Built To Last

Resurrecting The Past For The Future,these Conservationists Share With The Peak The Cultural Macrocosm That Exists In Malaysia’s Own Backyard.

- Swaroopini Udhaya Nair

“When we think about heritage, very often in Malaysia, people think about an old building. But heritage isn’t actually about just that. If there is an old building it actually suggests a whole bunch of other information such as the history of the place, why it was placed there, and who placed it there”, states Elizabeth Cardosa, President of Badan Warisan Malaysia or the Malaysian Heritage Council, in an interview with The Peak.

Seated at Birch over a cup of long black, the interview circles around the value of tangible and intangible heritage found in Malaysia and how our nation has, as a collective, gradually changed our viewpoint on our own history and built heritage. Working with the National Heritage Council for over 19 years, Elizabeth Cardosa is a veteran at pushing forth the notion that preserving and tending to the built heritage of Malaysia is one of the key ways in maintaining the story of Malaysia for those who are interested and she is not alone.

“You can see in the past 20 years there has been an incremental development of the Malaysian public’s interest in heritage. In television or in news back in the early 2000s, heritage stories would have been more nostalgia motivated, and it wasn’t in itself seen as important in terms of the current and the future world,” continues Elizabeth.

“We started in 1982 when heritage was nowhere on the map unless it was recounted under nostalgia or it carried a stigma. Old equals bad. Old equals rundown and dilapidated. It’s not modern, it’s not glass, it’s not steel. The need to retain those parts of the story give you a continuum and that is what heritage is about. Of course you can’t keep it (the space) as dilapidated, if you have a shophouse you have to modernise it. You have to put in your modern facilities.”