Mad Sally and the Snake

Joy here…As many of you know, "Joy" is not my real name, but the name I use on this sporting blog.  It came from a collaboration with my friend "Nomi" back when we used to blog together on East and West Running as we trained for our first-ever running races - her in Malaysia and me in Canada.  We took our names from Joy Kogawa's amazing novel Obasan about WWII internment and displacement of Japanese Canadians.  My co-blogger took the name "Nomi," the protagonist, and I took the name of the author herself.  It was our little inside joke and homage, and it's stuck.

So Joy I am.

But I'm also a writer in other genres.  In my past life I was an educator, writing teaching manuals; I was a scholar, writing peer reviewed, academic articles; I was a populist writer, penning materials for popular and trade magazines; I was a wannabe poet, drafting reams of earnest but bad poetry; and now I'm a writer of kid's books.

Here we are, the kids' story creative team:
I'm the arctic fox on the right, and Nomi is the kitty cat
painter, while her talented daughter is the imaginative beast.

Nomi and I have teamed up to write kid's stories; I do the stories, and she and her super duper talented 9-year old daughter do the illustrations.

Today's post takes the form of one of those stories, and it's about Mad Sally, yet another one of my pseudonyms.  You see, ex-pats (or white people) in Malaysia are referred to as "Mat Salleh."  There's debate about where the term originated, with some thinking it a bastardization of "mad sailor," those crazy drunken Europeans that early Malays didn't know what to do with!

Nomi's daughter looked at her just the other day and asked if I was a Mad Sally (mispronouncing Mat Salleh), so in this never-ending game of telephone where Mad Sailor -> Mat Salleh -> Mad Sally, I am now Mad Sally, and below is my weekend's adventure with a snake:

-----Mad Sally and the Snake-----

The early dawn light was just beginning to show,
So we loaded the car with bikes and got ready to go.

We drove out to the parking spot,
Getting ready before the day got too hot.

We put on our helmets and got ready to ride,
Up into the hills, side by side.

The trees were swathed in mist,
And the leaves glistened with dew newly kissed.

We were rather early and it was rather quiet,
Well, aside from the monkeys who always make a riot!

But as we rode in the early morning,
Suddenly without any warning, 

This Mad Sally
Had to pee.

So by the side of the road we stopped,
And off my bike I quickly hopped.

I looked into the trees;
It was still; there was no breeze.

There was green all around,
And I stomped to make lotsa sound.

I wanted whatever was in the bush
To get away from my soon-to-be-bare tush!

"Here I come," I said to shrub and tree,
Hiding myself from the road in order to pee.

Then I squatted as if the outdoors were my loo,
Only to see something pinned under my shoe.

Orange on one side it showed,
Then writhing its belly exposed

Horizontal stripes,

And I wondered how many types

Of snakes live out here,
And should I be in great fear

Of the little guy so bright
Pinned under my foot in fright.

My pants were half-mast,
And I peed super fast,

But had to release the snake from under my cleat
Without getting poison bitten into my feet.

So with my heart in my throat,
Fearing my chances remote,

Knowing I had no chance for mistake

I had to leap over a writhing snake!

I jumped half a mile
And ran with no style

Back to the road
Where my husband had slowed,

Waiting for me
To be done with my pee.

He heard my shout,
Wondered what it was about,

And when I described the snake
I had escaped

We decided that next time Mad Sally
Has to go pee

We'll wait and find a pot
So I don't have to squat

And risk the poisonous ache
Of being bitten by a Malayan Coral Snake!

-----The End-----


PS:  I didn't actually take pictures of the snake!  I found the images here from random google searching to find pictures of the little guy who struggled under my shoe!