WITNESSING AN UNNECESSARY ACCIDENT AT 6.07 P.M. ON 28 JULY, 2015 AT DAMAI PERDANA…

It is damn hard to sympathize with people who are reckless in their driving. Even if you try to you tend to feel sorry for them than to sympathize with them.

In the west these people are said to have an adrenalin rush. But in Malaysia they are said to be rushed by the devils and Satans.

They can be said to be people with single-track minds who are point to point drivers who only know where they want to go to and not care a hoot for the journey they have to take to get there, which can be a wonderful experience.

No one expects them to stop anywhere to smell the roses as there are no roses planted by the sides of the road; and if there are chances are the roses would not have been allowed to grow; they would be chopped off and stolen by some people who thought they could sell them for a tidy profit.

A friend of mind put some fake plastic roses on the ground beside a flower tree and even these plastic flowers were stolen. They are nice and can be put in the houses.

What is the most unfortunately is that, most of those in Malaysia who drive recklessly and who like to rush while driving are those who do not have any real future in anything that they do. So, what’s the big rush to do nothing and achieve nothing?

This is what’s puzzling me.

But the psychologists, sociologists and psychiatrists in Malaysia are not about to conduct any serious research on this. They are also not in any rush to do it because they do not seem to be aware of this problem, taking it as the Malaysian way of life – or death!

Even those who claim to be erudite in Islam have not said anything about it and why accidents happen in Malaysia involving the Melayu and their driving and riding habits which are not compatible to the teachings in Islam.

This means that if the Muslims uphold the teachings and values of Islam, then surely, all the accidents involving them would not have taken place.

It is also ironic how some of the accidents involve those Muslims who are on the way to or from funerals of their close relatives or even weddings they were going to attend. They just have to rush to get there and to return to their houses and along the way they become reckless and the accidents happen.

At some other instances, there are the younger Melayu men and women who decided to race with each other on the wide highways and in the process knock into some vehicles. But they are seldom given stiff punishments by the courts, when they should have been held in prison for half of their lives.

But you can’t blame them because they are meant to be this way. Even if they are supposed to be religious, but it still comes in their way with their judgment being taken over by the devils and satans that are waiting for them at every road junction and spaces where they think no one is watching them, no CCTV and ‘no god’ to fear.

They are supposed to be god-fearing but at most times they do not believe that there is even god anywhere or at all.

Their headscarves or tudung and skull caps or ketayap are just for show.

And this is definitely not something unusual, a sight that happens in Malaysia all too often.

In fact, most of the television news programs on television in Malaysia start with some major accidents somewhere in the country that had happened earlier, followed by the current political affairs.

And in fact, most deaths on the roads are on those who ride small motorcycles which are often with more than one pillion rider.

They can oftentimes include the whole family with a man riding and his overweight wife and two or even three small children, who are all potential road victims.

Some families had been obliterated entirely in accidents that could have been avoided.

Only in Malaysia a small motorcycle with from 100 to 150 c.c. can be turned into a mini-bus. And it is not illegal.

The accident I witnessed yesterday involved a Honda Vios car being driven by a Chinese man who drove off when the traffic light had turned to red at the junction in Damai Perdana. He immediately pressed the brakes and stopped in the yellow box.

And immediately behind his car a small motorcycle or moped being ridden by a tudung-clad Melayu woman (one wearing the headscarf) shot ahead and could not stop. She then rammed into the back of the Vios causing her to be flung to the side of the road.

And most of the motorcyclists like to overtake a vehicle at the left and at high speed thinking nothing of the dangers they pose to those who are driving at the right, who sometimes could not see them and when they had to swerve slightly to the left they knock into the motorcyclists thus denting their vehicles and spoiling their day.

I was driving just behind them and stopped at the junction before the light turned to red.

The woman lay motionless for a while before waking up. I thought she had died.

This was not the first time I had witnessed accidents involving small motorcycles; there had been many but most of the time I could only see them after they had happened and with bodies lying on the road being covered by newspapers.

Even Melayu women wearing the headscarves can be reckless riders sometimes…when they would also fling away all their religious values in their haste to return to their homes.

The religious teachers in Malaysia only teach the Muslim boys and girls matters which are petty and not those that involve modern day issues. And they like it when they get an applause or a laugh from the crowd.

They are the entertainers…not the preachers… And this is sad…