Malaysia-Indonesia: POPIAH WARS

Lately there has been lots of people making lots of claims. Some are claiming ownership to languages, islands and even certain types of dishes such as popiah, nasi lemak and chicken rice. I thought perhaps it is time I set the record straight about certain things which are rightfully owned by my family.

You see, I am the fifth generation here in Malaysia. My great grandfather who was fondly known as Aboo Tata, originated from a remote village in South India called Kadayanallur. One evening while Aboo Tata was having ‘tosai’ at home, the neighbour’s monkey jumped over the table causing the chutney to splatter all over his white dhoti. When he took it off, he discovered a beautiful design of artwork on his dhoti. Ever since then, Aboo Tata started printing beautiful designs on cloth. That was actually how batik was created. So technically, batik is owned by my family.

Now let’s move on to Aboo Tata’s cousin brother’s nephew who was simply known as Ghulam. He was a lazy bum who only enjoyed doing one thing – hunting. One day while using his slingshot at the birds, he discovered that strings tied to woods could produce a melodious sound. He then tied strings onto some sticks of bamboo and started playing wonderful music. That was how string instruments were created. So technically, sitar, guitar, harp and violin are owned by my family.

Ghulam’s aunt called Beevi Amma is also someone who made my family very proud. It has been told for generations that one day when Beevi Amma was on her way to visit her daughter-in-law, she brought some shrimp and chilli neatly tied in a small sack. However, the buffalo cart she was travelling in fell into a huge hole. The buffalo fell right onto the shrimp-chilli sack, the cart fell onto the buffalo and Beevi Amma fell onto the cart. When she finally found the sack, the shrimp and chilli turned into pastes and were all mixed up. That was how Beevi Amma discovered one of the best recipes in the world – sambal belacan. So technically, sambal belacan belongs to my family too.

Anyway, back to the story, since the buffalo fell into the hole, it was badly hurt. So Beevi Amma sent her son to the village bazar to sell it off for a good sum of money. After disappearing for almost half a day, her son – Packeer, returned with five magic beans. Upset and angry, she threw the beans into the ocean and never spoke to Packeer ever again. Do you know what happened to the magic beans? An island emerged right at the same spot Beevi Amma threw those beans. So technically, Sri Lanka belongs to my family.

By the way I forgot to mention about one of my ancestors who used to live in Packeer’s village. There is no record of his name but I was told by my grandmother that people used to call him Param. He was a traveller. According to my grandmother’s story, Param sailed to South East Asia in the 1370s and got married to a local girl from Palembang. They had three sons – Parameswaran, Paramesundram and Parameswara. His youngest son married the princess of Majapahit and became the ruler of Malacca. In other words, my family is the rightful heir to the throne of Majapahit and Malacca.

So you see, I am no ordinary person. I am the rightful owner of batik, guitars, sambal belacan, Sri Lanka and Malacca. But despite having the ownership of all those things, unlike a certain someone from Indonesia, my family and I have decided not to protest to claim ownership for them. We are actually very happy to share them with the rest of the world.

It’s okay, there is no need to thank us. We are after all from royal blood – it is our nature to give blessings to the commoners. - FMT