Ambam.

15.6.2014.

Ambam helped mom mainly with the washing, but probably also with this and that. Her brother, Ayin, used to keep mom company when everyone else was  away. I remember her as the chubby girl from Bukit Temensu who came each morning to the house. But was it from the Residential Area days or only from the Tebat Kering days? That I can't remember. 

Her father was Manaf, the chain-saw man - because I always saw him cycling to work with a big chain-saw strapped to his bicycle. In later years he started to come to the surau. In those early days he was the thick, strong guy who came back from work and at about magrib time would  cycle back to town for probably his teh tarik nights out with his friends. And he was strong. Once mom asked him to cut down an old coconut tree stump, and he did it all by himself. He dug around the roots, and then physically pulled out the whole stump.

Although Ambam was the hired house help, we treated her like family, just like we treated an earlier help, Sawa's younger sister whose name escapes me now. She had since died from some liver problem. She was a smoker, not a common Malay habit among the ladies in the kampong, and mom used to ask us to buy a pack of "rokok tembak" - the common brand - ready before she came to the house each morning.

So when Ati smsed me last week about an invitation from Ambam for her daughter's wedding, I arranged with Calit to attend. Ati didn't attend because she has "kayap", and Conen went to Sawah Lebar for another kenduri. But Mushitok was there with wife Yah and son  Rizal, who passed me rm 20, but not before Yah spotted it, ha ha.

Ambam said she's 65 now. Wow, that was a long time ago, this episode in our lives. She said she worked with a private company, an estate or something, until retirement, and is now on SOCSO. Unfortunately, she's now using a wheelchair to move about. She says her legs are now no good. I didn't want to ask more.

We missed the housing estate at first, driving past it to Batu Kikir. We got directions and  turned back. Surprisingly most of the guests were female. But I met Amat Kancil, Conen's classmate. I remember him driving his "motokar kasut". I can't remember the Japanese model, but it was shoe-shaped with a curtailed rear, like a "kasut". He was with his wife, and has 16 grandchildren now ! "You got married early" I said.

Ambam's father, who's from Melaka,  had died and is buried in Jalan Melang. But her mother was sick and brought back to Klebang, her place of origin, by Ambam's sister who was a nurse and working in Melaka. The mother, Besah, died  and was buried there. Ambam's 13 siblings are all over the place, all married and settled down with families of their own, except for Salleh. He fell with bad company and has lost contact with the family. Ayin said he was with Amat Bisu initially. That was where it all started to go wrong. But Amat Bisu has come back to Melang, but there's no Salleh. 

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