JAMBAN is the name given by my grandma to her faithful dog.

I met Jamban for the first time, when at the tender age of 11, I moved from Kuching city to stay with my grandma in an Iban village somewhere between Serian and Balai Ringin.

When he was first introduced to me, I had a fright. I swear today he was the largest fiercest-looking dog I have ever laid my eyes on in my life. He was completely covered in pitch black fur, and looked more ominous than the Hound of Baskerville in Arthur Conon Doyle’s fiction.

Naturally, like many of you readers out there, I wondered why he was given such a strange name.

My grandma told me that though she was in her 60s, she was still working in the rice field. Jamban would follow her everywhere. There was no toilet out in the rice-field, so like all rural ladies, she would just look for a tree or a bush to do her business. Without fail, Jamban would clean up after her, as rural dogs are wont to do! He had become her jamban! (I feel nausea-ted just retelling this story.)

When we first arrived at the village, we children discovered to our great delight for the first time that rambutan fruits actually grew on trees, instead of being sold on a table in the market. We went to a neighbour’s farm, where the branches of rambutan trees were so laden with ripe fruits that they were reaching ground level, and we gorged ourselves silly.

Then, we heard out neighbour’s dog growl. What frightened us was we saw Jamban galloping towards us. We thought he was going to eat us. So we screamed, ran and scrambled across a huge tree trunk that had fallen on the ground, except for my younger brother, who at age 4 then, was too short to climb. We thought he was finished.

Later, my younger brother said Jamban was not there to harm him. He was there to protect us from the neighbour’s dog!

Later, I discovered that Jamban was like a tua kampung for all the dogs in the village. Sometimes, the dogs would fight with one another, especially during mating season. Jamban would approach them and growl, and these noisy dogs would immediately cower, whimper, and scatter with their tail between their legs. Jamban was the ultimate alpha male!

My grandma and Jamban were inseparable. She had a special way of communicating with Jamban, and he would obey every one of her commands. Sometimes, I thought Jamban could understand the Iban language.

My grandma never went to school. She was that type of naturally good-hearted women in rural Sarawak who loved her family and worked hard on the farm everyday. She treated Jamban like a member of her immediate family.

My mother told me a story about my grandma once. They were working on the rice field together. My grandma suddenly became very agitated with her messy hair, which was getting into her eyes all the time and meddling with her work.

So she took up her razor sharp parang, and with a few swipes of that terrible blade, halved the length of her hair. Then, she went back candidly to her work!

Since then, whenever I have to part with a fortune to do up my hair in an expensive saloon for office appearance or for a special occasion, sitting in that chair for hours on end, I am always reminded of my grandma and her parang.

Unfortunately, my happy days in the village were soon over. I had to move to Kuc-hing city, to study and later to start working for a living.

Then news drifted to me that Jamban had died. He had ingested some poisonous pesticide by mistake. But then, when I met him, he was 12 years old. He was near the end of his natural life anyway. Still, I thought of my grandma, how she would mourn Jamban’s passing, and how lonely she would be without her faithful ever-present giant of a dog.

My grandma must be in her late 80s now. I hear that her eyesight is failing her. Naturally she has stopped her farm work, and depends on her children to look after her, as is the custom in the village.

Long since I left the village to work in the big city, I have met many people and seen many dogs. But none from either species have treated me with greater love than my grandma and Jamban.

Again, the responsibility of work keeps me far away from visiting my grandma in the village this year. As the Gawai Dayak day comes and goes, my heart is suddenly flooded with love and memory for both of them. I have made up my mind that next Gawai, come what may, I am sure to visit my grandma and Jamban’s grave.

(Ladybird can be reached at ladybird_wen@hotmail. com)