Saifuddin Sent BM Letter to DC and Received Another From Cairo in Hieroglyphs.
When Saifuddin our Foreign Minister Sent A Bahasa Melayu Letter to Washington He Received One from Egypt in Hieroglyphs
I don’t know how true this story is.
Some unconfirmed sources said, on the day when Saifuddin’s first letter in Bahasa Melayu was sent to Washington he received another from his counterpart in Egypt with the same intention of popularizing their own language.
This is how the story went.
When Saifuddin’s first letter in Bahasa Melayu to his counterpart, the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken arrived in Washington it probably landed on the table of one of the latter’s many assistants. Blinken would not have the time to read all letters received by himself.
Most likely it would be channelled to the Office of Maritime Southeast Asian Affairs (EAP/MTS) which coordinates policy on Brunei, East Timor, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Singapore.
We assumed that each country would be managed by a desk officer.
The executive in charge would then raise it with his immediate supervisor that the letter from the Foreign Minister of Malaysia was written in authentic Bahasa Melayu for the first time in their relationship with the country since its independence in 1957.
Before meeting the chief the junior looked up Bahasa Melayu. Google said it was the lingua franca of the Malay archipelago before the arrival of Western colonial powers.
The Chief of the department enquired, “Do we have anyone who knows Bahasa Melayu in this office?”
“No boss!”
“What do you want to do then?”
“Maybe I can try to Google translate it?”
“Good thinking young man. I didn’t know you could do that with Bahasa Melayu. OK then go ahead. But I think we should at the same time send it to our embassy in Kuala Lumpur and ask them to do that for us too. Just to be on the safe side”.
The junior officer disappeared and returned a couple of hours later to tell the boss he emailed it to the embassy in Kuala Lumpur.
“So, what does your Google translate have to say then?”
He showed the boss his rough Google translation. The boss glanced at it quickly and said, “Good, draft a reply and let me have a look first thing tomorrow morning but be sure to check with the guys in Kuala Lumpur just to make sure we don’t screw up! “
The junior officer returned to his desk consulted with a few of his teammates and wrote a reply.
Before quitting time, around 6 pm Eastern Standard Time, he left a draft on the desk of his boss and went home.
At about the same time but 12 hours ahead the American Embassy in Kuala Lumpur was just about getting ready to start the day. It would be three hours later around 9 am before it would be looked at by an officer at the Jalan Ampang office.
Meanwhile a few hours later, in Malaysia’s administrative capital of Putrajaya, the Malaysian Foreign Ministry, referred to as Wisma Putra reportedly received a strange-looking letter from the Foreign Minister of Egypt written in a language nobody in the office understood.
The Egypt Desk Officer was running around Wisma Putra checking with the senior staff but not a single individual had seen a language written in that manner. Not even the Resident Ustaz who received his Masters at prestigious Egypt’s Al Azhar University knew what to make of it. Someone suggested sending the letter to the Malaysia Embassy in Cairo.
I received a copy shared by someone through WhatsApp. I have attached it here for your reading pleasure. If you could!
Apparently, Egypt too was supposedly trying to internationalise the usage of their old and ancient language.
Anyway, last heard, US Embassy at Jalan Ampang was still translating Saifuddin’s letter.
In Washington, the Office of Maritime Southeast Asian Affairs (EAP/MTS) at the Department of State was anxiously waiting for the translation from Kuala Lumpur.
In Cairo, it’s Friday. The Embassy of Malaysia was closed.
Source : https://newswav.com/A2203_81W9yX
You Sir, have an excellent sense of humour. Made my day. Thank you.