The early influences on his art style were from the West. Like most of the Malaysian children in the 1950s, Lat watched Hanna-Barbera cartoons ("The Flintstones" and "The Jetsons") on television and read imported British comics, such as "The Dandy" and "The Beano". He studied them and used their styles and themes in his early doodles. After the foreign influences in his works were noticed by a family friend, Lat was advised by his father to observe and draw upon ideas from their surroundings instead. Heeding the advice, the young cartoonist intimated himself with local happenings. "Tiga Sekawan" was conceived as a humorous crime-fighting story of a local flavour. "Keluarga Si Mamat" and its protagonist were named after his youngest brother Mamat, its stories based on Lat's observations of his fellow villagers and schoolmates. The inspiration for his cartoons about "Bersunat" came about when he was on assignment at a hospital. As he was taking breaks from investigating the dead victims of crime brought to the morgue, Lat chanced upon the circumcisions performed by the hospital on ethnic Malay boys. He found their experiences clinical, devoid of the elaborate and personal ceremonies that celebrated his own rite to manhood in the village. Lat felt compelled to illustrate the differences between life in his "kampung" and the city.