The city of Miri, in the Malaysian state of Sarawak, owes its existence to the presence of oil - both onshore which was exploited from 1910, and now off-shore. Before then it was a small village but the nearby Niah Caves have shown evidence of human life from 40,000 BC.
Because of the importance of the oil industry it has always had a sizeable expatriate population. These included the Bettany and the Rhys-Jones families of Sophie, Countess...