Holidays

Good morning to the panel of honourable adjudicators, teachers, and friends. On this fine
morning, I would like to talk about Malaysian Holidays.

Our country of Malaysia is the home of people of different cultures and ethnic groups. The
majority of Malaysians are Malays. Besides Malays, there are Chinese, Indians, and so on.
We live here, Malaysia, peacefully without wars amongst ourselves.

There had been some disturbing talk some time ago about the necessity to do something
about Malaysia having too many holidays. I say ‘disturbing’ because who has heard of
having ‘too many holidays’? We’ve got along all these years celebrating every festival that is
on the calendar and still managing to keep up with the work that has to be done.

To students, a public holiday means having fun and relaxing. We students will get tired of
school if holidays didn’t exist. Spending our time on a holiday also means we could spend
some time with our family. A five-day school week gives us less time to hang around with our
families. During the weekends, our time is usually spent in shopping malls with either our
family or buddies.

On Hari Raya, Malay kids would be elated to have ‘duit raya’. My past years of going around
the village have passed, leaving good memories such as being chased by a goat with my
cousins. When I turned ten, I felt awkward being around little kids while collecting the ‘duit
raya’. This year I spent my time at my grandparent’s house with my siblings and my
12years+ cousins. I felt bored, having the urge to go back home and listen to head-banging
music. These days, teens as well as preteens don’t have the spirit of a get-together. To me,
it’s déjà vu every year.

Even though the spirit of togetherness is being overshadowed by the stress of a teenager’s
life, we still somehow find a way to make holidays with our families interesting. For example;
we try not to talk back on our parent’s opinion to go to an island somewhere in Borneo.
While we’re there, we have fun snorkelling and appreciating the wonders of the marine
world. And I thought I was going to swim with the lionfish!

Holidays should be spent with reasonable activities. Some parents send us to camps during
the school holidays. We dread of going to camps. I had the experience when I was 11. “I
signed you up to a camp in Rawang. It’s a four day study camp,” said my dad. I was like, “
What?! I’m so not going there!” I was full with anger and fury. My diary read – I can’t believe
this is happening! - Well, who likes to go to camps when their parents say so? I saw this poll
in the internet and it said 73% of people rather stay at home without TV than go to camp. So
it’s true that students don’t like being forced away to camps during the holidays.

The Chinese celebrate a lot of festivals. There is a list of the celebrations, but I’m going to
talk about two only. I’m not sure what they celebrate on the Moon cake festival, but what I
know is that there are loads of moon cakes. Yum! The most obvious and marking the first
day of the New Year of the Chinese calendar, is Chinese New Year. Lion dance and
parades are held, full of excitement.

The quietest of all the festivals known to my brain, Deepavali. I’m not the whiz of the details
of the festivals in this country. The kalam is a decoration they make out coloured rice. The
other thing that I know is they eat murukku. A delicious, country treat.
Of all the holidays in Malaysia, there is one celebration that most of the citizens watch or
attend. ‘Merdeka’ is the word that people cheer to at the stroke of midnight of 31st August of
every year. Celebrated at landmarks such as Dataran Merdeka, and many more in the
Wilayah Persekutuan.

Thanks are the word I would like to say, for sharing your time with me on this wonderful day.