alhamdulillah. i was there. completing the third chapter of my bersih story. so grateful that i was able to get involve in another epic of malaysian history. not having so many polices around had eased our journey to CM. ambiga was there to lead the crowd to dataran merdeka. i had a nice stroll at petaling street before that, watched floods of chinese people gathered with such enthusiasm, shared a packet of biscuits that i brought with a chinese elderly and had a quick photography session there. F and i bought yellow towels and even a mysterious guy handed me a yellow ribbon before he suddenly disappeared.
after zuhur prayer, we then marched towards dataran merdeka. the only challenges during that time was the extremely hot weather. we couldn't go any more further because jalan tun perak had already been crammed with people. it was in fact a very peaceful and calm rally. the demonstrators had really "Duduk & Bantah", acted CIVILIZED enough (so far from what they called as 'monyet kena belacan'). one chinese man then shouted, "ambiga had announced that bersih 3.0 was successful. now everyone can peacefully disperse". so, we headed backwards, walking towards CM LRT station, before we bumped into mat sabu's crowd in front of maybank building. it was about to end, then i whiffed the tear gas. i ran but slowed down to look for F, my demo-mate. i heard she cried, "humm, pedih, pedih". i just put some salt into her mouth when she couldn't find hers and asked her to cover her nose and mouth with the wet towel, and grabbed her hand and continued to run.
merciless!
i understand if the polices wanted to use teargas to disperse the crowd that was said to breach the dataran merdeka area (i was not anywhere near the provocation area, so i dare not to comment anything about it). but why on earth did they send the gas to jalan tun perak and others that the crowd had already on their way to disperse peacefully? shots after shots of teargas were bombarded to the people. despite all the chaotic things that occur, it was indeed a happy day - more like a carnival for the attendees. there will always be angels in disguise throughout the rally, sharing salts, water, handkerchiefs, and even consoled each other regardless of their races, ages and religions. 1 Malaysia? yes we are!
frustration
the mainstream media had never portrayed Bersih fairly. did they even interview any of the participants to hear their thoughts? none. and it seems so difficult to speak in an intelligent manner about this, because those who rule are not intelligent enough and too stroppy in dealing with this situation. plus, their premise stating that the participants support ambiga's LGBT movement is so ridiculous. how did actually a rally that seek for an electoral reform had turned into a demonstration calling for LGBT rights?
i never wish to witness any violence nor riots, and i believe everyone wish the same. none of us happily and willingly attended the rally just to provoke the polices to let us inhale those teargas or to rain us with water canon; and thus making them look bad and let us be the heroes. can't they simply understand all that we want is a clean and fair election? not more or less. i still can't understand the fact of us being blamed and offended for asking this basic humanity rights. ~sigh~
5 days ago
