Awang Goneng & Kak Teh

Folk are not sure who this Bergen really is but then it doesn't really matter because all they want is to read what he writes every now and then. Of course he writes funny most of the time; that's because he learnt English from movies he watched as a kid growing up in Dungun. He did most of the watching in a cinema called Panggung Happy which has been long demolished to make way for a spanking new building selling all kinds of stuff but not as much stuff you can find at Pekan Rabu in Alor Setar, but close enough to be one. Of course the folk running the shops don't speak like the girls minding the shops at Pekan Rabu but you get the idea what's the idea behind the construction of such a builing, which is to complement the one and only bus terminal the town will ever have if ever the town like Dungun will be the state capital of Terengganu one fine day when folk are fed up with Kuala Terengganu being so far north.

This Bergen character came out of the blue when blogging was the favorite thing to do among folk his age who found the shortest way to consider themselves a writer or something like that. At first this Bergen guy wrote things that didn't matter to none; things like his life before he discovered that there was more to life than going about with folk who didn't know any better that fun and laughter came to an end too, just like life itself.

And so this Bergen guy discovered the joy of writing and heaven knows he tried very hard to learn every trick in the book to be a writer. It took him almost a decade to finally muster what he got in him and start writing. The first entry of the blog was nothing but a completely gibberish sentences of a guy who drank too much coffee.

And then he discovered Kak Teh. After that he discovered Awang Goneng. And things changed. He discovered sentences that can be written in many different ways. And then he tried to write like Kak Teh, and Awang Goneng but it didn't work out.

And so he met them one day for lunch. And he tried harder to write. And he's been trying since and still trying.

The Biggest Secret.

Wan Yah would probably not talk to me for days but it's the kinda risk I'm gonna have to take when it comes to Ducati. And so I drove to Naza to check out the new Ducati Monster 795 and paid the deposit. I got home and Wan Yah says; We have to be in Penang this weekend and so I say, okay, madam. But she asks again, where did you go? I say, oh, I was at Naza motor. Why? I just booked a new top of the range Kia Sportage for you.

Looks like I gotta go to Naza again tomorrow and book the Sportage for real.

Let's Not Talk About My Past.

Wan Yah wants to know about Catherine. About Judge Baker. About what was it like to be married so young and lived in a foreign country. About what was it like to be married to a white woman. I really don't want to talk about it. Let's just forget the past and look forward to living to the fullest the days we've got remaining ahead of us. I say, Wan Yah, you don't have to tell me about what was it like to be married to the man you used to love with everything you got but Wan Yah says; I really want to know. Why? Because it sounds interesting.

Ha ha.

Well, we got to know each other. Fell in love. Went downtown to be married by a Judge named Baker. You may kiss the bride. And we kissed and came home to celebrate. Don't ask how we celebrated our wedding, let's just say, it wasn't the thing I am proud to repeat to a cockroach. I was young. I was naive. I was everything a young guy in a foreign country was supposed to be in the 80s. Wan Yah says; tell me more. And so I sing; Tell me more, tell me more did we get very far? - but I'm no John Travolta and Wan Yah ain't no Olivia Newton John and we are not in a Grease movie.

Did you have children?

(Don't make me think of Catherine, Wan Yah. I have you with me and this is as good as it can get.)

May I Keep This?

Wan Yah says this gotta go. It doesn't belong here in the cupboard with all these English design Royal Doulton sets we got on the last trip and so I say to myself, oh well, it's only a helmet. What do I do after that? If Wan Yah says it has to go that means it has to go and I am not the guy who wants to argue until the satellite comes crashing down, especially with Wan Yah. I know her better than any folk in this neighbourhood and so I take the helmet down to Saran wrap it and hope to find a place somewhere in the house to keep it out of sight until I can get my hands on a new super bike again. But Wan Yah says, you'd better sell it. Which makes a lot of sense since it is kinda supernatural to have a nice expensive full face helmet in the house and not a bike in sight in the driveway. And so I promise Wan Yah that I'd sell it to the first 'surat kabar lama and batteri lama' truck when it comes around the street we live on.

That settled, she says you'd better drive my car, it hasn't been started for weeks. And so we drive around in her car to go have lunch in Shah Alam at a restaurant where they created Upin and Ipin.

I miss my bike and my helmet. Oh well, I still got 'em as memories in my mind.

The buyer came this evening with the last payment on the bike that he fired up to a full throttle and roared out of the driveway into the sunset. I'm never gonna see that bike again and I'm saying inside; what have I done? But that's the way it's gonna have to be on account I won't be doing any riding anymore especially to Sungai Bakap now that I don't have a reason to be out of the house on a bike riding at 180 kph for the heck of it. But every part of me kinda miss the thing I used to love very much when love was a game of missing and thinking and imagining and daydreaming. Now that there's no need to miss and think and imagine and daydream anymore, there's really nothing much to do except sit around and watch the missus going about the house arranging and re-arranging things.

Next week we're taking the 4WD through the back roads. I've got it all planned out. The route. The hotel. Laundry rotation. Re-fuelling stops. And stuff like that. I hope she's gonna like the experience of doing something like this.

A few hours into being a husband to a woman called Wan Yah, you wonder if you are doing the right thing; now that the person you wish to meet in heaven has been brought to you live in a nice dark purple baju kurung with a matching lilac tudung that make her look so pretty you'd hear yourself think that you have indeed, just died and about to enter heaven.

You look a little further to the right side of the house, to a corner where a group of four girls are sitting pretty on the floor with a two year old baby in a nice dress going about asking about a grandmother. It dawned on you that the grandmother that baby is looking for is now sitting pretty next to you in a dark purple baju kurung with a matching tudung, smiling and looking so pretty that you hear yourself think, it would be nice to be in Damascus this time of year to eat as many as 4 nice peaches before coffee.

But you are not going anywhere fast because you've gotta be in this here town for a couple of days because she has drawn up a tight schedule folks she wants you to meet because these folks gotta know that Wan Yah has got a husband called Bergen.

You behave different. And you think different because you are now as married a guy can be as iPhone 4S with all the apps you can think of under the cloudy sky of a town in the North of the country called Sungai Bakap.

A Husband To A Woman Called Wan Yah

Love is a beautiful thing.