Malaysian Habits

As a typical Malaysian, we’ve all experienced sitting in the backseats of our parent’s cars, seeing motorists speed up at the yellow light and just narrowly escape colliding with an oncoming vehicle. This is the norm for us, and we’ve long become accustomed to this occurrence.

In Malaysia, we have many bad driving habits, one of the frequent ones is inconsiderate driving. Cutting lanes and speeding up without looking at the rearview mirrors first, not stopping for pedestrian crossings, irrelevant honking of the car horn and double parking.

Cutting lanes without making sure there aren’t any cars behind you is extremely dangerous and could harm not only you but the cars around you. Unlike other countries, Malaysians don’t tend to stop for pedestrians, they also tend to honk their horns when in a jam, even though it makes no difference. Double parking occurs very often in Malaysia, often outside shophouses, and this can be very troublesome if your car is blocked by an inconsiderate driver.

Some people in Malaysia even run red lights! Running a red light is the leading cause of road accidents in Malaysia, and the percentage of accidents steadily increase from year to year. Illegal U-turns also occur often.

The last driving habit i will be talking about, is also one of the worst. When accidents occur on the road, passing cars will slow to a crawl to find out what had happened. This almost always causes a major traffic congestion on highways.

Malaysia should stop these bad habits because they only bring harm and inconvenience to others.

Malaysians have many personality traits, though there are many bad ones there a few good ones. These habits and traits are what make us different from other countries.

When we talk about a Malaysian’s personality the most discussed trait is the way we talk. Malaysians always add certain slangs such as ‘lah’, ‘mah’, ‘haih’ and many more when talking, these slangs are used so often in our lives that we don’t even notice when we add them into our daily conversations. These slangs are used in the whole country that we even have a term for it - ‘Manglish’ which basically means broken English and it is usually the first thing that pops into people’s minds when they think about Malaysia.

Growing up and following our parents into marketplaces, we hear our parents bargaining and asking for discounts and free gifts when buying products. This is a typical habit and wherever we go, we hear people haggling prices, even in situations like taxi fares such, where haggling is prohibited.

Most Malaysian men, enjoy going to what we call a “mamak”, which is a hawker stall with various types of Malaysian dishes. They enjoy going with friends and other relatives as the atmosphere at the stalls really bring out the enthusiasm and football spirit in them. Whenever there is major football match, it is certain that “mamaks” around the housing areas will be filled with people. Another reason as to why men love “mamaks” is because at home either their wife or children don’t really enjoy football so it gives them an excuse to go out and watch football.

Lastly, Malaysians are awfully nosy when it comes to issues that do not involve them in any way. They feel the need to know whatever is happening around them. Malaysians in general love gossiping about almost anything.

In conclusion, Malaysians have many habits, not all bad and this is what makes a truly Malaysian.