MARRIAGE, they say, joins two families. Mine also expanded my dictionary.
When I married a Sabahan, I thought my Bahasa Malaysia was reasonably respectable. Then Sabah began speaking to me.
Suddenly there was bah everywhere. People were bubut-ing one another. Invitations came with kupi-kupi dulu, warnings with nanti kau, directions stretched into saaaaana, and words such as palui and tapun appeared with meanings no textbook had prepared me for.
There was no glossary attached to the marriage certificate.
I learnt the proper way - by getting things wrong and occasionally pretending I had understood all along.
I came from Peninsular Malaysia with Bahasa Malaysia that seemed to wear a tucked-in shirt. Sabah loosened the collar.
Words shortened. Vowels lengthened. Eyebrows acquired grammatical duties and lips became navigational tools.
One small bah could confirm, reassure, soften disagreement or signal that enough had already been said.
As a newly imported husband, I listened, nodded intelligently and perfected that useful marital expression suggesting comprehension had arrived just before it actually did. Sometimes it arrived only after the conversation had ended.
But language, I discovered, has a way of doing what formal introductions often cannot. It quietly lowers the fence.
A borrowed word becomes a shared joke, a familiar phrase becomes a small passport, and before long what once sounded foreign begins to sound like home.
Gradually, the words stopped sounding foreign. I stopped translating them in my head. Then one day, bah slipped naturally out of my own mouth – no rehearsal, no approval from Peninsular Malaysia.
That small moment stayed with me. I had gone to Sabah learning its words.
Somewhere along the way, those words began teaching me Malaysia.
That seems worth reflecting on this Malaysia Day.
Nation-building naturally invites large conversations about history, federalism, development, rights and responsibilities.
They matter. But nations are also built much closer to the ground – in how neighbours speak, how families cross cultures, how food is shared, how laughter travels, and how the unfamiliar gradually becomes familiar.
Malaysia was never meant to make everyone alike.
We carry different histories, languages, faiths, customs and accents.
The more interesting question is whether those differences can become familiar enough that they no longer create distance.
Sabah taught me something about that.
Through bah, I learnt how a tiny syllable can soften a sentence.
Through kupi-kupi dulu, that sometimes coffee should come before conclusions. Through kita-kita juga baini, that belonging can begin simply by making room.
Perhaps that is one of Malaysia’s quiet strengths.
We do not always become closer through grand declarations. Sometimes we get there through a word borrowed from a neighbour, a phrase picked up from a spouse, a meal shared across cultures, or a joke that needs no translation.
So this is not really an essay about Sabahan slang. It is about what Sabah, through its language, laughter and everyday warmth, taught one Peninsular Malaysian about becoming a little more Malaysian. And fittingly, the lesson began with one very small word: Bah.
The small word bah that carries a lot
Bah is so iconic in Sabah that a sentence without it can almost feel unfinished.
It is a popular discourse particle or linguistic suffix.
Calling bah merely a word underestimates its workload. Depending on tone, it can reassure, confirm, encourage, soften, insist, hurry things along or signal that enough has already been said.
For one syllable, it has an impressive job description.
Compare “Tidak payah” with “Tidak payah-bah.” The first can sound like a gate being shut. The second somehow leaves the gate closed but the relationship open. Some words carry messages. Bah carries atmosphere.
It is democratic too – equally at home with the professional and hawker, schoolchild and grandfather, planter and the uncle still telling the same story since 1963.
Titles come and go, policies change, but bah remains on duty.
Its real value is human: it can make a sentence warmer, less severe, less distant.
Malaysia could probably use a little more of that – whatever our preferred syllable may be.
Kupi-kupi dulu
If bah is Sabah’s public utility, kupi-kupi dulu may be its unofficial peace process. Literally: let us have coffee first.
Socially: perhaps do not say anything irreversible until caffeine has had an opportunity to intervene.
Before voices rise, before positions harden, before pride pulls up a plastic chair and applies for permanent residency, somebody says, “Kupi-kupi dulu,” and suddenly the revolution is postponed pending beverages.
There is wisdom in that ritual. Sit first, sip first, speak after. Malaysians are not short of opinions; social media has merely given them express delivery, often before reflection has found its shoes.
Sometimes speed merely allows misunderstanding to arrive earlier. Sabah offers an older technology: coffee.
Listening is not surrender, and a pause is not weakness. Sometimes it means remembering that after the argument, the person opposite may still be your neighbour, colleague, cousin or friend – possibly all four in a Malaysian family.
To me, this is muhibbah without backdrop and bunting.
Perhaps we sometimes treat that beautiful Malaysian word like ceremonial china: proudly displayed on important occasions, then returned to the cabinet.
It works better as everyday crockery.
Kita-kita juga baini
Another Sabahan expression I have grown fond of is kita-kita juga baini. Usage varies, but in its warm social sense it means something like: we are together here, among our own, so relax.
It helps explain why Sabah gatherings can be wonderfully elastic. Invite ten people and fifteen arrive. Three others hear there is food. Somebody’s cousin is “just passing by”.
By evening, the gathering has expanded without planning permission. The solution is simple: find another chair. Kita-kita juga baini.
The phrase does not deny difference. Sabah has tensions and disagreements like anywhere else. But its gentler instinct begins with relationship rather than suspicion.
There is a Malaysia Day lesson in that. Sabah remains Sabah, Sarawak remains Sarawak and Peninsular Malaysia carries its own considerable diversity. Unity need not mean cultural photocopying.
Sudah makan?
Then there is food, because every Malaysian story eventually reaches the table.
In Sabah, as elsewhere in Malaysia, food is rarely just food. It is affection with gravy. “Sudah makan?” may sound like a question about lunch. Often it means more: I noticed you. Have you been looked after?
Expressions such as tapun, katulahan and kampunan vary across communities, but the instinct behind them is familiar: food offered is relationship offered.
Malaysia understands this almost instinctively. We may discuss diversity through big nouns - multiculturalism, inclusion, tolerance - but ordinary Malaysians practise it through small verbs: eat, visit, share, invite, sit, pass the sambal.
“I’m full.” “Take lah.” “A little bit only.” And somehow a second plate appears.
Hari Raya, Chinese New Year, Deepavali, Christmas, Kaamatan, Gawai, weddings, kenduri and neighbourhood gatherings have been doing quiet nation-building for years, often under the supervision of aunties whose authority over portion sizes exceeds that of several regulatory agencies.
A shared table can achieve what a slogan cannot: it reduces distance to the width of a plate.
When kau became cow
Sabah also taught me the value of laughter. Take nanti kau - roughly, “just you wait”. Depending on tone, it may be warning, teasing or parental justice approaching.
A Sabahan mother in Australia once said, “Nanti kau!” to her child, who replied: “What type of cow, Mummy?” In one glorious moment, disciplinary Malay became livestock management. Not kau. Cow.
Then there is saaaaana. Elsewhere, distance is measured in kilometers. In Sabah, vowels help. “Sana” may be nearby. “Saaaaana” means farther. Stretch it long enough and you may wish to check fuel and daylight.
Directions may also come with lip-pointing - lips purse, chin tilts, eyes confirm. The entire face becomes Waze.
Humour, when carried by affection, makes difference less threatening. But context matters.
The word Palui ie stupid, foolish or idiot - among close friends may be playful; try it on the wrong stranger and your fieldwork may end abruptly.
Tone is the steering wheel. Relationship is the road permit.
From tolerance to muhibbah
Tolerance matters, but perhaps it is only the floor. Tolerance says: you may stand beside me. Muhibbah says: come and sit.
We need not agree on everything. Malaysians are exceptionally gifted at disagreement - politics, football and durian can keep us occupied indefinitely. The real test is whether disagreement destroys belonging.
A mature society builds enough trust to disagree without dehumanising.
Laws and institutions matter, but so do quieter habits: softening a sentence, finding another chair, sharing a meal, turning misunderstanding into laughter rather than ammunition.
The message is simple: you are still one of us.
We should also be wary of those who profit from widening differences and feeding suspicion. Nation-building is difficult enough without anyone pulling at the seams.
Perhaps that is where muhibbah earns its meaning: not by erasing difference, but by refusing to let it become permanent distance.
The vocabulary of belonging
Looking back, I began collecting Sabahan expressions because they amused me. Somewhere along the way, they began educating me.
Mati karan showed how efficiently a blackout can be announced.
Bubut introduced me to courtship - chasing conducted in better clothes and with plausible deniability. Saaaaana taught me that distance can be measured in vowels. Tapun reminded me that food carries more than calories. Kupi-kupi dulu taught me that timing can be wiser than argument. Kita-kita juga baini showed how a few words can draw people into the circle. And bah taught me how much warmth can fit inside one syllable.
What began as vocabulary became belonging.
Sabah stopped being simply where my wife came from or where work had taken me. It became part of my own story - not because differences disappeared, but because they became familiar enough to feel like home.
Perhaps Malaysia works much the same way.
Being more Malaysian should never require us to become less Malay, Chinese, Indian, Kadazan, Dusun, Murut, Bajau, Iban, Bidayuh, Melanau, Sikh, Eurasian or any of the many identities that make this country impossible to fit neatly onto one cultural spreadsheet.
Sabah need not sound like Sarawak, nor Sarawak like Peninsular Malaysia.
Unity is not cultural photocopying. It is the confidence to remain ourselves while making room for others to remain themselves too.
So this Malaysia Day, those Sabahan words offer lessons larger than language: more kupi-kupi dulu before disagreement hardens; more kita-kita juga baini when difference creates distance; more curiosity before judgement and more humour that connects rather than wounds.
No community, region or generation owns the complete definition of Malaysia.
We will disagree. The test is whether disagreement destroys belonging.
Laws, institutions and policies matter, but so do quieter habits: learning another community’s words, respecting what others hold sacred, sharing food, lowering our voices and pulling out another chair.
Malaysia has never been a solo performance. We are many voices, many accents and often several conversations happening at once - usually interrupted by someone asking whether everyone has eaten.
Yet after more than six decades, we remain in the same conversation.
Perhaps muhibbah begins there: not by eliminating difference, but by refusing to let difference end the relationship.
And that may be Sabah’s greatest lesson to this Peninsular Malaysian. Belonging is not created by repeatedly declaring that we are one. It grows when we keep making room for one another.
So when Malaysia becomes too noisy and everyone grows slightly too certain of being right, I will return to some wisdom acquired through marriage and many cups of coffee: Bah. Kupi-kupi dulu. Sit down. The table is still ours. Kita-kita juga baini.
And when, despite everything, our differences, laughter, food and friendship sit comfortably together, Sabah has another expression for that too:
Ngam bah. Selamat Hari Malaysia.
In Part 2, the conversation continues - from words and memory to the everyday spaces where muhibbah is quietly lived.
Joseph Tek Choon Yee has over 30 years of experience in the plantation industry, with a strong background in oil palm research and development, C-suite leadership and industry advocacy. The views expressed here are the writer’s own.
