Hamidah

This post was written by an external contributor. If you are interested in writing a guest post for our blog drop us a line here.

Words and photos by Shamaine Othman

Shamaine visited us through Tulisan Nusantara, our writers’ residency program. Each year, published writers from across the region are invited to spend time on the island, drawing inspiration from the natural world and the stories of the Riau Islands.​ During their stay, residents explore ideas connected to place, identity, and culture. Guests may spot them working in quiet corners of the island or join open readings and informal discussions when held. Each residency leaves behind a piece of writing, which will be gathered into an anthology over time.

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I stir to the sound of the azan from the neighbourhood mosque. I usually sleep right through it but this morning it cuts through my dreams. I do the unhealthy thing of picking up my phone right off the bat.

The WhatsApp from Abah says: “I read your article. Good luck.”

Is he worried about how the Islamic authorities—the religious gestapo, as I see them—will react? Is he being ominous? Sarcastic? Playful? I curse the inscrutability of text messages. But then—ding!—the follow-up arrives.

“Abah nak remind kat Mimi, at the end of the day, you are a Malay Muslim woman. You need to be careful, Hamidah.”

So, he is worried. And he has used both my nickname and my full name, that is, deployed both the soft and hard approach at the same time, evoking at once the gentle parent and the admonishing patriarch. Still, it annoys me. Mimi was the nickname I gave myself at five because Hamidah reminded me either of a strict school headmistress or a makcik who sells kuih under a tree. It embarrassed me, still does. From time to time Abah takes pains to remind me that my ridiculously traditional name derives from royalty.

I throw my phone on the bed, pull my blanket over my head and try to catch a few more winks, but it’s not happening. My phone continues pinging, a deluge of messages from friends and relatives carrying a mix of praise, concern and warnings. (Mostly warnings.) But it is Abah’s last message that bugs me. At the end of the day, you are a Malay Muslim woman. Why does Abah sound so unsettlingly similar to the anonymous men who have hammered me online? I am tempted to reply but this doesn’t feel like a conversation to be had over text. I will go to work and talk with him later.

I change quickly, head down to the carpark of my condominium, and find my beige Corolla covered in a bouquet of red paint, gleaming like an open wound.

I ring the building management and the police. When the cops show up, they do not take photos of my vandalised car. Instead, they tell me to retrieve my laptop from my apartment and drive me to Pantai police station in a squad car. It turns out that I’m the one who is, in fact, being investigated. Some parties have filed a report against my op-ed in the Free Malaysia Post and I am being detained under the Sedition Act.

“You are the writer behind the ‘Doktor’ series?”

“Yes, I am.”

“So you understand why we have to question you?”

I shrug noncommittally.

The scene is of a doctor taking a break from her duties for a brief conjugal visit from her husband. The location is his BMW. What the scene shows is the couple adjusting their clothes after a brief moment of passion in their car.

After the episode airs, the internet explodes with angry posts about the series, the actors and, yours truly, the screenwriter and creator. I suspect the backlash will die down after a day but the attacks on my social media pages are sustained. Indignant as to why a post-coital scene between a married couple has resulted in an online witch-hunt, I write an op-ed explaining why I choose to include such intimate scenes in my writing, pointing out the irony that a much more pernicious form of sex—rape—is often depicted on Malaysian television without consequence. I write that the slightest glimpse of a Muslim woman exerting agency in matters of sexual expression seems to trouble Malays—especially Malay men—and that troubles me, a Malay woman. In fact, I write that such attitudes make me embarrassed to even call myself Malay.

None of this is actually addressed by the police, who seem more interested in whether certain motifs—both in the TV episode and in my op-ed—contain obscene innuendos. Is the open guava really just an open guava? After several hours of questioning me along these lines, they release me but confiscate my laptop for “further investigation”.

Back home, after a lengthy shower to calm my nerves, I pick up my phone and try to ignore the barrage of hate comments including tagged photos of me arriving at the police station. I wonder what Abah will think when he sees these posts. “I told you so,” I imagine him saying. I decide to text him. I know I’m seeking his approval and comfort, but instead I tell him I’m disappointed—I thought he would support me instead of taking the side of the conservatives. But is this Abah’s actual position? Is the “I told you so” not my own projection? I delete most of the text and write a brief one instead.

“I had to go to the police station today. More people lodged complaints.” I hit send.

I wait for his reply but my eyelids grow heavy. I decide to pray Isha instead. And then my phone rings, as if Abah had known to wait for me to finish before calling.

But it is not Abah. It’s my older brother, Ariff.

“I hope you’re sitting down, adik,” he says.

I rush to my father’s home. Ariff and my eldest brother, Hisham, receive me with hugs. Aunties and uncles from both my father’s and late mother’s side of the family are there and they greet me too, but some are warmer than others. I get the sense they’re being nicer to my brothers than to me.

I want to help Ariff and Hisham perform ghusl, the washing of Abah’s body, but my aunties tell me I can’t and that I should let my brothers handle this. I watch them from outside the bathroom, and then my attention turns to Abah’s bed. I can still see the impression of his body in the crumpled bedsheets. He had died in his sleep and the doctor concluded the cause was respiratory failure. What was his last thought? My paranoid mind wonders if my situation had caused his death, the stress of reading all that online vitriol against me. Okay, not everything is about you, Mimi. I take one last look at Abah’s face before my brothers wrap him in a camphor-scented kafan. I feel a need to cry but can’t.

As we wait for the hearse that will convey Abah’s body to the mosque, a few aunties cast their eyes on my t-shirt and jeans and one of them tells me to get properly dressed. How can you enter the masjid like this? It’s a common refrain but today she is right, of course. I had rushed over without preparing an overnight bag with more appropriate clothing for the funeral rites.

I go to Abah’s wardrobe, open it, and look over his modest collection of mostly casual clothes. He only has a few silk batik shirts and three pairs of baju Melayu. I put one over my t-shirt and grab one of his sarongs to cover my head. The smell of Abah’s clothes reminds of him and I take comfort in that. I will need strength to deal with my own grief; to deal with the throng of mourners showing up at the mosque and the cemetery; most of all, to deal with my relatives’ disapproving glances, which I only vaguely resent, as they offer a mirror to my own guilt.

O Allah, forgive Samsuddin bin Mohammad Karim and raise his rank among those who are rightly guided. Send him along the path of those who came before, O Lord of the worlds. Make his grave spacious for him and shed light upon him in it. May his life and memory continue to inspire wisdom and goodness.

A few nights later, my brothers and I gather to clear up Abah’s room. It’s something we’ve agreed to do together, to grieve together. The task itself is fairly straightforward as Abah never accumulated much. He has a shelf full of rare Malay books, a keris inherited from his father wrapped inside a fraying wool scarf, and a few ornaments from his travels. A small chest holds his degrees, old letters he sent to my grandparents while studying abroad and…an envelope with my full name written on it: Hamidah binti Samsuddin.

“Why don’t you open it?” Ariff asks.

“No.”

“Open it,” Hisham echoes. “There may be things that involve us.”

I stare at the envelope and refuse to open it. Hisham moves over and is about to take it from me when the doorbell rings. It’s not quite dinner time and we are not expecting visitors.

Ariff goes to the window and peers out. “Polis,” he says.

“Stay here,” Hashim commands. “We’ll go.”

This is how it works. If my brothers answer their queries, the officers will be more polite, more deferential, may even extend their condolences. Sorry, Encik Hisham, Encik Ariff, for disturbing you, especially so soon after your father’s passing. Whereas if I open the door myself, I would immediately be escorted to the station.

My brothers tell me as much when they return.

“They couldn’t find you at your apartment,” Ariff says.

“They say they’ve gone through your laptop and have further questions,” Hisham adds grimly.

“I’m sure they do. I’m sure they find my e-books pornographic.”

“Why, adik? Why must you provoke people like this?” Hisham groans.

There it is. My eldest brother, voicing his explicit objection in a way that Abah was perhaps too politic to articulate himself. Blood rushes to my face and I’m about to give Hisham a piece of my mind but Ariff, my more peaceable sibling, intervenes.

“Abang,” he says to Hisham, “things are hard enough.”

Good old Ariff, he has always understood me better. We calm down and resume sorting out Abah’s belongings. We even laugh and cry together looking at old family photos. But the matter of the police never quite goes away.

As the light fades and we pick at our plates of Abah’s favourite kari kepala ikan, Ariff asks:

“What do you plan to do?”

“What can I do?”

“Want to know what I think?” Hisham grunts.

“No, Hisham. I don’t.”

Hisham thinks I should leave KL and “lie low for a while”. But why should I flee? Fleeing would be a sign of guilt and I haven’t done anything wrong. I reject his stupid advice—until I read my father’s letter. That’s how I end up in Abah’s old Volvo, driving south past stretches of green hills, palm estates and thick forests towards Johor—specifically, the Stulang Laut Ferry Terminal in Johor Bahru.

There, I get on board a ship bound for Bintan. I feel a bit anxious as I’m surrounded by Malays, but I’m also conscious that my anxiety is vaguely ridiculous. After all, the passengers are mostly families headed to one of Indonesia’s more popular holiday islands. Still, I won’t feel safe until I have left Malaysian soil. I make my way to my seat, drape a shawl over my head and hope nobody harasses me.

Inevitably, I find myself re-reading Abah’s letter, going over his dense and curiously formal diction, the words of an old-fashioned father stumbling to teach values to a child who is no longer a child.

While I’m sad about the attacks you’ve had to endure, I’m sure you were well aware of the sensitivities we live with today. I’m not saying you shouldn’t have written the op-ed, but as a father I fear I have failed to protect you. Some days I regret sending you abroad to get an education. It opened up your worldview but also drew you away from your roots. I’m not talking about Kajang. I’m talking about Pulau Penyengat, where your namesake, Raja Hamidah, ruled as queen of the old Riau-Lingga Sultanate. Not only did she unite the Bugis and the Malays and inherit a legacy of resistance against the Dutch, she turned the island into the literary and Islamic centre of the Malay world. So, consider paying a visit there. Maybe, by tracing the steps of a Malay woman who was ahead of her time, you will not be embarrassed to call yourself a Malay, nor condemn all Malays in your writing.

I fold away the letter, constricted with grief, but still the tears refuse to flow. I marvel at Abah’s cunning. He had wanted me to leave KL too, but knew I would resist the idea. So he shrewdly cast his suggestion as a pilgrimage, one he knew I would eventually feel obliged to make.

I google Raja Hamidah and learn that she is one of those princesses whose hand in marriage was used as a political bargaining chip. The daughter of a prominent Bugis warrior and leader, Hamidah was married off to the Malay sultan Mahmud Syah III in 1804 to strengthen the alliance between two competing factions, the Malay royals and the Bugis aristocracy. The internet tells me Pulau Penyengat was “given” to Raja Hamidah as dowry and thus the island is sometimes considered a symbol of love. But then I find out that the Sultan ruled from another island, Pulau Lingga, and never once spent a night with his consort. What kind of love was this? And why would my father name me after such a princess?

In Tanjung Pinang, the main town in Bintan and the capital of the Riau Islands, I transfer to another tiny boat that locals call a pompong for the onomatopoeic pops of its engine. The ten-minute ride is bumpy and I nearly drop my phone into the water while taking pictures. At that point, the thought crosses my mind to toss the damned thing into the sea and be done with the online hatred that has caused me so much trouble. But I don’t. It occurs to me that the police had confiscated my laptop but not my phone. Maybe it’s how they will trace me should I decide to flee overseas, hahaha.

I arrive at the Pulau Penyengat jetty and, the moment I pass through the red-and-yellow arch that welcomes visitors, something shifts. I can’t say exactly what—a gust of cool air amid the heat? a flicker of the evening light?—but it’s as if I black out for a split second. I blink as the dozen makciks who were also on the pompong move ahead to meet their husbands on motorcycles.

I stare at the main building, with its two-tiered triangular roof and intricate Islamic motifs. A petite girl of about eighteen, in glasses and a baseball cap, waves at me and approaches.

“Hamidah? I’m Alia, Nabilah’s niece. Welcome to Penyengat,” the girl says with a warm smile. Nabilah is the owner of the homestay where I have booked a room for a week.

Alia leads me to her bemo—a motorised trishaw with a sidecar—and tells me it won’t take ten minutes to cross the length of the island’s two kilometres. She cranks the engine and we set off on narrow winding lanes, passing roadside vendors that soon turn into a semi-forested road. We pass by a few colourful pink and green Malay kampung houses, with cats on the porches and children playing soccer in their school uniforms. It’s all very quaint to me.

“My mother tells me you’re a famous writer from Malaysia,” Alia says in that direct manner common in many teenagers.

“I don’t know about ‘famous’. Maybe a little notorious.”

Alia grins. “I hope you don’t find this place too boring. Because, trust me, it’s very boring.”

She laughs and I can’t help but laugh with her.

“Sorry,” she continues, “I’m being a terrible guide.”

“No. Boring is good,” I reply. “Boring is very good.”

We arrive at a house with bright yellow walls and a sloping blue roof. An older woman with a batik cloth wrapped around her body and a man in a batik shirt emerge from the front door to welcome me. My hostess, Nabilah, greets me and introduces her husband, Shamsuddin. It’s hard to ignore the uncanny similarity between Shamsuddin’s name and Abah’s—Samsuddin. I also cannot take my eyes off Nabilah, a vision from an earlier time; in today’s sensibilities, it is almost unreal to see a Malay Muslim woman dressed in a single batik cloth that shows so much of her shoulders and legs.

The couple lead me into their house and directly to a dining table, where a spread of seafood has been laid out. As in Malaysia, Indonesian hospitality dictates that a host’s first priority is to ensure their guest is well-fed.

As we settle down to eat, I glance around the cosy but uncluttered living room, whose centrepiece is an intricate table-top lantern adorned with the silhouette of a crescent and star. There is a small bookshelf by the side with mostly Malay titles.

“So, this is your first time in Pulau Penyengat?” Shamsuddin asks.

“Yes. Thank you for welcoming me into your home.”

“My wife says you’re a writer. I’m guessing you will want to learn more about our famous scholar, Raja Ali Haji.”

“Actually, I came to visit the tomb of Engku Puteri Raja Hamidah.”

“Of course, his legendary aunt,” Nabilah chimes in. “I will take you first thing tomorrow.”

“His aunt?”

“Didn’t you know they were related?” she asks.

“I must confess to feeling quite ignorant right now,” I say.

Shamsuddin chuckles, but not unkindly.

“Do you know, our Alia was named after Raja Ali Haji?” Nabilah continues with a smile.

At this, Alia rolls her eyes. “I may be named after him but I have no interest in his writing. They teach Tuhfat al-Nafis in school and I’m always falling asleep.”

“Raja Ali Haji set down the key Islamic ethics that shaped Bugis and Malay kingship and civilisation. You may find it tedious now, but in time you will go searching for his wisdom,” Shamsuddin says, tapping his daughter’s cap playfully while giving me a knowing glance.

“He has a few things to say about women too,” Nabilah says.

“He does?” I say, my interest piqued.

“He does?” Shamsuddin exclaims and everyone laughs.

After dinner, Shamsuddin and Nabilah take me on a walk to see Masjid Raya Sultan Riau, the regal, elevated mosque commissioned in the 1830s by the Riau-Lingga Sultanate. The mortar used to build the mosque was famously infused with egg whites that were gifts to the royal family, giving it a white sheen that was only later painted yellow and green.

It is not an ordinary evening. Ascending a wide flight of stairs, I see children playing in the courtyard while throngs of men, dressed in white Arabic thawbs or songket sampin with the ceremonial tanjak headgear, jostle to get into the prayer hall. A group of worshippers smile amiably and invite me to enter—“Jemput masuk”—but I shake my head as I don’t have a shawl to cover my head.

“What’s the occasion?” I ask my hosts.

“Prayers for the deceased before Ramadan,” Nabilah explains. “Do you want to join us?

I recall how my aunts often check my modesty before going to mosque and it strikes me how different the sensibilities here are. But I feel underdressed, nonetheless.

“No, thank you, Nabilah,” I decline politely. “I’ll just wait here.”

I watch Shamsuddin and Nabilah enter the mosque and am surprised, first at the feeling of disappointment that grips me, then by the instinctive response to run to a nearby stall to buy a sarong. I drape the cloth over my head and shoulders and rush back to the mosque.

It seems all of Pulau Penyengat’s residents are here, and seeing two thousand people performing sujud, prostrating themselves to be closer to God, fills me with a sense of awe and humility.

The imam begins his khutbah with a prayer for Muslims who fasted last Ramadan but passed before the coming one. May Allah forgive their sins and grant them the highest place in Jannah. May Allah shower them with His infinite mercy, ease their journey in the grave, and grant peace to their souls. May Allah surround them with light, and grant patience and comfort to their loved ones.

I think of Abah and, at long last, I weep. I call out to him in deep sighs. My heart is enveloped in a profound sorrow that convulses my chest. I ablute my hands with my tears.

In my grief, I look up and the sky briefly flashes white.

All of a sudden, the Grand Mosque is empty. The thousands of worshippers are gone. I am standing at the edge of the empty prayer hall.

“Hamidah Samsuddin.”

I turn and see a woman in Malay royal attire, embroidered with patterns that look emblazoned rather than stitched into the fabric. Her hair is pulled tightly into a bun and pinned with a cucuk sanggul that spreads out like a small peacock’s tail, glittering with jewels. A gold necklace sits close to her skin, her pearl earrings shimmer. Her wrists are stacked with gold bangles that jingle softly as she moves.

She addresses me in Malay.

“Follow me now. Khatijah has been arrested.”

“Tuanku, Raja Hamidah ke?” I ask.

She nods, clearly annoyed at being asked the obvious. She leads me quickly down the steps of the masjid. We cross the road and take a path through a forest.

“Where are we going?”

Raja Hamidah ignores my question and briefs me on the present situation. “Khatijah Terung, one of our most renowned authors, is being vilified for her latest book.”

“What book?” I ask.

“Perhimpunan Gunawan bagi Laki-laki dan Perempuan, a sexual intimacy guide for married women.”

We emerge from a clearing and arrive at a grand wooden building with a double-tiered triangular roof. The building has a lime green porch and intricate gebyok doors. We enter through the main door and find a hall packed with rowdy villagers, mostly men. I hear the words, Khatijah Terung’s name being uttered like something dangerous. The crowd’s anger is palpable.

I expect Raja Hamidah to speak, but she just stands there and watches as a young woman enters the crowd, parting them into two halves. I gasp as I recognise Khatijah Terung’s face as my own. She sits calmly in between the two groups with her book in her lap, and I realise she is on trial.

Raja Hamidah leans closer to me. “On the far side is the Rushdiah Club, of which Khatijah is a member,” she explains. “I commissioned this group of scholars and writers to turn Pulau Penyengat into a centre of learning for the Riau Sultanate. On the other side are the villagers.”

I look over at the second group, their voices sharpened by concern and tradition, insisting that Khatijah’s words have crossed a line.

A member of the Rushdiah Club steps forward and takes Khatijah’s book. He raises it, his expression neutral. The crowd murmurs its disapproval but the scholar holds up his other hand, seeking forbearance.

“The Muslim mind is an inquiring mind, one that seeks to understand,” he says, addressing the villagers. “But if we only accept knowledge when it is comfortable, then we stop being a knowledgeable people. What Khatijah writes is not indecent. It may be uncomfortable, but intimacy within marriage is not shameful to discuss. It is part of adab, of understanding how a husband and wife share responsibility, body, and faith. This book is not an attempt to corrupt the mind. It is an inquiry.”

The scholar returns the book to Khatijah. I feel something shift in the crowd, mumblings of uncertainty. Khatijah appears neither relieved nor victorious. She looks over and fixes her gaze on me. Her eyes are tired, as if she has heard variations of this argument in too many rooms, across too many lifetimes.

Then one of the villagers moves towards Khatijah and snatches the book from her. Another villager steps forward, strikes a match and sets the book on fire. The pages curl inward, blackening at the edges. Words disappear in the glow of the flames.

My attention shifts to Khatijah, who does not fight them. She just watches, as if conducting her own silent resistance. When the book has completely disintegrated, she rises and walks away from the crowd. She approaches Raja Hamidah and me.

“Awak yang menulis kan?” she asks, keeping her eyes on me. “You are the one who writes?”

I nod.

“Good. Then you will understand eventually that writing is not about being correct. It is about being responsible for what you reveal.”

Raja Hamidah draws us into a huddle, bridging something invisible.

“Writing is not just a manner of preserving memory, it is a way of wielding power. This island has always been a place for those who preserve and those who provoke. And between the two, there will always be a place for women who refuse to disappear.”

Khatijah and I look at each other for a moment, and then the same words leave our mouths simultaneously:

“Awak akan terus menulis? Will you continue to write?”

I hear the azan and my eyes slowly flutter open. I cough and force myself to sit up. I’m on a thin mattress in a spartan bedroom—the homestay. The sarong I had bought from the roadside seller lies crumpled at my feet.

There is a knock on the door and Alia and Nabilah enter.

“Are you okay?” Nabilah says, trying to sound calm but there is an edge of worry in her voice.

“What happened?” I ask, disoriented.

“A security guard found you unconscious in the main hall of the Balai Adat,” Alia says. “You’ve been asleep for nearly two days.”

“We need to get you to a doctor,” Nabilah says, placing a hand gently on my forehead.

“No, no, please, I…” I refuse to say I fell into a delirium or a dream, because a part of me does not accept that explanation. “I got caught up exploring and didn’t realise how tired I was. I feel fine now. Really. If I feel unwell, I will let you know.”

“Okay,” Nabilah relents. “I’ll prepare some lunch and you can rest some more.”

“Actually, will you take me to Raja Hamidah’s tomb? Please. I need to see it.”

Nabilah looks at me, like a reluctant mother tending to a stubborn child.

An hour later, the three of us are on Alia’s bemo, riding towards Makam Pahlawan Nasional, the complex that houses the tombs of Raja Hamidah, the writer Raja Ali Haji and other national patriots.

As we pull up near the entrance of the complex, I see two familiar faces waiting at the gates: the two police officers from KL. They have managed to hunt me down after all. Alia and Nabilah look on, puzzled and disturbed, as I approach the officers in dark sunglasses.

“Did you track me using my phone?” I ask.

“No. We just had to apply a bit of pressure on your brothers.”

“Can I visit Raja Hamidah’s tomb before we leave?”

One of them shakes his head and the other laughs. Somehow, I don’t feel a need to argue.

“Let me say goodbye to my hosts.”

I turn back towards Alia and Nabilah, still watching from the bemo. Nabilah’s face is wracked with anxiety but Alia wears an expression of indignation. I tap her cap playfully, the way I’d seen her father do.

“I have to go with these men. Thank you for taking care of me.”

Mother and daughter wrap me in their arms. I’m filled with gratitude for the care of these two women I still barely know.

“Allah yubarik feekum,” I say. May Allah bless you both.

“Barakallahu feeki,” Nabilah replies. “You will be back. The island will always find a way to bring you back.”