INTERVIEW | So what will you draw after this, I asked him. With Najib out of power and Rosmah unlikely to buy more diamonds or Birkins, where will he get new material for his political cartoons?

“Oh, that I"ll find easily,” replied Zulkiflee Anwar Ulhaque – or Zunar to his Malaysian fans.

The widely-anticipated criminal trials of the former Malaysian first couple will offer rich material that keeps him busy for a while, he said. Beyond that, there"ll be plenty of scope for political humour with the present government, he insists.

“In fact, there should be more opportunity than ever, given the liberal environment we"ll be operating in,” said Zunar. Then he mischievously added a kicker: “But I can tell you, in terms of a caricature, I'm going to miss Rosmah.”

“I don"t mind if Najib goes and Rosmah stays,” he said, cracking me up.

It was 10 in the morning in New York and I had just dropped the kids at school. In KL, it was 10pm and Zunar had just returned home for his first phone interview since discovering the previous day that he had been taken off the Malaysian immigration's travel blacklist. News that he was free to fly again coincided with another special occasion - his 56th birthday.

I asked how he felt about his new-found freedom. “Happy, of course,” he said. “Relieved, too. But still, it's a pleasant surprise, because it happened so fast. On the very first working day of the new government!”

He said he decided to check his travel status after learning with amusement about the flight ban placed on Najib Abdul Razak and Rosmah Mansor instead, and wondered if innocent people like himself had been taken off the blacklist.

He couldn't believe his eyes when the two magical words returned on his search: “Tiada halangan” (No restriction). Previously it was “Sila rujuk ke pejabat Imigresen terdekat” (Please refer to the nearest Immigration office).

“I said what?! I thought I had keyed in my ID number wrongly. So I tried once more. Again, it was 'Tiada halangan'. It was like 'Wow!'"

While the travel ban itself had been lifted, Zunar legal woes aren't exactly over, at least on paper. He has nine sedition charges against him. Yes, you read that, right, nine sedition charges – a record for any individual in Malaysia...