Tommy Peters' Bicycles

30 years ago in Iran, a fundamentalist posing as a moderate conducted a social reform movement so popular that everyone from the beguiled illiterate to the beguiled atheist with the religiously inclined in between, enthusiastically helped him overthrow the Shah. Then, as soon as he garnered enough power, he ‘threw his friends under the bus’ and thrust upon the people a theocracy where low drop hangings, amputations and stonings underscored its implementation. Now, Iranians romanticize and reminisce the rule under the Shah. They realized too late that the toss was between a corrupt but secular dictatorship and a fanatical ideology that used the premise of social reform as a ‘Trojan horse’. Several dictatorships in the vicinity have learnt from their neighbour and are understandably, resisting their own groundswell clamouring for reform. Malaysia, a vibrant multi-cultural-religious fabric, is an example of a dangerous reformation in flux. With the veneer of political correctness...

"Duty is a sublime word. You should do your duty in all things. You can never do more, you should never wish to do less." Robert E. Lee. “Shame is like everything else. Live with it long enough and it becomes part of the furniture” Salman Rushdie. Sometime ago, an award was bestowed upon a boy for gallantly rescuing a girl from drowning. A politician said the effort of the teenager be glossed over but the apathy of the throng that stood by the pool witnessing two lives at risk, be highlighted instead. He said it was not a rash but an innate human impulse that moved the boy to save a life and nothing less should be expected of a human being. Reading the lowest common denominator, the non-governmental organization that held the ‘Conversion Forum’ on Saturday August 9 th , is no different from the boy. Rights of some were perceived challenged and it stepped in on their behalf. It was a call of duty and nothing less should be expected of it. In allo...

With the recent bout of ‘school-girl’ hysteria, allow me to relate my experience in this regard. Early last year, a friend called to say his teenage daughter was in a recurring bout of hysteria and he asked me to come over. He said the ‘devil had again taken over’ the girl and he was helpless. Familiar with my non-superstitious persona, he was desperate for another angle to his predicament. Instinctively I brought along a headmaster’s cane. When I arrived at the middle-class home, a ‘bomoh’ was hovering over the girl, whom I know from birth. Wielding the menacing looking cane, I announced clearly I was driving the ‘ship’. I asked the medicine man to step aside and forcibly ushered the screaming teenager into the study. I locked the room and struck a leather chair repeatedly with the cane. The strokes evoked piercing shrieks from the girl, audible enough to alert the congregation outside the room who thought I was already inflicting the pain of the stick upon her. Amidst ...

On July 19 th 2008, at an art exhibition in Kuala Lumpur, I met an affable gentleman who warmed up to the subject of bicycles. Loh Gwo-Burne said the notion of swamping a city with the still germane century old invention, was a wonderful idea that has gained traction worldwide. The Member of Parliament said major cities have and are proud of their ‘Cycling Sundays’ and on that premise, Kuala Lumpur and Petaling Jaya should start its ‘wheels rolling’. He suggested traffic should be locked down at least once a month for the benefit cyclists and pedestrians, not to mention the environment. A cursory check reveals some cities in Europe have gone beyond the novelty of ‘Cycling Sundays’ and have begun a bicycling ‘revolution’ of sorts. In Paris for example, the success of the Velib Bike Hire scheme introduced in July 2007 was confirmed, when more than a million bicycles were hired in the first 30 days of operation and by the 60 th day, hires exceeded two million. Theft a...

Preamble: - Folks, I am aware you have enough to read in the course of your work and that is why I truly appreciate when you read what I write, even if clarity is wanting. My motto is ‘Clarity over Agreement’ attributed to a Jewish historian. I tell friends, as long as I am clear, I am relieved. Clarity should be the end result of a debate or commentary. Agreement is only a bonus. I deliberately blurred the commentary below but historical traction will clarify the subject. I call it ‘Below Empyrean’, paraphrased from a book titled ‘Above Empyrean’. The word ‘Empyrean’ according to the ancient Greeks is simply ‘the highest heaven Below Empyrean Bruce Herschensohn, author of Above Empyrean , said ‘the state of a human being is analogous to the state of a nation’. I have issues; government corruption, the economy, health-care, traffic jams, gas prices and the yearly haze. On the home front, I have unpaid bills, mortgages, taxes, not to mention garbage disposal and...