Halo!
This time, I decided to write another post about popular Indonesian children song. The song title, ‘Nenek Moyangku’, literally translates as something along the line of ‘My Ancestor’ or ‘My Forefather’. Though the word ‘forefather’ is not necessarily correct as, if you look at my family post, you will know that the word ‘nenek’ means ‘grandmother’. The word ‘foremother’ would sound strange in English, though, the same as how the word ‘kakek moyangku’ sounds really strange in Indonesia. Indonesia do tend to lean more towards a more maternal or at least neutral word as compared to, say, English, German, and the Netherlands. Another easy example would be how in English, the country of one’s origin or homeland is oft referred to as ‘fatherland’, whereas in Indonesia, we either say it as ‘tanah air’ (which literally means ‘land water’) or as ‘Ibu Pertiwi’ (which, if, again, you have read my post about family then you would know that ‘ibu’ means ‘mother’). I found this very interesting.
Anyway, this song was written by a famous children composer from Indonesia, the late Ibu Sud (or Mrs. Sud) in 1940. It is said that this song was inspired by her biological father, who was a former seafarer.
I chose this song because of a program in N*tG*o in where they said that the Austronesians composed of people who are spread across multiple countries: from Taiwan to Hawaii to New Zealand to Madagascar. If you look at a world map, you would notice how South East Asians countries, including Indonesia, Malaysia, Papua New Guinea, and the Philippines, are included, at least geographically, in the Austronesians. Further, when I watched the program, I realised how some of our words are also similar: the words for five (the number), fish, and ear, for example.
In that program, it is also said that our ancestors spread through the sea since thousands of years ago. When I was small, I thought the ancestors mentioned in this song make sense because I, as a Chinese descend, knew that Chinese merchants came to Indonesia through ships to trade. However, now I start to re-think the other half of my ancestry, who might as well had come through ships too even earlier than the Chinese.
Anyway, let’s look at the lyric:
Nenek Moyangku
Nenek moyangku seorang pelaut
Gemar mengarung luas samudra
Menerjang ombak tiada takut
Menempuh badai sudah biasa
Angin bertiup layar terkembang
Ombak berdebur di tepi pantai
Pemuda b’rani bangkit sekarang
Ke laut kita beramai-ramai
The lyrics can be translated roughly as:
My Ancestor
My ancestor was a seafarer
Happy to sail the wide ocean
Facing waves without fear
Going through storms was a daily activity
Wind blows and the sails are in the wind
Waves crash on seashores
Brave young men rise now
To the sea we go together
To be fair, I only remember the first verse. As in, I don’t have any memory of having hearing the second verse at all. The first verse is catchy enough to be remembered though, as I can still remember it more than a decade later.
The song mostly talks about how my, or our, ancestors came through the rough sea to successfully reach the land we call home now. Even through high tides and sea-storms, they persevered. The second verse, on the other hand, talks more about how young men are most likely the ones who are seafarers and brave the sea in search for land and food.
Alright, that’s it for my post about this ‘Nenek Moyangku’ song. If you want to hear the tone, which is actually very easy and catchy but I cannot say what the chords are as I was never particularly gifted (or gifted at all) in the music department, just type the title in Youtube and you should find it.
Thanks for reading! See you on my next post~
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