Incidents (of Travel)

Racks of batik cloth are being left to dry in the afternoon sun after repeated washing to remove the excess wax and dye. This allows the dye to set before the cloths are packaged. In Terengganu, batik workshops like this are increasingly uncommon as factory printed fabric become a cheaper alternative. As a craft tradition, batik is not exactly local. A common folk ditty goes something like this: “Batik cloth, batik clothing / Java was your land of origin / pretty lady, dashing lad / Like two halves of an areca cut.” Nevertheless, the Terengganu folks have managed to infuse it with their own vernacular over the past century. It has led to an earthier kind of sensuality that celebrates bold and simple patterns, bright colors and a willingness to embrace crackling – this creates a wavy line effect that bristles with energy.

On that fine morning, after hearty breakfast of nasi dagang (which translates loosely as “trader’s rice/meal”), we walked around the town’s market to find many batik stores already open. The market has two stories. On the ground floor is where you will find the daily produce on sale. Climb up a flight of stairs, and you will have the eating stalls on one end and the craft traders on the other. Here we found samples of garish batik textiles. These gaudy colors are what city-folks and the nouveau-riche look out for today, as opposed to the more subdued tones derived from traditional organic dyes. Traders and batik-makers are quick to adapt to the taste of the urban middle class.

Budu, a fermented fish sauce, is an acquired taste. It is made by storing a mixture of anchovies and salt in these cement containers for 140 to 200 days. The result is a sharp acidic pong that is in equal measure complex and pungent. When fermentation is complete it becomes the perfect accompaniment to a hearty but simple meal of rice, raw jungle ferns and grilled seafood. It’s a staple of the east coast, to the extent that even the Malays of the west coast are not accustomed to its faintly rotting flavor. Every time I eat budu, I imagine that it must taste rather like the Roman condiment garum. For one brief moment, two seemingly disparate cultures with almost no overt civilizational connections are drawn together by a shared love for rotten fish soup.

Here blocks of belacan are being sun-dried. This is a fermented ground shrimp paste used in cooking all throughout southeast Asia. To get that characteristic rosy pink, manufacturers in a number of shops have started adding bottles and bottles of rose syrup during the grinding process, resulting in a sticky sweet smell that attracts a lot of flies. In the next video, one gets to see what goes into the making of the keropok lekor – a kind of fish cake that is quintessential Terengganu snack food. The meat of the fish is ground up and mixed into a paste with sago flour, before being rolled into a sausage or tubular form. The lekor is then boiled very quickly in scalding hot water, so that the form sets. It is widely sold in Terengganu and it is eaten from morning to night. There are two principle ways to prepare it: deep-fried or steamed.

There are not many traditional boat makers left in Kuala Terengganu. This is struck a wistful note, given that traditionally the Malays were seafaring people. Old photographs of Terengganu showed how important sailing was to the traditional way of life – whether it is sea fishing that informs the livelihood of the village folks or the riverine culture along the Terengganu river, serviced by many water taxis that brought the Terengganu people from both ends of the river bank into trade and conversation. The boat shed we visited is located on Pulau Duyung, a little island nestled in the middle of the Terengganu river. The following video shows the studied patience and diligent labour that go into crafting a sailing vessel. It takes at least a year to complete a ship. But the boat-makers are never in a hurry, they take many cigarette breaks. When the hammering stops, one could hear the radio humming a soft rock ballad.

Dyed clothes ready to be printed with wax pattern. Batik is a wax-resist technique of creating patterned fabrics. Here we met some of the last few batik makers who are still committed to a daily routine of producing this textile craft of Javanese origin that emerged as a local economy a century ago. Unlike the fastidiousness of Javanese batik (both court and trade varieties), there is a casual unfussiness about Terengganu batik, almost like the former’s rock-and-roll counterpart. It is Javanese batik’s casual-but-edgier and more sensual cousin. By the afternoon most of the work has been done. The workers are putting the finishing touches to a block printing technique and will begin to dry the wax. The day begins early at daybreak as siestas are an important part of a daily ritual to sleep off the heat-induced stupor of another tropical afternoon.

Finally we arrived at Kampung Mangkuk and we are welcomed with a feast of keropok lekor (fried fish crackers) on the verandah of Pak Zaki’s kampung house. Tea here is sweet and cigarette smoke filled the air as peals of laughter ring through the slow languorous air. It was a joyous occasion, since chi too has not met the family for close to two years. They spoke fondly about village life, about whether or not chi too still remembers how to make a kite, about the delicate science of tapering off the bamboo stick so that the kite is able to achieve a quality of grace and elegance while it is in the air. Sightings of spirits were also casually brought up, ghosts and monsters live side by side with humans in the countryside. But like all afternoon chatter, this was soon followed by a siesta on the very same multi-functional raised platform where guests are entertained and brief greetings turn into long storied nights.

Kite making is a dying craft. Today it is still common to see kids and adults playing with kites. But these are modern day kites made of plastic and Styrofoam. There is little grace in the way they drift in midair, unlike the traditional wau which requires skillful handling. Pak Zaki tells us he is trying to raise some money so that he can buy a goat as the first prize for a kite-flying competition he intends to organize. These are not held as regularly as before. In the past, kite-flying competitions were organized after the harvest. Kite strings are painted with a coat of crushed glass soaked in gum. When the kites are flown, kite handlers battle each other out to sever his opponent's kite.