‘Tasting’ the identities wrapped up in food

ON the first day of Ramadan, March 23, I received a surprise food delivery from Mohamad (not his real name), a 26-year-old former postgrad student. Moha-mad’s mother had prepared kouyteav sachko (mee Champa), a Cambodian soup noodle dish for my iftar-cum-dinner.

Mohamad’s parents are refugees from Siem Reap, Cambodia, who came here in the 1970s. According to historical and ethnographic materials, about 250,000 Cambodians and Vietnamese people (sometimes called “boat people”) arrived in droves, fleeing persecution and unjust death. Of these, about 10,000 were accepted in Malaysia and some received permanent resident status.