Nasi Dagang, that Kelantanese MUST

Any self-respecting Kelantanese loves Nasi Dagang.  This literally means "Trade or Trading Rice". It's a semi-glutinous rice that has tinges of red in its grains. The famous dish just known as Nasi Dagang consists of this particular kind of rice that is cooked in fenugreek and coconut milk, then coupled with some form of chicken or fish curry, with cucumbers and hard-boiled egg on the side to finish it.  It is simplicity at its best. In my home state of Kelantan, we typically have it for breakfast, and sometimes for dinner.

Friday is the day when the best nasi dagang known to my family is sold. It is sold in a place called Tumpat, a town probably 20-30km from where I live. The seller only sells it on this day, the weekend in these areas, Friday being the holy day for Muslims. In our state, Fridays are in effect like Sundays almost everywhere else.

Normally the drive is about 20-30 mins but today it took considerably longer because there was a huge mother of a jam for a quarter of the distance. School is out and many people are on holiday back here and unbeknownst to us until we got home, a huge international kite festival was happening at a well-known beach just outside Tumpat. Traffic was horrendous. And here we were lamenting the state of it almost all the way there. Once we got to the stall, the food was present, but the owner was not. She had a couple of people move her stuff over there for her, but she was nowhere to be seen or heard.

The food is here, but there's no one to sell it to us

Her helpers looked at the customers who came and went. They were tired of hanging out there with us. I think she must have lost at least 30 customers who either walked by or drove by, cast looks and left, having decided that it wasn't worth the wait. We on the other hand, were the first to arrive, so we were first in line, and we had promised some guests from out-of-town that we were bringing them this awesome nasi dagang from Tumpat! We had no choice but to wait for the elusive seller to show.

Little Malay girls dressed in their tudungs
and normal clothes. When I was a child, I hardly
ever saw this. Most young Malay girls wouldn't have
cared to cover their hair back then.

 I saw these cute little girls who had come to buy some flavored drinks from a stall close to this one. Unfortunately that girl dropped that whole drink on the ground right after I took her picture. Minutes later, they came back for a replacement. And our nasi dagang seller was still M.I.A.

I was getting really tired of waiting, and so was my mum. She's sat on a stool given to her by one of the helpers. Red ants were crawling around her feet. This was not the place to be putting up a stall. Even a make shift one. Come on!!

After waiting for about 45 mins, she finally pulls in in her beaten up Proton Saga. She saunters over lazily without apology nor guilt. It's so close to prayer time, of course I'm going to pray first, she muttered, after my mum jokingly mentioned she was kind of late today.

It really is nice to have people waiting in line for your amazing nasi dagang, isn't it?  And of course she knows it. She can afford to make people wait. She doesn't care if she pisses anyone off. If you like, you join the queue and wait, if you don't..piss off.

That big large bowl of nasi dagang will all be
 gone by sundown.

So Mum goes and places the order for 9 packets of nasi campur (nasi dagang and plain rice together, because nasi dagang alone is really filling, and hard to digest) with both chicken and fish curry. The packet isn't that big but this costs RM5.50 each. It's what you pay now for this. Of course it used to cost less way back when. But at under 2USD, I won't be complaining. It is the bomb! Cik Izan (Ms Izan) or in Kelantan-speak we call her Ize..(i-zeh), you really know how to make this tasty. I almost... almost, want to kowtow to you. But I won't!

I had no appetite for this food when I got home. We delivered it to our guests and my mum stayed with them to have dinner. I went back home and got on the treadmill to see if I could find my lost appetite. It didn't let itself be found by dinner time, but eventually I got hungry and I ate my packet of nasi campur. And I wasn't disappointed. Even if my appetite was largely suppressed.

Georgia On My Mind

Talking about Georgia, Georgia...the whole day through, just an old sweet song, keeps Georgia on my mind...

I opened with this song for my new friends. It set the tone. I had been feeling sick all day and for a moment, I felt good. I'm so ready to be feeling good for a good long time, not just pockets of bliss here and there. We sang through the night until we closed the place down. It's mid-week and no one is here anyway. So we have the whole place to ourselves.

My new friends don't know me and I don't know them. It is a clean slate. No past, just the present. A wonderful beginning. These people are all singers. They have done this so many times, they know the lyrics, they know the music and they can sing. I feel like I'm in good company. There's a pool table too and I haven't played in forever.

The young Thai girl keeps coming over to pour beer in unfinished glasses and wrap her paws around the guys. I am not sure what she's working for. I don't think she gets tips. No matter. Since you are here, take this to the guy and let him set us all up for our next song selections. But then she comes back again, tipping ice into beer glasses and pouring more and more. You can't keep track of how many you've had. I put my hand firmly over my glass. No more!

Shelly is responsible for introducing me to this bunch of people. I am simply Gigi. No last name. No need really. I've known Shel for a long time but we weren't really friends. In 2 days we have become fast friends, connecting perhaps in many unspoken ways. These are her friends I am with. One of them in particular is an amazing singer. His repertoire stretched from Chinese songs of 20 years ago to Tom Jones, Michael Buble and Enrique Iglesias. And his voice makes anyone melt. I'll stop the world and melt with you. I'm reminded of that Modern English song. It was like a form of synaesthesia for me to feel his voice, and not just hear it. Sublime..

And now I see what the Thai girl is getting. Free beer. She has a little glass on our table as well. Funny I didn't notice that before. Why would one work for that? Wouldn't money be better?

The night ended more than 4 hours ago and I'm still wide awake. Something is keeping me awake and I can't put my finger on it.

Make me feel good today

Nausea permeates me today

I can't shake it

I just have to lie here 

and hope it goes away

I need to get up 

and go do something

eat, walk, swim

but all I feel like doing is lying down

I haul myself out of bed

But I don't do anything well

I'm going to go out with my friends

and hope I don't throw up

Perhaps forcing myself to feel normal

will make the feeling fade

12 hours of this and I'm tired of it

Give me a few hours of the day to be free.

The Beautiful and Dirty Business of recruiting part I

I have left the industry for many years now. Going on 9 years. And I bet the recruiting business hasn't changed much at all. I often wonder if I would ever go back. I fancy I was quite good at it when I was a recruiter. I wasn't by any means a cut-throat numbers cruncher, so maybe I wasn't that good, from the company's perspective. After all everything is about the numbers. You don't make the cut, you're gone. While I was in it, I did reasonably well.

My first "in" was a cattle call, off one of those short ads for making money you should never believe. It was straight off the heels of a mass interview from another of those kind of ads where I was ripped to shreds because I asked too many questions. It was a scam for selling perfume to people off the streets, in parking lots and back alleys. It was all incredibly shady and I was glad to walk out of that one and shame the recruiters and warn the potential "job seekers" of the fanciful accounting they were trying to sell to them.

Anyway, like I said..my first "in" to recruiting did come from a similarly worded ad. A reputable company with a proven track record was looking to hire fresh-faced, untarnished people to sell...people! And I had not learned anything from the perfume lesson, and went to try for this one as well. I was still new to America then. That's my excuse!

Turns out it wasn't so bad after all. My first boss was intimidating. She was this petite middle aged woman with neatly cropped short hair. She was attractive and somehow very enticing in her ways. We were first put through a battery of tests and the last one was a Myers Briggs test to make sure we were the right personality for her team. We were three of us, new to her team, and she picked me to watch over daily, situating me directly in front of her while we worked. She scrutinized my every move, every call, every word. I was so fed up of having to look at her day in and day out but I really appreciate her and thank her for maybe not trusting me to do well.

Our goals were, if I remember correctly - an average of 60 calls a day, totalling 2 hours of phone time. Every day. We read and "improvised" from a script and took notes while talking to candidates. All calls were logged and recorded, times were tallied and reports were printed. It was all in the numbers and you couldn't cheat the system. I learned fast. Initially she would stop me after each call and point out what I did wrong or didn't do. She would question why we took lunches or breaks. It was a hellish training that I loved so much that I would go home and continue to make calls. Then on weekends I would go to the office and make more calls. I think that this whole training way back when is the reason I can't talk to people on the phone for long any more, preferring face-to-face interactions any day.

With my boss's help, I was able to make some lucrative "permanent" placements and make quite a bit of commission on top of our meagre salary. Like any sales position, typically the salary is really disgustingly low, and you're supposed to be motivated to make all of your income via commission. For instance, this particular company charged a 30% commission off the new hire's starting salary. So if you place a person who makes 100k, the company would make 30k for the placement. That commission is then split top down, and the lowly recruiter still gets a nice chunk of change. Not a bad deal at all. It was a different breakdown with people who were placed as "consultants" but then the recruiter would get an ongoing daily commission based on the hours the consultant billed. Build up a nice base of consultants working for you and you'd still do all right.

to be continued

Kenduri

The kenduri was nothing like what we expected at all.

The nephew of a prominent politician was getting married and we were invited to attend the kenduri at his house. I was keen to attend because it'd been a long time since I'd been to a proper Malay wedding and even longer since I've been to an elaborate kenduri or Malay feast.

Imagine our surprise when we got there to be greeted by 2 small marquees with several plastic tables and chairs set up for guests, a buffet that consisted of 5 dishes and some rice and 2 choices for drinks. It was hardly the grand set up that I had envisioned.

We were the only Chinese to be seen and upon seeing us everyone assumed we had come from Kuala Lumpur probably because the groom works for a Chinese-owned law firm in KL. My brother was the groom's colleague.

"Did you come from KL?"
"Buke, dari KB ni..." No, I'm from KB, I answered in Malay, to prove my local accent.
Still, the reply came in English. "Ohhhh...you're from here" almost like it was a disappointment we weren't from out of town.

Had I got on a plane and come all the way from KL to attend this kenduri, I would have been more than a little let down.  I wondered how the royal family who were there before us and had left already thought about the whole set up. Surely they were disappointed as well?

We grabbed a plate and ate hurriedly. It was sweltering. Sweat dripped from my forehead. Zoe was dressed to the nines and suffering in the heat. She didn't want to play with any of the children who were there, and she didn't enjoy the food at all. I can't blame her. It was all a bit weird. They came by with wedding favors but didn't give each of us one.

I suggested to my brother that we get a picture with the bride and groom before we leave. We were invited into their room where a professional photographer took our pictures and then it was all over. We got in our car and left. What a disappointing first kenduri for little Zoe. I think she won't be keen to go to another.

Night mode

I've always been a night owl. I love night time. Or the semblance of night. When I lived in the UK, it would get dark really early in the winter time. Sometimes it would be 330pm and it would be dark. I loved that. I don't get that so much in the US Midwest. Night always comes slightly later than that even in the dead of winter.

Regardless of the season, long or short, it is still night time, no? When Zoe and the husband are asleep, it is most peaceful. I get a lot of things done during this time. I plan my lessons for the private classes I give at home, I study, talk to my friends from the other side of the world, catch up on news and do whatever I want. Nobody else needs my attention in the still of the night. It's bliss. Mostly.

Lately my nights have been difficult to get through. Ironically, it is for the same reasons they were so good before. Circumstances have changed. Outlooks have changed and a friend's unexpected early death also threw a wrench in it. I needed some libation to get through the night, a little self distraction to comfort my aching soul. I am not sure why I even resorted to it because it's not something I do. But for the past few weeks I have been slovenly. I have cared little about food or much else. My usually well stocked fridge was now full of old food that had not been eaten. I made sure Zoe was fed properly and with proper fresh food, but I didn't care about what I ate, when I ate or if I ate. Sometimes I survived on a banana or two throughout the day and ate a meal at dinner that I hardly tasted nor enjoyed. Sometimes I was lucky and had company over who would make me sit down and eat something with them. And I'd have to eat something really sweet or salty to overwhelm my failing taste buds so I could stomach any food.

It's funny how a lack of appreciation of food can lead to much more. My nights were horrid. Being alone at night while the husband worked out of town during the week was getting tougher. All things being normal, it would not have been difficult. He would be asleep if he were home anyway. It would not be any lonelier or harder. The difference was this: I could make my descent into night mode and he would not be around to wake up to find me gone and he wouldn't be able to pull me out of it. So, I allowed myself to drown in my sorrows, choosing to obfuscate the sadness nightly with my gin and tonics, wine or beer.

I was barely holding it together but I knew I had to keep it together. I didn't want to look down at the abyss that was beneath me. Just keep looking up and moving forward. The thing about being a strong person is sometimes nobody stops to ask you how you are because they think you have it all under control. Even strong people are vulnerable at times, no? Anyway, I think I'm nearly out of this sinkhole now. Perhaps.

Flowers for my grandparents

It was drizzling this morning when we set out to pay respects to my grandparents who have passed. I never knew my father's parents because they died before I was born.  My mother's parents on the other hand, I was very close to.  I lived with my grandparents when I was younger and remained close to them until they passed. I have so many good memories of them.

My maternal grandparents lie here.

We stopped to set flowers at my maternal grandparents' tomb or memorial in a smaller temple in what you can call the countryside.  There are numerous Buddhist temples peppered throughout this area that is Wakaf Baru or Tumpat. Our state of Kelantan is the closest to Thailand and many Buddhist temples in our region are strongly influenced by Thai Buddhists.  Some temples are incredibly elaborate, but some are minimalistic.

Traditionally offerings of food are presented to the ancestors. Joss sticks are also used to "pray to" (pay respects to) them, and then stuck in that little joss stick urn to burn to ash.  One would even burn fake money so that the dead can use that money to buy whatever they want wherever they are.

The Buddha sits on top of the house
of ashes

I agreed with mother that there was really no need for all that fanfare. I feel it in my heart. Let's not make a fuss. I'm going there to see them. But really I don't even need to go see them to feel them and remember them. Nevertheless, some traditions should be kept. Chinese people feel so strongly about who is going to "take care of their grave" when they are gone.  I personally don't need that but I can understand and appreciate the importance of having the tradition. It is especially important for children to recognise, respect and remember why this is done. And for Zoe, it is good to know some Chinese traditions, even if we as a family are not really exactly traditional or conservative.

Our next stop was a bigger temple a little further along the same road. This one has a huge brown sitting Buddha sitting atop its house of ashes.  Below the Buddha are dead people. This is the final resting place for my paternal grandparents who were for many years buried in a well known cemetery south of Kota Bharu.  

A few years ago, my father's family thought it was prudent to exhume his parents and cremate them so we could move them to this temple. This was primarily done to simplify Qingming or Cheng Beng for the family. Read about Cheng Beng here. 

Cheng Beng was so involved at my paternal grandparents' tomb that you'd need an army of relatives just to clean up the site. It used to be fun when we were kids but with all of us dispersed throughout the world, hardly anybody is left to do this arduous task of yearly maintenance.

My  mother making her way back to the
house of ashes after getting the key

We had some trouble getting to the site because the doors were locked. My mum had to go to the administration, today represented by an elderly fortune teller, to request a key to unlock the main gates so we could enter the house of ashes.  Normally we wouldn't have been able to get in but mum was recognised by the fortune teller: "Ahh, you are Leo's daughter, you have your father's eyes. Let me get you the keys, just make sure you lock up and bring them back."  

A stroke of luck. Guanxi works so well in this part of the world. 

Locating my paternal grandparents'
memorial was easy. Dead flowers still
hung from the last visit.

There's hardly any cleaning needed here. Maybe a little dusting off of the plaques, the removal of the dead flowers that were from a visit about a month ago during the actual Cheng Beng festival. We replaced the flowers with fresh ones and hung them by that little ring by the plaques. My fifth uncle also lies here next to his parents, himself exhumed as well from a different graveyard and then cremated so he would finally rest here.  My uncle was 15 when he took on the almighty Kelantan River and failed. Sadly, he drowned.

It was still drizzling when we left. I didn't do a whole lot of reflecting today but I did think to myself that it was good to be doing this today with my family. On Buddha's birthday, Wesak Day.