If Malaysia aims to be environmentally friendly and curb those traffic jam problems in big cities like KL and its surrounding satellite towns, she has got to really upgrade her transport system. One of the reasons why people want to own a car and get stuck in nonsensical massive traffic jams, is - they don't want to get stuck in some
Light Rail Transit that moves at snail speed and getting so acquainted with other commuters like sardines do in their cans, AND risk getting claustrophobic after the ride.
Yet, becoming part of the sardine phenomenon that is predominant in such below-the-mark commuting means did help me discover something new, something
interesting today. Honestly, if there weren't that many
sardines around, I wouldn't be trying my best to recoil to the corner just beside the sliding door and had I not stayed there for twenty minutes, I would have missed this out.
This, everyone, is a notice stuck on the glass pane separating the sitting sardines from the standing ones. It's in Malay - Malaysian's national language. Grammatically sound. Wonder what it means, for non-Malay speakers? Looks like the authorities are very kind too. They even translated it into English, the INTERNATIONAL language.
Such was the phrase they came up with, and such was the phrase they printed on notices that were stuck in LRTs.
But my grammar radar sensed some abnormality. Are you looking closely?
"
Seating". I know what a seat is, I know what 'sitting' means. And 'seating', as quoted from dictionary.com, actually refers to
an act of escorting to a seat. So, are you telling me that there are escorts bringing the handicapped to the allocated seats? Is that so?
The instance when I first read it was hilarious. I nearly broke out in giggles if not for the sardino-phobia I was experiencing at that moment.
Why, it's such a bad reflection of one, Malaysian's standard of English; and two, the level of professionalism in the government bodies! I could not believe a permanent notice like this, pasted on a means of commuting like this, could EVER be this flawed. It's not like some temporary notices erected around construction sites, or some temporary shut-down notices, or even temporary traffic diversion notices. NO. It has been there, and will still be there for years to come!
That is why, it is incomprehensible. Are you telling me that those who approved this English notice did not pass his/her Primary school english exam? It is absurd, unfathomable! How could the eyes that were supposed to watch closely be this careless! There are so many tourists using our LRT and THIS is the image you are sending to them? That Malaysians have highly ridiculous english standards? Or are they actually trying to say, we Malaysians are highly considerate beings who look out for the handicapped such that we station escorts in every train - which, apparently went missing when I tried to seek them out this evening?
I was amused, but at the same time, ashamed. With a little bit of disappointment. Why do they even screw up small and fundamental, yet important things like this? I am now already looking at their preach of a better Malaysia with increased cynicism. How can you even preach anything else with persuasion when you cannot even manage fundamental things like, say, correct usage of the language?
