LETTER: This is my third year not being able to celebrate Deepavali at home, in a part of the United Kingdom where the festival is not even routinely known or recognised.
I found myself on the couch at half past 10 in the evening, Greenwich Mean Time, tucked under a blanket because it is miserably cold, scrolling through YouTube.
And what do i find but a repost by Petronas. Their Deepavali advertisement from 2003.
It was quite a sensation back then, and remains one of their most memorable.
The one where Patti innocently asks Sam, in Tamil, what sort of a name Sam is, only for him to reveal that his actual name is Muthusamy Karrupiah.
I was eleven back then. A primary school pupil. My father was still alive and well. I had no ambitions, no financial obligations or worries. I was simply a child.
Now, over two decades later, I am a grown adult, navigating the uncertainties of life as an international medical graduate trying to build a life in the UK.
Rewatching it brought back memories of a better time.
Of those halcyon days, as one would say, when life seemed so much simpler and the people i loved were still around.
And the message at the end? “The world is changing, but we will always be proud of who we are.”
As an 11-year-old, i probably never gave those words a second thought. As an adult, I finally understand what they mean.
I am proud to call myself a Malaysian Tamil, and that will remain my identity no matter where life takes me. Living abroad also made me realise how much of myself remains rooted in the country i call home.
Perhaps that is the strange thing about growing older. Things that once seemed insignificant acquire an entirely different meaning when revisited through the eyes of an adult.
An advertisement that once interrupted my grandmother’s favourite Tamil serial has, 23 years later, become something that reminds me of home, my father, my childhood and the Malaysia I left behind.
I may be far from home, but my heart is there tonight. And I thank Petronas, one of our national prides, for sharing it again.
It brought a little Deepavali cheer to a Malaysian spending yet another festive season away from home.
‘Selamat Hari Deepavali’ to everyone celebrating, including Malaysians who, like me, are spending the festival far away from home.
LOSHI RAJEN
Merseyside, England