Fifty years as an independent nation. So, what makes Malaysia special for us?

Plenty.

We were once a well-knitted nation. Now, race-based politics and politicians have torn the fabrics and driven us apart.

We used to share the same faith in all religions this human civilisation has endured. Now, religious zealots are segregating us, separating you from we.

We used to be a melting-pot of voluptuous cultures. Now, they only get showcased to the foreigners during Visit Malaysia Year.

We are endowed with God-given wealth and extractive resources. Now, rent-seekers are draining our coffers and are sending the bills, wholly and squarely, to us. What a resource curse!

We used to pride ourselves in good tertiary education, with Cambridge University Examination Board as the benchmark for GCE O and A Levels before the degree-factory gets its raw supply. Now, we easily launch into celebration mode even if ever we enter the botton-rung of the Top 200 global list for best universities.

We used to be forward-looking, with a vision to be America’s peer by 2020. Now, we squabble over who should be communists and who should be WWII heroes that had protected Malaya during the Japanese Occupation. Now, we keep our eyes on the rear-view mirror called NEP, and we are oblivious of the train-wrecks that sharp bends of globalisation loom ahead.

We used to be a country revered in the region if not the world over for statesmanship. Now, we are “half-past-six” at best, so said a retired but living statesman.

That makes Malaysia so ever special for all of us. — Challenges and tribulations that may take another 50 years for us to undo and re-do. With a hefty pricetag, if we went off course yet again.

I remember Chairil Anwar used to say prophetically way back in 1943:

Kalau sampai waktuku
‘Ku mau tak seorang ‘kan merayu
Tidak juga kau
Tak perlu sedu sedan itu

Aku ini binatang jalang
Dari kumpulannya terbuang

Biar peluru menembus kulitku
Aku tetap meradang menerjang

Luka dan bisa kubawa berlari
Berlari
Hingga hilang pedih peri

Dan aku akan lebih tidak perduli

Aku mau hidup seribu tahun lagi

Translation:

If my time should come
I’d like no one to entice me.
Not even you.
No need for those sobs and cries.

I am but a wild animal
Cut from its kind.

Though bullets should pierce my skin
I shall still strike and march forth.
Wounds and poison shall I take aflee. Aflee
‘Til the pain and pang should disappear.

And I should care even less.

I want to live
for another thousand years.

Let’s live long enough to cheer for Malaysia. We shall prevail, shan’t we? If only we are not drunken with the zest for forms over substance in things we do these days. Is Bangsa Malaysia still a ‘dreamable’ dream, one may ask as the country moves into its Golden Jubilee?

JEFF OOI says:

Fellow blogger, mokciknab aka Tengku Elida Bustaman, tagged me when she blogged the 37th entry for the Poetic Justice — 50 Posts to Independence project that Nizam Bashir had initiated.

Mine is the 36th entry to the blogathon, and I am tagging Rocky’s Bru to make the 35th entry (on the descending order), and hopefully, the final entry will be on time for August 31, 2007.

This blog was supposed to have been uploaded during the wee hours on December 31, 2007. But it was held over due to the outage at Typekey that prevented me from updating my blog as it had affected my TypeKey Authentication API affixed to the blog engine.

P/S… Aku, here, refers to Malaysia 2007 — if you hadn’t got my drift.