National Attitude On Traffic

A long queue of cars waiting for the lights to go green under the flyover's interchange, and drivers squeezing in from the one and only 'U-Turn only' lane just for the 'fast track' . Cars occupying the center of an interchange, inside the yellow box, while the road ahead is facing a congestion. In the Light Rail Transport stations, the boarding passengers rushing in just to prevent the passengers in the cabin from getting out of that sardine can.

Yes, welcome to Malaysia. Feel free to enjoy this kind of 'treatment', 24/7 on or off the road.

People here are so 'competitive', they threw their manners into the Recycle Bin (or better still, Shift-Del), no matter where or when they are. Yes, you can see it everywhere, from the roads to the lifts in shopping complexes here. People here win people by playing the sport named 'squeeze-in first, argue later'.

Chances are slim if you expect the next oncoming car to let that old fat lady take the zebra crossing. I bet my (potato) chips on that driver jamming at his accelerator and 'WHOOSH' , let the lady bite dust. Point is, no one would ever want to stop their cars for nothing here. Well, except for stopping at the wrong lane in front of the reds, and parking at the perfect spot to make a traffic 'dam'. And oh WAIT, they'd stop too to have a better look on that accident occured on the opposite side of the road.

Toll plazas are one of my favorite places too - I can't find a moment where my parents will NOT swear on those 'lost' poeple who drove their cars to the wrong lane, and changing their directions in the last second. And not to mention queue cutters, one itself is already enough to create a chain reaction equivalent of the Hiroshima-Nagasaki combo.

So they called themselves 'city people', eh? I think otherwise. They're indeed city people, but they forgot to bring their brains to the road. Either that or they're sitting on it.

Ah, how about places without cars ? Shopping complexes, transport stations, places where people gather - it's almost all the same. Everytime I travel via LRT, I will have more trouble unboarding than when I board, because in the same time, the crowd will struggle for the 10 short seconds to enter/exit the train cabin. One bad thing leads to another - if you think this is already bad enough, wait till you're reminded that this is the perfect timing for pickpockets to take their chances. Expect the same behaviour in lifts of various areas, as well as some other places that involves the congestion of pedestrians.

If you think this kind of attitude runs in real life only, let me tell you that you're wrong. Check the Internet, and see how most Malaysians behaved on the Net. The forums enough is already an eyesore. Recently I'm into an online FPS (first person shooter, something like CS etc.) that's hosted locally, and naturally, majority of the players in the game are kids all around this country. Their behaviours reflect what their parents 'taught' them - which I have no idea how or what they taught to them. Expect lots of spammings, floodings and pointless stuff if you're unfortunate enough to be in the chats. You might say, not only Malaysians do that but other people around the world do that too; but I'd say, MOST of the Malaysians do that.

Sigh... enough of speaking the 'exciting' stuff in the locals. Let's look at somewhere else for some comparison...

I've been to Singapore, and despite their infamous 'kiasu' culture, their drivers will always stop in front of a zebra crossing. OK, their MRT's and buses might be a mess when the boarding/unboarding comes about, but at least they've a system to tone down the problem. You can say it's because their country's small and easier to be governed, but again I think otherwise - it's the mentality of the people that makes the difference.

Why our neighbours can while my fellow countrymen can't ? This is something that puzzles me everytime I compare my country's people with others. Up to now, my conclusion is that these people lack of the awareness to behave courteously. If this 'social disease' is still left unattended, it's likely our next generation will adopt this 'disease' and call it - Malaysian Culture. Dammit.