Frog Under A Coconut Shell Read online

  “You think you come from a university or what, huh? You can’t even write your own name. If you make a mistake, you could be sent to prison, you know.”

  In a sense, my father was right to caution her, babies snatched by death at birth were not uncommon in those days. There were no pre-natal check-ups for the kampong women, no tests. Perhaps the high mortality was due to poor maternal health which resulted in a sickly child, poor hygiene or the lack of aftercare or the lack of proper nutrition after the child was born. Who knows? Carrying a child to full-term in that era wasn’t a guarantee of a live birth. I can remember seeing the corpse of an eight-month-old foetus, a perfectly formed child who arrived too early and did not survive. The mother wrapped him in cheap cotton layette and placed him on a table whilst we all sat around to mourn the clipped life, the mother wailing the loudest. Surely my mother was aware of all this, but she paid little attention to her own welfare or what might happen if the babies she delivered were to die. She was that sort of special person. She felt it her duty to assist other women in deliveries, when many could not afford either a midwife or doctor. Mak seemed to have a capacity for beating off my father’s words, her face simply remaining serene as she went about her self-imposed vocation. The trouble was that babies tended to arrive at all hours of the day and night. Her departure from home late at night always ignited Father’s jealousy and wrath.

  “Are you sure you’re not meeting a man?”

  “Why don’t you come with me, lah?” She suggested in a quiet voice.

  When I was the youngest, she would take me with her whenever she attended to a birth, so long before I knew how babies were made, I knew where they came from. The first delivery I witnessed made such an impression that I can never rub it from my memory. It was when Petai gave birth. Petai was a huge Indian lady who did not look any different whether she was pregnant or not. At that time, she seemed rather old to me, but I expect she was no more than thirty. The voluminous sari that she wore was adjusted accordingly as the pregnancy progressed. She was so black that the Malays likened her to the bottom of a claypot, macham pantat belanga. In response, she would laugh showing off her false teeth which gleamed whitely like a toothpaste advertisement. She had sent for my mother in the late evening, the niece banging loudly at our front door. When we left the house, Ah Tetia was not at home. We only had a carbide lamp to light the way through a darkened lorong. I clutched my mother’s hand tightly as I stumbled along the rutted path, the carbide lamp hissing and spitting. In typical Indian melodrama, there were scores of relatives at Petai’s house, all talking in excited tones when we arrived. The house smelled of curry and spices. There was so much commotion that no one noticed me going to sit cross-legged, in the room underneath the table opposite the bed where the delivery was to take place. So I watched it all. I saw Petai’s folds and folds of ebony flesh, her huge belly exposed, naked. Lying there on the bed like an over-turned cow, her legs straddled, her arms threshing the bed. Petai moaned a terrible moan, making me cover my ears with my hands. Yet, I heard her cry, first in spasms, then in a piercing scream. Besides hers, my mother’s voice was gentle, calm, coaxing her, instructing her. And then I clasped my mouth in horror as a flash-flood of fluid and blood came from between Petai’s legs to be caught in several enamel basins by my mother and her helper. Petai screamed. I thought she was going to explode. And then, this small, wet thing emerged, rushing down the sluice of blood and water. My mother put her fingers in the baby’s mouth to clear it, then turned it upside down and gave it a sharp smack on its bottom. I was surprised, wondering why Mak needed to make the baby cry. All that time, Mak was cool and efficient, cutting the cord that was strung between baby and mother. She handed the boy-child to the helper to be washed, then she pushed hard into Petai’s belly, kneading it till Petai complained. And then it came, that ugly mass of blob that looked like liver, covered in dark blood and scum. I hated eating pig’s liver for months afterwards, not that our family could afford much of it anyway. When we went outside to show off the baby, everyone congratulated my mother for her work. Looking at my mother now, you would not believe that she was the same woman who was so efficient, so calmly delivering other people’s babies, the same woman whose mind today cannot even remember if she has eaten.

  Going home late, she had to deal with my father’s wrath. When he came home from the cabaret and found that she was out and not waiting up for him like a dutiful wife, he unleashed drunken words which tore at her self-esteem. It was perfectly acceptable for him to amuse himself with the ladies at the cabaret in New World, but if he thought that she encouraged a man to look at her, he would not let her be. His jealousy was legendary.

  On that auspicious day when I had cause to celebrate getting into school, he was intercepted by Ah Gu on his way home. Ah Tetia usually goes to work on a bicycle that Ah Gu had sold him. When passing Ah Gu’s shop, he would ring the bell to signal to Ah Gu that he was home so that Ah Gu could come around and the two of them would carry weights in the sandy yard. He cycled more than 20 miles a day for his work and carried weights every evening. He didn’t have much hair but he had a superb body. Unfortunately, he poisoned himself with numerous cigarettes a day and that was what got him eventually, at the age of 57. He loved to talk politics like most men, so Ah Gu and him would have a drink together after their workout. Mostly, it was Ah Gu who drank Guinness, while Ah Tetia smoked. Unlike my mother, my father did not have either Malay or Indian friends. He mixed with foreigners only when he was obliged to, like at work. That evening, Ah Gu was waiting outside his shop, his face a tabloid of melodrama.

  “What’s wrong?” my father asked.

  “Did you know what I saw today, huh? Your wife sitting thigh to thigh with that wretched Abu Bakar.”

  Their exchange was revealed to Mak later in Father’s heated, over-wrought voice. It was this incident, his treatment of her that woke something in me, something dark and malcontent. After all, aren’t I my father’s daughter, too? Can we escape our genetic inheritance? On that day, we knew from the moment we heard him arriving that he was upset. His bicycle screeched to a halt in the yard. He must have run over a rat because we heard it squeal in agony. The wall of our kitchen was made with wooden planks up to about four feet high and above that were simply wooden slats so we could see him from inside. He was certainly in a state of agitation. Usually, he would lean the bicycle neatly against the kitchen wall, but this time he simply let it fall and we heard it crash.

  “Are you alright or not?’ Mak asked as he strode into the kitchen, like an enraged bull, his nostrils flaring, his eyes narrowed.

  We had just sat down on the kitchen floor in a circle to begin dinner. Since we did not own a dining table, the enamel plates holding our food were placed on the rough cement floor in the centre in front of our crossed legs. In one corner of the kitchen was our washing-up area, a ridge of concrete separating it from the rest of the kitchen, where the water ran under the wooden wall into a cavity in the ground outside which we had to clear daily. Alongside this area which measured no more than two square foot was a giant earthern-ware Ali Baba type container called a tempayan. This was for storing drinking water fetched from half-a-mile away from the standpipe and it had a wooden lid over it to prevent the mice and rats getting into it. Next to it stood our meat-safe, which was a free-standing larder. As we had no refrigerator, this was used for storing the cooked food. Inside the frame of its two doors were fine wire-meshing, which let in the air and kept the food cool. Under each of the four legs of the meat-safe was a small saucer filled with water so that ants could not pass from floor to the legs of the larder.

  Four-year-old Bernadette was on Mak’s lap and Mak was using her fingers to put rice and meat into her own mouth to chew and soften before bringing it out of her mouth to feed it to Bernadette. Her intentions were good; most mothers and grandmothers did this at that time to make sure that bones did not get into a child’s food and that it was soft enough to swallow. Years later, when Mak
was looking after Agatha’s children, she used the same method to Agatha’s disapproval..

  “You’re feeding my children germs from your mouth! You’ll make them sick. You better stop this filthy habit, ahh!”

  We were seven on the kitchen floor that evening. All of us, except Bernadette, looked up when Ah Tetia came in through the door. He cursed in Teochew and I felt my mother react by drawing herself inward as though her instinct bade her to protect herself from what was to come. I have never heard her retorting and most times I wished she would. Sometimes, I was disappointed that she would be so passive in the face of his temper. Only later did I learn that if she had reacted, if she had responded, she would have fueled his anger more. Sometimes he might come on all loud and abusive but after a while, he would trail off into sullenness, but this was not that sort of time. There was no reprieve in store that evening. In his madness, he strode into the room, reached out with his foot to kick our plates and dishes. Everything went flying, enamel plates clattering, bits of food spreading. Shocked, Bernadette started to cry. Ah Cob who was then in his late teens leapt to his feet to restrain Ah Tetia as he made towards my mother.

  “How dare you lay a hand on your father!” Ah Tetia said, punching Jacob in the face. As Ah Cob reeled backward, he knocked the wooden lid off the tempayan. His bottom sank down into the jug. My father fished him out roughly and kicked him out of the house. Next, he shoved Jeremiah and Matthew out of the kitchen and bolted the door. Everything happened so fast. He snatched the baby from Mak, and shoved Bernadette in my arms. Then he pulled my mother’s hair and her bun loosened. Her face that day is imprinted in my mind forever, a look of utter fear as he dragged her into the part of the house which was our sleeping quarters.

  “Chow Chee Bai! (Smelly cunt!)” He swore, though I didn’t know what the words meant then. He slammed the door hard. Agatha started to whimper and I told her to shut up. I was shaking from terror and from a new rage that I did not understand. Something was germinating in the deep well of my being. I heard my father’s angry shouts and the sharp slaps, the dull kicks, a body crashing into the furniture, things falling. But not once did I hear my mother cry out.

  It seemed to last forever.

  It was not the first time nor the last. Jacob had tried to stop that sort of thing happening. Time and again, he would bear the brunt of our father’s fists. I believe that it was eventually the cause of his marrying early and leaving home. And yet, of all my brothers and sisters, Ah Cob seems the least tolerant of our mother’s debilitating mind. He loses his patience when she says things that are, in his opinion, wrong. He argues with her, probably not understanding that it is the disease that is making her act peculiarly. There is no doubt of his love for her. After all, he was a filial son and supported her financially after our father died. But Ah Cob is a man who has difficulty in expressing his emotions and does not exhibit any outward show of love. Perhaps in his mind, he thinks that by arguing with her, he is keeping her sane and from degenerating so rapidly.

  On that day when my father let loose his anger on my mother, something rose from the deep seat of my being. My sense of injustice framed itself in blasphemous thoughts. Was it not enough that he belittled her as he belittled us? His words used to make me weep. He said to me many times in Teochew, “Bor eng kai! Chiak leoh bi! (Worthless! A waste of rice!)” or he might say, “Anai ou! Bor nang ai! (So black [therefore, by implication, ugly]! No one wants (to marry).” For my mother and myself, I imagined myself with an arm that rippled with muscles. I saw myself thrust my manly fist into my father’s face. It would force him to make up excuses like my mother had to do to neighbours: “Oh, I ran into a door”; “You know, I totally missed that jutting pole”; “I slipped and knocked my head on the edge of the table.” These were the same kind of excuses I made in my later years. A woman is shamed when her husband beats her up, as if she feels herself unworthy and at fault. Today, I know what that feels like. But when I was a child and did not known this, I couldn’t understand why my mother did not retaliate. I was so furious with my father, and saw only that my father was to blame entirely. It was the one time I wished I was a man. Then I would do to him what he was doing to my mother. But I was not a man and my child’s fists would hardly wound him. I could only cower on my side of the door and listen with fear. But a huge wave of feeling was washing over me. That was when I knew I hated him. My father never even gave us the chance to tell him about my acceptance into school.

  Eight

  My mother’s perseverance got me accepted into school, her fortitude kept me in it. At that time, I didn’t understand what a tremendous achievement it had been. Today, I marvel at her source of strength. Where and how did a woman of such illiteracy gather and pool her resources? Where did her intelligence and resilience come from? How did she manage to get my father to accept the situation? Perhaps she simply stood her ground on the issue? When she eventually summoned the courage to tell my father that I had been accepted into school, he shrugged then said, “Aiiyah! Do what you like. But don’t expect me to pay for anything. If I find out that you are using the food money for the child’s books, I’ll belt you!”

  “I’ll help you, Mak,” my eldest brother Jacob said. “I can give Maths tuition to the village kids after school and earn a bit of money.”

  Ah Cob was already 21 and undergoing training at a Teacher’s College. Thank goodness, not all men thought in the same vein as my father. He was a very good brother, concerned about our welfare though he was strict. Ah Cob was forward thinking and he, too, was instrumental in my receiving an education. For that I will always be grateful to him. He persuaded the neighbours to part with $5 a month. He told them that the children had to be good in Arithmetic even if they were simply going to be hawkers and shopkeepers. He gathered his pupils, aged between six and 14; found some empty orange crates to use as stools and desks and there began his tuition school on our cement floor in the living room. I can still hear the younger kids saying in unison, “Good morning, Sir!” followed by their chanting of the multiplication table, in highly accented English, “TU times TU is FOR; TU times TREE is SIKS.” Jacob was an excellent teacher but his sterness made us frightened of him. Anyone, including myself who didn’t get things right, got our knuckles rapped by his wooden ruler. He told me that my capacity to learn Arithmetic was minimal, which was true and that I get all the English tenses mixed up, which was also true. Like our father, Ah Cob did not mince words nor give compliments. When I said I was going to be a writer, he laughed.

  “You’re joking! You can’t even string a sentence together properly!”

  I burned with shame at my preposterous dream. Firstly, you need talent, and secondly, you need money to write. It seemed that I possessed neither. However, I am still indebted to Ah Cob, without whose efforts to bring in the money, complementing my mother’s, I would not have been able to go to school at all and thus would not have even begun to live my dream as a writer. When I told my mother my dream, she did not laugh like Jacob, instead, she said, “Work that calls is guided by soul to express spirit. It is work that will bring you greatest happiness. But never forget to thank those who help put you on path.”

  It was her way of telling me to be grateful to Ah Cob because she knew how he and I clashed sometimes. So when I started working, I always bought him gifts; and when I moved to England, I sent him an air ticket to join our wedding party and gave him a good holiday. My eldest brother is 13 years older than I am. Like all my brothers, he is very handsome. My family falls in two categories, the dark and the fair. Jacob, Matthew, Robert and I have our mother’s complexion whilst Romia, Agatha and Bernadette inherited our father’s fair complexion. When we three sisters stand together to pose for a picture, no one would believe that I am related to the other two. My schooling set a precedence for my two younger sisters so that when their time came, my father did not even bother to protest. But even Jacob’s tuition money was insufficient to buy books and uniforms and all the other necessary th
ings for school.

  “Ah Yee’s mother is pregnant and she can’t squat down easily,” I volunteered. “Since I am in afternoon school, I can do the washing for her before school. And when I come back from school, I can do the ironing.”

  “Alright, lah. I shall help you with the saris. I will show you how to fill the iron with coals.”

  Mak had to wash the clothes of nine people everyday by hand. Up until then, helping her with the washing was a game for me. After all, I was only eight and a half years old. She gave me the little things to wash, underpants, knickers, handkerchieves. Now I would have to learn to wash clothes properly. My education was hard-earned and not just by myself. That is why I appreciate being educated so much, as so many other people’s dreams sit upon my shoulders. My fulfillment is also theirs. It was not all hard work because my mother had a way of making every chore seemed an undertaking of the spirit and she would do everything joyfully and I had picked up this trait from her, singing whilst doing my chores to lighten the load. We’d carry the pails of washing to the bathroom and took turns to draw water from the well, always careful not to pull up the catfish that lived at the bottom of the well to eat up the algae and mosquitoes. We sat on our low, wooden stools and scrubbed the clothes on wooden washboards. We washed the clothes with Sunlight soap until we could afford a better detergent like FAB. The corrugated zinc bathroom had no roof, so we sat under the warm open sky, the tops of banana and coconut trees visible, birds flying overhead. The bathroom door would be flung open so that we could keep an eye on Bernadette and Agatha playing Balloon (hop-scotch) in the sand. Mak sometimes strapped Robert to her back with a sarong or left him in the oval metal bucket which she lined with a folded bed sheet. Mak always used this time to entertain me with her days of plenty in Malacca. I loved listening to her voice, to the happiness which made it glow when she talked about her family and her privileged life in Malacca.