Pasar Pagi (Morning Market)

The phone rang and Bill picked up the hand phone, immediately after answered the phone, he woke up by jumping, rushing to wash room and wash up. He did not care he was cleaned, his teeth was fully or not fully wash.  He rushed or rather rushed and jumped; three steps became one step down the stare case. Starting to pack and put them or rather thrown them into his van. Normal circumstances, he needed one hour to do the packing, tonight or morning he overslept and it was 12.30am and only needed half an hour of packing

Bill was a processed food second whole seller, every night at about 10.00pm, he would packed the processed food from his cold room and sent them to his store at the second whole seller market latest at 11.30pm.  He should have ready by 12.30am for the retailers as the retailers would go to the second whole seller market by 12.30am.

Generally the wet market system of the country was operated by having the importers and the farmers, they would sent the produce to the whole sellers market, re-sell to the second whole sellers market, re-sell to the retailers and sold to end users at the retailers markets throughout the country. There were exceptions, there were distributors, they bought in bulk, re-packed and processed at their factories/workshop, re-sell to the second whole sellers.  By this way, the whole sellers were dropped off the picture; the chain of distribution was broken from the normal way.

The second whole seller market, voices from the retailers, low voices, high pitch voice, loud voices over here and there, Bill was kept on saying “Sorry” and “sorry”   retailer “Boss, please 1.30am in the morning……” retailer” please, I need to travel …….” Retailer “because of you, I waited ……..” Bill was doing the bills totaling and collections, his helpers was busy packing and sending to the retailers ‘vans/pickups.

Jason and Jessie, the retailers, the husband and wife, the husband would go over to the second whole seller market, doing the purchases at 12.30am.  He would have finished his purchasing at about 2.30am.  Travelling from the second whole seller market to his house, it took him one hour. The unpacking, washing and packing for re-sell, taking breakfasts and get every else ready to go to the retailers market, it took him and two hours. Jessie”Oldie, finishing your breakfast and lets go” Jason “Have you checked everything and all of them inside the van, old woman!”

Jason and Jessie were office workers for twenty years; they were tired of the office politics. Starting their wet market retailers business, it was another twenty years passed.  Every day they were doing the same old jobs and having the same old life, days become nights, nights become days. They were happy as they were being their own boss.  Nobody would finger pointing at their back, once a while they would rest and went for a holiday for a few days.

Morning at 5.30am, Jason and Jessie, they would start to unload the produce and display them at their store.  They would put the weighing machine, plastic bags and others in place and wait for the customers to pay them a visit.

The retailers market would get hot up and customers’ voices over here and there by 6.30am. The customers mostly untie and uncles, it is difficult to find young ladies and handsome boys. May be young unties were around.

Young untie “Uncle Jason, how much the total?” Jason were murmuring a few seconds “Altogether twelve ringgit” (Please refer to my earlier blog of New Year Shopping - the ringgit and sen) Jason had graduated the mental counts after twenty years of practicing. The young untie went away and Jessie Looked at Jason “Oldie, are you tried to impress the beauty, it should be twelve ringgit and twenty five sen” Jessie also graduated from the mental counts.  Jason smile said “Old woman, please, don’t you know jealousy can kill a cat! Today we are short of coins and young untie is our regular, she is smart in calculation. She will know that we have given her a discount!”

Noon at about 12.30pm, the morning retailers market, the noises slowly down, unties and uncles customers went off one by one. Retailers were closing down their store one by one.

Next Topic (9)  Pasar Malam (Night Market)

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The Potluck

John’s parents had six children, three sons and three daughters.  The father used to talk to them during dinner time; he was a very fair and justifiable person. He gave the society six children at an equally distributed among the sexes.  Three boys and three girls, no gain and no lose, boys after married, they brought in three girls. Girls after married there went off three girls.

The Chinese community here or any other place, they are practicing the same traditions. Boys are responsible to take care of their parents.  Girls after married, they have to take care of their husbands’ parents.

Both the parents passed away, John the eldest talked to his younger brothers and sisters at one of the occasion when they were together.  John “Since our parents passed away, the last time we all met and be together, it was six months ago” Jessie the forth eldest sister “Yeah, it is truly quite some time ago, at time, I do felt that we were not so close as what we were before” John “I do share the same feeling, there are times, it just pop up in my mind, what happen to you all?  what were you all doing? What happened to all my nieces and nephews?”

A routine potluck was suggested and accepted by all the brothers and sisters, best of all, all the in laws were also subscribed to it. It was agreed that there would be once a month, one session of potluck be held. It would on a rotation basis, each month one of the house of one the families would become a host and a gathering place for all.  The hosting family would prepared main course for the dinner, other family would bring along one course for the dinner. It was to reduce the heavy burden of kitchen jobs for all six families of about thirty members of the day of gathering.

The potluck was conducted for more than ten years and never failed.  There were conversations, exchanges of each other recent situation and activities for the month, releasing information to each other, information of useful related interests, economic situation, and news of related interests and jokes of the day if any. Most of all, they would play mahjong, the traditional Chinese table game for three or members a game. It was a saying, playing the traditional Chinese table game of mahjong.  It was a good medicine of prevention of getting old and diseases of old age. Is there any truth? It may be, because they are all happy whenever they were together and happiness is medicine to all diseases.

The Living hall, they are in laws watching movies, a group of their children were playing toys game, and another group was playing electronic games.  There were groups making conversion and joking to each other, outside the front house’s garden.

There was a mahjong room, two tables of three members playing at each table. John “hold it, hold it, I have full house” he opened his set of mahjong cube cards and continued “Pay up, pay up, I have twenty doubles and self drawn cube card, it is double wins, two ringgits multiply by two, four ringgits each of you” Hanson gave four ringgit unwillingly “Something is fishing, our big brother, the whole night was wining” Jessie “You are the youngest but not necessary a sure win every time you play. The last time you had won most” Jessie was playing at another table with two sisters in laws. The second eldest brother “The whole night I was quietly to wait for the God Of Luck to come back to me and you all making noises and chased away my Good Luck God” He continued “shut up” Laughed by all

John won again; Hanson stood up “It is not possible, it is incredible, I got to go to toilet, releasing bad luck into toilet bowl” a burst of laughter by all. The second eldest brother followed and stood up “He is using black magic to usher the Lucky God, I also needed to go to toilet to do something” John joined them “You all are doing one way or another for a change, needless to say I do have to maintain the good luck charm to be with me”

The rotation continued it was Jessie’s turn; there were three tables for mahjong players.  There were two groups of players. The family members and outsiders, John was playing with family members. He never played with outsiders; he was a principled man and never changed.

One of the outsider “Your brother is very fantastic, all these years never changed, play only for the common pool” he continued “what is the fun? Wining but no bets in pocket, all belong to the common pool” John Tan, the Tan family had a common pool, all wining bets were deposited into the pool. The fund of the pool would be used for family travelling, family outing for dinners, high tea and others.

There were occasions; outsider would join them for the monthly potluck and gathering.  They would played the Mahjong with the Tan family and wining bets belong to them, Tan family or outsiders. John would never play with them, taking bets into one’s pockets. It was not a game, it was a gambling. It was John’s belief, one’s fun, happiness, and joys were needed to be tempted by money. It was not a true feeling of joys and of anything.

Next Topic (8)  Pasar Pagi (Morning Market)

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The Stories of our Daily Life (6) New Year Preparations

John and Shirley, both of them were helping each other to make some home cooked New Year cookies. The Love letter cookie, the bee hive cookie, the arrow shoot chips, the special and traditional glutinous rice pancake, the traditional fried rice biscuit, these  were use to be homemade cookies by each and every home.  Hypermarkets were having plenty of these cookies for sale nowadays. John preferred to have them done homemade.

New Year around the corner, last Sunday for the New Year, early in the morning, John was excited as Shirley and he were planning to do the homemade New Year cookies. He brought all those cooking and baking utensils and placed them in front of their house, the car porch.  He brought out the charcoals; he brought out the cookies ingredients, started the fire and waiting for Shirley.

Neighbors teased John “John, making cake?”  John looked at them and smiled and they laughed. [Do read my other blog, The Morning Business, there were something about making cake]

Shirley was doing the baking and cooking; John was doing the packing and eating! Shirley padded lightly and pushed John’s hand away, indicating not to eat some more. “Please, John do not create a situation that we have no cookies for the New Year”

They lived in the housing estate where they owned the house. The housing estate was not a high end housing estate. It was considered as middle and upper class of housing estate, when it was newly completed. The area was quite a nice place to live on then.

Those newly moved in, either they had bought the house or rented. They made extensions illegally and the way they did the extensions, it looked like a village house. Some of them even treated the car porch in front of the house as a kitchen, a toilet, a hall, a dining hall, they cooked there, they ate there and may be one of these days, and they would sleep there as well.

As the old sayings, we could not fight against them, we joined them.  John did the cooking and baking in the car porch! It was not really joining them! John did the cooking only once a year!

John was brought up in one of the villages, houses were wooden built. A few days before New Year, every house, each and everyone, starting to cook and bake New Years cookies, in front of their houses, at the side of the houses or back yards. It was a scene that was created, a feel of full of joys, warmness, loves and cares to each other, what you had that was what I had.

House cleanings and New Year decorations, John and Shirley, they were still maintaining the traditions. It was a good tradition. It was also another good tradition; normal days no one was willing to thoroughly clean their houses! New Year times of cleaning, it was a real cleaning and clearing, one would have dug everything, dirt hide underneath, corners, crack walls and behind all cupboards, the paintings on the walls and many more. Old things had to go, as per the old sayings, the olds not going, the news (new thing) not coming.

New Year eve, annual dinner was one of the best traditions, it was a tradition for sons and their families only. Married daughters had to attend their husbands’ annual dinners. The first day of New Year belonged to the married daughters. They would go to their parents’ house together with their husbands and children.

John and Shirley would uphold the Chinese New Year traditions that were passed from their parents. Their parents passed on the traditions from China as they came from China and brought along with them. Some would regard that this was a religion traditions, John would prefer to have a belief that this was a tradition, and carried on from generation to generation, indicating some long lost stories behind each and every event before and after the New Year. Those events were they long lost true stories and became legends? It would be a historian’s jobs to find out.

Next Topic (7) the Potluck

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