Australian Courtesy: Something That Malaysians Must Learn

With a lil sneak peak of Melbourne's Day 2 post. This will be the next post after this.








These are the snippets. Now, back to the topic.



It's been a week I'm in Australia, and it's crystal clear to tell how courteous Australians are when compared to us. Be it the Caucasians, Asians, the Aborigines, etc, they are all polite and kind to almost anyone. 


And yes, Malaysians. We all should learn from them, despite the stress or anything else that affects our life. 


Let me give you some examples that we should follow:

1. Australians never horn, even under traffic jams. In the city of Melbourne, they are traffic lights every 200m, and whenever they stop, they never complain if a red light is on. They don't speed and drive like any daredevil Malaysians (as they got speed cameras around). They even let pedestrians to cross the road. 


Meanwhile, in Malaysia, I remembered how difficult was it to walk from KLCC to Bukit Bintang. The cars wont even let you pass as they drive fast. They just ignore you. 


2. During the 2nd day in Melbourne, a stranger suddenly greeted us politely with a nice "How are you?". And even though we tended to ignore him, he still said "Have a nice day." instead of being rude. I at least replied him with a smile. 


And that made me wonder: Will we Malaysians do the same thing? 


It's our norms, back then, to ignore strangers (except for tourists) as they can be a threat against us - frauds, criminal tricks, and all the bad stuffs. But, here, they still greet people. 


And yes Malaysians, these Australians don't have any "Budi Bahasa Budaya Kita" campaign. 


3. Beggars are considered as outcasts generally. But here, I saw locals sitting next to these unfortunate people and even chat with them. I was flabbergasted to acknowledge such a caring society. I thought such society is only a myth as people are getting busier. Do Malaysians do that? 


Isn't that enough to see how civilized Australians are when compared to our mentality? You may argue that I am just a tourist. But ask yourself. 


- How courteous are the people in our LRTs, KTMs or other public transport? 


- How many times will you hear hornings during traffic jams?


- How courteous is our taxi drivers? Can they be trusted? Are they polite? Even the Australian taxi drivers are well dressed. 


- How many times do you greet a stranger? 


- Can you feel that our society is sick?


Of course, every society has their own problems. Even Australia faces her own. Well, dear Malaysians, instead of watching American Idol or Glee, or CSI or whatsoever media programmes that makes you feel like a Westerner, why not focus on their courtesy? We got a lot more to learn from them.