A Walk Down Memory Lane 8 FOCUS Having established firmly as facilitator for bilateral German Malaysian business relations the Chamber is proud to celebrate its silver jubilee this year a quarter of a century MGCC In conjunction with the celebration MGCC invited a number of old hands from the German business community in Malaysia as well as long serving MGCC staff for a walk down memory lane The session which took place in the Chamber s premises on the 47th floor of Menara AmBank Jalan Yap Kwan Seng brought about a lot of fond and nostalgic memories among the participants Speaking of nostalgia the highest German Chamber in the world will soon be a part of the history books itself as MGCC will be moving into its new office premises on Jalan P Ramlee Menara Hap Seng 2 by the end of 2016 EXPATRIATE LIFE IN KUALA LUMPUR THOSE DAYS The Subang International Airport in Selangor now known as Sultan Abdul Aziz Shah Airport served as Kuala Lumpur s main airport from 1965 until 1998 before the Kuala Lumpur International Airport KLIA in Sepang started its operations The flight from Germany to Malaysia had two stop overs back then and there was not even a proper airport International planes had to land in Singapore as Kuala Lumpur couldn t handle big planes It was not easy to get here remembers Mr Heinz Müller In 1965 there were only 65 Germans in Malaysia 15 to 20 of us were involved in building dams in Cameron Highlands under the so called Cameron Highlands Hydro Electric Scheme At that time I was an expatriate working in a trading company on a three year contract My working contract stated that I was not allowed to get married and I had to work continuously for three years before being given a holiday he continues When asked about the telecommunication system Mr Müller shares how tedious it was to communicate with people from different communities As an expatriate from Germany he often had to communicate with the German headquarter I had to go to an operator to send telex or telegram and it was very expensive We only used telex and telegram in cases of emergencies For non emergency cases we would communicate via letters Sending a letter usually took two months I am really amazed with how telecommunication has progressed today with e mail WhatsApp and other social networking that get us connected in just seconds According to him during those three years in Malaysia the food he missed the most were German sausages And bread and HARIBO adds Klaus Stapmans the Managing Director of The European Taste Sdn Bhd who has been visiting Malaysia on business since the late 70s But it was not easy to receive a parcel or so called care package from the other side of the world back then Mr Müller shares that one had to have good connections with the captains arriving at Port Klang to ensure the parcels reached the recipient safely He laughed when recalling a particular memory when his mother had sent him a Christmas tree but unfortunately the tree had withered upon arrival in Malaysia Heinz Müller also reminisces about the fun times he had in Malaysia The German community was very small Once in a while we would gather on a ship arriving in Port Klang to party Whenever somebody returned from Germany they would bring back sausages and share them with everyone That was the time that we would party and finish all the sausages on the same day And those parties were very good he adds with a smile With an estimated 300 400 emails the MGCC staff is sending every day to member companies and clients in Malaysia as well as all over the world it is difficult to imagine a working environment without those means of communication Nevertheless German companies and traders have been active in Malaysia for a long time long before the Malaysian German Chamber of Commerce and Industry MGCC as we know it today was founded in 1991 by Cheryl Sim and Sabine Franze MGCC

Hinweis: Dies ist eine maschinenlesbare No-Flash Ansicht.
Klicken Sie hier um zur Online-Version zu gelangen.