BEFORE THE DAYS when they could go to a shop and buy cooking oil with money, the Temuan depended on the perah nut which produces a delicious, fragrant oil when dried and pounded and boiled into a paste and then smoked for a week in sealed bamboo tubes. The nut comes from a tropical hardwood much prized by the timber industry. It's becoming rarer and rarer to find a perah tree nearby since logging became a lucrative business. From afar you can spot a flowering perah by its striking red-orange-pink leaves. This usually means the nuts are already growing. The Temuan are particularly sad to see loggers cut down the perah trees.
Indah explained: “We use the perah nut in so many ways. Boiled, it can be eaten like a cempedak or jackfruit seed. Powdered, it can be mixed with vegetables and fried - very tasty. And, of course, the perah nut was an essential source of cooking oil for our great-grandparents. We never chop down the perah tree, even though its wood is excellent for building. We believe that the perah was a special legacy from Inak Bongsu. When it came time for her to depart the Earth, she chose the form of the perah tree as an emblem of her eternal blessing. The perah grows in great abundance on the slopes of Gunung Rajah. It's a very sacred tree to us. We must sayang (cherish) the perah.”