Category: Life

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On Literature and Being Human

A few months ago, in a short essay on reading that I had written in reflection of the recent turns in my evolution as a reader, I wrote briefly on how, starting off as someone who was focused mostly on reading histories, biographies and other pieces on nonfiction, I have slowly gotten around to adding more literary and fictional works into my reading diet.

In recent weeks, I have come to the belief that my reading experience and pleasure would be best served by focusing even more on literature, and to reduce even further the mix of nonfiction works in my reading queue.

Let me explain.

Like many, I spent most of my youth believing that “nonfiction” means what it says on the cover: that by reading works of history and biography and science, one would get a better appreciation for the reality of the world that surrounds us. What better way to prepare oneself for the world, than to gain deeper knowledge and appreciation of how that world works: its grand design, the outsized historical figures that direct the currents of politics and nations, the workings of human societies and the vast natural endowments that surround and support those human civilisations, the animals and the trees, and the physics of pebbles as well as planets.

By contrast, the very term “fiction” conveys a certain sense of fakery – why should I spend my time being immersed in the doings and goings of made-up characters in some random person’s imagination? And “literature” added another sheen of (what I then perceived as) stuffiness and pomposity around works of fiction; as if there was a certain class of nonfiction that ought to be elevated above others, by the simple device of approbation from peer writers and the reading public. “Apa yang bagus sangat?” as one would say.

As I mentioned, it was only after marrying a committed lover of literature, that my attitude towards this dichotomy was finally broken. And in more recent weeks, I find myself feeling even more committed to the value and pleasure of reading good literature.

One could ask: what do you think of as “good literature”?

The answer to this, I think, rests in what I believe to be the essential nature of the contribution of literature to the human spirit: by dramatising human dilemmas and struggles and travails in fictional terms (which are often just thinly-veiled depictions of real events), the best authors are able to capture in words and on paper, however fleetingly, essential and timeless truths about human nature and the struggle of existence.

As I mentioned to a good friend recently over coffee, in nowhere else but in literature, I believe, can one human being truly immerse themselves in someone else’s mind and consciousness, to walk in someone else’s shoes. I am thinking here of Victor Hugo’s depiction of Jean Valjean’s internal struggle on whether to give himself up in place of someone else who was mistakenly arrested by the authorities. I am thinking of James Agee’s masterful narration of the inner monologue of Ralph Follet, the alcoholic brother struggling against his addiction and self-loathing. I am reminded here of Tolstoy’s Pierre Bezukhov, and his long journey towards finding himself amidst the hedonism and travails of early 19th century Moscow. Moments in Proust and Austen and Eliot when a smattering of letters and punctuation marks and lines can come together to paint a picture of utter realism in the lives of people who are recognisably human in their frailties and concerns and inner doubts.

This is why I read literature. For pleasure, yes, and to while away the time, certainly. But more than anything, it is through literature, I believe, that we can best get past the superficialities of our mundane existence, to attempt to touch the very core of what makes us truly human.

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On Political Ambition

When I was in university, I got involved in student politics, and got bitten by the politics bug. Perhaps it was natural – at a place like Cambridge, you suddenly find yourself a small fish in a big, big pond, filled with many other fishes, big and small, many of whom have grand ambitions for themselves. I remember, in my earliest days at university, visiting the room of one of my fellow Malaysian students, and noticing a copy of Margaret Thatcher’s memoirs on his bookshelf.

It is a small and flitting memory, but distinct for several reasons.

The first is that after many years of being in high school where I got ribbed often for reading too much, I had found myself in a new social environment, one in which it was almost taken for granted that everyone reads. More than that, it was an environment in which ambitious and competitive young students would often compete to see who has read what. It took a while to get used to this.

The other reason why this was so memorable was that I had finally found myself in a place where mostly everyone would have some opinion on politics, and many others would (often not-so-secretly) harbour ambitions of politics. I remember hearing, in hushed tones, of recently-graduated seniors having been recruited to become a special officer to so-and-so. I had contemporaries who were themselves scions of political dynasties, or hungry to make their own.

Of course, little did I know that coming up to university in the summer of 1997 was soon to thrust me into a world I had scarcely imagined, when the comfortable assumptions of what I thought I knew about Malaysian politics would be exploded by the arrest of Anwar Ibrahim and the rise of Reformasi.

I am old enough now to see friends in university now taking on important jobs in Cabinet, and many others over the years in the halls of government, as speechwriters, as special officers, as political operatives, as aspiring front-line politicians themselves. And of course there are many others who started out with that fire in their eyes – but later on, choosing different paths in life: corporate law, or working in MNCs, or taking up big jobs in GLCs, or investing in private equity.

What I can say, after having lived this long on this earth, and observing others and myself as we wrestle with our own individual hopes and ambitions, is that there is no one right way to live life. The years will come and go, and the fires of youthful ambition, as important as they are, are only as important as you would like them to be.

Know why you are carrying this ambition within you, and if and when you let go, know for whom and why that decision is made. For those who are still in the arena, I congratulate you and I wish you all the very best. In the end, we have nothing and no one to answer to but our own selves, and our Creator who will be waiting for us at the end of this long journey through existence.

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On UMNO’s (and Malaysia’s) Survival

In a few weeks’ time, we will likely see the dissolution of the legislative assemblies for the six states of Terengganu, Kelantan, Kedah, Pulau Pinang, Selangor, and Negeri Sembilan. What was once a strategic measure on the part of the competing political parties to conserve their forces for the 15th General Elections in November 2022, has become a major headache especially for the ruling Unity Government. The nascent coalition of necessity under PM Anwar Ibrahim is still embroiled in internal frictions, especially between DAP and UMNO, while also having to contend with an aggressive and bullish Perikatan Nasional.

There are many moving parts, of course, to these upcoming state elections, but from most people I talk to, one of the greatest preoccupations of observers for this coming elections is: how bad will UMNO get whacked? The 15th General Elections was a chastening experience for the Grand Old Party: not only did UMNO and its Barisan Nasional partners fare poorly in the urban seats all across the country, which have increasingly become strongholds for the likes of DAP and PKR, but PAS and Bersatu have routed UMNO in its rural heartlands. UMNO was a distinct third choice for Malays across the peninsula.

Amazingly, not only did the party leadership escape unscathed from accountability over this atrocious performance, it achieved a major coup, becoming an integral part of the governing coalition under Anwar Ibrahim, and succeeding in purging or silencing many of its critics.

The problem for UMNO, of course, is that nothing has changed since then. Its performance in government is nothing to shout home about, and there has been precious little red meat that its representatives in Government have been able to bring back to its remaining supporters. Even being told to vote for DAP candidates has become a touchy and controversial subject in the party.

Quo vadis, UMNO?

My own take is that many of its remaining state seats will go the way of how it was in the 15th general elections: in the direction of PAS and Bersatu. The Malay rejection for UMNO will likely be encompassing and total. Will non-Malay votes from local DAP and PKR supporters help to shore up UMNO’s position? Perhaps. But I suspect that once the dust has settled, the ongoing momentum of Malays walking away from UMNO will become even more pronounced and undeniable. UMNO might survive this coming PRN, perhaps with DAP and PKR votes in its corner, but it might win the battle only to lose the war for its long-term relevance and survival.

UMNO, of course, has shown great resilience in the past. It would be foolish to fully count out UMNO. But under the current leadership, the party appears adrift, unclear of its purpose and existence, and unable to forge a new narrative for itself in a new political environment.

The ideal post-PRN outcome for UMNO, existentially-speaking, is that another seismic defeat will force its leadership to finally demonstrate accountability. After the fiasco of the recent party elections, there is only a small window of opportunity for UMNO to rediscover its mojo, and for it to articulate a clear vision for the future of the party to its members and supporters.

It is not enough to claim that the party needs to play third fiddle for the sake of “unity”. Everyone knows that there is a ticking clock to this coalition – will UMNO honestly accept being subordinate to PKR and DAP over the long term? Will the Sarawakians tolerate being in permanent coalition with DAP, its only real competition in its own backyard? How will the Sabahan political winds blow come the next general elections?

More importantly, I believe that the long term stability of Malaysia rests on it being governed by a government that approximates the formula that was forged by Tun Razak under the Barisan Nasional: Malay-led, centrist, competent, trusted, inclusive, pragmatic. The nation cannot long survive a tussle in which maximalist politics are pursued to the detriment of peace and public order. What role UMNO will play in that future, or if it will even survive these next few years, will be a pivotal question in determining whether Malaysia as a nation makes it safely through these next few years of political uncertainty.

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On Knowing

The day you finally grow up
is the day when you finally realise
that after all you have learnt
and all that you know

You actually know very little
about the universe
about the stars that hang in the night sky
about the planets that swirl in the darkness of space
about the human heart and its flits and sighs

We blind ourselves
with laws and theories 
and books and pages
until most of us forget
that what passes for our knowledge
is just a mere drop in His ocean
a humble letter in the book of Existence

So talk a little slower
walk a little lower 
as you sail along
through life's angry ocean
because you and I
we are finally grown up enough
to know that we know too little.
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On Hard Choices for Malaysia

There is a palpable sense of frustration and crisis in Malaysia today. After the democratic revolution of 2018, having turned out the Barisan Nasional coalition that had ruled the nation for more than six decades, Malaysians can only look back at the past four years with a sense of loss at the missed opportunities. 

After witnessing the Pakatan Harapan coalition win power at the Federal level back then, many had begun to dream that Malaysia was finally ready to move forward beyond the shibboleths of the past. It was an error similar to that committed by many Americans who had believed that Obama’s victory in 2008 was heralding a new post-racial future for the US. And like the US, today Malaysia is arguably even more racially polarised than before. 

There is a cancer at the heart of the Malaysian body politic, and this is the malignancy borne out of the fateful compromise we made at the inception of this nation. For the Malays, they were promised a truly independent nation at last, and provisions in the Constitution were made to reserve a number of rights for the Malays: scholarships, civil service jobs, land ownership. For the non-Malays, an immediate and irrevocable pathway to become citizens in the land that they had made into their home, and the right to have their children educated in their own mother tongues. 

This fudge, this two separate but entangled strands of rights guaranteed for citizens of Malaysia – lives lived apart but united as one nation, different but yoked together by history – this has become the foundation for our lived history as a country, but also the dark heart of our troubled nation. The ways in which our political lines are drawn are an expression of the blurred compromise that is the foundational puzzle at the heart of our constitution. 

It is my humble belief that this nation will find no true or real peace, until we come to grips with that foundational puzzle: is this a Malay nation, or a Malaysian country? 

And from that core question, the subsequent and subsidiary questions roar in strong and hard: What does it mean to be Malaysian? What does it mean to be Malay? Who is the pendatang? What does it mean when we declare that Islam is the official religion of the Federation? Is it Bahasa Malaysia, or Bahasa Melayu? Why shouldn’t we have a united national education system? Why shouldn’t our children be taught in the national language, and no other? 

One explanation for the chaos around Malaysian politics today, is that for many Malays, the political contract forged by the Barisan Nasional has been broken. The genius of the Barisan Nasional was to build a truly multi-racial coalition, but forged out of parties representing the various races, with the Malay party, UMNO, in the primary leadership position. It asserted the political dominance of Malays, but in a configuration in which the Malay leadership was broad-minded and not parochial, and able to restrain the more unruly and extreme strands of Malay nationalism, in favour of a more inclusive formula for nationhood.  It was a compromise, but it worked for its time and in response to the trauma of 1969. It brought in peace and prosperity – but it was an uneasy truce. 

In some ways, that uneasy truce was never truly stable. Every public argument, every racial incident, every uproar and every conflict that has occurred in the public life of Malaysia since the 1970s can be traced back to the way in which the foundational puzzle was kept in place, almost in stasis, and how the can was kicked further up the road every time. 

But we are coming ever closer, I feel, now, to a point of decision. The old Barisan Nasional consensus is broken. A new coalition is in charge today, but an uncertain and roiling one. 

The collapse of UMNO is the seminal political event of my lifetime. The Grand Old Party has been riven by crisis, tarred by corruption, and now reduced to a rump of its former self, its leadership ranks now staffed by sycophants and chancers. PKR, Bersatu and PAS have all feasted on seats lost by UMNO: all three imagine themselves to be the possible new axis around which Malaysian politics could revolve around in a post-UMNO world. 

The centre could not hold – could a new centre be forged out of the ashes? Or will we be torn apart by the ever-present centrifugal forces that has forever attended our multi-ethnic polity? 

And herein lies the existential challenge for Malaysia: each of the three parties I mentioned, and perhaps UMNO included, will have a different offering, for what they think Malaysia’s social contract ought to be.

One of them (maybe more than one!) will tell us that the social contract of 1957, reaffirmed in 1963, is what has taken us this far, and that we should stay faithful to a working formula. Another (actually, certainly more than one!) will tell us that a new Malaysia requires a new formula that revolves around a common and equal citizenship: a “Malaysian Malaysia”, if you will. Yet another (you know which one) will tell us that only Islam can save us: that sacral as well as national salvation rests on God’s path.

My contention is that that axial leadership of Malaysian politics will fall to that entity that would have the courage to articulate a new social contract for Malaysia: forged for a new generation of Malaysians who have known no other home but Malaysia, and having the courage and conviction to finally break through the fudged compromise of our nation’s foundational puzzle, and articulate that new social contract, with confidence and conviction and grace. 

We have always come close, but never quite articulating what it means to live in the way that we live: a multi-racial, multi-religious nation, brought together by geography and colonial legacy. There is no utopian solution here: at least none that can be forged without bloodshed. So negotiate we must, if we are to continue living in peace, but this time around, with true and real peace: a calm and serenity borne out of a polity that has truly come to terms with the messiness of its past and present, and having the courage and maturity to forge a peaceful and shared future.

There is no alternative: we can either forge that peace, however uncertain, or risk national disintegration and oblivion.

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On Growing Old

One of the best things about growing old
is that I am no longer worried
about what my friends would say
about my hair
or my clothes
or what car I drive
or where I live

I can damn well do whatever I want:
cut my hair short
wear batik to work
drive my beat-up Japanese car
live in my small cozy home
with my wife and my cat

sleep in all weekend
read Marx
watch the sun go down from our balcony
watch stand-up comedy all night on Netflix

They say growing old is frightening
and painful
I say hogwash

Be yourself
Be original
Be old.