NOW & THEN #05 - CLUB HOUSE

NOW & THEN #05-CLUB HOUSE 

SUNDAY 28.2.2021

Last night, I dropped by into an Online Clubhouse hosted by my friend Johan Shafie. This is COVID19 period where most of our activities are done online. He was talking about Balik Kampung(going back to our villages) for Eid FEstival

Clubhouse is an apps that hosts Audio Chat Online.It started in April 2020, but I only know of its existence this month and by invitation only. for now,it works on iOS only. I don't have iphone, so I use my iPad instead. My thanks to Haafiz Nordin for the invite. I hope something similar will be available for android platform soon.


Back in 1950s/60s, my kampung(vilage) had a Rumah Kelab( Clubhouse). It is a timber building,single story  with an area of 500 square feet. It was constructed by my late father on his land next to our house for his students( Pondok Beris/MAIP) and kampung folks. It has a radio, few books and magazine and newspapers. By the way, the newspaper was a few days lat. Kota Bharu is about 20km from Pondok Beris, my kampung. By the way, in the 50s, this is only place for students and my kampung folks can listen to the radio and read newspapers and magazines.

By the way, TV came to Malaya in 1962. And  electricity came to my kampung in 1978. We were quite behind in physical infra structure. Pipe water only arrived in 1980s but now no water coming from the government pipelines. We had to get back to good old well.

I am very pround of the vision and leadership of my late father that he set up this Rumah Kelab before Merdeka 31/8/19557 (Indepence)  to provide the hub for people to get information ,knowledge, get together, meet and collaborate for mutual benefits.

Coming back to the present time, we have radio at home, listen to the radio in the car and radio is available on our smartphones. Every house has a TV. With Internet, we can communicate with everyone and every where-via text, sound and live video. The rest is history

For the record, I was appointed by National Art Gallery to conduct course to transform 25 young artists to become entrepreneurs. Since we cannot meet in person, we have to resort to using ZOOM. I hated teaching students online but I had no choice, but I managed to the best I could. Nowadays, we can have meeting anytime any where.

Back to 1980's, a new type of clubhouse got very popular among the corporate executives like me. Cost of membership can vary from RM10,000 to RM50,000. I was a member of Kelab Darus Ehsan(KDE) near Ampang Point and located only 5km from my house in Taman Maluri. Here, I can enjoy all the club facilities and also play golf. My handicap remains 24 until today. Nowadays, I don't play golf. I prefer to cycle in Putrajaya.

In the old days before we have hotels all over the cities and towns, we have Rest House for governmnet officers when we travel for OGS(official duty) or for pleasures. When I was the District Engineer of JKR(PWD) Alor setar, Kedah I did maintenance work for government Rest House in Alor Setar. It is open to all state and federal officers. Once a while, when I have some extra cash, I took my family to have a weekend holiday in Penang . We stayed at Kedah Rest House for RM30 per day.

Clubhouse has many forms of existence. The cafes in Paris are clubhouses for the intellectuals in 19th and 20th centuries. Cafe is not  just a physical place to meet and eat but it is a rendevous for people to congregate and have conversations when written words are not adequate for intellectual discourse.

The word club means a group of people who share ideas,lifestyle,worldviews, hobbbies etc. The word house is a building to meet.Now, the 'house' can be on ZOOM,Chatroom and video Conference Call! For me, I still prefer a real cafe when I smell the aroma of roasted coffee floating around and a cozy ambience to have food and drinks with my friends.







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