Mum Left Home for Food

During the Second World War and just before the Communists occupied  mainland China, my mother, my eldest brother and my paternal grandmother were living in a remote village in Southern China.
At that time my mother had to shoulder the burden of taking care of the whole family. She had to take up any odd jobs available in the village. She would  toil in the field, threshing rice. At times she would pluck fruits in an orchard. Other times she would work as a construction worker, carrying stones, sand or cement, just to earn a meagre income to support the whole family.
Job opportunities at that time were scarce, especially in the remote and underdeveloped villages in China .At times, my mother was out of work for days at a stretch, particularly during the drought, flood and winter season. The livelihood of the family was badly affected.  Consequently, all the members in the family had to “tighten their belts” during those difficult and trying times.
Sometimes my mother could not stand to see my grandma going without proper meals for days. So, she had to resort to a short-term but yet effective measure: to bring my brother along to visit my maternal uncle for a few days, so that they could have “free food and lodging” at my uncle’s house.
When it was time for my mother to go home, my uncle would provide her with plenty of foodstuffs and other daily necessities acquired from his sundry shop. My cousin sister would also ‘pilfer’ other essential goods from her father's shop to let my mother bring home too. Although my maternal uncle and auntie knew about what their daughter was doing, they pretended not to notice and they did not pursue the matter.

(http://zest-zipper.blogspot.com/search?q=a+letter+from+nanyang)

Many a time, out of concern for the well-being of my mother, my maternal uncle would get somebody to deliver a letter asking my mother to bring my brother to visit him if he had not heard news from my mother for quite some time.

Unfortunately,some ignorant and irresponsible folk in my ancestral village misconstrued the noble intention of my mother. They blamed her for being unfilial by leaving grandma alone at home uncared for, while my mother and my brother were having a gala time at my uncle’s house. Little did the folks know that the provisions my mother brought back from my  uncle’s place were worth far more than my mother’s income for the entire month, as the rations she brought home could feed the whole family for weeks. The folks were unaware of the fact that if my mother had not gone back to her brother's house for material assistance, all the members in the family would have died of starvation. In those difficult times, it was a matter of 'do or die' that matters most. It was no point to go around telling people of your legitimate 'birth right' which nobody would bother to listen anyway.

In a way, my mother was a wise woman. She quietly went back to her brother's house instead of proclaiming her 'birth right' for all the villagers to hear.

A DREAM OF 200 DOLLAR NOTES

Today I was alarmed to wake up, this time not by an alarm clock, but by my own dream of 200 dollar notes. Thus, my routine nap was cut short with this sudden awareness that there were a few among the notes that came out from an ATM machine were RM200 notes, which were not in circulation.

I said to myself,

"This time mati lah! "

"Where got money like that one! ?"

"How am I going to dispose this money of rare denomination to the vendors at the market or food court without being suspected by them?"

"To say the sum is big, it isn’t that big.”

"To say the sum is small, it isn’t small.”

"If I don't make use of the money, it is a great loss to me."

"But, on the other hand, it is not legal tender!"

"Moreover, it is not easy to cheat or take the vendors for a ride as they are not as stupid as we want them to be. In fact most of them could be smarter than our university professors. "

"Their eyes are as sharp as an eagle's hovering in the sky eyeing a small chick on a farm land."

In the end, before I could give up thinking of how to dispose of the money, a brilliant idea suddenly popped into my rusty mind. It suggested that I should resume my nap instantly before the bank would 'call it a day' with the hopes that I could get a chance to see the branch bank manager to get him change the money to smaller denominations.

一个两百块钱的梦

今天我突然从午睡中被自己的梦惊醒。

原来我梦到我到一间银行提款机领钱，所吐出来的钞票其中有一些是两百块钱的钞票。看到这异常的钞票我顿时错愕。因为这种钞票没有在市面上流通。拿了这样的钞票，等于废纸回收，我不知道要如何处置。

我对自己自言自语地说：

“这次惨啦！”

“为什么会跑出这样的钞票？”

“既然这类钞票没有在市面上流通的话，我要如何在巴刹或饮食中心消费它而又不被小贩们识破呢？”

“讲起小贩们，他们并不像我们想象中的那么笨。其实他们比大学里的教授更加精明。要逃过他们的电眼可不简单。他们的眼神犹如在高空盘旋的老鹰般，紧盯住农场里的小鸡，等待时机成熟时闪电出击。所以想通过小贩这个关可要比登天还难。”

“说到这笔钱大，它也不算大。说它小，它却不小。”

“不拿它来用很可惜。要拿它来用又不知道如何着手，也不知道它又能买些什么东西呢？”

正如杨修所说的鸡肋：

“鸡肋，弃之可惜，食之无味。”

想来想去，想不出一解套的方案。

最后幸好我那即将生锈的脑袋给我一个我心里很乐意接受的方案：

它建议我重新躺下睡午觉，再回去该银行找经理商量，希望他能够将两百块钱面额的钞票换回可以在市面上自由流通的钞票。

 

母亲离家出走

我大哥，母亲及内祖母一家三口，在中国大陆解放前是住在广东省大埔县一个偏僻的村庄里。

大哥当年只接受了三年的私人书斋教育后就自动停学，因为他不忍心看到母亲一个人辛辛苦苦出外做散工来维持一家生计，所以一心想跟着母亲出外干活来分担家庭负担。

当年在乡下山区，经济活动有限，工作机会很少。有时一连好几天都没有工作，没收入，一家三囗只得挨饿过日子。母亲不忍看到祖母继续挨饿，只好重施故计，三十六计中的“走为上策”，带着大哥 离家出走回娘家住一阵子，暂时舒缓挨饿的日子。

舅父当年是开杂货店的。母亲和大哥在那里，食、住，不成问题。

等到母亲即将回家时，舅父会让母亲带回家一些米，亁粮和 日用品，足够家里维持几个星期的食用。表姐还会偷偷从舅父店里拿一些东西让母亲带回家。舅父、舅母虽然知道了，也一只眼开、一只眼闭。

有时候母亲很久没回娘家，舅父还会托人带信来问候并邀请母亲再次回娘家小住一些日子。舅父一家人都很体谅母亲的生活困境。他老人家会不定时地伸出援手，雪中送炭，救母亲燃眉之急。舅父的恩情令我们后辈毕生难忘，也无从报答。

母亲的离家出走回娘家难免会被一些乡民们误解，以为母亲不顾祖母的死活，自己一个人带着孩子回娘家消遥快活。孰不知母亲自己有难言之苦。与其在家里一家三口抱着一起饿死，不如厚着脸皮回娘家求救，重新杀出一条生路。

母亲无怨无悔的付出，是我们后辈们的表率。我只能趁母亲节前夕，含泪感恩拜谢。

"FATE FOOLS US" 命运弄人

Whenever people talk of ‘faithfulness’, my mind can't help but to think of "fate fools us."

当人们谈到英语词汇里的 ‘忠心’，我却会联想到 ‘命运弄人’。

For instance, I heard a friend telling me about another friend's ‘pride and prejudice’.
No one knew how, why and what had made that friend of mine very prejudiced against our Indian friends. As he was a swimming instructor, he had made a declaration that he would never want to coach any Indian in his swimming lesson.

听一个朋友说，我另外一个当游泳教练的朋友对印度友族很有偏见。不知他受了什么刺激，让他发誓永远不教印度人游泳。

True enough he had kept his attestation till the very last day he departed from this world.

真的，他严守誓言，由始至终从来没有教过任何印度人游泳。

Days before he was summoned by the Almighty God, fate had played the fool with him.

可是在他临命终时，命运却和他开了一个大大的 玩笑！

It seemed that on one particular morning he was told to stand in for another person to be a lifeguard in a Penang swimming carnival.

话说有一天早上，他临时被安排替代一位朋友去槟城海滩嘉年华会当救生员。

As he had no means of transport, the organizer had arranged for a lady driver to ferry him to Penang. After the event was over, he was brought back to Bukit Mertajam in the evening. While he was about to cross the main road to walk home, he was knocked down by a drunken motor cyclist and was immediately rushed to the district hospital where he died a few days later.

由于他本身没有交通工具，主办当局安排一位女生驾车接送他去槟城。傍晚司机载他回大山脚。正当他过马路要走回家，突然被一俩飞奔的摩多单车撞倒。他伤势严重，即刻被送往地方医院救治。数天后他不幸身亡。

Think as you may, and say as you like....
Deep in your heart I suppose you may be wandering :

Is it purely a coincidence?

Or,

Is it that fate is playing the fool with him?

或许各位会对我这位朋友作出种种的猜测或联想：

这是是凑合？ 仰或是命运弄人 ？

It turned out that the woman driver and the drunken motorcyclist aforementioned were BOTH INDIANS!

这也难怪各位能作诸多的联想，因为事发当天，那位载他的女性司机和撞倒他的摩多单车手全部都是他生前不想接触的印度人！

All the way our friend did not want to have anything to do with Indian friends, but in his last hours in this world he could not escape from their presence.

我们这位朋友一生都不想和印度朋友有任何的接触，可是他却在临终时跟印度人结下了局号的缘份。

My Old Town Postmen

When I was a kid, I had a high respect for postmen and the services they rendered. The postmen then were very professional in carrying out their duties.

At that time, during the Sixties of the last century, the postmen were mostly of Indian descent. There were also a few Malay postmen in their rank and file. The postmen then could endure the heat under the hot sun or the shower of the falling rain while delivering letters on their bicycles. Usually they would dispatch letters twice a day, six days a week except public holidays.

In those days correspondence through post was the cheapest and the most common means of communication among people living in different parts of the world. As usual, it was always a joy for the elders in my family to receive letters from friends and relatives from near and far, especially letters, sent from my maternal uncle or from my paternal cousin brother living in the Canton, a Province of China, which were most welcome. My mother would be very glad to hear news read out aloud to her by my eldest brother, the news of my maternal uncle or my paternal grandmother who were our most intimate relatives staying in mainland China.

At that time there were no diplomatic ties between Malaya and the People's Republic of China due to the difference in political ideologies, in which the two blocs of nations~the Communist and the Capitalist countries~were at a deadlock during the Cold War era. Although correspondence through letters between the people living in two different blocs of nations was allowed, it had to be done through some form of surveillance or scrutiny by the authority of the countries concerned.

Correspondence through letters between my family and our relatives in China was written in the Chinese language. All the envelopes addressed to us from China were written in Chinese characters. No writing in English or Malay appeared on the envelopes. But somehow or other the postmen at that time were very dedicated and diligent in carrying out their job. They would take the trouble to get the help of the other staff in the post office to translate the address written in the Chinese characters into Romanized English or Malay so that they could deliver the letters to the recipients concerned without fail.

At that time, along the short stretch of High Road of Nibong Tebal, there were two households having identical addresses. One was our shop house and the other, a Malay coffee stall opposite the Parit Buntar bus station bearing the same house number of 176. We did not know how this mistake arose. It could be that a careless or inattentive staff working at the District Office had mistakenly allocated the same house number to the two households along the same street. But this did not deter the postmen from delivering the letters to their rightful recipients, except in a few instances whence the letters were mistakenly sent to the wrong recipients.

Sadly, the postal service has deteriorated in later years, especially after the implementation of the New Economic Policy of our country. Later the service was getting from bad to worse since its privatization. The postage increases multifold but the services provided do not commensurate likewise.

Instances of bundles of letters 'camping in the bushes’ or 'swimming in a mountain stream' were reported once in a while in the local newspapers. This was done deliberately by some of unscrupulous postmen to save their time and trouble in delivering the letters.

I personally had a bitter experience of failing to receive an insurance maturity cheque sent to me by AR registered mail. The letter bypassed me. It took a detour back to the sender, the Great Eastern Assurance Company, without my knowledge as the addressee. Neither did the insurance company itself make any attempt to contact me regarding the matter.

Two years later the money was sent by the insurance company to the Treasury of the Ministry of Finance of Malaysia as an unclaimed sum.

Another instance was that a close friend of mine, who wanted to send me a letter, but the letter was delivered back to him as the postman delivered the letter based on the address of the sender written on the reverse side of the envelope. Just imagine that!  The sender received the letter he posted, and wasted the postage of 80 sen! Both my friend and I were rather  puzzled and could not comprehend why the postman concerned was unable to read and understand simple English; to differentiate between the words, 'To' and 'From', written on the envelope. Or was it due to sheer carelessness?

I had been told by my other close friend, Christopher Lo,that there were a few among the postmen who were illiterate. I didn't want to believe him then. But now I am beginning to take his words seriously.
Gone were the days whence we could have a reliable and efficient postal service of the post Merdeka years. No wonder many people would prefer to use courier service from other mail service providers; the most prestigious and reliable one at the moment would be the DHL.

The Halong Bay(下龙湾)

Three days after the incident of the disappearance of the MAS airliner MH370, our family made a long-anticipated trip to Hanoi travelling on the Malaysian Airline.

On board the aircraft I came across a caption of  an advertisement from the Malaysia Airlines  magazine, 'going places', that reads ‘On this journey of life, we’re all travellers looking forward to make that great trip with someone.’

Indeed, 'we are the travellers  to make that great trip to Hanoi' planned by my daughters, tailored specially for my wife's needs  as she has suffered for years from osteoporosis which makes her movements "very, very difficult and challenging".  

So, the itinerary of this trip would be basically "quite free and quite easy"; it would be quite relaxing as it would involve minimum walking on our part and we would try to spend more time 'on wheels' for moving about.

In Hanoi, we decided to book a spacious, luxurious cab so that my wife could sit comfortably with more room to stretch her legs.

As for lodging, we followed the recommendation of TripAdvisor to stay at Hanoi Guesthouse. Opposite this hotel and not far from it, there were quite a number of restaurants and eating stalls. Dining was not a problem at all.

In the evening on our arrival at Hanoi, my daughters suggested we should patronize Bobby Chinn's restaurant to taste some of his signature dishes which he, as a celebrity chef, had demonstrated in his programmes on the Travel and Living Channel (Channel 707) of the Astro cable television network. Initially I was not in favour of this proposition as it would be expensive to dine at this costly restaurant. My contention seemed to be more untenable than the argument of my other family members that "if we don't patronize it now, we may not have the chance to do so later!"

Like any democratic entity, I, as the minority, had to abide to the wishes of the majority.

Moreover, I had just come across a catchphrase on the menu while having lunch that very afternoon at the restaurant opposite our hotel which reads,

‘Life is a journey, eat well, and travel well ….

So, we decided to have our dinner at Bobby Chinn's restaurant to 'eat well', and, of course, not forgetting to 'pay well' as well. Luckily I wasn't the one to foot the bill!

On the following day, at noon, we embarked on the Dragon's Pearl Cruise for a 2D1N cruise excursion. This junk is equipped with 11 cabins with a maximum capacity of twenty travellers on board.

The Dragon's Pearl Cruise is the newest and the largest cruise of the Indochina Junk Company with three junks, each of which bears the identical name of the Dragon's Pearl Cruise.

On board the cruise, my wife and I were allotted to a cabin adjacent to the dining hall. This time around, all the cabins were fully occupied with a total of twenty travellers; most of them were from Europe and the States. We did not have any problems explaining to the other travellers where we came from as they were fully aware of and constantly updated by the CNN regarding the mystery flight of MH370 airliner.

After lunch, our cruise was anchored near the Titov Island. My daughters and I were among the enthusiastic tourists who were ferried on shore in a boat.  We climbed a flight of a hundred steps to enter and explore a huge limestone cave. This cave was once the home of a fisherman and his family before Halong Bay was declared a UNESCO World Heritage site.

From the cave we followed another trail leading to the beaches where we spent the remaining afternoon on activities like swimming in the bay and kayaking through a limestone cave. There was a group of youngsters playing beach football.

Next morning we were guided to a tour of a fishing village and the pearl cultivation farm at the Halong Bay.

We disembarked from the cruise after lunch was over.
The most significant feature of this cruise tour was the route navigated by the cruise which was to deviate from the mass tourist sites, to bring the travellers to the remotest parts of the bay where the travellers could enjoy a quiet and serene natural surrounding far away from the other passing vessels or fishing boats.

Some people might consider a cruise excursion of this sort expensive, but it is definitely worth the money spent if one were to choose a good shipping company which provides a superb itinerary coupled with good food, comfortable lodging and excellent service.  And the Indochina Junk Company is one such company you could rely on if you plan to visit the Halong Bay.