In my lame effort to make up for missing out on "Our Burmese Days" that was shown in class during my absenteeism, I will review a documentary I watched during the KLPac Urbanscapes event earlier this year. Indicine at KLPac had always shown different genres of films and I would actually attend a screening from time to time, even if it wasn't on a regular basis.
Ahem, I have digressed enough. My point is, this particular documentary caught me in a thorny position of sorts. A taboo, touchy subject in Malaysia, a country whom most of us would agree, is a place that can be as open and warm one minute and as cold as ice in the next. It really would depend on what we are talking about. There are sore wounds out there tonight in the streets of KL, I hope they feel better when they watch this amazing film because to be absolutely frank, I felt for them.
"Pecah Lobang" directed by Poh Si Teng, features Muslim transsexual sex workers in Malaysia. In particular, she focused the documentary around the life of one person who relates the community as a whole and the difficulties they face in every day situations as well as being a Malaysia. To me, I found it complicated that we give ourselves definitions after definitions after definitions. Must it be as such? Of course, I will be amongst the first to disagree that we are individuals and to be an individual, thus we require clarity to prove ourselves amongst society and its many individuals. But to be exact, it is a tremendous task.
The Muslim/Transsexual/Sex Worker/Malaysian. We get four different distinctions of what it's like to be the main character in the documentary. I was torn watching her, when she explains her life, her role, her job, her struggle both internal and external. WHY. The question is why are we forced to separate our multitude of alter-egos in the face of "taboo" and "law" and discrimination. I am lost in my own thoughts about how she must feel every single morning as she wakes up to a country of people who take her as someone who shouldn't exist. I strongly believe she has made her choice in terms of lifestyle, because quite simply there is no other way to go about this situation.
Throughout the entire documentary, she shed tears on the legal difficulties that she had to endure, and apparently at the time of filming, it was on-going. The issue of changing the gender from "male" to "female" is opposed by the government, also with the fact that the character is Muslim, therefore religious matters come into play. Being a sex worker is something that leaves her with no other options because people simply won't hire you, on whatever reasons they may have. i feel so angry for her, for people like her, for people who don't understand her, for the way our society is run, the way our thoughts are structured to be. perhaps all my angst is for nothing, because in a way, i can do nothing. you can only change if you want to.
Is the refusal to accept the laws of society are we considered rebels to be prosecuted against? I just want my rights, to be heard and seen, because everyone’s opinion should matter. Not just the ruling government who gives clockwork instructions.
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