Growing Up in Trengganu - Awang Goneng

            

It was 10pm in the evening as we (abah, my little brother and I) traversed a very quiet road from Tok Uban to Pasir Mas town. I gazed upon the night sky, recognizing each constellations that I knew, smiling back to the moon (sounds crazy but yeah I did it anyway), and winked my eyes to the stars; for Kelantan’s astronomical sphere have never let me down especially during a dry season.

            It was silent and tranquil along the way, until abah braked the car for us to get a crisper view of what’s happening outside. I made that face expression of ‘eh bakpo brek ni bah?’ sambil menggaru-garu kepala yang tidak gatal.

            “Weh laa banyoknyo kgheto. Caekak ado pasa malae maso nih..? ado gapo ni abah?” asked my brother curiously. I looked around, and I saw nothing but roof zincs being erected to block my view at the other side of the road.

            And it was only after we heard some loud gendang noise that we eventually found out what’s what.

            “Oghe ggocoh,” abah said. Yes, the gendang noise was quite familiar for us. I remembered on how abah persuaded my brother and I to learn muay thai, formally years before. At an instant, adrenaline rushed its way out, my eyes expanded and we tried to have a peek of ‘oghe ggocoh’ from inside the moving car.

            As abah continued our journey to Pasir Mas, I pondered upon a story told by some random old folks about this ‘ggocoh’ event. We were quite aware that there are several ‘ggocoh’ occasion being held a few times a year in Kota Bharu, both legally and not.

But this one is in Pasir Mas (which is quite rare, I think), and we were totally thrilled with the heat in the air. How I missed those ‘ggocoh’ moments… the bleed and sweat, the fast-beat-yet-motivating gendang, the gelanggang, the killer kick and elbow moves, the opponents, the everything…!

The point is, people do get excited when they experienced aforementioned experiences told by others.

Like what happens when you just got back to your hostel from a week-long ‘pulang bermalam’ and you just can’t stop talking and chatting with le friends during the break from maghrib to isyak in the surau. (and the seniors will shhuuuhh you because the surau is so noisy with chatters)

Like what happens when you got excited if le friends share those ‘sekolah rendah agama’ moments of playing cepers, baling selipar, tamiya, beyblades, crushgears, pokemon cards, and main kejar-kejar.

Like what happens when Syeikh (a friend of mine now in Imperial) shared those funny gestures about Upin Ipin by some Indonesian fellow in Mecca, and I got extremely excited because I experienced that in the first place.

This euphoric-like feeling of excitedness, I termed it ‘mutual experience’. <-- sukati aku je haha.

credit picture: here

And I felt that ‘mutual experience’ dearly when I happened to read this good book of ‘Growing Up inTrengganu’ by a fella named Awang Goneng, though I’m not a Trengganuian either. Dah lama pun baca buku ni tapi baru nak buat review heh…

Copy paste (from the back of the book): ‘Growing Up in Trengganu started life as the blog of Awang Goneng (pen name of writer Wan A. Hulaimi) until it was found to be too good to exist only in cyberspace. Through a collection of memories retold in glorious colour, Awang Goneng evokes the pleasures of a kampung childhood for the benefit of new generations brought up in air-conditioned condominiums. Listen to the azan call to prayer from the surau of Haji Mat Kerinci, order satay with toast for breakfast, meet notables such as Tun Long the laundry man and Cik Wook Payong Locoh, whose umbrella turned inside out in a storm, and relive the pleasure of hearing the rain hammer down on a corrugated-iron roof while reading The Beano and eating kuih putu. Sultans, sweetmeat sellers and shopkeepers all act as springboards as you meander through Trengganu history, and by the end of this book you will have painlessly mastered the Trengganuspeak that foils even fellow Malaysians.’

So who is this Awang Goneng? Yes, you might always find his articles in viewpoints section of the new Sunday times, babbling about cultural and language and current issues whatnot… uh huh, just googled (since when google has become a verb ey?) out his name, no worries.

Abah loves to tell stories of the past which we would always look forward to hear more of those. Sometimes he recalled on how deep into the forest he went, with an intention only to find the hardest buoh getoh, a rare one, to compete in a game with his schoolmates. And once abah had said,

“Hargo kasut skoloh abah dulu pak riya milae ploh sen (rm4.90) jah… kasut rrayo hok tu, kasut skoloh pon hok tu lah jugok….”

Awang Goneng said the same thing in his writing, but abah don’t even know who’s this chap…. I smiled, for reasons unknown, for feelings uncertain, for I don’t even know what stories I can tell to my children in the future. How…errr… pelik, haha.

"The sad things about Hari Raya was that it came and went all in a day. And the sadder thing about it was the way it dropped us again with a plop into the middle of everyday reality. Father had a way with Hari Raya based on the state of his economy: he'd buy us only shoes hat we could wear again daily to school, so our shoes were mostly white Bata, and the same too applied to the colour of shirts so, in parts, we were on our Hari Raya outfit throughout the year". Page 25. =.=

True enough; Awang Goneng does with words what Lat does with pictures. I’ve heard worse (I mean, those incomprehensible dialect of the people in hulu Trengganu… KoleBrang, maybe), so let’s just have some good poem (if I might say) read, will ya? Read this out loud, guys… XD

Pak Ok kaki kecok

Dia dok wak dok 

Cakting-cakting

Tahang tu dok ok

Cari Mak Jeng Bbatu Burok

Nok mitok tulong urok

Bila ttemung tepak dudok

Dia pulok takdok setabok

Jjalanglah dia cakting-cakting

Cari bining keliling pusing

Nak mitok urok keting

Jjalang ddalang panah ddering

Pak Ok jerloh ddalang lokang

Sakit naik sapa pinggang

Adoh! Adoh! Dia ngerrang

Ba’pelah nasibku ni sunggoh malang

Bila bini balik jengok

Tengok dia tengoh ggosok

Dia terus suka selok

Sapa dok buleh ok

Tulah, Guane gamok?

what lies behind 'keputusan spm'?

It’s that time of the year again: the day spm results being announced nationwide. Entri kali ini sekadar suka-suka, tapi semoga bermanfaat buat semua yang membacanya (pernah pulak entri aku bermanfaat? Haha). Hajat diri bukan ingin membicarakan isu biasiswa or of the sort ‘what’s next after spm?’, tapi berkisar tentang…

...kepuasan individu, kepuasan masyarakat, dan pengamalan ilmu.

            Sudah menjadi resam dan adat masyarakat, ibu bapa akan memberikan ganjaran kepada anak-anak mereka atas keputusan peperiksaan yang cemerlang. Zaman dulu, selalunya budak2 laki mintak motosikal...zaman sekarang, ada je yg mintak kereta. Takpun, paling koman, dapat semakfon atau leptop atau Ipad. Well, aku pun tak terkecuali. Masa dapat 5A upsr, abah aku bagi handset Nokia kot. Gila. Kecik2 lagi dah dapat handset, walhal aku tak mintak apa2 pon...

            Masa jantung tengah dupdapdupdap nak terima result upsr dulu, aku ada terfikir jugak hadiah apa nak bagi kat parents kalau dpt 5A. Ada jugak tercadang nak buat kad je wish ’thank you umi abah for everything’. Sbb dulu2 aku suka buat kad2 ni, mengalahkan adik pompuan aku haha. Ditakdirkan Allah, aku dpt 5A. Tipu lah kan kalau aku tak gembira. Mana taknya, pengorbanan tu banyak...pergi tusyen, kelas tambahan sekolah lagi, abah pulak beli berbakul-bakul buku revision.

            Tapi, kepuasan aku dapat 5A tu cuma 2 minit. Lepas tu, aku tak pikir dah pasal aku. Slip keputusan tu dilipat dan disimpan dalam poket, lalu aku memerhatikan satu persatu wajah sahabat2 di sekolah. Prioriti pada ketika itu ialah nak tahu siapa yang tercicir dalam kelas aku dan nak dekati kawan2 yang tak dapat result seperti yg diharapkan. Haih tak tahu lah kenapa semangat batch masa zaman aku ni dahsyat gila. Mungkin sbb kitorang batch pioneer upsr kat skolah tu, jadi secara tak langsung semangat ingin mengharumkan nama sekolah tu sangat tinggi lah ye kawan2.

            Then it turned out that I don’t need to make cards. I gave the boarding school offer to my parents. Rasanya, pemberian surat ‘urusan paduka baginda’ tu lebih best kot, hihi. Arakian, bermulalah kembara pmr dan spm di sebuah sekolah berasrama penuh yang terletak di luar bandar….

            Cerita pasal result pmr pulak agak scary. Boleh pulak aku mengalami nightmare hari sebelum pmr diumumkan. Aku mimpi aku dapat 8A 1B. B tu bahasa arab. Pastu datang la lembaga berupa Ustazah Ku Zainab, marah2 aku dan interrogate aku. Pengalaman dileter ustazah sbb dpt B bahasa arab merupakan my worst nightmare la habaq kat lu. Bangun2 je menyimbah satu badan… lega ianya hanya mimpi….

            Masa nak amik result kat sekolah, mimpi yg sama dok menghantui fikiran aku. Last2 aku fikir, ahh redha je lah kalau dpt B bahasa arab… aku pun bukannya orang arab pun. Kalau dapat B bahasa melayu tu ye lah kott kalau rasa nak malu nya. Lalu masa pengumuman pun tiba. Panjang pulak ucapan alu-aluan dan analisis cikgu haiz~ Apabila ucapan habis, kitorang diminta beratur di kaunter kelas masing-masing untuk check result. Awkward kot. Mula2 semua taknak beratur sbb cuak… lepas kena paksa, baru kitorang pegi ke kaunter…-.-

            Aku pun mendekati kaunter 3 Al-Biruni. Di kaunter tu ada sehelai kertas yg tertera list nama pelajar dan keputusan pmr in table form (kot, dah lupa). Aku tengok list kelas aku tu dari atas sampai bawah secara kasar. Ada 30 students kesemuanya. Aku tak cari nama aku. Sebaliknya, aku terus perhati keputusan pmr di sebelah kanan jadual dari atas sampai bawah. Macam tak percaya. Aku tengok dari atas sampai bawah buat kali kedua, tanpa melihat nama2 pelajar di sebelah kiri. Ok, kali ni aku percaya.

            Aku pun tergedek-gedek jumpa abah kat belakang dan cakap, ’abah, alhamdulillah semuo oghe dale kelas abe buleh 9A’. Abah aku pun macam biasalah, senyum pastu terus call umi. Sekali lagi, pada kali ini, kepuasan aku peroleh 9A hanya lebih kurang 2 minit. Lepas tu; aku sibuk dok tanya result kat kelas lain. Mengetahui keputusan orang lain lebih menggembirakan bagiku. Rasa sebak pun ada. Berkongsi kegembiraan dalam jemaah. Kepuasan sekolah dan ahli2 batch. Out of 90 candidates, 60 buleh 9a, lg 18 buleh 8a1b (kot...).

            Exam bertulis dunia, ketiga terbesar dalam hidup; spm. Kepuasan individu masa dpt result spm ni lama la sikit kot... sbb persiapan spm mcm x seberapa. Subjek yg paling aku tak yakin dapat A+ ialah bahasa melayu, yang yakin pulak sejarah dan bahasa arab tinggi je. Dahlah aku first batch guna sistem A+ (khabarnya markah 90 ke atas), so lagi lah aku x expect pun dpt semua a campoq, huhu...

            Pagi itu, Cikgu Fuad kat atas pentas cakap ada 2 org pelajar dpt stret a+ tahun ni. Dlm hati aku, ’mintak2 lah sekolah aku top 3 malaysia tahun ni... tsk tsk’. Aku pandang kanan, nampak muka Badak. Pandang kiri, ustazah mariaton (ajar pqs) senyum kat aku. Peluh mula merenik di dahi, sbb memang dewan seri gemilang ni tak pernah sejuk nya pon... Tiba2 nama aku pulak yg first kena panggil naik atas pentas. For the first 5 seconds, aku blur jap. Boleh pulak abah yg dok sebelah aku gelak. Ciss

            Di atas pentas dengan abah yg dok busy texting ngan handset beliau, and as cikgu fuad called out names, my mind spun fast. The memories of struggleness and friendship kept flooding my brain gates, oh well. Sorang2 muka kegembiraan yg naik atas pentas aku tengok, as images of the past made me to cherish the moment even deeper. Jiwang la pulak mangai…

            Sambil aku dan kawan2, Mudzafar, Badak, Syukdong, Madud, Syafdanny, Ameer, Aiman, Jehan, (dan ramai gila lg) turun dari pentas, aku tertanya-tanya, ‘so what’s next for us?’ ‘takkan mcm ni je pengakhiran kita?’ ‘weh aku taknak berpisah dengan korang..!!’ dan banyak lagi monolog2 dalaman yg tak terungkap, tapi ditafsir mudah dengan renungan mata persahabatan.

Walaupun sukar, tapi ‘hakikat’ itu kami terima dengan redha, the ’hakikat’ that sounded dimly at the back of the mind indirectly, that goes ’jadikanlah nikmat yang diterima secara berjemaah ini (result spm laa) sebagai penguat diri dalam haluan masing-masing selepas ini, dan semoga kepuasan secara berjemaah ini mengingatkan kita tentang perlunya menjaga benteng iman yg sudah lama dibina di sekolah’. Hmmm macam tu lah lebih kurang nya, aku ni pun bukan pandai sgt nak olah psikologi orang macam Mitch Albom… kuang3~

Jadi, kepada lepasan spm baru2 ni, cuba muhasabah diri balik, banyak mana dah ilmu2 yg dipelajari dulu yg masih diaplikasi dlm hidup? Terisikah masa cuti panjang anda dengan aplikasi ilmu itu? Redhakah masyarakat (ibu bapa, jiran tetangga, kawan2) dengan keberkatan ilmu anda? Fuyyo banyak betul aku tanya, haha. Kat akhirat nanti pun 2x5 jugak... yang husnul khatimah, mula2 puas lah alhamdulillah... lepas tu, sibuk dok cari orang lain sbb nk kejar kepuasan bukan individu. ingat, hidup bukan untuk disuap je, tapi juga untuk memberi.

Sekian, wassalam.

KY Islamic Week 2012

Kenal effysaiful? Aku pun lupa macam mana aku boleh tiba-tiba ter-kenal mamat ni... err.. time twinsoffaith malaysia, barangkali. ya, juga sempat meluangkan masa bersama-samanya di mph alamanda putrajaya dengan ikhwah2 yang lain. ahhh, memory does fade. All in all, his recent post regarding a syrian's erythrocyte gawped me, in a way.

And hence, creatures are bounded by time and space. Semua orang tahu itu. Tapi tak semua orang sedar bahawa mereka juga secara tidak langsung terpenjara dalam dimensi nilai kemanusiaan. and the circle of humanity went across religions, races, genders and age. Aku tahu ini cliche, tapi kena selalulah diperingatkan bahawa 'to get is to give'. And the person who are being given might just be induced to be generous to other people. <-- video topaz la ni yg best sgt.

Those little things in life like giving salam and hugs should not be taken for granted, i believe. And for this reason, the mission of discovering the essence of humanity need to be campaigned for a week. haha ok lame. So inilah dia, usaha juniors dalam KY islamic week 2012 yang superawesome and insightful.

 

Ustaz Syaari Abdul Rahman from Ibrah Paradigm Consultancy cakap pasal pembukaan Konstantinopel. Nak kata best, tak de la best mana. Kadang2 bosan jugak cara penyampaiannya. Still tak boleh lawan Ustaz Nizammuddin Alias dan Prof Kayu. Ahaha jahat gila aku sesuka hati je komen orang.

Forum tentang 'Seni dan hiburan dalam Islam' oleh Ustaz Hasrizal dan Ustaz Akhil Hayy juga agak menyengat. Pendapat aku, Abu Saif banyak menjawab persoalan2 yang diutarakan. Berkali-kali juga beliau memberi penekanan bahawa Islam merupakan agama knowledge-based. Banyak kisah sirah, hadis dan pendapat ulama berkenaan hiburan dalam Islam yang beliau kongsikan. Antaranya, huraian motion bahawa 'music must not be purposeless', sejarah penggunaan muzik di Edirne semasa kerajaan Uthmaniyyah dan pendapat Yusuf AQ berkenaan muzik dalam kitabnya Malamih Mujtama' Islam (yang merumuskan bahawa khilaf muzik ada dua; iaitu sahih tetapi tidak sarih dan sarih tidak sahih). 

I am delightful with those pencerahan, but on the other hand, Ustaz Akhil failed to meet my expectations. Ternyata sudah Abu Saif lebih dekat di hati wahaha~ At the very start of the event, i pondered upon sufism practices and how it can be related to seni in islam. Of course, i wished to ask the matter during a 20 minutes Q&A session (sekejap gilaaaaa), which i failed to do so to give way to the other eager listeners as their questions were basically quite fundamental.

But yeah, as soon as the session over, I quickly went to stage and cleared my confusions right. Sufism practices, as Abu Saif said, is not a music/art by itself. Rather, it is a method created to improvise an individual self in spiritual sense. And oh well, cultural assimilations made some of them went overboard, transgressing the principal of Islam in the first place. It's funny anyway; the way aku terus tanya ustaz hasrizal tanpa mengendahkan kehadiran Akhil Hayy (seorang artis kottt...) di sisi. haha

Then, the "Misunderstandings in Islam" talk by brother Lim Jooi Soon. Questions by not-yet-Muslims regarding 'kau kata kapir masuk neraka, habis kau ingat kau Islam kompem masuk syurga ke?' issue is the cream of the cake, as usual. It's awkward though, when kadang2 soalan tentang asas Islam diajukan tetapi otak buntu tak tahu nak bagi jawapan apa kat diorang. hmmm...

Brother Lim, persistent as he is, reminded the listeners to 'judge religions by looking at the source, not the followers', for blacksheeps in every community is unavoidable, no? Na;udzubillah min zalik. And yeah, listening to this kind of talk surely made me miss those FCR inputs gained before...

Oh, and there's this nasyeed interhouse competition. All of my chaletmates and I kembali beraksi pada tahun ini, hehs. Under the theme humanity, we sang Berilah Harapan by Raihan and 'we will not go down' (song for Gaza). They put a lot of effort in practicing (err... aku banyak tuang je kot) and we won second place. Fuyyo tak sangka pun dapat second sebenarnya... so memang grateful gila lahh...alhamdulillah~

Not to forget, Kiwee occupied my time too. Firstly, the time to revised sedikit sebanyak syariah dan fikh in preparation for the islamic quiz. But of course, the time is well spent. Existing and new knowledge is to be applied in life and to be conveyed, bukan disimpan jadi pekasam, insyaAllah. The only thing is that, soalan kuiz tahun ni macam senang sikit dan general knowledge punya soalan macam merapu gila, haha. Secondly, the time untuk melepaskan kerinduan terhadap archery. Kat sekolah dulu selalu jugak la kot main archery. Good job juniors. Aku suka event ni.