Hippies Begone
Welcome to Malaysia: Hippie-free Since 1957
I simply had to steal this from Joe (who reblogged it from a bunch of people). Just crediting them for the picture though really, it should already be common knowledge that Malaysia has a no-hippies policy.
Malaysian History X
I try very hard to avoid the topic of Malaysia and its politics and policies. Not because I don’t care – because I do – but because I never know how to begin writing about Malaysia without bringing up the immense complexities of Malaysian society and history. To truly understand the hows and the whys of the state of things in Malaysia, one has to consider a dizzying array of variables that has shaped the foundation of the country and continues to affect its future.
Which brings me to question the wisdom of the drastic changes to the history syllabus to “instill patriotism” (which I didn’t even know was lacking amongst Malaysians). Sure, I can accept that history is viewed through the eyes of the victor (or, in our case, the dominant majority), but the complete omission of whole sections of history in favor of one ethnic group over all others is utterly deplorable. We are thus denying our very own citizens a true appreciation of our diversity & historic unity in forming the country as it stands today. The founding fathers of Malaya when it achieved independence was a multi-racial group after all.
And let’s not kid ourselves, most Malaysians (excluding the orang asli, or original people) can trace their ancestry leading from elsewhere. We don’t even have to look very hard. Tun Dr. Mahathir Mohammed’s father was from India. Heck, even Parameswara, the great hero and “founder” of Malaya (whose chapters are always mentioned first in our history books, as if there were no known humans on our lands before him) was from Indonesia. As far as I’m concerned, we are all immigrants if we look back far enough.
The trouble is, in roughly 30 years, the minorities have been slowly written out of the history books. I suppose we are expected to assume that 40% of the current population and their ancestors miraculously appeared from the abyss post-1930? The title of this article from the Centre for Policy Initiatives says it all – “Half the country disappears in Malaysian history syllabus.
Where are those haikus?
I have been a good contributor to The One A Day Project, dutifully crafting daily haikus. However, this means I have been less attentive about posting those very haikus on my own site. Call me lazy, but cutting and pasting is a lot of work. I might just choose a couple favourites to post here every now and then.
If you’d like to read them on a daily basis, CLICK HERE instead.
Cloud Cult
Why haven’t I heard of Cloud Cult until today? It’s okay. I have the rest of my life to listen to the playlist, I suppose.
