Dear Abah,
You should've seen me today right after I had a bowl of red glutinous rice porridge with durian. It was about 3:15 pm. "Wasn't it a little early for tea?" You'd probably wondered. You're right, it was early for tea, but you see I didn't have a proper breakfast this morning. While scrubbing the bathtub, the bulb in kitchen department in my head lighted up, and you know whenever that bulb lights up, I have to put on hold everything I do and follow where the light takes me.
And this morning the luminous spotlight fell on the frozen food aisle at Super88Market. I had a quick breakfast, Danon Strawberry yogurt and a second cup of coffee and took a fifteen minutes walk to the store. It was 30 degree outside, the sun shone, the dried leaves sat still on the frozen soil, so fifteen minutes walk did a wonderful job to my heart
Abah,
You must be wondering why did I prepare red glutinous rice porridge when the black glutinous rice that I was craving for? You see, the store only carried 5 pounds bag of all types of rice except for red glutinous rice they have it in 2 pounds bag. I bought red glutinous rice.
If it wasn't for the red glutinous rice I would've had my meal sooner. I didn't know red glutinous rice soaked up a lot more water than regular rice. For a half cup of red glutinous rice I cooked, it took five cups of water to turn the rice into porridge. I was furious at myself for bad timing. It was too late for lunch and too early for tea. What the heck. I scooped the porridge with durian into a bowl and put it away to cool it off.
I wiped the kitchen counter, rinsed and put away the clean dishes. I'd probably set the Guinness World record under A Malay Woman Who Cleaned Her Kitchen In One Minute As She Was Waiting For Her Red Glutinous Rice Porridge With Durian To Cool Off category. And Abah, you wouldn't want to miss this part. You would be laughing your head off when you read this. You knew that only me your daughter managed to do this dumb thing since I was young, and you knew that I'm not dumb. After I had three spoonfuls of my creamy and sweet porridge, I noticed the durian wasn't mushy and it was still remained as a whole. Durian should've blended with the porridge. The flesh was still attached to the seed. I picked it up and took a bite. Oh.......my goodness, I didn't remove the clear plastic that wrapped the durian. I was so excited to eat pulut durian, my usual observant mind and eyes were shut down completely. But you knew me Abah, I was the only one in the family who have been always walked into the doors, furniture and cooked frozen durian along with its plastic wrap.

Nevertheless Abah, I enjoyed it very much. I thought about you when I ate it because it was one of your favorite dessert. When ever Mak cooked black rice porridge with durian, she hid it away. Otherwise you wanted to have a dessert before you had your lunch.
Every time I step out the door I never forget to greet the earth, "Assalamualaikum earth, assalamualaikum sky, assalamualaikum clouds, assalamualaikum trees, assalamulaikum birds, assalamualaikum earth worms". You taught me the first time to greet the nature when we were living in Pengkalan Chepa, Kelantan. I was five years old. And now the snow cover the earth, I add to my greeting, Assalamualaikum snow. I miss you Abah.
Recent Comments