It’s not difficult to tell, “Oh sawang buyah hatikoo” is “Oh sayang buah hatiku”. Mom told us girls a story from her childhood. There was this one lad in her kampung, Ron Stoppable (bukan nama sebenar, nama ini adalah untuk hiasan sahaja.) He was the bodo-bodo-alang type, if you know what I mean. A bit bodo, a bit chee sin loh. He liked one of Mom’s cousins ke saper ke ntah. So one day Ron wrote her a love letter asking her to meet him bawah pokok manggis besor dekat jalan hala ke tebing tu. His terms of endearment read:
“Oh sawang buyah hati koo….”
Ron was stood up. Right there, bawah pokok manggis besor dekat jalan hala ke tebing tu. And though the girl had a good laugh that day, little did she know that the lad she stood up di petang yang hening itu was going to be a legend. Pokok mangosteen jadi saksi. The lad’s words as the pembuka kata in his letter are stuck in our head like getah manggis lekat di baju. Today, many many many years later, his sepatah kata seulas pinang dan seponjot manggis made it to the internet…sawang and all. Us, girls shall never forget. Lest we forget, there’s another one we shall remember. The pun on a card Ka Cher received from her pen-friend, Dhoruri, today in 1985:
“A man-gos-teen just thinking about you.”



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