MALAYSIANS KINI In an Orang Asli village just an hour’s drive away from Kuala Lumpur, a group of 20 women, young and old, are gathered under a hut on an overcast Tuesday morning.

The women, from the Mah Meri tribe in Pulau Carey, are artisans who collectively form the Tompoq Topoh crafts workshop situated in Kampung Sungai Bumbun.

They have come to the hut, situated outside their small concrete workshop, with tote bags filled with colourful and finely woven crafts - bookmarks, purses, small bags and boxes - made of dyed pandan leaves.

One of the women, however, is not quite like the others.

She is Reita Rahman (right in photo), a petite Malay lady in her mid-40s and one of the core volunteers of the non-profit group Gerai OA (Orang Asal).

She came with tote bags of her own. One is filled with snacks including chocolates for children whom the Mah Meri women have brought in tow. The others are empty, waiting to be filled with crafts.

Armed with a small notebook, Reita takes record of the women’s crafts and calculates their earnings.

Because Gerai OA’s pop-up stalls are only set up when they are not charged rent, Reita is able to give the artisans 100 percent of the sales earnings.

The artisans get paid half at the time of collection, and are paid the other half once the items are sold.

The Mah Meri artisans Malaysiakini met got an average of about RM100 each.

It is not much, but it is a source of supplementary income for the women, many of whom are full-time housewives with no land of their own to farm and grow oil palms.

“It’s a part-time job for us, besides processing coconuts at home and helping our husbands with odd jobs,” one of the women who identified herself as Ani, told Malaysiakini.

But according to Reita, the work Gerai OA does for the women is about more than just giving them money.

“It has actually given the women a voice over the years. Some of the ladies, previously, wouldn’t even be able to look me in the eye.

“Now they can joke with you. Now they can speak up,” said Reita.

One of the jokes, as told by Tompoq Topoh chairperson Maznah Unyan, is about why the Mah Meri women are always looking down.

“It’s because we're busy counting money!” Maznah said, to laughter from the group.

Blue ribbon specials

The Mah Meri village in Pulau Carey is just one of 30 villages throughout Malaysia that Reita and her group of 80-rotating Gerai OA volunteers collect crafts from.

Each village has their own specialised traditional craft to offer, including rare items - dubbed blue ribbon specials - that only one artisan produces.

Those interested in the items that have blue ribbons tied around them, can only buy one at a time.

Despite having a vast network of villages to service, the Mah Meri in Pulau Carey appears to have a special place in Reita’s heart.

It was here that the idea for Gerai OA began to take shape in 2004 when Reita was just a researcher studying indigenous crafts in peninsular Malaysia.

While carrying out her research in Pulau Carey, the women artisans approached her and asked for her help in dealing with middlemen who were squeezing them out of their profits.

“This store (Gerai OA) was never part of the plan, but then more and more villages started getting involved.

“The objective was to break the monopoly. The idea was to let the villagers have alternatives. Whenever there is a monopoly, that is where trouble usually starts. So the first monopoly we broke was in Pulau Carey,” Reita said.

Since then, she has become part of the community, often using the terms “we”, “our” and “us” when speaking about the Mah Meri’s past, present and future.

She even has a foster mother, an elderly artisan who retired after suffering a stroke.

But her passion for all Orang Asal, their crafts and traditions, is evident as she fondly shows off photos of other communities and their crafts through a hand-me-down tablet.

It is her hope that through Gerai OA, the public can gain awareness, not just about Orang Asal crafts, but also the issues they face, such as lack of access to water, electricity, and land rights.

Gerai OA usually sets up shop once a month, with the last sale of the year being at Bangsar earlier this month.

Their next sale will be at Damansara City Mall, as a part of a three-day bazaar beginning on Jan 6, 2017.

Malaysians Kini is a series on Malaysians you should know.

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