THE MEMOIRS OF MUSTAPHA HUSSAIN - Malaysia Today

94 Memoirs of Mustapha Hussain
Five dollars was an unthinkable amount to these impoverished
farmers. Each farmer would have to tap, collect, roll, smoke and sell
almost a pikul (130 pounds) of rubber to pay the five dollars. What
injustice! A foreign capitalist had oppressed these poor Malay farmers! I
cried in my heart. I felt ashamed to face the farmers. I knew all of them,
including a haji who was old and deaf. I planned to ask Jamil to give
them the money for the fine, but alas, I was only earning a small salary.
Again, I asked myself, “Why are the Malays, who own this land, so damn
poor?” Jamil, in a most regretful tone, tried to console me, “What can
we do? You came to this district during the Depression. Had you come
earlier, when things were good, there was plenty of money. The chettiars
gave money, the Chinese rubber growers gave money, some even sent
money regularly, once a year.”
Following the dispute with the Estate Manager, a letter arrived
transferring me from my Agricultural Assistant position in the field to a
lecturing job at the School of Agriculture.
More About My Unforgettable First Boss Ariffin
I can write a whole volume on my first boss Ariffin, but I shall just jot
down some sweet memories we shared for almost two years. Raja
Mohamad, an Agricultural Officer from Kedah, with vast experience in
rice planting, succeeded him.
Once, when Ariffin and I were riding his old, under-powered motorcycle
on a narrow estate laterite road, he braked just short of a visible
slippery stretch of road. We got off and he began to push his bike. Before
I could open my mouth to suggest that we could still go on riding using a
lower gear, he proudly said, “This is why I have never met with an accident.”
Once he left a coat and some clean clothes at my house. I asked Jamil
what this was all about. He sniggered and gave the same ‘wait and see’
routine. One evening, Ariffin arrived in a huge taxi and asked me to
accompany him to the fun city of Ipoh. Then I knew why he had left his
clothes in my house, so that his wife would not know where he was going.
In Ipoh, we watched a movie from third-class seats, because he claimed
he did not like the higher-class seats.
On another occasion, while I was at his house, he forbade me to use
the word Penang or Pulau Pinang. I was to just say ‘the island’, so that
his non-English-speaking wife would not know where we were going. So,
we went to Penang and came back the same night. What good was it to
travel all that distance and then rush back before one could really have a
good time?