This article first appeared in Capital, The Edge Malaysia Weekly on August 21, 2017 - August 27, 2017

I must confess, I have no idea what to do if there is a nuclear attack. Do you hide under your desk? Scream and panic? Call a coconut-wielding bomoh?

Please don’t think my question frivolous, because having grown up during times of (relative) peace, nuclear Armageddon wasn’t taught in schools along with fire safety.

And to be frank, even if it was, most of us would probably ignore it. Admit it, when you hear a fire alarm, you do not calmly head for the exit — you would probably complain that it’s noisy-lah, and just go back to work.

This is what happens when you live in a country that has had almost no natural disasters to speak off, well, unless you count the evening traffic jams. It says a lot that most of the populace is more concerned that Singapore is getting the nasi lemak burger first, rather than let’s say, a nuclear winter.

Yet it seems that knowing what to do in the event of a nuclear fallout is increasingly valuable knowledge, given the amount of sabre-rattling being done by Trump and Kim.

Most of you would probably say, why worry-lah, let them bomb each other, the world would be grateful.

The truth is, we should be worried, but for very different reasons. In North Korea’s case, their technology is far from top notch, and we mustn’t forget that they have been trying to launch missiles for donkey’s years.

Most of the time it ends in spectacular failure. The rockets have not only exploded in mid-air but some even failed to get off the ground. So the big fear is that while the rockets would most likely never hit the US, guess who is nearby?

That’s right… us!

And don’t forget, after that little incident at the airport with the LOL-shirt, North Korea isn’t exactly our best buddy right about now.

On the other side, we must remember that Americans are shockingly bad at geography, and if you are looking for proof, look no further than the current commander-in-chief.

In a recent interview with The Wall Street Journal, Trump admitted that he had been surprised that countries like Malaysia and Indonesia were “quite so large”.

Trump, also known for not really thinking before he speaks, did come out in favour of Neo-Nazis recently after all. So it would not be too far a stretch to think that if he’s in a hurry, he might just instruct his army to fire in the general direction of North Korea, where once again, we would most likely kena.

So what do we do now? As always, Google is a useful tool, but the only advice I seem to get is “Don’t Run. Get Inside”, which is really very not comforting. Maybe we need to suggest to the government that they stop chasing troublesome submarines, and instead invest in more comprehensive disaster drills.

And maybe, on our part, we should stop ignoring sirens and actually follow instructions for once, although that may be too much to ask of Malaysians.

The sad fact is, this is where we are at the moment. The saying goes that those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it, but given that the world seems to be fighting Nazis and fearing nuclear war, I didn’t know that we are doomed to repeat it quite so literally.

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