Tuesday 27 January 2004
On Sunday, just after 11am we went to Hulu Terengganu for the whole of the afternoon. I wanted to get out of Dungun, and show the children something other than the interior of local houses. This time we took a new road to the north of the town, over the bridge, near the New Straits Times printing works, a place I took a group of students to one night in 1997 or 1998. It is a small road, running west, then swinging round to the north to Ajil, and then west again to the district capital of Kuala Berang, a journey of about an hour and ten minutes. The first road was new to me, and passed smallholdings growing sugar cane, yams, bananas and other fruit and vegetables, a fishing pool, and a place with fresh water fish for sale. Another place sold kampung chicken. The road was in good condition, fairly straight, and very quiet. Further along were logging tracks off into the interior. Then we saw an unusual sign, a chilli sauce factory. This might be one of the many state and federal government projects to inject some energy in the form of employment into an area that apart from small farming, logging, oil palm estate work, and possibly tourism, has not much else. But it is a pretty part of the country, unpolluted and quiet. The hills up by Kuala Berang are good to look at, even on a windy and rain slashed day at times. Once back on the main road to Ajil, the smallholder makes way for oil palm estates and factories, with the odd quarry and research farm in evidence too. One thing is clear, and that is the amount of unemployment plus the lack of business. The number of closed, abandoned, and broken down stalls and eating-places was huge. The one exceptional to this was that all the schools we passed had freshly painted buildings and a proper wall around them.
Ajil is little more than a few shop houses, a saw-mill, a couple of other factories, one of which produced minerals, but what, I have no idea. There is also a pheasant farm, but I did not mention it to them, wanting to keep it for another time. Just outside the town is the new district hospital, and then you are in Kuala Berang itself.
We pulled in front of a bakery and bought some longitudinal pizza and three sausage rolls. Ai Hwa, not in a good mood as is her norm, went off, at my suggestion, to get some chicken in a neighbouring Malay restaurant. I was told some time ago that, for a picnic, it is best to take dry things ie not curry sauce as it can make a mess in the car, whine moan etc, something that had not occurred to me during my safaris in various places. I thought some plain rice and fried chicken would be suitable. She came back with curry fish. This later had to be poured onto the rice, not an elegant sight when sitting in the car. Then we meandered along the road to the Lake Kenyir dam and hydroelectric power plant at its foot. It is nearly 500 feet high.
The last time I was here was in 1989 with my father and mother. I think it was a similar weather day, gusting with light drizzle. We took the car, after much nervous refusal from the chauffeur, who insisted on asking one of the local jungle folk, complete with sizeable sheath knife, if the car could go over the dam. As there is a clearly marked road on the top, and the fact that I had taken a car there myself on at least two previous occasions, the bother was uncalled for. However, what would a day be like without moaning? The children were interested in the structure, and went off to explore the lakeside where there were some motor boats moored. Near us was a Met post. I told them what would be in the various containers, and suggested that the weather data might be relayed, by computer, to the airport or other agencies that used weather information. I do not know, it was just a thought. There were only two other cars, some Malay youths who left after a few minutes, and a noisy Chinese family, with no young children, from Kuala Lumpur, if the car registration is anything to go by. They took a few photographs and then left, leaving us to the whirring of the turbines, the wind, and the rain. When we made a move, there was another Chinese group taking photographs on the top of the dam. Climbing up the hills were two lines of power cables. We stopped by the information hut and the children had a quick look at the photographs of the project.
Then, to their joy, Ai Hwa, in complete defiance of the road sign ‘Gunakan gear rendah’, coasted down in free gear. A ladybird joined us for the trip. Then we went back to Kuala Berang, some fourteen kilometres, past the new Malaysian Building Academy. I have a sneaking suspicion that they will find it hard to get lecturers there. The low cost of living and pollution free environ may not do the trick. On the way, a snake slithered across the road, about a metre long, green I think. We missed it, I think. The strange thing was that earlier in the car, we had talked about different wildlife and the problems of seeing them in the jungle, and I had remarked on how few reptiles I had seen in Malaysia. Back over the sungei Terengganu bridge and into the town, and then to the turning for kampung Sekayu, and its waterfall. It is not a waterfall in the conventional sense. I told Rhiannon not to expect the Victoria Falls. It’s really a series of slight gradients down which water flows fairly rapidly, in some places mini white water. We paid three ringgit for the privilege of being greeted by a huge amount of uncollected rubbish, but if one ignored that, it is a pretty place, with tall trees, many named by the Forestry department. There were few people about, it being a school day here.
The chalets are run down, as is much of almost everything we saw. The boss had a sleep in the car, and I took Harri and Rhiannon up the path where they played on the playground things for a bit, and then we found a sheltered spot where they changed and went for a splashing session for an hour or so.
Ai Hwa joined us with the fish curry, resplendent in her long skirt and cheongsam top and high heels. Just what the well-dressed woman wears to the jungle. The steps are slippery and uneven, so she took off her shoes. The authorities have put up warning signs. It might be picturesque, but it is also dangerous if one is not careful. We finished the fish curry and rice and some more of the pizza, saw a monkey, many small fish, a golden bird, and on the way out, a fleeting glimpse of a squirrel by the car. I was happy to go there, seeing especially how the children enjoyed it, but it was sad to see the decay of such a nice place. Then we went into the nearby agricultural park, where a similar feeling enveloped us. There were a few ostriches, cows, some chickens, a fishing lake with three old men, and a couple of orchards. A kingfisher waited on a telephone wire. It was vaguely reminiscent of films about the future, where they come back and find the ruins of a former settlement.
Now it was about 5 pm, so we made our way back past small kampungs where young children played at the side of the road. I remarked to Harri and Rhiannon that if these sons of the soil kanak kanak were in Dungun, they would be glued to their computer, playing games. For once, AI Hwa agreed with me, but only after having my logic translated first, as she thought I had said these urchins were inferior to the small town variety. What I had pointed out to our two was that these future technocrats were playing together, and would know many things about the farm animals and crops and garden flowers etc. The smart-fashion offspring of sundry shop merchants would not know that these existed, let alone know any detailed information about them.
We saw rice and rubber growing in a few places, but I think more is grown on the west coast. On the return journey, we found the source of the most pungent smell that engulfed the air; a rubber research factory. It is a world away from the Kuala Lumpur city centre, and the airport. We went back the same way, and then to Kuala Dungun, where the children wanted to play in the water. Mother said no, it was low tide and the water dirty. She left us at the estuary while she went off to buy some noodles, but came back after a few minutes having found that the shop was closed, just in time to catch the two children disobeying her orders and playing on the jetty, climbing down by the water’s edge ...
However, a very enjoyable and full day out.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Wednesday, March 25, 2009
2003 Kuantan/Pekan
Friday 12 September 2003 9 am
Trip to Kuantan and Pekan, Pahang
It is a bright sunny morning, after a day and night away from this place. We went to Kuantan by car, using the same hotel we’ve used before, clean, simple and of course, cheap. Quite an educational trip for the children too, technology talking, seeing the power station in Paka, the oil and gas and petrochemical complex at Kerteh, and showing them the effects of erosion and landslides on the road banks. We did quite a lot of geography, and some useful vocabulary too; erosion, pylon, cable, oblivious, logger, forest reserve, collapse, ramshackle, derelict, etc. We went through the town of Cukai, nothing much new here. There were cabins for vendors or parking ticket staff in the shape of giant durian or coconuts. I thought it quite witty, and the children thought as much too.
We got into Kuantan at around 4 30pm, then to the hotel before going to the famed Hugo mega mall shopping complex. This I have heard about on many occasions from people here, how wonderful it is, how popular with Dungun people at the weekend etc. I have heard it ad infinitum. The reality did not impress me. It is, to my mind, a dreadful place, noisy, crowded, smoky, and it took ages to get to the top floor, where the cinema is, because of the position of the escalators. You go up one floor on one side, and then walk halfway around the building to get the next escalator up to the next floor. We checked the films and the price of the ticket. Then, I had to leave; I just couldn’t stand it. They went back later to see a film, RM15 for the three of them.
Back in the car, Ai Hwa wanted to show them a Vietnamese restaurant. What benefit showing someone the exterior of a restaurant is baffles me. It was closed. There was a major argument. Then we went to a small, clinical coffee shop for tea. The walls are white tiles, and lighting fluorescent, but it is very clean, and the food is good. We had chicken in a sticky sauce with what might be sesame seeds in it, cabbage, fried flat fish, and chicken with petai, a local vegetable good for cleaning the kidneys. I had a small bottle of beer, so different to the tinned stuff I get here. I waited, watching and writing, in the coffee shop for a time after they went off back to the cinema.
Quite a number of women came in for a take away dinner in a tiffin tin, for themselves rather than family I would guess, judging from the quantity they bought. From the rear, it could have been anyone in the UK buying a take away on a summer’s evening; short skirts, high heels, jeans, long dress, loose tops. One young lady, after sneezing, said ‘Excuse me’, in English, for my benefit? The people there are much smarter than the locals here are, in clothing, fashion, shoes, and hair.
Across the road, there is the football ground of the local secondary school, Air Puteh. In Malay, it means White Water. A practice game was in progress. A bunch of thick leafy trees stood at the edge of the ground along the road. Right next to this is the hotel, The Greenlast. Ai Hwa has some connection with the company. After they left for the cinema, I wandered along the street looking in the shop fronts, including the bookshop, then went back for a quick shower, then across to the supermarket to buy some beer, then back to the room for a quiet few hours before they got back around 10 30. We didn’t get a very comfortable night, because of the slight shaking from some party music in the fun pub (their name, not mine), and two single beds were not really adequate for the four of us.
On the Thursday morning, we had a late breakfast of nasi lemak, noodles, and some mee soup, plus tea for Ai Hwa and barley for the children and me. Then, we went by car to the royal town of Pekan, some 55 km to the south, past the industrial estate, maybe a farming research station, and an open-style prison. On getting to Pekan, Henry remarked that it didn’t look that royal, a sentiment I agreed with. It does have a wonderful location though, right on the banks of the sungei Pahang. But the idea was to show them something new, somewhere they hadn’t been to before.
We went further south, to Tanjong Agas, a small hamlet where the road quite literally comes to a stop; there is a small circle, that one could describe as a roundabout, and then the road goes back. In front is the South China Sea. It appears to be a good place for crab fishing. The settlements we passed were quite poor, no street lighting, and land fairly bleak looking in places. We went past an aqua farm, with ponds with spinning fans, to oxygenate the water, one assumes. An old lady with an umbrella attached to her head rode past the longhouse-looking secondary school on her bike.
Then, back through Pekan, this time through a better area, with the museum and its fighter aircraft and helicopter mounted outside. It is quite nice here, next to the sungei Pahang. Then it was back to Kuantan, and to Telok Chempedak, the beach area of expensive and ministerial housing. It was, however, fairly grubby by the water, with rubbish lying around. We waited there for a bit whilst Ai Hwa went off up the road to the place where she has an apartment, to settle some things. Getting fed up, the three of us then trekked the 0.7 km up the hill; it was now around 1 30, fairly hot, but quite pleasant with the tall trees and ferns at the edge of the winding road. We waited a few minutes until she came out, and then headed off to try to find a restaurant for lunch.
We did, after numerous attempts, to find it closed. Navigating is not her forte. Many other places were shut too. She had forgotten about the Moon Cake festival later that evening. We went off to Cherating, taking the broken and under-repair road through Kuantan port. The quarry was in action with the conveyor belt piling up the rock, there were a few ships, miles of fencing, mounds of containers, and the BP storage facility. Plenty of good technology to see, and I think useful for youngsters to learn about. To me, it brings textbooks to life. Then we got to Cherating, where we stopped for some tea in an open-air restaurant right on the beach. It has a roof, but no walls; cheese sandwiches for the children, and some noodles for Ai Hwa. Rhiannon and I went to the immediate beach, with our restaurant fronting it. We watched tiny crabs make small balls of sand around their burrows. I assume they are squeezing them for nutrients or microorganisms. Rhiannon made a castle, using her foot to create a circular wall, with the centre the keep. It was quite a spacious panorama, with the port some way away to the right, a few radio or telephone masts sticking up, and the expanse of the bay fairly shallow and calm. Cherating is a popular place for both local and foreign tourists, quite laid back, and with a fine panorama thrown in. Now having complimented the place, I’ll read it’s a drugs hangout.
Then it was back to Dungun, past the Perwaja steel mill, and the Tioxide plant producing paper whitening. I worked for the company some years ago, teaching the new trainees, but not in the factory. The children wanted to spend the night with their teacher aunt, so we left them at the house in Batu Enam. Here, the polytechnic is now open, as is the technical secondary school, plus other blocks of shop houses. Many of the latter are uniformly ugly. Garish might be a better word, horrible colouring, and style too. Aunt gave me a packet of cashew nuts that became my dinner, and then the two of us went to Kuala Dungun, quite a few change there since my last trip almost two years ago. The trees were bigger, and a new road at the back of the school means quicker to work in the morning on a school day. We went to the new supermarket, as it is called, for me to find it was a warehouse with air conditioning, run by a local young Chinese. It’s popular not only for the lower prices, but also for the temperature. I waited in the car.
Now it is12 20, Ai Hwa is out getting a take-away lunch. We often have one at the weekend, for it makes a nice change from the amah’s cooking; it is getting jaded to the palate. She knows ten or so dishes, and that’s it.
Trip to Kuantan and Pekan, Pahang
It is a bright sunny morning, after a day and night away from this place. We went to Kuantan by car, using the same hotel we’ve used before, clean, simple and of course, cheap. Quite an educational trip for the children too, technology talking, seeing the power station in Paka, the oil and gas and petrochemical complex at Kerteh, and showing them the effects of erosion and landslides on the road banks. We did quite a lot of geography, and some useful vocabulary too; erosion, pylon, cable, oblivious, logger, forest reserve, collapse, ramshackle, derelict, etc. We went through the town of Cukai, nothing much new here. There were cabins for vendors or parking ticket staff in the shape of giant durian or coconuts. I thought it quite witty, and the children thought as much too.
We got into Kuantan at around 4 30pm, then to the hotel before going to the famed Hugo mega mall shopping complex. This I have heard about on many occasions from people here, how wonderful it is, how popular with Dungun people at the weekend etc. I have heard it ad infinitum. The reality did not impress me. It is, to my mind, a dreadful place, noisy, crowded, smoky, and it took ages to get to the top floor, where the cinema is, because of the position of the escalators. You go up one floor on one side, and then walk halfway around the building to get the next escalator up to the next floor. We checked the films and the price of the ticket. Then, I had to leave; I just couldn’t stand it. They went back later to see a film, RM15 for the three of them.
Back in the car, Ai Hwa wanted to show them a Vietnamese restaurant. What benefit showing someone the exterior of a restaurant is baffles me. It was closed. There was a major argument. Then we went to a small, clinical coffee shop for tea. The walls are white tiles, and lighting fluorescent, but it is very clean, and the food is good. We had chicken in a sticky sauce with what might be sesame seeds in it, cabbage, fried flat fish, and chicken with petai, a local vegetable good for cleaning the kidneys. I had a small bottle of beer, so different to the tinned stuff I get here. I waited, watching and writing, in the coffee shop for a time after they went off back to the cinema.
Quite a number of women came in for a take away dinner in a tiffin tin, for themselves rather than family I would guess, judging from the quantity they bought. From the rear, it could have been anyone in the UK buying a take away on a summer’s evening; short skirts, high heels, jeans, long dress, loose tops. One young lady, after sneezing, said ‘Excuse me’, in English, for my benefit? The people there are much smarter than the locals here are, in clothing, fashion, shoes, and hair.
Across the road, there is the football ground of the local secondary school, Air Puteh. In Malay, it means White Water. A practice game was in progress. A bunch of thick leafy trees stood at the edge of the ground along the road. Right next to this is the hotel, The Greenlast. Ai Hwa has some connection with the company. After they left for the cinema, I wandered along the street looking in the shop fronts, including the bookshop, then went back for a quick shower, then across to the supermarket to buy some beer, then back to the room for a quiet few hours before they got back around 10 30. We didn’t get a very comfortable night, because of the slight shaking from some party music in the fun pub (their name, not mine), and two single beds were not really adequate for the four of us.
On the Thursday morning, we had a late breakfast of nasi lemak, noodles, and some mee soup, plus tea for Ai Hwa and barley for the children and me. Then, we went by car to the royal town of Pekan, some 55 km to the south, past the industrial estate, maybe a farming research station, and an open-style prison. On getting to Pekan, Henry remarked that it didn’t look that royal, a sentiment I agreed with. It does have a wonderful location though, right on the banks of the sungei Pahang. But the idea was to show them something new, somewhere they hadn’t been to before.
We went further south, to Tanjong Agas, a small hamlet where the road quite literally comes to a stop; there is a small circle, that one could describe as a roundabout, and then the road goes back. In front is the South China Sea. It appears to be a good place for crab fishing. The settlements we passed were quite poor, no street lighting, and land fairly bleak looking in places. We went past an aqua farm, with ponds with spinning fans, to oxygenate the water, one assumes. An old lady with an umbrella attached to her head rode past the longhouse-looking secondary school on her bike.
Then, back through Pekan, this time through a better area, with the museum and its fighter aircraft and helicopter mounted outside. It is quite nice here, next to the sungei Pahang. Then it was back to Kuantan, and to Telok Chempedak, the beach area of expensive and ministerial housing. It was, however, fairly grubby by the water, with rubbish lying around. We waited there for a bit whilst Ai Hwa went off up the road to the place where she has an apartment, to settle some things. Getting fed up, the three of us then trekked the 0.7 km up the hill; it was now around 1 30, fairly hot, but quite pleasant with the tall trees and ferns at the edge of the winding road. We waited a few minutes until she came out, and then headed off to try to find a restaurant for lunch.
We did, after numerous attempts, to find it closed. Navigating is not her forte. Many other places were shut too. She had forgotten about the Moon Cake festival later that evening. We went off to Cherating, taking the broken and under-repair road through Kuantan port. The quarry was in action with the conveyor belt piling up the rock, there were a few ships, miles of fencing, mounds of containers, and the BP storage facility. Plenty of good technology to see, and I think useful for youngsters to learn about. To me, it brings textbooks to life. Then we got to Cherating, where we stopped for some tea in an open-air restaurant right on the beach. It has a roof, but no walls; cheese sandwiches for the children, and some noodles for Ai Hwa. Rhiannon and I went to the immediate beach, with our restaurant fronting it. We watched tiny crabs make small balls of sand around their burrows. I assume they are squeezing them for nutrients or microorganisms. Rhiannon made a castle, using her foot to create a circular wall, with the centre the keep. It was quite a spacious panorama, with the port some way away to the right, a few radio or telephone masts sticking up, and the expanse of the bay fairly shallow and calm. Cherating is a popular place for both local and foreign tourists, quite laid back, and with a fine panorama thrown in. Now having complimented the place, I’ll read it’s a drugs hangout.
Then it was back to Dungun, past the Perwaja steel mill, and the Tioxide plant producing paper whitening. I worked for the company some years ago, teaching the new trainees, but not in the factory. The children wanted to spend the night with their teacher aunt, so we left them at the house in Batu Enam. Here, the polytechnic is now open, as is the technical secondary school, plus other blocks of shop houses. Many of the latter are uniformly ugly. Garish might be a better word, horrible colouring, and style too. Aunt gave me a packet of cashew nuts that became my dinner, and then the two of us went to Kuala Dungun, quite a few change there since my last trip almost two years ago. The trees were bigger, and a new road at the back of the school means quicker to work in the morning on a school day. We went to the new supermarket, as it is called, for me to find it was a warehouse with air conditioning, run by a local young Chinese. It’s popular not only for the lower prices, but also for the temperature. I waited in the car.
Now it is12 20, Ai Hwa is out getting a take-away lunch. We often have one at the weekend, for it makes a nice change from the amah’s cooking; it is getting jaded to the palate. She knows ten or so dishes, and that’s it.
2003 Kuantan
Friday 19 December 2003
Around 8 30, we went past the Dungun Technical school near the forest reserve to Cukai. It is a small reserve, going towards the sea and up the hill and has some interesting sedimentary layers where the banks were cut to make the road straighter; prior to that, some years ago, it was a winding affair. Twenty minutes later, we went over the Paka estuary bridge, with the trees to the right, and the sandbank towards the sea, a scene that I always enjoy. A few minutes down the solitary road of the town, we came by Paka power station, and the petrochemical complex of Kerteh, with ethylene and polyethylene plant, MOX, with the storage tanks and piping and the oil and gas terminals. It is about twenty minutes from the south side of Kerteh to Cukai. Before that is the industrial area with the Tioxide plant that produces paper whitening material, and the Perwaja steel plant. The old road used to run right past the place. At the rear is Kemaman port.
We went through Cukai, as usual without stopping; there is little to see here, and it is not a prettiest place. Then, it takes an hour to Kuantan, passing Cherating, the nearest thing to a hippy place here on the east coast. In Kuantan, we stopped first at a hawker stall where Ai Hwa, complaining of having gastric pains, sensibly ordered spicy soup with oysters. The other two had kong low mee, ie noodles. I, not appreciating the décor of the place and getting depressed, had a small can of Guinness. This made me feel better. Then we went to the Hugo shopping mall that I have mentioned to you before; it was crowded, raucous, and not over-clean. However, it is the highlight, for the colourful Dungun folk, of their escape to the big world of a proper town. We checked the cinema, but there was nothing until early afternoon. We bought the children an ice cream, and picked up some potatoes, garlic, and a few other things. I was unable to find Lego, which was annoying, as I wanted to get some for the children. We went across the road to a four or five * hotel, and wandered through it.
We then went around Kuantan by car, the streets crowded as it was now lunchtime, and she took a number of wrong turnings, meaning we went down the same route a number of times. On the way to the apartment, we stopped in a small supermarket for some crisps and biscuits, the children doing the shopping, choosing what they wanted, and paying for it, with my money. Their enthusiasm was so marked that Harri went racing out of the place, forgetting about me.
Then we went up the hill to the resort complex, overlooking the South China Sea and the bay of Kuantan. It is a fine panorama. There is thick forest around one, and a good breeze. We went to the open-air French restaurant, with nice wooden tables and chairs, a pretty waitress, fans, and almost no one, except us. There were place mats, mats for the water glasses, napkins, and an ambience that was quite relaxing.
Right, now for the catch; it had most un-French like food. The dishes were continental, but expensive, so the three of us had the chicken burger with very hard chips, the burger having the flattened appearance of being run over by a car. Ai Hwa had the set meal for the day, fruit punch, mushroom soup, grilled tuna with rice, and ice cream to finish. That looked much better. There was not much change from 50 ringgit. However, the water was good, and I mentioned the view before.
Then, Ai Hwa went off to the office, whilst the children went to the play area. I wandered around, and then went to see them.
‘We’re commandos, this is our assault course’.
I said something like, 'okay, Captain, carry on’. Harri shouted quietly to Rhiannon, ‘the General’s here’.
Rhiannon wanted to show me the helicopter-landing zone. I assumed it was a real one; it is the kind of place that you could well imagine having one. No, a flat area of grass it was. Then, they showed me the rifle range ie the car wash place, where the end wall reverberates when you stamp of the tarmac, rather like the sound of a gun. Then we watched and shouted to the monkeys, who ignored us, preferring their lunch of tropical foliage. After some time, we were on our way back to Dungun, with a brief stop in Cukai to try to get Lego, but nothing there either, or it was a horrendous price, I’m not sure now... We went this time on the road past the port and Perwaja steel mill, before going past my old employer, Tioxide.
It began to rain near Paka.
I thought that we had a pleasant day out; there was plenty to talk to the children about, and we had seen and done quite a bit.
Around 8 30, we went past the Dungun Technical school near the forest reserve to Cukai. It is a small reserve, going towards the sea and up the hill and has some interesting sedimentary layers where the banks were cut to make the road straighter; prior to that, some years ago, it was a winding affair. Twenty minutes later, we went over the Paka estuary bridge, with the trees to the right, and the sandbank towards the sea, a scene that I always enjoy. A few minutes down the solitary road of the town, we came by Paka power station, and the petrochemical complex of Kerteh, with ethylene and polyethylene plant, MOX, with the storage tanks and piping and the oil and gas terminals. It is about twenty minutes from the south side of Kerteh to Cukai. Before that is the industrial area with the Tioxide plant that produces paper whitening material, and the Perwaja steel plant. The old road used to run right past the place. At the rear is Kemaman port.
We went through Cukai, as usual without stopping; there is little to see here, and it is not a prettiest place. Then, it takes an hour to Kuantan, passing Cherating, the nearest thing to a hippy place here on the east coast. In Kuantan, we stopped first at a hawker stall where Ai Hwa, complaining of having gastric pains, sensibly ordered spicy soup with oysters. The other two had kong low mee, ie noodles. I, not appreciating the décor of the place and getting depressed, had a small can of Guinness. This made me feel better. Then we went to the Hugo shopping mall that I have mentioned to you before; it was crowded, raucous, and not over-clean. However, it is the highlight, for the colourful Dungun folk, of their escape to the big world of a proper town. We checked the cinema, but there was nothing until early afternoon. We bought the children an ice cream, and picked up some potatoes, garlic, and a few other things. I was unable to find Lego, which was annoying, as I wanted to get some for the children. We went across the road to a four or five * hotel, and wandered through it.
We then went around Kuantan by car, the streets crowded as it was now lunchtime, and she took a number of wrong turnings, meaning we went down the same route a number of times. On the way to the apartment, we stopped in a small supermarket for some crisps and biscuits, the children doing the shopping, choosing what they wanted, and paying for it, with my money. Their enthusiasm was so marked that Harri went racing out of the place, forgetting about me.
Then we went up the hill to the resort complex, overlooking the South China Sea and the bay of Kuantan. It is a fine panorama. There is thick forest around one, and a good breeze. We went to the open-air French restaurant, with nice wooden tables and chairs, a pretty waitress, fans, and almost no one, except us. There were place mats, mats for the water glasses, napkins, and an ambience that was quite relaxing.
Right, now for the catch; it had most un-French like food. The dishes were continental, but expensive, so the three of us had the chicken burger with very hard chips, the burger having the flattened appearance of being run over by a car. Ai Hwa had the set meal for the day, fruit punch, mushroom soup, grilled tuna with rice, and ice cream to finish. That looked much better. There was not much change from 50 ringgit. However, the water was good, and I mentioned the view before.
Then, Ai Hwa went off to the office, whilst the children went to the play area. I wandered around, and then went to see them.
‘We’re commandos, this is our assault course’.
I said something like, 'okay, Captain, carry on’. Harri shouted quietly to Rhiannon, ‘the General’s here’.
Rhiannon wanted to show me the helicopter-landing zone. I assumed it was a real one; it is the kind of place that you could well imagine having one. No, a flat area of grass it was. Then, they showed me the rifle range ie the car wash place, where the end wall reverberates when you stamp of the tarmac, rather like the sound of a gun. Then we watched and shouted to the monkeys, who ignored us, preferring their lunch of tropical foliage. After some time, we were on our way back to Dungun, with a brief stop in Cukai to try to get Lego, but nothing there either, or it was a horrendous price, I’m not sure now... We went this time on the road past the port and Perwaja steel mill, before going past my old employer, Tioxide.
It began to rain near Paka.
I thought that we had a pleasant day out; there was plenty to talk to the children about, and we had seen and done quite a bit.
2004 Bukit Besi
Friday 16 January 2004
There were four classes am, took in the dhobi, and had a talk with the amah Siti. For lunch, I had a ta pau/take away, or bungkus in Malay, of mixed vegetables, rice, and two small fried fish. Then, we went to Bukit Besi, via kampung Che Lijah, past smallholdings, oil palm, some small agricultural projects, and fairly run down looking housing. Just by Bukit Besi itself, we were flagged down, quite literally, and stopped by the traffic police, for speeding in a reduced speed zone. This was, in all honesty, a bit daft, considering the isolation of the place. The result was a 150 ringgit fine, but Ai Hwa negotiated 20 ringgit for coffee money. Harri and Rhiannon wanted to know what was going on. This was very exciting for them, highly amusing for me. Mrs Homer was far from happy. I explained Mum was trying to arrange something the policeman.
Harri said,‘You mean a bribe.’
A bit silly on a rural quiet road. Whilst she was across the road, the children told me they had, that morning, by coincidence, played at traffic police in the car, using tiny tissue packets as microphones. They showed me this later;
‘car tt4033, pull over, this is the traffic police. Control, car tj7711 is going 90kph through the speed trap' etc.
Now Mum was trying to work something out.
A few days later, I mentioned that I had, some years earlier, had a ticket in Kuala Abang, coming back from the science college for the weekend. I had not told her at the time, fearing verbal disharmony. She asked me if I had offered money to the policeman. I explained that I did not have the chance; he was very professional and courteous. Then she said, ‘That’s because you’re orang puteh /white man’.
The police know that if a white man pays a bribe, he will, the next day go and report it. The locals do not. That is why I got a ticket. In Bukit Besi itself, we saw the old working remains, the lake, landslides, plenty of erosion, old workers housing, before going to the waterfall and the lake, and they are always nice to see. I climbed some steps with Rhiannon, getting a good view of the jungle surrounding. She wanted to run up and down. Back at the bottom, she said, panting,
‘fourteen or fifteen.’
I said that is way out, I can count 25 odd steps just from here.
No, fourteen or fifteen seconds to run to the top.
We walked a little way by the lake, where she pointed out a pitcher plant, two birds, and the ubiquitous rubbish everywhere. It is such a pity in such a beautiful place . Then, we went towards Kuantan for a few kilometres, past oil palm again, then made a U-turn to go up to the Pasir Raja road for a few km, then on to Jerangau over sungei Dungun.. There were some deer in a veterinary department park. Along the road were stalls selling drinks, watermelon, other fruit etc. We stopped to look at a kingfisher, amid complaints from Ai Hwa about having to pull up short on a deserted road.
Then we went past a honey lime project, and on to Nibong over the old railway bridge, along the banks of the Dungun, past crab nets, fishing boats, to the estuary point, where Ai Hwa told us where her childhood home used to be. She spent some time explaining to the children how she took the boat, then had to go to school etc. Then the two children played in the water, up onto an unloading and refuelling jetty, scampering over the wave break rocks. I thought I would check the two pipes on the jetty to find out the one for fuel, and the one for the water.
I put my fingers into the end of the nozzle, and they smelt of fuel. Now wiser, and being one of the few non-fishing folk who can tell what pipe is what, I wandered round the back to the tanks, and read the notice:
Petronas Jet A irritant to the skin, hazardous.
I washed my hand in the sand. I checked some small rocks on the dirt road, quartz perhaps; they were of various colours, and very pretty. There were few people around. Then we stopped for some quick shopping, vegetables, apples, pickled mustard for soup, and bread. Then we had a light dinner in the house, just oil, one tomato, and some toast for me. Ai Hwa cooked keow tiaw for herself and the children, with anchovies, fish ball, sawi minyak, and the thick, and to my mind, greasy, noodles. However, they seemed happy enough.
There were four classes am, took in the dhobi, and had a talk with the amah Siti. For lunch, I had a ta pau/take away, or bungkus in Malay, of mixed vegetables, rice, and two small fried fish. Then, we went to Bukit Besi, via kampung Che Lijah, past smallholdings, oil palm, some small agricultural projects, and fairly run down looking housing. Just by Bukit Besi itself, we were flagged down, quite literally, and stopped by the traffic police, for speeding in a reduced speed zone. This was, in all honesty, a bit daft, considering the isolation of the place. The result was a 150 ringgit fine, but Ai Hwa negotiated 20 ringgit for coffee money. Harri and Rhiannon wanted to know what was going on. This was very exciting for them, highly amusing for me. Mrs Homer was far from happy. I explained Mum was trying to arrange something the policeman.
Harri said,‘You mean a bribe.’
A bit silly on a rural quiet road. Whilst she was across the road, the children told me they had, that morning, by coincidence, played at traffic police in the car, using tiny tissue packets as microphones. They showed me this later;
‘car tt4033, pull over, this is the traffic police. Control, car tj7711 is going 90kph through the speed trap' etc.
Now Mum was trying to work something out.
A few days later, I mentioned that I had, some years earlier, had a ticket in Kuala Abang, coming back from the science college for the weekend. I had not told her at the time, fearing verbal disharmony. She asked me if I had offered money to the policeman. I explained that I did not have the chance; he was very professional and courteous. Then she said, ‘That’s because you’re orang puteh /white man’.
The police know that if a white man pays a bribe, he will, the next day go and report it. The locals do not. That is why I got a ticket. In Bukit Besi itself, we saw the old working remains, the lake, landslides, plenty of erosion, old workers housing, before going to the waterfall and the lake, and they are always nice to see. I climbed some steps with Rhiannon, getting a good view of the jungle surrounding. She wanted to run up and down. Back at the bottom, she said, panting,
‘fourteen or fifteen.’
I said that is way out, I can count 25 odd steps just from here.
No, fourteen or fifteen seconds to run to the top.
We walked a little way by the lake, where she pointed out a pitcher plant, two birds, and the ubiquitous rubbish everywhere. It is such a pity in such a beautiful place . Then, we went towards Kuantan for a few kilometres, past oil palm again, then made a U-turn to go up to the Pasir Raja road for a few km, then on to Jerangau over sungei Dungun.. There were some deer in a veterinary department park. Along the road were stalls selling drinks, watermelon, other fruit etc. We stopped to look at a kingfisher, amid complaints from Ai Hwa about having to pull up short on a deserted road.
Then we went past a honey lime project, and on to Nibong over the old railway bridge, along the banks of the Dungun, past crab nets, fishing boats, to the estuary point, where Ai Hwa told us where her childhood home used to be. She spent some time explaining to the children how she took the boat, then had to go to school etc. Then the two children played in the water, up onto an unloading and refuelling jetty, scampering over the wave break rocks. I thought I would check the two pipes on the jetty to find out the one for fuel, and the one for the water.
I put my fingers into the end of the nozzle, and they smelt of fuel. Now wiser, and being one of the few non-fishing folk who can tell what pipe is what, I wandered round the back to the tanks, and read the notice:
Petronas Jet A irritant to the skin, hazardous.
I washed my hand in the sand. I checked some small rocks on the dirt road, quartz perhaps; they were of various colours, and very pretty. There were few people around. Then we stopped for some quick shopping, vegetables, apples, pickled mustard for soup, and bread. Then we had a light dinner in the house, just oil, one tomato, and some toast for me. Ai Hwa cooked keow tiaw for herself and the children, with anchovies, fish ball, sawi minyak, and the thick, and to my mind, greasy, noodles. However, they seemed happy enough.
2004 New school year, January
am on Sunday 4 January 2004
They have just left for the first day of the new school year, after a breakfast of cereal, apple and papaya, and a glass of water. Rhiannon looked smart in her new prefect uniform. They are up early for school, me at 5 30 to get the breakfast ready, boil water, make tea, get the washing machine on etc, and now is only 7 30. I put on, quietly, the RPO and Tchaikovsky, and switched on the Christmas tree. The fish is defrosting and the cabbage is broken and soaking in water, as the vegetables are every morning. This year, Ai Gnor is not coming on Sunday, as this is my day off, so I am playing an even bigger role as househusband on this day. I do most of the above anyway, except usually cooking the lunch and ironing the clothes. In reality, she has little to do, as the washing is done before she comes, and is often on the line. The food is out thawing; the breakfast things washed and put away, the floor swept etc. Now she has two days off a week. No doubt, she will have mo intention of getting a second job. They are in many ways an indolent family. Many people make the fundamental mistake of thinking that rushing around in a car, chatting in a coffee shop and talking in a loud voice on a phone equates with hard work.
Friday 2 January 2004
Early morning classes, pay for some of yesterday’s petrol.
Sunday 4 January 2004
There were no classes, as this is my rest day this year. There was no Ai Gnor, so I prepared lunch, my first full Chinese meal on my own. I was going to do cabbage with garlic, rice, and fried fish, cleaned and trimmed by me. There were two plain, and one with chilli for Ai Hwa. They seemed to enjoy it. Today is the first day back at school, Rhiannon looking smart in her prefect’s uniform. I went to town with Ai Hwa to get money from the bank, saw a Malay female Chief Inspector of Police in the bank with whom I fell in love. Then, whilst Ai Hwa went to gold shop to try to sell whatever she sells now. I wandered round in the hot sun, but cooled by the incessant sea breeze. I tried to get a boat across the river to Seberang, but nothing seemed to be going that way. There was plenty of rubbish lying around; it was sad, but it is expected here. Then we went back to the house to prepare lunch. Rhiannon went back to school in the afternoon to decorate the classroom.
Harri read the history of the world, the book I had bought them for Christmas, and then we went for a walk, or a march, for about forty-five minutes, to Sura Gate, then on to the sea. He had an ice cream on the way to Sura Gate, the ice cream wallah on his motorbike and side cart seeming to know him, and we got 1 ringgit’s worth of goreng pisang, or fried bananas from a stall on the beachfront. We ate these whilst walking along. Then we went into Jalan Kenanga, where disaster faced us. Coming down the road towards the sea was a khaki Ministry of Health Landrover with cart, churning out clouds of thick poisonous smoke, deadly to the dengue mosquito I assume. What could we do? There was nowhere to go, no way to escape. Cool under pressure, and sweating from exertion rather than fear, I pulled out the small bottle of water that was stuffed elegantly in my trouser pocket, poured some of the contents onto Harri’s tee shirt, and then did the same to me.
We pulled them over out faces, and held our breath whilst marching through the smoke; a brief pause to take in more air, and then we continued until out of danger. The Ministry man gave us the thumbs up or waved as we went by. Okay, I know it is boring, but that is life here. I phoned Andrew to wish him happy birthday, and as I wanted him to have a full day’s enjoyment, rang him at 7 30 am UK time, hoping he would be in bed. He was not. What a pity.
Monday 5 January 2004
I was up as usual just after 5 30, to get the breakfast. I put out the cereal, the water, milk, fruit, toast etc. I put on the washing machine, and got the kettle going. I ironed Harri’s shirt, then did the rest of the ironing, as the iron was hot. We had breakfast, and they went off at 7 10. This routine happens every weekday morning, bar the ironing. There are no classes today, as students need to find out what the school has on in the afternoon before finalizing their time with me. I put the clothes on the line; on a typical morning, they dry in next to no time. I came in and began to scrap and gut the fish, peel the garlic, and put the aubergines in to soak. I had taken instruction in cleaning fish and meat some weeks ago, from both Ai Hwa and Ai Gnor, and one day had cooked a fish or two for Ai Hwa for lunch. Afterwards she looked at me and said,
‘You forgot to clean the head. I got a shock’.
It would give anyone a shock if they saw what was inside. That was some weeks ago. Yesterday, I left the three fish on the side for her inspection, and I passed with flying colours. Back to today.
Then I cleaned the garden so Rhiannon and Harri can plant some seeds now that her two papaya trees are gone. I used the jembi to break up the earth, got rid of the weeds, and inadvertently, some or Ai Gnor’s plants that she uses the leaves for curry, and for laksa, a soup with noodles in it. Oops. There are many different types of laksa, the most famous being from Penang, but I have also tried Kelantan and Terengganu laksa, quite different in taste, although they look the same. A soup, spicy, made with chilli and lime, with fish and rice noodles. It is nice. I tried the three types the same day at a function in the Science College in Kuala Terengganu in the mid 1990’s. I am surprised to find it is now nearly 4pm. My back is aching.
Wednesday 7 January 2004
They have left for school. I was up early this morning, boiled the water, got the washing machine ready, and put out the breakfast. Fifteen minutes later, they came in. I ironed Harri’s shirt, after washing it late last night. It was overlooked for the dhobi. The washing machine is on, the cuttlefish, pork and two fish are defrosting, the aubergines and cabbage are soaking, everything is washed and put away. I had a lecture on the Battle of Waterloo, the mud on the ground that affected Napoleon’s cannons, his handing of power to his deputy, the tactics of Wellington, the Prussians, this from the discovery channel I was told by the professor, and it’s only 7 28 am. There is only the garlic to peel, so I thought it better to use the computer first. I do not want the keyboard to reek too much. Yesterday, I met over the garden wall, the Indonesian maid from the house at the back, who has not left her employer’s house for two years. She is going back home this month. She works a Monday to Sunday week, early morning to late evening. There is your much talked about Asian morality for you.
Yesterday, I helped Ai Gnor with the lunch, learning more about her style of Chinese cooking. We washed and packed the prawns in sugar water for freezing for Chinese New Year; these were bought for Ai Hwa’s sister, cost 50 plus ringgit. I had a class this afternoon. The girl, one of the brighter ones here, went to Genting Highlands and Kuala Lumpur for about a week. What did you do? She went shopping; the only thing she could tell me about her holiday was the names of the shopping centres she went to with her pals. In Genting, they played the games in the indoor and outdoor theme parks, and then went to bed. A whole family in one room, but no problem. The mother and father went from midnight to early morning to the casino. They came back for breakfast. She went to Malacca a couple of years ago, but it was boring ...
I prepared the food tonight, but Harri cooked; nasi goreng, with garlic, onions, cabbage, lettuce, pepper, dried salted fish, orange juice, and two beaten eggs. This was Harri’s idea, making the rice yellow.
There was roast pork and guava on the same plate, with honey, and oil and orange juice dip. They seemed to enjoy it. Rhiannon was very tired after her basketball practice, and then she had an hour of piano. Ai Hwa is out at PIBG parents teachers meeting. Her sister Ai Ling, swee ee is younger auntie, phoned. I asked her what she wanted to talk about. Could Ai Hwa buy something for her in Dungun? They were the above-mentioned prawns. I told her that they were already in the fridge. The other things for Chinese New Year she could buy cheaper in Kuantan. Now I know that most things in Kuantan are cheaper than Dungun, but prawns are cheaper here. This morning, I had a discreet wave from the Indonesian maid over the wall. The Chinese neighbours were around, hence the soft tone.
Thursday 8 January
I was up early this morning to get the breakfast ready for everyone. They left about 7 30, by which time the dhobi was well into its cycle, the fish were defrosting, and the bitter gourd was soaking in the filtered water. By 8 30, I had finished everything, but waited half an hour to see if it was going to rain. It is cloudy but a little bright. Ai Gnor asked if I wanted the fish in tamarind sauce, so I helped her with this. First she cooks her own chilli paste in a little oil, and then adds the sauce. It has quite a pungent reek. The paste she makes from pounded chillies using the pestle and mortar, garlic, and then she showed me what I thought was galangal. She insisted it was not, it is kunyit. I thought it is halia in Malay., but it is not; halia is ginger. I knew the word but could not think what it was. It turns out to be turmeric, according to my list of four-language cuisine terminology. I had kept the tamarind seeds with the idea of planting them in the newly cleaned circle of garden, in the otherwise concrete yard, only to find she had thrown them out. I had planted earlier some bits of guava with seeds in them, together with the seeds of the bitter gourd. Maybe something will grow.
Sunday 11 January 2004
There were classes on Friday morning, and yesterday was full. I reheated food for lunch to save a trip to buy ta pau/take away, and money, too. It is a quiet, changing afternoon, and I am not sure if it is going to rain, or not. On Thursday evening, there was a power cut for about forty-five minutes, so I used this to clamber over the wall at the rear, trek across the empty plot of long grass and earth, to chat discreetly with the maid. It was really quite exciting. It was until the streetlights and house lights came back on. I slithered back to the wall, to the far end where there is no barbed wire. I hoisted myself up, and half fell into the yard, scraping my arm. The following night I was in the yard when there came a crash, and a bag with a broken tile and a letter in it hurtled by me. In the letter, she told me of her time in the house here, and something about herself. It was quite touching.
This morning, after Ai Hwa had taken the children to school, I yet again put the dhobi out to dry in the bedroom, as the sky was threatening to rain. She came back, and we went into Kuala Dungun to do some shopping. She popped into the market, bought some chillies and limes, but little in the way of fish; one man told her the wind was too strong so the waves were too big so the boats could not go out. It reminds me of the fishermen in ‘Under Milk Wood’; they look at a flat sea, no wind, and mutter ‘too rough’, and go to the pub. Whilst I was in the car, waiting for her to come back from the market, there were a group of men sitting under a tree, doing nothing more than smoking. There was rubbish everywhere. We went to the grocer’s to get some flour and yeast. The latter was in a large packet, too big so I said I would wait until he got something smaller. He suggested it, then pulled out a book of vegetarian cooking to show me recipe for making bread. He is quite knowledgeable about food and drink, actually takes an interest in his trade. He told me how to make crackers from unwanted stale bread, and that I have been doing. He explained the dried soya in the packet outside the shop. I bought some Histon apricot jam, low cholesterol eggs, and Tabasco sauce. On the main street, Jalan Besar, she pointed out a Chinese man from China on a bicycle, but why, I do not know. Now it is time to prepare lunch. I cook the rice, fry two types of fish, and cook the long green cucumber-type vegetable with garlic and an egg. This is new.
Now it is three pm.
They have left for school, for sports practice, and the high jump. The lunch went down well, the fish was almost finished, and the vegetable too, although I stirred in the egg too late, meaning it looked like a broken up omelette among the chunks. We had apple to finish. My wife complained I had not cooked enough rice.
My new housemates include a young cicak whose domain is around the rubbish bag at the back window. If he is feeding himself on this, then he is not doing his proper job of getting the mosquito. The other is a tiny two-centimetre long frog who pops in and out of the bathroom, and has to be taken out with care, not because I have an inherent dislike for the fellow, but he is in danger of being trodden on by accident. There are a few small spiders who roam around, and when chased away for the same reason as frog, bounce along the floor. So cute, as children would exclaim here. Scold is another popular word here.
I forgot to write this the other day, I think Thursday. Ai Hwa had bought what I thought were yams, but she said no, they were ubi kayu or wood potato. I then assumed they must be sweet potato, but turned out to be tapioca,. The following day I was looking for some flour to try to make some bread, and came across a packet in the drawer, only to find out that the flour Ai Gnor uses is tepung ubi kayu, ie tapioca flour. No wonder the cakes we made a couple of months ago turned out a bit strange. I was shown how to peel them by the two women. Then I boiled them with a little salt, and tried some later. They are interesting to try, if one thinks the blandness of starch so. I must have tried them before, either in Africa or here. Incidentally, I have now spent one third of my life in south East Asia including just over twelve years in Malaysia.
I have now prepared the evening’s meal; frankfurters chopped into small pieces fried in oil with lime juice, then skewered on a toothpick with lettuce and cucumber, extra lettuce, and a variety of condiments, lime, oil from Italy, Tabasco sauce, Lea and Perrins, parsley, so they can add what they want. A box of the crunchy bread I made this morning should suffice, with again a dessert of apple.
Thursday 15 January
I was up early to lay the table, get breakfast going, boil the water, and get the dhobi underway. I went jogging on the spot, and then some yoga-type stretches. After they went off to school at the regular time of 7 10, I had my breakfast of toast, yesterday’s soup reheated, some watermelon, and mango flavoured seri songket tea from the Cameron Highlands. Then I swept the floor and started washing the mah chai, gutting and cleaning the flat fish, not pomfret, but looks like one, ikan cermin in the Malay language. Pomfret is ikan bawal. I peeled the garlic, put the dhobi on the line, with all finished about 9am. Then I went to work on the computer.
Much of the past few days I have spent cleaning the cupboards and fridges, and throwing away out-of-date cooking materials and other assorted rubbish the inveterate collectors of garbage have picked over the years eg bags of sugar, sachets of coffee or tea from a hotel, tomato sauce from a take-away, throw-away spoons from somewhere etc. I put many of the condiments in containers; jars and bottles were washed to get the layers of Chinese stir-fry fat off them, cooking extras packed into containers in the fridge, and whole place looking cleaner and neater than for many moons. In a less-than-bright move, one of the racks was placed almost over the cooker, resulting in an onslaught every time cooking is done. Chocolate powder, curry, flour and barley are in Pyrex containers; the latter I used to make a barley drink for the children the other day, using soya and sugar. It is quite nice, and is used to cool the body. By watching, and increasingly trying, I am learning more about Chinese cooking, in particular the vegetables; kai lan, sawi/mustard, seow pai chai, and lien oh, the soup made from dates and small nuts. There is a tuber that grows under water; it has holes in it like Gruyere cheese. Today, we had mah chai, a lettuce like leaf that has, to my mind, little taste. The vegetables are always cooked, at least here, with garlic and a little tapioca flour with some salt to taste.
The past few days I have had a lot of work with some classes in the afternoon; it is tiring, but I am happy with it. I am doing much of the housework in the morning too. I am now quite adept at ironing, and recently ironed my first blouse and skirt. Rhiannon’s I mean. She examined them carefully, and pronounced herself happy with the result, Harri too. I have cooked fried mackerel, cabbage with anchovies and garlic, steamed aubergines, roast pork in the past week or so. I am getting pretty good at cleaning the insides of the fish; fingers in the gills and then a hard pull, and the whole lot come out. Madam Chong’s new job, one of many that she currently holds, is a supplier of German beer. This in a state in Malaysia where 90% of the population are Malay. The odds of success are not that good. It is the first time she has ever offered me a tin with the explicit instruction to drink it; not later, but now. Well, I will do, when it is chilled. The first is from the Hanseatische Getränke Industrie gmbh of Hamburg. The second is made for them in the Brauerei Abfüllung. I assume it must be either Austrian or Swiss. The first beer has the contents in most western European languages, plus Japanese. On the tin is the stamp ‘German Purity Law of 1516’. This means it must be good. The second has the same as the former, minus the Japanese, but including Russian, and what I take to be Latvian, Lithuanian and Ukrainian, the latter written in the Russian script, with water, malt and hops being the same in both languages, as they almost are, with malta and malte in Spanish and Portuguese. It is less than three ringgit per can, making it much cheaper than locally made pilsner. She intimated it came from the port of Kuantan. The expression ‘fell off the back of a lorry’ came into my mind, except in this case ‘was slipped over the side of a ship in the middle of the night’.
Yesterday was busy, as I was covering my weekend classes, as many people will be away for the five-day break. They went out for dinner in Batu Enam, untidy and grubby home of Ai Gnor and a thousand useless containers of polystyrene, cardboard, glass and any other material you can think of , that she collects in the way dogs collect fleas. She has a reluctance to throw anything away.
I was very pleased with both the offspring on learning that they are to represent the school in a chess competition. This is not Chinese chess, but the other type. Rhiannon’s selection was a bit easier in that only two girls in the whole school know how to play the game. There are about ten or so boys too. However, they want only four, so Harri was involved in playoffs to choose the members of the boys’ team. He beat one character in eight moves. Whom they are to play against I am not sure. They are both taking part in sports day next month, running for their houses, named in a cunning way after the colours of their sports shirt. That means if your child has a shirt with lots of yellow on it, he or she represents Yellow House.
I assume it is to help the parents work out what is going on.
Right, here is a minor departure from the subject of sports day in Malaysia.
In Nairobi School in Kenya, the houses were named after distinguished people, some of whom had no connection what so ever with the continent, let alone the country. They have now prudently renamed them after Kenyan geographical features, the names of mountains if I am not mistaken. Alexandra Primary in Singapore was more logical; there were four British army generals, rather befitting an army school.
Right, now let us get back on track. I think this is the first time Harri has qualified for the finals; Rhiannon has a bunch of medals, mostly bronze, in her cache of prizes. The event takes place in February or March, for most of a morning on the padang in Kuala Dungun, next to the beach. February and March seem to be the hottest months of the year, too. The arena is soaked in the sunlight for much of the day, and even the non-stop breeze from the sea is not enough to make it comfortable. There is a half-hearted attempt at a grandstand at one end. The tall on the bus terminus side, way from the sea give no protection from the sun, until the afternoon. The grass is sparse in spite of the rainfall we get here and the terrain rough enough to provide toughening up exercises for the Army. One advantage is that the government health clinic is right opposite, in case some chubby oriental television and computer game addict crashes into the ground and shakes like a jelly in a mixture of fear and humiliation.
In the evening, I put out the Christmas tree as a Chinese New Year tree, in the same place, and with the same lights. Then the amah climbed over the two walls and we had a quiet chat, first in the garden yard, sitting on the concrete with legs over the drain, looking at the stars, clouds and watching out for mosquitoes. I asked her if she was all right. There was a big smile in the moonlight, and ‘I am very happy’. We had only the sound of the night insects and the breeze for company. We talked, and she told me something of her life until the car engine disturbed the two of us. We made a quick scramble back over the wall, made more remarkable when she was unable to climb over it. I assisted, by lifting her up, no mean feat, but calm in the knowledge that it takes several seconds to park the car, and get the grill unlocked, locked again, and then the mosquito doors after that. It was, therefore, not that big a problem.
This morning, I had breakfast by myself: a fried tomato, toast, banana, and a cup of coffee for a change. Ai Hwa came in looking as if she had had a rough night on the town and quite a number of beers too many. I know that one does not sweep the floor on the first day of the Chinese New Year, so I asked if one could put the dhobi on. No. I then asked if one could wash the dishes. Yes. Cook lunch. Yes.
She then said, ‘you can even see your girlfriend’, and found this funny. I did too, but for another reason. I looked at the clock. 8 30 and I thought of 12 hours ago.
12 05 pm I have just had a shower; I came out of the bathroom to be greeted by a deafening series of explosions, to find out that it was next door let off their string of firecrackers. It is made worse by the amplifying factor of the garden wall. Now they are watering the garden, or washing way the remnants of the TNT. Handel would be pleased, ‘The Fireworks’ first, then ‘The Water Music’. If I had had my wits about me then, I could have played the music from ‘High Noon’, but as it opens with ‘Do not forsake me, oh my darlin’, on this our wedding day’, it might have suggested the wrong thing to young Siti. We are not that advanced yet. Chong daughter number three has come in with my lunch, nasi laut, or sea rice. However, it does not have fish, only chicken. There is also a mild curry sauce, with some vegetables. This I have eaten on many occasions before. It fills the stomach but one is soon hungry; maybe this is why the Malays snack a lot. The rice is off brown, with what I think is coriander, or ketumbar in Malay. I think that their food is very appetizing, but the four of us do not eat it often because of its high salt, oil and sugar content.
The cuisine is not as varied as that of India, Europe or China, but there are some good dishes, notably the breakfasts, that are light years ahead of Chinese and of other ones. I would rate a typical Malay breakfast in my top three or four. I think that the finest buffet breakfasts I have enjoyed both visually and in experience are ones prepared by a Malay chef. I can recall the Awana hotel with you, the Concorde Inn at the KLIA, to name just two. A typical Malay restaurant would offer about ten dishes: fried chicken and fish, two types of chicken curry, mixed vegetables, a couple of other vegetables, perhaps with pineapple, fish in a yellow sauce, beef, and maybe egg.
They have just left for the first day of the new school year, after a breakfast of cereal, apple and papaya, and a glass of water. Rhiannon looked smart in her new prefect uniform. They are up early for school, me at 5 30 to get the breakfast ready, boil water, make tea, get the washing machine on etc, and now is only 7 30. I put on, quietly, the RPO and Tchaikovsky, and switched on the Christmas tree. The fish is defrosting and the cabbage is broken and soaking in water, as the vegetables are every morning. This year, Ai Gnor is not coming on Sunday, as this is my day off, so I am playing an even bigger role as househusband on this day. I do most of the above anyway, except usually cooking the lunch and ironing the clothes. In reality, she has little to do, as the washing is done before she comes, and is often on the line. The food is out thawing; the breakfast things washed and put away, the floor swept etc. Now she has two days off a week. No doubt, she will have mo intention of getting a second job. They are in many ways an indolent family. Many people make the fundamental mistake of thinking that rushing around in a car, chatting in a coffee shop and talking in a loud voice on a phone equates with hard work.
Friday 2 January 2004
Early morning classes, pay for some of yesterday’s petrol.
Sunday 4 January 2004
There were no classes, as this is my rest day this year. There was no Ai Gnor, so I prepared lunch, my first full Chinese meal on my own. I was going to do cabbage with garlic, rice, and fried fish, cleaned and trimmed by me. There were two plain, and one with chilli for Ai Hwa. They seemed to enjoy it. Today is the first day back at school, Rhiannon looking smart in her prefect’s uniform. I went to town with Ai Hwa to get money from the bank, saw a Malay female Chief Inspector of Police in the bank with whom I fell in love. Then, whilst Ai Hwa went to gold shop to try to sell whatever she sells now. I wandered round in the hot sun, but cooled by the incessant sea breeze. I tried to get a boat across the river to Seberang, but nothing seemed to be going that way. There was plenty of rubbish lying around; it was sad, but it is expected here. Then we went back to the house to prepare lunch. Rhiannon went back to school in the afternoon to decorate the classroom.
Harri read the history of the world, the book I had bought them for Christmas, and then we went for a walk, or a march, for about forty-five minutes, to Sura Gate, then on to the sea. He had an ice cream on the way to Sura Gate, the ice cream wallah on his motorbike and side cart seeming to know him, and we got 1 ringgit’s worth of goreng pisang, or fried bananas from a stall on the beachfront. We ate these whilst walking along. Then we went into Jalan Kenanga, where disaster faced us. Coming down the road towards the sea was a khaki Ministry of Health Landrover with cart, churning out clouds of thick poisonous smoke, deadly to the dengue mosquito I assume. What could we do? There was nowhere to go, no way to escape. Cool under pressure, and sweating from exertion rather than fear, I pulled out the small bottle of water that was stuffed elegantly in my trouser pocket, poured some of the contents onto Harri’s tee shirt, and then did the same to me.
We pulled them over out faces, and held our breath whilst marching through the smoke; a brief pause to take in more air, and then we continued until out of danger. The Ministry man gave us the thumbs up or waved as we went by. Okay, I know it is boring, but that is life here. I phoned Andrew to wish him happy birthday, and as I wanted him to have a full day’s enjoyment, rang him at 7 30 am UK time, hoping he would be in bed. He was not. What a pity.
Monday 5 January 2004
I was up as usual just after 5 30, to get the breakfast. I put out the cereal, the water, milk, fruit, toast etc. I put on the washing machine, and got the kettle going. I ironed Harri’s shirt, then did the rest of the ironing, as the iron was hot. We had breakfast, and they went off at 7 10. This routine happens every weekday morning, bar the ironing. There are no classes today, as students need to find out what the school has on in the afternoon before finalizing their time with me. I put the clothes on the line; on a typical morning, they dry in next to no time. I came in and began to scrap and gut the fish, peel the garlic, and put the aubergines in to soak. I had taken instruction in cleaning fish and meat some weeks ago, from both Ai Hwa and Ai Gnor, and one day had cooked a fish or two for Ai Hwa for lunch. Afterwards she looked at me and said,
‘You forgot to clean the head. I got a shock’.
It would give anyone a shock if they saw what was inside. That was some weeks ago. Yesterday, I left the three fish on the side for her inspection, and I passed with flying colours. Back to today.
Then I cleaned the garden so Rhiannon and Harri can plant some seeds now that her two papaya trees are gone. I used the jembi to break up the earth, got rid of the weeds, and inadvertently, some or Ai Gnor’s plants that she uses the leaves for curry, and for laksa, a soup with noodles in it. Oops. There are many different types of laksa, the most famous being from Penang, but I have also tried Kelantan and Terengganu laksa, quite different in taste, although they look the same. A soup, spicy, made with chilli and lime, with fish and rice noodles. It is nice. I tried the three types the same day at a function in the Science College in Kuala Terengganu in the mid 1990’s. I am surprised to find it is now nearly 4pm. My back is aching.
Wednesday 7 January 2004
They have left for school. I was up early this morning, boiled the water, got the washing machine ready, and put out the breakfast. Fifteen minutes later, they came in. I ironed Harri’s shirt, after washing it late last night. It was overlooked for the dhobi. The washing machine is on, the cuttlefish, pork and two fish are defrosting, the aubergines and cabbage are soaking, everything is washed and put away. I had a lecture on the Battle of Waterloo, the mud on the ground that affected Napoleon’s cannons, his handing of power to his deputy, the tactics of Wellington, the Prussians, this from the discovery channel I was told by the professor, and it’s only 7 28 am. There is only the garlic to peel, so I thought it better to use the computer first. I do not want the keyboard to reek too much. Yesterday, I met over the garden wall, the Indonesian maid from the house at the back, who has not left her employer’s house for two years. She is going back home this month. She works a Monday to Sunday week, early morning to late evening. There is your much talked about Asian morality for you.
Yesterday, I helped Ai Gnor with the lunch, learning more about her style of Chinese cooking. We washed and packed the prawns in sugar water for freezing for Chinese New Year; these were bought for Ai Hwa’s sister, cost 50 plus ringgit. I had a class this afternoon. The girl, one of the brighter ones here, went to Genting Highlands and Kuala Lumpur for about a week. What did you do? She went shopping; the only thing she could tell me about her holiday was the names of the shopping centres she went to with her pals. In Genting, they played the games in the indoor and outdoor theme parks, and then went to bed. A whole family in one room, but no problem. The mother and father went from midnight to early morning to the casino. They came back for breakfast. She went to Malacca a couple of years ago, but it was boring ...
I prepared the food tonight, but Harri cooked; nasi goreng, with garlic, onions, cabbage, lettuce, pepper, dried salted fish, orange juice, and two beaten eggs. This was Harri’s idea, making the rice yellow.
There was roast pork and guava on the same plate, with honey, and oil and orange juice dip. They seemed to enjoy it. Rhiannon was very tired after her basketball practice, and then she had an hour of piano. Ai Hwa is out at PIBG parents teachers meeting. Her sister Ai Ling, swee ee is younger auntie, phoned. I asked her what she wanted to talk about. Could Ai Hwa buy something for her in Dungun? They were the above-mentioned prawns. I told her that they were already in the fridge. The other things for Chinese New Year she could buy cheaper in Kuantan. Now I know that most things in Kuantan are cheaper than Dungun, but prawns are cheaper here. This morning, I had a discreet wave from the Indonesian maid over the wall. The Chinese neighbours were around, hence the soft tone.
Thursday 8 January
I was up early this morning to get the breakfast ready for everyone. They left about 7 30, by which time the dhobi was well into its cycle, the fish were defrosting, and the bitter gourd was soaking in the filtered water. By 8 30, I had finished everything, but waited half an hour to see if it was going to rain. It is cloudy but a little bright. Ai Gnor asked if I wanted the fish in tamarind sauce, so I helped her with this. First she cooks her own chilli paste in a little oil, and then adds the sauce. It has quite a pungent reek. The paste she makes from pounded chillies using the pestle and mortar, garlic, and then she showed me what I thought was galangal. She insisted it was not, it is kunyit. I thought it is halia in Malay., but it is not; halia is ginger. I knew the word but could not think what it was. It turns out to be turmeric, according to my list of four-language cuisine terminology. I had kept the tamarind seeds with the idea of planting them in the newly cleaned circle of garden, in the otherwise concrete yard, only to find she had thrown them out. I had planted earlier some bits of guava with seeds in them, together with the seeds of the bitter gourd. Maybe something will grow.
Sunday 11 January 2004
There were classes on Friday morning, and yesterday was full. I reheated food for lunch to save a trip to buy ta pau/take away, and money, too. It is a quiet, changing afternoon, and I am not sure if it is going to rain, or not. On Thursday evening, there was a power cut for about forty-five minutes, so I used this to clamber over the wall at the rear, trek across the empty plot of long grass and earth, to chat discreetly with the maid. It was really quite exciting. It was until the streetlights and house lights came back on. I slithered back to the wall, to the far end where there is no barbed wire. I hoisted myself up, and half fell into the yard, scraping my arm. The following night I was in the yard when there came a crash, and a bag with a broken tile and a letter in it hurtled by me. In the letter, she told me of her time in the house here, and something about herself. It was quite touching.
This morning, after Ai Hwa had taken the children to school, I yet again put the dhobi out to dry in the bedroom, as the sky was threatening to rain. She came back, and we went into Kuala Dungun to do some shopping. She popped into the market, bought some chillies and limes, but little in the way of fish; one man told her the wind was too strong so the waves were too big so the boats could not go out. It reminds me of the fishermen in ‘Under Milk Wood’; they look at a flat sea, no wind, and mutter ‘too rough’, and go to the pub. Whilst I was in the car, waiting for her to come back from the market, there were a group of men sitting under a tree, doing nothing more than smoking. There was rubbish everywhere. We went to the grocer’s to get some flour and yeast. The latter was in a large packet, too big so I said I would wait until he got something smaller. He suggested it, then pulled out a book of vegetarian cooking to show me recipe for making bread. He is quite knowledgeable about food and drink, actually takes an interest in his trade. He told me how to make crackers from unwanted stale bread, and that I have been doing. He explained the dried soya in the packet outside the shop. I bought some Histon apricot jam, low cholesterol eggs, and Tabasco sauce. On the main street, Jalan Besar, she pointed out a Chinese man from China on a bicycle, but why, I do not know. Now it is time to prepare lunch. I cook the rice, fry two types of fish, and cook the long green cucumber-type vegetable with garlic and an egg. This is new.
Now it is three pm.
They have left for school, for sports practice, and the high jump. The lunch went down well, the fish was almost finished, and the vegetable too, although I stirred in the egg too late, meaning it looked like a broken up omelette among the chunks. We had apple to finish. My wife complained I had not cooked enough rice.
My new housemates include a young cicak whose domain is around the rubbish bag at the back window. If he is feeding himself on this, then he is not doing his proper job of getting the mosquito. The other is a tiny two-centimetre long frog who pops in and out of the bathroom, and has to be taken out with care, not because I have an inherent dislike for the fellow, but he is in danger of being trodden on by accident. There are a few small spiders who roam around, and when chased away for the same reason as frog, bounce along the floor. So cute, as children would exclaim here. Scold is another popular word here.
I forgot to write this the other day, I think Thursday. Ai Hwa had bought what I thought were yams, but she said no, they were ubi kayu or wood potato. I then assumed they must be sweet potato, but turned out to be tapioca,. The following day I was looking for some flour to try to make some bread, and came across a packet in the drawer, only to find out that the flour Ai Gnor uses is tepung ubi kayu, ie tapioca flour. No wonder the cakes we made a couple of months ago turned out a bit strange. I was shown how to peel them by the two women. Then I boiled them with a little salt, and tried some later. They are interesting to try, if one thinks the blandness of starch so. I must have tried them before, either in Africa or here. Incidentally, I have now spent one third of my life in south East Asia including just over twelve years in Malaysia.
I have now prepared the evening’s meal; frankfurters chopped into small pieces fried in oil with lime juice, then skewered on a toothpick with lettuce and cucumber, extra lettuce, and a variety of condiments, lime, oil from Italy, Tabasco sauce, Lea and Perrins, parsley, so they can add what they want. A box of the crunchy bread I made this morning should suffice, with again a dessert of apple.
Thursday 15 January
I was up early to lay the table, get breakfast going, boil the water, and get the dhobi underway. I went jogging on the spot, and then some yoga-type stretches. After they went off to school at the regular time of 7 10, I had my breakfast of toast, yesterday’s soup reheated, some watermelon, and mango flavoured seri songket tea from the Cameron Highlands. Then I swept the floor and started washing the mah chai, gutting and cleaning the flat fish, not pomfret, but looks like one, ikan cermin in the Malay language. Pomfret is ikan bawal. I peeled the garlic, put the dhobi on the line, with all finished about 9am. Then I went to work on the computer.
Much of the past few days I have spent cleaning the cupboards and fridges, and throwing away out-of-date cooking materials and other assorted rubbish the inveterate collectors of garbage have picked over the years eg bags of sugar, sachets of coffee or tea from a hotel, tomato sauce from a take-away, throw-away spoons from somewhere etc. I put many of the condiments in containers; jars and bottles were washed to get the layers of Chinese stir-fry fat off them, cooking extras packed into containers in the fridge, and whole place looking cleaner and neater than for many moons. In a less-than-bright move, one of the racks was placed almost over the cooker, resulting in an onslaught every time cooking is done. Chocolate powder, curry, flour and barley are in Pyrex containers; the latter I used to make a barley drink for the children the other day, using soya and sugar. It is quite nice, and is used to cool the body. By watching, and increasingly trying, I am learning more about Chinese cooking, in particular the vegetables; kai lan, sawi/mustard, seow pai chai, and lien oh, the soup made from dates and small nuts. There is a tuber that grows under water; it has holes in it like Gruyere cheese. Today, we had mah chai, a lettuce like leaf that has, to my mind, little taste. The vegetables are always cooked, at least here, with garlic and a little tapioca flour with some salt to taste.
The past few days I have had a lot of work with some classes in the afternoon; it is tiring, but I am happy with it. I am doing much of the housework in the morning too. I am now quite adept at ironing, and recently ironed my first blouse and skirt. Rhiannon’s I mean. She examined them carefully, and pronounced herself happy with the result, Harri too. I have cooked fried mackerel, cabbage with anchovies and garlic, steamed aubergines, roast pork in the past week or so. I am getting pretty good at cleaning the insides of the fish; fingers in the gills and then a hard pull, and the whole lot come out. Madam Chong’s new job, one of many that she currently holds, is a supplier of German beer. This in a state in Malaysia where 90% of the population are Malay. The odds of success are not that good. It is the first time she has ever offered me a tin with the explicit instruction to drink it; not later, but now. Well, I will do, when it is chilled. The first is from the Hanseatische Getränke Industrie gmbh of Hamburg. The second is made for them in the Brauerei Abfüllung. I assume it must be either Austrian or Swiss. The first beer has the contents in most western European languages, plus Japanese. On the tin is the stamp ‘German Purity Law of 1516’. This means it must be good. The second has the same as the former, minus the Japanese, but including Russian, and what I take to be Latvian, Lithuanian and Ukrainian, the latter written in the Russian script, with water, malt and hops being the same in both languages, as they almost are, with malta and malte in Spanish and Portuguese. It is less than three ringgit per can, making it much cheaper than locally made pilsner. She intimated it came from the port of Kuantan. The expression ‘fell off the back of a lorry’ came into my mind, except in this case ‘was slipped over the side of a ship in the middle of the night’.
Yesterday was busy, as I was covering my weekend classes, as many people will be away for the five-day break. They went out for dinner in Batu Enam, untidy and grubby home of Ai Gnor and a thousand useless containers of polystyrene, cardboard, glass and any other material you can think of , that she collects in the way dogs collect fleas. She has a reluctance to throw anything away.
I was very pleased with both the offspring on learning that they are to represent the school in a chess competition. This is not Chinese chess, but the other type. Rhiannon’s selection was a bit easier in that only two girls in the whole school know how to play the game. There are about ten or so boys too. However, they want only four, so Harri was involved in playoffs to choose the members of the boys’ team. He beat one character in eight moves. Whom they are to play against I am not sure. They are both taking part in sports day next month, running for their houses, named in a cunning way after the colours of their sports shirt. That means if your child has a shirt with lots of yellow on it, he or she represents Yellow House.
I assume it is to help the parents work out what is going on.
Right, here is a minor departure from the subject of sports day in Malaysia.
In Nairobi School in Kenya, the houses were named after distinguished people, some of whom had no connection what so ever with the continent, let alone the country. They have now prudently renamed them after Kenyan geographical features, the names of mountains if I am not mistaken. Alexandra Primary in Singapore was more logical; there were four British army generals, rather befitting an army school.
Right, now let us get back on track. I think this is the first time Harri has qualified for the finals; Rhiannon has a bunch of medals, mostly bronze, in her cache of prizes. The event takes place in February or March, for most of a morning on the padang in Kuala Dungun, next to the beach. February and March seem to be the hottest months of the year, too. The arena is soaked in the sunlight for much of the day, and even the non-stop breeze from the sea is not enough to make it comfortable. There is a half-hearted attempt at a grandstand at one end. The tall on the bus terminus side, way from the sea give no protection from the sun, until the afternoon. The grass is sparse in spite of the rainfall we get here and the terrain rough enough to provide toughening up exercises for the Army. One advantage is that the government health clinic is right opposite, in case some chubby oriental television and computer game addict crashes into the ground and shakes like a jelly in a mixture of fear and humiliation.
In the evening, I put out the Christmas tree as a Chinese New Year tree, in the same place, and with the same lights. Then the amah climbed over the two walls and we had a quiet chat, first in the garden yard, sitting on the concrete with legs over the drain, looking at the stars, clouds and watching out for mosquitoes. I asked her if she was all right. There was a big smile in the moonlight, and ‘I am very happy’. We had only the sound of the night insects and the breeze for company. We talked, and she told me something of her life until the car engine disturbed the two of us. We made a quick scramble back over the wall, made more remarkable when she was unable to climb over it. I assisted, by lifting her up, no mean feat, but calm in the knowledge that it takes several seconds to park the car, and get the grill unlocked, locked again, and then the mosquito doors after that. It was, therefore, not that big a problem.
This morning, I had breakfast by myself: a fried tomato, toast, banana, and a cup of coffee for a change. Ai Hwa came in looking as if she had had a rough night on the town and quite a number of beers too many. I know that one does not sweep the floor on the first day of the Chinese New Year, so I asked if one could put the dhobi on. No. I then asked if one could wash the dishes. Yes. Cook lunch. Yes.
She then said, ‘you can even see your girlfriend’, and found this funny. I did too, but for another reason. I looked at the clock. 8 30 and I thought of 12 hours ago.
12 05 pm I have just had a shower; I came out of the bathroom to be greeted by a deafening series of explosions, to find out that it was next door let off their string of firecrackers. It is made worse by the amplifying factor of the garden wall. Now they are watering the garden, or washing way the remnants of the TNT. Handel would be pleased, ‘The Fireworks’ first, then ‘The Water Music’. If I had had my wits about me then, I could have played the music from ‘High Noon’, but as it opens with ‘Do not forsake me, oh my darlin’, on this our wedding day’, it might have suggested the wrong thing to young Siti. We are not that advanced yet. Chong daughter number three has come in with my lunch, nasi laut, or sea rice. However, it does not have fish, only chicken. There is also a mild curry sauce, with some vegetables. This I have eaten on many occasions before. It fills the stomach but one is soon hungry; maybe this is why the Malays snack a lot. The rice is off brown, with what I think is coriander, or ketumbar in Malay. I think that their food is very appetizing, but the four of us do not eat it often because of its high salt, oil and sugar content.
The cuisine is not as varied as that of India, Europe or China, but there are some good dishes, notably the breakfasts, that are light years ahead of Chinese and of other ones. I would rate a typical Malay breakfast in my top three or four. I think that the finest buffet breakfasts I have enjoyed both visually and in experience are ones prepared by a Malay chef. I can recall the Awana hotel with you, the Concorde Inn at the KLIA, to name just two. A typical Malay restaurant would offer about ten dishes: fried chicken and fish, two types of chicken curry, mixed vegetables, a couple of other vegetables, perhaps with pineapple, fish in a yellow sauce, beef, and maybe egg.
2003 Trip through the country
On Sunday 28 December 2003, after lunch, we left for Kuantan, going on the by-pass that takes you past Kuantan airport. We then went onto the southwest running road across country to Segamat, where we spent the night. The road, just under 200 km, is wide, fairly straight, and fast. There are literally tens of thousands of oil palm trees on the way, covering the undulating Pahang and Johor landscape. On the way, we stopped at an ostrich ranch, and the children had a tour, saw the birds close up, and stood on the eggs and so on. I had seen this before, in the Karoo in South Africa, plus of course the animals in the wild in Kenya. The outskirts of Segamat are typical of many small towns here; cement products, machinery for hire, timber cutting, pipe making etc. Then, a few km after the junction, we came to the town. The first thing we noticed, and was expressed by Harri, was that the people here like cars. There were showroom after showroom, plus the usual traffic. The time was now about sunset. We drove around looking for a hotel found one, a tall building but on getting there, found it to be abandoned. In our trip of 4 towns, we found 2 others in the same condition. We found a place on the main road, a dual carriageway running through the town. It was not an attractive place, although I pointed out to the children, whilst binti was fuming about the traffic, road and life in general, an old colonial house on a quiet road. Apart from that, and some other wooden buildings we passed the next morning, there was not much of interest. The inn has a magnificent view of the next-door Shell establishment, although it did have the dubious advantage of being able to see hundreds of sparrows or swallows resting for the night on the roof, and there was a car park at the back. Free That makes Ai Hwa unfailingly happy. Across the road was a small Chinese restaurant where we had a nice dinner of two types of oyster, steamed fish and some vegetable, plus a welcome change of drink in Heineken beer, in a bottle too. The table was put out in the road, and we watched more birds lined up on the telephone wire, occasionally rising up in mini flocks, orange speckled in the light of the street lamps. Rhiannon thought it looked as if it were snowing. Back in our less than attractive room, we watched an old Malay film, interesting to me, boring to them, so they got the in house film, only to find they had ordered the wrong one. When it came, sleep was most welcome.
Monday 29 December 2003
I was up early for a breakfast of water and biscuits, the family had the same later. Ai Hwa’s idea of a holiday, like most in Dungun, is to sleep. Mine is to go and see places, and do things. On this matter, we have a fundamental disagreement. We left Segamat, and went on our way to Gemas, where I took them, as a surprise, to the 1922 British-built railway junction, where the east and west coast lines split. This had all the interest, for Ai Hwa, as a bag of rubbish. We had breakfast there, roti cani, the oily flat pancake with a spicy dip, and nasi lemak, a Malay favourite, rice with a quarter boiled egg, anchovies in a piquant sauce, peanuts and cucumber, plus a chocolate drink, and tea. I showed the children the sleepers, the narrow gauge track, and we were fortunate that a freight train came in, with 20 odd containers of sugar, each around many thousands of kilograms. I got them to look at the weights on the bogies of the carriages. They had their photograph taken, and then Harri illegally entered the VIP lounge to try the sofa and chairs.
After that, we went on towards Tampin. But before that, we had passed many rubber plantations, so I told them about how it was collected etc, and when we found an area we could pull off the road, I took the children across to see, smell, and touch the dripping latex. After a few minutes, it became sticky on our fingers, dried up, and then we rolled it into a tiny ball and flicked it off. Rhiannon picked a nut from one of the trees, and it is now in the house. She wants to watch it to see what happens. We did a rough count, and in the small area where we were, there were in the region of a thousand trees. There must be millions, or tens of millions of both rubber and oil palm in the country.
Just before Tampin, we turned southwest towards Malacca, hoping to go to the A Famosa water world, but could not find the place, a glorified swimming pool theme park I think. Then we went on through the countryside, past a large lake with lotus, by the airport, home to the Malaysian Flying Academy and one of the few airports that fly only to one destination, namely Pekan Bahru in Indonesia. The traffic was thick. We went past a church built in 1710, and then through the old part of town, where we found a car park, and then started to explore. First was the Royal Malaysian Navy museum, just down the road. It was closed but there were exhibits outside, a torpedo, depth charges, guns that the children enjoyed playing with, and a patrol boat that one accessed by a series of steps. Here was a coincidence. The boat was the Sri Trengganu, using, you might note, the old name. It was built in Portsmouth, and across the road on the side of one building, I read the Cambridge Language Centre; three of my places meeting here.
Then we went on a reconstructed Portuguese galleon, another museum, just across the way. After that, the Stadhuys, the residence and/or offices of the Dutch Governor, Christ Church 1753, the clock tower, and the fountain by the Victoria memorial, inscribed in Latin. Rhiannon read it. They had a bottle of water and some ice cream as the water sprayed. Then they took a trip in a trishaw that was brightly coloured; the Raleigh bicycle and locally built side craft. They have an umbrella, and they are allowed to decorate as they wish. There were plenty of tourists from many places. We went up the very steep St Paul’s Hill to the church and statue of St Francis Xavier. After that, we wandered around the Nonya part of town, some of the houses well restored, with fine windows, doors, and walls; it was very pretty in places. We managed to find a businessman’s hotel, convenient because of being able to take the car off the street and into the car park, clean, comfortable, a change from the previous night, and quite cheap. We ate a very late lunch; tuna sandwiches for Rhiannon, kampung nasi goreng for Harri and me, and Penang char kway teow, the thick noodles for Ai Hwa, but we tried each other’s too. A shower later, we took the car back into the main part of the city, past the bus terminal, but this was by accident, not on our plan. We saw Bukit Cina, the largest Chinese cemetery outside of China itself, the Buddhist temple built by a Chinese Kapitan in the 1700’s, making it the oldest temple in Malaysia. There were a couple of old mosques, the Kampung Ulu mosque near the Nonya area, and the unique building style of the Tranquerah mosque towards the northern outskirts of the town.
It was here we came across yet another abandoned hotel, of some 8 storeys. We took dinner in the deserted Portuguese Square, nothing of the vibrancy you might recall in 1989, no dancing, few people, run down, and some little bastards setting off noisy firecrackers in a drain fifty metres away. It meant a disappointing end to a good day, and then back to the hotel.
Tuesday 30 December 2003
I was up early for a good breakfast just after 7am, free, included in the price. The others were sleeping. When they had woken up and had the second free breakfast, we took the car back to the old town centre, where the children had another go on the playground, then to the tiny A Formosa, and next to it, the building where the Declaration of Independence was read out. We met again the trishaw man; he told me I had ‘two bright children’. I thanked him, and said he had a nice trishaw. The children gave him a ringgit each, for a cup of tea, and took his photograph. He was a very nice fellow. They can get 100 a day, or in the holiday season, 150. Work it out for 25 days a month. That is more than most teachers here get, and tax-free, according to the Brains Trust. Then, we went on our way past Alor Gajah, and the road to Tampin. We stopped at a mineral spa, for Harri’s skin. They play here for an hour or so under the hot sun and it seemed to do his skin, already much improved as he gets older, some good, for there was little scratching in the car the rest of the day. Just after Tampin, we turned north towards Pahang, going across miles of oil palm and rubber, small wooden shop-house villages, mostly Chinese, when in middle of nowhere, the Negeri Sembilan Cement Company rose up, a huge place. Further on, we ate lunch in a one-horse town, Bukit Kikir, little more than a dual carriageway through two rows of shop-houses. They went into a Chinese coffee shop; I ate mine in the car, watching the chef smoking and scratching his hair whilst cooking. Fortunately, it was after he had cooked ours. Then, part of the road going through more oil palm and rubber estates, part winding through more unspoilt jungle as we approached the Titiwangsa mountain range that runs along the western side of the peninsula, with limestone outcrops of jungle, quite spectacular in places, and attractive in most. We came through the small town of Karak, then along the highway a short way to Bentong, where we stayed in the same hotel as some years ago. A small, clean but slightly run down place, but a good-sized room.
Bentong is surrounded by mountains, tree covered, with early morning mist everywhere, cool and refreshing. We went around by car, and I pointed out one of the few street names that are still in English, on the end of one of the shop houses. Many of the buildings date from the 1930’s, I imagine, some have the date on them. Whilst checking the price of another more modern hotel, they noticed a restaurant in the same building. We went there for dinner. It was a proper eating-place, with glass in the windows, tablecloth, matching crockery and so on. The waitresses wore a Cheongsam top, with a short skirt, but the effect was neutralized as many had on shoes that would have graced a Bulgarian female factory supervisor in the days of rationing. At first we waited outside, considering the cost; I suggested we go in and look at the menu. Ai Hwa said this we could not do. It would give people the impression that we had no money and were Ulu. Hulu, in the modern Malay spelling, means interior or jungle in other words. If someone is ulu, they are a bit primitive, backward, not used to town/city life. I answered in that case, that they were right on both counts. However, in we went, and had a very nice and inexpensive meal; Harri and I had ostrich in pepper sauce, Rhiannon the lemon chicken, and then Harri also had a spicy tau fu, plus the usual vegetables, chrysanthemum tea, and a bottle of Tiger, that needed a class of ice to chill it a bit more.
Then it was off to bed. I have forgotten if it were here, or in the place in Segamat, that I went to sleep fairly early and woke up about 2am, and lay in bed for a few hours before a short sleep prior to getting up.
I could not help thinking that being with the family in some grubby bedroom here was a big improvement on getting married to some girl from the north of England and spending my life in Rotherham. In addition, I would not have seen millions of rubber and oil palm trees either; that made me feel good.
Wednesday 31 December 2003
I was up early for a good breakfast, but first I had to go out and buy it. I stole twenty ringgit from the boss’s handbag, and then went next door to a Chinese coffee shop for some pau, the bread buns filled with meat or vegetables, and some sticky rice, both steamed. It is not my choice for 7am food. I bought a bowl of noodles for Ai Hwa, the latter costing 2 50, and I had only 2 40 in small change. No matter, the man accepted 10 sen short. I told him I would be back later. I was true to my word, and when Harri gave him the money a couple of hours later, there was a big wave to me as I was getting into the car. Harri remarked on my honesty.
After getting the things from the Chinese place, I wandered round to find a Malay coffee shop, and for one ringgit got a packet of nasi lemak. I got back to the hotel, still quite dark, and had my breakfast with some biscuits on the edge of the single bed. I woke the others up, only to be told it was a holiday, and she wanted to sleep. Then, much later, we went off northwards to the small town of Raub, pretty little place; this part of our safari was new to me.
Raub had a nice town hall, and some old wooden colonial buildings. The road after the town however, was being upgraded, and for short sections of a few hundred metres we had to go off the tarmac. Ai Hwa commented that her sister, whose car we borrowed, would not be too happy if she knew the shaking it was getting. I kept quiet. It was slow going in places, but interesting in that the children were able to see in some detail engineering work going on, with excavators, lorries, graders, new water pipes waiting to be laid, the hardcore packed down under the roller etc. The next town was Benta, and here we turned east to Jerantut. The way north takes you to Kuala Lipis and the national park. Now, the narrow road wound rather in the same way as to Bukit Fraser, with tiny hamlets, and jungle, climbing in places. It was very nice too, even better as I was not at the wheel, but with the children, relaxing in the back. Jerantut was nothing to write home about, the main feature of interest was Ai Hwa’s bad-tempered excitement in trying to find a choo. Harri pointed out the Tandas Awam, public toilets, but that was not clean enough apparently, from inside the car 20 metres away. Petronas petrol found the solution. I suggested Kentucky Fried Chicken for lunch. No, the oil was too dirty etc. We went on eastwards, then turned south to Maran, on the main Kuantan to Kuala Lumpur road, a place we have passed through on innumerable occasions before. The road again was passing through rubber and oil palm estates, with the same kind of small shop-house fronted kampung. Maran is only 70 odd km from Kuantan, and 30 of those are dual carriageway, so it was quite a relief to get there. Whilst I found the journey interesting, it is not the kind one would want to do again, I don’t think.
We had lunch in a Malay coffee shop, the children getting half a boiled egg, some curry fish, fried chicken, with vegetable, and for me, some yellow sauce. Most Malay eating places offer a moderate range of food, usually fried chicken, boiled eggs, curry chicken and fish, one or two vegetables, and some a spicy curry of beef or chicken. In a Malay restaurant, there is not the breadth one gets in a Chinese place. However, their cuisine is known for its fine taste, and to keep in harmony with the place, we ate Malay style, with our fingers, without making a mess. Then, it was an hour or so to Kuantan, where we found a nice hotel overlooking the sungei Kuantan; it seemed to be a smart business class place of some nine storeys. The main disadvantage was that, being New Year’s evening, there was a function in the café area, open air, downstairs, and our room was overlooking this. No matter I said, the noise won’t reach here, it won’t be too bad. Ah, foolish words I went out, after a shower, for a walk around the old town, and then to a small Chinese eating place just up the road, in fact the next building, for a beer; they wanted to watch the end of some soap opera in Chinese.
My main memory of that walk-about was of a middle-aged Chinese woman, working away at making one of the screens that hang outside buildings here to keep out the sun. She was putting together the pieces, working on a long bench, in what was more of a small workshop that a shop per se. Maybe she was the boss, I do not know, but she didn’t seem to be. I thought it quite sad that someone had to work like that on the 31st at the end of the year, at 7 30 pm.
They met me later, and I suggested eating in the same place, as it served bak kut teh, pork on the bone in a sauce, served with a type of Chinese bread and rice. I had heard about it many times, but had not tried it before. It was quite tasty, but not something I would want frequently. Then we went back to the room. The noise/concert/show ended about 1am, so I was told. I had fallen asleep.
Thursday 1 January 2004
The next morning, I was up early for a good breakfast in the restaurant, almost alone. The restaurant is overlooking the water, and with almost no one about except the staff, it was a relaxing breakfast. Across the water is a line of trees, like a mini-jungle. The small wooden fishing boast went past from time to time, their approach marketed by the throbbing of the engine. These hotels serve much the same: fruit, cereal, bread, and a selection of cooked food, both local and western. It is more often than not, laid out in a buffet, as it was this morning. I had some scrambled eggs, and a selection of some Malay offerings, too. I was not sure how to mix them correctly, so I tried all of them. I had juice and tea or coffee too. The others came down later, and then I went with the children for a brief fifteen-minute walk around a fairly quiet town centre. I wanted to show them the Indian cloth merchants, the dates on some of the old shop houses etc; Harri noticed the three shops, joined together, in the same style that I had noticed the night before, built in 1939, 1940 and 1941. They went off to the cinema, and I waited in the room, doing some exercises, reading the telephone directory, and looking at the fishing boats going by. The film finished after 2pm, so about 1 30 had a shower, and went down to the lobby to wait for them, one backpack on my back, one on my front. I felt like a policeman with his flack jacket on. The sliding door was not working, and there was a very strong breeze coming off the sea, so the air was cool and fresh. The noise would have graced your garage on a bad January night. I waited, practiced my Malay with two of the staff, and 2 15 came and went. Finally, at three, they came back, Ai Hwa popped in to settle the account, and in the car I asked the children if they had enjoyed the film. Oh, they did not go, as the queue was too long. I wanted to know what they did for 4 hours. They told me that they went shopping, and had lunch. Good, what did you have? They mentioned noodles, steamed fish, spring rolls, duck etc. This was not coffee shop fare. Where did you go? We went to a nice place, with a tablecloth, just here. They pointed it out, on the ground floor of some smart hotel. Who paid? Ai Hwa’s brother. I was pleased they ate somewhere decent. I, in the meantime, in the hotel room had had a few Marie biscuits, and water. Then we went off to another supermarket to get some supplies for the house, and back to Dungun, stopping in Kijal, just before the Awana hotel, to buy nasi lemang, sticky rice smoked in bamboo. We had this for dinner back home. That was our four-day expedition around the country, and very enjoyable and educational it was too.
Monday 29 December 2003
I was up early for a breakfast of water and biscuits, the family had the same later. Ai Hwa’s idea of a holiday, like most in Dungun, is to sleep. Mine is to go and see places, and do things. On this matter, we have a fundamental disagreement. We left Segamat, and went on our way to Gemas, where I took them, as a surprise, to the 1922 British-built railway junction, where the east and west coast lines split. This had all the interest, for Ai Hwa, as a bag of rubbish. We had breakfast there, roti cani, the oily flat pancake with a spicy dip, and nasi lemak, a Malay favourite, rice with a quarter boiled egg, anchovies in a piquant sauce, peanuts and cucumber, plus a chocolate drink, and tea. I showed the children the sleepers, the narrow gauge track, and we were fortunate that a freight train came in, with 20 odd containers of sugar, each around many thousands of kilograms. I got them to look at the weights on the bogies of the carriages. They had their photograph taken, and then Harri illegally entered the VIP lounge to try the sofa and chairs.
After that, we went on towards Tampin. But before that, we had passed many rubber plantations, so I told them about how it was collected etc, and when we found an area we could pull off the road, I took the children across to see, smell, and touch the dripping latex. After a few minutes, it became sticky on our fingers, dried up, and then we rolled it into a tiny ball and flicked it off. Rhiannon picked a nut from one of the trees, and it is now in the house. She wants to watch it to see what happens. We did a rough count, and in the small area where we were, there were in the region of a thousand trees. There must be millions, or tens of millions of both rubber and oil palm in the country.
Just before Tampin, we turned southwest towards Malacca, hoping to go to the A Famosa water world, but could not find the place, a glorified swimming pool theme park I think. Then we went on through the countryside, past a large lake with lotus, by the airport, home to the Malaysian Flying Academy and one of the few airports that fly only to one destination, namely Pekan Bahru in Indonesia. The traffic was thick. We went past a church built in 1710, and then through the old part of town, where we found a car park, and then started to explore. First was the Royal Malaysian Navy museum, just down the road. It was closed but there were exhibits outside, a torpedo, depth charges, guns that the children enjoyed playing with, and a patrol boat that one accessed by a series of steps. Here was a coincidence. The boat was the Sri Trengganu, using, you might note, the old name. It was built in Portsmouth, and across the road on the side of one building, I read the Cambridge Language Centre; three of my places meeting here.
Then we went on a reconstructed Portuguese galleon, another museum, just across the way. After that, the Stadhuys, the residence and/or offices of the Dutch Governor, Christ Church 1753, the clock tower, and the fountain by the Victoria memorial, inscribed in Latin. Rhiannon read it. They had a bottle of water and some ice cream as the water sprayed. Then they took a trip in a trishaw that was brightly coloured; the Raleigh bicycle and locally built side craft. They have an umbrella, and they are allowed to decorate as they wish. There were plenty of tourists from many places. We went up the very steep St Paul’s Hill to the church and statue of St Francis Xavier. After that, we wandered around the Nonya part of town, some of the houses well restored, with fine windows, doors, and walls; it was very pretty in places. We managed to find a businessman’s hotel, convenient because of being able to take the car off the street and into the car park, clean, comfortable, a change from the previous night, and quite cheap. We ate a very late lunch; tuna sandwiches for Rhiannon, kampung nasi goreng for Harri and me, and Penang char kway teow, the thick noodles for Ai Hwa, but we tried each other’s too. A shower later, we took the car back into the main part of the city, past the bus terminal, but this was by accident, not on our plan. We saw Bukit Cina, the largest Chinese cemetery outside of China itself, the Buddhist temple built by a Chinese Kapitan in the 1700’s, making it the oldest temple in Malaysia. There were a couple of old mosques, the Kampung Ulu mosque near the Nonya area, and the unique building style of the Tranquerah mosque towards the northern outskirts of the town.
It was here we came across yet another abandoned hotel, of some 8 storeys. We took dinner in the deserted Portuguese Square, nothing of the vibrancy you might recall in 1989, no dancing, few people, run down, and some little bastards setting off noisy firecrackers in a drain fifty metres away. It meant a disappointing end to a good day, and then back to the hotel.
Tuesday 30 December 2003
I was up early for a good breakfast just after 7am, free, included in the price. The others were sleeping. When they had woken up and had the second free breakfast, we took the car back to the old town centre, where the children had another go on the playground, then to the tiny A Formosa, and next to it, the building where the Declaration of Independence was read out. We met again the trishaw man; he told me I had ‘two bright children’. I thanked him, and said he had a nice trishaw. The children gave him a ringgit each, for a cup of tea, and took his photograph. He was a very nice fellow. They can get 100 a day, or in the holiday season, 150. Work it out for 25 days a month. That is more than most teachers here get, and tax-free, according to the Brains Trust. Then, we went on our way past Alor Gajah, and the road to Tampin. We stopped at a mineral spa, for Harri’s skin. They play here for an hour or so under the hot sun and it seemed to do his skin, already much improved as he gets older, some good, for there was little scratching in the car the rest of the day. Just after Tampin, we turned north towards Pahang, going across miles of oil palm and rubber, small wooden shop-house villages, mostly Chinese, when in middle of nowhere, the Negeri Sembilan Cement Company rose up, a huge place. Further on, we ate lunch in a one-horse town, Bukit Kikir, little more than a dual carriageway through two rows of shop-houses. They went into a Chinese coffee shop; I ate mine in the car, watching the chef smoking and scratching his hair whilst cooking. Fortunately, it was after he had cooked ours. Then, part of the road going through more oil palm and rubber estates, part winding through more unspoilt jungle as we approached the Titiwangsa mountain range that runs along the western side of the peninsula, with limestone outcrops of jungle, quite spectacular in places, and attractive in most. We came through the small town of Karak, then along the highway a short way to Bentong, where we stayed in the same hotel as some years ago. A small, clean but slightly run down place, but a good-sized room.
Bentong is surrounded by mountains, tree covered, with early morning mist everywhere, cool and refreshing. We went around by car, and I pointed out one of the few street names that are still in English, on the end of one of the shop houses. Many of the buildings date from the 1930’s, I imagine, some have the date on them. Whilst checking the price of another more modern hotel, they noticed a restaurant in the same building. We went there for dinner. It was a proper eating-place, with glass in the windows, tablecloth, matching crockery and so on. The waitresses wore a Cheongsam top, with a short skirt, but the effect was neutralized as many had on shoes that would have graced a Bulgarian female factory supervisor in the days of rationing. At first we waited outside, considering the cost; I suggested we go in and look at the menu. Ai Hwa said this we could not do. It would give people the impression that we had no money and were Ulu. Hulu, in the modern Malay spelling, means interior or jungle in other words. If someone is ulu, they are a bit primitive, backward, not used to town/city life. I answered in that case, that they were right on both counts. However, in we went, and had a very nice and inexpensive meal; Harri and I had ostrich in pepper sauce, Rhiannon the lemon chicken, and then Harri also had a spicy tau fu, plus the usual vegetables, chrysanthemum tea, and a bottle of Tiger, that needed a class of ice to chill it a bit more.
Then it was off to bed. I have forgotten if it were here, or in the place in Segamat, that I went to sleep fairly early and woke up about 2am, and lay in bed for a few hours before a short sleep prior to getting up.
I could not help thinking that being with the family in some grubby bedroom here was a big improvement on getting married to some girl from the north of England and spending my life in Rotherham. In addition, I would not have seen millions of rubber and oil palm trees either; that made me feel good.
Wednesday 31 December 2003
I was up early for a good breakfast, but first I had to go out and buy it. I stole twenty ringgit from the boss’s handbag, and then went next door to a Chinese coffee shop for some pau, the bread buns filled with meat or vegetables, and some sticky rice, both steamed. It is not my choice for 7am food. I bought a bowl of noodles for Ai Hwa, the latter costing 2 50, and I had only 2 40 in small change. No matter, the man accepted 10 sen short. I told him I would be back later. I was true to my word, and when Harri gave him the money a couple of hours later, there was a big wave to me as I was getting into the car. Harri remarked on my honesty.
After getting the things from the Chinese place, I wandered round to find a Malay coffee shop, and for one ringgit got a packet of nasi lemak. I got back to the hotel, still quite dark, and had my breakfast with some biscuits on the edge of the single bed. I woke the others up, only to be told it was a holiday, and she wanted to sleep. Then, much later, we went off northwards to the small town of Raub, pretty little place; this part of our safari was new to me.
Raub had a nice town hall, and some old wooden colonial buildings. The road after the town however, was being upgraded, and for short sections of a few hundred metres we had to go off the tarmac. Ai Hwa commented that her sister, whose car we borrowed, would not be too happy if she knew the shaking it was getting. I kept quiet. It was slow going in places, but interesting in that the children were able to see in some detail engineering work going on, with excavators, lorries, graders, new water pipes waiting to be laid, the hardcore packed down under the roller etc. The next town was Benta, and here we turned east to Jerantut. The way north takes you to Kuala Lipis and the national park. Now, the narrow road wound rather in the same way as to Bukit Fraser, with tiny hamlets, and jungle, climbing in places. It was very nice too, even better as I was not at the wheel, but with the children, relaxing in the back. Jerantut was nothing to write home about, the main feature of interest was Ai Hwa’s bad-tempered excitement in trying to find a choo. Harri pointed out the Tandas Awam, public toilets, but that was not clean enough apparently, from inside the car 20 metres away. Petronas petrol found the solution. I suggested Kentucky Fried Chicken for lunch. No, the oil was too dirty etc. We went on eastwards, then turned south to Maran, on the main Kuantan to Kuala Lumpur road, a place we have passed through on innumerable occasions before. The road again was passing through rubber and oil palm estates, with the same kind of small shop-house fronted kampung. Maran is only 70 odd km from Kuantan, and 30 of those are dual carriageway, so it was quite a relief to get there. Whilst I found the journey interesting, it is not the kind one would want to do again, I don’t think.
We had lunch in a Malay coffee shop, the children getting half a boiled egg, some curry fish, fried chicken, with vegetable, and for me, some yellow sauce. Most Malay eating places offer a moderate range of food, usually fried chicken, boiled eggs, curry chicken and fish, one or two vegetables, and some a spicy curry of beef or chicken. In a Malay restaurant, there is not the breadth one gets in a Chinese place. However, their cuisine is known for its fine taste, and to keep in harmony with the place, we ate Malay style, with our fingers, without making a mess. Then, it was an hour or so to Kuantan, where we found a nice hotel overlooking the sungei Kuantan; it seemed to be a smart business class place of some nine storeys. The main disadvantage was that, being New Year’s evening, there was a function in the café area, open air, downstairs, and our room was overlooking this. No matter I said, the noise won’t reach here, it won’t be too bad. Ah, foolish words I went out, after a shower, for a walk around the old town, and then to a small Chinese eating place just up the road, in fact the next building, for a beer; they wanted to watch the end of some soap opera in Chinese.
My main memory of that walk-about was of a middle-aged Chinese woman, working away at making one of the screens that hang outside buildings here to keep out the sun. She was putting together the pieces, working on a long bench, in what was more of a small workshop that a shop per se. Maybe she was the boss, I do not know, but she didn’t seem to be. I thought it quite sad that someone had to work like that on the 31st at the end of the year, at 7 30 pm.
They met me later, and I suggested eating in the same place, as it served bak kut teh, pork on the bone in a sauce, served with a type of Chinese bread and rice. I had heard about it many times, but had not tried it before. It was quite tasty, but not something I would want frequently. Then we went back to the room. The noise/concert/show ended about 1am, so I was told. I had fallen asleep.
Thursday 1 January 2004
The next morning, I was up early for a good breakfast in the restaurant, almost alone. The restaurant is overlooking the water, and with almost no one about except the staff, it was a relaxing breakfast. Across the water is a line of trees, like a mini-jungle. The small wooden fishing boast went past from time to time, their approach marketed by the throbbing of the engine. These hotels serve much the same: fruit, cereal, bread, and a selection of cooked food, both local and western. It is more often than not, laid out in a buffet, as it was this morning. I had some scrambled eggs, and a selection of some Malay offerings, too. I was not sure how to mix them correctly, so I tried all of them. I had juice and tea or coffee too. The others came down later, and then I went with the children for a brief fifteen-minute walk around a fairly quiet town centre. I wanted to show them the Indian cloth merchants, the dates on some of the old shop houses etc; Harri noticed the three shops, joined together, in the same style that I had noticed the night before, built in 1939, 1940 and 1941. They went off to the cinema, and I waited in the room, doing some exercises, reading the telephone directory, and looking at the fishing boats going by. The film finished after 2pm, so about 1 30 had a shower, and went down to the lobby to wait for them, one backpack on my back, one on my front. I felt like a policeman with his flack jacket on. The sliding door was not working, and there was a very strong breeze coming off the sea, so the air was cool and fresh. The noise would have graced your garage on a bad January night. I waited, practiced my Malay with two of the staff, and 2 15 came and went. Finally, at three, they came back, Ai Hwa popped in to settle the account, and in the car I asked the children if they had enjoyed the film. Oh, they did not go, as the queue was too long. I wanted to know what they did for 4 hours. They told me that they went shopping, and had lunch. Good, what did you have? They mentioned noodles, steamed fish, spring rolls, duck etc. This was not coffee shop fare. Where did you go? We went to a nice place, with a tablecloth, just here. They pointed it out, on the ground floor of some smart hotel. Who paid? Ai Hwa’s brother. I was pleased they ate somewhere decent. I, in the meantime, in the hotel room had had a few Marie biscuits, and water. Then we went off to another supermarket to get some supplies for the house, and back to Dungun, stopping in Kijal, just before the Awana hotel, to buy nasi lemang, sticky rice smoked in bamboo. We had this for dinner back home. That was our four-day expedition around the country, and very enjoyable and educational it was too.
2003 Christmas Correspondence
Thursday 25 December 2003
Merry Christmas.
Yesterday, I had three classes in the morning, and then put the washing on the line outside, and swept the floor. I cooked a brief lunch of chips, and then began to prepare the evening meal, a turkey from Illinois or Ohio, I think. It was not that big, but too large to fit into the oven, so it was chopped into two, and cooked one after the other in a coating of Italian oil; yes, extra virgin, yes, first cold pressing, yes, expiry date okay, yes, opera singers gargle with it…what, do they? I did not know that.
With the oil, I put some Australian honey, and Malaysian lemon juice and pepper, making it a real multicultural turkey. There were boiled potatoes, lettuce and tomato, and for dessert, papaya from the garden. We put out long-stemmed glasses with red grape juice, one of them being quickly knocked over by Ai Hwa, meaning we had to wash the tablecloth, and now have a purple mark on the table. I made a dip of limejuice, oil, and honey. Rhiannon especially took to it. I played traditional Chinese music with the meal, erhu, pipa etc. After washing up, I used the bones to make a soup with onions, garlic, and potatoes. I made another soup, using some tau fu, fish balls, and Chinese cabbage. This was at Ai Hwa’s suggestion. She said her sister would like it. I hope so; that is what she is getting tonight.
Today is quiet. They went out to Tanjong Jara early, so I put the washing on the line, and have spent much of the morning writing to you, and it is now the afternoon. For lunch I had a cosmopolitan fare of chips imported by the Saudi Cold Storage company, a couple of shots of the children’s Coca Cola, made in Malaysia, it being the first thing I saw in the fridge, and a piece of yesterday’s turkey.
The other night, Harri told me a joke. You have heard of the trilogy The Lord of the Rings. I did not know the titles but they are, he told me: the Fellowship of the Ring, the Two Towers, and the Return of the Ring. He whispered his idea; The Lord of the Car 1 the Fellowship of the Proton 2 the Two Porsches, and 3 the Return of the Ferrari. I love his sense of humour.
This morning, they were pleased with their presents from Father Christmas, colouring pens, RM50, Chinese calligraphy pens, watercolours, packets of nibbles and so on. I was thinking, just after lunch, that the two of them know the ten countries of the region, their capitals, and can find them easily on the map. They know the major currencies of the world, plus most of the regional ones, and Harri knows their value against the Malaysian ringgit. They still however think there is Father Christmas. Harri wants to shift his account in the UK overseas, currently to Japan, so he can have Yen. Indonesian rupiah is Rhiannon’s idea as there are 2000 odd rupiah to 1 ringgit, so imagine 100 pounds… thousands of rupiah. A Swiss account is out of the question, I have told them.
Merry Christmas.
Yesterday, I had three classes in the morning, and then put the washing on the line outside, and swept the floor. I cooked a brief lunch of chips, and then began to prepare the evening meal, a turkey from Illinois or Ohio, I think. It was not that big, but too large to fit into the oven, so it was chopped into two, and cooked one after the other in a coating of Italian oil; yes, extra virgin, yes, first cold pressing, yes, expiry date okay, yes, opera singers gargle with it…what, do they? I did not know that.
With the oil, I put some Australian honey, and Malaysian lemon juice and pepper, making it a real multicultural turkey. There were boiled potatoes, lettuce and tomato, and for dessert, papaya from the garden. We put out long-stemmed glasses with red grape juice, one of them being quickly knocked over by Ai Hwa, meaning we had to wash the tablecloth, and now have a purple mark on the table. I made a dip of limejuice, oil, and honey. Rhiannon especially took to it. I played traditional Chinese music with the meal, erhu, pipa etc. After washing up, I used the bones to make a soup with onions, garlic, and potatoes. I made another soup, using some tau fu, fish balls, and Chinese cabbage. This was at Ai Hwa’s suggestion. She said her sister would like it. I hope so; that is what she is getting tonight.
Today is quiet. They went out to Tanjong Jara early, so I put the washing on the line, and have spent much of the morning writing to you, and it is now the afternoon. For lunch I had a cosmopolitan fare of chips imported by the Saudi Cold Storage company, a couple of shots of the children’s Coca Cola, made in Malaysia, it being the first thing I saw in the fridge, and a piece of yesterday’s turkey.
The other night, Harri told me a joke. You have heard of the trilogy The Lord of the Rings. I did not know the titles but they are, he told me: the Fellowship of the Ring, the Two Towers, and the Return of the Ring. He whispered his idea; The Lord of the Car 1 the Fellowship of the Proton 2 the Two Porsches, and 3 the Return of the Ferrari. I love his sense of humour.
This morning, they were pleased with their presents from Father Christmas, colouring pens, RM50, Chinese calligraphy pens, watercolours, packets of nibbles and so on. I was thinking, just after lunch, that the two of them know the ten countries of the region, their capitals, and can find them easily on the map. They know the major currencies of the world, plus most of the regional ones, and Harri knows their value against the Malaysian ringgit. They still however think there is Father Christmas. Harri wants to shift his account in the UK overseas, currently to Japan, so he can have Yen. Indonesian rupiah is Rhiannon’s idea as there are 2000 odd rupiah to 1 ringgit, so imagine 100 pounds… thousands of rupiah. A Swiss account is out of the question, I have told them.
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
1981 University PGCE
Richard Homer
PGCE course 1980-1981
School of Education
Leicester University
Course Tutor
Mr Glyn Loosmore BA LLB MM Croix de Guerre
DISSERTATION
CREATIVE MUSIC IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS
CONTENTS
1 Introduction
2 Bibliography
3 List of projects
4 List of instruments
5.2 Experimenting with, and practising the project
5.3 recording the pieces/discussing the pieces
6 Project 1 Fairground piece
7 Project 2 clock piece
8 Project 3 number piece
9 Project 4 Morse Code piece
10 Project 5 river piece
11 Project 6 the sea
12 Writing a score
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1 A Short History of Western Music Arthur Jacobs
2 The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Music Michael Kennedy (ed)
3 Sound and Silence
classroom projects in creative music John Paynter and Ian Aston
4 Pop Music in Schools Ed Vulliamy and Ed Lee
5 Twentieth Century Music Peter Yates
6 Experiments in Sound Gertrud Meyer-Denkmann
7 Projects in Music Books 1, 2 and 4 Ian Lawrence
8 Advanced Projects in Music Ian Lawrence
CREATIVE MUSIC IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS
INTRODUCTION
Creative music is the term used to describe the music which is thought up, experimented with, and performed by the children. It is a striking contrast to the kind of music usually associated with schools. Traditional music was, and is, very much a teacher centred activity, frequently following one or other of a limited number of options – e.g. the singing lesson, listen to a record of a piece of music, or talking about the life of a famous composer, and so on.
Creative music, on the other hand, is much more a child centred or learner centred activity. The teacher acts more like a central advisor rather than the leader of the class. Creative music is the activity where the children make and perform their own music, using (for younger groups) ideas suggested by the teacher. It is therefore an activity requiring full and active participation from every individual in the class. It is therefore essentially an experimental situation. It is not necessary for the children to be able to read conventional musical notation, although for certain activities, like making a score, a knowledge of a conventional score will help. Neither is it necessary for children to be able to sing or play any of the standard orchestral instruments. Again, if they can, an extra dimension can be used in their music. I have included a list of the instruments used in projects I have worked on. Most of these are non-pitched instrument - that is, they do not play a particular note – and the ones that are, such as the glockenspiel and the chime bars, have the note written on the metal bar.
The projects described here together with most of the information in the dissertation came from my teaching practice in Judgemeadow School, Leicester. All I have learned about creative music in schools had come from Mr John Broadhurst and Ms Helen Reece of the music department there. Without their very considerable help and cooperation, any sort of dissertation along these lines would have been impossible to write.
I would also like to thank my PGCE tutor, Mr Glyn Loosmore, for the constant interest and encouragement shown to me throughout the course in general, and with the music in particular.
PROJECTS DONE AT JUDGEMEADOW SCHOOL, LEICESTER 1980-1981
Ist Year
Machines
Fairgrounds
Clocks
Numbers
Morse Code
Patterns
Constellations
The Sea
2nd Year
Journeys (of anything)
Space
River Journeys
Reflections
Metamorphosis
Echoes
The Sea
Not all these projects will be completed in this order by every class. They give an idea of what has been done, and what could be done, in the first two years of secondary school. Of the projects listed here, only two others have I had no experience of - constellations and reflections.
Constellations involves the group choosing a well-known constellation, drawing its shape and any animal or being associated with it, and making a piece of music based on this. Reflections looks at the way objects are reflected – back-to-front and upside-down, and apiece of music is created using these ideas.
If possible, it is a good idea to play pieces of music on record or tape which illustrate the type of idea that the class is exploring.
For example, there are numerous space films which have had their soundtracks recorded: Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica. For machines: Pacific 231 (Honneger); for fairground pieces: Fourth of July (Ives), Parade (Satie) and Circus Polka (Stravinsky).
INSTRUMENTS USED IN MUSIC PROJECTS
If any pupil was able to play an orchestral instrument, and wished to do so in a particular project, then they were free to do so. The actual times this happened were few and far between as most of the children did not play an instrument.
The instruments used were largely percussive.
Tuned instruments, but with the notes written on the keys.
Glockenspiel
Chime bars
Xylophone
Metallaphone
Non tuned instruments
Bass drum
Side drum
Bongos
Temple blocks
Triangle
Wooden block
High hat cymbal
Crash cymbal
Finger bells
Shakers (home made from containers with sand/peas in them)
Whistle
Bottle
Quiro
Beaters – three types are used 1 hard eg standard drum stick
2 soft eg felt head stick
3 wire brush
PROJECTS
The project is the term given to the particular piece of work undertaken by the children. All projects follow the same basic outline. This serves two purposes; first, it is a sensible and logical way of organising a class. Second, it gives the children a broad framework to work in, as well as some kind of continuity in their musical appreciation and training. That is, although each project in terms of subject material is very different, the broad guidelines enable a class, once they have completed one project, to tackle another without any feeling of being totally lost. The project itself necessitates both the whole class as well as group work, the latter being the greater part of the project – some 80-90% of the project being done in this way. The class comes together as a whole at the beginning of the project, and at the end. The outline of a project is as follows:
1 Introduction to the project
This is done by the teacher or teachers. (In Judgemeadow School two and sometimes three teachers were in the class at the same time. This is especially useful when a large amount of group work is taking place, not only in terms of class/group control, but also in the amount of time given to each group. The system seemed to work extremely well.)
A particular topic will be introduced. This takes the form of the teacher informing the whole class about the project, and then getting them to elaborate on this by asking questions, suggestions, ideas, etc. Lists, diagrams, and any other relevant material can be put on the blackboard to illustrate the project. (This will become clearer later during descriptions of particular projects.)
The class is then divided into groups for the next stage of the project. This division usually takes the form of those children sharing with their friends as much as possible. If they are to work in small groups, then the greater the cooperation between members of that group, the better. Frequently, if a group has worked well with one project, they then prefer to keep to the same members for subsequent projects. Groups usually have four members - there being 7 to 9 groups per class. This does not have to be rigidly adhered to, although it makes a good balance for instrumental sound production. Groups that I have worked with have ranged in size from 2 to 7. At Judgemeadow School, music was allocated one double period per week - 70 minutes - for years 1 and 2. Thereafter, music becomes one of the options.
2 Planning the project
After the project has been introduced, the class divide into groups to plan their own piece. This is done in their folders, into which are put all work associated with the projects. Planning requires them to write down which instruments they are going to use, and how. Whilst a detailed description of the use of the instrument is not required at the stage, some idea of how and why they are going to use a particular instrument is needed to prevent an instrument being taken without prior thought as to what it is suitable for.
For example, in the project Clock Pieces, it would not be suitable to use the bass drum by hitting it hard and quickly. Similarly, to give the idea of noise, movement and variety of colour in a fairground, gentle, occasional hits on a triangle might not be the best way to show this. It is therefore not only the type of instrument that has to be considered - the type of sounds it is capable of making - but also the way in which it can be used.
For example, cymbals are often associated with loud crashing sounds; but by reversing the beater - i.e. hitting the cymbal with the light bamboo handle, or stroking it with a bow, or tapping it with fingers - the range of sounds produced can be extended to produce those far removed from the standard, more usual sound that one is accustomed to hear.
Cage in Prepared Piano with its wood, rubber, metal, glass etc muted strings does much the same thought of thing. Birtwhistle, Berio and Xenakis have also used instruments to produce different sounds.
The planning of the pieces includes a description of what each instrument is supposed to represent, that is, trying to build up a picture of the overall frame of their piece. For example, in River Pieces, a group might choose to use a triangle for the start of the river, with its light, cold and quick sound; a cymbal and drum - continual movement, like a roll - maybe to illustrate rapids; bottles and shakers to illustrate the movement of the water over the sand and stones on the bottom of the river.
Planning may also take the form of consulting with the teacher as to whether perhaps a particular instrument is suitable for a special sound, or perhaps this could be used for this purpose. Once they have finished their planning, they draw out their plan in the form of a picture – which for younger children can be coloured. The idea of creating a picture in music is helped by creating a picture in graphic form. This helps the group to remember what their general idea is. Not every project is suited to picture-drawing.
For example, Clock Pieces, reflections might be done with a picture. Fairground Pieces, Rivers, Constellations are usefully assisted in with a picture.
3 Experimenting with, and practising the piece
This, the third part of the project, takes up the greatest time in proportion to the total project. Some projects vary in length, partly due to the simplicity of the work involved, or conversely, its complexity; partly too, to the ability of the group. To give two examples, one 1st year group halfway through the third term were starting their third project; another first year group were doing their sixth.
Having been divided into groups, the children then take whatever instruments they require. (A list of instruments is included separately on another sheet.)
Occasionally, one of the group who may be a member of the school orchestra might decide to use their own instrument for a particular piece.
For example, one girl used her violin, played glissando, to represent the ghost train in her Fairground Piece.
This part of the project, more than anywhere else, requires a child-centred creative ability to be used. The job of the teachers is to monitor what is going on, to give advice if it is asked for, to listen to a preliminary play-through, perhaps make suggestions if things seem to be grinding to a halt.
Physically, the groups are spread out over the music room and into surroundings areas if any are available. The larger and more divided up the music area of a school, the better. By divided up, I mean the provision of practice rooms with their own doors, and with enough space in them for four or five children to play their instruments in some degree of comfort. This is a sensible and practical arrangement for obvious reasons – to have several groups playing mainly percussion instruments in a confined area, each member of each group doing his or her own thing, would result in aural chaos.
During this practice time, there is plenty of opportunity for experiment. I have found that experimenting with the instruments is less likely to be done unless the teacher shows how it can be done.
For example, if they choose a drum, then this will be hit with the usual end of the beater; there is frequently no use of any other method of sound production. There are a number of other methods of hitting a percussion instrument - fingers, reverse stick, different heads, metal/wooden side of the drum, different places on the drum skin etc. But generally, the familiar way will be used by children automatically.
(A list of different methods of sound production has been included separately.)
Two things may happen during this practice and experimental session: the instruments may be changed; or an individual may swop his or her instrument with that of another member of the group. The latter often seems to happen because of a sudden preference for another instrument. In particular, noisy and disruptive members of certain groups generally tend to choose the drums to play, rather than one of the quieter instruments, regardless of the type of project they are doing.
For example, certain children will decide that the best way to show the colour and feel of a watch, in Clock Pieces, might be to use the bass drum.
The change of instruments for part of the group is an admission that the planning they have done previously has gone wrong, possibly because they have not been careful enough, although sometime an idea comes up in rehearsing the piece, and the group decide that a certain instrument is not quite right.
As in all aspects of creative music, there is flexibility in the approach to this, and they are permitted to change their instruments, although with teacher permission and suitable comments or criticism.
For example, a group that have reason for changing their instrument, and have thought carefully about what they are doing, and why, can be commended for their thinking. A group that changes without a particular reason may be sent back to re-plan their piece on paper.
This third section of the project goes on until the majority of the class decide that they are ready to record, or until the teacher decides that enough time has been spent on the project, and nothing more can be gained from continuing the work
4 Recording the pieces and discussing them
This section is usually about a period long, or with a big class, may run into two.
The class re-assemble and each group take it in turn to come out to the front and perform their piece into the recorder. Whilst recording is taking place, it is essential that the rest of the class are quiet, all instruments are on the floor, and all beaters out of hands. The group who are playing come out to the front of the class with their instrument. The physical layout is very important during recording. Most schools are equipped with tape recorders of less than professional recording ability. The reproduction is unlikely to be of the highest quality. Therefore, to get as good a recording as possible, some care has to be taken. The instrument layout is the first thing. The louder instruments generally go further back, the quieter ones near the microphone. However, care must be taken to find out from the group how loud an instrument is going to be played.
For example, a glockenspiel played firmly too close to the microphone may well distort the sound, whilst a cymbal played softly, if placed at the back of the group, may well barely be heard on the tape.
Nothing will be worse for a group member to feel that their contribution was of little value because he or she could not hear himself or herself on the tape. These are small practical points to mention, but I feel very important. Another thing to watch for is one player turning their back on the microphone, masking the sound, or one other members of the group. I have always tried to get a group to watch each other, by facing inwards slightly whilst they are playing. Few string quartets would play in a straight line.
Each group introduces their own piece, either through a spokesman, or individually. Apart from the organisational value of the tape for future listening, it gives the group the firm idea that THEY are talking about THEIR piece.
When a group has finished recording, they immediately return their instruments and beaters to the storeroom or boxes. Whilst they are doing this, the next group comes out and gets ready to record. The reasons for this are obvious: less time is wasted, as two activities are being carried on at the same time; fewer instruments and beaters in the room during the remainder of the recording mean less chance of disturbance; the group again get further responsibility for storing their instruments correctly and in a tidy way. This system is helped by the presence of two teachers in the room, one to do the recording and organising related to the activity, the other to mark the piece and to make sure the instruments go back in the correct place and are not left around. With the number of children involved, the value of the instruments, the cost of the tape recorder, and the different groups, good organisation is essential.
When every group has been put on tape, a few of the class go round to make sure nothing has been left out, particularly beaters. It is a sensible move for one of the teachers to check this afterwards.
A practical point of importance is to write on both the tape and the box the class year, group number, project title, and if possible, the counter number where each piece begins and finishes. The next and final part of the project is a form of simple musical appreciation and criticism. The class as a whole listen to their recordings. First, the group who made the recording are asked for their comments. Apart from the inevitable smart answers from a few, the majority of comments, criticism and suggestions are sensible and mature. The role of the teacher here is important, as he or she help the discussion along. A question used frequently to begin the session is ‘Do you think that piece gave the idea of…’? ‘If so, why’? Or the converse.
This part of the project is designed to encourage both critical and careful listening to music, which can later be extended to orchestral works, particularly those which aim to do the same as the projects - create a picture, for example Gershwin An American in Paris, Mendelssohn The Hebrides, Tchaikovsky 1812 Overture etc. These works might be used to introduce certain projects.
Summary
Each project is a self-contained work activity, although they all follow the same basic framework. The division of the project into four main sections helps to give the children some sense of continuity with their work in the music lesson. Each part of the project serves a particular purpose with the overall aim being to stimulate young children’s awareness of different types of sound through their own music, and to develop a sense of musical analysis and appreciation.
PROJECT 1 FAIRGROUND PIECES
(This was the second project that various groups had tackled, the first being Machine Pieces. They therefore had some experience of making ‘machine music’. It was the first project that I was involved in.)
This project started with the teacher asking questions about a fairground. These were along the lines of ‘Who has been to a fairground?’, ‘What sort of things can you find there?’, ‘What sort of colours/sounds/ smells/movement are there? – and so on. The idea is to get the children to start thinking in their own minds of a fairground they have been to. (One of the reasons that this title was chosen was that most of the class had been to one. There was little teacher talk of what one finds in a fairground, but more child-suggestion. (Other projects may have to be explained because the subject matter may be less familiar, or to complex for the children to cover all aspects of it.)
A general picture of a fairground would gradually be built up. Basic general impressions would include such things as: machines - big, noisy, circular movement; lights - flashing, colours; stalls - rifles, coconuts; people - movement, bustle, talking. These few suggestions all give the idea of some kind of movement, which is one of the main features of this project. The music they had to make had to reflect this idea.
The next thing they had to do was to get down to planning their pieces, and in this project, being a first year one, a colour picture was asked for as part of their plan - to be done for homework This was then put in their folders. The use of folders rather than exercise books seems sensible for a number of reasons, one being the size of paper that could be used could be much larger than if it had to fit into an exercise book. But more important, the use of a folder gives the idea of what is in that folder being rather more personal, something that one made oneself, than an exercise book, which is immediately associated with the school, classroom, and exercises/writing. A folder seems to give the work a less ’school flavour’ to it.
Once the initial planning had been checked and deemed to be satisfactory by one of the teachers, the students were free to get their instruments out and start to experiment and practice. The main theme in this project was that of movement, and how it could be represented musically. One way in which this could be shown is by using repeated themes; another way might be by the use of quicker, shorter notes.
PROJECT 2 CLOCK PIECES
This project begins with the teacher getting the class to write down as many examples of clocks and watches as they can think of. Usually, because of the large number of individual lists, a wide selection of clocks can be obtained. These clocks can then be divided into large, medium and small types. The reason for this is that large clocks (building clocks, grandfather clocks) produce low, slow sounds, and small clocks and watches faster, higher pitched sounds. The idea therefore is to draw attention to the wide variety of sounds, both in pitch and speed, produced by clocks and watches.
This project explores the concept of rhythm, and how different types of rhythm can be combined to produce an interesting piece of music. This project seems to be enjoyed greatly by the classes who worked on it. Apart from being a fairly simple project, the nature of it precludes one member of any group having a more dominant part to play. That is, it is a project in which everyone in the group plays a more or less equally important role. It is a good exercise for rhythm training, especially in maintaining a regular beat. Clocks and watches, one wound up, do not vary their speed. It is important to illustrate this in the project.
Each member of the group may have a different speed, but one that speed has been started, then it should continue in the same way. There is nothing to stop a group member from representing more than one clock however.
For example, if a group decided to begin their piece with the sound of a church clock - perhaps using a slow speed on the triangle - they could have that member change from the church clock to the rapid ticking of a watch - perhaps by hitting two bottles. They may decide to finish the piece as it started, with the church clock, and the triangle player could then revert to his original instrument and appropriate speed.
This project can create some very good pieces of music with practice, and it is in this project that practice is of great importance, because the correct and regular speeds have to be played; another reason why this seems to go down well is that most of the sounds produced do bear a close resemblance to the real-life sounds.
For example, two bottles, an inch apart, hit gently with the bamboo handle of the beater produce a sound almost exactly like a small clock ticking. Similarly, a triangle, especially the heavier kind, hit firmly with a wooden beater rather than a metal beater, does sound like a church bell.
Another sound that is very popular is the cuckoo clock, the sound of which can be produced either with a recorder, or a swanee flute - a whistle with a sliding piston inside it, producing a sliding sound. Although the project is concerned largely with rhythm, this does not mean that melody is ignored. Several types of clocks can be called ‘musical’ clocks. Big Ben is an example. The short melodies made by this type of clock can be effectively portrayed or imitated by using the glockenspiel, with its bell-like sounds, with hard headed beaters.
PROJECT 3 NUMBER PIECES
This is a fairly simple project to do, and is particularly well-suited for the less able groups to perform. The emphasis is less on a complex musical item, and more on a fluent and accurate performance of the piece they create.
The construction of the piece takes relatively little time; what does take time is the practice of the piece. This should become clear as the project is explained.
It is based on the idea of bell ringing, which uses a series of numbers. These numbers are then repeated in a different order. The ideal number in a group for this project is four, one number being assigned to one member of the group. That member then makes up a short musical theme or rhythm, which is repeated in the same form whenever his or her number occurs.
For example, a simple sequence of numbers might be as follows:
1 2 3 4
2 3 4 1
3 4 1 2
4 1 2 3
1 4 3 2
2 4 1 3
3 4 2 1
4 2 3 1
The sequence can be made more complicated in two ways: increase the number of permutations; and increase the number of digits to five. A further complexity can be made by getting each member of the group to play two parts - that is, make up sequences of six or eight numbers. The piece now can be very difficult to perform.
In the above series of numbers, to make it straightforward for younger groups, one person takes a number. They keep that number for the whole piece. As each number occurs the same number of times as the others, no one in the group feels he or she is being left out, or playing a less important role, something which has to be considered especially with groups containing less able pupils.
Number 1 might decide to use a triangle, number 2 a wooden block, number 3 a couple of bottles, and number 4 the bongos. Each member then works out a short rhythm if using non-pitched instruments, or perhaps a short melody, if using pitched instruments. The theme, whether rhythmic or melodic, should be short for two reasons: the repetitions have to be clear to the listener; more importantly, they have to be performed fluently. Long themes are difficult to play; therefore, the shorter the themes, the easier they are to perform Even making it this simple does not make the project too easy for most groups. A longer theme will make the piece appear to be too uneven when performed. Speed is not of paramount importance; fluency and accuracy are, and this project is a useful coordination exercise apart from its creativity and enjoyment.
In the example, number 1, the triangle, might decide to play one long beat, two short, followed by two long again.
In conventional notation - crotchet, 2 quavers, crotchet, crotchet
Number 2, the wooden block, might decide on two short beats
In conventional notation - two quavers
Number 3, the bottles might decide to play four short notes followed by one long beat, the short one being played on one bottle, the long one on another, of different pitch.
In conventional notation - 4 quavers, 1 crotchet
Number 4, the bongos, might want a slightly more complicated rhythm, using both drums, perhaps with a long beat, followed by four very short ones, then one long beat again, in turn followed by two long beats on the second drum.
In conventional notation - crotchet, 4 semiquavers, then 3 crotchets
When each member of the group has decided on his or her theme, the group can start to practice these together, following the sequence they have already written down.
One major advantage of this project is that it can be kept fairly simple, as in this example, or made quite complicated, which is useful for mixed-ability groups. In addition, once the idea of making up a sequence of numbers is understood, then the group can either make up their own sequence of numbers and work out another piece, or use the same sequence, but use different rhythmic and melodic theme to create a completely different piece. Even the instruments can be the same, although they may be changed around within the group, but the result will be very different.
It is a good project for both higher ability and enthusiastic children, who, once they have finished one piece can be left to work out another with little teacher supervision, but also for lower ability groups who may find some projects very demanding. This project is simple enough for them to do it, and do it well. It can be made as easy or as difficult as you want to.
PROJECT 4 MORSE CODE PIECES
This is another project which can be kept fairly simple, or made more complicated. As in the previous project, a good deal of freedom is given to the children to choose how they want to work - keeping it straightforward, or doing something more challenging. Again, as with the number pieces, one they have finished one piece, they can go on to create another, with little help from the teacher.
This project, as the title implies, uses the Morse code invented by Samuel Morse (1791-1872). This uses a system of dots and dashes to represent the different letters of the alphabet, plus the number 0 to 9. in the project the dots are represented by short sounds, the dashes by long sounds. Once the class has copied down the code, each group then decides what word, words or message they want to use.
Examples used in class frequently were such things as:
Names of children, short messages such as ‘I love you’, or ‘see you tomorrow’. In practice, almost anything can be used.
Whatever is chosen, the group then decide how they are going to divide the work up. Each member might play a particular letter or letters, or they might play one letter each until the word or message is finished. This type of decision is left entirely up to the group, rather than the teacher.
Each member of the group will then chose an instrument, although having said that, some groups have used two people on one instrument.
For example, two playing a xylophone, one the upper register, the other, the lower notes. They then look at the code they have copied down, and write their message/words in code. Then they can start to work out what they are going to play.
To take a simple example, the call sign SOS; in the code this is … --- …that is, three short sounds, followed by three long sounds, then the short sounds repeated.
This might be represented by three short hits on a triangle, then three hits, sounding longer, on a wooden block, followed by three hits again on the triangle. Needless to say, this is a very simple example, and would require little practice to get fluency in playing.
The longer the message, the more complicated the project becomes, and in particular, the greater the difficulty in playing the piece with accuracy.
Like the previous project (Number Pieces), one of the important aspects of Morse Code Pieces is the ability to perform well. The piece can be made more interesting musically by including in the instruments
used, one which can play different notes. This again can make the piece more complicated, and might be suggested for certain groups. Other less able groups might be encouraged to concentrate more on the rhythmic aspect of the work. That is, a less able group might use a triangle, a wooden block, side drum and bottles. Rhythmically, an interesting piece will be created; melodically, it might be less so. One difficulty has been removed. A more able group might be encouraged to use a xylophone with perhaps tow players, a cymbal, which requires some skill to play long and short notes one after another, plus a shaker or drum. Not only is the rhythmical aspect of the piece the same as the other group, but they have the added difficulty/problem of making the piece melodically interesting.
An example of how a longer word might work could be as follows:
The group chose (as several did) JUDGEMEADOW SCHOOL LEICESTER
Most groups decided that member 1 would play J, member 2 U, member 3D, member 4 G and so on. Each member of the group would make his or her own copy of the words, with the appropriate code written next to the letter. In order to make it easier for the individual members to read their own copy, I suggested that they mark whichever letters they are playing in a different colour from the others, or put an asterisk next to them – something that will make it clear which are THEIR letters, and which are the OTHER. Each copy might look like this:
(Here I have used three columns to save space. It is clearer for children to have one column, rather than them try to jump across the paper from one column to another.)
J .---
U ..-
D -..
G --.
E .
M --
E .
A .-
D -..
O ---
W .--
S …
C -.-. .
H ….
O ---
O ---
L .-..
L .-..
E .
I ..
C -.-.
E .
S …
T -
E .
R .-.
Assuming that there are four members in the group; each will play one instrument. Number 1 might play the triangle, 2 the bottles, 3 the wooden block and 4 the side drum. I have used non-pitched instruments to keep the explanation simple. A point of practical importance: the difference between long and short sounds has to be made very clear. From my experience with this project, this difference is not made distinct enough, and in some cases, not at all. Frequently, children seem to think that hitting an instrument more quietly makes the sound shorter - which in some ways it does - but the difference is not immediately apparent.
One way that sounds can be shortened is to muffle them, by using part of a finger or hand, or clothing.
Member 1 might decide to play short sounds on the triangle by touching the metal with a finger immediately after striking the instrument. The long sounds will be made in the normal unmuffled manner.
This project therefore, is useful for both learning to play in different ways on an instrument, as well as for learning to play a piece of music, as in Number Pieces, with fluency and accuracy. It is a suitable activity for mixed ability classes, as more able children will carry on making new pieces with little help from the teacher.
One way in which this can be done is to make every member of the group write their own message/words. In this way, there are at least four (in a group of four) separate pieces to work on. With the more able groups kept busy, and contented too, the teacher can spend more time with the less able groups, helping for example with playing an instrument with a child who thinks there is only one way to play it, or by suggesting more interesting ideas which could be used in the piece itself. In the same way as the Number Pieces, this project brings a lot of pleasure to the children, making it a rewarding time.
PROJECT 5 RIVER JOURNEYS
The aim of this project is to try to describe the various phases of a river journey, using musical ideas which should give the colour, feel, the movement of a river. The project can be introduced by a description of how a river grows, what happens from the start to the finish, where the river might go, who might be on the banks etc. This can be done, as in the other projects, by asking the class questions, getting them involved from the beginning.
A ‘typical’ journey might be as follows:
The river begins in the mountains, formed partly by the rain, maybe come out of a spring. The volume is small, but the movement fast; it’s cold and clear. The second stage id where the river broadens out slightly, flowing through forests and villages, or near roads and railways, before slowing down on the final leg and coming to the sea. Here, it moves much more sedately, it is much broader and deeper, before it loses itself in the estuary or just disappears into the distance. The ideas in this simple example (and this is just one possibility) can then be represented musically by the groups. This is one project where pictures or photographs can usefully be employed in the initial presentation pr discussion.
A useful aid in explaining this project to the class, illustrating how music can represent pictures, and in this case, a river, is to play the class, talking the class through the various sections of the piece. If there are any orchestral players in the class, the symphonic poem could be briefly mentioned, with a couple of examples and simple explanation.
To take the example above, possible ways of doing this might be as follows: (All the examples used have actually been created in school in various groups.)
The start of the river in the mountains; rain is falling and the water moves quickly. It is cold. The ideas of rain, the cold, quick movement can be exploited: metallic instruments are good for this. Quick movement, small volume of water can be suggested by light, soft metallic sounds on the triangle/glockenspiel/bells. The rain is conjured up using the cymbal with wire brush/bamboo handle of beater, hitting the cymbal in a light and quick way.
The middle section of the river can be given distinctive features. A forest could be suggested by the wind in the trees. This might be done with a recorder/whistle, or by using a shaker. A railway was very popular with the movement and sound of the train suggested by a drum being stroked in circular way with a wire beater, with a four beat rhythm, the first beat being accented. That is, a ONE two three four piston-engine train type of sound. A church can be suggested by the sound of bells, using either the small hand bells, or the triangle.
The idea of the river might be suggested by the use of a musical theme. This theme, or short melody, might be used in the beginning to show the rapid movement of the river in the mountains. As mentioned earlier, it would probably use higher notes to give the idea of height and size. To show the river at various stages of its course, the same theme could be used in different ways. The central section of the river is slower and larger than the source. The music should reflect this, by becoming slower. This represents the change in speed, but not the size. This might be done by playing the instrument louder, and using lower notes. Lower notes can give the idea of depth and width.
Another way might be to use another instrument, such as the xylophone which has a lower and drier sound. The glockenspiel therefore might be used for the upper reaches of the river, but the xylophone for the lower, broader, slower parts.
To introduce extra variety into the piece, the river might go over a waterfall, or rapids, which would give the group the chance to use loud, crashing sounds, perhaps with drums and cymbals.
The final part of a river journey is going to be slower. Pictures of an estuary might be shown to the class by the teacher. Ideas of a quiet, rustic nature might be suggested, with birds, cows, other wildlife being suggested. The river might flow away into the distance, or it may finish going through a city, with the opposite images of noise, rushing about, factories, cars etc.
River Pieces is therefore a particularly good project for creative music, as the possibilities are almost unlimited, in that there are so many aspects of a river to explore before any musical ideas are worked out. It provides a good contrast to the two previous pieces, which are fairly short and simple. Being more complicated, it can give a group a great deal of work to do, as each member can quite easily be doing two or even three things during the piece, on different occasions.
For example, the cymbal might be used for the rain at the beginning of the piece, and also for the rapids in the middle of the journey.
PROJECT 6 THE SEA
This project examines both the types of sound one hears by the sea, and the type of movement associated with the sea. Like earlier projects, it can be introduced by the teacher in the form of a question and answer session, to try to get the children to give their ideas and impressions of the sea, rather than have the teacher tell them what they should be looking for. It is important in creative music not to lose sight of the fact that it is the children who are creating something, not the teacher. As with the other projects, there is no ‘one way’ of making the piece. What might emerge in the end may well be different to what the teacher or even the group had in mind in the beginning, and there is nothing wrong with that, so long as it falls into the general big picture. As with the other projects, it is the creativity of the children that is the key factor, the most important element in this type of work. It is quite possible, that for much of the class time, the teacher keeps quiet. This is my own experience.
Initial ideas which may be discussed at the beginning of the project by the teacher and class may include the different types of movement of the sea – near land, next to the beach, crashing against the rocks, a still, windless sea without movement, the waves etc. Other things which influence the sound and movement of the sea can also be included, such as the wind and the rain. These can also be portrayed in sound in the piece.
In order to show the way in which music can illustrate some of these things, one could play La Mer/Debussy, the teacher talking the piece through.
One way of illustrating a type of movement in music is to use a short theme in different ways. One can change the tempo, repeat the theme, change the dynamics, change the pitch etc.
The piece might tart off with the gentle movement of the sea being represented by a short, quiet theme on one of the melodic instruments. In this example, the upper register of the glockenspiel might not be used because this tends to give the idea of something short, sharp and light, inappropriate for a unit as large as the sea. The teacher might suggest the lower register of the glockenspiel or the xylophone, with its broader sounding notes. If, however, a child might suggest that the glockenspiel here is representing flying fish jumping out of the water, or sea birds pecking at something on the surface, or a light drizzle, that, to me, would be quite acceptable. It is their idea, their creativity, their imagination; so why not use it?
Rain starts to fall, and a storm blows up. This might be done using bottles to represent the rain hitting the surface of the water, followed by soft rolls on the cymbal, or a shaker, to give the idea of the wind blowing. Thunder and lightning follow, using perhaps rolls on the bass drum to illustrate the thunder, and short, hard hits on the cymbal making the cracking noise of lightning. The storm blows away, the instruments fade, and the sea is calm once again, with the return of the original theme.
Another piece of music created around the idea of the sea might try to illustrate the way in which the sea moves towards the land. One might consider the changes in sound as the sea comes onto the beach, with the waves rolling over the sand making a hissing noise, the sand and small stones being moved around by the water, and the sea moving back away from the land. This could be suggested by the use of a cymbal with a soft beater making a quiet roll to give the idea of the waves turning over; the sound of the sand and stones can be done effectively and realistically with a shaker (which might even have small stones inside it) which is moved upside down and back, giving the hissing sound heard along the coast.
The return of the water to the sea can be shown by the theme already in use, and maybe turning it around, too.
Another aspect of this piece might be to look at the sort of sounds produced when a rough sea hits against a cliff or rocks. The movement of the sea will be more violent, and this can be reflected in the music. The crash of the waves against the rocks might be done with drum and cymbal, to portray the boom of the hitting water, and the softer sounds of the spray hitting the land.
Some groups have used other ideas such as the sound of a ship, or a church bell in a coastal village, or the sound of seabirds. This, however, is really getting rather too far away from the main idea of this piece, which is to look at the type of sounds the sea makes, rather than sounds made by things on or near the sea, and the types of movement the sea might make in a different place and a different time.
WRITING A SCORE
The writing of scores serves two main purposes; firstly, it is a written record of the piece that the students have just made up. It is something they can keep in their school portfolio; secondly, it enables either the same group or another group to play the piece again with some degree of accuracy at a later date. Another, though perhaps less important reason for writing a score, but a useful and interesting one, particularly for the younger children, is the creation of an attractive piece of art work. Once again, if the children enjoy doing it, then that should be good reason.
A score shows two main things: a list of the instruments used in that piece, and some kind of representation of how these instruments are used in playing the piece.
The list of instruments is fairly straightforward. The instruments used are listed on the left-hand side of the score, as in an orchestral score. Depending on the age of the group in question, these lists can be either simple or complex. For younger children, the instruments can be drawn and coloured as well as written, thereby helping them to learn the names of the instruments as well as giving some practice in writing and spelling. (The most common mistake which occurred time and again was ‘symbol’ rather than ‘cymbal’.) Younger groups can also colour in these mini-pictures if they so wish. The name of the player who uses the instrument can be written under the name and picture of the instrument. For older children, the name of the instrument used will probably be sufficient, but younger children seem to like the idea of drawing, colouring, and putting their name next to their instrument.
The greater part of the score is taken up with notation; that is, what is to be played, and how. This can be made as simple or as complex as required. For younger groups, time can be dispensed with; that is, there is no marking for a time-frame on the score. Perhaps a simple indication will be written on the score.
For example, they might write - ‘count 5 for the cymbal, count 10 for the triangle’, and so on.
The speed of the piece naturally varies with the speed at which they will count. If one wanted a more complex score, then times could be written in, maybe at the top of the score. For example, the length of the score could be divided into 5 second sections. This would give the piece a fairly tight overall time-frame within which to work.
The score so far consists of the title at the top, a list of instruments down the left-hand side, and some kind of graphic representation of how these instruments are to be played. This part of the score takes up the largest amount of space on the paper, and needs to be worked out carefully. However, as in all parts of creative music, there are different ways of doing this, and more than one suitable way of showing the same thing. Again, as throughout creative music, the teacher can suggest certain ways of doing this, but there is no one correct way. This reflects one of the important aspects of creative music - that it is an exploration of sound, and as in all art/creative forms, every individual will have a different response to a particular stimulus.
One of the most striking ways a score can come alive, especially for children, is through the use of colour. When score writing is introduced to a class, this is one of the things that can be mentioned. The idea is to represent certain instruments with colours that reflect the ‘colour’ of that instrument. For example, wooden instruments would be in brown, metallic instruments in yellow, bass instruments in blue or black, representing respectively the ‘colour’ of a wooden block or xylophone (flat, dry, natural sound), the bright, metallic and hard sound of the triangle or cymbal, and the darker, heavier sound of the bass drum. This idea of using different colours for different instrument, in addition to making a colourful and interesting score, also helps young children to sense and feel various sounds.
Whilst the colour of the instrument helps to set the tone of the piece, it does not tell a performer how or when to use that instrument. This is done by using a variety of graphic symbols, written opposite the name of the instrument; that is, moving from left to right in the same way as written orchestral music does. (It is becoming clear that, as I said in the introduction, a knowledge of written ‘classical’ music, whilst not essential for the teacher, is very useful and helpful.) For the moment, the time factor will be ignored, to be mentioned at a later stage.
When the basic score outline has been written down (that is, the title, the instruments, and the section lines drawn in - the dividing lines between each instrument), the next thing to decide is how to represent how the instrument is to be played. This means two basics of music: pitch, and rhythm.
Both these terms will have to be explained to the class before they start on any project at all, and score writing comes after they have done at least one project. They therefore are terms which they are familiar with. Pitch is basically described as the ‘level’ of the notes played – high, medium, or low notes. Rhythm is explained as the speed of the music and the individual notes in that music. These are slightly simplistic explanations, and deliberately so. Notes will be fast, medium, or slow, single, or in groups. Whilst not actually using the word dynamics, explanations will be given relating to how quiet or loud the instruments have to be played. Dynamic markings as in orchestral music - cresc, dim, accent, etc - would not be used. Unless there is someone in the group who plays an orchestral instrument, this seems to be complicating the score unnecessarily.
In writing down the pitch of the instruments that can play a variety of notes - glockenspiel, metallaphone, chimes bars, xylophone, and perhaps the recorder - there are different way in which to express this. The simplest way is to write down the notes which are of high pitch in the top area of the section, and the lower notes in the bottom area of the section. This, of course, only gives the approximate pitch of the notes required, and does not specify one or more particular notes.
If a particular note, or sequence of notes, is required to be written exactly, then the names of the notes can be written in the order needed. For younger children, it is often the case that they are not interested in playing an exact order of notes, but rather that a group of notes in no fixed order will suffice. The degree to which the exact notation on the score is required is left up to the writer.
Dynamics likewise can be very easily written down. One way of doing this is to make the louder sounds look louder on paper, i.e. to make them larger and heavier, by making, for example, dots bigger and filled in with coloured pencils. A soft sound might, in contrast, use a small dot or other mark only lightly coloured. If more exact instructions are needed, then the degree of loudness or softness can be written in on the score.
For example, if the bass drum needed to be hit hard for four beats, then along the bass drum section on the score might be four large heavy marks with possibly the instruction 'hard’ written under them.
Both the pitch and dynamic markings are straightforward, perhaps over-simplistically so. However, the basis of a good score is that it is clear to other people as well as the writer, and can be looked at several months later and the piece performed with some semblance of accuracy. Again, this is one of the reasons for scores in orchestral music.
The method of writing down the rhythm is slightly more complicated as this covers two aspects of performance - the speed at which certain things are to be played, and the number of times they are to be played. To take the latter first, this presents fewer problems as simple marks can be used to represent individual ‘hits’. This works well until the other factor of rhythm is needed. It is easy enough to play x number of dots or marks - some children preferred dashes, commas, etc - the actual graphic symbol is unimportant. Dots were preferred largely because of their economy in usage, i.e. you can write in dots more easily, particularly in a small space - until they need to be played in a particular order - the rhythm.
To do this accurately, some form of notation similar to that used in orchestral scores is needed, and this for the purposes of creative music is too complicated. It should be remembered that the majority of children engaged in creative music do not, and will not, play any orchestral instrument. Therefore, to start to use a form of notation similar to the traditional type would be getting away from one of the important elements in creative music, namely, its creativity and child-centred activity. It is therefore necessary to use a type of notation which, although not completely accurate, gives an approximate idea of what is required. There are many different ways in which to give the idea of a rhythm, and all are valid if they enable the performer to read his or her score with some degree of accuracy.
One way is to arrange the dots closely together for a quick rhythm, and spaced further apart for a slower beat. So a score which had perhaps
…………. . . . could be played as a series of short, fast notes, followed by three long notes. It is not an exact way of showing a rhythm. It is not meant to be.
Another way of showing rhythm and speed is to have a series of inverted V’s joined together. Closer together would mean a fast speed, and spaced further apart, a slower speed. The speed is much easier to notate than the rhythm. For younger children, the idea of complex rhythm patterns does not occur. What rhythms they do use are simple, and can be written fairly accurately in the above ways.
The bottom of the score must have a key. This tells what each symbol on that score means. In addition to the musical information it gives, it seems also to be another way of getting children to think about hat they have done, and to explain why. Once a particular form had bee decided upon, and suitable graphic symbols used, the key can be written in, simply explaining what each symbol on the score means, and how it should be played.
SUMMARY
Score writing for a creative music project serves several purposes. It introduces the idea of scores in the wider sense to children, useful to those in the group with orchestral experience, or likely to be getting it. It enables all the group to make an individual contribution to the project, as distinct from a verbal and possibly not-very-considerable one. It also gives a certain amount of expressive writing and colouring - which seems particularly well-suited to younger children - to every member of the group.
A good score therefore will have all the following on:
A title, a key, a list of the various instruments used, by whom, and an indication of various degrees of complexity, (depending on the age range and ability of the group concerned), of the pitch, dynamics and speed/rhythm required for performance.
PGCE course 1980-1981
School of Education
Leicester University
Course Tutor
Mr Glyn Loosmore BA LLB MM Croix de Guerre
DISSERTATION
CREATIVE MUSIC IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS
CONTENTS
1 Introduction
2 Bibliography
3 List of projects
4 List of instruments
5 General description of projects
5.1 Introduction by the teacher5.2 Experimenting with, and practising the project
5.3 recording the pieces/discussing the pieces
6 Project 1 Fairground piece
7 Project 2 clock piece
8 Project 3 number piece
9 Project 4 Morse Code piece
10 Project 5 river piece
11 Project 6 the sea
12 Writing a score
BIBLIOGRAPHY
1 A Short History of Western Music Arthur Jacobs
2 The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Music Michael Kennedy (ed)
3 Sound and Silence
classroom projects in creative music John Paynter and Ian Aston
4 Pop Music in Schools Ed Vulliamy and Ed Lee
5 Twentieth Century Music Peter Yates
6 Experiments in Sound Gertrud Meyer-Denkmann
7 Projects in Music Books 1, 2 and 4 Ian Lawrence
8 Advanced Projects in Music Ian Lawrence
CREATIVE MUSIC IN SECONDARY SCHOOLS
INTRODUCTION
Creative music is the term used to describe the music which is thought up, experimented with, and performed by the children. It is a striking contrast to the kind of music usually associated with schools. Traditional music was, and is, very much a teacher centred activity, frequently following one or other of a limited number of options – e.g. the singing lesson, listen to a record of a piece of music, or talking about the life of a famous composer, and so on.
Creative music, on the other hand, is much more a child centred or learner centred activity. The teacher acts more like a central advisor rather than the leader of the class. Creative music is the activity where the children make and perform their own music, using (for younger groups) ideas suggested by the teacher. It is therefore an activity requiring full and active participation from every individual in the class. It is therefore essentially an experimental situation. It is not necessary for the children to be able to read conventional musical notation, although for certain activities, like making a score, a knowledge of a conventional score will help. Neither is it necessary for children to be able to sing or play any of the standard orchestral instruments. Again, if they can, an extra dimension can be used in their music. I have included a list of the instruments used in projects I have worked on. Most of these are non-pitched instrument - that is, they do not play a particular note – and the ones that are, such as the glockenspiel and the chime bars, have the note written on the metal bar.
The projects described here together with most of the information in the dissertation came from my teaching practice in Judgemeadow School, Leicester. All I have learned about creative music in schools had come from Mr John Broadhurst and Ms Helen Reece of the music department there. Without their very considerable help and cooperation, any sort of dissertation along these lines would have been impossible to write.
I would also like to thank my PGCE tutor, Mr Glyn Loosmore, for the constant interest and encouragement shown to me throughout the course in general, and with the music in particular.
PROJECTS DONE AT JUDGEMEADOW SCHOOL, LEICESTER 1980-1981
Ist Year
Machines
Fairgrounds
Clocks
Numbers
Morse Code
Patterns
Constellations
The Sea
2nd Year
Journeys (of anything)
Space
River Journeys
Reflections
Metamorphosis
Echoes
The Sea
Not all these projects will be completed in this order by every class. They give an idea of what has been done, and what could be done, in the first two years of secondary school. Of the projects listed here, only two others have I had no experience of - constellations and reflections.
Constellations involves the group choosing a well-known constellation, drawing its shape and any animal or being associated with it, and making a piece of music based on this. Reflections looks at the way objects are reflected – back-to-front and upside-down, and apiece of music is created using these ideas.
If possible, it is a good idea to play pieces of music on record or tape which illustrate the type of idea that the class is exploring.
For example, there are numerous space films which have had their soundtracks recorded: Star Wars, Battlestar Galactica. For machines: Pacific 231 (Honneger); for fairground pieces: Fourth of July (Ives), Parade (Satie) and Circus Polka (Stravinsky).
INSTRUMENTS USED IN MUSIC PROJECTS
If any pupil was able to play an orchestral instrument, and wished to do so in a particular project, then they were free to do so. The actual times this happened were few and far between as most of the children did not play an instrument.
The instruments used were largely percussive.
Tuned instruments, but with the notes written on the keys.
Glockenspiel
Chime bars
Xylophone
Metallaphone
Non tuned instruments
Bass drum
Side drum
Bongos
Temple blocks
Triangle
Wooden block
High hat cymbal
Crash cymbal
Finger bells
Shakers (home made from containers with sand/peas in them)
Whistle
Bottle
Quiro
Beaters – three types are used 1 hard eg standard drum stick
2 soft eg felt head stick
3 wire brush
PROJECTS
The project is the term given to the particular piece of work undertaken by the children. All projects follow the same basic outline. This serves two purposes; first, it is a sensible and logical way of organising a class. Second, it gives the children a broad framework to work in, as well as some kind of continuity in their musical appreciation and training. That is, although each project in terms of subject material is very different, the broad guidelines enable a class, once they have completed one project, to tackle another without any feeling of being totally lost. The project itself necessitates both the whole class as well as group work, the latter being the greater part of the project – some 80-90% of the project being done in this way. The class comes together as a whole at the beginning of the project, and at the end. The outline of a project is as follows:
1 Introduction to the project
This is done by the teacher or teachers. (In Judgemeadow School two and sometimes three teachers were in the class at the same time. This is especially useful when a large amount of group work is taking place, not only in terms of class/group control, but also in the amount of time given to each group. The system seemed to work extremely well.)
A particular topic will be introduced. This takes the form of the teacher informing the whole class about the project, and then getting them to elaborate on this by asking questions, suggestions, ideas, etc. Lists, diagrams, and any other relevant material can be put on the blackboard to illustrate the project. (This will become clearer later during descriptions of particular projects.)
The class is then divided into groups for the next stage of the project. This division usually takes the form of those children sharing with their friends as much as possible. If they are to work in small groups, then the greater the cooperation between members of that group, the better. Frequently, if a group has worked well with one project, they then prefer to keep to the same members for subsequent projects. Groups usually have four members - there being 7 to 9 groups per class. This does not have to be rigidly adhered to, although it makes a good balance for instrumental sound production. Groups that I have worked with have ranged in size from 2 to 7. At Judgemeadow School, music was allocated one double period per week - 70 minutes - for years 1 and 2. Thereafter, music becomes one of the options.
2 Planning the project
After the project has been introduced, the class divide into groups to plan their own piece. This is done in their folders, into which are put all work associated with the projects. Planning requires them to write down which instruments they are going to use, and how. Whilst a detailed description of the use of the instrument is not required at the stage, some idea of how and why they are going to use a particular instrument is needed to prevent an instrument being taken without prior thought as to what it is suitable for.
For example, in the project Clock Pieces, it would not be suitable to use the bass drum by hitting it hard and quickly. Similarly, to give the idea of noise, movement and variety of colour in a fairground, gentle, occasional hits on a triangle might not be the best way to show this. It is therefore not only the type of instrument that has to be considered - the type of sounds it is capable of making - but also the way in which it can be used.
For example, cymbals are often associated with loud crashing sounds; but by reversing the beater - i.e. hitting the cymbal with the light bamboo handle, or stroking it with a bow, or tapping it with fingers - the range of sounds produced can be extended to produce those far removed from the standard, more usual sound that one is accustomed to hear.
Cage in Prepared Piano with its wood, rubber, metal, glass etc muted strings does much the same thought of thing. Birtwhistle, Berio and Xenakis have also used instruments to produce different sounds.
The planning of the pieces includes a description of what each instrument is supposed to represent, that is, trying to build up a picture of the overall frame of their piece. For example, in River Pieces, a group might choose to use a triangle for the start of the river, with its light, cold and quick sound; a cymbal and drum - continual movement, like a roll - maybe to illustrate rapids; bottles and shakers to illustrate the movement of the water over the sand and stones on the bottom of the river.
Planning may also take the form of consulting with the teacher as to whether perhaps a particular instrument is suitable for a special sound, or perhaps this could be used for this purpose. Once they have finished their planning, they draw out their plan in the form of a picture – which for younger children can be coloured. The idea of creating a picture in music is helped by creating a picture in graphic form. This helps the group to remember what their general idea is. Not every project is suited to picture-drawing.
For example, Clock Pieces, reflections might be done with a picture. Fairground Pieces, Rivers, Constellations are usefully assisted in with a picture.
3 Experimenting with, and practising the piece
This, the third part of the project, takes up the greatest time in proportion to the total project. Some projects vary in length, partly due to the simplicity of the work involved, or conversely, its complexity; partly too, to the ability of the group. To give two examples, one 1st year group halfway through the third term were starting their third project; another first year group were doing their sixth.
Having been divided into groups, the children then take whatever instruments they require. (A list of instruments is included separately on another sheet.)
Occasionally, one of the group who may be a member of the school orchestra might decide to use their own instrument for a particular piece.
For example, one girl used her violin, played glissando, to represent the ghost train in her Fairground Piece.
This part of the project, more than anywhere else, requires a child-centred creative ability to be used. The job of the teachers is to monitor what is going on, to give advice if it is asked for, to listen to a preliminary play-through, perhaps make suggestions if things seem to be grinding to a halt.
Physically, the groups are spread out over the music room and into surroundings areas if any are available. The larger and more divided up the music area of a school, the better. By divided up, I mean the provision of practice rooms with their own doors, and with enough space in them for four or five children to play their instruments in some degree of comfort. This is a sensible and practical arrangement for obvious reasons – to have several groups playing mainly percussion instruments in a confined area, each member of each group doing his or her own thing, would result in aural chaos.
During this practice time, there is plenty of opportunity for experiment. I have found that experimenting with the instruments is less likely to be done unless the teacher shows how it can be done.
For example, if they choose a drum, then this will be hit with the usual end of the beater; there is frequently no use of any other method of sound production. There are a number of other methods of hitting a percussion instrument - fingers, reverse stick, different heads, metal/wooden side of the drum, different places on the drum skin etc. But generally, the familiar way will be used by children automatically.
(A list of different methods of sound production has been included separately.)
Two things may happen during this practice and experimental session: the instruments may be changed; or an individual may swop his or her instrument with that of another member of the group. The latter often seems to happen because of a sudden preference for another instrument. In particular, noisy and disruptive members of certain groups generally tend to choose the drums to play, rather than one of the quieter instruments, regardless of the type of project they are doing.
For example, certain children will decide that the best way to show the colour and feel of a watch, in Clock Pieces, might be to use the bass drum.
The change of instruments for part of the group is an admission that the planning they have done previously has gone wrong, possibly because they have not been careful enough, although sometime an idea comes up in rehearsing the piece, and the group decide that a certain instrument is not quite right.
As in all aspects of creative music, there is flexibility in the approach to this, and they are permitted to change their instruments, although with teacher permission and suitable comments or criticism.
For example, a group that have reason for changing their instrument, and have thought carefully about what they are doing, and why, can be commended for their thinking. A group that changes without a particular reason may be sent back to re-plan their piece on paper.
This third section of the project goes on until the majority of the class decide that they are ready to record, or until the teacher decides that enough time has been spent on the project, and nothing more can be gained from continuing the work
4 Recording the pieces and discussing them
This section is usually about a period long, or with a big class, may run into two.
The class re-assemble and each group take it in turn to come out to the front and perform their piece into the recorder. Whilst recording is taking place, it is essential that the rest of the class are quiet, all instruments are on the floor, and all beaters out of hands. The group who are playing come out to the front of the class with their instrument. The physical layout is very important during recording. Most schools are equipped with tape recorders of less than professional recording ability. The reproduction is unlikely to be of the highest quality. Therefore, to get as good a recording as possible, some care has to be taken. The instrument layout is the first thing. The louder instruments generally go further back, the quieter ones near the microphone. However, care must be taken to find out from the group how loud an instrument is going to be played.
For example, a glockenspiel played firmly too close to the microphone may well distort the sound, whilst a cymbal played softly, if placed at the back of the group, may well barely be heard on the tape.
Nothing will be worse for a group member to feel that their contribution was of little value because he or she could not hear himself or herself on the tape. These are small practical points to mention, but I feel very important. Another thing to watch for is one player turning their back on the microphone, masking the sound, or one other members of the group. I have always tried to get a group to watch each other, by facing inwards slightly whilst they are playing. Few string quartets would play in a straight line.
Each group introduces their own piece, either through a spokesman, or individually. Apart from the organisational value of the tape for future listening, it gives the group the firm idea that THEY are talking about THEIR piece.
When a group has finished recording, they immediately return their instruments and beaters to the storeroom or boxes. Whilst they are doing this, the next group comes out and gets ready to record. The reasons for this are obvious: less time is wasted, as two activities are being carried on at the same time; fewer instruments and beaters in the room during the remainder of the recording mean less chance of disturbance; the group again get further responsibility for storing their instruments correctly and in a tidy way. This system is helped by the presence of two teachers in the room, one to do the recording and organising related to the activity, the other to mark the piece and to make sure the instruments go back in the correct place and are not left around. With the number of children involved, the value of the instruments, the cost of the tape recorder, and the different groups, good organisation is essential.
When every group has been put on tape, a few of the class go round to make sure nothing has been left out, particularly beaters. It is a sensible move for one of the teachers to check this afterwards.
A practical point of importance is to write on both the tape and the box the class year, group number, project title, and if possible, the counter number where each piece begins and finishes. The next and final part of the project is a form of simple musical appreciation and criticism. The class as a whole listen to their recordings. First, the group who made the recording are asked for their comments. Apart from the inevitable smart answers from a few, the majority of comments, criticism and suggestions are sensible and mature. The role of the teacher here is important, as he or she help the discussion along. A question used frequently to begin the session is ‘Do you think that piece gave the idea of…’? ‘If so, why’? Or the converse.
This part of the project is designed to encourage both critical and careful listening to music, which can later be extended to orchestral works, particularly those which aim to do the same as the projects - create a picture, for example Gershwin An American in Paris, Mendelssohn The Hebrides, Tchaikovsky 1812 Overture etc. These works might be used to introduce certain projects.
Summary
Each project is a self-contained work activity, although they all follow the same basic framework. The division of the project into four main sections helps to give the children some sense of continuity with their work in the music lesson. Each part of the project serves a particular purpose with the overall aim being to stimulate young children’s awareness of different types of sound through their own music, and to develop a sense of musical analysis and appreciation.
PROJECT 1 FAIRGROUND PIECES
(This was the second project that various groups had tackled, the first being Machine Pieces. They therefore had some experience of making ‘machine music’. It was the first project that I was involved in.)
This project started with the teacher asking questions about a fairground. These were along the lines of ‘Who has been to a fairground?’, ‘What sort of things can you find there?’, ‘What sort of colours/sounds/ smells/movement are there? – and so on. The idea is to get the children to start thinking in their own minds of a fairground they have been to. (One of the reasons that this title was chosen was that most of the class had been to one. There was little teacher talk of what one finds in a fairground, but more child-suggestion. (Other projects may have to be explained because the subject matter may be less familiar, or to complex for the children to cover all aspects of it.)
A general picture of a fairground would gradually be built up. Basic general impressions would include such things as: machines - big, noisy, circular movement; lights - flashing, colours; stalls - rifles, coconuts; people - movement, bustle, talking. These few suggestions all give the idea of some kind of movement, which is one of the main features of this project. The music they had to make had to reflect this idea.
The next thing they had to do was to get down to planning their pieces, and in this project, being a first year one, a colour picture was asked for as part of their plan - to be done for homework This was then put in their folders. The use of folders rather than exercise books seems sensible for a number of reasons, one being the size of paper that could be used could be much larger than if it had to fit into an exercise book. But more important, the use of a folder gives the idea of what is in that folder being rather more personal, something that one made oneself, than an exercise book, which is immediately associated with the school, classroom, and exercises/writing. A folder seems to give the work a less ’school flavour’ to it.
Once the initial planning had been checked and deemed to be satisfactory by one of the teachers, the students were free to get their instruments out and start to experiment and practice. The main theme in this project was that of movement, and how it could be represented musically. One way in which this could be shown is by using repeated themes; another way might be by the use of quicker, shorter notes.
PROJECT 2 CLOCK PIECES
This project begins with the teacher getting the class to write down as many examples of clocks and watches as they can think of. Usually, because of the large number of individual lists, a wide selection of clocks can be obtained. These clocks can then be divided into large, medium and small types. The reason for this is that large clocks (building clocks, grandfather clocks) produce low, slow sounds, and small clocks and watches faster, higher pitched sounds. The idea therefore is to draw attention to the wide variety of sounds, both in pitch and speed, produced by clocks and watches.
This project explores the concept of rhythm, and how different types of rhythm can be combined to produce an interesting piece of music. This project seems to be enjoyed greatly by the classes who worked on it. Apart from being a fairly simple project, the nature of it precludes one member of any group having a more dominant part to play. That is, it is a project in which everyone in the group plays a more or less equally important role. It is a good exercise for rhythm training, especially in maintaining a regular beat. Clocks and watches, one wound up, do not vary their speed. It is important to illustrate this in the project.
Each member of the group may have a different speed, but one that speed has been started, then it should continue in the same way. There is nothing to stop a group member from representing more than one clock however.
For example, if a group decided to begin their piece with the sound of a church clock - perhaps using a slow speed on the triangle - they could have that member change from the church clock to the rapid ticking of a watch - perhaps by hitting two bottles. They may decide to finish the piece as it started, with the church clock, and the triangle player could then revert to his original instrument and appropriate speed.
This project can create some very good pieces of music with practice, and it is in this project that practice is of great importance, because the correct and regular speeds have to be played; another reason why this seems to go down well is that most of the sounds produced do bear a close resemblance to the real-life sounds.
For example, two bottles, an inch apart, hit gently with the bamboo handle of the beater produce a sound almost exactly like a small clock ticking. Similarly, a triangle, especially the heavier kind, hit firmly with a wooden beater rather than a metal beater, does sound like a church bell.
Another sound that is very popular is the cuckoo clock, the sound of which can be produced either with a recorder, or a swanee flute - a whistle with a sliding piston inside it, producing a sliding sound. Although the project is concerned largely with rhythm, this does not mean that melody is ignored. Several types of clocks can be called ‘musical’ clocks. Big Ben is an example. The short melodies made by this type of clock can be effectively portrayed or imitated by using the glockenspiel, with its bell-like sounds, with hard headed beaters.
PROJECT 3 NUMBER PIECES
This is a fairly simple project to do, and is particularly well-suited for the less able groups to perform. The emphasis is less on a complex musical item, and more on a fluent and accurate performance of the piece they create.
The construction of the piece takes relatively little time; what does take time is the practice of the piece. This should become clear as the project is explained.
It is based on the idea of bell ringing, which uses a series of numbers. These numbers are then repeated in a different order. The ideal number in a group for this project is four, one number being assigned to one member of the group. That member then makes up a short musical theme or rhythm, which is repeated in the same form whenever his or her number occurs.
For example, a simple sequence of numbers might be as follows:
1 2 3 4
2 3 4 1
3 4 1 2
4 1 2 3
1 4 3 2
2 4 1 3
3 4 2 1
4 2 3 1
The sequence can be made more complicated in two ways: increase the number of permutations; and increase the number of digits to five. A further complexity can be made by getting each member of the group to play two parts - that is, make up sequences of six or eight numbers. The piece now can be very difficult to perform.
In the above series of numbers, to make it straightforward for younger groups, one person takes a number. They keep that number for the whole piece. As each number occurs the same number of times as the others, no one in the group feels he or she is being left out, or playing a less important role, something which has to be considered especially with groups containing less able pupils.
Number 1 might decide to use a triangle, number 2 a wooden block, number 3 a couple of bottles, and number 4 the bongos. Each member then works out a short rhythm if using non-pitched instruments, or perhaps a short melody, if using pitched instruments. The theme, whether rhythmic or melodic, should be short for two reasons: the repetitions have to be clear to the listener; more importantly, they have to be performed fluently. Long themes are difficult to play; therefore, the shorter the themes, the easier they are to perform Even making it this simple does not make the project too easy for most groups. A longer theme will make the piece appear to be too uneven when performed. Speed is not of paramount importance; fluency and accuracy are, and this project is a useful coordination exercise apart from its creativity and enjoyment.
In the example, number 1, the triangle, might decide to play one long beat, two short, followed by two long again.
In conventional notation - crotchet, 2 quavers, crotchet, crotchet
Number 2, the wooden block, might decide on two short beats
In conventional notation - two quavers
Number 3, the bottles might decide to play four short notes followed by one long beat, the short one being played on one bottle, the long one on another, of different pitch.
In conventional notation - 4 quavers, 1 crotchet
Number 4, the bongos, might want a slightly more complicated rhythm, using both drums, perhaps with a long beat, followed by four very short ones, then one long beat again, in turn followed by two long beats on the second drum.
In conventional notation - crotchet, 4 semiquavers, then 3 crotchets
When each member of the group has decided on his or her theme, the group can start to practice these together, following the sequence they have already written down.
One major advantage of this project is that it can be kept fairly simple, as in this example, or made quite complicated, which is useful for mixed-ability groups. In addition, once the idea of making up a sequence of numbers is understood, then the group can either make up their own sequence of numbers and work out another piece, or use the same sequence, but use different rhythmic and melodic theme to create a completely different piece. Even the instruments can be the same, although they may be changed around within the group, but the result will be very different.
It is a good project for both higher ability and enthusiastic children, who, once they have finished one piece can be left to work out another with little teacher supervision, but also for lower ability groups who may find some projects very demanding. This project is simple enough for them to do it, and do it well. It can be made as easy or as difficult as you want to.
PROJECT 4 MORSE CODE PIECES
This is another project which can be kept fairly simple, or made more complicated. As in the previous project, a good deal of freedom is given to the children to choose how they want to work - keeping it straightforward, or doing something more challenging. Again, as with the number pieces, one they have finished one piece, they can go on to create another, with little help from the teacher.
This project, as the title implies, uses the Morse code invented by Samuel Morse (1791-1872). This uses a system of dots and dashes to represent the different letters of the alphabet, plus the number 0 to 9. in the project the dots are represented by short sounds, the dashes by long sounds. Once the class has copied down the code, each group then decides what word, words or message they want to use.
Examples used in class frequently were such things as:
Names of children, short messages such as ‘I love you’, or ‘see you tomorrow’. In practice, almost anything can be used.
Whatever is chosen, the group then decide how they are going to divide the work up. Each member might play a particular letter or letters, or they might play one letter each until the word or message is finished. This type of decision is left entirely up to the group, rather than the teacher.
Each member of the group will then chose an instrument, although having said that, some groups have used two people on one instrument.
For example, two playing a xylophone, one the upper register, the other, the lower notes. They then look at the code they have copied down, and write their message/words in code. Then they can start to work out what they are going to play.
To take a simple example, the call sign SOS; in the code this is … --- …that is, three short sounds, followed by three long sounds, then the short sounds repeated.
This might be represented by three short hits on a triangle, then three hits, sounding longer, on a wooden block, followed by three hits again on the triangle. Needless to say, this is a very simple example, and would require little practice to get fluency in playing.
The longer the message, the more complicated the project becomes, and in particular, the greater the difficulty in playing the piece with accuracy.
Like the previous project (Number Pieces), one of the important aspects of Morse Code Pieces is the ability to perform well. The piece can be made more interesting musically by including in the instruments
used, one which can play different notes. This again can make the piece more complicated, and might be suggested for certain groups. Other less able groups might be encouraged to concentrate more on the rhythmic aspect of the work. That is, a less able group might use a triangle, a wooden block, side drum and bottles. Rhythmically, an interesting piece will be created; melodically, it might be less so. One difficulty has been removed. A more able group might be encouraged to use a xylophone with perhaps tow players, a cymbal, which requires some skill to play long and short notes one after another, plus a shaker or drum. Not only is the rhythmical aspect of the piece the same as the other group, but they have the added difficulty/problem of making the piece melodically interesting.
An example of how a longer word might work could be as follows:
The group chose (as several did) JUDGEMEADOW SCHOOL LEICESTER
Most groups decided that member 1 would play J, member 2 U, member 3D, member 4 G and so on. Each member of the group would make his or her own copy of the words, with the appropriate code written next to the letter. In order to make it easier for the individual members to read their own copy, I suggested that they mark whichever letters they are playing in a different colour from the others, or put an asterisk next to them – something that will make it clear which are THEIR letters, and which are the OTHER. Each copy might look like this:
(Here I have used three columns to save space. It is clearer for children to have one column, rather than them try to jump across the paper from one column to another.)
J .---
U ..-
D -..
G --.
E .
M --
E .
A .-
D -..
O ---
W .--
S …
C -.-. .
H ….
O ---
O ---
L .-..
L .-..
E .
I ..
C -.-.
E .
S …
T -
E .
R .-.
Assuming that there are four members in the group; each will play one instrument. Number 1 might play the triangle, 2 the bottles, 3 the wooden block and 4 the side drum. I have used non-pitched instruments to keep the explanation simple. A point of practical importance: the difference between long and short sounds has to be made very clear. From my experience with this project, this difference is not made distinct enough, and in some cases, not at all. Frequently, children seem to think that hitting an instrument more quietly makes the sound shorter - which in some ways it does - but the difference is not immediately apparent.
One way that sounds can be shortened is to muffle them, by using part of a finger or hand, or clothing.
Member 1 might decide to play short sounds on the triangle by touching the metal with a finger immediately after striking the instrument. The long sounds will be made in the normal unmuffled manner.
This project therefore, is useful for both learning to play in different ways on an instrument, as well as for learning to play a piece of music, as in Number Pieces, with fluency and accuracy. It is a suitable activity for mixed ability classes, as more able children will carry on making new pieces with little help from the teacher.
One way in which this can be done is to make every member of the group write their own message/words. In this way, there are at least four (in a group of four) separate pieces to work on. With the more able groups kept busy, and contented too, the teacher can spend more time with the less able groups, helping for example with playing an instrument with a child who thinks there is only one way to play it, or by suggesting more interesting ideas which could be used in the piece itself. In the same way as the Number Pieces, this project brings a lot of pleasure to the children, making it a rewarding time.
PROJECT 5 RIVER JOURNEYS
The aim of this project is to try to describe the various phases of a river journey, using musical ideas which should give the colour, feel, the movement of a river. The project can be introduced by a description of how a river grows, what happens from the start to the finish, where the river might go, who might be on the banks etc. This can be done, as in the other projects, by asking the class questions, getting them involved from the beginning.
A ‘typical’ journey might be as follows:
The river begins in the mountains, formed partly by the rain, maybe come out of a spring. The volume is small, but the movement fast; it’s cold and clear. The second stage id where the river broadens out slightly, flowing through forests and villages, or near roads and railways, before slowing down on the final leg and coming to the sea. Here, it moves much more sedately, it is much broader and deeper, before it loses itself in the estuary or just disappears into the distance. The ideas in this simple example (and this is just one possibility) can then be represented musically by the groups. This is one project where pictures or photographs can usefully be employed in the initial presentation pr discussion.
A useful aid in explaining this project to the class, illustrating how music can represent pictures, and in this case, a river, is to play the class, talking the class through the various sections of the piece. If there are any orchestral players in the class, the symphonic poem could be briefly mentioned, with a couple of examples and simple explanation.
To take the example above, possible ways of doing this might be as follows: (All the examples used have actually been created in school in various groups.)
The start of the river in the mountains; rain is falling and the water moves quickly. It is cold. The ideas of rain, the cold, quick movement can be exploited: metallic instruments are good for this. Quick movement, small volume of water can be suggested by light, soft metallic sounds on the triangle/glockenspiel/bells. The rain is conjured up using the cymbal with wire brush/bamboo handle of beater, hitting the cymbal in a light and quick way.
The middle section of the river can be given distinctive features. A forest could be suggested by the wind in the trees. This might be done with a recorder/whistle, or by using a shaker. A railway was very popular with the movement and sound of the train suggested by a drum being stroked in circular way with a wire beater, with a four beat rhythm, the first beat being accented. That is, a ONE two three four piston-engine train type of sound. A church can be suggested by the sound of bells, using either the small hand bells, or the triangle.
The idea of the river might be suggested by the use of a musical theme. This theme, or short melody, might be used in the beginning to show the rapid movement of the river in the mountains. As mentioned earlier, it would probably use higher notes to give the idea of height and size. To show the river at various stages of its course, the same theme could be used in different ways. The central section of the river is slower and larger than the source. The music should reflect this, by becoming slower. This represents the change in speed, but not the size. This might be done by playing the instrument louder, and using lower notes. Lower notes can give the idea of depth and width.
Another way might be to use another instrument, such as the xylophone which has a lower and drier sound. The glockenspiel therefore might be used for the upper reaches of the river, but the xylophone for the lower, broader, slower parts.
To introduce extra variety into the piece, the river might go over a waterfall, or rapids, which would give the group the chance to use loud, crashing sounds, perhaps with drums and cymbals.
The final part of a river journey is going to be slower. Pictures of an estuary might be shown to the class by the teacher. Ideas of a quiet, rustic nature might be suggested, with birds, cows, other wildlife being suggested. The river might flow away into the distance, or it may finish going through a city, with the opposite images of noise, rushing about, factories, cars etc.
River Pieces is therefore a particularly good project for creative music, as the possibilities are almost unlimited, in that there are so many aspects of a river to explore before any musical ideas are worked out. It provides a good contrast to the two previous pieces, which are fairly short and simple. Being more complicated, it can give a group a great deal of work to do, as each member can quite easily be doing two or even three things during the piece, on different occasions.
For example, the cymbal might be used for the rain at the beginning of the piece, and also for the rapids in the middle of the journey.
PROJECT 6 THE SEA
This project examines both the types of sound one hears by the sea, and the type of movement associated with the sea. Like earlier projects, it can be introduced by the teacher in the form of a question and answer session, to try to get the children to give their ideas and impressions of the sea, rather than have the teacher tell them what they should be looking for. It is important in creative music not to lose sight of the fact that it is the children who are creating something, not the teacher. As with the other projects, there is no ‘one way’ of making the piece. What might emerge in the end may well be different to what the teacher or even the group had in mind in the beginning, and there is nothing wrong with that, so long as it falls into the general big picture. As with the other projects, it is the creativity of the children that is the key factor, the most important element in this type of work. It is quite possible, that for much of the class time, the teacher keeps quiet. This is my own experience.
Initial ideas which may be discussed at the beginning of the project by the teacher and class may include the different types of movement of the sea – near land, next to the beach, crashing against the rocks, a still, windless sea without movement, the waves etc. Other things which influence the sound and movement of the sea can also be included, such as the wind and the rain. These can also be portrayed in sound in the piece.
In order to show the way in which music can illustrate some of these things, one could play La Mer/Debussy, the teacher talking the piece through.
One way of illustrating a type of movement in music is to use a short theme in different ways. One can change the tempo, repeat the theme, change the dynamics, change the pitch etc.
The piece might tart off with the gentle movement of the sea being represented by a short, quiet theme on one of the melodic instruments. In this example, the upper register of the glockenspiel might not be used because this tends to give the idea of something short, sharp and light, inappropriate for a unit as large as the sea. The teacher might suggest the lower register of the glockenspiel or the xylophone, with its broader sounding notes. If, however, a child might suggest that the glockenspiel here is representing flying fish jumping out of the water, or sea birds pecking at something on the surface, or a light drizzle, that, to me, would be quite acceptable. It is their idea, their creativity, their imagination; so why not use it?
Rain starts to fall, and a storm blows up. This might be done using bottles to represent the rain hitting the surface of the water, followed by soft rolls on the cymbal, or a shaker, to give the idea of the wind blowing. Thunder and lightning follow, using perhaps rolls on the bass drum to illustrate the thunder, and short, hard hits on the cymbal making the cracking noise of lightning. The storm blows away, the instruments fade, and the sea is calm once again, with the return of the original theme.
Another piece of music created around the idea of the sea might try to illustrate the way in which the sea moves towards the land. One might consider the changes in sound as the sea comes onto the beach, with the waves rolling over the sand making a hissing noise, the sand and small stones being moved around by the water, and the sea moving back away from the land. This could be suggested by the use of a cymbal with a soft beater making a quiet roll to give the idea of the waves turning over; the sound of the sand and stones can be done effectively and realistically with a shaker (which might even have small stones inside it) which is moved upside down and back, giving the hissing sound heard along the coast.
The return of the water to the sea can be shown by the theme already in use, and maybe turning it around, too.
Another aspect of this piece might be to look at the sort of sounds produced when a rough sea hits against a cliff or rocks. The movement of the sea will be more violent, and this can be reflected in the music. The crash of the waves against the rocks might be done with drum and cymbal, to portray the boom of the hitting water, and the softer sounds of the spray hitting the land.
Some groups have used other ideas such as the sound of a ship, or a church bell in a coastal village, or the sound of seabirds. This, however, is really getting rather too far away from the main idea of this piece, which is to look at the type of sounds the sea makes, rather than sounds made by things on or near the sea, and the types of movement the sea might make in a different place and a different time.
WRITING A SCORE
The writing of scores serves two main purposes; firstly, it is a written record of the piece that the students have just made up. It is something they can keep in their school portfolio; secondly, it enables either the same group or another group to play the piece again with some degree of accuracy at a later date. Another, though perhaps less important reason for writing a score, but a useful and interesting one, particularly for the younger children, is the creation of an attractive piece of art work. Once again, if the children enjoy doing it, then that should be good reason.
A score shows two main things: a list of the instruments used in that piece, and some kind of representation of how these instruments are used in playing the piece.
The list of instruments is fairly straightforward. The instruments used are listed on the left-hand side of the score, as in an orchestral score. Depending on the age of the group in question, these lists can be either simple or complex. For younger children, the instruments can be drawn and coloured as well as written, thereby helping them to learn the names of the instruments as well as giving some practice in writing and spelling. (The most common mistake which occurred time and again was ‘symbol’ rather than ‘cymbal’.) Younger groups can also colour in these mini-pictures if they so wish. The name of the player who uses the instrument can be written under the name and picture of the instrument. For older children, the name of the instrument used will probably be sufficient, but younger children seem to like the idea of drawing, colouring, and putting their name next to their instrument.
The greater part of the score is taken up with notation; that is, what is to be played, and how. This can be made as simple or as complex as required. For younger groups, time can be dispensed with; that is, there is no marking for a time-frame on the score. Perhaps a simple indication will be written on the score.
For example, they might write - ‘count 5 for the cymbal, count 10 for the triangle’, and so on.
The speed of the piece naturally varies with the speed at which they will count. If one wanted a more complex score, then times could be written in, maybe at the top of the score. For example, the length of the score could be divided into 5 second sections. This would give the piece a fairly tight overall time-frame within which to work.
The score so far consists of the title at the top, a list of instruments down the left-hand side, and some kind of graphic representation of how these instruments are to be played. This part of the score takes up the largest amount of space on the paper, and needs to be worked out carefully. However, as in all parts of creative music, there are different ways of doing this, and more than one suitable way of showing the same thing. Again, as throughout creative music, the teacher can suggest certain ways of doing this, but there is no one correct way. This reflects one of the important aspects of creative music - that it is an exploration of sound, and as in all art/creative forms, every individual will have a different response to a particular stimulus.
One of the most striking ways a score can come alive, especially for children, is through the use of colour. When score writing is introduced to a class, this is one of the things that can be mentioned. The idea is to represent certain instruments with colours that reflect the ‘colour’ of that instrument. For example, wooden instruments would be in brown, metallic instruments in yellow, bass instruments in blue or black, representing respectively the ‘colour’ of a wooden block or xylophone (flat, dry, natural sound), the bright, metallic and hard sound of the triangle or cymbal, and the darker, heavier sound of the bass drum. This idea of using different colours for different instrument, in addition to making a colourful and interesting score, also helps young children to sense and feel various sounds.
Whilst the colour of the instrument helps to set the tone of the piece, it does not tell a performer how or when to use that instrument. This is done by using a variety of graphic symbols, written opposite the name of the instrument; that is, moving from left to right in the same way as written orchestral music does. (It is becoming clear that, as I said in the introduction, a knowledge of written ‘classical’ music, whilst not essential for the teacher, is very useful and helpful.) For the moment, the time factor will be ignored, to be mentioned at a later stage.
When the basic score outline has been written down (that is, the title, the instruments, and the section lines drawn in - the dividing lines between each instrument), the next thing to decide is how to represent how the instrument is to be played. This means two basics of music: pitch, and rhythm.
Both these terms will have to be explained to the class before they start on any project at all, and score writing comes after they have done at least one project. They therefore are terms which they are familiar with. Pitch is basically described as the ‘level’ of the notes played – high, medium, or low notes. Rhythm is explained as the speed of the music and the individual notes in that music. These are slightly simplistic explanations, and deliberately so. Notes will be fast, medium, or slow, single, or in groups. Whilst not actually using the word dynamics, explanations will be given relating to how quiet or loud the instruments have to be played. Dynamic markings as in orchestral music - cresc, dim, accent, etc - would not be used. Unless there is someone in the group who plays an orchestral instrument, this seems to be complicating the score unnecessarily.
In writing down the pitch of the instruments that can play a variety of notes - glockenspiel, metallaphone, chimes bars, xylophone, and perhaps the recorder - there are different way in which to express this. The simplest way is to write down the notes which are of high pitch in the top area of the section, and the lower notes in the bottom area of the section. This, of course, only gives the approximate pitch of the notes required, and does not specify one or more particular notes.
If a particular note, or sequence of notes, is required to be written exactly, then the names of the notes can be written in the order needed. For younger children, it is often the case that they are not interested in playing an exact order of notes, but rather that a group of notes in no fixed order will suffice. The degree to which the exact notation on the score is required is left up to the writer.
Dynamics likewise can be very easily written down. One way of doing this is to make the louder sounds look louder on paper, i.e. to make them larger and heavier, by making, for example, dots bigger and filled in with coloured pencils. A soft sound might, in contrast, use a small dot or other mark only lightly coloured. If more exact instructions are needed, then the degree of loudness or softness can be written in on the score.
For example, if the bass drum needed to be hit hard for four beats, then along the bass drum section on the score might be four large heavy marks with possibly the instruction 'hard’ written under them.
Both the pitch and dynamic markings are straightforward, perhaps over-simplistically so. However, the basis of a good score is that it is clear to other people as well as the writer, and can be looked at several months later and the piece performed with some semblance of accuracy. Again, this is one of the reasons for scores in orchestral music.
The method of writing down the rhythm is slightly more complicated as this covers two aspects of performance - the speed at which certain things are to be played, and the number of times they are to be played. To take the latter first, this presents fewer problems as simple marks can be used to represent individual ‘hits’. This works well until the other factor of rhythm is needed. It is easy enough to play x number of dots or marks - some children preferred dashes, commas, etc - the actual graphic symbol is unimportant. Dots were preferred largely because of their economy in usage, i.e. you can write in dots more easily, particularly in a small space - until they need to be played in a particular order - the rhythm.
To do this accurately, some form of notation similar to that used in orchestral scores is needed, and this for the purposes of creative music is too complicated. It should be remembered that the majority of children engaged in creative music do not, and will not, play any orchestral instrument. Therefore, to start to use a form of notation similar to the traditional type would be getting away from one of the important elements in creative music, namely, its creativity and child-centred activity. It is therefore necessary to use a type of notation which, although not completely accurate, gives an approximate idea of what is required. There are many different ways in which to give the idea of a rhythm, and all are valid if they enable the performer to read his or her score with some degree of accuracy.
One way is to arrange the dots closely together for a quick rhythm, and spaced further apart for a slower beat. So a score which had perhaps
…………. . . . could be played as a series of short, fast notes, followed by three long notes. It is not an exact way of showing a rhythm. It is not meant to be.
Another way of showing rhythm and speed is to have a series of inverted V’s joined together. Closer together would mean a fast speed, and spaced further apart, a slower speed. The speed is much easier to notate than the rhythm. For younger children, the idea of complex rhythm patterns does not occur. What rhythms they do use are simple, and can be written fairly accurately in the above ways.
The bottom of the score must have a key. This tells what each symbol on that score means. In addition to the musical information it gives, it seems also to be another way of getting children to think about hat they have done, and to explain why. Once a particular form had bee decided upon, and suitable graphic symbols used, the key can be written in, simply explaining what each symbol on the score means, and how it should be played.
SUMMARY
Score writing for a creative music project serves several purposes. It introduces the idea of scores in the wider sense to children, useful to those in the group with orchestral experience, or likely to be getting it. It enables all the group to make an individual contribution to the project, as distinct from a verbal and possibly not-very-considerable one. It also gives a certain amount of expressive writing and colouring - which seems particularly well-suited to younger children - to every member of the group.
A good score therefore will have all the following on:
A title, a key, a list of the various instruments used, by whom, and an indication of various degrees of complexity, (depending on the age range and ability of the group concerned), of the pitch, dynamics and speed/rhythm required for performance.
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