Thursday, July 29, 2010

Hanafi Kasbi




Although we both joined the same organization Felda after leaving the then College of Agriculture Malaya (now Universty Putra Malaysia) in 1972, our path has never crossed and thus we have never met.
Hanafi was not only a classmate in Serdang but he was also a groupmate. In Serdang term this is a group of ten person who will form the smallest unit for each year from a total of approximately 180 students. The formation was done by the College authority, Every activity will revolve around this unit for tutorials, sharefarm and many other activities within and without the college. It was a closely knit unit randomly chosen irrespective of race, sex, religion and state where we came from. A member of this group are like brothers and sisters. Even outings for satay Kajang in Kajang are made together after every disbursement of scholarship money by the College.
It was after some members namely Aziz Abu Hassan, Dato' Khalid Hassan and several others were planning a get together in August and another one in October 2010 that we started looking for all the members. Thanks to Facebook, things were made easier for us all to locate each other.
The biggest surprise came on 28th July 2010 when we were chatting on facebook and we enquired about each other's location. He dropped the bomb and told me that he had settled down in Kubang Kerian, Kota Bharu, kelantan since 2008, almost 3 years ago without any of our other classmates knowing it. Being a Selangorian, I thoght he must have settled down in Selangor at the very least. Who would have thought of him settling in Kelantan?
Since we are quite near with me staying just a across the Kelantan River, a meeting was in order and he agreed to come over to Pasir Mas at 3.00 PM.
He was supposed to come via the Tendong bridge to pick me up at my house before we proceed to an eatery famous for its Mee Udang. He came via the Jambatan Salor instead after missing the turn to the Jambatan Tendon which often happens to people not familiar with the area. If you were to follow the road sign to Pasir Mas, it will lead you to pasir Mas via the Salor Bridge.
He made a stop and called me for direction. Since the place where he stopped was close to the mee udang eatery, I told him to just stay there and give me time to meet him there.
It was impossible to talk much at the eatery as the place is located to close to the busy road. We finished our delicios plate of mee udang and proceeded to my house in Mekasar a distance of about 6 km on the other side of town.

We reminisced about old times especially about those times we were employed by Felda.
The best topic was about our classmates especially the group mates during our first year in Serdang. We recalled the other members of the group comprising of the only rose in the group Rokiah Yusoff from Terengganu, Mohd Hamzan Din from Negeri Sembilan, Taharin Shafie , Aziz Muhamad from Pahang, Sabundok Linggo from Sabah, Adzaudin bin Salleh from Kedah, Zainuddin Shamsuddin from Penang, Ali Abu Bakar and of course himself Hanafi Kasbi and myself Mohamad Zawawi Ahmad.
I related to him on how I met Sabundok Linggo in Bukit Bintang KL and after telling him who I was, we parted as complete strangers as he couldn't recall much of our time together in Serdang way back in 1969.
As to Hanafi he remarried a Kelantanese since the demise of his wife some ten years ago due to breast cancer, an incurable disease that has been inflicting the female gender. I guess Kelantan will be his home and he will settle here for good. It is normal for non Kelantanese to SKMK, Sampai Kelantan Mesti Kawin and Saya Kahwin Mek Kelantan. In Hanafi's case he married the Mek Kelantan while they were based in Kuantan where they met.

16 comments:

Pak Idrus said...

Zawi, Great narative of the meeting.

At this age it is always great to meet those who were with us in our youth. Surely there are plenty to tell in such meeting.

In the golden age friends is one asset that we should treasured, other than of course our loved one.

Have a nice day.

Tepi Sungai Batu said...

Pak Zawi,
SKMK - Siang Kerja Malam Kerja (barang semua dah naik harga).

Wan Sharif said...

Salam Bro Zawi,
One of the pleasure of life.. to meet old friends and reminisce about the time share together..

Pak Zawi said...

Pak idrus,
Friends are most treasured at this age of ours. We were in our youth since we were last together and we were innocent of the problems facing the world then.

Pak Zawi said...

Pak Man,
Kerj la sepuas puasnya semasa boleh kerja. Bila dah tua dan tak larat dah tak boleh kerja.
Selamat bekerja.

Pak Zawi said...

Wan Sharif,
So much to talk about, so much to laugh about but time is now the constraint. We will be having another get together with more members in the future.

~CovertOperations78~ said...

It's great to keep in touch, Abang Zawi! So many things to catch up on, when we meet up with old friends. Glad you managed to reconnect with old coursemates.

Pak Zawi said...

Ee Lynn,
When you are at the tail end of your life, everything becomes precious, what more old friends. Time is no longer a luxury. Yes, time to catch up now since some have already left us while a few are unable to travel for being wheel chair bound or dependence on dialysis machine.
Hope you enjoyed your langkawi trip, especially when that special someone is around.

Temuk said...

Salam Pak Zawi
It is certainly great to be able to meet with old friends. Of course, we might find one or two old friends who don't seem to be interested in cerita dulu-dulu. Such friends might have their own personal problems that we are not aware of - health, money, marriage, etc. Kesihan juga, ada kawan2 lama, bila kita temui, baru kita ketahui nasib mereka tak sebaik kita. Ceria selalu!

Pak Zawi said...

Salam Temuk,
How true with what you said about friends who had to go thru life the hard way and suffered failures. There are many others like me who didn't manage to pursue higher education and remain at the bottom rung of the hierarchical while in service, thus feeling inferior when meeting friends with higher degrees or became wealthy. Fortunately I didn't suffer from such inferiority complex and remain steadfast that I could do it if I had wanted to especially now with the education system where you can choose the subject you feel good at. For what I didn't get to do, I ensure that my children get to do it with me feeling being part of their success.
Forever I will continue to look up old friends whatever their position is in life.

Unknown said...

it's nice to meet up with old buddies. And that Mee Udang shop.. where is it ? It it at Pasir Mas somewhere near Bomba ? Your house is huge !

Pak Zawi said...

Lim,
The mee udang is in Lemal infront of Petronas. My house is a small one. Come to my house again and I will show you.

Lee said...

Hello Zawi, very interesting reading. I remember several of my father's old friends, now long gone were graduates of this College once upon a time.
Good college then. Lost touch about it since.

How you doin'? Wishing you the best of health, Lee.

Pak Zawi said...

Lee,
Judging from the many successful people that was produced by the College (not me anyway) I guess the College did produce fine graduates. I guess an education from that College was very rounded we learnt many sciences that proved to be useful in our life.
I am doing OK and now it is the beginning of the fasting month and I hope to shed a few kg of excess weight.

Atok said...

salam abe wi,

selamat ber-ramadan. makae sedak2 tu ingak2 oghe jaoh :)

ambo sinning mmaepeh weh, mugo 17 jae poso :(

Pak Zawi said...

Atok,
Selamat berpuasa bagi Atok sekeluaga. Posa 17 lagi besar pahala dari poso 12 jam sini. Kena ingat juga ada masa disana yang tak sampai 10 jae pun. Kuat kan Iman dan 17 jae tu tak rasa lama.