M A C V A Y S I A

Those who have been reading my blog for a few years now might remember that back in 2007 I wrote a post calling out Malaysia’s Information Minister for things he had said about children of mixed parentage. Basically, the Minister at the time, Zainudin Maidin (aka ZAM), didn’t want to see such children in local advertising because they’re “not Malaysians”. The post I wrote in response to his ridiculous remarks generated a lot of comments; in fact, while there were posts in my old Blogspot days that had generated more (unfortunately those comments have been swallowed by the Internet), that particular post remains the most commented post since my switch to Wordpress. Most of the comments were equally critical of ZAM, but some displayed racism that matched and perhaps even surpassed the things he’d said.

Well, how have things progressed in the nearly three years since then? The Information Ministry has been merged with the former Culture, Arts and Heritage Ministry to form the Information Communication and Culture Ministry (which can’t seem to decide whether it wants a comma after the word Information). The new Minister, Rais Yatim, who thinks Malaysians’ use of the Internet, social media, and ‘bahasa rojak’ (the mixing of Malay and English in daily speech) are all very bad things, is unfortunately no less an embarrassment to the country than ZAM was. And unfortunately Rais is no less racist.

Recently that bastion of Malay nationalist journalism, Utusan Malaysia, front-paged an article in which Rais made comments about mixed marriages, in response to a question about the marital troubles of Malaysian actress Maya Karin. Now before we move on to Rais himself, let’s all shake our heads at the fact that Utusan chose to put that as its lead article that day, and that the paper had even seen fit to ask Rais to comment on something which was none of their business, and certainly none of his. Shame on them.

Now, on to Rais. Like I said, what happens in Maya Karin’s marriage is really none of his business. Yet there he was, using the question to deliver a little rant about the perils of entering into a marriage with someone of another race and/or nationality. Not only that, he singled out westerners, particularly white westerners. As Utusan is a government mouthpiece, it’s unlikely they just asked him about this out of the blue and he was simply giving his opinion on the spot. When asked about the matter, Rais didn’t just give his opinion; he backed it up with results of a study undertaken by local sociologists in which it was found that seven out of every ten mixed marriages end in divorce.

Well, I have some big problems with not only what Rais said, but in the so-called evidence he put forth to back up his claims. First off, let me state that I’m not saying mixed marriages are all fine and dandy. There are bound to be divorces. Just as I didn’t completely disagree with ZAM’s criticism of the prevalence of so-called mixed-race actors in local advertising, I don’t completely disagree with Rais’ assertion that mixed marriages will fail at a higher rate than marriages between people who are from the same race/ethnic group/country. But having said that, I have big problems with what he said anyway, just like I had big problems with what ZAM said. Aside from what I’ve already mentioned, here’s where Rais went wrong:

The study he referred to is outdated. According to the Utusan article, the figure of only three successful marriages out of ten is based on research that covered only the years 1995 to 1998. That was 12 to 15 years ago. Not only is the research outdated, it wasn’t done long enough for researchers to come to any reliable conclusion.

The geographical scope of the study was even more limited than the temporal scope. It seems Rais was only referring to marriages in the state of Johor and the federal territory of Kuala Lumpur. That’s a very insufficient sample.

‘Artistes’ are hardly representative of the general public. Everyone knows actors and singing stars generally go through spouses like Planters goes through peanuts. I’ll be the first to admit I have no hard statistics to offer up in support of my claim here, but I daresay this is the case in many countries, not just in the west. In pointing to failed marriages among Malaysian celebrities as proof that mixed marriages don’t work, Rais is really barking up the wrong tree. Sure, the study he’s relying on involves more than just celebrities, but highlighting them at all to prove his point is pretty silly.

He’s almost right, but completely wrong. I’ve long said that marriages between Malays and non-Malays can only work if both partners have similar ideas about religion and culture. Rais is saying the same thing, but I think he overstates the number of cases in which this doesn’t happen. Of course, considering the shortcomings of the study he uses to back that up, it’s almost impossible to say. So how can I say he’s wrong? Because since Leen and I moved to Malaysia from Canada we’ve come to know many couples in similar situations to our own. We have indeed met couples whose marriages were a bit rocky, and people whose mixed marriages had already ended. But those were the exceptions. Most mixed couples we’ve met were happily married at the time and remain so today. Sure, some of them will fail, but that is the case with all marriages. Actually, there may be higher rates of divorce with mixed marriages, but…well, see below.

For someone who doesn’t like things that are mixed, he’s sure got this mixed up. Rais actually acknowledges that one of the factors in the failure of mixed marriages is the difficulty foreign spouses — especially foreign husbands — have as immigrants in this country. He even acknowledges this is all due to rigid government policies. But here’s the thing: instead of saying Malaysians should avoid marrying foreigners because the government he’s a part of makes it difficult for them to live and work here, wouldn’t it be better for the government to actually make it easier for foreign spouses to live and work here? Oh, wait…

Rais is out of touch with current events and trends. The Malaysian government is, in fact, beginning to make it easier for foreign spouses to live and work in Malaysia. The government recently announced it would give Permanent Resident status to foreign husbands, something Malaysian women and their foreign-born husbands have long been hoping for (read here for my latest update on that). The advice Rais is doling out to Malaysians reflects either complete ignorance of his own government’s initiatives, or an unwillingness to accept them. Either way, Rais Yatim is not doing his job properly.

Just the other night I watched an interview Rais gave on TV3 and was treated to further proof that he 1) has a real dislike for westerners and their culture, and 2) is unfit to lead a government ministry. While he did make some valid points (advocating more parental guidance in children’s use of the Internet, for example), most of his comments were absolutely sickening. His skeptical comments about the Internet and social media were nothing new (he’s been saying those things for a while now, resulting in a hilarious backlash by Malaysian Twitter users and bloggers), but I have to admit I was taken aback by what he said about language. That was nothing new either (his preference for the Malay language was quite evident when he once arrogantly scolded a journalist for daring to ask him a question in English not long ago), but he somehow outdid himself this time.

When asked to comment on bahasa rojak (basically ‘mixed language’), Rais really made himself look foolish. Remember I said he doesn’t like things that are mixed? Well, here’s the proof. He looks back on a time when the Malay language — the Johor-Riau dialect, to be more precise — was untouched by other languages. Let’s put aside how ignorant that very idea is in and of itself (I mean come on, he thinks the Johor-Riau dialect was not itself a hybrid of various smaller local dialects, and that it wasn’t influenced at all by other languages? Seriously?). Let’s look at what he said next: He actually lamented the fact that there came a time (a long, long time ago in fact) when the pure, precious Malay language was poisoned by other languages. Yes, that’s what he said. He used the word diracuni — poisoned. This is what he thinks of the influence of other languages on the Johor-Riau dialect of Malay. He displayed a particularly sneering contempt of the English language and the growing tendency of Malaysians to inject it into their everyday speech. He made it clear that Malaysians who speak in Malay should not mix words from other languages into it.

Let’s not even get into the fact that it’s pretty much impossible to speak Malay these days without using at least some English loanwords. Let’s just look at the basic thrust of what Rais was saying. It is painfully obvious that the Minister of Information Communication and Culture harbours unrealistic fantasies of linguistic and cultural purity. It is also obvious that because of these delusions he is out of touch with the realities of language and culture. He is out of touch with the way this country’s national language and its culture are heading. He is even out of touch with the direction in which the government he is a part of appears to be heading, or at least claims to be heading. He is, therefore, unfit to occupy the post he now occupies.

Now, I can express my personal opinion all I want — that Rais should either resign or the Prime Minister should put him out to pasture — but I’m not Malaysian, so who am I to even suggest what the Malaysian government should do? In fact, it seems Malaysians who support the current government don’t take too kindly to foreigners telling that government what it should and shouldn’t do. Well you know what? Anyone who would rub that in my face now can just stuff it. When a Malaysian government minister uses his position to make bigoted comments about mixed marriages and/or mixed-race children, it concerns me because it concerns my wife and children. The sensitivities of Malaysians who dislike the intervention of foreigners into their affairs are duly noted, but the current government should bear in mind that while I can’t vote here, my wife can; our children, if they decide to stay here into adulthood, will be voters too. So will the spouses and children of a lot of foreigners in this country — maybe a lot more than Rais can imagine. And we’re not just talking about foreigners here. We’re talking about anyone who marries and has children out of their so-called race. Does Rais Yatim really think that he or anyone else in this country is “pure”? Please.

Just imagine if Malaysians actually follow the advice of their Minister of Information Communication and Culture. They might take his ’stick to your own kind’ rhetoric too far. Why, we might end up seeing disturbingly high numbers of incest cases among rural Mal…oh, wait a minute. I guess Rais should really be careful what he wishes for. And the people of Malaysia should be careful who they vote for.

I’m not a big fan of the Royal Malaysian Police. As far as I know, none of the police reports I’ve made since coming to Malaysia have resulted in anything resembling a thorough investigation; no one I’ve ever made a report against has ever been held accountable for whatever it was they had done. I’ve even had run-ins with the police myself: one off-duty officer nearly killed me when he acted as if a one-lane road had two lanes, then pulled me over when I gave him the finger; one time an officer who was directing traffic watched a motorcycle cut in front of me and run into me, then told the motorcyclist to continue on his way and told me he didn’t care about me or my car. Then there’s all the bribery. I don’t think I need to point out that Malaysian police officers will often take (and ask for) bribes. We’ve all seen it.

Yet I was glad to see news recently that officers of the Royal Malaysian Police will be getting a raise. Yes, believe it or not, I think they deserve more money. I think if Malaysian cops made more money, they might (and hopefully would) become more professional. Or, to put it another way: a pay raise would be one of just many steps the government could take towards making the Royal Malaysian Police a better police force.

The response to that statement is almost always the same: Even if they’re paid more, people told me, Malaysian cops will be corrupt. Do I really believe cops here would stop asking for bribes if they were paid more? No, I don’t. I understand it will take some time to eradicated corruption in the Royal Malaysian Police, because it’s deeply ingrained in the culture here and isn’t just caused by low pay. But I really do believe paying Malaysian cops more money will help. They’re currently getting what to me seems like the equivalent of what I made when I was working as a security guard on the Halifax waterfront. Except for one overzealous guard, who had a tricked-out utility belt and a badge and desperately wanted to be a cop but kept getting rejected, pretty much everyone who worked for that company did the barest minimum of work that was required of them. Why? Because they were all getting paid minimum wage. The boss paid them the least he was required to pay, so they all gave the least amount of effort (when I say they I mean we, of course). Even the wannabe cop finally cracked and was arrested for breaking into a shop on his watch and stealing clothes.

When I was working as a security guard back in those lean times, I didn’t think I was getting paid nearly enough to deal with drunks, shoplifters, panhandlers, and the occasional rowdy pub-goer. There was even an armed robbery once on the property I was guarding, but I wasn’t about to chase a guy with a gun. Not for the crap money I was making. That’s a job for real cops. They have weapons, they have training, and they have a sense of pride in what they do. Malaysian cops, it seems to me, have only two of those three things (and only barely so, I might add). They face the same dangers as cops back home — even worse dangers, I think, considering how much violent crime we have here — but they don’t even come close to displaying the same professionalism. It’s not a stretch to think their low salaries might have something to do with that. No, they wouldn’t all suddenly become better cops if they were paid more. But I really do think higher salaries would lead to a rise in professionalism, or would at least be part of any sincere effort to improve policing here.

My father with a new police car in 1978.

My father is a retired police officer. He served for over 20 years with the Sydney Police Department (now known as the Cape Breton Regional Police Services), first as a beat cop and then as a member of the ‘Ident’ section (basically, Dad was a CSI). My best buddy from high school is currently a member of the force. I thought about becoming a police officer myself, long ago, as did my brother. It’s a job people want to do, and one they’re proud to do. Cops back home make decent money. It’s not that they do their job well just because they’re paid good money. They’re paid good money because of the work they do, and because of what’s expected of them. There are lots of good police forces in Canada, including the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, which to me seems as different from its Malaysian counterpart as day is from night.

The MacVay boys, Officers Mopey & Dopey.

Malaysia has a lot of cops who don’t do their jobs very well, but there must be cops here who do. Reward them. Make police work something Malaysians want to do, and something they can be proud of. Higher salaries constitute just one step, of course, in a series of steps required to make the police force better. It’s a start, though.

And while we’re at it, how about teachers? And nurses? I know, maybe what I’m suggesting isn’t 100% realistic. I mean, we’re not just talking about different police forces but different countries, different economies, different-sized middle classes, different styles of government (I’m having a good day so I won’t elaborate on that last one). But still, it would be nice.

Wednesday was turning out to be a pretty good day: I had a very smooth, efficient visit to Immigration in Shah Alam; I got paid; I got an awesome, free lunch, not to mention great company and conversation. Yes, it was shaping up to be a pretty good day. I did some banking, paid some bills, and was on my way back to Kajang when the car started to feel sluggish, heavy. Then, as I was climbing a hill, the car died. Just like that. Running one moment, then suddenly…silence and engine lights. I coasted to the side of the road, next to the Petronas station in Taman Len Sen, Cheras. I called Leen, who called a relative who lives nearby, who called a mechanic near her place. Then I spent about three hours sitting on the side of the road, waiting. And waiting. And waiting.

Leen and I spoke several times on the phone. It was almost time for her to punch out for the day, so we planned to meet at Ibu’s cousin’s place in Bandar Tun Hussein Onn. That’s where Al hangs out while we’re at work. At six, she left Masterskill College with her assistant, H, who’s been staying with us. H drives Leen to work every morning; they drop Al off on the way and pick him up on the way home. The plan for Wednesday was pretty much the same, except this time they were going to wait for me at Ibu’s cousin’s place.

Major change of plans

Sometime after six I was still sitting there on the side of the road watching the mechanic perform battlefield surgery on my poor old Wira, when suddenly Leen called me, all in a panic. She and H couldn’t meet me at Ibu’s cousin’s place, because someone had just taken H’s car right out from under them. In fact, the perpetrator was still there; Leen alternated between breathlessly filling me in and ruthlessly cursing the villain. Were they being carjacked? Yes, but no. The car was being repossessed. But actually, as far as I’m concerned, it was a carjacking.

Here’s the story as they told it to me: They had just left Masterskill and were driving along the road to Batu 9 Cheras when the car in front of them suddenly began to swerve left and right. H honked at the driver, who would put on a turn signal but then swerve in the opposite direction. If that sounds like a dangerous thing to do on a busy road, what happened next was even worse: the driver swerved in front of H in such a way that she had no choice but to go off the road, onto the strip of dirt and rocks that passes for a shoulder. Then the driver of the other car got out and hustled over to H’s car. He banged on her window, waving a piece of paper at her, saying it was a letter from the bank and that he was there to repossess her car.

I really don’t know the details, but apparently H had missed the maximum number of payments one can miss in a row before repossession takes place. The bank had every right to repossess the car. H said she doesn’t recall getting any notification to that effect, but her family recently moved, and she figures the letters went to the old address. Whatever the case, she had signed an agreement with the bank, and not making her payments meant she had to suffer the consequences.

But did she have to suffer through what she was enduring on the side of the road Wednesday evening? When she put her window down to argue with the man, he immediately reached in, switched off her engine, and pulled out the key. H managed to grab part of the key ring as well, and the two had a tug-of war. H has skinny little arms, so no prize for guessing who won. The thug, whose name is Nathan A/L Supramaniam, ripped the part with all the keys right from her grip; H was left with the remote for the alarm and a twisted piece of metal that used to be a key ring.

Leen was out of the car by that time, and was yelling at the repo man. H got out too. Before they could even fully take in what was going on, a tow-truck that had been tailing them pulled up, the repo man hooked H’s car up to it, and it drove away. That was around the time Leen called me.

Once the car was gone, Nathan, the repo man, tried to pour on the charm, but the whole “Just doing my job” thing didn’t make the ladies feel any better. Nor did the fact that he even gave them a lift…to the next traffic light. Leen and H got out of Nathan’s car (which also contained several children) and walked up a hill to a bus stop on the side of the Cheras-Kajang highway. Then Leen called me again. And again. And again. My wife, eight months pregnant and tired from a long day at work, didn’t deserve the treatment she got that day. Nobody deserves that, but come on. It was nasty.

I was still standing on the side of the road in Taman Len Sen. When the mechanic had finally fixed my car, I forked over 400 Ringgit (sucks but it could have been way worse) and raced to that bus stop to get Leen and H. Needless to say, they were a mess. H was crying, and Leen was still swearing.

It gets worse

The next day H’s family managed to gather together enough money to get the car back. When she finally got it back, she asked for the keys and was told they should be with her. Nathan, she was told, had said she still had the keys. But the last time she’d seen the keys was when he’d ripped them from her hands. Next stop: the police station in Puchong, near her parents’ place.

When she made a police report, an interesting thing happened: the police actually expressed concern. Now, I’ve dealt with the Royal Malaysian Police on several occasions, and my opinion of them is not exactly glowing. Insult a monarch and you’re royally screwed, but you could very well get away with screwing over the average citizen — or, in my case, the average visitor.

And yet here were the Royal Malaysian Police expressing great concern over H’s safety. Okay, so she’s young and slim and pretty…but I’m trying to believe that wasn’t the only reason the cops were concerned. She said they were actually concerned, so I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt. According to the officers who took her statement, there have been many cases just like H’s, and they didn’t all end well. Apparently there are syndicates that are closely tied to the repo men, who sometimes really are gangsters in every sense of the word. The repo men (or the gangsters they work for) take the keys to the car and simply wait for the owner to get the car back. Then they shadow the car and waits for the right moment to strike. Some wait till the owner leaves the car unattended; others will just run it off the road, open the door, toss out the driver, and take off with the car. Unfortunately the ‘toss out the driver’ part often includes violence. Terrible violence. The police officers strongly advised Hanim to change the locks on her car right away.

The fact that the police called H several times to make sure she was okay didn’t really comfort any of us; it just made us worry more. H is afraid to drive her car now, especially alone, and especially at night. I’m not too thrilled by the idea of Leen and Al leaving her every morning in that car, either. So this morning I drove everyone to their respective destinations.

The more we talked about it, the angrier I became. I mean, I don’t dispute the bank’s right to repossess a vehicle when a certain number of payments are missed. Nor do I disagree with the concept of the repo man. But I think a line was crossed in this case…and, I’m told, this case is not unique. A lot of people who heard this story over the last couple of days have told me that it’s quite common for repo men to bully drivers off the roads and out of their cars. In Malaysia, anyway.

Theft Vs. Robbery

We have repo men back home too. I’m sure there are probably all kinds of cases in which repo men have nasty confrontations with people whose cars are being repossessed. But there’s a very important difference between auto repossession in North America and here in Malaysia. Here’s a description of how auto repossession is carried out in the US, for example:

It should be pointed out that almost all state laws require that a repossession be done in a peaceful manner. Since most people get very upset when they see a repo man repossessing their vehicle, most repossessions are completed in the middle of the night or while the debtor is working without the owner’s knowledge. It’s really a legal steal. This gets around the “peaceful manner” state laws. The old term “possession is nine tenths of the law” applies in auto repossession. Normally, the repossession is not complete until the vehicle is off of the debtor’s property. It is usually unlawful to enter a closed garage in order to complete the repossession. In such a case, the repo man usually waits until the subject is at work or he’ll follow him to the grocery store or something. That way, the repossession can be completed in an easy manner.

Before the repossessor attempts to repo the vehicle, he must first make very sure he is repoing the right car. He will match the VIN number he obtains from his client to the VIN number on the vehicle. The VIN number is usually located on the dashboard on the driver’s side.

The repossession agent has a number of methods in which a vehicle is removed or taken into possession.

KEY CODES
Just about every vehicle that has been sold in the last five or six years has a key code. Key codes can usually be obtained from the title slip. A copy of the key code is usually kept on file at the car dealership. In more recent times, it has become the practice of many banks to obtain the key codes for each loan file and they will have a record of it. Some banks even go as far as having a set of keys cut and kept with the file. A key code is simply a code number used to cut the keys. The repossessor either does this himself with a key cutting machine or has a locksmith do it for him. Although many repo men have become auto locksmiths themselves, this is really not a requirement. The majority of repo men simply have an account with a local locksmith who does his work for him. With the key codes, the repo man simply has a set of keys cut and uses them to complete the repossession. However, sometimes key codes are not available and other times the debtor has had his locks changed so the key codes will not work.

TOWING
Many repo men use towing as a means of repossession. Many start out making a deal with a local towing company who will give them a discount price. Later, the repo man can purchase a used tow truck if he likes this method.

LOCK PICKING, LOCK PULLING, PICKS AND CLICKS
You can purchase a small metal rod called a slimjim that is used to place down the door which catches the lock part that pulls up the door lock so you can open the car door. Another method is the coat hanger method. People do not know this but glass will bend somewhat.

Once inside the vehicle, the repo man uses several different methods to start the vehicle if he does not have the key. The old key housings that are located in the dash simply unscrew. Once unscrewed, all one has to do is place a screwdriver into the housing and turn. On newer models, the lock housing is on the steering column. In such a case, the repo man either pickes the lock or uses what is called a dent puller. A dent puller is a large round rod that has a sliding hammer on it. On one side is a screw type bolt that can be screwed down into the lock housing. Once in place, the lock housing can be, “hammered” or “slammed out”. This item is used by auto body shops to pull out dents. Another method is a lock lifter. This is a screw type piece of equipment that goes over the lock housing. It forces tension on the lock until the housing is lifted out. Once out, the repo man simply starts the vehicle by placing a screwdriver down into the now open housing.

Note the part that calls auto repossession a “legal steal”. That’s basically what it is: legal theft. But there’s a very clear distinction to be made between theft and robbery. What happened to H and Leen on Wednesday was not theft. It was robbery, plain and simple. They were carjacked. Considering the police reaction to this particular case, I’m not even sure if we can call this legal robbery. Maybe technically it was. But whether or not it was legal, one thing is certain: this particular carjacking was carried out on behalf of a major financial institution, namely RHB Bank. The carjacker may have been working for a different company (in this case PJ Automart) that RHB Bank had contracted the job out to, but the bottom line is that the guy was working for RHB Bank.

Through some contacts I managed to talk to someone from RHB Bank’s Corporate Comms today, a friendly fellow named Zaihan. I explained the situation to him, and even managed not to yell. He expressed shock and dismay. There are protocols repo men are supposed to follow, he said. I’m sure there are rules these guys are supposed to adhere to, but is anyone enforcing those rules? If the rules are not enforced, and the repo men don’t follow them, who is held accountable? I don’t think simply terminating the services of repo men who do things like this is enough. Ultimately, RHB Bank is responsible for what happened. Mr. Zaihan apologised on behalf of RHB Bank, but I wasn’t the victim here. I told Zaihan that RHB Bank should 1) apologise to H and my wife, 2) replace the locks on H’s car, and 3) put in place a stricter policy so that incidents like this do not occur in the future.

Where to now?

Zaihan said he’ll get back to me Tuesday, so we’ll have to wait until then to see where this goes. I appreciate his concern, and I really hope this can be resolved amicably. This is an opportunity for RHB Bank to take the lead in putting stricter, more adequate controls on the business of auto repossession in Malaysia. Yes, supposedly there are rules in place, and supposedly there is a ‘Car Repossession Code of Ethics‘, but it seems to me Malaysian auto repossessors are really stretching the boundaries of what is legal and ethical.

If you believe everything happens for a reason, then you might believe my car broke down so I wouldn’t be able to race to where Leen was in time to have a violent confrontation with the thug who took H’s car. The 400 Ringgit I had to pay the mechanic is a small price to pay for the fact that I’m sitting here and not in a prison cell doing time for seriously injuring someone. You might also believe this entire incident happened so that a spotlight could be cast upon the dirty tactics employed by repo men in Malaysia. I don’t know if I believe any of that, though it is tempting. I just hope this incident ultimately leads to some positive changes, and ideally the end of bank-sanctioned carjackings in this country.

When I logged into Facebook today I noticed a whole bunch of people on my list were posting one-word status updates, all colours. Then I noticed only the ladies were doing it. Then I noticed guys leaving comments asking them what it was about, and the ladies were almost all at least a little cryptic about it. So I asked my friend Google, who told me it was a meme in which women are to say what colour bra they happen to be wearing at the moment; the meme was supposed to raise breast cancer awareness. All I can say is:

WTF?

It seems a lot of people found it tee hee cute, but how many people know more about breast cancer now because of it? All I know is what colour bra half the women on my list wore today. Even worse is that people were cryptic about it. I even read somewhere that someone who wanted their friends to do the meme threw in a line about confusing men. Well isn’t that cute! Let’s deliberately confuse half the population, to raise breast cancer awareness!

Ok, I’m not actually upset about all that. That would be silly, so don’t anyone get their pink polka-dotted bras all knotted up. And if some women out there actually did end up at least thinking about breast cancer because of that meme, that’s great. But is that going to be the end result in most cases? Seriously, I applaud any effort to raise awareness of cancer, but…What I really want to say here is: If you want to do this, do it right.

For someone to participate in that meme, all she has to do is remember what colour bra she put on this morning. That’s it. If she has somehow forgotten, she might look at her bra and say ‘Well shit look at that I put the fuschia one on today!’ But how many are going to start pawing at their own breasts, looking for telltale signs of breast cancer? No, like I said, if you want to do this kind of thing, do it right.

By the way, I don’t know crap about breast cancer, so I can’t tell anyone how to ‘do it right’. I love holding breasts in my hands as much as the next guy (well, depending on who the next guy is), but they’re not MY breasts, and like I said, I don’t know crap about breast cancer anyway. So what to do?

Well, one thing I can do is try to raise awareness of testicular cancer among the fellas out there. And guess what, fellas? I don’t care what colour underwear you’ve got on right now. I don’t even care whether you’re wearing boxers, briefs, tighty-whities or those litte bikini brief things. I don’t care, because it doesn’t matter. All I care about is this: do you know how to check yourself for signs of testicular cancer?

Um…

Yeah, go ahead, laugh it up. But bear in mind that testicular cancer is the most common cancer in males age 15 to 35. That’s an American statistic, but in Canada it’s probably about the same. TC is still pretty rare compared to other cancers, and is way less common among Asian men, but you know what? Its relative rarity here in Malaysia means fewer men have even heard of it, so I’ll bet a lot of cases go unchecked way longer than they should because of an almost complete lack of awareness (not to mention cultural stuff that may or may not inhibit men from talking about their balls with doctors and whoever else). I’ve heard a few stories about Malaysian guys who got testicular cancer; too many of those stories didn’t have very happy endings, compared to stories from home. Anyway, no matter where you are, I think it’s a good idea that you have some awareness of testicular cancer.

Since I’m no doctor, I’ll just point you to some websites where you can find information about testicular cancer:

What is testicular cancer?
Testicular Cancer at Medline Plus
The National Cancer Institute

And, saving the best for last:
The Testicular Cancer Resource Center

That last site is awesome. It even has a section called ‘The Humorous Side of TC’. Even if you never find out you have TC and end up saving your own life because you had proper awareness of it, you’ll at least know some good jokes about testicles. Trust me, when everyone’s telling jokes and you’re searching your memory for a few good ones to contribute, nothing beats testicle jokes.

Anyway, after taking a look at those websites (you will take a look, won’t you fellas?) I hope you’ll take the time to do a self-examination. A detailed description can be found here. If you’re easily bored by details, then at least do this: Grab your balls. If you don’t find any hard, pea-sized lumps on what should otherwise be the smooth surface of your testicles, you’re probably OK. But check again some other time. And READ THE LINKS I JUST POSTED, ESPECIALLY THE ONE ABOUT THE SELF EXAM. Oh, and just as the ladies out there (and the men who love them) know that all breasts are kind of lumpy, you fellas should bear in mind that you don’t actually have two smooth eggs in your scrotum. There’s all sorts of plumbing in there, so it will feel kind of lumpy. You just have to know where the lumps should be, where they shouldn’t, and whether there have been any changes in where your lumps are. Anyway, just check the links.

Why?

I do appreciate the fact that you’ve read this far. In case you’re wondering why I’m going on about this stuff, and you don’t know my background, this is where I should point out that in 2002, when I was 28 years old, I was diagnosed with testicular cancer. I had a lump that turned out to be an epididymal cyst, which I went in to have removed; when the doctor opened me up he found lesions on my right testicle. He removed the testicle as well. That wasn’t a spur-of-the-moment decision: the testicle had atrophied and he was going to remove it anyway, with my consent. But still, having one of my nuts sliced off was not something I was looking forward to. Anyway, the lesions turned out to be malignant tumours, and the next thing I knew I was being told I had seminoma. (That sucked but it sure beats non-seminoma, which grows and spreads much faster.) I was assured my cancer probably hadn’t spread, but CT scans revealed it had in fact spread to my retroperitoneal lymph nodes. To kill the cancer I underwent radiation therapy, during which I would lie motionless on a table while a big machine shot beams of radiation into my abdomen. I did this 20 times, the beams hitting exactly the same spots each time thanks to seven tattoos a nurse had put on me to use as a map. After that I just did my best to recover, though in hindsight moving to a developing country a stone’s throw from the equator two weeks after completing the radiotherapy may have complicated things a wee bit. Still, I think I’ve done pretty well, thanks to a positive attitude and a supportive family. And I’ve got a wonderful little boy, and another one on the way. Life is good. But there’s always the possibility the cancer will return; I’m also more likely to get other types of cancer, such as leukemia, thanks to the radiation I was exposed to. So far so good, though. I just need to stay positive and stay INFORMED.

Oh, and ladies, you can help! This is not just a man thing, no ma’am! You see, YOU might be the one who finds the lump. Or maybe your man finds one, or has symptoms that at least one of you suspects might be signs of testicular cancer, but he’s all macho and doesn’t want to see a doctor. Seriously, you can help. We need you, ladies. If it makes you feel any better, we’ll do our best to help you check for breast lumps. We’ll do that, won’t we fellas?

In the meantime, anyone reading this can help, simply by sharing what I’ve just written with their brothers, sons, fathers, friends, cousins, colleagues, or anyone else who could benefit from at least a little awareness of this thing called testicular cancer. And if anyone out there happens to know anyone here in Malaysia who has testicular cancer, or has been through it, please put them in touch with me. I think I want to start a support group.

Anyway, sorry if I’m being pushy or preachy about this stuff, but really I think most guys out there need a good boot in the arse to get them to be aware of testicular cancer. If you think that sounds a bit harsh, I can tell you it sure beats a kick in the balls.

Update (2010/01/11): Some people I know actually did share this (thanks so much!); the comments I’ve seen elsewhere seem to be somewhat evenly split between something like ‘Yeah, he’s got an excellent point!’ and something like ‘He’s over-reacting, and besides, it seems this meme did work because it even got him thinking about cancer.’ Well, to those who disagree with what I’ve written here, please understand that despite the facetious tone of my post, I don’t mean any disrespect. There’s nothing wrong with the meme itself; that is, it’s no worse than other memes that are seemingly pointless but somewhat entertaining, memes I find myself taking part in too. My main point of criticism is that I just don’t think this particular meme really did much, if anything at all, to increase awareness of breast cancer. Even if it did, it could have been more effective, perhaps with a shortened link to real information about breast cancer appearing in every one of those status messages. And I should point out that the meme didn’t get me thinking about cancer either. I think about cancer often. In fact, what got me thinking about my current idea to set up a testicular cancer support group here in Malaysia was not that meme, but rather a whole bunch of other things: visits to hospitals to visit people I know with cancer; stories I’ve been told about people with cancer; and thoughts about my own cancer adventure and what it must be like for Malaysians with testicular cancer. Anyway, the meme didn’t get me thinking about cancer, but I’ll admit this: it did spark this post. If that’s going to be taken as proof that the meme was a success, that’s fine, because the winner here is cancer awareness either way.

One of the biggest problems most people will face when researching their family history is that as they go back through the generations they will find fewer and fewer women. The women were there, of course; after all, they make up fully half of anyone’s genealogy. But in days gone by, women were commonly ignored in official records. When you’re looking at generations that are beyond the reach of family stories and memories, lack of documentation means a lot of people, especially women, will remain as blank spots on your family tree. This problem affects men too (I don’t know who the parents of Alexander MacVay and Elizabeth Armour were, for example), but there will usually be cases where you can find at least the name of a male ancestor — and maybe more information as well — but his spouse has been left behind by history; it’s almost never the other way around. For example, some old census records only recorded heads of households; their wives remain anonymous, unless we find information on them from other sources. Even when we can find some information about our female ancestors, it’s usually not as much as what we know about their male counterparts. We often don’t know their real family names, who their parents were, where they were from, etc. It’s even worse in Malaysia: I only need to go back to Leen’s great-grandparents to find blank spaces where I wish I could find the names of the women who belong in those spaces. It’s sad.

The good news is that while stories about my female ancestors are few and far between, I do know some stories, about fascinating women who lived fascinating lives in fascinating times. One story I find particularly fascinating is that of the woman who became the matriarch of my maternal grandmother’s family, the Martells.

The story begins in Paris, France, in the year 1668. It was in that year that 23-year-old Marguerite L’Amirault said goodbye to her family and set out on a journey that would take her to the New World, never to see France again. She was going to Quebec (then called New France) with many other French women as part of a program called Les Filles du Roi — The Daughters of the King. None of these women were actually daughters of the king; most came from families that couldn’t afford to pay dowries, which meant it was difficult for these young women to find husbands. Fortunately for them, there was a fairly large population of French men who couldn’t find wives. Unfortunately, those men were on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, where they had gone to establish New France. To entice poor French women to go to New France and marry the Frenchmen there, the French government offered not only free transport but also attractive dowries to women willing to make the move. Here’s a good description of the program from a recent post at a great genealogy website:

Starting in 1663, the French government recruited eligible young French women who were willing to travel to New France to find husbands. The King of France offered to pay for transportation to New France of any eligible young woman. He also offered a dowry for each, to be awarded upon her marriage to a young Frenchman. Each woman’s dowry typically consisted of 1 chest, 1 taffeta kerchief, 1 ribbon for shoes, 100 needles, 1 comb, 1 spool of white thread, 1 pair of stockings, 1 pair of gloves, 1 pair of scissors, 2 knives, about 1,000 pins, 1 bonnet, 4 laces, and 2 silver livres (French coins). Many also received chickens, pigs, and other livestock. Because the King of France paid the dowries instead of the parents, these women were referred to as the “Daughters of the King,” or “Filles du Roi.”

Their travels must have been difficult. In 1664, the Conseil Souverain reported to the French minister for the colonies, Jean-Baptiste Colbert, that sixty of the 300 people who embarked at La Rochelle the previous year had died at sea before reaching New France.

Since most of the women who took up the offer were from poor families, and the voyage was not without its dangers, not to mention the fact that life as a pioneer in New France would be rough, it might come as a surprise that some of the Filles du Roi came from relatively well-to-do families. Marguerite L’Amirault was one of them. When she stepped out of her house on Rue des Poullies she was right in front of the Louvre. Her father, Francois L’Amirault, was a coachman for the Royal Household. She certainly didn’t need the dowry, and probably could have found a suitable husband right there in the centre of Paris. So why did she get on a ship and go to New France?

The plot thickens upon Marguerite’s arrival in New France. She could have received a dowry befitting her status by marrying an officer. Instead, she chose to marry a common solider, and therefore got a lower dowry. Not only that, but the soldier she married, Honoré Martel, was 36 years old. He was 13 years Marguerite’s senior, and older than most of the other soldiers. He had been a soldier for some time and had seen a lot of fighting. Now he wanted to settle down. Why would Marguerite L’Amirault give up her comfortable life in Paris and sail all the way to the New World just to marry a common soldier who could only offer her a life of hard work?

At least one researcher (here, and here if you can read French) has a theory that to me sounds like a reasonable explanation. Honoré Martel was a son of Jean Martel and Barbe Marie Duschesne. Jean Martel, whose parents were Jean Martel and Anne Marizy, was a horse merchant in Paris. Jean and Barbe Marie lived on Rue des Ursulines, mere blocks away from where Marguerite’s family lived (Marguerite’s street, Rue des Poullies, no longer exists, but Rue des Ursulines is still there). Also, the fact that Honoré’s father worked as a horse merchant would almost certainly have put him into contact with Marguerite’s father, who was a coachman, especially since Jean’s business was on Rue de Richelieu, near the Louvre. So it’s quite possible (I daresay probable) that Honoré and Marguerite knew each other growing up in Paris. There are all sorts of possible reasons that Marguerite left Paris to marry an aging ex-soldier in the wilderness of New France. Maybe she just wanted an adventure. But I think there was more to it than just adventure. I think she did it all for love.

Honoré and Marguerite, my great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-grandparents, were married in 1668 and had many children, who in turn had many children, and so on. Their life in what would one day be Canada was hard — neither of them was really prepared for the life of a farming family in New France — but they built a life and a family together despite the hardships they faced. Marguerite died fairly young, at the age of 62, on 17 October 1706, at a hospital called l’Hôtel-Dieu de Québec; Honoré married Marie Marchand a year later, so his youngest children would have a mother. But he and Marie never had any children. Honoré and Marguerite’s offspring grew into a family that probably appears in the family trees of most people with a significant number of Acadian ancestors. You can see some members of the Martel/Martell family (13 generations of them!) at my fourth cousin (twice removed) Bob Martell’s site.

I guess this means I have a good reason to visit Paris someday!

Some of you may know by now that Leen and I are expecting our second child (you can call him A2 for now) sometime in March. That means I’ll be doing all that baby stuff again, which includes not only sleepless nights (woohoo, can’t wait) but also a visit to the National Registration Department to get our child a birth certificate. I blogged about the registration of Alisdair’s birth here. If you don’t want to read that post, here’s a summary: the form asked for both my keturunan and Leen’s; since keturunan means ancestry and my ancestors migrated to Canada from Scotland, England, France, and Ireland, I put European on the form. Traditionally, children in Malaysia (at least in the dominant Malay culture) have taken on the ethnicity, religion, etc. of their fathers. So technically, at least according to his birth certificate, Alisdair is not Malay but European.

As someone who’s interested in culture, history, and genealogy — and as someone who spends way too much time thinking about things when most people would have just moved on — I’ve spent the last few years wondering about the choice I made that day, identifying myself and my son as European. After all, he’s never been to Europe, and the only time I’ve ever been there was a brief transit through Stockholm on my last trip home in 2005. I suppose if I had to choose just one population to identify with in terms of ancestry, I’d just go along with what the MacVays have been identifying themselves as for several hundred years: Scottish. But I went with European anyway, since it’s also technically true. I certainly wasn’t going to go with Caucasian or White or anything like that.

Well, it turns out European is exactly what the Malaysian government considers my ancestry to be; the National Registration Department would have put that into their system even if I had put Scottish or Canadian (which one could argue is a good label for my ancestry, though it’s more accurately my nationality) on the form. I know that because fellow blogger Bin Gregory recently visited the NRD/JPN to register his youngest son (his seventh child, I believe). Here’s what he told me:

JPN has redesigned their birth certificates again. For the first time, the race of the child is listed right on the cert. As you know, in the past it listed the race of the mother and father but not the kid, leaving the child’s race undetermined. Well not anymore - the kid takes the father’s race and now I have my first official European child, haha, though in fact the JPN told me all my kids are in the computer as Euro. Just thought I’d tell ya, in case you were as confused as I was about it. I asked to be listed as American, but that’s not a recognized category, apparently. I don’t suppose Canadian is either. :-)

So I guess I made the right choice in identifying myself as European, since that’s what all ‘white’ parents of Malaysian children are labeled with anyway. But Bin Gregory’s experience did leave me somewhat confused. When I registered Alisdair’s birth I already suspected that the lack of space for his keturunan on the form meant his would just follow mine, but I was never really sure. Leen and I always assumed — or rather hoped — that the lack of an official keturunan for Al meant we could get away with identifying him as Malay. But again, we were never sure. With this new information, it seemed we had our answer: all ‘white’ parents are European by default; children inherit the keturunan of their fathers by default; therefore, Alisdair is officially European, not Malay. OK, fair enough (he’s still got bumiputera status anyway, by virtue of having one Malay parent), but I needed to be sure. So I went straight to the source.

Today I called the National Registration Department and asked someone there the following questions: 1) Do all ‘white’ parents of Malaysian children have European as their keturunan? 2) Do children automatically follow their fathers? 3) If a child’s ancestry is European, does that mean the child is officially non-Malay, even if the child’s mother is Malay?

1) According to the friendly officer who spoke with me (I didn’t get his name because I’m really horrible at remembering to ask for names like that, and even worse at remembering them), yes, all ‘white’ parents of Malaysian children are automatically European. It doesn’t matter what they enter for their keturunan, because in the department’s system they’re on file as European. That’s why Bin Gregory was told all of his children were in the system as European, even though that’s not what he’d listed as his ancestry. Whether you’re American, Canadian, or actually one of the various flavours of European, you’re European to the Malaysian government. As long as you’re ‘white’ anyway. Asian ancestries are broken down (Malay, Chinese, Indian, etc.) but those from outside Asia are put into larger groupings. So if you’re American, Canadian, European or whatever, and you happen to be black, well then your ancestry will probably be in the system here as African (though that’s just an assumption, since I didn’t specifically ask about non-white foreigners).

2) Yes, children automatically follow their fathers. So if my ancestry is European, my children are considered European as well. However, that’s just the default. For more information on that, let’s look at the answer to the next question.

3) Yes, if the father’s ancestry is European, and the child is officially European as well, then the child is not Malay. Bumiputera, yes, but not Malay. However, like I said above, that’s just the default. This is where the reasoning for specifying the child’s keturunan on the birth certificate comes in: parents can now choose to have their children be officially identified with either of their ancestries. So when our next child is born, I’ll be European, Leen will be Malay, and A2 can be either one. I’m not completely comfortable with this, as I would prefer to have both lineages count towards his ancestry (even if that meant he would be put into the system as Eurasian). But it’s good news for anyone who really wants their kids to be ‘officially’ Malay. We’re still undecided. I mean, Al (along with his future adik) is for all intents and purposes Malay, no matter what label the government puts on him; plus, like I said, he’s also a bumiputera, which will come in handy. What we need to figure out is whether or not there’s any real advantage to being not just Bumiputera but a Malay Bumiputera. Being a Muslim and a Bumiputera should mean our kids will have plenty of opportunities and privileges even if they’re not technically Malay (opportunities and privileges which ideally all Malaysians would enjoy, but I’m thinking as a parent here).

But there’s a catch: children born before the introduction of the new birth certificate are considered to be of whatever ancestry their fathers are; to change the official ancestry of a child born before the new birth cert came out, parents have to apply to the National Registration Department. The officer I spoke to reminded me that there’s no guarantee such applications will be approved. So it’s quite possible that if we choose to register A2 as Malay, we’ll have one European kid and one Malay kid, even though both have the same parents. That would be a bit strange.

As I view any news related to the possibility of getting Malaysian PR with a skeptical eye, I’ve been saying that even if the government were serious about this whole PR thing it would still take a long time for me to get PR. Why? Well, I’ve been aware for some time now that there was a huge backlog of PR applications sitting in a pile somewhere. I thought there were about 5,500 applications, but the Home Minister recently stated that there were actually 16,812. I don’t think I have to explain how a sentence with the words government, inefficiency, and backlog sounds much, much worse when that number is added into the mix. Ever the skeptic, I thought that was the catch: they’ll give me PR, but they’ll spend years going through that pile first.

However, over the weekend the Home Ministry proudly announced that it had driven its employees like pistons and cleared over 140,000 applications, including those 16,812 applications for PR. Wow, that is pretty impressive, though I hope the speed wasn’t the result of having one guy go through the pile with a big stamp that says REJECTED. (See? I can’t turn off the skepticism here.)

Still, it is a positive sign; I look forward to seeing more of those.

As a Canadian living in Malaysia, I find it interesting whenever I find some connection between the my country of my birth and the place I now call home. That is, I find it interesting when two seemingly separate aspects of my life intersect beyond the boundaries of my little family, like one time when I watched a Canadian and Malaysian driver battling for position in an A1 race (let’s face it, you usually don’t see Malaysia and Canada competing against each other in pretty much anything). It reminds me of my wedding, when people who were in my life but not one another’s lives were suddenly sitting together at one table. It was like a comic starring both Batman and Spiderman. It was interesting.

I got that feeling again (and more) today when my friend Tariq alerted me to a National Film Board of Canada documentary from 1999 called Unwanted Soldiers. It tells the story of a group of young Chinese-Canadian men who lived in a society in which they couldn’t vote, get decent jobs, or even safely leave Chinatown. When the Second World War came along, they discovered to their great frustration that they couldn’t even get accepted into the army to fight for their country. However, when the Japanese occupied what was then called Malaya, the British hatched a plan to drop soldiers into the Malayan jungles to arm and train the guerrillas; the natural choice was to find Chinese-speaking soldiers who could blend in. That’s when they got the Canadian army to open the doors to Chinese recruits, several of whom were taken to an island off BC and trained in commando tactics. The soldiers were then dropped into the Malayan jungle and remained there until August 1945, when the Japanese finally surrendered.

Who knew there was such a fascinating Canadian connection to such a tumultuous period in Malaysian history? I certainly didn’t.

Of course, the story doesn’t end in 1945. There’s more to this documentary than just war. The fighting these men did in the jungle was nothing compared to their fight for dignity. The documentary is almost an hour long, but it’s worth it. Do take a look.

Sure, it’s not Remembrance Day anymore, but it doesn’t have to be, does it? As fellow Cape Bretoner and blogger Kate Beaton writes:

Remembrance Day always makes me ruminative about the place of history in our current consciences, because it is one of the few holidays where we are explicitly told listen you have to remember this thing that happened ok and, one, people pay attention, two, there is nothing jamming the line like bbq’s or parties or football games or chocolate eggs or presents. History: You should give a shit, who knew.

Anyway, watch the documentary if you have time. It’s a truly moving Canadian story, with a bit of Malaysian spice.

Most people who know me (and probably most people who read my blog) know that it really annoys me when someone spells my last name wrong. Actually, it annoys me a little less these days, just because I’m so used to it. But it’s still annoying. No matter how many times I tell people it’s M-a-c-V-a-y, I still see all sorts of different spellings. Probably the most common misspelling is the use of Mc instead of Mac. But while I’ve always found it somewhat irritating to see my name spelled M-c-V-a-y, lately I’ve been thinking it might be just as correct — or at least almost as correct — as the way I currently spell my name.

First things first: Both Mac and Mc mean exactly the same thing. Mac means son in both Scottish Gaelic and Irish. Contrary to popular belief, if does not mean son of. Instead, the word mac before a name places that name in the genitive case, which in Gaelic necessitates what’s called lenition or aspiration. In plain terms, that means the first letter of the name changes a bit. Names beginning with B, for example, will become Bh, which sounds like V. Hence beatha, meaning life, becomes bheatha (which is, interestingly enough, very similar to words for life in Latin languages), so that the family name becomes MacBheatha, which is pretty much pronounced the same as MacVay.

Mc is simply a contraction of Mac. There are all sorts of theories out there about the difference between Mac and Mc, the most common being that Mac is used by Protestant and Mc by Catholics (and also that Mac is Scottish, Mc is Irish; from these two misconceptions we get the origins of Irish Catholics being called Mickeys in America), but while that may be true in some cases (more on a possible example below), in most cases Mc is nothing more than a contraction of Mac. Here’s a better explanation than mine, an extract from a book called Tartan for Me! by Philip D. Smith, Jr. (which I found here):

Mac, Gaelic for “son”, is the most common element of Scottish and Irish surnames. In both countries, Mc is always an abbreviation of Mac. There is absolutely no truth to the American myth at Mac is Scottish and Mc is Irish. Mac used to be abbreviated M’ although this spelling is not common now. At times, all three versions can be seen. in an early book on Highland music, the author spelled his own family name three different ways on the first two pages — “MacDonald”, “McDonald”, and “M’Donald.”

Black’s The Surnames of Scotland and MacLysaght’s The Surnames of Ireland both treat Mac in the same way — as the only and original spelling. Persons seeking a name spelled “Mc” are expected to know that it is a conventional abbreviation for Mac. This same approach is used in Tartan For Me! To find “McDeal” look for “MacDeal.”

Mac is always considered an addition to a name. Before there was a “Donald’s Son” there was a “Donald”. In both Scotland and Nova Scotia, names beginning with Mac were traditionally alphabetized under the first letter of the second name — MacArthur under “A”, MacZeal under “Z”. Many Scots dropped “Mac” as they became Anglicized or emigrated, “Mac Wyeth” becoming simply “Wyeth”. “Kinzie” is from “MacKenzie”. The one notable exception is the Innes and MacInnes families, each quite distinct. The Innes family have Pictish roots and are from the east coast of Scotland with a red tartan. The MacInnes are of Gaelic origin from the west coast and wear a green tartan.

Mac takes a variety of pronunciations. In Islay Gaelic, Mac is pronounced like /mek/. In the United States one hears it as “mick”. Preceding a /k/ or /g/ sound, the final /k/ of Mac disappears. It became the practice in both the south of Scotland and in Ireland to write two words as one (MacGill to Magill; MacHale to Makale). In other names the /k/ sound of Mac is duplicated and attached to the front of a following word if it begins in a vowel (MacArter to MacCarter). The reverse also occurs. If the second name begins with a /k/ or /g/, producing two /k/ sounds together, one may disappear (MacGill to Magill; MacKenzie to MacEnzee). Mac is at times pronounced “muck” and written that way (Mac ‘il Roy to Muckleroy).

There’s also an interesting bit about the Anglicization of Gaelic names being helped along by the fact that a lot of Gaelic speakers could not read or write Gaelic (this one’s debatable) and would therefore just write names in English as they sounded in Gaelic.

Anyway, I’ve always taken it for granted that my family has used the MacVay spelling for a long time, beginning way back in Scotland, before my family moved to Ireland in the 17th century. Sure, the name was always recorded as McVay (or McVey, McVea, McVeigh, McVeagh, etc.) on old documents from Scotland, Ireland and Canada…but I know my MacVays have always spelled the name M-a-c-V-a-y, at least in Canada.

Or have they?

The grave of Alexander and Elizabeth MacVay

When I posted my family’s history a few months back, someone noticed the McVay spelling on my great-great-grandfather’s gravestone and asked in the comments if the family name had once been spelled that way. Here’s what I wrote in reply:

I’ve seen the name spelled McVay on documents, and of course on that gravestone. As far as I know, in my family it’s always been MacVay. Some members of the family got used to the McVay spelling and stuck with it, but most continued to use MacVay, even when they were still in NB. It would have been MacVay originally anyway, ‘Mc’ just being a contraction.

One interesting thing is the presence of the lines under the ‘c’ in ‘Mc’ on the gravestone. Alexander’s name was also spelled that way on the birth certificate of his daughter Isabella in Scotland in 1855. The clerk who copied down the name didn’t spell other ‘Mc’ names with the little lines. I know the lines were used to signify a raised ‘c’ (and therefore ‘Mc’ as a contraction of ‘Mac’); I suspect they were also used to show that a name spelled with the contraction ‘Mc’ was actually spelled ‘Mac’, whereas ‘Mc’ names without the little marks were always spelled ‘Mc’. That’s just a theory though. The short version of all this: I’m pretty sure we’ve always spelled it MacVay.

I now know that all of the descendants of my great-great-grandfather used the MacVay spelling, but in spite of that, I have to admit there’s another possibility besides what I wrote in that comment. That possibility is that my great-great-grandfather, Alexander MacVay, may have actually spelled his name Alexander McVay. The 1855 Scottish birth record of Isabella MacVay that I mentioned in that comment provides another clue: it appears to contain my great-great-grandfather’s signature, which reads Alex McVay. It looks like it may have actually been written by the clerk, because it looks suspiciously like the other signatures on the page. But if it is indeed my great-great-grandfather’s writing (the only example of it I have ever seen), then it appears the family name may have actually been McVay.

While the whole Scottish/Irish/Protestant/Catholic explanation of the difference between Mac and Mc may not be generally true, interestingly enough it may have been the reason behind the spelling change (if indeed there was one) in my family’s name. When my family arrived in St. Stephen, New Brunswick in the early 1860s, they found a number of McVays already living there, all Irish Catholics who had been in the area for many years. My family had lived in Ireland for several generations but didn’t consider themselves Irish. They were Ulster Scots who were fiercely proud of their Scottish roots; they were also staunch Presbyterians. Had my family settled in Cape Breton straight off the boat, I might just think they changed the spelling to fit in with their neighbours (who mostly used Mac). Instead, it seems like my family may have been trying to do the opposite.

Sure, it’s possible the spelling was MacVay all along. Like I said, maybe that signature wasn’t really written by my great-grandfather. And maybe the name was spelled wrong by whoever made that gravestone. All possible, but I’m not sure. After all, Alexander’s eldest son, my great-grandfather William MacVay, was an expert stonemason and may have made that gravestone himself, or at least had a hand in it.

Whatever the case, the name is MacVay now and my kids will be at least the fifth generation to spell it that way. But when I see our name as McVay (when, not if, because it’s pretty much inevitable), maybe I’ll be slightly less annoyed than before. Maybe. But only slightly.

The other night a reporter from the Malay Mail called me to get my thoughts on the recent announcement that foreign husbands will get PR. Here’s the article that appeared the next day, entitled ‘Budget 2010: Visa cheer for expats’:

THE 2010 Budget announced by the Prime Minister last Friday has brought smiles to expatriates planning to spend more time here.

Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak in his maiden budget announced that the government would be making it easier for talented and skilled expatriates to get permanent residence (PR) status in a bid to drive the economy forward.

He said visas would automatically be granted to working family members within 14 days for those coming to work here, in addition to the extension of PR status to foreigners married to Malaysian women.

This was well received by expatriates residing in Malaysia who have been longing for PR status.

Canadian Jordan McVay, 35, who has been living here for the past seven years after marrying a Malaysian said he would be elated if the government kept to its announcement.

“Within seven years, I have had 17 visas and each trip to the Immigration Department has been frustrating. I have been told so many times that it would be difficult to obtain PR status here by Immigration officers,” McVay told Malay Mail.

“If I had brought my wife back to Canada, she would have been granted a PR within six months. It has been easier for foreign women that marry Malaysian men to obtain PR status.

“Previously the government announced different types of programmes for expats, but they didn’t work. I really hope that this does work. I will be very delighted,” he added.

Cyrus Daruwalla from India echoed McVay’s sentiments and said that the government was moving in the right direction.

“This will definitely encourage more expats to come to Malaysia but we shall have to wait and see how this is going to play out. I am still skeptical about the PR issue.”

Daruwalla has been living in Malaysia for 16 years after marrying a local woman.

“The government is making the right move and it shows more equality. This will help bring in expats,”
Daruwalla said.

Briton Bob Teasdale was equally thrilled with the announcement and said he would apply for PR status now that the rules have been eased.

“Asia is the way of the future and Malaysia is doing the right thing. The Malaysian government has had various programmes to encourage foreigners to move here and it has all been great, especially the Malaysia, My Second Home programme,” he said.

“I have family and friends who will be interested to move here if this programme is implemented. However, it is still easier to obtain PR status in Hong Kong and Singapore,” Teasdale said. Teasdale has been living in Malaysia for 16 years and is married with two children.

It wasn’t just my name the reporter got wrong. Not all of the quotes attributed to me in the article were my exact words, as far as I can remember anyway. To be fair, though, I sort of talked the guy’s ear off, which gave him a lot of quotes to work with but may have overwhelmed him a bit if he was jotting down notes instead of recording the conversation. When I realised afterwards that he had probably missed quite a bit of what I had said, I sent him an email with some quotes he could use. Here’s what I wrote:

My wife and I have been married since 2001, and we’ve lived in Malaysia since 2002. Since coming here I’ve had 17 visas, the longest being just short of two years. Getting those visas was frustrating enough, but what’s been even more frustrating is the fact that it’s incredibly difficult to get PR here. I have a number of friends who are married to Malaysians and they all face the same obstacles when it comes to dealing with the Immigration Dept. and trying to get PR. I know people who have been here for decades before finally getting PR. How many have given up and left, taking their Malaysian spouses away with them?

When the news about PR being extended to foreign husbands of Malaysian women came out in the last couple of days in relation to the 2010 budget, of course I was excited, but I haven’t really allowed myself to jump for joy yet, because I’ve been excited by promising announcements in the past only to be disappointed. For example, a couple of years ago the government announced that foreign spouses would be able to get five-year visas, but it turned out only those with five-year work contracts would be eligible. I don’t know anyone who has ever had a five-year employment contract, let alone a five-year visa.

If the government is serious about this latest initiative, then I will be very happy, and very grateful. Extension of PR to foreign spouses would be an acknowledgement that we are immigrants, not merely visitors as stated on our visas. We have strong ties to this country, with not only Malaysian spouses but in many cases Malaysian children as well. My wife and I have a three-year-old son, born and raised here, and another on the way. Getting PR here would certainly make it easier, not only for me but for my entire family, to enjoy life in Malaysia and to contribute in our own way to this country we all call home.

My written quotes didn’t quite make it into the article, but I suppose the reporter did get the gist of what I had told him, despite a few mistakes here and there. I wish he’d got my name right, though. I thought I had spelled it out pretty clearly. But hey, it’s not the first time: people get it wrong all the time in Canada too.

Meanwhile, the details of this new PR initiative are still scarce. I think the next step will be a call to the Immigration Department. Let’s see what they say.

Today a friend (who could hardly contain his glee) told me about a great online resource called Sejarah Melayu (Malay History), which bills itself as A History of the Malay Peninsula but contains goodies from all over the Malay Archipelago. What’s especially interesting is the Sejarah Melayu Library, which is described as…

…perhaps the largest public on-line collection of books and other texts on the history of the Malay archipleago and its surrounding region. Consisting of over 600 documents in electronic PDF format, the library includes books related to specific topics in the history of the Malay archipleago and its surrounding region, travelogues, general histories, academic papers, encyclopedias, dictionaries and other types of references. Essential downloads include the Sejarah Melayu itself, the Kedah Annals, Hikayat Abdullah and The Commentaries of Alfonso d’Albuquerque.

Of course, I find myself drawn to the drool-inducing Language section. There’s lots of other great stuff hiding elsewhere on the site too, I think. Do check out this fascinating (and free) resource if you’re interested.

I often find myself lamenting the lack of sidewalks here in Malaysia. Sometimes I think it’s silly to feel annoyed that there are so few real sidewalks here, but I just can’t help it.

Well, maybe it’s simply in my blood to feel that way: while googling for some further information on the members of my family mentioned in my previous post, I discovered that my great-granduncle Joseph MacVay’s son, William Alexander MacVay (technically my first cousin, twice removed), actually co-invented the sidewalk as we know it today. The Wikipedia article on sidewalks says:

Arthur Wesley Hall and William Alexander McVay invented concrete sidewalks and partitions in St. Stephen, New Brunswick in 1924.

The source given for that is page seven of a book called Memorable Maritime Inventions (1828-1930), which I can’t find any mention of online outside of references to sidewalks. Anyway, obscurity of the source aside, it’s an interesting little fact, and yet another reason for me to try to get in touch with Bill MacVay, William Alexander MacVay’s 89-year-old son.

And I still find it annoying that there aren’t a lot of sidewalks over here, but I kind of understand, given that it’s too hot to walk anywhere anyway. Sigh.

In my first post about the MacVay family, I mentioned that my great-grandfather, William MacVay, helped his brother Joseph (who was working with his son, also named William) build the railway station in McAdam, New Brunswick. Well, today I read a news article from New Brunswick that mentions the MacVays’ work.

The article provided me with a couple of interesting bits of information:

1) Apparently there was a master mason named Archie B. MacDonald who worked on the station. So my great-grandfather may have been MacDonald’s apprentice, which is a great bit of information for me because I’ve always wondered how and when William MacVay became a mason. In all the records and stories I knew of, he’d been working in lumber and carpentry and then suddenly he was a mason. Now I may have some perspective on his transition to that trade. However, MacDonald was younger than my great-grandfather (according to NB census records), so the teacher-apprentice relationship may have been the other way around. Also, apparently the station was built between 1900 and 1911. William MacVay moved to Cape Breton sometime in 1901, so I wonder how much of the stonework he actually did on that station.

2) William MacVay is alive! No, not my great-grandfather, but my cousin. Actually, he’s my second cousin, once removed. He’s also the only male MacVay descendant of Alexander MacVay outside of my immediate family. When I wrote that first post on the MacVays not long ago, I wrote that he had passed away, since I’m pretty sure another cousin told me he had. And yet there he is, alive and well, visiting the McAdam railway station with his sister. William and I used to write letters to each other; I think I’ll try to get in touch with him again. I’ve edited the original post.

Anyway, do check out the article. Great stuff, and nice to see another MacVay.

Here’s a nice travel piece about Cape Breton. The writer describes it as

…a place where impenetrably forested mountains plunge straight to the sea, their descent interrupted only by the frail ribbon of the Cabot Trail; and where the vast saltwater sprawl of Bras d’Or Lake convolutes nearly every route between one place and another. Its rocky little Canso Causeway, a scant half-century old, is its only link to a province so tenuously peninsular that it is almost itself an island.

I like this too, a bit on the Scot’s chronic longing for home, even when we are home:

Nothing is as sad as a sad fiddle tune from the Gaelic-speaking world. These aren’t songs about lost loves, but about a lost land. “A lot of the traditional songs date back to the early settlers,” I was told by Katie MacLeod, a seventeen-year-old fiddler from Inverness, just up the coast from Mabou. “They’re sad songs, because they were people who missed their homeland.” Katie, who began playing on a child-sized fiddle when she was four, well understands the pull of home even if sadness seems a stranger to her cheerful demeanor. She lives in a house that has been in her family for 140 years, and says of her generation that “a lot of young people leave — but they come back if they get a chance.”

You can read the full article here.

Here’s an article that might jolt some of the ‘Israel is the innocent victim’ people back to reality. Of course, some of them will keep on believing nonsense. Reality’s not for everyone, I guess. That’s a shame.