Kacang Cendol after School

It is very hard to explain how much a cold sweet 'ais kacang cendol' was worth to us on the hot afternoons after school. I can only attempt to describe their real worth by relating our experiences and the sacrifices we were willing to make just for a 'mangkok' of 'angtau cendol'. Ooooh...they tasted soooo good!!

I think Kuching's 'angtau cendol' is the best in the world! Till today the 'angtau cendol' at open air market (no longer open air for a long long time now) and its 'offspring' outlets throughout Kuching is on the must visit list if I am in Kuching. I can still remember the name of one of several ice kacang stalls in Kuching - Chan Swee Kang. And of course there was the famous Ah keng, the guy that sell his 'ais kacang' on the tri-shaw in the kampongs.

The angtau cendol in Kuching is incomparable. The red beans that have swell to four or five times the normal size; are different from anywhere else that I know. And the green cendol, the dark almost luminous green cendol smells so sweet; unlike the light green so called cendol in KL. Of course the way the ice blocks were manually scrapped, before the advent of mechanization, were quite a major task. You can develop good strong arms by scrapping the ice daily. But mind you, handling the ice daily can take its toll on any human hand and you really do not want to pay too close an attention at the fingers of those cendol sellers. hehehe...

Imagine the kacang, cendol in a glass mangkok or ceramic bowl filled with very fine ice flaks and then came generous pourings of rose syrup, delicious gula apong syrup (not gula malacca mind you but 'gula apong' ok!), the 'air gula' and the creamy milk. The cendol man would use up one can of the creamy milk for not more then ten bowls of kacang cendol. No cutting corners here! Or you can have a choice of santan or coconut milk instead of the cream milk. Then the cute little spoons, plastic or ceramic, feeding the delicious concoctions to our hungry little mouths. On a hot humid afternoon day! Yummmy!!!

Of course we cannot forget the 'Special' - combination of jagung, pineapple cubes, red jelly strips, sago, green jelly cubes, etc. A bowl full of these colorful delicious stuff with the ice flaks, generous portions of cream milk that the cendol man would just pour round and round and round into the bowl. The rose syrup, air gula and maybe the gula apong too. The 'special' smells very sweet!! Yes, now I remember why, they would sprinkle some vanilla essence in the special if I am not mistaken. 

A bowl of angtau cendol, special or the kacang cincau would cost about 10 cents those days, equivalent to a one way bus fare on bus no 4B from Satok Suspension Bridge on the Matang side to Kampong Gita. Decision, Decision! Everyday we are faced with the decision - to get a comfortable 15 minutes bus ride home for the 2 miles from the bridge to the Kampong or enjoy a mangkok of delicious Kuching angtau cendol and walk 45 minutes the 2 miles on a hot dusty afternoon? Of course the cendol won every time.

After tucking in on the super cold, sweet, fragranced and creamy angtau cendol we would set foot on our journey home carry our heavy school bags over our shoulders. 

But never for long. Because there are 3 good old chaps who would cycle home from school every day. These guys deserve special mention! They are Akbar (now retired Professor Akbar), Hakim (now retired Marine Police boss) and Abang Abdillah Dtk Abang Othman ( now of the very senior Police officer in Sarawak). These three seniors would be cycling home and they would always take pity on the three 'cute' eurasian kids Piruz, Betty and me; walking home along the hot, dusty Matang Road. They never failed to stop and give us a ride home. 

It was not comfortable sitting on the bicylces' metal bars on the stony Matang Road for 2 miles on a hot dusty afternoon. The poor guys would be sweating profusely paddling their bicycles with the extra loads. We were chubby kids mind you. But they never complained and neither do we! We had our angtau cendol and we got our ride home, albeit not on comfortable bus 4B cushioned seats. These went on for several years to a point when we got too big or we got our own bicycles. 

Things do not always went our way though. Somedays these three good samaritans did not appear so it was a long hot and dusty walk home for us. Sometimes some other kids beat us to the ride but not very often.

I would like to say thank you to these three fine individuals who turned out to become accomplished gentlemen. And nothing beats Kuching's angtau cendol, special and kacang cincau!!