ABSTRACT
Read any tourist brochure about Malaysia, and the virtues of life on the east coast of the peninsula are sure to be extolled. Here, one can experience the Western idea of a lotus-eating tropical paradise: relax in the serenity and calm of the Malay villages or kampongs, spend all day basking on the glorious sandy but empty beaches, and forget about the cares of the other world that you have left. This tourist idyll, however, is only one aspect of this part of Malaysia. For the Malays the east coast is seen as the cradle, the nurturer and the preserver of Malay culture. Here it was, in the small kampongs dotted along the coast and along the river banks, that the traditional Malay life was lived: where rice and the other simple necessities of life were grown; where birth, life and death followed a prescribed pattern; where everyone knew their place and life followed its relatively predictable course. Malaysia is one of the more industrialized countries of the region, but life in these east coast kampongs seems to continue much as it has always done.
