Don't misbehave or else...

Short story from my dad:

My dad was serving as a civil servant in one of the more rural states in Malaysia just before I was born. It being a rather small state, everyone new everybody else. One of my dad's friends was a very senior state civil servant.

This civil servant liked to have a drink every night after dinner. And he used to invite my dad over to join him. The only problem was that his alcohol tolerance wasn't overly high, and when he was drunk he could become somewhat rowdy.

As a senior civil servant, he had a handgun (gun laws in Malaysia are extremely restrictive. It's extremely difficult to get a license to own a handgun) and he wasn't shy in waving it when he was drunk.

Usually the drinking would go on until it was fairly late, and my dad would try to excuse himself saying that he needed to get to sleep in order to work the next day. At that point, the senior civil servant would whip out his handgun and tell my dad, "You stay and drink. Or do you want me to shoot you?"

His wife wasn't too happy about her husband's drinking habits, and my mother told me she'd come to visit her the next day in tears. There were instances when he was so drunk, he couldn't find the bathroom before going to bed and he would open the closet and pee into it.

During one of our yearly festivities, my dad held an open house for visitors to come and join in the celebrations. At that time, my grandmother had come down from another state to join us as well. It was during the open house that she met the senior civil servant.

My dad laughed as he recounted the incident. The senior civil servant was sober and very gentlemanly but he did have an odd way of thinking at times. Whilst chatting with my grandmother (who was a very sweet, small little old lady) he told her, "Auntie, if your son ever misbehaves, you tell me and I will shoot him" whereupon he took out his handgun and put it on the table.

According to my dad, my grandmother's eyes virtually popped out when he'd said those words and showed her his handgun.

Thankfully, he never did use the handgun on anyone.

Malaysian drivers and roads

You know, there's something really wrong with Malaysian drivers. I've driven in several different countries (mostly developed nations though) and in contrast, the Malaysian is truly abysmal in their standards of road-worthiness.

Anytime I take to the road, I'll typically see one if not more of these instances:

1. Inability of the driver to keep within his lane. The tires of the car will touch or cross the diving lines between lanes. Happens constantly.
2. Never heard of using the signal indicators when turning or switching lanes.
3. Side view mirrors are cosmetic accessories on vehicles. A lot of people don’t use them when turning/switching lanes.
4. Switching on the hazard lights whilst driving in heavy rain. Hazard lights are for when your vehicle is at a standstill. Your driving being that of a mobile hazard does not qualify!
5. Driving on the emergency or taxi and bus lane with impunity during periods when you're not allowed to do so. Doing an emergency cut-back into a regular lane (whilst causing near accidents with other drivers in said lane) when you notice a cop standing in the emergency or bus and taxi lane up ahead, with his ticket book in one hand.
6. Putting up sunshades on your rear windscreen. That's illegal by law, and it obstructs the view of the driver behind you from seeing what's up ahead of your vehicle.
7. Jumping queue at junctions/traffic lights. This is truly an art that only our drivers can excel at. Never mind that you're causing law-abiding drivers to spend more time on the road thanks to your selfish acts.
8. Red traffic light? What red traffic light? No car coming lah, just go already dah.
9. Green traffic light = Go. Yellow traffic light = Go faster. Red traffic light = bloody hell, I told you go faster didn't I? Now we gotta wait till the next light change.
10. Pedestrian (zebra) crossing? What pedestrian crossing?
11. One way street? I'm a motorcyclist. Can just go against the flow, no problem.


And on the subject of roads, it's not just the drivers. It's anyone using roads.

1. For pedestrians. Pedestrian bridge? What for climb the pedestrian bridge? It's so high and tiring. Just run across the road when got no car lah.
2. The pedestrian traffic light shows red. Cross the road only lah. Pedestrian lights got no yellow light, so our red is the equivalent of "Stop, or cross if you can."
3. If you've ever been a pedestrian in the heart of Kuala Lumpur, take a look at the pedestrian lights. There are times when they're not in sync with the rest of the traffic lights. When the light should be green, it still shows red, for no reason whatsoever. I've noticed this so many times at different places in town (the Central Market area is a big culprit). Looks like no one in City Hall could be bothered to tweak it.


And what about road maintenance?

There are times I strongly believe that within City Hall and/or the Public Works Department, there are a couple of special hitherto unknown positions to the general public. They are, the Director for the Department of Road Maintenance, assisted by the Deputy-Director (Operations), the Assistant Director (Road Tarring), the Assistant Director (Road Painting - Traffic Lines), the Assistant Director (Road Painting - Speed Bumps), and the Assistant Director (Road Patching). This is of course the operational side of the department.

Before any work orders can be issued by one of these august personages, one has to deal with the administrative half of the department which is led by the Deputy-Director (Administration and Finance), the Assistant Director (Policy), the Assistant Director (Tenders and Contracts), and the Assistant Director (Supply and Logistics).This is all of course a figment of my imagination (I hope!) but I somehow can imagine the existence of such a department.

When road patching works need to be done, it takes forever for it to be attended to, even after a complaint has been lodged. I guess the complaint lands in the DD (Operations) desk who liaises with the DD (Administration & Finance) as to whether a tender needs to be issued. The DD (Administration & Finance) liaises with the AD (Policy) and AD (Tenders and Contracts) to determine whether a tender needs to be called. If not, he then liaises back to DD (Operations) who directs AD (Road Patching) to handle the matter. The AD (Road Patching) will talk to the AD (Supply and Logistics) about requisitioning the necessary bitumen and sand to patch the road, which when he receives will then be passed on the work gang to finish the job.

Yes folks, this is the process they use to get ISO certification!And of course lest I forget, it takes one full lorry load of bitumen and sand to patch several small holes and for some strange reason when the lorry returns back to the depot, it's empty. :P


[Let me interrupt here for a quick commercial on what might happen in the everyday life of someone who lives on landed property (a house so to speak).

DING-DONG (doorbell rings)

House occupant opens front door.

A lorry filled with bitumen and sand is in front of the house. A man stands at the gate by the doorbell.

Man: Uncle, itu driveway mahu tar ah? Banyak murah. (Uncle, do you want us to tar you driveway? Very cheap)

We now go back to our regular article. We apologise for this short interruption.]


And let's not forget signboards on our roads. It's amazing how we can find road signboards blocked by trees, billboards and even posters (exclaiming some exhibition, offer or event).

I have noticed in cases where you’re traveling on a road and the road branches off into two or more directions (leading to the same destination), the signboard will invariably point in the direction of the tolled road. I may be a regular in the city that I live, but I have made the mistake several times of driving onto the tolled road simply because the signboard pointed me in that direction.

To wrap up this article, I note with amusement that over the past 5-6 years, we have got two new government departments related to roads/driving emerging. Where in the past we had the loan Road Transport Department alone to handle vehicle and driver’s licensing as well as certain road enforcement acts (along with the Traffic Police), we now have the Road Safety Department trying its best to change the mindset of the regular Malaysian driver. We also have the Malaysian Institute of Road Safety Research which conducts studies on how to reduce the accident/death rates on our roads.

Good luck to them, I say! Although frankly, I’m not holding my breath or keeping my fingers crossed.

Vision 2020

Short story for the day:

This was told by my sociology lecturer to our class. Several years before, he had gone to a foreign film festival which was being held in Malaysia. Hishamuddin Rais (for those who don't know who he is, he's a social activist who went into a self-imposed exile from Malaysia many years ago) had just returned to the country and he too attended the festival. They chatted amiably before entering the theatre area to watch a show. The whole thing was a pretty big do, done with government support.

Now since it's an foreign film festival, it was pretty much artsy stuff, so not really mainstream films. But since the government was involved, FINAS (the national censorship board) was involved. And since FINAS was involved... there was a lot of blurring and pixelisations at various parts of the film.

According to my lecturer, every time this occurred, Hishamuddin Rais would pipe up with, "Inilah Wawasan 2020!" (This is Vision 2020!)

[Vision 2020 being then prime minister Dr Mahathir's plan for Malaysia to become a developed nation by the year 2020]

Heh, amusing. Wish I'd been there to witness that.

Religious classes in school

I listened to a discussion amongst friends the other day about religious education in school, and that made me think of my own experiences. In our school system, Muslims would go for religious classes whilst at the same time, non-Muslims would attend classes on Moral Education.

When I was in primary school, the first three years of my life I had an ustazah (female religious teacher) who took our classes. She was neither overly strict nor was she overly lenient. Considering the fact that we're talking about kids between the ages of seven to nine, that's understandable.

By the time I hit upper primary though, a new teacher took over our classes, an ustaz (male religious teacher). I'll never forget him as he was a kind, gentle man who didn't believe in using physical punishment or even raising his voice to get the points into our head. I think practically the whole class looked up to him since we were more afraid of his gentle verbal scolding when we did something wrong then if he had raised his hand to give us a tight slap. He was the kind of person that made you feel really small and guilty if he had to chide us (always in a gentle manner). Three interesting years of religious education where I enjoyed learning more about my religion.


When I hit secondary school though, things truly changed. The first two years of my life there, classes were taken on by an ustazah who was so set in her ways that it left me very little with new religious understanding but more on depression at having to attend the compulsory classes.

I'll never forget our first class with her. She had taken a look at the register of names and then she called out the name of one Malay boy, "Jeff. Come to the front." (all this was in Malay of course, I'm translating it now to English since my command of Malay has deteriorated over the years).

Jeff went to the front of the class to stand next to her with a slightly apprehensive look.

Ustazah: "What is your father's name?"
Jeff: "Yahaya, ustazah.
Ustazah: "From now on, I shall address you as Yahaya. Jeff is not a Muslim name."

There was silence in the class at that. I didn't really think much of it then being just 13 years of age, but now that I'm much older (and I hope, far wiser) I wonder at the irony of it. Jeff is not a Muslim name? It might not be a Malay name, certainly but...

Think about other Muslims throughout the world. I met a man from China sometime back, his name was Lee Hui. He was born a Muslim, his passport states just that as his name. He was addressed by his name by other Malaysian Muslims, and I never heard any issue about his name not being a Muslim one.

Anyway you can imagine the tone of the classes for the next two years from there I'm sure.


If I thought things were difficult in the first two forms, I had a rude shock by the time I reached form 3 in school, the religious teacher changed to an ustaz who truly believed in the rod anytime over words. He truly made me think that "brimstone and fire" was the attitude that he gave out toward us. He was not shy to raise his voice at us, and at times he went out on a witch hunt against the boys to try turn up whatever wrong-doings we might have no matter if we were doing anything wrong or not.

We were also required to attend extra religious classes a couple of days a week after school. He refused to accept any excuses if we were unable to attend. It didn't matter if we had tuition, or extra curricular activities. No excuses or he would want to see our parents.

I truly felt uncomfortable with him mainly because I felt he could be a bit racist at times. As I'm the product of a mixed marriage, I wasn't viewed as "Malay" by the others but more of an outsider. And I could tell that there was no love lost between us. I was picked on quite a bit more (by him and my fellow classmates) then I was in preceding years.


This lasted only for a year though. In form 4, again another teacher change to a much younger ustaz. He was much like the gentle ustaz who thought me in primary school, soft spoken, always believed in trying to advise or guide us rather then to reprimand our mistakes. He was well liked by the class and was viewed as much as a friend as a teacher since he was only about 10 years older then we were.

Alas, this lasted only a year, for in my final year of school we reverted back to the old ustaz. Again it was a fairly difficult time for me. My only saving grace was that for some reason or other, I always scored well in Islamic studies during exams. I was usually amongst the top 5 at least. Thank heavens for that!

My feelings of the ustaz being somewhat racist came to fore that year. During the year we in the fifth form had elections for the position of head prefect. As I recall there were three candidates running. Two Malays and a Chinese. One of the Malays was there only to make up the numbers and he was definitely not considered a likely candidate by the majority of the students. The other two however were considered worthy candidates, with the Chinese leading with quite margin due to his strong attributes and personality.

During one of my religious classes, he asked us how we were going to vote for the elections. There was silence for a bit before one of the boys chimed up that they were of course going to vote for the Malay candidate. He then replied, "Good. Make sure you do. Don't vote for the Chinese guy. You are Malays and should stick to your own race." So much for racial integration these days, eh? And our politicians are wondering why there's no racial unity these days, sheesh.

I do wonder though how religious classes in school are like these days. Any improvements? Any changes? Hrmm...

Finas and subtitling

Short story for the day:

Spoke to a friend some time back. We were discussing subtitles and FINAS (the national censorship board) in general.

My highlight of the conversation, I went to the cinema to watch Bruce Almighty (yes, that controversial film according to some of our politicians / religious leaders) and there was one scene that struck my mind. In it Morgan Freeman was introducing himself to Jim Carrey with the words, "I am god." Of course FINAS butchered the word "god" out of that sentence (they cut just that part of the film, leaving the "I am" untouched). The irony of it though was that the Malay subtitles was maintained, "Saya adalah tuhan" (literally, "I am god.").

So butcher the English verbiage out, but maintain the Malay written script of it. Hilarious.

My friend's highlight though truly out-trumped mine. He had gone to see the film The Day After Tomorrow at the cinema. This show was about the Earth facing a weather apocalypse for those who haven't seen it. Anyway at the beginning of the show when the title appeared on-screen the Malay subtitle that appeared was "Lusa" (literally "day after tomorrow"). He broke out laughing hilariously at that. Have to love our translators at the effort that they take in their work.

Another amusing subtitle incident from the past, there was a Batman and Robin cartoon showing over local television. In one scene:

Robin: Batman, Batman! Joker is getting away!(Orang Kelawar, Orang Kelawar! Orang Kelakar melarikan diri!)
Batman: Don't worry wonder boy, we shall stop him.(Jangan risau budak ajaib. Kami akan menangkap dia.)

For those who don't understand Malay, the translations here were very literal. I.e. Batman is a name, but the translator made it out as Bat Man. Joker was translated to the equivalent of Funny Man, and Wonder Boy was translated literally as mystical/magical boy.

Old Boys Gathering

My dad told me a story about when he was helping to organise a gathering for his college old boys. Bear in mind that during my dad's time in college, there was a very solid racial mix of students (unlike what you find in local universities these days).

Anyway, my dad attempted to contact each and every old boy around his year by phone. Many of whom he had not spoken to or seen in decades. One of the people he called up was this Malay chap. Midway through the conversation it went on to something like this:

Dad: So will you be able to make it for the gathering?
Malay chap (MC for short): Will there be liquor served at the gathering?
Dad: Yes. You know how it is, it's a large diverse group.
MC: Then I won't be attending.
Dad: Why?
MC: Because they're not respecting our religion. You know when I went to the United States for a delegation visit my hosts respected me. They made sure that our meals were all pork free and that no liquor was served.
Dad (who is utterly flabbergasted by MC's attitude by now): Tell me, would you want beef to be served at the gathering if you were able to come?
MC: Yes, of course. I like beef.
Dad: Then aren't you disrespecting the religion of the Hindus there?

MC was utterly annoyed at that statement and shortly after rang of.

The point of this article? Religious understanding can be severely underrated in our country. A case of "My religion is better then your religion. You should kow-tow to my needs before yours."

Highly depressing isn't it?