Friday, January 30, 2009

Sea food in my blood

You may wonder why we have such fascination with seafood. It is in our blood. On both sides of my parents' family. They have fish ponds.
Even now, despite having the Chan family's land confiscated by the Communists Government for three decades, the family in China are back rearing fish in Kwong Liang.
Mum's Dad had a fish pond in Durin. We loved it when it was time for harvest. We drove up to help him. He had a little dam at one end, and he would release some of the water so that we could go down to the water which was our shoulder deep. It was a festival affair. The men and the boys went down the pond, but no body could stop me. We went from one end of the pond pushing a big net like a tennis net and waded towards the other end. The choice fish and prawns went to the restaurants in Sibu town. We were left with giant predator fish. There was no refrigeration then. The women cleaned the fish at the deck and we had a big feast. We sun dried the rest. Grand Dad had a generator which fueled a motor to pump water to the house. I thought he was very smart as the other villagers had to carry water from the river.
Mum's Brother Uncle Sieng Shui still keeps that fish pond, though not as large scale as before. My friend K, a horticulture teacher, and Mum's cousin said the problem with that pond was it's location. It was near a stream, and there were lots of predators. Four legged ones like ottors and two legged ones. I will not elaborate on the two legged ones here, I reserve it for my Borneo book.

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