What are the factors contributing to poor reading habit among Malaysians?

Just look at the statistics posted by my friends. Do I need to explain the level of reading in our country any further? Probably I should not, due to the fact that explaining statistics over and over again will not bring any benefit to anyone. So what should we do? Well, of course, to make things better, we always have to find solutions. Solutions, yes, the government surely knows about that. Book fairs? Campaigns? Anything more? Sure one, they are the government, are'nt they? They must have plenty of ideas to sort this problem out before 2020, don't they?



Problem is, this reading problem has flooded Malaysia for centuries! What can they possibly do to increase this embarrassing level to reach the so called 'ideal' level in ten years to come? According to Professor Datin Dr Noran Fauziah Yaakob, President of Malaysian Psychology Department, to find the solution of any matter, we need to search for the causing problems first. Which brings us to this one simple question - Why do Malaysians just do not read?



Well, for a start, let me tell you a little bit about the habit of our people. If they hear a Malay speaking English, they would go "Ahh, that feller wants to show off laa. He's not one of us maa". If they see a Malay being open, liberal, and speaks up his mind, they'll go "Haiyaa, he critisized the government ah? Surely not one of us maa ". And finally, if they see a Malaysian reading in public they'll go "Look at that boy laa, reading everywhere, why still got nerds here ah? Send them away maa, they're not one of us". Get the point? Its our mindset - our third-class mindset. Reading in public is thought of as weird, nerdy, and maybe even creepy. Why is that so? Why are we so afraid to open our mind up a little bit? My cousin, who studies in Tokyo, is a regular train passenger over there. He says it is weird to see the Japanese to not read while in the train! So there you go, my first point, our people are afraid to read in public because they will be perceived by 'our people' as 'not one of us'. Book fair organiser Datuk Ivan Hoe was once quoted as saying "they forget that books are intellectual food".



Im a big fan of American best-selling author Mitch Albom. Among his inspirational books are Tuesdays with Morrie, The Five People You Meet in Heaven and For One More Day. When I went to the bookstore to check out these books, I could not believe my eyes when I saw the price. Nearly RM100 - and some were more. "Perhaps Mitch's books are always expensive," I thought. Then I looked to the other international books, and.... Yes! You guessed it right! All books are so expensive that students would have to starve their tummies for months to be able to buy it! Why is this so? Why have'nt the government controlled the price for these interesting reading materials so that we could afford them? Maybe providing subsidies, anyone? Oh yes, I forgot, they've been putting their efforts so much on reading campaigns and missed the whole point of why we cant afford books we want. Good job Mr.Government. Should this problem continue, only the rich would be able to buy them, and only the rich would taste the benefit of living in this country.



But yes, some might argue, if we cant afford the expensive books, why dont go for the cheap ones? Why dont we borrow from the library? Well, you see, the quality of the library here in our country is not even comparable to the ones overseas. Of course there are good libraries in some schools and universities, but overall, the standard of our libraries are so devastating. I once went to a library in town to do some research. Apparently the place was dirty, the air-conditioner was'nt working, and the people were so noisy. Most of the people there were'nt looking for books, instead they were busy dating!

Speaking of creative, best-selling, awesomely popular authors, I dont think many of my friends even bother to know who they are. Higly-rated overseas, they seem to be no one here in our country. That brings us to my point number three, Malaysians prefer light reading materials rather than books. Stats carried out by Ministry of Arts, Culture, and Heritage showed that out of 85% of Malaysians who read regularly, 77% of them prefer newspapers, 3% read magazines, 3% read books and 1.6% read comics. If we were to compare with American citizens, 53% of them read fiction and 43% of them read non-fiction books. If I ask my friends if they know about any popular books or articles I find interesting, I would never get a good feedback. But if I ask them whats the latest comic edition they have, they'd be listing out all sorts of comic titles. Ujang, Apo, Anak-anak Sidek, One Piece, Naruto, Sin Chan, the list goes on and on. Yes, reading comics can also be categorized as reading, as they say, I cant deny that. But at the end of the day, who benefits most in terms of knowledge? The book reader - or the comic reader?

Some other sad reasons given by Malaysians for not reading is no leisure time and no interest in reading (Ministry of Arts, Culture and Heritage). To be perfectly frank, even my 6 month old baby nephew knows those excuses are just unacceptable. Seriously? No time? Whatever reason it is, Im pretty sure there's one thing we need to change - attitude.

Some sentences are purposely written in our Malay-English language to show what we really are about.

Mohd Akif Farhan bin Ahmad Basri.

A126895.