Sunday 6 May 2018

GE14 jalan-jalan in Johor and a Namewee video

I've been driving around a lot over the past two days.

No time to do any extra posting.

I actually did my last post somewhere near Parit Raja where I spent the night on Friday.

That evening I drove around Batu Pahat after meeting my DAP friend in Yong Peng.

Surprisingly the election atmosphere was not so much felt in the Batu Pahat town.

Relatively not many flags and posters in the town centre.

It's more felt in the surrounding villages.

This is at the village where I stayed that night;


My friend, whose place I stayed at that night said it was the first time that the opposition party workers dare to put up their posters there because it's an Umno stronghold.

The village is in the Sri Gading parliamentary constituency, a "white" BN's area.

Yesterday, I first drove from the village to my hometown Kluang.

I've not been back there for quite awhile.

After passing the GE14 hot spot of Ayer Hitam where DAP and MCA are fighting over a Malay majority constituency, I stopped at my father's kampung to visit the family graves.

My father's family graves are behind the kampung mosque which is the building with blue roof in the background. The pedestrian bridge in the foreground was built when the trunk road was widen to four lanes several years before the last general election.
I proceeded to Kluang town and discovered that the flags and banners there were more numerous than in Batu Pahat.

Going back to Kluang has always been an emotional experience for me.

Too many memories.

The famous Kluang railway crossing

It makes me miss my mother so much at that moment . She's now looking after my elderly grandparents in KL

Passed by the entrance of my mother's school. She loves her school so much.
I stopped at the Kluang town centre to visit my friend's family watch shop located in front of what used to be the main bus station, which has now been turned into a parking lot.

The Wong family watch shop has been around since before Merdeka, if I'm not mistaken. I bought a Casio watch there yesterday.
After that I drove back to Ayer Hitam town where I was supposed to meet a friend who was driving down there from KL.

It turned out that the guy's appointments with BN candidate Wee Ka Siong and DAP candidate Liew Chin Tong had been arranged in such a way that I have to go to Yong Peng to meet him.

So, I drove again to Yong Peng like the previous day and waited for him at the famous Traffic Light Coffee Shop.

The kueh and kopi at the kopitiam were marvelous.
As I was sitting there alone, it so happened that a group of DAP party workers came in for a drink and one of them is a very dear friend from many years ago in JB.

It was a short but very happy reunion.

She's a very important member of Lim Guan Eng's team and now resides in Penang.

She and the others were there to help Chin Tong's campaign.

I later met my friend from KL at another kopitiam near the DAP operation centre after his appointment with Ka Siong and Chin Tong.

That night I went to see the ceramah by Tun Dr Mahathir and other former Umno oldies in Ayer Hitam.

My DAP friend said they estimated the crowd at about 1,500 people.

After the ceramah, I drove back to JB and treated myself by staying at a better hotel. I've been staying mostly at budget hotels ever since I came here more than two weeks ago.

This morning my friend picked me up at the hotel and took me jalan-jalan.

First, she took me for some shopping at the newly opened Paradigm Mall, which used to be the long abandoned Kemayan City project from the first half of the 1990s.

Paradigm Mall JB. View from Jalan Skudai

View of the place which was then called Kemayan City from almost the same angle several years ago. At that time the place was a favourite among drug addicts to  get their fix.
After that we drove around a bit looking for a place to get a nice massage.

It was then that we passed the Lot 1, which may look okay in this picture but is actually still mostly abandoned since the days when TS Muhyiddin Yassin was the Johor menteri besar in the 1990s.


Back then, there were several such abandoned buildings. Some were revived such as the one turned into the Paradigm Mall recently and another one called Danga City Mall which was revived before the last general election.

I always think that Muhyiddin should not have allowed the building of those malls back then when he was the MB.

Hopefully if he becomes the MB again in the event Pakatan wins this general election, he wouldn't make the same mistake again.

I ended my rounds with my friend with a late lunch at a Japanese restaurant near Sutera Mall which compound was the site of mammoth Pakatan rallies during the last general election five years ago.

There are no rallies there now.

I was told that the management of the mall has had enough of political rallies there which was said to be not so good for business.

Well, for this general election, it seems that the rallies, particularly in Johor were rather small such as the one in Ayer Hitam last night.

Okay, that's about it.

Tonight I'm back to sleeping at a budget hotel.

Oh, one more thing - someone requested for me to write a bit about this video by Namewee, urging Malaysians to vote;


Honestly, I don't really catch much what he was rapping about except the part where he whacked Perkasa.

Well, I don't mind that as I'm no fan of Perkasa too.

I just don't like Malay extremists or any other kind of extremists.

I actually cringed when Dr Mahathir became Perkasa patron back then.

Hopefully, if Pakatan wins and the handsome old man becomes PM again, he would stay away from those clowns.

21 comments:

  1. MO1 who 'ordered' jho low not to be tangkap but sadly after GE14 MO1 himself will be tangkap!!!
    The saddest part is MO1 is the so called 'chosen one' who dragged BN to their graves wakakaka

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I order anjing UMNO to declare state of emergency

      Jho Low
      Adun indonesia
      Parlimen Hong Kong

      Delete
    2. enter ph no need to kena tangkap

      Delete
    3. Anon 2147
      Keep on dreaming.
      Prof Kangkung

      Delete
  2. most likely..outcome is v much status quo.. we ll know by the evening of 9 may..penang n selangor v much are still under PH..kelantan falls to BN..PAS making good gain in terengganu and kedah..that s basically it.. what else to say..n we can.move on with our daily life..sigh..too much politicking..it is the economy stupid..not politics..i m not saying to u annie..i m talking about politiciana..

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Anon 2227
      I do agree with you on Penang but for Selangor I have doubt of PKR can retain it.My take on Kelantan,I believe Pas can still keep Kelantan with smaller number of seats.Having lived in Kelantan for the Pas 31 years I know Pas in Kelantan is a tough nut to crack.
      Prof Kangkung

      Delete
  3. Ayoo u budak sri lalang ke annie

    ReplyDelete
  4. undi BN = selamatkan MO1 sigh
    undi Harapan = selamatkan negara right

    ReplyDelete
  5. Kemayan city terbengkalai pd tahun 1997, sapa mb johor masa tu annie, tsmy ke atau idola u ghani othman

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Biasalah Annie selective amnesia. Ghani has been an MB for a very long time. Longer than TS Muhyiddin. Muhyiddin’s tenure as MB was just a flash in a pan. For you to solely whacked Muhyiddin for anything wrong happening in JB is grossly unfair.

      Delete
    2. Kemayan City was conceived in 1993.
      eomsociety.org/ieom2014/pdfs/339.pdf
      TS Muhyiddin Yassin was Johor MB for nine years, from 1986 to 1995
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muhyiddin_Yassin

      Delete
    3. Btl keje2 pembinaan mula tahun 93, dh siap bangunan tu masalah ialah flyover jln msuk yg pemaju buat tidak ikut spek, jd cfo tk ble lulus, lupa ke smpi penduduk bukit mewah mtk kjaan bri juga kebenaran mbjb utk guna flyover tu sbgai jln msuk ke taman mereka, org bkt mewah dn tmn munsyi tntu ingat guna flyover tp jln nyonsang seolah kete kita left hand drive, tkde salah tsmy dlm hal ni annie, lps ni jgn plak u ckp waterfront city tutup pn kerana tsmy, by the way how old were u back in 97

      Delete
  6. reporting/journalism is an art rather than science, articles written are from the point of view of the writer, in this case, annie.. same la with joceline tan, awang selamat, philip golingai, wong chun wai, and bloggers rocky bru, etc even tun M's blog.. articles are written from their point of view.. there's no right or wrong, as long as views stated are backed by facts rather than simply hentam suka suka saja...

    ReplyDelete
  7. undi BN = macam hidup MO1 (dia tu dah makan quinoa tentu hidup panjang) atau hebatkan MO1 (dia tu dah dunia top kleptocrat nak hebatkan lagi) apa lagi MO1 (atau BN) mau???

    ReplyDelete
  8. It's good to see something good has finally come out of the abandoned Kemayan City project. However, if im not mistaken Lot 1 was opened in the late 90's. The only early 90's shopping mall that opened then were Pelangi and Kota Raya if i'm not mistaken.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Hi Annie,

    I think Rafidah speech make a lot of sense.

    Election is like a renewal of contract.

    Looking at both track record, Rafidah said Tun M government got A or at least B+ with KLCC, PLUS highway, Penang Bridge, KLIA, Proton, Putrajaya.

    Najib management got F with 1MDB, RM2.6 billion donation that goes into his account and etc.

    So, why on earth would anyone want to renew a contract with and F track record.

    I think we can evaluate Tun M and Najib which one got A and which one got F.

    ReplyDelete
  10. Namewee is always on my blacklist previously, but not this time, what he said in the video is to certain extent correct. the only thing is his presentation is a little bit crude.. but this is pale in comparison to Nga of Teluk Intan candidate.. poking fun at Tun M.. saying Lee Kuan Yew is waiting for Tun M to play mahjiang.. that's very rude.. it reflects Nga's poor upbringing by his mom..

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Never trust the chinese.
      Prof Kangkung

      Delete
  11. annie no prediction of GE14 outcome??? Macam BN dah ditumbangkan, dare not or too sad to blog about this end of BN???

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Dr M prediction BN MO1 will not hand over power to Harapan sigh

      Delete
  12. can ismail sabri explain this dumbo uturn - from boikot cina to peluk cina komunis aduhai

    ReplyDelete