#malay proverbs

'di mana bumi dipijak, di situ langit dijunjung'.

It means 'where you plant your feet, is where you hold up the sky'.

"wherever you are you must follow what people there do..

–their custom their ways. So we bit our tongue when people whispered about us behind our backs, or made those sharp little comments to our faces, or even spit on our door. We paid our fees to the neighbourhood gangs regularly, so hooligans wouldn't cause us trouble. We knew they asked us for more than our neighbours, but we paid anyway."

"No choice. That was our sky."

"Gajah Seekor, Gembala Dua"- One elephant, two shepherds.

"You may plant the bitter cucumber on a bed of sago, and manure it with honey, and water it with treacle, and train it over sugar canes, but when it is cooked it will still be bitter."

Maxwell, Malay proverbs, JMBRAS (1878).