By CALYN ONG, CHESTER CHIN, CHONG KAH YUAN, SONG SOOK KIN and TING ZHAO SONG
Smashed beer bottles, cigarette butts and torn junk food packets.
Walk through the lakeside promenade and Beijing precinct at Westlake in Kampar on a Saturday morning and chances are you will be greeted by these items strewn across the pavement. Moved by this filthy sight, our reporting team decided to look into the matter and discovered a debauched night life culture at the Westlake housing area in this quaint little town
 |
Clean up one’s act : It is more than time for the students to get their act together besides cleaning up after themselves after a night of running riot. |
During one of the team’s midnight stakeouts at Jalan Seksyen 1/1 in Westlake, we discovered a group of young people who were engaging in rowdy behaviour. They were shouting and screaming in ecstasy. We tried to approach the group but were stopped by a female member who said in Mandarin, “Don’t come near! War is starting”. Minutes later, they started giving chase and threw a white powdery substance at each other while laughing hysterically.
On the same night, about 100 meters away from this group of students, a black Proton Wira was seen parked across the row of houses along the road. What set this particular vehicle apart from the other cars there was that it was blasting loud music from its stereo. The shocking thing was that all this transpired at the wee hours of the morning when everyone has fallen asleep.
Driven by this course of events, our reporting team approached Danish House Sdn. Bhd. at their office in Manchester. The company managed the majority of hostels at Westlake. Not only that, their company is also responsible for supplying neighbourhood security within this housing vicinity.
When asked for comments regarding this night activities in Westlake, the representative at the Customer Service desk declined to provide an answer. When pressed further by one of our reporters, she hesitated before finally saying that the company can’t divulge such information.
Unsatisfied with this rigid response, two of our reporters went undercover and visited the Danish House Westlake Oxford office. Posing as students with a complaint regarding the ruckus at the Beijing precinct, the Customer Service officer gave our reporters a card that contained mobile hotline number. She then proceeded by telling them that occupants can just ring up the number and security personnel will check out the issue.
With this piece of information, we paid the guard house a visit at night and spoke to Salleh bin Din, a security guard who is in charge of night patrol at the Westlake neighbourhood. According to Salleh, the noise and littering issue in Westlake is nothing new. The Danish House Management has received many complaints from the residents throughout the years.
When asked if the management is doing anything to solve this, Salleh gave the same answer as the one given earlier by the second Customer Service desk we visited. “Yes, a hotline number is provided and the residents can call us if they find the noise too unbearable or probably if they happened to encounter any dangerous situation,” he said. However, Salleh said the security will only take action after midnight, unless if the matter needs immediate action.
He added that sometimes those residents, whom he assumed are also varsity students, will talk back when reprimanded, probably because they are drunk. “All of this is actually quite worrisome because we also have Tan Sri Hew See Tong living right across the Beijing Park,” Salleh elaborated further.
 |
Double bind : The security guard faces some difficulties in warding off the noise and littering issues. Can he fulfill his responsibilities by rebuking the students for the sake of protecting other students? |
Tan Sri Hew See Tong, a tin miner-turned-developer is one of the individuals who gave Kampar a new lease of life by getting Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman (UTAR) to set up a campus in the town.
The security guard also voiced his concern over the rubbish littered after the many parties the students have at the Beijing precinct. “We will take down their contact details if we see them having such gatherings. If any complaints of the gatherings received, we will contact them directly. But that is about all we can do, we can’t possibly stop them from drinking or even stop the parties as we don’t have such authority.”
We also found out from some of the Beijing residents that the late night disturbance has been occurring on a regular basis every now and then. When one of the residents, Fong Renee was asked regarding the ruckuses near Beijing Park, she said that it is nothing new and she is starting to get used to the noise at night.
According to Wong Han Hui, a foundation student from UTAR who is also staying at Beijing, her housemates and her would not bother about the noises, but when it is near to examination period, she feels extremely annoyed by the inconsiderate students, and some of them are not even Beijing residents.
What Wong said was true, our reporters observed that the group of students drove and cycled away from Beijing after the party ended. Wong also added that some of the students were acting like illiterate peasants in her past experience. “They were so rude when I personally asked them to tune down a bit, instead of apologising, they just ignore my words. They even turned up the stereo volume!”
The party aftermath that can be clearly seen in the morning has proven that most of the students do not clean after their own mess. To further obtain information regarding the night culture which has emerged in Westlake, particularly the lakeside promenade, we went to the Kampar Municipal Council. With the help of Mohammad Shafiq bin Mohammad Salim, who is an officer in the Sanitation Department, we managed to attain a more in-depth analysis of the littering issue.
 |
Drink it up : Evidences of intoxicant consumptions and dregs is an unbecoming trend bringing close resemblance to the acts of mat rempit in the city. |
According to Shafiq, the municipal council has received tonnes of complaints from the public regarding the filthy scene at the lakeside pavement. “It is not just a matter of hygiene, these broken beer bottles left on the pavement can be very dangerous for the people who pass by the lakeside,” said Shafiq.
The lakeside pavement that links UTAR to Westlake is a highly utilised route in the morning. Some use it for jogging while most of the students who live in Westlake walk or cycle to UTAR through that pavement.
Shafiq told us that the council has not come up with a solution other than cleaning up the pavement every morning. He explained that the lakeside pavement is a public place. Therefore, neither the council nor the police have the authority to disallow people from having beer at the lakeside.
“We tried sorting the problem out by reaching the Danish House, but there was no fruitful outcome.” On his personal view, Shafiq commented that when there is a bunch of twenty somethings consuming alcohol at the lakeside, anything could possibly go wrong.
All this risqué behaviour is actually helping to build a non-flattering image of the Kampar varsity students’ community. The booming roars of the stereo so often accompanied by indecent squealing and loud whoopee draw a close resemblance with the infamous mat rempit found throughout the city.
 |
Flotsam and jetsam : The panorama of the lake is tainted by the remaining debris leftovers of the students’ misconduct from the night before. |
To make the gap between mat rempits and a bunch of excited hormone-driven undergraduates even thinner, they purchase Guinness and Tiger beers from time to time at the local mini market in Westlake. A shopkeeper who only wishes to be known as Mr Tan told us that his sundry shop which is operating within Westlake has often time sold out many of these beers at night.
When asked why he decided to carry alcoholic beverages knowing that most of the residents are students, Tan replied that it is an individual’s prerogative whether or not to purchase it. “The thing about students is that when there is no parental supervision, they have to take responsibility for their own action. If they want to drink beer, then that is their own choice,” Tan offered and added that he is just a “shopkeeper”.
However, Tan is very skeptical of the security team’s effectiveness. “Sometimes, this problem brings into question a matter of security here in Westlake. What about the securities? Why aren’t any actions taken to reduce the ruckus?” Tan who is from Penang commented.
If a local shopkeeper could have this notion despite being a resident of Westlake himself, then what would others possibly think of the security here? A security that allows the cause of disturbance to run wild and rampant in a neighbourhood where it is mostly populated by students?
To make matters worse, the wrongdoers are varsity students to begin with. When outsiders have a chance encounter of this kind of scenario, it is inevitable that people would link the misconduct of the UTAR students to the university itself. This in turn will denigrate the institution’s reputation as a respectable university.
From a bunch of boisterous, even downright reckless people who pump up the stereo, to people who kick up a huge racket screaming in the middle of the night, these are the epitomical acts of ignorance towards the consideration of others who reside at the Westlake.
While the culprits may not have harmed other residents in any physical way, rumors has circulated that a certain motorbike gang had been going around swinging their helmets at random passers-by along the walkway that leads to the housing area.
Ma Foong Mei, an undergraduate of UTAR, was one of those who were alarmed by the news. “People are saying that these mysterious bikers are seriously injuring students who happen to be walking along the walkway. However, I do not know how far true the rumor is.”
At the moment, night patrols have also proved to be futile. There is only so much a security guard could do before a drunkard retaliates, sometimes dangerously. Students in the midst of studying for their examinations would also have to bear the unwarranted pandemonium.
Perhaps it is time for the ones calling the shots to step up and concoct a better solution to solve this issue before it blows up to a level that could threaten lives and the university’s reputation.
Posts
