Selamat datang
Ever wondered:
- why your writing sounds fine to you, but teachers still mark it up in red?
- why your Malay sometimes feels like a translation from English?
- why you can put a sentence together just fine — but you’re sometimes unsure the imbuhan is right?
For a lot of readers here, Malay is the mother tongue — but somewhere along the way, English got there first. School, work, friends. And now it feels like your own language is playing catch-up. For others, Malay came later, through years of classes and effort, and it’s the fine print that still won’t quite settle.
Either way, you’re not starting from zero.
You’ve got a foundation — classes, dramas in the background, conversations you’ve followed even when you didn’t always join in. This blog is about closing the gap between what you already know and what actually comes out.
What we’ll get into
- Adalah or ialah? They’re not the same — and even the newspapers get this wrong.
- Tidak or bukan? English has one “not”. Malay has two, and they do different jobs.
- Ke or kepada? Both mean “to” — but not in the same situations.
Not textbook theory. Just the stuff that quietly trips people up, finally explained.
Jumpa lagi.
— Abang Zul 😊