Happiness in a long house

I was on my way to Batu Niah from Miri last Friday with a friend in his chauffeur-driven Toyota Fortunar early in the morning. As we travelled along the coastal highway, he took the opportunity to show me some big bungalows built next to each others not too far away from the beach a few kilometers away from Miri. You could hardly see so many big mansions next to each other in East Malaysia, but in Miri, big bungalows which are all about the size of the one belong to the former Mentri Besar of Selangor, are common, it goes to show how rich are the people in Miri, which are mostly accumulating their wealth from timber. I told him that these must be big families therefore building such a big mansion but my friend shook his head and told me that the big houses were mostly occupied by not more than 2 or 3 people.

How come? He explained that these houses belong to rich people in Miri of which their children are mostly residing overseas, leaving behind the parents at the place where they spent their whole life time building up their wealth in order to send their children studying overseas and ended up their children are more attracted to the lives on a greener pasture and decided not to come back. Such situation is quite common in West Malaysia as most of the people that I know; especially those involved in plantation business are somehow or rather having this sort of experience of sending their children overseas and ended up lonely during their golden age as their children are mostly becoming citizens abroad.

My friend than joked with me that perhaps we should not be working so hard for the children but enjoying every bit of the hard earned money as either way, with or without children, the parents may end up guarding their own house in loneliness when their children all spreading wings and landing somewhere far away. As we were approaching Batu Niah, there were a few modern long houses along the road and I pointed to these seemingly congested long houses and told my friend that perhaps these long house people are living in a more fulfilling live in their small and congested long house as they have all their children and close relatives around them even though they don’t have a luxury bungalow. Neither do they have a lot of money, but they have the luxury of their loved ones around them through thick and thin.