I'm eating this when I go to Taiwan

Yes, I know. I'm thinking of eating KFC when I'm in Taiwan.

I love the Taiwanese media

How CTi reports the news:


How CCTV reports the news:


This is why children should NEVER be in the passenger seat of cars. Everytime I see Malaysians who have their children held by the passenger in the passenger seat, the only conclusion I can come to is that they don't love their children.

BERISH 3.0 Brisbane: The wet

There is no other way to describe it: Brisbane was a very wet place on 28 April 2012. I was wondering if there was going to be anyone other than the 20 people that turned up for the workshop earlier. It was not the kind of weather to be out in, and frankly I was starting to think everyone was mad having a public gathering in this weather.

Around 1.30pm people started gathering outside the shaded area outside the BCC building, sheltering from the rain. There was no organisation, just pure chaos where no one seemed to know what to do.

Eventually one of the organisers came forward and led his flock out to the open space just outside the Treasury Casino, and tried to get the crowd together.

At this point the crowd will still largely scattered around, and some stragglers still sheltering outside the Subway, even if the organiser tried to clear them away so as to not block their business.

As per usual, we had a hippie from the Socialist Alliance come along, providing the hailer while trying to peddle their natty newsletter. The numbers have shrunk through: only 2 Socialist Alliance hippies were present this time round, down from the 12 or so from last year.



The rally started off with a message from Ambiga Sreenevasan being read out to try and get the crowd in the mood.

The crowd started out at around 80 people (I was continuously counting  the numbers) initially, which led me to think the numbers would be around the same as last year.

Speeches were made to try and engage the crowd.

The speeches this time were a bit more focused, and some did try to touch on electoral reform. But for others, it was just another platform to talk about their BERSIH 2.0 experience in KL. The water cannons, the tear gas, the police brutality. Really, it wasn't so much the cause as much as the actual physical experience.


For others it was a nice (?) date out with their loved one.

Unlike last year, more members of the crowd were more forthcoming to the front, to pick up the hailer and speak of their experiences, either the perceived injustices they've faced being non, or the reasons (largely economic) why the left Malaysia and are in Brisbane.

The crowd did grow, and at its peak we had around 120 people. Tops.

The weather was really terrible. It wasn't so much pouring rain as the annoying spray that was neither strong enough to fully warrant an umbrella full time, but annoying enough that you got wet and the rain kept spraying into you eyes.

It was cold, but a different cold from last year. Last year most of the cold came from the wind blowing from the Brisbane river across the Square, and it was the dry type of cold. There wasn't as much wind this year, and temperature wise it was slightly warmer than previously, but it was still pretty cold, and the wetness didn't help when everyone become sodden before long.

For some it was really cold.

We must have been a oddball type of group to the onlookers that passed by.

Umbrella's did get in each others way when walking around.

It must have looked and sounded weird to passer-by's when they broke out into "Negaraku". I wouldn't be surprised if we had looked and sounded like a cult gathering to outsiders. 

View from the 1st floor of the library. It was pretty optimistic for one of the organisers to claim 200 people turned up. 120 people were there, tops.

The crowd kept spreading out, probably to stop knocking each other with umbrellas. As pretty much nothing was open at the square that day, and the wet weather made it hard to get around, there wasn't the on-and-off crowd as last year which kept disappearing and reappearing with hot drinks.

The reggae busker outside the Casino was still there, but was drowned out by the noise of the rain this time.


Because of the rain, this is what the view of the speakers looked like to most people in the crowd.




Maybe I'm being paranoid, but there were one or two dodgy looking people at the sidelines, just looking at the events, but not doing much. I wouldn't be surprised if they were Special Branch informants.

Malaysians never pass off a photo taking opportunity.

After about 45 minutes, after when most people were frozen solid, it was decided that a group photo would be taken. I suppose the it says a bit when the crowd this time was actually big enough to not be able to fit into a single photo frame easily.

After the gathering was over, the crowd disappeared even quicker as it appeared, no doubt due to the terrible weather.

Most of the crowd then retreated back to the shade to try and dry out:

Where the huge makeshift banner for BERSIH 3.0 was rolled out and people started writing their messages on it.

Damp and wet weather +  the smell of paint = not the best thing on earth.

Messages were written in the usual 3 languages of English, Chinese and Malay. A few had some thought put into it.

The person on the right was a self-proclaimed BERSIH 2.0 veteran, recounting stories of his exploits and "waiting for [his] friends in KL, who are marching, for their SMS when it starts to happen".

He reminded me of the communist cadres of time gone past in the Malaysian communist insurgency, with his descriptions of what he and his mates were doing, how they were prepared to fight for the cause, and waiting for "action" to happen so that they can be martyred.

The Brisbane gathering was from 1.30pm to about 2.45pm AEST (UTC +10), which was about 11.30am - 12.45pm MYT (UTC +8), before it all started.

The organisers of BERSIH 3.0 became mini-celebrities for a while:

I was approached by the camera crew if I would go on camera to record my opinion. I declined.

Final words: 

BERSIH 3.0 Brisbane this time round was far more organised than last year, and I suppose it does say something that despite the terrible weather which tends to discourage people from leaving home, the turnout this year was slightly more than last year.

The reality is, the BERSIH movement strikes enough of a chord with enough people to have them come out publicly in support, at least on the surface, electoral reforms.

But some things do not change: the number of people who are not registered voters in the crowd still beggars belief in me, and there isn't so much a coherent message as a mish-mash of voiced. Things are changing, and we (hopefully) will get there, but the journey, if it even exists, is still long.



The letter that one of the organisers wrote to The Malaysian Insider requires some contemplation:

1) There was definitely not 200 people present that day. True, numbers may not be the final metric, but a dose of reality would be prudent.

2) The writer is a self-proclaimed Christian, using the perceived moral high ground of the Christianity faith to justify his actions, but he's a bit too "angry", starting his letter with all the anger in him.

3) I will agree that a lot of time and effort was put into making BERSIH 3.0 Brisbane a reality, and credit where it is due.

4) Calling the BERSIH rally "a calling for me from God" and "know[ing] that God protects those who are righteous" isn't helping the image held by some of  the Malay nationalists and Chinese culturalists that the whole BERSIH movement is a Christian plot from the West to undermine their interests.

5) "a few white Aussies"? Not really, no. It was a very Malaysian event. There were only 2 caucasian's in the crowd, and they were only they because they were from the Socialist Alliance.  The majority of caucasians were curious onlookers and bogans wanting a slice of the action.

6) An hour surprisingly did go by very quickly that day, despite the weather

Was BERSIH 3.0 a success? From a logistics and human resource perspective a lot of effort was put in. It was handled better than last year.

But even just focusing on the BERSIH Brisbane subset, there is still a long way to go for the movement if it is truly interested in electoral reform that may or may not lead to a better Malaysia.