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Monday, January 12, 2015

A letter to poor Najib – Rip van Winkle



Dear Najib, old boy:
How are you, old chap, old pal? I’ve waited from last Monday for your response to my last letter. I was hoping you’d write, that you and I could’ve had lunch this week, or teh tarik kurang manis, after my return from Bombay (oops, Mumbai; we don’t want to upset Narendra Modi now, do we?). Not a word from you. Silence is golden, I suppose, but I was beginning to think you’d flown the coup. Again. Off into the wide blue yonder.
I hear you’re down with a bout of E .coli after visiting flood victims – and right after you scurried out of your bunker in Hawaii on your golf holiday with Barack. What rotten luck! I’m sorry to hear it, old man. I trust you’re on the mend. Those things can give you the runs. Have you had one of those? It’s like having salmonella poisoning. Nasty things. Lots of water, fella! Maybe an aspirin or two as well. And if it persists see your doctor.
Barack sent me an email the other day. I told him we – you and I – are acquaintances. Long-long tale. Anyway, he says “hi” and wants you to hurry back. I presume he means back to Hawaii to finish off the golf game and talk geopolitics, what with the Islamofascists going cuckoo and all. I think he wants to sell you a couple of his subs. Better than the Scorpenes. By the way, where do you hide the Scorpenes these days – in some secret, hi-tech, undersea cave like in a James Bond movie?
Barack also told me you didn’t even come close to a hole-in-one. Said you were miles and miles away. More practice, that’s what you need. Close an eye when you hit the ball next time. Then, if you miss the fairway or the green or the putt or even the ball altogether when teeing off, you can always blame it on some mysterious insect that assailed you out of the blue. Yes, things come right out of the blue, just as things fly right into the blue and disappear altogether. Isn’t life strange?
So how was your trip home? Heard you had to hunker down in an RMAF C-130 Hercules that had to be flown out to you to bring you back from Hawaii. A Herculean task where you’re concerned. Can’t have been first-class, though. Was the food crap too? What did they feed you – salted kacang in teeny-weeny MAS packets? How many packets of those can you chow down before paying the price? A real back-breaker, those planes. Rough as guts, as my Australian friends would say. Did they make you wear a parachute?
I heard you flew right into Kota Baru to pay homage to the flood victims, that you waded in knee-deep water and directed traffic like a hero. That’s the sport. Quite the Ultraman, aren’t you? Mighty brave of you, old boy. Hope you didn’t encounter any of those water urchins. They really can get under your skin and give you more than the runs.
Then you flew to Pahang, your home state, to visit flood victims there too. But here’s the bit that had me in total awe: before anybody could blink you were seen hanging out in Bangkok, sashaying at some posh international hotel, on yet another holiday. All the hard work you put in day and night must have blown your gaskets, huh? Golly-gee, man: I wish I had as many annual leave entitlements as you. Plus a government jet – wink, wink – to use at my beck and call. Snap, and a helicopter fetches me. Snap, and a C-130 fetches me. Snap, and 9M-NAA Airbus A319 comes right out of the big blue sky and, like good old Lassie, fetches me.
You know, Najib, I’ve been thinking, and it hurts when I think. If I had my own plane, I’d have a tail number like yours but I’d register it as 121-55. Some Chinese big business honcho in KL told me a joke related to 121-55 over lunch one day last month. I told him I was trying to eat but he carried on regardless. Wouldn’t shut up. I think he’s like you – laughs at his own jokes. When he told me the 121-55 joke I half-laughed – to please the poor sod. We do what we must, right? Afterwards I thought of calling our old buddy Vincent Tan and placing those numbers with his Berjaya lottery joint. You never know your luck. I could berjaya too and buy Liverpool.
Strike it rich and retire before I hit 30. I’m sure you know much about striking it rich. Tell you what: Let’s have lunch one day this week, Friday – that’s if you’re not taking off again and you’re over your E. coli – and you can tell me your secrets to striking it big-time. I’m sure you’d have some system worked out. Vincent wouldn’t tell me. Last time I talked to him he kept babbling “red or blue, red or blue, red or blue”. Drove me nuts. Next thing I knew he’d done what you do – taken off! Snap. He’d scooted off to Cardiff because his mother told him to go fix up his mess. Naughty boy, our Vincent. I hope he’s not using 9M-NAA, Najib. Oh, jeepers, man: You said it was my turn.
Aren’t you going to ask me about my bijnis trip to Bombay (aiyo! Mumbai)? Never mind. I’m sure you have more pressing things to worry about than my bijnis trips – like how to get waves of sympathy from your Malaysian people over your e.coli infection and play up your flood-victim status so the next wave of your popularity comes like a South China Sea tsunami. Thunderbirds are go!
Say, here’s an idea. Go on TV3 and RTM and demand all the other TV stations including our pal Ananda’s Astroboy to broadcast a “live” telecast of your address to the nation the way US presidents do. Make it presidential, like you’re running a republic. Get cosmetics to make you look pale. White as a ghost. When recording, grasp your poor old tummy, moan and groan, pain writ large on your face. If not pain then discomfort. Jiggle about in your chair like you have the shakes.
Malaysians will start crying openly for you. They’ll sing kesian, kesian Najib kita. Mark my words: you’ll win the 2018 elections hands down. Two-thirds majority guaranteed return. Rather like buying 1MDB bonds with those kinds of handsome yields, right? Meanwhile Malaysians will put you on a pedestal, call you the most caring, loving PM and world statesman! (Psst! Ignore Mahathir; he's just jealous.) Learn from Tricky Dicky – Richard M. Nixon. He was such a shyster meister until The Washington Post sunk him good and proper. Trick’s not to get bugged out by the media. You’re safe in Malaysia, though. All dance to your tune.
Let’s lighten up your mood since you’re down in the dumps with E. coli and being a flood victim. (I have tears in my puppy blue eyes.) Ever heard the Lyndon B. Johnson joke when he visited India and Indira Gandhi was then prime minister? Let’s do lunch and I’ll tell you. You’ll have kittens. Promise. Hope you’ve a funny-bone. Hard to tell with you lot if you do or don’t.
Please write. I rindu dan bimbang.
Sekian, your pal
Rip van Winkle.
* Rip van Winkle reads The Malaysian Insider.

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