Looking back, I realize that all these years of wondering
around from places to places, and from job to job must have got me to somewhere
where I should spend the rest of my life. The search for adventures will
finally have to come to an end. All those years that passed by, seem to have
happen just like yesterday. Time past so fast and I remember this very well now
but had never taken it so seriously. A doctor who used to treat me for malaria
at the Tawau General Hospital, with whom I was talking with as he was curious
to know about how a man with my background landed in the hospital. We spoke at
length of our wondering around. To him, he was concern of his patients where
ever. Time that passed was the essence of our subject especially with regard to
life, and he finally summed up by saying, “time flies”. So many years passed,
and I never met him again then, and I survive.
What would I do if there are more years left
ahead of me? Probably nothing much, as I am already burnt out. But it does not
worry me, since time to me now is just a matter of space denotes by numbers so
we can acknowledge the hours, days months and years. A space where we moved
around and had fun, and I never want to look back and regretted.
More than thirty six years had passed since I
left the island. I did not just left my childhood friends behind but my
family. Not only did both my parents
passed away on that island, but so were many of my friends. I did come back to
the island once a while but rarely did I meet my friends. We had grownup now
and something must have changed. So I long to go back to the island and meet
those friends and relatives whom I left behind. This could be fun since I last
set foot on the island almost three years now.
The opportunity came where my classmates
organized a school reunion at the 11th of January 2009. I contacted
one of the organizers by the name of Donald Wee Sim Haw, a familiar name when
he called me back and ask who I am, my reply was, “Ever heard the name of Said
Basman?” and he replied back, “Of course, its been a long time, but good to get
you”.
Came the 10th of January, me, my
youngest son and my wife who was also very excited set off on our way to the
island. It was a smooth drive all the way to the jetty at Menumbok, where I
meet an old teacher, and an old friend Mr. Johnny Teo (late) who was junior to
me. Up on the ferry I keep telling my youngest child and wife of the nearby
islands and fishing grounds. Soon the shore line of Labuan met our eyes. It has
changed a lot over the years, and I never expected it. Tall buildings could be
seen from afar, unbelievable, and quite a contrast from the days ever since I
left the island.
On board we meet a few others old friends Omar
Kadir, Rosalind Chew and the evergreen Jenny Lee, who since have move to reside
in Kota Kinabalu. We spoke about nothing, but of the good old days and of our
families, and our wondering around.
As we
set foot on the island, I noticed that Labuan had transformed itself from a
sleepy town, into a very lively and modern one. Well once again I had the
feeling of being a stranger here. After paying respect to my parent’s graves,
we made our way round the town, and again meet old friends. Koh Chan Lee was
the first I recognized as I fought with him in the old days. A good former
South East Asian boxer now has white hairs, but not surprising, as we are now
in our mid fifties. It took me quite sometime to recognize the rest as it has
been so long. We even lost our way while visiting my late ‘guru’ family. But
his children still recognized me as I was among the seniors still alive, I have
no student as foretold by their late father.
It was
raining heavily and a little hard to find our way to the Dorset Hotel. As late
comers, and as we entered the hall most people gave us the stare and my thought
was as if they were staring at a ghost. I was lost as it took me quite a while
to remember the names and faces. “Hai Said, where have you been all this
while?” was what I heard from all around. “Good to see you again”. I was amazed
as I shook hands with them and introduced my wife. I could only said “I am
still alive”.
These
were tense moments and the organizers were lost to quiet us down. For once we
were like children again and only our teachers looked aging. But our hairs
change colours. Most have white hairs and some of the ladies especially dyed
blond to look evergreen and with no offense intended I believe they have every
right to do so.
I really admired the achievements of my old
school mates. Some have become ‘tau-key’, opening up restaurants, constructions,
barter trade and whatever and some have gone very far in their professional and
Public careers, like Peter Ho who is currently station in Guyana and Lee Eng
Lang who had since migrated to the United States and Ang Heng Thiam with his
gang who migrated to New Zealand. Margarete is currently station in Jakarta.
Awang Mulok who was a junior to me was once the Member of Parliament of Labuan.
But whatever our standings are, I believe our prime times are over. Most of us
are either retired or coming soon to be as there is none who is below the age
of fifty and some have been conferred with ‘atuk’ or ‘nenek’.
When asked by Gregory Reuterns and Patrick,
“what am I doing now?” My reply was simple “I am retired, completely retired
and occupy my time with attending to my small garden”. “You are still a bit
young to retire completely”, said Patrick. To this curiosity, and smiling I replied
back “I have achieved my dreams. All this while it has been like chasing
rainbow beyond the horizon. Now there is hardly energy left and there is no
more desire to quest for an adventure. I just like to spend my time with my
family and friends without any reservation”.
I did not expect to get a lot of attentions from
old friends around. Perhaps I have been away too long and they must have
somehow wonder whether I am still alive or perhaps those days I was one of
those being feared. I noticed that everybody was in a good mood and I was
completely lost while watching them. I did manage to take opportunity of
greeting and meeting all my old teachers and some did remember me. Surprisingly
this was the placed where we used to have our fifth Former Ball more than
thirty six years ago, only with the building completely replaced by the hotel.
The brief moments we had together at that point
in time was more of nostalgia and perhaps will be treasured by many in the
years left available to us. To sum up perhaps Anuar Nordin comment was right,
by saying, “lama ta jumpa, seronok betul, bila lagi nak jumpa begini tau”. We
were the last few to leave the hall and with us we bring more memories and hope
that somewhere in the future we may meet again. But in this modern time,
sophisticated communication systems allow no barrier; just a touch can allow us
to communicate with each other.
When dawn came, after our morning prayer, we
said “goodbyes”, to my cousins, and all his families. We had to make our way back. We still had to stop at Pimping, Membakut to meet auntie Aisah for the
last piece of information of my ancestor history and upon reaching Kota
Kinabalu the journey end. Another day will begin and another plan for a
journey, I do not really know but I always hope to have just not one but a few
more. It keeps me alive, but whatever lies ahead is none of my business as I do
not want to choose another path again. This path has been long and winding like that of
a tree with so many branches and the road to glory and achieving material gains
is not always pleasant to write, as often; I am lost in the quest as I always
said to friends “I want to interfere with fate”. What is written could not be
possibly unwritten and neither can I make any different in anyway possible.
There are too many ‘ifs’, and at the end of the day I get passed on by people
who took advantage, never again. The years that passed by had made me much more
wiser and simple and perhaps my Chinese friends is correct in calling me ‘Lau
San Cho’.
At this point in time when writing this chapter,
the world is almost facing an economic downturn, where there is a credit
squeeze and prices of goods and services go spiral-up, and Malaysian like the
rest of the world began panicking. Probably interests are being affected. The stock
markets all over the world experience the shares value of many corporate began
to fall and Malaysian share market indexes painted on a piece of paper
resembles like the hills of the Croker Range. So on paper some corporate rulers
are roughly cut by half. Political and corporate leaders started to get jumpy
because the Malaysian government and the politicians especially their cronies
with the corporate firms may have vested interest.
Fortunately the Malaysian parliament and states
elections (except Sarawak State) were hold in early 2008. If held much later
the likely hood of a change in the central government is eminent. In general
the lifestyles of the politicians of the ruling government and their policies
are too versatile therefore are never prepared in facing an economic crises.
The “yes-man” technocrats either have superficial knowledge, self interest, too
beautiful and always paint colorful economics scenarios to please but
ill-advice the political leaders and the general public. So not surprisingly as
always was, and as in this case, Malaysian government leaders, and corporate
figure do a lot of propaganda s backed by untested and glory seeking
academicians to hide their panics. Their immediate step is to form a economic
advisory committee to look into ways of handling our economy. And I think
honestly this is a bad move, a waste of time and public funds. A committee
which rarely meet and composed of members who have vested interests and
‘prophets of dooms’ will do more harm than good. If they are good we will
experience a very minimum impact as a whole.
Looking back at the time when the price of
petroleum jumped from about US40 dollars to almost hitting US150 dollars, the
government and corporate leaders started to panic. The government started to voice
out that they give subsidies for the general public consumption of petroleum
and diesel etc. So they have no choice but to increase the price of petroleum
products like gasoline, diesels etc; the only consolation to consumers with
vehicles less than engine capacity of 2000cc would receives a maximum of RM600
as rebates for insurance and road tax but this is a shorterm solution. With the
United States controlling the cartel of oil producers the price of petroleum
will never reverse back to that of the eighties. The government and decisions
makers realized that an increased in the price of petroleum products will
definitely caused an increase to cost of another products and services. They
even realized that savings will decreased within a short period because of the
lost in purchasing power of the consumers who are slow to adjust to a new life
style. This spiral price increase was suggested by those who ill-advised the
government and I always called them ‘prophets of doom’. Like wise the
government lost a number of states and has its majority in Parliament reduced.
Even till today, when the price of crude oil
have drop down slightly, the price of petroleum locally have yet to drop to a
very low level and so too are the consumer goods and services. In fact they
tend to increase further, since the major cartels are controlling their
supplies. The recent price increase in the price of crude oil has nothing to do
with supply and demand but on speculations and is temporary because major
producers like Iraq are invaded by the United States, and productions slowed,
the Gulf States of America experienced natural disasters, and so too are the
oil producing Arab States. The government at that time had several options
available such as step-ladder or flexible method. A critical path analysis
should had been done or may be just
ignored because of greed and the corporate leaders never lost money and they
will benefits most.
In western countries and Japan, a person or
persons responsible for causing economies shortfalls will tender their
resignations because of ethics and professionalism. In Malaysia they are given
immunity. So our economic system developed and there will be an imbalanced in
incomes. Those effected will rise through streets protests and this together
with political agendas will emerge as the main tool to gather a momentum to
weaken the government.
The political scenario undergoes major changes
both to the institution and structures. Major political parties from the ruling
Barisan Nasional are rendered obsolete. To make matter worse they experienced
the leadership crisis. Their system of leadership selections and candidates are
no longer accepted by the general voters, but good enough for their own party.
Voters are more matured though they do not necessary become members of any
political party. Issues of personalities and principles and what they can do
for the people are more important. The Sabah scenario is different since the
federal manage to successfully apply the divide and rule policy. Furthermore the
opposition lack of sound strategy, finance and logistics made it too difficult
to make any inroads; but change will eventually come.
An economic crises can be predicted and weather
out. Modern media and electronics system will make financial data available
which could be studied interpreted and use for prediction and decision makings.
As Malaysia is dependent upon trading and providing of services and supplies,,
it must avoid a further inflationary increase to prices of transportation and
there after allowing more savings by the consumers. There is nothing wrong with
slowing down physical developments because the illegal migrants problem who
form the supply non-skilled cheap labor, could at least be solved. Malaysian
government protects mega companies, so we have a system of either monopoly or
oligopoly rather than face enterprise. Just as monopoly, oligopoly is worse.
They dictate the price of goods and services and since we have two Malaysia,
that is West and East Malaysia. The East Malaysian states suffers worst in terms
of cost of and of standard living. Let alone physical developments especially
with regards to infrastructures.
So we have a problematic
scenario, and the peoples are getting restless because of the economic and social
imbalance and will eventually burst. Perhaps the time of the present government is numbered;
out of control by the demonstrations and voices of the opposition.
Demonstrations peaceful or otherwise are a common feature of a democratic
system. Only authoritarian is practical
in China, Russia and North Korea who manage to minimize such incidents. I see
the strategies used by the government to win the heart of the people are more
of propaganda tactics rather than of solving methodology. They used every
authorities even to the extend of involving religious institutions like the
National Fatwa Council whose members are perhaps more of sectarian. I am of the
opinion that the present governmental system had been rendered obsolete.
Reformation will require drastic changes both in ideology and methodology, to
change the present economic, social, government, and political system.
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