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It was a bloody drowsy day. My head hurts and I cannot do anything more other than to take a rest. I woke up and I felt slightly better. Whoa! I never feel this way before. Oh yeah, now I remember, it was that four all draw football match early this morning that actually kept me awake and resort to not enough sleep. Well, football is a wonderful game. A lousy one, when my team should have gone for the kill. Five minutes to spare including extra time, two extremely foolish goals and here we are standing at number three for the Barclays English Premiere league.
It had actually kept me frustrated all day, I decided to go for a walk and a dinner at Chinese restaurant. I got myself a modest chicken rice and some finger food. I thought to myself, "there goes my night".
However as I am having my dinner, I am filled with amazement by the other table, adjacent to me. Something is happening and it is mind boggling for sure. I found two ducks having their good time talking to a goose. Somehow all of them are having beers with chicks watching and giving some aide to the goose at the other table. No! I am putting this into a literature perspective. You did not get what I meant?
It is about two fine British men talking to a Bajau, a Malaysian citizen but I believe to be originated from the Philippines. Again, I am assuming he is one of the many created Malaysian from the Project IC in the past. It has given the National Front the benefits in killing the local strong left-wing political party at that period. I hesitate to talk more about politics; it is not that I am refraining myself from talking about it but politically, I surge like a madman in defending my thoughts. Let us not go even near to this topic.
So as I am enjoying my dinner after being doing all sort of crazy stunts for a few days in order to keep myself within the budget, I found myself listening to this table where all three guys talking at higher tone. I guess it must be sobering effect after consuming buckets of beers. The two British look sloppy and goofy while the other Bajau, needless to say looks like a tramp; drunken tramp on free ride.
I found that there a few girls at the other table smiling at them. At first thought, I actually thinks that these are hookers putting up their
boobies trap if not
titsy traps. Hahaha!
Amazing words. But to my bloody mistake in judging them, these two Brits are having a good beer drinking session and these girls are actually the restaurant servants who serves beer. My bad, my bad; apologize for that. I swear that at most time, my instinct proved me right. But why are these girls are interfering with their conversation?
Alas, they are actually trying to help this tramp to converse with these Brits. Okay! Now this is getting more exciting. I slower down my eating pace and I sip my Iced coffee slowly. This is surely something worth to watch. The girls are laughing, to my Good Lord; that tramp hardly speaks English and try to express what he is trying to say in Malay. Wow! That two Brits surely are resilient and patient dudes. Needless to say they are trying to stir something up to make it fun and kill the night off.
What in the hell is happening? An old Bajau who hardly speaks English. My words! I found this to be amazingly humorous. I came from Sarawak and living far away from home taught me about living independently but this, this is something I hardly come across over at my hometown. Old man cannot speak English. From my experience, working and traveling around the whole Sarawak, I could have taking things for granted. Only now I knew that most of the older Sarawakians converse very well in English. For those who did their MCE, they are good in writings as well it is their nature to have English newspaper clutched at their armpit as they walk down to the nearest coffee shop for breakfast.
Now that make some sense to why some of the people around me now, never even carry newspaper. It is not the act of that justify the lack of interest in reading, it is just a plain wall who cannot actually understand what the paper have written. Worst, some younger generations only browse through the ads column as well as the badly translated section of the newspaper. It made the local paper lack in their competencies in writing nicely if not profoundly well. I found that their English standard are on par with me, taking to the consideration that my English writings are full with errors. I am bad in writing and I admit to that.
If the local newspapers is dying due to the bad sales, the national English paper hardly make it to this region. That is why I hardly find these newspapers around. Comparatively to the Sarawakian newspaper, there is no Malay section since everyone speaks good English and understand English writings. An English newspaper is always a fully English newspaper. So as the Malay newspaper is fully a Malay newspaper. The younger generation at Sarawakian cities goes to an extend of fine tuning their preferred slang to sound like either White Americans, Black Americans and British. Britannica and Americana rules down there. So when you are down there at Sarawak, if you heard them conversing in this way, it is not about being a snob; it has being a culture down there. At the last paragraphs, I will explain why. Bear with me for a while.
If the town scenario seems to be an unfair territory to make judgment, I might have to say that you can find English speaking communities in the jungles and at high plateaus. I coordinated a project at Bario before. Most of you might not even heard about Bario before the infamous helicopter crash as well as before Mr. Idris Jala reforms Malaysian Airlines after being left with deep shit created by those smart-fool idiots who call themselves corporate figures.
You, I feel like I want to fist your anus with a spade! Bloody buggers.They speak fine English. It may not be so great to fit into Thomas Jefferson's profile but they did cross their Ts and dot their Is in their writings. They converse with some consideration of proper tenses. Many dropouts make their good income by being tourist guides here.
I pondered for a while. I resume back and listen to their conversation and this time, I cannot help myself to give some deep thought about the past. Looking at them makes me think, how the missionaries work in the past. They are trying to live their pious life here by spreading the word of the Lord and have to deal with someone who do not speak their language. Put this into perspective, this tramp is having a good relationship with these Brits. What the missionaries when through is far worst as they have to perform at spear point. This does not come easy. Trust me, if you have twenty workers demanding for their wages is already a big headache; think about two hundred men with swords, spears and blowpipes telling you to leave. You have to compromise with them as your task must be perform accordingly.
Conversing with body languages and with all the flaws in communication spattered all around, understanding can be very difficult and tricky too. I found it is amusing that a journey like this is a memorable one for these Brits, therefore they are trying to get something out of it even if they have to talk to a goose. Regardless of the others around, they just try and have a good time. Mesmerizing!
I am laughing to myself and giggles around when I see them communicating. It is hard to call it conversation since both parties got it wrong somewhere, somehow and most time. I wish I can have a drink with these Brits and tell them that tramp is hardly a Malaysian. I mean how bad can we be as Malaysian; a former British colony with lots of inheritance from the British can speak like this. The Queen surely laugh till she fart as if a jester is cheering her mood after the defeat of Malaya in the hand of the Japs. What is wrong with this tramp and the batches of these incompetent peoples around us? Is it hard to even put up an
A-man-and-a-pen conversation rather than to say 'yes', 'no' and 'boleh' or 'can-can' then continue with walla walla yada yada nadda?
At one point, these two Brits did not understand what he said in English. The pronunciation is misleading and the diction, God safe our fools for once. I cannot bear to hear these two Brits teaching this tramp how to pronounce the word "Welding". They thought they heard that tramp said "wedding". Worst, these gentlemen have to show what is welding and a wedding with gestures and even with the aid of the table. They have to mimic the action of welding. They even ask that silly tramp to pronounce it right. It is not they are discrediting us, they have that nature to make things right. Earlier, they receive a phone call and the caller hardly speaks English?
Is that particular caller a Bajau or a Bruneian? I heard from my dad about the true reality around us as he traveled frequently. I am cushioned with the surroundings which are perfect back home. At this age, exposed to these kind of happenings, I am agitated with these tramps who make us look like some sort of a country which have just recovered from war, tore apart by civil war and just exposed to English by the rescuer. But is this the reality? Are they living in their own matrices? My holly cow dung! I cannot believe this is Malaysia. Regardless of English being the second language here in Malaysia, it seems like it is an alien language. Is that true? How true? What do we perceive as the truth? Is there any truth in this claim?
I recalled what my dad told me before that sadly, most of the Sarawakian only speaks good English. He added that there are also several others who can speak English around Malaysia but mostly, they cannot even start a conversation fully in English. They will resolve to some sort of other language but at most time to Malay. What contributed to this tragedy? Look at Ivory coast and Togo, they speaks good French when that is not their mother tongue. They are French former colonies. So what is wrong us?
To unfold some of the actual contributions to this particular scenario, we can actually trace it easily. This happened during Dr. Mahathir (
Dr.M hereafter) era as the Minister of Education. He abolished English as the education medium and usher in Malay language, the later Bahasa Malaysia as the backbone of the education system. By doing so, this will ease the burden of most local who have the hard time struggling to understand English. The architecture of this system works well without any further thought on globalization. The system backfires and only until recently he want science and mathematic subjects to be implemented in English. Initially, I thought this is a half cork if not half bake or half past six idea. Since Malaysia love to change their policy, I surely think that this will change soon. He backed his idea up of discrediting English by establishing another policy called 'Look to the East Policy'.
What happen when we try some new policy? Proton and Mitsubishi? Both almost bankrupt. Korea, Japan and China are the oriental powerhouses; the Peninsular which looks like a human appendix in the map are trying to follow these powerhouses. It took Dr.M thirty years to realized the result which My dad had earlier forecast when he read the Malay Dilemma book written by Dr.M in 70s. Why this policy created an irreconcilables scenario now?
Our government never acknowledge the Chinese influences as well as the transmigration of the Chinese which form most of the natives here. I mean the Dayaks. Thus, he failed to understand why his policy does not work his way for the Malays or the non Dayak natives.
Korea and Japan are part of China long history. Wars and revolution, makes it hard to tell what kind of policy and mentality they have currently. Dr. M failed to recognize the signature of these oriental powerhouses. They are from the same group of people who evolve through time and geographically. Dr.M, look at their skin and eyes, you know that they are all groups of people with Chinese inheritance during the ancient time. They only thing that evolved is their calligraphy. They have 5000 years of history. Science and mathematics are part of their life. They derived scientific names to all the elements and they have archives of findings.
What do we have? Hang Tuah's sacred Kris called Taming Sari? Worst, we are still fighting to clarify who are Hang Tuah and his gang. Either he his a Bugis, a Malay, a Mamak, a Chinese or IDUNNOwho.
As Dr.M pressed on Malay Language as the education medium, the Peninsular accepted it and then a few years later Sabah accepted it. Thanks to Dr. Mustapha, a Filipino who was the Third Chief Minister of Sabah who are well known for threat against those who goes against him. The use of the infamous ISA after he was granted such power from the federal government. He also sponsored most of conversations of the natives in Sabah. If any local who do not convert, they will have no chance of promotion or even get a job in the government sector. He then declared Malay language is the new medium for education for Sabah.
Tun Abdul Rahman Ya'kub rejected the idea but peacefully proposed a transition for this to take place. This is when SPM exam replace MCE. One of my family friend's son who failed horribly a few times in his MCE, got flying color distinction in his SPM. My dad told us, that is surely something that will lead to doom in the nearest future. He does not know what doom will it bring but surely as a Dayak, he prepared well. My dad actually did it in a more practical way. Our family converse in English, Malay with our nanny and mother tongue with our sumuk, babai, kung-kung and popo (Bidayuh Grandfather, and grandmother; Chinese Grandfather and grandmother).
The transition of English to Malay language as education medium did materialized but the impact is so visible between Sarawak and the other states. As the precious eight years of transition did open the mind of the local Sarawakians and have prepared them well for the future upcoming. As the system reformed, the blow is cushioned well as majority educated people are from this precious eight years. They continued the usage of English in their daily life and actually they inherit it to their offspring.
As they grow older with their maturity, like most people said the old habits die hard; they use it in their daily life in form of communication. Maybe a lot of Malaysians are not aware the degree of English usage among the Sarawakians. I believe the foreigner too will be spellbound by the level of English being use publicly.
If you put two Bidayuhs from two different villages which have different slangs, publicly or in the office; they would rather converse in English. Why? To make instruction clear to everyone. It is the same thing when peoples from different races meet, they prefer English rather than to waste their time to translate the actual ideas into some other language, to structure it back and then rephrase it which is something deem to be time consuming if not stupid.
The Sarawakians are totally different type of peoples. The state constitution as well as government sector correspond greatly in English. Minutes and bulletins are in English. The state government servant often make fun of the federal government staffs whom they deem as lackers. You should see them make fun of each other during the good old days. They mimic they way the letter is written which they got from the federal government, it is clearly a direct translation to Malay from English. They read it loud and translate it to their preference. Some time it sounded stupid and most time it sounded corny. It was the humor of the era. Even the local Sarawakian Malays look it as something incompetent for professional use. Nowadays, some of the older generations who served the Government often literally make fun of the newer generation. It is true that they have no idea about English if not inadequate knowledge about English.
Now, put this in another perspective. When someone ask "Did you went to Jesselton at Sabah or Anson Bay at Perak", there are large number of people start to wonder where the hell is it? I am surprised that when my dad ask the newer generation of Government servants these questions, they have no slightest idea about the question nor the whereabout. They hardly knew that when they actually came from Kota Kinabalu and Teluk Intan.
The ignorance is due to lack of knowledge since most historically correct books are in English. The abolishing of English as our medium of education had jeopardize if not halt the knowledge of our history. Most of our history books are in English. You should check out interesting books from Oxford Publication, which are written by some of the English Governors at that period of time. We always talk about the act of remembering our own history. What can we remember if we cannot read it? Worst, the vague idea of our history can contribute and aggravate toward far more complicated situations. Imagine teaching others our history, the wrong and twisted version. What possibility would happen?
Malaysia lost their bloody Shit dropping island called Pedra Branca or Pulau Batu Puteh heavily due to the lost of translation in correspondence. Thanks to the Assistant State Secretary of Johore at that time. But why put an incompetent fool to correspond? Later, all the cow dungs stories. So what happen then? Singapore got our one of our island. So? Shame on us. I am counting more to go, perhaps we will loose more if we have a very soft agreement at Wilayah Pembangunan Iskandar. Is it part of the scheme to sell Johore to Singaporean directly? Who knows? I am assuming without no theory or hypothesis.
My father love the **tuut/censored** Department's Motto in Malay. It sound something like this. "Barang Anda Kebanggaan Kami". In English it mean "
Your Substance (
barang = part - a vulgar word for private part is our Sarawakian Malay language)
is our pride". It sounded more like "
Your private part is our pride". I mean that is direct translation without much common sense.
Until today, the tradition and it is the norm for many Sarawakians to continue in English. You can see older Malays reading Borneo Post and sometime giggles on the grammatical error in the younger generation's writings. Having a drink is incomplete without newspaper.
I sometime gets accustom of most restaurant having newspapers like back home, mostly English newspapers and a Chinese daily. But here in Labuan, none. Nadda! So as most restaurants at Kota Kinabalu. Most people will sit down and yadda yadda and walla walla about politics with no guidelines and true sources. It makes me want to puke!
Speaking English surely does not make you look any superior than others but this is a necessity. It is like going to the washroom without wearing a flip-flop or a shoe instead barefooted. It is not wrong, it simply look wrong somehow. Most perceived it as wrong or lacking.
Being fluent in English surely gives you a whole lot of advantages. Imagine being able to accumulate knowledge as we read English references and debate in forums. What if we do not know or incompetent? It is surely our lost. When we lose, it is usually somebody's gain.
This particular incident really open my eyes and open myself to accept that many Malaysian hardly understand English so as using them. Mostly, half-corked Malaysian tends to jumble up English with their mother tongue. Without shame, they just fire it out publicly. Feeling glamorous being able to do it even though it is fully wrong. For sure their pronunciation have the amplitude and wave length of their mother tongue.
Many younger Chinese (
I mean those who grow without daily sparring or speaking within the family or so) tends to pluralized their English words with the 'S's. It sounded like their microphone in their Mars Exploration Space helmet have the treble-based echo. Need calibration,
hello! For example, Mens loves goings to the libraries. Bitter to swallow but this is the reality. The non-Chinese and non-Indian will speak something like this. "
I believe you boleh buat tu. Not hard, Easy what. Can lah aah?". A cross breed of Singlish and a pure evolution of Minglish. Sometimes, I pondered. Why are we raping English like horny yet pathetic macaques?
I pity them but what can we do? What can my empathy do for them? Our system did play the biggest role in resulting to this crap. Dr.M's policies has the biggest impact to all. Even if the Malaysian call him the father of modernization, surely he is not even close being the foster grand-nana of globalization.
People will say some American cannot even spell but speaks good English. I admit that. But why do we need to follow some dumb
Ass, Mule, Donkey, Llama, Pony or Keldai?Badawi? Ermm... Najib.. Waduhh! Glokal? Najib starts his Glocal agenda. A cross breed of idiots who thinks about global locally. Put this into a clearer picture, it means just think globalization, locally. Wikipedia said this is a portmanteau of the word global and local. It is also described as a process of thinking globally and acting locally. It is also mean to bridge local to global. I am not sure how this is working. But surely this is a good start and heading for explosive dooms day real soon.
For example,
"No need worry one. We speak business in Malay also can but later we think the global market of the business la, at your office at batu Beruntung. After this we lepak-lepak at Ceasar Palace. Good place to relax. We can play batu selemban with the chips. If not we play carom. You can shop for minyak lintah. We langgan cucur tonight lah!". Geographically lost friends, speak to foreign investor in local dialect at Las Vegas and acting like locals.
Another classic example,
"You past that brochure to my office boy. He will courier it by post to Uganda. Also don't forget to tell Mr.Whitestçigger I will go out at 3pm for coffee. You punch my card k? I Ular a bit today. Tomorrow your turn". Where he can actually email it instantly in PDF format at a single click as globally accepted and have coffee break, that is so local. This is the process of bridging local to global. Acting locally, global market and this what we called bridging the local and global.
Yeah! Najib is so yesterday doesn't he? So as his soup-parred bowel (
super-power) subs.
Malaysia, O Malaysia! How art thou shall be? Wherefore art thou to be?*Erm, knock-knock
**Who is there?
*A pity and sorry bronze ass filled with Najis after gluttonous buffet with Mdm. Rust Mug. (Rusted and contaminated but fulfilling).
I thank you the white-men who came a long time ago to liberalize us the Dayaks from the nasty Bruneian Empire; infested with draconian rulers and ordinates. Thank you as well for helping us to be literate during your missionary period. Special thanks to all the Jesuits and volunteers. Thank you Tun Abdul Rahman Ya'kub for those eight years of transition. If not because of your great wisdom and wise decision, I will be blogging in some other language, alien to most internet communities.
Again, Thank you!
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