Aye! Yai Matey!

"Learn your history properly before coming up with an answer of what you think we are. Yes we are Warriors. Yes we are Brave. And whether you like it or not, Yes we are Pirates. But there's a Name for all that. We Bugis are Buccaneers! What is Buccaneers? BUCCANEERS ARE PIRATES WHO ARE MORE CIVILIZED!" -DYAM Tunku Ismail Ibrahim (Tunku Mahkota Johor)

Years and Years ago, I asked my dad "Abah, bah...where does your ancestors come from?"

He looked at me, and answered "Hmm....Tok Ona is chinese and arwah Tok Awang is orang asli?"

I looked at him confused whether to believe his answer or not, because you see my dad has always been a joker, even though he has a muka garang . Than he gave me a look of annoyed and I left. And I have always believed that I'm a mixture of Chinese, Jawa and orang asli. Until a few years later, dad's sister (my aunt), came to stay at our house for hajj.

During her stay at our house she told alot of stories. Stories about her family, about her childhood, about politics and religion. It was quite an entertaining. And it was through her that I found out that my dad is not from orang asli, but from bugis.

Hah! I knew it. Dad was joking about him being an orang asli. Hahaha...abah oh abah, the the things he would say just to shut me up.

So, I finally learnt I'm a mixture of Bugis, Chinese, and Jawa. But believe you me, that time I had no idea what bugis was. I was young and naive.

Upon returning to Malaysia to further my studies, I learnt from friends and lecturers (who are Bugis descendants), that Bugis people are naturally "ganas", or aggressive when they are angry. And they say that it's quite a scary site to see when they fight.

So that stuck in my mind for a long long long time, until a few days ago, I was browsing the land of the famous blue bird and read a tweet from His Royal Highness Tunku Mahkota Johor, Tunku Ismail, twitting that "Bugis are Buccaneers! What is Buccaneers? BUCCANEERS ARE PIRATES WHO ARE MORE CIVILIZED!"

Now that seemed like a more logical answer for me, to what is Bugis. Haha

ha....after I read that tweet from his Highness, this song came singing in my head:

In my little world, the title would be changed from " I'm a pirate you're a

princess" to " I'm a pirate you're a prince"...

And after reading it, this man popped in my head:

Jack Sparrow.

Now I can proudly tell people that my I have a blood of Jawa, Chinese and pirates (Bugis). Hardiharhar!