Of raya and raya

Raya this year is merrier than the previous year because most of my aunties and uncles are back. Iols is happy =)

Was supposed to leave for kampung only on the day before raya sebab last day tu dapat half day kul 12 boleh balik so ingat nak jimat cuti. On Monday Cikpi called me and managed to convince me to take a leave on Wednesday and balik kampung earlier. So balik lah iols on the Wednesday's night, Traffic was all smooth and clear so yes, boleh consider kawen dengan orang kampung Johor kahkah macam lah ada calon. Reached Muar around 230am, met the others at bando Muo for sahur. And finally reached kampung around 4am.

I slept from 5-8am and the preparation started. As always whenever makpah is around, her rendang is a must have dish. And the preparation takes agesss. Because the expert wasn't up yet, we had to light the fire ourselves. Menggagau la kehulu kehilir nak buat api. Sabut kelapa bakar paper segala and lastly tiub beskal jugak does the trick. Most challenging part of makpah's rendang is the reduction process of the santan from full size of the kuali until half. Ajegile nak menunggu eh tak boleh tinggal takut berkerak hangus. We took turns and luckily we had the bibiks to take over when the sun was up and shining bright like a diamonddd. Tapi sebak sikit bila Uncle Mazlan it's about time I inherit Makpah's rendang job sebab depa semua dah tua. Sedih please :( The rendang took almost 12 hours to be fully ready haha masakler nak take over the job lepas ni.

The rendang at it's 12th hour of cooking. . Bayangkan la santan tu dari penuh nak tertumpah keluar kena jadi half the size.

Soon after I'm off the shift to stir the santan I joined the dapur team to prep the ingredients. Potong daging la bawang la. InsyaAllah, if I ever get married and have mertua with expectations of having the menantu nolong kat dapur I hope with the training given by my makciks I'll be prepared. Makcik-makcikku ni macam petir mana boleh tak buat-buat sibuk kat dapur tu. Kahkah. We prepared dishes for ngunjung (a tradition where we send/exchange lauks to the neighbours around us - neighbours tu adelah dalam 20 rumah ok). Usual dish prepared - nasi himpit, sambal ikan bilis, rendang, ayam ungkep.

Managed to escape for a while around 2pm ikut cikwa pergi Parit Sulong beli ais. Itu pun kejap je lepastu kena join balik the team. 3g connection in kampung was almost none so we had to go to Parit Sulong. Hari-hari mesti ada trip gi Parit Sulong bersama team cari line. 

As always every year Cikwa tokey mercun and we had the annual lawan mercun 4 penjuru. Berdentam-dentum bunyi love-hate relationship betul iols dengan mercun ni loved the thrill but hate the sound sebab iols lemah jantung senang terkejut. 

Aleesya enjoying the bunga api. Tak padan kecik budak ni berani gila..

The 128 das fireworks!

On the raya day itself sebab tahun ni ramai balik so pergerakan lambat sikit. Tak sempat nak salam tetamu dah sampai nasib dah standby cawan kuih dekat depan. Soon after the first entourage left we quickly had our salam raya and photog sessions. Meriah sikit sebab the cousins are all teenagers now so memang never ending jugak la photog session.

Le familia

Perasan teenagers join depa in the line T_____T

Mak-mak pun nak jugakk kasi la  can 

Food management pun was pretty good this year by the time petang 1st day raya lauk raya dah almost settled. Maktip and I proceeded with projek nasik beriyani. CikAris did the daging beriyani and itu memang secret recipe habis semua benda dia letak dalam tu sedap nak mamps. Alhamdulillah our nasi beriyani kukus was a success despite Maktip's claim that it's a bit bland. Apa lagi smash la setepet darah tinggi kencing manis segala. 

Lepastu Uncle Mazlan ajak pergi Parit Jawa on 2nd raya and we bought fish because we think we had enough of the dagings. Siang tu I decided I can't go anymore with the daging so makan nasik telur kicap je. Ummm dap dap! Malam 2nd raya tu dah keluar gi Muo makan mi bandung..3rd raya we went slightly healthy makan ikan bakar and ikan asam pedas je. Malam 3rd raya Uncle Azhar brought some prawns back from his kolam so we had udang masak tempoyak on the last day at kampung. Super yumms all the food at kampung balik terus insaf semalam naik bukit puchong 3 jam T__T