Excuse me, are you from Indonesia?

I met up with two Sabahan friends of mine just now. One of them has been working here in KL for quite a bit while the other was in town for a few weeks for this course he was taking.

We spoke a mixture of Bahasa Malaysia and English throughout our conversation and our BM "accent" seems to have caught the attention of the waiter, who appeared to be an ethnic Malay (actually it doesn't matter what race they are, they always mistake our accents as long as they're not born in Sabah).

Anyway, just as we asked for the bill, our curious waiter tried to be smart and asked my visiting friend: "excuse me sir, where are you from ya? Are you from Indonesia?"

I corrected him immediately and said "That's a Sabahan accent."

Sure, I probably sounded defensive but then, I'm not about to let him get away with that. It's like mistaking Spanish for Italian, or something to that effect.

The point is, peninsular Malaysians tend to be unable to tell the difference between a Sabahan accent and an Indonesian accent. (Heck I think they make fun of Sarawakian accents too but then, this blog is about Sabahans so no hard feelings ya my good neighbours).

I remember when I first got here to the peninsula, there was this kid who also remarked that Sabahans speak like Indonesians.

And just the other day, a colleague of mine seemed rather surprised that I was from Sabah and even had the cheek to ask me why I don't speak like other Sabahans.

I don't know whether that was an insult or a compliment but excuse me, do we sound funny now?

Granted, it could be our geographical proximity with Indonesia and the Philippines that influenced the way we talk but no sireee, we do NOT sound Indonesian or Filipino for that.

We sound Sabahan. Full stop.

Now that just reminded me of another one of my colleague who seemed stunned when I started speaking Bahasa Malaysia over the phone, Sabah accent and all.

She thought it was a foreign language.

Sigh...