Let me savour this moment....aah, what a feeling!

Election '08 - A finale

Let me reiterate one thing here - this is not a political blog and it will not be one. I am just recording election '08 as a personal reflection as the theme of the blog would allow it.

As a finale, I would like to record a couple of issues during this election.

The kids and I had a big flag during our journey to and from Kuala Lumpur. To be honest, I am glad we did it. Along the way from Dungun to KL, we had over 38 cars giving us the wave, or the slight high beam or the honk. It is nothing compared to the thousand of cars that we had passed by, but significant enough to be mentioned.

These were typical scenes during the journey.

If we were to pass by cars with BN flags - and they are many I must say, I would not even bat an eye lid. I would simply ignore them. To me it is done in the spirit of the election - opposition or otherwise.

Until I had a chat with a relative upon returning from KL today - he is an UMNO party member and have business dealings with UMNO. Upon knowing I had a flag on my car, he asked me if my car has been fully paid. I said no and asked him why. "Be prepared that by Monday, you would be asked to pay back all your loans in total," he warned me. "How would they know? The SB would have recorded my car's number," he explained.

When I told him that mine is P***'s, he changed his statement a bit and said if my loan is with P**** Bank, may be I'll be ok, but C*** certainly would have revoked my loans.

I believe him. He has no reason to lie to me as a relative, and Muslim and a lawyer. More importantly he is on the other side of the divide, and a reasonably prominent one I would say.

And I had enjoyed our conversation the past week or so.

Well, if so, what can I say? This is a police state?

But any bank for that matter would have difficulty finding a commercial reason to do that - I have been a good customer. But I guess in a police state, they need no commercial reason.

I would have to say that the trip back and forth was typically good natured. Until we reached MRR2, with the massive traffic jam. Fortunately the jam was on the opposite direction!

On another note, I would like to record too, that upon reaching the flyover above the "Makro" roundabout, a motorbike overtook us on the left and slowed down, while doing a zig-zag in front of our car in the middle lane of MRR2.

He has no business overtaking me on the left, so close to my car and then slowing down while doing a 'jig' right in front of a moving car. If he was to fell, I might not have enough time to stop and I might have run him down.

Out of the blue and for nothing, I must say. He was wearing a BN white t-shirt and had his face covered up. The first two digits of his number plates was also covered with - of all - a KeAdilan sticker.

Why is his plate covered with a KeAdilan sticker? Is he trying to be mischevious? Definitely this is a no no. But the fact he is wearing a BN tshirt but a KeAdilan sticker covering his number plate, and trying to provoke a car in the middle lane with a PAS flag, it is all too fishy.

Close up of his number plate. See the KeAdilan sticker conveniently covering his number plate?

As far as I am concerned, he was a provocateur extreme. I have heard of this type of person many times and this is my first encounter first hand - just because I was carrying the flag for an opposition party. I managed to overtake him, record him, and upon realizing that he was being captured on camera, he sped up and showed us the finger.

His face is all covered up. But he didn't cover the front plate. After he passed up by the second time (we managed to overtake him after he slowed down on the left lane), and upon realizing that he was being recorded, he showed us the finger (which unfortunately was not recorded by my damn slow Olympus! )

Enuff of the election - irrespective of who would win tonight. I have done my part. The rest I leave it to God.

EPILOGUE

The lawyer relative of mine called last nite to inform me that he was only joking when he said that my number would have been recorded by SB when I flew the flag while driving around during election day. I will take that remark in good faith and at face value - that it was just a joke on his side.

Election '08 : The Banner War

These two banners greeted 'pengundi perantau' or if you are like me, pengundi luar albeit one that is registered for 18 years already. The one below was right near the entrance to Merteh mosque.

Aameen!

The PAS workers were still unfurling this big flag at 5 pm yesterday, while the BN workers were nowehere to be seen.

And the battle begins. There is nothing like it in the Malay heartland of Terengganu.

While I can't speak for Kelantan, I am glad to be a voter in another Malay heartland - Terengganu. To me, what I saw in KL pale in comparison compared to Terengganu. KL looks like childplay to me. Terengganu is the real thing.

Terengganu is not about flags and poster. Terengganu is about banners. Banners on issues of the elections, of their needs, of their dissatisfactions. It is a war out here.

Here is one about the royalty.

Hope it is as clear as the day and need no translation. Take anything they give.

Or else the gasoline price will go up again.

Just a reminder to the government of all the promises in 2004.

Yeah, and this one again.

These are all in Kerteh - the heartland of the oil and gas industries.

According to the banner below, they listed the deed of PAS and the misdeeds of BN. Let's hope the BN would respond.

(Below) this was one banner that we show justifying their voting trend in 99 and 04, and how they should vote in 08.

These are the three BN banners condemning PAS. On this basis, BN lost DUN Kemasik big time. Then again...

This one say that PAS is a liar, but no other detail is given.

Lastly some snapshots of me and the kids in Kerteh. The leko was at Teluk Lipat in Dungun.

Election '08 : Live from Terengganu - The Journey

Well, not quite live, but close enough I guess.

We had an interesting journey. In fact to my mind, the journey itself was as important as the destination. We were heartened by what we saw on the way to Dungun. We still have hope, I think, irrespective of the result come Sunday morning.

These are what we (the kids and I) saw this day 7th March 2008 - the day before the election '08.

These two big bikers saw us with a similar flag when they overtook us at the Karak highway and gave us the hands-up as an acknowledgment. That was the spirit during the journey as quite a number of cars with BA flags wave us as they overtook us. I was taking it easy with the accelerator.

Unfortunately, Maxis Mobile is so slow here in Kerteh that I am unable to upload all the interesting pics that we took during the journey and of course all the 'funny' and not-so funny banners in Kerteh. I had a chat at the PAS post in DUN Kemasik, a constituency that was in the realm of UMNO even when PAS ruled Tranung Kite, and apparently the workers there are confident that the ground swell this time around is bigger for them to take over DUN Kemasik.

Updated 8 March 08 - 1514 hours (after returning from Dungun)

The long queue to exit the East Coast Hiway at Jabor. Luckily we have a touch-n-go that was on sale during the last Raya, so it was a breeze for us. Phew!


Someone would have to climb to plant this bendera at this bukit in Geliga Kemaman

The bridge near Chukai

This one right in the middle of town in Cukai near Hai Peng.

This is the Paka Bridge

This one in Dungun

My wishes for the election '08

By the time you read this, I hope I am on the way to Terengganu, or perhaps at my voting centre in SK Sura in Dungun.

If SPR think that by moving my wife's voting centre to here in KL would cause us not to travel to Terengganu where we had voted twice, then they are sadly mistaken. I hope to be travelling with the kids while she would be doing her duty casting in Selangor. Hope it will be an easy ride - nothing to rush, but hopefully Allah will make it easy for us to do our duty.

The kids with their flag before the journey

I do have a wish for this election - I mean I have many wishes for the election. I wish for a government who

1. is clean from corruption
2. would not pay commission of RM500 millions for purchasing a French submarines or pay commission of RM340 millions for the purchase of army aircraft or whoexploits the poor and make RM900 millions from land deals
3. would give free education (I mean really free) for all from primary to university level
4. would not build a crystal mosque just to showcase Islamic civilization (huh?)
5. would guarantee the security of the people and the nation
6. would calculate & report inflation correctly and not be in cohort with industries to increase prices at the expense of the public and consumers
7. would not use government project to fill up one's own pockets at the expense of the country
8. would not use ISA for any reason, nor would use C4 to blow up anyone
9. would not appoint 'sedara-mara' to government's post or projects and run the country as if their grandfathers own them
10. would not send Malaysian passenger in a Russsian space cab
11. (whose) prime minister would even sleep while standing up (with the other world's leaders) - NOT!
12. Fill up as you please

Selamat Mengundi, and may we get a (new) clean government by Sunday morning. Aameen.

EPILOGUE

I have been sent this sms by my sis. Apparently according to the sms, it was the doa recited at Nikko Hotel by Nik Aziz.

" Ya Allah, kami diserang, dihimpit dari segenap penjuru dalam menegakkan agamamu, sesungguhnya kami tak terdaya. Maka kami berserah kepadaMu untuk bantu kami dalam menegakkan agamaMu"

The art of ageing

So I am 45 going on 55 today. Or if my partner is to be believed, then I am actually 45 going on 60!

Funny guy this Peter. He has no sense of diplomacy at all with this friend of his. Luckily I knew him well enough not to get offended!

I remember reading an article about Alex Ferguson when MU won the league last season in the Daily Telegraph. The writer describes him as 65 years old, looks 55, and has the zest of a 25 years old. In response to that, I wrote that I am 40 something, look 60 something and has the zest of someone on a death row!

That describes me well, I must admit.

I have read somewhere that it is all dependent on how one present oneself. If you, like me, act as if you are 15 years older than your age, then people would perceive you to be just that.

When I was in F1, I remember queueing for food at the dewan makan. Two seniors wanted to overtake the queue and so they seek my permission. "Dik, akak potong, boleh kan?" they asked me. A friend of mine (Birin) at the same queue responded, "Adik? Ni bukan adik, kak ooi, ni bapak budak dah."

Smart aleck, this friend of mine. But he was not wrong, I looked matured enough even for a F1 student.

When I first joined an oil company in the late 87, I had to undergo orientation week at a training centre in Bangi. When I introduced myself and of course my age, the facilitator asked me, "Are you sure your parents didn't lose your birth cert?" Oh boy, another smart aleck, but I guess I looked that old.

On the other hand, I also know someone having the same birthday albeit many years apart. When we found out that we shared the same birthday - she was a classmate in my MBA class at UIA, another classmate remarked, "Obviously! That explained why the two of you behave very similarly."

There is no doubt about it - we share very similar traits; impatient, emotional and hot tempered.

I would like to think that this single positive trait - passionate - as encompassing these three negative traits.

That's Piscean to you, if the 'horror-scope' is to be believed.

The day Tuan Guru became tok kadhi

I remember the days when we used to sponsor the top guns of Malaysian politicians of the alternative kind.

As members of the Monash University Islamic Society (MUIS), we used to be active politically and were very politically aware. The weekly usrah, where we learnt the religion (and politics), and of course the cricket or badminton games shortly after - we look forward to all these each Saturday.

But the highlight of it all, in hindsight, was the fact that we used to sponsor Malaysian politicians from the alternative camp even in those days.

Who said Malaysian students are a pampered lot, are not patriotic and would only know how to party?

I remember the 3 years in the 80s, we had sponsored two top guns from Al-Arqam, whose name escaped me at the moment (definitely not Abuya). The previous years we had Allahyarham Haji Yusuf Rawa, then President PAS and Wan Mutalib Embong, and the year after Al-Arqam, we had Haji Hadi (now Datuk), then third in line to Haji Yusuf Rawa and Allahyarham Hj Fadzil Noor and Mustapha Ali (now Datuk).

Before you start thinking that we students had too much money, let me assure you that as a registered body at the university, we received grants from the Students' Union too.

Beside, unlike ministers from the establishment, they would be staying at students' house and we would take turn to cook. Definitely they weren't expensive at all.

While I don't remember the details, I remember Almarhum Haji Yusuf Rawa as a soft spoken person. His English though was very good. I remember too Wan Mutalib Embong as being a good translator during the ceramah we organized for the benefit of other Malaysians students at Monash.

But I remember the year we had Haji Hadi and Mustapha Ali well too. At one stage, we even had a young Lim Guan Eng at our centre to discuss the details of the logistic of having Haji Hadi giving a speech at the university for the Malaysian students. Lim Guan Eng then was the president of the Malaysian Students' Association at Monash (he was studying economics, I engineering).

I must say that Lim Guan Eng then was so soft spoken and very unassuming that I was doubting that he was the son of the fiery Lim Kit Siang. I would not have thought he would have made it far in the context of Malaysian politics, but he had proven his worth; being jailed for trying to protect that Malay girl in Malacca, and of course for becoming the secretary of the DAP.

At the talk by Haji Hadi, we were practically ready for anything. We were strategically placed to protect him. Not that we were expecting anything - just in case. I remember seeing him looking down on the rostrum when he was speaking, so I thought he has a script to guide him.

But he was only playing with his watch!

I must say the highlight of his trip, from a personal perspective, would be the fact that Haji Hadi became a tok kadhi that week by marrying off two of us brothers (both Dr, one in medicine and another in engineering) to two of the sisters. I remember it well, because I was the official photographer on that occasion. I believe the two grooms were very satisfied of my picstures then, but since they had given me the camera for me to take pics with, I didn't have any copy at all.

I wish I have a copy of the pictures from the occasion. I have lost contact with the two grooms then (Dr Rainey and Dr Dzahar); otherwise I would be posting them here, just to showcase the PAS president in a very different and rare role.

That of a tok kadhi!