ON the eve of the historic date marking the formation of Malaysia, I want to share the story of a man who, to me, was a quintessential example of that generation of Malaysians who grew up before Sept 16,1963.

MALAYSIA, with her 39 ethnic groups, is a fragmented society. We live as strangers among ourselves, with the Semenanjung people not knowing and generally not caring to know our brethren in Sabah and Sarawak and vice versa.

It hurts when you’re made to feel like a stranger in your own country.

PANIC disorder is a debilitating mental health condition that you would not wish on your worst enemy.

Have you read a book recently by a Malaysian scholar that changed the way you think about the world?

IT IS universally accepted that every­­thing has an end. However, there is no broad agreement on what an “end” is and its form or nature.

When government buildings incorporate elements of representation, accessibility and accountability, people can better appreciate their true role and power in national politics.

IN today’s column, I want to talk about a little storybook by Enid Blyton that only now resounds deafeningly in my mind as an important contribution to the idea of nation-building.

Without reading books and thinking independently, we are merely downloading information instead of actually learning.

TODAY, I wish to propose a twist in the teaching of a category of subjects that some in both public and private universities have dismissed as “unimportant” – the Mata Pelajaran Pengajian Umum (MPU) or General Studies subjects.

The Covid-19 pandemic has forced us to pause and reconsider our lives. It is a time to figure out how we can do things differently so as to have a better future.

More than 1,400 years ago, a woman decided to be kind to an infant despite no promise of a reward. It’s a story whose lesson continues to resonate today.