(1314)Cowardly

I am essentially a coward. Many times I shied away because I dreaded a situation, not knowing how to behave and what to say. It was much easier to stay away.

Many years ago, when I was new in Silver city, I would attend two fellowship groups from two churches each week. It was a happy way to meet new people and to make friends. There was a group that met in the Assistant Leader's home, which until today I hadn't learn how to navigate there. I readily admit to anyone that I am quite hopeless in remembering geographical locations. After a year of being driven to the meetings every Friday night, I couldn't drive to that house on my own. In those days there were no ways or GPS.

Abruptly, the meetings changed to the Leader's house and the Assistant Leader stopped coming. I was curious and surprised, I asked and the answer was he had a project out of town and his wife was busy preparing for the coming wedding of the eldest son. A year later I realized that there was only seven months between the wedding and the full moon celebration of the first grandchild. Then I was aghast how badly I had behaved. Normally I am a person who hardly call folks on the phone. I did try once or twice to get someone to lead me to their house so I could visit. But I did not try that hard. It really looked like I judged them and dropped them like hot cakes during a difficult time for them. In real life I was more blissfully ignorant than being judgemental. I felt very bad.

In between, my family moved 200 miles to the south. One day, another Silver city friend called and said that the Leader's youngest daughter was going for a second scan in a hospital near my new home. This time I made sure my husband called and make appointment to take them out for dinner. We feared the prognosis was cancer. I was fearful of not knowing how to respond and what to say. We had a very nice meal, my husband and I listened to their pain and many fears. We ended saying a short prayer before parting. It was not as difficult as I feared. That was many years ago and the girl went on to remission after surgery. She qualified as a doctor in Australia six years later.

The two incidences happened ten years apart. It is amazing how time taught a person not to be immobilised by fear. I have learnt to walk into a situation fearfully than doing nothing.

(1313)Social distancing

When I was resident in Regent Garden, Silver City, I used to buy minced meat that was quick frozen from half a shop nearby. It was a very quiet area, the lady habitually half shuttered and locked the grill door. I had to ring an electric bell to get service if she happened to be out of sight. After a while, I would time my purchases to my return journey from picking up my youngest. At that time in the afternoon she normally was seated hand slicing meat from bristle about six feet from the opening. I would make sure my child had locked the car door before I walked out to buy a few packets of meat.

The entire row of two-storey shops consists of five shoplots. Four of them were in use, one at the end was untenanted and looked run down. This was fairly common in Silver City, many shops in unpopular areas were just left vacant. The owners would not sell even if they could not let the shops out year after year. These poperty owners must have deep pockets as they would have to pay quit rent, accessment rate and utilities even for unproductive real estate.

One day I talked to my left hand neighbour who owned and managed an electrical sale and repair shop outside of our housing area. She was one of the first to move into my row of houses. She told me that four shops made up a catering service consisting at least two legal entities owned by one man. The unassuming looking lady who sold me meat is his wife, a person who is from a rich family herself. The boss owned two shops, the one I frequented was rented from a close relative at a nominal rate. He took over the catering business from his father, that was the Chinese cuisine line. He partnered a friend to start the kosher line and later began a vegetarian one as the green movement swept the area. That was why there were three distinct kitchens for the three separate services.

The boss' wife is a rare breed who do not want to run the three kitchens. She merely passed her time preparing and selling parts of the animals that could not be used in the catering. As I became a regular, we chatted. During peak business period, her husband would purchase an animal 3-4 days. She pointed to her three deep chest freezers, they would be each almost full then. During slack time, one animal might last 10-14 days. That was when I would see her doing patch work under an old study lamp an hour or so before she would close for the day.

She is knowledgeable about animal facts - the culinary kind. I asked about liver, it supplies iron. She said all pieces were booked always. She sold them by the kilo at whole sale price. Kidneys? That too, restaurants would stock them as the older generation considered it to be a delicacy. Interestingly, penises were in demand for medicinal use. The most unexpected call she had was someone asking for animal teeth. I laughed with her, neither of us could imagine a common use. She deflected that call by giving a few phone numbers of the eateries that brewed stock from animal heads.

Recently I thought of her, in the year 2000 way before COVID, she was already practising social distancing. She would hand me the meat packs in a bag, collect my payment and give me the change standing at least three feet behind the grill door. Yet I can't say she was unfriendly. She would often voluntarily suggest how I should cook that batch of meat according to the prcentage of fat. For a woman with means, she was peaceable, contented, and quite happy to serve a customer like me who run in and run off within three minutes.

(1312)Thought of a faraway friend from long ago

Now I am back in the north-eastern part of Borneo since July 2020. We are currently under a third lock-down due to COVID. In between house work, cooking abd writing, I resorted to reading Time and Newsweek magazines from years past. A word smith has to hone her craft. Since libraries are closed, I would read whatever at hand.

The latest copy I read was Newsweek from 2007. It was the copy that honoured the American Military personnel that died in Iraq. Most of the photographs were of young male, 18-30 years old. Of course there were of older male and a few female soldiers, but the numbers were low.

Thoughts flew back to the summer of 1984. I was in Texas housesitting before college term started. Apart from a cat and a few phone calls, it was like a silent retreat. As I picked up a few calls and took down messages, I started chatting with a Navy pilot based in San Antonio. He was a contact of my host, a General in reserve. We met once in church while my host went to speak in a nearby town. At that point of time an offer was made to enrol me in University of Texas in Arlington. Even though the finance part was taken care of, circumstances were such that with a grateful heart I declined the offer and left to go home. It was sad that I was not able to stay on in Texas to continue the accidental friendship.

Sitting on a balcony surrounded by constant drizzle, the fifth rainy day in a week, I wonder if my friend was well. It was unlikely he would be a statistic in the gulf. It was most unlikely he would be in the land battle. Also his age group did not co-incide with the fatal statistics. I am glad. If he survived the Middle Eastern conflicts, he should retire next year. I wish him and all my American friends well in this turbulent time.

(1311)Hiding an abused wife

I have an old friend who believes that one day she would run an abused women's home. For a single mother who brought up one son with a good job in Singapore, she is now free to run her rooming house and live in any way as she is pleased. After all, her rental surplus is more than her simple needs. What her son sends her just goes into the bank in case there is a rainy day later.

This lady has a sister who was my next door neighbour for fifteen years. Let us call the neighbor Betty. Betty brought up three children with the help of her mum after her ex-husband committed bigamy. Now and then I see Betty having guests, one who was a cousin from Kedah; another who was a school friend from Penang. Living in a big city, even as neighbours we might not see each other for a week or ten days. Our schedules varied as she worked full time but I was a homemaker with grown children. There was one guest whom I did not meet but caught a glimpse of getting into Betty's small car. I just assumed it was one of her cousins from up north.

It was Betty's sister who met that guest somehow. The latter just run away from an abusive husband living in Seremban, about one hour by highway south of where we lived. For some reason, she confided in my friend. When Betty met the abused victim over dinner and learnt of her predicament, my good neighbour open her heart and her home to this person. Within the week, the stranger's family in Penang arranged to have the runaway work for a distant relative as a companion to an elderly woman. That way, she could hide from her abuser as well as save some money for a formal divorce. The episode ended happily as the abused ran to Johor, four hours away southwards before Singapore.

Having lived a rather sheltered life, I was shocked to hear that 1. strangers rise up to help a complete stranger. 2. Betty managed to time her comings and goings for a whole week so as to protect the privacy of the abused. 3. No one suspected anything, most of us were used to her having guests off and on as she was a most hospitable person and cooked lovely meals. 4. Until today, Betty never uttered a word of that incident to me.

In case you were wondering, around that time Betty's sister was studying in a Theological College and rented a tiny room near the college. There was no way she could accomodate the stranger without her landlady's consent.

(1310) Circuit breaker

I came back from buying breakfast. It was overcast and has been raining six nights consecutively. Thank goodness we live on high ground and are less than 3 km away from the coast. Else we would have been evacuated as flood victims.

To have a meal, I switched on the overhead light. Oh-oh! The line tripped. As I quickly switched it off as soon as I realized what happened, my son went to the mains to reset the offending switch. We were dismayed that the freezer unit did not kick on. It was full of uncooked meat. Our landlady is a caterer. The long deep freezer is probably holding $5,000 worth of red meat.

On top of low customer demand and the fast approaching Chinese New Year, she does not need anymore worries. I quickly laid hand on the affected freezer and prayed a restoration prayer. We looked at each other and decided to eat our early meal before deciding to call her with the bad news. After all, a functioning freezer could hold its own for about 8 hours even if there is a black out.

Lo and behold, as I was swallowing my last mouthful of fried noodle, the freezer kicked in. I wasn't sure and went to touch it to feel the vibration that should be there. My son was jubilant! He knew each freezer intimately by its individual whirring sound. Thank God it worked on, thus delaying the inevitable evil day. We prayed it will not stop working until every last piece of meat is cooked. After all, it is a most hardy machine that lasted at least 10 years. May it take the final rest when the owner does not need it after the peak period.

(1309) Legendary Borgia

A friend told me her neighbour's child returned home from a great aunt's with plates, bowls and other crockery pieces. Moments later I recalled a story I heard seated on my grandma's lap many years ago.

Long ago and far away in a great city of China, an important man with everything he could want in life lost his wife in childbirth. What could he do? There were five children left by his beloved wife. After mourning for a year, he looked for a second wife. The matchmakers looked high and low and found a match.

The seemingly perfect second wife arrived with an entire set of kitchen ware. The cook's husband was the master's coach man. He was sent to ask the master as to what he wanted to use: his old dishes or his new wife's. The master asked his new wife why she brought what she brought. She answered that her forebears were master porcelain makers. Those were her dowry, actually family heirlooms. She tactfully said that they were only meant for display.

Life went on. The second wife was good to her stepchildren. Her own children were born by and by. Then tragedy struck, the eldest step child, a girl of fifteen years old, died. It was an unexplained death. The girl was not sick, she died in the night. The serving maid noticed that the stepmother cooked one dish that evening, but the entire household partook of it. Anyway she was a humble servant and kept her peace.

The second child of the first wife was a boy. The servant boy who served this young master happened to be a younger brother of the serving maid mentioned above. A year later, the stepmother cooked a delicious dessert and served everyone in the household after dinner but before bed time. The humble but observant serving maid noticed her mistress took out an ornate bowl from the display cabinet to serve the young master's portion. She hurriedly took it to her brother, whispered that young master should not consume it. This interference actually saved the young man's life.

Five years flew by, child number three and four who were girls, both died at different times and in different ways. By now, there were three people who suspected the stepmother: the serving girl, her brother and the young master. On the eve of the young master's departure to take the Imperial Examination, the serving girl quietly packed a few sets of clothing for the youngest girl of the first wife. The maid's brother secretly placed the bundle amongst the young master's luggage. At the last minute, the fifth child was bundled into the carriage and taken away.

Young master passed the examination and became a Magistrate in a nearby town. His youngest sister from the same mother was safe at the maternal grandma's house. The Master, who had a second wife, seemed to accept his daughter's long visit in her mother's childhood home.

Years passed, the small girl grew up under her grandma's care. In the traditional way, a match was made and the stepmother persuaded her husband to throw a big wedding do in their home for the nuptial of this daughter. It was a good thing her brother the magistrate heard about it. He reacted by taking his sister straight to his own home, and quietly held her wedding there. A court case ensued: the father sued the son for kidnapping his precious daughter, son sued the father as accessory with his second wife to the murder of three daughters. The Emperor's physicians, porcelain experts, poison experts... were all called as expert witnesses to carefully examine and inspect all possible evidence available. All three tombs of dead stepdaughters were exhumed, and it was found that each of the three girls had died of ingested poisoning. Their bones showed without a doubt that poison had been administered over a period of time before leading to their deaths.

Apparently, certain rare color pigments used to decorate expensive bone ware not fully fired in the kiln, were poisonous to humans. But if one served ordinary food on it, no one would suffer. It took an initiated person to cook a common dish with unusual ingredients to bring out the poison in the utensil. The second wife came from a family with such knowledge. Had she been able to have her way, every single one of the first wife's children would have perished, yet each death would occur at a different time in varied ways. Needless to say, she spent the rest of her life behind bars.

(1308) Free

I have spent most of my life in Peninsular Malaysia. Though third world, plumbing works there. Here in northern Borneo, I live in an eight hundred thousand dollar(local currency) building. The only clean water tap head we use is connected to a water storage drum, blue in colour. There is no stop cork switch in between the drum and the tap head. Hence there was no way of repairing the tap unless one switches off the mains and drains the drum completely.

Well, the building is superbly situated in a safe and prosperous area. Electrical supply is relatively stable compared to surrounding areas. Wi Fi signals are better than all our friend's. Whatever we need, we could get it by walking to nearby shops. I did not appreciate these wonderful good points until Movement Restriction Order. For weeks we were house bound. Then the head of household could go out and buy essentials. I was a prisoner freed to walk around all the shops, holding some food purchases. It was wonderful to be free to walk around again.

(1307) Survive

In Grade 6 I was in charged of the corridor notice board. My teacher advisor told me to visit an exibition down town and write a report to be pinned on the board.

What could I do? I dared not venture into the big bad city alone. The deadline drew nearer and I was getting depressed. My good friend advised me to look out for the newspaper coverage and adapt from there. Out came my rescuer, an unlikely person who was from the fringe of my group. She volunteered to accompanied me there and back. We will call her Kimberly here.

We visited the exibition and I took notes for the report. On the way back, she pulled me into a road that led to the police station. I was puzzled. There was a tea stall under a tree next to the police gate. We sat down and she ordered a glass of milk tea. When the boy delivered the tea, she talked to him in rapid fire Malay. She helped her mom in the wet market and was fluent in market Malay. The boy related what she said to the owner of the stall. The latter hurried and said a few reassuring words.

A group of policemen came sat down. The owner served them and must have said something to them. They turned and stared at the suspicious character that my friend detected and we changed route to avoid him. One hefty police stood up and walked towards the thin, shifty looking guy. The latter ran out of sight. A pair of jovial policemen walked us to the nearest bus stop. We hopped up the very next bus that was heading to the station.

Today Kimberly owned a factory and a showroom dealing with automobile fittings. It was abundantly clear that at age 12 she was a most resourceful person.

(1306) Tumour

Lately the food served during breakfast came out late for a few days. At first I attributed it to heavy rains in the mornings. Yesterday I turned up at 7:15am, only one noodle was fried and three side dishes were out. They were: eggs sunny side up, bitter gourd stuffed with fish meat and brinjal cooked as the gourd. I was surprised. The customer in front of me asked why they were so very late. The lady boss said her cook was on MC. He had a tumour in his neck. The assistant cook and the cook's boy were having a hard time filling in. Normally at 7:00am there were at least three types of noodles and at least 8 dishes. Besides those three listed above, we have deep fried egg roll, curry taufu pok (fried tofu stuffed), fried pork hakka style, barbecue meat slices, and squid in dark sauce.

This is the second cook I knew of taken ill. The first one had an abcess in his abdomen.He elected to return to his village in the interior and not trust government surgeons. One restaurant owner called it occupational disease. Most cooks have been apprenticed from age twelve. They were usually from poor families. The position in the kitchen enabled them to have much opportunity to eat what they like, within reasons. The consumption of unlimited food bad for them over time bred ill health. A skillful cook earns $1,200 per month with housing, two meals a day and sometimes a second hand car for marketing. That is considered good remuneration here for a local who did not get an educational certificate at age 17.

(1305) Birds

Being confined to a building for weeks at a stretch actually allowed me to be observant of animal life in the neighbourhood. Gangs of sparrows flitted from the roof to the window grills. Pigeons haunted the eateries looking for handouts. Swiftlets nested in the nooks of untenanted corridors. A pair of hawks flew high in the sky floating on thermals. Black birds with orange beaks, the type that could be trained to imitate human speech, roamed on the green lawn. Two wild chickens, which annoyed the delivery boys by pecking on their shoe lace, were shooed away. Last of all a pair of nesting yellow wag tails lived nearby, but moved after my close observation for too many days.

For a busy commercial area, I am blessed with such a wide range of wild birds. Oh, I forgot about the many white cranes hanging around the pond. It sounded like a wild life sanctuary, didn't it? Thankful for the many bird songs, I threw egg shells broken into bits and papaya skin cut into shreds near the pond for them. That is my bit of conservation effort.

(1304) Scaling

A

While still under Conditional Movement Restriction Order, I have a lot of free time to watch the park like area in front of where I live.

Three days ago I was highly entertained by 2 wild chickens' repeated attempts to get to the top of a huge lorry parked in the open area. After many attempts, one black chicken was standing on the metal bar under the front lights. The other one managed to perch on the windscreen wiper. After four failed attempts to jump higher, it did manage to reach the top of the cab for a few seconds. However, the metal paint on top was too slippery for the chicken's claws. It fell all of 6 feet to the grass.

All these happened within 40 minutes or so. I used to think that chickens were impulsive animals. After this I realise one or two could be quite persistent. There was no food on top of the cab. Why did the chickens tried hard to achieve such a difficult feat? Indeed why do we climb mountains?

(1303) No Deal

There was a couple who taught in China for a year. It was in a small town of a poor province up north. According to them, every parent they met with wanted their children to learn English. Therefor private entities sprouted out all over to meet that demand. That couple was in touch with a private tour agency which took care of their visa from Hong Kong.

They came back to their minor town and reported their experience to their church. Indeed the harvest field was white, but the workers are few. They presented evidences of people saved, bible study and discipleship classes completed. It was interesting how church leaders pointed them to South Asia. The enthusiastic couple retorted that they knew not a word of that language. Had the church been able to find a suitable language tutor, they would start language lesson that very night. They walked off, deeply diappointed at the throat constricting national policy of short visits to one or two target countries only.

Two years later, I heard that they joined a different denomination and turned to work with migrant workers. Looking at the narrow mindedness of the leaders in the first group, they could be thirty years away from dying. Perhaps the millions invested into church buildings would be sold to be used in other ways as the old believers die. Of course mismanagement of funds could occur in Buddhist temples, Hindu kuils, Moslem mosques or other religious edifice. It really is a human condition, nothing to do with any specific religion.

(1302) Adoption years ago

This is a story of adoption in the era around 1916.

A couple was childless. They adopted two girls as infants. Next they negotiated the adoption of a 6 year old boy. The boy's mother died of consumption. The poor widower father hurt his back as a coolie. He was about to return to his hometown in China as a cripple. His son refused to leave with him.

Since the prospective adoptive dad was rich, he actually sum up 1. a one way ship ticket 2. the cost price of a healthy horse 3. 6 months of wages earned by a farm hand. The grand total was given as a one-time gift to the crippled father. It was the means to a new life. The transaction was not human trfficking. The adoptive parents wanted a son to carry on the family name. The crippled man wanted to return to the shelter of his family. It was an amicable exchange. A document was drawn up, both men signed it in front of a commissioner of oath and a local business leader.

As far as I know, the adopted son died in the 1990s.