Saturday, November 24, 2007
roots
tomorrow sunday 25th November, if everything goes as planned, thousands of malaysian hindus will march to the british embassy. their grouse? i don't know what exactly it is but apparently it is to demand restitution from the british government for uprooting them from india many decades ago and use them as ruber tappers in malaysia - labourers- that sort of thing. and according to the forum that was held in seremban a month back it seems that their grouse is more than just that. the march is organized by HINDRAF (hindu rights action force) and they are demanding something like a few trillion US dollars(!) compensation and according to calculation this will make every single hindu man woman and child an instant millionaire if the british government agrees to their demand. well, that'll make our indian friends the richest community on earth. (no country or community as far as i can tell has 100% of their populations as millionaires)
it all sounds rather woolly to me but i support the right of all malaysian citizens to express their concerns in any peaceful manner including street marches and demonstrations. and as such i am sympathetic to their right to march for whatever cause they think is legitimate- no matter how woolly it may be. all right minded people should know and agree that this is a basic right in a real democracy . it's time for malaysia to move forward and behave like a real democratic nation. anwar ibrahim made an interesting plea as you can see here.
but we don't have street demonstration culture, said the chief of police. and goes on to arrest the hindraf leaders for the march. and come tomorrow in all likelihood things won't go as planned. hindraf insist on marching on. but the police have started to make life difficult since friday by having unnecessary road blocks everywhere in kl. it'll be interesting. knowing indians, well they are not malays. we malays prefer to run away when things get tough and fight another day or just go to sleep and forget about things....but indians , with a few pints of toddy in their veins...well anything can happen. lets see.
but this is not my main point here. my interest is why are they so concerned about their roots and history NOW? some of my naughty friends (chinese) wonder why are these people complaining? they should be grateful to come to malaysia! and even now indians come in droves to work in malaysia - as rubber tappers some of them too! so i said to my naughty chinese friends... it's easy for you to say. the british put you in towns and now you become rich towkays and pirate dvd manufacturers... what about us malays? the brits keep us in the village and let us sleep. we should file a suit against the british government too for keeping us backward.no you're not, they said. you're now melayu BARU mah! so i said. oh fuck melayu baru. melayu baru is just another name for corrupt umno assholes and they are not typical of real malays i said.
it all sounds rather woolly to me but i support the right of all malaysian citizens to express their concerns in any peaceful manner including street marches and demonstrations. and as such i am sympathetic to their right to march for whatever cause they think is legitimate- no matter how woolly it may be. all right minded people should know and agree that this is a basic right in a real democracy . it's time for malaysia to move forward and behave like a real democratic nation. anwar ibrahim made an interesting plea as you can see here.
but we don't have street demonstration culture, said the chief of police. and goes on to arrest the hindraf leaders for the march. and come tomorrow in all likelihood things won't go as planned. hindraf insist on marching on. but the police have started to make life difficult since friday by having unnecessary road blocks everywhere in kl. it'll be interesting. knowing indians, well they are not malays. we malays prefer to run away when things get tough and fight another day or just go to sleep and forget about things....but indians , with a few pints of toddy in their veins...well anything can happen. lets see.
but this is not my main point here. my interest is why are they so concerned about their roots and history NOW? some of my naughty friends (chinese) wonder why are these people complaining? they should be grateful to come to malaysia! and even now indians come in droves to work in malaysia - as rubber tappers some of them too! so i said to my naughty chinese friends... it's easy for you to say. the british put you in towns and now you become rich towkays and pirate dvd manufacturers... what about us malays? the brits keep us in the village and let us sleep. we should file a suit against the british government too for keeping us backward.no you're not, they said. you're now melayu BARU mah! so i said. oh fuck melayu baru. melayu baru is just another name for corrupt umno assholes and they are not typical of real malays i said.
