It is often my job to gather ingredients for the meal from our garden. Our ginger has lately done well enough to allow some occasional harvesting. Considering we use it in virtually every meal I doubt we’ll ever be self-sufficient but it’s nice to eat from your own land when you can.
Category Archives: Journal
What Fronds Are For
The mighty coconut palm provides an afternoon’s entertainment. The fronds (Malay: pelapah) dip low enough that the kids can grab them and sling themselves into the air. After an hour or so of swinging the frond is swung out and hangs limply from the trunk. It’ll take a few weeks until the next one has […]
Income Inequality
Slate has a fantastic, no, wait: terrifying 10-part series on income inequality in the United States. All my life I’ve heard Latin America described as a failed society (or collection of failed societies) because of its grotesque maldistribution of wealth. Peasants in rags beg for food outside the high walls of opulent villas, and so […]
Hari Raya 2010
Sleepy brown toad sits on a log A loud lorry passes, making it start Even though we are far from your eyes Know that you are close to our heart. *** Selamat Hari Raya, Eid Mubarak, Maaf Zahir dan Batin.
AbangChu
I got the best birthday present ever yesterday: my wife delivered a healthy baby boy on the 9th of November, my birthday and my uncle’s birthday. His name is redacted, born 1.30pm, 3.9kg (that’s a little more than 8 and a half pounds for you non-metric people). We opted for elective C-sec since the baby […]
Selamat Hari Raya 2009
Eid Mubarak and Selamat Hari Raya one and all. It was a very busy, very difficult Ramadan for me. I worked three weeks straight without a day off until the Friday before Eid, barely stepping into my neighborhood musallah all month. I lost around five pounds, putting me to my thinnest since I got married, […]
Berjayalah Taskiku!
ABIM, the Malaysian Islamic Youth Movement, is one of the oldest and strongest Islamic NGOs in Malaysia today. Founded in 1972, ABIM is influential on the national stage in lobbying for Islamic policies. It is the leading component organization in PEMBELA, an Islamic affairs pressure group. But its most recognizable effort on the ground is […]
Upcoming Productions
As both of my regular readers are well aware, the major focus of this blog is whatever adorable thing my children happen to be up to at the moment. Nonetheless, I do try to intersperse that with other topics to keep things fresh, and so with that in mind I’d like to share with you […]