There are these two cities called Armsterdam and Rotherdam, two big and busy cities in Holland...and Holland is a State sort of underwater....just like two fishing villages at the coast of Sarawak called Meludam and Pendam....in (not)fact long time before the arrival of the British sailors, the Dutch had made both Meludam and Pendam as the twin cities of Armsterdam and Rotherdam....
(2) Pendam literally means graveyard....jirat, as the other word in Malay. I can't remember when, this Pendam had been changed to Sadong Jaya (Victorious Sadong)....and the reason for the changed is to Rebrand the area to symbolise a journey of success...socio-economically....a moral booster for the local to emulate change...I presume....and also to reflect it is a place to live not a place to die (graveyard)...
(3) In fact, the word Pendam used to name this place has nothing to do with the human graveyard...it was in fact (as narrated by the local old folks)a place where the local had burried a dead phyton....under the olden day gigantic mangrove tree (just by the jetty as shown in the picture). Since the place had never had a name before...and since this area is a popular hunting and wondering area for the olden day folks....such PENDAM is the rv (or meeting place)for those hunters and farmers....
(4) I wonder, if we could reverse the naming of this place.....or let keep the place called Pendam, while the sub-district called Sadong Jaya....I don't see any reason why we should feel ashame of coming from Pendam....there are those places called...Batang Berjuntai, Batang Ai, Kolam Air, Telaga Air, Pengkalan Kubur, Tengkek, Batu Burok,....all sort....if we wanna be blue...then lot more..we just change for the sack of changing....
(5) Pendam, Meludam, Armsterdam, Rotherdam....all of them share one common environment....they are all below mean sea level....so keep them at par....
(Pendam, Simunjan
5 April, 2009)
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