JULY 16 — Long before July 9, I had already made up my mind that I must attend the Bersih 2.0 rally. I missed the 2007 rally so I was very determined to make it to this one. I even started a “Penangites attending Bersih 2.0 rally” event page on Facebook, to try to see how many Penangites will go, and maybe arrange to go together.

Unfortunately, with all the clampdown going on, I was advised we should not go together in a big group. In the end I went with two of my SABM (Saya Anak Bangsa Malaysia) Penang friends, Stanley and Howie, in the latter’s car.

We bought along our yellow T-shirts but we did not wear them. We hid them in the car, and later Howie and Stanley hid them on their bodies while I hid mine in my backpack. I painted my nails yellow as I figured if I can’t get to wear yellow T-shirt, at least I have something yellow on!

We left Penang early, at 5am, and when we reached Sungai Buloh about 9am, we realised the road to KL was blocked, so we decided to go to Bangsar and park our car there. We took the LRT from Bangsar to Masjid Jamek.

It was relatively quiet at Masjid Jamek since it was still early. Some policemen could be seen loitering here and there. We decided to walk to Jalan Bukit Bintang to hang around some shopping malls. Since all the roads had been blocked, it was a breeze strolling along the city roads, which, on ordinary days, would have been jam packed.

We looked for updates of the rally from Stanley’s Twitter account and from a friend of mine who is in KL. We decided that we should join a group. We found out from my KL friend that there was a group gathering in Chinatown, so we decided to go there. Thank God there was a taxi driver who was willing to drive us there but he dropped us near Central Market. From there, we walked to Chinatown.

Indeed there was a large group there — about 1,000 people. They were standing around, chatting but after 10 minutes, they decided to march. A few young men led the march with arms locked. I felt excitement building in me as I joined in the march. As we marched, we were chanting “Bersih! Bersih!”, “Reformasi, reformasi!”, “Allahuakbar!” Although I’m not a Muslim, I joined in the last cry too. It was fun!

I didn’t know where we were going to march to but I didn’t care. As we moved we shouted to people standing by the side to join us. Some of them clapped and cheered us on as we marched past. It was around 1pm at that time.

Then we stopped in front of Menara Maybank and I realised there was someone in front of the bank speaking. By the time we reached Maybank, Howie was separated from Stanley and I. Stanley and I were busy taking photos. I didn’t realise that the crowd had grown so big until Stanley said to me, “Wow! Big crowd” and I looked all round me and was totally astounded! There were as many as 5,000 people. It seemed that some other groups from Puduraya had marched and merged with our group at Menara Maybank.

We stood there listening to the speeches. In between the speeches, there were lots of chanting of course. “Bersih! Bersih!”, “Tukar, tukar! Tukar SPR!”, “Reformasi! Reformasi!”

As I stood there and turned to people around me, I realised whoever I got into eye contact with would smile at me. It was a “feel-good” moment for me, realising that all of us felt the true 1 Malaysia spirit right there. We were strangers, yet we smiled and talked to each other like old friends.

As I was totally immersed in the speeches and the chanting, I suddenly heard someone call out “Bersedia ya! Water cannon akan datang.” Five minutes after he said that, I suddenly spied the menacing red truck moving towards us… and without warning, jets of water shot out! Everybody shouted and ran helter skelter! I quickly ran up the stalled escalator of Menara Maybank to enter the open lobby.

As I ran up, suddenly some people who were already up there shouted and ran down. It was near panic. They pushed us, those who were going up, and we who were going up pushed them too! Some of them jumped over the wall near the escalator. It then dawned on me as to why they were rushing down — tear gas was slowly seeping in the lobby! For a moment, I didn’t know what to do. Should I go up or should I jump over the wall? But I was afraid I might not be able to jump, so I decided to go up to the lobby.

Luckily, since the lobby was high up above the road, only a little of the tear gas reached it. Still I was hit by it a little and my eyes started to sting. The smell was terrible! About 20 persons were up at the lobby too and I could see several of them were gasping and coughing. One young man was literally crawling on the floor. I guess he had been hit fully by the tear gas when he was down on the road.

I quickly took out my packet of salt, bottle of water and mini towel (yes, I came prepared). Put some salt in my mouth and poured the water on the towel to wet my face. Then a man walked up to me to ask me for the salt and I noticed that he went up to the man I saw crawling to give him the salt. Others also started to pinch some of my salt. However, I was not the only one with salt. I heard one man going around, crying “Garam! Garam!”

I decided to stay up at the lobby until the police left. I had a good view of what was happening on the road. Two FRU trucks were parked right in front, with several policemen standing in front of the trucks. I also saw some people being arrested and taken to the Black Maria.

It was then I called Stanley to find out where he was. He was at Puduraya and told me that they were trapped there with police on both sides! He advised me not to come down from the Maybank lobby yet as police were still busy running around on the road arresting people!

So I stayed up there and waited. Later on, about 2pm, I heard another round of tear gas being fired but luckily it was quite far from where I was. Anyway, because of that tear gas, a few other people came running in to the lobby again. Five minutes later, I head shouts from the police and one policeman came running up the escalator. I was shocked as I thought the police were coming up to the lobby to arrest the few of us who were still there. Where could we run to? Nowhere! Luckily though, he stood at the foot of the escalator only and looked around, then went down. Phew!

Then it started to rain. What a relief, I thought to myself, that the rain came just minutes after I heard the second round of tear gas. The rain will lessen the effect of the tear gas. Even the heavens were on our side!

I waited until the rain stopped. At that time too, the Maybank woman security guard came to chase us away. She was quite polite though. She said when the tear gas and water cannons were unleashed, she allowed us to come up and hide in the lobby but now that the police had left, she wanted us to leave. Fair enough.

I went down and called Howie to find out where he was. He said he was with a group at Jalan Hang Jebat. So I decided to go there. I was pleasantly surprised to see a large group there, standing right in the centre of the traffic intersection. Howie was having fun with his Bersih headband, “canvassing” for people to take photos with the headband. “Come on,” he said, “for souvenir!” Quite a number of people obliged him!

We stood there for around 15 minutes before we heard some noises from far away and to our delight, we saw a group of people marching towards us. All of us waved to them and called out “Yeh! Yeh!” while some clapped. When this group reached us, we started to march towards the stadium. We marched and chanted, while some were chatting cheerfully with each other. The atmosphere there was simply great!

An elderly beggar with a small cute cat on his shoulder was walking with us too and many people teased him. Howie even put the Bersih headband on the cat and took a photo. When asked if he supported Bersih, he said: “Memang lah. Tetapi saya mana boleh bersih. Saya tak cukup wang untuk beli sabun.”

As we approached the stadium, we noticed there was a crowd there already, and with us joining them, there seemed to be about 10,000 of us there at that time. Of course we could not enter the stadium, so we just stood there and took pictures (with Howie “canvassing” for photos with his Bersih headband again!).

At 4pm, Howie received a SMS which mentioned that the organising committee asked us to disperse. Well, the original planned rally was from 2pm to 4pm, so naturally at 4pm, we had to disperse. Howie and a few others shouted “Bersurai!”, “Bersurai, dah pukul empat!” and remarkably, everyone did! You can see how disciplined we were.

Howie and I decided to catch the LRT to Bangsar where our car was but to our disappointment, the LRT service was closed. So we walked instead to the KTM railway station to catch the KTM Komuter train to KL Sentral.

The station seemed to be crowded with Bersih supporters, all waiting to board the train. As we rushed into the train, it was sardine-packed! However, nobody complained as at that moment, we knew we were all Malaysians with one aim — to seek for clean and fair elections. Somebody in the train even shouted softly “Bersih!” And someone jokingly said the train would take us straight to jail!

We reached KL Sentral and met up with Stanley, and at 6pm when the LRT resumed service, we took it to Bangsar to get our car and then headed back to Penang.

I realised that I had spent about six hours walking up and down almost the whole of KL city! Masjid Jamek, Bukit Bintang, Puduraya, Pasar Seni, Chinatown, Jalan Sultan, Jalan Hang Jebat and other surrounding areas. My leg ached like mad the next day but it was well worth it. I walked for democracy in our country. I walked as Anak Bangsa Malaysia who wants to save her beloved country.

What I found most enriching from the experience was a sense of euphoria to see people of all races, sizes, colours, coming together in a spirit of unity and joy with one common aim. This is truly what we called 1 Malaysia!