MyIndo.com somehow has this propensity to find itself basked in bits of innocent yet gleefully effortless 'fame.' This is one of the reasons why I love running it.

In February 2005, I received an email from a freelance image finder based in Australia named Tracey. Her email was as follows:

My answer back to Tracey was of course a no-brainer and an enthusiastic "YES!" My ketupat photos were to become part of an international book for kids!, I thought. I'd be crazy not to jump the bandwagon.

I furiously scrambled through my archive of photos for the ketupat ones I had used for my Making Ketupat Daun Palas article and sent them off to Tracey in two shakes of a ketupat weaver's hands.

Some months passed by and I heard nothing from Tracey about the book or of my ketupat photos.

And then one day, on 24 November 2005 I received this package from Seattle, Washington, USA.

At this point I had completely forgotten about Tracey and the book project, and thought some freaky company had gone through a lot of trouble to send me a registered product catalogue.

As I slit the envelope open this slim book fell out, and I squealed like a mouse being trampled on by an elephant!

The Weavers of the World book! By Nan Walker! The book was finally published! And look whose family's ketupats made it on the front cover!

I ran to my parents and practically shoved the book up their noses. They bore looks of utter confusion until they realized that their hands and ketupats were featured in the book! And they were just as excited as I was!

(Did I mention that I come from a family of nerds?)

This is the index of the 16-page book aimed for kids in the age range of 6-8 years old (my guesstimate).

Find my name in the line of credits! :)

McGraw-Hill is a well-known book publisher. I remember my university textbooks being McGraw-Hills.

This is the first page on which we see Dad's hands rolling up ketupats on page 2.

And this is the chapter on Indonesia in which our ketupats were featured.

However this segment of the book rendered our ketupats non-Malaysian. :( Before you accuse me of being a traitor to my own country, I am just as dismayed that Malaysia did not get a mention. Sigh. That was the only gripe that I had with this book.

Otherwise I am quite happy that Indonesia is featured in this book, a representative of sorts from our Southeast Asian region, ey?

Lastly the content of the "Indonesia" chapter featured our old pot full to the brim with lovely ketupat daun palas, to which my mother exclaimed, "hey that's our periuk!" Indeed.

My dad scrutinized the text on page 14 before saying "now that's grossly inaccurate, our ketupats are not made from coconut leaves as the book says."

He's right. Although some ketupat are made from coconut leaves, ours were weaved out of palas leaves that come from a palm tree of the Licuala species.

In the right top corner of this page is my dear mother's hands stuffing half-cooked pulut rice into a ketupat casing like the expert that she is.

Still feeling slightly dissatisfied with the whole Malaysia-elimination issue from the book, I decided to write back to Tracey:

Tracey wrote me back, saying:

(Hey at least I tried, right?)

At any rate, I am happy that MyIndo.com's ketupat photos make it into a book! Thank you Tracey and Trillium Publishing for making this possible.

(And hey look you can buy the book online!)

Relevant links:

The MyIndo.com article that started it all:
Making Ketupat Daun Palas (spot the photos in the article that are featured in Weavers of the World!)

If you're considering buying Weavers of the World.