Five for Yasmin Ahmad

One.

I have a copy of Yasmin Ahmad's Talentime, original DVD, that I want to give out. It's not subtitled - I've watched it before in the cinema and I think the major languages used are English, Malay and Tamil (logical deduction - could be Hindi for all I know), perhaps with a slight smattering of Mandarin. So if you understand English, Malay and Tamil, or know someone who does who will enjoy this movie, get in touch with me (june dot tan at gmail dot com) and I'll make the arrangements to send the DVD to you. It's a great movie and I don't want the DVD to go to waste with me because I can't understand parts of it, so I'm going to send it to you for free. Consider it as a gift from me.

If no one contacts me within a week of this post, I will put up a notice on the Couchsurfing forum and give it out through there (since the forum has more than five readers). So do be quick if you're interested =)

Two.

Muallaf is now screening in Malaysia. I watched it in Singapore first, last year, and this trip back to Malaysia I watched it again at GSC 1Utama. Catch it before it stops screening!

Three.

I bought this book called Yasmin Ahmad's Films, by Amir Muhammad, yesterday. I find it a delightful accompaniment to the movies as it highlights some details that I missed in the movies, and the commentary is very useful for foreigners who may not understand some of the cultural references that are uniquely Malaysian. RM30 at major bookstores.

Four.
photo credit

I teared when I saw this. It's graffiti art drawn at the Klang River, Pasar Seni, by two local artists named Jeng and Kioue, after Yasmin Ahmad's death. Sigh. Damn sad.

Five.

I've created a new label called Yasmin Ahmad and there are 12 posts that I've tagged with the label. I didn't realize that I had written so much about her before. Here are the previous posts that I've written on Mukhsin, Sepet, Muallaf.

The morning after.

I am back in my room in KL.

The past few days have been a crazy whoosh. It's one of those periods of time when things move so quickly, it's like you're in a corridor with a slippery floor and someone gives you a push and you slide, frictionless, bouncing from one wall to the other in a zigzag fashion. Sometimes you note the wallpaper and a painting or two or bump your knee against the teak furniture (of course it has to be teak!), but you never really have time to reflect upon what actually happened, because everything's just too fast-moving and you don't have time to grab onto a rail that doesn't exist anyway to stop all the movement.

The crazy sliding has stopped. I hang onto a door knob or something, dazed, sleep-deprived, unsure whether I prefer motion or stillness. I remember Asa, LL, Woei, YJ, Silver, my primary school friends. I remember a dinner, a failed attempt to watch some Yasmin Ahmad movies, a visit to the Islamic Art Museum, sleeping on a really comfortable bed in Malacca. I remember being early for my bus, Silver missing his, forgetting my (new) hand phone and getting it back, awkward social situations, sleeping. Waking up very reluctantly. Sleeping. Waking up even more reluctantly. Sleeping. Don't. Want. To. Wake. Up.

I just got a paper cut on my middle toe. I shall not furnish you with the details.

I should go to bed, I really should. Did I mention I really need sleep?

//I fell asleep promptly after the last line, although I'm sure I had some thought-provoking sentiments about sleep deprivation to share. But here's posting it in the morning after.

Kena curi lagi

It is that time of the year again. What time of the year, you ask. Well, the time of the year when I get my personal belongings stolen, of course. What else?

Last year on November 27th, I was robbed in Kota Kinabalu. This year on November 28th, I lost my bag and its entire contents to a thief who somehow figured out the padlock combination of our dragonboat locker cage. Five or six bags were stolen, including mine. This is the first time that something of the sort has happened in my team, although someone cut through the American team's cage before, apparently.

Things I lost: My trusty Esprit bag, which YKent who bought it from Hong Kong sold to me, and it has weathered through so many conditions formal or rough because it's so versatile. Sigh. It was a good bag. My wallet which was cheap and falling apart, so no love lost there. S$100 which I had just withdrawn the day before, and a couple of hundred RM, which, don't ask me why I was bringing all around Singapore when they don't accept RM here. My student ID, my debit card (which has 2 bucks in it, they're welcome to it), my ATM card, my EZLink card, random transport cards that I collected from the US. My phone, the one that I hated. Well good riddance, except that all my contacts and sim card were in it. My umbrella. A library book - Jane Austen's Sense and Sensibility, which I had not finished, damn it. And it looked pretty old too, bet it was published a long time ago... well, let's just hope that the thieving bastards would appreciate classic literature. My Vegetarian t-shirt =( and my very absorbent gym towel. My house keys.

Things I didn't lose: More important forms of ID - my passport and Malaysian IC or driver's license. My research notes and camera which I took out right before I left, because I didn't want to make them wet.

Things I thought I had lost but didn't: my pencil case, my supervisor's library book, the cable for my external hard disk, my mp3 player which contained the 3-hour interview with Tope my Nigerian CSer (!!!).

All in all I suppose the damage wasn't huge, since most of the stuff that I lost are replaceable, apart from that vegetarian t-shirt that I got from San Fran... but I guess I could be thankful to the fact that I didn't lose my Old School or "If you can read this: make me a sandwich" t-shirts that are my favouritest t-shirts in the world, bought from Wellington, which have been with me through thick and thin, through leech infested tropical jungles and dry dusty deserts. Sucks that I lost all that money, but then money doesn't have emotional value so that's fine. Ambivalent that I lost my phone, along with it old and musty messages that hinted of relationships that could have been, people whom I've lost contact with, dear messages from my good friends that I can always accummulate again. I shall think of it as a yearly cleansing ritual, losing a phone and all the contacts, and building up again the core of people who matter.

The police took ages to arrive and in the meanwhile everyone crowded around to cancel credit cards and phone cards. The ones who weren't affected stayed back to give emotional support. There was this British uncle who kept growling in frustration every five minutes, haha. A really nice Indian guy loaned me 50 bucks. People kept speculating how it happened, and after they had already exhausted the possible scenarios they just repeated themselves over again.

After settling the collective police report (I'll have to make another individual report later) - I had a fifty dollar bill on me and a card with the case report written on it. And an old energy bar wrapper in the back pocket of my shorts, from the Grand Canyon hike. I could choose to go home, and wait till Housemate David gets home, but that could be a long wait. I decided to go get my sim card fixed at Raffles City instead. Then I changed my mind because I didn't have any form of ID on me and they probably wouldn't take my case; so I took a map from the Concierge and ran all the way to Chinatown to catch the free public screening of Gubra, a film by late Yasmin Ahmad, my favourite Malaysian director. After watching the (really good) movie I met Adibah (a Singaporean CSer) and her friends by chance, and they walked me to Outram Park MRT, although I told them that I couldn't be mugged since I didn't have anything on me. Well apart from 48 bucks and a case card and a Singapore map, but what are the odds, seriously?

There I took an MRT back to Pioneer, stinking everyone within a 3 feet radius of me with a combination of dried sweat and dried river water. After that I walked home from Pioneer MRT. Apparently it only takes less than 20 minutes, and it was nice walking under the night breeze in the knowledge that I had already exhausted the probabilistic quota of being robbed within a day.

Curses! The Honest Scrap Awards!

Chindi my old time buddy in the blogging world has given me this unenviable task of putting down 8 things previously unknown to any soul in the world on my blog. About me. And me, being the open book that I am, it is extremely difficult to think of anything that I have never told anyone before. Stuff I can't tell the general public, I tell to my best friends. Stuff I don't tell my best friends, I tell random strangers that I meet. And stuff that I don't tell anyone at all - well, don't expect me to put it here, because they're secret for a reason.

Cue intense soul-searching for the most difficult blogging assignment ever.

Anyway, since I have family reading this blog, the content remains [my] family friendly, I have devised a clever scheme to stick to the rules of the award yet not divulge any secrets worth knowing, muahaha! So here's a list of things so trivial about me that I've never thought about telling anyone:

1. I have a habit of compulsively rereading the newest post on my blog until I do a new post, then I'll read that new post instead.
2. I had a great idea for a personal ad last week and posted my first ad ever online... and the replies have been coming in like averagely five emails a day =_= My semangat died approximately two hours after I posted the ad, and now I am faced with the prospect of answering the pile of emails by strangers whom I don't want to disappoint but don't really care about either. On top of that I have to answer emails from people that I do care about, and I have to start doing my research, but now I am blogging.
   
3. I need a personal assistant who will stop me from doing stupid random things that eat up my time such as posting personal ads at whim and answering blog tags.
   
4. I just got an email from my co-supervisor giving me an assignment for his class which I'm sitting in. And you heard it first, from June x 2. Damn, more work on top of the pile of emails I have to reply!
5. Sometimes I think I put too many dashes into my writing - like that - but I like to articulate my pauses without using too many commas.
   
6. Someone washed my feet at the Burning Man.
7. I'm struggling here - oh yeah occasionally I have vain spells which result in me staring at the mirror for extended periods of time. After I cut six inches off my desert-fried hair I used the household webcam to take self-portraits (see right, behold, the thinker pose!).
   
8. I have only visited Yasmin Ahmad (my favourite Malaysian film director)'s blog once after she died, and till now I still have the unconscious habit of typing her blog address into the address bar, hesitating and not clicking enter. Whenever I do that I am slightly sad.
   

OK, not tagging anyone as usual, too much time-wasting, the time-wasting's gotta stop!

Shall not be updating the blog too often recently until I get my life back into order, namely getting a place to stay and sorting out all the work-related clutter. Have to work really hard for the following few months to complete my confirmation report to get it out of the way from any travelling opportunities, and to impress my World's Coolest Supervisor.

RIP Yasmin Ahmad

This morning I returned to Singapore from India, to a world that has Yasmin Ahmad no more. I am very sad at her passing. She was one of the directors whose movies I never failed to watch, and every time I watch them I am moved to tears and laughter, she was truly an amazing storyteller. We have lost a national legend, a kindred spirit who was able to see beauty in small details of life, and express them so that people all around the world are able to see what she saw. I don't think I can say anything more. Rest in peace, Yasmin Ahmad.

Yay Malaysian Arts!

Waaaaa Talentime Free Screening!

I'm as prolific as humping rabbits today - three posts in a day! Anyway, another community service announcement - there's a free screening of Talentime (by Yasmin Ahmad) at 3pm, May 23 this Saturday - but I'm going to have to miss it because I'll be camping =(

But you can go! There's a Q&A session after the free movie, YASMIN AHMAD'S GONNA BE THERE, and the co-author of my blogging book Prof Wan Zawawi Ibrahim will also be on the panel. =D (I curi-curi tumpang glamour.) Movie screening will be held at Pawagam Mini P.Ramlee. Pretty much identical information (without the hyperness) at Yasmin Ahmad's blog here.

Toilet

This evening I went to KLPac and watched Toilet (dance/theatre). After kena ffked by numerous people one after another, I ended up watching it alone, and I'm really glad I did. Somehow it lifted the pressure of hoping that people I invited would like it, so I immersed myself thoroughly in the message that they tried to convey, on life, on indulgence, on internal conflict, on humanity.

I'm no critic, this is the first ever dance performance that I've ever watched, but I did enjoy it. I loved how the stage was designed - there was one sequence playing with disco lights and mist that is exactly how I imagine being stoned would be like - and the dance movements were engaging although I could see some trembling of the limbs which might be signs of inadequate training, I wouldn't know, have to ask Yuen.

Also there is girl-on-girl kissing action on stage. With passion, and not only once, I might add. Do I see some guys perking up right there? (Boy-girl kissing also have. And there was one boy-girl intimate dance sequence that I really liked as well.)

So check it out if you have time - it's only showing till May 24 - tickets cost RM37 for regular price, and if you happen to have a student card like me you get to pay only RM24 ;) Link here.

Kaleidoscope: Hands Drumming Festival

I picked up a flyer when I was at KLPac and it features drums, something that I'm a little partial to. Drumming workshops and performances will be held from 10-14 June during the festival.

For ex-Chonghwarians you would know 吴圣雄老师, pretty much the Art teacher, and he's also behind the drum team 二十四节令鼓in Chong Hwa. I don't know whether he's still in CH or not, but I do miss the drum team, and if I remember correctly he's the founder of Hands Percussion Team. Oh yeah he is, just checked out the official website.

Sadly the dates are on probably my masa kegentingan for Double Deadline 15 June, so I probably won't make it =( Someone go with my spirit can?

So Hindi songs are awesome.

Why did no one tell me before? Do you people not like me?

I am currently listening to soundtracks of two Hindi movies, Aaja Nachle and Lagaan. I found Aaja Nachle through the song O Re Piya, which is featured in Yasmin Ahmad's new movie Talentime (showing on March 26!! Jump jump jump!!!)

O Re Piya - Rahat Fateh Ali Khan

And here are the trailers of Talentime, the first one gave me goosebumps, and the second one made me laugh, Yasmin Ahmad is seriously the greatest.




I read somewhere that Talentime is going to show in Singapore one month later than in Malaysia (where it premieres on March 26), you lucky bastards, go watch the movie go watch the movie go watch the movie!!! But DON'T tell me the plot or I will freaking kill you.

Since Fridays are my gym days I am not to be blamed for dishing out death threats. Or doing the Indian head bob. Or looking like I'm nodding vigorously when I'm actually doing the Indian head bob. Damn them flexible Indian heads. Gosh that sounded racist. Oh well, while we're at it, damn us Chinese sepet eyes as well. I can't think of any Malay body parts to damn. Damn Malay perfection!

Click play if you haven't already. Three times. Up there. *points*

This is sick.

Prompted by Elviza's kind email regarding relief efforts by Mercy Malaysia offered to Palestine, I took some time off this evening from my readings and read up a little more on the situation in Gaza. I'm sure most of you would have kept yourself more informed than I have, so I'm just going to show some pictures ripped from NYTimes. Because many of us are quite insensitive to human suffering unless it is shoved in our faces.

The funeral for 14 of around 40 people killed on Tuesday when Israeli mortar fire struck near a United Nations school in Gaza where many people were taking refuge. Picture and caption taken from NYTimes.com

Women grieved during another funeral, for ten family members killed in a missile strike. Picture and caption taken from NYTimes.com

The aftermath of an airstrike in the Rafah refugee camp on Wednesday. The rising civilian death toll in crowded Gaza heightened international urgency to end the combat. Israel has said repeatedly that it will not end the operation in Gaza until it is certain that Hamas will no longer fire rockets into its civilian areas. Picture and caption taken from NYTimes.com

From Yasmin Ahmad's blog, I read SMSes from Dr. Jemilah from Mercy Malaysia who is currently delivering aid on the ground at Gaza.

"Salaam. I am leaving tonight for Egypt and onto Rafah, to set up a pipeline for aid into Gaza. Don't worry, it is safe there. Pray for us and the people who are suffering there. Happy new year, I love all of you." (Dec 31)

"Salaam, Min. As I write this, in the last 15 minutes more than 20 bombs have fallen on Gaza, within the distance I can hear them. We are about 2 km from Palestine, and it is a case of so near and yet so far. Our five trucks are loaded with USD100,000 worth of valuable medicine, surgical sets, and disposable items, including syringes, intravenous infusions and bandages. We will wait till the bombings stop, and once the gate opens, we will try to push the goods through. While the Egyptian border has thankfully allowed aid to go through, the challenge is to wait for trucks from the Palestine side to come and collect the goods. For the past day, they have not been able to collect even life saving goods as Israel continues with land and air assaults. We will try our best and stay till we can assure our aid goes through. Many people have been kind to us here and we ask for your continued support and prayers." (4 Jan)

"Alhamdulillah (Praise the Lord). Nothing short of a miracle and Allah's love and mercy for us. We managed to transfer 50 tons of supplies. Many people waited for days, but we sailed through. Alhamdulillah. How was your TV thing? To be honest, it's been very slow on the fund-raising side from HQ." (5 Jan)

"Alhamdulillah. I am fine. Spent some time with Palestinian kids transferred to Cairo for treatment. They were crying and wanting to go home! They don't realise their homes have been blown apart. So very sad. Getting the second consignment ready to go again. Take care. Salaam to all and thank everyone for their generosity and doas." (7 Jan)

I think, witnessing all the efforts that Mercy Malaysia is putting into helping all the innocent lives taken and injured (according to Elviza's blog, Al-Jazeera has the figures that 700 Palestinians have been killed, 219 of whom are children; more than 3000 are wounded), supporting them is the least that we can do.

How you can help? Monetarily, Mercy Malaysia needs more contributions to buy surgical kits, medicines and hospital equipments to help the hospitals in Gaza.

• Cheque is to be made payable to “MERCY MALAYSIA” and addressed to Mercy Malaysia, Level 2, Podium Block, City Point, Kompleks Dayabumi, Jalan Sultan Hishamuddin, 50050 Kuala Lumpur.
• Cash donations can be made via on-line transmission or deposit at CIMB Bank Account No: 1424-000-6561053.
• Donation form can be downloaded from here.
• Further enquiries are to be directed to +603-22733999 or info@mercy.org.my

No amount is too little, every contribution can make a difference to someone's life out there. Please, please help. Elviza, who has been volunteering for Mercy Malaysia for about a year, has more details here.

***

And then I watched two videos, also from Yasmin Ahmad's blog, on the American media portrayal of the Israel-Palestine conflict. As a media student I am fascinated, but as a layperson I am overwhelmingly disgusted by the underhanded tactics used to virtually mask the events from the rest of the world. Each clip takes 30 minutes, but I assure you it's worth it, to learn from media activists, scholars and journalists what's really the situation, and how the media twisted the facts.

Peace, Propaganda & The Promised Land - U.S. Media & The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict (Part 1)



Peace, Propaganda & The Promised Land - U.S. Media & The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict (Part 2)


To sum things up, these videos will show you how Israel is obsessed with its PR image, how the media content goes through some 4 major filters, i.e. 1) the owners of the US media and their business interests, 2) the political elites, 3) the PR efforts of Israel and 4) Pro-Israel media watchdogs. Then they show you, in six clear points, the PR strategies of Israel. Interesting bits include how the journalists are being forced to use language such as "neighbourhood" instead of "settlement" to mask the (very much illegal) occupation of Palestine; and how they give uneven portrayal (empathy on Israel side and nonchalance on the Palestine side); and how they use words like "retaliation" to imply that the Israelis were acting out of self-defense... it is really fascinating.

It's too long to summarize here and I'm quite eager to get this post out, so for you weirdos who want to read the transcript of the videos instead of watching them, here's the link to the transcript. The videos are produced by the Media Education Foundation, a nonprofit organization which produces documentaries looking at media critically.

While waiting.

Whiling away time, I have an 11am meeting and I thought it probably would make no sense to dive into my research now, since that I would be interrupted 20 minutes later. And I hate being dragged away while I'm at it because it takes some time for me to settle down and actually start doing it again.

"My spring has come," I told the girls yesterday. Because it has. I mean, finally I can do my own research without worrying about other coursework which, I told my supervisor last sem in a rather presumptuous manner that were only distractions to my real work. In time I found that it was not true, the coursework that I did, especially the one by Prof K was really useful in giving me the theoretical foundation, of what was available out there. But I'm glad that's all over and December, although cut in the beginning and the end for homecoming purposes, will be my "spring" for all the ideas frozen underground to sprout and to take shape.

Already I've found this guy Eric Uslaner who works on trust and social capital, whose work is exactly what I'm looking for, and he provides this huge list of papers which I am going to comb through today, syokness!

Oh yeah I watched Muallaf yesterday! (Wikipedia contains spoilers! I recommend you read only after you watch the movie - here.) It's directed by Yasmin Ahmad my favourite director, showing at The Picture House. It was really good, although I'm not really spiritual or religious but the movie gave me goosebumps anyway, it shows faith with forgiveness, with love, with beauty; which is a far cry from the contemporary media portrayal, what with the banning of yoga and suicide bombing and religious warfare and etc. For the first time in perhaps ever, I thought maybe I'm missing out, being an agnostic. No I'm not an atheist, I have this really vague idea that might be considered as my religion, of karma and of a personal guardian angel who looks over me. But I don't belong anywhere and there's no verses that I chant nor hymms that I sing - upside is that there's no religious bigot to tell me what to do and not, because I'm the only one belonging to my religion and I make the rules. Downside, well, I suppose there are reasons why the big religions are big. I just don't know enough about them to actually believe in them.

OK gotta go.

Here in my home

Although most of you would have seen the video by now from other blogs, I'll put it in just in case there are some of you people who only read blogs with an L on their foreheads.

*foreLhead*


Malaysian Artistes for Unity - Here In My Home

Loved the video and definitely will download the ringtone when I'm in Singapore and get a better handphone than the current one. (Which doesn't have enough of memory space for the song... 330kb nia... doesn't have a cable... WAP nia... Ai, as long as the joystick works I'm not complaining... please don't malfunction on me again...)

I like the Indian part of the rap the most. And I like Afdlin Shauki, the Sepet couple (!!!), "We the rakyat lah!", Harith Iskander, the airplanes, and the official site! It's so fun and lighthearted, you can't help laughing along with these crazy people. Kononnya the song began with a story that started with Pete Teo juggling tomatoes. How can you not love a song involving tomatoes being juggled? And a music video directed by Yasmin Ahmad and Ho Yu Hang? And the zero budget, zero profit - as Val would say, anarchistic production? AND the central theme of racial unity?

SOKONG!!!!

Ei. Watch the video lah. Then you'll know what I'm talking about.

Video, song, ringtones available for download here. These folks are teh cool. Pimping them is the least that you and I can do.

I'm racist

This morning when I re-listened to my recorded interview with Rustam A. Sani, I thought about what an amiable fellow he is, and dropped by his blog. Previously he had stopped updating it for a couple of months then I sorta forgot about it. Fortunately it looks like he is blogging regularly again, and I've added him to my sidebar.

Rustam is an academic, and he has been described by Jomo as "arguably Malaysia's leading public intellectual". His latest post, Let's all go to China - to settle down! set me reflecting about how myself, the self-professed patriotic liberal who tries to avoid racialization - have been racist all this while, unconsciously.

For example, yesterday I was trying to tell YKent about Sepet and some notable scenes within it to entice him into watching it, when the inevitable question came up: "What movie is it ah? Is it a Malay movie?"

I hesitated a little. "Erm... it's Malay... but there's a lot of Cantonese inside, then English, somemore suddenly got Hokkien wann... how to explain ah?"

"So it's Malaysian lah." A simple reply from YKent at the wheel nudged me to the sudden realization that it was indeed the only adjective for the cultural rojak that is Sepet. Why did something so obvious escape me?

Rustam puts it this way:

Our political discourse up to this day, in my opinion, still smacks of the flavours of our good old racist days in the 1960s, when our supposedly brightest political thinkers were still struggling with their woolly thoughts such as found in The Malay Dilemma.

There is no denial that times have changed and the world too has changed. But the terrain of the Malaysian political discourse – or at least of its realpolitikal maneuverings – remain the same (at least in the fuzzy perception of some of our political leaders): the keris-bearing Malays are still loyal servants of their “sultan”, the transient Chinese still longing to go back to China to really be successful, and the Indians still looking for opportunities from the emerging market that India is today – their “true” homeland.

Alas, I am still but a mere mortal thinking from a framework that has been instilled into me since I was young. I am guilty of thoughts of wonderment when I see Indian girls wearing baju kurung, and a Chinese eating with his hands. A crime that happens automatically sees me asking about the perpetrator, "What race was he?"

There is hope yet. I am a thinking human, I learn, and I am an agency of change. I live to make a difference, and I have a bubbling fountain of contagious (and probably slightly annoying) enthusiasm. Yasmin Ahmad's films make me think. In turn, I am spreading it to my inner circle of friends whom I hope may be able to share the reflections that I had after watching the movies.

Ask Guang Hong whom I lured to Wiun's house with sandwiches then strapped onto the sofa to watch Sepet. He was enthralled. YKent who was preparing the said sandwiches didn't get to watch, but is dying to. Wiun who was impressed by Mukhsin (he had to go watch it after my glowing review) has borrowed Sepet and will hopefully not copy the DVD for his collection - RM19.90 only wei! Sokonglah sikit filem buatan Malaysia!

Lack of sleep has gotten into my head. I think I will go to bed instead of waiting for KF to wake up from his deep slumber at the other end of the world.

FYI I've extended the deadline to this Friday. Till then, the march continues.

Mukhsin

Mukhsin. I loved it.

I don't want to do a review on it, rather I just want to gush about it like how I did when I called YJ right after the show, squealing, "You have to watch it! Ho Yu Hang's back is featured in it!" and how I told Wiun, "After the movie I just wanted to hug the person beside me and say, 'I'm a Malaysian too!'" or how I hopped around the kitchen while Wiun and YKent were preparing sandwiches and wouldn't stop distracting them with sporadic ejaculations of "It was great! You should watch it! It was so Malaysian! There are worse ways you can waste RM10 you know! Who wants to watch Sepet? Oi why so long one I haven't eaten since breakfast!"

Don't let me overrate it for you. I know sometimes it's just irritating when someone says it's so incredibly nice and you walk out of the cinema feeling cheated. These things are subjective and different people look for different things in a movie.

Enough with the subtle disclaiming!

The storyline was simple - that's what puppy love is all about. Carefree and slightly wistful when it ends. But the parts I really liked in the movie was actually the scenes secondary to the storyline, the bits and pieces that followed the development of Orked and Mukhsin's budding love. Orked's irreverent parents. Good-natured gossip from Kak Yam. The blackboard in Orked's room. Orked's defiant spunk and English accent. "Pencemar budaya". So many so many little things inside that make you chuckle, or slightly thoughtful, or go "Hey, that's Malaysia!"

There are so many media products out there, from the U.S., from the U.K., from China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, etc. Watching them gives me a slightly detached feeling, kinda like being an onlooker or an outsider. It's like watching through a glass into worlds where Devils wear Prada, or construction workers climb up bamboo sticks, or where all girls look the same and act stupid. Even some shows in Malaysia. I don't identify with that dunno-from-where accent. I don't get the slapstick humour (which made me lose all interest in local productions). And I definitely don't get that lobster suit you're calling a lizard.

But Mukhsin. I felt at home. I felt proud of it being shown in Berlin and winning. I felt proud of the community and family ties and multiple languages we have. I felt proud of identifying with all the symbols within that hint of Malaysia. Our culture. *beams*

OKlah maybe I haven't watched too many local productions to say only Mukhsin is Malaysian. It isn't. But this certainly restores my faith in local movies and please please please Yasmin Ahmad Tan Chui Mui Ho Yu Hang Amir Muhammad and co., make more movies and I promise I'll see them all! (And make all my friends go too!)

Other random jots:

• The scene I loved the most was the dance scene in Orked's livingroom. The warmth penetrated my soul and my eyes welled up for reasons I don't know. It was comical, yet slightly sad. Maybe it was sad because such moments are so precious and once they are over, they are forever gone.
• Tiny little gripes: a couple of scenes involving Chinese were a little fake. Didn't see much of Indians within.
• Yasmin Ahmad's blog can be accessed here.
• Ho Yu Hang is a local director who directed Rain Dogs, a movie which YJ loved.