Cast From The Herd: Memories of Matriarchal Malaysia
M. Bakri Musa
Excerpt #116: Alberta, Here I Come!
I arrived at Edmonton’s Nisku International Airport on a cool autumn evening, the sun still glowing bright orange in the low western horizon, the residuum of the midnight sun. The outside solitary flag post cast a long shadow onto the pavement. As I emerged from the arrival lounge, a familiar-looking young man extended his hand.
“You must be Bakri!” he said with a ready smile. The mention of my name in a strange city and in a foreign country, properly pronounced too, warmed my heart. “I am Ben Azman; we are your welcoming committee,” as he introduced another Malaysian.
They took my bags and off we went to his car. “I oso from Malaysia, lah!” the other student finally blurted as he introduced himself. Unlike Ben, he was more Malaysian, meaning, he was rather taciturn. Also unlike Ben whose diction was clear and slow, this other fellow’s words just rushed by in a torrent, made worse by his singsong Malaysian accent, as with emphasizing the last syllable in Malay-see ah as well as oso and ending with the all-encompassing lah. As I was still fresh from my native land I could comprehend him. However, after having listened only to Canadians for the past few days, I found his words just swishing by.
“It’s hard to call ourselves Malaysians,” Ben said as we drove off. “We’re so used to being Malayans.”
I told him that I was still Malayan as per my passport; I left on the eve of the formation of Malaysia.
“This is Alberta,” as Ben waved his right hand across the clear windscreen of his Ford sedan, “wild rose country.”
The scene looked familiar, thanks to the many colorful brochures sent to me earlier by the university. I looked around; vast open sky and endless flatland. The soft evening sun gave a subdued beauty to the landscape. It was right out of a Zane Grey novel except for the smooth car ride on the undulating well-paved freeway. That prompted me to ask, “Are there many wild buffalo here?”
“Nope, not on these plains! The wild buffalo here are all fenced in. We’ll take you to Elk Island National Park this weekend,” Ben suggested.
You could never fence in the wild buffalo back home, I thought to myself. The seladang there is feared; its mere mention would make villagers tremble with fear. Here in Canada, wild buffalo are fenced in and turned into tourist attractions!
The supreme irony! Here I was in praise of the solitary seladang, cast from its herd and free to roam far and wide. I modeled myself after it. I had flown across the vast Pacific, the towering Rockies, and the rolling prairies only to discover that my idolized wild buffalo but of the Canadian variety had been fenced in.
Oh Allah! Bless and guide me in my new life’s journey. Let me be like the seladang of my native land, respected if not feared, and free to roam God’s vast earth, guided only by my deep abiding faith and rich resilient tradition but tethered to neither. Oh Allah! Spare me the fate of my grandfather’s buffalo, well fed and lovingly cared for but alas even the village idiot could lead and control it by holding on to the rope attached to the ring through its nose.
Next: Excerpt #117: An Unexpected Identity Crisis
