The house would be crowded with relatives I barely recognised, people whose names I struggled to remember but who somehow knew exactly who I was.
Someone was always sleeping on the floor. The kitchen was unbearably hot, with aunties moving between large pots of “kuah” (gravy) and trays of kuih while the fan spun lazily above.
At my maternal aunt’s house in Penang, the smell was unmistakable: nasi tomato, acar buah, and trays of sweet treats that seemed to appear endlessly on the table.
Every surface felt sticky with...