I had to laugh out loud at our dear tourism minister's ridiculous remark that AirAsia is misleading the public. If he claims that they are being given to tour companies, then the public can also call up and book through these tour companies, no?

In my own limited experience having used different budget airlines all over the world, that's a pretty normal situation. But I'm not distressed because I'm flying to Penang for RM49.98 (return airfare plus airport tax) next weekend. I couldn't get the RM1.99 one-way fare but hey, I'd rather pay RM50 than the hundreds of ringgit MAS charges!

AirAsia is providing desperately-needed competition to MAS which, to the rakyat , is healthy and fair. At least we're not helping to 'prop up' MAS as much as we used to and it may just shake MAS up a bit.

Malaysians are so kiasu - maybe Johoreans are more due to their proximity to Singaporeans! - that they want to complain about something like that when they happily splurge on at least RM5 a day on just one packet of cigarettes. On top of that, they will still refuse to pay a RM1 toll fee even when a particular toll road cuts their journey in half which means they can spend more time at home with their family, for example.