Wong Juat Wah: Malaysia’s ‘Sugarcane Granny’ Who Tackled Tamil And Tigers Alike

When Vikings invaded the holy island of Lindisfarne in England, they killed everyone except Æthelstan, the monk. He survived for one reason: His knowledge of Old Norse, the language spoken by his attackers.

Similarly, Wong Juat Wah believes she was spared by a tiger in a Malaysian jungle because of the Tamil she spoke.

Chinese by heritage and raised as a Buddhist, she learned Tamil from her neighbors of South Indian descent, growing up with deep respect for their culture, religion and deities, including a tiger-mounted goddess called Durga (pronounced dhoor-gah).

It all proved invaluable one afternoon, when she was clearing a forest patch in Pahang, on the eastern coast of peninsula Malaysia, to make way for an oil palm plantation. When she whirled around, she found a tiger staring at her from just a few feet away. 

Terrified, she dropped her machete — called parang (paa-rung) by the locals — which she used to cut her way through the thick vegetation. She sank to her knees, trembling as she locked eyes with the animal. 

Folding her palms in prayer, just like she did at the Hindu shrine in her neighborhood, and invoking Durga in her mind, she told the tiger in Tamil:

“Please don’t eat me. I have young children to care for. I am just here to work for a living.” 

The big cat looked at her for several seconds. Then it turned and went off in another direction. There was no telling what was on its mind but she was sure about something. 

“It seems to have understood Tamil,” she said with a chuckle.

The tale, often told to roars of laughter around the table, was one of the many the so-called Madam Wong regaled visitors to her home with. Veera Pandiyan Manickam, a newspaper veteran who got me into the reporting business, was among those who had heard it, recounting it in an obituary he wrote after her passing on March 22, 2024 — seven months short of her 90th birthday. 

Mike Thu, the youngest of Madam Wong’s three children and a buddy of Veera’s, acknowledged his Mom being somewhat of a celebrity, winning people with her unassuming, innocent and cute ways.

“She always had friends — and fans — alike,” recalled Mike. “She was the bread lady of her village, running the bakery there with my Dad. She helped clear the jungles of Pahang, paving way for some of the first oil palm trees planted in the state. She also had a popular following for the sugarcane drink she sold.” 

“More than all these, people were fascinated with her mastery of Tamil. Here was essentially a Chinese woman who sounded like an Indian when she spoke!”

An Unlikely War Hero, And His Daughter Who Came Into Her Own

In 1941, a couple of years after World War II began, assault ships of Japan’s Imperial Army reached Malaya — the stretch of land between Thailand and Singapore, which together with two other territories on Borneo Island, eventually became known as Malaysia. Upon berthing, the Japanese killed or captured British soldiers within sight, challenging the might of King George VI and his empire, which had already been in Malaya since the 1800s.

A decade before the Japanese arrived, Wong Ah Heng, a Chinese peasant, landed in Malaya in search of opportunity. He learned to repair tractors and heavy machinery and settled in a rubber plantation in Kluang, Johor, south of the country. He also married and sired seven children, the third being Wong Juat Wah.

In his village, the senior Wong operated a mechanic’s shed which had an underground passage. In ordinary times, it was used for storage of tools and other stuff. During the war though, it served a very different purpose: Hiding of British troops wounded or on the run from the Japanese.

“My grandfather sheltered a few British soldiers there, giving them food and medicine, till they were strong enough to be on their way,” said Mike. “Everyone knew the risks of going against the Japanese. To be caught meant being beheaded instantly. But my grandfather was already thinking like a son of Malaya by then, and was guided by his conscience too.”

To Wong, his deed was no different to what any ordinary person would have done, given the circumstances.

But the British viewed it differently.

When the war ended and the soldiers who survived from his help returned to their base, a letter of appreciation arrived from Louis Mountbatten, Supreme Commander for the Allied Forces in Southeast Asia. 

Along with the letter, the Wong family was verbally told it could ask whatever it wanted in exchange for the help given to Her Majesty’s soldiers.

“My grandfather wasn’t the sort of man to do something expecting something in return,” Mike said. He initially said: ‘I don’t want anything.’ But the British kept insisting. Finally, he relented, saying: ‘If you really wish, build me a house then, since I don’t have a proper one.'”

It turned out to be the biggest home in the village — bigger than even that of the English manager of the plantation where Wong’s shed was located. It was here that Juat Wah grew up with her siblings, coming into her own with a courage and compassion resembling her father’s.

The Breadmaker, Forest Hacker and Tamil/Tiger Conqueror

Into her teens, Juat Wah chose to settle with Thu Geek Mook, a Chinese immigrant who, like her Dad, came to Malaya in search of a new life. 

Thu initially worked on a canteen-on-wheels operated by Malayan Railway. He then learned baking.

Married, he moved his wife to Renggam Estate, an oil palm plantation in Johor, where they set up a bakery. The Renggam city outside the plantation is famous for having recorded a visit from Queen Elizabeth in the 1950s.

Veera, in his obituary on Madam Wong, cited the buns she baked for her plantation community.

She was also determined in “raising her children in Tamil, a language which she truly loved”, he wrote.

Adds Mike:

“Those days, the rubber estates in Malaysia were filled with people of all ethnicities — Malays, Chinese and Indians.”

He remembers some of his Malay and Indian friends being fluent in Cantonese, the other language spoken by his mother.

It’s a situation perhaps best captured by P. Ramlee, an artistic giant often hailed as Malaysia’s greatest filmmaker and celebrated for movies that unfailingly showcased the country’s diversity and social cohesion — even before a word was coined for it: Muhibbah.

“My mother was the one who delivered the bread in the estate we lived in,” said Mike. “She had a lot of Indian friends and she picked up Tamil from them. The camaraderie among the different races then was just like in the Ramlee movies.”

While delivering buns was a joy for his mother, baking as a business only got the family so far, said Mike, recalling his parents’ difficulty in making ends meet with three growing children.

It was at this time that his father got an opportunity to hack down a forest patch in Pahang earmarked for a new oil palm plantation.

The family moved to Pahang and Juat Wah joined her husband on the forest trail, leading to her encounter with the tiger.

Later Years: The Emergence Of A Sugarcane Celebrity Called “Kaarumbu Paati” 

Over the years, Madam Wong moved again, residing finally in the Subang area not too far from the Malaysian capital. With her children having their own families, and her husband having passed by 2007 at the age of 82, she wasn’t content to sit still.

In Kampung Dato Hormat, a working-class neighborhood adjacent to Subang, she set up a cart that sold sugarcane juice. The drink itself is a Malaysian favorite, often downed super-chilled by people seeking to escape thirst in a country that sits just above the equator.

Madam Wong’s customers were wowed by something else: Her Tamil.

Those who spoke the language couldn’t help but be amazed by how fluent she was at it. 

The Tamil word for sugarcane is ‘kaarumbu’. For a grandma who looked to be well in her 70s, it wasn’t surprising that she quickly earned the nickname of ‘Kaarumbu Paati’ or Sugarcane Granny, noted Veera.

A Spokeswoman For Peace

Already popular for her Tamil and sugarcane extract, Madam Wong’s social stature reached new heights after she was featured in a muhhibah clip made in conjunction with Malaysia’s national day, which falls on August 31.

The video of her speaking in Tamil was shot by a college student, who was a fan of both the grandma and her sugarcane juice. 

“When it went online, it became viral and was viewed by those who had long lost contact with my mother, ” said Mike. “People she had not spoken to for years began calling and she reconnected with a larger circle from her past.” 

Those who heard her Tamil were astounded by her grammar and diction.

Her wish for everlasting peace among the different ethnic groups in the country — and her small effort to unite the Chinese and Indian communities through her Tamil — touched many.

Madam Wong’s contributions, of course, went beyond language. She had also raised three model citizens. While her daughter is a homemaker, her sons are senior automotive industry staff in Malaysia for top Japanese brands Toyota and Nissan. 

Mike, however, remembers her for something else: A woman who played to perfection the different responsibilities of sister, daughter, wife, aunt — and most of all, mother — which had been thrust upon her during her 90 years.

Her demise creates a longing among those who hold fast to the notion that we’re all one and let nothing — color, creed, nationality nor religion — separate us. 

Veera writes in summation:

“Good bye, Kaarumbu Paati.” 

“I wish I had talked with you one last time before you left. May your athma (soul) attain shanti (peace).”

* This tribute is a Mother’s Day 2024 special.

** All pictures of the Wong and Thu families courtesy of Mike Thu  

*** Barani Krishnan is founder and America’s editor for justneverforget.com, a Malaysian-based startup that proudly tells stories of ordinary people with extraordinary lives.