Little things make a house a home I “went fishing” off Lombok with some friends in September 2006, in every sense of that expression, and recalled the simple pleasures of life. A couple of days later, I heard not the sea but hints of a coup in Bangkok, as Thailand’s polarisation over Thaksin Shinawatra intensified. 17 September 2006 “It’s the little things that make a house a home.” On a fishing trip with five friends last weekend, I remembered this line from a song I liked many, many years ago. It’s not the plush Italian furniture or your Murano glass tiles or the 53-inch LCD television or the Myanmar teak flooring that makes a house a home. It’s the chipped tiles where the kids dropped the batu lesong when playing home-maker, the smell of fish curry and sambal belacan coming from the kitchen, the mango tree in the garden which never fruited and where the children and their friends carved their names, and the blooming rambutan tree, which was given by Cheah, our remisier friend, who died at a young age. The memories in every nook and corner are what make a house a home. Long after the kids have left home, we will continue to cherish these memories and remember events with clarity. And long after we are gone, the kids will relive these memories with similar clarity. The song resurrected itself from the deep recesses of my mind on the last night of our fishing trip when just minutes before we pulled up anchor and headed back to land, one of our friends excitedly announced he had a big catch. It was our third night and we had all been pretty unlucky, just catching a few small fish and a foot-long barracuda which, as our host remarked, “is good only to be salted fish”. Therefore, wishing against the bad luck we had had, all of us cheered him on as he battled with his line. As it came nearer, we saw that it was indeed the best catch of the trip. Not that big but still a 3.5kg red snapper. Now, this was no ordinary fishing trip as all of us had never been avid fishermen. One of our friends owned a boat which had been stationed in Bali for some weeks and he suggested that we fly to the Island of the Gods and cruise to Lombok. As we found out later, Lombok is not really known for its rich bounty of fish. But who cares. We were all stressed out, tired of the haze and the politics, and needed a break. We learned many lessons, like we should never take a small boat into the high seas, especially the Lombok Straits where the cross-currents rock the boat from side to side like a cradle. We learnt that seasickness pills must be taken way before you start feeling queasy, not when you are about to throw up. We learnt that in Lombok, you may be snorkelling in 10 feet of water and before you know it, there is a sheer 200-foot drop and for those of us who could not swim or swim well, it was frightening. But we also learnt that despite being rather undeveloped, there are many tourists in this part of the world because the waters are beautiful and clean and the village streets and beaches free of rubbish. And we grimaced when we thought of how so many of our own beaches and beautiful spots, like in Penang, had been destroyed by the dumping of rubbish and uncontrolled development. Three days of camaraderie, enjoying simple food, the sea breeze and not too concerned about the news back home. It was the greatest pleasure for all of us to be able to switch off our handphones as we hardly could get service on the boat. And then came that red snapper. When we landed it, each of us posed with it, our fingers in the gills as we held up the fish for all the digital cameras on board to record. After my turn, I watched as my friends posed individually and collectively with the fish. Later, I e-mailed my wife, and told her about the fish. Here were six grown men, all in their mid-40s to early 50s; all fairly successful in their careers and businesses; and all of whom had taken time off from punishing schedules to go into the blue yonder, and what made them happiest? A 3.5kg ikan merah which they could have bought from the market at a fraction of what it cost to get to Bali. And that is when, as I wrote to my wife, the song came back to me. It’s the little things, really, that make the hardened and battle-weary old men happy: good company, good food and clean fresh air. Two days later, in Bangkok, at the charming Baan Kanitha restaurant where you get absolutely the best Thai desserts and tom yam, some of my Thai friends were complaining about Thailand’s future. Just a few years earlier, these same friends had been bullish about their country. Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra had opened up great opportunities, they said. Business was booming and Thailand was out of the post-Asian crisis and would boom like it never did. Now, there was a sense of gloom. It is something that outsiders like me could not see because Bangkok seemed to be booming just like before. The streets were crowded, the malls and restaurants were full, and the traffic jams at peak hours were still horrible. But to the Thais I met, the cheer of the years past was gone. Their skies were overcast and gloomy. I asked them why. Business appeared good, and there still seemed a lot of activity. The issue, they said, was that the whole country was tired of the political conflicts and conspiracies. Thaksin has a rally, his opponents have a counter rally, and they clash. The university students demonstrate more than they seem to want to study. The businessmen are hedging their bets as they are uncertain of what is ahead. The Thais have had two elections in the last 20 months and a third is scheduled for October but it may not take place. The Thai papers the past few days I was there were rife with reports of a possible coup against Thaksin. The sale of Thaksin’s Shin Corp to Singapore’s Temasek Holdings was still hogging the headlines as “nationalist” politicians and newspapers questioned the sale to foreigners. The Singaporeans, it seems, are not that popular in Thailand as well. Now, my friends said, they don’t care whether Thaksin wins or his opponents win. All they want is for the fighting and public washing of dirty linen to end so that they can get on with some semblance of normalcy in their life. That’s all they want. I could commiserate with my Thai friends. After all, Malaysians have had this sort of thing almost at a stretch for almost 24 years. And it’s still going on… Give me the seas off Lombok anytime.
Posted on: Fri, 02 Jan 2015 01:12:07 +0000