More Awang Goneng

I tried to capture the rhythm of the language, the lifestyle we had back then. Writing the blog liberated me from my rigid, structured background as a journalist. I was always neurotic about writing the first paragraph! But the blog was free-flow. I wasn’t writing for anyone; I was essentially writing for myself. I could write whenever I wanted.

Awang Goneng tells fellow Terengganu-ite Dina Zaman in Starmag today. It's a very nice piece but how I wish more space had been given for it. (And I wish it hadn't been padded out with words Dina did not write!

My review of Growing up in Trengganu which I was asked weeks ago to write to go with her article, doesn't appear. Perhaps by now with so much publicity for the book already in the other newspapers, it has rather timed out.

Having to stick to the meager word limit means that all almost the examples I so wanted to include had to be cut out (making it a piece that I am less than satisfied with myself).

Here 'tis though, for your eyes only:

There is a delicious irony about the fact that a book as distilled from memory and marinated in the rich spice of nostalgia as Awang Goneng’s Growing up in Trengganu actually owes its existence to the electronic media. For this is one of Malaysia’s first “blooks” (as books based on a blogs or websites are known).

Awang Goneng is actually the nick of London-based veteran journalist Wan Ahmad Hulaimi who began Kecek-Kecek (which means “just chatting” in the dialect of Terengganu) as a way of recording what his childhood was like for his children who have grown up in Britain. The blog (which can still be read online at http://k ecek-kecek.blogspot.com) would probably have remained online had it not been for proactive publisher Philip Tatham of Singapore-based Monsoon Books who contacted Hulaimi and asked him whether he thought there was a book there.

There was. And while the material has been re-editing and reorganized for print, the book retains many of the characteristics of the blog and I’d say is enhanced by this, rather than otherwise.

Just as the online reader drops by a blog casually and may read posts out of sequence, this is a book that can be dipped into at any point since each short piece is self-contained and satisfying, often flowing in stream-of-consciousness style from a thought or a photograph. This is not a book to be hurried through, but rather sipped slowly and relished.

Interaction with readers plays a very important part in shaping a blog, and Pak Awang (for so I shall call him) soon acquired a following of readers whom he credits with filling in gaps in his own recollection.

Not that he seems to have too many of those, for although he protests at one point that “The light of the present has limited recall when you open the door slightly to the dark back room of your past”, what amazes the reader is the detail in which he is able to render each scene, bringing vividly alive the sights, scents and tastes of his childhood.

Whether he’s describing listening to storyteller by lamplight, talking about how Trengganu-ites coped with the monsoon season, letting us in on the secrets of making the infamous anchovy sauce budu, ruminating on the role of chickens in kampong society, or describing a family Hari Raya, Awang Goneng proves himself an erudite and gently humourous companion, weaving personal recollection into the rich tapestry of everyday life of Terengganu of the period.

It is, though, the recollections of ordinary people, shopkeepers, hawkers, kampong folk, imams and teachers, each of them described with respect and love, none of them are too humble to be noticed, that most strikes a chord.

Another of the great delights of the book is the insights it gives into the “Trengganu speak”, a dialect (which I’ve always found impenetrable and mysterious) which has a word for everything, for “There are as many ways to speak as there are chairs for cats to scratch” as Pak Awang says.

While Growing Up in Trengganu is a book which is intensely personal it is also a stunning cultural record of a time and place greatly changed, and not necessarily improved, by “progress”. The crowds flocking to the launch of the book in Kuala Terengganu and to author events in KL have clearly taken the book and its author to their hearts. The book is now into its second reprint, just a few weeks after publication.

That’s not bad going for a writer who hadn’t even thought about making a book from his blog!

I nicked the lovely photo above from Kak Teh's blog. It shows Awang Goneng with the son of one of his old teachers.

Kak Teh wasn't only Awang Goneng's bag carrier on their recent trip back to Malaysia, she also put together a documentary account for RTM's Galeri Perdana. The first part of her Jejak Awang Goneng is here**, and even if you don't understand the Malay, it gives a wonderful flavour of the place and personalities the book is based on, and the sound of the dialect:


*And I wish it hadn't been padded out with a paragraph Dina did not write! There has to be some integrity with what material goes out in your name, doesn't there?
**The links to other parts of the programme can be found on Kak Teh's blog and on Youtube.

I nicked the lovely photo above from Kak Teh's blog. It shows Awang Goneng with the son of one of his old teachers.

The Awang Goneng Roadshow!

Awang Goneng (Wan Ahmad Hulaimi) is a writer very much in demand and working tirelessly to promote Growing Up in Terengganu.

Firdaus sent me this link to pictures and a video of his session at the International Islamic University.

His wife Kak Teh describes how Huliami was asked by the Chief Minister of Terengganu to speak at an event called Sembang-sembang Awang Goneng, and how:

... when he spoke about the need to keep the people, the soul of the city, in the city, to grow with the development, he got a bit emotional and couldn’t speak for a while.

If you have hitherto missed Awang Goneng, you can catch up with him at MPH Midvalley on Sunday 20th Jan, 3-4 pm.

Was delighted to find this short video clip of Hulaimi singing at the reading at Seksan's. This is a moment of pure magic. Thanks so much to "Akarimomar" for uploading it.


(Pic nicked from Kak Teh's blog.)

MPH Literary Tatler

Am playing catch-up with some pictures of a couple of MPH events that I meant to post earlier. what can I say ... my hard-disk crashed so I couldn't post them immediately ... and then so many other things got in the way. (And I was a little lazy too ...)

Anyway, if you missed last month's Writers' Circle (held at 1 Utama, 13 March) kick yourselves because there was so much in the talk for writers of creative non-fiction!

Invited speakers Larry Parr (co-author of business tycoon Tan Chin Nam's Never Say I Assume!) and Balan Moses (author of Brickfields: A Place, A Time, A Memory) talked about the researching and writing of their books.


American author Larry Parr had forgotten the first time we met some years ago. I was wandering around the Sucasa very early one morning looking for a decent cup of coffee. (I was due to observe one of my students teaching in the school opposite but needed a caffeine fix first! School canteens don't have Americanas!) I bumped into Larry who told me that there was no coffee available, but there was a small newsagents which also sold second-hand books very cheaply for charity. (Damn! Wasn't going to let that slip!)

We got talking about books (as one does!) and it turned out that Larry collects old novels written about Malaya which he's bought from second-hand bookshops here and in the States. I'm actually quite envious! He told me then that he was going to be working with tycoon Tan Chin Nam on his autobiography and it seemed a really interesting project. We exchanged cards, but I didn't see him again until the Writers' Circle at MPH 1 Utama when he talked about the finished book and the challenges of writing the story of this very important businessman, whose life story parallels the history of the country.

Larry is a fascinating speaker. (This wikipedia article contains some inaccuracies e.g date of birth and number of kids.) He was an expert in Soviet affairs and the editor of Glasnost magazine, and he also edited Chess Life magazine, the official publication of the United States Chess Federation.

(And he's going to be co-writing a thriller, but it's all top secret for now!)

Balan Moses is the news editor of the New Straits Times and has spent all his working life with the newspaper. His book on Brickfields is a loving portrait of an area of the city with a very distinctive history that's rapidly changing out of all recognition. And into the history and geography of the place, Balan weaves personal recollection and portraits of the inhabitants ... as well as mouthwatering descriptions of the food to be found there. It is in many ways a guide book to an area that tourists seldom travel too, but which yields as much (or more) cultural interest as the more famous haunts.

The book is apparently selling very well, and small wonder because I feel it's one that KLites, and particularly Brickfieldsians (!) must surely take to their hearts. I heard from friends who attended a talk that Balan gave at the Commonwealth Club, that members of the audience virtually hijacked the meeting to talk about their own reminiscences of the area and suggest what should go into the next volume!

You can catch Balan at the "Readings" in May. (More about that later.)

The other MPH event was the second Breakfast Club for the Litbloggers held at the Bangsar Village branch on March 24th with Mrs. Good (Lydia Teh) slugging it out with Mrs. Dark Side (Xeus). I'm joking of course ... it was a lovely morning spent with friends chatting about writing and getting published. Both Xeus and Lydia are very good speakers and kept the crowd well entertained.

Xeus (whose very full account of the event can be found here) gave some excellent writing advice.

Lydia Teh was just hilarious. She turned up with a horn so she really could honk! And I loved the piece she read from her book which was a glossary of expressions translated from standard English read into "Manglish" (Malaysian English).

It was Kak Teh's (Zahara Othman) birthday and it was lovely that we were able to celebrate it with her. I like this not yet posed, informal shot. Left to right: Chet, Xeus, me (tangled up with the ficus plant), Lydia, Kak Teh blowing out her candles, Eric Forbes and Janet Teh.

Do come along to the next one this coming Saturday. If you missed Larry Parr, you have a chance to see him again. The mind-expanding Farish Noor will also be along, as will I Am Muslim author Dina Zaman (whom I am introducing).

I must add a silent prayer that the irrepressible and irrelevant questioner behaves himself. Still Kenny will be moderating the session, so we know we're in safe hands. (He will restrain me as ... )

Oh ... and if you do come along, do stay in Bangsar and come along to "Readings" afterwards!

Stumped by Salina

Kak Teh wrote a very nice piece about our national laureate, Dato A. Saman Said, the other day: do go take a look.

I see him around town, quite often - riding the LRT or browsing in Kinokuniya. With his distinctive white beard you can't miss him, and he looks every inch the eccentric writer.

Years ago, when I was learning Malay I hoped to become a fluent enough reader to tackle some of the classics written in the language, and everyone told me that Salina was the one Malay novel I must read.

Up to that point I'd been doing fine with my Malay and felt that I was ready to graduate from kid's books and newspaper articles to the fiction I longed to read in the original language.

But I managed just half a page of Salina.

You see, I got to a sentence that read: Mentari terbit, and I just couldn't imagine what a government minister was doing rising in a field. Nothing that came after that seemed to make sense.

I asked my friends at school and they just laughed at me. A minister, of course is menteri. Mentari is a literary way of saying matahari, meaning sun.

It struck me then that the serviceable, everyday Malay I'd learned wasn't up to the task of coping with the literature.

I'll read Salina in an English translation, I said, put the two editions side by side and study the Malay that way.

But I never found one in the bookshops.

And more or less my Malay got stuck at that point. Frustration point. In a sense it was a good lesson for me, because I understood what many of my students were feeling about English.

But I feel still sad about my inability to read literature in Malay and I'd love to do something even now. Especially so that I could read all those old books of poetry in the backroom of Raman's shop.

And of course, Salina.