"BANGAU Perahu is the chosen national costume for our reigning Miss Universe Malaysia Jane Teoh when she competes in the international pageant in Bangkok, Thailand on Dec 17, 2018," quips my son, showing me the newsfeed on his phone featuring the Penang lass in her specially designed three-piece outfit.
The brainchild of designer Salleh Hamid, the costume costing RM7,000 is an artistic interpretation of the bangau or sail guard commonly seen on traditional fishing boats in the East Coast of the Malay Peninsula, between Patani and Pahang.
Together with the okok and caping, the bangau makes the front section of Teoh's flamboyant costume resemble the bow section of a fishing vessel while the playful shimmer of her skirt gives an illusion of the glistening sea water when the boat cuts effortlessly through the surface of the water.
This design makes a bold statement, highlighting the rich Malay cultural history as well as the artistic boat-making craftsmanship still found today in the traditional shipyards of Kelantan and Terengganu. I particularly like Salleh's incorporation of the colourful awan larat motifs into his composition as they help bring the intricate Malay wood carving heritage to fore.
TERENGGANU MUSEUM
As I digest the information, I suddenly recall my recent visit to Kuala Terengganu. It was at the State Museum's vast collection of boats and fishing-related artefacts that I first learnt about the protective attributes of the bangau. It was believed to have watched over the fisher folk while they set about their task reaping the bountiful harvest from the sea.
The bangau is actually a Malay word, usually applied to the elegant, snow-while cattle egret which is often seen perched on the backs of grazing water buffaloes or on exposed mudflats during low tides. On fishing vessels, the bangau, together with several others like okok and caping, represent various decorative projections that served to secure spars, sails, masts and anchors when they’re not in use.
For time immemorial, ingenious boat builders and skilled carpenters have turned these functional vessel parts into decorative art pieces which resemble, sometimes in very abstract form, different types of objects such as the head and neck of a wayang kulit (shadow play) figure, a dragon, a seahorse, a fish, a hornbill or even a duck.
Many historians believe that these ornamental embellishments were possibly relics of the golden age of the ancient Kingdom of Langkasuka. It has been created and reproduced by countless generations of Malay master boat builders to please the eye of their ruling monarch as well as those of the common folk, many of whom eked out a living as fishermen.
MALAY FISHING BOATS
Some 80 years ago, there were six common types of Malay fishing boats. The largest and most elegant fishing vessel back then was the payang. Measuring 14 metres long and 2.5 metres wide, it had a tall, steep-rising bow and a stern with equal height. Together with a main sail and a small jib, the payang carried a crew of between 15 to 20 men, a dozen oars and several leaf-shaped paddles. It was made even more attractive when painted white with horizontal bands of three or more bright colours.
While most payang were built in Terengganu, some were also built in neighbouring Kelantan. The Kelantanese fishermen favoured lighter and shorter versions which were more suited for use on their broader sloping beaches.
The second largest fishing boat was the kolek, measuring about 10 metres in length and had tall curved ends, rising nearly 4 metres from both ends of the keel, forming a shape quite similar to those of a crescent moon.
Apart from the payang and kolek, four other different types of sailing boats were in regular use until the early 1960s. The kolek kue was a smaller version of the kolek while the 8.5 metre-long bedar had prominent low projections at its ends that resembled a duck's bill. The sekochi was the smallest and lightest with plain low ends while the jalora was very similar to the sekochi except that it was built exclusively in Pahang.
BANGAU, ANAK BANGAU AND OKOK
While looking at the various exhibits at the museum, it dawns on me that the design of the bangau varied according to the type of boat it was fitted on. Like the interpretation on Jane's costume, the bangau is always found on the left side of the boat and represents the longest and most elaborately decorated projection on the vessel.
On all Malay fishing boats except the payang, the right projection bears a very close but much smaller resemblance to the bangau on the left. Due to this fact, it’s sometimes called the anak bangau. It stands upright near the edge of the boat and is seldom more than a foot high.
The payang is unique in the sense that the figure on the right is even more elaborately carved than its larger counterpart, the bangau on the opposite side. It looks completely different from the bangau and, as such, is known by an entirely different name, okok, which is a colloquial word that doesn’t appear in any dictionary.
The skilfully carved and ornate okok is usually made to represent the head of an ogre prince depicted in the Hindu epics, Mahabaratha and Ramayana. This character was introduced to Malay audiences in the East Coast through the once-popular wayang kulit or shadow play. The okok is brightly coloured and stands more than double in height compared to the anak bangau.
The bangau, anak bangau and okok are all made of hard wood to withstand the ravages of the elements. The raw materials for their construction are usually sourced from the leftover wood used to construct the main boat itself. In the past, the process of obtaining the correct type of wood from the jungle was both laborious as well as dangerous.
SPIRIT OF WOOD
Until at least the first half of the 20th century, it was common to see groups of men consisting of the prospective boat owner, master craftsmen, helpers and a bomoh or spirit medium going into the forest with provisions and equipment for up to three months to seek suitable trees that would yield the best wood.
The bomoh was skilled in incantations needed to ward off evil or dangerous spirits while the men had faith in God and since young had memorised special Islamic prayers that would help ensure safety especially at night. These prayers, called ilmu pagar, protected them from wild animals on the prowl.
Timing was important. The search had to be conducted during the dry months and completed late enough for rivers to have risen sufficiently to float the logs downstream but not too until the full force of the monsoon was upon them.
The most favoured hardwood was the cengal. Once identified, a small incision was made around the trunk. The tree was deemed sufficiently old and would yield good quality wood if little or no sap flowed out at all. Once the required number of trees have been identified, the bomoh would proceed to propitiate the spirits of the forest, jenggi kayu, seeking their permission to cut down the selected trees.
BLESSING CEREMONY
In the distant past, the people held on to an ancient belief that every object, animate or inanimate possessed a spirit. The fishing community believed that the spirit of the Malay fishing boat was embodied in the bangau. Back then, most boat owners arranged blessing ceremonies at least three times a year where their vessels were pulled up to the beach and prayers were recited for their protection as well as those of the crew members when out at sea.
The ceremony, conducted by a bomoh, involved an ancient ritual that revolved around the bangau and okok. The carved figures were anointed with oil, covered with face powder and garlanded with fragrant flowers. The people back then believed that the friendly spirits of the sea and sky and invisible wardens of the elements constantly hovered over the bangau.
At the same time, evidence of Islamic philosophy can be seen in the awan larat or basic design principle that governs the way embellishments are carved on the bangau. Although the term awan larat can be translated literally as 'stretching clouds', it’s actually a metaphor for the natural flow of life in nature.
In actual fact, the awan larat is more than a simple set of rule governing the patterns and designs of Malay artefacts. In fact, it’s a generic term which subsumes a number of other special forms. The rules and the underlying ethical and aesthetic values of the awan larat are passed on by example and practiced from one generation to another.
There are four basic rules governing the use of awan larat. First, the carved elements must be evenly distributed over the composition. Second, the ratio between the voids or empty spaces and the elements must be approximately the same size. Third, the elements must only depict plants, regardless if they’re real or imaginary, as plant-inspired motifs are central to Islamic art. Consistent with the generally accepted Islamic view about the form and representation of images, traditional Malay wood carvings never include human or animal images.
Lastly, the presence of a central motif or ibu, such as a flower, the underlying design must be repeated all around it. The carvings produced based on the application of these rules usually depict plants that are spirally and extended, filled with leaves, flowers and buds. When coloured with various natural pigments, the awan larat design gave the fishing boats both character and identity.
END OF AN ERA
The introduction of affordable motor engines in the early 1960s brought a dramatic change to the fishing boat industry. Based on statistics in several of my reference books, only one boat out of 6,840 fishing vessels registered with the East Coast Fisheries Department in 1949 was motorised. The number jumped exponentially in 1962 when 2,635 of these sailing boats were fitted with modern outboard motors.
The sekochi and bedar proved to be the most suitable for mechanisation while the graceful payang and moon-shaped kolek became fewer and fewer in numbers. Today, apart from vessels meant for recreational purposes, there are hardly any boats that carry sails anymore.
The disappearance of the masts and sails eventually led to the redundancy of the bangau. Despite its artistic attribute, many boat owners decided to do away with the bangau. Plausible excuses given at that time was that retaining the bangau impeded movement on the vessel and it made the vessel unnecessarily heavier, slower and less manoeuvrable.
An unsubstantiated tale in the 1960s told of a wealthy Kelantanese merchant who fitted all 10 of his fishing boats with in-board engines and sawed off all their bangau. The repercussions for his act were swift. Within days, he lost the respect of his men. Soon after, three of his boats were lost at sea while two others were intercepted by pirates and had their engines stolen.
Having already discarded the sails, the crew of the ill-fated vessels were forced to row more than 16 kilometres back to shore. After that, the village was awashed with talk that the incident would never have had the slimmest chance of happening if the guardian bangau had been left undisturbed.
With this in mind, I hope that the incorporation of the bangau in Teoh's costume will lend her assistance and help her prevail in the coming pageant. We should proudly rally around this year's Bangau Perahu design just like we did with the nasi lemak-inspired national costume last year and the jumpsuit featuring the Petronas Twin Towers worn by Miss Universe Malaysia 2016.
With the symbolic presence of the bangau watching over Teoh this time around and giving her the extra edge, who knows, perhaps this will be the year when Malaysia finally prevails and makes pageant history.