I'm sorry. This time I really have to rant.

By now, everyone in Malaysia knows about the recent 0.78 cent increase in fuel costs, bringing the total amount to RM2.70 ($0.83 USD) for a litre of petrol. As far as I have seen, the majority of Malaysians have viewed this with a near panic by causing massive traffic jams in the city streets in the effort to fuel up before the midnight price-hike deadline and with a worrisome hatred for their future and their government. To all this I say one thing.

My God, you're all whiny ungrateful sods.

Sure, Malaysia is an oil producing country, but do you really expect all that oil to last us forever? Did you really stop and think for a moment that other countries (fine they are non-oil producing countries) are paying still paying 2-6 times more per litre than you are? Did you really think, with how oil is meticulously searched and found, siphoned off a well maintained rig in the middle of the seas that probably took months to build, transported, refined in some huge refinery, stored, transported again, used to fuel our cars, then have a big chunk of the profits given to people for no good reason that it's amazing that fuel prices could have stayed as low as less than 2 Malaysian Ringgit?

Wow you must be feeling self-righteous that your daily transport to work alone in your car has now lost all meaning. You know, forget about the fact that your exhaust fumes are killing the planet. Forget about the joys and freedom of spending money on your late night rituals of food and drinks whining about the how the fat cats are taking your money for the sake of taking back what you know is a stupid move.

Here's an idea, why don't you drive a little less and think about how the rest of the world has put up with a high price in petrol for the past few years. Why don't you take a break from your whining and think about how the rest of the world has been hard at work trying to solve a global (as in amazingly includes you too) energy crisis that has been debated for years. Why don't you just suck it up and stop being part of the problem and go do something about solving it?

The good thing about this that if no one is going to actually do something about it, rest assured, everyone will stop making a fuss and toughing it out, after two months of useless fist shaking. Oh Malaysia, have you really changed at all?

It's an old question of the day set on by Quofda.com, but Estarla set about answering the question which in turn made me think of my own responses (does that make her the leader here?). But before that, I'll put down the definitions for a leader and follower, for my sake and yours so that we understand where we're coming from.

Leader - A person who rules or guides or inspires others.
Follower - A person who accepts the leadership of another.

The common stereotype of a leader is someone who's in charge. Normally someone higher up the hierarchy. Your parents, your boss, some older senior who's picking on you all the time, someone who makes the final decision and tells you what to do. They dictate your role and you're expected to follow making you the stereotypical follower.

The pattern of being a traditional leader or a follower is built over the respect of a social status, the knowledge and ignorance between the leader and the followers and fear of repercussions by the one in charge. At the end of it, this is what most people know and understand because at it's most basic levels, this is all too often true.

But being a leader or a follower doesn't always equate to a how you appear in public. While I still define a leader as someone who makes the final decision, it doesn't necessarily mean that the most public figure displays true leadership. A poster boy can command an audience yes, but if what they say and do aren't actions of their own, then by all means, they aren't leaders.

All too often the illusion of who is in charge is overlooked by the masses who only understand that what you see is what you get. If leadership is based on the one who makes the final decision, then those who work behind the curtains to place, to inspire and to guide the public figures around are the real leaders. To that end, a person can be your boss, but they can never be your superior.

The same can be said for dominant/submissive relationships. To those unfamiliar with the world, it is the submissives who have power over the dominant partner because at the end of it, it is the submissive who ultimately dictate how far they can go. This kind of inverse powerplay is more suited in the world today where the lines are blurred between our roles in society and our understanding of our individual persona.

Now, I can answer the original question because I know I am not a follower. I do whatever I can to dictate the eventual outcome of the life ahead of me. Irrespective of who I bow my head down to, every one I know has their place along my life and every action I take is with a purpose. I know, I will never have the ability to become an actor on the stage, but I do know I have what it takes to be the director and producer behind the scenes. If there is a goal to something, I will produce a storyline towards that end.

So am I a leader? Not if you want to count me as a public figure. But as someone that can orchestrate and execute plans within plans. I know now that I fit that bill. Chances are, I won't be remembered down in history as someone who did something great, but in great people are the small deeds that they do with great passion and commitment. Maybe that's how a leader should be, at least one I aspire to become.

While Malaysia might not be my birthplace, it is certainly the place where I was raised throughout my life. Despite of what I say about myself, it's hard to imagine growing up in anywhere except for Malaysia and be anything but Malaysian. The values learned still bears a stark contrast to the cultures I'm more comfortable with everywhere else. One of which reflects the inherent birthright of every Malaysian because I am a racist.

Yes you heard me. I am a racist, that Malaysian you know is a racist, that person raised in Malaysia is a racist. In fact, everyone born and raised in Malaysia is a racist.

How could we not be? Regardless of whether Malaysia claims to be a racially tolerant nation, from young we are taught to look at our skin colour, our language and our beliefs. What's yours is different from other people and with it comes the stigma that's all too coloured.

"The Malays are lazy and want to convert everyone to Islam…"

"The Chinese want your money and care for nothing else…"

"The Indians are dirty and will steal from you…"

These beliefs are drilled into the minds of every child with every Malaysian parent in an unending cycle. Echoed in the simple friendships we make to the people we fall in love with. Interracial relationships have it hard in Malaysia, more so given the differences in religious beliefs that primarily govern every race. These differences are reinforced by our peers and even more so by the education system. Regardless of whoever claims that they are not the least bit racist, it is that awareness of our physical, cultural and religious beliefs that starts the long line towards a "racial" segregation.

Even though, other Malaysians children do outstandingly well in their education, it is the Malaysian Malays that benefit the most from Government scholarships, If I still recall correctly, the racially enforced public university quota still exists. To what end, I can't even fathom, but it does breed an underlying belief in the core of our society, that whatever you do, you're never going anywhere unless you're born into it, or rich enough to escape it. A belief that has turned into a wall of mistrust and suspicion between the races in Malaysia.

Perhaps the worst part of Malaysian racism is our subconscious quest to prove that we're better, not just as a nation, but as a racial and religious stigma. Religion and race are tied as one in Malaysia. By law, every Malay is automatically a Muslim. It is enforced in forms we write and the social security cards we carry with us all the time. The walls separating the people further raised by religious differences stereotypically carried by birthright. Sometimes it's no longer about the cultural stereotype, but whose God is better. An argument that has no ending, only a pathological misunderstanding, hatred and perhaps more than a fair share of broken hearts in between.

Then there is the motherload with Malaysian politics bringing to light the constant struggle for every racially governed faction to claim that they are better because everyone else is a racist but themselves. While I make it a point to never touch Malaysian politics, considering only a racially prejudiced person would single out anyone else that's different as a racist. This "pot-calling-the-kettle-black" hypocrisy of such claims beggars belief.

The only hope at least for something to change are the new generation of youths exposed to the world and all its ideals. Youths that are taking a stand somewhere along the line saying "Something is not right with our country". With that are youths who aren't afraid to admit that yes, we are racists, but by knowing that we are, we can start doing something to change that. By admission of our own faults, we can start by repairing the damage so future generations won't look at another person and think race first.

I'm not saying that this is going to be an easy road to walk on. I admit, I for one am a racist because I have a deep hatred for my own race and what it has stood for. I find myself hating the very structure of the system that has alienated me from people who I could have known better. But in knowing what I am, what I see and what I hate. I know exactly where to turn back from and where to make amends for.

If more people could do that. Then maybe Malaysia would become more than just a nation with racially tolerant people. It'll be just a nation with people and I like the sound of that.

"The fact that you let be whatever I want to be for as long as it makes me happy tells me one thing."

"And that is?"

What's to say about relationships? What's to say about this relationship? I've never had it gone this far. I've never been in it this deep. I've never gone this way before. Part of me is still horrified and scared to be happy fearing the repeat of a past I cannot shed. Part of me is grinning until it hurts because of a newfound innocence I thought I'd never see again.

If I could stand on top of the roof of my house shouting to the world how happy I am in this perfect little connection, I would. Fortunately, I have better senses than that…and I don't really have a ladder that goes that high.

As I sit here trying to put into words how I feel right now, I realize that there is no words I can put into to describe how I feel, because that's what love is. It's excitement, it's fear. It's happiness, it's pain. It's selfishness, it's self-sacrifice. It's the best of who we are, it's the worst of what we can be. It's everything. How do you describe everything? You can't. At least not in one blog post. Even if there are no words to tell you how I feel, I guess this will have to do.

Offsetting everything in the way of the relationship, everything that should go right, has gone right. I think without a doubt, this would be the first time I admit looking at my world from brighter side of it. Regardless of the time and distance between us, I think, no, I know without a doubt that I will spend the rest of my life with her. Loving her not for the rest of her life, but one day at a time, for the rest of mine.

"It tells me that I couldn't have chosen a better man to love."

The thing about academic writing is that it shouldn't be forcibly worked on, non-stop, in a matter of days. The side effect of is that after you're done, your brain is so overworked with with thought that even the normal things that you say on a daily basis seems to have no meaning anymore.

So when it comes to what I really want to say, I just am not in the right frame of mind to put it down. It's not like I already don't have a backlog of matters that have been crossing my mind for the past two weeks. Which things I meant to say and things I ought to say, I feel that somehow I have a lot to make up for when writing is my sole comfort. Unfortunately, that shouldn't be the case.

We write, we blog because we have something to say and not because we force ourselves to have something to say. That has always been a cardinal rule to good blogging.

Of course sometimes, especially when you know you have readers who like what you wrote, that you can get carried away with the expectations you impose on yourself in regards to what other people expect from your own written thoughts. It's easy to fall into that pattern especially when you enjoy the attention you know you're getting.

So make no apologies for things I told you I wanted to write. I know it's good business to owe up to what you said you were going to do and it's not like I won't get to them. It's just that it all goes back to what this blog is all about. If I'm going to keep forcing myself to write the things I don't feel like writing, the end result wouldn't be have much of me in it. And on the scale of what's important before I even think of blogging, Mel comes first, I'm number two, and rest of the blogging world would be somewhere out there.

This weekend at least is about taking care of me. It is for me unwind and tie up any loose ends here in the real world. Whatever thoughts that are on my mind will have to wait as always, the world won't implode because I haven't written it yet. So at least when I do put it down, it'll be the best that I can put it. Which will always be better than if you force yourself to do it.

Now there is a little bit of wisdom there you can go ponder on.