Farewell Dinner for Pak Tommy

Last night I was at a farewell dinner for the outgoing Indonesian Ambassador Pak Tommy, hosted by my good friend Prasoon.

It was a cosy gathering of friends and several other ambassadors to say goodbye to a good friend at ShangriLa. There was the Mexican, Canadian, Cuban, Denmark, Finland, Indian, Kazakhstan and Norwegian ambassadors present at the dinner.

Over a sumptuous meal, we talked about Indonesia and its prospects and how its political situation is so different from that in Malaysia, the rise of islamist politics in Malaysia, the situation in Bangladesh and what may be the election outcome there next year and of course China and the US.

As I sitting across the Kazakhstan ambassador, I had the opportunity to learn much about this country as well. I didn’t know that more than a million Germans, who were living on Russia at the start of the German attack on Russia during WW2, were thrown out of the country and they eventually settled in Kazakhstan.

Pak Tommy has also written a book, entitled Call me Tommy, and he presented me with an autographed copy. That was very kind of him and he said some very nice things in his farewell speech.

I wish him well and a happy retirement. He is still young and I am sure he has many more years of doing good.