From Brickfield to Small Town Balakong

Some one commented on my small town Balakong. It brought back memories. It got me thinking about the time when I actually hated Balakong. The year I was born was they year my grandfather retired. Upon retirement, he bought a house in SS5, where I spend my first phase of childhood. The next 17 years of my life was in Brickfield; a row of little houses that was built during the British colonization. Known as the 100 quarters by all but, heaven for just the four of us. The house not only gave major impact in our life but to anyone that had known us in that period of time. Despite being known as the “it” place by the police, never a day in our 17 years have we encountered bizarre incident happening there. It was so safe were able to go 7-11 or other eateries at 12 midnight without any trouble.

We always knew Brickfield house would never be our permanent resident. The movement appa says god bye to his job, its good bye to the house as well. But we choose to live in denial, till one day the Government of Malaysia gave us the notice to move out of the quarters, for future development of Bickfield along with KL Sentral. Hence, appa quickly searched for a house far, far away from the city, friends and relatives. This place was known as Balakong. But to akka, ma and me, it was twilight zone. But lucky us, when the 1997 financial crisis hit, the project were cancelled and we ended up spending another couples of years in Brickfield. That gave us time to adapt to our so call “vacation house”. However, when our house got robbed twice, appa was very determined to move. Moreover, Brickfield was changing and was getting too crowded specially with occupants from India. The persona that Brickfield once had when we first arrived was no longer there. The moment we all had that funny feeling, the decision was made to move, for good.

Nevertheless, Balakong was never our cup of tea. Akka and I hated that place- the long stretchy forever road with holes, useless 7-8 traffic lights, a river and bridge to cross just to get to our taman. Sigh! It worst then the old klang road strech. We had mines but most of the time ended up going to dirty supermarket (so used to calling by that name I actually forgotten the real name) to buy stuff, as we have to rely on pa to drive us around. The rule was, if the car stops at Cheras Jaya, then it remain there till we depart. It was never soin Brickfield. Since neither akka nor me was capable of driving then, we hardly know how the town was and hated it more. The only good thing about the house was convenience for pa to fetch akka from upm every Friday night.

But as time pass by, as I returned from Penang and akka finally got her car, we slowly moved to Balakong. Life was much more easier when I got job in Putrajaya. It was bye bye Brickfield and hello Balakong. By that time, the new road was completed; the other side of Balakong was seen. to my suprise, there are more banks in Balakong compare to Brickfield, more hypermarket and so on. Everything was just 5-10 minutes drive away. We soon realize that despite the horrible name, the town had everything a person need, a complete town in the district of Kajang.

However, this small town was lacking of one thing. To akka and me we endure our younger days with main 4 shop in Brickfield: Sri Pandi (Indian restaurant), Sri Kota (grocery shop), Bintang (a book shop that has been close down for sometime) and 7 -11. A trip to shop will never be complete without a trip to 7-11…strange but true. Finally last year, a 7-11 was opened in Balakong town and couple of months later was Jaya Jusco shopping complex. It has completed our little town of Balakong and we are happy to stay here. However, my retired pa sometimes has this funny idea of moving elsewhere. But me and akka, we fight for our house as we did for Brickfield, along time ago. Today we don’t called it as Balakong house but home.