Depressing Reality: Malaysians are Trashing Our Own Streets and Don’t Feel Guilty About It

We recently celebrated the independence of our country and after 62 years of building our nation, there is still one aspect that Malaysians still seem to instill in their patriotic spirit.

Cleanliness.

An 18-year-old netizen, Aimanariffinnn, took to his Instagram account to showcase the aftermath of the Merdeka day celebration in a disappointing post, as he had stayed for 2 hours after the event to clean up after hundreds and thousands of Malaysians who left their trash scattered around the location, just seconds after proudly yelling, ‘Merdeka!’ and going home.

View this post on Instagram

The night of Merdeka should’ve been a night full of joy, fun and laughter but it made me feel internally anguished by our depths of ignorance. We’ve built engineering marvels that has mesmerized the world and we’ve defended Islam with our dying breath but at the same time we have failed to defend our country from the ignorance of our own. After the show of fireworks ended i was perplexed by the sheer amount of garbage that has simply been littered all over the area, literally seconds after people were screaming MERDEKA people started to throw their trash EVERYWHERE! THIS IS NOT THE MALAYSIA THAT OUR ANCESTORS HAD FOUGHT FOR! You can defend Islam but you can’t defend an integral teaching of Islam which is CLEANLINESS! If you need an 18 year old to spend 2 hours cleaning after your trash, then how far have we truly come as an independent nation? ( Last pic was the amount collected in only 5 minutes out of TWO WHOLE HOURS so you can imagine the amount of trash that was littered ) . Tidakkah kalian malu sebagai seseorang yang berbangsa Malaysia? Tidak kah anda merasa seperti anda telah meludah atas perjuangan ibu dan bapa kita sebelum ini? Malangnya, ramai anak-anak muda kita telah terasuh dalam mindanya bahawa pembuangan sampah secara merata bukanlah sebuah masalah yang besar. Sejujurnya, kejayaan sesebuah negara tidak boleh diukur dengan ketinggian pencakar langitnya, kemegahan angkatan tenteranya ataupun kebesaran tanahnya tetapi kejayaan sesebuah negara hanya boleh diukur dengan rakyatnya sendiri. #MalaysiaBersih(?)?? ( P.S thanks @pdrmsia_official atas sokongan anda semalam ❤️ )

A post shared by @ aimanariffinnn on Aug 31, 2019 at 5:54am PDT

Aiman showed his hands after spending his night cleaning up after everyone else.

He wrote, “The night of Merdeka should’ve been a night full of joy, fun and laughter. But it made me feel internally anguished by the depths of our ignorance. We’ve built engineering marvels and defended Islam, but we’ve failed to defend our country from our own ignorance.

After the fireworks had ended, I was perplexed by the sheer amount of garbage that was simply littered all over the area. Literally, seconds after people were screaming ‘Merdeka’, people threw their trash everywhere. If you need an 18-year-old to clean up your trash, then how far have we truly come as an independent nation?”

Source: Instagram

The poor kid spent 2 hours trying to clean up as much as he could. He even pointed out the amount of rubbish he picked up in the span of 5 minutes.

Source: Instagram

Ironically, this year’s Merdeka slogan is Sayangi Malaysiaku: Malaysia Bersih which means, Love My Malaysia: A Clean Malaysia.

“Honestly, a country’s success cannot be measured by the height of their skyscrapers, the strength of their military or the mass of their land, but by the actions of the citizens themselves,” added Aiman.

Malaysians should consider the fact that if they were to properly dispose of just their own trash, someone else wouldn’t have to waste hours trying to clean up an entire area. Think of all the time Aiman would have saved to do something productive for himself, or even our public council people who have to clean up our mess day after day.

Aiman’s posting has since garnered over 1,050 reactions.

Thank you Aiman, we need more people with your mindset for our nation to prosper in the future.

Also read: Watch: Malaysians Proudly Stand & Sing Along As National Anthem Plays Through Cafe Speakers