A Feast to Celebrate!

The Malaysian food scenes. Where can you get arrays and rows and rows of good food if not in buffet, family gatherings or wedding ceremonies. The colours and smells can make your tummy rumbles...yum...yum...

The last time I was in a family gathering was last month, in my sister's house in Sungai Buloh. After four hours of travel down south, we finally arrived at her new home. It was already middle of the night, but hey...sis, mom and nieces were coming, so my sis, her hubby and daughter were waiting patiently for us to appear. Finally, after midnight, we knocked on the door. They greeted us with a smile. Hands shakings were exchanged. Ahh...

Our visit was to perform an Aqiqah for my daughters and my sis's newly born daughter, Khaleesa Jaida. We slaughtered three goats and distributed the meat to the poor, family members and neighbours. It cost RM 600 for each goat for each daughter. So I had spent RM 1 200 on the goat alone. The goat's price used to be cheaper, but it seems everything has gone up in pricings. The Aqiqah was long overdue. We were suppossed to have it when they were still new borns. Now my eldest is already five years old and her sis is almost four. It just so happen my sis just got a new baby, we therefore decided to combine the feast and celebration. Hence, the Aqiqah at her place.

Back to the preparation,...there was nothing much to prepare by the way because everything was already planned. The tables and chairs, the guests, food and canopy...All had been sorted out. So my visit was more of 'sit and do nothing' guest...(I hope I was not a pest!).

The next morning, we had breakfast. Another day to wait for the big day. So, I had nothing to do than munching and putting food in my mouth. Roti canai, nasi lemak,fried noodles and some sweet desserts, or kuih like we call it here. My mom was sitting on the sofa reading newspapers, the children were upstairs, all by themselves. In the evening, my sis called. What's for dinner? ha? Dinner? Oh...we have masak lemak ikan merah...and fried eggplants...What? What to buy for dinner? Hmm...since you asked....get us fried koay teow and koay teow kung fu for us all here. Hungry? The children were...they have been playing with too little food in their stomach. The adults...hmm...we were the ones with less activities but too much food. Makan lagi...

Anyway, that night, me and my sis made ourselves busy. We decided to give the guests some gifts, so we were spending quarter of the nights putting sweets and chocolates in an organza pouch and tied them nicely and arranged them in a basket. For the children, we had two badges and chocolates in decorated plastic pouches tied with strings. They loved it!

The next morning started a bit slow. Mom cooked pulut kuning or yellow sticky rice. I had cooked besamah daging or beef styled curry the night earlier. These two dishes are best eaten together. Besides besamah daging, we also eat our pulut with rendang...yum...yum...(the recipes...later). Anyway, the guests would only arrive after 2pm, so we had plenty of time. My sis hubby was the cook. He hired a few people to help him cook the dishes...briyani rice, chicken curry, black pepper lamb, cucumber and pineapple salads, spicy fried chicken. The drinks...teh tarik and a mixture of orange and syrup. Yum...yum...The food were fantastic. I could taste the herbs and spices and the briyani rice was superb! I noticed many had second servings. My uncle had five glasses of teh tarik!

The small feast was merry and full of kindred spirits. We had our relatives, friends and neighbours coming to join in the celebration. It made us all closer and in the end, with a huge sigh of relief, I felt that my duty has completed. I have done my requirement as what I should do as a parent, that was to perform an Aqiqah. Although it was a bit late, I thank God that all went well.