At last, I can now breath easy, the household chores are done, husband and son are fed, I've done my Ini-Yang-ngabas-bala-uchu part cos Kunchi, mom, ika & Kumang are away holidaying in Langkawi and I was asked by big sister to pop in once in a while to check on Amum and her brood. My, what a brood, the twins are so adorable, so sumo-like and they are so well-behaved. As long as they are fed (every 2 hours mind you, so its little wonder they look like little sumo warriors)and comfortable, they would nod off to slumberland. The not-so-well-behaved child is of course the eldest, Aaron Jaul. Word has it that his paternal grandpa, who is a pagan, ever gave him mandi with batu kera upon his birth, to the dismay of Kunchi, ika and ini wai. Seeing as how Kunchi is a Christian manang in her own right, ika a faithful disciple of Christ and ini wai a staunch believer in the Lord, I jokingly told them to call on the Holy Spirit to descend upon their uchu/ichit and wash his stain. That they did, but Jaul is still as manchal as ever, so we unanimously concluded that Jaul is sigi manchal, enda bula manchal, period. Ann-Marie Jeburi is as lovely as ever but after two weeks of not going to the physiotherapist for her exercise, she has turned lazy - she would just sit on her walker or lie down and refused to walk. Igat attempted to walk her round the sitting room but she was not co-operative. Muntai was there, volunteering her help, tho I did not see much evidence of it. Well kids are kids, and town kids who grew up with indons to do their bidding are the worse - I know so, I've been living with three such kids. In retrospect, seeing as how the girls turned out to be okay, I mean from the photos they posted on their blogs - that do indicate they know how to cook, clean and take care of themselves, perhaps dad and I should've done away with the indons before..(ahem.. the last sentence is a redeeming grace, just in case I got bombarded with "mami..mami..how could you" calls from them after they read this posting).
Now I tell you of my childhood years in rumah panjai. You might wonder why I chose Indu Rumah Panjai as my url. Well, I am what you may call you-can-take-the-girl-out-of-the-rumah-panjai-but-you-can't-take-the-rumah-panjai-out-of-her. Indeed, the rumah panjai values are so deep-rooted in me. Indu rumah panjai of my times were brought up to be bagas, to be indu asi, indu ai, to be gracious to temuai, to be respectful of our elders, to be generous to others, to be caring and supportive, to be loving to our children and at the same time to discipline them. See, in those days, indu dara and bini urang woke up early, as early as 4.30 am to do the laundry and berapi for breakfast and tapau lunch to be brought to the kebun/umai. Then came the time to serve breakfast, sent the kids to school, tidied the bilik and set off to the kebun/umai. They worked alongside the men and when it was time to prepare lunch, they stopped and prepared lunch. Then it was off to toil again, to go back home by about 5.30pm. Along the way, they picked ripe buah letup and whatever buah babas to bring home for their kids. And the kids would go jengkak-jengkak when they saw their parents coming, hoping for some treats..well buah letup, buah kubal, and when its fruit season, buah lumok, buah temedak, buah kemanti, buah ma.
The evening ritual was to mandi and masu gari. I loved the mandi time, cos that was when you could socialise with others and to be with your parents. While indai brushed and banged the laundry against the hard board of the jelatong, apai would turned himself into John Travolta's Powder - his body would be covered with suds from top to bottom.. and then it was time to dip in the river to get rid of the suds, and to play with the kids. Apai would toss me up and up, and I would fall, stayed in water as long as I could hold my breath, and then popped up again. Then came the merus daki ritual - I hated this part. It was the time when indai stopped the play, got hold of me and scrubbed me with some rough, used piece of cloth, from top to bottom. But the best part was when indai, after she had washed herself, got in the river, pumped air into her sarong which caused the sarong to balloon up and then I would climb from behind, numpang indai itit. My, it was so cool...
Back from mandi, the indu dara and bini urang cooked and the apais minded the children until its makai time. After the dishes were done, its time to ngelipat gari and later, socialise. Some elderly women with menantu and anak dara to do the chores normally busied themselves beranyam after dinner. Sometimes, when its jagung season, the adults would bring big baka and dried corns in the cobs to the ruai and we gotong-royong picked the ears of the corn out of the cobs. The jagung were then stored - some for cornmeal, but mostly for pemakai manuk.
We were told to be gracious to visitors. When they came, we were not allowed to ask whether they have eaten, cos people might be malu to say they have not eaten and instead they said yes and ended up hungry. Rather, we were told to prepare food and serve visitors at any time of the day. The second rule is to mela as quietly as possible. If we make a lot of noise - from clanging pots, plates and spoons, it would indicate to the visitors that we were not pleased in preparing their meal, so they would not feel welcomed. The third rule is not to meda urang makai, enggai ke urang malu. So it would be the elders to sit and eat with the temuai. If the indu dara have not eaten, they got to eat later, after the temuais had their meal.
We were told that its disrespectful to call people by their given names. So depending on the relationship, we either addressed the men as aya, ika, adi, aki or by the names of their eldest children - apai Bulau, for instance. Women were addressed as ibu, ini, ika, adi or indai Bulau.
We were trained to be clean. So at about 4.30 pm, it was time to nyauk and mugal periuk. We took the pots and pans to the Niah river, we used sand and dried daun kemplas or sometimes daun lumok (when we ran out of the berus dawai alus) to scrub the pots and pans till they shined, till we could see our faces mirrored on their surfaces. We proudly held out our pots and pans to the passing motor chalo, and the urang kapal showed their black pots and pans at us. We made faces at them, and they made faces at us.
We scrubbed the papan dapur, tempuan and underneath the dapur, clean. We nyapu abu from the dapur and threw the ashes away. We cleaned and scrubbed the shelves holding the pinggai mangkuk. We cleaned the water bottles regularly (we used glass F & N bottles) and to prevent dust from settling on the clean plates and bottles, we covered them with clean towels. Our jemari pinggai was the envy of many, cos dad was great at making those things. Many came to seek his favour to make sarang pinggai for them. He obliged them all, but he could only make them during the night as he was busy during the day.
When the neighbours were in need of sugar, coffee, tea, garam, biching, pusu, minyak and sabun, it was the norm to lend and they would repay later. If the neighbours were hardup, we never expected them to pay back, nor did we nagih them. If someone still had a lot of padi to be harvested while others had completed their harvests, the folks would gotong royong to assist with the harvest. If someone fell ill, their bilik would be full of folks coming in to ngabas, gave comfort, ngurut if the illness was urutable, and just to be there, for company. If someone died, all would gotong royong-the men to make the santubong, the women to cook. People would sleep on the ruai and the ruai of the dead was always full of relatives and if there were not many relatives, the longhouse women made sure that they kept vigil with the immediate family members.
Skilful women were and still are held in high regard. Women learned to weave, ngaga pua, nusuk manik, beranyam, learned to ngaga penganan semut, kuih chap, kuih buah ulu, penyaram, ngaga tuak. So as best they could, longhouse women of my times learned to acquire these skills. With all these attributes, bagas gawa, bebasa ke urang, manah ulah, they became what is known as indu asi indu ai. Such women built a name for themselves, so they became very good wife material. More so if they have the looks, that upped their value in the longhouse community.
These values are still held dear by the Iban community until today, tho sadly, I see less and less women are of indu asi, indu ai material these days. With modern conveniences available even in the longhouse now, one could still see some biliks need a lot of an indu asi indu ai's touch. It 's no longer shameful to wake up late, some don't know how to address people according to adat and basa, some don't even know how to converse with guests and some don't see the need to learn to make penyaram, penganan semut, kuih chap, those so Iban must-haves for Gawai - leave it to the indai or ini to do. True, some might say, why make, why not buy, but to me, if you have the time, its fun and very fulfilling to make one's own, especially for the husband, kids and relatives to chomp on.
What had those years in the longhouse taught me? A lot, it taught me to work hard, it taught me tenacity, it gave me a lot of courage, it taught me to be resourceful, it taught me to be resilient and it taught me to be a hostess to make my husband proud. I still hold those values dear today, and as best I could, uphold those values and impart them to my children (tho I nunga my visitors makai, not left them alone). I know I don't merit the gelaran indu asi indu ai as I fall short in many things, but I know I set those values as benchmarks for the things that I do and say. I am blessed I have a bilik in the longhouse that I could put those values into practice in its original setting. I am blessed that my parents and kaban belayan taught me well so those attitude came in good stead now that I don't have a helper or when I face seemingly daunting tasks. Oh, I am lazy at times, especially after a hard day's work in the office. So that's when I would do the minimal household chores and leave the rest for Saturday, like today. Today I woke up at 6 am, housecleaned, laundered, until 10 am. I don't mind the hard work, as it gives me great pleasure to see my house spick and span. It is therapeutic, and best of all, over long periods, it help to get rid of some unsightly bulges.
I thank God, now when I am mentally and physically drained, we would head to the Kopitiam (the veritable Chinese semua ada), Popular Corner (anything Malaysian), Apple (standard Chinese food), Blueberry (the usual sidewalk cafe fare), Mount Zion (for mix of western and oriental), Ezy Plus (for Japanese food) Marco Polo (for some high end dining), Capitol restaurant (for some old world atmosphere, great fried mee sua and deep fried duck) Everly (for olang tengok olang only, the food is not to our taste), Peace Garden (for ikan bakar) Spring Garden (for deep fried chicken feet and fried perut babi that are to die for, never mind the less than ahem ahem environment) Pizza Hut and KFC (when we have to pander to Igat's whims) Plaza Regency (well, when we need just a different environment), Riverfront cafe (to makai ramai-ramai with the evening mass crowd on Sunday) 888 (for bak kut teh) Lily Insol (for kampua, laksa, loh see fun & the usual, both for taste and sisterly support ahem her stall is behind the new Sing Kwong's supermart ahem ahem)and lately, the new seafood beside the Christian cemetery at Tg Batu. Their ikan and sotong bakar are great and the price of food is very reasonable. To top it up, dadi and I would sip our favourite red wine and I would pop in my favourite chocolate. Ah, the blessings of modern life, ooh, the blessings of education, to enable a middle aged woman with ati agi tubah ati indu rumah panjai to savour the comforts not available then to the older womenfolk. The Lord be praised indeed.
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