Raya Mischiefs

We were boys; and kampung boys were synonymous with raya mischievousness. Somehow they just seem to be drawn to each other. It was probably the lax supervision during raya days when our parents were distracted by the guests; perhaps it was the fact that we had had a month long lay off from mischief during posa and it was finally over and we were itching to go. Maybe it was the sudden sugar rush during raya after our abstinence that turned us into hyper active compacts. But mischief rules during raya.

The mischievous acts ranged from innocent minor little things that were cute to downright bad boys’ pranks. And of course there was a multitude of stuff in between which we were all guilty of from time to time that got us an immediate rebuke (or delayed punishments which cannot be delivered on the spot in front of visitors). These were the scary stuff; my mum would sternly and between gritty teeth tell us..."tunggu kau orang dah pulang, kenak kau!"...which literally means..."just you wait till our visitors leave, you’re going to get it!" Woh!! Those threats was scary; you were caught, found guilty and sentenced but given suspended sentence....I would rather we were given instant punishment; it was the suspense of waiting for the punishments that tortured us the most.

In such instances we would try to behave like angels in the hope that mum's heart would melt and forgive us; or we prayed really hard that our guests did not stop coming till late at night and mum would forget. Or if she did not forget we would go to bed early, pretending to sleep with on angelic smile while we slumbered. That usually worked and we would get a kiss instead. No parent would wake their kids up to punish them for an 'innocent' mischievous act committed ten hours earlier. You can call it scheming, we called it surviving and growing up. We observed adults do that all the time too...

Our boss was my brother Piruz, Chief Mischief Officer he was. But Betty was an able deputy and at times outdid the boss himself by far. We will get to that some time. I was the follower; at least I hoped my parents would think I was too young to think up those mischievous acts on my own… this riled the boss and his deputy at times. It was one of the rare advantages of being several years younger and having an innocent look… heh heh.

We were kids placed in an environment where it was just impossible not to succumb to temptations. There were cakes of all types, shapes, colours, tastes and scents and equal assortment of biscuits too. We had brown chocolate cakes, cheese cakes, creamy green, red cake lapis, dark marble cakes. The different aromas and scents from the vanilla essence. All laid out on the table ready for our raya visitors to enjoy. But they were so inviting, looking at us, mocking us, begging for us to pick them and taste them.

One of our chores during raya was to clear the glasses, plates and dishes after the visitors and before the next batch of visitors arrived. And believe me our visitors were non-stop during raya. During the 'interludes' we would swoop in on the cakes and biscuits. In between clearing the glasses, one hand lifting the cakes tray cover, the other moving swiftly on the cakes. Within seconds we would have a mouthful of the much sought after chocolate cheese cakes or the chocolate pandan cakes or the cake lapis. And at least a few pieces of pineapple tart biscuits, or the evergreen 'semprit' in our teluk belanga pockets.

After several such rounds mum would be vigilant when we circled the table, our noses catching the whiffs of delicious chocolatey, cheesy yummy scents of the cakes. We would drive mum up the wall when she realised how much of the cakes we had consumed and how often she had to replenish them on the table. Worst when our friends would drop by, hang out with us and partake in the 'feasts' and these are not considered “berjarah” because these boys would hang out all day or drop by several times in a day.

When we were kids, carbonated/fizzy drinks were rare luxuries and we looked forward to raya for these treats. In fact other than raya I cannot recall even seeing them displayed for sale at Hap Joo, Teng Wak or Oh Nga's shops. These drinks came in all sizes, colours and tastes. There were the small bottles labelled Aeroplane (belon) or Ship (kapal) brands. They were in orange, strawberry, sarsaparilla, and ice cream soda tastes. Packed in small wooden box of twelve bottles, they were fondly made in Petanak Road, Kuching. We were allowed almost free access to these drinks. Usually these drinks were served in tiny glasses that emerged only during raya. To keep the dispensing of the drinks in very minimal quantity.

Then there were the F&N Fanta and Mirinda drinks - Fanta green, red, orange, grape, etc and of course later the Coca Cola and 7-Up. These were the treasured, more expensive drinks and we were allowed little access if at all. They would be stored properly in a small store or even kept under the bed supposedly out of the boss' and my reach. However check our tongues and you would see the red, green, orange, purple and black shades at different times of the day; undeniable evidence that we had our hands on the treasured stuff.

Completely out of bounds for us were the Shandy, Anglia Shandy, because they contained alcohol. I remember a Shandy ad in the cinemas before, set in a cowboy saloon, a mean looking oriental cowboy, complete with boots and spurs, leather attires, sombrero, pistols in his hip holsters; pushed the swinging saloon door; stopped for a second as his eyes squinted and surveyed the room, amidst a feeling of suspense, fear and silence, approached the bar; slammed his fist on the bar top and demand for "...shandy...chin chin shandy..." and his face broke into a wide smile when the fearful bartender served in Anglia Shandy, the atmosphere changed into laughter and revelry after that.

So Shandy... how could we be denied our curiosity? With the boss leading the way we would have our share of shandy too, albeit secretly. I honestly thought a time when Piruz and I and maybe one or two other friends lying on the floor in our bedroom, feeling intoxicated after our shandy binge. (But my son, Mark, said: “Thats lame papa, shandy contains less then 1% alcohol"). Well maybe I have no tolerance for alcohol.

We were boys, growing boys, and we needed energy from all the activities and running around. And, trust me, there was lots of running around in the spacious kampung. So naturally we would forage for food and drinks all the time. Outside of raya time, Milo drink was most craved after. The Milo tins had to be kept well hidden from Piruz and myself. We loved our Milo in any form. We could just dip our spoon and enjoy the plain Milo powder as it is. Or we would enjoy our Milo drink thick and rich with milk powder (klim, dumex, nespray, etc), hot or ice cold Milo. There were times, when denied our Milo, Piruz and I would lie down in the bedroom and imagine when we grew up and got our own jobs and money we would fill up the 'tangki' in the bathroom with ice Milo and we would enjoy our Milo to our hearts’ delight. (...the tangki in our bathroom was where we store water for our bath; and it was made of concrete, 6 feet long, 3 feet wide and 3 feet deep. That was going to be one big Milo container).

It did get worse, our mischief; as the next contraband item that would start tempting us would be cigarettes. Being the inquisitive misfits we were, we succumbed to this temptation too. The cigarettes available in the house then would be my grandfather's Rough Rider and Camel, dad's 555 or Capstain. During raya there would usually be extra stock of these to offer visitors and guests to the house. The boss, I and a few friends would smuggle this precious foul smelling contraband and had our puff either in the bedroom or hidden somewhere outside the house. This was one adventure that we found difficult to escape capture as there were just too many tell tale signs - the smoke, the matches that went missing, the coughing from inhaling the smoke, the smell of tobacco smoke on the bajus, the tobacco left over in our shirt pockets, etc. And this would earn us maximum and usually immediate punishment.

Growing up in the kampung we had our share of being bullied just as we were bullies ourselves. Because of our mixed parentage and had a surname like Macpherson we expect to draw attention, flaks and brickbats from the kampung bullies, though there were really not very unpleasant experience. Betty was called batman just because her name sounds like 'bat-ty', Piruz would be called 'bango' meaning crane because he is very tall. However we held our own and earned the respect of most of our peers. Still there were a few we would enjoy dishing out some extras. These boys would invariably come to berjarah raya at our house despite the spats we had. Piruz, Betty and I would gleefully wait for them, as they were the more mischievous boys we anticipated that they would not refuse cigarettes nor deny an opportunity to 'steal' the ciggies when we were not looking. Boy, were we prepared for this. Camel cigarettes are the most sought after, as they are expensive , and it suited our scheme perfectly. Camels do not come with filters so it was easier for us to take out the tobaccos, put in the small mercun padi (available in abundance during raya) and packed back with tobaccos. I bet they had a BLAST!!

Less mischievous acts targeted at adults or children alike would include having their raya shoes and slippers hidden. The meaner the neighbourhood adults were to us the worse the treatment. There were one or two busy bodies who liked to report to our parents or to grandma of our naughty deeds in the kampung. They might find their shoes or slippers wet and no tell tale signs of what happened.

The 'really baddest' of the mischief conjured by Piruz, Betty and I was when we did a prank while one of our uncles was asleep. I won't elaborate what we three little kids did. .Wow!!! Nasty! It was capital punishment meted out instantaneously for us.

They were lots of 'gaming' activities going on in the kampung during raya too. These would include the harmless game of marbles and rubber bands. There would surely be the game of 'tungko' using the 'tudung lemenade' (lemonade bottle caps). Tungko was a game where we would draw a small rectangle (about 12 inches by 6 inches or so) on the floor preferably against a wall or anything upright like piece of wooden planks, etc. Four of five kids place a tudung lemenade each into a pool. Each kid at a time would take turns to throw the tudung lemenade at the rectangle from about four feet or so. The other kids would indicate which tudung for you to target with a 'cue' tudung lemenade like a cue ball. The cue tudung lemenade would be filled with candle wax or clay. If you hit the target and remain in the rectangle you win all the tudung lemenade. If your cue ended out of the rectangle or hit a tudung other than the target you would lose or 'tungko' as we called it. Well, it was something like that la...

The innocence of tungko may dissipate as the kampung boys graduated from tudung lemenade to 10 sens, 20 sens, 50 sens coins and even RM1 shillings. Some migrated to cards especially 21 and maybe poker at times. A practice they saw and participated with the Hap Jo, Teng Wak and Oh Nga when they celebrated Chinese New Year. But these were all in good fun and with very little money exchanging hands. The older boys were also quite honourable in that they never allowed the younger boys to participate. It was always restricted to those in the late teens and early twenties. The younger boys earned tips serving drinks, buying cigarettes or by just giving moral support, etc.

I guess we had our share of mischief, our experiences add colours to our lives and as our career and goals brought us further and further away from each other; hopefully reminiscing over these experiences would keep us close as brothers and sisters despite our differences.

As I worked on this post I remembered names and faces of the boys and adults from Kampung Gita who featured in all those activities and interactions. I hope to write about the people and faces of Kampung Gita some day.

Next have to be about my first day in school - Catholic English Primary School.

[Editor’s note: I know what they did to earn capital punishment…]