'Tumbuk Cili'

Juan Or loves doing the 'tumbuk cili' (pounding the chili in the pestle and mortar) act - lifting his legs up high in the air and then stamping the legs down onto the floor with force, producing a thudding sound. The 'tumbuk cili' phrase was coined by his paternal Grandma and it began like this:

In the wee hours of the morning at about 4.00 am, Mommy had already finished breastfeeding Juan Or but Juan Or refused to go to sleep and wanted to play. So Mummy left him on his mattress to play by himself. So he started pounding the floor repeatedly with his legs. A few days later, his paternal Grandma started mentioning about the pounding sound she heard that day and thought that this must be the work of some crazy neighbour who started pounding chilies (to prepare sambal for nasi lemak, perhaps?) during the wee hours in the morning, only to know later that it was actually her grandson's work!