the White South is in my heart

This is a short reflective piece of my creative writing I did for my Creative Writing Class, 'We all have our own White South' is the sentence that I took from the novel 'Tera Incognita' to be the topic for this time... In the novel, White South refers to Antartica, but I did differently to show a little bit of creativity in my writing..




When I am abroad and missing home, what do I miss the most? Of course my home sweet home. Then the food, and then the fruits. Home means a host of little things I never knew I loved so much until I am out here in a foreign land.



All those things come to my mind and tease my nostalgia. I miss the laughter in dining room with my brothers and sisters. I miss mum’s tea with her baked banana balls when we watched television. I miss massaging my dad’s leg when he sat on the sofa with bare foot. I yearn to do those things.



I remember the smells of my house, sweet and nice. Smell that I could not get at other places except my home. I miss to wake up early in the morning and fed the chickens with my little sister at the backyard.



How can I forget having a scrumptious home made lunch under the rambutan tree with the whole family in our beautiful, colourful garden. I remember the time when my dad climbed the coconut tree just to get the nice coconut juice for all of us.



I definitely could not forget when I helped my dad to clean our beautiful garden from any unwanted weeds. I certainly could remember every dry evening I played badminton with my brother and of course he won all the times.



And when August comes, everyone will be very excited as it is the fruits season. This time, my mum will be the busiest person in our family. Make sure our neighbours get a bunch of rambutans and a bunch of mangos teens. I love the time really.



Most of all, I miss all the ways. I could not forget every single thing that made me feel belonged. How far I go, how long I am away, I will still keep thinking about this little thing. We all have our own White South. And my White South is my home. There is no other place called home. I cannot see it now but it is inside me.

The feedback I got after reading this to the class were all positive. They kept asking me some sort of questions like...

1. what is banana ball ? (haha)..'cucur kodok' la..i dunno what to say in english....and i replied to them, banana ball is kind of malaysian dishes, crushed bananas mixed with flour and then fried.

2. what is rambutan? i just said, it is called singaporian lychee here..actually, rambutan originated from Malaysia..and they said.."we dont know that"...

3. what is mangosteen? what?? they dont know it !! this time i dunno how to explain.. my answer is, it's a purple fruit with sweet taste...

4. I like the way you describe the garden.. It sounded like it was in the jungle.... (what? perli ke ape budak ni...?)

5. I bet you miss your home very much.. (of course..but I'm not homesick..LOL)

6. Sense of repetition in your writing style..i like it

7.You start with a question at the beginning of the writing..it made me eager to know what is the answer...

8. the way you decribe the scrumptous homemade lunch makes me feel like, I dont want to eat any other bloody chicken KFC and McDs...haha.. (sounded good..ermm)