I am not happy
I, like my brother, always think of ourselves as a people who has detached ourselves emotionally from the news published in various forms of media. My brother’s reasoning was that if we were to have an emotional spike for each tragedy that occurs around the world, we would have no emotions left for ourselves. While I do reserve some thought for the victims, that’s usually about as far as I allow my emotions to dwell on such matters.
As clichéd as it might seem, I’ve also always thought of tragedies as things that happen to people we never know. People around us; our family members, friends and other acquaintances seem to be blessed by having simply having known us, thus made invincible, immune to tragedies and other afflictions.
Unfortunately, tragedy reared up its ugly head on Friday. A friend of mine was killed in the bus accident.
You could perhaps argue that with the increased amount of commuters, accident statistics are bound to increase. To paint a clearer picture, allow us to assume that 0.01% of buses will meet in some form of accident, tragic, minor or otherwise. When the number of commuters is low with probably a hundred buses travelling in a day there would probably be a bus a day running into some sort of trouble, be it a puncture, some mild engine trouble or an accident.
Multiply the accident rate with more buses and the occurrence of accidents would obviously increase. You could let nature take its way by allowing such events to carry on, or form a special committee to intervene and reduce the numbers. Unfortunately, as much talk as there are about arresting drivers with outstanding summons, or not allowing them on the road; one such driver was allowed to drive last Friday and it resulted in the death of my friend; and also the deaths of two other people.
My question running through my head at the moment is ‘what has the authorities been doing?’ Do we need a high profile person like a minister or some foreign diplomat (touchwood) to be involved in an accident before REAL action is taken? Other questions running through my mind would be ‘how difficult is it to drive a bus safely?’ or perhaps more appropriately ‘how difficult is it not to speed and overtake and drive like a hoodlum?’
You could perhaps argue that to drive a bus reasonably safe is a difficult task to do. A bus is generally a large metallic monster, and large vehicles are difficult to drive. “You’re not driving a bus,” you could tell me, so stop spewing such brickbats. However, bus drivers are people who are trained to perform such duties in a safe manner, and again, one driver did not do his job properly on Friday.
Owing to the high possibility that one would be riding in bus with a speed demon, many of my friends have sworn themselves off buses. When are we going to stop reading about such tragedies? When a blanket ban is imposed on the reporting of such events or when tragedies are things of the past. I cannot imagine what state of mind her family and boyfriend is in.
If you cannot feel it already, I am unhappy and angry.
Malaysian government's a mofo. Repeat after me.
Related posts:
Jolene Lai - RIP: I Never Knew Her But I Can Just Imagine
Tan Yee Wei - RIP: can consumers make economics work in their favour?
Jolene Lai - Help Nian Ning’s Family, Fight With Them.
Chooi, C., (2008), Bus crash: Driver had 13 outstanding summonses, The Star, 26th January 2008, p.16
Filmer, A., (2008), Family mourns loss of beautiful, intelligent go-getter, The Star, 28th January 2008, p.3
As clichéd as it might seem, I’ve also always thought of tragedies as things that happen to people we never know. People around us; our family members, friends and other acquaintances seem to be blessed by having simply having known us, thus made invincible, immune to tragedies and other afflictions.
Unfortunately, tragedy reared up its ugly head on Friday. A friend of mine was killed in the bus accident.
You could perhaps argue that with the increased amount of commuters, accident statistics are bound to increase. To paint a clearer picture, allow us to assume that 0.01% of buses will meet in some form of accident, tragic, minor or otherwise. When the number of commuters is low with probably a hundred buses travelling in a day there would probably be a bus a day running into some sort of trouble, be it a puncture, some mild engine trouble or an accident.
Multiply the accident rate with more buses and the occurrence of accidents would obviously increase. You could let nature take its way by allowing such events to carry on, or form a special committee to intervene and reduce the numbers. Unfortunately, as much talk as there are about arresting drivers with outstanding summons, or not allowing them on the road; one such driver was allowed to drive last Friday and it resulted in the death of my friend; and also the deaths of two other people.
My question running through my head at the moment is ‘what has the authorities been doing?’ Do we need a high profile person like a minister or some foreign diplomat (touchwood) to be involved in an accident before REAL action is taken? Other questions running through my mind would be ‘how difficult is it to drive a bus safely?’ or perhaps more appropriately ‘how difficult is it not to speed and overtake and drive like a hoodlum?’
You could perhaps argue that to drive a bus reasonably safe is a difficult task to do. A bus is generally a large metallic monster, and large vehicles are difficult to drive. “You’re not driving a bus,” you could tell me, so stop spewing such brickbats. However, bus drivers are people who are trained to perform such duties in a safe manner, and again, one driver did not do his job properly on Friday.
Owing to the high possibility that one would be riding in bus with a speed demon, many of my friends have sworn themselves off buses. When are we going to stop reading about such tragedies? When a blanket ban is imposed on the reporting of such events or when tragedies are things of the past. I cannot imagine what state of mind her family and boyfriend is in.
If you cannot feel it already, I am unhappy and angry.
Malaysian government's a mofo. Repeat after me.
Related posts:
Jolene Lai - RIP: I Never Knew Her But I Can Just Imagine
Tan Yee Wei - RIP: can consumers make economics work in their favour?
Jolene Lai - Help Nian Ning’s Family, Fight With Them.
Chooi, C., (2008), Bus crash: Driver had 13 outstanding summonses, The Star, 26th January 2008, p.16
Filmer, A., (2008), Family mourns loss of beautiful, intelligent go-getter, The Star, 28th January 2008, p.3
posted by 陈一豪 at 8:58 AM
<< Home