An indie protest
4 min read
On September 29 and 30, hundreds of thousands of Malaysians showed up in defiance of the Peaceful Assembly Act 2012 and the Home Minister’s comical ban on...
A right time for novel fashion, retail and architecture
8 min read
Situated along Jalan Kelawai is a breathtaking piece of structural design. Two blocks of 43-storey residential units and a 10-storey office tower rise over a fu...
Loving the art and the artist
7 min read
Not all marriages are made in heaven.For nuptials between artists, some may well start on the canvas, or off it. But they are more likely to first meet in cir...
In the shelter of family trees
4 min read
The intimacy of the questions used to surprise me, but I have now become accustomed to being asked who my adoptive parents are or husband is. It’s not inq...
One country’s Merdeka is another’s damage control
6 min read
It takes two hands to clap; there is no shore unless there is sea; one man’s ceiling is another man’s floor – as the poet rightly claims.You...
Going Dutch: Lessons in urban amenity from Amsterdam
7 min read
It’s a human theatre conducted against the gracious Golden Age backdrop, where over 7,600 buildings in the city centre alone are listed as “monument...
Penang targets non-traditional tourists
6 min read
Greg Caplan, the founder of Remote Year, was three seas and two continents away when I called him. His team of six was in Slovenia, with 75 Remote Year particip...
Highlights of George Town Festival 2015
11 min read
The Metamorphosis, Android VersionIn France sometime in the near future, as war rages in the background, Gregor wakes up one morning to find that he...
Living hyphenated
6 min read
With a writing style that’s thematically similar to Irvine Welsh (and with praise from the man himself on the front sleeve of his book), Malaysian-Austral...
Stories from some young Malay minds
4 min read
They say don’t judge a book by its cover, and in the case of Young and Malay: Growing up in Multicultural Malaysia, I couldn’t agree more. The spunk...
Malaysia’s troubled state
5 min read
Malaysia is currently in crisis. The ringgit seems to be on an inexorable downhill slide, ethnic tensions have deteriorated from uncomfortable simmer to open fl...
Medical tourism: A billion-ringgit industry for Penang
6 min read
Medical tourism, or health tourism, is defined as the travel of people to a foreign country for medical treatment. In an estimation by Nikkei Asia, the worldwid...