COMMENT It leaves a bad taste when a group of mostly senior citizens and young primary school children were barred from using the Forest Research Institute of Malaysia (Frim) campus in Kepong on Saturday morning.

The experience was enough to leave behind an unpleasant feeling, despite all the damage control done by its director-general, Dr Abdul Latif Mohmod, who apologised to the party concerned on behalf of Frim for the way the security guards had handled the group, promising that he would personally look into the matter urgently.

Representing the group from Sri Damansara SIB Chinese Church, Pastor Inky Ong said that the young Sunday school children were wearing their T-shirts for easy identification reasons when they went on a group outing with the senior citizens of her church.

It was part of an effort to help bridge the generation gap and to get close to Mother Nature by doing the morning walk together. This was meant to be some good exercise for both the young and the older people.

“We chose Frim because it is the nearest park around, and it is a beautiful place for a walk on a Saturday morning,” she said. “Mostly equipped with bottles of water, and some holding their walking sticks, we were all excited to go out together as a group.”

But just before they were going to hike up the hill, they were stopped by a group of Frim security guards who forced them to leave the place.

“We explained to them that we were only going for a morning walk together, but the guards refused to accept our explanation,” she said. “Instead, they insisted that we should apply for a permit three days in advance.”

A check on Frim’s website did not show that groups of more than 10 needed to register three days in advance. It would have been different if the group had wanted to organise a family day at the Frim campus, but this was just a group of senior citizens and young children wanting to go hiking up the hill together.

The only ‘offences’ that Ong said could have been committed were that the group had informally sung a short song in Mandarin and some of the young people brought along with them their ukulele just to entertain themselves.

“No one was indecently dressed or making a nuisance of ourselves,” she said. “At the very most, the guards could have told us what we could not do, but to chase us out is rather unkind. I hope such incidents do not happen again.”

Frim’s botanical garden

According to Ong, even Frim’s botanical garden in Kepong was out of bounds for the primary school children.

“After some haggling with the security guards,” she said, “the senior citizens decided to move on to other places where they had their other activities, but we did not want to disappoint the younger children seeing that they were enthusiastic about the morning walk.”

Thinking that the group was much smaller, they attempted to enter Kepong Botanical Garden, and there, they were also told by the same security guards that they were not allowed into the park.

“This is rather unusual because many other groups of visitors have entered without any problem. Some families even brought food with them to have a small picnic. Therefore, why did they make such a big fuss about our children?” she asked, adding that the group was not making much noise throughout their walk.

Every few minutes, the security guards would return on their motorbikes to stop the group from proceeding further with their outing. Ong said some of her church members felt intimidated and decided to leave the premises.

Not the first time

This is not the first time that visitors to Frim have had unpleasant experiences with its security guards.

This has often brought embarrassment to the Frim management. On one hand, it seeks to become a popular tourist destination; on the other hand it has rules that can make it difficult for groups of more than 10 people to enjoy their activities together.

Rules are also subject to the interpretation of the person in charge of security for the day. Its guidelines said that “any gathering of visitors or any group activity involving more than 10 people must be registered with the Frim One Stop Centre before the gathering/activity.”

However, if taken strictly, even two families with four children each would easily make 10 in a group, which means that their outing together, despite having purchased the tickets in advance, could be spoilt by some security guards.

Even the word ‘indecent clothes’ can be interpreted differently by an overzealous security guard. In multiracial Malaysia, there needs to be mutual respect between people of all races.

STEPHEN NG is an ordinary citizen with an avid interest in following political developments in the country since 2008.