CEKIK - a novel by Ridhwan Saidi

1. FATHER

When the call to prayer is heard outside, my mobile

phone rings. I am in the kitchen cooking Maggi instant noodles
while listening to the Yuna song Decorate coming out of my
laptop speakers, which must be the ideal musical
accompaniment for cooking Maggi noodles. This is not because
the song is about two minutes in duration, which is the same
amount of time Maggi noodles need to reach the condition of al
dente, but because its rhythm seems to slowly give hope and life
to the Maggi noodles boiling in the pan.
At first I do not intend to answer because the song
Decorate has already reached its peak, which means that my
Maggi noodles are almost done. I do not like Maggi noodles that
are swollen from being overcooked. This is because their
elasticity when chewed will not give any pleasure to my tongue
and throat.
The phone stops ringing. I stir and, with a fork, gently
fiddle around with the Maggi noodles boiling in the pan. The
heat permeates the entire kitchen, making my forehead sweat. I
break two eggs into the pan. I watch as the two egg yolks slowly
harden.
Suddenly I hear the phone ring again. I reduce the heat
and then move to get my mobile phone that is next to the laptop
on the living room table. This time it is not a call, but a short
message from the Village. I do not use this mobile phone very
often, so I just let the ring-call tone and the short-messaging
tone be the same even though this can lead to confusion. I click
open the inbox and there is a message, YOUR FATHER DIED.
FUNERAL TOMORROW. EVERYONE IN THE FAMILY
EXPRESSES SYMPATHY. My gaze shifts to the window that
faces the kitchen. Are my Maggi noodles swollen by now?

............................................
 2010, The Village. At that time I was 6 years old. Father
earned a living as The Village imam. He was small in stature,
and had brown skin. His hair was short, his moustache thick.
Usually when he went to the small mosque, he would wear a
Malay top of pale yellow, with a red and white keffiyeh around
his neck, a sarong of the Sitting Elephant brand, and a pair of
expensive sandals that he had bought while performing his mini
haj in Mecca. He was 51.
Father had a habit that I found strange. Each night after
dinner or before sleep, Father would iron his clothes with care.
He would continue to iron in the living room as long as there
was even the slightest crumple or imperfection. Father would
sometimes take hours to ensure that all his clothes were in
immaculate condition. Because the shaft of the florescent light
would penetrate the bedroom, I would find it difficult to sleep.
This ... is something I will always remember.
Father would spend more time at the small mosque than at
home. It could be said that in an average day, aside from ironing
his clothes before sleeping at home, he would spend hours and
hours at the small mosque. He would be there before dawn to
perform the pre-dawn prayer. Then he would wait for the
afternoon prayer close by, at Opah's coffee place. I knew this
because I always accompanied him when I was 6 years old.
"Father, I want to come along," I would say.
"You're too young Warith, wait till you grow up," he
would reply while starting his Vespa.
"But I want to come along," I would shout above the
sound of the Vespa engine.
"Then come up," he would say while patting the back seat
of the Vespa.
I would latch onto Father's sarong-clad thigh and try to
climb the Vespa, whose seat was as tall as me. My little hands
would slip and Father would grab them again. Father would then
carry me up to sit on the back seat.
This is how I wanted Father to treat me. But it never
happened that way. Father never gave a damn about me. Father
would just go off, leaving my 6 year-old self alone at home.
Father never taught me how to pray, read the Quran or do
anything religious. I was left adrift.
My home in The Village was very big and spacious. Or
perhaps it seemed so because at that time I was small. The walls
looked far from each other, and the roof seemed high. Seven
steps led to the porch, which led to the main part of the house
with its one bedroom, and then seven steps led down to the
kitchen. From the kitchen window you could see the outhouse
toilet, with a river as a backdrop. Father forbade me from
leaving the house. I obeyed, even though village houses are
naturally open. The furthest I would go was to the outhouse
toilet, which was still within the confines of Father's ancestral
land. I once ventured out to the river to see the fishes swimming
there but I got scolded by Father. I forget what happened next
but after that, I did not dare venture out of the house, even to the
compound. Except to the outhouse toilet, which I rarely used.
Sometimes, Grey and Orange in the back of the house
accompanied me. But they were still too small to know anything
(still nursing). Every day I would spy on them by looking down
through the kitchen window. A few weeks before, their mother
Bedah came to the back of the house to give birth to them.
Father and I accepted them gladly. We provided food and water
for Bedah to help her raise her children. Our lunch dishes like
fried fish-head were also given to them.
After Grey and Orange were old enough to stop being
nursed, their mother Bedah left them both in our house. We took
over the duties of raising them. When they reached their youth,
something strange happened.
One afternoon while I was eating lunch alone in the house
- rice, chillied mackerel, a little soy sauce - I saw Grey and
Orange outside making noise. Since they were both tomcats, I
assumed they were fighting, but they were actually making love.
This I found out when I was on the way to wash my hands near
the kitchen door. I saw Orange licking his cute dick, which was
pink and erect. Grey was bending his head down towards
Orange's body. I thought about this all day.
Since they were both male, what were they doing?

............................................

Returning to the kitchen, I see that my curry-flavoured

Maggi noodles are swollen. I am not happy. I dump the Maggi
noodles into the food container for our pet cats, Ash and Amber.
Yes, 'our'. I live in this apartment with my lover Suria. We have
been a couple for two years. I see the Maggi noodles are still
steaming in the yellow catfood container - in dismay. I feel a bit
sorry for these Maggi noodles. I can feel empathy for their fate:
how sad it would be to be fed to two nasty cats which would
chomp and tear me apart. They would not eat me but rather play
with me. I would accept this fate and not fight it, because I
would be just a powerless bowl of Maggi noodles. I slip my
hands into my shorts pocket and bring out a pack of Wrigley's
Doublemint chewing gum. I tear, I chew, I try to relax. They say
chewing gum is good therapy.
Our studio apartment is on the first floor, and is owned by
Suria. I started living with her two years ago. It measures 6 x 9
metres, has a mezzanine level and a main section. Aside from
bathrooms at the top and lower levels, there are three main
areas: a bedroom upstairs, a kitchen at the mezzanine level, and
a high-ceilinged living room. This house has an open concept
with no walls except for the bathrooms. There are no solid
barriers such as walls between kitchen and living room, and
from the bedroom we can look straight down into the living
room. From the front door, we can see a full 5 metre-tall glass
window that gives a view of the Warisan Merdeka Tower. This
100-storey skyscraper is shaped like the number '1'. On a night
like this, the lights from the sky-scraping concrete headstone
glimmer and colour The City. I hear a train pass by.
The clock says it's eleven at night. Suria usually returns
from work at ten, bringing me food. But tonight she might be
working late - she's still not back. I cooked the Maggi noodles
just for the sake of eating something, because I had not eaten
since morning. In the morning, I ate a bowl of corn flakes with
milk. But strangely enough, I was reminded of Maggi noodles
while eating that breakfast. How could corn flakes with milk
remind me of curry-flavoured Maggi noodles?
The Yuna song Decorate plays again from the laptop
speakers that decorate my lover's studio apartment. Suddenly
my mobile phone rings again. At first, I am not sure if it is an
incoming call or an incoming short message. I will only know if
it reaches the third ring, because the rings for a short message do
not exceed two. First ring, second ring, third ring - it's a call. I
hurry to get my mobile phone from beside the laptop.
I take the call, but for a moment no one speaks.
"Hello?" I say.
"Warith," says the caller.
 "Yes, that's me. Who is this?" I say while chewing gum.
"Did you receive any news from The Village?" the caller
asks.
The voice of the caller sounds like that of Faisal Chal,
better known as Kuzi, from the film Wild Teenagers. There is a
childish quality amidst the seriousness of his voice. Sometimes
the voice sounds like it belongs to the dubbed cartoon series
Detective Conan.
"Yes, I just got it -"
The caller ends the call. Strange, I never use the mobile
phone to call anyone except Suria. I have never once been
unfaithful to Suria. So who just called me? Did Suria give my
mobile phone number to one of her colleagues? Or does this
have something to do with Father's death? Something doesn't
feel right.
If this has something to do with Suria's friends, well, I
have long since left the socialite world. I no longer accompany
Suria to hang out with her hipster friends. It's like this. Suria
works from seven to five, but only reaches home at ten at night
to bring me food. She always asks me out for dinner with her
friends but I refuse. I am not fond of those bourgeois friends of
hers who are snobbish but lacking in taste. I believe they have
are the new generation of the backwards elite that was sparked
off by the government's affirmative action policies. They live
only for material things. They are staunch buyers, wearers and
consumers. I am dismayed whenever I try to discuss the
philosophy behind the fashions they adore - on the contrary,
they understand nothing. They follow fashions just to be trendy.
Even sadder is that many of them are teachers. Their
philistinism is then passed on to the children of this land.
Suria once told me that, in just her first month of lecturing
at a private university, she was already shocked at the extent of
corruption in that place of learning. Each time the students had
to make a trip to a place, they were charged up to four times the
amount. These students, who comprised the children of the
middle-class, bourgeoisie, foreigners and plantation share-
holders, just went along with what their lecturers commanded.
For example, if a trip required just RM50 per person, the charge
would be RM200. In that way, the lecturer would fraudulently
gain a profit of RM150 per person. That was just for one person,
but what if the trip had 100 students? The lecturer who was in
charge of organising the trip would easily get a quick profit of
RM15,000. If, for example, a lecturer wanted to buy a Leica MP
camera, he or she would just organise a compulsory trip to
nearby Sungai Buloh! This cycle of corruption will persist and
be perpetuated when some of these dumb students who got
conned then become lecturers in the future.
If this has something to do with Father instead, it has been
two years since I last went back to see him in The Village or
even communicated with him. In fact, I can't even remember
Father's full name.