Response to "Kampung Boy"

I was not quite sure what group of people from Malaysia would be in this book and while reading I found that there were many things that I did not know about the Malays. I suppose the main thing that I did while reading this book was I compared this boy and his family to the American culture. There were obviously big differences, which was not surprising at all. The whole birthing processes is way different than that of what you would find in the American culture. It was interesting to see that they called the woman’s lochia (post partum bleeding) to be her “Pantang” (taboo) period. In addition its interesting to see that after the mother’s complete recovery from her Pantang that the family had a ceremony where they brought the baby out of the house for the first time and that they shaved the baby and gave him a bath. This is different because in the American culture a party is usually held before the baby is born and this is called a baby shower. It is interesting that they family would wait so long to bring the baby out of the house and in addition that they would shave the child’s head. A first haircut for children in American culture usually does not happen within the first 6 months after the child is born and it depends on how fast they child’s hair has grown.

 It was interesting to see how the family kept the boy as a baby in the house as much as possible. It was also interesting to see that the family kept the children naked until they went off to school. In the American culture we like to dress our children and have them fully clothed as much as possible, if we do not have them in clothes we generally have a diaper on them which seemed like they did not have that with the family in the home. In addition, it was interesting to see that the family had the boy take care of his baby sister that is generally not something that you would have your small child do.

The boy and his father seemed to have a similar relationship with that of a boy and his father would have in the American culture. Before the boy was sent off to school he looked forward to having his father come home from work and they would play when his father would come home. For bath time, this Malaysian family did not have their own bathtub; they would go with the father and walk down to the river. While we would go shopping for groceries once a week or a few times a month, this family would go on a monthly shopping trip. The boy would look forward to riding into town on his father’s bike to purchase supplies. The American culture also usually takes a car to go grocery shopping and also if they were to take a bike, they would have the child sit in a child’s bike seat, not just on the bike frame holding on to the handle bars.

The boy went off to school at the age of 6 which in the American culture children usually start between the ages of 5 and 6 so that was an interesting similarity however, the father paid the teacher upfront and monthly and he also gave the teacher a cane to use on his son when the sun was “stubborn or naughty… as long as you (he) did not break any bones of blind him.” In the American culture public education is free and physical punishment is illegal.

         The traditional weddings of this family’s culture were much different from the weddings found in the American culture because both the men and women in the American culture sign the marriage papers whereas in the book only the groom needed to do so. Also the book showed that there is a reception that is held after the bride and groom are ushered into their bedroom to be left alone. In the American culture, the wedding reception is held with the newlywed couple and they later go to a hotel/honeymoon.

         The father and how much he wanted his son to succeed in school was much like of the children and their parents in the American culture, especially since college has become such a big thing in the past decade or so. It was also interesting to see the boy’s thoughts as he was leaving the Kampung to go onto school his feeling seemed to be very similar to those that an American student may feel as they leave for college. Looking back on the family within the book and an average family found in the American culture it was interesting to see the similarities an the differences.