Somewhere Down The Road...

It’s been a hectic couple of months for me (changed jobs, puasa, raya). I know I said I wanted to restart the blog, I did that and I stopped. Blurrgh.

BUT I did update my photography blog when I recently went to Dhaka, Bangladesh on a mission. Can read it here: http://syazwanrahimy.wordpress.com/2012/07/13/bangladesh-the-forgotten-country/

Didn’t really want to give an in depth view of what I saw there and how it is compared to Malaysia. I actually like the country and do not want other people’s view of the country to be skewed by my point of view. Sufficed to say, the country is not progressing as fast as the rest of the world. I fear though, that if Malaysia doesn’t buck up, we might end up on the same track.

We won’t, of course, end up exactly like Bangladesh as we have progressed quite well. But I fear more for the wealth gap between the poor and the rich.

If you want to experience Dhaka, you have to go out  on the town at night. It may be dark but it would shed some light on the situation. You can see big buildings, so colourful, so bright, and so opulent but does nothing for the many that stands and even sleeps outside its gates.

At first dismissing it as something that happens only to third world countries, to my surprise, 3-4 weeks after my return from Bangladesh I read a feature in The Star which kind of confirms my fears. Thousands are homeless and living in KL - our proud capital city which houses the rich and the famous and yes, big, colourful, bright, opulent buildings.

Forget not being able to afford a house in PJ or not being able to drink cappuccino at Starbucks, if thousands living on the streets doesn’t speak of great income disparity, what does?

My only counsel is that we should keep the powers that be in check. No matter who is the government, there’s every chance that the administration will screw up. But even though Government have executive power the people have the power to decide. Enough pressure and they’ll turn their heads.

With election around the corner, we’ll be seeing a lot of PROMISES, ACCUSATIONS, thieves bearing GIFTS and the whole lot - words, mostly words. What we need to do is understand the facts behind those words, the reality behind the deception, the tears behind the joys and so on so forth.

Figuring all these things out once every 5 years is not exactly the hardest part, but making sure the government stands by certain principles is. In the end, you will never know if you’ve chosen the right government; but for the one you’ve chosen*, try to make them choose the right actions. That is a continuous tiring process, but someone’s gotta do it.

* Yes, I know for some of us the government we wanted is not exactly the one that is chosen, but we can still do something about that. No, not overthrow. Remind.