As if BM is merely an optional subject in our primary and secondary schools.

But BM is a compulsory subject and we learned it for at least 11 years.

During my Form 5, some Chinese and Indians consistently outscored the Malays in BM, till our BM teacher held a 'chat' with the Malay students in our class. If they expect us to write the "bahasa berbunga-bunga", that's very hard for us to do because we are non-native speaker of BM.

BM is our national language and I respect that. But we have to be practical as well. Truth is the application of BM is very limited in business and science. Not only its usage, the vocabulary is limited as well. I would say the peoples who refuse to recognize the importance of English or refuse to learn a third language are also ignorant as well. They'll complain after refused employment by the private sector and end up leeching in government agencies.

Many of them will say the Japanese, Koreans, Taiwanese, French, Germans, Russians are successful without English. Mind you that the Malaysian heritage, work ethic, culture and history are very different than those countries. Are we one of the kuasa besar dunia? What we have to offer to the world till they have to learn BM to master it?

Guess the writer is one of the many who are impressed by Banglas' ability to speak BM fluently in six months and ready to share his/her tongkat with Banglas.