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This blogspot is a medium to share my thoughts and adventures apart from promoting my books. Below are the books which have been written or authored and published by myself.


"Berpetualang ke Aceh: Mencari Diri dan Erti".

ISBN 983-42031-0-1, Jun 2006


"Berpetualang ke Aceh: Membela Syiar yang Asal"

ISBN 983-42031-1-x, May 2007


"Berpetualang ke Aceh: Sirih Pulang ke Gagang?"

ISBN 978-983-42031-2-2, November 2007


It is interesting to note that while these books were written in Malay it has gained enough attention to merit being part of the collections of the American Library of Congress and National Library of Australia. Look here and here.


While the first three books were published by my own company, the fourth titled "Rumah Azan" was published in April 2009 by a company called Karnadya with the help of the Malaysian national literary body Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka. It features beautiful pictures along with stories behind selected mosques which could be related to the history of Islam and the Malays alongside the formation of the Malaysian nation. Look at the article A collaboration of old collegemates - the book "Rumah Azan".


My fifth book "Ahlul Bait (Family) of Rasulullah SAW and Malay Sultanates", an English translation and adaptation of the Malay book "Ahlul Bait (Keluarga) Rasulullah SAW dan Kesultanan Melayu" authored by Hj Muzaffar Mohamad and Tun Suzana Othman was published early 2010. Look here... My 5th book is out! Ahlul Bait (Family) of Rasulullah SAW and the Malay Sultanates... . For more information check out my Malay blogspot CATATAN SI MERAH SILU.



Like my fourth book "Rumah Azan", the sixth book "Kereta Api Menuju Destinasi" is also a coffee-table book which is published by the company Karnadya with the cooperation of Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka (the main Malay literary body in Malaysia). Coming out January 2011 it features pictures and stories on the adventure travelling by train to all of Peninsular Malaysia along with the interesting places which could be reached this way.


My seventh book "Jejak keluarga Yakin : Satu sketsa sejarah" in turn is a coffee-table book which is written, editted, designed and has pictures taken by me. Coming out of the factory October 2011, this book which combines family history with history of places such as Singapura, Johor, Batu Pahat, Muar and in fact the history of the island of Java and England has been reviewed with me interviewed live in the program Selamat Pagi Malaysia at RTM1. Look at the article Siaran langsung ulasan buku "Jejak keluarga Yakin : Satu sketsa sejarah" dan temu ramah di Selamat Pagi Malaysia. Some selected contents have been featured in Sneak peek "Jejak keluarga Yakin : Satu sketsa sejarah".


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The "Berpetualang ke Aceh" series of novels could be obtained in e-book form. Enter http://www.e-sentral.com/, click general novel and go to page 4. You can also type the word "Aceh" at the search box. Or click straight Book 1, Book 2 and Book 3.


Sunday, September 23, 2007

Taiping to Kuala Kangsar... A dangerous look at Malaysian history?

And so from Gunung Semanggol, I took the bus to Taiping...

Soon enough I arrived at Kamunting just a few kilometres from Taiping... Here is a very famous (or rather infamous) place... For some people, the name Kamunting draws almost instant horror! For it is a place known to be some sort of jail for those detained under the ISA, the Internal Security Act where practically anyone who is considered a possible menace to the social order (or rather accused as such by the powers-that be) can be locked up and have the keys thrown out just like that.

Under the act, one could be detained without trial for any amount of period they see fit. Being detained and being denied legal rights under some sort of house arrest is another thing... The worse is the horror said to happen behind the locked doors, the kind that escapes any official acts or public knowledge... That is, we're talking about the things they do to extract information (some say even false confessions) out of those unlucky enough to be Kamunting inmates...

Soon enough, I arrived at the Taiping bus station...


Notice this building right in front of the station? The name tadika means it's a kindergarten while Che Pheng Kor sounds like the name of a prominent Chinese. This reminds me of the same name I saw on a well-positioned building on the island of Pangkor.... A building that immediately caught the eye as one is about to arrive at the island from Lumut.
Perhaps the name Pangkor came from the name Pheng Kor? After all the island used to be called pulau (island of) Dinding. One thing's for sure... The name Pangkor came after the Pangkor Treaty of 1874. I've read the original treaty which was signed on a ship off the island and I remember the island was called Pulau Dinding in the treaty but yet the treaty itself is known as the Pangkor Treaty... Think...
Perhaps Pheng Kor is a prominent Chinese who helped the British achieved their aim of forcing the Malays to submit rule to them through the Pangkor Treaty? After all, whether by design or not, official history does show Chinese gangsters were instrumental in creating the disturbances in Perak which paved the way for the treaty. The treaty on the other hand gave the British the political room to manouver inside and get involved in Malay affairs and rule. This eventually led to the colonisation of the Malay states in the Peninsular...

As I've said in the previous article, my actual destination for the day was Kuala Kangsar. Oh, the date was 21st July 2007. While waiting for the bus to the royal town of Perak, I managed to set up the promotional poster for the "Berpetualang ke Aceh" book series...


I stopped by at the food and drink stalls beside the bus station. Somehow, whenever in Taiping, I would stop by and at least have a drink at this particular spot with a burger stall called Love! Make love not war I guess...

Which reminds me, Taiping was the first so-called modern town in the federation of Malay states which is now known as Malaysia... Modern by British definition British that is, a slanted definition which consciously tries to marginalise the original Malay population while bringing up outsiders they brought in to dominate the scene.

Little that people realise, when Taiping was created in the 1880s, Malay towns which have existed for centuries were destroyed or burned down by the colonialists. This is to eradicate any significant memory of Malay history and concrete evidence of its former greatness while at the same time, new townships using British town-planning models were raised and promoted only to be steered by the Chinese while the Malays were left to rot in the rurals...

This resulted in most Malays now not knowing their actual roots much less the actual greatness of Malay history! Think... The Malacca Sultanate was a great Malay empire with the 15th Century city of Malacca touted as the Venice of the East while 17th Century Aceh Sultanate, also a symbol of Malay greatness was recognised as one out of 5 greatest Islamic powers in the world!...

While some might have learned about it in history, many doubt its actual relevance to the current state of affairs. This is sad as they could have learned, the fall of the great empires was not because the Malays were stupid or uncivilised as the Western-biased history taught them but because of internal strife which were taken advantage of by the colonialists... At least they could have realised that the Malays were already very adapt at doing business and dealing with the outside world on a cosmopolitan egalitarian world-class scale!

Now, many Malays got the wrong idea that in order to move forward and walk shoulder to shoulder with other races, they must shed away their Malayness and adapt the values of others. They are taught they must be robust to cut a piece of the action even if they have to resort to lying, cheating and bribery because that is the order of the day!

The history of the Malays have been systematically reduced to insignificance through a major social engineering effort by the British such that most present Malays believe business (as in market dealings and such) were brought in here by the Chinese... Allegedly, the Malays never knew how to conduct business until the Chinese taught them so! How did that happen? Let me try to be as brief as possible...

The Pangkor Treaty of 1874 which saw the installment of the first British resident to a Malay state, J.W.W. Birch angered the Malay nobles for stepping on local values and being rude to the extent of practically cursing the Sultan, the ruler of the Malays in front of public. Protocol faux pass aside, the British through the treaty have also made some major changes in local commerce, how it was done, who was involved and which party should get the spoils and shares. In time, the dissatisfaction and anger among the Malays grew unbearable and this lead to the murder of Birch in Pasir Salak 1875.

This in turn caused the British to conduct a massive manhunt for those involved. Inevitably a war ensued between the locals and the colonialists, a war which saw some Malays siding the British because of the lucrative promise of rewards made... Plus the fact that those who refused to cooperate with the colonialists were labled as rebels and thus risk themselves and their families being harassed (if not tortured and killed) all their lives!

The result, some Malay nobles were hanged to death while the ruler and his advisors were exiled. That was when Perak was left without real leadership... Whatever royalties and noblemen left to run the country were practically made puppets if not gagged or turned into official rubber stamps... And thus the British could do whatever they want unhindered including destroying Malay towns and turning it into estates or jungles while building up new ones which consciously marginalised the Malays and created strongholds for outsiders.

The result is as you can see now, what is called the reality of the situation... The Malays despite being the original landlords has less than 30 per cent, perhaps only 10 per cent of the economic cake... Worse of all, most of them have no idea there was such a thing as a Malay town ever! After all they entered the world with ALL TOWNS in Malaysia already conquered by the Chinese! Little did they realise Malay towns and cities have existed for centuries. Its just the legacies left by such empires as Malacca and Aceh have already been wiped out by the Westerners when they came in full force at the end of 19th Century AD!

Ah... Enough of this...

Anyway I left Taiping feeling quite angry after knowing the unofficial version of its history, the one that some people tried to hide under the guise of maintaining social order and such. The word Taiping is said to be Chinese for "peace everlasting"... Perhaps so but peace for who really? What I do know, Taiping is the first Chinese town created in Malaysia and it was to be the model for all towns in this region under British stewardship...

And I do know that the first community leaders for Taiping were selected among whom? Guess whom... Of all people, the leader of the gangsters which were instrumental in creating the troubles in Perak leading to the signing of the Pangkor Treaty of 1874! Now, why is that? Think deeply... Connect all the dots and you'll find the word conspiracy close at bay...

On the way, I passed Bukit (hill of) Gantang. Just like Gunung Semanggol, here is a place with a name that carries a certain reverberation inside me...


I arrived in Kuala Kangsar quite late... After searching and walking around for a while, then only I found a cheap affordable hotel on the outskirts...

And so I rested for the day. Above is a picture of the books I brought from the "Berpetualang ke Aceh" series which got wet in Gunung Semanggol because of the rain. I dried it up using a fan. Now that I've done this story, it is time to do one at SENI LAMA MELAYU (MALAY OLDEN ART) . See you there...

Gunung Semanggol... The threat from the mountains

Continuing from where we left off... From Taiping arriving at Gunung Semanggol...

The small town of Gunung Semanggol lies at a junction heading for Bukit Merah which is quite famous for its big lake and an amusement park. Gunung Semanggol on the other hand is probably well-known only to those who read history voraciously especially on subjects related to the resurgence of Islamicic movements against the British colonisation of the Malay Archipelago...


The first time I went to Gunung Semanggol was about a year or two ago... To find the original location of an old house which has been relocated to Janda Baik, Bentong, Pahang. Click Rumah lama Perak di Janda Baik (An old Perak house in Janda Baik) for the story.

Prior to that my knowledge of Gunung Semanggol was that it used to be quite a prominent place for people who wants to deepen their Islamic knowledge. The idea I got was the place holds some esotoric secret knowledge based on the deeper and more spiritual aspects of Islam.

The name which could be translated as the mountain of (gunung) Semanggol itself sounded rather mystical... Although I've heard about it more than 20 years ago and since then I've passed it a few times while going from Taiping to Parit Buntar and vice versa, it's only quite recently I actually stopped there and try to find out what's all the fuss about...


A view of parts of Gunung Semanggol from a restaurant I stopped by at. Notice my travelling gear which includes a 'promotion kit' for my "Berpetualang ke Aceh" (literally translated as "The trip to Aceh") book series?

As I've said earlier, I first stopped here a year or two ago to find the original location of a certain old house and dig it's history and significance. That's when I found out there's a prominent and very famous (among those interested that is) religious school called Ma'ahad Ihya Il Sharif!


I stopped by at the main mosque... Got the time to hang my book series poster. God willing, a pictorial story on the mosque will be written for the bi-lingual blogspot SENI LAMA MELAYU (MALAY OLDEN ART) later.
Back to Maahad Ihya Il Sharif. I don't remember when it was established but it has been around at least since early 20th Century. The story goes that the school saw the first official grouping and meetings of Malay nationalists fighting for the independence of Malaysia (then known as Federation of the Malay states or something like that), even earlier than the meetings against the British-invented concept of Malay Union which resulted in the creation of the Malay political party UMNO in 1946.
The problem is the nationalists which gathered at Gunung Semanggol were staunch Muslims, the kind that were later officially announced by the powers-that be as being related ( I believed allegedly) to a certain opposition party. Yes, the meeting did give some people the impetus to create a pro-Islamic party which has been labelled as anti-development but I do believe the people who lighted up the fire of independence there where not into partisan politics. They were just decent Muslims who were tired of the country being run by infidels...
Nevertheless, the confidence they inspired made certain parties worry especially the British. And so the people who converged in Gunung Semanggol to fight for the rights of the Malay (mind you, being a Malay MUST MEAN you are a Muslim, if you actually know what Malay stands for) were labelled by the British as the threat from the mountains (as in gunung). The propaganda machines painted them in unflattering ways as if they were communists trying to create hell for the people.

Anyway, it's time to leave Gunung Semanggol...


This is the actual hills known as Gunung Semanggol. Not tall enough to be regarded as mountains... Nevertheless, there's an ominous presence which says there's more than meets the eye... Just like the name Gunung Semanggol seems to reverberate through my being everytime I think of it...


While on the bus to Taiping, I tried to snap as many scenic pictures as possible using my cheap digital camera which doesn't register too well on bumpy rides...


Nevertheless I tried even though the result were 'wavy' pictures like this... Perhaps this picture could denote the fact that life is just like a dream? Que sera sera... Next story please!

From Kedah to Perak... The show must go on!

Greeting dear readers. Tonight, the 11th night of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadhan I feel like continuing the story on my last long travel made over 2 months ago covering the states of Pahang, Kelantan, Kedah, Perak and Selangor.
In my last posting here on the subject (titled A typical day in Alor Setar? ) I talked about having a quite day at the Kedah capital. The story-telling was continued with Jalan-jalan (walkabout in) Sungai Petani... in the blogspot SENI LAMA MELAYU (MALAY OLDEN ART) before ending the session in Malay with a piece called Kuala Ketil, Mastura dan Char Koew Teow... in the blogspot CATATAN SI MERAH SILU . So let us continue from where we left off... In the town of Kulim, Kedah.

After spending the night in Kulim, it's time to move on. Earlier, I've spent 4 nights in Pahang and 5 nights in Kelantan. It's only in Sungai Petani the previous night that I noticed the number of nights spent at the respective states.... When circumstances like missing the last bus for the day (plus the fact that I was so damn tired) forced me to stay a night there after spending 2 in Alor Setar and a night each in Sikh and Baling. Otherwise I couldn't care less as I wasn't counting time. I was just travelling and stopping wherever and whenever I felt like it, that's all.

Now, having noticed the numbers, I felt obliged to follow a certain order. After all, I do have a fetish for numbers. So naturally, to follow the progression I should spend 6 nights in Kedah and the night in Kulim was the 6th. So it's time to head for the next state Perak.

Above is a picture taken the previous day at the bus station in Kulim. The friend who hosted me for the night sent me there the following morning. I intend to take the bus to Parit Buntar, the closest town in Perak but there's few direct service to the town from Kulim... Instead I took a bus which ends at another place... A bus which arrived earlier than the one to Parit Buntar.


So there I was at the small town of Serdang which lies on an alternative route to Parit Buntar. On the way I passed through the district of Selama and learned you can go to Lenggong, Perak from there. All this while I only knew the Kuala Kangsar route to Lenggong which lies on the way from Perak to Kelantan.
Here in Serdang I missed the bus to Parit Buntar twice, once because I was in the toilet, the second time because I decided to have lunch at a foodstall nearby. Luckily there's regular service heading to the Perak town every half an hour. So on to the next picture...

At last I arrived in Parit Buntar. And at last I am in Perak, the state where my father was born in.


There, a look at the bus I was on. That's when I realised why circumstances made me took the route through Serdang... It was the first time ever I moved from Kedah to Perak or vice versa without going through Seberang Perai which is a district in the state of Pulau Pinang. Otherwise I might have to burst the bubble on my plan to follow a progression of nights spent at each succesive states.... Having spent 4 nights in Pahang, 5 in Kelantan and 6 in Kedah, I must spend 7 nights in the next state and it's just too much time to be spent on such a small state like Pulau Pinang... No offence to the locals ya...

Besides, if I do spend 7 nights there, then I must spend 8 nights in Perak, that is if I were to stick to the progression of numbers. As it is, my girlfriends in Kuala Lumpur where already complaining that I spent too much time on travel when they needed me to be around. And before embarking on this session of travelling, I told them I was planning to be on the road for just only a week...


Now, I intend to head for the royal town of Kuala Kangsar. Naturally, for someone who refuses to use express buses (at least for certain trips and sessions of travelling) the next step is to take the bus to Taiping first... And there's a destination in between which I felt obliged to visit.


There... The destination I must stop at between Taiping and Parit Buntar. The name is Gunung Semanggol and it carries certain reverberations and significance for those who know why...