (self-declared) panic attacks. Maybe part of it is that 犯贱 mentality in the works - when you are told you can’t do something, that’s when you really want to do it. I usually don’t even crave to go home that much, just the usual two trips per year. 

Too bad borders were still on full on lockdown mode at that time. But thank god SG, in their attempt to revitalize Changi Airport a bit, started opening up unilaterally to countries with low risks and lo and behold, NZ and Brunei were the first countries that they chose. 

I won’t lie, I was EXTREMELY excited at the news. It was partly unexpected in a way because even though Brunei had went through 3 months without locally transmitted cases at that point, I didn’t think Brunei would be a priority lol. Turns out the Brunei-SG relationship is stronger than I imagined. And even though it was unilateral I thought it might be a matter of time before Brunei reciprocates because SG’s cases were hitting double digits too and we looked like we were on our way to get it well under control. 

Well Brunei didn’t exactly reciprocate fully. Even till today. Yes, soon after there’s the green lane for business travel between both countries, and SG had the Air Travel Pass for Brunei residents entering SG for whatever reasons, but no word on allowing foreigners to enter Brunei for general travel purposes. Brunei simply can’t afford an outbreak and hence were extremely cautious on this part, which I understand, but am getting impatient.

I can’t remember how I found out, maybe from my regular visits to RB website but what happened is one day I saw this link to an Entry Travel Pass application guidelines and that is when it dawned on me that they are starting to allow visitors in. Maybe they didn’t publicize this, maybe my Brunei sources failed me but hey why didn’t anybody tell me about this lol. 

And it wasn’t some dodgy back door policy either, there were very clear documented guidelines and application procedures. Granted, entry will only be considered for business reasons, students, medical reasons (hard to think of why anybody would want to visit Brunei for medical reasons TBH) and “compassionate and other special circumstances including immediate family members of Brunei citizens/residents”. BINGO. 

That being said, you never know if they will be mercurial and just selectively approve some applications and reject others, so I didn’t dare to get my hopes too high up. It was October by then, and my first thought is to maybe try going back in December, but I still wanted to be home for CNY too (and my covering officer had choped December leave) so gritted my teeth and decided to save it all for February instead. And I am so going to disappear for a month to make up for it (if approved). Also it’s not gonna be cheap so better make it worth. 

Plan was to speak to my boss in December about going on extended leave since she is bound to have to make special covering arrangements (I know I would, if I am in that position). And one day in December I spotted from her IG stories that Amilyn heading back to Brunei and a brief check with her very quickly established the feasibility of my plan - and so it’s time to kickstart the whole process!

I had casually told my covering officer of my intention to take extended leave during CNY period (in my mind back then, if I can’t go back then I’ll just take long leave and wallow in sorrow at home) in October and she acknowledged. Thought I would confirm with her before I speak to my boss and voila, there’s this heart attack moment when my covering officer announced that she is gonna be clearing her (many days of) leave too in preparation for her official retirement in April, which meant that essentially she is disappearing for 3 MONTHS which clashes with my planned leave. I almost couldn’t hide the fact that I was more worried about not being able to take leave than I was sad about her leaving lol. 

Quickly sounded out my boss, who, very thankfully, was very understanding and still agreed to let me off, coping with the manpower shortage by a mixture of adjusting CO’s leave dates and loading on to the rest of my team. So that paved the way for me to start applying for ETP. 

But before that, the requirements! 

First step is to have a sponsoring agency to apply ETP on your behalf. In my case is my reason for entering is family reasons so obviously the sister became my sponsor (it will be the company or govt agency if you are entering for business reasons). On paper, anyway, because I was the one doing all the work. 

Then, the various accompanying documents. 

And submitted. 

And to my utmost pleasant surprise, the response came in less than 24 hours. Mind you this was over holiday period (not that most of Brunei actually celebrates Christmas but still). I was requested to provide a whole lot of supporting documents - my birth certificate (I guess to prove that my parents are really my parents), family details in Brunei (Passport, Pass Endorsement, IC Brunei, Foreign Worker License and Parents marriage certificate) which all made sense because they needed to verify my family’s residency status. All except parents marriage certificate but oh well, my parents were able to fish those out without difficulty so whatever goes. 

I actually omitted one doc - my dad’s foreign worker license which had expired and in the process of being renewed and they were on it like a hawk, and within one day too. So had to upload the expired one and thinking if they asked I just have to explain that it was being renewed. 

But they didn’t. And 2 days later... 

And I spent the rest of the day grinning from ear to ear. 

With entry granted, the next step is to complete pre-trip requirements. There is a list of documents that you needed to show to airline staff when checking in and to immigration staff upon arrival - other than the obvious air tickets and self isolation reservation, there’s also: 

And there were quite a bit of courier duties to take on too, mainly because poor Brunei ppl haven’t been able to travel, not even to Miri bless them. New year goodies and clothing were some of the common requests (ok to be fair I only provided services for family members and BFF duo) but as usual my own luggage items took a backseat. 

Everything in order so reported to airport on 28th January in extremely good spirits. Even though I have not been sleeping well for almost a week because of anxiety and paranoia (see above) and I have been extremely busy at work - not just because of my impending leave but everybody seemed to have woken up in January after the most relaxing December ever (for me at least). I am talking about cases that suddenly resurface after a long period of dormancy too, and some on my last day of work even. Casually mentioned this and my boss saw the funny side of it too - “this is just a phenomenon that is unexplainable”. But mad scramble and it was my most efficient days of work in a very long time. 

Airport was a ghost town as expected. Shops were mostly shuttered except the luxury goods shops, which I imagine don’t see much business anyway. There were more people on flight that I expected though. Flights have reduced to two flights each way per week from the usual two flights each way per day, and only Bruneians/PRs can leave the country - if you were foreign workers license holders/student pass holders like my family, you are going to have problems re-entering the country (read: you can’t). So I was a bit surprised to find about 15 of us, I guess mostly business/medical travelers although they really don’t look the part (looked more like leisure travelers). As expected, no warm food on flight but they did hand out pre-packed sandwiches, snacks and drinks. 

Given the exceedingly low number of flights these days I guess it’s not that hard to space out arrivals such that every passenger that arrived at an airport can be accounted for - and there shouldn’t be any confusion as to which flight they were on/which country they arrived from. So on arrival, ushered to the immigration and there were the typical temperature scanners/airport staff collecting health declaration forms filled in beforehand which is really no different from pre-COVID. Immigration officers checked the extra documents, asked your purpose of visiting, and actually forgot to check if I had BruHealth installed. Luggage collection as usual (is it me or maybe they sped up a wee bit on this part). 

The exciting parts only happened after this point - customs were a lot stricter than usual. In the past they basically chilled around waiting for the last flight of the day to clear out then they can knock off, while this time round they checked every single passenger, asking you to open up your luggages and poked around. Good that I came well prepared. Specifically I decided not to bring back anything that might be questionable i.e. my (and a lot of people’s) CNY staple of bakkwa lol. Maybe I overthought but this is something I never really figured out if it’s legal or not or where is the line that they drew on this, so decided to do without it for one year, much to the disappointment on Stel and KH and the sister actually hahah. In my defense because of COVID it’s also hard to purchase it in store this year - think online purchase, minimum purchase, delivery fees and all. Did have to answer random questions like how much stel’s COACH purse costs (I answered honestly that I didn’t know and they let me off lol) and stel’s 艾条 did triggered raised eyebrows and all but in the end they decided that it’s no biggie. Even asked a few times if I vaped -.- and confirmed that I didn’t bring in alcohol (honestly I think all the personal stocks in Brunei have ran out by now). 

Cleared customs, and there’s a station set up just before the exit where a volunteer (most were wearing Pusat Belia tees so I am guessing they were volunteers? Although why pusat belia idk) will check with you on your accommodation and cross check with lists from various hotels that they pinned up on a small board (lol, quite telling how many people they were expecting each day). Once checked another volunteer will lead you out to the arrival hall in search of the driver from your hotel, and the driver will lead you to the vehicle and so on. In my case, I was the only guest they were expecting that night (so they didn’t even need a minivan or anything) and it wasn’t long before we were on the way, with all windows rolled down for the driver’s protection hahahaha. 

Arrived at Parkview Hotel, similarly there’s a separate station set up for check in, filled in registration form where staff explained some basic house rules during quarantine, for instance only breakfast provided (and only if you paid the room rate with breakfast, as I would find out later), deliveries in allowed but not out, and that’s about it. I guess they already know who’s coming so there’s no need to verify your details and all. Though actually I am more concerned with my activities for the coming days (I.e. my test) but at this point nobody could answer my question on when my test is gonna be - which is very unsettling. But from staff’s experience he thinks it won’t take too long for arrivals from Singapore, so I guess that hasn’t changed. 

Won’t dwell too much into quarantine experience since I already had another post on it, but just know that I was so thankful for the efficiency eventually when I got tested the next day itself (considering I arrived late at night) and the results came out in less than a day so I was out and back at home within 40 hours of check in lol. 

Good old Brunei has continued to go on its own ways even during this pandemic - thanks in part to the very stringent restrictions on who can enter/exit the country imposed very early on, they just got it under control and haven’t lost it since. The result is BAU for everybody, just that residents can’t leave the country without a good reason. No masks required anywhere unless you are in the F&B line of work (why them only, not sure) and recommended but not mandatory for other public facing work. Public gathering capacity was at 300 or 500 (can’t remember) but in any case that’s more than enough for regular events, parties etc to happen as usual (heck, even national day celebrations proceeded as usual). Only thing is they restricted celebrations for CNY which was really an excuse IMO (because weddings can happen but open house and 拜年cannot happen...?) but it wasn’t that strictly enforced in a sense that..we can just say we are visiting friends and not 拜年 mah lol. Also quite interesting was that if you were to invite lion dance troupes to your home you have to apply for permit prior to that and issue a QR code for all your visitors to scan lolol. 

Speaking of QR codes, you were supposed to scan in and out on the BruHealth app when you enter shops etc which is similar to Safe Entry but as I mentioned earlier, nobody really bothers if you do it or not...but as model citizens of course I do. Your status in the app is color coded and resets every day so you have to answer the same self assessment questions every day to generate your code, green and yellow allows you to enter premises and red obviously does not allow you to. For the first day I was code red obviously because I had travel history and I hadn’t done my test, but subsequently I was assessed to be code yellow (because I still had travel history in the last 14 days but I had cleared my test) and finally green after 2 weeks. Milestone moment lol. 

There’s also this running joke where other countries were reporting the first arrivals of vaccine shipments while Brunei was reporting on arrival of lamb shipments lolol. There were some produce that Brunei have been facing shortage on since COVID because they restricted imports from certain countries (I still don’t get this logic) - certain veg, lamb, ducks (of all things) for instance. So in most Chinese restaurants duck dishes have been suspended for a while. Amazingly pork is still available lol. 

Then we move on to the preparations for returning to SG (because I covered my holidays thoughts in other posts already). 

As a returning citizen/PR there’s no need for application beforehand. No pre-flight test required (those are only reserved for a handful of high risk countries). And returning from the few low risk countries SG is open to meant that SHN is not required even, though you do have to be tested on arrival at airport and self isolate while waiting for results, clearing which you can resume normal activities. So the only preparation beforehand is to fill in and submit the arrival card online 3 days prior (declaring that you are in good health and you have no other travel history in the last 14 days), and pre-book/pay for your arrival test (at $160 now, down from $200). 

And also mentally prepare yourself for reality sigh. 

Airport operating as usual, at least the public areas. Which isn’t that much different from usual hahaha coz Brunei airport has never seen big crowds anyway. No docs to check through before checking in (for me at least, Brunei residents obviously have to show their ATP and all). Again, ghost town inside the terminal and about 15 people waiting to board the flight (including a few, according to my sources, visiting SG for leisure reasons under the cover of business/medical reasons sigh - I don’t suppose SG minded that much for now seeing Brunei is really low risk). 

On arrival at Changi Airport, similar story - because arrivals are so minimal and sparse, there are already people on hand and very quickly we were ushered to immigration where they scanned the QR code on your online arrival card, cleared immigration and luggage collection as usual, and proceed to the test. As seamless as you would expect from SG - scanned the QR code from your reservation, verify your particulars, did test (nose and throat) and you are sent on your way. 

I did think they were a bit relaxed but maybe it’s coz they know it’s an arrival from Brunei (you were given a sticker beforehand which probably identified you as low risk). Still, nobody (immig officer for example) explained requirements to you e.g. how you are supposed to stay at home while waiting for results, you are only supposed to isolate with someone of the same travel history as you. Nobody explained transport arrangements to you and guided you on where to go after you exited - I could have shopped in Jewel (there’s nothing stopping me from entering Jewel from the arrival hall) and hopped on train/bus home for all they know. In any case I had a hard time looking for the arrival pick up point for me to call grab and when I did, I had no issues booking grab and the grab driver didn’t even breathe a word seeing that I obviously looked like I just returned from overseas. So that was a bit lax I thought. I am sure they are a lot stricter with other countries I suppose. 

I was fully expecting to self isolate till the next morning at the very least but I was so surprised that they even manage to top my expectations - the results came within 5 hours. I can even go out for dinner if I wanted to but I had prepared myself for a couple of days of stay in so yep. Low key paranoid about catching anything from airport (remote possibility I know but oh well) so I still made a mental note to not go out too often for a week at least. 

So that concludes the whole process. Highly feasible if you don’t mind the extra costs. An ex-colleague asked me if it was worth all the trouble and the answer was clear - it’s worth every single cent and every ounce of effort. 

That said I still won’t do it that often la but it’s comforting to know that I have the choice to do it if I needed to. Chances of getting in should be quite high. Though I did hear of a story from Amilyn, while I was in Brunei, that a friend of hers applied not too long after I did and was rejected hmmm. So I am not sure if it’s my citizenship that played a part here or they still have a quota on the number of foreigners that can be let in at any one point (coincidentally that was also the period when there were 15 imported cases in one day from UK so maybe their resources were a bit stretched so they rejected applicants idk). Can only speculate. 

So! Next trip in August? Lol.