What is a sarongutan? Part 1

Sunset at Tanjung Aru, my home.

Hello. My name is Hugh Mann. I am a sarongutan.

I grew up on the beach my whole life. My parents, Mr. Mann and Mrs. Mann, worked at a beach in Sabah, Malaysia called Tanjung Aru. Dad rents out jetskis while Mom sells yummy satay sticks by the beach. My Dad isn’t a Malaysian, but he decided to live here after witnessing “the most magically inspiring sunset on the face of the planet” during a holiday here, whatever that means. Mom is a local, born and bred right here in good ol’ Sabah.

What I like most about the beach besides the sunset is how colorful it is. Everyone here wears a colorful sarong. I started liking the sarong when I was 10. Mom and Dad wore sarongs all the time but they never made me wear sarongs. I asked Mom, “How come everyone at the beach wears a sarong? Where’s mine?” To which she replied, “Hugh, honey, you don’t need a sarong. You have fur.”

Fur?

Other kids always teased me at school because of my funny face and my orange, hairy body. When I was young I didn’t understand why I looked different. Maybe Mom fed me Dad’s hair-loss medicine instead of milk? As for my face, I always thought I was kinda cute. Some girls told me I was cute but when I asked them to go out on a date with me they said, “Not in a million years!”

Am I really that different? What am I?


To be continued…