dear all,
setiap saya membaca artikel/berita di media india, yg
wartawannya diundang ke malaysia, pasti isinya selalu
kekaguman dan kekaguman. dari glamornya, indah
alamnya, bersih birokrasinya, metropolisnya, dll. saya
tidak tau bagaimana kesan wartawan2 yg diundang
berkunjung ke indonesia, apakah begitu juga? Well,
kita pasti tahu jawabnya.
salam,
Fairways, other ways
- By S. Shankar Menon
Here in Kuala Lumpur for golf as part of an Indian
media team, it is not the fairways but the other ways
that will interest you. More so since Mahathir�s
Wawasan 2020, gathering momentum when I was last here
three years ago, is in full flow with his successor
Abdullah Badawi. The vision of this country getting a
Newly Industrialised Country status by then, includes
creating a common unified Malaysian identity, to
replace the various communal identities of Chinese,
Malay, Indian and so on, an educated society based on
spiritual values.
In the run-in from the state of the art airport, my
colleagues in the team, as expectedly, go to town over
the broad roads, how we are � guess, guess � held back
only by corruption. They do not know of my misspent
past, perpetually fighting these notions. Traffic jams
of horrendous dimensions lie in wait the next day, the
system here of adding percentages for the elected and
selected in huge infrastructure contracts works very
well with the delivered, spanking product.
Badawi actually bothers about the bureaucracy. He
constantly harangues the civil service to deliver at
the cutting edge. Has any of our Prime Ministers done
that over the last half century? Examinations and
in-service screening of a deeply analytical nature are
evolved lately for promotions, the unions are
predictably miffed. Awards are given by the chief
secretary Tan Sri Samsuddin Osman for performances by
regional civil servants, honoured at the national
level. When will this ever happen at home? The new PM,
after the benevolent dictatorship of the old one, that
found consistent electoral support by a country who
knew they were on to a good thing, now pleads for
religious moderation. Overwhelmed at the thought and
breaking down in tears at a world conference on faith.
The Petronas and Kuala Lumpur Towers, are only the
symbols of this huge new thrust to modernity; Bukit
Nanas, the equatorial forest with its swaying cable
cars above in the middle of town when I first came
here in 1978, is now preserved as a jungle trek
without the accents of tourists from the Mid-West
shrieking down from below.
There is no time on this trip to breathe in the orchid
or hibiscus gardens. Stumble across a clump in the
Cameron Highlands from where the black lapwing Rajah
Brooke butterflies rise like shreds of an umbrella.
While doing the Kinabalu climb on an earlier visit,
there was the largest flower in the world next to the
path as you panted upwards. In the forests of Sabah,
the
rafflesia is a metre in diameter in full bloom, taking
many months to develop; the open bloom lasts a few
days, is a parasite, has seven species altogether. I
am more obsessed with not missing putts smaller than
that on the unbelievably zippety greens of Impian. Our
scratch teaching pro in the team is partying till four
every morning, while I hit balls at a driving range as
thunder and lightning and rain sweep outside. Ajay
Gujral and I have the same net score on the first day,
he is asked to look for babes later, crackles in the
second round at Saujana, while I sag miserably in the
heat.
It is all good fun. My playing partner, a lady
photographer from Delhi, has completely different
playing rhythms and I grit available teeth, generally
silently. Our Golfline magazine business head, Anil
Dev produces a great effort on the second of three
days, but unless I deliver in the final round over
three courses, chances of making it to the finals in
October in Terengannu are bleak. An inter-team amateur
world championship is being played a lot more
seriously while the rest of us hack. Malaysian Tourism
has splurged on hospitality. To be accompanied by a
police escort for the media bus as we make our way to
the venue of the day, reminds me of getting the
President of Seychelles from Santa Cruz airport to Taj
Hotel in Mumbai in 25 minutes flat.
This country has a population less than twice that of
Mumbai. The capital is at 1.6 million people, only
twice that of a town where I was chief cook and bottle
washer 20 years ago. Time being a function of
interest, I still try to find the bookshop where under
an atrium, there are waterfalls and ferns in the
garden section, children sit around on park benches
reading about the botanical and natural wonders of
this amazing country. In the process, I find again the
elaborate Kournikaya, where a small lift only for one
wheel-chair, takes you straight to the poetry section
in the fourth floor of a shopping mall. Unfortunately,
Toni Morrison and her contemporaries are cellophaned
from the itching hands of the seeking public.
The MPH book-store in the Mid-Valley shopping mall,
has no flowing water any more, but the garden chairs
and the children are still there. There is also a
competition to describe their outlets in three words.
Comprehensive, delightful, romantic, I say and wait
for the first prize of a car to be shipped to
Prabhadevi.
Malaysia gets 6 1/2 million tourists in six months, we
get 2 1/2 a year. Their infrastructure is spectacular,
from mountain biking to endurance events in Sabah
around tea estates, the executive sportsmen in our
stressed cities, have an ideal venue for combing back
their disappearing hair. The charm of the people in
the service industries is a magnificent plus. Though
their wages are good, prices are reasonable, the
bio-diversity, carefully preserved, takes the visitor
through the enthralling countryside of Sabah and
Sarawak in a fragile environment.
Last time here, on the trail of Jim Thompson the
maverick bringer of silk to this country and possibly
a CIA agent straight out of Somerset Maugham, I saw a
few of the Orang Aslis come down from the tea gardens.
The original inhabitants will be dazed at modern
Malaysia. The government looks after them as well
without condescension. The press here may not welter
in our great freedoms, which include rotten golf
scores for our media team, but Mahathir has created a
genuine nation. It is not about too many countries,
including China or us, that we can say that.
Hope to play better golf in Bangkok this morning,
hopes [EMAIL PROTECTED]
=====
Mario Gagho
Political Science,
Agra University, India
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