What It Means To Be Malaysian

Happy Merdeka, everyone! a bit late where you guys are, i know, but it’s still the 31st here.

i had this really long Merdeka Day post drafted out in my head, but it’s a nice sunday afternoon and after a delectable lunch of mystery meat with gray gravy from the dining hall, i’m feeling too comfortably sleepy and lazy to do anything, much less kick my brain into action to write a long essay. but just to lessen the degree of my laziness, i will tell you the title of my Merdeka Day post that is now never to be. it was supposed to be called ‘What It Means To Be Malaysian’.

being Malaysian, i think, will have a whole different meaning for me now that i am abroad. it’s too early now to say just how different, but it’s only been a week and already i’m feeling the slight shifts in momentum. for instance, news were so accessible back home, and conversations about the latest national or local issues happened so often because everyone knew what was going on or at the very least, were interested to know. i felt close to these issues; i knew them well and i was comfortable speaking my mind. but over here, i worry about misrepresenting Malaysia to a bunch of people who already think that Malaysia is a country of political assassination, high crime rate, errant cab drivers, racial injustice and human rights oppression. and the sad thing is, these opinions arent unfounded. i am torn between admitting that they are right (and they are), or pulling out the old ‘yes well, but not everyone in Malaysia is like that..’ line. would it be unpatriotic for me to do the former? and conversely, would grasping at straws to paint a better picture of Malaysia cause me to misrepresent the country?

we had a discussion the other day about classroom culture in our respective countries. they asked those of us who were encouraged to speak up in class and debate with their teachers to stand on one side of the room, and those of us who were brought up to NOT challenge our teachers to stand on the other side. on the other side, it was just me, one kid from Corea and four kids from China. the rest of the room, and that’s something like 40 people, were on the side where they were encouraged from young to speak up in class and challenge their teachers to nurture individuality and critical thinking.

some people later asked me to explain why i was on that side of the room, and i said something like, “in Malaysia, they say they want you to speak up and form your own opinions, but when you do it, especially when you say something in disagreement with a teacher, they think you are disrespectful or speaking out of turn.” back in high school, i actually did not speak up much in class, because well, NOBODY spoke up much in class.. but i remember during the times that i did, i would get remarks like “you cikgu ke saya cikgu?” (are you the teacher or am i the teacher?) or impatient looks.

also, i remember how we were generally not encouraged to engaged in discussion. teachers come in, write on the whiteboard and blab to a bunch of faces, give homework and leave. they are friendly with us and everything, but in the classroom, they dont ask us what we think, they dont encourage us to speak up if we have differing opinions, they dont make it a learner-centric environment. it’s pure regurgitation from one source to another. this is my view on our education back home. and i shared it with my new collegemates who were very baffled that such a system was meant to educate and shape young people’s minds. and then i felt uncomfortable after that, and i wondered if i should have said all that, or if i should have sugarcoated anything. what would people think of Malaysia now?

the truth?

is that a bad thing or a good thing?

for every day that i’ve been here, the first thing i do when i wake up in the morning is check my email and read Malaysiakini. i always introduce myself as Su Ann from Malaysia, and i make sure that my new friends call me by Su Ann and not some truncated version. i brought a big Malaysian flag to pin up on my wall. i’m always happy to talk about Malaysia, both the good things and the bad. i brought lots of Malaysian food to share and cook if there are going to be cook-outs. i am always polite and i force myself to talk even when i’m too tired to hold conversations or simply dont feel like speaking, because i dont want people to think that Malaysians are unfriendly or unsociable, or that Malaysians cant be intelligent because they are products of a discouraging education system. over here, i’m not just me.. i’m also a Malaysian.

like i said earlier, it’s too early for me to tell what it means to be Malaysian over here in NYC, but i’m sure it will be clearer and clearer to me as i navigate the next 4 years. and it’s going to be an adventure :)

i spent my Merdeka Day in Philadelphia (a city in the neighboring state Pennsylvania) with Martian and my aunt. i was soooooooooo happy because my aunt took us out for Malaysian food in this restaurant called Banana Leaf!!!!!! what we had:

roti canai, which was crispier and thinner than what we’re used to back home. something like roti tisu, but tastes exactly like roti canai! gooooooood

hainanese chicken rice. awesome rice, but the chicken was just a tad drowned in soy sauce.

nasi lemak with the best achar ever!!!!!! this brought tears to my eyes *emo

char kway teow!!!!!!!

kangkung belacan, which i just HAD to have cos i missed it so much. this is my favorite vegetable dish of all time. i was so happy they had this on the menu…!

cendol with real gula melaka… *heart*

sigh so blissful. it was such a good dinner. everything tasted like the real thing back home.

over dinner, my aunt told me that it was surprising that i was homesick, and that she thought i was the last person to be. well.. i definitely dont hate the fact that i’m here in America and away from home; i love it actually. i love all the new things and the excitement of change, the fact that i’m going to be learning so much and i’m going to be seeing a lot of things that i’ve never seen before and that will change my outlook on life forever. i am always going to be grateful for this opportunity that i got. but the thing is.. my life back home was great. so of course i will miss it. i had a lot of freedom to do anything i wanted, school was easy, i made my own money, i had family who were always there for me no matter what, i had real and true friends who loved and supported me and are so much fun to hang out with, i could see Martian so often, i knew exactly where to go if i needed to buy something, i knew my own city inside out.. everything was familiar. i didnt want for anything, because i had everything i could possibly want. i had so much love and everything was just at my fingertips.

and that’s what i miss. i miss the love, the warmth and comfort and the accessibility of everything. that’s why i’m homesick. of course, i do know that i’m now in an exciting new place that is bursting with possibilities, opportunities, uniqueness and also love.. but it’s different. i know i’m going to be very happy for the next 4 years, and i will have so much to share about NYC and America here in my blog, but at the back of my head, i will always miss Malaysia. i will always still want to know what’s going on back home, i will always be more than happy to talk about my country to people who are unfamiliar with it, and i will always be glad to talk in Manglish to any fellow Malaysians i happen to come across.

there really is no place like home. Happy 51st Birthday, Malaysia :)

guess i wasnt so lazy to write this post after all!

Comments August 31st, 2008

With Love From New York

i write this in a mild state of shock - a direct effect of the sudden imposed revamping of my linguistic hard-wiring. i used to think that if i ever moved to the US or the UK, i would be able to quickly and smoothly adapt to the local lingo, owing to the fact that i read a lot and talk often to friends of both countries, but after four days here, i find that i have been grossly presumptuous about my adapting capabilities. it’s not as easy as reminding yourself to say ‘kleenex’ everytime you want tissue; instead, it is about being totally cautious about what multiple names any given item may have, and then running through your head what would be the American name for it. here, it is ‘elevator’, never ‘lift’. those nametags you hang around your neck during orientation or events? it’s called a badge. ‘faucet’, not ‘tap’. and like, no sentence is complete without throwing in the word ‘like’ as a precursor to like, your articulation of ideas. i observe and soak up these idiosyncrasies with intrigue and bright eyes. yet at the back of my head, i still miss saying, ‘what lah you!’.

so it’s my fourth day here in New York and i must say that things are getting very exciting. i was so tired for the first couple of days because it was non-stop speed-socializing on top of all the unpacking and settling down, and it was hard to even get a moment of alone time because everyone here is so chatty and eager to make friends. dorm room doors here are mostly left often, so people can walk in and out as they please, looking at your books and eating your cookies or whatever. that’s fine by me, but i must admit that my room door has been mostly closed, simply because i still need my me-time to do my own stuff without having to make small talk every now and then. small talk is easy, i know, but believe me it gets so exhausting when you have to repeat the same stuff about yourself every 5 minutes.

however, listening to (probably repeated every 5 minutes too) stuff about my new schoolmates is a whole different thing altogether. i absolutely love it. there are so many different kinds of people here, all of whom are extremely bright and talented individuals with the most diverse hobbies and backgrounds. i met this girl who’s a contortionist on rope - basically a gymnast who does all sorts of stunts on a rope suspended high off the floor. she showed me pictures of some of her performances and i was totally awestruck at how unique her hobby was. then there’s this guy who builds robots in his free time, and he once built a small machine that would run off on wheels with his alarm clock every time the alarm goes off, just so that he would have to get out of bed and hunt it down, awakening himself in the process. damn cool right? and there are many others with equally interesting stories. mine sound bleak in comparison, but the odd thing is, everytime i talk about myself, the focal point of the conversation always falls on malaysian politics.

almost everyone i’ve spoken to knows about malaysia and our politics. the first few times it happened, i was so fascinated, because i was expecting to say things like, ‘oh we’re north of singapore’. of course, Anwar is the most well-known topic among them, and one guy even knew about the Permatang Pauh win. the best part was when i was explaining the social contract to someone, and i used the word ‘indigenous’ in place of bumiputera.. and the girl sitting next to her piped up and told her friend, “oh the term is ‘bumis’” :O words fail me. i feel an urge to go read up on Venezuelan politics now.

thanks to everyone who’s emailed or MSNed me to ask how things are, or left me supportive comments on my blog. i’ve been good. tired, like i said, but very good. i’ve been settling down well. when i first got here, my aunt came to pick me up at JFK armed with this huge box of stuff that i really needed, like voltage converters, adapters, snacks, water bottles, mug, tissue kleenex and vitamins. then she took me to buy furniture and things for my dorm room. and yesterday she called me to ask if i wanted a rice cooker or a water boiler! she truly is an angel :D and then of course, Martian came here with me to help ease the transition and to give me extra luggage allowance!!! he’s staying at a nearby hotel and checking out museums while i’m at school, but he’s gonna be leaving soon :( i feel very thankful that he came with me though. i feel less lonely and homesick knowing that he’s just a few blocks away from me, and of course it’s so good to be able to spend some more time with him.

and speaking of luggage allowance, i really wish i had brought more stuff because i had something like an additional 20kgs that i didn’t use. should have brought Pooch, more shoes, more photos and more bags :( i really miss Pooch! (he’s this stuffed dog that Martian bought me, btw)

and while i dont have my American phone number yet (soon, soon! i decided on AT&T), what i do have is my mailing address! so if any of you guys wanna drop me a postcard or a letter, which i would really really love, the address is :

Su Ann Lim
5771 Lerner Hall
2920 Broadway
New York, NY 10027-8358
United States of America

i’m thinking i’m going to get my mom to courier Pooch to me :D along with lots of Maggi. dining hall food is balls. i’ve been eating nothing but apples and pretzels since i got here :( oh but yesterday Martian took me to Little Italy for pasta so that was good. and just to give you guys a gauge of how truly expensive NYC cabs are, a 20-minute ride from my college to Little Italy cost us 22 dollars, inclusive of a 2 dollar tip. that’s an RM 75 cab ride!!! oh the trauma! we swore never to take another cab in NYC again :\ the subway is cool but still a bit foreign to me, which is why i got lost coming back from Times Square. wuwuwu!

and uncharacteristically, i dont actually have any photos of my college! hahaha! i just realized that myself. have been so busy running around that i totally forgot to take pictures. but i will take many in due time. for now, i will just have to show you the only photo i have, which is a snapshot of one page from the used copy of The Iliad i bought from my school’s bookstore. the former owner basically annotated the pages with his own contemporary interpretation of the verses:

oh and i am changing the timestamp on my blog to NY time! i’m exactly 12 hours behind you guys, and it’s almost 7pm now, which means it’s time for a quick dinner before the next orientation event.

sigh. i miss lots of things already.

Comments August 28th, 2008

Sigh

I’m writing this on my phone now while waiting to board. I’ve got a lot of things to say, like how my wardrobe looks so empty now, and how i had to choose between indomee and maggi, and how deciding what to bring was so much easier than i thought it would be, and how saying bye to everyone at the escalator in klia was so much harder than i thought it would be… but everyone in the lounge has boarded and i’m still here typing into my phone frantically, so i guess a lot of things will just have to be left unsaid.

Bye bye :(

Comments August 23rd, 2008

The Last Leg Of Things

i usually sit in the lounge at the lower deck when i take the bus back from singapore, because the seats are wider and a lot comfier, and also because there’s usually no one else there, which means i get unadulterated peace and quiet. it’s also great being able to pick whatever movie i want. but sometimes i’m not so lucky, and i get a hollering bunch of kids who in between jumping up and down the seats, fight with each other (ignoring the fact that i could put up a good fight too) over which movie to watch. i long to tell them that there really is not much of a difference between Balls of Fury and Talladega Nights; they’re both lame. but then again when i was younger i really liked Mars Attack so who am i to pass commentary.

then there is the occasional lone guy who tries to keep a tete-a-tete going even though i pointedly keep staring at my book (which then gets: oh hey that’s a really good book, i read that a few years ago, have you gotten to the part where he meets the sheep man, oh you havent oh i’m sorry did i spoil it for you, but even so another book you have to check out is blablablablabla) or loudly exclaiming how i’m so tired (yeah me too haih life is so difficult these days study study study then after school have to work like a dog to earn money hey what do you do anyway? i actually run my own business blablablabla), but much to my chagrin, i sometimes find myself being very curiously drawn into these conversations.

then there’s also the guy who talks too loudly and too long on his mobile phone. or worse yet, the guy who’s far too generous with his bodily gases and isn’t ashamed of it.

but the other day, i encountered a new species of lounge partners: The Caucasian Expat! there were four of them - an american couple and an australian couple - and they’d all been working in Malaysia for 3 years. throughout the entire 5 hour ride to singapore, they talked about Malaysia and all the gritty comparisons that will inevitably come to anyone who’s lived in another country besides Malaysia. it started when the american lady expressed her disdain at the service in Malaysian hospitals, but the australian lady said that when she was at Gleneagles, the service was wonderful - “they even gave me little sandwiches and drinks and everything, but i suppose that was because it was a case of ‘hello, white person!’”, and ended with the american man saying with much sprightliness, “coming into singapore from malaysia is like getting out of a jungle and being welcomed into civilization” upon arrival at the Singaporean immigration.

many other topics were touched on in between, ranging from our political situation and our taxis to the state of our toilets and our currency. (my favorite phrase of the day was: “it’s okay to pay extra, after all it’s only ringgit. the ringgit is like leaves off a tree!”) mostly these things made me sad, but i didnt know if it was because some of the things they said were glaring truths, or if i was upset that these foreigners had such a bleak view of my country. maybe a bit of both.

i’m two days away from leaving, and i feel like there’s so much left to KL that i havent even seen or fully absorbed. i’m going to be taking away with me only fragments of a big picture, only such small pieces of this city that i grew up in. there are a lot of things i havent done, and many of these things wont fit in a suitcase. it’s been a very melancholic couple of weeks. i know i will eventually come back one day, and there will always be summer breaks, but there’s just a lot that i will be missing out on. four years is such a long time to be away. it’s going to be a time so pregnant with events, opportunities, big things happening to loved ones, new restaurants, stories, political change, exams, weddings, graduations… and i wont be here to see any of these. sigh. i dont care what anyone says.. skype just isnt the same as being there in person.

i’ve been frantically eating all sorts of malaysian food over the last week. all my final meetups have been done over delicious things like a piping hot claypot bowl of bak kut teh or my favorite teochew porridge in pudu. yknow, the things i will miss. i really gotta have that SS15 rojak and a really good bowl of curry laksa before i leave. tonight: nasi lemak antarabangsa with Martian! and tomorrow, chili pan mee with the nuffnang folks!

though some of my friends are being cheeky. remember the New York Cheesecake sieutheng and the bunch got me for my farewell party? last week, i wanted to eat chili pan mee for my farewell lunch with the nuffnang boys, but they took me to this place called Yellow Cab Pizza instead, and ordered these pizzas called ‘New York’s Finest’ and ‘Manhattan Meat Madness’. then just yesterday, edmund passed me a box of Big Apple Donuts from his sisters, with a note attached - “Preparing you for the onslaught!” hahaha so cute all these people. i heart.

a picture from my farewell dinner with waifon, albert, skyler, arthur and nazrul, because it’s the cutest pic ever! arthur was teaching us a rude sign, so we all decided to take a photo with various rude signs:

the guy who’s seated second from the left is arthur, and he and i go way back :D one day i’ve gotta tell you guys the story of arthur and i. hahaha it’s a barrel of laughs. “i hate fish” hahahaha okay shhhhh dowan to spoil it. waifon is on the furthest left and she is seriously the most sweetly garang person you will ever meet. it’s hard to explain :P albert is behind me doing this very complicated series of rude motions with his hands. i met him at this play called Endgame, and i was very amused to see his confused and completely mind-boggled face after the show. i swear his eyes were glazed hahaha. nazrul is second from right, and he is one of the coolest guys ever. nazrul, i’m so glad we met :) skyler is on the furthest right, and working with her was a truly fun experience because there’s just so. much. to talk about! she’s also damn angsty wan, as you can see from her blog :P

and here’s the luggage bag i just bought. it’s so humongous that i can curl up in it, and there’s still extra space. and once i fill it with all the shoes and bags i plan on bringing, i hope i figure out where to put all the rest of my stuff :\

so many things to bring, so little luggage space. and dorm room space, too :( apparently i only get 110 sq feet. i’m going to be a mouse!

Comments August 21st, 2008

Plurking My Days Away

hellohelloe! in between crazed attempts to cram my entire room into two suitcases, teary final meetings with loved ones as well as other frantic preparations for a long 4 years away in the US of A, i am here to introduce to you all the best ever micro-blogging tool i’ve had the pleasure of using :) it’s called Plurk, and it’s that orange-colored widget that’s been on my sidebar for a few months now.

i’ve been meaning to write this review for the longest time, but i’ve been putting this off. apologies to all the curious folks who’ve been emailing me and leaving comments asking me how to work Plurk and what it’s all about :( i actually told them all to wait for this post that i would be putting up “in a few days time” (ya i’ve been saying that for so long now, SORRY :( !!), but i think most of them went already ahead and figured out Plurk by themselves :P or at least, i hope they have!

in a nutshell, Plurk is like a mini-blogging site where you can post your updates (aka Plurking) either through the website or from your mobile phone. then, your Plurks will be displayed on your Plurk page (aka your Timeline) for your Plurk friends to see and interact with, OR your Plurks can also be displayed on your blog, should you want a display widget on your blog like i did. you can Plurk anything at all - what you’re doing at the moment, how you’re feeling, a question that you would like feedback for, your thoughts and opinions, etc. it’s a little bit like blogging, but a whole lot more instantaneous, mobile and random!

this sounds a little bit like Twitter and any other similar SMS-update/micro-blogging tools, but where Plurk differs is through two major features: one, its concept of a community timeline; two, it is feedback/comments enabled. i’m going to explain these two features first, and then later on i’ll explain a few other nifty things in Plurk that i really like.

1. THE TIMELINE

Plurk’s Timeline concept is something that’s really quite genius and is the backbone to the entire site. it confused me like hell the first time i logged into Plurk, but after some guidance from the almighty Puppy who introduced me to Plurk, i saw how simple it really was. it’s mind-boggling because it’s so simple.. kinda like when the iPod first came out and people couldnt wrap their minds around the one-button interface. anyways this is how the timeline looks:

the blue area is the timeline, and those white blurbs of text are plurks by me and my friends. it’s displayed in chronological order, with the ones on the left being the most recent plurks, and the further you go right, the older the plurks are.

clicking on the timeline and dragging left or right will take you through the timeline. this is helpful for navigation and catching up on plurks that you may have missed while you were away. you can go months and months back into your timeline if you so wish, just by clicking and dragging. it’s easy and smooth, apparently a programming wet dream (puppy not my words!!!).

your timeline will have your plurks, obviously, but it will also show plurks by your friends. i love it because i can be updated with whatever my friends are doing just by going into one single page, kinda like a compilation of everyone’s Facebook Status updates that is sorted chronologically. in this way, Plurk does away with all the fun frills of all other social networking sites out there, and focuses on what matters most: keeping in touch with your friends and loved ones. and um, people-stalking :P

2. FEEDBACK / COMMENTS ENABLED

i loooooove this function. i’ve used a couple of micro-blogging tools that didnt allow feedback, but i quickly grew disinterested because it was like talking to a wall. with Plurk, everytime you update, people can click on your plurk through their own timeline and leave you comments.

the boxed numbers are the number of comments each plurk has. red means there are unread comments. clicking on the plurk will open up the comments box immediately and on your timeline:

besides the mobile phone version, this is THE function in Plurk for me. i love the interaction i get from my friends (especially those who dont read my blog or never leave me comments, hmph) and also the conversations with them about our everyday activities and events. every time i’m bored or waiting in line somewhere, i get onto Plurk via my phone and just start plurking with my friends, because there’s ALWAYS people on Plurk to keep me company :D it’s like an SMS chatroom, but FREE! hahahaha! and not to mention more ORGANIZED!

this comments function is also such a convenient way of getting feedback. for instance, i once asked for laptop advice and suggestions, and i got over 250 comments from my friends on Plurk and even blog readers who signed up on Plurk just to help answer my question :D

3. FRIENDS AND FANS

in Plurkville, you have both friends and fans. friends are people whose Plurks you follow and who can also follow your Plurks; fans are people who follow your Plurks but you dont follow theirs. basically, fans are people whose plurks dont show up on your timeline, but they can see your plurks on theirs and they can respond to them too.

this is a good thing, because if you have something like 1000 friends, you’re going to have one very busy timeline that is cluttered up with plurks by people you dont even know. when Puppy was explaining Plurk to me, this is what he said, “so plurk is like, if you have to choose 5 of your most important friends from your facebook friend list, and add them as your plurk friend, then you will start to see the beauty of plurk.” and now that i am familiar with Plurk, i totally agree :) Plurk is cool because it keeps you in touch with the people you care most about and are close to, yet not completely alienating everyone else.

there are also extensive privacy settings where you can choose to add someone as a friend yet not follow their plurks, or you can choose to ‘mute’ certain plurks that are getting way too much feedback that you are not interested in, or you can block non-friends from viewing your timeline at all (disallowing fans) and many other settings that you can customize to your own liking.

4. SEARCH PLURKS

if you look back at the first picture of the timeline, there is a little ’search’ button on the lower right of the timeline. you can use this to search for any keywords throughout your own plurks, your friends plurks, or EVERRRYYYONE in Plurkville! i had fun searching for ‘Phelps’ yesterday and reading how many people think he’s not human :P

5. MOBILE PLURK

a godsend! Mobile Plurk is basically Plurk for mobile phones. i love it. i can Plurk everywhere and at anytime, get feedback instantly, start chatting with friends on Plurk when i’m bored (naeboo, artreyu, wolfx and ionstorm are the most amusing bunch!) and also follow or stalk out all my friends lives anytime and even when i’m not at the computer.

of course, this is only for 3G phones, and would be best if you had an unlimited data plan, because going online with your mobile phone can get pretty expensive especially if you start downloading videos or picture-heavy websites.

my favorite Mobile Plurk moment was when i went go-karting at Shah Alam with Martian and my brothers, and i was in a two-seater kart with Martian, and i got bored of helping him steer, so i started plurking and telling everyone i was karting. hahahaha the responses were like “huh why are you on your phone then?? go play!” hahahaha because i CAN’T KART, you guys!!! i always end up last… T___T

6. EVERYTHING ELSE

so, some other reasons why i like Plurk in general! i like the fact that Plurk compiles day-to-day, diarylike updates from my friends, yet is not intrusive. i really dont like the micro-blogging tools that spam SMSes to my phone each time someone updates, especially since i had a lot of spammy friends on those networks, and it made my phone bleep all the time :\ at least with Plurk, there is the timeline which i can check at my own free time. also, props for a wide range of privacy settings, as well as the Private Plurk function where you can send Plurks to just one person or a couple of people or even Cliques that you can pre-determine!

and i also love that some of my best friends are on Plurk. it’s so cool because i get to see what they’re up to at any time of the day, whether they’re in PJ or Penang or Canada or London. this is going to be especially useful for me when i’m away in the US and will desperately want to be in touch with friends and family back home :(

this concludes my n00b review of Plurk! do give me a holler if you decide to join Plurk! to all friends and family reading this, SIGN UP RIGHT NOW so that i get to keep an eye on you guys when i’m no longer in Malaysia!!! yes that means you too Martian -___-

you can sign up easily at Plurk via the widget on my sidebar :) or sign up here at my referral link if you want to donate me Karma Points! Karma Points will earn me some really cool smileys and features in Plurk :)

Comments August 18th, 2008