Nasi Ambeng

     'Nasi Ambeng' and chicken rice, two delicacies which are quite popular among Malaysians, were brought into the lives of Malaysians by the Javanese and chinese respectively.  Nasi ambeng [^m beng] consists of white rice prepared with chicken currv or chicken cooked in soy sauce, vegetables, fried noodles, some salted fish, fried coconut flesh, and so on.  Everything is put on a round tray which has been laid with fresh banana leaves, and served to guests, four people to a  tray.  Although only four people are assigned to one tray of nasi ambeng, it can be eaten by more than that number.  Therefore, guests are given plastic bags in which they can put the 'berkat' (food from the pan that they have secured in plastic bags) to bring home for their wives and children.  During the good old days, plastic bags were not issued as they were not produced yet.  Instead, hosts prepared old newspaper and banana leaves so that guests could use them to wrap and pack the food.  After that, they used strings made from banana bark to tie the pack since plastic string were not invented.

Nasi ambeng or Ambeng Rice.  Notice the banana leaf?

    Usually guests are invited to feast at dinner time.  In those difficult olden days, most of the villagers in my area only had a bicycle each with which they used as a form of transportation. Therefore, they put the packed 'nasi ambeng' on the handlebars of their bicycles, or sometimes tied it on the carriers of their bicycles using a bicycle tube. 

'Berkat' or food that guests brought home on the handlebar

Their houses were quite far apart from each other, their roads were bicycle paths under rubber trees.  Going back to their homes, they cycled their bicycles on the gloomy paths under the rubber trees, sometimes using their bicycle lamps to show the way, but most of the time, using their instincts.  Sometimes they ran over rubber tree roots that protruded on the ground, causing them to fall and the 'berkat' scattered on the ground.  Pity to their children and wives!

Riding a bicycle under rubber trees.  This picture was taken in the day.  How would the situation be if it was taken at night?

Condolences

Thursday, October 14, 2010

Condolences

    I am saddened to read about the accident that happened on the PLUS highway near the Simpang Ampat Tol Plaza.  Long ago, vehicle accidents did not take so many lives.  Victims were 'slightly injured', 'badly injured', some 'died on the spot' (I did not make any inquiries, only based on my childhood experiences as a 'kampung boy').  Now it seems more people died in road accidents.  

     I remember when I was small, an uncle of mine commented about a car which appeared to be moving very fast.  "At least he is doing 60 (60 miles per hour)," he said.  It dawned on me that cars were not moving as fast then as they are nowadays.  Of course at that time there were no highways in Malaysia.  We only saw highways on TV; CHiPs (California Highway Patrol) starred by Larry Wilcox and Erik Estrada in the 70s.  Our winding roads and the heavy traffic prevented drivers from speeding.  On lonely roads, I did not know.  At least I thought so.   The speed limit was 30mph (30 miles per hour) in urban areas.

     Nowadays, the speed on the PLUS highway is 110 kph.  Based on my experience, if I were to heed the speed limit while travelling along the highway, I would only be able to overtake heavy lorries, small motor cycles and cars moving slower than 110.  However, a lot of cars would be overtaking my vehicle, sometimes a string of them.  It shows that breaking the speed limit is nothing to be worried about to most drivers, regardless of their ages and gender.  In fact, driving a Honda Civic at the speed of 140 kph along the highway doesn't make me feel worried about the circumstances that I would have to face if anything bad happens.  I feel so safe behind the wheel, I don't hear the sound of the wind.  The car is so stable.  No wonder if an accident happens, the impact is so great.

     Therefore, I think drivers should abide by the traffic rules.  Do not overspeed.  Care about other people's lives if you don't give a damn about yours.

(Err... what do you say Laili?  Thank you for monitoring my blog.  May Allah protect you and give you a leeway in performing your Haj.  Ameen)

Posted by Borhan Mohamed Dali at 6:50 PM 0 comments Links to this post

Water Closet ,, Toilet, Outhouse

Water Closet ,, Toilet, Outhouse

     See the picture above?  The caption underneath reads:
"Can you guess what are they doing?
If not I can explain, though the thing is really shocking. The story is that this Russian girl has dropped her cell phone into… into this hole that they use in villages as a toilet (it has no drain or sewer system - just a hole and all the people drop there), probably you have seen such system at least once in your life. So she dropped her cell phone occasionally and it got right inside this thing. She got a choice - to forget it or to try to get it from there. She has chosen the latter and…."

     I was browsing the net to find a picture of an old village toilet in Malaysia because I wanted to relate one with my experience as a small boy, when I underwent my practicum, and when I started my service as a government servant.  However, the few pictures that I found (one of them is what you see above) caught my eyes.


     That reminds me of the 'toilet' I used when I started my service as a government servant in a remote area in Pahang, Malaysia.  There was no electricity and pipe water.  So what I saw and used was acceptable.  To make a toilet, or an outhouse, a hole around three or four feet deep was dug at the back of a house.  A stone slab with a hole in the middle was then put on top.  After that, a wooden cubicle was built.  He presto! The 'toilet' was ready.  While staying at one of the houses for three years before being transferred to another place, that was the kind of toilet that I used.   Usually, I used that thing before going to the river. (I bathed in the river, mind you).  I covered my head with a towel, leaving only my eyes to see where I was going.  Entered, 'dropped', quickly walked out, straight to the river.  Fortunately, I did not share the outhouse with anybody else, so, although it was not so 'fragrant', it was only mine.

     Another 'toilet' that I used when doing my practicum was a little bit different.  The toilet was situated at the corner of the house compound.  More or less the same as the one that I had described in my August posting 'Sakit Perut Waktu Tarawih (1)'.  The only difference was a pail or bucket was placed under the hole so that that thing could drop there.  Every morning, a old man would take the bucket, scrapped the content into his big bucket, and put it back under toilet.  I would wait until I could not stand the urge anymore.  Then, covering my nose with a towel and taking a deep breath, I quickly rushed in, dropped the 'bomb', and rushed out to wash.  Hah... (relieved)

      Nowadays, I doubt it if the same scenario can still be seen in Malaysia.  In remote areas, perhaps?

When It Rains

      That Friday it rained at all places.  On Saturday it still rained.  Today (Sunday January 30, 2011) it still drizzled.  The village headman was worried.  If rain continued, surely he would have to send the flood victims to a refugee camp.  He was away but had directed his secretary to make his rounds at intervals and update him with the latest development.  It was reported that the water level at Parit Mohamad had risen, but was still below the danger zone.

Black sky.  Sometimes it rains, at other times, it doesn't.

Rain, rain, go away...

      My daughter, Husna, prepared lunch which consisted of lobster cooked in coconut milk, fried cabbage and fried fish.  The tummy is always hungry when it rains.  Therefore, having lunch when it rains is always interesting and enjoyable. 

Lobster cooked with coconut milk...

Fried cabbage...

   

    When it rained, Dad stayed home as he could not go to tap rubber.  Mum and sister prepared lunch early.  Once, they prepared white rice with 'meranti leaves'  (a kind of vegetable that was abundant in the countryside) cooked with coconut milk topped up with fried soy cakes dipped in hot ketchup.  They set the food near the doorway facing the neighbour's house.  Then the whole family sat down to a delicious lunch in the cold rainy afternoon.  That was the good old days.
   

  

Tauhu goreng sambal kicap

Sometimes it rained suddenly while we, the children were enjoying our games in our village, we scampered back to the safety of our own homes.  Sometimes, the rain got too heavy which soon resulted in the whole village soaked in flood which was not too deep.  Only around the ankles.  When that happened, we would go out and waded in the water, enjoying the feeling of the current around our toes and heels.

    

Enjoying ourselves in the flood

You also want  to enjoy the flood?

     Sometimes we couldn't manage to reach home before the rain, therefore we sheltered under somebody's house (wooden houses were built on stilts; quite high which enabled us to stand under them for shelter against the rain.  To kill the boredom, we would look for lizards in between the wooden stilts.  Sometimes we found them and killed them.  Sometimes we would find centipedes which these we too, would kill.

     Sometimes, we found a lot of interesting things under the houses.  We found hairpins, combs, belts, coins.       

    

Coin

     Those were the good old days.  Now, it has been a long time since we were caught in flood.

Wrong Entry (Part Two)

In "Wrong Entry (Part One)" I wrote about my carelessness in entering a girl's toilet.  Was I found out? By whom?  Was it by a lecturer?  Was I excused for my mistake?  The following paragraphs will tell all.

      Just then I heard the sound of the stole of shoes on the tiled floors in a steady rhythm that seemed to me that the owner knew of my presence and was determined to find me out bring and bring me to the authority for violating human rights; a man in a ladies' toilet!  I felt my heart beat fast.  If a lady lecturer fond me in side a girl's toilet, that would be the end of me.  I pricked my ears to listen.  The sound of the footsteps moved towards the far end of the toilet, paused for a moment, then retreated back towards the door, passing the cubicle I was in.  I could see a pair of shoes for a moment, as it passed.  A pair of black leather high-heeled shoes.  Madam Sarimah?  No, she didn't wear that kind.  I thought I had seen them recently.  Whose were they?  Aah... it just escaped my confused memory.  They say if you want to remember something, it just slipped out.

     I held my breath as my heart beat furiously.  It seemed a whole day when I heard the sound of the footsteps moving out of the restroom and diead away.  I heaved a sigh of relief.  Quickly I washed myself and stepped out of the cubicle.

     "Hah...!" a stiffled cry behind me made me jump out of my skin.  I turned to face the source of the sound.  There was Quratul Aini, my coursemate who had come out from behind the door she was hiding, grinning  while her right fist was clenced, the index finger pointing at me.

     "What were you doing in a gir's toilet?" she asked, still wearing the mischievous grin.  So, it was not the lecturer.

     "I didn't realize it.  It was emergency," I answered, begging for sympathy.

     "I saw you entering as I was coming out from the lecture room just now,.  Lucky for you nobody else saw you," she added laughingly as she re entered the restroom.

     *        *        *        *        *        *

     At another time, while at a girls' school in the town of Batu Pahat, I felt the need to ease myself.  I asked my friends around about the toilet but they were not sure.

     "May be over that side, near the office," one of them suggested, pointing to a block of building.

     Hurriedly, I went and sure, it was a toilet but I couldn't see any sign to show that it was a male toilet.  I couldn't wait.  Hastily I stepped in, a pungent smell sprang into my nostrils.  I looked into the first compartment.  There was neither a small water container nor a rubber hose.  The second compartment.  Disgusting.  Dirty, eee...  Black substance in the toilet bowl.  (How could anybody put his head in the toilet bowl?  But that was another story).  The third boot.  Ah, quite clean, there was a rubber hose attached to the tap.  I entered quickly and closed the door.  The latch had broken.  Didn't matter.  I would not take long.  Besides, I could easily hold it if somebody tried the door.  I had no time to find another one.

     While hard at it, I heard the sound of somebody entering the lavatory.  The person mumbled something in a husky voice, but I knew that it was a female's.  I tried to picture the person; burly, quite dark, having an oblong face, wearing short hair like a boy's, rough...  Now only I recalled.  It was a girls' school.  This toilet was a girl's toilet!

     I could hear the lass moving to the first toilet, the sound of the door being thrust open.  Then, the second toilet, the door pushed open hard.

     "Eee... disgusting..." she scolded with a loud voice.

     Surely the next would be the one I was in.  I held the door shut with all my might using one hand while squatting above the toilet bowl so that the girl would not be able to open it from outside, all the time praying secretly.

     Luck was on my side.  That teenager gave a hard push on the door.  It opened a little but closed again quickly under the weight of my strong arm.  She didn't give a second try, but proceeded to the next boot, then went out.  After that, everything was silent again.

     Quickly I cleaned myself and sneaked out carefully so that nobody would nobody could see me coming out of that horrorful room, yet had made me comfortable again.

Wrong Entry (Part One)

Monday, January 24, 2011

Wrong Entry (Part One)

     Sometimes we happened to do things that we were not supposed to do without realizing it until it was too late to back off .  Consequently, we had to face the circumstances, sometimes they favoured us, at other times we had to face the music.  Then, we would smile whenever we reminisced it.  This was what I faced when I was  pursuing my first degree.

     At the university where I studied, the faculty block was a four-storey building with two restrooms built in at every level, one for the ladies and the other for the gentlemen.  These rooms were situated at the far north and the far south of the building.  The restrooms for the gentlemen and ladies at every level were situated alternately.  If the ladies' was placed at the north on level one, the gents' would be at the south.  Then, at level 2, the gents' would be at the north, and the ladies' would be at the south.  And so on.  We, the students, used to wander from one room to another for our lectures, which made the situation a more complicated.  Therefore, the nearest restroom to our lecture room would be the ladies' at one time and the gents' at another.  For that reason, a man who wanted to use the restroom needed to make sure he did not enter the girl's toilet and vice versa.

     There was once when, while in the middle of a lecture, I suddenly felt the urge to ease myself.  I thought I could hold it until lecture was over, so I stayed put, but the inclination to pee became greater and greater.   I puffed and grunted, cold sweat trickled down my spine, my palms became clammy.  In the end, I could stand it no more.  Eventually I got up and walked briskly to the lavatory nearby, meeting no one along the way.

     I entered the clean lavatory.  In front of me were two rows of toilets, obviously had recently been cleaned.  I got into the first one and started to ease myself.  While hard at it, my eyes devoured the graffiti that filled the door.  It was clear that the students not only satisfied their physical needs in the toilet, but also their sexual emotions on the toilet doors and walls with obscene graphics and scribblings.  I read the dialogues one after another enjoying the message that came out of it.  

     Suddenly, I sensed that something was wrong.  The dialogues were written by females, I was very sure.  I began to wonder whether I had entered the wrong lavatory.  If I had, there would be a big row if I was found out.  Every body would poke their fingers at me.  My lecturers; Madam Sarimah Yusof, Madam Rosila Manap, Dr. (cute) Azizah our course moderator, Dr. Najib.  Tch, tch, tch...

     Just then I heard the sound of the sole of shoes on the tiled floors in a steady rhythm that seemed  to me that the owner knew of my presence and was determined to find me out bring me to the authority for violating human rights; a man in a ladies' toilet!  I felt my heart beat fast.  Oh God, what should I do?

Posted by Borhan Mohamed Dali at 1:01 AM

Beano And Dandy

Saturday, January 15, 2011

Beano & Dandy

     Hi!  One of the reading materials that interest teenagers like me is comic books.  However, as a kampung boy, I got to know about it quite late, that was in Form One, when I studied at High School Muar.  It was because I started to see them at bookshops when I rode my bicycle through the town center on my way to school. 

     Some of us readers in Malaysia who were educated in schools using Malay as their medium of instruction may not get any idea what Beano & Dandy is.  However, those who were from English schools may knnow that they are comic newspapers.  Those were some of the comic newspapers that I cam a across when I started to cycle my way to and from school every day since from one at High School Muar.

     Flashback - I, with some of my friends used to cycle n the mornings to a religion school in Muar, "Sekolah Agama Dumpar Rendah Pagi".  After school at 11.00 a.m., we changed into our secondary school uniforms and shared our food which we had brought from home at lunch.  While waiting for the afternoon session at High School Muar to start, I would go to an Indian book store in town to look at the comincs that were hung at the shop.  They were 'Beano', 'Dandy', 'Beezer', Biffo', 'Topper', 'Mad' and a lot of other comics that I cannot remember.  

     I thought I could flip through the pages of those comic newspapers dangling on a string in the shop, but the shopkeeper wouldn't let me read them there, so I had to buy them for thirty-five cents (35 cents) which was quite expensive at that time, as I only got twenty cents for pocket money every day.  Came to think of it, I would only buy them once or twice a week.  So, I saved up some of my pocket money to buy them twice a week and read them alone.  I couldn't share the cost with my siblings, because they were not interested in reading an english comic, as they were educated in a malay school.

     How I got attracted to these comics, I was, and still am not sure.  But attracted to them, I was.

     I found the comics humorous.  The humour in both comics was basic – the fun stemmed from the idiosyncratic and often larger than the life characters allowed readers to relate to and sympathise with them, and also laugh at the ridiculous scrapes they got into.  All characters were interesting: Desperate Dan, Korky the cat, Dennis the Menace, Minnie the Minx, Bash Street Kids, Roger the Dodger, I enjoyed reading them all, I stored the comic papers away carefully as if they were something very precious, with the intention of salvaging them some day and read them again.  But after so many years, I can't find them any more.  I have lost my precious treasure, so cheap but so valuable. What can I do?

Posted by Borhan Mohamed Dali at 9:05 PM