Hello Steemians!

I broke my daily posts routine again haha.... but I had a really good reason for that.

Yesterday, 09 May 2018, was a historical day for myself for everyone.

Just as my friend shared with me,

While my parents and grandparents shared with me about 13 May (during the massacre), I will tell my children and grandchildren about 9 May (when Malaysia is re-born)

Yes folks. For the very first time, many of us, almost all of us, more than 50% of men and women of Malaysia, took the extra mile to make a difference. Even some sacrifices were made along the way.

This is a very un-Malaysian as we have been perceived to be Leisure Loving People

Thanks and no thanks to our dearly beloved late Tunku Abdul Rahman, our first Prime Minister of Malaysia. It was both our strength and our weakness at the same time.

But we started to wake up.

Well, at least for me. Because I personally have not done this for the sake of my country before.

It all started at 3am

I wished I remembered to save my photos from LIT which I was posting my progress while stuck in the jam. One of my buddies and bestie since 2000 ever since I started working in KL, hardly slept, came to my house at 3am by the help of her husband while we started our journey about almost an hour later; after I realised my Touch and Go card needed top up for the highway tolls and I needed to order some drive through food since I didn't eat anything since 6pm earlier haha.

Although with some jam for a short while, we saw many cars from all over heading up North or South, knowing that we were not alone on the road. There were even cars stopped by the roadside along with long trailers (who usually rest during night drives) and the entire journey was very peaceful. There were no "road blocks" (as circulated by people to invoke fear) and the journey was way much better than the usual festive season jam despite of the heavy traffic. Before 7am we already arrived my hometown and I managed to send my buddy to her home where her brother awaits.

A cold hometown

As I drove through the city heading back to my parent's place, I have not seen such a quiet city of Ipoh ever at 7am. Usually at this time you will see people already on the road heading to work, and hawkers would have already serving breakfast. Not the day of the General Election. All the shops in town were closed and even markets near my parents' home had hardly any people opening the stalls early. The 24 hour mamak (Indian Muslim) eateries looked really empty even though business were still running. It was an unusual feel and phenomenal feel for me as I drove through quiet, almost dead-like city and towns before I reached to my parents' 30 minutes later.

Off to Vote!

Despite of rumours how bad the situation is going to be since the ruling government will do whatever it takes to stay power, my hometown was welcomed with cheer and excitement. You see no one with frown or worried faces, just smiles and chats and the volunteers were super nice and informative with directions. The most important is that those who did not know which gate to go for voting pro-actively went to check their latest voting information. That was the most organised and smooth process I have seen despite I have to queue for 1.5 hour just to arrive as the 85th voter for my queue.

No One Complained

Despite the long queue, everyone were in high spirits. Every single senior citizens who had trouble walking in or weak were all wheeled in first to vote. Other senior citizens who were in lane one, those who were usually above 50s or 60s, did not even complain or demanded that older individuals were wheeled in first. They all knew they need to get it done and everyone patiently waited with happy chit-chatting about how the process will be done.

I even get to take pictures and with this surprising reflexology path inside the secondary school. This allows students and teachers who were feeling tired could just come over, take off their shoes and just walk pass these painful spiky pebbles just to massage their foot for the sake of internal health. I have never seen this in schools before during my studying days and I think this school did a fantastic job.

(Some kids played along challenging themselves to walk the path while they wait for their parents to vote, which is quite entertaining to see their reactions)

My Wait is Over

Finally. Patience paid off as it was my turn to vote. The officer accidentally called my Identity Card ID wrongly and I gently corrected her, but it was a happy time. We all laughed and she apologised loudly so that she can re-recite my ID again. I truly was very grateful that the second officer that was supposed to ink my left forefinger stopped immediately when there was a mistake. She asked me not to do anything until I made sure my name was correctly mentioned and my ID was returned to me before I was handed my voting papers.

Their work were professional and quick at my side, and I went out showing off my inked finger with a smile while the rest that were queuing clapped and smiled with thumbs up. What a positive environment we had there.

Other places had some confusion.

Although my area was smooth, there were indeed some confusion in other places. The ballot boxes were mislabeled, whether deliberately or unintentionally. But some volunteers were sharp enough to verify and quickly rectify it. Here is one of the celebrities who mentioned about the incident but he was basically not upset (despite of fake news about him lashing out on the volunteers). More confusion came but in the end it was clarified and no votes cast by the general public were void (unless they spoiled the vote intentionally or accidentally) and not placing at the wrong !

Back to my parents' place

After my vote, I went home seeing the other voting station that was closer to my parents' home were fully packed. I was voting at a totally different district (as now I feel it was a blessing in disguise) and my parents who were first not wanting to cramp in queue to vote, has decided to head out to see the situation after 11 am after I told them how peaceful it was to vote from my voting district.

I believe that was the very blessing in disguise came in. If all 3 of us would have been voting at the same place early in the morning my parents would have to endure the queue. My mom being unable to see well were escorted promptly and assisted to dip her forefinger. My dad with his cane and his wobbly steps were also allowed his time to vote.

By the time I found a parking place they already were walking out. The police who were in charged at the senior citizens lane said we missed the heavy crowd and it was a great time for my elderly parents to vote.

That is where I receive as a sign of Grace from Heaven. Even if you noticed the picture above, while my intention was to capture how jammed the parking was, I noticed the rays from the scarce clouds above showed some magnificent rays captured by my camera. Oh how grateful that is for me to see it!

Early Celebration

After voting we head to a store to get some essential stuffs before heading home to celebrate an early birthday for my mom. It is going to be this Friday and I feel it is going to be special because it is going to be a memorable one because its is coincide with the birth of a new country.

Even the cake was an unplanned prophecy that it is going to be a wow factor for our lives in this country!

Jam, with Patience and Anxiousness

At 3pm when it is time for me and my buddy to head back to the capital, I realised that everyone were thinking the same and we ended up jamming back to the capital.

But with another miracle and blessing, it didn't take us too long to head back, except about 4 hours drive; which usually for festive season it could be until 7 hours.

I supposed most of them who came home to vote decided to stay back to make sure that the election process was fair.
My buddy had to work tomorrow (in case nothing happens) and so I too decided to head back before I return to my hometown again on Sunday to take my mom to the hospital for her General Anesthetic test before her eye surgery at the end of June.

While we were still on the road when it was 5pm, my buddy was reading through all the headlines from Facebook and facebook live, and we also realised that we needed more prayers for this country.

Despite our smooth (for my buddy it was a little confused because her area had 9 voting lanes) process, other states were battling from corruption.

The state of Selangor, one of the largest states that had the opposition coalition who wants a new government, was in a very crucial state where there were so many attempted foul play taking place. While I was driving I could hear from Facebook live videos that people were all defending their polling stations during counting process from foul vehicles, unfortulately from police cars, to bring in pre-marked (skewed) parliament vote tickets (that was not voted by the citizens) into the scene.

If you guys are curious I think you can search in Facebook for GE14 past facebook live videos.

I truly appreciate and am grateful for those who hold the fort and avoided fraud to happen to crucial polling stations.

 
I dozed off for a few hours due to exhaustion of lack of sleep and driving (since I am not a volunteer I could do nothing but just pray and give thanks to God), I woke up to a sea of red results to see that for the very first time in history, Malaysians decided to sacrifice complacency and learn to be uncomfortable for the sake of change.

For as long as I was born, I have never seen this sort of result from Federal Territory. No matter how hard the opposition was, it was always a sea of blue.

  This has truly spoken that the people are tired of having their country's flag humiliated countless times throughout the years, from scandals to corruption.

And believe it or not. God answered His people's cry.

This reminded me of the story in Exodus when the Hebrew people mourn for freedom and God answered and brought them out; when the Philippines where mourning for a new leader God rose that one man who had to make all hard decisions to deliver Philippines from corruption; when the USA was crying for a different kind of president and American citizens rose to vote; and now Malaysia woke up as a nation together for the first time crying out, "enough is enough."

And in all the gratefulness, there were some sadness in me too

I had a friend, a mentor, a senior whom I knew during my school days who trained me to be a better young teen who was running for a Parliament seat, but he was at the wrong (corrupted) party. I personally believed he was trying to change and make things new from within and he was succeeding - based on my old classmates and schoolmate's testimony, unfortunately he was sacrificed along the way, not of his fault, but because the people knew that the needs of a nation outweighed the needs of a small town.

I truly hope that he will contest again in the future, while keep serving the public because I know he will do great as a leader for I know he has a good heart.
And I hope the opposition party, now heading toward to form a ruling government, will see pass parties and collaborate together for a better township of my hometown.

Keeping Faith On while Penning Down My Last Thoughts

As we enjoyed a unique experience of "government-less" nation for a few hours, about 40 minutes more, even though being government-less has been quite a push for those who promote #anarchy (absence of government and absolute freedom of the individual, regarded as a political ideal) these days, I believe my nation is not ready for this and some order is still greatly needed while I pray for every of my fellow nation who stays in Malaysia to exercise self-accountability and accountability for one another.

Join me together to experience a new birth of a new nation. Let the once glowing country of "potato and doghead" (I'll explain it next time. It's nothing offensive) be restored in NEW GLORY and NEW RIGHTEOUSNESS with the blessing of God Almighty.

On an end note let me share with you scriptures that holds dearly in my heart

And I will restore to you the years that the locust hath eaten, the cankerworm, and the caterpiller, and the palmerworm, my great army which I sent among you. Joeh 2:25
Again I will build thee, and thou shalt be built, O virgin of (Malaysia*): thou shalt again be adorned with thy tabrets, and shalt go forth in the dances of them that make merry. Jeremiah 31:4

*The name was personalized to Malaysia

And another happier end-note, I would like to share my country's dearest 93 (probably going to be the oldest in world history) former Prime Minister, re-nominated Prime Minister (hopefully) Tun Mahathir's end note. His statement of BS has my highest respect and salute. He never fail to make his citizens laugh with his sense of humour.

ps: He is not perfect. He knew his short-comings and mistakes during his time as a Prime Minister, and we are grateful he has finally aware and want to make amends.

Until then

Thank You for Your Time

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