The trip to Pahang……was exhaustive.
The trip started at 12am between friday and saturday : ) and for 4 hours, the six of us, three brothers and three sisters plus the driver were squashed in an Unser. Supposedly to be rather comfortable but believe me, it was not that much of a pleasant ride. The three girls- me, prezdayz and amy_pc fitted just nicely at the back seat. and we can’t really sleep during the ride. A brother, azren was talking with the driver just for the sake of company for the driver so that he won’t be bored and he really had a LOT to talk about. Our backside were screaming just two hours on the road and i actually missed the latenight journeys from jb-iiu!!! At least we know where to put our legs on the coach!!
Reached Rompin, Pahang at around 5 am. We had a rest at this old untended mosque, kind of creepy~ we could at least stretch our aching bones and washed up before breakfast (just wash up, don’t even think of having a shower there!) and of course, Subh prayer. We thought there could be people coming in the mosque to pray congregational Subh, like we understood it usually is in Kampung life, but NO, nobody came, no one did the call for the prayer…it was sad~ so just the seven of us in that mosque.
We had breakfast and I never know I have a good appetite for breakfasts! I ate my nasi lemak to the very last piece! Maybe it’s the journey or the dish was just plain delicious kampung style or maybe it was because that was the first time I even had a breakfast!! Considering back in campus, my day starts at 10.30 am, not exactly breakfast time! There were a number of log trucks passing by at high speed and woow, what are they rushing for?? A two-way road, large LOG trucks, high speed~
Went to another mosque, which was much better than the former and nicer toilets. Now we could have a short shower~ Proper and fresher to have a meeting with an officer at his office. There’s two problems for me in trying torelate this story here. Firstly, I have short memory and which much of the little details just don’t stick to my mind like the place, the hour of journey and secondly, during the meeting, they used a LOT OF ACRONYMS and names of M’sian top people which DOESN’T RING A BELL in my memory. I had to ocnstantly asked Amy, what those acronyms stands for. Like DO, ADO, JKR, JJ (JJ stands for one of their YBs, by the way, not a place or rank), and yes, YB. And I’m unsure whether YB stands for Yang bahagia or Yang berhormat. Sheesh! I learnt this already in my Nusantara class!! The officer was nice and polite, he’s an IIU grad and he gave a lot of information about Rompin and its people. It was all useful. The people think highly of the P’s and Q’s and very much serious about the political scenes there. It’s politics, it’s a mess. My concerns are the youths there. Their lifestyle and their faith. There seems to be a problem there. Rompin was near to the beach and modern from it’s tourism businesses, pretty much controlled by the Chinese instead of the Malays. One of the aims of the programme is to reach out to the youngsters and build an entrepreneurial spirit among the villagers.
We spent almost to two hours of discussion with the officer. Had lunch at brother director’s house which was another two hours (if I’m not mistaken, I slept the whole way) of journey. The place known as Muadhzam. His was a nice cosy house full of ROSES. A nice family as well but rather serious and formal. Maybe because his father was one of the top persons there. All six of us were tight-lipped, just sipping our tea and looking at each other. Of course, Brother director talked with his father. But they were serious talk!! Politics, business~ Not some casual talks of how’s the weather, your studies? How’s your family? None of that! It’s gut wrenching and tense. But lunch was palatable and we got to have some real nap on a warm queen sized bed! Well, for the girls that is!! We were so grateful for the hospitality.
We left for IIU at around 5 pm and nothing much on the road. Reached IIU at around 9 pm. Thank Lord. It was all a safe journey, thanks to brother driver.
On a last note, I’m pretty much worried about the whole programme but brother director knows what he’s doing, I’m just following the flow and see to the small things. I’m learning frm them.
living seri 