I was driving into our apartment’s parking area when my eldest daughter spotted an incredible stellar phenomenon last night, December 1.

“Look, the moon is smiling. Two eyes and a smile,” said Dinie. We gazed out the car’s windows and there it was ..the smile and the bright, sparking eyes in the western night sky.

Instantly a thought crossed my mind that Allah had sent a cheerful SMS, a Smiley to us mankind, like a year-end holiday greeting or something.

It sure cheered me up. It couldn’t have happened at a better time than last night when my entire family is grieving the loss of a family member over the weekend. My niece’s hubby, Abdul Rahim, succumbed to renal failure on Saturday. All of us had returned to Alor Setar upon being informed of the death to be with Aziah and her four children. The burial was held on Sunday morning.

It is my wish that the “Smiley” would help my niece Aziah and her children to bounce back from this setback in their lives and move on with renewed strength.

Millions across the globe witnessed the stellar show. A check on the Internet revealed the phenomenon was caused by Venus, Jupiter and a three-day-old crescent moon aligning at the right spot to form the Smiley. It is calculated that the another Smiley would appear again in another five years time.

Apart from the Smiley, I had another awesome sighting but more of an earthly kind.

It was decades ago when my elder brother brought home a dead Rajah Brooke Birdwings butterfly in a glass frame. It was a beautiful insect, which had fascinated me eversince.

Only once I saw a life Rajah Brooke butterfly spreading its magnificent wings on a rock at a waterfall in Yan, Kedah. I think I was only 10 years old then and I never saw another life one again despite having gone into the jungles countless times, here in the peninsula and in Borneo.

However, the insect appeared before me when I wasn’t looking out for it. After four hours of driving from Alor Setar to KL, I stopped at the Gua Tempurung rest area to let the kids run free for a moment. Gua Tempurung is our favourite stop on our way back to KL because of the scenic view, cool air and a refreshing stream nearby.

As always, I went to the stream to wash my face. Suddenly, I noticed a beautiful butterfly spreading its wings on a rock a distance away from where I stood. I immediately grabbed my camera, set it up and tip-toed closer. Yes! There it was, the Rajah Brooke Birdwings. I just could not believe my eyes. A magnificent sample right there in the clearings…

The insect is from the animalia kingdom. Its binomial name is Trogonoptera brookiana. Synonymously referred to as Troides brookiana.

The Rajah Brooke butterfly is a distinctive black and electric-green birdwing butterfly from rainforests in Borneo and Malaysia; this rarely sighted butterfly is the national butterfly of Malaysia and is protected.

The wings of the male butterflies are black and each forewing has seven teeth-shaped electric-green markings or more like fern leaves (the smaller hindwings are also black and green markings).

The wings of the female butterflies are browner with prominent white flashes at the tips of the forewings and at the base of hindwings. The head is bright red and the body is black with red markings.

This butterfly was named by the naturalist Alfred R. Wallace in 1855, after James Brooke, the Rajah of Sarawak.

Last one with brother and sisters before he turns into a man...

This will be my ride or else, no circumcision...

No big deal lah To'Wan...

This doctor did it ...

Time to rest and heal....

My youngest son, Alif, is a very worried almost-eight-year-old. The final term school break is a fortnight away and he realizes that his days as a little boy are numbered.


I could read the anxiety written all over his face. I could sense that he is not really looking forward to the year-end school holidays because that is when he would go through the Muslim rites of passage, a child becoming a young man, with religious and social responsibilities and obligations.


InsyaAllah, Alif is to be circumcised this coming school holidays. Berkhatan, bersunat or “potong ko**” as his uncles and elder brother Patpat would crudely put it. Some pillars of strength these men folks are to Alif. A fine band of macho men Alif could turn to for inspiration, encouragement and motivation……..


The stories they told Alif about circumcision and the manner the ritual is performed could scare the living daylights out of the bravest of men, even. Of course, they were merely teasing him, just like how their elders had teased them. I believe Alif knew they were pulling a fast one on him and how they were trying to intimidate him with all those tales. Alif would smile and laugh along with them. I, however, could sense he was putting a brave front… control macho, as the young ‘uns would say it nowadays.


I had my share of mental anguish as well during my time. I had it done with my brothers, Kamal and Udin, together with a friend when I was almost nine. It was a traditional “potong ko**” ceremony where we had entrusted our “manly future” in the trembling hands of a very old Tok Mudim with failing eyesight, who was holding a very, very sharp cut-throat razor blade!


Of course there was a banana trunk for us to sit on, a bamboo thong to clip the foreskin for that clean cut, a bowl of ashes which the mudim would sprinkle on the wound to stop the bleeding and very thin paper, the kind one uses in kite-making, for bandages. In the olden days, circumcision was a grand celebration. Relatives and friends would gather at your home, and there would certainly be a feast.


The boys would be treated like kings, almost all their wishes fulfilled… Ask for anything to eat , your wishes would be granted. Somehow, I can’t help thinking that we were no different than the maidens of the Aztec civilization, well fed and cared for , bedecked with gold and precious stones, and appeared radiant with the best of fineries, only to be thrown into a pit of melting lava at the end of it all to appease their angry Sun God!


In those days among the Malay community, the boys would be taken for a bath in a nearby river or well. The cold water would soften your muscle, particular that most-important part of the anotomy. After taking a drink of blessed water and munching on the sirih leave and betel nut to summon courage, they would be hoisted up on the shoulders of their elder brothers, uncles or fathers and paraded back to face the Tok Mudim.


As we were living in a government quarters in Jalan Pegawai then and the nearest river, the terribly polluted Sungai Kedah, was some three km away, we had our ritual bath under a shower in the courtyard for all to see. Then, one by one, we were taken to the mudim, who was seated cross-legged in our living room which by then was already filled up with older relatives and neighbours. I was fervently praying that the Tok Mudim could keep his hands steady so that he would remove only what should be removed, nothing more than that!


Except for my father, uncles and elder brothers, I can’t recall who else were there in the living room at that most important, terrifying moment of my childhood life but I could certainly remember a band of cheeky, geeky, pony-tailed young neighbourhood girls peering through the windows, gawking at us naked boys, straddled over the banana trunk. At that moment… control macho, babe….. It was too late to back out of it, to chicken out, so to speak. If I did, they would make sure my future generations would know about it. They would instantly forget about my bravery, but not the grunt or that single drop of tear or that hesitant step I took as I was making my way to the banana trunk. Fearing the embarrassment I would have to go through for the rest of my life, I did what almost-a-man would do at that critical moment of his life….control macho lah!


Oh yes, there was also a pair of lizards, somewhere on the ceiling right above me. I was already comfortably seated on the banana trunk and held down by I-don’t-know-who. I remember looking at the Tok Mudim and trying to locate the razor blade which he had hidden out of my sight. Suddenly, he said, “Eh! Tengok tu, cicak bergaduh atas tu.” I looked up, and swooshhhh… I’d stepped over. I was no longer a child. And, Praise to Allah the Most Merciful, Tok Mudim did not take out more than what was necessary…. By the way, there was never a lizard anywhere on the ceiling that afternoon!


I was then taken to a room to heal under an unsewn piece of “kain cap”, hung up by a piece of string from the ceiling. It looked like the American Red Indian teepee. All four of us were lying on our mattresses, each under our own teepee. Each of us was provided with the most important equipment, a “tempurung”, a half coconut shell. It was so very helpful during the uprising, if you could catch my drift. One would take the “tempurung”, tap on the kneecaps, and ahhhh … you should get things under control!


We would receive visitors, mostly kay-poh-chee aunties and makciks, who would lift our teepees just to look at our “you-know-what”. I did not mind because after the show, they would give us “angpows”! But, I still cannot figure out what was racing through their minds when they took a look under our teepees…hmmm.


But my son Alif, just like his brother Patpat, would not have to go through such a ritual since he would entrust his “manly future” in the hands of a doctor. Nowadays, circumcisions are done in clinics by trained medical practitioners. A jab or two to numb that part of your body, a Tara/Smart Clamp inserted, a snip here and there and… it’s over. In under a week, one could wear a pair of jeans and walk about with ease.


I discussed this circumcision plan with Alif early this year. We talked about it a few times since and last night we talked about it again. I could understand his apprehension and his fear. But, Patpat, what a rascal he was….I had to ask him to go lock himself up in my room and play with the computer while I, all over again, tried to allay Alif’s fear.


Alif had asked me why it is necessary for a Muslim to be circumcised. I explained to him the concept of hygiene and stuff. I promised I would look up in the Internet for him, the reasons and logics per below:

Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) said, "Five are the acts quite akin to fitrah: circumcision, clipping or shaving the pubes, cutting the nails, plucking or shaving the hair under the armpits and clipping (or shaving) the moustache." (Reported in Bukhari & Muslim)

What say you, Tok Wan?