Wednesday, November 11, 2009

Childhood 1-'Lork'

One late afternoon, Sis and I were told to buy some 'budu'/fish sauce from a shop about 1/2 km from home. With a small aluminium basin in hand we walked through the rubber smallholding. The dried rubber leaves made squeeky sound under our feet. The sun light squeezed through the florage and casted shadows here and there. We hurried through the rubber trees and jogged along the dirt path. Hard luck. The budu was out of stock. Disappointed, we made for home.

Reaching the rubber smallholding, gradually, sis quickened her steps and overtook me. In return, I made the same move. The squeeky sound under our feet sounded eerie. The shadows were 'flying' among the rubber trees. After several attempts on our part to overtake one another and about 100 meters from home, Sis let fly the basin. We ran the fastest 100 meters of our life while yelling at the top of our voices.

I fell into the arms of Koek ( father's youngest sister) who was bathing by the well. Ma came running from the kitchen. Sis and I were speechless. We were panting away. It took a lot of coaxing from the adults before we came forth with some explanations. Colours returned to our small faces amidst laughters from the adults. We were told it was an episod of ' lork' or autosuggestion/self-scare. Ma and Koek went to recover the basin.

Anyway, sis and I developed fever for the next few days.

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