Fish in a glass tank

My office is a one-storey buliding built in a shape of an inverted T , unlike t-junction you encounter on the road. It is surrounded with glass-panes. No matter where you are, of course minus the “loo”, you are like a “koi” peeping out from the tank. Reminds me of the story of Red riding hood and the ugly wolf. “Oh what big eyes you have grandma”, said little red riding hood. “To better see you with”, cried the wolf. This could be my ex-boss intentions for all we know. As more and more office workers find themselves stuck in 4 concrete walls, for us it was a blessing in disguise.

This is what we get to enjoy everyday:

Morning - birds with colorful feathers chirping, singing or pecking away at the fruits on the trees or on the grasses. On bad days, the birds commit suicide when they mistook our window panes for their landing rights and with a “thud” drop “dead” or fainted.

Iguana, snakes and monkeys are common sights. Sometimes the iguana or monitor lizard with their long slim body and short legs crossing your path in their slow gait when you swear under your breath “move faster, move faster”. Or a snake flatten like pancake when our driver rolled over it in their haste. Dont play play with our monkeys. Besides scavenging our garbage bins, they have a jolly good time swinging from trees to trees like tarzan, and even carted away our durians meant for the staff’s durian fests.

In front of the office entrance, there is a well-kept garden cum field with beautiful landscape. Here is where we hold our sports and games. And it is a good spot to snap a picture or two as momentos, esp. trainees from outstation and overseas.

Stories out of banana plants

Everyone knows banana plant has its many uses - from the leaves used for wrapping food to ikan bakar; the fruits for desserts, making cakes or puddings or fried as in goreng pisang. The Malays churned out delicious dishes from the flower shoots. The trunk was once  used by poultry owners  as feeds for the pigs, once its been cut into small pieces and cooked over the firewood for more than a week until soft. As for the Indians , the young plants with newly grown fruits are used as oranmental plants for prayers and weddings.

For the Chinese who loves to try their luck for anything that can bring them wealth, used it to ask for 4 digit number. And they believe that the tree has spirit in it. And that is how the banana ghost story comes about.

Near where I grew up was an old well surrounded with banana plants. One day there was a drought and the tap went dry. A young pregnant woman tried to draw water from the well. She peeped  into the dark well trying to see whether there was water in it and accidentally fell over.  The residents immediately sealed it off to prevent any more accidents. Evey year during Qing Ming time, her heartbroken husband used to offer prayers by the banana trees.

At midnight, the story goes that she will sit by the side of the road with baby in her arm to buy food from passing food peddlers. And thats how my story of the kuey teay man came about in my earlier blog. We heard the kuey teay man met the ghost. After taking the fried kuey teay she said she will go back and take money to pay but disappered into the banana trees. And the kuey teay man was never heard of.

HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY

14-2-2007 A SPECIAL DAY

“LOVE IS SOMETHING IF YOU GIVE IT AWAY, say

GIVE IT AWAY, say   GIVE IT AWAY

LOVE IS SOMETHING IF YOU GIVE IT AWAY

YOU END UP HAVING MORE….”

This is the lyrics of a chorus I sang growing up. Valentine’s Day is special for all of us who has loved, been loved and still in love. But there are those who has been hurt or have their love rejected. May I wish you find true love again. Despite all life’s difficulties, let’s use this day to spread a little love or pamper ourselves : go for our favourite movie, take a walk by the beach, listen to our favourite music/songs; enjoy a cuppa. A time by the lake with nature can be so soothing; Dressed-up and get out of the house if need be or cuddle with hubby in-tow.

No matter what, we always hope tomorrow will  be a better day. Today must be well-spent.

I am just going to do that with my still handsome hunk.

Food peddlers

I used to live along a very interesting street that begins from the T junction and ends at an intersection.

In the early days, food peddlers on bicycles or motorbikes that were converted to moveable food stalls, ply this street in the morning or late at night. With their rubber honk and bells that goes clink!clink! we have the roti man on their overloaded bicycle; the chui kueh seller with his steamer;  the kueh-mueh Ah Soh with assortments of bingka, harm chi peng, yue char keuh etc.  Later in the morning, the meat and vegetable seller comes a-calling. Then in the hot afternoon, the ice-cream and the ice bola seller knows how to quench our thirst.   Oh, not to forget the konk-konk man chiseling away piece by piece the sweet candy, and as he twirls and twirls his sticky beh leh koh on a wooden stick.   Then we catched the kacang putih man clad in his familiar sarong, balancing his wooden box-cum-table atop his turban head, like the acrobat doing their act in the circus.

In the evening,  we wait patiently with bowl or plate in hand along the street,  for the wan tan mee seller and later in the night, the kueh teuy man. They never disappoint us. Dieting was never an issue. At precisely the same time every night, these two peddlers will pass by this stretch of street. If you missed them going down the street, not to worry. You can catch them coming back the same way once they complete a full circle.  Unlike hanging out at mamak shops for teh tarik and play catch-up, we sit by the side of the road under the street lamp , yaking the night away with  ghosts and orang minyak stories.  

One day the kuey teuy seller stopped coming. We told him one day he’s going to meet a beautiful ghost if he goes back so late everynight. So each time he passes by that mangosteen and banana trees after 12 midnight, all is quiet and eerie, we heard he peddaled for his life. So when he failed to turn up after that, we thought he met his ghost.

Further up the street, near a railway track, we heard a rock was shooting out water with healing powers.  News of this sort caught the attention of the media. People with asthma, skin disease and kidney problem testified to its truth. My family like every other family went to fill up our empty bottles and we drank and we were cured of sore throat, skin  rashes. My mother used this water to make cake powder that gives a cooling effect for the face. Each day the crowd swelled and got bigger. Finally the railway keeper decided to condone the area and began charging the people. Just as suddenly it came, as suddenly it stopped. Thats the end of the story!

Going to the movies with 5 good friends

I’ve been tagged!

Going to the movies (vern)is one of my hobbies. My mother used to take me along whenever she goes for the shows during the 50’s & 60’s. Because we can’t afford a TV, those black and white screen, that was the next course of entertainment.

Klang is such a small sleepy town then. It is divided by the famous Double decker bridge linking the Klang South to Klang North. Most of the excitement is found across the bridge. The only cinema this side is Rex cinema. This cinema sits on a small hill slope, just behind the present Jalan India, famous for anything Indian - from clothings to food. And the rich Chertais(money changer) sit in their small cubicle with money changing hands thro’ a pigeon hole. After the show, we stopped by the chinese coffee shop(now better known as Fatty Poh’s kopitiam) to bungkus  dumplings or fried noddles for my siblings.

Across the bridge, we have the Regal theatre. At the other end, we have Cathay cinema where English (John Wayne horse-riding, while drawing his guns like speed of a lightning)and Malay (Hang Tuah who lived during the heyday of the Melaka Sultanate and Hang Jebat ) were played out. We watched the Three muskeeteers “all for one and one for all” remind us of their commitment to a cause. Just behind Cathay cinema we have Capitol and Lido back to back. These two usually have Chinese movies - from producers like Shaw brothers, Run Run Shaw and Run me, protraying those San Ker(moutain songs) shows with the likes of Yeh Fong, Lin Chin Sia, and the famous One-Arm swordman of Ti Lung and  David Chiang

People from the smaller towns like Kapar, Meru, Kuala Selangor and even as far as Banting and Jenjarom travelled to Klang for their shows. Due to great demand, black market was rampant. A normal ticket could go as high as 300% on good shows and during festive seasons. Sometimes these movie mania from outstation had no other choice since most of the tickets have been taken up by these black market peddlars. Money was hard to come by, so what to do. Buy only lah. 

When the lights go out(show over), we have our supper esp. after the midnight shows at the Emporium makan. Wonder (wonda) why we stayed slim and sweet? Without any bus services, we walked where our two companions , Bilboa and Ligdo (my two legs) can take us. Walking across the double-decker bridge with the dirty Klang river flowing under it, is a rare experience if you have not tried it. Never heard of rape, kidnapped or snatch-theft those days.

But sleepy Klang is not what it used to be anymore.  Now we are famous for many things-some not so nice ek. But the aroma of bah kut teh still attracts food lovers….or our famous Seafood in Bagan or Pandamaran.? If you are more adventurous, Pulau Ketam beckons.

To all the Beautiful woman

            …and all she ever want is dance, dance

Here is a wonderful poem Audrey Hepburn wrote when asked to share her “beauty tips.” It was read at her funeral years later.

For attractive lips ,  speak words of kindness..  
For lovely eyes ,   seek   out the good in people .  
For a slim figure,  share your food with the hungry.
For beautiful hair  , let a child run his/her fingers through it   once a   day.
For poise , walk with the knowledge that you never walk alone..  
People,   even more than things, have to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed,
and redeemed; never throw out anyone.
Remember, if you ever need a   helping hand, you will find one at the end of each of your arms.
As you grow older,   you will discover that you have two hands ; one for helping yourself, and the   other for helping others.

Dragonfly-messenger of the dead

The story continues…..

Thus Trudie began  journey to Singapore but was sadly told upon arrival by her husband’s manager Rhys that he had died two days ago in some remote place out of Malacca.. So, stubborn like a mule and refusing to turn back, she hop on to his cart and made that “rockety” journey to the plantation. Anyone travelling through an estate road in a truck will know what the journey is like. But imagine during the 1800s? My backbone will probably rattle; those who are pregnant probably will have a miscarriage. It was here she befriended Wu Chao, a woman from mainland South China. Later she was to find out how closely  “related” they both were through her marriage to Jeremy.To cut the story short, with Wu Chao’s help and her acute business sense, she became a successful woman, dealing in Oriental artefacts, buying and selling these decorative ornamentals from Malacca to London. The author introduced us to the Nyonyas and the Babas with their pigtails, sam foos’ and cheong sams’ . Of course some very interesting phrases like “eat her out of her house’, “a toss in the hay”(that’s for you to find the meaning).  After the death of Wu Chao, she adopted the child……When she paid a visit to the cemetery at the mainland, a dragonfly flutter and landed at her feet. She believed it a message from her dear departed Wu Chao that she’s happy wherever she is.  And with that she turned and walk towards the man waiting for her.., .THE END!

A Messenger of death

The edges of the pages had turned brownish and the book looks like it has seen better days. This is the condition of Elizabeth de Guise’s book on “The Flight of the Dragonfly”, first published in 1990 by the Grafton Books when I lay my hands on it at my friend’s place.

Set in London in 1857, Trudie cannot stand her Reverend father’s holier- than-thou attitude and a mum who has been reduced to a jelly state taking her marriage vows literally “Wives submit to your husbands”.  So when Jeremy Maddock, her brother’s friend came by one day with talks of his exciting plan to open an Emporium in Regent street , she fell headlong for him and his grand ideas. Marriage is her ultimate solution out of an unhappy home environment. Anything is better than under the strict and rigid ways of her father, Jonathan Grant.

The author,Elizabeth brings us a story not only of romance, but about a young innocent girl whose courage to cross the unknown borders to seek her own destiny makes the book so special. The story takes us from her dull life in London to the East in a plantation somewhere in Malacca where workers are mostly immigrants, cholera is rampant and where European women are considered “foreign devil” or yang kwei. She made that long and arduous journey alone to his plantation in Malacca and to be left destitute upon arrival due to his sudden death with cholera. It is here she learnt the ugly truth about her mysterious husband she married in haste back home. But like every novel, there is a Prince charming coming to the rescue. This is in the form of a Welsh miner, whom she mistaken for her husband’s koolie (worker), where she refused to let him brow-beat her into admitting defeat. The story is about her courage to seek a better life despite the odds and the determination to make a success of it. But it is not the romance that captured my interests. I am sure you all are dying to know the ending……next chaptere

p/s. My year end 2006 sunday school musical has been defered due to poor uploading.

I RESOLVE

I have been sending my resolutions to friends and guess what? They like it. I know everyone of you post something on 1 2007 except me. My line was like the tortoise, so I just curled up on my sofa and read, read, and read. I finished Jeffrey Archer “False Impression”. My friend’s “The Flight of the Dragonfly” by Elizabetg de Guise. Great books. Now reading “The Cell” by Stephen King. Want to post a synopses for you once  my connections improve…until then MY RESOLUTIONS 2007

Some things I can change and some I cant, some I just dont bother.
But whatever it is, for 2007 take me for the good as well as the bad, but I hope you can remember the good ones and tell me the bad ones so I know. Or else if you think I am easily hurt, just DISCARD them away……….

For all my blogger friends( not that I have many, but I appreciate the few of you who has spend much time reading my stale blog day after day, but kept me writing), I resolve to be improve….

 

Serve or be served

My colleague and I were having a chat over cup of tea at our office canteen with my boss. This topic of “to serve or be served” pop-up and as we grow wiser in age, I agree but our younger generation might just brushed it off “ Fat hope” or “siong leh”

Malay girls are taught by their mothers from a very young age to be submissive to the man. By the act of serving it does not mean, she is taken for granted as a servant or treated as one (According to the malay man, since they are allowed many wives, so mother’s girl fear that she will lose her son-in-law to another woman). Most girls are married before they reached 30 years of age. My female colleague will “salam” her husband’s hand when he drops her off. If not, they will “salam” before she leaves their home. Even if they marry a “lousy” husband, they accept fate has dealt them a cruel hand. To leave is a shame.

 For a chinese girl, seldom do we hear mothers teaching their children to be “obedient” or submissivie to their husband. It will just have to come naturally? In fact sometimes, when the man takes so long to carry out one task, we beh tahan, quickly push him aside, “I do, I do”. Remember when we take the marriage vows, we nod our heads and say “I do, I do”?. Ah ha!. And we have been doing that since. Speaking for the men, my boss advice to the younger generation of girls,“don’t try to do everything and left the poor husband nothing to do. Woman loves to take charge – from kids to studies to home and now even at work. Man still remains like man. Some are just plain lazy and sometimes need the push. So if you love them to distraction, they will be easier to – go pay the bills, carry the garbage, follow you shopping for hours even if you buy nothing, yum char with you at Fatty Poh’s kopi tiam but don’t forget give each other some space. He for his football you go joined your yoga classes.