Model relations

“A lifestyle is a terrible thing to waste.”

-Vincent Chase
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For the moment:

Nipelaki Kwa Baba-Doctor King’esi
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*In oder to make the post ‘concise’, and seek a better understanding, I have omitted the last paragraph whick makes up 1/3 of it. I will post that portion in another post for your convenience. I don’t regret it like construction work on roadsides. Don’t apologize.
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I am now in Singapore. This is a family oriented trip and I’ve done little of what most non-JBites Malaysians do in Singapore.
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I was reading the Monday December 10 issue of the Today paper. It is free and similar to The Sun newspaper in Malaysia. I noticed something I found very interesting, but not peculiar. And I must have it here.
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*Before I go on I should point out what may be obvious by some. It appears the papers have been reporting quite a sum on the recent rally in Malaysia, which I feel is natural. I am not going to waste time speculating the possible agendas. But a point to put forward to cynics is that, if the kids of your next door neighbour decide to park their bicycles behind the cars of their parents as a sign of unhappiness, in you seeing what happened, would that not get you to talking to even a single member of your family?
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On page 4 there was a half page article above an advertisement. The title read,

A MODEL FOR THE MUSLIM WORLD

with a blurp directly below it that read,

Spotlight was once on Malaysia, Indonesia but now the focus is on Oman

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*Just so you know (in case you didn’t :) ) , embassies in each country will read newspapers and magazines that are available to the people of the country where that embassy is based. They will select articles that are relevant to them and have it sent to relevant departments of their government. If the article or piece of work is in a foreign language, they will have their local staff to translate it for them. This practice was made known to me by a relative of mine, a Muslim Singaporean Arab, who used to work for the Embassy of Israel in Singapore. Her job was to translate relevant articles from the Bahasa Melayu papers, into English.

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That raised my eyebrow. A little.

• Singapore (the paper/author) was indeed blatantly admitting that her neighbour, competitor and friend, was (once) a model to Muslim nations.
• The complimentary highlight/mention of Oman. A state rarely spoken by the layman of either country (Malaysia, Singapore).
• The accuracy of Indonesia (once) a model Muslim country. With respect to the Indonesian people, I wonder if Indonesia has in the past or present been used as a model of a Muslim state. Keeping in mind the old communist rule, various conflicts and economy. If I have erred here, please correct me. But in isolation of this specific mention of Indonesia, I do question the accuracy of the author, if not the agenda.

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Here’s the juice.
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Behind it, on page 5, one quarter of the page had a small section called Singapore Snippets. 1 of the 3 snippets had a title that read,

OMAN, SINGAPORE STRENGTHEN TRADE TIES

I think it would be a waste of time if Malaysians were to expect sincere nobility by the Singapore papers, and complain about the unnecessariness of the paper mentioning Malaysia and Indonesia as the ‘former’ model and should have just jumped straight to talking about Oman. That I feel is immaterial, irrelevant and immature to speculate.
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1. I don’t think what happened was peculiar. I’m not sure if Switzerland, known to be a neutral state, would not have done so. But I am certain such a thing occurs in many other parts of the world between neighbouring countries. More so, if they are both competing states. Even states who by no choice have minimal international political ambition and policy such as the Netherlands and Belgium (thus making the Hague and Brussels centers of international institutions), do the same. So again I reiterate, not peculiar.
2. I am not familiar with Oman and how it is perceived as a state or a Muslim state. In the most diplomatic tone I can conjure, I have in fact never heard of anyone (state) using them as a benchmark, point of reference or model.

However, that could be due to my (and your) unusual ignorance. No?