Asnida Daud’s heart has always been with the sea. 

As an Orang Laut, the indigenous islander population of Singapore, she spent a significant part of her childhood learning about her culture and heritage, which she’s grown to love. 

This love comes through most potently in her music. Written in Malay, her songs are more than just songs. The 52-year-old calls them “aural histories” that carry the voices of her mother, aunts, and other relatives, and echo the folklore and lived experiences of her people. 

Rapid urbanisation, economic shifts, and changing identities are threatening to erase the memory of her people, Asnida told me. 

For her, music is the vessel that ensures those stories are not only remembered, but passed down, bringing to life the almost-forgotten world of the Orang Laut. 

“As Orang Laut, a lot of our stories and experiences are often told orally and aurally,” said the mother of four adult children. “We didn’t often write our stories down because most of us just loved to sing, to speak, to tell – a lot of our liveliness comes from our songs and conversations.”

AN UPBRINGING OF MUSIC AND STORIES

“Dik, music is woven into my DNA,&r...