Bureaucracy

Today we went to Putrajaya the new administrative capital upon which all government function including the prime Minster will be moving to. It is almost complete with only a few touches to be done and I didn’t see much change from when I first went there nearly a year. One of the aspects of this city is to project a first world mentality for Malaysia to show that they are developing and on target for the industrialized nation target of 2020. A lot of design and effect has obviously gone into from the choice of building materials to the layout. We went to the immigration dept to extend my visa as par course of my settlement here under the spouse program. From there it went downhill. Two and half hours to get this simple act done all complete with the grumpy cashier moaning about her not having gone to lunch yet. First of all neither have the rest of the people waiting here who have not had lunch yet. It just too difficult to do so, not knowing when your tickets (any one of three different groups of numbers) will be called, even a bathroom stop is risky. It was evident at one point that several people were for whatever reason held up because they did not respond to the calling of their ticket. There are nineteen counters spread over an approx distance of 100 metres. You fill your form at one end and then sit down for 2 hours. You get a call to the cashier right at the opposite end and you to pay. You don’t get your passport back as it sits in a pile behind the cashier waiting for someone to pick it up. 30 minutes later you get another call at the opposite end of the hall to where you are to have someone just hand over your newly stamped passport. Now I know the government is worried about the fitness and health of Malaysians but I can think of better ways to make them fit other than have them running from end of the hall to the other. I know that the government is running a campaign to get public servant to be better mannered to the public they serve, the bureaucracy and attitude ranges from bad to appalling. My father in law used to be a civil servant and he loathed the way the civil service comes across and I have seen him frustrated by the said service when waiting to pick up his IC for the umpteenth time as they upgrade the system yet again. The building is which immigration is housed is a nice building which I think most people would love to work in. its comfortable and well designed except for this immigration hall which had litter everywhere and no bins. The floors are still scuffed with black marks on a cream coloured floor which were still there from the first time I went there. The saying in Malaysia is “first world buildings- third world mentality”.

On a more positive note there are a lot of cats in our area albeit with no owners. One cat that we were always kind to whenever she appears and who follows us around obviously hoping for food. This morning we walked out of our door to find this site on our front porch. Maybe the cat knows she is on to a good thing.







Music of the moment: Groove Armada – At the River