The trek back home

email to story@cba.org.uk

The morning began with the sun over the Ysgyryd. It was a clear May sky, the kind of sky one gets here once in a long, long time. He left the house after breakfast, wearing a jacket, just in case the weather turned. He didn’t think so, though. He had taken a couple of plastic bags for the shopping, rolled up in his pocket. He walked down the hill, past the new Georgian houses, and, on a whim, turned into Croesonen Road. ‘It’ll be quieter than the Hereford Road,’ he thought. ‘The scenery is better too.’ He went under the old railway bridge. A line used to run here years ago. There were few cars and fewer people about. The hedgerows were full of grass, leaf, and bird. He passed an old man walking his dogs. They were big, golden dogs almost shining in the sunlight.

‘Nice morning.’

He concurred. He went further down to where the Ross houses were set back from the road. He went on past the church, one of many in the market town, but this one alone. The others went on the opposite town, grouped together. He went to the café near the bus terminus for a cup of tea in the sun. Then, he walked up the main street, with four names, depending on where one is. The Town Hall clock showed 11 30. He looked into windows to see what would be on in the theatre over the next few weeks. There was nothing.
He went to the Post Office first, waiting in the queue, listening to the announcements in both languages. Next stop was the greengrocer. He picked his usual selection; some leeks, courgettes, tomatoes and so on. The butcher was next.

‘I’ll have two pounds of that lamb there, please.’

The scales went higher.

’I mean two pounds money.’

‘Oh, sorry, daydreaming.’

He put the wrapped meat into one of the plastic bags. The other counter sold cooked meat. He bought a pasty from the old lady there.

‘Thank you, bye.’

He walked back towards the Post Office and through the car park towards the wall. It might be unusual to have lunch in a car park, but the wall made this place different. You had to look over it to see why. Beneath you, some hundred metres away, was a farm, and after that, the Usk. In the far distance, the mountains were now a warm golden brown waiting for time. He ate the pasty, watching the time go by.
He turned to go. He made his way to the west, to go past the rugby ground.

‘How many places have a ground with a view like this?’ he thought.

In front was the Sugarloaf, the beginning of the National Park. He waited there, just looking. A couple of schoolgirls walked by, laughing. He continued back up the hill, past the old railway again. He suddenly noticed the darkness creeping up. Key in hand, he opened the front door, the plastic bags banging and twisting against his legs. One of his neighbours went by.

‘What’s the time now?’

‘Nearly eight.’

‘Eight? It can’t be,’ he thought.

‘It’s going to be cold tonight. They’re forecasting snow.’

‘Snow?’

He heard his own alarm. Why would they have snow now?

The neighbour laughed, and went on.

‘It’s November, don’t forget.’

He went in. The house was cold. It was very cold. He began to tremble.

‘November? No, it can’t be.’

Through the rear windows, he saw the first flecks of snow. There wasn’t one leaf on any tree.

(595 words)

The chapati Urdu: چپاتی, Hindi: चपाती,

email to story@cba.org.uk

He thought about his mother. He thought about the curries she used to make. They were hot, with chicken or lamb, meaty, with a fine array of condiments - pineapple, nuts, currents, egg, cucumber etc. They were something, they really were. What made her curry making rather unusual was that she wasn’t an Asian, nor actually ate curry.

The car pulled up in front of the house. The door opened, and she came in.

‘Here are some chapatis for your tea.’

She went to the back.

‘Do you want me to bring them in there?’

‘No, thank you, I’ll come.’

He carried on with the writing. She came through the house again, opened the front door, then went out. He heard the sound of the car going away.

A few minutes later, he went to the rear, and opened the oilpaper pack of chapatis. There were
four. She had already poured the sauce into a bowl. He picked up his mug of tea, to find it popular with a large gang of small ants. He placed it in the sink, letting them escape. He thought it a bit unkind to drown them when they were just after a little sugar. He got another mug and poured in some water from the jug. Picking up the bowl of curry sauce, he walked to the worktop; he put the bowl next to the paper with the chapatis. He thought, ‘if I take them to the desk, I might make a mess, so better have them here. There’s no-one else.’

He began to break the soft khaki-coloured flat bread, and dipped it into the sauce. They were quite nice. Four might make it a bit heavy, but it wasn’t everyday he ate them. He continued eating, a couple of drops of the sauce dropping onto the worktop. He tore off another bit, and put it into the sauce. A fly came by; that was something he didn’t want getting on the food. He had known from an early age that a fly is dirty, in particular near food. He flicked it away with his hand; it was instinct. He missed the fly, as he knew he would. But at least it went away. With it, however, went a fine spray of curry sauce, across the wall, the worktop, and the floor; it was rather like a fine coat of paint spray in a car workshop. It wasn’t super- serious, as it could be wiped off with ease, all three surfaces having tiles. He sighed.

‘I’ll finish eating, and then do it,’ he thought. ‘I don’t want to get my hands dirty, and then have to wash them again.’

He heard the car come. She was back with the children, rather sooner than he had thought. She came through the house, and stopped upon seeing him.

‘Oh, my goodness,’ she uttered. The ‘my’ and the ‘good’ were stretched out, in an Asian singsong effect.

‘I’m just going to clean it up,’ he said. The children began to laugh.

‘I cannot believe this,’ she went on. ‘You cannot eat chapatis without making such a mess. Look at your new tee shirt. How are you going to get the sauce out? You are a teacher. You always like to tell people you got a master’s degree, but people with no education can eat cleaner than you.’

She turned, and they left the room.

He sighed, got the cloth, wet it, and wiped the sauce away. He thought about his mother, and her curries.

‘I bet she used to spill a bit now and again.’

The woman who knew

The morning came on, bright and clear. There were barely any clouds in the sky, and the chance of rain was negligible. By the woman’s side, the eight year-old girl was sitting, looking at the fruit in front of her. She knew some of them of course. Who wouldn’t? Involuntarily, her tongue ran over her lips. She began to think of their names. That one was a papaya. Everyone knew that. The skin was a smooth looking orange. She knew it would taste just right. It wasn’t too ripe, nor was it too hard. Not that she would have cared either way at the moment. Her mother used to squeeze the juice of a lime on it. Her tongue came out of her mouth a little. Ah, there was a lime. There was a small pile of them, about nine or ten. Next to them were three pineapples. She thought long and hard. The interior of a pineapple was yellow, juicy, and sweet. But there was something she didn’t like about them. What was that? Ah, yes, they had a prickly skin, and the leaves were painful too, if they caught you the wrong way. She began to laugh silently, but only for a short moment. She didn’t have the energy these days for much. There were bananas, oranges and apples. But there were also some types of fruit she didn’t recognise. There were some small round ones, with a yellow skin. There was one big one in the centre. It must be heavy, she thought. It looked shiny and hard with a bright green skin. She thought long and hard, but could think of anywhere this fruit might grow.
The ache in her stomach returned, and she looked up at the woman, who was now reclining next to the trunk of a small thorn tree.
‘Mum,’ she whispered.
The woman didn’t move or open her eyes. The girl tried again.
‘Mum, are you alright? Mum, look at this.’
The woman stirred and looked at the fruit.
‘Yes, my dear, they look wonderful, don’t they?’
She wiped a tear away from her cheek.
‘What’s this on?’ asked the girl, pointing to the big green fruit in the centre.
‘That’s a coconut. You can’t find them here. They need water.’
‘Mum, why are you crying?’
The woman wiped another tear away, using the sleeve of her blouse.
‘I am unhappy because I cannot do things for you, I cannot take care of you as a good mother should. That’s why.’
The little girl put her arm around her mother’s thin body.
‘You are a very good mother, and I love you for that.’
They hugged each other. A gentle breeze took the edge off the heat for a few minutes. A few small birds sang on and off in the trees. The muted talk of the other people began to come back to the girl. She picked up the torn magazine photograph, and looked again at the fruit. She turned to her mother. ‘Maybe one day, I can see and touch a coconut. I will share it with other people.’
The mother looked at her, thought of talking, but began to cough. She stroked the girl’s hair.
An army officer walked by, trying not to make eye contact with anyone. A murmur went up from the mass of people in the camp.
On the horizon, they could see the dust of the lorries. They might bring something to eat.
‘Yes,’ said the mother, ‘maybe one day you can have a coconut. That is what I hope for you.’

597 words

© Richard Homer 2008

The raining of the waning night

The thought came in the house, after a couple of beers. It was a slow jazz composition, for vocalist, piano, drums, double bass, and flute. The song began with the piano soloing, for a few bars when the bass and drums blended in. then, the flute entered, and finally the singer. This song required a female vocalist, someone with a warm, non-strident voice. Not only the words and music had to come out, the emotion too. It was important to him. The drums added a regular rhythm, pushing the work along. He used the word drums guardedly. He was always reluctant to call a jazzman a drummer; percussionist was a far better word, he thought. Jazz, to him, was percussion rather than just drumming. Any fool could beat the living daylights out of a set of drums. Many had done so. But jazz needed virtuosity, the gentle subtle touch. You knew the drums were there but you didn’t notice them. He thought of the George Shearing quintet, and their way of playing; it was smooth, sophisticated, and very fine playing, real musicians who knew what they were doing. The percussion, as in an orchestra, added colour and mood to a piece, which a drummer didn’t. He thought of most of the music you could hear now. You didn’t need to kill the instrument or go prematurely deaf when playing. They were unaware of the nuance of rhythm. You just had to listen to anything commercial, and compare that with the playing of someone like Armando Perrazza. Now that was a real class act.

He came back to the song. It was in C, not the most imaginative of keys, but it was what he wanted, in 4/4 time, a slightly warmed-up andante, the type of tempo that would go down well in a plush bar late at night, when patrons wanted to talk in a cultivated way, and listen with interest at the same time. It gave the atmosphere that he was looking for. You had the group on the stage, in intimate ambience with the well-dressed audience, the kind of people who appreciated good food, drink, company and of course music., and some of them were very knowledgeable too. It wasn’t the type of place with cheap champagne and packet peanuts, and waitresses with smart dresses but wearing boots. No, in this place, the two young womengi were dressed in the right way, uniform clothes, and shoes to match. The barman knew how to mix, and there were no slot machines. The tables and chairs were bamboo, a reflection of the nostalgia of the owner, Henry. He had come here from Singapore, where his father had run a similar place for thirty or so years. The bamboo was a light yellow-brown giving the lounge a warm, airy tropical feel. The parquet floor was ochre, and on the walls were old black and white photographs of a Southeast Asia that had all but disappeared, thanks to industrialisation and modernisation. There were old wooden houses on stilts, trishaws, women holding oilpaper umbrellas, uncongested city centres, and the waterfront, where people from all over the world had come and mixed together. Along the main wall was the bar, with high stools. To the right, the small stage for the group.
At the rear was a small room; to call it a restaurant would be incorrect, although this is what it was. It was tiny, barely enough room to walk in and out. There were ten tables, half with four chairs, and half with two. It was a perfect setting for two people in love. The area had an obstructed view off the bandstand, with the connecting wall between it and the piano, but nonetheless, a pleasant spot for those who wanted a meal with their jazz. You could hear just fine. Henry’s brother did the cooking.
Everyone knew him as Chop-chop, but that wasn’t his real name. He cooked a limited array of food; in fact, there were just two. There were the traditional British fish and chips, although this was way removed from the typical fish and chip bar of a town. He cooked a whale-size chunk of fish in batter, with irregular chips he cut by hand from garden potatoes, and a rich, exciting mélange of raw vegetables, like a salad, but it didn’t look like a typical one. You ordered the items you wanted, and he would chop and mix them up for you, but in a different way each time. On the top, he sprinkled small nuts, sunflower seeds, and pepper. He might cut it small, in matchstick like size, or you might get squares or rectangles. You just didn’t know. He made his own dressing with oil and lemon, and you dipped in if you wanted too. The other offering was Alaskan crab from the Barents Straits. This was expensive, but the customers - he thought of them as regulars, almost associates - were happy enough to pay. They had the money, and they knew the quality. Alaska crab was supposed to be the finest in the world. The eaters here seemed to agree.

He came back to the song. The piano began the melody, taken up in a haunting manner by a low flute. Nothing strident, and typically flute, just, at first, the first octave and a half. It was warm, sensual, and sensuous music. The bass built a thick foundation and the percussionist used the wire brushes in a warm sensual way. The woman began to sing;

The raindrops that fall in the light of the night

The group played on for a few bars after each line.

are like the tears of love when the autumn kicks in.
to a woman, the words and tune, they’re sunset bright
to let a late night loving come, place a bet, and we will win.

The flute took over, the cymbals went a little quiet, and the people watched. A man put his arm around the woman’s shoulder. Almost all the people there were touching, or holding, or near each other. The two waitresses waited in circumspect way, enjoying the song. No one ordered anything; they were too engrossed with the quintet. The barman polished glass after glass, but at the same time, watching the group. A man and a woman got up, and began to dance a couple of metres from the group.
The singer began the second part.

The trees and the flowers might sway in the night air

The bass plucked a gentle train of ascending arpeggios.

but I only want to be in motion with you, this time when I
know you gaze at the early morning legs, you touch my hair
to watch the morning change, and the rain of the waning night go by.

He wondered what Mortimer Adler would have made of this. Was it culturally rich enough?
Was it scholarship? Was it one of the top hundred songs of all time? The song ended with a whispering roll. The people in the bar applauded warmly, and the singer, a white woman in her forties with golden hair, bowed, and then turned to acknowledge the other members of the group. High heels augmented her good legs, indeed, her figure in general. The applause faded away, and they began another song. This one was a little faster, with the bass player, a short white man, going bald, working a regular four-crotchet rhythm, with the percussionist colouring in the enhancement. He was an Asian man with a perpetual look of pleasure; it was quite clear he enjoyed his work. Well, they all did. The pianist was a mixed race man; someone said he was from Cuba, someone else said Guatemala. It didn’t matter. What mattered was that he was a first-rate musician, the piano turning out the melody and chords without any apparent effort. The flautist was a Filipina woman in her late twenties. She had long light brown hair, and her evening dress of a soft green contrasted well with the lounge suits and bow ties of the three men. She had a bracelet on both wrists. They changed position depending on the angle of the flute. Her dress was split at the side, in the style of a cheongsam, showing her calf. There were about fifty people in the bar that night. It was a Monday, and at 9pm, that wasn’t too bad. There would be others later. It was a popular place. The décor was old fashioned, and the lighting bright enough to see each other, but not too bright to take away the romance. When people said they were going down Henry’s Quay, everyone knew they would have a good night out. They also knew it wasn’t Henry’s Quay. Its real name was The Cockatoo, but no one used it. A tourist once asked people the way to The Cockatoo. No one knew what he was talking about, until he mentioned the owner was someone called Henry, and that jazz was played there.

Out at the front of the lounge, overlooking the harbour, a gentle rain was beginning to cool the warm night air. A yellow taxi went by. A puff of smoke came from the window. On the water, the yachts went with the motion of the sea. On some of them, you could see groups of people sitting under the cabin light, drinking, and laughing, and having a good time. It was that kind of place, easygoing, open, gracious, and welcoming all rolled into one. It had class, but it was the relaxing type.
Back in the lounge, the music had stopped, and the band was taking a drink at the bar. There was the merging of people, the low murmurings of those brave to talk out loud in a public place. The eating area was packed like sardines, as usual. One idiot customer, an Oriental, had finished eating, and in a loud, laughing way, had told the others at the table, and the rest of the assembled eaters too - he couldn’t fail to, the area being so small - that when he was trying once to catch lobster, he had fallen out of the boat. For some reason, he thought this amusing. The rest of the people there half-laughed, but it was probably at him, rather than because of the incident.
Henry would wander round from time to time, sometimes stopping for a chat, or sometimes helping behind the bar or bringing the drinks, if the two girls were stretched on a full night.
It was a place to relax with good food, music, and company. The group began to play again, a beautiful slow number, ‘When April comes again.’ Around one of the glass-top circular tables, three men and a young woman were talking quietly. Next to them, an elderly couple were watching the others in the lounge. Now and then, one would lean forward and talk to the other. There were about fifteen of these tables, the attendant armchairs with bamboo motif on the cushions. Henry used to change them according to season. Now, in the summer, they were a light beige and green. In the winter, he put on a warmer brown and orange. Two young men in tee shirts and jeans walked in, and went to one of the tables near the group. One of the girls walked over.

‘Good evening, gentlemen.’

‘Hi, chica.’

She stiffened. She didn’t like being called chica by anyone. She knew by the accent that he wasn’t from here. And people here didn’t greet others with ‘Hi’, either.

‘Two beers.’

She looked at them. ‘Please’ would be nice. The people who came in here said ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ as a matter of course. The man took the pause to mean she hadn’t understood him.

‘Two beers.’

There was still no ‘please’. She was right. He was, or maybe they both were, English.

‘We don't serve people dressed the way you are'. .She pointed at the small sign on the wall near the entrance. The man got up and walked over.

‘Dress. Smart casual.’ The man swore quietly, and went back to the table.

‘What’s up?’ the other asked. The first man told him. The second man got up, and they both walked to the door.

‘Bye, chicos,’ she said.

The couple at the next table began to laugh. The man, who was big, was the local butcher. He had a droopy moustache. His wife, who in contrast was a slim thing, worked as a receptionist in one of the numerous hotels here. She gently slapped the girl on the arm. ‘Maria!’ and began to laugh again. Two members of the Police came in. They both wore the long leather boots of the motorcycle patrol. They walked over to the bar, but didn’t sit down. People there knew why. They were glad to stretch their legs a bit.

‘Good evening, gentlemen,’ the barman said. ‘Two cups of tea, please.’ ‘Right you are.’

He placed the two cups on the bar top, and pushed a bowl of sugar towards them.

‘Thank you.’

They drank their cup of tea , put some loose change on the bar, and turned and walked out, their boots resonating on the wooden floor. The barman put most of the cash into the till, and the tip into his waistcoat pocket. He had worked at Henry’s Quay for a number of years now. The clientele always found him to be pleasant and polite, a nice chap.

The thought came in the house, after a couple of beers. It was a slow jazz composition, for vocalist, piano, drums, double bass, and flute. The song began with the piano soloing, for a few bars when the bass and drums blended in. then, the flute entered, and finally the singer. This song required a female vocalist, someone with a warm, non-strident voice. Not only the words and music had to come out, the emotion too. It was important to him.


© Richard Homer 2008

Ban the time

The pub they were in was nothing that remarkable; it was typical of many a pub one would find anywhere in Britain, anywhere that is, near the port. The smoke brushed cream walls, the wooden tables and chairs with their brown leather centres, the long bar with the gleaming pipes, the clientele, were to be found in many places. But tonight, in many places, things were about to change…for the worse. One might guess with a good degree of accuracy that the same talk was being carried out, throughout the whole country; or what was left of it, many might argue. Twenty years of chronically bad government had meant a high rate of unemployment, social malaise, poverty not seen here since the pre war days, and a population that had seen its rights go through the window of the fight against terrorism. The cynical referred to it as the fight against our freedom; there was, in many people’s minds, precious little of that left now. Cameras were on every street corner; smoking in public places was banned; the right to trial by jury was a thing of the past, and the crackdown on gun ownership meant that violent crime in the urban areas had, rather than drop, skyrocketed out of all proportion. Many parts of the capital and the large cities, indeed even some of the towns, were in practice, no go areas; the police had long ago thrown away any responsibility for them. Once a proud part of the country’s heritage, respected and, in parts, liked by the population, they had degenerated into an authoritarian armed paramilitary body, disliked, not trusted, and held in total lack of respect.

The two old men were playing draughts in the corner of the pub, by the window. It looked out over the port; the water by the quay was just the road width away. The smell of the sea and the sound of the seagulls accompanied the laughter, the chatter and the aroma of beer in the pub; tonight, though, was an exception; there was little chatter, and even less laughter. The two old men came here almost every night of the year, barring sickness. They were both pipe smokers, in contrast to the rest who seemed to be an 80-20 split between smokers and non-smokers. They paused from time to time, taking a quiet puff or a discreet sip of their pints. To be able to smoke in the pub was a thing of the past; tonight, though, no one cared. Those that wanted to light up did so, those that didn’t told them; ‘Go, enjoy, tonight I don’t care’, or words to that effect. The two old men pulled on their pipes, enjoying the relaxing effect. They muttered something to each other from time to time. The quiet air meant that you could hear the click of the draughts piece on the board; if you listened with care, you might hear the almost silent, warm sigh of pleasure of having captured the opponents piece. On the next table were two middle aged couple, the men with beers, one woman with what appeared to be a glass of lager, and the other, a gin and tonic. One assumed this from the lemon on the rim. They were laughing and talking, although in a muted way. The laughter was almost forced; it didn’t sound genuine. The men wore tweed jackets and ties; the women both had a blouse top and a knee length skirt. Behind them, over the back of the chair, were their raincoats.
One of the men asked the other,

‘Can the government really do this? Can they really enforce a ban?’

The other responded, ‘I don’t know. I think myself they will do it. They’ve already enforced other unpopular laws.’

The first man said, ‘Would you like another?’

‘Yes, please; the same.’

He handed over his glass, and the second man got up. He turned to the women and said.

‘You two want another shot?’

‘No, thanks,’ they answered, almost in chorus.

He went off to the bar. The two old men continued with their game of draughts.

‘Are you alright?’ asked one.

‘Yes,’ answered the other. They continued with their game.

In the other corner a group of quite young people were trying to enjoy the evening. Two were men, three of them women. They looked like students, but these days, one couldn’t be sure. Having opened up the university sector to everyone in the population, one might argue, with some degree of accuracy, that almost everyone in the country was a student now. The government had boasted in arrogant fashion some years before of the number of graduates produced every year. There were those, both in the country and overseas, who had sneered at the figures, thinking they were inflated, that so many degrees meant that not all could be worth something. The observant ones, however, noticed the government used the word 'producecd' in regard to education. That summed it up for many people; education had become a form of factory farming, with a product at the end of the line, rather than a whole person ready to take part in some useful activity for mankind, a person able to, and wanting to make a contribution to their part of society. The rot, in many thinking people’s minds, had begun with the awarding of degrees and diplomas by companies.

The initial reaction was one of amusement; it tuned in no time, to one of contempt. The main stream universities had found themselves cut out of part of the action; people now wanted a company degree; they were guaranteed a job with the firm afterwards. Who could blame them? The companies had a point; most university teaching was irrelevant to the needs of modern business. Now, the universities found that they were losing customers; this had led to a cut back in courses and of course, in staff. They had increased their fees, meaning that the average university was for someone from a rich background; and so the cycle went on. The end result was a country where one in three of the population had a degree; of these, 85% had a degree that was, in reality, of little practical value, and even less intellectual worth. But no matter; we still had the highest number of graduates per population of any country in the world. Hurrah; the fact that almost no overseas students came here any longer was forgotten, not mentioned in the newspapers. The unkind would argue that, even if the newspapers reported this fact, it would have made no difference, as half the population couldn’t read the newspaper in the first place. Be that as it may. The students, if they were, in the corner appeared to be having a modest time on the scale of happiness. The number of bottles on their table grew.

The main bar stretched the length of the room, some nine metres. There were always at least two full-time bar staff, sometimes as many as four of them, depending on the day of the week. There were eight dispensers, each of a different type of ale, cider, or stout. The fact that this bar had draught beers made it a magnet for the locals of the area. There was also an excellent selection of quality homemade fare, albeit of a limited variety. But, as regulars had mentioned ad infinitum, it was what they were used to, they wanted, and they enjoyed. The patron’s wife, a busty woman in her fifties, used the limited kitchen space to produce sandwiches, rolls, an all day breakfast, and for the adventurous, a simple, yet potent, curry and rice.

But it was the bread that well down well; it came from a well-known local bakery; some were soft, some crispy, and some had sesame seeds on them. Inside, you had a thick cut of meat, with a slice of tomato, cucumber, a ring of onion, a leaf of crisp lettuce, and sprinkle of garden herbs. The meat was the real thing, not something she had grabbed in the supermarket, and put in the microwave for a quarter of an hour. No, this was good meat from a quality butcher. The regulars didn’t mind the little extra they cost; they knew it was worth it. They were particular popular towards the end of the evening, when the alcohol began to work up the hunger buds in the stomach, mouth or brain, wherever they were. Tonight, however, was different. She had already prepared more than three times the usual amount.

Her years of business acumen in the pub trade had told her when was a good time, and tonight would be one of the peaks. It would also be the last of the peaks too, in this particular place. The landlord had made it clear; no beer, no here. He wasn’t going to belittle himself or his centuries old trade by pouring pints of soft drinks, no way.

‘They’re going like hot cakes tonight,’ she told her husband. ‘I’m not surprised on a night like this. Let them enjoy it.’

Her husband nodded in agreement.

‘Yep,’ he said, ‘the last round will be on the house, too.’

He put his arms around her, saw the tears in her eyes, and kissed her gently on the cheek.

’Bastards,’ he said under his breath. ‘Who do they think they are?’

She didn’t answer. She already knew. Along the bar was a line of stools, each occupied tonight; well, to be honest, they were taken on most nights. The bar staff here had a good reputation for being professional and courteous, but at the same time, ready to have a chat about almost any subject under the sun; it was a relaxing place to be in, nothing pretentious, nothing fake, nothing cheap. It enjoyed the name of a good place with genuine nice people in it. Here, the regulars would come to drink, talk, and joust and needle each other, in a gentle way. Empty peanut packets filled the ashtrays.

Tonight, the regulars were in fine form. The drinks flowed freely, and freely, in many cases, as each man or woman sought to out-buy the other. It was not a put-on show to claim attention, as happens in other parts of the world, but a genuine attempt to please each other.
Above the bar was a clock, a very old, crafted clock. It showed fifteen minutes to one am. The patron looked around the place was full to the brim now; it was packed like a tin of sardines.

‘At least they had oil,’ he thought to himself. ‘These, as from tomorrow, or later today, will have nothing.’

He sighed, and went back to taking orders.

‘Yes, last orders,’ he said, ‘and this time, they really mean it.’

The two old men finished their last game, and picked up their beer mugs.

‘Cheers,’ they said to each other and the room in general.

They finished their drinks, and hand on shoulder, walked to the bar, shook the patron’s hand, said goodnight, and then left. Over the next ten minutes, the others followed. The early banter and laughter seemed to have dissipated into the early spring air.

The two couples at the neighbouring table ordered another round. Quietly, they finished their drinks. They handed in their glasses to the patron. The number in the bar had thinned quite considerably by now. The front door opened, bringing with it a blast of chilly air. Two armed policemen in uniform entered. The pub went quiet.

‘Come on, please,’ the first said in an authoritarian tone.

‘It’s after one am;’ the other joined in, ‘you’ve had a long time tonight. Now it’s time to go.’

The patron rang the bell.

‘Time please, ladies and gentlemen, time please’.

There were only a handful of people in the bar now. One of these went up to the first policeman. He looked at him, the contempt clear.

‘You must feel pleased with yourself, yes?’

The policeman kept quiet.

‘Answer me, you bloody pig,’ the man shouted, and grabbed the policeman by the collar.

The others grabbed him, and tried to pull him off.

‘Just cool down,’ one of the others said. 'Get away from him, you fool,’ another muttered, ‘you know what they’re like and what they can do now.’

The policeman straightened his collar.

‘I’m only doing my job. You try that again and I’ll use the gun, I’m warning you.’

The second officer chimed in.

‘You watch yourself, boy. I can react in self-defence, that’s the law.’

‘Bugger the law. Who said we have to …’ the assailant trailed away.

‘I’m only doing my job, I’m only doing my job,’ mimicked another of the people. ‘It’s alright for you. You get well paid, and you have your own clubs where you can get it at a cheap price, too. What about the ordinary working man and woman? What do they do now?’

The second policeman laughed.

‘Join the police. But of course, you couldn’t, you don’t have the brains, you don’t have the ability. And turn the music off, too.’

He was almost shouting now.

The landlord walked to the stereo and switched it off. Another of the regulars launched in.

‘No, we don’t have the right morality, that’s why. We wouldn’t enforce unjust laws. You get paid three times the average wage in this country, plus who knows what perks that we aren’t allowed to read about. You are as bad as the journalists. It is one big secret club; the lawyers, the politicians, the press, and the police. You are all scum. You should hang when the revolution comes.’

The first policeman laughed, and poked the talker in the chest with his glove.

‘Yes, the revolution is coming, with what? With what, you tell me, Mr Intelligent, with what? How, where, why, with whom, you tell me. You can’t get publicity, you can’t assemble, your phones are monitored, you are watched by camera when you step out of the house to when you go back home, we know what you buy, where, the quantity, how often etc; you have no firearms; you’re just a big, bloody joke. The revolution is coming? I’ll know about it when I see it. Ha, the internet, well done the internet. ‘Oh, we’re free, we can post what we like, what we want, we’re free.’ Ha, little did you, and others around the world, think that the freedom was to be brief. People like you created it; we just use it. But we use it against you.’

The pub remained in silence. If the people wanted to speak their mind, their thoughts, they were keeping it hidden and quiet. The second policeman was looking around, and saw a plate of the last remaining rolls. He walked over to where the owner’s wife was watching, from behind the bar. He took off his glove, picked up a bun, and began to eat.

‘Nice’, he said between mouthfuls. He helped himself to another. The owner’s wife stood there and said nothing. The owner came over.

‘They’re one pound fifty. You owe me three pounds.’

The policeman picked up a pink tissue from the top of the bar, and wiped his mouth.

‘Okay, I’ll pop in tomorrow night,’ and began to laugh.

The first officer joined him, laughing too; they looked at each other, and the first one said

‘Come on, we have to check on the other pubs to make sure they are obeying the law. Rule Britannia, everyone.’

They walked over to the door and went out. The room was silent, the people morose and quiet. There were about ten of them. They looked at each other, then lowered their eyes, and sighed, as if in a chorus. One of them began picking up the few empty glasses on the tables; another man joined him, and one of the women went round collecting the beer mats. In a short time, the place was clean.

‘I’ll do that,’ said the landlord to the man who was sweeping the floor.

‘No. it’s okay, I’ll do it, I’m happy to help a bit.’

The landlord thanked him. In the corner, another regular was shutting the curtains. The landlord’s wife turned off the main lights. There was now just the soft pink glow of the three wall lights, and the counter light behind the bar. The owner stood near the bar, his arms folded. He leaned against the wall. The man finished sweeping the floor, and picked up what little rubbish there was.

‘Where do I put this?’

The owner’s wife showed him. The man doing the curtains came over and joined the group. A few of them pulled up a bar stool each, and got on. One man pulled a couple of chairs across from the nearest table. They were sitting around now, a group of ten people, in silence, in the soft light of a now-deserted pub. No one spoke. There was just the sound of breathing, the clock, and the scratching of a match or two a some of them lit up. The smoke curled up towards the top of the room. The owner switched off the counter light, and two of the wall lights. The place was, to anyone out in the street, empty. After a long time, one of the men spoke. He breathed out in a laboured, tired kind of way.

‘What’s going to happen to the pubs now? Are they just going to left empty? How many are there throughout Britain, ten thousand? Ten thousand pubs empty.’

A woman joined in.

‘I heard that some landlords will continue to run their place, but just sell soft drinks. I think that’s strange, don’t you? I mean, who on earth wants to go out at the weekend and sit round with a lemonade for half the night? I don’t.’

Another woman added, ‘Can you imagine going to a dance, and being offered a coke, orsomething like that? It makes a mockery of the whole thing about going out and enjoying yourself.’

There was a murmur of agreement.

‘You go out and they get you over the outdoor limit, and you get a hundred pound fine; the second time, it’s five hundred, and the third time you’re on home detention,’ another woman said, ‘ and the outdoor limit is one little drink, isn’t it?’

‘Yes,’ a man added, ‘about a half pint of weak ale, or a mini gin or rum. Who gets high on that? I don’t, I can’t.’

The government had introduced the new laws earlier in the year, and they were passed through Parliament with unheard of speed. The ostensible reason for the draconian measures was to stop youth, and others, binge drinking, but most of the population knew the real reason, or what they though was the real reason; that was to keep people off the streets in the evening, as part of the ongoing war against…well, against everything and everyone. The use of home detention in place of minimum security prisons was welcomed by the ‘civil liberties’ coalition, now in many people’s eyes, just another government front, packed with freeloaders and the toady group, ready to praise the introduction of health laws, security laws, prison reform, the usual things that had gone under the microscope at the end of the twentieth century…as long, of course, these measures didn’t affect them; of course. The measures were for public protection and social cohesion. After the disastrous social engineering project of the fifties onwards, the multicultural society, passport to people’s delight and pleasure, with the resulting race riots, ghetto building, the break down of law and order in many sink estates, the soaring drug problem, low educational attainment, and so on, it was little wonder that so many of the population had emigrated to what were far better places to live and raise a family, to work and to play. Many of those left were unable to go, either for financial reasons, or the lack of education and training qualifications, meaning they had no choice.

They knew this, and a kind of bond had formed between them. People now began to realise what they were up against, and why they were here, and a growing quasi underground movement had emerged, linked in large part by word of mouth. No one in their right mind would use the internet; that was the fast way to get your door whacked in the early hours of the morning; the initial reaction had of course targeted what most people would object to: child pornography, paedophilia, extremism in one form or another, chat rooms for young people organised by people who were anything but young, and had anything but children’s welfare on their mind, too. No one had objected to those being made a target; they had gotten massive support from the general populace whose main concern and puzzlement was why it had taken the government so long to do anything about them. The problem was one of escalation. having seen the reaction of the population to these measures, the government went at full speed in targeting anything they thought was, or might be, or even could be, a ‘social nuisance’. This quickly became a euphemism for just about anything. The prison planet, at least in the part of the world here, had become a tight, unforgiving reality. And the odd thing was, the whole business had crept upon the population almost by stealth, with few people giving it a thought, the majority accepting it, albeit in weary opinion.

The result was a government by a few, who knew they could do just about what they wanted, and now worked in this way. The slogan appeared to be ‘Bugger the people; we do it our way.’ Now, the final straw had taken effect; the abolition of an institution, a way of life for the ordinary man and woman of Britain for hundreds, maybe a thousand years, that gave them a simple yet enjoyable way of passing their free time in the warm summer evenings, watching the bowls or the tennis, sitting in the warm pm sunshine; or grouping round a blazing log fire, the horse brasses on the granite walls gleaming in the light in a cold and grey winter. It was true that the government had no plans…well, that’s a contradiction, because no one knew what the government were thinking; the less charitable, meaning ninety percent of the population, were of the opinion that the government didn’t think, they just began a programme of action, a sort of raffle.

‘What can we do this week?’

‘Oh, let’s increase the tax on hotel charges.’

‘Why?’

‘Why not?’

‘Excellent, I’ll inform the minister or someone else if the minister is on holiday in…you fill in the blank. The blank was always, it seemed, a foreign country, often one with a warm climate, a low cost of living, meaning the natives were paid little for their work in rather nice resorts. This was in the interest of value for money for the MPs, of course, who went there on ‘official government business’. The three day conference in the Gambia in December to explore the environmental impact of a resurgence of mosquitoes on childhood malaria was a pressing problem for that country; no one would argue against such a proposition. Quite how ten MPs from Britain, all of whom didn’t know where the Gambia was on a map, could benefit the country, theirs and ours, was not clear to the British people.

But they did report that the food, that is, the food in their hotel, was wonderful. The interior of the country was explored by the intrepid MPs using an air-conditioned boat, complete with supper buffet; the trip lasted half an hour. The buffet went on half the night, but ‘useful contacts were made, the British High Commission did a splendid job, magnificent’. The New Year’s Honours list featured a new knighthood for a diplomat no one had ever heard of; what a surprise.

The whole thing was indicative of a government without emotion or care, but with now almost ending power. Those brave enough to voice a conflicting opinion were imprisoned on some phoney charge…a danger to public security/health/education/themselves/the community…take your pick. The unlucky ones found themselves on the end of innuendo, often of an unpleasant sexual nature, and the mention of young children…well, you know the rest. The number of suicides increased, making Britain the third highest suicide nation on earth. The effect of these previous unblemished men and women now being hauled without mercy through the nails of the press hit their families hard, of course. They, through association, had become the guilty. The effects were a catastrophe for thousands out there.

The pub was quiet again. The people in there, the ordinary hardworking, decent men and women were reflecting on the changes to their once respected country; not always liked, it was true. No one would argue against that. It had a colonial history peppered with some untoward incidents, that was true. But, by and large, when the colonies had asked for independence, they got it, together with a functioning infrastructure, education and health care. It wasn’t perfect, but it wasn’t a brutal legacy either. A man chipped in.

‘You notice the BBC and the others have increased the licensing fee and the ‘pay as you go’, ‘pay as you watch’, whatever it’s called these days, that business. Quite a coincidence, isn’t it? They know people will be forced to remain in the house, and that means people will turn to home entertainment. That means bigger money for the entertainment companies, oh, it’s one big con, the whole thing.’

There was another murmur of agreement from the listeners. There was now a mood of sullen acceptance.

‘The whole bloody county’s big con,’ responded one man.

The landlord walked behind the bar, and began to pull a number of half pints. ‘We’ll use these; if the bastards come back, we can finish them in no time. Ladies, you want the same or a short?’

There was some murmuring amongst the crowd as they thought about their choice. The landlady walked across to the curtains to check that they were shut tight. She then switched of the light behind the bar, and two of the wall lamps. The place was now, to anyone passing by, shut and the people gone home. That, of course, was the whole purpose. As if to reinforce the message, the landlord said,

‘Right, we keep it quiet; no raising the voice, no laughing, okay?’

There was a slight ripple of laughter; no one in their right mind found anything to laugh about.

‘Yeah, you know what I mean’.

One man sitting on a stool by the bar asked, ‘What going to happen to the police, then? They’re going to get their own bars in the Headquarters, or something?’

One of the men with a cigarette chipped in.

‘No, they’re not in the HQ. What they have done is to buy, at a cut-throat price of course, the pub favoured by the majority of their members…it’s like a bloody club now, isn’t it…the members of the police force in a particular area. It is then for their own use, and their guests.’

‘Who’ll be the local lawyers and the councillors, yes?’

A woman butted in, a look of annoyance clear.

‘Are you trying to tell me that the police are allowed to buy a pub, I mean, they can buy a physical pub, the building, and then use it like a club, but we have to drink in the house? Is that what this is, is that right?’

The others nodded in an unhealthy agreement. One man said, ‘Well, we’ve said it for years, haven’t we? There’s one rule for the rich and one rule for the poor. But I don’t think anyone thought it would ever come to this.’

‘They make me sick,’ the woman went on. ‘How can they do it, and how can we let them do this?’

‘They can do it because the government, bunch of grease proof bastards, make the law, and the law says they can buy a pub; there are plenty on the market. What landlord wants to keep an empty building with no customers?’

‘You’re right there,’ the landlady answered, ‘we might have to sell up and go somewhere else. I don’t know what we can do; we’ve done this throughout our working life, haven’t we, Andrew?’
She turned to her husband, who nodded in sad agreement.

‘You’re right, my love, you’re right.’

He sighed, and went back to polishing the glassware. The people in the pub watched him, knowing he was polishing just for something to do, to keep his mind off the night. He, and his wife too, had enjoyed a high degree of popularity throughout their time here; they had come about twenty years ago, when the place was run down and inhabited by the less than clean crowd who appeared to have no home to go to, but enough money to drink whilst not enough to buy soap and shampoo, or new clothing. They, the landlord and his wife Joyce, had turned the place around to become a well-known, popular establishment, where people from all walks of life, and a number of different races came to enjoy the evening, and on occasion, the lunchtime too. The fact that the crowd in here tonight was white, with no minority group, was a reflection of the condition of the country rather than the racial thinking of the clientele. Those members of different minorities, who had family elsewhere in the world, had taken advantage of this, and without much prompting, had emigrated. No one could blame them. Why remain here when you could get a better life overseas? It made sense. It was a phenomenon that the government were quick to play down, and after a few rather blazing headlines regarding the minority emigration, little was read in the press; it was embarrassing, for the very people that the governments over the past fifty years had sought to please and court their support, were the very same people who had left at the first opportunity. Many of the emigrants had expressed their emotions to the remaining population, and the most frequent quote was something like, ‘We feel sorry for you; we’re fortunate we have somewhere to go; take care,’ and off they went. Who could blame them? Most of the remaining population would be off if they could, but they couldn’t. They didn’t have the family connection, the money, and often the skill to get them up and running in a foreign land, although in many ways Britain, this place was foreign to them now. A woman spoke, as if to echo their thought. ‘It’s a foreign country now; our own place if foreign to us, the people. No one could imagine it coming to this, I don’t think’

A young man sitting at the edge of the group spoke for the first time. ‘I agree with the first part of what you said. I think everyone would. I would disagree with your second opinion. I read a lot on the internet, note the past tense, people, and there were writers who went on about things like this for a number of years. But nobody took any notice…no, let me rephrase that. Plenty of people took notice, but they were ignored by many. They were dismissed as cranks, and mocked in the media. The idea of Big Brother becoming a reality, well, they went on about it for a number of years, but they were either ignored, or in some cases, imprisoned. Another factor was the apathy of the people here. It is the ‘It can’t happen here, it’s Britain’ mentality. You think back to when they were going to issue identity cards. How many people said ‘I don’t care, I have nothing to hide.’ Then the fingerprinting of children, the DNA samples if you were caught bloody speeding, the medical records on computer, what a cock-up that has turned out to be. ‘No misuse, we promise you.’ How many records have gone missing, think of Newcastle those years ago, data discs etc, how many incorrectly stored, how many sent to the wrong address, how many have the wrong diagnosis because they’ve mixed with someone else of the same surname? No one now has a clue whether this record is the correct one. The last time I went to the doctor, oh, about a year ago when I hurt my back, the doctor looked at me and said ‘How was your last pregnancy?’ There was an outburst of half-laughter from the rest of the people.

‘I’m not joking,’ the young man continued. ‘That’s what the records showed. The doctor pointed to the section on the screen. It was there, as clear as can be. What a joke; what a bloody country.’ He stopped talking, and leaned back, his back against the radiator. He blinked. The others were not sure if it was the smoke, or whether he was beginning to cry.

He thought about the story; how am I going to continue from here...

2004 Kuala Berang

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.