The Lady in Pyjamas and Hair Curlers

A newcomer in the form of a sophisticated lady with lacquered nails and a made-up face, shifted into the house a few doors away from mine, and for some time, I could see a few women in the neighbourhood mysteriously gathering in the midst of their household chores to discuss or rather gossip about her.  I had a few glimpses of her when I walked past her house while I was running errands for my mum or grandma.  She was hardly seen outside her house and most of the time her front door was kept half opened.

  Nine out ten times that I saw her, she was still clad in her pyjamas and her hair still in curlers though the midday sun was already high above our heads.  Her face always had make up on when I saw her.  Her lips would be painted the brightest red, almost like scarlet, which made them looked even thicker, and that made many of the other women say unpleasant things behind her back.  I would see them bending and rocking their bodies as they guffawed. What is so funny about thick red lips, I used to wonder.  I could not understand what they were laughing about.  Later, I realised it was not how she looked because she really looked very attractive,  but it was the way she purposely did things to attract the opposite sex.  A few men in the neighbourhood were so ‘mesmerised’ by her that their wives literally had to pinch their ears for ogling.

One day, I chanced to see a girl of my age coming out from the newcomer’s house.  She was a  pretty girl.  She had long straight hair, the longest hair I had ever seen.  From that day on, I vowed that I would never have my hair cut short.  I wanted to have long hair like hers.  She smiled at me but did not make an attempt to speak to me.  Not the type to break the ice, I merely waved my little hand to her and smiled.  She went in quickly when a voice summoned her, so quickly that I could not even have time to open my mouth to say anything. I was later told that she was the daughter of the much talked about lady.

A few days had passed and most of the things that happened concerning the newcomer did not slipped the attention of the other women in the neighbourhood.  One late evening, a big impressive looking car was seen parked in front of her house. Its engine was running and a smart looking man came out.  Not long after that, the lady came out dressed in the most stunning attire I had ever seen and I could see the eyes of the other women nearly popped out of their heads.  The newcomer was going to work in a bar not far away.  It was newly opened in one of the shop-houses. 

Just after dinner, when everybody came out of their houses to chat and enjoy the cool night air, Sam Koo, who was the newcomer’s next door neighbour, walked all the way from her house to carry some of her tales.  She had such a funny way of relating her stories that hilarious laughter could be heard from the group of ladies listening intently to her.  Now and then, I could see her getting up on her feet to demonstrate some movements, which I learnt later that they were actually dance steps of the newcomer whom Sam Koo saw while she was practising them at home.

A few months after the newcomer had shifted into the neighbourhood, I became friends with Ah Eng who was her daughter.  She went to the same primary school that I was attending.  She was quite polite and hardworking too.  I could see that she had very neat school work.  As days went by, our friendship blossomed and I felt very bad when the other women gossiped behind her mother’s back.  I used to purposely interrupt their conversation by giving them a false alarm.  Sometimes I would just say the water had been boiling in their kitchen or someone’s child had just awakened from the hammock or something like that.  Of course, as time went by, the other women also found out about Ah Eng and how well she performed at school.  That shut their mouths a little.

 

The Fish Pond, the Stench and the Wrath of a Farmer

The hot sun was heating up the zinc roofs of our houses so much that it was hard for us to stay indoors in the afternoon. The wind was blowing gently outside and the temperature was much lower. After lunch, my brother and Ah Peng’s two elder brothers decided to go to the farm not very far away from our houses to catch butterflies.  There were many at the lotus pond near the pig sties. The butterflies often came out at this time of the day.

So, it was decided and that if Ah Peng , her two younger sisters and I were to tag along, we must walk hand in hand.  We were to obey their instructions and not to cry.  We agreed eagerly and were excited to start.  As we headed towards the farm, we were joined by another two boys who lived down the street.  They were about my age and I had never spoken to them before but they were my brother’s friends.  The first part of the journey to the farm was fun.  We talked and laughed as we walked.  The nearer we were to the farm, the faster the pace of the older boys.  They were running after the butterflies, trying to catch them and forgetting about us.  We had to quicken our pace and soon we were no more holding hands but moving at different speeds. 

I was the last in the line.  I was not a good walker due to my plump body and extra weight.  Everyone had gone ahead of me and was enjoying the sights. I could hear them shrieking in laughter and someone was exclaiming in surprise of having caught a fish.  I dragged my heavy body towards the pond and by the time I reached it, I was hot and panting. What was left was a muddy pond; the other children had scooped the water to catch the fishes and poured back again, stirring up all the mud from the bottom. They had just left, and I was left behind, staring after them.  Where is the fish, I demanded to know, but they were too busy running off to look at the pigs to answer me.  Oh, the lotus is beautiful, I thought.  I tried to use the farmer’s scoop to pull the plant a little closer so that I could get my hands on it but to no avail.  The scoop was too heavy for me.  I shouted to my brother to help me but he was nowhere to be seen.

Unwillingly, I left the pond with no fish to see. I rushed off to join the rest at the pig sties. As I went nearer, I could smell the awful stench.  I started to complain and would not want to join them.  I hated it when the others seemed to be enjoying themselves so much.  They were laughing hilariously.  That made me wonder what was going on but I refused to go any nearer to the filthy, smelly sties. What they did at the sties made the pigs squealing so much that the farmer’s dogs started to bark.  The farmer came out of his house which was quite a distance away. From there, he could see us.  He shouted at us and was about to ride his bicycle over when we all left the place running as fast as our legs could carry us.

Ah Peng and her younger sisters took off their large slippers so that they could run faster.  I would not want to go bare footed because I was squeamish about the muddy path.  I had to trudge slowly behind them.  Not long after that, the rest of the group could not be seen and I was left alone.  I was getting angry with Ah Peng and everybody else.  I was indignant about the whole thing and thinking about it made me cry.  As I walked on home, I cried.  Halfway, I was almost scared out of my wits when something landed on top of my head.  It jumped down to the ground and flew away as I screamed and bent my head.  I thought I saw a monitor lizard. 

Back home, I complained to my mother about my brother for not having taken good care of me and that he had ran off leaving me behind to face the crazy barking dogs and the very angry farmer.

Fake Stamps for Genuine

After the incident of my brother’s trickery, my mother’s words were soon forgotten.  My brother had gone back to his old ways of taking advantage of others.  This time it had to do with the girl next door.  She was a year younger than me and her name was “Ah Lu”.  Normally, she would be indoors and would hardly come out, not even to the veranda which was connected to ours but separated by a wooden barricade. Both of our houses were built by my father and they formed a single storey semidetached type of house.  We used one unit while the other was sold later on to Ah Lu’s father when my father had financial difficulties.  It was supposedly built for my youngest uncle who was my father’s youngest brother, to live in when he settled down. 

Ah Lu, being the youngest in the family would usually feel very lonely at home when her elder sisters and brothers went out to work or to school.  One afternoon, when I was playing with her at the veranda, she took out her collection of stamps to show to me.  They must have been her elder sisters’ or brothers’ because I did not see how she could have collected so many. They were neatly kept in stamp albums and I had never seen such collections before.  Just then, my brother came out and he saw what we were doing.  Knowing that he was not popular with Ah Lu or any member of her family, he did not come near for fear of being caught by Ah Lu’s mother who did not like him at all.

A few minutes after he had gone into the house, I was summoned to go in.  Wondering what the matter was, I went in to investigate.  Much to my surprise, he requested to have a look at the collections of stamps.  After much persuasion and also after being sweet talked, I went out to ask Ah Lu if my brother could have a look at her very unusual collections.  Feeling happy that my brother commented how special and priceless her collections were, she allowed him to have a look.  But my brother would not come out as he was afraid of Ah Lu’s mother.  In the end Ah Lu allowed the albums to be brought into our house.

My brother was all excited when he got his hands on the albums.  Much to my dismay, he started removing some of them from the albums.  What do you think you are doing, I asked. He hushed me and called me a ‘silly’.  Why, he said, these are rare collections and she would not know if some of them are missing, he whispered.  No, you cannot do this, I snapped at him, but he refused to give back the stamps he had taken. He ran away quickly.  I had to give Ah Lu the stamps back but short of the ones my brother had removed.  Instead, some large and colourful stamps, mostly fake ones were replaced after second thoughts.

That very evening, one of Ah Lu’s sisters came over to our house and complained to my mother about my brother.  She told my mother that my elder brother had stolen her stamps.  My father had just come back from work and he overheard the conversation.  My father was unhappy that my brother had stolen and nagged at my mother.  He complained that my mother had not been keeping a close eye on my brother.  That was like adding salt to wound.  My mother was even angrier then and she had her cane ready, waiting for my brother to walk into the house.

Just then, his whistling could be heard and my heart started to thump so hard that I thought it was going to explode.  I tried to signal to my brother about the cane that my mother was holding but he was too busy whistling the same tune he was whistling the past few weeks.  As quick as lightning, the cane came down sharply on his thighs.  Although he dodged, the cane still managed to bite into the raw flesh of his thighs and soon two red marks, one on each thigh could be seen. I could see that he was wincing.  At first, he was quiet but when my mother’s cane swished down on his thighs again, the pain must have very unbearable and this time, he howled so loudly that I thought my heart had come out through my mouth.  He yelled and howled, and for the first time I saw him shed tears.  I felt so sympathetic towards him that I cried and begged my mother to stop.  Wondering what the commotion was, my grandma came to his rescue.  My utterly heartbroken mother stopped immediately for she did not want the aged lady to fret too much.

That evening, everybody had no appetite to eat dinner except me.  I was left to eat a bigger portion.  I needed replenishment for the energy expended and I did not see any good sense in letting such matters bother me too long. 




 Everything is governed by laws of nature, no matter how humans try to 'unnaturalise' them. Such a simple thing as a mother exercising her human intervention on another human to do moral good.  It is as natural as she breastfeeding him during infancy.  What is not natural is ignoring your hunger pangs!

Mirror, Mirror on the Wall

For a few days I dared not approach my mother about buying a frock like the one ‘so and so’ had worn.  One fine day, I was told to go home from Ah Peng’s house because my mother had something for me. Having forgotten about the frock that I wanted so badly, I had actually refused to go home, thinking my mother would not have anything interesting to give me except for a few coconut sweets.  Usual stuff, I thought to myself.  My mother was shouting from across the road and it baffled me very much.  What can it be and why is my mother acting so strangely, I queried aloud.  I rushed off home with Ah Peng tagging behind me to find out what my mother had in store for me.

As I reached the front door of my house, I saw my mother holding a pink frock.  Oh my! I could not believe my eyes!  My mother had bought it without telling me.  Quickly, I undressed so that my mother could put on the new dress for me.  The chiffon frock was poky and I fidgeted as my mother tried to put it on for me.  It was just big enough to fit me and my mother had underestimated the size of my body. It would be better if it was larger so that I could at least wear it for another year or so.

  But I could not wait for another day, could not wait for it to be exchanged for a bigger one and insisted on wearing it at that instant.  Seeing that I could not be coaxed, and feeling too embarrassed about going back to the shop again, my mother eventually allowed me to wear it. Ah Peng was excited as well and she waited eagerly as my mother pulled up the zip behind me.  Suddenly, the zip bit into my skin and I gave a shriek.  I was mad at my mother for hurting me and for being very clumsy with the zip.  She was not very good with the zip because all our clothes had no zips!  My mum used press studs or buttons to secure any openings in her blouses and the children’s dresses were purposely made with broad enough neck holes so that they could just slip them over their heads. Zips were unnecessary and that could save on costs too.

After I had my new pink frock on, I ran out to show off to my neighbours.  Hoping to win a few praises, I paraded down the lane with Ah Peng.  The frock was extremely uncomfortable as the stiff chiffon kept on scratching my skin.  The hot afternoon did not help either. Soon I began to feel irritated by the dress.  To make things worse, nobody seemed to notice me and the few who saw me did not even make a single comment about my new dress.  I was disappointed at their behaviour. I was also angry because I thought that if it was ‘so and so’ they would be very generous in giving compliments. Nobody was impressed at how I looked.  Years later, I learnt to accept the fact that I was no natural beauty and that some are born to be exceptionally beautiful. I would just have to accept the reality that if it was only the dress that won praises and not the wearer, I would have to be graceful about it.

Feeling dejected, I went straight home to have the chiffon frock changed into my cotton dress with large sunflower prints.  It was my favourite dress because it did not make feel hot and it gave me much freedom.  I could jump, run, or sit anywhere while wearing it. As I grew older, i learnt that being happy with what one has is true happiness.

A Parakeet, a Broken Tail and Trickery(continuation)

The next thing my distraught brother did was even stranger. Instead of putting the bird back to the cage, he took some tapioca flour to make some starch.  He used the sticky starch to stick back the tail, much to the annoyance of the struggling and squawking bird.  Then, he left the house in a hurry, warning me not to tell my mother about what he had just done.

Later that evening, a Malay boy mysteriously appeared at my house asking for my brother.  Nobody understood very much what he said but at the mention of my brother’s name, we knew it had something to do with him.  He was holding the same parakeet that my brother had that afternoon! 


 I could recognise it by its broken tail.  He sounded very angry.  On seeing that we could not produce the person he wanted, he left the house shouting something that I knew could not mean anything good.


  Just as the Malay boy cycled away in his bicycle, my brother appeared behind me.  He whispered to me that if he ever came again, I must tell him that he did not live there.  I demanded to know the reason and my brother waved three dollars at my face.  What is that, I asked.  Incidentally, that was the money from the sale of the parakeet.  He chuckled as he related how he tricked the boy by selling him the parakeet with a broken tail.  If he had not stuck the tail back, the deal could not have materialised.  Who would want to buy a parakeet with a broken tail, he remarked.

I did not like it at all.  I did not like the way he tricked that boy, but my brother thought he was being very clever. 


 The incident about the sale of the parakeet had to be kept a top secret from my mother.  My elder brother had told me specifically that if I ever let the cat out of the bag, he would hit me out of my skin.  Ah, the usual threat but he would not dare, I mocked at him.  He knew he had too many shortcomings that he would not like anymore to annoy my parents.  He tried to bribe me and I demanded one of those syrupy ‘ ice balls’ he would often buy on the way back from school. 


However, my brother could not keep his mischief under control for long.  One day, for no reason or rhyme at all, he irritated me to the extreme. He made scream at him all kinds of names I could think of and feeling defeat, I blurted out the secret that was so well kept for the past few weeks. 


 Unfortunately for him, my mother’s sharp ears picked up the exchange between both of us and the look on her face changed immediately.  In a serious, nonsensical voice she reprimanded my brother and told him to return the three dollars to the Malay boy.

A few weeks passed with the incident totally forgotten.


  One evening, I saw the same Malay boy cycling towards our house.  Quickly, I signalled to my brother who was lazing on the floor of the living room, of his arrival.  As swift as a deer, he got up and ran into the bedroom to hide.  When the boy came up to the door of our house, he spoke in Malay.  I could not understand a single word and I was a little mad at him because he spoke no other language that I could understand.  Using sign language, I knew he wanted to show off his bird which had by then grown its tail again. I could hardly recognise it myself.  Its new owner had fixed one end of a metal chain which was about a foot long at its leg and the other end was fixed to a T-shaped bamboo stand, cleverly made with a handle to hold. It looked happy and would not give me a look when I called out its name.  I called it “Chit-chit” when it first joined our family.

 A few moments later, my brother appeared, pretending to stifle a yawn and pretending that he had just woke up from his nap. They began to speak amicably which told me that there was no more anger from the Malay boy.  He must have forgiven my brother after all “Chit-chit” did gave him much happiness during the past few weeks.

A Parakeet, a Broken Tail and Trickery

My elder brother would be out of the house once the sun has risen from the eastern sky.  He hardly brushed his teeth and I could not remember if he had ever taken any breakfast before going out.  My mother was often worried about his whereabouts which he never disclosed and even if he did, it was not always the truth.  Being the only son, he knew how much he had been dote upon by both my mother and grandma.  My father, on the other hand, was cold to both of us but deep down in my heart, I knew he had just wanted to put on such a front so that we would be fearful of him and would keep out of trouble. 


 However, my brother was not one to be fearful of anybody.  If at all he was home, he would make me cry by his teasing and annoying antics.  The only way for me to take revenge was to call him all sorts of names that were within my vocabulary.  He was too agile for me to catch up with him and too strong for me to give a good fight.

There was one place that my brother frequented at some point with a few of the neighbourhood boys.  I happened to be around when they were chatting about it and having known about it, it brought much misery to my life because I had to keep it a top secret.  Many times I intended to break this promise especially when my brother had irritated me to the extreme.  Letting out the secret meant offence done not only to my brother but to the whole group of burly looking boys and I was intimidated by them.

 It was the foothills of Gunung Lambak, a mountain about less than 1000 feet in height.  Over there, the boys were trying to catch some parakeets found to be nesting in that area.  These birds were of bright green and red in colours.  After hours of bird watching and setting traps, the boys managed to catch a couple of these birds.  My brother brought home one. 


 My mother saw it but could not open her mouth to scold him because she, herself was fascinated by it.  She even helped him get a cage to put the lovely bird.  Together I saw them making the bird feel at home.  Although my mother was very worried about my brother spending time bird watching in the jungle with his friends, there was not much she could do actually.  She had to take the ‘soft approach’ towards tackling the problem.  Her first step was to allow him have this hobby, hoping that it could keep him at home.  However, her hopes were soon dashed.

One late afternoon my brother came rushing home to his bird cage, startling almost everyone; even my father was awakened from his nap.  There was a lot of commotion as he tried to retrieve the equally surprised bird from the cage.  As the bird flew away from his grasp, it squawked and flapped so hard that some feathers dropped off. 


 Suddenly there was a loud shout from my brother which made me run towards him to see what was going on.  Normally I was clever not to meddle with his affairs but I just could not control my curiosity.  I saw that he had successfully got hold of the bird in his right hand, but what caught my eyes was something in his left hand which looked very familiar. 


It was the tail of the parakeet. It might have been accidentally broken off due to his rough handling. My brother looked devastated; he looked as if the sky had fallen down. I jeered at his carelessness.  He was so mad that he shouted at me and this made my mother come out of the bedroom to investigate what the noise was.


 Feeling as sad as my brother, she consoled him by saying that it would soon grow back and told him to leave the bird alone. Birds or chickens are not to be held in the hands for too long because they will feel overheated, my mother added. 

Disobedience and Nightmares

As I recalled the occasions when my stubbornness had the better of me, I could not help flashing back on one. I was reminded of the morning when my sister and I had to be at the mortuary of  General Hospital where my mother’s lifeless body laid awaiting some preliminary funeral rites. 

 My mother’s good friends were gathered to help my sister out with the putting on of special clothes for my mother.  As I knelt by my mother’s already stiff and cold body, my sister and her friends put on four sets of clothes for her, layer by layer. (The number four as pronounced in Mandarin ‘si’ which also sounds like ‘death’ is significant here when all things followed the same number, including the number of times a knot is to be tied!)


  While doing so, they would chant something and her limbs would become flexible to allow them to do their work.  I was forewarned not to open my eyes during the procedures but just to kneel down quietly. Now and then, I was instructed to call out to my mother as if to inform her I was by her side when all these were happening.

However, my curiosity was too much to control, so I lifted my eyelids a little to steal a look.  In the end I witnessed everything, from the dressing up of my mother’s dead body to the closing up of the coffin’s lid.  I saw how a few men heaved the heavy coffin out the room and on to a lorry outside the mortuary.  My disobedience was not let off because soon enough I was punished. 


 That night and several nights after that, I had the strangest nightmares, the sort that I dared not reveal to others lest they thought I was mentally disturbed or the like.  I dreamt that my dead mother came back to life and insisted that she was still alive when they hammered down the coffin’s lid.  Horror of horrors, I thought to myself, that could not be and I reasoned out the impossibility. 


 Why are dreams always so stupid, I remember saying.   


When I was a young adult, I realised that there was a good reason for not allowing a young child to witness the preliminary funeral rites as the ones mentioned.  My mother’s friends were afraid that I would not be able to accept the fact that my mother was suddenly dead.

Nonetheless, I refused to link the disobedience then, to the unfavourable ‘feng shui’ I have experienced in any other times of my life.

VIPs' LUNCH, FRIED MEATBALLS and SWEET TALK

News that my youngest uncle’s prospective wife and her family were coming to pay us a visit caused such a stir that even I who was not expected to know anything was affected to a certain extent. 


 Innocent of being in their way or of shifting the furniture away from the recently changed position, I was unjustifiably shoved off to play or to stay out of the house as much as possible.  Even when I was indoors my movements were restricted, certain parts of the house had became inaccessible. 


That had aroused my curiosity a great deal and many times, I tried to snoop around but was caught by my ‘always on the alert’ grandma.  She knew that both my elder brother and I would not give her peace, especially my crafty brother who always had eyes for her cookies that were secretly hidden in a corner of her bedroom. How did she know that I was assigned by my brother to snoop for him?


 As my mother and grandma busied themselves to clean up the house, both my brother and I were constantly reminded to have our feet cleaned before coming into the house. I was told not to rummage the cupboard in the bedroom for any specific clothes because my mother had been made tired by her endless effort of stacking them neatly.  


Every part of the house was ensured of its neatness and cleanliness lest the ladies in the house be ashamed by the long nosed visitors. Ah Peng and her siblings were kept out of bounds by the scowling look of my grandma.  At one time, one of Ah Peng’s younger brothers was so slow in running away from the veranda of my house that he nearly fell when my grandma wielded her broomstick to scare him away.   I was very upset about her behaviour although I knew she had not meant to do any harm to the poor boy.

Ah Peng grew very angry at me after her several unsuccessful attempts to lure me out of the house to play. The bustling in the house was too great an attraction for me to leave it.  The different aromas coming out from the kitchen made my mouth drool and my stomach was groaning so loudly that I was sure anybody near me could have heard it very clearly. 


 I tried to make myself useful, bringing the elderly ladies this and that.  Now and then, when there was tasting of any food I too would want a share.  When my brother pretended to come into the kitchen for something, he would, with his quick hands, pop some food into his mouth and run off. 


 My mother would be so confused about the number of spring rolls she had just counted that she thought she was getting old and had poor memory.  My grandma was heard grumbling about one of the ‘cookie’ containers not being closed tight enough.  She suspected that my brother had got his hands on the cookies and she was afraid that he might finish them before the guests had even arrived.


  The fried meatballs made everyone’s mouth drooled.  Its aroma must have drifted far because it brought back my elder brother from ‘who knows where he has gone’ to see what was cooking in the kitchen.  As he stood in front the big bowl of hot fried meatballs, he ‘sang’ praises of my grandma’s cooking.  My grandma was swooped off her feet by his sweet talk and offered him one to taste. 


 Pretending to be satisfied, he dragged his feet to leave the kitchen but not without pocketing another one when my grandma’s back was turned.  I was quick to imitate him and as fast as lightning, I popped one into my mouth and another, when none of the ladies was looking.


 The heat scalded my tongue a little and I was huffing and puffing some air to cool it before chewing. I was careful not to let them roll off my mouth due to the fact they were so very hard to obtain and that they were extremely delicious.   I could not open my mouth to speak when my mother asked me a question.   I had to run off to finish eating the meatballs before I dared to remain in the kitchen any longer.  Indeed they were delicious!