Understanding Malaysians.

Obviously, many people in the world are already aware that we Malaysians are multiracial society, and we have accepted different cultures, beliefs and celebrations in our daily surroundings. But my question is now, yes we have accepted the differences, but do we really understand them?

Last week, my friends and I organized an event which involved many of us, and as always, Malays, Chinese and Indians were there of course. So while the ongoing program was moving on, we served breakfast, which we packed some local 'kuih' which on of them was Karipap. We never knew what was inside the karipap, until an Indian friend of mine said there was meat. She said that some Hindus are vegetarians on Fridays, and she had accidentally ate the meat, and she really felt so bad about it.

Oh man... I felt as bad as she was for not being considerate, a totally ignorance. I never knew there was time when Hindus and Buddhists are vegetarians, which I asked, Fridays for Hindus and during the early and middle of Lunar months for the Buddhists (correct me if I am wrong). I, as a Muslim myself would like my other Malaysians friends to know when we do we perform our fasting, what could be eaten and what not, or everything which involve them. 

So guys, let us be more considerate. We should not only ask people to understand us, we should understand them as well. After all we are all Malaysians.

A First Class Society.

I came across an article in a well known Malaysian blog, claiming that Malaysia is the world champion in corruption. Maybe some people would think that I'm being defensive as a government officer, but I'm so definitely sure that this article is not true and totally unreliable. If there are readers who believed that, then I guess they are like the dust under the bed where all the could judge is the darkness of the surroundings, full of ignorance and I felt sorry for them. If you ever been to the neighboring countries, then you'll know how much we are better in term corruption.

 I wonder how a 1,000 corespondents survey could conclude a whole report only with a percentage of perception? Have you never heard of Corruption Perception Index on which Malaysia is ranked #54 released by Transparency International. It is not established simply with 1,000 corespondents, but it came from 13 well known bodies including World Economic Forum and World Bank. The surveys do not cover only the public, but they include business people opinion and assessment of a group of analysts. I am not saying that we are good enough at #54, but the fact that we are the champion of corruption is not true at all.

The main issue here is not that the news written is a lie, but the way 'some people' think without any critical judgment. What makes it more pathetic is that these 'some people' really thought that this lie should be spread out just to give bad impressions on the government by sharing it online. To me, vision 2020 to reform Malaysia as a developed country is possible, but I doubt that we would have a first class mindset society if many of us would react and accept any negative news about the country without any research or investigation. What is the point of having all the 'world' on your finger when what you do is only sharing lies?

Oh, Malaysiaku.