Hello and hi again to all!
Today I'm dedicating my latest blog for my over-seas readers. I am gonna write about how we, the Malays live our daily lives here in this beloved country of ours, Malaysia.
Just for general information, Malays are Muslim by birth. Chinese are mostly Buddhist and Christian. Indians mostly Hindus and some are Christian as well.
Malay is the largest ethnic in Malaysia. If you were in this country for the first time and don't know how to differentiate us,you can do so by looking for some distinctive appearances. Malays usually have brown and fair skin with big eyes. Chinese are very fair with small eyes. Indians are mostly dark in skin with sharp nose and big eyes. But nowadays, it is sometimes confusing even for us to identify who's who because of the many inter marriages.
For us, the Malays, our day starts with praying at dawn, that is at about 0600am and lasts just before the sun rises. We perform the prayers five times a day, that is at dawn, in the afternoon, late afternoon, another one is just after the sun goes down and the last prayer would be after eight p.m. Each of these prayers will only take a few minutes. But not everyone does it dutifully.
On everyday scale, most people left for work at about 07:00am (Government sector opens at 0800am) and at 08:00am for those in private sector (starts at 0900hrs). Even though we live in a Muslim country, we are a moderate Muslim country. Therefore women are allowed to go out and work. Women are allowed to do anything they wish to do, provided they have the qualifications and expertise in whatever field they wish to be. The only setback we had over here is to find a house maid to look after the children if women were to leave for work. The country usually works closely with our neighbouring countries such as Myanmar,Indonesia and The Philippines to get supplies of women workers in domestic sectors.
Malaysians, we are a noisy lot. Doesn't matter if one is Chinese, Indian or Malay. Once seated in a coffee shop or anywhere for that matter, everybody talks like nobody's business. Nobody cares. That is why, when watching a game such as badminton, sometimes we had to be told to be silent as it could distract the concentration of the players.We are known to be very friendly people. Sometimes overly friendly to the extend of being annoying. Please bear with us!
Our children can play right in front of our neighbour's house, screaming and shouting their heads off without worrying about anything in the world. They played without choosing what skin color to play with, whereas there were still some adults who stick to their own color. Racism is everywhere in this world but we minimize it by being considerable to other ethnic beliefs. Otherwise, how can we live harmonically in a country with three strong ethnics in peace? That is why, I personally believe too much verbal freedom is not so good for human kind, because sometimes it can lead to destruction. Everything should be done or taken moderately. We're better off that way.
I heard from a friend of mine who were in London for holiday, he said while cooking some Malaysian dish in their rented apartment, the aroma of chilli paste had find it's way to the unit below. A while latter, an Englishman came up and asked if they were cooking something and he said yes. The Englishman advised them that it is not allowed to cook something that can send strong aroma and cause disturbances to others. I find it funny but then, every country has their own culture.
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| This is mens' sarong |
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| And this is ladies' sarong |
Cooking and food. First of, Malaysian staple diet is rice. Some people will have rice for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Today, most people are health conscious, rice are slowly being replaced by some healthier alternatives. The basic for Malay cooking are chili and coconut milk. Therefore, most of our gravies mainly laced with coconut milk just like western cooking with cheese.
Since rice is our staple food, a large selection of ways of cooking it, has been created and improvised, over the years. Most famous here are, Fried Rice, Rice with Coconut Milk,Tomato Rice and many more. We eat rice using fingers, right hand fingers. White rice will usually be eaten with a few selection of dishes such as Fish Curry, some mixed vegetables or malay salad, maybe some fried chicken and squid in chilli sambal. That is a typical malay lunch.
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| malay salad |
I will usually take about 45 minutes to cook all these. Preparation took longer as one had to clean up fish or chicken and crushing garlic and things like that.
By nature,Malays are shy people sometimes to the extend of being timid especially among our young children. We were taught to respect and obey the elders, no questions asked. We would never raise our voices especially towards our parents because that's the biggest sin in Islam. We must always obey them unconditionally unless it is against the teachings.Even then, we still have to be respectful when voicing out our disagreement. Unknowingly, we grew up with this trait still thick within us. We followed what teachers told us to do and they (the teachers) expect the same from student. We would keep our opinions to ourselves and we especially would never hurt other's feeling by retaliation or say out loud things we disagree. That is why, I think, Malaysian student always excel in their exams no matter where they were but poor in interaction, which is sad because it could work both ways. I prefer American style of teaching where student can communicate and interact with their teachers openly and free to receive and give ideas. Of course,there were pros and cons. I will not delve into this because it will take too long to elaborate.
I think I should stop now. Too long will make you guys bored. If you wish to know more about us, write to me or leave a comment. I may resume on this topic or something else.
Happy reading and out for now.
Rose
24th.November '12
