Malaysia Journal 3 - Books, CDs and Movies

Books

The bookstores in Malaysia, especially around KL, are so to my taste. They have large collections both of English and Chinese publications. Especially Chinese publications, they are from China(mainland), HK Taiwan and even local Malaysian and Singaporean presses. It is very hard in mainland China to buy books published in HK or Taiwan, especially when the books are politics-related.

There was one bookstore in PJ (a district near KL), called Popular Book. (大众书店）It's kinda of interesting to realize there was no Bahasa Melayu on this website, only Chinese and English. The company was established in 1984 and now have some 60 store around Malaysia. Asian Weekly (亚洲周刊), a HK based international Chinese magazine, publishes weekly Chinese book bestseller lists from leading bookstores among Chinese speaking cities, among which Popular Book stands for whole Malaysian Chinese Literature.

Another bookstore I visited was Kinokuniya (纪伊国屋书店). It was a Japanese based global bookstore chain. It was located at Level 4, KLCC. It was such a big store that you couldn't even miss. Interestingly, the Chinese books are far more than the Japanese books in that store. Kinokuniya also operates a store in Sydney and said to be the biggest in Australia. Borders, a British bookstore chain, is also very popular in Malaysia. They also have large Chinese collections.

The books in Malaysia is very cheap, compared to Australia, who has stupid publication restrictions which are supposed to aim at protecting local publication industry. The Chinese publications are also reasonably priced, taken exchange rate factors into account.
CD

There I went to a lovely CD store in KLCC, in which you can first happily and later a little embarrassed ask the shop keeper to test the CD for you. You can pick up any of the CD and present to the shop keeper and they will unpack the CD and lead you to the CD player even though you don't want to buy it. So after listening to half a dozen of CD, I bought four local Malaysian albums which I supposed were nowhere else could be found in other countries.

I always remember in an Indonesian movie I have seen, there was a female singer in a bar at KL, her voice was so beautiful and I believe she was singing in Bahasa Melayu or Bahasa Indonesia, which two were basically the same. So I requested several albums contained Bahasa Maleyu. I was amazed at the popularity of English songs, though. It seemed very hard to find an indie or acoustic album totally in Bahasa Maleyu.

Movies

Malaysia is definitely heaven for a movie bug like me. American, Thai, Japanese, Chinese, Malaysian, Indian..... original soundtrack and English-Chinese double subtitle. The prices for student were so cheap (only about RM10 - CNY 20 or AUD 3.3) that I watched 4 movies in total during my stay in Malaysia.

I saw a local Malaysian film which was such a novel experience to me. It was about a poor street boy whose daily activity was racing motors with mates and delivery mails as a job. Then accidentally appointed to be temporary boyfriend of his beautiful rich boss, whom he secretly loved. The boss was from a rich family and her friends were all sort of upper class. After several up and downs the two fell in love and.... Well, personally, I don't think they will live happily ever after, which the movie tried its best to convince its audience. During most of my stay I interact with local Malaysian Chinese and barely spoke to Malay unless I have to. So the movie showed me a different view of Malaysia which really was a pleasure. An interesting phenomenon in this movie is that not a single woman wore a headscarf, which I though was a requirement of Melays.

Great Ocean Road

After being in Melbourne for almost 2 years, today I finally grasp a chance to visit the Great Ocean Rd.

The road was being constructed since 1918, after World War I. 3000 soldiers were back from Europe and apparently had nothing to do in that period of time. Therefore they were assigned to build such a road in a manner to memorize the soldiers who died in the war.

It took about 12 years for the road to be completed, then it became a tourism hotspot of Victoria. Hundreds of thousands of tourists came to boost the local economy every year. Honestly I was very impressed by Australian involvement in WWI, whose continent the fire of war didn’t reach at all. Everything they did in the war was for England - their motherland.

Then I heard a terrifying story about how a ship from England crashed to the cliff a hundred years ago. Only two survived. They now develop this area as a tourist attraction which I do not appreciate at all. I have to admit I am a little suspicions and concerned about the welfare of the passed-away.

The scenery, I’d say, is fascinating. However I am not sure if it is fascinating enough for one to sleep in a van for 7 hours ups-and-down on the rugged road to just have a look of the stuff which they could find on every website.

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Malaysia Journal 2 - Baba Nyonya

How lazy I was to hold this topic until a month after my visit to Malaysia! Writing journal is never a easy job, especially when writing about something you don't really know about and in your second language.

Baba Nyonya (峇峇娘惹 in Chinese) refers to the descendants of the Chinese who immigrated to Malaysia during 15th and 16th. It was used as a term to separate the Chinese arrived in Malaysia after that time. Before 1960s, Baba Nyonya were considered as Bumiputra (literally means 'sons of earth', referring to native Malaysian people, predominately Malay ethnic), and enjoyed all the privileges as in the law. However the violence between Chinese and Malay in May 13 Incident (1969) and promoted the implementation of a group of policies in favour to created more opportunities of Bumiputera, and therefore reduce the economical power of Chinese Malaysians. The definition of Bumiputera then narrowed to Malay people and several other indigenous Malaysian ethnic groups.

The term of Baba-Nyonya originally means Grandpa and Grandma, while Baba refers to the male and Nyonya female. This race is considered as upper class in Malaysian society. They could speak English, Malay and Chinese so that they could establish business relations with each of the groups. Their loyalty to British Crown during colonial time and their social connections accumulated a huge amount of fortune for them.

Baba-Nyonya was famous for their astonishing architecture, costumes and customs. Their lifestyle was influenced by both Chinese and Malaysian cultures, and, on degree, Western cultures. They lives were extravagant in whichever way. It is said that they must have 12 dishes in every dinner. Considering their sizes of family, I am little convinced. The traditional clothing for Nyonya is Kebaya, a traditional Indonesian clothing. It now can be found on the Air Attendants from Singapore Airline.

Now Baba Nyonya has lost its status as the policy is no longer in favour for them. Many of them has immigrated to Singapore, North American, Australia and New Zealand. Some of their mansions are kept well as a place for ancestor memorial or a meseum. They are a nice place to visit and to take photographs. Especially wedding photographs.

Kitten of Nyonya.

A Combination of different cultures

Ancestral Hall

Go West, A Lucky Luke Adventure - A Movie Review

French animations always have a fascinating sense of humour and beauty. Though the story itself is little bit of cliche, hero won, gangster lose, the greedy richman got what he deserved. The figures in this movie are very formulaic and predictable.

However, I still love this movie. It has a sense of humour what Made in Hollywood don't acquire.

The story was simple. It started in New York City in the period of California Gold Rush. Lucky Luke was a handsome and clever detective who was also a cowboy riding on his romantic horse. His role in the movie was to catch the Dalton Brothers and send them to prison. The Dalton Brothers were a foursome gangster who were famous all over the country by their passion of robbing banks and playing guns.

After a dramatic and wild tram ride, the Dalton brothers managed to escape from the police under their eyes. They hide the money they robbed from the bank into a wagon and hope to pick it up the next day.

However the next day turned out to be a day with dozens of wagons gathering around the square. They were a group of fresh-on-boat foreigners who were deceived by a dealer, Crook. They bought a land from that Crook in California at a very low price under one condition, that they must arrive their within 80 days, which seemed impossible at that time.

Lucky Luke showed up and caught the Dalton brothers, who were actually relectant to leave in order to search their money among the wagons. The foreigners begged Lucky Luke to help them find a quickest way to California.

During their way to the west coast, they encountered the 19th century USA and all the cats and dogs. The Chinese couple who had a restaurant wagon was also entertaining.Another astonishing plot was the big 3D screen showing as a prophecy of modern lifestyles by a Indian wizard. Kids were somehow chewing pop corns.The whole movie was in French without a single piece of English conversation. I must say it can touch the softest part of your heart, awakening childhood memories.

（The Copyright of the images belongs to their original owners)

Malaysia Journal 1 – The Indians

It has been days I went to Malaysia. Sadly I didn’t post anything much onto my blog about the trip. There are so much to say but so little time. I’ll start with Malaysian Indians, an area I least familiar with.
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It is well known that the Malaysia population consists of three ethnic groups, Chinese, Malay, and Indian.
Before my trip, I somehow have understood the existence of the former two, the third one, however, was beyond my awareness.
Geographically, Malaysia is a neighbour of India. There is only Bay of Bengal (the bay north of Indian Ocean) between them. That explains the huge number of Indian dwellers in this country.
The first breakfast I had in Malaysia was at a small Indian restaurant near my hostel. I tasted roti and, OMG, it was so cheap! A roti with egg was only about RM2 (A$0.67, CNY4). Watching the guy making roti was a lot of fun, reminding me a classic Chinese joke about how bad for an Indian chef to make roti with both of their hands, coz they use their left hand for some other purpose. Anyway, I was thinking about the joke while having the roti, it was a sin.
Then in Penang we went to a district marked as ‘little India’. It was full of Indian boutiques, DVD/CD stores and food stalls. I was attracted by a huge gorgeous picture of Brahma. (I didn’t figure out it was Brahma until I realized he had four heads.)

Opposite to this poster was a DVD/CD store. The young Indian shop assistant was very warm and beautiful that we had three pictures with her. (they are unfortunately in my cousin’s camera) I bought my housemate a CD of religions Indian music, which later on turned out to be he didn’t like. And I bought an anima DVD about the story of Ganesha (the Indian god with an elephant head).

The Indian people we met in Malaysia were really nice and friendly. Here are the photo we took in an Indian restaurant.


In Penang we went to an Hindu temple. I had heard this religion encourages its followers to worship multiple gods. But I was still amazed that the number of statues in that small temple.




The gate tower (Gopuram) was medium-sized.

In Kuala Lumpur I went to a Gurdwara (Sikh temple). Lonely Planet claimed it as the biggest temple in SE Asia. Upon entrance, every visitor is required to cover their head up. (I should have taken a picture but it seemed inappropriate) Then I came through the dining hall. The guys sitting there kindly offered me food and drink (they were free) but I just had lunch. Then a guy took me up to the Darbar Sahib (main hall) upstairs. I had to wash my feet before entering. It was a big empty hall and I walked extremely cautiously. At the end of the hall, under the statue of their god, lying a bowl of Karah Parshad, which is a sweet food made by semolina, butter, and sugar. I was offered one spoonful and I thought it was rude to refuse so I tasted it. Sweet it was. And oily as well. I asked my guide what it meant to be but he just smiled and refused to explain.


In Kuala Lumpur, I talked to an Indian young man who can speak fluent native Mandarin. He said he went to a Chinese school in Malaysia. He was the only one in his family who attended a Chinese school, under the will of his grandfather. I thought it must have been difficult for him to start learning and starting making friends with Chinese people.

Malaysia Now

Here I am in Chinatown of Penang, Malaysia. The weather is hot and humid．Even though the fans are swirling at their top rates, the room is still full of sweaty people sitting uneasily in front of computers getting here and away.

It is such a lovely trip that I found most of the food on street are affordable compared to their counterparts in Melbourne. Today seems to be an Indian food day for us.

Now we realized how common Chinese is used in Malaysia. As the approaching of Chinese new year, Penang is full of sales and new year musics which made me reluctant to realize that I have to go back to Melbourne for Chinese new year. Anyway this would be my first time of having new year without family so could be novel or painful.

Tomorrow a friend will accompany us to the sites around Penang. I will take a lot of photes of course and upload them to facebook or/and flickr.

Applause to Google

The sensational news in China yesterday was baidu.com, the biggest search engine of that country, was hacked by an organization claimed themselves as Iranians. Comments and observers, however, doubted this claims based on the fact that there were no major conflicts between the two countries.

While the only time I used baidu.com was when I wanted to input some Chinese characters on a computer without Chinese input programs. What I did was input pinyin into baidu and copy the Chinese characters it prompted. However baidu.com still became the largest search engine of China, partly because the illegal piracy mp3 links it provides and other secret ingredients appealing to the massive Chinese netizens. Though I don't use baidu.com that much, I still feel sorry for its being hacked. On this particular occasion, it seems to be innocent based on the information I am concerned.

The sensational news in China today is, Google, after struggling from censorship scandals and high pressures from Chinese authority, is thinking about to quit Chinese market. (A New Approach to China, Official Google Blog)

According to the author David Drummond, a high level official in Google, the company is 'no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn'. Besides, he suggests that Google has been investigating several cases of Gmail accounts being hacked, most of which belong to Chinese human right activists.

Someday, Google will return in glory.