Welcome to Malaysia
Where the Streets Have No Rules
Driving in
“Why are you stopping?” asked my friend in the passenger seat.
“Pedestrian crossing,” I answered. “And there are pedestrians that need to cross.”
“You actually stop at a pedestrian crossing? How un-Malaysian of you.”
“I’m very Malaysian, thanks. I’m just not an asshole…….in this aspect, at least. Saya pemandu berhemah”
The driver of the car behind me, he was honking loudly and impatiently but an old lady was trying to cross the road for god’s sake! What did he want me to do? Run over someone’s grandmother to save five measly seconds of his time?
And just the other day, I was nearly involved in a car crash when this idiot decided to suddenly switch lanes without turning on his signal or utilizing his side mirror and I responded by slamming the brakes and using my honk to say in Morse code, “Oi nak mati ke?!!! Kalau nak sangat, come here, I’ll beat your head with the hood of your car till it splits open!”
The car slowed down to the side of the road and the driver, raised his hand in apology as I passed him by. My sister, who was in the car with me, started bursting out in laughter. “Geez, you scared the hell out of him……..”
I might be female but when I get behind the wheel and my wheel gets behind a driver who appears to have no depth perception or actual lessons in the fine art of driving, I’m 100% pure raging testosterone. And now I must hang my head in shame – in my effort to become a pemandu berhemah, I’ve turned into a road-raging psycho who patiently stops for little old ladies while threatening to crack open the skulls of those that won’t.
So, if you’re driving around the Klang Valley and happen to come across a girl beating the shit out of some man with a baseball bat by the side of the road while chanting, Use Your Signal, Motherfucker, Use Your Signal, don’t worry, that’s just me being a courteous driver and making sure the streets of Malaysia are safe for future generations to drive in.
Uh.
Where the Streets Have No Gravity
Here’s a question – why would
K thinks he might have the answer. “Well, someone needs to figure out how to play batu seremban without the help of gravity…..”
*For the uninitiated: Batu Seremban is a traditional Malay game played with either tiny rocks (the Malay word for ‘rock’ in the non-musical sense is ‘batu’) or little cloth sacks usually filled with sand or uncooked rice or beans. The objective of the game is to throw these things up in the air and catch them before they fall to the ground. Uh. That’s the over-simplified explanation, at least.
Where the Streets are called ‘Presint’ and Come to A Dead End
The problem with democracy in a country which has not quite let go of its feudal past is that everyone ends up having to apologize. Unless of course, you are Prime Minister and President of UMNO – you will often find yourself having to forgive, forgive those like Mukhriz Mahathir that dare say such defamatory and slanderous things against your highly honorable and exalted self, things such as how your UMNO annual general assembly speech “offers nothing new” when in fact, your speech offers and highlights almost as many new things as a bout of déjà vu. Apparently, stating the obvious is a great offense in this harmonious and tolerant nation with a leader of great sensitivity.
Pak Lah says he’s tired of being criticized. Suck it up, Pak Lah, you’re Prime Minister, not our middle child. What do you want - gold star stickers on your exercise book? Quit your preaching, get the brown noses out of your behind and tell Hishamuddin to stop waving and wagging his big keris around before he pokes his own eyes out with it. By the way, ever since you came to power, we’ve been inundated with politicians lecturing the people on moral values. Fancy that, politicians giving the rest of us little people lessons on morality. Here’s a lesson on democracy for the politicians: we did not elect you to tell us how to lead our lives, we elected you to run the damn country so that we may peacefully and comfortably lead our lives in a way in which we see fit. Don’t be fooled by the people that practically prostrate themselves before you as you greet them on your campaign trail – they’ve confused you with a sultan and themselves with Hang Tuah. Make no mistake about it; you are in power only because the people put you there. You work for us, buddy. (Alas, alas, in theory at least).
Oh yes,
Now if you’ll excuse me, I must commit acts of self flagellation for writing statements that might offend the Prime Minister. Let the deep regret I feel for my words and actions be splashed across the pages of our newspapers for weeks on end and be passed off as ‘journalism’. Let us now believe, as we flip through the pages of The Star, NST, Utusan etc.. that there is nothing else going on in the country that is more important than a Prime Minister’s hurt feelings.
