What is it to be Truly Malaysian?

Your sentences end with any tail word - “Lah”, “Ah”, “Loh”...

(Loo Yi Huan)

There is a slogan says that - If you're Malaysian, just say “Lah”.

According to Shaun (2008), the very unique term “Lah” is most commonly can be heard in Malaysia and Singapore, even we have three and above different races, but we used to end our sentences with “lah”. This term could have originated from our main language - Malay, or inter-borrow phrases and expressions from any other local languages or dialects.

Only a Malaysian born and bred in this country will know how to use the “lah” properly. Based on an article in the Malaysian Trade Quarterly (Jan-March 1995), it has stated that a lot of foreigners have the mistaken notion which let them get away with a good impression of accent of Malaysian by adding a “lah” to the end of every sentence.

Here are a few examples of using “lah” in the sentences: 

·        "You see lah, like that also you cannot do!" (Can't you even do such a simple thing?) 

·        Hey, shut up lah! (Could you please be quite?)

·        "No fun lah, you!" (You're really no fun at all!) 

Beyond that, other than the term “Lah”, Malaysians still have more tail words up their sleeves or off their tongues. For instance, “Ah”, “Wah”, “Loh”, “Leh”, “Meh”, “Hor”, and so on so forth.

First of all, the term “Ah” is also very popular in Malaysia. It has tons of meanings and expresses the feelings, just depending on how it is used. For instance, a simple “Thank you” to a Malaysian may sound too curt. Most Malaysians would prefer to say “Thank you ah!” as it sounds friendlier and softer.

Other than that, a “Okay ah” response and a “Okay lah” response are also different in meanings. If someone were to ask her friend a question, such as, "Do you want to eat Japanese Food?”

·        The response of “Okay ah!” means that she is totally agreed to eat Japanese Food.

·        The response of “Okay lah…” means that she agrees as well but not really wanted to eat Japanese food. 

Sometimes, Malaysians will not only use single or double tail words in the sentences, but also with another languages or dialects. For instance:

·        “Wah, you very pandai (clever) loh!” (2 tail words and a Malay word)

·        "He's so bodoh (stupid) lah!" (one tail word and a Malay word)

·        “I belanja (treat) you lah!” (one tail word and a Malay word)

·        You so kepo (busybody) hor? This is none of your business. (one tail word and a dialect – Hokkien)

·        "Why your dressing so Ah Beng (frumpy) one ah?" (one tail word and a dialect – Hokkien)

·        “Cincai (Whatever) lah, what you order I also can eat” (one tail word and a dialect)

Last but not least, tail words not only appear at the end of sentences, but also somewhere in the middle, for example:

·        Tell me the truth lah man!

·        Don’t cry for that bad guy lah sis, you deserve better.

All in all, Malaysians usually speak two types of English, one is the proper English which particularly using in professional or business settings; another one is Malaysian-English, which comes with its unique and irreplaceable expressions.

References

Astro. 10 ways you know you’re Malaysian. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.astro.com.my/negaraku/ArticleDetails?articleId=2389&catId=92 [Accessed 17 March 2016].

Yiyang, Yuan. 2014. Why do Singaporeans say ‘lah’ at the end of every sentence? [ONLINE] Available at: https://www.quora.com/Why-do-Singaporeans-say-lah-at-the-end-of-every-sentence [Accessed 17 March 2016].

Su Kim, Lee. The Adorable Lah – Authentically Malaysian. [ONLINE] Available at: http://pgoh13.com/article_lah.php [Accessed 17 March 2016].

We prefer our food as spicy as they come.

(Tang Cheah Ying)

Malaysian cuisine is a unique melting pot of Malay, Chinese, Indian and Nonya cooking and cultures that build deeply-layered spicy flavors. For our Malaysian, we would like to throwing pepper on something doesn’t qualify as ‘spicy’ such as sambal belacan, chili potong, chili padi, chili sauce, or dry chili powder. No matter how hot the weather is, our passion of spicy food still remains the same.  When you were eating at nasi kandar mamak, you can see Malaysian would like to ask the staff for “kuah campur” which means variety of curry mixed together on rice.

 

 

I am the one who loves spicy food too! I like to add on sambal chili in my food. When I was eating hokkien mee, curry mee, fried rice and so on.  For an example, my friends and I always like to eat those meatballs selling by a peddler  in front of our school. We always like to eat with many types of chili sauce and chili powder as long as it is enough spicy for us. 

Our Malaysian national cuisine must be Nasi Lemak. Nasi Lemak is basically rice cooked in coconut milk packing with banana leaf by Malay. Depending on where you are in Malaysia, it comes with variety of accompaniments, such as hard-boiled egg, peanuts, cucumber, ikan bilis, and sambal sauce. Nasi Lemak is traditionally eaten by Malaysian for breakfast and perfect match with a cup of teh tarik or traditional coffee.

Lastly, we love to add on chili padi, or sambal on everything we eat! This isn't just limited to local food. Whether when eating KFC fried chicken, McDonald's burger orpizzas, we always like an extra adding or chili sauce or chili flakes. We like our food as tough, dramatic, and sweet-inducing as a wrestlng match. We're not bland and our food shouldn't be either.

Reference

Malaysian cuisine: What to eat. CNN Travel. 2016. [ONLINE] Available at: http://travel.cnn.com/malaysian-food-334106/. [Accessed 19 March 2016].

Ten ways you know you are malaysian. CNN Travel. 2016. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.astro.com.my/negaraku/ArticleDetails?articleId=2389&catId=92 [Accessed 19 March 2016].

We feed our phone before we feed ourselves.

(Ong Beng Fung)

I will like to talk about one of the Malaysian eating habits. Based on a survey which has done by Astro, there are 10 ways that we know we are Malaysian. One of the ways is that “we feed our phone before we feed ourselves”. Nowadays, our technology is become more and more advanced in the world, most of everyone have at least one high tech product on hand including child and the aged.

Besides that, there are also a lot of social media and the increase of sharing platforms. Such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat and so on. Because of these, now most of the teenagers will take pictures of everything they eat and upload or share it on various social media. I’m also one of the people who like to snap my food before I eat. Whether we’re eating Japanese food, local food or Western food, whether we’re fine dining restaurant or eating at Mamak, whether we’re with friend or alone.

  

 

So far snap picture are a must for Malaysian. So it gradually become our Malaysian eating culture. In addition to this, not only teenagers will do this, elders also keep up the pace of young people start to follow the custom, snap the food before eat and upload to Facebook, even my parents also will do this.

      

You can see in the picture they are busy on snap the food, even man also doing this. Many people starts to master the skill of food photography, and some of them want to take the perfect food photo they will try to find the best angle like the picture at above, some more if needed they will request that you turn the torchlight feature on your smart phone to give their photo a better lighting. Finish snap the nice food photo then everyone start sharing it to their own social media, that’s why this call “we feed our phone before we feed ourselves”, and it also become one of our Malaysian eating culture. 

Reference

Astro. 10 ways you know you’re Malaysian. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.astro.com.my/negaraku/ArticleDetails?articleId=2389&catId=92 [Accessed 20 March 2016].

Jellytelly. 2014. [Kopitiam] Do you snap before you eat? [ONLINE] Available at: http://en.miui.com/thread-63856-1-1.html  [Accessed 20 March 2016].

MOBerator 4. 2015. Top 10 Malaysian Eating Habits. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.mob.com.my/news/community/november-2015/top-10-malaysian-eating-habits#.Vu6YeOJ96Uk  [Accessed 20 March 2016].

You call everyone “Boss”

(Goh Fang Yi)

How to be a boss in Malaysia? The fastest way to be a boss is to be a waiter at any Mamak restaurant in Malaysia. For god-knows-why reasons, everyone will call you boss.

In Malaysia, we seem to develop the tendency to call elderly “aunty” and “uncle”. We also call everyone else “boss” or “bro”. “Boss” in Malaysia’s culture is not literally mean boss as in the head of an organization or owner of a company. You call everyone “boss”, and you don’t work for any of them, this is the culture of Malaysia. Your lawyer, your barber, the guy serving you at the Mamak- they’re all your “boss”. For example, when you need them to calculate the bill, you just say, “Boss, kira”. Or we might say, “Boss, kuah lebih sikit”, to Mamak waiter, or “Anneh, ice kosong one”.  “Anneh” is stand for Indian guys. It makes no sense at all, but it’s friendly and respectful. The mixture of languages in one sentence is the nature to us Malaysians.

Besides, in Malaysia’s culture, some of the Chinese men will call their wife as “Tauke”. “Tauke” (Malay) when translated directly to English means boss. The men will call their wife as “Tauke” when they are talking in front of their friends. For example, “My tauke don’t allows me go out today”. They are respecting their wife and put their wife at first as they call their wife as “Tauke”. 

In addition, most of the Malaysians will called all the elder as “uncle” and “auntie” no matter who you are, and either they know or do not know you. All theirs relative are “uncle” for men, and “auntie” for women as well. Sometime my dad and mum will scold me when I call my relatives as uncle and auntie without called them with the proper and respect dear title. The way of Malaysians talk is the sense of belonging. This is the unique of Malaysia, and only in Malaysia.  

Reference

Funnymalaysia.net. (2014). How to Act Like a Malaysian. [online] Available at: http://www.funnymalaysia.net/how-to-act-like-a-malaysian/ [Accessed 20 Mar. 2016].

Malaysians hope for a holiday

(Kang Sing Yee)

When people heard the word of “Public Holiday”, we can imagine that there is a holiday is coming and peoples no need to wake up early for working or studying. This is the happiest news that people want to hear ever. Do you think so?

Especially we hope for a public holiday whenever our athletes win at sports. Whether it’s our badminton stars at Thomas Cup, our athletes at the Olympic game or our football team at the Suzuki Cup and we wish that they do well and win at the sports.

The first example, when our badminton star, Lee Chong Wei was won in the recent Thomas Cup Final, Malaysians are happy and excited while waiting for the government declared of the public holiday.

The second example which is the Selangor state government has declared Monday (Dec 14, 2015) a state holiday after its football team won the Malaysia Cup. It is also Selangor's 33rd Malaysia Cup win. Therefore, the state of Malaysians can have a holiday with it. Obviously a sports victory is a big deal for the nation, and Malaysians as well. This is a holiday due to the great news.

How about the bad news? But the holiday is still going on.

I believe that everyone also know that the weather are going worse and worse in recent day. In year 2015 of October, Education Minister announced that there are few of schools in several states are force to close due to the worsening haze. In year 2016 of March, Education Ministry announced that the temperatures in the northern region went above 37°C for more than three consecutive days; therefore the Education Ministry made a decision that the schools in Kedah and Perlis will be closed for two days.

In order to protect the health of students during the hot weather, so the Education Minister is announced for a holiday to the certain schools. This is the bad news that I said.

References

Wani Mutihiah. 2015. Selangor declares Monday a public holiday following Malaysia Cup win. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.thestar.com.my/news/nation/2015/12/13/selangor-declares-monday-a-public-holiday-following-malaysia-cup-win/ [Accessed 21 March 2016].

Astro. 10 ways you know you’re Malaysian. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.astro.com.my/negaraku/ArticleDetails?articleId=2389&catId=92 [Accessed 21 March 2016].

Malaymail Online. 2016. Kedah, Perlis schools to close for two days amid heatwave. [ONLINE] Available at: http://www.themalaymailonline.com/malaysia/article/kedah-perlis-schools-to-close-for-two-days-amid-heatwave [Accessed 21 March 2016].

                                                                                          

CAPITAL ACCOUNT LIBERALIZATION AND ECONOMIC PERFORMANCE IN MALAYSIA

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Pronouns  (pink)

Adjectives  (coco)

Articles  (yellow)

Determiners  (dark purple)

Adverbs   (light purple)

Verbs   (grey)

Prepositions  (orange)

Conjunctions  (green)

CAPITAL ACCOUNT LIBERALIZATION AND ECONOMICPERFORMANCE IN MALAYSIA

(Loo Yi Huan - Joyce) 

This study examines the impact of capital account liberalization on economic growth in Malaysia from 1970 to 2004. It uses two measures of capital account openness, namely de jure (an index of liberalization) and de facto (the volume of capital flows). The empirical results based on the modified growth model demonstrate that the de jure measure of capital account liberalization shows an adverse effect on growth in Malaysia. However, the de facto measure shows a robust positive effect on economic growth. The results also highlight that the effect of capital account liberalization on growth is contingent on a country’s level of financial development and the quality of its institutions.

Introduction

The past decade has witnessed a dramatic increase in international capital flows from developed countries to developing countries. Many developing countries implemented trade and financial liberalization programmes in the late 1980s including their capital accounts, hoping to fuel economic growth by attracting foreign investment. Nevertheless, the financial crises in Mexico, East Asia, Russian and Latin America in the early and late 1990s gave increased prominence to the debate over the benefits and costs of capital account liberalization. These crises occurred in the wake of increasing financial openness, prompting some economists to question the perceived benefits of open capital accounts (Rodrik, 1998). Instead, liberalization invites speculative money flows and increases the likelihood of financial crises with no discernible positive effects on investment, output, or any other real variable with nontrivial welfare implications (Rodrik, 1998; Stiglitz, 2002). On the other hand, many economists argue that the traditional theoretical benefits of increasing financial openness outweigh any potential costs (Fischer, 1997). Such benefits include greater risk diversification opportunities, a more efficient global allocation of resources and increased discipline on domestic policymakers.

(Tang Cheah Ying - Eva)

According to Singh (2002), one of the most controversial issues in examining the relationship between financial liberalization and long-term economic performance is capital account liberalization. This is because it is the area where there is the greatest disconnection between economic theory and actual events in the real world. Neoclassical theory suggests that the external capital flows should be equilibrating and help smooth a country’s consumption or production paths. The proponents of neo-classical theory argue that the case for free capital flows is no different than that for free trade. A good starting point in analyzing the link between capital account liberalization and long-term economic performance is the broad-brush approach adopted by Singh (1997). He suggests that the experience of developed countries is very useful for developing countries. This is because the developed countries have operated under a regime of relatively free trade and capital flows for nearly two decades. The experience of these countries therefore provides a useful test case for assessing the benefits of liberalization and globalization. The evidence suggests that the economic performance of developed countries, namely The United States, Japan, Germany, United Kingdom, The G7 countries, EU15 and OECD, has had less than impressive in the post 1980 s. For example, The GDP growth, the productivity growth and employment in the 1980 s and 1990 s under a liberal regime of private capital flows were much lower than that achieved in the 1950 s and 1960 s.

Rodrik (1998) examined the effects of capital account liberalization on economic performance in developing countries. The indicator of capital account liberalization employed was the proportion of years from 1975 to 1989 the where the capital account was free of restrictions. His study controlled other relevant variables to the as initial income, initial secondary school enrollment, the index of the quality of government institutions and regional dummies for a sample of 100 developed and developing countries from 1975 to 1975.

(Ong Beng Fung - Bieber)

He found no relationship between the capital account liberalization in these countries and three indicators of economic performance, namely GDP per capita growth, share of investment in GDP and inflation. In other words, there was no evidence in the data that countries without capital controls grew faster, invested more or experienced lower inflation. The objectives of this study are two-fold. First, it examines the impact of capital account liberalization on economic growth in Malaysia. Second, this study further investigates whether a country with better financial development and good institutions would derive a higher growth effect from capital account liberalization. Representing an extension of previous empirical work, this study provides direct testing of the effect of capital account liberalization on growth. It also investigates the roles of financial market development and institutions channels to further establish empirical validity for the effect of capital account liberalization on economic growth.

Four motivations give rise to this study. First, Malaysia imposed capital controls on inflows and account transactions in the beginning of 1994 after the late 1993 capital flight, and later fixed the exchange rate in September 1998 due to the 1997–1998 East Asian The Singapore Economic Review 1350022-2 financial crisis. However, both of these capital control episodes were gradually dismantled and lifted in August 1994 and the early 2000s, respectively. These capital control measures created an ideal laboratory to investigate the effect of capital account liberalization on economic growth in Malaysia.2 Second, although much research has examined this issue (Singh, 1997, 2002, 2003; Stiglitz, 2000, 2002; Quinn, 1997; Rodrik, 1998; Krol, 2001; Eichengreen, 2001; Levine, 2001; Eichengreen and Leblang, 2003; Klein, 2005; Quinn and Toyoda, 2008; Klein and Oliver, 2008), the empirical results are generally inconclusive. One explanation is an increased probability that countries will experience financial crises when they open up their financial markets to foreign capital. In addition, good institutions may be needed to ensure that countries enjoy the benefits of financial globalization.

(Goh Fang Yi)

Third, to the best of our knowledge, no empirical studies have been undertaken to assess the effect of capital account liberalization on economic growth in Malaysia. Fourth, some authors argue that capital account liberalization has both direct and indirect effects via financial market and institutional channels (Edison et al., 2002; Eichengreen and Leblang, 2003; Klein, 2005; Bekaert et al., 2005; Klein and Oliver, 2008). Therefore, it is crucial to evaluate whether the effect of capital account liberalization on growth is subject to the country’s level of financial depth and the quality of its institutions. This provides another view of the way policies tend to work, instead of expecting to find a direct negative or positive effect from capital account liberalization on growth.

Quinn (1997) found that the change in capital account liberalization had a strongly positive and significant effect on economic growth in 58 cross-countries from 1960 to 1989. In contrast and similar to Rodrik’s (1998) finding, Kraay (1998) also found no evidence that the combination of open capital accounts and strong financial systems were correlated with long-term economic performance in large cross-sections of countries. In another view, Klein and Oliver (2008) viewed financial depth as an endogenous variable in the process linking financial liberalization and economic growth. They found that capital account liberalization had a substantial impact on growth via the deepening of a country’s financial system. However, this applies only to a subsample of highly industrialized countries. Klein and Oliver (2008) concluded that the beneficial effects of capital account liberalization, at least with respect to promoting financial depth, were achieved only in an environment in which there was a constellation of other institutions that can usefully support the changes brought about by the free flow of capital.

(Kang Sing Yee)

Edwards (2001) addressed the hypothesis that capital account liberalization had different effects in high and low income countries. Using Rodrik’s (1998) controls but Quinn’s (1997) measure of the intensity of capital account restrictions in 1973 and 1988, he claimed that liberalization boosted growth in the 1980s in high income countries but slowed it in low income countries. The dummy variable for capital account openness enters negatively; in other words, while the interaction term between capital account openness and per capital income enters positively. Edwards (2001) further showed that the significance of capital controls evaporates when the IMF index used by Rodrik (1998) was substituted for Quinn’s (1997) more differentiated measure. Thus, it is tempting to think that the absence of an effect in previous studies is a statistical artefact. There is some suggestion that capital account liberalization is more beneficial in more financially and institutionally developed countries.

The remainder of this study is organized as follows. The next section describes the empirical model and econometric methodology. The third section explains the data employed in the analyses and the fourth section reports and discusses the estimation results. The final section presents a summary and conclusions.