Feeling ripples before the tsunami

I immediately felt the ground shake and when the votes were being counted. I was assigned to a rural polling station where the majority of the voters were Malays. This was a place where DAP had hardly any chance of scoring any significant number of votes based on past election records. It was difficult to describe my surprise and shock of my BN counterpart when the ballot papers showed again and again crosses next to the picture of the rocket. My PKR's counterpart was equally surprised.

I just felt like getting on the phone to call the next room, call the other polling stations and ask, "Is this happening elsewhere??!!?". I had to keep my eyes and fixated to the votes being counted - to make sure it was real. All the while, I was asking myself, "If this is the response from a rural area, with possibly limited internet access, what's happening in the larger cities?"

When I walked out of the room upon confirming the results, we quickly tabulated the counted and were were shocked with the results with rest of the rooms. We quickly relayed the resulted to the HQ and drove back to our rendezvous point about 10 minutes away. When set and had our drinks (Chinese tea), the phone calls started to pour in. One by one, the (unofficial) results was, "We won here and there and everywhere!" There was jubilation in the air. There was sense of satisfaction.

There were about 10 of us crowded in this small coffee-shop shack in the middle of rubber and palm estates, trying to get the latest results. Drinking hot tea, we were full of excitement and and anticipation waiting for the next phone call to come in. After several minutes, the lines were jammed - calling in and out was getting increasingly difficult. But hey, I have a 3G phone and I quickly powered the browser up and immediately looked for results. The site that offered (almost) minute by minute updates was malaysiakini.com. It reported wins after wins for the DAP-PKR-PAS parties. In no time, the Chinese tea was "upgraded" to tiger beer! Food was brought in, it was party time! The ripple effect at the voting station during count was turning out to be a tidal wave! Indeed, The Star called it "Political Tsunami" the next morning.

I called home to relay the updates. My wife and my parents, glued to the TV did not get any news on any of the local stations, except for the occasional wins by BN. I told them to go burn the TV and get on the internet - check out Malaysiakini! The local television covering the elections did not report any opposition wins and held back till the very last minute when the barriers finally broke. Yet, they did not give a true sense of what happened on the ground.

Back to this little place, we did not realize the impact until the next news flash came: "Penang Falls". The it really took us by surprise - we wanted to win, to give a opposing voice, to provide check and balance - now it's the other way. While I was thinking deeply about this matter (will share my thoughts on a separate entry), the little dinner celebration continued. Shortly after, I parted my new found friends.

We reminded each other to go home, relax and go sleep. We hoped that energies will be channeled in Parliament to make changes - not onto the streets.

It had been a long day day for me. Sleep was what I really needed. I got out of the house before 7, voted in one place, polling agent in another and counting in one more and got back by midnight. It was extremely interesting and rewarding to have participated in the democratic process.

It was extra rewarding to be part of a process of a historical event unseen for the past 50 years!