Malaysian food... If you find in your supermarket, please avoid it!

Banned 50 years ago, Rhodamine B still used in foodstuff

PENANG: Food operators are still using a cancer-causing dye in the preparation of belacan (shrimp paste) and several popular Chinese buns and kuih, according to the Consumers Association of Penang (CAP).

The dye was banned more than 50 years ago but food operators are still using it due to lax enforcement, said its president S. M. Mohd Idris.

He said a recent test by CAP found that samples of the food items contained Rhodamine B – a pink-coloured dye banned under the Food Regulation 1985 and Food and Drug Ordinance of 1952.

Mohamed Idris said CAP first detected the presence of Rhodamine B in belacan in 1973. Since then, random tests on several other items were conducted between 1983 and this year.

“On each occasion, we will notify the Health Ministry of our findings and request that they conduct an investigation,” he said at a press conference here on Tuesday.

Idris said the ministry’s failure to enforce the law could jeopardise the public’s health.

“We discovered traces of the dye in five samples of belacan bought from a famous wet market in Kuala Lumpur and in eight samples of Mi Ku, Siew Ku and Huat Kuih bought from several wet markets in Penang,” he said, adding that the tests were conducted in the last two months.

“The dye is commonly used in the textile and plastic industries to give containers and cloth a bright pinkish hue. It is also used to dye feather dusters,” he said.

“Almost all Malaysians are at risk because belacan is widely consumed. Producers of the dye are very clever. The dye is packed into small consumer-friendly bottles and is readily available at sundry shops everywhere.

“The Health Ministry should stop the sale of dye in small quantities because it is not meant for consumers,” he added.

If any colouring agent must be used, Idris said natural dyes, like beetroot extract, should be the option.

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Malaysia is not safe at all... Think about it!

Quoted from BBC News

Malaysia celebrates 50 years of independence this year and to mark the occasion it has launched Visit Malaysia Year 2007.

The country's palm-fringed beaches, affordable priced hotels, sprawling shopping malls, fantastic food and wildlife already make it one of Asia's premier destinations. And this year its tourism authorities hope a big push will propel visitor numbers towards an astonishing target of 20 million. But following an incident late last year, American Wayne Wright is far from convinced by the promise of Malaysian hospitality and the claim of its tourism slogan that it is truly Asia.

"I was walking in Chinatown," he told the BBC, "when a gentleman in very scruffy type clothes, nothing that you would associate with police or anyone in authority, walked up to me and asked me, "Can I see your passport?"."

Fearing a scam, Mr Wright refused and tried to move away.

"At that point he essentially lunged at me, grabbed me, put handcuffs on me really tightly and called for a few other people out in the crowd," he explained.

Mr Wright, a serving US Navy lawyer, says he protested that he was a US citizen and told the men who had grabbed him that his passport was in his hotel room, a matter of a few hundred meters away. He was taken, shackled, through Chinatown and put into a caged truck used by the Malaysian immigration department.

Worst experience

There he met a second American, who had also been grabbed by men who refused to show any identification, Yahweh Passim Nam. It became abundantly clear to Mr Wright and Mr Nam they had more in common than their nationality. Both they and every one of the 30 or so other people arrested in the same raid were black. This was probably the worst experience I have had in my life

"At this time I'm knowing this is racial profiling, beyond a shadow of a doubt," said Mr Nam, an ex-US Navy serviceman and now a multi media engineer living in Vancouver, Canada.

"This is definitely some screwed up mission by some... militant group, trying to get Africans to take us somewhere," he said, adding that he feared for his life.

They were taken to an immigration detention center where for almost 24 hours they say they were fed only bread and water, not allowed to go to the toilet and refused permission to contact the US embassy.

"I was treated inhumanely," said Mr Nam. "I felt like a dog, I felt like something worse than a dog."

Mr Wright agrees. "Honestly this was probably the worst experience I have had in my life," he said. Both say that, when they were finally freed, immigration officers treated the matter as a joke, something that incensed them.

Morality patrol

Malaysia's Head of Immigration Enforcement Ishak Mohamad was approached by the BBC for comment, but was unavailable. Nor would the prime minister's department comment, although a senior official privately cast doubt on the accounts of the two men.

However not only do they appear to bear one another out, but they are also backed up by the US embassy, which confirmed it provided consular assistance to have them released from custody. No charges were filed against the men. The incident does not appear to be isolated.

Several Africans approached on the streets of Kuala Lumpur by the BBC over the issue reported facing discrimination in Malaysia, whether it be people refusing to sit next to them on public transport, taxis refusing to stop for them through to harassment by police and immigration officers. Nor have recent problems been confined to people of African origin.

In October, a couple in their 60s from the US state of Alaska were woken at 0200 with threats to break down the door of their rented holiday apartment on Langkawi Island. It was an Islamic morality patrol, which under Malaysian law has widespread powers over Muslims' behavior.

"When I opened the door I saw six men, in my face, yelling at me that they want to inspect the apartment, that I'm Muslim and that they're coming in," Randal Barnhart said.

He told the men he was not Muslim and refused to let them enter, but they persisted.

"They started yelling, 'We want to see your woman, we want to see your woman'," an angry Mr Barnhart recalled.

"So I asked Carole, who was just wearing a sarong to stand back 15 feet in the light so they could see that she is a white woman - my wife of 42 years."

The intruders refused to leave without seeing a marriage certificate and were only persuaded to go after being shown the couple's passports. Mr Barnhart says his wife suffered a nervous breakdown and returned to the US and he is currently pursuing legal action against the religious department.

But rather than disciplining the officers - who apparently broke the law by carrying out the raid without regular police in tow - local politicians defended them saying Mrs Barnhart was mistaken for a local Muslim because she liked to wear a sarong. That assertion has been greeted with derision by some in Malaysia.

Regrettable

Malaysia's Tourism Minister Adnan Mansor defended the immigration department, pointing out that Malaysia has problems with illegal migration.

"Sorry to say especially there's a lot of Africans, black people, who come to our country and overstay," he said.

"What they did was just trying to clean up some of these people who've overstayed in our country."

Both Wayne Wright and Yahweh Passim Nam had not overstayed their welcome. They had legitimate tourist visas. The minister says he is keen to repair the damage.

"Give us a chance and let us correct this," Mr Mansor said.

He has apologized to the Barnharts and acknowledges Malaysia has a problem with petty officials who readily abuse their power - a problem he says the government will address by re-educating them. But it is not the kind of news the country needs on the cusp of its big tourism year.

Asta, the American Society of Travel Agents, described the incidents as regrettable.

"Authorities have an obligation to educate the local populace about the importance of tourism and their role and to be vigilant and protective of anti-tourist incidents," a spokesman told the BBC.

And more worrying still for Malaysians is that such incidents are merely symptomatic of a wider issue - public servants who are increasingly resistant to government control. Newspaper columnist Dina Zaman says some Malaysians are looking to Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi to take a tougher line.

"They don't think he's authoritative enough," she believes.

"You need someone to actually sit down and say, 'Look you can't do this, you can't do that'. And yes, he's a nice man but with... the crime rate, all these things... it just makes you wonder whether he's too nice."

Millions of people will doubtless visit Malaysia during 2007 and most will have a very happy time. But until Malaysia's bureaucracy wants to make sure they all do, some would-be visitors may be deciding to holiday elsewhere.

‘Armed group ‘tailed mum’

MALAYSIA is promoted as safe country! Is it ?

Yek: She had called her son after finding her windscreens smashed

PETALING JAYA: The son of a woman who died after being involved in an accident in Puchong said several men confronted his mother just before her death early yesterday morning.

Yew Yong Hon said he received a call around midnight from his mother Yek Yow Ngan, 51, who said her car rear windscreen had been smashed.

Hours later, he received another call from his mother saying that the front windscreen was smashed.

“After receiving the second call, I quickly rushed over from my house in Ampang with my girlfriend,” Yek said.

Yew claimed that when he arrived, his mother, a Nanyang Siang Pau employee, was surrounded by a group of men with parangs and iron rods at her house in Batu 8, Puchong.

“I got out of my car and yelled. They then fled,” he said.

Yew, tailed his mother, who was in her own car, to lodge a police report. However, along the way, they saw the group of men waiting by a car and motorcycle at the roadside.

Son’s sorrow: Yew mourning the death of his mother at the Kwong Tong funeral parlour yesterday evening. Offering their sympathies are state assemblyman for Kinrara Dr Kow Cheong Wei (centre) and Puchong MCA division chief Wong Hock Aun. Yek’s body was released for burial after a post mortem.

“My mother sped off and I reversed my car to go another way. The group split into two and chased us. That’s when my mother and I got separated,” he said.

Yew said he managed to shake off his pursuers.

He then found his mother's car in an accident with another vehicle at Taman Bintang, near Bandar Kinrara. He brought Yek to Assunta Hospital.

“However, the hospital demanded RM10,000 for my mother’s operation but I only had RM250 with me. They made us wait an hour before transferring her to Hospital Kuala Lumpur,” he claimed.

Yek died three hours after she was admitted to HKL.

Meanwhile, Assunta Hospital said a medical officer had immediately attended to Yew's mother.

It said Yek was comatose restless and had suffered a heart attack. She had to be resuscitated and intubated, and needed four pints of blood.

However, when Yek was being prepared to be admitted to the Intensive Care Unit, Yew asked about charges.

“Hospital staff counselled that the estimated final bill could be more than RM10,000 in view of the severity of her injuries.

“The patient's family then requested for the patient to be transferred to a government hospital,” said the hospital.

It said the patient had incurred a bill of RM1,900 but only RM250 was paid.

“Assunta Hospital carried all emergency and necessary care and treatment for the patient and did not deny treatment or demand a deposit be paid before treatment,” it said, adding that all facts and information had been forwarded to the Health Ministry.

When contacted, Subang Jaya OCPD Asst Comm Zainal Rashid said police were unaware of the assault on Yek.

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...and the wind was blowing his galleon away in the sunset...

Once upon a time...

Well, all the fairy tales should start in such way and I will not make it different, one time at least in my life, as always I tend to be different from anybody else!

My English is slightly broken and the improvement I've got while living in Malaysia, help to make it worse. So I "beg your pardon" and "ask your sympathy" if something you are going to read anywhere down here is simply "too broken" for you to understand your real meaning.
I will also try to be less annoying when telling my points: anyway as firm Italian man, I can simply tell you that as you came here your own, you can leave anytime you will feel.

Once upon a time, there was a quite shy but naughty rebellious boy, let's say aged 10, waiting for his favorite tv show every Monday night on the 2nd Italian national tv channel. The show was called (and probably still is) "Sandokan, the tiger of Monpracen";

What's so nice about that tv show ? Hard to say right now, maybe because already 25 years passed under the bridge, maybe because I can't remember right now the feelings of a 10 yo boy about far east lands, or simply, I strongly believe those feelings did vanish after have spent 5 years in that far land, now called Malaysia, not in search for any pirate, but in search of more business opportunities, one, before any others, to serve my existing Asian clients, faster and if possible cheaper.

25 years later this naughty boy is living in that far land, once called Malaya, now renamed Malaysia, fighting like a pirate many daily battles. to conquer not the land but the heart of the local people, not to be the new leader of this land but to "survive" in one of those "nations" that outsider consider as "paradise for turist" but that really have nothing to be good of.

Malaysia: 24 million people, 1 million jobless and more than 1 million foreign worker! What does make you think about it ? Why I should come to Malaysia to establish my business and later found that the laziness of locals force me to employ foreign poor workers from Vietnam, India, Nepal, Myanmar ? Why I can't simply go Vietnam and settle down there ? Why...

I did spend my last 3 years thinking what I did wrong to have so many daily problems.
Why my eyes and my feelings in love for this country did allow me to see through that invisible barrier how is really Malaysia ?

When I settle down here, together with my Princess (that she is also local Chinese, proud to say "Chinese" and funny she is the one that daily keep remind me to pack and move away from this country asap), I was confident that Malaysian people can help to develop an already 40 years old family business, exporting worldwide to almost 100 other countries.

Malaysia is made of spoiled, pampered, egoist peoples that didn't learned anything from that bad May 1997 when their economy drop down the drain, when suddenly nobody can't afford to buy a daily bowl of rice anymore.

Malaysia a "paradise" in those laminated catalogs you can surf in any travel agencies in your town, something recalling magic land, uncontaminated beach, etc..
Have you been in Malaysia ? Yes, maybe as a tourist, when local people are so friendly simply because they "control" you. They fix their prices and they know that you "mat salleh" (white man) can pay "their" price that is 10 times compared to the price for local.

But my question is clear... how you been in Malaysia as employer ? or simply as worker ?
No, right ? Okay this blog is for you, it will tell you the story of a 10yo naughty boy that one morning, 22 July 2002 packed his own belonging and take a one way flight from Italy, hope to have find a paradise, a nice place work to work, where to build a comfortable house for his Princess, far from the new Italian "dolce vita", a post Euro Italy where "proforma" is much important than real facts and where people, especially new generation, are empty like a bottle of beer rolling down the steps outside of the many discos...

5 years ago this boy, 32 at that time, start his journey, his new life here, with a lot of ambitions, believing that working hard could made the things possibles, never imaging what is the real Malaysia, a self egoist country where people are more interested to cheat foreigner as much as they can...

My comments, my daily posts will be always only my honest opinions and they will based on true life episodes. Malaysian government is so proud to promote this country as place of freedom and multi racial nation. I have the rights to express my own personal opinion and to inform my friends as all of you are about what's happening here, as all other media are reporting as well.

So if you want a first personal suggestion, chose other place for your holiday, other country for your investment! Don't waste your time, your money here. There are many other Asian countries much better than Malaysia, from my own point of view, like Singapore, Vietnam for example for business and Thailand for holiday.

"...the Majesty, the biggest galleon ever seen, was leaving Malacca that same afternoon. Mr. Berton can't turn to view that old town for last time as the sunbeams was hacking is eyes. The smell of drugs and spices blow by the wind towards the sails was the last thing he could remember from that old deadly town..."