Ridiculous Indeed

I was chatting with a friend about history (called Sejarah in Malay language) in Malaysia a while ago. As we shared our thoughts, I am reminded of something that happened to me in Form one.

Form One was the first year I came to learn Sejarah "academically". I remember that for almost the whole year, the only thing we learned was the history of the Malacca Sultanate. Founded by Parameswara, a prince from Palembang, Malacca thrived as an entrepôt where traders along the East-West route converged for trading.

Our teacher was a great narrator. She always had a great way of making Sejarah interesting for us. At the same time, however, she had the tendency to aggrandize the greatness of the Sultanate, to the extent of describing Malacca as the world capital and the leaders as flawless statesmen. She also has this ludicrous way of punishing us - she got us to run around the school as the punishment for not doing her homeworks.

So there was one day that she said something ridiculous. I can't remember exactly what she said, but I think it was something like, if the Portuguese had not used some unfair magical tactic to distract the Malacca troops, the troop would have been able to fend off even ten Portuguese marine troops. Or China during 15th century would have had to bow to Malacca's greatness. Something like that.

As recalcitrance got the better of me, I yelled out indignantly,

"MUKA TEMBOK"
["Shameless"]

The teacher's jaw dropped. She hurled the chalk towards the blackboard, then sat down livid with anger. Go figure the rest of the drama with your imagination. Or ask Eric.

That would go down the history as the most ridiculous thing I have done in my life.