In a story that warms every Malaysian’s heart, Chinese villagers repaired a road in the middle of the night to help Aidilfitri travellers as they drive home.
Hari Raya Aidilfitri is fun, but it also marks the occasion when millions of vehicles flood the highways as Malaysians travel to their hometowns and back. The already busy highways will be so choked with vehicles that some motorists look for alternative routes. However, some of these are not B-roads, but off-road paths.
Such was the case in this story, when Zairul Annuar wanted to avoid a traffic standstill on the PLUS highway heading to Kuala Lumpur. He decided to exit at Gopeng to take the inner roads, only to find that road had a massive traffic jam in Ladang Bikam.
He then decided to follow a reroute suggested by Google Map, albeit an unpaved trail for an oil palm estate.
“Slowly, we continued our journey. Suddenly, a few cars from the opposite direction can be seen, who then stopped beside us to inform us that the road ahead was impassable.”
“They directed us to turn back. All of the cars behind us were instructed to do the same.”
He then did so but as his car re-entered the residential area, Zairul wasstopped by a group of middle-aged Chinese men living there.
They then asked Zairul if he and his family were heading to Kuala Lumpur and urged them to not turn back as they would be stuck in a traffic jam.
Instead, the Chinese villagers said that they would repair the blocked road so that cars could pass through. The group of middle-aged Chinese men said to Zairul. The conversion can be heard in Zairul’s video, “The road ahead of you is blocked, right? Don’t worry. We’ll bring a backhoe to repair that road. You wait a moment.”
Zairul then said that the neighbourhood turned out to be a Chinese residential area and that the residents collectively agreed to help facilitate the passage of vehicles through the neighbourhood.
The villagers banded together and used a backhoe to level out the road for strangers to use.
In the video of travelling through the trail (colloquially called ‘jalan tikus’), a backhoe could be seen by the roadside after it was used to level out the road so that normal cars could pass through, as only 4x4s could do so before due to an incline.
Touched by the Chinese villagers’ action of going out of their way to help strangers on Aidilfitri, Zairul heaped praises on them, saying, “They came out of their homes and worked together. The people of Perak are amazing. Powerful. This is the true spirit of Malaysia.”
