The case of the missing ‘mushroom’

The notice asking ‘Have you seen this mushroom?’ tells of the ‘missing’ Tunku Pavillion, last seen in 1997 and now a symbol of the people’s loss of the Merdeka Park to development. 

(The Malay Mail) - The park referred to in the posters is Merdeka Park — also popularly known as Tunku Park after the country’s first Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman — which was demolished in the late ‘90s. Long forgotten, this park has become the focus and symbol of a protest against the proposed multi-billion Warisan Merdeka development.

Like notices for a lost pet, the “Missing” posters come with a photograph but instead of a cute little dog, the picture is of a mushroom-shaped concrete structure, with details such as its birth date, April 20, 1958; height 11 feet 8 inches and weight 1,957 kilogrammes.

“Merdeka Park Mushroom, a 56-year-old concrete parasol from Kuala Lumpur, was last seen in 1997, standing at the park near Stadium Merdeka and Stadium Negara.”

The park referred to in the posters is Merdeka Park — also popularly known as Tunku Park after the country’s first Prime Minister Tunku Abdul Rahman — which was demolished in the late ‘90s.

Long forgotten, this park has become the focus and symbol of a protest against the proposed multi-billion Warisan Merdeka development.

Hoardings now enclose the space where Merdeka Park used to be and these mock “Missing” posters are pasted on it and even tacked onto nearby trees with the message: “Have you seen this mushroom?”

The word mushroom and the picture of the mushroom structure are a play on Tunku which sounds like the word for mushroom in Cantonese and Mandarin.

There is a particularly striking black-and-white poster which shows a raised fist grabbing a mushroom, with the slogan “Ruang ini untuk cendawan, bukan hartawan” (This space is for mushroom, not property tycoon).

These creative posters are the work of a small group of citizens who have taken to street art and art installations in the form of pop-up parks in their quest to reclaim the historical Merdeka Park.

Fahmi Reza, the graphic designer behind the posters, said they are intended to remind people of the park’s history and the lost public space.

A man looks at the striking poster of a raised fist grabbing a mushroom on a poster-covered wall, with the slogan ‘Ruang ini untuk cendawan, bukan hartawan’ (This space is for mushrooms, not property tycoons).“The ‘Missing’ poster is to highlight what happened to the mushroom,” he said of the posters which have been up since July 28.

“I’ve been researching, trying to find out what happened to it. When I asked around, the mushroom was last seen in the late ‘90s,” said the Kuala Lumpur resident who is now in his thirties.

“The wall that we dubbed the Merdeka Wall is where we put people’s old photos, show old memories of the park... what’s left is old photos and memories,” Fahmi said, saying that his parents often brought him to Tunku Park when he was young.

“The wall can be seen as a memorial to remind people that there used to be a park and what the park was like,” he said, adding that these were photos from personal collections.

“There’s not enough green space in the city... now they’re taking away the second oldest park in the city to give way to build an office building without the consent of citizens of the city,” he said.

An architect, who only gave her name as Foo, expressed her concern over how the nature of the neighbourhood would be changed with the Warisan Merdeka project.

“By having a 118-storey tower and high-end condominiums, the concern is not just the project, but because it will affect the immediate surrounding,” the architect said, pointing out that the area had a low-density population.

She also expressed worries that the schools and stadiums in the area would one day go the way of the park and be replaced by development, referring to the Bukit Bintang Girls School which was torn down to be replaced by Pavilion, a shopping mall.

The 32-year-old Petaling Jaya resident contrasted Malaysia with Europe, saying that people visit the continent to experience its carefully preserved heritage.

“It’s really interesting in Malaysia, how we keep demolishing our monuments. One day we will be a city without soul,” she said, pointing to the recent bulldozing of the city’s infamous prison Pudu Jail to make way for wider roads and other projects.

“In Europe, master planning is actually centred around public space,” she said, saying that planning in Malaysia was done the other way round, with ‘leftover’ bits designated by the government as public spaces.

Mooza Mohd, 25, said most of the grassroots movement behind the Reclaim Merdeka Park campaign were initially “strangers.”

“We’re just people who love parks and public spaces,” the drama facilitator said.

The group came up with the idea of setting up a “pop-up park”, a temporary public space of sorts with real grass patches, Mooza said.

She said they will continue to set up the park every Saturday for the whole of August.

“It’s important for people not just to protest but actually realise their dreams or their needs for parks,” the Bangi resident said.

The “pop-up park” is also intended to raise awareness about how public spaces are grabbed from the people, Mooza said when lamenting the lack of well-maintained parks for communities.

She said that “regular citizens” are blocked from having their say on how the city is shaped, adding that the shots are called by those with financial and political influence.

Parks are generally seen as having no value with no prospects of generating a profit, she said, suggesting that this had led to the lack of public spaces.

On July 9, several local dailies reported that the developer of the Warisan Merdeka project could start construction work in Kuala Lumpur’s heritage area within three months, as it was in the last stages of fulfilling Kuala Lumpur City Hall’s (DBKL) requirements before getting the green light.

Federal Territories Minister Datuk Seri Tengku Adnan Tengku Mansor had last month said Warisan Merdeka would bring new life into the “dead” heritage area, giving his assurance that its heritage value will be kept intact.

Government-linked firm Permodalan Nasional Berhad has formed a wholly-owned unit, PNB Merdeka Ventures, to carry out the project which is said to cost RM5 billion.

The project — which will include a 118-storey tower, a four-star hotel and two blocks of 40-storey condominiums — will see Stadium Merdeka and Stadium Negara being retained as heritage sites.

Warisan Merdeka will also be the tallest structure in the country once completed, eclipsing the iconic Petronas Twin Towers.

A man looks at the wall plastered with old photographs featuring the mushroom in Tunku Park and also a poster saying ‘Kembalikan Taman Tunku’ (Return Tunku Park).