Zan Does Afghanistan

After covering and chronicling the South Thailand insurgency in the book titled Operation Nasi Kerabu: Finding Patani in an Islamic Insurgency, journalist and filmmaker Zan Azlee turned his lens towards a conflict zone much further afield: Afghanistan.

A "KL-ite journalist who has lived all his life in non-conflict zones", Zan travelled there "to see if he can come up with the best travel guide for the country. With no idea what he is getting himself into, he dodges suicide bombers and IEDs, and even gets embedded with the army, to plan out the best tourist route in Afghanistan." Okay....

Upon his safe return to Malaysia, Zan has gone on to write articles and produce photo essays and video clips on his trip to Afghanistan. As part of his various Afghanistan-related multimedia projects, Zan, together with creative director Arif Rafhan, brings us his Afghan adventures in a black-and-white graphic novel.

Zan and his fixer's first meeting (as Zan imagined it, I believe)

The monochromatic textures and shades manage to convey the mood of the characters and scenes, bringing home the reality of the Afghan conflict (it's not like Rambo III at all) and its impact on the long-suffering populace. The results are more National Geographic than Lonely Planet, though I felt the book was a bit short.

As I said before, Adventures of a KL-ite in Afghanistan (I suggested a title change, but no) follows Zan the "macho" solo-journalist (he says) on his romp around the war-torn country in his attempt to put together said tourist guide.

Going to the ground with his fixer, Ahmad Bilal Raghbat, Zan sees first-hand the plight of the Afghan people and the efforts of those who are contributing towards rebuilding the country and returning some semblance of normality to Afghan society.

Our intrepid protagonist also talks to (allegedly) the last Jew living in Afghanistan; witnesses an orderly, police-assisted march in honour of Ahmad Shah Massoud; meets Oliver Percovich, founder of NGO Skateistan; looks up the empty gigantic cavities that once housed the Buddhas of Bamiyan—the fulfilment of a years-long dream; briefly accompanies Malcom ISAF 2, Malaysia's military contingent, on a humanitarian mission in the war-torn country's Bamiyan province; and more.

Plus, a cameo by a mat salleh who looks like Dave Grohl. Awesome stuff overall - what's not to like?


Zan Azlee is a TV/film director, producer, videographer and writer who's involved in journalism both for broadcast and print, a content developer for new media/Internet, and a content consultant. He also runs Fat Bidin Media. You might have seen some of his scribblings on the online news portal The Malaysian Insider.

Arif Rafhan is a Malaysian creative director of web design agency who loves to draw on anything – from dead-tree media to his computer monitor and his son's bedroom wall. He is also the illustrator for Imaginary Friends: 26 Fables for the Kid in Us by Melanie Lee.

12/08/2014  Listen to the podcast of Zan and Arif's interview on BFM89.9 about the book.

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Adventures of a KL-ite in Afghanistan

Zan Azlee
illustrated by Arif Rafhan

MPH Group Publishing
136 pages
Non-fiction
ISBN: 978-967-415-196-6

Buy from MPHOnline.com

Musings Of A "Zebra Mom"

"Zebra" is a medical term for a surprising or unexpected diagnosis. In medical school, physicians are taught to think of a horse, not a zebra when they "hear a gallop and hoofbeats". The analogy means that the simplest and most straightforward explanation is often the answer.

Which is perhaps why, during a routine check-up for a bad bout of flu, Patsy Kam and maybe her doctor were caught off-guard when the latter found something else entirely, which marked her a "zebra".

Galloping into bookstores nationwide: I Am a Zebra! by Patsy Kam

Kam learnt that she has paraganglioma, a rare condition. Estimates say that one out of 300,000 people in the general population are diagnosed with it every year. Though not debilitating in itself, the condition can lead to something worse if left untreated.

Overnight, her world changed, as she prepared for a future fraught with doctors, medical exams and surgeries, while trying to balance her roles as a journalist and mother of three.

This is the story of a woman who discovers her inner strength and resolve as she battles this disease while muddling her way through motherhood. Plenty of drama here as Kam braves painful medical procedures and the side effects of her treatments - on top of the antics of her three sons, who keep proving to be a handful and a half (each) as they grew up.

And hers wasn't a smooth transition to being a mother.

"For starters, I was not one of those women who glowed and beamed as their stomachs grew progressively larger," Kam writes. "Some of them claim they never suffered a day of morning sickness in their lives, and giving birth was as easy as 'pushing out an egg'."

But perhaps it was motherhood that lent her much of the strength she needed to battle her condition.

By sharing her experiences as a patient in this book as well as stories of some people like her (a handy glossary and resource section is provided at the end of the book), Kam hopes more people will learn about the disease and its effects, and spur more research towards finding a cure.

"When I first discovered my medical tragedy, my world came crashing down. There seemed no respite from the surgeries and the drama that unfolded, and there were many, many times when I wanted to call it quits," she says. "But it’s not all bad as I’ve since learnt how to cope with paraganglioma."

"Hopefully, someone, somewhere, will glean something from my experience," she adds, "and be aware of this rare disease and be able to do something about the tumours that come with it before it’s too late."


Patsy Kam is a mother of three and a journalist with Malaysia’s leading English daily The Star. Follow her further adventures beyond this book at her blog Me and My Lumps.

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I Am a Zebra!

Making Sense of a Rare Disorder

Patsy Kam
MPH Group Publishing
160 pages
Non-fiction
ISBN: 978-967-415-200-0

Buy from MPHOnline.com

Coming This Way Soon

I felt it was appropriate to release this sneak peek on Teacher's Day. Guess which teacher wrote this?

Yes, the adventures of the "teacher in the interior" continues.

And also, this:

This one you have to guess (or Google) - not hard, really.

I'll have more to say when both come off the presses. Stay tuned.

And good weekend.

Masterclass In Session: Sapna Anand's New Indian Kitchen

What struck me most about this publication were the photos in the first laid-out drafts. A cookbook is supposed to be a visual buffet, and like real ones, it has to be really good.

Indian cuisine, that heady melange of flavours and colours, owes part of its unique character to the people who dropped by the lush, exotic subcontinent over the centuries, including the Portuguese, the British and the Moghuls.

Born and raised in Goa, cooking instructor Sapna Anand ended up going places, much like the traders and colonists that left their mark on her homeland. Her travels and experiences changed the way she saw and cooked the food she grew up with and encountered on her journeys.

She eventually came to Malaysia, where she currently teaches Indian cooking and French pastry at Hellen Fong's At 19 Culinary Studio. She also maintains the My Test Kitchen Facebook page and blog, and caters for niche dinners with her own kind of modern Indian cuisine.

Not bad for someone who says she wasn't much of a cook when she was younger. "In fact, when I got married, I still wasn't much of a cook," she says. "But I had always liked cooking for fun. As a kid, I tried making roti (Indian wheat bread) and French fries. I guess my penchant for food from the East and the West was there from young."

Now, she's sharing that penchant for food through a cookbook.

Sapna's New Indian Kitchen, part of the MPH Masterclass Kitchen series, features a variety of dishes that are primarily from the Indian regions of Kerala, Goa, and northern India. Each recipe is a milestone in her life's journey, vividly coloured and flavoured by the dishes, sweets and snacks made by family, friends, and neighbours.

The recipes are divided into four categories: Brunch & Bites, Meals Best Shared with Family & Friends, Quick & Easy Meals, and Something Sweet, to help you decide what to cook and serve for which occasion. " I have used my education in French pastry and familiarity with Western cooking to add an interesting twist to the traditional recipes."

Alongside such traditional and familiar fare as chicken biryani, raita and kebabs are edamame upma, achari chicken tart and keema lasagna, among others – examples of how she uses the cooking techniques she picked up to breathe new life into the time-tested flavours of her homeland.

There's also a section that describes the basic ingredients used in the recipes and how to prepare some of them (like garam masala and paneer). A section on spices, which she presents with the help of the Spice Board of the Government of Kerala, India, has loads of information.

Above all else, this cookbook is more of a personal project for Sapna, who, with Santa Barbara-based photographer Chris Owen, did much of the photography and food styling.

"People like to say, 'If you do not try, you'll never know.' How true it is, especially
with cooking," she says, "Here, in this book, are the fruits of my experimentations – recipes for you, made and created with love, from my kitchen to yours."

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New Indian Kitchen

Sapna Anand
MPH Group Publishing
200 pages
Non-fiction
ISBN: 978-967-415-203-1

Buy from MPHOnline.com

Popular-The Star Reader's Choice Awards 2014

The Popular-The Star Reader's Choice Awards is upon us again. I'm more excited about this year's picks because I'm more familiar with some of the titles in the running. And it's a pretty tough line-up.

I reviewed two of the titles nominated under Fiction: Golda Mowe's Iban Dream and Tash Aw's Five Star Billionaire. The former is a magical and lyrical tale (though the characters sound like they're performing on stage) about an orphaned Iban boy who would, under the guidance of powerful spirits, become an accomplished headhunter, warrior and longhouse chief.

Boey Cheeming's When I Was A Kid 2 (left) and Golda Mowe's Iban Dream

In comparison, Aw's story of five Malaysian Chinese who went to 21st-century Shanghai to make their fortunes had a more hectic pace and a grittier feel, but okay overall.

Five Star Billionaire is by Tash Aw (left), who met fans, read some
passages from the book and fielded questions during a meet-up at
Silverfish Books in Bangsar on 23 February 2013

Though I haven't read Barbara Ismail's Princess Play yet, I did read Shadow Play, and while the portrayals of the characters and backdrops were somewhat realistic, the pace was a too languid for me. I'm expecting similar stuff from Princess Play.

I did some work for two books nominated under non-fiction: A Backpack And A Bit Of Luck (the newer edition) by Zhang Su Li, and Hafsah Md Ali's If Only Airports Could Talk.

A Backpack and a Bit of Luck by Zhang Su Li (left) and If Only Airports
Could Talk by Hafsah Md Ali

I considered the latter a dark horse; penned by a former MAS ground crew member, it was something that I envisioned an older Yvonne Lee (The Sky is Crazy, Madness Aboard!) would write. Zhang, meanwhile, needs no introduction. We were asked to re-package the book, which was first published by Marshall-Cavendish. I quite liked the stories inside, despite the faint shades of purple.

And, of course, there's Boey's second book, When I Was A Kid 2, which I reviewed (months after his first) and won't say anymore about. Both, after all, are ... popular, from what I'd heard.

If you're interested, vote now. For your favourites, not mine. I'm hoping for different outcomes this time (no politicians or sports personalities, please), but I'm not holding my breath.

(I also helped proof one of the nominated books not mentioned here - and I'm not telling.)


03/08/2014   Results are in, though a wee bit disappointed that my favourite books didn't grab the top spots. But top three's quite decent.

Non-fiction:
Karpal Singh: Tiger Of Jelutong   Tim Donoghue
When I Was A Kid 2   Cheeming Boey
A Backpack And A Bit Of Luck   Zhang Su Li

Fiction:
New Beginnings   Chan Ling Yap
More Hotel Tales   Hanley Chew
The Mouse Deer Kingdom   Chiew-siah Tei

Congratulations to all those who were nominated; you're all winners as far as I'm concerned.

Masterclass In Session: Fat Bites With The Fat Spoon Girls

Many Klang Valley urbanites would be familiar with Fat Spoon, a rustic little eatery in Damansara Utama owned and run by sisters Melissa and Michelle Pong. The establishment, with its repertoire of Nyonya-inspired delights that incorporate family tradition and Gen-Y ingenuity, has gained a following since opening around the middle of 2010.

And now, they're coming up with a cookbook - are you not excited?

I can't remember when my first visit to Fat Spoon was, but I do remember the décor that made the relatively small space cosy and homey.

Small touches like the wooden food cabinet and the trays of canned drinks that were sometimes placed at the bottom reminded me of Chinese New Years at the ancestral home in Taiping. Small old read-with-me hardbacks were recycled into their menus. A larger chalkboard menu was hung on a wall. A fat wooden spoon was the handle to the front door.

Part of the interior of Fat Spoon Café, 06 May 2014 or, as they'd say, "yesterday"

Ah yes, the food. It was the first time I had ulam fried rice, and their Fat Hot Chocolate was rich, warm and creamy. And whether you're out of a traffic jam after work, or back from the airport, college, a boring meeting or the hospital, you'd want to come home to a bowl of their Spicy Beef Macaroni (soup).

But I haven't been back for a while. So I returned yesterday evening. Oh, quite a bit has changed. The chalkboard was replaced with a mirror, and the old menus were replaced with ones that looked more like menus. I guess some change was inevitable. But the food was still good.

New dish: ulam angel hair pasta and the pumpkin fritters (left) and the
durian crème brûlée; recipes for the fritters and dessert are in the book

Still, I was surprised to know that the Fat Spoon girls were coming up with a cookbook. Months in the making, it has blossomed into the visual feast that I knew it would be. Just about every facet of the book said "Fat Spoon".

The Fat Spoon Cookbook is a wonderful collection of recipes that offer a glimpse into the kitchen at Fat Spoon and the minds behind such creations as ulam fried rice, pumpkin fritters and cempedak spring rolls with vanilla ice cream.

It is a reflection of their personality and passion for good food, nurtured by a familial love of the good stuff and their adventures in food.

Among the old-school recipes and favourites from their family’s kitchen, revitalised by a youthful zest for new flavours and cooking techniques, are some original creations that showcase the sisters’ inventiveness and flair for marrying old and new.

But don't just take my word for it.

"Their innovative creations never disappoint — they’re always so surprising and comforting," gushes Joyce Wong, aka KinkyBlueFairy, in the foreword. "I always feel the love that goes into their food, which is probably why I crave it when I travel overseas for long periods."

After taking you through the basics: making chicken stock, fried shallots/garlic, batter for frying, gula melaka syrup and the like, Michelle and Melissa take you through the making of things like avocado fritters with kaffir lime mayo, beef and basil popiah wraps, Asian salmon tartare with poppadom chips, teapot mushroom soup with rice and durian crème brûlée.

Cockle non-fans will be tempted to try out their cockle salad, and the duck and goji burger sounds like something that Fat Spoon would make. Fans will recognise at least two items in the book: the pumpkin fritters and the signature Fat Spoon noodles. The pictures, by photgrapher Audrey Lim, are gorgeous and manage to capture the essence of what Fat Spoon is and what can come out of it.

Though merely a small sampling of what their eatery has to offer, the book manages to convey a small slice of that rustic yet homey atmosphere from the sisters' childhood that would, they hope, encourage you to re-live yours by trying out the recipes within – and maybe come up with your own.

"We hope this book will inspire you to go crazy in your kitchen," says the girls in the preface. "Take some ideas from our recipes and go wild with them. What if your culinary creations fail? Remember how that four-year-old kid who fell from the swing picked himself up and ran into the monkey bar? It’s a playground, go nuts!"

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The Fat Spoon Cookbook

Melissa and Michelle Pong
MPH Group Publishing
155 pages
Non-fiction
ISBN: 978-967-415-195-9

Buy from MPHOnline.com

Epicurean Editor Cooks Some Chook

Up to last week, my chefly ventures never went beyond vegetables, carbs and processed protein.

Then a friend challenged me to cook chicken. Raw chunks of thigh, still on the bone. Inspired, in part, by a picture of spicy chicken wings on a Facebook page. She even bought the raw meat, just in case I tried to squirm out of it (photos here aren't mine, by the way).

Though intrigued by the prospect of trying out turmeric chicken, I felt it was too ambitious, and where was I going to find gloves? So I settled for a simple rub: salt, pepper, olive oil and a sprinkling of McCormick's mixed herbs (marjoram, rosemary, sage, thyme, savory). I let the whole lot sit for up to half an hour before putting it in the oven.

While that sizzled away, I prepared the other half of the meal.

Butternut squash, zucchini, red and yellow bell pepper, carrot and potatoes, all chopped up for roasting. I seasoned it with the same stuff I used for the chicken (with less salt and pepper). There was no room for brinjals by the time I was done with the other veggies. After that, crushed cloves of garlic went in and a few tosses later, all was ready.

The chicken cooked for about 45 minutes on 180 degrees C before I turned off the oven and took it out. It was delicious, and the taste even had the hint of KFC. If that wasn't enough, I splashed water on the pan, scraped what I could of the bits that clung onto the bottom, and mixed it all into a sauce of sorts.

... Yep, a bit too much salt. But what manner of alchemy merged the fat and juices that oozed out of the chicken with the oil and seasonings and turned it into something ... near-divine? I took spoonfuls of the sauce (for lack of a better word) with each bite of meat, and drizzled some over the roasted vegetables, which also turned out fine.

So, yes, I managed to cook raw meat. And the results were better than expected.

The friend loved it too. She used the word "orgasmic" at one point - betraying, perhaps, her penchant for drama. But it was relatively cheap and we didn't have to wait in line or pay any sales and services tax. And we knew what went inside.

And it was easy.

From that point on, a wide horizon of shifting colours stretched before me. Right now, it's tinged with the stark yellow hues of turmeric.