Sunday, March 26, 2006

Pre-wedding preparations

The timeline up to the wedding day...

On the 7th of March, village folks from Kg Baru Jumpa, about 20km away, came over to Irene's house to put up the zinc canopy for the wedding feast. Those men were pro. The whole canopy was up by noon. Irene's dad figured that the canopy was not big enough, so he arranged for an extension of a canvas canopy at the side, where traditional Lundayeh wedding food (read on) would be served. There was also a smaller zinc canopy beside the house, built for the folks who would be preparing Muslim food. Non-Muslim food would be prepared at the adjacent neighbour's house. I wasn't on scene; was shopping for tech stuffs in LowYat and SungaiWang KL.



On the 10th of March, Irene's parent's relatives and friends from nearby villages of Kg Baru Jumpa, Sapong, Kongsi Lundayeh and Tenom came over in the morning. God bless those helpful souls. First thing was they made nasi bungkus (fragrant rice wrapped in leaves) and some dishes, which will be their meals for the rest of the day as they work on the wedding preparations. Click HERE to view the photos.


There was much camaraderie. They prepared coconut milk from real coconuts (no no... instant powder packets from the supermarkets were unacceptable). That was for the cooking of kuih kelupis (glutinous rice cooked in coconut milk and then wrapped in leaves), the must-have delicacy in every Lundayeh feast. The cooked kuih kelupis were then tied together in rows like fire-crackers, and were hung overnight.


Meanwhile, I went back to Keningau to receive my relatives who were coming from West Malaysia. After arranging for their meals and lodging, rushed back to SIB Sapong Church for a brief rehearsal.

When we got home, the workers had already hung up huge chunks of the pigs which were slaughtered a bit earlier. The men then stayed up all night and chatted away, while keeping watch on the meat. I stayed up late too, to complete the PowerPoint presentation.

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