Aku banyak member. Respek aku.

Ahli Fikir really made me fikir. It took me few years to apprehend what their song 'Samseng' was all about for real. It is sad of how the thing got us really occupied, stupidly. Here how it goes, and I’ve been thinking to write this thread every time I got back from any kedai mamak or malls, where men in group can be seen easily around.

When you go around, you want to look cool on foot with your bunch of friends, or should I say clan. It is somewhat an era of foolish reasoning of believing that if you are alone, with no one backing you on your back, you will breathe your last breath and die unaided. I go about anywhere to see people sit in group, looking each other intensely, like trying very hard to trigger any spot for a fight. They just love to be intense and create such stressed ambiance around.

Who is stronger? That is one and only thing that somewhere to be found in their intelligence. It’s the matter of who got more troops to back them up, and if you have more than 5 or 10 of your clique, you will breathe easily and walk like a real dick and if you don’t, you better be scared not to get beaten if you say something wrong.

Aku banyak member. Hisap konek aku.

Fuck off. You deserve a middle finger dude, big time.

Joining a gang and being in a clan or clique means you have lots of friends. Middle finger. Joining a gang makes you look like an idiot wannabe you idiot wannabe (yes, I repeat). Being in a gang is not just walking around with a red or blue belt around your waist. Being in a gang is not a game, and it is not the way to show that you have the biggest dick. When 30 people started to beat this one rebellious guy, who has larger dick? You tell me.

We are an advancing species. We develop new technologies, as well as new means to be recognized, to be respected. And looks like being in a gang or a clan would give us that petty latter more easily. They just get the wrong end of the stick of what respect is all about. For them, respect means fear. Dude, respect is far beyond that stupid fixation. Days in Koleq really thought me about the subject of respect. You don’t have to have the physical strength to get respect, you don’t have to have the cash to make everyone bow and do you a blowjob. It’s about respecting others, and it will be reciprocated, and that’s the only way to gain respect, and not by staring at others like you are the only who have glaring eyes or being part of your stupid clan. At Koleq or it can be anywhere, there are many figures that made their name in sports, academics and leadership etc, but only few and not all of them really got my respect as to develop such in me, they have to be all down to earth and humble, and have a great deal of respecting others.

We live in the world where there are so many progress and changes as days go by. We progress in our culture so well. We start to recognize gay marriage, human cloning and other things which are unimaginable to us in the past. So people sitting in a gang, and dreadfully looking forward to be in any fight, walking around with killing stare, is something we should expect. It happens everywhere in the world, so why shouldn't we expect it to happen here as well? So let’s go against the stereotype guys. People think (it is for real) that we are a bunch of wannabes that trying very hard to look cool by being in a gang, talk big and nothing come in return. We still sit there at kedai mamak, waiting for tey ais. Unlike the real deal, the Mafias, the Yakuzas, who talk less, and earn both money and respect in return. I’m not trying to give an idea about being like any Mafias or Yakuzas, but they really dig up the thing called respect the right style and what is more is they talk less, and do their shit more, not just sit there and stare, stare and talk big.

Butterfingers had adroitly coined once, in this brilliant line of their song,

Bila kawan ramai
keliling kita
Cakap besar tunjuk belang
Tapi bila sorang-sorang
Pengecut pemalu
Macam semua orang

I suppose that if your mates look after you, then it is a good thing. But terrorizing and creating discomfort of other people is definitely not. Most of us feel safe having their friends around but intimidating other people is a cheap way to earn a middle finger, not respect. You aren’t going to get any respect if you don’t respect others in the first place, and talking trash with millions of your clan behind your back isn’t going to make you a respected person. It only makes you a good pemidato and you might want to compete for Kejohanan Pidato Piala Di-Raja for being able to talk that big.

The best thing to give to an opponent is respect, and never takes a person’s dignity and self-esteem, they worth everything to them, but nothing to you. Just bare that in the end, we are all separate - our stories, no matter how similar, come to a fork and diverge. We are drawn to each other because of our similarities, but it is our difference we must learn to respect. Just be smart by respecting others, as what goes around comes around, and you might get the biggest respect by simply give others a little respect.

Saya ni bukan sempurna
Tapi saya tahu
Dosa dan pahala
Ku tuhan sahaja yang tahu

P/s – 'You’ll Never Walk Alone' if you have the thing called respect, and it not necessarily literally.

A Sad Day For Malaysia

I am too tired, too devastated to jot anything down after reading this article on Malaysiakini. Have a look.

Sorry for the hazy picture, try to key in the boy's IC number and do the semakan daftar pemilih yourself if you keen to.

Let us put it this way. Hopefully it is merely a political propaganda, a twist made to fuel the scorching jostle of the political atmosphere in Malaysia. But if it is not, what a sad day it is for Malaysia...

My Celebrity Look-alikes. Ha Ha Ha

http://www.myheritage.com

Where do you want to go today?

I was reading the newspaper yesterday when a piece of news caught my eyes. Apparently our government is baffled why we Malaysians love to travel abroad and are planning to implement a form asking people what they are going to do oversea. What the hell?

I always love travelling, I really do. I love to go to other people's places and get involved in their culture and lifestyle as well as see different vistas that are not readily available here in our own country. That is why most people travel don't they? Then why do they still wonder why 15 million people go abroad each year compared to the 17.5 million tourist who come here? Why is that our government still need us to fill out forms as if we are asking for their permission to go here and there.

Every day, more and more of our privacy is disturbed. First they force us to register our prepaid account though I accept that there is a good reason for it. Then they illogically suggested that we register our bloggers so that it is easy to keep track of them. What they really mean is that it would be easier for them to throw our bloggers in jails. Now they want us to tell what we are going to do abroad. What next? What colour is my underwear on Mondays? Laugh if you may but you'll never know what those people at the honourable Parlimen have in mind.

Now, let me get this straight. If you want people to sign a form, does it mean all Malaysians including all our ministers, judges, governmnent officials or just us poor citizens? I suspect the latter. They would probably make exception for the big shots for reasons of 'national security' though the destination of the particular government guy might be somewhere in Bahamas or Tahiti and he's travelling with his whole family.

Sometimes I think some of us just want to travel overseas to get a break from this country. Not because we don't have snow, not because our beach and sea is polluted, not because we don't have a Grand Canyon or a sphinx. We just want to get a break from all this hullaballoo..

Good To Meet You Brothers!

This morning I went to Liverpool to a friend’s place with some other classmates. No, not that Liverpool in UK. This is Liverpool, New South Wales, about an hour journey by train from Sydney. We are basically working on a group project for Engineering Design subject. Her father offered to help us and he happens to own a factory there, so we decided to go have a look and work.

It was 5.30pm when we boarded the train back, which means Maghrib was looming. True to the nature, I had this uneasiness feel of not being able to make it on time to reach home for Maghrib. Having three Muslim counterparts out of four people with me did not give any help either; they simply did not seem to care about performing their obligation. So I decided to stop in the middle of the train route at Auburn, a small, very nice Muslim town. I had been here once before, and I knew they have a mosque where I decided to pray.

I performed solat jemaah with a few locals, and finished praying when I realized that there was someone observing me. After I was done with my doa this guy approached me, and decently asked, “Where’re you from?” To which I replied, “Malaysia.” This guy seemed to be excited at seeing a foreigner at that mosque and probably keen to find out more from me, which drove to more dialogue between us, and apparently more questions from him,

“So what’re you doing here?”
“How long have you been here?”
“So how do you find Australia?”
“Well I actually have a friend who just came back from Malaysia, he went there to watch the Formula One. Do you watch Formula One?

After a series of conversation, he finally revealed his actual intention for approaching me. Apparently he noticed that I did something in my solat that is not right, and he made it a point for him to show me to right way. Later a friend of his saw us and joined in the conversation,

“Assalamualaikum. Chinese?” (as you might have expected)
“Oh Malaysia! I’ve been there!”
“Malaysia’s very nice. I found that people there’re very humble.”

To those people who read my previous two postings in my blog and decided to judge me as always trying to find a way to be critical to my home country, this piece proves that I am actually not.

By the way, the first fellow’s name is Yasser, while the second one is Mustaffa. Both are locals, but I believe hail from some Arabic countries.
The conversation continued.

“So you’re a university student? Petroleum engineering? Wonderful! It’s good to learn that we’ll be getting plenty of Muslim professionals in the future.”

I am posting this not because this was my first time meeting other Muslims in this country. My Petroleum Engineering class itself in fact has Muslims covering more than half of its students, mainly from Saudi Arabia, Brunei as well as Malaysia. Besides, I encountered hundreds of them every week during the Friday prayer. But as far as I am concern, my meeting with Yasser and Mustaffa was the first of its kind I experienced. I found that most of Muslims I am living with here choose to segregate themselves according to background, countries where they are from in place of one genuine label; Muslims. Those from Saudi never bother to greet Malaysian blokes, and pretty simply the other way round. Again, I am not referring this bigotry to all of the Muslims here. I am merely saying most of us. Those who decide not to live in such way, I take my hats off in praise for them.

Well, back to my trip to Auburn. Yasser and Mustaffa apparently had some other serious concerns and left before Isya’ while I decided to wait for one, so here goes their final dialogue,

“Good to meet you Brother.”

Indeed, it was good.

Filem Malaysia

I managed to watch Fenomena Seni last Friday while waiting for the KTM Komuter to Rawang. The discussion was on what constitutes a Filem Malaysia where panelists UM Media Lecturer Dr. Abu Hasan Hasbullah, Film Director Shuhaimi Baba and Farid Kamil argued on their perception of the term while being hosted by Rosyam Nor.

The issue of Filem Malaysia has been around since a long time albeit many people have little knowledge about it. Currently, for a film to be recognised as a Filem Malaysia the main criteria is that the movie must be in the Malay language. Nevertheless, not many people agree with this fact since out of 24 million Malaysians, 52% are Malays, 30% are Chinese and 8% are Indians. In their opinion, the current method is wrong in portraying the real Malaysia.

Dr. Abu Hassan is an advocate of the current criteria in determining Filem Malaysia. He argued that in other countries like in Germany and Nepal, they have everything in their native language thus concluding that they are more in touch to their culture and identity. Since Bahasa Melayu is the official religion of Malaysia, Dr. Abu Hassan believe that all film worthy of the title Filem Malaysia should reflect that statement by being made in the language.

On the other side of the arguement, is Shuhaimi Baba. Contrary to Dr. Abu Hassan, Shuhaimi brought up the arguement of multiculturalism which Malaysia is heavily marketing throughout the world with its Truly Asia tagline. Why can't the film industry too reflect the multicultural aspect of Malaysia by awarding the title to any film made by Malaysian or is about Malaysia regardless of the language. She argued that it is suppressing the creativity of moviemakers by limiting their option to express their story.

I noticed that Rosyam Nor, albeit being a host, is more towards Shuhaimi Baba's arguement rather than Dr. Abu Hassan's. He mentioned that if Utusan Melayu can become Utusan Malaysia (actually both are different newspapers but I get the point) so why can't film industry bend their regulations to which Dr. Abu Hassan again replied that we have little respect for our identity and culture. He argued that that is the reason why this whole arguement started. If everyone is in touch with their culture and identity, the issue would never surface. Is it true?

Again we look back at Malaysia as a whole. The country is multicultural and every people have their own background and identity unlike less multicultured countries such as the ones Dr. Abu Hassan mentioned. Though Bahasa Melayu is our official language, we didn't manage to implement it the way the Indonesian did with their Bahasa Indonesia. I never hear any of my Indonesian Chinese friends speaking to eachother is any other language than Bahasa Indonesia an though Indonesian are regarded as serumpun with Malaysians, we mostly have our conversation in English. That does not make us less serumpun does it? In fact, by communicating in English makes us more serumpun since we are able to communicate better and easier. So what does this have anything to do with the arguement? It means that whatever language you use to converse does not make you less of a Malaysian. Who is more Malaysian, a Malay who speaks only Malay and hangout with only Malays or a Malay who speak both Malay and English but have friends from all sort of race and culture. The latter is the Muhibbah we should be striving for.

Back to films, I must say that what would you feel if you make a movie about Malaysia in English or Cantonese or maybe Tamil just to discover that your movie cannot be deemed as a Filem Malaysia just because you are not using the official language even though the storyline is definately Malaysian? Then again, what about if I shoot a movie in Kelantanese or the northern dialect. Would that be a Filem Malaysia?

The more I think about it the more it makes me agree that this topic is very-very difficult to settle. It is an issue that border many sensitive issues of our countries and I would really love to get reader's comment on the issue. What do you think?

Preface

We are proud to be Collegians, how can we ever make you see? Well, for one is having a blog showcasing what we think and what we are capable of don't you agree? Firstly I would like to thank you for having the time to spare to visit this blog which is still in its infancy.

So, why a blog? We have a Yahoo! Group up and running, we have a Flickr Pool, with our pictures there and the all new Freindster Group for our discussion. Well my dear friends, as I mentioned in Pelangi Hitam Putih, we have great minds in our batch. We have people who in the future, I believe would be the mover and maker or our country. We are after all Budak Koleq, we've been doing that since forever. Nevertheless, some of these people felt that they lack the time and opportunity to speak up their mind and they might also lack support in bringing out the best of them and instead of presenting their ideas to the world, it remain buried in a diary or in their mind. That would be a waste don't you think?

This latest effort of mine is also keen on showcasing the capabilities of us Budak Koleq for the whole world to read. I really felt disappointed reading newspaper articles about people questioning the capabilities of Budak Koleqs which in their eyes are no more better than any other students. That is their challenge and this is my answer and I hope you guys would join me in answering these questions and change their point of view of us as well as our beloved Malay College.

Interested to write for this blog? Set up a Blogger account and leave your email address in the comment section for this posting and I will add your name as author. It is as simple as that. Thank you for supporting this effort and do inform other of its existance.