Building on the success of its first edition, the revised and updated new edition of Chronicle of Malaysia beautifully showcases 50 years of events and happenings in the country.

From politics to personalities, from sports to scandals, and from development to disasters, the story of a country can be chronicled in its news. Seeking to do just that, the new edition of Chronicle of Malaysia: Fifty Years of Headline News, 1963–2013 brings to light the full dramatic sweep of the history, heroics, and heartbreak of this still-young Southeast Asian country. This is a substantial tome, measuring a whopping 26x28cm and redlining the scales with nearly 400 pages. History buffs and expat readers in general will delight in flipping through the well organised pages and learning so much about this history of their adopted country.

From the inception of the Malaysia we know today back in 1963, as the Federation of Malaya welcomed Singapore, North Borneo, and Sarawak, to the newly formed country’s near-simultaneous conflict with Indonesia, to its unceremonious expulsion of the state of Singapore less than two years later, Chronicle jumps headlong into the country’s history and pulls no punches. Stories are taken more or less directly from news accounts, so there’s a healthy mix of the good, the bad, and the downright fascinating, all revised and rewritten to engage and speak to today’s readers. Who knew, for instance, that when the “space-age” Subang Airport opened in 1965, the $52 million venture was then the most expensive project in the country’s history, and it’s 11,400-foot runway was then the longest in the whole of Southeast Asia?

Each of the book’s 50 years of history is accorded about eight pages, introduced with the year’s key events in Malaysia, and with the major world news headlines from that year appearing on a sidebar to paint a picture of the world at the time, a world in which Malaysia was taking its first uncertain steps. Several pages are dedicated to the May 1969 riots, still the worst in the country’s history, while just two months later, newspapers reported on large crowds of Malaysians gathering for a very different reason – to listen to a live transistor radio broadcast of American astronauts Neil Armstrong and Edwin “Buzz” Aldrin taking their first historic steps on the moon.

Through each year and each decade, this fascinating book recounts stories great and small, some of which may inspire recollection, such as a diplomatic row in early December of 1993, prompted by Australian prime minister Paul Keating referring to Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohamad as “recalcitrant,” a fuss completely swept aside just days later by the tragic collapse of a 12-storey block of the Highland Towers luxury condos in Ulu Klang, a disaster that killed 48 residents, a quarter of whom were expats.

Chronicle of Malaysia covers each notable event in the country’s march to modernisation, beginning with the nine-point Vision 2020 manifesto outlined in 1995, continuing through the Asian Financial Crisis and recovery, up to present-day events under the Government Transformation Programme.

A chronological compendium that will appeal equally to history aficionados and casual readers, the book covers not just the political and economic events making headlines, but also the human side of Malaysia, from sports and fashion to music, the arts, and the country’s changing social scene. It’s an outstanding book, boasting over 1,200 photos and specially commissioned cartoons, that gives readers a real sense of each era of Malaysia’s past leading right up to its present.

Chronicle of Malaysia, published by Editions Didier Millet, is sold in major bookstores throughout the country. RM120.00

Source: The Expat Magazine February 2014

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