Languagle #81: Malay
Berakit-rakit ke hulu, berenang-renang ke tepian; bersakit-sakit dahulu, bersenang-senang kemudian
"Raft upriver, swim to the bank; suffer first, enjoy later."
What it means
Suffer first, and enjoy the reward later. The first half is the picture: paddling a raft upriver is hard work, and only then do you get to swim to the bank. The second half spells out the lesson. It is one of the best-known Malay peribahasa (proverbs).
How to say it
buh-ra-kit ra-kit kuh HOO-loo, buh-reh-nang reh-nang kuh tuh-PEE-an; buh-sa-kit sa-kit da-HOO-loo, buh-suh-nang suh-nang kuh-MOO-dee-an
Malay stress is light, usually on the second-to-last syllable. The e in ber- and ke- is a soft 'uh'.
Word by word
- Berakit-rakit buh-ra-kit ra-kit: rafting along (rakit, raft)
- ke hulu kuh HOO-loo: upriver
- berenang-renang buh-reh-nang reh-nang: swimming along (renang, swim)
- ke tepian kuh tuh-PEE-an: to the riverbank
- bersakit-sakit buh-sa-kit sa-kit: suffering (sakit, pain)
- dahulu da-HOO-loo: first
- bersenang-senang buh-suh-nang suh-nang: taking it easy (senang, happy, at ease)
- kemudian kuh-MOO-dee-an: afterwards
It's a pantun, a traditional Malay verse form: the first half paints a picture and the second half, which rhymes with it, makes the point.
Where it was found
A traditional Malay saying in the form of a pantun, a short rhyming verse. Malay calls sayings like this peribahasa. This one is from a list on eCentral.
Similar sayings
- English: No pain, no gain
How to recognise Malay
Malay uses the plain Latin alphabet with no accents. It builds words with prefixes and suffixes like ber-, me-, ke- and -an, and doubles words with a hyphen to make plurals or add emphasis (rakit-rakit). Yang, dan, di and ke turn up constantly. Indonesian is almost the same language and has used the same spelling since 1972, so the clue is in vocabulary: a car is a kereta in Malay and a mobil in Indonesian.
About the Malay language
Malay is an Austronesian language and an official language of Malaysia, Brunei and Singapore, where the national anthem is sung in it. Indonesian is a standardised form of Malay, so counting both, it is used by well over 200 million people. For centuries it was the trading language of the islands of South-East Asia. Today it is written in the Latin alphabet, called Rumi, and also in Jawi, a script based on Arabic.