Malaysian Passport 1

"A passport is a document, issued by a national government, which certifies, for the purpose of international travel, the identity and nationality of its holder."
--Wikipedia

I have got my Malaysian Passport renewed. But it was rather a pain for Malaysians to renew their passports in Australia. Simply because we have to go to the High Commission of Malaysia in Canberra to do it. Right, no other way! How outrageous is that you have to take a flight to Canberra, if you are a Malaysian in Melbourne or Sydney, or poorly those even further? No one is going to refund your travel expenses including flight, taxi and public transport.

(It is hilarious that the High Commision building is simply another Malaysia official-like building with the 'bumbung' of rumah kampung, being put in the context of Australia. Just as stubborn as how they put the Arabic-like domes all around on the buildings in Putrajaya. Apparently, architects, are useless for them since some of them don't mind to have non-context-responsive concept. Just like attitude, they are lack of having promptly effective response in different context while keeping their usual attitude as in Malaysia.)

In regards to that, i was trying to get a consular to talk about it. But i ended up very disappointed because there is no consular in Melbourne! No consular in Victoria State of Australia. It is simply pathetic that the Malaysian government always claims they are catching up the developed country but they don't even allocate a consular here giving attempt to help those oversea Malaysians.

How ridiculous is that for a place like Victoria (Australia) which is bigger than the Malaysia Peninsular not to have just a consular? And so i kept stalking them. I made phone calls. The official explained that the Malaysian government needs to save money. Well, i know they spent a lot in other aspects where the Malaysians taxation went to... Besides, i also know building-a-castle-as-a-house is costly, buying military aircraft is expensive , and of course sodomy charge and its movie-making is hardly affordable too. All these cost a lot of money yeah..

In order to test how helpful and how interactive are oversea Malaysian officials in Australia, i then tried emailing to every (i might have missed out one of two) consular in other states of Australia such as New South Wales, Queensland, Western Australia, etc. But, as expected, none of them replied me. I even received notification saying that a few of my emails to them were 'delayed' until no time. Most possibly, some email addresses are not even updated with current consular on position. Again, the government always claims to have advanced facilities but the service and attitude are never up to the front line. Just like computer, the outcome will be just crap, no matter how good is the hardware if the inferior software is not helping it.

Besides, i would like to say that such new policy having the must to renew passport in Canberra tells the very consequences of Malaysian government always causes: enlarging the environmental footprint! Such policy is just not economically and environmentally sustainable. So many Malaysians have to take flight to Canberra, plus the taxi travel forth and back, thus significantly increase the CO2 emission caused per person. I feel so bad for it! IF, we really have to continue doing that in Canberra, at least a good suggestion here: please provide a van or mini-bus to bring the poor Malaysian crowds back and forth from the Canberra Airport. I would even rather pay for this and appreciate it.

(I took the cheapest domestic flight, but it still cost me some amount of money which is equivalent enough to have bought about 100 days of Nasi Lemak for breakfast in Malaysia. But still, who cares?)

Last but not least, Passport, is the most important thing for oversea Malaysians to prove their identity. I am not very into politics and maybe i am not one of the most patriotic, but i am not ashamed to tell people that "i am from Malaysia". Because the 'formation' of myself is largely contributed from the origin. I love many people and places in Malaysia. Not forgetting the Malaysian food! But i would really appreciate and support the government if they are really doing the right things, helping to ease the burdens on the nation but not causing more troubles.

True Politic, should not be a stake for performance and speculation of power of the politicians. True Politic, should be the understanding and promises between the nation and the ruler.

p/s:

A bunch of my friends who have had their passport renewed in Canberra some time ago also commented with consensus that the whole procedure and attitude of the passport renewal done by the official did look like: they are not so pleased to process all those for us. Or, we are not welcomed? The mood went even worse when Ahmad Ismail's claim of "Chinese squatters" burst. So, the Chinese in Malaysia are not Malaysian? So, who am i?

Responsibility and Apologia simply don't exist for those governors anymore. And why should the nation entrust them? I have a few nice Malay friends and they are all good and more rational in thinking. Is it because they are new generation? Have been exposed to more in oversea? I am not bias to anyone or any party. But i won't buy the idea to keep immature racist in government. Hey, it is so out-of-fashion! Come on, racism is no longer working.

Reference:
http://www.malaysiamysecondhome.org/malaysia-newspaper/
http://blog.limkitsiang.com/
http://www.kennysia.com/
http://mustafakanuar.wordpress.com/2008/09/01/why-more-heat-is-on-ahmad-ismail/
http://timnam.blogspot.com/2008/09/politic.html