When I was young....

Lailatul Qadar will be coming soon. It will  happen in the last ten nights of Ramadhan. I would blog about the Lailatul Qadar later, but today I would like to share with you about my life in kampong in the early 70’s.

There was no electricity in my kampong, and by 7pm, the whole place would be dark and quiet. The only noises would be coming from crickets. We used oil lamp to lighten up the house. So at night, there were not many activities for us, kids. 

Most of the time we spend our nighttime studying or we went for Quran reading class. Walking in the dark to the Ustaz could be very challenging and scary. I was lucky that the Ustaz house was just across the main road.

Every evening, before it gets dark we were already at the Ustaz’s house. Well, there were more than ten of us, and we had to take turns to read in front of the Ustaz. While waiting for our turn, we would recite it first over and over.

The Ustaz was a fierce man. He didn’t like us to talk or play. If anybody caught playing, he would smack you with his cane. Hahaha…. Everybody would sit as far away as possible from him. Those who came in last would be the unfortunate one to sit near him.

We would not leave until he gave us permission to leave. In other words, we can only leave once everybody has finished his or her session with him, and normally, it will be after eight. By then, it would be very dark.

Since our house was only about 500 meter, we just ran across the road without any lights to assists us, but there were two sisters and a brother who lived quite a distance from the Ustaz’s house.

Since there was no road lights to lit the way, they used the dried coconut leaves to help them see their way home. The coconut leaves would be tied together, and they would light it. It’s their torchlight.  They would bring three of it and would light it one after another.

They didn’t mix much with the rest of us, and because of that we liked to tease them.  When we were half way to our house, we would shout at them, “Hantu……” or “Ghosts…” and ran as fast as possible.

The three of them would be running and screaming down the road with the burning coconut leaves. Every time they screamed and ran down the road, we would be laughing, until one day, their grandfather came to the Ustaz’s house and warned us.

From that day onwards, we didn’t tease them anymore. Furthermore, not long after that, they lost their mom. I didn't see them much after that. I wonder what happened to them now. I have not heard about them for so long. Maybe I would take the opportunity this Raya to ask my aunty or cousins about them.

The difference between today's circumcision compared to forty years ago.

Today everything is back to normal. Hubby went back to work after taking the day off yesterday and left me with the kids. I have no complaint about that. It was a lovely time for us to spend our time at home together.

I thought that I was going to have a tough time to take care of Zaki, but he was such an easy boy to take care. He also didn’t lie down on his bed all the time. In fact, he went up and down the staircase making me worried that he might fall, and make it worse. If I compared his circumcision with what my brothers went through before, it was totally different.

When my brothers had their circumcision done, it was such big occasion for the family. The whole family and kampong folk celebrated their journey to manhood. My Bang Ngah was 12 years old while my abang Zahir was two years younger than Bang Ngah. To celebrate, there was a big feast where everybody in the kampong was invited.

The event started early morning. The kampong people would come dressing in their best dress and brought some food or cookie with them. The morning tea was served and later, the womenfolk joined my family members to cook foods for lunch.

While the kampong people prepared the food, my parent was at the hospital with my brothers. At that time, it was uncommon for boys to circumcise at hospital. Most of the kampong kids had theirs done in the traditional way. Hmmm... I don’t encourage any of the young boys to go through that.

Before noon,  my brothers reached home, and they were helped by the men to the house. They were taken to their special bed in the living room. At the living room, the ceiling was covered with a special cloth and so did the wall surrounding the bed. I didn’t know what it was for, but it has something to do with our customs.

My brothers were then put side by side, and their sarongs were then tied to a string which was strung to the special cloth. This was done in order to avoid the sarong from hurting the newly cut skin.

They were treated like princes, and they were not encouraged to get out from the bed. Foods and drinks were sent to them. There were always someone with them, and at night time, there was music to keep them company.

It was not live band singing rock songs, but a violinist and his group singing folk songs. The group was led by an old man known as To Ki Jambut, and it was the main event where everybody was looking forward to. Not only people from my kampong came to the house, but those from the next kampong also came to watch the performance by To Ki Jambut.

Heh! I don’t know whether my brothers enjoy the music, but for one thing they can still remember the old man.

Looking at what my brothers went through and what my kids went through, It was such a vast difference.  We don’t have a big feast, no musician, no special treatment, no special place for them to sleep and the only common thing is the sarong still needs to be tied to avoid hurting the little birdie.

Ahh… modern world!