If Southeast Asia is an office that opens at 7am, Burma would be 30 minutes too early. Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam would just be on time but Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia and the Philippines would be an hour late. An office with half of its staff coming in late wouldn’t do the job efficiently, would it?
Our region is in 4 Time Zones (UTC+6.30, +7, +8 and +9). Indonesia is the only country that uses 3 time zones from +7 to +9 and Burma is the only country that uses +6.30. If you would look closely at the map; Singapore and Kuala Lumpur is in line with Bangkok and Jakarta is in line with Hanoi at +7 -- but they are on a different time zone (+8). They share it with Manila, which is hundreds of miles east of Thailand. Have you ever wondered why?In 1981, Malaysia’s Mahathir Mohammad changed their time zone to +8 to unify East and West Malaysia. And for economic cooperation, the great Lee Kwan Yew followed suit for Singapore because they will be in an awkward position. Meaning technically, the Philippines and Brunei should be the only countries in the +8 time zone.
If Southeast Asia is a hospital and baby Burma came in at 6:30 with an asthma attack, she has to wait 30 minutes to see if Dr. Thailand or Nurse Vietnam got a Ventolin inhaler. But when they came in at 7.00-- they don’t have any. Meanwhile, old Mrs. Laos and baby Cambodia came in with an asthma attack too! Now all of them -- panicked and all -- have to wait another hour to see if Dr. Singapore, Dr. Malaysia or Nurse Philippines have the inhaler. Unfortunately, when they came in at 8.00, it turned out that Dr. Indonesia got the inhaler but he’ll come in at 9.00! Now the hospital is in one BIG 2 ½ hour mess! An utter tragedy!
The ASEAN Common Time is an idea by the ASEAN to adapt a standard time for all member countries. The initiative will unify our great region – economic wise, for efficiency and mutual benefits.
If we can come to the office all at the same time, we can finish more work. And if we can come to the hospital altogether, we can relieve more patients and efficiently solve the problems.
What do you think?
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-- Pisanu, Thailand
As posted on BISEAN
13 shared thoughts:
Yes. It would be beneficial.
Is there any concrete proposal on this? I think it would be really beneficial for all of us especially if we would have one common market.
Cool writing. How'd you think of that? A common time would be great! No watch winding and unwinding when travellling to Bangkok or Rangoon.
ayoko ng mga gnitong posting-posting dtech! wla bng huvadchuchu na mhinchung? dfat puro pinoy badinggerzie na lng nagpoposting ditech.
I really like how you write, my Thai brother. Your article about the abortion policies in south east asia is making waves on global voices already. Wow! Considering how short the post is. I enjoy your writing style. Really.
KUNG CNO KA MANG KABADINGBADINGAN PINOY KA, SNA D K N LANG NAG-COMMENT!
OBVIOUS NA GALING SA PINAS ANG KOMENTARYO MO. NKKHIYA! DI MO CGURO ALAM NA NKKINTINDI NG TAGALOG ANG AUTHOR NITONG POST NA TO NO?
BURAHIN MO YANG COMMENT MO! PINAPAHIYA MO ANG BANSA NATIN! BAKLANG PARLOR!!! GAGO!
that's why singapore is on the wrong time zone! thanks for the info!
very insightful, pisanu! loved the post!
hey, i'm macky, i would like to join United SEA and be a member.
here's my email add: mackysroom@gmail.com
you could also check my blog @ mackysroom.blogspot.com.
hoping for your favorable response. thanks!
Macky, the invitation has been to your provided email.
Cheers!
Hi all..
Yes it will be very beneficial for the whole ASEAN. And to answer the question if there is a proposal about the ASEAN Common Time - yes there is!
It was in fact being pushed by the ASEAN members who are already at UTC+0800, the members who are reserving their comments and support for it are those who are not using UTC+0800.
Also, as a correction (if you don't mind), Singapore is on the correct time-zone, which is UTC+0800.
The official name of our time is the "ASEAN Common Time" or "ACT" for short.
The company I work for, we already adopted the still proposed ACT. We use it in all our communications from papers, media, to legal documents. We simply put for example: 2:30am ACT.
Our company's scope of business is the ASEAN region, and I really pushed the use of the ASEAN Common Time for our communications. It actually helped us, as there is ZERO questions and inquiries as to what time-zone or time our postings are for them.
It shows that ACT really works, and people understand what "ASEAN Common Time" is. And the name itself will make anyone new to it to do a research, and they will see that ACT is UTC+0800. From there they can compute it (say Vietnam is UTC+0700) and get used to it.
We have customers in these countries and they are happy and in full support with ACT. Now all that is left is for the Official ASEAN political body to finally implement it.
Now of course this is a small portion of our combined population, but think about the large reach of our business, it is still countless. If it is already working even at the proposal level, then how much more once it has become an ASEAN Law.
Anyway, I'd like to join United SEA. my blog is at http://gameshogun.ws/ Contact me at Laibeus at Laibcoms dot com.
Btw, I'd like to invite you guys to the East Asian Community at BUMPzee.com -> http://www.bumpzee.com/eastasia/
Glad to know Thailanders are pro "ACT", let's push our respective societies and governments to support the "ASEAN Common Time"!
it is really a good idea. it will remove barriers created by existing different time zones. I live near jakarta, switching to ACT will mean that we will have sunset at 7pm!! an excitement! i like it. anyway... how about easternmost indonesian regions? ACT will mean early sunrise and early sunset, not really convenient.
It's not really a problem per se, coz our body clocks rely on the planet itself rather than the time measurement we human beings invented.
I've been thinking about that in respect to Russia, in a 'what if' scenario that they adopted a one time-zone policy.
Found out (at least personally and by experience) that our body clocks is more attuned to the planet than what the artificial time measurement we use.
Our body, by nature, knows what time is it. If it is sunset, it is sunset regardless if the artificial clock says otherwise.
A good example are the northern and southern most lands where they have months of daytime and months of nighttime. In these regions, their bodies still know which is nighttime and which is daytime, even though their eyes sees otherwise, and the artificial clocks do not reflect the reality (saying pm when the sun stays up for months).
So, with that, I believe, what we need to adjust is our "perception" that night is 6pm and morning is 6am. Our body knows it by nature even if, in my example "Russia", sunrise is 10am and sunset is 10pm. To our bodies, nothing changed.
Once we set our mindset to the new day-night division, we will be fine.
:)
Just a thought.
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