Blog
The Art of Compass Fixing
Lee Cheng Jie
If you ever fail to locate Cheng Jie, lay out a trail of teh tarik, pineapple pizza, B99 episodes, Malcolm Gladwell books, and she will come running to you.
It is ironic to admit that I am prouder to be Malaysian while studying in Manchester than back home in beautiful Pulau Pinang. Growing up in front of Astro Ceria, running along lorong’s carefreely, queueing up by the milo truck drenched in sweat, I took the Malaysian part of me for granted.
Because the brutal truth is that I also grew up consuming American television, reading more Penguin classics than pantun’s, having Ivy Leagues and Russell Group schools plastered all over my vision boards, and listing the English language as my native tongue. These were all things I had patched together to form my identity: the Malaysian kid who wanted nothing more than to be anywhere else, surrounded by the western culture she claims to fit in with.
In hindsight, of course, it was ignorant and privileged of me to dismiss all my home country had to offer, to be tricked by the western mirage. The fact that I had attended a Chinese private high school and spent my days hitting IGCSE books did not help, but this was no excuse for my not being updated when it came to Malaysian issues. I recognised then that even when there was a political shift in our country or a case of injustice committed against an individual or a group, there was nowhere and no one I could turn to debate the issue. We were discouraged from discussing anything political on school grounds, where most of my time was spent during my adolescence.
My awakening to reality came, unsurprisingly, when the pandemic ran rampant globally. At this point in time, I had been in college for a year. Suddenly, I was staying home just like everyone else, surrounded by an unlimited supply of content to consume. Billions of eyes across the globe were on their respective governments, tracking every policy and mandate implemented to contain the spread of the pandemic whilst stabilising economic activity. My father, who worked from home during this period, would spend his after-work evenings in front of the television, the news anchors’ voices turned up that I could hear it from my room.
I began sitting with him on the couch, watching silently as layers of our country were peeled back by the pandemic. I lingered at the dinner table for longer, even after I was done with my meal, bringing up any topic that came to my mind and earnestly waiting for my father to expand on it, to let me in on a fresh perspective. My father, bless the man, is an endless tank of insight on his own who still debates the news with me through video calls to this day.
But that was just the beginning.
When I started pursuing my undergraduate in Manchester and was, by chance, introduced to the United Kingdom and Eire Council for Malaysian Students, my life took a sharp turn, and so did my identity. My initial motivations for joining UKEC were simply to make friends and form a community I could depend on away from home, but I reaped much more. UKEC, operating on its five pillars, serves not only Malaysian students abroad in the UK and Ireland, but also our country back home.
And so, I increasingly became exposed to the myriad issues Malaysia has been and is currently battling. I became well-acquainted with the commonly thrown-around acronyms and relentlessly headlined problems out of necessity. Out of necessity. I don’t think many people understand the gravity of such a scenario. To be compelled by forces unknown to read the news every day, to not only be an observer of the way your country works, but also to participate in it, to propose charted courses, and to decide which star we should follow to arrive at the future we aspire.
The more I read and the deeper I searched, what I have come to realise is how wrong I was to hold the West in such high regard, that outside of its silver screen portrayal, the West has waves of issues across the political, economic, and social landscapes that won’t be calmed anytime soon, just like Malaysia does. If this was the case, should I not have a duty to improve my motherland? Not in competition with the West or in hopes that we could one day attain the status of a “developed country,” but simply because it is the country whose streets I ran along, whose languages I speak, and whose well-being reflects on mine.
As my colleagues and I stepped onto trains around the UK to host regional events, it became clearer than ever that there is hope for the future. These young minds abroad have strong roots tethered to home, and there is no sign of them giving up anytime soon. It might have taken a while, but the realisation eventually dawned on me that all of us want what is best for our country; it truly is as simple as that. The challenge comes in understanding the various definitions of “best” that individuals have, which is the core reason why UKEC exists.
More than anything, we hold a loudspeaker in our hands and encourage the youth to tell us—and our country—what they envision for the future of Malaysia and how they think we’re going to get there. Can our current compasses get us to that ideal land, or does it require fixing?
The conversation may never end, and I hope it never does as we continuously strive for a higher level of betterment. But if you want to participate in conversations that matter, look no further than UKEC’s oldest flagship, Projek Amanat Negara, coming back for its twentieth edition this February in Manchester.
Sign up today at https://pan-xx-2023.eventbrite.co.uk