Budak Kurang Ajar

Kurang Ajar is an overrated expression because it now serves as a curse word, not an apt expression of frustration for the behavior it describes. I've even heard a mat rempit shouting 'kurang ajar' to another mat rempit because the other mat rempit forgot to pay his mamak bill

The meaning and definition of kurang ajar is now so diluted it can be used to express dissatisfaction in general. Because KL youths use kurang ajar to each other often, could it be that they are themselves the very personafication of kurang ajar?

Okay, maybe I'm a little 'kampung' and therefore judgemental but KL teenagers are getting more and more kurang ajar nowadays. Last year when my cousin's friends from KL spent a night at my grandmother's house, they didn't make any initiative to interact with our family at all. Instead they acted rowdy and expected to be served like glorified guests.

The same can be said to a pair of girls who visited us 3 nights ago. For an hour, they did nothing but texting on their blackberries, ignoring the whole famiy. That is what I call 'kurang ajar'.

A friend told me that the kurang ajar attitude is common among KL teenagers. "They are extremely calculative Afiq. If they don't see how they can get anything in return by being nice, they won't."

"But don't their parents teach them basic manners?" I inquired.

"They are the products of the latch key kids generation. Their interaction with older people are kept to a minimum like during Raya and... yea, just Raya."

I also notice that my friends who comes from other states are adequately respectful to older people so my assumption that the 'kurang ajar' attitude stems from cultures cauldrened by KL is reinforced.

If we blame the bustling life of KL city as the cause of their kurang-ajarness, Tokyo is a few times busier than KL and yet their citizens are considered as one of the most polite people in the world.

Yesterday, it was announced that they are demolishing the old prison because it was considered an eyesore. I was livid when I heard the announcement. Pudu Prison is a heritage site so how can it even considered as an eyesore? It's not hard to read between the lines though, I'm sure we are all thinking the same thing: valuable land = redevelopment = profit = duh. My cousin Hariz supported the demolition. He said we shouldn't keep old buildings because it serves no purpose to us. I disagreed.

"So should we throw away photos and journals of our ancestors? We might as well kill 'purpose-less' folks at the old folks home."

And these KL teenagers, sure they are not literally killing their grandparents but they are killing any chance of learning anything from them by shutting them away from their lives.

Is that how we view things of relatively old age now? And is it the same attitude we opt for older people who we think will not serve us any return benefits?

Will Internet kill the video star?

(What?)