Chapter 19 Those Were The Days

Many,many,beautiful events during those final fifteen years of Alex's working life.He had psyche himself to perform very well in the eyes of the Boss.Well motivated for the position should be more appropriate.

Sri Jaya was a kampong and never a town,maybe they have changed all that,I surely would like to know,in the meantime it remained a kampong or village.The town's population was wholy Chinese,mostly of Hock Chew decent and some Hokkien with little Cantoese.The rest of the races were in smaller minoerity whereas surrounding this little town were a number of Malay kampongs.

In the last two previous election the Chinese voters here voted against the ruling party why asked themselves why?The small township had improved with two rows of shop houses althpugh not fully utilized.

Alex used to be a know character around during his last fifteen years of active services with the plantation.He normall had tea or tea "tarik" at the "makmak"restaurant in the afternoon,there were pretty Malay maids serving in those restaurants.Chinese restaurant served only Chinese food.

In the other part of town was a shop catering hardwares and other items for plantation etc.,the attractive proprietress was the attraction there.Very smart and hardworking female.
Alex always patronized that shop for his sundries,who wouldn't with that attraction around.

The tyreshop was well equipped besides offering excellent services to the plantatio at reasonable prices.This shop deals with all the punctures of tyres'from the plantation.Here was where the Boss put to test many things to test out Alex's honesty.Alex knew it all the while and was never in any thing with them though the temtations were there.

The elephant hunter also stayed at his house in one of the older shop lot.Being an excellent crafts man could do wanders with the tools he pocessed.In those days of hs working in Sri Jaya,Alex had full access to many wild life's meat,all given to him by many other hunters.Just imagine a small ting town yet so many "rela" guns around.

Poor animals were all mostly hunted down to extinction.Had it not been the roving rangers all the animals were gone much earlier.Plenty of the animals were over hunted by these huters.Animals like "Selandang"or wild buoffaloes very randonly shot down by hunters with very powerful rifles definitely not those single barrel riffles owned by "rela"force."Pelandok" and wild goats were no more to be seem anybmore.Wild boars roamed in smaller groups of hardly five each group,perhaps maybe no more now.

The hunter Alex and neighboring plantations was an ex -bandit,a restricted residence.That was why he was so well versed with the jungles and could walked non-stop around those jungles,like knowing the jungle tracks like the palm of his hands.He can be acclaimed as the best hunter around,should he be No.2 no one can assumed the No.1 position.

Just imagined he hunted down nothing less than fourteen elephants with those fifteen years of Alex's service with that plantation.Not only was he excellent in jungle tracking but he also excelled in fishing.He like fishing Toiman because fetched $8/=per piece sduring those time and he had a small tank full of them.He caught those fish in the swamp of Pekan.

The other attraction in this tiny town aws the "Orabg Alsi" cave,a cave where the natives seek refuged on rainy days.It was a huge cave and can easily reached.It was situated at the entrance road of Jaya Asia Estate.Locals knew that place.

Sri jaya was also known for gold minning.Gold can be panned at the Sungai Luit.In fact Chinese had been there since the 1850's,and there were Chinese graves to prove their existence then.The name of that river was called Luit because the Chinese named it "Duit" money for Gold.Surrounding land were gazetted as gold minning land.The present highwah cut through it.Happen to be around,go try your lock panning Gold go there.

Those days transport were almost nil,then how on earth those old timers reached that place to pan for gold.It was claimed they walked all the way there but there were no remnants of any Chinese survivors there only Malays from elsewhere.Surprising there were Chinese who had merged into the Malay population but they never submit themselves as Chinese although they understood Chinese spoken.When approached them in Chinese they ignored everything and spoke in Malay denying any close attachment to Chinese.

Many mining companies had tried their luck mining gold but mostly ended with significant losses.One company claimed that it would be too a expensive processed in separating the gold from copper as the main reasons.Many others the extensive labor costs involved.Those remaining reserves land were illegally occupied by many small holders,laying a stake in those land.Will they ever get the approvals of those occupied land were left to be seen but with"Malaysia Boleh",everything were possible.

The forest adjacent to the plantation after the Lepar river were excellent jungle tracking and many adventurous people in four wheeled drives had many expedition over them.In that forest were many natural lakes many quite huge and very good fishing ground.Local Malay youths from surrounding kampongs maintained a lucrative livelihood by night fishing and trapping fish in these beautiful lakes.Such occupations deemed dangerous for city folks but never to them.Trapping fish in wild animals infested jungle,anyone want a try?Wild animals like to face in those jungles were wild elephants,tigers,panthers wild boars and others.

It was rumoured that there were also crocodiles in those lakes but no much reports of tyheir sightings were known but mostly like many of those seen were iguanas.Imagine the days Alex was there there were huge iguanas as big as a crocodile.These youths also catch green baby arowanas (dragon fish).Arowanas unlike other fish secured their young fish within their mouth and split them out for a breather at night.That was the time fishermen caught them with the aid of a bright light wading through the sides of lakes in a small sampan.Very often they find vipers chasing after those lights.Very dangerous occupation indeed.

Alex's plantation also had quite a number of lakes,but those lakes were over fished all the time but with Alex pushing all the bamboo grooves around those lakes the situation was reversed.Thus fishes began further breeding and were full of smaller fishes.With this the population of fishes increased tremendrously.

Many of Aex's friends from the city many a times came fishing and hunting, camping within his bungalow's compound and spent a jolly good time fishing there.At the back of the bungalow was also an orchard established by Alex.So was his bungalows.Come fruit seasons there plenty of durians,rambutans,orages,pemeloes,bananas.papayas and ranbutans.Thee was also a small plot of coconut palms a short distance away.

Alex's main labor force were Indonesians with local as drivers.His staffs were all local.It was a beautiful working environment Alex had.His main headaches were the absconding of the Indonesian labor force.For this he enlisted the local Poice to assist him ,enforcing a police present most of the time.This help to prevent the absconding to a certain extent.

His next big head aches were his Assistant Managers.It was quite difficult to get a good one or two.First he had an Assistant who tried to chase him off the moment he first step into the plantation.But he was too seasoned and too experienced for such a ridiculous character,he simply squeezed him off with only a finger.He promoted another to another plantation who also left after some time for a better position else where.He replaced him with another he personally trained,lesser qualified so no chance of running away for better position elsewhere.

For the main plantation he replaced that Assistant with another,a young obedient hunter but his tenure was short lived as he also got a better position in Sabah and left.In place he employed a conductor from a known plantation as Assistant,but that too was futile as this man proved to be nothing more than a lazy pig.Going round the plantation only on all main roads.Now with so much work in hand Alex does not require any others to roam and supervised the plantation.Another bad thing about this man was,he was gossiping ridiculous suggestions as if he was that smart, to the contractors and others about Alex and his methods.

Well.Alex does not require such a man,his job was to follow the Boss instructions and as an Assistant his job was to follow however stupid the orders maybe.Any wrong be the responsibilty of the Manager not him.But how can he be possibily wrong if those were Boss's instructions.Assistant who were too smart can never be acceptable and never in Alex's agendas.

Following he was subsequently replaced by an Indian Assistant who sneaked into that employment by some stupid recommendation of the pseudo Engineer and the Accountant.He had no practical experience whatsoever and was a dirty crook,claiming to be an ex-employee of Socfin.This man was a good actor pretended to be very obedient.Once the Manager's turned his back,he tried to create havoc.

Some where in 1997 Alex and the accountant took flight because of impending Police raids and arresting of plantation Managers for employing illegal workers.Alex had to escape that dragnet with the accountant Loo tagging along.Why he was on the run God alone knows but the Police was definitely not after him but the plantation Manager.Perhaps it was God's blessing he came along and no sooner had they left the plantation the police came in,and what a lucky escaped?.

They were in hiding in USJ,Petaling Jaya for almost three weeks.The plantation was not running for almost three weeks and the Assistant took that three weeks to reinforce himself,undermining the management by passing bad rumours to all the workers and some staffs.It was easy to poison the minds of these people and he took full advantage of it to induced them to pay him money to do up their passport claiming the Manager could not do them for him.Could be he was out of luck as Alex and the accountant were soon recalled back to the plantation to face the Police as all were settled.

On arriving at the plantation.the ignorant Assistant tried to scare the Manager off telling him that the Police were waiting for him not knowing what the Boss had already done.Alex kept his cool and confidently replied that they will not arrest him.The Assistant blushed and found to be shaking badly.Alex immediately knew somethoing was wrong.Next the contractors and all the staffs saw him the next morning but the Assistant dared not go to the office.

By now the Assistant had informed the Boss that he had brought in a fresh batch of workers with permits and had started work.Alex soon found out the bluntant lies,he had only taken over all the workers and claimed as his.Alex had only to adjust by telling all the workers to returned their respective contractors,thus dismissing the claim by the Assistant.Next he told of the plot by the Assistant trying to usurp his position.Such a stupid hijack never work as Alex returned in time to exposed it.

Than he saw the Police to give his statements and was released.On returning he sacked the Assistant without any notification.He fleeced with an accomplice ,failing which he would be arrested for cheating some worker,collecting money from them.He bolted with fear as those workers having learned that they were cheated, were after his skin.He ran away back to Johore never to be heard again.The accountant and the pseudo disclaimed any connections with him,what lairs?

Next he interviewed an Assistant who had just returned from Sumatra,he was A Kuantan residence.It began well with him talking sensibly but as he continued he gain confidense and began talking rubblish and began critisizing Alex's cheap replanting in Semanbu Estate,that agitated Alex.He further contuinued as though he was surely going to be recruited by Alex,continue blowing his talks as if he was going to be the Manager's partner in work.Alex wandered,"What ? here I am trying to recruit him as an Assistant and he is already thinking of working at par with me not under me?.Should that be the case,this guy before me employing him he was already talking about taking over from me,another stupid Assistant".

Alex cut him short by rtelling him to go and wait for his reply.He never even took the trouble to consider him.However he never gave up and continously called the headoffice to inquire about his appointment.With everyone having no idea about it he was soon forgotten.

Thereafter no Assistant was ever recruited,as the Boss left it to Alex to arrange everything he thus prefer to train unqualified men to perform those duties splitting up the responsibilities and making them have written reports on them.By so doing he had all the necessary information he required.So with Alex's experienced to have them or not it made no difference it was sheer determination to perform well paid off dearly.Motivated to work hard was no problem to Alex but he was a happier man without any other worries.