WHEN PENANG CELEBRATED RAYA BANZAI

THE ageing piece of newspaper cutting slips out from between the pages of a book I just acquired from the Penang flea market. Not daring to grab it in mid air out of fear of crumpling the fragile parchment, I patiently allow it to come to rest on the carpet in my Magazine Road hotel room before picking it up for a closer look.

My heart skips a beat when it turns out to be part of the Penang Shimbun, an English language daily published during the Japanese Occupation of Malaya. Dated Aug 27, 2603, it announced, among other things, the date for local Muslims to commence fasting during that particular year, which coincided with 1943 in the English calendar.

The declaration, made at the Penang Muslim Association by Syed Hashim Idrus who represented the state’s Board of Kathis, stated that Muslims in Penang and Province Wellesley would begin their fast on Sept 1 or a night earlier, depending on the sighting of the moon on the evening of Aug 31.

The paper went on to explain that Muslims the world over began their annual fasting on the first of Ramadan, the ninth month in the Muslim calendar. The fast, which lasts for a full month, begins each day before the sun rises and ends with its setting below the horizon.

A prominent community leader, A.M. Yusuf Izzudin, was quoted in the text asking Muslims in Penang and Province Wellesley to offer special prayers in mosques during the fasting period to seek divine intervention to help the Japanese Imperial Army win an immediate victory in the war.

This immediately brings to mind the oldest mosque in Penang, Masjid Kapitan Keling. This19th century place of worship, built by early Indian Muslim traders in George Town, must have surely been one of those places where these sanctioned prayers were held during World War II.

Located strategically at the corner of Lebuh Buckingham and another road that bears its name, Jalan Masjid Kapitan Keling, this prominent Islamic centre originated from humble beginnings. Back