Those Days
I was born in a small township named Kuala Lipis, in Pahang, an East Coast state in Peninsular Malaysia. The date was 20th September 1969 and the time was 1.25am. I was born at home not at the hospital and I’ve never thought to ask my mom who the midwife was. Perhaps I shall, after this posting. No. 96, Jalan Pekeliling was very synonym to me and my family because that’s where we lived from the day I was born til I was about 11 years old. Those times one could hardly see the house from down below because it was shadowed by fruit trees and surrounded by rubber trees. The only thing that could tell there’s a house on that hillside was the garage at the bottom of the hill and lights emitted from the house at night.
I was born in a small township named Kuala Lipis, in Pahang, an East Coast state in Peninsular Malaysia. The date was 20th September 1969 and the time was 1.25am. I was born at home not at the hospital and I’ve never thought to ask my mom who the midwife was. Perhaps I shall, after this posting. No. 96, Jalan Pekeliling was very synonym to me and my family because that’s where we lived from the day I was born til I was about 11 years old. Those times one could hardly see the house from down below because it was shadowed by fruit trees and surrounded by rubber trees. The only thing that could tell there’s a house on that hillside was the garage at the bottom of the hill and lights emitted from the house at night.
As I’ve mentioned, I had a normal life. Therefore my childhood days were filled with good memories. Never once would I recall having to go through any hardships. Though Kuala Lipis is considered a town (it was once the capital city of Pahang, before Kuantan) but the surrounding of the house made it feel more like living in a village. I had the freedom to run about through the trees, play under the house, climb the trees, even adventuring into the rubber plantation owned by an Indian man, in adjacent to my grandfather’s land. In dry seasons, the leaves would be blown by wind and we would act as if we were in some western country, experiencing ‘snow’ and spring time.
There were only three of us children then – my elder brother and me, we were just 11 months apart and a cousin who was ‘adopted’ by my grandparents to live with them. But she was not so active like me and brother. I could only recall quarreling with her most of the time for no apparent reason.
I was born in a family of discipline and unconditional love. ‘Unconditional’, the first time I heard that sentence was from my grandfather. He said it means ‘kasih saying yang tak berbelah bagi’. True enough, though the family members did not apparently show their affection towards each other – no hugs, no kisses…as far as I could remember, the bonding was very close and tight.
My grandfather disciplined us through Islamic practices. He taught us to read the Muqaddam, before we would complete and ‘upgraded’ to reading the Al-Quran. We’d do this every night, at 8pm after his Maghrib prayers. Thus we have to take our baths before Maghrib. Else it would be noisy with scoldings and urgings to hurry up because the elders wanted to take their ablution to perform the Maghrib prayer. Sometimes we would get a ‘lashing’ from my grandfather’s cloak – a piece of cloth he’d usually wear around his shoulder and which I kept till today.
I’d remember during those reciting times, my brother and I would quarrel on who should be the first to do so because at 8.30pm Six Million Dollar Man would be on air. That series was a big hit then, followed by Bionic Woman, Man of the Atlantis, and such. Most of the time my mother would close the door on us so that we would not be able to listen to the TV when we were reciting.
My parents were both teachers. Such I was disciplined in terms of time – time for study, time for play, time for reciting Quran and time for sleep.
