Terengganu’s understated charms (BusinessWorld)

Originally appeared on the March 27, 2015 issue of BusinessWorld. Posted late because I only just discovered that this story came out last year. Click here for the original article and more photos

By Jennee Grace U. Rubrico

Terengganu’s understated charms

Posted on March 27, 2015

SCULPTING a section of wood that will form part of the hull of a 50-foot boat, the shipwright says that the vessel, when completed, can travel the seas for up to a century.

  

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Terengganu sights: a shipwright builds a boat at Pulau duyong

“It is made of cengal,” the man, whose withered face makes it difficult to ascertain his age, declares through Syed, our tour guide and translator, as he dusts off wood shavings. “Yes, (it will last) up to 100 years.”

The boat maker from Pulau Duyong (Mermaid Island) in Terengganu cannot tell us what makes cengal (pronounced che-nguhl) special. But Syed, a staff member of the local campus of Malaysian university UCSI who used to work for the tourism board, says that the hardwood, endemic to Malaysia’s forests, has been the timber of choice of the state’s shipwrights for generations.

Duyong Boatyard builds yachts and fishing boats, the shipwright says as he takes out pictures of the vessels they completed over the years. It takes a year and a half to build a big vessel, three months for a small one.

Patrons pay a premium for their work. “The price of one fishing boat is 800,000 ringgit,” Syed says, adding that a yacht can go up to 5 million ringgit. The shipwrights build the boats one at a time.

Two relatives join the boat maker at the dry dock. He mentions that the shipwrights of Terengganu build boats from memory and do not use plans. The trade, he says, was learned from their fathers and passed on to their sons.

Nowadays, orders come in trickles. The artisans say that only one other family still makes boats on the island. “They are closed right now, because they don’t have projects.”

Malaysian varsity seeks more students from Brunei (The Brunei Times)

Published in the January 13, 2014 issue of The Brunei Times. Click here for original article

Malaysian varsity seeks more students from Brunei

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  The Terengganu campus of UCSI University, located in Marang, Terengganu Darul Iman. The varsity is recruiting students from Brunei and other neighbouring countries this year. BT/ Jennee Grace U Rubrico
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  The Crystal Mosque in the state of Terengganu. The Terengganu campus of UCSI University is incorporating Islamic programmes into its academic offerings in light of its demand for the courses. BT/ Jennee Grace U Rubrico
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  Mohd Suhaimi Shamsuddin, chief operating officer of the Terengganu campus of UCSI University, speaks to ‘The Brunei Times’ in his office. BT/ Jennee Grace U Rubrico

Jennee Grace U Rubrico

BANDAR SERI BEGAWAN

Monday, January 13, 2014

THE Terengganu campus of Malaysian varsity UCSI University is recruiting students from Brunei and other neighbouring countries to beef up its enrolment, as it adds more Islamic modules and programmes into its range of academic offerings.

UCSI Terengganu Chief Operating Officer Mohd Suhaimi Shamsuddin (picture) said in a recent interview that the campus, which currently has 200 students, is working on getting more enrollees from neighbouring markets after already penetrating the Arabic countries and China.

Currently, 25 per cent of its students come from the Arab countries while 18 per cent are from China, Mohd Suhaimi said. Around five per cent are from Maldives and Sri Lanka, while the rest are from the ASEAN states, he added.

“Our focus countries for 2014 are India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, Brunei and Papua New Guinea,” he said.

The next intake of the campus is in May, during which it hopes to get 40 new entrants.

The campus has a tie-up with UCSI Kuala Lumpur for its Medical programme, wherein Malaysian medical students earn part of their credits in the Terengganu campus.

UCSI Terengganu also has programmes on Education, and Oil and Gas Management, which the official said is a monopoly of the campus.

“We offer both BBA and MBA for Oil and Gas Management... In ASEAN, only this campus offers the programme,” he said.

The campus is working on a fourth programme, on Islamic Banking and Finance, Mohd Suhaimi said.
“Currently we have eight students (taking it up). We need two more for it to be launched as a programme,” he said.

The move to offer the Islamic finance programme, he said, stems from the location of the campus as well as the global clamour for more conservative banking practices.

Noting that the campus is hosted by an Islamic state – around 97 per cent of Terengganu’s one million-strong population are Muslims — he said the UCSI Group has decided to incorporate Islamic course offerings into the programmes of the Terengganu varsity.

“The east coast of Malaysia is synonymous to Islam. We offer Finance in the Kuala Lumpur campus, but we took Islamic Banking and Finance and placed it in Terengganu,” he said.

Meanwhile, shifts in the global economy also precipitate the need for more Islamic finance offerings, he added.

“The economy is different now because of 2008,” when the global banking industry went into a crisis due to unmanageable sub-prime loans. “Everybody is searching for Islamic banking and finance,” he said.

The campus is also integrating an Islamic module into its early childhood development offering, Mohd Suhaimi said.

Other initiatives in the offing include potential collaboration with international universities that would allow students to earn some of their credits in the campus before proceeding to partner universities elsewhere and vice-versa.

"We are looking to collaborate with other universities and institutions to minimise expenses for the students. We (should) have the same syllabus, so students can do two years here and one year in the partner institution, and vice-versa," he said.

The campus, Mohd Suhaimi said, accommodates students of all faiths, as evidenced by the fact that Christians, Buddhists and Hindus together make up half of its populace.