Tan Hong Ming in Love~

aku just nk share ngan korg ttg video yg aku pilih untuk assignment koku Counselling Group aku. enjoy :)

TAN HONG MING IN LOVE (2007) directed by YASMIN AHMAD

Summary of the Video

Tan Hong Ming in Love is a PETRONAS merdeka commercial about a primary school student declaring that he secretly likes his best friend Umi Kazrina and wants to take her out on a date. He doesn’t want to ask her out because he says he is shy and that everybody will laugh at him.

The crew then interviews Umi and asks her who her best friend is. She replies that her best friend is Tan Hong Ming. The crew then ask her if she has a boyfriend and she says yes, it is Tan Hong Ming.

What makes the short commercial so special is the look of surprise and joy on Tan Hong Ming’s face as he sheepishly takes Umi’s hand and leads her away. In the end of the commercial, appear the sentences, ‘Our children are color blind. Shouldn’t we keep them that way?’

Message in the Video

Yasmin Ahmad, the director of celebrated films such as Sepet and Mukhsin is well-known for her racial unity and peace messages in her artwork, and Tan Hong Ming in Love is a no exception.

Small children are like a sponge. They absorb everything that they see, hear, feel and learn just like us adult, but the different is, they are not judgemental. These children have no fears and mindsets as we adult have and that is what Yasmin Ahmad tries to convey to us, the fact that two small children, despite the different races, having fond of each other.

I admit that, in UTP itself, racial unity is not fully achieved. Malay has their own clicks, Chinese has their own gangs and Indian has their own clans. And the international students? Not much a bother of the local students. If it’s not because of fixed lab teams, or assignment groups, it will be hard to see students from different races sit together round a table doing a discussion.

This commercial gives a reality check to us UTPians, if not to all Malaysians. This commercial is a message sent to all parents, to the government, to us adults ‘why shouldn’t we let our friendship surpasses beyond any races or beliefs?’ because it is not race that decide a good friend, or a well-grown human being. But one thing is for sure, with racial unity encouraged by us, we are sparing a harmonious, peaceful environment for ourselves and our children.

While our children are growing up, let us not contaminate their mind with bad thoughts about people from different races than us, just like Tan Hong Ming and Umi Kazrina themselves. They are ‘color blind’, in the sense where skin color is not a border in their friendship. And we as the adults, as the one who are supposed to lead them, should never say ‘no’ to this holy relation.

Malaysia has reached its 50^th independence year, and in fifty years we have learnt the bittersweet of multi-cultural environment. No way would we like to drive ourselves to the 13 May tragedy again. Let this commercial be a new start of a more harmonious and understanding, beloved community that unite together and becoming Malaysians!