Malaysianology #1: Low Cost Terminal to KLIA-2

Posted by Magician @ http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=331041&page=40


I had been traveling a lot these days and there are a lot of thoughts here and there conjured out from here and there and everywhere. Basically, I am against planning my blog post but I think it's time to at least get the theme right so that I can organize my mind when I am blogging. One of the series I had in mind for a long time is one about Malaysians and Malaysia. Bits of these and those. Let's call this series: Malaysianology. Now I think I gonna start with this one which is on my mind since yesterday night.

I didn't know of the very thing called new Low Cost Terminal nor KLIA (Kuala Lumpur International Airport) 2, until last night. The plan is shown in the figure above.

Why would I mention this out of nowhere? It's because the original theme for this new terminal is Low Cost Terminal and I heard from a contractor working on the KLIA-2 on stupid things that not even I can imagine of.

New LCT is meant to be 'low cost' but because it is such a huge piece of meat, every contractor and the person who applied for the grant (always a bumiputera, or aboriginals or in most cases in Malaysia, almost 99.999%, Malays) is trying their very, very, very best to squeeze as much money out of the government as possible. Now let me relay to you what I heard of:-

(1) In LCT standard, two levels of building is already considered a lot. HOWEVER, they built multiple stories, with 4 levels being the least. Thus, everything has to be upgraded, including shop lots, interior design, ventilation. The cost for the airport is RM$2 bil., and now it is nearly impossible to build the whole thing under RM$4 bil.;

(2) Thus, they decide that the name Low Cost Terminal is urm, inappropriate. They changed the name to KLIA-2. Wow.

(3) It is not unusual that a big projects involves a lot of contractors. In this case of "KLIA-2" involves unusually a lot. But that's not the point I want to make. The point I want to make is, they are so unsystematic that one design clashes the other. A control tower worth $RM 150 mil. was forced to be demolished and rebuilt because they found out that it blocks the line of sight of the pilot from the airport runway. Ridiculous? Not in Malaysia apparently. They just, you know, demolished it and rebuilt another one by the side. RM$150 mil. gone, just like that.

(4) The volume designed for the LCT is now urm, much much much lower than the amount of passengers that KLIA-2 can accommodate now, because everything is built so much extra in advance that the contractors themselves understood that unless Malaysia becomes a huge metropolitan city like Singapore or Hong Kong, or else it is near impossible to use up to even 50% of the volume.

So how do I feel after listening to these? Sad? Disappointed? Aghast?

How am I going to just accept these?

How much more stupidity like these I have to endure more, from the government and the thoughtless corrupted MPs trying to squeeze every part of the the $RM 5 mil. assigned to them so that they can put them in their pockets?

Fellow Malaysians, I, for one, cannot accept this at all. I believe, and still believe, KLIA happened in that way too because every time I was in KLIA, I felt its bizarre emptiness and casual traffic instead of the busy pace I experienced in Hong Kong. I cannot keep thinking myself that, what is wrong with the Malaysian government?

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Just Attempting

Suddenly cannot find a word and a direction in my mind. It's blank and full of pure simple emotions. Maybe I am too tired after so long, or maybe I just accepted that I am attempting to do the job instead of doing it, the part on communication with superiors and negotiation alike. I find that when I am doing a negotiation which I would like to strike a chord to, I would be so intimidating instead of accommodating, like what happened last Friday.

Just so obvious to me now, another mask removed.

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Am I a lost cause?

There were too much negative emotions in the 1 year and 7 months I'd been spending, studying the master research degree here.

To make it worse, for the past two months I think new ones sprouted.

As a rational university graduate (well, from UG for now I guess), especially with research training, I doubted since long whether I am the sole person who created all these troubles. I was a lost cause in my first semester, almost covered by darkness alone and there was no light permeating through my life. Not a single ray.

However all these darkness seems to be stripped off me forcefully by the end of December 2009, when I chose to step up and face it.

Then I came to see GL from a whole new angle, and then the time we spent together led me to self-awareness and thus to facing myself honestly, deleting each mask and layer as time goes by. And because of her, I found aikido, one of the closest discipline I encountered which ultimately led me to my first enlightenment experience.

I say, I am really grateful.

Don't curse me yet. I am not whining here. I am just, still doubtful.

I knew that I am very interested in language research. Now I understand I am more suitable to that field instead of being stuck here, unhappy.

I knew I want to spend some time in Japan to study both aikido and Japanese, to see how much more I can venture on this Way.

What you knew and what you are doing, in my case now, is perhaps at the most polarized extremes. The traditional Chinese perception is that you should persevere and just do it. But for me, each day is inching on with my heart screaming: You're just wasting time.

Moreover, I am starting to have this kind of uncomfortable barrier with old friends I made in my university. The feeling of me unable to be honest to them pains me, and the way they are trying to make a point to avoid making me feel bad make me feel worse. I guess the culture of Hong Kong does brew this kind of very strange way of communication with each other. I do not understand why. It seems to me that it is exceptionally hard to express honest feelings to each other comparing to that of which I experience with fellow Malaysians, Singaporeans and other nationalities.

On my side while all facets have already changed 180 degrees, looking at these people distancing away really, really does sadden me.

Then for a moment of two I am starting to think again: Am I the lost cause again?

When I am starting to blame the culture and the people, I think, maybe it's just me who doesn't fit in. I admit that I held up a considerable of pride to try to keep quiet and see what kind of reactions are tailing, although till now there is none, I am still too proud to keep my silence.

No matter what, I made new friends. New friends who I can work with in a totally honest fashion. I love that kind of frictionless communications. I guess from the start, one side has to initiate this atmosphere to ensure this feeling is secured and flowing.

Had a very fruitful experiment with a friend again last night on aikido. We learn that there is a huge difference between doing the technique itself or doing the technique in accordance to the attacker. When you are doing the latter, there is a feeling of engagement between your center and the attacker, and you are so aware of the connections that the flow of the technique is almost flawlessly circular.

I guess this is the way of communication too. Only when engagement happens, then feelings towards each other along with the intentions will be met and felt. At these moments, there is strange feeling that you are both relaxed and attentive, and your center feels really stabile. This is really, what I have been searching all along and trying to refine every moment I have the opportunity to.

Still, I am a lost cause, for I know what is going on and still I upheld the pride to not initiate conversations. Although I did send emails but I still do not think that is good enough.

Well, I have enough to deal in my hands already. The biggest one, is of course, to start commit to what I knew and understood all along, instead of wasting more time.

Somehow I sensed that there will be a severe thunderstorm about to cross my path very soon. I am waiting for it, since long, long ago. In fact, I welcome it. And I welcome the sunny rays that will shower me after the ordeal.

Life, after all, is about living, not living what others think you should be living. This becomes even a clearer fact when you had done more than a year of soul searching and really know for sure what are you going to do in your life when all these nightmares end.

Just let me be the lost cause for a little more. Just a little more.

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Trust, and Commitment

Had a long talk with GL tonight, albeit jeopardizing the urge to sleep thus still wide awake at this unearthly hour, it does reorganize what I had been toying with in my mind in just a cloudy form for the past few months. I gonna share with you all here.

At this very moment, I had seen what can be jeopardized by a non-committal attitude. And in this eventual awakening, I knew how many mistakes I made in the past that possibly caused a lot of chances coming by me wasted.

The very first of all, trust is something that you have to pay ultra-extra effort to earn but too, can be lost easily.

All my life I had been assuming too many things, including that which I can afford to be late, especially when it involves my best friend. However, it seems not to be so. Although I was late without receiving too much of just a scorn from my best friend, I definitely lost the confidence of him towards me if we were to be involved in something really serious, for example, business venture.

If I am late most of the time, I guess nobody will really put his/her faith in me even though he/she is my best friend.

Slight difference? Nope. Huge difference.

In this light, I come to understand just how much I did which, just out for my own comfort, in one way or another destroyed me. Yes, it destroyed me not just in terms of credibility, but most crucial of all, the determination to live on.

When Natalie Portman is asked what she thinks of afterlife, she said:-

"I don't believe in that. I believe this is it, and I believe it's the best way to live."

That exactly brings out the message of life. This is it. Live it, or live in lies. Commit, or spend most of your life dealing with 'reasons' of your non-committal attitude, especially after you promised something, whether formally or informally.

How much are you willing to commit to the words you utter out of your very own mouth? "I will come" but then you did not show up. Not even a message to clarify before that? For me, the acceptable time is to tell me at least one hour earlier, best if two hours earlier. Sorry, something's coming up and I might be late. How late? Be honest.

When you try to save face by being courteous: Oh no no no, just a few minutes late, and you turn up an hour late, guess what will happen. Well, most of the times nothing will happen. It just happens that you lost the trust of whoever that is at the receiving end that he/she will just 'assume' you won't have it serious the next time.

This, turns out to be really irresponsible. However if you were to speak on the enlightenment level, you are messing yourself up by living in your mind. Your own reasons. Your own expectations and cover-ups for the socially defined misbehavior. Who's gonna lose? Nobody nobody but you.

Natalie Portman had it right. This is it, this is the only life you are going to live. Commit, or die in vain. Living means committing.

Don't give reasons. Don't explain. If you just can't show up or don't want to, tell me that you won't. There's nothing to hide, nothing so hard after all. Be brave, be yourself, be a man. Face yourself, face your own life with the commitment that, this is the one and only life you are going to live.

p/s: Although I am being cool here, I realized there's still a long way from fully committing. I was late in the past few occasion as well. For those who were disappointed by me, I am sorry, although that apology really does not mean anything at all. I am, on the other hand, observing myself more and more intensely and calmly. I am really sorry.

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