Surrogate nenek

A few days ago, I received a text message 'Opah meninggal'. My heart suddenly stopped beating for two seconds and I find it quite difficult to breathe. She was one fine lady.

She wasn't my Opah and no, we were not related, either by blood or by marriage.

It all started when I came back after finishing my studies and eager to start the working life. Coming from Kedah, it was quite difficult to get a job just by sending letters to potential employers. So, my friend and I decided to pack our bags and try our luck in KL. Before we could stand on our own feet, we stayed with her aunt and family, and Opah at Kg Pandan.

Never in my life before I heard orang Perak speaks Malay. It was such a linguistic shock to me, trying to understand each word or jokes traded between them. Whenever I didn't understand anything, I just grinned and laughed at myself. Opah was very good at telling stories and boy! she could tell you a lot. Most of the times, I had a translator who pitied me and let me on the stories.

She usually started her stories like 'Zaman bard dulu...' I am sure you're wondering what the heck is bard? It was her word for JWW Birch. So zaman bard is actually the time when the British had a forceful influence, having appointed Bard as the first British Resident in Perak. Though she wasn't around at Bard time,she had wonderful life experiences because she grew up during the time when the world was in chaos and our nation was struggling for her own identity.

She would relate each story to a real person and how that person make an impact on the history. Like the time when the first PM trying to negotiate our independence. All of the orang kampung, rich or poor, helped by donating whatever savings or gold they had, just to buy Tunku a plane ticket to London. She remembered that day clearly and painted the picture to me and her grandchildren. She was so passionate and proud to be part of something so big. The kind of things we never read in our history text books.

When she was living in KL, she actually had her eyes wide open to the ongoing sagas, gossips or development. You would think that a nenek from kampung wouldn't know what was going on in the social circle of KL life. Well, you're wrong. She could tell you whos who or which clubs to avoid. She loved taking a bus (I think it's No. 32 Metro Bus) to the town. She even told us that years ago, KL did try to use a double decker like the red London bus but to no success. She even had the opportunity to ride in one before the plan was abandoned. For some reason, I didn't quite believe the story but I was sure she wasn't lying. She was very particular about ethics and honesty.

Her knowledge of English wasn't so bad either, though she made it her own version. I laughed so hard when I first found out what she meant by 'setempeket'. It was her version of 'certificate'. And not to forget the words 'renen' and 'statmet' being 'raining' and 'estimate'. She was hilarious and a very sporting nenek.

The stories stopped coming after she became weak and diagnosed with cancer. She was fighting for her life and sadly, last week her fight ended. She was a beautiful lady in every sense of the word and I hope she had lived her life to the fullest. Though she wasn't flesh and blood, I loved her.

Al-Fatihah to you, Opah. You will be fondly remembered.