Sweet potatoes

Nostalgia Dessert for Your Grandpa and Grandma
A bowl of Sweet Potatoes Soup in exchanged for some old days stories


Written by Mrs. Money

You might listen your old parents or grandparents repeating their 40s Japanese occupation same old stories of how they hated sweet potatoes, as sweet potatoes took just three to four months to mature but it took longer for rice to get harvested thus in those old war days dinner table, more sweet potatoes would show on their plates than rice.

Chinese immigrants left China to settle down in Sarawak mainly due to bandits attack and poverty in their old villages back in China, then under communist era, these Chinese-Sarawakiens wouldn’t be able to return China as freely as before. Once the iron curtain opened in 80s, old folks who could still walk would “return” to China as often as possible. Can you imagine one day when they get so old on a wheelchair but they want to die next to their kids, so they would not be able to die in their birth place? Most old folks are very lonely and towards their dooming days nostalgia takes over them, they would sigh, “That’s life!”

I realize that I have no feeling and not that keen to visit China as a second generation Chinese-Sarawakien born in Sarawak, but I could see my dad and Mr. Money still like to go visit China as they are the first generation born Chinese-Sarawakiens. If one day I migrate to NZ for good, due to I want to be next to my kids, but where will my nostalgia heart falls to?

No matter how badly happened to a country’s political and crime situations, if one born there, once drank the water and ethic foods there, these are the hooks that forever trapped on one’s subconscious mind.

So ready to turn your old folks touchy?

Make sure you have a whole free afternoon! Cut the potatoes into pieces, add water and sago. Boil for 20 minutes, finally add in coconut milk and sugar. Serve the dessert in Jingdazhen bowls, when you present this dessert to your old folks, whether they reject you or not, there will be some nastalgia stories ready to listen!

Kiwi will call sweet potatoes as kumara. It is very easy to plant, make sure you have a raised bed for your patch, try to get some sweet potatoes cuttings from your friends. Insert each cutting into the patch with a marking. Make sure y0u water it on sunny day. After three months, you look up for the old marking, use a spade to dig the soil carefully surround the marking, you will find few sweet potatoes in each marking.