surat-hersarong

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 18. I found a little gem of a memory with just you and me.

Dear Mok,

Do you remember that time when we you visited us in Sungai Petani? I must have been 12 or 13. It's one of the few times I remember being with you anywhere other than at your house. I had found a small block of wood, about 6" long, 3" wide and maybe 1" thick, in Abah’s workshop and I wanted to carve something into it as a present for Mama, I think. I was diligently smoothing it with a piece of sandpaper on the front porch when you came by to see what I was up to and stayed to watch. And then Abah saw us and asked the same question and I told him, "I'm going to carve it."

"Oh, I don't think you can do that!" Abah said.

"Why not?" I asked.

He explained that the piece of wood in my hand wasn't meant for carving; it would be too hard and the grains are too coarse. I'll just be hurting my hands. 

"Oh," I said, feeling at once dumb and disappointed. Abah must have felt bad for having to quash my budding creation.

You, on the other hand, kept up a cheery stream of chatter complimenting me for being smart and imaginative and creative and daring to try something even though I didn't know what I was doing and how that makes me unique and good and different from everyone else. It was a brief moment—Abah telling me the bad news, me feeling crushed, you jumping in with your compliments—but I remember thinking how disjointed your words were from what was going on. You kept saying something like, “Yes but she’s so creative! She just went ahead and tried anyway!”

I didn’t make sense to me then, but now I wonder if maybe you saw how crushing that moment was on my little maker spirit and your maternal instinct was to try and soften the blow. I know you're no stranger to carpentry and woodwork, having built and fixed everything around your house with nothing more than your trusty old ax. Or maybe you really were just simply marvelling at my creativity and ingenuity and adventurous spirit.

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 17: What do you want for us? Dear Mok,

That this as good as it gets. I realized this a few days ago as I sat on the sejadah, legs folded underneath me and hands held up in supplication. In the same breath I thanked God for the numerous blessings I had been bestowed upon just on that day, and begged for forgiveness for all the ways I had fallen short, also on that day. I realized then, that there will never be a time when everything feels fine on all fronts. There will always be a vice that I’m secretly addicted to, a grievance I’d rather hold on to than let go, a loved one I’m neglecting out of my own selfishness—“I need to focus on me right now”—an aspect of being a Muslim that I wilfully abandon because the alternative is more fun/cool/popular/acceptable to others.

Did you have standards you would have liked us to live up to? Or dreams and aspirations for us? Where there jobs you hoped we’d do because you felt particularly fond of them? I was too young to ask you all this when you were around and lucid. You were too old by the time I realized I wanted to know. And now that you’re gone, I’m desperate for answers. If only I knew the mold you wanted me to fill. Was it enough for you to live long enough to know that we weren’t combing bushes looking for firewood as our mothers did? What, then, should we desire for our own offsprings?

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 16: Maybe it was watching us the whole time. Dear Mok, It’s true that time waits for no one, but the time keeper has all the time in the world. Literally. I’m still astounded by the fact that I just happened to glance up and see this clock. The kitchen is where I feel you most, so I let myself linger there as long as I could. If my eyes weren’t roaming the walls, absorbing every nail holding every piece of wood and every gap between them, I might have missed the clock altogether. It feels as though it’s been hanging there quietly, waiting for one of us to take notice. I have a mental picture of you standing on a chair, reaching up to wind the clock. It wasn’t ticking anymore when we took it down. Mama says it’s been around for as long as she can remember. That makes the clock at least 60 years old. The key and pendulum were still there, so we tried winding it up. It started ticking right away. We sighed both in amazement and relief. I imagine it keeping watch over us all these decades. It must have seen Mama, Mama Yah and Mak Long go from little girls to young women to mothers corralling their own broods. It must have watched you going about the kitchen, your pace slowing down as the years wore on. I like to imagine that it got annoyed as the sounds in the kitchen got louder and louder, as there came to be two, three, six, ten and then fourteen grandchildren crowding around the dinner table every school holiday. Did it wonder, after seeing Tok Ayah take his medication along with his food, why he left one day and never came back? I wonder when you got too weak to climb up on a chair to wind it up. I wonder if it misses the feel of your hands gently winding it back to life. Perhaps it wasn’t worried at all; perhaps the clock knew—having kept time for decades—exactly when the time was for it to be noticed.

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 15: You’re invisible here.

Dear Mok,

I’m sorry I haven’t written in a while, or as much as I’d promised. It’s been harder than I thought.

The distance is challenging—knowing that you’re so far away and that my mind tends to forget still makes me anxious. The cold is hard too; my mind refuses to go to those sunny places where we both existed.

But the hardest thing about being back is how you’re invisible here. I don’t hear echoes of the words you used to speak; I can’t taste the flavours you used to feed me with, there’s no sunlight filtering through palm fronds, no coconut trees swaying in the breeze, no sweltering midday heat forcing me out of the house and into the company of neighbours. I feel all alone here, out of place and not quite anywhere. And it’s so cold.

I’m trying to hold on the euphoria from moments when I discovered pieces of you to keep myself warm, at least long enough until I can return. I know there are reservoirs of them in my mind, my notebooks, the photos, in the sarongs I took with me, and most certainly in that mug of yours that I chanced upon. Maybe I should make myself some tea in it and drink from it. Maybe if I put my lips right where you put yours, the tea will turn into an elixir that will chase away all my demons.

Maybe.

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 14: Siestas on the verandah.

Dear Mok,

Beranda, as we say it. It must be the last major improvement we did to your home since its humble beginnings as a rudimentary wooden box. First it was made of wood, like the rest of the house. Then it was redone in brick and mortar and the stairs were covered in smooth cement. I remember when we finally redid the three steps and added tiles to match the veranda. They were blue the colour of the sky on a day when the air was so still that not single leaf stirred on the jambu air tree.

On those days the house would get so hot that blasting the old table fan straight at my face didn’t even help because it was just blowing hot air. I remember how you’d sometimes roll out the small straw mat with green borders out on the veranda for a siesta. Tidur petang. I don’t think I ever actually fell asleep there; I was always too excited by the prospects of napping on the veranda.

I don’t think you ever napped there either, at least not after we replaced the wooded enclosure around it with wooden balustrades, giving it a little less privacy from our neighbours. Instead, you’d lie down inside the house with your head in the doorway, with your long hair hanging down the stoop onto the veranda.

You’d tell us—whoever was around—to pick out the grey strands from your hair. In the days after your cancer, you’d also remind us to be gentle and careful not to pull out anything but the greys because the chemo therapy didn’t leave you with much hair. How we’d rush to be the ones to do it because there couldn’t be more than two or four of our tiny hands sifting through your delicate locks. As you drifted off, you’d mumble about not really caring about the grey hairs; having us play with your hair helps you relax and fall asleep.

Sometimes a neighbour would pass by on their way to or from the grocery shop or some other place; they’d say hello and ask what we were up to with a casual but not dismissive, “Wak gapo  tu?” They might joke about us sleeping on the verandah or exchange some news or gossip as they walked by. Sometimes they’d ask who we were by way of asking how we were doing, and you’d explain which of your daughters’ children we were and which city we were returning from.

My heart always sank whenever you rolled over and got up with a sigh or a groan. Those siestas with you were never long enough for me. I remember feeling a slight desperation as I watched you sweep your hair up into a knot at the base of your neck and slowly walked down the hallway to the right heading for your room or the kitchen, untying and retying your batik sarong at the waist in preparation of whatever task was ahead of you.

I wanted those moments with you to stretch forever but they were so precious precisely because they were so transient.

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 13: I couldn’t find batik sarongs like the ones you made.

Dear Mok,

I don’t think they make batik sarongs the way they used to anymore.

Gone are the days when batik sarongs are stamped with motifs in wax and filled in with colours individually. All the ones I found in Kota Bharu are either printed en mass in factories like any other printed fabric, or are Indonesian made. So were the ones I found in Alor Setar. The batik wholesalers and retailers I spoke to couldn’t tell me where I’d find such batik sarongs. Neither could the staff at the Kota Bharu Tourism Centre. Everyone’s looking for batik tulis now, the lady at the information desk told me. All the workshops I visited on the way to Pantai Cahaya Bulan were also solely making hand-drawn batik.

Hand-drawn batik, or batik tulis, can be custom-made to be very exclusive and fetch higher prices, like the ones at the Nordin Batik show room. Cheaper ones can be made quickly with simpler designs and minimal colour variations. Block-printed batik sarongs, on the other hand, vary in price based on the quality of the fabric; the labour that goes into producing each piece remains the same. Batik sarongs are also worn more as every day wear rather than as occasional wear. It’s just too much work for something you’d wear at home, I suppose.

It’s a sad and surprising discovery for me. I remember the growing feeling of despair as I went from store to store sifting through stacks of plastic-wrapped factory-printed batik sarongs, feeling the coarse fabric against my finger tips and staring at garishly coloured hibiscus and roses in such precise detail that can never be produced by copper stamps.

As usual, it’s a case of survival of the fittest. The art of block-printing batik sarongs is dying because it couldn’t withstand capitalism’s test of economy and efficiency.

I know you went into colouring batik sarongs purely to bolster the family’s income; all the same, I wonder if you feel strongly, one way or the other, about the trade that helped you break us out of the cycle of poverty.

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 12: He arrived wrapped in a batik sarong.

Dear Mok,

Do you remember when Pak Li knocked on your door and handed you a bundle of fragile limbs wrapped in a batik sarong and still bearing a hint of newborn fragrance? He was barely a week old. By Mak Long’s estimation, it would have been around 1957, the year Malaya got its independence from the British, just before she started school.

Mak Long said he was the unwanted child from the family of one of your brother’s managers. Pak Li had heard about the young lady’s pregnancy and that her father, his manager, didn’t want to keep it. They needed it gone as soon as it was born.

So Pak Li took pity on the little newborn, bundled him up as securely as he could, and took him on the bus from Temangan where he was working at an iron ore mine to Kota Bharu where you lived. It takes about an hour and a half to drive from Temangan to Kota Bharu today. I imagine the roads and public transportation were much worse in the late 50’s; it must have taken them hours to reach you. How did Pak Li, a single working man, manage to make that journey with a newborn?

The hours on the road must have weakened the baby, because he became ill and died few days later.

What made you and Tok Ayah take him in? You can barely feed the three little mouths you already had. I imagine the mother in you saw no other option.

Mak Long says she doesn’t recall seeing the baby being buried. You were all living at Jalan Gajah Mati at the time, and he was buried at the cemetery in Kampung Kubur Kuda. Mak Long thinks you might have taken a rickshaw—Kelantanese call them teksi—with Tok Ayah and the baby’s body to the cemetery.

You all named him Rahimi. Do you remember him?

Pictured: Mok with my cousin Intan Salwani. January 5, 1980 at Taman Jepun, Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia. Archival photo courtesy of Hasiah Kadir.

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 11: Your house misses you.

Dear Mok,

I fear your house may not be around much longer. It breaks my heart to say it. I suppose it’s the nature of things, no matter how much we cherish them. We took lots of photos of your house when we visited and I think we have enough to preserve it in drawings later. I hope we have enough.

Everything I know of you starts from there, and I’ve been going back to that place in my mind over and over for the past seven years.

Perhaps its best that you don’t see how your home has aged since you left. I found myself stepping gingerly around your kitchen—not because I feared it would collapse, but because the weight I carried strained each aging floorboard beyond what it could bear.

It misses you. The humble wooden box with rattan woven walls that you, Tok Ayah and Mak Long scraped enough money to build and later grew to make room for three generations: it misses you and I felt it. It misses your gentle hands sweeping away onion skins off its floor boards, opening and shutting its windows, leaning against its walls. It misses you as much as I do.

I feel like H.G. Wells’ The Time Traveller or the ghost in A Ghost Story as I stood in the middle of your house, rooted in one spot while everything around me changed, stretched, evolved or decayed and disappeared altogether. The Chinese family with the dog in the house behind yours has been replaced by another. The yard in front of their house that used to be nothing but undergrowth with the occasional grazing cow is flat, dry and houses a massive TNB substation. The school next door gets so noisy that Mak Cik Ni keeps the kitchen window closed most times for privacy. Even though most of the fruit trees are gone from your front yard, I can’t imagine ever playing hopscotch or galah panting or selipar toyol there.

There is now constant hum of traffic from a massive freeway—Jalan Maulana Khurasan—to the south of  Kampung Kubur Kuda that’ll take you straight to the gigantic AEON Mall (I tried to bypass it by navigating through serpentine jalan kampung to get to KB Mall when I stumbled upon your house. Can you believe it? I stumbled upon your house). I can park my car KB Mall’s massive new parking lot to go visit your grave. An outdoor eatery comes alive in the evening right across the lane from the cemetery. I wonder what it’s like to be casually dining with music playing in the background while gravestones sit silently within view.

I thought that’s where all my memories of you live; that’s why I’m trying to preserve as much if it—of you—as I can. If your house is no longer there, if Kampung Kubur Kuda morphs into something else, if Kota Bharu grows into another metropolitan city, I fear my memories will feel like figments of my imagination and nothing more.

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 10. Islam isn’t there anymore.

Dearest Mok,

Kota Bharu has grown, stretched and expanded since I was last home. The area around where you are buried is barely recognizable to me. There’s no shortage of hipster cafes offering fusion menus of nasi kerabu and steaks with your choice of mash or fries on the side. We can now also get a tea for RM1.50 or RM15.

Tok Ayah’s favourite kedai kopi is still there at the corner of Sultanah Zainab Road and Sekolah Kebangsaan Kampung Sireh Lane, you’ll be happy to hear. The coffee shop must be at least forty years old now. But Islam isn’t there anymore. He sold the coffee shop to Wan Rosnani and her husband Zainal a few years ago. The couple had been running a food stall in front of the shop and eventually bought it from Islam lock, stock and barrel for RM75,000. When I went there the other day, they told me Islam has taken over another coffee shop near the Zainab 2 high school about a mile away. I wish we’d had more time to track him down at his new shop; he’d be able to tell me more about Tok Ayah.

Do you remember how he threatened to close the coffee shop if Tok Ayah refused to go to the hospital after his heart attack? Do you think that would have worked?

When I first heard about this little anecdote years ago, I was tickled. Thinking about it now, I realized that that was community. Islam was no relation of ours; he was an Indian immigrant who happened to run a coffeeshop that Tok Ayah patronized daily. But they had clearly formed a bond strong or deep enough for him to want to shutter his business and compel one of his customers to go to the hospital and get treated.

Isn’t that just beautiful?

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 9. It wasn’t another goodbye, after all.

Dearest Mok,

I’m flying out today. I thought I’d be leaving you again, as I had done many times before. But my departure wasn’t another goodbye, after all. I’ve discovered the roadmap to find my way back to you.

It’s been a whirlwind of a week. I haven’t felt so emotionally and physically stretched like this for a long time. I woke up feeling heavy at first. Perhaps it was the stacks of your old sarongs and baju kurung I needed to sort and pack. It might also have been all the things I’ve learned about you, this achingly beautiful city and its people—my people—and what to do with their stories. And then there are all those things I’ve come to learn about myself.

I know now that I tend to hold on to things even when they hurt, like the regrets I carry for not spending more time with you. Or that pile of your old clothes that had no value other than sentimental ones I made up in my mind to justify bringing them with me back to Toronto.

If I had the money, I’d take everything that ever graced your hair, your hands, your fingertips and your feet with me and enshrine them in a library of all things Mok-related. A Mok-ery, as Asad suggested. Even the faded, moth-eaten t-shirt you used to wear would have its own display.

Alas, my backpack can only carry so much. This journey I’ve started is a long one; as I keep going and returning, there will be many more places to go, closets to rummage through and people whose stories I must record. Finding the treasures that I did this past week is a blessing. Discerning between what to keep and what to leave behind is now the challenge.

Photo by Asad Chishti

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 8. The three-wheelers are gone.

Dear Mok,

There are no more rickshaws in Kota Bharu, the taxi driver told me on the day we arrived.

I was almost sorry I asked him about them; I was looking forward to seeing modern reincarnations of the three-wheelers that Tok Ayah used to ride to carry passengers. People prefer Grab Car or Uber these days, and these rickshaws are only summoned for parades and shows.

Do you remember the first time you rode in his rickshaw? Were you alone or were you with your mother? Mak Long said you must have been in your late teens then, and probably on your way to sell your goods at the big market. I wonder where we’d all be, today, if Tok Ayah had gotten a different job when he arrived in this city. I wonder where we’d be if he’d stayed in Selinsing.

The taxi driver was wrong, thankfully. I did see one or two rickshaws, all of them close to Siti Khadijah Market. They were all driven by old men and only once did I see one with a passenger. He, the driver, looked to be in his sixties and she, the passenger, looked equally old and not likely able to go far on foot. They both seemed to exert a lot of effort as the rickshaw inched forward, cutting languidly through heat, humidity and traffic.

I saw one this morning on one of our many visits to the market. It was moving quite slowly so I was able to drive ahead of him to get a good look. His plastic tarp was pulled down because of the rain but it was only covering empty seats. Asad didn’t have his camera with him so we raced back to the hotel, which wasn’t too far away. We couldn’t have been gone for more than ten minutes but the old man and his rickshaw were gone when we came back to the area. I hope he found some passengers but I’m not sure how likely that was; it was a quiet street and there weren’t many people about because of the rain.

Perhaps this is how relics like Kota Bharu rickshaws will slowly get off the streets and into museums—quietly, slowly and often because nobody needs them anymore.

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 7. Her blue eyes. Dear Mok, I felt like I was saying goodbye all over again when I left Tok Su the other night. She’s the spitting image of you. I was surprised and happy to hear her list all but one of your thirteen siblings. At 73 years old, she had the tendency to doze off without realizing. “Is it past your bedtime?” I asked at one point, feeling guilty for keeping them all up with my questions. “No, her brain just shuts off sometimes,” Aunty Nor explained. “We have to wake her up otherwise she’ll take a tumble and hurt herself.” Being the youngest, there were brothers and sisters Tok Su didn’t get a chance to meet. There were a few that died young. There were also a few who escaped the Japanese occupation by way of Thailand and never came back. Do you remember Siti Aishah? Do you remember what happened to her? Even with Aunty Haifa and Aunty Nor’s gentle prodding, Tok Su wasn’t able to recall. She does remember that time when Siti Aishah was rolled up in a mengkuang mat and leaned against a wall, hidden in plain sight as a few Nippon officers ransacked the house. She was prime comfort woman material, what with her sparkling blue eyes. Apparently she was so shaken that she fell ill after that and died, but Tok Su can’t seem to say that for sure. Do you know why your sister Siti Aishah has blue eyes? Photo by Asad Chishti.

[surat-hersarong]

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Day 6. 60 years later.

Dear Mok,

I feel like I met the millennium version of you today. Kak Nab, Kak Na, Aya, Ja, Kak Mah, Kak Ti, Nurul, Na, Farisa, Nur, Kiki; they all got into batik out of necessity. Passion is a precious commodity, still, for women in these parts. What’s more important is that they’re able to be mother, wife and worker. Making and selling batik lets them be all three without compromising one or the other. They don’t need uniforms or formal attires—their casual batik sarong and t-shirt ensemble is the ideal work wear. They can pick their kids up from school when needed and keep the younger ones around them as they work. I saw Kak Na’s hand move deftly from petal to leaf to vine before resting her brush to go change Awa’s diaper. The four-year-old came back holding a bottle looking quite pleased. If the women can’t come to the workshop, Kak Nab said, they can take the batik home and do the work there, just like you did. Mak Long told me that you got the family into batik work because you needed the money, but she loved it and never felt like it was a burden. She absolutely enjoyed being able to help the family earn a few extra ringgits. “Just like the man you marry,” Kak Nab told me, “making batik is the vocation that fate has dealt us, so we have to learn to love it and be good at it.” I look at the beads of sweat forming along Ja’s hairline and I’m reminded of the 10 cents that you, Mak Long, Mama Yah and Mama were paid for every piece of batik sarong. Today they’re paid RM6 for a piece of completed batik fabric, which then goes to a wholesaler for $100 a piece. Batik is a valuable component of Kelatan’s tourism market, but I don’t think these women are reaping much of the benefits. The gender roles are also largely unchanged; men draw and women colour. I wonder what the wisdom is behind this decades-old order. . #hersarong #sarongstories #suratsarong #chatkahaani #kotabharu #kelantan #malaysia #grandmother #batik #sarong (at Kota Bharu)

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 5. Your body never moved, but I couldn’t find you. Dear Mok, Where are you? I thought I’d be able to instinctively find you, but I was wrong. The mosquitoes were out in full force while the sun was starting its descent, but the day’s heat hadn’t relented and drops of sweat started trailing down my back. I became more and more desperate as I went from grave stone to grave stone trying to find your name. Some were covered in moss, some were buried in wild undergrowth, and others had been chipped or eroded by sun, wind and rain. None of them bore your name. The sweet-smelling bunga tanjung tree that shaded Tok Ayah’s grave was no longer there so I couldn’t find him either. I assumed you’d be buried together. Pak Cik Pandi told me later that that wasn’t the case. I realized that I was hoping this would be a reunion of sorts for us, and that I would get a sense of closure since I never got to see your body being laid to rest. The sadness, grief and shame came at once, so I just stood there and cried. Have I wandered so far that I can no longer find you? I’m so sorry, Mok. Photo by Asad Chishti.

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 4. When the rains come. Dear Mok, You should have seen the thunderstorm we had yesterday. For about two hours scores of lighting struck quite a show. I can now check-off “thunderstorm” from my list of things to see here. The connection was touch-and-go when I called aunty Maimun to say I’d be visiting her when I go to Kelantan next week. She said Kota Bharu has been getting a lot of daytime downpours lately. Naturally, since it’s December. I have to remember to get myself a pair of galoshes, and I’m hoping I’ll get to use them, to be honest. I wonder how much these annual torrential rains and flooding shape the character of east-coast states. I always thought their lag in development and growth compared to the rest of the Malaysia is the result of our colonizer’s legacy—favouring and developing states on the trade route like Johor, Melaka and Penang while neglecting east cost states like Kelantan Terengganu. Sometimes, though, I feel Kelantan lags behind the rest of the country because Kelantanese have developed an extraordinary level of resilience and capacity for withstanding adversity, like the annual onslaught of the monsoons. Virtually all farm work grinds to a halt, and only the most desperate of fishermen wander out to sea. I often hear stories of families surviving on boiled cassava—or tinned sardines for the more fortunate—until the rains abated and the markets can open again. For weeks, roads disappear beneath muddy waters and even sturdy bridges sometimes give in and swim away with the currents. Maybe that’s why, regardless of where I am in Malaysia, I’m bound to run into entrepreneurs with the gentle lilt of Kelantanese to their diction, or who can trace their families to Pasir Mas, Gua Musang or Kuala Krai.

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 3. Paper boats in flood waters.

Dear Mok,

Remember how we used to plaster your yard with paper boats? Our annual school holidays had the misfortune of coinciding with the monsoon season on the east coast, so we’d be cooped up in your house for at least a week every time we visited. The whole village would be submerged in flood waters—one or two feet around your yard, higher in other parts of the kampung—and we’d have to try our best to entertain ourselves indoors.

When all the colouring books were filled and all the math exercises were done and all the puzzles had been solved, we’d turn to making paper boats out of pages of our exercise books. There were the triangular paper boats for novices and there were the more intricate and sturdier sampans that were harder to make but stayed afloat longer. I always felt compelled to make both types, although I favoured the latter. The trick was to try and land our boats upright; that’s no easy feat considering we were dropping our contraptions from your living room window to the waters six feet below. I loved discovering which way the water flowed by watching where the boats go. If our boats landed sideways or facedown, we’d make another and try again. Usually we’d have one or two extra boats ready just in case, which we’d drop in the water too just for fun. Sometimes they’d go as far as the back road about 20 yards away before they get soaked and sink out of sight.

When the flood waters receded and the afternoons were no longer drenched in rain, your yard would be plastered with tired and muddied paper boats. I don’t recall ever hearing you complain or reproach us for the mess we made. I know how much pride you took in keeping your yard neat and tidy, free of weeds, garbage and leaves fallen from the mango, coconut or rose apple trees that shaded your house. You’d patiently sweep them all up along with other debris brought about by the flood with your trusty old “penyapu lidi”—a broom made out of the veins of dried coconut leaves. This would be in the late afternoons when you had done your asr prayer and we’d all have had our tea. After about an hour or so, you’d have all the garbage piled in one corner of the yard, ready to be burned in one glorious garbage fire. We’d get excited about the fire too, having little to no exposure to open fires in the suburbs where we lived the rest of the year. We’d poke and prod the fire with sticks, scrounge around the yard for more garbage to burn and throw in different things to see if they’d catch fire.

To this day, the smell of smoke on my clothes always takes me back to those late afternoons when the monsoons finally left and we could go wild around your yard again.

[surat-hersarong]

Letter 2. You without him.

Dear Mok,

It feels as though it’s always been just you. I know I have a grandfather, but I guess I was too young to remember. I don’t know if that photo of Tok Ayah lounging shirtless in a pelekat confirm my hazy memories of him or retroactively inform what I remember.

I know he worked just as hard to educate Mama, Mama Yah and Mak Long in order to raise all of us out of poverty. More than once Mama told me how he managed to become president of the PTA even though he was illiterate. Mama also like to reminisce, with some degree of pride, about how he faked being able to read and write in order to get the job as a tanker truck driver for Shell. The packs of cigarettes he smoked to stay awake on those long drives across the Malaysian peninsular were probably what ultimately weakened his heart.

Still, I struggle remembering both of you together. It feels odd to imagine you as a wife to someone. In my mind, it’s always been you caring for us grandchildren, you who maintained the house, kept the yard in pristine condition, and mended leaky roofs or broken stools. Were you thinking of him in this photo of us visiting his grave?

All this was on my mind our our day trip to  Seri Menanti two days ago. It’s been almost sixty days since abang Isyak’s father, Pak Cik Sani passed away, and so it’s time to hold a tahlil for him. I wondered if Mak Cik Khasiah was ruminating on how she would rearrange her life now that her husband was gone. They’d been married for so long.

What adjustments did you have to make after Tok Ayah passed away? Did you feel lonely after he was gone? Did you also feel relieved? What parts of life with Tok Ayah did you miss most?