Chinta dan Lagu

I was up till 2 am on Tuesday, stuck to the couch watching an old unusual musical Malay movie. ‘Chinta dan Lagu’ with Hail Amir and Yusoff Haslam playing rivals, in a race for love. It is a well thought movie, produced in the early 80’s, beautiful places with pretty Malay girls playing extras. No pan-Asian, just pure Malay looking girls with tight kebaya and short sarongs, so natural – just the way I like it( what do you expect from a kampong boy).

Singing and acting with low tech equipment but what an entertaining result, supported by the beautiful scenery, virgin looking earth with no multimillion concrete landmarks.

The plot or storyline was pretty much related to the future, showing clearly that we haven’t change that much. Zulkifly was the hero winning the precious love of Noraini ahead of the nasty and arrogant son of Penghulu Malik. Malik exploit the powerful influence of his father to take control of the kampong while the father was away. Malik and co’s kidnapped Zulkifly on his wedding day and dump him on one of the island. Everyone knew Malik was the culprit but none wanted to act against the Penghulu’s son especially the old who refused to take action without blessing; “no evidence” said the oldies. There were young rebels but the numbers were just they to be ignored.Oon the other hand it was a typical Malay movie – happy ending.

Does that ring any bell? Isn’t that reflects the situation today? ‘Son of’ and friends are living above the law’s, doing what they want at any time they feel appropriate (only to them). Nobody would stop the perpetrators coz finding evidence is just an impossible theory. The oldies today would prefer to carry on safeguarding what they’ve accomplished, ignoring daylight robberies in the name of ‘blessing’.

Another observation of that movie was the simple fact about ‘tudung’. It is impossible to see anyone in that particular movie wearing tudung, even in the kampong scene, free hair and kebaya – fashion for all. When was the turning point for Malay girls? No doubt it’s for the better but perhaps the reason should be highlighted coz I’m tired seeing people who does not portrays the right behaviors behind the cover up. Stop making the tudung as a meaningless gesture.

Salute to Hail Amir anyway, the silat move was just awesome.

My dad (or Apak in the Perakian way)

He’s 87 this year, most of his friends are no longer in this world, and few that are still alive is not even fit to stand on their own mostly, lying in bed waiting for the final call. My dad is still strong, strong enough to travel the distance from my sister’s to the nearest coffee shop(about 500m) for his daily ‘teh tarik’ session.

Surviving the British, Japanese, Communist and the Umnos is a big achievement for him, not the materialistic way. He was a farmer, a fisherman, a policeman, a newspaper vendor, an activist and even a construction worker at one time. From radio to black and white tv to the super pretentious Astro satellite tv, my god! He’s been around for a long time.

He used to write letters to me while I was in the UK, with old Malay spelling method, where the letter ‘h’ seems to appear in every word.

Kehadhapan anakanda yang di shayangi,

Belajarlah bershunggoh – shunggoh, kita orang shusah…

I should’ve frame it back then, but enjoying life was the wrong priority of choice, maybe the excitements of being oversea was too much to handle. I did it my way those days, but how I wish for a better plan and execution. Regrets, it is too much to mention. Same goes to my dad, he must have made mistakes along the way, 3 times further than the journey I’ve completed.

He needs someone to talk, someone that can listen to the adventurous journey. My mom was there before she suffered the strokes attack, my sisters were there before they were assigned to attend to my mom’s needs on that bed, I was there before I entered boarding school 17 years ago. We can’t be with him all the time now, but we do our best to spend time whenever we can, be it after work or even weekends.

But sometime that is just not good enough, and he is looking for someone who understands, someone who traveled the distance and survived. They are the heritage and the historians of this country and it is about time the government looks at them and look-up for ways to make them feel needed. Don’t just blame the children’s; stop telling bad things about places of which old folks stays together. Stop building the unnecessary buildings, build up a nice enjoyable parks where old folks can get together, and please don’t tell me they should only be doing ‘ibadat’ at the nearest masjid.