Categories
Photography Travels

[2652] Borobudur, checked!

I have finally made it to Borobudur last December. At last, it was something concrete to back up all that I have learned about the Sailendras and Srivijaya. There it was, a concrete proof in the form of one of the largest Buddhist structures in the world, standing right in front of me. I do not have to imagine the words that I have read anymore. There is now a mental image in my head, full of details no word can ever describe fully.

Angkor Wat, checked. Borobudur, checked. Next, I think I want to see Pagan in Myanmar. We will see how that goes. Myanmar will definitely be more challenging that both Cambodia and Indonesia. Also, more adventurous.

What made me excited about actually being there was that I knew the history behind both Angkor Wat and Borobudur. I know exactly how both are linked. The Sailendras built Borobudur. Jayavarman who lived among the Sailendras, was sent to Cambodia to govern it. Once there, he rebelled against the Sailendras and founded the Khmer empire, the builder of Angkor Wat and other magnificent Angkor structures littered throughout Cambodia and beyond in Indochina.

Understanding the link made me all the more appreciative of history. I know that these are not mere stones. They are proofs of our history. Some might want to deny it but there they are, shouting, we are here.

I could not help myself comparing Borobudur to the mountain temples in Siem Reap. Somehow, Borobudur has not been conserved as well as the Angkor temples. this appears to be true for Prambanan temples as well, which are located about 50km to the east. Maybe it is just me.

Nevertheless, Borobudur was abandoned for hundreds of years before Stamford Raffles re-discovered it in the 19th century. Borobudur was buried under volcanic ashes. For Angkor Wat and others, many of them were working temples even as the Khmer empire was long gone.

Furthermore, conservation works on Borobudur were carried out pretty late compared to Angkor Wat. My guide told me even in the 1990s, villagers living on and around the temples. Suharto evicted them later.

This was especially true for Prambanan. Worse, residents took some of the stone blocks from Prambanan for their own purposes, whatever that might be. Sacrilege. In Yogyakarta, there is a ruin called the Water Castle, or Taman Sari. And there are houses around the ruins.  I imagine it was worse for Prambanan some time ago.

Anyway, here is a typical relief of Borobudur. My guide at Borobudur was not as good as the one in Siem Reap. So, I did not get to learn the story behind many of the reliefs. But one has to notice those featureless cubes. The Dutch (or was it UNESCO?) placed them there because the originals are lost.

Some rights reserved. Creative Commons 3.0. Hafiz Noor Shams

In fact, many features at the lower levels are unseen as they are behind modern stone blocks placed to stabilize the whole structure. I suppose, that is the sacrifice of saving Borobudur. I hope, one day, those conservationists will develop a technology to stabilize Borobodur and remove those modern stones so that visitors can see Borobudur for what it truly is.

Here is what I mean.

Some rights reserved. Creative Commons 3.0. Hafiz Noor Shams

See the stone floor? That is not part of the original structure.

Categories
ASEAN Economics Liberty

[2651] Something is missing from the Asean integration

I have set a goal for myself. I want to travel more throughout Southeast Asia to learn about the region that I call home. So far, I have been to five Southeast Asian countries, including Malaysia.  I have travelled across Cambodia and Indonesia for roughly a month in total last year alone. Part of the reason why I do want to see more of Southeast Asia is because I believe in the importance of closer integration across the region. I want to know more about it before the actual integration begins.

At heart, I am an internationalist in the sense that I believe in free trade across countries. True global free trade is hard if not impossible to achieve, however. There are just too many competing interests for a true global agreement to come to being. The Doha Round, which aimed at reducing trade barriers across the world, has been going on for years now without much progress to show. Even if by some miracle there will be a global accord, the result will be a bastardized version of free trade, with a horn in the forehead.

With the global ideal stuck, many are left to the less than ideal bilateral free trade arrangement, or a regional one. I see the Southeast Asian grouping Asean as the second-best option which is realistic to a truly global trade accord that is now a phantasm.

With more than 500 million persons living across the region, the opportunity for economic growth and more is massive that no one country in Southeast Asia can achieve alone.

The integration is already underway and 2015 is set to be the year when the Asean Economic Community (AEC) will come into being, where the whole of Asean will be a single market. Each Asean member will effectively maintain an equal free trade agreement with one another. Such closer economic integration will inevitably will closer relationship between individuals across countries. One hopes the closer integration creates more goodwill than conflict.

Things do not look too good on the ground however and so, on that front Southeast Asia is probably off to not so great a start.

The challenge is when a majority in one society thinks the others are their inferiors. In Malaysia, many look down on Indonesians as most Indonesians in Malaysia are mostly low-skilled workers. The association by profession has been generalized to include all Indonesians everywhere. Burmese refugees suffer no less. Meanwhile in the Land Below the Wind, it is not uncommon for Sabahans to hold overtly racist views against Filipino who reside in the state illegally.

It is not just Malaysia and it is not just about a sense of superiority. The Thais and Cambodians have issues between them. Between them are hundreds of years of history. Some Cambodians, as I learned during my travels in Cambodia, distrust Vietnamese.

There is no silver bullet to the problem and it will take years to overcome the ill-will of ancient and modern origins. Nevertheless, equality of rights will have a role to play in creating a more harmonious and an integrated Southeast Asia. When everybody is granted equal rights and it is actually enforced where even foreign low-skilled workers are not discriminated against by domestic laws, then perhaps we can start to respect each other regardless of national origin.

Here is where the Asean Charter and the Asean Human Rights Declaration come to play. Yet, these two documents are crafted to disappoint. They are only paper tigers.

The Asean Charter is only important to the diplomats who drafted it. Its ratification was a process of rubber stamping, driven from the top down and appears to have no effect on the life of ordinary persons so far. It is so far detached from the ground that citizens of Southeast Asian countries do not feel any kind of ownership towards the Charter the way many do towards the constitution of their own country. After all, there was no referendum and the citizens themselves were not involved in the process.

As with the Asean Human Rights Declaration, too many Southeast Asian governments violate some of the typical fundamental rights so blatantly. The latest happened in Laos where an activist, Sombath Somphone, has been missing for about a month. His abduction was recorded by a CCTV. He was arrested by the police and has yet to be heard from since.  The Laotian government is widely suspected to be involved in the abduction, especially given his strong opposition to the construction of a dam in the northern part of Laos, which is backed by the government.

Despite the Human Rights Declaration celebrated by Asean diplomats, Asean governments have not even voiced their concern of the potential violation. It is the policy of non-interference that matters and that probably shows how useful the Declaration is at securing human rights in Asean.

So, we do not have an egalitarian mechanism to help with harmonious people-to-people integration.

Well, we do have a flawed one. Instead of a proper political structure to help with the integration, we have cultural shows with the accusation of culture-stealing to follow.

How sad.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved
First published in the Selangor Times on January 18 2013.

Categories
Politics & government Society

[2650] January 12 is just another rally and part of the new normal

A lot have been said about the opposition rally in Stadium Merdeka in Kuala Lumpur on January 12. Pro-Barisan Nasional individuals and groups are either downplaying it or claiming that it is a flop. That harks back to the pre-2008 era of denial that ultimately proved disastrous for Barisan Nasional. They can close their eyes at their own expense. On the other hands, many pro-Pakatan Rakyat are overemphasizing the importance of the rally.

The rally was big and pro-BN groups can say whatever they like. Overwhelming sources of independent origins will lead to the conclusion that the rally was big. The thousands who took similar photos cannot lie at the same time. These are the days of social media but BN-controlled and friendly media are still operating as if the masses do not have access to the internet.

Some spins work because its truth cannot be ascertained. Others do not because it can be decisively disproved. BN operatives tend to find themselves in the latter group.

I find these individuals and groups have zero credibility, much like Utusan Malaysia and TV3, which has been sued too many times and lost too many times. The proceeding of the cases is enough to damn Utusan, never mind the eventual judgment. How does one react to things like ”I don’t have enough time to proofread or fact checking”? I can only conclude that they maintain low standard of journalism or even decency.

On the other end of the spectrum in the camp of Pakatan Rakyat is one of self-aggrandizing. According to them, the rally is historic, a watershed, the opening of a new Malaysia, the retelling of Malaysian history (by virtue of having the rally in Stadium Merdeka where the independence of Malaya was first celebrated) and among many other outrageous claims, the rise of the people.

The rise of the people… maybe these people just watched Les Misérables and got carried away by it. I know, rally such as this can lift up the spirit. I remember during the 2012 Bersih sit-in, I sang “Do You Hear the People Sing?” to myself as I packed up my stuff to go into the city. It was exciting and I am sure the attendees of the January 12 rally felt the same as I did. Yet, the living in the moment and looking stuff from a macro perspective are two different matters.

Beyond songs, the word people is problematic since it is very likely that the electorate is split right in the middle. If the people describes only half of the whole, what does that make of the other half? I have been critical of this kind of rhetoric only in the past, it was BN that liked to use it. They still do it. These days, PR is committing it as well.

The main point of all this is that I think Malaysia has one too many rallies already. This is not saying that we should prevent rally from taking place. No. I personally am suffering from protest-fatigue because large opposition protest is the new normal these days.

The adjective historic should be used when something new and big happened, like when Bersih made its impacts initially. But big rallies are not new. What differ from rally to rally are only insignificant aspects.

And this is the not the first time a peaceful assembly has been held within a stadium. The stadium in Kelana Jaya had one although that was smaller than the one of January 12.

Like I said, the new normal. There is finally a compromise between the two camps, despite the heaty exchange. And that is not new anymore.

As for the retelling of history and the subversion of narrative that UMNO had dominated in the past, again, the January 12 crowd neither started it nor enhanced it. All Anwar Ibrahim did was that he shouted “Merdeka” at Stadium Merdeka. Mere symbolism and too many attach too much meaning into such mere gesture. And Anwar Ibrahim is a man of grand gimmicks. Have we not gone wiser over the years?

It is only everyday politics. The wider repercussion, well, here we are, in a new normal. The new normal maybe historic, but the rally itself is not. It is a speck of a wider trend. To describe the January 12 rally as historic is to debase the very meaning of the word historic. It is an exaggeration.

What was historic was the beginning of the new normal. We are already well into the new normal. The next historic moment may be the next general election, depending on the results.

Categories
Economics Society

[2649] Malaysian demographics in 2040

Last week, the Department of Statistics released its projection of Malaysian population in 2040.[1] The Department projects that there will be 39 million persons living in Malaysia by 2040, of which 93% of them will be Malaysians. In 2010, there were 29 million persons living in the country with 92% of them being Malaysians. The median age is projected to be about 10 years older than what it is right now. In 2010, the median was 26 years old.

The projection has two population booms in it (possibly three; whether the third is part of the second or distinct by itself is up for debate). The first is the current generation either in universities or has just entered the labor market. The next boom is expected to happen between the next five and ten years or so as the earlier boomers start their own families and do what rabbits do (chart from the Department of Statistics):

Some rights reserved. Creative Commons 3.0. Hafiz Noor Shams

If the assumptions of the projection are taken to heart, Malaysia’s economic growth from now till 2040 might set to be strong if nothing disastrous like wars or institutional degradation happens. Growth may begin to slow down 20 years later in 2060 when the first Malaysian baby boomers enter retirement. The real demographic trouble may start in 2080 when the second boomers enter retirement.

The projection states that the Malaysian society will become an aging society by 2021 but this is merely definitional problem as the projected median age in 2021 is around 30 years old. That age is still well inside the productive age, and probably close to the optimal age/experience to productivity, wherever that point is.

It is possible that the second boomers may bring about a third boomers (there is a third local peak for 5-9 cohorts in 2040) but the fertility rate is projected to be pretty low by the time the second boomers reach their 20s, which is expected to happen in 2040s. Fertility rate in 2040 Malaysia is expected to match that of an advanced country.

The Malays and the other Bumiputras are expected to experience an annual population growth rate of less than one. The Chinese and Indians lose interest in making babies and only the mysterious “Others” will have an amazing rabbit-like rate of 2%.

So, it appears, 40 million to 50 million (or 60 million but anything above 60 million sounds like a very unlikely scenario) people may be the maximum number for Malaysia in this century.

The projection however may be conservative. The growth rate of non-citizens is low and given how ASEAN is set to integrate even further and on top of that, more globalization, one would expect more non-citizens.

But anyway, based on the population projection by the Department of Statistics, the population dividend Malaysia is enjoying is set to last for a very long time. It will probably outlast my generation, which is part of the first boom.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved
[1] — [Population Projection, Malaysia 2010-2040. Department of Statistics. January 18 2013]

Categories
Society

[2648] The future importance of the Malay language

I have two related conversations to share. The first happened in a cab in Sydney and the other happened over lunch in Jakarta. Combined, the conversations are possibly a testament of the future importance of the Malay language.

The first conservation was not really a conversation. The cab driver, who was probably in his 40s or 50s, was overly chatty. He drove both the car and the conversation alone. “I came from Hong Kong,” he said without being asked.

“Oh, did you?” I answered with feigned surprise. I was tired and I wanted to go wherever I needed to go quickly and painlessly. So I took the cab. He did not take the hint, however, and so he went on talking.

So I learned that he immigrated to Australia some time when the United Kingdom returned Hong Kong to the People’s Republic of China in 1997. He left because he did not trust the communists and he did not want to risk his livelihood under communism.

Since he was already at it and I was trapped in his cab, I decided to somewhat participate in the conversation. I was especially encouraged to do so when he demonstrated that he was an anti-communist. At least, I thought, there would not be any ideological battle here.

But I wanted more nuance. So I suggested to him that China might be communist in name only these days as the Chinese government had embraced capitalism with a surprising fervor. He would have none of that. “The communists are not good.”

“I’m an Australian now,” he said to end that part of the conversation. To him, communism is communism and it is all the same.

The fact that he is a first-generation immigrant was easy enough to spot. He did not sound like a completely naturalized Australian. He shouted his English with a strong, harsh south Chinese accent. He failed to use the word ‘mate’ whenever it is proper to do so. He also did not end his sentences with question marks, like a stereotypical Australian would do.

Between the accent and the shouting, I had to frown to catch his words. I know it does not make sense but somehow frowning helps with my hearing.

Another thing that I made out of the conversation was that he understood the importance of Mandarin in this era. Who does not, really? With about one billion native speakers in China alone and the country becoming more and more open than the China that the cab driver once knew, there is really no room for a dispute.

However, he confidently said there are only two languages that mattered in this world: English and Mandarin. The word only stirred me.

“Only two?” I asked skeptically. In my head, I could name several more languages of global importance.

“Two only,” he replied with an almost angry tone. I could not be sure if he was really angry because he sounded angry throughout the conversation anyway.

The really interesting part of the conversation came after he gleefully expounded on the importance of Mandarin, almost exhibiting a hint of cultural superiority. Or maybe he was not. Something might have been lost in translation.

“What language do you speak?” he asked.

“I speak Malay,” I answered.

With the same confidence, he dismissed the Malay language as useless. “What would you do with that language of yours?”

I smiled, looked outside and tuned out. “Are we there yet?”

More than 5,000 kilometers to the northwest, in Jakarta two years later, a friend was treating me to lunch. The friend is an Indonesian of Chinese descent who is currently residing in Sydney. He was on Christmas holiday and I was travelling with Jakarta being my first stop.

“I’ve been in school for too long. I want to take a gap year. I want to see the world,” he told me after we argued whether Malaysia or Indonesia is the real owner of nasi goreng and batik, among many other things.

He is training to be a surgeon and he has been in university for too long. That means English has been his primary language for some years now. He has little opportunity to practice the other two languages that he speaks, which are Indonesian and Mandarin.

He plans to spend his gap year by staying in Beijing for six months to practice his Mandarin and another six months somewhere in Indonesia to practice his Indonesian, which is not very different from the standard Malay language. To most speakers of standard Malay, understanding Kelantanese is likely harder than understanding Indonesian.

He wants to practice Indonesian because he knows that the Indonesian economy is growing rapidly and the population is large; the country is the fourth most populous country in the world. A population of more than 200 million, add another 30 million from Malaysia and several more million from elsewhere, the importance of Indonesian and Malay will be as undeniable as Mandarin, contrary to the opinion of the Australian cab driver. The friend does not want to be in a disadvantageous position when the language finally becomes a major world language in the future. The friend is in his 20s and he has a more urban, modern and global worldview than the cab driver. He has some ideas of how the future will look like and he is preparing for it.

In contrast, the cab driver is living in the present and stuck with old ideas. All he sees are the vehicles on the road and nothing beyond that. The only fortunate thing for the cab driver is that, the development outside of Sydney or even Australia probably does not matter so much to him. So, he can afford to keep his opinion.

Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved Mohd Hafiz Noor Shams. Some rights reserved

First published in the The Malaysian Insider on January 16 2013.