Ungku Aziz’s “Siapa Aku?”
Introductory remarks: With his kind permission, I am pleased to be able to share with readers my e-mail exchanges with Din Merican. I have known Din for a long time, and thanks to the wonders of the Internet, we have been exchanging views regularly. We have also written joint essays on a number of occasions. Our cyber collaborations have been extremely fruitful.
I found his insights and perspectives that much more relevant because he has been trying to affect changes to the system from within for a long time. A George Washington University MBA, he has worked in the civil service and the various Government-linked corporations. He has been with and loyal to the system. He is now a private consultant and a Senior Research Fellow with the Phnom Penh-based Cambodian Institute for Co-operation and Peace.
In short, Din has been a practitioner and a realist, making his views all that much more pertinent. I am thrilled that he has agreed to share his views for a wider audience.
Bakri Musa
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Dear Bakri:
Yes, you may post our exchanges on your website. You ought to consider doing the same with Kassim Ahmad’s piece so we can invite comments from others.
It is time for us to stimulate some critical and rational thinking among the younger set. Let them have a posture of doubt and not accept everything that is handed down to them without first verifying against their experience and common sense. They need to understand what they are doing and why. Understanding and experiencing are the keys to learning; you will not easily forget what you understand and experience.
I have been re-reading Allan Bloom’s The Closing of The American Mind. Although published in 1987 and concerned with the state of affairs at American universities in the immediate post-Vietnam era, nonetheless his ideas on liberal education and the role of the universities have relevance to our country.
I am not suggesting that we adopt his agenda but we ought to be rethinking the role of our universities in the development of our people. We cannot allow our universities to proliferate at the expense of quality; they cannot be just degree-producing factories. There is more to life than getting a degree. We must be concerned with building a civilized society where people can think and discuss issues without going to war with one another or isolating ourselves in enclaves.
Let us get back to basics. What is a good Malaysian and a good education? What should a university be and do in the 21st century? A university should not be a status symbol. Anything that encourages research and teaching suits me.
The four years at university should be a journey of self discovery, of developing one’s character, the … “space between the intellectual wasteland he has left behind and the inevitable dreary of professional training that awaits him….” There is a real world out there that a person must journey through. Without a proper compass, he or she can be lost, frustrated and agitated. Maybe this is what Ungku Aziz meant when he pondered, “Siapa Aku?” (Who am I?)
The University of Malaya of my time did nothing for me in terms of education, although it gave me a “passport” for entry into the Malaysian Civil Service and its colonial-type administration. Whatever I learnt after that was on my own effort and curiosity. In short, my journey of self discovery began only after I graduated from UM. I often wondered why this journey did not take place during my school (especially Sixth Form) and undergraduate years. Maybe the British did not want us to think for ourselves, and this sentiment was unwittingly carried through by our “Happy” first Prime Minister during my time at UM.
We were so focused on didactic teaching and passing examinations such that the self remained an unschooled identity in what was then a confused world. Over the years I carried with me a baggage of myths, prejudices and taboos, together with some limited knowledge of my field (economics) and a false of sense of superiority. I was one of the hometown heroes with plenty of parents offering their beautiful maidens in marriage.
The first rude awakening for me came on August 15, 1963 when I reported for work for Tan Sri
Ghazalie Shafie
, then Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He told me that if I had not read Machiavelli’s The Prince, Discources, and The Art of War, I had wasted my time at the University. He was looking for an educated man, someone who had read literature, history, philosophy, economics and politics.
King Ghaz sympathized with me and taught me that it was never too late to learn as life itself is an educational process. He added however, the indoctrination I received at UM was an obstacle. His advised me that I should start all over again! I must thank him for this shokku. I have never stopped learning ever since.
When I was at George Washington University in 1968 for my graduate studies, I began to experience real university life amidst the turmoil of the Vietnam protests. At the graduate level you are left on your own. I ate and practically slept among the books in the library. It was tough to be in a foreign land for a boy from Kedah. It was also catch-up time.
Why? I found out to my horror that I knew far less than my American classmates. Despite Bloom’s criticisms, these students knew their country’s history and read the classics. They discussed politics and gender issues (Betty Frieden and Gloria Steniem et. al) intelligently, and knew what they expected out of their graduate studies. It dawned on me – and they confirmed it – that they all had good liberal education while in high school and as undergraduates. Ghazalie gave me my first shokku, but this American SHOKKU was even greater.
Clearly our schools and university during my time were inadequate. For me to complain about the current state of affairs means that we have reached a crisis of enormous proportions in our education system. When will our leaders and their advisors realize that we must act fast? Tinkering with the system with quick fixes will not do. Education with clear objectives is a must now.
Regards, Din
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Dear Din:
Could not agree with you more! I too read Ungku Aziz’s Utusan interview and also Kassim Ahmad’s essay on why Islam is always an ultra sensitive topic in Malaysia. Kassim was kind enough to send me his submitted copy. Utusan “edited” the piece heavily; nonetheless his points came through loud and clear. I was betting that Utusan would can the piece!
As for Ungku, I have a tremendously high regard for him. He seems to be harping on nutrition, and he is right. But good nutrition is more a function of economic development. Post-war Asians are bigger and taller than their pre-war counterparts because of good nutrition made possible with economic development. However with pseudo-modern development, we tend to ape modernity rather than getting its essence; thus the high consumption of sugar leading to diabetes among our people, and fat leading to heart diseases. We do not emulate the west regarding exercises or breastfeeding.
When we were in Malaysia and my wife was breastfeeding our baby, I made sure that she did so whenever we visited the villages. We usually got a general look of disbelief from the women. They thought that “white people” are modern and thus did not breastfeed their babies. I told them the observation of a famous American nutritionist that cows milk was best only for calves!
I am however disappointed that Ungku has not seen fit to put his thoughts in words, that is, to write books. Mind you, the man has written volumes in his field, nonetheless I would dearly like to read his take on Malaysian life generally, not necessarily on economics.
Sallam,
Bakri