Applying the Malaysian Citizenship for child born abroad at Putrajaya

Update on 04 Aug 2017: My brother in laws went to pick up the certificate in July 2017. We finally got to see it during our last trip to Malaysia. This is how it looks like! And we managed to get a MyKid for her too.

Her Malaysia Citizenship Certificate

We applied for MyKid while we were in Malaysia in July 2017, normally it only takes two hours, but for some reason they needed to call Putrajaya to verify something so we only got it the day after.

Update on 15 Feb 2016 : Went to Putrajaya then JPN Selangor, we finally got the letter stating that the application was approved! The letter was issued on May 2014 but for some reason my family had not received it. We submitted the required documents, JPN will issue us a certificate of nationality between 3 to 6 months. Yeah, she got it!

Ever since I knew that child born abroad to Malaysian mothers could apply for Malaysian citizenship, I have been preparing the documents to apply Malaysian citizenship for Aelig the next time I go back to Malaysia. Finally, mission accomplished and now fingers crossed for the application result.

We arrived at Putrajaya around 2pm. We wasted some times looking for the Jabatan Pendaftaran Negara (JPN) as I forgot that Putrajaya was divided into many Precincts. JPN is located in Precinct 3, not far from the pink Putra Mosque.


The main entrance to JPN at Putrajaya.


The citizenship department is located in level 1.
Once arrived, I went towards the receptionist stating my purpose of visit. She checked some of the documents:
1. Malaysian marriage certificate (I'm so glad I took the hassle to apply for this cert even though my civil wedding was carried out in France)
2. Aelig's birth certificate (They accepted the French-issued multi-lingual birth certificate without problem)
3. Aelig's passport
I sensed that the whole purpose was to make sure that we got married before having Aelig. This was one of the conditions that we have to meet before handling in our application.
She then proceeded by giving me the application form (Borang B).



And she asked me a question that costed me RM70.
"Did you wear long pants?"
"No". I showed her my blue short pants.
"Well, you will not be allowed to go through the process with this pants. Please come back tomorrow."
I was a bit surprised. I do not remember this attire request when I came to JPN last time for the "Certificat de célibataire".
Well, I decided to respect the requirement and asked for direction towards the closest shopping mall and bought myself a pair of jeans. Problem solved.

I took some times to carefully filled out the application form. Here are the required documents (original + 1 photocopy):
1. Child's birth certificate
2. Child's passport
3. Child's photos (3 pieces)
4. Child's first time entering Malaysia (photocopy of the page in the passport)
5. Applicant's birth certificate (I'm the applicant in this case)
6. Applicant's IC
7. Applicant's passport
8. Father's birth certificate (translated in English or Malay)
9. Father's passport
10. Parents' marriage certificate

At that time we were the only applicant at the Citizen department. We were handed a number and moved to another counter. The officer checked through the application form and I had to modify two information:
1. Aelig's race.
In the application form there was Malay, Chinese, Indian and Others. I checked "Others" and put a side note that she was a mixed between Malaysian and French.
Well, the officer insisted that I had to choose between Chinese or French. I hesitated. For me she is Malaysian French. Eventually I chose Chinese, now I regretted. She would probably have more chance if she is grouped in "Others".

2. Aelig's religion
I entered no religion for Aelig. It was apparently not an acceptable answer. Again, we needed to choose. We explained that she has no religion but the officer did not seem to understand. To move on I kindly asked him to check "Christian".

I would say that the whole process was very pleasant and the officers were polite and professional. They verified the photocopies from the original one and chatted with us from time to time. At one point Aelig heard us saying "Terima Kasih" (Thank you in Malay) so she repeated it. The officer was interested in knowing if she knows other Malay words, but she didn't want to corporate. She did sing part of "Chan Mali Chan" in front of them though. I hope this would win their heart and eventually grant her the citizenship. Fingers crossed!

Side note: Hubby was very impressed by the courtesy shown by the government servants he dealed with in Putrajaya. He felt that they are way better than the French civil servants in terms of attitude and service.

Belum-Temenggor Escape - Accommodation

We had a 3D2N escape to Belum Temenggor, situated at the North of Perak, bordering Thailand. From Penang's Berjaya Junior Suite, we moved to the traditional Attap roof Malay style chalet with basic amenities in an isolated island.


The chalet.


It had enough room to host three of us under one roof. I expected to see insects crawling around or being waken up by unknown flying / crawling stuffs, but to my surprise non of these happened.


The back side of the chalet facing the lake.


The back side opens into a balcony.


In the morning when we open our eyes, we were welcome with this scenic view.

It was a perfect spot if you want to stay within the nature. Unfortunately the tranquility was broken with the noise from the generator.

Road Trip to Penang

We went for a one-week road trip to the North and Eastern part of Peninsular Malaysia. The trip was well organized with activities that suited different age ranges. Everyone had a blast.

The first stop was Penang, famous for its food and beaches.

It was quite a long trip for Aelig, luckily the car built-in DVD player kept her busy. Everyone in the car had to watch "Tinker Bell" over and over again though.


After some food hunting we went for durian hunting in "Balik Pulau". I had been there more than 10 years ago, the price had skyrocketed and durian has become an expensive fruit. Aelig was more intrigued to the shape than the taste.


We went for swimming in Batu Ferringhi. The public beaches are filthy and polluted, I would rather enjoy the swimming pool in the hotel.


I missed being with my family. My nephews and nieces have grown up so fast. I'm glad Aelig got to blend in with them.


I'm not sure if this was Aelig's first encounter with monkey, but she surely was not afraid and wanted to feed them as close as possible. She didn't realize she could get hurt.


After savoring the infamous "Asam Laksa", we visited the Kek Lok Si Temple. Around the Buddha status there were the 12 Chinese zodiac animals. It was a popular spot for photo taking.


During the evening the Gurney Drive was packed with people. Some come for food and some just to enjoy the sea-watch. Lots of kids were playing with their bubble gun. The market price is RM10 each. Aelig was crazy with it.


The stop at Penang had greatly satisfied my craving for local food. During the two-day's trip I had taken in different kind of noodles, seafood and hawker food. I could stay longer just to feed my stomach. I love hawker center, you can get so many choices in just one location. I hope we can get this in France. Imagine everyone goes to a restaurant and we get to eat crêpe, couscous, mussels with fries, pad thai, confit de canard...all at the same location.

We have arrived

Despite several hurdles before departing, we are finally home.
Well, the photobooks I made for my family didn't arrive on time. Their website said they would be delivered under 7 business days but it didn't happen. One production line broke down was what they told me when I called. Then, I was eyeing for one Groupon hotel deal for our trip to Thailand, but the hotel didn't want to confirm their availability before I buy it.

Anyway, the whole trip was quite smooth, both train and plane departed and arrived as scheduled.


A little problem when passing through the French immigration. Aelig was tired and she wanted to follow me to the "Non EU" line. She yelled and yelled "maman" seeing me going through another line. Well, this time the "Non EU" was a lot faster.


I passed the immigration and still heard Aelig calling for me. Once she saw me on the other side she calmed down.


Thanks to the onboard entertainment, we had a better flight this time. Aelig was watching "Ice Age 2" over and over again. I also prepared several DVDs and played it on my laptop. I pampered myself to three different Asian movies.
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We were traveling light this time. No wine nor cider, just bought the Eiffel Tower Brandy in the tax free shop. It was so much better, packing bottles was simply painful. My mother ordered several packs of local biscuits. And lastly, a suitcase dedicated to 13 Long Champ bags. Well, that would be a story for another post if I have a chance.

Another encounter with Louis Vuitton

With Euro depreciating against RM, some of my family members were eyeing at the relatively deflated French luxury bags.
One asked for a LV bag. And since the closest shops are in Paris, I tried to check out the online option.

The elite webste did not appeal to me. As a customer I prefer wesbite that is intuitive and user friendly. I hope to just enter the product code and find the item immediately instead of going through categories of products and have to look at the photos one by one. Well, it was not the worst and the fact that they only have 20 items per category reduced the searching time.

The website says that it could delivery within 4 business days. And I was leaving in 5 business days. A bit risky I thought. So I called the customer service. Surprisingly, I got a pleasant male voice with perfect French (not those call center in North Africa) and every willingness to help me. He said it would be delivered next week before I leave France but there is no guarantee. Plus, Saturday is not considered as business day. From my experience, when a website says 4 business days it could be delivered before or after what was promised. So I considered it too risky so we just called the whole thing off.

So, no LV bag this trip home.

All these bags buying adventures leads me to think about the marketing strategies for the luxury brands. LV is certainly one of the most successful one. Some of the strategies:

1. Limited distribution channel: only available in touristic cities (Paris, Strasbourg, Bordeaux, cities in South of France)
2. Restricted purchase item: maximum 3 items per person, one item per model
3. Conditioned online purchase: do not delivery to hotel or professional addresses
4. Elegant (or cocky?) customer service: they could refuse to sell you item

Well, the cockier they are, the better their business goes.
It has been an interesting encountered, now I'm in their customer list. They send me their seasonal collection catalog every year (see photo).

PS: Do you think people really bring their LV suitcases to desert?

He tried his best

So Datuk Lee lost the game and Malaysia got a silver for badminton men singles, which was really not that bad.

I didn't watch the direct games so when I got home I went straight to check the result. Then I watched the replay, and from his performance I had doubt that he could lose. He played so well!!! Actually, both of them demonstrated nearly perfect skills so to gain one point they had to force the opponent to make an error. It was simply impossible to tell who would win until the very last moment.

It was so cruel to see their extremely opposite emotions when the games ended. The dishearted and gloomy Lee vs excited and triumph Lin. All these just because Lin had a better luck that day.

Luckily, there is always hope.
Let's hope for a gold in Rio 2016.

Eager to hear Negaraku in London 2012

The French are thrilling in the Olympics games so we hear their national anthem over and over again. Hubby jokingly said that we might never hear the Malaysian national anthem since Malaysians are generally not strong in sports.

True, but we have one hope tomorrow.

Chong Wai Lee has advanced into final to face his invincible opponent Dan Lin from China. With a little bit of luck we may hear Negaraku tomorrow.

Malaysia boleh!!!