Author: Hafiz Noor Shams

The local blogosphere is amassed with photos of the Bersih rally and I have contributed my share. But how was it like before the rally took place, before the tear gas, before the peaceful march to the Istana Negara?

I took the train to stop at Masjid Jamek as around 11:00. I came in early because I did not want to be in a train packed with people. Given massive road blocks set up by the police to discourage the rally (rumors have it that the road blocks were extend all the way down to Johor!), I had expected people to use the train and I definitely wanted to avoid a packed train. The decision was an excellent one as later, both stations at Masjid Jamek and Central Market — the two nearest stations to the Dataran Merdeka — were closed. Trains would scream pass the two stations for an hour or two.

Besides, early birds get the worms and this is proven by how I managed to get into Dataran Merdeka. I was prevented to do so earlier by the police but I will write about that later in this entry.

A stranger even asked where I was from. His tone was irritating and I asked him back the same question just to irritate him. I do not entertain rude people. Rudeness deserves rudeness in return; I am a firm believer of tit-for-tat for a one time encounter; economics teaches me that!

As I set out of the train, police presence could immediately be felt.

There were police officers all around the area. I know that the government had deployed 4,000 personnel to suppress liberty but number does not quite translate well into reality until one actually sees it for oneself. Sure, the number of police officers from various department at Masjid Jamek did not reach 4,000 but it was enough to give a feeling that something is going to happen, even to those that are clueless, or the yuppies that are concerned with shopping and nothing else.

I wanted to check out the situation at the other side of the Padang but I was denied entry into the Dataran Merdeka. So, I had to circumvent the whole area, theoretically. Why theorectically? Control of the area was lagged, just like that at our borders, and I managed to enter (maybe sneaked is a better adjective?) Dataran Merdeka with little effort. I was unsure of what would happen to me as there were police — riot police — all around me. I figured, they would have halted my advance even before I took the first step. Yet, I put a confident face and flash my DLSR and I found myself close to the Padang. I am unsure how the flashing helped but I am sure it contributed to my successful entry into the Square.

Yup. Truckload of, er, trucks?

After witnessing all this, I had a feeling we were in some kind of emergency. The Prime Minister’s earlier “saya pantang dicabar” threat further strengthened a feeling of inevitable violent clash. I was so glad that was not the case for overwhelmingly majority of the rally participants.

The dark sky somehow tried to relay the message to the contrary.

It was cloudy the whole morning and in fact, the whole day. As I have mentioned earlier, the rain might be a blessing; it made tear gas as well as heat stroke irrelevant.

The copter was ever paranoid, circling Dataran Merdeka frequently.

While I was passing through Dataran Merdeka, rain started to pour in and I had to seek refuge at the Kuala Lumpur Library. Once the rain stopped for a moment, I continued toward Central Market, one of initial four rallying points.

And guess what? More police. I think given Johor Bahru’s reputation, that city could use this treatment more than Kuala Lumpur.

At the very end of Central Market, the one farthest away from Dataran Merdeka, a unit of riot police was being deployed. Many members of the public were amused, taking photos with their cute camera phones. It rained again and I was getting hungry.

I thought of having my lunch at a socialist-friendly place, despite I myself sitting at the other end of the political spectrum, but Hishamuddin Rais was not there; the restaurant was closed.

That was not before I captured the shot above. They, the police, were everywhere! If the Malayan Emergency that ended in 1960 were still in place, Hishamuddin Rais would have no place to run!

Disappointed and refusing to eat at anywhere else, I returned to Dataran Merdaka. The riot police, locally known as the Federal Reserve Unit (FRU) had set up a tiny base in front of the Sultan Abdul Samad Building. This unit would become irrelevant because the crowd would bypass the Square altogether. Oh, before I made anybody confused, I am using the terms Dataran Merdeka and Square to refer to the same place.

MERDEKA! Ironic that while the government celebrates 50th year of Malaysia (despite the fact that Malaysia as a state is only 44 years old), its citizens, us, still struggle to assert our individual liberty. And observe how many police personnel could be seen here.

Back to the other side… If you wonder why the police stood in line, they were taking shelter from the rain under a train viaduct that runs parallel to the road.

Ambulances at ready! How thoughtful!

And back to the other side of the Square. Quite quiet, until Tian Chua and gang emerged.

Close to the barricade was where the fire brigade made their home.

The FRU during lighter moment.

And it poured just before the game began…

After departing home at around 10:00 to reach Masjid Jamek at around 11:00, only to move around from there to Central Market and later to Dataran Merdeka to witness myself the heavy police presence in the city, getting drenched in the rain while waiting for the rallying crowd, following the crowd all the way to Istana Negara, in the rain until the crowd broke up at around 17:00, and then visiting the Hang Tuah police station, simply just curious how the detained participants of the rally were doing, and reaching home at round 19:00, I am tired. I cannot feel my legs and my brain is simply refusing to churn out words. Thus, photos.

The police blocked off all entry points into Dataran Merdeka. Though I was not there when it happened, this was close to the spot where tear gas was launched. The rain might be a blessing because it rendered the tear gas useless. Rumors had it that up to 80 people were detained. TV3 says 15. Al Jazeera, 23. According to Sonia Randhawa, at least 20.

The above photo was taken around 13:00, just before the cloud decided to release everything on this fair earth.

There were 2 copters hovering around Dataran Merdaka. Both kept circling the Padang, probably updating the police force of the situation on the ground with an bird’s eye view. For your information, Dataran Merdaka was full of members of the Federal Reserve Unit, reporters but not participants of the rally. Oh, yeah, and me!

The day started ominously cloudy. It rained from early morning. The rain took a pause only to pour much heavier later. I was caught in the rain and took shelter at the Kuala Lumpur Library which sits right next to the Royal Selangor Club. At around 14:00, it started to relent and noise could be hear from across the field.

In retrospect, I have no doubt that that noise was associated with the confrontation between the crowd and the police which involved tear gas. I rushed across the Padang to find out what was going on. It turned out, the crowd had decided to skip Dataran Merdaka, which was to be the main rallying point, and head to the final destination, Istana Negara instead. That decision had probably kept the rally from becoming violent.

Given the Prime Minister “saya pantang dicabar” warning, honestly, I feared for the worst but things went smoothly and that convinced me to join the crowd instead of following them behind the police line, which was what I did earlier. I do not know how did I get the privilege but I think, if one has a DSLR, some liberty stands mightily in the face of tyranny. The police seemed to give me some kind of respect, probably mistaken me as a reporter. Or maybe, they had a larger cake to deal with. But boy, at the Istana, some said it was 20,000, some 40,000, others insisted there were 80,000 people. Whatever it was, the size of the crowd was sufficiently large, as far as the eye could see, for one to say it was uncountable!

Li Tsin overhead an old lady remarked: MILLIONS!

Amusing.

Here, the Police is seen rushing to reinforce the human wall. Quite unnecessary since the crowd was remarkably organized and disciplined.

A line formed by the organizer of the rally separated the crowd from the police line, thus preventing any untoward and unwanted incident from happening. I was amazingly impressed and confident that this would be a peaceful rally, which it was. I felt safe mingling with both the crowd and the police.

A rally participant recording a speech made by somebody.

Police. Yes, I crossed the police line with impunity countless of times. And I love my D40 even more for that. Okay, okay. I am getting over myself.

A leader of Parti Keadilan Rakyat, Khalid Ibrahim with a songkok wrapped with a yellow cloth, and in the background with the turban, Abdul Hadi Awang of PAS, were preparing to hand over the Bersih memorandum to a representative of the King.

Meanwhile:

Look at the boots! Awesome. I want one.

Yeah, it was starting to become boring. This is clear through my mediocre effort at creative photography, whatever that is supposed to mean.

They passed the memorandum to the Istana. In the photo, Anwar Ibrahim, Khalid Ibrahim (Are these guys brothers? I know, I know. That is lame.) and Lim Kit Siang.

If you notice, the photos have some kind of glow. I did not do any digital editing to cause that; it was the rain. The rainwater affected the lens; on whether for better or for worse, I am quite unsure.

More photos later. For now, I am grateful for having a bed to lie on.

Before I end, I would really love to hear what the highly intelligent-insulting Information Minister has to say. Previously, he shouted out loud that it is ridiculous to expect a large groups of people to congregate to support the rally. He should be eating his words right now. But I bet he is used to that, anyway.

p/s — a video on the tear gas episode (via):

[youtube]BzqSddWkxGs[/youtube]

Wow. The scene is quite different than the one I had gone through today.

pp/s — for photos on the clash at Masjid Jamek, Kickdefella was there.