Pulau Seking: the final link to pre-Raffles Singapore

Pulau Seking: the final link to pre-Raffles Singapore Vivienne Wee & Geoffrey Benjamin

P

ulau Seking (sometimes written Sakeng or Siking) is one of the many small islands located off the south coast of Singapore. The other 'Southern Islands' (as they are known) include Berani, Sentosa (formerly known as Belakang

Mati), Stjohn's (or Bendera), Bukom, Sebarok, Semakau, Senang and Sudong. (See Map of the Southern Islands.) Historically, these islands were inhabited mostly by Malay-speaking Orang Selat or 'people of the Straits', who formed one of the several populations known collectively in Malay as Orang Laut (Sea People) and who were the original inhabitants of Singapore. In early 1819, Singapore had about 1,000 inhabitants. Of these, some 500 were Orang Kallang and 150 were Orang Gelam. There were between 10 and 30 Malays in the Temenggong's entourage, and roughly the same number of Chinese. That leaves about 300 Orang Selat----one-third of the total population! These were among the people whom the British considered to be 'pirates', and who were therefore largely removed from the waters around the harbour by 1840.

Map ofPulau Seking to be supplied

197

TRADITIONAL PRACTICES IN SINGAPORE

The information and photographs presented in this essay derive from the au-

Until their destruction, the seventy-six houses, mostly built on pillars over the

thors' field research in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and from a detailed study by

water, occupied three-quarters of the island's coast, except for the south-eastern end

Normala Manap done in 1982, when Pulau Seking was a still-lively settlement of

and the adjacent mangrove extending halfway along the southern shore. To casual

around 525 people, mostly descendents of Singapore's Orang Laut. This, the last

eyes, Pulau Seking appeared to consist of a single continuous village, but it actually

settlement of the Orang Laut sea-people within the territory of Singapore, was de-

contained four named areas of habitation, which reflected differences between

molished by the Government in 1993 so that the island could be converted into an

kelompok (cliques) indentifiable by kinship alignment and micro-ethnicity.

offshore garbage landfill. (For the rationale behind this, see Parliamentary Debates

The main residential area, situated on the north coast facing the mainland, was

Singapore, volume 61, no. 11, columns 1006-9.) The people were resettled in Hous-

known as Kampung Tengah (middle village). This was the only part of the island to

ing and Development Board flats on Singapore island and the community conse-

be inhabited until the 1930s or 1940s. In 1848, Robert Little found that there were

quently became dispersed.

just seven houses there, all built on the north face of the hill, and occupied by

The Seking islanders acknowledged themselves as Orang Selat, and considered their homeland to be in various parts of southern Singapore, such as Pasir Panjang,

approximately thirty people engaged in boat-building and the growing of fruit trees (1848: 593).

Kampong Bahru, Telok Saga and Pulau Brani. Significantly, some said that their

Tanjung Berkat (blessed headland), to the east ofKampungTengah, was inhabited

ancestors had moved to the Southern Islands because of their dislike of the British.

mainly by Orang Selat who moved in from Pulau Bukom when the Shell refinery was

Nevertheless, Orang Selat had already been living in the Islands since long before

opened there in 1961. Like the people of Kampung Tengah, these islanders were

British times. Indeed, archaeological surface finds dating possibly to the fourteenth

mostly engaged in wage labour on Pulau Bukom or the mainland. This was the first

century or earlier have been found on Pulau Seking.

section to be vacated in the late 1980's as some people moved away from the island.

Pulau Seking lies some seven kilometres away from the mainland, and was nor-

The western end of the island was known as Tanjung China (Chinese headland),

mally approachable only by motorised sampan-taxi from the larger Bukom island, a

a name said to derive from the former presence of some Chinese graves. The residences

10 minute ride away. (Bukom in turn lies five kilometres from the mainland, requir-

of the penghulu (headman) and schoolteacher were situated here. Some of the Tanjung

ing a 20 minute journey by ferry from Pasir Panjang.) Seking measures a mere 500 by

China houses can be glimpsed on p. 205, beyond the swampy area.

200 metres, but the encircling intertidal zone extends the island for another 200 metres

At the southern foot of the hill was a group of houses known as Sebelah Sebong

at low tide. A central hill oflittle more than six metres cuts the north and south coasts

(Sebong side): the people living there probably descended from the Orang Laut of

off from each other's view.

Sebong island in Riau. At the time of our study these people were still more involved

The vegetation is scanty, except for the larger of the two low-lying swamps, which

198

Pulall Sehng: the final link to pre-RajJles Singapore

in boat-building and fishing than the rest of the islanders

is covered in scrub. Robert Little, visiting the island in 1848, said that it had then

During their last few years on the island, the people of Seking were already facing

recently been cleared of 'jungle'. Until the 1940s, Seking was still surrounded by

the impending closure of their settlement, and this had a profound effect on their

mangrove trees, but most of these were later cleared for firewood and the building of

lives. By 1993, the population had dwindled to just under two hundred-a figure

houses for migrants who were moving in from the other islands (some of the remain-

probably close to the original size, when most of the Southern Islands were inhabited.

ing mangrove is shown on p. 205). In the 1970's, a few fruit trees and two small

However, only 19 of these last inhabitants were young unmarried people, indicating

fenced-off vegetable patches provided some patches of green against an otherwise

that the island now had a very different demographic profile. The people became less

brick-red ground. The clearing of vegetation led to considerable soil erosion, but

motivated than previously in maintaining their physical habitat, accounting for the

even when there was topsoil, its nutrient quality must have been poor. A scrub-covered

slightly dilapidated state revealed in some of our photographs. Government services,

cliff of white clay at the south-eastern end of the island added some variety to this

such as the postal agency and the primary school, were being gradually reduced.

miniature landscape.

(The school was established in 1953, and still had 45-50 pupils in 1982.) Medical 199


Pulau Seking: the final link to pre-RajJles Singapore

In his summary account, Sopher noted: In a century of description (from the 1820s to the 1920s) of the strand population of this area, the total picture is one of continuous and accelerating transition of sea nomads to sedentary land-dwellers ... The settled strand folk, however, usually remain preoccupied with sea activities; this often takes them out to sea, and on visits to fairly distant islands. It is The jetty, north coast of Pulau Seking ,

not surprising, therefore that they are referred to by the same name [Orang

with Pulau Bukom (at

Laut] as the nomadic boat people.

left) and mainland Singapore (Telok

In the 1980s, some Seking islanders still referred to themselves as Orang Laut, in

Belangah) in the

this more general sense of the term.

distance.

services had ceased by the mid-1970s. Despite the presence of a modern Community Centre and a police post, as well as a few provision shops, the villagers' mood was no longer what it had been. The picture above shows the jetty of Pulau Seking pointing towards the southern coast of Singapore island. The great length of the jetty was made necessary by the coral reef extending some 200 metres from the shore, which made it impossible for boats to come any closer at low tide. The top left part of the photograph shows the residential quarters on Pulau Bukom, which became the site of the Shell Refinery in 1961.l\1any of the indigenous inhabitants ofBukom were displaced at that time to be resettled on Pulau Seking, leading to a sudden population expansion. The people of Pulau Seking may be described as the 'sedentary descendants of

Conversion to Islam was an important feature of this shift to a sedentary life on land. This photograph below depicts the mosque on Pulau Seking. The portion of the building jutting out from the right-hand side is the mihrab, indicating the direction of Mecca towards which Muslims must face in their prayers. It was not until the 1980's, however, that most of the islanders began to share the more active interest in Islam that had already been taken up by the mainland Malay community. While they did not always observe Islamic rituals devoutly-e.g. praying five times a day or congregating at the mosque to pray on Fridays-their Muslim identity served to differentiate them clearly from other, non-Muslim or 'less Muslim' The mosque, on the mid -slope of the hill.

sea nomads'-to borrow a phrase from the geographer David Sopher. Sopher tells us that one of the earliest nineteenth-century references to a settlement of boat people occurs in the accounts of Colonel Farquhar's landing in 1819 on Singapore Island to negotiate its purchase from the local vassal of the rulers of Johor and Riau. Several 19th century writers refer to the tribal and still-pagan Orang Suku Laut of Singapore. Even earlier, in the sixteenth century, Portuguese sources had referred to the 'Cellates' (i.e., people of the Selat or 'straits') as the piratical and spear-fishing inhabitants of the area later known as Keppel Harbour. These sources show that, prior to British colonisation in 1819, Singapore and the small islands surrounding it were geographically, historically and ethnologically part of the larger context ofJohor, Riau and Sumatra. The Orang Suku Laut of Singapore were thus related to the various tribal groups living in the waters of this region. 200

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Pulau Seking: the fin al link to pre-Rajjles Singapore

\

Sea People. For example, when such visitors arrive

of the royal family of Johor in Malaysia. The

from the Riau islands in Indonesia, the people of

significance of this lies in the historical relationship

Seking usually did not allow them to land.

between the Orang Laut and the family of the 19th

Consequently, these visitors could only stay on

century Temenggong (Malay Minister under the

their boats anchored near the shore. (See Figure

Bendahara who is the finance minister)ofSingapore,

3, showing some visiting fishermen from Moro

from whom are descended the present-day Johor

island in Riau who had only recently become

royals. (Even as late as the 1980s, the islanders still

Muslims, and who consequently still exhibited

believed that Seking was protected by a mystical

much of the older tribal way of life, despite their

kingly power known as daulat raja.) Figure 4 shows

self-identification as Malays.)

a racing kolek, similar to those used for the royal

Interestingly, the reason given by the people of

canoe races of the past. Although this canoe race

Seking for disallowing non- or 'less Muslim' Orang

among the Southern Islanders ceased in the 1970s,

Vi sitors from Moro

Laut from landing was that they were afraid of the latter's black magic, which reputedly

the people of Seking continued, to the end, to treasure their racing koleks, such as the

A racing ko/ek (small

island (Riau) in their

could either kill or cast a spell to J;Tlake them blindly follow these outsiders to sea. In

one shown here, which was freshly painted in bright colours and kept dry under a

boat) in its shelter

shelter.

Orang Laut-style boats anchored off

Riau-including Singapore's Southern Islands-the Orang Laut are universally

the south coast of

acknowledged to be Melayu asli, '(ab )original Malays', even if they would not

In the past, koleks were used in the pursuance of a quite different activity: piracy.

Pulau Seking.

necessarily be considered to be Melayu murni, '(culturally) pure Malays'. As Sopher

Until the extension of organised policing to Seking between 1926 and 1928, some of

noted:

the islanders were in the habit of raiding slow-moving Chinese tongkangs plying between Tanjung Balai (Karimun), then an important port, and Singapore. Each Among the predominantly Moslem strand and river population of this area,

sampan kolek carried six or seven men, armed with weighty wooden clubs known as

it is of some importance whether a particular group of sea folk is Moslem or

belantan or with knives. These small bands of pirates raided tongkangs manned by

non-Moslem, and it is this secondary characteristic of conversion to Islam

twenty or thirty Chinese traders, seizing food (for themselves) and tobacco (for resale).

which is most often used as a criterion to distinguish between two kinds of

The traders were especially fearful of the Seking islanders. We were told by one old

sea folk.

man that the pirates used to cut off the ears of their victims, in the belief that this would prevent the corpses from floating back to the surface after they were thrown

Among the Orang Laut of Riau, conversion to Islam was and is an important

Some islanders later claimed that it was migrant Bugis men who had carried out

elite of Pulau Penyengat, just offshore from the main Riau town ofTanjung Pinang

these raids, rather than native Orang Selat, but there seems little doubt that the latter

(Indonesia). In the past, this social proximity was often expressed in terms of special

too were involved-as reports from several centuries previously had also claimed.

relationships between the two classes. These included specific corvee (kerahan) services

(An article in The Straits Times from 1982 mentions the suspicion that Pulau Seking

to be performed by the Orang Laut for the aristocrats, as well as the rewards given by

was serving at that time as a stopover point for smuggling from Indonesia.)

the latter to the Orang Laut.

202

overboard.

indicator of social proximity to Melayu civilisation, as moderated by the aristocratic

The seaward orientation of the Seking people may be seen in the landscapes

As part of this special relationship between the Orang Laut and the aristocracy,

depicted on the following pages. Most of the houses on the island were built on stilts,

there used to be an annual canoe race among the inhabitants of the different Southern

half over the sea, half on land. Those house shown on p.204 were on the north-western

Islands of Singapore. Significantly, the winners' prizes were presented by members

shore of the island, facing Bukom and the southwest coast of Singapore (see p.200). 203


Pulau Seklng: the final link to pre-Raffles Singapore

those that were kept fenced off in the kitchen-gardens maintained by a few 'outsider' families (i.e., Javanese or Baweanese). The football field led to the loss of vegetation because many trees had to be cut down to make way for it. While the accuracy of the islanders' analysis of the erosion problem cannot be guaranteed, it is interesting that their constructions identify outsiders rather than themselves as the source of the problem-namely, Chinese or Semakau islanders setting goats free on the island and British soldiers cutting down trees. One major consequence of this erosion was the drying up of the village wells, which had already begun by 1945. The ground water could no longer be retained once the vegetation was lost, and the topsoil rapidly washed away. According to the Seking people, when this happened it was arranged for the wells to be dug deeper. But instead of providing fresh water, the wells became salty by 1959. From then on, the villagers faced a daily problem of obtaining fresh water. This was solved in two ways. First, they managed to collect rainwater off the roofs Above Left: Trapped-

This was the relatively sheltered side of the island, which (as shown above) had only

seawater swamp, with

a few clumps of mangrove, due to the relatively high housing density. But there was

mangrove trees, Tanjung China.

a much more extensive growth of mangrove on the uninhabited south-eastern side of the island.

Above Right: Houses

in Sebelah Sebong,

Apart from mangrove, cultivated coconut was the other plant species that thrived

of their houses, but this was an uncertain procedure. Second, and more securely, they obtained water from the Shell Refinery on neighbouring Bukom island. This became the main source of fresh water on Seking from around 1961, and it was stored in large steel drums of the kind shown on the verandah of the house at the left-hand side of p. 204 (photograph on the left). Mangrove at low tide,

facing south-west,

on Seking. The tall coconut trees shown in on this page and the next (in the

seen from the hill in

background) were about 10 years old. Given the impending end of their village at the

the centre of the

time of our visits, the Seking people were not motivated to plant more coconut trees.

anchored off Sebelah

The relative lack of covering vegetation had in any case led to the still-increasing soil

Sebong on Seking's

island.

erosion of Seking, clearly discernible in many of the photographs.

with Orang Laut-style boats in the distance,

south coast.

While erosion is a problem frequently encountered on small islands, the people of Seking viewed this problem as having been brought about by two factors: goats, and the football field built for them by the British Army in the 1950's. According to some of the Seking people, goats were first set free on the island by Chinese visitors who came to make offerings at the sacred grave (keramat) of Yang Meleking-the woman reputed to be the founder of the settlement, centuries ago. Others said that the goats were first brought to Seking by people who moved there from the nearby, and significantly larger, island of Semakau in 1974. The goats multiplied and consumed most of the Seking's vegetation. (They were sold off to the mainland once a year for sacrifice during the Muslim pilgrimage season, providing an extra source of income for some of the islanders.) The only protected plants were 204

205


Pulau Sektng: the final link to pre-RajJles Singapore

The Seking people regarded the Shell Refinery on neighbouring Bukom as

originally from one of those islands, Mecan. His

generous in providing them with water free of charge. When their drums were empty,

family and relatives lived on the north-western and

the villagers carried them on their motorised boats and took off for Bukom, where

western sides of Seking and had ongoing links with

they refilled them from a tap located conveniently at a jetty on the south coast. Despite

people in Mecan and the neighbouring Riau islands

these solutions, the loss of fresh water made Seking somewhat less habitable than in

of Sarang and Nirup.

the past. Obtaining water by boat required time and expense; even though the water

The post of penghulu originated in the days of

was free, the people still needed to pay for petrol to run their boats to Bukom and

the pre-colonial sultanate, but it was retained by

back, a distance of 2 kilometres each way.

the British colonial government and then by the

On the whole, however, the Seking people managed to maintain a good quality of

Singapore government. The Penghulu of Seking

life. As shown in Figure 6, they still enjoyed spacious housing, fresh seafood, cool

was one of only two officially appointed penghulus

breezes and a wide view of the horizon from their houses on the strand.

in the Republic of Singapore. (The other was on

The seaward orientation of these strand dwellers was shared by their more nomadic

Pulau Tekong.) This post has now lapsed, because

fellows-the boat-dwelling Orang Laut. The photograph on p.202 suggests something

there are no indigenous settlements left in

of the boat-dwelling way of life followed by Orang Laut from the Riau islands who

Singapore.

used to visit Pulau Seking. Their boats were characteristically shielded from the

In contrast, the families located in Kampung Tengah along the northern coast of

elements by a simple thatched roof named after the kajang palm from which it was

Seking traced their ancestry to the Suku Gelam. These were the original inhabitants

made. Boat-dwelling Orang Laut mostly came into Singapore waters to sell their

ofKampung Gelam on the Singapore mainland, where the royal settlement ofTengku

catch-usually to some of the Seking people as intermediaries. However, as noted

Husain Long's descendants is still located. Going further back, the Gelam people of

Akib, Penghulu of

above, despite these transactions, the Muslim Seking people kept the non- or 'less

Seking identified the original village where their ancestors first settled on land as

Pulau Seking.

Muslim' boat-dwelling Orang Laut at arm's length by not encouraging them to land

Gelam Tua on the southern tip of Bulang (or 'Bulan') in the Riau archipelago.

Mohamed Yatim bin

on the island, even if they were staying overnight.

Sub-ethnic diversity thus existed on Seking. The Gelam descendants considered

Transactions were thus done from the boats

themselves of higher status-that is, as 'more Muslim', and more closely linked to

moored near the seaward verandahs of houses

the Johor royal family-whereas they considered those living along the north-western

along the Seking coast. Occasionally, however,

and western sides of the island as more animistic and more closely related to the boat-

these visitors would be invited into the houses on

dwelling Orang Laut.

the southern Sebelah Sebong side of the island, to watch television or enjoy a snack.

206

The puaka tree with its keramat shrine.

Animism was visibly present on Seking in the form of the tree, found at the top of the hill in the middle of the island. Originally, the offerings left at the base of this tree were

The Seking people who had relatively more

intended for the puaka, or 'locality spirit', thought to inhabit it. Like other puaka trees

transactions with the boat-dwelling Orang Laut

found elsewhere in the Malay world, this tree was Islamised through the device of having

were those located along the southern and western

a keramat grave said to contain a pious individual established at the foot of the tree.

coasts of the island. This is because these families

Significantly, no one on Seking could identify who this was, beyond referring to him as a

were related to the people of certain small islands

'Syed'-a man reputed to be descended from Prophet Mohamed. This contrasted with

in the Riau archipelago, off the northern coast of

the clear identification of the sacred grave ofYang Meleking, the founder of the settlement

Bulang. For example, the Penghulu of Seking-

on Seking, with many stories about her legendary strength and bravery. Her grave (see

Mohamed Yatim bin Akib (Figure 8)-was himself

next page) is at the foot of the hill, not far from the puaka tree.

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The rhyming of

Pulau S eking: the fin al tink to pl'e-RajJles Singapore

'~1eleking'

with 'Seking' is not accidental: in older

Malay, me-, le- and 5e- (or 51-) are Austronesian prefixes carrying a variety of meanings. In particular, the S- that begins the names of so many islands throughout Riau and Singapore's Southern Islands, is an abbreviated form of the individuating, humanising prefix 5i-. The archaic title Yang also carries such agentive meanings as 'deity', or 'ancestor'. In other words, these islands were seen in an animistic sense as individual persons in their own right. The individuality of Seking island was personified in the The grave of Yang Meleking, the

keramat grave of its mythicised founder, Yang Meleking.

Interestingly, in the narratives of the villagers there was a seeming division of

founder-ancestress of Pulau Seking.

labour between these two keramat sites. The spirit of Yang Meleking was said to

The cloths tied

grant wishes, including those made by Chinese devotees who came and released goats.

around the

In contrast, the spirit of the keramat at the puaka tree was said to have provided

gravestones were left there by visiting

crockery and utensils for the weddings of the islanders. Apparently, those who needed

supplicants.

such items would make their request to the spirit of the tree, and the next day the required items would appear at the foot of the tree. The puaka tree contrasted with the mangrove trees. The former stood on Seking's highest point with an umbrella-like canopy of branches pointing skyward. It was, moreover, the only specimen of its species on the island-a feature that in Malay animism is often taken as indicating the possession of a spirit. In contrast, the mangrove

trees grew plentifully in the coastal swamp, the lowest point of the island. None of

Above Left: Boat

these mangrove trees was regarded as sacred.

being moored at a

The trees on Seking-the mangrove, the coconut and the other assorted specieshad long ceased to provide sufficient wood for the villagers to use in building their houses and boats. But Seking was still an original do-it-yourself community, for all the houses were built by the islanders themselves. A number of individuals in the village were well-known as skilled carpenters who could build boats, both life-size

Above Right: Clothes

drying in the breeze on the landward side of Sebelah Sebong .

(on p.Z08) and miniature (for example, thejong sailboat used for races). The wood

Delivery of a newly-

used for house- and boat-building was brought over from different islands in the

built boat, Sebelah

RiauArchipelago. Sometimes, the Seking villagers did not make the boats themselves,

Sebong.

house in Sebelah Sebong.

but placed orders for them to be made by Riau islanders. The above-mentioned picture shows a newly built boat being brought to shore after delivery. As shown in the photograph, the wood was not yet painted or lacquered, which was to be done on Seking. The same picture also shows a typical Malay house on pillars, with a verandah facing the land. Such a house may also have a verandah at the other end facing the sea. The Seking people who lived in these coastal houses enjoyed the best of two worlds-sea and land. They could sail off at a moment's notice in their boats, which they moored directly to their houses. The sea was their highway. At the same time, they could use the land for various everyday purposes, such as planting trees and drying household articles. The Seking community was self-sufficient in many ways. This was especially so up to about 1965, when babies were still delivered by local midwives on the island

208

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Pulau Seking: the final link to pre-Raffles Singapore

and the dead buried in graves there. By the time we did our research, however, all babies were delivered in hospitals in Singapore. Nevertheless, they were brought back to Seking and oftentimes brought up in multi-generational households. This photograph shows a newly born Seking baby in the arms of her grandmother. Almost everyone on Seking was a Malay of one kind or another. There was only one Chinese household on the island, consisting of two brothers running a shop founded by their late Mak Mok with her

father in 1955 (below). As the largest local 'shop' (kedai) on the island, it carried a

newborn

wide assortment of items, but mostly 'dry goods'. Two or three other islanders ran

granddaughter.

refreshment places, where they also sold some basic supplies. For fresh food, such as vegetables and meat, however, the villagers had to go to Bukom or Singapore for their purchases. In the last days of the settlement on Seking, when the entire community was being relocated, there was a palpable mood of grief and loss. The once house-proud villagers reluctantly left the houses they had built for themselves to go to rack and ruin, eventually to be demolished altogether. They sold their boats, thereby giving up their means of transport on the sea. Their relocation from Seking to Singapore was

The Chinese provision shop , Kampung Tengah.

not just a move from a small island to a bigger island. More fundamentally, it ended an indigenous way of life oriented towards the sea that had existed since long before the British colonisation of Singapore. The end of Seking as a community is a loss not just to the people of Seking and their descendants, but to all of us who are 'Singaporean' in one way or another. All

Above Left: View

westwards along the 'street' leading from Tanjung Berkat to Kampung Tengah. Above Middle :

that is left are our archive of pictures like these which can be shared and the less easily

Evening light over a

shareable memories of those of us who had the privilege of experiencing (to a greater

verandah, Tanjung

or lesser extent) a way of life that is predicated not on concrete, steel, asphalt, glass

Berkat.

and chrome, but on gentle sea breezes, swaying coconut trees and wooden houses.

Above Right: Hou se

Post-Seking Singaporeans may think of sea breezes and coconut trees only in terms

pillars fully exposed

of 'holiday getaways' in some exotic resort, without realising that once upon a time,

at low tide , Tanjung Berkat.

this was an everyday reality for many people in Singapore. In the last days of Seking, we worked with a film crew from the Singapore Broadcasting Corporation to document how the islanders felt about the impending end of their village. One young Seking woman said, 'I am very sad to leave this island. Here, from my house, I look out and see a wide horizon where the sea meets the sky. Where I am going, I will no longer wake up every day to this vast view The loss for all of us is the loss of such a possibility in our everyday lives-the possibility of a gentler, slower, more natural way of life.

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