At the stroke of midnight today (Jan 1), thousands of Malaysians celebrated the coming of 2025 by either attending countdown parties or hanging out with friends and family.
For a group of youths however, they found themselves spending the first minutes of 2025 doing ear squats under the watchful eye of traffic police officers.
Group of M’sian youths made to do squats for riding ‘basikal lajak’
In an 18-second video which has gone viral on Facebook, it showed a group of around 20 youths standing in a line with their arms crisscrossed and holding onto their ears.
They then performed several squats in tandem while being watched by a Road Transport Department (JPJ) officer, presumably to ensure that they did the squats properly.
Several other JPJ officers were also seen taking photos and videos of the youths as they did the squats in full view of the public.
According to China Press, it is believed that the youths had planned to celebrate New Year’s Day by taking their illegally modified bicycles (basikal lajak) out for a ride but were apprehended by JPJ officers.
However, it’s not known where exactly the video was taken.
‘Serves them right!’
The clip has since garnered over 120,000 views at the time of writing, where netizens expressed satisfaction and amusement over the youths’ ‘punishment’.
‘Pretty sure this moment will be a sweet memory for them.’
‘Should have made them waddle like a duck around KLCC.’
Others joked that the youths were undergoing early training for National Service (NS), which is expected to be relaunched this year.
Watch the clip here: