Kecek-Kecek

Now that GUiT has gone into its third print and looking perhaps at its fourth, I hope you will excuse my self-indulgence as I put on my reminiscing hat. GUiT has brought many good things to me and pleasures that I never thought would materialise simply from writing a book. The son of my second Qur’an teacher (Che Yi) wrote in to say hello, and the son of my first one, a very interesting man, emerged from behind his locked gate as I was looking with sad eyes at a derelict, hand-crafted old Trengganu Malay house where I read my first lines from the Book. I will not hesitate to say that that was the defining moment of my visit to Kuala Terengganu (as is) after nearly a score years.

I was then accompanied by Cik Gu Wan Chik, one of my first teachers at the Sekoloh Melayu Ladang, a jovial and fit man who you probably saw in the Jejak Awang Goneng series of shorts on RTM as the man who twirled a finger at his noggin when Kak Teh asked him about me (a gesture that — according to kak Teh — meant that I was a bit soft in the head). As we were talking, Pak Ibrahim the son of my first Qur’an teacher Pak Haji Ali, emerged and took me on a guided tour of the sad and empty house. And then my Cik Gu mentioned (in front of the camera) that he (Pak Ibrahim) was a distinguished musician, so I said in my half jocular tone, “Give us a song!”

“Wait,” answered Pak Ibrahim, “I must go get my violin.” So that was how we got that mournful, lilting tune that became the signature track of the Jejak.

We met many kindly people: some were old friends; many, complete strangers. Cik Gu Mat — another Cik Gu, bless them all — fed me beludas and gave me a book on the histroy of Trengganu written by the local historian Misbaha (whose son I met in a Trengganu delegation to a Tourism fair in London), and then he introduced me not only to one of the best little restaurants in Kuala Terengganu (The Singgang), but also to the lady who is still, in this age of clockwork electoral candidates and weapons of self destruction, sitting quietly in her house making the beluda with margarine, and condensed milk and stuffing self-raising Trengganu air into the bread.

There were many, many more people I met in our 3-month speaking and signing tour for GUiT. I hope I shall one day be able to incorporate them all into a book to celebrate Trengganu and Trengganuness. And I wish to thank them all again here for helping me make GUiT a success.

In my talks I often spoke of how each step we take informs on the next, or how present ones shed light on the past and vice versa, ad infinitum, in a series of interconnecting beats in life’s long sidewalk. And how again our paths interconnect with those of others, in ways that are often mundane, sometimes unexpected. In GUiT I wrote somewhat whimsically about the ‘strange object’ in the Masjid Abidin that sent incense smoke curling up to the ceiling at mid-day on Fridays, and then in Kuala Terengganu recently I met Pok Daud who gave me a thoroughly fascinating take on its origin. When I popped into the Masjid one afternoon I found that the object was no longer there, so imagine my delight when, a couple of days ago, this email came from New York:

"Dear Mr. Goneng:

"I write to you from Brooklyn, New York...but I learned of you during my travel in Borneo and western Malaysia. I came upon your book in Melaka (Mallacca, etc., similar to Terengganu or Trengganu), and read it through my travel from the south to the north, on the west coast of Malaysia. After reading your book, I left from Penang and right into Trengganu! I had to! I wanted to sense the life of your home town, I wanted to feel some moment that you felt, I wanted to bring your book alive and I was happy that I did. I met some beautiful people in K.T., such as, Regen, a Tamil, who rode me on his motorcycle around the town and its environs... your book has made its way to NYC and in the hand of a friend. Oh..... the “strange object in the Mosque chamber” (p,220), is now located in Kuala Lumpur. I came upon it at the Komplex Kuala Lumpur, Jalan Conlay (Kuala Seri Utama-Hari Kraf Center), in the main building, right, dead center. I have attached a photo of the same.

"All the best!
Louis Crespo
Brooklyn, New York"