Need I say anything?
Hail Marco van Basten! Ajax’s new coach.
And ah, hell. If the Italians are so mad with Nistelrooy’s goal, let’s just disallow it and win 2-0 instead. It is still a win!
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Author: Hafiz Noor Shams
For more about me, please read this.
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
“Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!” cries she
With silent lips. “Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”—The New Colossus. Emma Lazarus, 1883
Spot the error:
In the first place the Government should not have floated the Ringgit. A floating rate creates uncertainties and we cannot gain anything from the strengthened Ringgit. Certainly the people have not experienced any increase in their purchasing power because of the appreciation in the exchange rate between the US Dollar and the Ringgit.
Actually the Ringgit has increased by about 80 sen (from RM3.80 to RM3.08 to 1 US Dollar) per US Dollar, i.e. by more than 20 per cent. Had the Government retained the fixed rate system and increased the value of the Ringgit, say 10 per cent at a time, the cost of imports, in Ringgit terms can be monitored and reduced by 10 per cent. At 20 per cent appreciation the cost of imports should decrease by 20 per cent. But we know the prices of imported goods or services have not decreased at all. This means we are paying 20 per cent higher for our imports including the raw material and components for our industries.
Since oil prices are fixed in US Dollar, the increase in US Dollar prices of oil should also be mitigated by 20 per cent in Malaysian Ringgit.
But the Government wants to please the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank and decided to float the Ringgit. As a result the strengthening of the Ringgit merely increased our cost of exports without giving our people the benefit of lower cost of imports. [Oil Price. Dr. Mahathir Mohamed. June 5 2008]
If you cannot find the mistake, I would like to point out that the former Prime Minister does not appreciate the concept of ceteris paribus.
The relationship between Srivijaya and the Sailendras has always been problematic to me. Initially, I had believed that the two were separate but closely linked entities but the truth is, the relationship is far more complex than that.
Srivijaya of course was the confederation of Malay states or rather, cities with the principal center being Palembang on Sumatra. The principal city did move from time to time to Jambi but Palembang was the main center of power for most of the times. From Palembang, Srivijayan influence radiated outward toward the Isthmus of Kra, western Borneo and central Java. It also controlled several areas on the bank of the Mekong until Jayavarman II declared independence to establish the Khmer Empire.
The nature of the Sailendras is more mysterious to me. They ruled over western and central Java, considerably far from Palembang but yet, they played a huge role in Srivijayan politics. Now, the question is, did the Sailendras exist independently of Srivijaya? Was Sailendra part of Srivijaya or merely a faithful and reliable ally? Was the Sailendra a kingdom or a noble family typical of a feudal society?
The background of several maharajas of Srivijaya further does not make the situation any clearer. The 8th century maharaja Dharmasetu was not a member of the Sailendras but he was mentioned as the head of Sailendra. Succeeding Dharmasetu as the maharaja was his son-in-law, a Sailendra. Samarantungga, another maharaja in Palembang, was a member of the Sailendras whom married Dharmasetu’s daughter, Dewi Tara.
The son-in-law which became the maharaja, known as Vishnu, was the one that started the construction of the Borobudur. Here is yet another question: Srivijaya was known for its Buddhism while the Sailendras were Hindus. Why a Sailendran would build not only a Buddhist monument, but the largest Buddhist monument in the whole wide world at its time?
More question: what happened before Dharmasetu? What was the nature of Srivijaya-Sailendra relationship before Dharmasetu and during Dharmasetu’s reign? Why did the Sailendra hold a special place within Srivijaya?
By the time of Vishnu, the one thing that I know is that the Sailendras married into the existing Srivijayan royal blood and from there on, they took over the helm of Srivijaya. After Vishnu, the Srivijayan throne went to Samarantungga, yet another Sailendran. His son Balaputra also became the maharaja of Srivijaya.
Balaputra began as a weak head of the Sailendra. During this time, the Sailendras saw their influence being challenged by the Sanjayas. Now, the relationship between the Sailendras and the Sanjayas is another issue lost in history. That notwithstanding, The Sailendras were forced to leave Java by the Sanjayas during a power struggle in the 9th century. The Sailendra retreated and settle in Palembang, the home city of Balaputra’s mother, Dewi Tara. After the overthrow of the Sailendras by the Sanjayas in Java, Balaputra became the maharaja of Srivijaya.
After Balaputra, somehow, the Sailendras ceased to come up in my reading despite the fact the Srivijaya lasted for at least another 400 years. This could be explained by the expulsion of the Sailendras from Java by the Sanjayas but this that would treat the Sailendras as a kingdom, and not a family, which is another cause for confusion.
But in any case, the Sanjayas continued to build the Mataram kingdom. They ruled of western and central Java until Srivijaya eliminated them in the 11th century. As a side note, the fall of Mataram led to the formation of a Javanese royalty by the name of Airlangga to build the kingdom of Kahuripan. This kingdom is the precursor to the kingdom of Singhasari which later led to the Majapahit kingdom. The Srivijayan empire came to an end when Majapahit occupied Palembang and Jambi in the 13th century.
It is worth noting that the rivalry between the Sailendras and the Sanjayas may well be the beginning of the famed Malay-Javanese rivalry.
To make matter more confusing, the Sanjayas were actually part of the Sailendra dynasty.
While the home of the Sailendra was central Java, they were not of Javanese origin. So for from my reading, they might have come from Sumatra, Funan or India. The strongest possibly in my opinion on the moment is that they came from Sumatra. The reason is that Old Malay instead of Sanskrit were extensively used in matter related to the Sailendras. But I suppose, nobody knows for sure.
It was one morning during one of those ugly winters in Ann Arbor when I found myself sitting close to the front row of an economics class. The professor sounded odd but then again, I am sure I sounded odd to my friends here.
Regardless, with me still half awake, I heard the professor say something about the amount of trade between Vancouver and Seattle corresponding to the distance between the Earth and the moon. Was the professor nuts or maybe I was dreaming?
That statement was so out of this world that it halted my descent to slumberland. It turned out that the professor was discussing the relationship between trade and currency. Yawning widely, I straightened my back to have another shot at staying awake.
On the screen up front, there was a table listing trade volume between various US cities and with cities in other countries. There was a typical regression model projected on the screen too. I do not particularly remember the exact equation but the conclusion was clear: monetary union encourages trade.
Trade volume between New York and Seattle was much higher than that between Seattle and Vancouver. This was despite the fact that New York is located on the East Coast while Vancouver is situated on the West Coast just a few hundred miles up north where the people speak rather strangely. New York and Seattle, of course ,use the US dollar while Vancouver uses something else entirely.
The whole class then mentally swam across the Atlantic to trace the evolution of the Euro. The conclusion was reinforced: trade substantially increased after the Eurozone countries adopted a single currency.
The virtue of a single currency was hammered home further by another graph indicating how fluctuation of exchange rates between countries within the Eurozone virtually disappeared: uncertainty eliminated. The professor with his New Zealand accent announced that the Europeans got tired of the exchange rate fluctuation so they decided to get rid of it altogether.
I was stranded somewhere in Minneapolis when the Euro was officially introduced to the public on Jan 1, 2002. Reactions to the introduction ranged from celebratory to bitterness at the loss of local currencies. Anecdotes by individuals having trouble adjusting to the new reality were amusing but I was merely a curious observer across the Atlantic.
Close to three years later, I found myself in a class undergoing official economic training in Ann Arbor. That particular class made me an Aseanist: I became a monetary unionist. I want to see Asean repeating the same experiment the Eurozone is undergoing, hoping this will bring on yet another halcyon period of prosperity for Southeast Asia.
The years leading to the late 1990s were great but those days are gone. Sure, we have learned one or two things from the Asian financial crisis but nothing beats the feeling of being on top of the world. When Deng Xiaoping visited Southeast Asia back in those days, he was expecting to see backwaters cities but boy, he had the shock of his life. Not only were the cities modern then, they out-rivalled those of China’s. Nowadays, the feeling is almost reversed.
The rise of Southeast Asia is a story of trade and it goes all the way back to the era of Srivijaya in the first millennium. The prosperity of this region has always been linked with trade. The prosperity of this country as a small open economy has always been linked to trade.
Asean already has a regional free trade agreement in place and progress so far has been encouraging, especially when compared to the disappointing Doha Round. We could probably see the full effect of the FTA by 2015 when all tariffs imposed on almost all Asean-based goods must be lowered to 0%. That should fuel inter-Asean trade but as demonstrated by the experience of the Eurozone, trade could be enhanced further with the introduction of a monetary union.
p/s — the article was first published by The Malaysian Insider.