The Forgotten Script of My Ancestors | Remembering the Papan Turai

The majority of us are familiar with Egyptian hieroglyphics. However, not many people are aware that the Iban used to have their own type of pictorial writing. My ancestors’ written language, known as “turai,” is carved onto wooden boards called “papan turai.” During major festivals like Gawai Batu and Gawai Antu, lemambang (ritual bards) used these boards to recall and recite the pengap (folk epics), timang (invocations), and many other types of Iban poetry (leka main asal).

The papan turai is more than just a ceremonial piece. It serves as a link between oral and written tradition. Some of these carved symbols date back about four centuries. They preserve fragments of genealogy (tusut), the Iban’s migration history from the Kapuas region of Kalimantan to Sarawak, and even tales of tribal conflicts and legendary Iban leaders.

Researchers from the Sarawak Museum and UNIMAS have been examining these boards to find out what they symbolize. What is remarkable is that lemambang from various areas can comprehend each other’s papan turai. This demonstrates that there was once a common symbolic language among people in different communities.

This discovery goes against the previous belief that the Iban were completely “pre-literate” before Western influence arrived. The papan turai shows that our forefathers had their own way of keeping records of what they knew, which was based on ritual, cosmology, and collective memory. It reminds us that being able to read and write doesn’t just imply knowing the alphabet and how to write on paper.

In 1947, an Iban scholar named Dunging anak Gunggu expanded upon this tradition. He developed a whole writing system based on turai. However, few people know about this writing system, even among Sarawakians.

When I stood in front of the papan turai at the Borneo Cultures Museum, I felt a sense of recognition. They reminded me of the pua kumbu patterns that Iban women wove to tell stories about spirits, dreams, and journeys. Both have the same goal: to record, remember, and preserve meaning alive beyond the present.

It made me realize that each culture had its unique way of retaining memories. Some people carve it into stone, some into wood, others into sound, and yet others into cloth. For the Iban, it may have been all of these things at once. The lemambang sang what the papan turai contained, and the pua weavers wove tales and ancestral history into the thread. These were our books before books.

As I stood there, I thought about how easily such histories fade away. It’s not because they aren’t relevant, but because they aren’t documented in the systems that the world relies on. The papan turai lived on through continuity of ritual and faith. Its knowledge lived on through the lemambang, in various ceremonies and festivals, and in the community gathered around the ruai during Gawai. When modern eyes look at the papan turai, they may see only strange markings. But these are not just symbols. They hold our heritage. They are reminders that our people were already keeping records of their lives in their own way long before British colonials came with pen and paper. However, I am not sure how long we can keep them alive, as the lemambang is becoming a dying breed of heritage guardians of the Iban.

I felt pride and loss as I left the museum that day. Pride, since the papan turai shows that Iban civilization was more complicated and deep than most people realize. Loss, because so few of us can interpret those symbols today.

Maybe this is why I write and draw. I want to continue that old rhythm in a new form. My writings and drawings are like my own papan turai, illustrating the lines that connect the past and the present. I strive to document things that could otherwise disappear, including stories from my indigenous perspective, feelings, and fragments of my identity.

To me, the papan turai is more than an artifact. It is a mirror that reflects an ancient hunger to make meaning clear and to preserve memories alive before they disappear. And maybe that instinct to leave a mark and to tell a story is something that never truly goes away. It exists in our language, our art, and our digital words. It’s the same urge that led a lemambang to carve symbols into wood hundreds of years ago, hoping that someone would remember it someday.

Sources: Religious Rites and Customs of the Iban or Dyaks of Sarawak by Leo Nyuak and Edm. Dunn (1906), UNIMAS Gazette.

I write about Iban culture, ancestral rituals, creative life, emotional truths, and the quiet transformations of love, motherhood, and identity. If this speaks to you, subscribe and journey with me.

The Mouse-Deer and the Crocodile | A Classic Iban Folktale

One day, the mouse-deer (pelanduk) went out to look for food. After walking for about an hour, he reached a swamp covered in tall grass (madang melai) and water plants. Not far from there, an old Malay man named Pak Dollah was busy clearing the area to prepare it for farming.

The mouse-deer wanted to eat the fallen fruits of the simpur tree (pun buan) that grew nearby, but he was afraid Pak Dollah might see him. He moved carefully, one step at a time, hoping to stay unnoticed. But his fear was unnecessary, Pak Dollah was too focused on his work to notice anything around him. So the mouse-deer went ahead and ate the fallen fruits to his heart’s content.

When he was full, he turned to leave. Just as he was about to walk away, a female crocodile (baya indu) suddenly shouted at him.

“Hey, Mouse-Deer!” she called.

“Oh, Crocodile! You scared me!” he replied.

“You ate my eggs, didn’t you?” she accused.

“What? Of course not!” said the mouse-deer.

“Don’t lie! I saw your footprints near my nest. All my eggs are broken because of you!” the crocodile shouted angrily.

“You can’t just accuse me like that. What proof do you have?” asked the mouse-deer.

“I saw your footprints, that’s proof enough!” she insisted.

The mouse-deer tried to stay calm. “I didn’t eat your eggs. Maybe they broke because Pak Dollah accidentally cut through your nesting spot while clearing the grass. Look over there, he’s still working.”

But the crocodile didn’t believe him. “Don’t try to trick me. I know your sly ways, Mouse-Deer,” she said. “You’re so small that even if I swallowed you whole, I wouldn’t be full.”

“Alright,” she continued. “If you really didn’t eat my eggs, prove it. Let’s have a tug-of-war. If you lose, that means you’re guilty. If you win, I’ll believe you’re innocent.”

The mouse-deer pretended to think for a moment, then agreed. “Big body, small brain,” he muttered under his breath. He asked for three days to prepare, and the crocodile agreed.

When he got home, the mouse-deer sat quietly, trying to come up with a plan. He knew he could never win against the crocodile by strength alone, so he decided to use his wits. He called his friend, the tortoise (tekura), for help.

“Oh, Tortoise,” he sighed. “I’m doomed. The crocodile challenged me to a tug-of-war because she thinks I ate her eggs.”

“Don’t worry, my friend, I’ll help you,” said the tortoise calmly.

“Do you have an idea?” asked the mouse-deer.

“I do,” said the tortoise. “When the contest starts, tie your end of the rope to the coconut tree by the swamp. The crocodile won’t see it since she’ll be in the water.”

“That’s brilliant. Thank you, Tortoise,” said the mouse-deer, feeling relieved.

Three days later, the crocodile waited by the swamp.

“Hey, Mouse-Deer! Are you here yet?” she called out.

“I came earlier than you,” the mouse-deer replied.

“Are you ready?”

“I am. But before we start, we need a referee,” said the mouse-deer.

Right on cue, the tortoise appeared slowly from behind a tree. Seeing him, the crocodile quickly appointed him as referee. The tortoise pretended to be surprised but accepted.

He set the rules. “Crocodile, if your feet touch the land, you lose. Mouse-Deer, if your feet touch the water, you lose. I’ll go back and forth to make sure both of you obey the rules.”

The crocodile went into the water, holding one end of the rope in her mouth. The mouse-deer stood by the coconut tree, holding the other end. Once the crocodile was ready, the tortoise hurried to help the mouse-deer tie his rope tightly to the tree.

“Alright,” said the tortoise. “One! Two! Three! Pull!”

The crocodile pulled with all her might. Her tail whipped through the water, splashing high into the air. But no matter how hard she pulled, the mouse-deer did not move an inch. On the bank, the mouse-deer pretended to pull back with great effort, squinting and swaying from side to side as if truly struggling.

The contest went on for hours, until late afternoon. The crocodile grew exhausted and finally released the rope, gasping for breath as she crawled onto the shore. The mouse-deer still sat there, holding his end of the rope, calm and unbothered.

The tortoise approached them. “The match is over. Since the crocodile let go of the rope first and came onto land, the winner is the mouse-deer. This proves he didn’t eat your eggs. They were broken because Pak Dollah accidentally cut through your nesting ground while clearing the area. You were the one at fault for laying eggs on his land.”

“See, I told you I’m not afraid of you on land,” said the mouse-deer. “Next time, don’t accuse others without proof.”

The crocodile said nothing. Embarrassed, she quietly slipped back into the water. The mouse-deer and the tortoise looked at each other and smiled before heading home, pleased with how things turned out.

Note:

I translated and adapted this story into Malay (shared on Threads) and English (here on my blog), based on the version originally shared by Gregory Nyanggau Mawar on the Iban Cultural Heritage website.

Why Malaysians Can’t Debate and What Literature Has to Do with It

I have been thinking about this sentence for days: Literature is vital to the development of civilization. It sounds lofty and almost too academic, but the truth of it becomes painfully clear when you look at what’s going on around us right now. In Malaysia, social media has become a chaotic place where people shout at each other, often without understanding what they are shouting about. The topics change every week, from the Israel-Palestine conflict to alcohol to race to religion, but the pattern stays the same. The loudest voices get the most attention, and the most aggressive ones dominate the space. It doesn’t feel like engaging in conversation and more like moral warfare.

Every time you scroll through Threads or Facebook, you see another argument about who’s right and who’s wrong. There are a lot of insults, accusations, and name-calling in the debates. Malaysian netizens have been calling each other kafir, Yahudi Laknatullah or Zionist sympathizers, pemabuk, tak sedar diri, and poyo just for saying something that doesn’t fit into the dominant narrative. The moral superiority that oozes from these posts is exhausting. Many Malays—though NOT ALL—seem to think that their views are the most righteous and anyone who questions them is automatically condemned. This behavior is so common that it is now seen as virtuous.

Seeing all of this happen has made me deeply weary. There are times when I want to say something, stand up for those who are insulted, and fight against racism and hypocrisy. But I never do. I stop myself every time I want to type a response. I know that trying to reason with people who don’t want to understand is a waste of time. I also know that entering a discussion driven by anger will only drain me. Still, I can’t help but think about why our public discourse is so shallow and why we as a society seem incapable of having difficult conversations without turning them into battles. I think the answer has to do with our relationship with reading and literature.

Literature teaches us how to think, to see beyond ourselves, and how to listen to others even when we disagree. It teaches patience, builds creativity and empathy. Reading widely and deeply helps people learn to see things from multiple perspectives at the same time. They understand subtleties. They acknowledge there are no absolutes in life. In a society that values literature, debates are chances to learn and grow. But in a society that lacks interest in literature, discussions turn into shouting matches. Without the habit of reading, people struggle to form coherent arguments. They react with their feelings, not their brains. Instead of engaging, they attack. They want to be validated, not told the truth.

The lack of reading in Malaysia is not a new issue. We all know the statistics. In 2024, Malaysia ranks 6th among nine Southeast Asian countries in a survey by CEOWORLD magazine, with an average of only 5 books read per year. There are Malaysians who proudly say they haven’t read a book since school. Many bookstores close down, and libraries stay empty. People who do read often stick to light, motivational books that make them feel good without challenging them. Literature that makes us think, makes us uncomfortable, and makes us question ourselves is deemed boring or irrelevant. When we lose the habit of reading such works, we lose something crucial: the ability to think beyond our experience. And when that happens on a large scale, it affects how a nation speaks, argues, and grows.

The decline of reading is not only a cultural issue; it is a civilizational one. A society that stops reading is easy to manipulate. It forgets how to ask questions, or how to separate truth from propaganda, and how to think for itself. That’s when people start using emotional slogans and moral policing to show who’s in power. We can see this now in how some Malaysians use religion and race as weapons to silence others. The line between being morally right and being self-righteous gets blurry. People get hooked on how good it feels to be right. They use religion to protect themselves and their identity to attack others. In that environment, there is no room for contemplation or compassion. The only thing that is left is the sense of supremacy or dominance.

I often think about how literature could change this landscape. One novel or poem can’t solve racism or fanaticism, but it can help. It can make us pause and remind us that every opinion comes from one individual with a story. When we read stories from perspectives different from ours, we are forced to see the world in a wider frame. That is the beginning of understanding. Civilization moves forward not through arguments or viral posts, but through the slow work of broadening our minds.

I have learned how to use my frustration to write. Instead of arguing online, I write essays, poems, and reflections about the things that are important to me, like memory, stories, experiences, identity, culture, and belonging. I write from my Iban perspective because that’s how I see the world. I know that my writing won’t go viral, and I’m okay with that. I do work that may seem trivial to others, but it is important to me. It is my way of preserving a voice that might go unheard in the noise of bickering Malaysia.

Some days I wonder if my work matters. Even though I’ve published some art-related books, exhibited my art a couple of times, been featured in a newspaper and a magazine and two radio interviews—I’m still relatively obscure. I don’t belong to any literary groups. I only have my blogs and a small space on social media. It might not seem like much. But the more I think about it, the more I realize that literature starts right here: in small feats of expression and the bravery to write the truth even when no one is paying attention. Civilization does not develop solely from great orations. It grows from regular people who choose to share their stories, write down their thoughts, and share what they know. My poems and essays may not reach many people right now, but they carry pieces of history, language, and culture that should live on.

Choosing not to argue online doesn’t mean you’re weak. I choose to protect my peace and integrity on purpose. I don’t want to give up insight for outrage. If you have to lose your dignity to win an argument, it’s not worth it. I want to put my energy into something that will last. For me, writing is a way to get that energy back. It lets me deal with the world without getting stuck in its noise. It reminds me that silence, when it comes from being aware, is not the same as being absent. It is a form of strength.

The past week has reminded me that Malaysia is still struggling to mature in its discourse. Racism, feeling morally superior, and needing to control others through shame all show how weak our collective thinking still is. But I also think that change starts with small steps. Anyone who reads with an open mind helps make that change happen. Every writer who doesn’t give up helps society become more thoughtful, even if it takes a long time.

Literature is not entertainment for the elite. It is the basis of empathy and the record of human complexity. It is also the space where we learn to think beyond survival. Without it, civilization loses its soul. We might still have cities, technology, and institutions, but we wouldn’t have the inner structure that allows a society to reflect and grow. That’s what I see happening around me now: a country that is loud but empty and full of opinionated people but sadly, uninformed.

I don’t expect everyone to understand why I write or why I stay quiet when things are crazy. I do it because I believe that words have a slow power and they move differently. Words help us to remember who we are and who we could be.

I hope that when the noise dies down and the arguments stop, what is left is not anger. I hope what is left is the persistency of those who kept writing and reading. Literature may not change everything, but it is still the soul of civilization. Without it, we lose not only our stories but also our ability to envision a wiser, kinder world.

Fragments of Obsession V | What Remains of Him

This fragment of obsession is a continuation of Part 4. You can find the first four parts here: part 1, part 2, part 3, and part 4.

The Victims

They stay with him. That much I know.

They weren’t merely evidence in sealed bags. They had names. They had voices. They were echoes in a room where someone had begged, bled, or died without being heard. They live somewhere behind his eyes, hidden deep down but never completely out of reach.

He doesn’t discuss them. But I can sense it in the way he moves, sometimes too still like he’s bracing for the inevitable. I wonder which one visits him in sleep. Whose case file he opens up in his dream without meaning to.

He must have a list in his head. A list of faces, some vaguely remembered, some impossible to forget. The girl with the red hoodie. The elderly man found with his hands tied. The body that no one claimed.

I used to think that grief only belonged to families and those who loved them. However, there is a certain kind of pain that comes from being the last person to look at their picture, read their texts, or trace their final hour backwards. He carries that deep in his soul, mourning for people he never knew.

Maybe it hardens something in him. Or maybe it makes him gentler in ways he doesn’t realize. The truth is I don’t know. I just know that he touches the evidence gently. And he blinks slower than usual when he stares at a photo too long.

In my culture, the spirits—antu—linger when death is unresolved. Some say they roam, whispering into the ears of the living. He doesn’t fear ghosts or darkness. The ones that haunt him are printed on paper, kept in boxes, and saved on hard drives. There they remain. Always waiting. Always watching.

The Walk

He walks at night, but not every night. Only on those when sleep is a stranger and the weight on his chest refuses to lift. He seeks the hour between two and four. That’s when the world goes quiet, signaling him to step out.

He brings no phone, has no destination. Just his feet on the pavement, carrying his momentum through sleeping streets. He passed shuttered shops, empty lots, and the lonely glow of neon signs. In this slumber, the city is transformed—muted, and temporarily pacified.

Is he trying to shake them off? The blood, the tragedies, and the ghosts that cling to the inside of his eyelids? Or is he chasing the silence he can’t find inside? Or maybe he just believes that if he walks long enough, the chaos in his head will have to settle.

Hands in pockets, shoulders a permanent slope. From afar, he’s just a man. But a closer look at his eyes would tell you everything.

This is the unseen part. The aftermath, stripped of crime scenes and case files. There is no suspect to corner, no puzzle to solve. He’s a man alone with the night, waiting to feel human again.

In that moment, I don’t see the criminologist. I see a tired man who would rather move through the honest darkness of the streets than lie still in a loud, empty room.

Epilogue

All of this, I’ve only imagined. The desk. The scene. The interrogation. The victims. The walk. They’re a part of his life that I will never touch. He doesn’t talk about it much, at least not directly. A line may slip out from time to time, and that’s it. Most of it comes through in other ways, like when he gets too quiet and his hands stop moving. The tension in his jaw after a long day. The shadows beneath his eyes that no amount of sleep seems to erase.

There are nights he startles awake. He never says why, just lies there, breathing heavily. I never ask either. I simply wait for his return.

What he endures is his own. And I’ve stopped trying to reach for it. His work is an extension of who he is, bound to his bones. It affects how he sees the world and how he protects others without even thinking about it.

However, there are times when it becomes apparent. Like when he touches me and listens to me even when I say something silly. Or how he holds silence like it’s sacred.

I used to think he was distant. But now I understand: he was too full of things he could never say. I write these fragments not to know him better or to hope that he’ll find them. He won’t. The door closed two decades ago. These are the only pieces I kept.

Fragments of Obsession IV | The Criminologist

Some time ago I began writing Fragments of Obsession, brief glimpses into a private world of desire and distance. These new pieces pick up where the last ones left off, but they explore a darker area: the world of a criminologist.

I can’t sit at his desk or walk with him into the places he inhabits. All I have are fragments, imagined through the silence between us. They’re not about the crimes themselves but rather the places around them: his desk, the crime scene, and the interrogation room.

What interests me is not the evidence he gathers, but the burden that persists afterward. These pieces are how I watch from the outside and write about things I’ll never see. They belong to the same map of longing I began tracing in the first three Fragments of Obsession — part 1, part 2, part 3.

The Desk

I never stood in front of it, but I know it like I’ve touched its surface a thousand times in my mind. A desk that holds the stories that no one wants to tell, and even fewer want to hear. Its top is scratched, probably from years of people dropping folders, forgotten coffee cups, and constant shuffles of pens and clips. Sturdy but with scars like him.

On one side, there is an uneven stack of papers threatening to tumble. Case notes, autopsy reports, and transcripts of late-night interviews with men who lie easily and women who have given up on getting justice. I imagine the edges fading from being read too often, held in worn hands. Underneath them, photographs turned face down, and the victim’s eyes still burning even when hidden.

The other side is neater. A computer. A notebook with a page full of his neat, small handwriting. His pen would sometimes rest diagonally across it, with ink smudges on the margins where he applied pressure too hard. I imagine him hesitating mid-thought, his brows furrowing.

There must be a hidden gun nearby. Cold, clinical, and within his reach. The barrel pointing nowhere, a constant reminder of how violence is always a part of his life. My people never lived with guns except for the ones that were passed down to us. My grandfather’s shotgun passed to my father and now to my eldest brother. A hunting tool, not for murder. Unloaded but heavy with potential, lingering like a sinister presence at the periphery of every thought.

I can see his hand, with raised veins and long fingers, tracing the tabletop absentmindedly when fatigue creeps in. A gesture that seems almost loving, as if he were anchoring himself. He’s a man who has read too many lies in too many statements. He doesn’t stop. He keeps returning to this desk, like a man returning to his menua, the land he was born in, where his roots are waiting for him, no matter how far he has gone.

I’ll never sit across from him there. I only know it through imagination. This distance allows me to observe things that others may overlook: the silence around him, the way the desk has become an extension of his body, his determination, and his solitude.

The Crime Scene

I picture it as the opposite of his desk. No order, no familiar scratches, no steady ground. There was chaos sealed off by yellow tape. It’s a place where a life has ended and everything normal—shoes by the door, a half-empty cup on the table, a curtain in the wind—suddenly feels obscene.

The air is thick with things that can’t be cleaned. The iron tang of blood and the sour staleness of fear. A house where someone used to laugh is now silent. He goes through it methodically, but I know he notices everything. The scattered belongings. How things look wrong when they aren’t where they belong. The imprint of violence that remains like smoke after a fire.

He kneels by the details others step over. A broken clasp. Mud tracked across the tiles. Fibers snagged on a nail. His hand hovers above them, never in a hurry or careless. He bends down low to collect evidence. I imagine how his eyes narrow as he gathers pieces that the rest of us can’t see.

Somewhere close, a camera flashes, officers talk, and someone fills in a logbook. He moves like none of them are there. The scene is speaking to him. It tells him what to look for, what to doubt, and what doesn’t belong.

And maybe he thinks of the victim too. Not just as a body drawn in chalk, but as a person who went barefoot over this floor and brushed their teeth at that sink. He’s seen too many of them. Each scene digs into him like a thumbnail.

According to my people, when someone dies tragically, the place becomes restless. You don’t linger there long unless you want to carry that darkness home. He has to stay. He lets the silence seep into him and the darkness push against his skin. This is the only way to read what the dead left behind. The chaos doesn’t stay behind when he finally steps back over the tape. It follows him and becomes the real evidence he can never log.

The Interrogation Room

I can see it clearly, even though I’ve never been inside. The walls are bare and dull gray with faint finger prints on the paint from palms dragged in terror, boredom, or defiance. A single table in the center with uneven legs. One chair on each side but only one feels in charge.

I imagine the air stale with breath and the absence of sunlight. There are no windows to the outside world. Only a dark pane of glass on one wall. He knows they’re watching. He doesn’t care. His focus is always here. This is a space where people stall, spin, crack, or burn.

He sits across from them. Calm. Still like the river at dusk before swallowing the last light. He doesn’t raise his voice. He waits and lets them fill the silence with their own guilt. Lets them fidget, lie, and repeat themselves. Lets them feel uncomfortable about what they said.

There’s always a file in front of him. Sometimes it’s closed. Sometimes it’s open to a photo or a sentence scribbled in red. He doesn’t look at it much. He stares at them, watches how their jaw moves, how they scratch their nose, and how their eyes dart to the door when they think no one’s watching.

I wonder if he thinks of the victim while he listens. If he remembers the angle of the neck, the bruise on the cheek, and the time of death. If he keeps those pieces in his pockets like charms, reminding him of who he’s really speaking for.

In my people’s old way of life, truth wasn’t pried out in rooms like these. We invoked Ini Andan, the goddess of justice, and waited for signs. Now there are only fluorescent lights and CCTV. The ritual remains the same. Watching. Listening. Putting the soul on a scale.

He doesn’t need to catch them lying. They’ll hand it over eventually. Little by little, like decaying meat falling apart in their hands.

Note:

I’m still working through two more fragments—The Victims and The Walk. They’ll come when they’re ready, and together they’ll complete this small sequence of obsession.

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I write about Iban culture, ancestral rituals, creative life, emotional truths, and the quiet transformations of love, motherhood, and identity. If this speaks to you, subscribe and journey with me.

Iban Folktale | The Tale of Tekuyong and Pelandok

A long time ago, when animals could talk like we do, the river snail, Tekuyong, was slowly moving across a wide rock by the riverbank. His body glistened in the morning light as he licked moss off the stone and nibbled quietly.

Pelandok, the mousedeer, came along. He was light-footed and couldn’t sit still. He was sniffing the ground for soft buan leaves to chew. He stopped and yelled, “Oi, Sambi Tekuyong!” when he saw Tekuyong stuck to the rock with his head bowed. (Sambi means “friend or pal.”) “Why are you sitting there so still? You’re not moving at all.”

Tekuyong lifted his feelers. “I’m not idle, Sambi. I’m eating the moss by licking the stone. That is my food.”

Pelandok tossed his head back and chuckled as he heard this. He laughed until his little body shook. He laughed until his eyes welled up with tears, and his bladder gave way, soaking the ground.

Tekuyong watched silently. When Pelandok finally caught his breath, Tekuyong asked, “What is so funny, Sambi? Why are you laughing at me?”

Pelandok, however, pointed to Tekuyong’s sluggish, gliding body and continued to laugh. Shame burned at Tekuyong’s heart. “Enough, Sambi,” he finally said. “Since you find me so amusing, gather all the animals together to watch us race. We’ll find out who is actually faster in a week.”

Pelandok clapped his hoofs in delight at this. “A race? Against you? Ha! I will surely win.”

They decided that the course would run from the foot of the hill where they were standing to the great rock by the sea.

Pelandok trotted through the jungle that evening to tell everyone about the race. “Come on, everyone! Watch me, the fastest creature in the forest, defeat Tekuyong the snail!” The monkeys shrieked with laughter, and the birds spread the news with their calls. Soon, the whole jungle was buzzing with excitement.

Tekuyong, on the other hand, crept home with a heavy heart. He called his family together and said, “I challenged Pelandok, but I wish I hadn’t. How can I ever outrun him? He runs as fast as lightning, but I crawl slower than a feather in the wind.”

Some of his family members whispered and shook their heads. One person said, “Why didn’t you think before you spoke? It is better to accept shame than to face certain defeat.”

But Tekuyong stood up straight and said, “If you won’t help me think, then I must think for myself.” He paused for a moment before revealing his plan.

“Apai (Father), Aya (Uncle), and Aki (Grandfather), I need you.” You must wait at different points along the racecourse and pretend to be me. Aki, wait upon the rock by the shore. Aya, take your place at the midpoint. Apai, sit beneath the big tree near the finishing line. You all have to shout when Pelandok passes so he thinks I’m ahead of him. As for me, I’ll start the race next to him and then hide.”

The older snails nodded slowly. “It is cunning,” Aki said. “Let us see if arrogance can be taught a lesson.”

The week went by quickly. On the appointed day, all the animals in the forest came together. Monkeys hung from branches, hornbills flew overhead, kendawang (red headed krait) snakes slithered on the ground, and wild boars dug around the edge of the clearing. The air was full of excitement.

At the starting line, Tekuyong and Pelandok stood next to each other. They picked rhinoceros to start the race. As he counted “One! Two! Three! Run!” his deep voice shook the ground.

Pelandok shot forward like a dart from a blowpipe, his hooves hitting the ground like drums. Dust flew in his wake. While everyone was busy admiring Pelandok’s speed, Tekuyong moved slightly, then silently rolled into the grass and vanished from view.

The crowd cheered for Pelandok’s speed. “Look how fast he is!” the monkeys yelled. “The poor snail will never make it to the end.”

But when Pelandok reached the rocky shore, there sat Aki Tekuyong, waiting calmly.

“Apu! (Oh no!)” Pelandok gasped in disbelief. “How can Tekuyong already be here?” He pushed himself harder.

At the midpoint, Aya Tekuyong called out cheerfully, “I’m ahead, Sambi! Why are you so slow?”

Pelandok’s heart raced. “Apu! Apu! He has beaten me again!” He ran until sweat streamed down his body and his breath tore at his chest.

Near the finish line, his legs trembling, he looked up, and there was Apai Tekuyong, waiting under the big tree! Pelandok collapsed, his sides heaving, his body drenched in sweat. “Apu! I am defeated,” he admitted.

Apai Tekuyong smiled gently. “Why are you so slow, Sambi? I’ve been waiting here for a long time.”

Pelandok bowed his head in shame. “Yes, I have lost.”

“Let this be your lesson, Sambi,” Apai Tekuyong said with a smile. “Don’t ever laugh at other people or think you’re better than them. Each of us has our strength, even the least of us.”

So Pelandok never mocked Tekuyong again. And all the animals who were there that day took the story home with them. That’s why the Iban people still say malu tekuyong today. It means shyness, which comes from respect. For example, when someone invites you to dance the ngajat (Iban traditional dance) or speak in front of the elders, you feel both honored and somewhat uncomfortable or embarrassed. We call that feeling malu tekuyong.

And that is how the snail taught the mousedeer and gave us a saying that we still use today.

Note:
I translated this folktale from Iban into English and Malay. The Malay version is available on my Threads. The original story was written by Gregory Nyanggau Mawar and published on the Iban Cultural Heritage website.

Sarawak Folk Noir | Red Eyes at the Ara Tree

This story was inspired by a real event, a memory from my childhood. I’ve always loved noir—the sense of dread, the fatalism, the uncertainties, and the things left unsaid. But I couldn’t find any noir stories told in an indigenous voice from Borneo. So I wrote my own. Red Eyes at the Ara Tree is what I call Sarawak folk noir. It carries the core tenets of classic noir: unseen forces, a haunting past, and the slow unraveling of certainty; but roots them in a rural, post-colonial setting where belief and memory still shape the edges of reality. There is no detective here. Just a child, and the adult they become, trying to make sense of what cannot be explained. The crime is an intrusion of something ancient and watching. It’s of the unknown stepping into an ordinary life.

When I was seven years old, we lived on top of a hill in a government housing complex. It was a modest row of boxy flats nestled along the slope, built for civil servants like my dad. Thick jungle pressed in from all sides. People said that years ago, communists camped all over this hill and the jungle beyond it. I guess that rumor was true because one afternoon while I was playing near the black drain, I saw a group of soldiers going down the hill. The town lay below. It was quiet during the day, but after nightfall, it was ghostlike, as if it had shrunk back to the edges of the footpath at night.

My parents kept chickens and grew vegetables like kangkung, changkok, and daun ubi in our small backyard. There was always the smell of dirt, raw chicken feed, and shit in the air. My siblings and I played barefoot in the yard after school, with the red earth staining our soles. Life was simple and boring back then, until it wasn’t.

There was an ara jejawi tree about three hundred meters down the road, on the slope of the hill. People said these trees were old, too old, and not all of them were empty. Spirits dwelt in such trees. They were not necessarily bad, but never to be disturbed. The tree was huge. Its roots stretched over the earth like petrified pythons. In the afternoons, the tree cast wide shadows that spread to the road. Every family on the hill passed it on their way to town. Most of us walked faster around it or crossed to the other side of the road. Some others, like my mom, muttered short prayers.

Our kitchen faced the ara tree. There were two doors at the back. One was a solid wooden door with a metal latch, and the other a lighter screen door made of wood and mesh. We usually left the solid door open so the air could move through, but we kept the screen door closed to keep mosquitoes and flies out. I never gave that door much thought. It was simply part of the kitchen, like the tiled counter or the creaky faucet.

That night, everything was normal. It hadn’t rained for weeks. The heat lingered on your skin long after the sun went down. The cicadas were shrieking in the trees, and the chickens were quiet. We had dinner. My dad was at the head of the table, my mom was next to him, and the rest of us were spread out around the small table. My eldest sister sat right across from the screen door, looking out to the backyard and the ara tree beyond it.

I remember my spoon scraping the bottom of the plate. My mom asked if anyone wanted more sambal belacan. Someone knocked over a cup and somebody wondered out loud who would win the WWE match later tonight. My sister stood up to get another helping of rice.

She paused.

That’s what I remember. Her hand hovered above the rice cooker. Her face had gone still. Almost blank. She didn’t utter a word. She shifted her gaze and quietly scooped her rice and went back to her seat. The conversation went on. None of us noticed anything strange. Not then.

She didn’t say a word until later, when we were in the living room and the dishes were clean. My dad had switched on the TV to watch the evening news and my brothers were bickering about whose armpits stank the most.

She said she had seen eyes. Big, red, staring right at her from the ara tree. Right through the screen door. The eyes didn’t blink or move; they grew. Larger and larger with radial blur around the edges. Even while they stayed still, it appeared like they were getting closer. She swore they pulsed, like slow breathing.

We didn’t speak for a long time after she told us. My mom told her not to bring it up again. That night my dad closed the solid kitchen door and pulled the bolt tighter than usual. No one complained.

The next morning, it was a Tuesday and like any school day, we got up early to go to school. However, my sister complained of feeling chilly, though her skin was hot. My mom instructed her to stay home and prescribed Panadol. By afternoon, her temperature continued to rise. Her brow was sticky with sweat and her eyes couldn’t focus. Her appetite disappeared. She lay curled on her thin foam mattress, sweating and mumbling, eyes drifting in and out of focus. The doctor called it a viral fever and sent her home with Panadol. But after two more days, my parents started asking around and were given a number to contact. He was a manang who lived in a village near the town.

I remember the manang arriving late in the evening, when it was a little cooler. His rusty white Corolla E70 arrived at precisely 7PM. A balding man with two beady eyes emerged from the car. He shook hands with my parents and my dad invited him in. He didn’t say much. He took off his sandals at the door and nodded politely at us. One of my brothers started to point to a strange-looking bag he was carrying on his back. It was an old wooden cylinder bag that looked more like a box—lupong manang, his healing kit. I had never seen one before, but I knew better than to ask.

The manang sat next to my sister and opened his bag. Inside were small vials of various sizes, each one containing suspicious-looking liquid. A smooth stone that sparkled under the light—batu ilau—my mom whispered—and a small bundle of dried plants, a small bowl, and a white armlet. He softly murmured words I couldn’t understand and touched my sister’s forehead.

My parents prepared a piring on a tray with betel nut, leaf, tobacco, glutinous rice, salt, two chicken eggs, and a small glass of tuak. I don’t remember how long he stayed because I fell asleep halfway through the strange healing ritual. But by the next morning, her fever had subsided. It wasn’t completely gone, but it seemed like something had finally released its grasp.

The fever broke after five days. My sister woke up as if from a long dream. She never talked about the eyes anymore and refused to sit in that chair again. No one wanted to sit at that chair so we ended up squeezing on one side of the table, our elbows touching as we scooped food into our mouths. And after that, every time we drove by the ara tree in dad’s mung bean green Datsun, she would look at the miding sprouting above the bush along the road and never ahead.

After all these decades, it’s likely that the tree is still standing. I never returned to that town, though my siblings had visited on their various work trips. None of them bother to check on our old neighborhood or the ara tree. The last time I looked on Google Maps, the area had been cleared and developed. More houses and buildings. The surrounding jungle is still there, but less menacing, somehow tamed. Even now, as an adult, I don’t try to explain it away. Maybe the fever would’ve broken on its own. Maybe the manang did nothing at all. But something changed that week—and I’ve never looked at shadows the same since.

Whether the tree still stands or not, in my memory it always does. It stands motionless with its thick trunks and aerial roots guarding its inhabitant.

Watching. Waiting.

Note:

Kangkung – water spinach
Changkok – pucuk manis (popular leafy vegetable native to Southeast Asia
Daun ubi – cassava leaves
Ara jejawi – banyan tree
Sambal belacan – shrimp paste
Manang – shaman
Lupong manang – shaman healing/medicine kit
Batu ilau – divining stone used by Iban shamans during healing rituals.
Piring – offering
Tuak – rice wine
Miding – a type of fern, Stenochlaena palustris, a popular edible plant in Malaysia and other Southeast Asian countries.

The Tale of Endu Engkejemu and Endu Engkejuang

This is an Iban folktale I grew up with. I translated this old Iban folktale in my pursuit to preserve the Iban oral literature in my own little way. The Iban version is available online, but as far as I know, no English translation has been made. I translated this in hope I can share my obscure culture with the world. I didn’t profit from this work, and I plan to translate more stories in the future and make them available on this blog. This is the story of two women, one patient and one impulsive, and how their choices led them down very different paths.

Long ago, in a place called Lubok Meram, near Lansar Kerangan Betumpu Man and Rantau Rutan, the sacred domain of Raja Ganali (King Ganali) and Bunsu Ikan, the fish god – there lived two young women named Endu Engkejemu and Endu Engkejuang.

Both were beautiful, but Endu Engkejemu’s beauty stood out. She was graceful and brilliant. Aside from her beauty, she was wise, skilled, and thoughtful. Her calmness and ability to do things well were her strengths. Endu Engkejuang, on the other hand, was full of life and quick-tongued. She was usually the first to welcome guests and try new things. She hated being second, but her impatience showed in the fact that she didn’t always do things right. For her, how quickly something was completed was more important than the quality.

One day, as they were bathing at the river, Endu Engkejuang admired her friend’s long, beautiful hair and asked, “Wai (dear), your hair is so lovely. What’s your secret?”

Endu Engkejemu replied, “Eh, no secret, wai sulu (dear friend). I just use tilan fish bones to comb my hair.”

That evening, Endu Engkejuang found a tilan fish bone and combed her hair while chanting, “Comb my hair, oh tilan fish bones, comb it to the very end.”

But she had not spoken the request properly. The bones obeyed her words exactly, and by the time they finished, she was completely bald! Crying, she ran to Endu Engkejemu for help. Her friend gently explained, “You must ask kindly. Say, “Oh, bones of the tilan, I ask you to comb my hair well so it will grow long and thick.”

Endu Engkejuang followed her advice, and slowly, her hair began to grow again.

Not long after that, Endu Engkejuang saw a handsome man sitting at Endu Engkejemu’s ruai, the communal space of the longhouse. Curious, she rushed to her friend and asked, “Wai, who is that handsome man?”

“He appeared after I pounded some rangan lime leaves,” Endu Engkejemu replied.

Without hesitation, Endu Engkejuang gathered some leaves but picked them carelessly, including old and rotten ones. She pounded them, hoping to summon someone like the man her friend had met. Instead, an old, wrinkled, and scarred man with warts appeared!

Horrified, she ran to her friend again. “Why is yours so handsome and mine so ugly?”

Endu Engkejemu answered simply, “Because you didn’t choose the leaves properly. Only pick the young and nicest leaves. Good things come from good intentions, wai.”

Later, while working in the paddy fields, the two friends were swarmed by mosquitoes. Irritated, Endu Engkejemu said aloud, “There are so many of you! If you love me so much, why not take me as your wife?”

To her surprise, the mosquitoes lifted her gently and carried her to Raja Nyamok, the Mosquito King. There, she became his wife.

Life in the mosquito kingdom was difficult. The mosquitoes fed on blood, and Endu Engkejemu could not eat what they ate. But she never complained. She continued to treat her husband with kindness and respect, even though she was silently suffering.

Eventually, she pretended to be ill. Raja Nyamok, concerned, summoned a manang (shaman) to heal her, but she only became worse. Finally, she pretended to die.

Heartbroken, Raja Nyamok arranged a grand funeral for her. He ordered her body to be placed on a high altar, as was the custom for royal family members. He provided her with new clothes, jars, traditional musical instruments like setawak, dumbak, bendai, menyarai, engkerumong, and gong. There were many other valuable items to accompany her in the afterlife.

When the mourners returned home, Endu Engkejemu quietly unwrapped herself and took everything back with her to her longhouse. Her return amazed everyone. No one could believe what she had brought home.

Endu Engkejuang heard that she was back and she was filled with burning envy. Determined not to be left behind, she hastily went to the paddy fields and let herself be bitten by the swarming mosquitoes. “Take me as your wife if you want me so badly!” she yelled.

The mosquitoes carried her to Raja Nyamok, who accepted her as his wife. But unlike Endu Engkejemu, Endu Engkejuang couldn’t hide her disgust. At the sight of blood everywhere, she whined and complained, “My father never raised me to drink blood like this. I could never be married to someone like you!”

Insulted, Raja Nyamok declared, “You have humiliated me in front of my people and insulted our food and our way of life.”

He ordered his followers to tie her hands and feet and leave her in a part of the jungle where no one would find her. Alone in the middle of the jungle and covered in bruises and mosquito bites, Endu Engkejuang eventually freed herself and stumbled back to her longhouse.

Her family was shocked to see her when she arrived. She looked terrible: her face was swollen, her clothes were ripped, and she was crying pitifully.

Endu Engkejemu, on the other hand, lived on with quiet dignity. Her story, which has been passed down through the generations, reminded everyone that being wise, patient, humble, and caring pays off, while being envious, petty, and rushing often leads to disaster.

Note:

I translated and adapted this story into Malay (shared on Threads) and English (here on my blog), based on the version originally shared by Gregory Nyanggau Mawar on the Iban Cultural Heritage website.

The Ritual of Water | An Iban Ceremony for New Life

Last weekend, I found myself standing knee-deep in a shallow river in Janda Baik. The sunlight came through a canopy of trees above, casting soft streaks of light on the water’s surface. Everything felt quiet and peaceful. My kids splashed further upstream, and their laughter echoed off of rocks and trees. I stood still, closed my eyes, and let the water swirl around my legs as it flowed downstream.

It reminded me of the Iban traditional child-naming ritual. I’ve never seen it with my own eyes, but I learned about it from the elders and through reading. This ritual was held following the naming of the child and to formally “introduce” the child to the river.

In the Iban way of life, water is more than a physical element. A body of water like a river is also a spiritual space. It gives life, but it is also a source of danger. We wash with water from the river, and sometimes, when the water is clear, we even drink and cook with it. It carries our boats to other villages, fields, and faraway places. However, it’s also where crocodiles and other dangers live. No Iban has grown up without hearing stories about someone who was attacked at the river. When a child is born, we don’t just give them a bath. We also hold a ritual to beg the river not to harm them.

After the child is named, the bathing ritual begins. The night before the ceremony, the father informs the longhouse community of his intention. At dawn the next morning, the whole longhouse community walks to the river in a solemn procession. A flag bearer is at the front, and a man carrying a fowl follows him. Both of these men are chosen from among the respected elders. Two women walk behind them. One carries offerings and the other carries the child wrapped in handwoven pua kumbu. The rest follow, beating the gongs as they walk.

At the riverbank, the flag bearer cuts the water with a knife. The man with the fowl recites an invocation to call upon the spirits of water, earth, sky, and all the creatures that swim below the surface. He asks that the child be given good fortune, sharp vision, and safety. He calls the crocodile, the soft-shelled turtle, the barbus fish, the semah, and the tapah. He calls each one by name and tells them to regard this child as family, not food. He says,

“If this son or grandson of ours happens to capsize and sink while he is visiting, you are the only ones who can lift him up and keep him afloat.”

It is not a metaphor but a real request, born out of fear and hope.

After the invocation, the child is bathed and the fowl is slaughtered. People make noise on purpose, like banging gongs and laughing, to drown out any bad omens. If the child is a boy, one wing of the bird is tied to a spear with red ribbon. The wing is attached to a heddle rod if it’s a girl. A bamboo basket full of offerings is then hung from a leafy pole.

After that, they return to the longhouse and sprinkle the child with sacred water to get rid of bad omens. A feast is held and the gongs ring out to mark the ritual’s success. The child is now considered truly part of the community, and both the people and the river know it.

As I stood in that river at Janda Baik, I began to think about the rituals we’ve forgotten. What would it mean to reclaim a gesture like this, perhaps not literally but in spirit? The Ibans don’t all live in longhouses anymore. Some of us reside in cities and raise our kids as urbanites, but water still calls us. Maybe part of why we seek places like Janda Baik is because something in us still longs to make peace with the river. Rivers still take us places. They still give and take. And we too are still vulnerable to things we can’t see.

Maybe modern mothers need more moments like this, when they can recognize their fears, their prayers, and their desire to protect the people they love. We might not need to cut the water with a knife, but we can still offer a prayer, still whisper a blessing:

“We beseech you to confer on him fortune, give him sharp vision so that he will be fortunate, wealthy, and blessed with good health throughout his life.

We can still speak to the river, and certainly we can still be heard.

After Andrea | A Tribute to Andrea Gibson

Image source

When Andrea Gibson left this world, they didn’t vanish. They simply changed form.

That’s what I believe. What I’ve always believed. That death isn’t the end but a transformation. It’s a reassembly of light, soul, and memory. It becomes energy that lingers in the folds of pillows, in dog-eared pages, in the sound of your laughter.

Andrea said it best in one of their final gifts to the world: “Dying is the opposite of leaving. When I left my body, I did not go away.”

I read those words with a lump in my throat, but not because I was grieving. They reminded me of something I wrote months ago, not knowing then how it would one day connect me to someone I admired from afar.

So when we grieve for an unbearable loss and feel the crushing weight of absence, perhaps we can take comfort in knowing that nothing is ever truly gone.

The ones we miss exist in a different form now. They are scattered across the cosmos, carried in rays of sunshine, drifting in the gentle breeze. The photons that once danced across their skin continue their journey through space. Their laughter still lingers around us, waiting to be felt by those who remember.

If we explain death by physics alone, the conservation of energy means that when we die, our energy disperses into heat, into the environment, and into the people we loved. ~ Excerpt from my blog: The Physics of Goodbye

Andrea’s poems weren’t just poems; they were silent revolts against erasure and the lie that pain and beauty must live apart.

And maybe that’s what we leave behind: words and permission. Especially permission. Permission to grief and cry. To be angry. To acknowledge love out loud. To die beautifully. To stay, even after.

After Andrea

I want to call you by the sound your bones made when they fell into the light. I want to call you return instead of loss, to pin your spirit to my wall like the last goodnight of a sunbeam. You are not gone. You are still here. You are a new verb. You breathe through my ribcage at midnight when I forget my name and remember yours. Your echoes make me who I am. You are the ghost of the lamp turning on by itself, the sudden music when no one’s home. What trick of physics lets a soul remain when the body collapses? What cruel grace? Andrea, I never touched your hands, but I have held your sorrow, your laughter, your thunder, your holy queerness. I carry it now. In me, and in everyone who heard your voice before they knew you. Thank you for the light. Thank you for the absence that still feels full. Thank you for dying like a poet; all metaphor, without end.

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