Paddylands – Grace P. Garnier (1947) (1st ed)

In short, this children’s book is an introduction to Malay culture disguised as a children’s story. The story takes place in a village in Kedah, and is really quite an easy and concise way description of life in a Malay kampung. In this short book, the author manages to incorporate everything considered typically “Malay” – kampung life, durians and other tropical fruit, monkeys, elephants, padi fields, sarongs, Rajahs, sampans and perahus, etc etc etc, – while managing to explain what these are in a succinct manner, and, impressively, without prejudice.