Perempuan Joget aka The Dancing Girls - in a not so nice connotation :-(

The year was 1977. We were in form 3 and we were supposed to be studying for our LCE/PMR which are equivalent to the present day PMR examinations.

Being the ever playful lot, we just went on to enjoy school life as if there was no major exam! :-)

Just the year before our school was already in the top 3 in the state for the traditional dance competition for Inang and Zapin. Most of the dancers then were already in their final year (Form 5), except for Oji, Mek Rock & (the late) Sharifah Aloyah.

So that year (1977) these 3 tried their best to reform new teams of dancers. I can’t remember how it happened, but eventually I was in the zapin team, with Sharifah, Jenny, Puyah, Oji, and a junior, I think. At the same time Nury was in the Joget team, with Ylina, Sally, Siti Haslina (I think so..) and others whom I can’t recall anymore.L Mek Rock was with the Inang team.

We went on to compete level after level, and eventually ended up in the final 4 teams (for each category) for the state level competition! Unfortunately, the final competition was held during the week when we were supposed to have our trial LCE/SRP while the other students had their term 2 examinations (those were the days when school year was divided into 3 terms)!

I remember we went to Sek Zainab in the morning for the competition, competed and we did quite well with the following results:

i. First place for Inang

ii. 2^nd place for Joget

iii. 3^rd place for Zapin.

We were so excited with our achievement, despite practicing all the while on our own, with hardly any help from the teacher in-charge (I don’t even remember who that teacher was!). The Inang group, being the champion, was given the honour to perform to the then Regent of Kelantan (who's now the Sultan).

We came back to school in the afternoon and were quarantined in the school compound. I think we were placed in Block B (or was it the main hall?). We couldn’t go back to the hostel, to avoid us from meeting any of our friends and had to sit for the day's exam papers before we were allowed to go back to our dormitories. It was one of the longest days to me then!

Apparently the principal then was not so happy with us for causing the inconvenience to the teachers who had to stay back to invigilate us for our delayed exams :-(

During the week we were referred to her as “Perempuan Joget”, and wI don't remember us getting any recognition from the school for our achievement (it was a common practice then to announce any achievement made by any student during the assembly. Even if there was, it was not looked at with pride :-(

I'm glad I was in the zapin team, because during our rehersals, we not only improve our zapin steps, but we also learnt to do the joget and inang, and vice versa.

When I was a lecturer in UNISEL, a group of students approached me and asked me to be their advisor (for their Cultural Club), which I duly obliged. When they were practising their zapin, I was glad I could help them with their moves. The students were surprised too, to find out that this programming/mathematics lecturer can dance! :-D

Even right now, when I hear a zapin melody, I still feel like getting up and do my steps ;-)