At school, lessons became more useful. We learned how to make salty eggs, embroidery, and menata janur—a Malay wedding decoration. Better yet, we started stumbling through the English language: good this, good that, excuse me, I beg your pardon, and I am fine, thank you. The most enjoyable task was learning how to translate songs. It turned out the old song Have I Told You Lately That I Love You had a beautiful meaning. Its lyrics, more or less, tell a story about a young child who always hated being sent by his teacher to buy chalk, until one day, he left in irritation to buy it, unaware that destiny was waiting to mercilessly ambush him at the fish market. Buying chalk was without a doubt the least enjoyable class chore. Another chore we really hated was watering the flowers. The various ferns, from the Platycerium coronarium to the dozens of pots of Bu Mus' beloved Adiantum, had to be treated delicately, as if they were expensive Chinese porcelain. Careless handling of the flowers was a serious violation.
