changing pakcik

i have been in malaysia for close to three years. when i first got here i was told by some that certain things would never change. there were too deeply protected in the society, and changing such things would bring about a crisis that the government could never accept. the pakcik who run things on seemingly all levels are too protective of their hold on the country, it could just not happen. but i see the country changing as i watch… i wonder if anyone else senses that the things they thought impossible are now happening.

this country is accelerating the process of fracturing into the cosmopolitan and the rural communities represented almost singularly by the micro-sized copy of los angles we know as kuala lumpur, and the vast number of kampong communities which the expats here almost never see. for most expat, malaysia is KL, penang and a group of exclusive islands used for weekend getaways. the british used hilltop retreats to escape the tropical heat… KL locals now use them to gamble and experience a faux western location without air travel.

certain behaviors which only brought disgust and denial three years ago, are now openly discussed. not only do i have an openly gay staff member… or more… but the newest member of parliament is a married man, with 5 children, who no one can really say if he does or doesn’t also have a semi-hidden gay lifestyle. but, i am told is accepted by the gay community either way.

KL has nearly open prostitution, bars that stay open into the late hours of the night, a community of married men and woman who have secret, but not entirely hidden affairs, and the ability to find recreational drugs if you are interested. i have a couple next to me as i type this, the upwardly mobile chinese kid has GQ magazine in front of him and is drinking an espresso drink. in a loud voice he uses well known western colloquial phrases like, “let’s not fuck this up”. he just said, “you can find a lot of partners, you get what you need and you get out” followed by “i know there is a risk involved”. the two i thought were a couple are really a gay man and his female friend out for brunch to discuss his sex life.

when i tell people KL feels like the US this is what i mean. i could be sitting in the US right now and it would feel no different, the things around me would not be much different and the way i am going to spend the rest of my day would mostly be the same. KL continues to become more and more western, specifically american, but american in the early 60s. amercia has melted together, that has not happened here yet, sad and possibly dangerous.

i have been asking myself how this could happen and if it is a good thing. pertronas is quickly running out of oil to help fund the economy here, people still believe they should be retiring at 55, the economy is slowing down, inflation is picking up, and people expect higher raises. The fact that there is other competition outside the country, and that each act here reflects on the country as a whole is not really factored in. people only have a micro-view of their rice bowl, but the world views things in a macro sense and malaysia is not growing fast enough to compensate for its desires.

this is squeezing the small middle class which is crammed into KL and the klang valley. but, what is really hurting things is the self-driven need to copy and compete with the west. the need to have the status symbol of a western produced car, when they cost 3 times what they cost in the west… while the common person makes 25% of what someone makes in the US. this translates to cars which in real terms cost the price of a house in the US are being purchased by people who have the salary of a college drop-out working in starbucks in my home city.

building of real estate continues, junior staff members purchase homes and cars which they would not be allowed to get loans for in the US, but they do it expecting the homes value to have a 30% increase in over short periods to bail them out of danger. “las vegas” vacations are taken couched in the guise of a shopping or beach vacation. life in this sleepy little country on the other side of the world becomes more and more familiar to the westerner.

all of these thoughts were prompted the other morning when i was driving to breakfast and was aggressively cut off by two different middle-aged malay pakcik, not an upper class guy being driven in a western luxury sedan, a standard uncle wearing a songkok with makcik sitting next to him as he drove. this was a first for me, and it happened twice… it happened during ramahdan a time when the devil does not exist.

the pakcik are changing in government, they are losing power and will be replaced. but the pakcik-pakcik on the streets are changing too. when an uncle driving a waja cuts off a matsalleh driving a perdona i know something has changed in this country. i don’t mind getting cut off, i grew up with east coast drivers, i have no issues in boston, hartford or new york traffic, but … this is a “tipping point” moment. things are changing.

i had a meeting with my staff this week. i showed them that there was an opportunity, and benefit, of working more hours and measuring themselves against the staff in the west. i realized that i am helping to drive this change. 30% of my staff is naturally aggressive, a few of them went to school in the US, others have travelled there, but some have/had never left the country, but they are western in both mind-set and behavior. i have helped to foster that because it’s good for the company. the remaining staff is now the target of my “modification”. i am looking to make them a group that not only competes with, but beats americans at a game the west invented and is now bringing east.

as westerners continue to come here, as we show examples of consumerism, workaholism and socially progressive lifestyles are we doing the right thing?

i guess that’s for the people to decide. there are two malaysia’s, kampong is there to move back to, no one is telling them they need to be westerners… but if they have decided that they and their country are going to leave the third-world and enter the first… things do need to change. trying to pretend they have not already changed (and will continue to change faster as they can hold onto the rest of the world) is not going to bring success.

pakcik has figured things out, you can either sit in stalled traffic, or you can push forward.

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someone should tell the chinese guy on the other side of me though that not all things should be copied. red cargo shorts and orange croc clogs are a fashion no-no, east or west…