by Yap Swi Neo
Hanny does not serve angel cake. A little slip with the eggs, the cake flops. That weekend Hanny and I work to bake the perfect angel cake. Many eggs have been laid in vain, as cakes flop. Finally, Hanny discovers it is the temperature of her oven. The angel cake is perfect, with a sprinkling of sugar dust.
On Monday, Hanny packs six whole pink angel cakes with a lacy ribbon tied round each. I take the bus with Lin San to LOVE Home. Hanny says there must have been a great celebration among the elderly at LOVE Home. We are sure there was. That night Hanny and I talk late into the evening. A 12-year-old girl has taught us, two matured seniors, what love and responsibility for family is.
* * *
Screwpine leaf. ↵
In Asia, elders are addressed as ‘aunty’ and ‘uncle’ out of respect. ↵
In Towkay Lee’s Mansion
‘In Towkay Lee’s Mansion’ describes the daily activities of a Peranakan household as seen through the eyes of a ten-year-old Indonesian girl, whose Mak worked for the Lee family. She wondered why Mak, an educated professional, chose to work as a ‘domestic help’ when they had been comfortable at home. Not everything is as it seems.
Mak got a job in Towkay[1] Lee’s mansion. She refused to talk about Bapa, my father, in the Lee household as it made her sad. End of Bapa, end of story. It was only Mak and I here in Singapore. Mistress Lee agreed to accept me though she complained loudly and when she was mad with whomever and whatever, she screamed, ‘Employ one mother, two mouths come eat!’ Towkay Lee was kinder. He greeted Mak and me cheerfully, ‘Good morning, selamat pagi.’
One morning he asked, ‘What’s your name, little girl?’
‘Rositawati.’
‘Your name so cantik, so pretty, just like you. I call you Rosi, easier to say. Just like a rose, so pretty, so wangi, so nice smell like perfume.’ I was happy now that I had a name in the house, not ‘Girl’. I was a person with a name. I told Mak but she was not impressed.
Mak spoke little, silently doing what was asked of her. I believed she was sad to leave Bapa and her parents back in Surabaya. Bapa worked in a lawyer’s firm. Mak was a teacher at the polytechnic. I was in school and Mak had applied for a one-year leave of absence from school for me. She had stated that I was to enrol in English lessons at the British Council in Singapore. I was very excited to go to Singapore. I wanted to ride the cable car, go to Gardens by the Bay, Sentosa Universal Studios, and learn more English.
Soon Towkay Lee patted me on the head, then on the cheek, then on the back. I was afraid to tell Mak that Towkay gave me $5 every time he patted me and said I was so cantik, so pretty. I kept the money between the pages of my book, in my school bag. It came in useful as the canteen food at British Council was expensive. I dismissed Mistress Lee’s words as the idle chatter of a matriarch with a lot of unhappiness inside her. But I was careful not to upset anyone. Mak did the laundry and cleaned the house for them and taught Indonesian cuisine to Towkay’s sister. Mistress Lee ruled over a household of eight: Towkay Lee and her; Young Master Lee, their eldest son; his wife Young Mistress Lee; Young Master Lee and Young Mistress Lee’s eight-year-old twin daughters, Agnes and Amy, and a baby, Adrian. There was also Towkay Lee’s youngest sister, who was the cook and single. She hardly spoke, moving silently cat like, so that when she cleared her throat, I jumped. I wished she would meow when she moved. She slept in a room adjacent to the main lounge, while Towkay and family had their suites upstairs. I do not remember her ever leaving the house. She was Rapunzel trapped in the kitchen. No prince had come her way, because she wore her hair very short.
Why, really why, did Mak choose to work here? I did not understand why Mak had to come to Singapore to work as a housemaid and cook. She explained that Towkay Lee’s sister wanted to learn Indonesian cuisine. Mak taught her all about Indonesian cuisine, while the towkay’s sister taught Mak her Peranakan cuisine, a sort of kitchen cultural exchange. Towkay Lee had wanted an educated and reliable teacher for his sister. Mak explained everyone had to eat, and to eat we had to work and when we worked we had money to buy food to eat so we would be alive. She confused me. We did eat in Surabaya. We ate bakso, beef-balls in spicy soup, penyet, crispy fried chicken, and Bapa took us to Japanese and Chinese restaurants sometimes. We had pizza and McDonalds and KFC too.
Mak’s and my territorial space was the kitchen and the pantry where we slept. I was allowed to sit at the kitchen table after the day’s work to do my homework. Mistress Lee’s kitchen was large and handsome. It was adjacent to the dining room with its twelve-seater rosewood dining table. The first weekend I discovered the table could be pulled along its breadth to turn it into an eighteen-seater table. The tablecloth and table runners were batik pieces. On one side of the kitchen a wide door opened into the garden, where the gardener had planted herbs: pandan leaves, kaffir lime, curry leaves, chillies, lengkuas, serai, and in small planter boxes were daun kesum and daun kemangi for culinary needs. Beyond that were the rambutan tree, papaya, and banana plants. On the opposite wall of the kitchen were stainless steel cabinets with several shelves. A Miele fridge with tens of magnets from countries visited, and a Miele dishwasher had their place beside the cabinets. The smaller Miele kitchen gadgets lived inside the cabinets. The stainless steel worktable was an island in the middle of the kitchen. I was surprised that the table, like the dining table, could unfold to extend it. Under the worktable were open shelves for different small-sized bottles of salt, sugar and pepper; different sizes of knives, long, short, big and small; chopping boards and washing-up liquid. At one end was a little DVD player for entertainment. Towkay’s sister enjoyed keroncong[2] and Mak had brought six sets of DVDs for her. Her favourite was ‘Bengawan Solo’, played repeatedly until I felt suffocated and drowned in the River Solo. The Miele hobs and hotplates had their own place on the third wall beside the triple washbasins. To soften the harshness of the stainless steel, the walls were painted a soft bronze. The pale yellow ceiling lights created a harmonized tone for the kitchen, which gave it a pleasant warmth. The loud noise of the extractor fan, together with the pounding, cooking and keroncong formed an immense orchestra which transformed the kitchen into a lively Woodstock, a great contrast to the quiet living room. It was Mak’s and Towkay’s sister’s turf, where they prepared every meal.
Our small kitchen in Surabaya was where Mak taught me the intricacies of the kitchen. We had a small TV on the wall. Mak’s favourite chef was Gordon Ramsay. Our kitchen was a laboratory where Mak taught me the spices for pepes[3], sate kambing[4], sayur urap[5]. Scrambled eggs were my favourite breakfast. Mak was pleased it was Gordon Ramsay worthy. It would be nice if Gordon Ramsay said it.
Lying on the thin foam mattress in the pantry, my back rested against the sacks of Thai Fragrant Rice Grade A, Jasmine Rice A, US Long Grain Rice, Basmati Rice A from India and Pakistan, brown rice, organic rice. I didn’t know there were so many varieties of rice. On the shelves above were rows of extra virgin, virgin, cold press oils – olive, coconut, flaxseed, almond among others. The stainless steel pots and skillets cooled Mak’s back. Other electronic gadgets fought for space above. I soon realised gadgets were not the only things edging one another out. On the upper shelves were tins of infant formula, cereals and milk. The cans of Australian abalone with price tags of $105 a can and packs of Premium Birds Nest at $2,800 for a 200-gram pack seemed to look down with disdain upon the cans of Yeo’s Sardine in Tomato Sauce at $3.90, and pickled cucumbers in small bottles at $1.40 on the lower shelves. There were enough beverages to float Datuk’s, my grandfather’s, sampan, the small fishing boat he had built himself. If it had been slightly wider, the pantry would have resembled a mini market in my Datuk’s kampong. Mak didn’t mind the tight squeeze though and reminded me neither should I. That was my first experience sleeping uncomfortably on the floor but I felt wonderful in Mak’s embrace. Now I understood why Mak and Bapa always slept together.
We had plenty of food, leftovers from the family meals. Most of the food Towkay’s
sister cooked we did not like. Some, Mak said we could not eat. We had Indonesian dishes most days as Mak showed and taught Towkay’s sister the intricacies of our cuisine. Mak said she was a good student. Mak never knew her name, they addressed each other kakak. I thought it strange as kakak meant elder sister. How could two women address each other elder sister? Mak brushed me off, ‘Never mind.’
At night, Mak was busy writing in her notebooks. She had already filled one and was starting on a second. ‘What are you writing, Mak?’
‘Some recipes, new kinds of food. Nenek and Datuk I’m sure will like these new dishes.’
I wasn’t sure my grandparents would like them. Buah keluak comes from Indonesia. Mak mashed some black meat of the keluak nuts into the spicy beef or chicken broth. Rawon is a family favourite for its spicy nutty flavour and dark broth. Mistress Lee cooked the black meat of the keluak nuts in spicy-sour gravy with chicken. Then there was chap chye, a stew of cabbage, carrots, and black fungus Mistress Lee called ‘rats’ ears’ – they did look like rats ears, really; itek tim, a tart duck soup cooked with pickled salted mustard leaves; meesua, strange fine hair noodles cooked with pig liver and kidney, yucks! Mak and I did not eat the meesua. As I didn’t like these foods, I was very sure my grandparents would not like them.
‘That’s our little secret and surprise for Datuk, Nenek and Bapa. Don’t tell anyone,’ Mak whispered. ‘Mistress might not like us copying her recipes.’
One day I looked into Mak’s notebooks. She had lots more notes than recipes. She drew pictures of Mistress Lee’s sarongs and beautiful hip length kebaya blouses enriched with colourful embroidery of birds, fish, flowers and fruits. Mistress Lee had dozens of these kebaya and matching sarong skirts. She had several silver belts. She showed them to Mak. ‘Let me teach you about our clothes culture. I have seven chain-linked silver belts, all pure silver and the clasp is fourteen-carat gold. This three-inch-thick one is for important functions like New Year, weddings and birthdays. This one is lighter and thinner for daily home wear, this for going out, the others whichever I choose to wear. See the patterns of each link are different in each belt. This one is a fish looking up, this one a fish looking straight, these have three flowers and these two different birds.’ She then went on to show us her collection of kasut manek, beaded slippers with their loud giddy colours. She explained the significance of the different patterns and colours. She muttered that young people no longer appreciated their culture. They preferred jeans, pants, cropped pants, T-shirts, tanktops, half-naked dresses and flip flops as well as five-inch stilettoes. ‘Teach them a lesson. I’ll sell all my antiques and jewellery. Nothing for them!’
That night I excitedly told Mak, ‘Mistress Lee was so kind to tell us about her kebayas, belts, and slippers.’
Mak educated me on the sly ways of the matriarch. ‘It was not to educate us, it was warning us she would know if we stole any of her valuables!’
Nonetheless, Mak had her writer’s ‘aha’ moment. She wrote all that Mistress Lee told her about the significance of each pattern on the kebaya, on the belts, what colours were appropriate for which occasion. She checked with me the accuracy of what she had written. I conspired with Mak, ‘I’ll listen carefully to everything Mistress Lee said about her household. Perhaps we could publish a story when we get home and earn lots of money.’ Mak was silent.
Mak drew pictures of the colourful Peranakan chinaware with its intricate patterns of dragons, phoenixes and chrysanthemums in different colours. She described the Thai rosewood prayer table, another piece of furniture with intricately carved sides and legs. On it were the daily offerings of joss sticks, and fresh flowers, and food offerings to the gods on ‘special days’. That was Young Mistress Lee’s responsibility. Mak asked Young Mistress Lee what the daily offerings meant and she was glad to chat with Mak when she had no lunch or tea appointments with friends. She preferred cropped and cut-off jeans and T-shirts – ‘More comfy’. Mak wrote copious notes on each of her illustrations of chinaware that she had faithfully copied and coloured.
On Sundays, Towkay’s siblings and their families came for lunch. It was the family tradition that the eldest son, as head of the extended family, ensured the ritual was kept. The kitchen was a beehive with mothers and daughters and daughters-in-law buzzing around washing, cutting, pounding, cooking and chatting. Queen Bee Mistress Lee decided on the menu, buzzed instructions on how to slice onions, chop the meat and how to cook each dish. She spewed stings to show her displeasure. At other times she dribbled honey to show favour to another. And Mak wrote many stories of the domestic affairs, the hushed tones of gossip, illicit affairs, the single Miss Lee who was the cook, why she was single, or was she, and why was she the cook; the fights and the celebrations, Towkay Lee’s frequent business trips, what kind of business even his wife did not know about. I enriched Mak’s writings with stories on Agnes and Amy, the twins.
I had responsibilities too. Three years older than the twins I was to be their shadow, to ensure they didn’t hurt themselves, and to attend to their wishes. ‘They are still babies,’ Young Mistress Lee reminded me. At eight years old in Surabaya I was already boiling rice and cooking simple dinners for Mak and Bapa.
‘I wish I could sleep in mummy’s arms like you and your mother, Rosi,’ Amy said sadly when she went to the pantry one afternoon. ‘We have to sleep in our own room. We can’t even sleep together. Sometimes I see ghosts, but Mother says I am just being silly. No ghosts in our mansion. Only Father can sleep with Mother and Grandma with Grandpa.’
Once, Amy suggested that they took turns sleeping with Mak while I slept in their bed. They would not tell anyone. Promise. ‘Please kakak, just one night we sleep with you and you hold us in your arms, please.’ Mak would have nothing of it. Agnes and Amy made me sleep in their bed once, to empathise with their loneliness. Mak did not say anything so that meant I could. I sank into the mattress, the blanket smelt like the roses in the garden, the room was large, cold, and as I merged into the darkness I felt abandoned. I saw ghosts as well, but was too afraid to scream and be discovered sleeping in Amy’s room. I understood their need for their mother’s warmth, why they felt sad. I was happy. Now in this grand mansion I have something they didn’t have. I no longer envied their rows of Barbie dolls and clothes. Mak said nothing when I told her how sad Agnes and Amy were. Mak did not say much when I told her about the twins. She wrote them into her notebooks.
‘Rosi, you are so lucky. You can stay in the kitchen and help cook.’
‘Ya, we can’t go into the kitchen, right, Amy? Grandma said knives have a life. And if we drop them they will come and sleep with us.’
‘Rosi, let’s play masak-masak.’ But first they had to change into their play clothes. Their clothes were kept in separate closets – home clothes, play clothes, going out clothes, special occasion clothes. Same with their shoes, all of which matched their clothes. It was tiring when I had to wait for them to change into their ‘right clothes for the right occasion’ clothes. Why couldn’t they be like Mak and me – T-shirt and pants all day until we took our bath at night, then a change into pyjamas for bed?
Amy did the marketing for our masak-masak cooking games. She picked choice rose stalks, and red, pink, white and yellow roses. Not even the gardener missed them. Agnes enjoyed being the cook, she masak-ed sand into fragrant rice, roses and ferns magically turned into stir-fried vegetables, twigs into strips of meat and water into soup. We had real dessert of fresh mangoes, rambutans, chikus and jambu during the fruit season. Large palm leaves were dinner and serving plates. I was served. I stole some dishwashing liquid from the kitchen and they washed the dishes with the garden hose, after which the dishes and leftover ‘food’ were thrown onto the compost. They were happy, we were happy.
One weekend, with much fanfare, the grand piano eased itself into the alcove of the sitting room. Young Master Lee proudly proclaimed, ‘Ivory and ebony, like the piano keys,’ as he placed an ivory miniature grand piano on the ebo
ny piano. From then on it was casually referred to as Ebony. Young Mistress Lee was pleased. Music and piano skills would display the twins’ grace in good society. My task was to wipe and polish Ebony with the piano cloth until it mirrored me. In Surabaya I wiped our piano with old T-shirts.
Teacher Pi An filled musical scores into the newly ordered ivory-coloured bookshelf. ‘Mrs Lee, I guarantee you lovely Amy and beautiful Agnes will be the new-age Liberace, fingers fleeting across the blacks and whites (and in a lower tone) like mine. Within a year you will need another bookshelf for additional musical scores.’ Only the grandparents and parents were pleased.
‘People say I’m the best piano teacher in Bishan, Clementi and also Sembawang. What is a piano? Amy.’
‘Teacher Pi An, you are a piano teacher and you don’t now what a piano is? That one, beside you.’
‘How many keys are there? Agnes.’
‘I don’t know. Front door keys, room keys, kitchen keys, cupboard keys …’ she giggled.
‘Agnes, piano keys!’
Eighty-eight. Fifty-two white keys and thirty-sex black. I wiped them daily with the special piano cloth. They were clustered in 8s. From Middle C to the end of the left side the tone sounded lower and lower, while the right-hand keys rose to a higher pitch.
‘People say I’m the best piano teacher in Bishan, Clementi and also Sembawang. This is a clef, and this is a bass, symbols for right and left hand keys. Listen carefully I’ll play this only once. What beat is this?’
‘A drum?’
‘My reputation is ruined! But I need to eat,’ and his ‘frustration’ piece followed – ‘Pretend You’re Happy When You’re Blue’. I didn’t know that piece but I can play and sing ‘Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious’ superfast. In Teacher Pi An’s class adagios and allegros intermarried; forte edged lento; staccato and legato were Best Friends Forever, chromatic scales confused octave. Young Mistress Lee had insisted the lovely twins learn music theory immediately. Teacher Pi An in his agony had to oblige, as he reminded us, he needed to eat, so he prepared basic worksheets. I needed another piggy bank for coins, a coin for each correct answer on theory worksheets.