A morning blaze in a kampung off Mengkuang Road in Butterworth
Fire in a kampung
From a distance, grey plumes
Darken the morning sky,
Someone’s in trouble,
Someone’s home is ablaze.
Passers-by gawk in awe,
Fire-fighters frustrated,
As hoses run dry,
Valuable moments lost.
Flames dart higher,
Zinc sheets tossed in the air…
A police officer arrives,
Blows whistle officiously,
Preep-preep! Preep-preep!
Onlookers scurry away,
Suddenly… water jets out – Whoosh!,
Blaze doused quickly,
Neighbours sigh in relief.
But what of the burnt houses?
Charred shell remains,
Memories buried in ashes,
Another village home lost.
Do villagers have fire insurance?
Can they afford it?
If not, what happens now,
where do they go?
We rarely pause and wonder;
after all, it’s just…
another anonymous kampung.
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What you need to do is ask Koh Tsu Khoon where are the billions of ringgit the BN government have done with for the past years?
These are the billions to lift the poor out of poverty.
No need to write all those sympathetic poems. For what? How do you want to help them. Poems don’t.
Anyone who lives in Butterworth will know that the areas surrouding Mengkuan Road is surrounded by the most number of volunteer fire fighters in the country. Within 5 km there are 1 unit from Raja Uda, 1 unit in Sungai Puyu and 1 unit with own equipped ambulance in Bagan Ajam. That is just the volunteer units and we have yet to touch on the other volunteer units beyond 5 km, then there is the Bomba which is located just 5 minutes away and very big Bomba unit 15 minutes away located in Prai. Fact is in most cases it… Read more »
In this case, the Bomba appeared at the scene first, although the volunteer units arrived not long after.
How come there seems to be not much firemen nor action from them to put out the fire or at least to try and stop it from spreading… All I can see is one fireman with a hose pipe and no water. In one of the pictures only one hose spewing water and the fire seems to be raging furiously treatening to spread to the houses on the left. This is Malaysia boleh. Police not effective, firemen also not effective. I pity the residents who lost their homes irrespective of the race,creed or colour. If muslim so close to Raya.… Read more »
so then.. why not blame the god?
because make you being poor and had only kampung house?
Kenapa masa ini terlalu banyak berita sedih?
Tidak apa, kampung ini berada di Pulau Pinang. Kerajaan negeri boleh bantu mereka, asalkan jangan minta rumah teres lagi.
Sigh………..