Hakka and home

You couldn’t really tell which was the noisiest – the smoke-belching diesel generator or the whining gears of a concrete mixer. Or those Hakka plasterers.

Neither could you tell which deserved Workhorse of the Month Award – the seasoned-grey jackhammer rat-a-tatting for hours or the diamond-tooth power grinder spewing dust and sparks. Or those Hakka plasterers.

I came upon these folks one morning on a walkabout at a bungalow construction site. They left a lingering impression.

Way before Live-Work-Play became an urban lifestyle catchword among developers, these people were already embodying it in their own way. Dressed in utility samfu and pasar malam pants and dusty canvas shoes, these middle-age women and men bring their daily mirth to the workplace, unencumbered by the dour weight of the world. They don’t care about yoghurt, maybe yongtowfoo; not latte, perhaps satay. And don’t tell them to quiet down. That would be very bad manners on your part.

“They’re from Kajang,” the main contractor told me. He too was amused. “They are like one big family. They move as a group from job to job. Always the same members.”

And they’re so in demand they’re booked solid for months on out, he added.

Every morning before sunrise, a “family” van moves through the kampung baru alleys and picks up the members. Some of the menfolk may have already set off on their kapchais. Some mornings they’d stop for breakfast, especially if someone chung tau 4-D; they’d ynim kopi, sik yew-cha-kuee and set off for work.

In The Hundred Secret Senses, Amy Tan writes from the yin-eyes of Kwan: “We had a saying. When you marry a Thistle Mountain girl, you get three oxen for a wife: one that breeds, one that plows, one to carry your old mother around. That’s how tough a Hakka girl was.”

Well, I’ll be. It wasn’t thaaaaat hard to miss.

Along with the men, the women shoveled sand and lime, dumped sacks of cement into the mixer, and pushed loaded wheelbarrows over gangplanks. They plastered on the scratch coat, then the final coat days later leaving behind a finished sheen so smooth you’d feel bad it was going to be painted over.

The best part was they seemed happy. They seemed like community, like family. They spoke animatedly while plastering, moving as a group moving from room to room. They talked about their men and their children, and the food they had yesterday. They ribbed each other in a dialect I could not fathom but in laughter that I could. They had fun. And they did good consistent work.

These Hakka plasterers are a traveling social unit. A mobile cottage industry, they exemplify local community and support. No government aid, no datuk connections, just making an honest living. They are a post-colonial, post-Emergency style EPF, Socso and health insurance scheme all rolled into one. With breakfast thrown in sometimes.

Much has been said about the dearth of quality local artisans these days. From Kedah to Sarawak, many have left for a better paycheck in Singapore be it tile-layers, finish carpenters, painters, welders, masons. It’s not just brain drain, it’s skills drain just as much. Merit pays.

These Hakka plasterers have the skills. They too could have moved to work in Singapore and yet they stayed. They stayed because community - not just money - provides security.

“Haiyo, what for go there? Home is here,” one of the louder women answered me.

Her simple answer made me feel stupid for even forming that question. Plus the irony that Hakkas were considered foreigners amongst the Chinese, gypsies in their own land.

I think our local industries and human resource gurus could learn from this. That community needn’t break down in deference for a corporate-style method of operations. We needn’t whole-heartedly adopt Western concepts. Corporate ladders and KPIs may make surface sense but can it truly stir deep productivity?

In the first place, is productivity the proper gauge? As a word, it feels too slanted towards the mercenary and devoid of the spirit.

There must be a better word to measure performance, a word that reaches at deeper commitments rather than production numbers, of a nourishing environment that makes you want to stay, contribute, and be creative.

Perhaps something like belongivity instead.

I’ve done the corporate thing in a previous life. Yes, the company takes care of you, great benefits and all, but ultimately it is a machine mindset and you’re a cog, and you have a shelf life. It is cold, brrr-uddy cold.

And then there are those plasterers… Through all that yakkity-yak and smooth troweling of walls, they’re quite a scene to behold, and quite a lesson. It makes you think. Belongivity over productivity. Through them I learned, that size aside, some of the best things actually come in loud packages. Hakka loud.

And guess what. Home is here. Duhh.