08online - Making Waves In Cyberspace
To: The Editor
The Star Malaysia
"Pedal car racing to debut in Penang?"
I am writing in reference to your article dated 17th of April titled "Pedal car racing to debut in Penang".
I find it quite misleading. Firstly, "pedal car racing" is nothing but outdated, and is quite a far cry from being a "new sports novelty" as claimed in your article. Scouts from the Penang Free School have in the yesteryears hosted this event on an annual basis. In the past, pedal car races have already been held at the City Stadium and at the road in front of the now Gurney Plaza as a major scouting event, which we dub the "Scout Car Grand Prix", with much success. As such, pedal car racing would not be making a "debut", but would be held again instead. There is, as long as Human Powered Vehicles are used, no material differences between both the races.
Furthermore, organising chairman Kayes Choo mentioned in the article that scouts in the past have assembled bicycle parts together and treat this as a "past-time sport". While the former is accurate, the latter seems like a direct attack on the credibility of our event. Given that a lot of time and money were invested by us in the making and decorating of our cars, much injustice is being done in reducing the Scout Car GP's prestige to being a mere past-time sport. Nor can one discredit the Scout Car GP just because it is a school scouts event. More surprisingly, the suggested title "1st Malaysian Pedal Car Race" seems to be grossly inaccurate, if not, totally disproportionate as pedal car racing is not being held for the first time in Malaysia. On the flip side, if one thinks of it as the first race of it's kind at national level, then one could be forgiven.
The article also mentions a local engineer being engaged in the manufacture of the pedal cars. While that may be for a reason, we have certainly managed to construct our own cars from scrap metal and bicycle parts by our own. Lack of technical expertise was never a hindrance as we relied more on common sense and trial and error. What makes our event special is that the cars are constructed by secondary school scouts and the whole event was organised by the Rover Scout Crew.
All in all, tourism seems to be the winner of the day. Although a hint of acknowledgment has been given to the scouts for being the first to stage the event, it is nonetheless demoralising for the chairman to have an indifferent attitude towards the Scout Car GP. The novelty claim remains undoubtedly untrue, and most definitely is in stark contrast with the title of the article.
Shreeram
haha rampati so typical u to write this kinda stuff. Do update if they actually posted it in the papers.
i doubt they will publish the letter since they are the media sponsor for the event!
the only avenue for voicing any grouses you have is The Star. might be fruitless in the end but still, worth a try. bored writing my stupid law articles, so i thought why not write something different. and that kayes choo guy should have been more articulate and sensible in commenting. peace out
the star is very much at fault too cos they've covered our scout car grand prix before and now seems to be ignorant that such a thing ever existed!
http://www.malaysiarecords.com.my/
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There you go, set the record straight. Maybe you should write a letter to them instead of The Star.
not so soon....don't get ahead of yourself....we're just getting started!
do you really think that during my research i wasn't able to dig out those contact details?
just waiting for the right time...
Commenting by HaloScan
