It was wonderful to see an article about physics in Malaysia in the February issue of Physics Today (page 32). I taught physics at the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM), the National University of Malaysia, from 1975 to 1978 as a Peace Corps volunteer with a master’s degree. It was one of the best experiences of my life.
I had many great colleagues in the UKM physics department. Professors Yatim and Lim were particularly memorable. I wish I had a photo of the group like the one of the University of Malaya physics department published in the February feature.
The author (left) and Allen Brailey on vacation in Bali during their stints in the Peace Corps teaching physics in Malaysia. Brailey is holding a copy of Gravitation by Charles Misner, Kip Thorne, and John Wheeler.
The author (left) and Allen Brailey on vacation in Bali during their stints in the Peace Corps teaching physics in Malaysia. Brailey is holding a copy of Gravitation by Charles Misner, Kip Thorne, and John Wheeler.
During my time at UKM, I was the first to obtain a grant for a telescope at the school. It was installed on the top of the science building, and many students enjoyed superb views of the Moon, which plays an important role in Islam. I also established an astronomy istilah (glossary) by using an algorithm to translate technical terms from English into Malay, which I learned during Peace Corps training in Kuantan, on the South China Sea. I also taught beginning-level astronomy classes in the language. It was a great experience.
For the more advanced courses—nuclear physics and graduate-level electricity and magnetism—my students knew English much better than I knew Malay, which was helpful. I must say that the students in those courses were fantastic: Each of them always turned the homework in on time and had excellent handwriting. They spoiled me into imagining that being a professor in the US would be similarly easy!
In one fun anecdote from my time teaching at Reed College, a colleague of mine, David Griffiths, could hardly believe that I taught electricity and magnetism—out of John David Jackson’s Classical Electrodynamics, no less—in Malaysia and in Malay. Who could blame him? But David, himself the author of a popular undergraduate textbook on the subject, was convinced when I showed him my lecture notes.
I am eternally thankful to the US Peace Corps and UKM for three spectacular years in a great part of the world.
