happy merdeka!!

i read someone's status on facebook something about being too old to celebrate merdeka and that celebrations worth celebrated are raya and birthdays.

huh.

my first reaction was, shock, then pity. shocked that a person can be so shallow in her thinking and i pity her for not knowing the real meaning of 'merdeka'.

i believe that you people must have your own definition of 'merdeka' based on, well.. living experience and stories of grandmothers and grandfathers. listening to my grandma's horrifying epics during the Occupation Time, a story most memorable to me is when she was at a Japanese's gun point after being sold out by so-called best chinese friend. the main reason why she hates the chinese til today.

i wouldnt say i hate chinese because that would label me a racist. i think that because of the hardships faced during wars, people tend to do anything just to save their own skins regardless of their principles and moral values. we never know what we will turn to be unless we are being put in the same situation. we could have done the same thing all over again.

'merdeka' has many contexts, depending on how you look at it. yes, we are 'merdeka' from the colonisers, but are we really free from thinking like them? looking at the current politics in malaysia, the government is really making a good job of trying to oppress the people. we should be free to think and express of what we feel with the government as a leader to guide us along the way. if we cannot express our opinions on what we expect from them, how can they expect to give us a better life without knowing what we want?

the government must listen to us and we should be heard. only then, we can move forward as one. 1malaysia? huh, we'll see how far they can go. shutting up the people and making decisions best suited to them make them no better than what the colonizers did to us in the past.

referring to the claim above, that someone does not celebrate 'merdeka'. now, come to think of it, i'm almost amused by her honest declaration. she must have think that she sounds intelligent for coming up with a statement like that. judging from her profile, i think she was once a hijab-less girl and hang out with hoo-haa crowds. added to the bonus, she went to all-girls school so you can imagine what it's like. now, she goes to an international islamic uni which of course it is compulsory to don hijabs. she not only wear hijabs but she totally changed her entire attire and look like an arab woman, long abayas, colorful shawls and black-circled eyes.

yes, it is a good transition from ignorance to consciousness of right/wrong. she didn't see it that way as freedom from the black hole, perhaps the main reason she changed is because she prefer to be an arab rather than a malay. hence the not celebrating 'merdeka'. hence the celebration of eid adha and fitr. but birthday? doesn't sound quite right to me. in fact, it's downright funny and a bit stupid.

my hope for 'merdeka' is to be free from society's vicious grips and expectations, from government's unnecessary oppression and from my own side-tracked thoughts that i shouldn't be thinking at all.

overall, happy merdeka people! and enjoy what we have now because we never know what will go missing until they are gone.