Just the other day, I was fetching a customer from overseas, Singapore to be exact, from the airport. You know how some "turtle" drivers whose driving skills and understanding of driving ethics on the road are pathetic. And this driver was driving at 40-50kph on a no-overtaking road. But behind me was the police. So I took the gamble by overtaking him with no car insight along the quiet road alas as I was rushing to my workplace. Guess it wasn’t my day and the police immediately sounded the siren and signalled me to pull over!
Oh my gosh, I didn’t want to put my guest thru’ all this! So, as usual the police in Malaysia will ask for your driving licence and ID when they stop you on the road, just to make sure they can catch you in the tighter spot i.e. expired licence and blah blah blah - meaning more opportunities la! Oh yeah, one thing I must add though; the policemen here are famous for one thing, has become ’infamous’ to all fellow Malaysians (all drivers).........thats why they have a sticker on the back of the police car reads "NO BRIBERY" in our national language. If you translate into Malay language would be "Jangan Rasuah". Now that tells you they are so used to it!!! Hahaha.
The story continues.....one of the younger guys called me over to the police car (out of my car) and pulled out a piece of paper with some names jotted down, perhaps were the names he caught for some minor offences and "let go" during his round of the day. Or just got the kopi money (we meant bribe here) and let people like me off the hook. As I was thinking the moment I got stopped by them, I needed to make up a story to get myself off the hook - the ticket. So, I told the policemen.......Sir, I am rushing my guest to factory and you need to give me a chance. Moreover the car in front of me is driving so slow. As usual, in most cases with the policemen in Malaysia, you can only "buy" your way out, forget about your sob stories. One of the younger guys said if I wanted to be given a chance, I needed to tell him the amount. There you go......!
But I was not going to part with my hard-earned cash and I always felt for minor offence like this, a verbal warning or reminder would be enough. Then, he asked me who was the Malay guy sitting in the car (that’s when I did the trick) and was he a Datuk (in Malaysia a Datuk means a person with honorary title and a big shot) or what?? I quickly said to him ’a hell yeah’ and you gotta keep your image from taking money from me in front of this Datuk, my honourable guest. They were looking back at my guest a couple times and my guest nodded to them in acknowledgement, as cool as he could. So, need to do the honourable thing which he certainly did and they LET ME OFF THE HOOK and drove off to find their next prey. HAHAHAHA.
So, to all fellow Malaysians, this is a lesson or trick you may use the next time you encounter a situation like this.....be witty and don’t panic. All they want is your hard-earned cash and all we need to do is ’use your brain la brother’! Show them we got more brain than them. With that I’m signing off with terimakasihhhhhhh and do come back for more interesting realtime stories from me.......PEACE!
1 comment:
I have also encountered with the police but was left off the hook for beating the traffic light, basically b'cos i was unwilling to bribe.i believed to reduce corruption in our country comes from the "rakyat"itself not to encourage bribery by accepting or giving.
As for Kenny,called it your day,seems the MP's are very prompt in solving the problems.
Again..it's the mandate of the "rakyat" who put them to this position and we are the boss.
Good day!
Larry Low
Post a Comment