Enchant1MST: 1 Malaysia Spiritual Tourism City

It started with what seemed to be a fairly innocent news piece about an announcement on a large development in Pahang, specifically in Gambang that would cover 250 acres.

The purpose was to build a huge multi-faith complex (excluding Islam of course, because... err .. well.. lets not go there) that would house retail, function halls, a resort and most importantly, a final resting place (ashes only, I think!) for your dearly beloved and/or yourself of course.

Going through their website, the stated intention is noble enough. Creating jobs, attracting tourists and so on. No doubt, it will help the local economy there which is about 30km away from Kuantan or a 3 hour drive from KL.

However, look a bit further into their business model and it starts to look very much like an MLM where the product being sold are the columbarium niches at about USD700 a pop. Which is cheap now and what they are promising would be that each niche will triple in value or more in time - so it's essentially a property play and nothing new because this was what Nirvana Memorial did a couple of decades ago.

Frankly, their sales incentive scheme is complicated or perhaps you need someone to present it because I sure couldn't figure it out from just reading the slides! Seriously convoluted...

On the non-financial front - a Muslim NGO has protested this development and scanning through some of the pro-UMNO blogs, they are also up in arms against it - the usual rhetoric. Don't want to repeat it here, sully my pages only. Check them out yourself but be warned.

So this being a review and analysis type thing, what do I think about the whole thing?

Overall - the whole thing seems rather overblown in 2 main aspects:

1. Financially - the returns seem to be rather crazy although honestly, I don't doubt that they can make it because the way the development is controlled (only 200,000 niches being built and released at a time, up to a maximum of 5 million! That's 25 tranches and based on their pricing and they were quite transparent about the fact that the 1st tranche is going to be enough to build the whole place already - so subsequent releases are almost pure profit)
2. Religiously - the whole concept is big and bold, almost like a religious theme park! OMG (oh my goddess) I think it may be a bit too much and in-your-face. To me, religion and spirituality is best kept personal and internal - not an external show of piety. Building a big monument is not really necessary, I feel. 

Just some details on that, the layout concept is like that of a lotus and each petal represents Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity, Taoism, Kuan Yin, Confucianism. Err... ok, very Chinese focused right, with some tokenism for the Hindus, Sikhs and Sai Baba followers. Goodness knows what Christians think about it but they do seem to be like almost an after-thought.

I am a Buddhist (lean towards Therevada) and also venerate the Goddess of Mercy / Kuan Yin pusa, plus culturally Taoism and Confucianism figure largely in my life - and yet, I do find this development somewhat unnecessary. After all, we've got huge Buddha statues and ancient temples here already, I don't really see the need to build a huge and rather crass looking (based on their mock-ups) complex in the middle of nowhere AND fund it by some dubious looking MLM type scheme.

By the way, 5 million niches is overkill to the max - in total, we have around 6 million Chinese in Malaysia alive today, add in the Indians - another 2 million and sad to say, they are not going to pay RM2,000+ for a little boxed shelf to store their ashes, so it's going to be a 100% Chinese kind of thing - you don't need that huge a capacity because it's in Kuantan, Not everyone is going to want to be interred there!

So in summary - it's audacious and it's controversial. And a bit suspicious. I think IF it were toned down a bit (actually, tone it down a lot) then it would stand a better chance of materialising.

What I would like to see is:

• a more straightforward way of fund raising - this MLM method reeks and too mercenary, not in keeping with the noble intention of inter-faith harmony (lets face it, that is just a cover for a property play, that's all.. sigh, Chinese people .. why are we like that one??)
• tone down the "1Malaysia" boot licking - please bitch, who buys that these days? It's "Endless Possibilities" now, baby! hahaha
• just be honest about it and say that you're selling mini cemetery "plots" for urns in a complex disguised as a mall cum resort! LOL

I predict it could actually take off but only after scaling it down to appease the NGOs and right wingers. As with anything of this nature, first mover advantage is key because it looks much like a pyramid scheme to me or it is very dependant on demand escalating enough to make it lucrative.

Bear in mind that there are 2 existing players in this space: Nirvana and Xiao En Group - so there is risk of MST creating excess supply thus bringing down value. Don't forget that existing cemeteries can be recycled as plots can be exhumed if abandoned after a long time.

So in conclusion - I think the intention seems noble and good, however, the method and communication leaves very much to be desired. And that is already creating a major stumbling block for them before any construction work has started.

Update: December 2013
Now it seems that the land approval was originally given to a company called Waris Mekar for a mixed commercial development. WM entered into a joint venture with Enchant1MST to develop the land but this was one of several JVs that WM signed in preparation for this development. When the news and controversy broke on this matter, WM lodged a police report. The land approval has now been supposedly revoked.