*

Sunday, August 26, 2007

22. Bangsa Malaysia Forum

Yesterday, Saturday 25th August 2007, was an important day in the history of The National Alliance of Bloggers, or All Blogs for short.

A Bangsa Malaysia Merdeka forum entitled " Bangsa Malaysia - The Way Forward " was held at 5pm at Blog House, 66 Lorong Setiabistari 2, Damansara Heights. The main sponsor and event organiser was Haris Ibrahim, a lawyer and blogger, who together with Tony Yew and his organising team did a magnicent job.

The speakers were Dato Zaid Ibrahim, Bernard Khoo, Jayanath Appadurai, Ahirudin Atan, Malik Imtiaz Sarwar and Azmi Sharom.

It was a very interesting forum touching on many aspects of Bangsa Malaysia. The floor also raised many interesting points of race, definitions, inter-racial marriages, multi-culturalism and other points.

After the first part, some light refreshments and food was served. The attendees mingled, made new friends and exchanged views.

This was followed by the second part. The President of All Blogs, Ahirudin Attan, gave a short speech and opened Blog House. Negara-ku was sung, with much feeling for the country, by the entire gathering.

Jeff Ooi read a pantun and Big Dog a poem by Datuk Usman Awang.

Malaysia Berjaya was then sung. Azmi Sharom, Black in Korea, and Walski did their guitar presentations.

Haris Ibrahim then announced the formation of PELITAR, a vehicle to carry his message of Bangsa Malaysia in a road show to various parts of the country.

This first ever get-together of bloggers, ended at about 11pm with a recitation of the Rukun Negara as the basis for the way forward in the creation of Bangsa Malaysia.

It was a very meaningful get together on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Malaysia.

_________________________________________________