BY GABRIEL LIHAN & JASMINE BADUN
KUCHING: Two good friends have decided to play their part to preserve their native language – by introducing their first book, titled ‘Nama Berita’, which also means ‘How are you?’ in the Iban language.
Its author, Natasha Binya Nanta, 32 and illustrator Felicia Bateman, 29, said the children’s book aimed to encourage kids to talk about their feelings and to promote the native language.
The idea came about during the movement control order (MCO) in June last year, when Natasha started making Iban quizzes on her Instagram account.
Surprisingly, she received overwhelming responses and many expressed their interest to learn more about the language.
“I started some online classes to teach the language and I was glad that many were really enjoying the sessions,” Natasha told New Sarawak Tribune recently.
“So, I shared my idea with my friend, Felicia – about publishing a book to introduce some Iban words. She supported my idea and helped me with (illustrating) the picture of the book,” she said.
“We want a fun and quirky topic to start off the book, thus, we choose several words about feelings, such as happy, sad, angry and how to pronounce them in Iban and English.”
“In a way, we are playing our part to preserve our native language for the future generations,” she said.
Natasha said among those who were interested and purchased ‘Nama Berita’ including family members, friends and even strangers, some of them even bought it for themselves despite it being a children’s book.
“We are already brewing ideas for new topics in the Iban language to further expand the readers’ vocabulary. We hope everyone will be proud of the Iban language,” she added.
Natasha, a pure Iban born and raised in Kuching shared that her grandparents taught her to speak and read in Iban since she was little.
“I live in a household that very much embraces our Iban culture. We are always proud of our Iban heritage, from the language to traditional adat-adat Iban,” she said.
Meanwhile, Felicia is a Eurasian of English, Iban, Bidayuh and Chinese ancestry. She is also the owner of The Ink Spot, an online Instagram business account focused on printing, designing, and crafts.
“We want the book to be inclusive so that everyone can identify with it, whether you’re a traditionalist, a modern Iban, mixed race or simply just want to appreciate and celebrate the culture,” she said.
“We spent a few months finalising the idea on the illustration for Nama Berita as we did not want the characters to be pigeonholed into looking a certain way given that the book was meant for everybody.” she said.
“During Natasha’s lessons, she had mentioned that Iban were greatly influenced by nature and what was around them.
“So, we decided to take natural elements like the sun, sky, river, flora and fauna as well as the traditional Dayak elements like the bunga terung and hornbill feathers,” she explained.
Felicia also said they decided to go for a different colour palette by making it bright, fun and attractive to kids.
“Throughout the whole process we are very determined for it to be deeply rooted in the culture, even if we were departing from traditional means of depicting them,” she said.
Felicia who started illustrating last year said it took her ages to think about her decision and finally decided to take a leap of faith to explore digital illustrations.
“The most enjoyable thing about this project was how much I got to learn about my own culture as well.”
“This book could have just been another idea we would always talk about but never actually get around to doing. The thing I am proud of is that we actually did it – as the hardest part is always starting…,” she added.
Nama Berita is sold for RM35 and it comes with an interactive sticker sheet. Thus far, the duo managed to sell the initial stock of 100 books and are in the process to reprint more copies. For more information on the purchase of the book, follow @the_ink_spot on Instagram.
