I am fed up. As Malaysians, we all must be fed up.

VMY 2008 is Visit Meliwat Year. That's the latest joke in town.

With Balasubramaniam's SD1 and SD2, Najib is now getting his balls squeezed by the Pak Lah boys. The PM is, hence, eased from announcing the Umno leadership transition and to stick to his own timeline.

Meanwhile, all and sundry from the MI chief to the PM to Rosmah have refuted RPK's SD -- except Police and the AG.

You should know who should gain most in Visit Meliwat Year 2008 -- The Pain of Sodomy for all Malaysians.

I've been wondering whether or not I should write about this so publicly, you know, what with the price hikes and all. It might not be so prudent to talk about these expensive purchases.

Eric called me two weeks ago to tell me the good news, 'Honey, I did it.'

'Did what?'

'I bought the car!'

'What?'

'The Honda Accord.'

Huh? 'You did what?'

'Don't worry its not brand new, I'm not so silly to get a brand new car… its the 2006 model.'

'Errr… how much was it?'

'well… not too bad lah. A little over 110.'

'…'

So now we have THREE CARS! My pathetic wira, his blood-sweat-tears-and-i-invested-a-lot-of-dosh-into-modifying-this Accord '94 and then the latest addition to the family. And we're, we're, we're getting married in less than four months!

My feelings are somewhat misplaced these days. Ask me at various times of the day and I'm either seething mad, in utter disbelief or beamingly proud to be engaged to Eric.

As Ed would remind me, SURRENDER, babes, SURRENDER to your life.

A shoutout to all my American friends.

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY, HAVE A GOOD ONE!!

Tags: America, festival, Friends, General, holiday

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Ordinary is when you get to the office after taking two days off thanks to a medical chit, and then wishing that the doctor had allowed you three days away instead. Its when you feel shitty and decide to call the fiance on your mobile phone only to have him go, 'OK dear, can I call you later, I'm a little tied up right now.'

Ordinary is when it's been 3 hours and he's still tied up and not yet in. And then its when you surf the blogosphere afte eons of never doing so and then, its stumbling upon the blogs by the famous 'greats' down under in Singapore. Its when you go, 'Huh? Still on ah that girl,' and for some reason, regretting you'd ever pen that crazy story about a fictitious pink dog with curls.

Its reading the papers every day fearing that some crazy reporter who called you yesterday would have forgotten not to quote your name, and then its answering e-mails from colleagues who insist that their grand big project requires a feature in the papers (as if we owned them local media, these people, really). It's trying to decide on whether to go to Koh Samui or to Bali for a honeymoon, and deciding that the budget would be a little under RM4000 either way for a five day four day relaxation trip after the wedding. Its occasionally looking back to those 'older days' and wondering about what would have happen had another choice been made, would free first class trips be part of the lifestyle?

Ordinary is deciding that an enviable lifestyle isn't about frivolous things like gorgeous brands, hanging out with famous peoples and getting featured in MTVs. Its about making that conscious choice to choose selecting invitation card printers who offer the lowest prices, and debating religious topics online, and bitching about crazy colleagues and lazy cashiers, and mad fundamentalists complaining about how spiritually unsound and dirty places like Thailand are.

It's about painfully keying in the url to Malaysiakini and feeling disgusted at the things that's reported on that site, its about getting worried, and thinking about what's going to happen next. Its about waiting for that month-end paycheck and wishing to God that you would get a raise soon.

Ordinary is about worrying about the things that matter.

Private investigator P. Balasubramaniam created shock waves yesterday when he made public his statutory declaration (SD) linking Deputy Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Razak with the murdered Mongolian national Altantuya Shaariibuu, with several astounding assertions about the relationship conveyed to him by both Altantuya and Abdul Razak Baginda. Today, Balasubramaniam created a second round of [...]

Anal sex now rank up there with statutory declarations as the favourite pastime. Whatever happened to blowing someone without C4...

I had a most vivid dream early this morning. It involves me, Jason Mraz, a baby and blended avocados. Can’t really tell you the details because… 1) I guess it involves me being head over heels with Jason Mraz, and that itself is somewhat embarrassing 2) I really don’t want a baby of my own, unless [...]

If you’re a computer tech person who assembles new computers everyday or even a consumer who just purchased a new computer, it is important to test the system stability by putting heavy load on system resources. Anyone who has used computers for any period of time will understand the importance of having a stable system. The cost of a hardware failure can be enormous. If you are lucky your data will only become inaccessible while faulty components are replaced. If you’re unlucky you can lose your files completely or have them permanently corrupted. Even if you have good backups, you can still lose days of work returning the PC to its pre-failure state.

When I ordered a dedicated server from Softlayer, they too ran a stress test using Passmark BurnInTest to make sure that the server’s hardware are stable before handing the server to me. Passmark BurnInTest is a very good PC reliability and load testing software but it is not free. Here is a free tool called HeavyLoad which you can easily use to test your system stability.

HeavyLoad is intended to stress all resources of a PC (like CPU, RAM, harddisk, network, operating system, etc.) in order to test, if it will run reliable under heavy load. This is useful for testing important file or database servers before using them productively, or just to check if your new PC might get too hot when used intensively.

To stress your PC or server, HeavyLoad writes a large test-file to the temp folder, it allocates physical and virtual memory and it draws patterns in its window. When you’ve used HeavyLoad, memory will be fragmented and the swap file could become quite large. So you should restart Windows after using HeavyLoad. If HeavyLoad has not been terminated normally because of an unstable PC or operating system, a large test file may be left in one of your temp directories on your PC. You can manually delete the temp file from temporary directory or just run Disk Cleanup.

You should run it as long as you want to test your PC or server, at least several hours. HeavyLoad can run on all Windows platform. Newest version includes features to use multicore processors to full capacity, full support for Windows Server 2008 and some minor changes and improvements.

HeavyLoad is not as powerful as Passmark BurnInTest but it is capable to test the main components on a computer and it’s FREE. It is also portable and you can carry around with you in your USB flash drive. Very handy tool for any computer users.

[ Download HeavyLoad v2.4 ]

Technorati Tags: heavyload, stress, test, loop, stability

Yesterday I went to the Main Post Office in Shah Alam to renew my road tax and to my surprise they asked me to collect the RM 625.00 petrol rebate at the same time. I was surprised because due to lack of clear information, I was under the impression, based on what some people told me, that the rebate for renewal in July 2008 would only be paid in August 2008... Typical Malaysians. Always pretend that they know everything and then go and tell others about their ajaran sesat... Anyway, the...

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Big Question.

Twenty-four hours after releasing his SD with a lawyer in attendance, private investigator P. Subramaniam showed up at a hotel -- with a new lawyer -- and a new statutory declaration.

The PI said he wished "to retract the entire contents of my statutory declaration dated July 1 2008. I was compelled to affirm the said statutory declaration under duress".

Interestingly, his new lawyer said his client – the PI who was hired by Razak in October 2006 to help him deal with Altantuya – was summoned by the police a few hours after he released the first statutory declaration.

Big Question: Did the police intervention have any influence on his retraction?

Which of the two SDs filed by the PI will be used by the Police to investigate for now, and for truth to prevail? Blogger-lawyer Malik Imtiaz Sarwar tells you why Balasubramaniam's first declaration is still significant.

Do we have the institution of trust in this country?

Fooled by SD (statutory declaration)? or We are a bunch of fool? Who is not telling the truth? Good script for TV series, anyone interested? “#¤%&@

PI retracts stunning statutory declaration
Jul 4, 08 11:11am
breaking news P Balasubramaniam dropped the second bombshell in less than 24 hours, this time claiming that he was forced to make his shocking statutory declaration linking Najib to Altantuya

Yesterday, he said €£RM in his SD. Today, he said in his NEW SD that €£RM was forced to make. So, in his NEW SD all references to Najib were missing. Strange, strange, strange. Bala woiii Bala, what happen there?

Bala’s new statutory declaration in full
Jul 4, 08 1:10pm

The following is the new statutory declaration released by P Balasubramanian today at a press conference in Kuala Lumpur.

I, Balasubramaniam Perumal, do solemnly and sincerely declare as follows:

1. I have been a police officer with the Royal Malaysian Police Force having joined as a constable in 1981. I was subsequently promoted to the rank of lance corporal and finally resigned from the Royal Malaysian Police Force in 1998.

2. I currently work as a freelance private investigator.

3. I wish to refer to the statutory declaration I affirmed on July 1, 2008. I refer specifically to paragraphs 8, 25, 28, 49 and 50 to 52, wherein I have stated inter-alia that:

a) Abdul Razak Baginda informed me that he was introduced to Altantuya Shaariibuu by a VIP;

b) Najib Razak informed Abdul Razak Baginda that he had a sexual relationship with Altantuya Shaariibuu and that she was susceptible to anal intercourse;

c) Najib Razak instructed Abdul Razak Baginda to look after Altantuya Shaariibuu as he did not want her to harass him since he was the deputy prime minister;

d) Najib Razak, Abdul Razak Baginda and Altantuya Shaariibuu had met and all been together at a dinner in Paris;

e) Altantuya Shaariibuu wanted money in the sum of US$500,000 as a commission for a submarine deal she assisted with in Paris;

f) Altantuya Shaariibuu met Najib Razak in Singapore;

g) Altantuya Shaariibuu wanted me to arrange to see Najib Razak;

h) I told the police about the relationship between Najib Razak and Altantuya Shaariibuu but when it came to sign my statement this detail was left out;

i) The prosecutor during the course of the trial in the High Court of Shah Alam did not ask me any questions in respect of Altantuya Shaariibuu’s purported relationship with Najib Razak or of a phone call I received from one DSP Musa Safri, whom I believe was the ADC to Najib Razak and/or his wife;

j) Abdul Razak Baginda informed me that he had sent Najib Razak an SMS the evening before he was arrested but did not receive a response; and

k) Najib Razak sent an SMS to Abdul Razak Baginda on the day of his arrest to the effect that he was going to see the IGP that day and that the matter should be resolved and for Abdul Razak Baginda to remain calm.

4. I wish to retract all the statements that I have made in paragraphs 8, 25, 28, 49 and 50 to 52 of my statutory declaration dated July 1, 2008. The statements contained in paragraphs 8, 25, 28, 49 and 50 to 52 of my statutory declaration dated July 1, 2008 are inaccurate and not the truth. I wish to expressly state that:

a) At no material time did Abdul Razak Baginda inform me that he was introduced to Altantuya Shaariibuu by a VIP;

b) At no material time did Razak Baginda inform me that Najib Razak had a sexual relationship with Altantuya Shaariibuu and the she was susceptible to anal intercourse;

c) At no material time did Abdul Razak Baginda inform me that Najib Razak instructed Abdul Razak Baginda to look after Altantuya Shaariibuu as he did not want her to harass him since he was the deputy prime minister;

d) At no material time did Razak Baginda and/or Altantuya Shaariibuu inform me that Najib Razak, together with Abdul Razak Baginda and Altantuya Shaariibuu had met and all been together at a dinner in Paris;

e) At no material time did Altantuya Shaariibuu inform me that she wanted money in the sum of US$500,000 as a commission for a submarine deal she assisted with in Paris;

f) At no time whatsoever did Abdul Razak Baginda and/or Altantuya Shaariibuu inform me that Najib Razak met with Altantuya Shaariibuu in Singapore;

g) At no time whatsoever did Altantuya Shaariibuu inform me that she wanted me to arrange to see Najib Razak;

h) At no time did I tell the police during the course of their investigations about any relationship between Najib Razak and Altantuya Shaariibuu as no such relationship existed to my knowledge. Accordingly, the statement I signed before the police is complete;

i) At no time did Abdul Razak Baginda inform me that he had sent Najib Razak an SMS the evening before he was arrested; and

j) At no time did Abdul Razak Baginda inform me that Najib Razak had sent him an SMS on the day of his arrest to the effect that he was going to see the IGP that day and that the matter should be resolved and for Abdul Razak Baginda to remain calm.

5. In addition, I wish to retract the entire contents of my statutory declaration dated July 1, 2008. I was compelled to affirm the said statutory declaration dated July 1, 2008 under duress.

And I make this solemn declaration voluntarily and conscientiously believing the same to be true, and by virtue of the provisions of the Statutory Declarations Act 1960.

Balasubramaniam a/l Perumal

His previous statutory declaration

TechTags Plugin [ Altantuya | Najib | Rosmah | Raja Petra | DPM | Prime Minister ]

The FREE KFC Happy Tuesday Discount Card is extending it's promotion until 31st Dec 2009. Quick grab one now.

With the rising cost of construction materials, here’s a cheaper alternative of building homes made of… earth.

This is actually a project named Earth House from Erdhaus, a Swiss architect and team. The homes are built to live under or in the ground, but with it, unlike conventional homes. [link]

Reminds me of the Hobbits’ home in LOTR.

When I'm high and deprived of sleep, I would go make dumb meaningless videos like this one. Hahaha... Few seconds of dumb shit. Download video p/s:in the video I wrote the list of software wrongly. They are supposed to be: Audacity, MediaCoder, MonkeyJam, Paint, Psycle and Wax.

Photo credit: Thomas Hawk I’ve been asked hundreds of times to quote for a web site project. Nothing strange about it, right? The thing is, the web site project consists of only one page! So have I ever taken any of these one page web site projects? Not even once. So what do I normally do then? [...]

UPDATED VERSION. We know the what, now let's see the how and why.

ONE: According to The NST, that culprit that paralysed Bursa Malaysia to an all-day trading halt, the worst systems breakdown in its history, was a faulty computer hard disk.

TWO: According to Bursa Malaysia chief information officer (CIO) Yew Kim Keong, its trading hardware is supplied by Hewlett-Packard Co.

THREE: According to Bursa Malaysia CEO Yusli Mohamed Yusoff, his company lost an opportunity cost of about RM450,000 in potential clearing fees yesterday, based on the average value of RM1 billion of stocks traded for the last two weeks.

Moving forward, Bursa hopes to launch a new equities trading system in the next two months. The vendor is US-based Atos Euronext Market Solutions Ltd. Trial runs will start in the coming weekend.

Was the confidence of investors seriously impaired? Read here.

UPDATES: As at 2:46pm, KLCI slipped 33.24 points to 1,120.46 with thin volume traded of 3,195,127 lots. Losers led losers 661 by 86. Unchanged 103.

I have been installing some forum for my property website because I feels that it needed a strong community touch up. phpBB was my initial choice because it is one of the longest open source forum script outside. Unfortunately it is very hard to configure anything in phpBB because you will have to change the code manually, and there is no turning back once the code is edited.

Kimmy introduced MyBB that is used in his community, saying it is easier to install plugins and mods. To my notice, it is real easy. Practically similar to Wordpress, you just upload into the plugins forum and activate them. Although I dislike the arrangement of the style in the admin, I must say MyBB is a much easier php script to use.

I choose not to touch phpBB because I have too many scripts to understand at the moment and phpBB will add up to another hard to learn script. Although there is some good debate comparing this 2 forums and both have its pros and cons.

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Related Posts

• MyBB vs phpBB
• Busy with Upgrades on my Malaysia Classifieds

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Last Friday afternoon, I was working at my desk, and a guy with a rope went running through my backyard. My backyard faces the river, and I live down a one lane private road, off the highway. No one really can wander down here easily. I went out the door to figure out what was [...]

By now, everyone should be aware of the highly entertaining fued between Singapore's queens of controversies Dawn Yang and Xiaxue.

Everyone should also be aware of the dramatic battle of one upmanship between our future prime minister Najib Razak, and our other future prime minister Anwar Ibrahim.

I'm not sure if I'm the only person who notices this. But... don't you think the fight between Najib Razak and Anwar Ibrahim is so similar to the fight between Dawn Yang and Xiaxue?

Here, let me explain.

Najib = Dawn Yang
Anwar = Xiaxue

What? You mean you haven't noticed?

As glaringly different as these people may be, they actually have a lot more in common than we give them credit for.

Let's look at the long list of similarities of these two "almost equally high profile" bitchfights, shall we?

Xiaxue Vs Dawn Yang	Anwar Vs Najib
Xiaxue and Dawn Yang are two big time bloggers in Singapore.	Anwar and Najib are two big time politicians, both of whom are deputy prime ministers predicted to become Malaysia's future Prime Minister.
Dawn Yang has a hate site, authored by Dawn Wayang.	Najib also has a hate site, authored by Raja Petra.
Xiaxue accused Dawn Yang of lying about plastic surgery.	Anwar accused Najib of playing a role in the Altantuya murder case.
Dawn Yang vehemethly denied allegations of plastic surgery.	Najib vehemethly denied having ever met Altantuya.
Xiaxue insists on calling Dawn Yang a liar.	Anwar insists on calling Najib a liar.
Dawn Yang used her manager Noel to make Xiaxue shut up.	Najib used Saiful (or more accurately, Saiful's ass) to make Anwar shut up.
Xiaxue refused to shut up.	Anwar refused to shut up.
Instead, Xiaxue used the increased publicity to introduce to everyone... Mr R!	Instead, Anwar used the increased publicity to introduce to everyone... Mr Balasubramaniam!
It was then that an explosive bombshell was dropped.	It was then that an explosive bombshell was dropped.
Shock! Horror! Dawn Yang went to Bali on Valentine's Day with Mr R!	Shock! Horror! Our deputy prime minister likes anal sex!

Now don't you agree they are just soooo similar?

Yeah… I received my Microsoft Wireless Notebook Laser Mouse 7000 finally. Thanks to Fionie for helping me bring it back from US.

Microsoft Wireless Notebook Laser Mouse 7000

(more…)

That is the title of the report by E. Lopez-Garcia, R.M. van Dam, T.Y. Li, F. Rodriguez-Artalejo, and F.B. Hu in the 17 June 2008 issue of Annals of Internal Medicine. (haha, yes my ignorant mind is laughing too... annals... hHHAHHAHAH!!! you just GOT to put that S after the 'annal') How much coffee do I consume everyday? Minimum 5 cups, usually up to 10 cups. My main source of water is from

A controversial post on the recent allegation of Anwar’s sodomy case.

It’s a known fact that Anwar is from MCKK, so am I. Often when I claimed myself to be an old boy, an annoying question never fail to surface, MCKK gay?

Depending on my mood, Yes and No. When I say ‘Yes’, I simply want to avoid this crappy talk. Because if I say ‘No’, I’ll be bombarded with questions like, “I heard X is gay, is it true?”. I’m not a walking Google, I don’t have the answer, much should I give a damn about their life.

The Malay College Kuala Kangsar (Malay College, MCKK, MC or Koleq, Kolek and sometimes dubbed “the Eton of the East“) is a premier residential school in Malaysia. It is an all-boys and all-Malay school located in the royal town of Kuala Kangsar, Perak. In the Malay language, it is called Kolej Melayu Kuala Kangsar or formerly Maktab Melayu Kuala Kangsar. For more info, go to the official website or Wikipedia entry.

Now the question, since it’s a single sex school you guys are definitely gay? Well, if you have to put it that way, St. John is gay, so is Victoria Institute, Sekolah Tunku Abdul Rahman, Sekolah Alam Shah, Royal Military College, Tunku Kursiah College, Sekolah Seri Puteri, Sekolah Tun Fatimah and perhaps some kindergarten too.

But I heard of something like ‘brotherhood’? It’s renowned tradition, to mentor¹, nurture and torture juniors. That’s why it’s easy to signify Malay College Old Boys, by the way we dress, talk and think. We have the same mold.

What about Jambu? Bahasa pasar would be a baby faced boy, I’m sure many of you would have heard of that. For us, it’d be the junior we are mentoring or little brother.

Betik? It’s for the senior who’s doing the mentoring or elder brother.

What is the relation of Jambu and Betik? 2 guys, a junior & a senior and they are adik-abang angkat.

Homo Sexual activities? In my 5 years as a student, I’ve never saw nor heard of such story.

I hope that clarifies some of the ambiguous tradition we have.

So is Anwar gay?

Dato Kamarudin Jaafar bersekolah bersamanya di Maktab Melayu Kuala Kangsar. Kemudian jadi Setiusaha Agung ABIM. Anwar masuk Umno dia masuk Umno, Anwar dipecat dari Umno dia keluar Umno, tidak pula terdengar kisah Dato KJ ‘disapunya’. - read here

Technically, he can’t be one. He has a wife and that would automatically qualify him as a bi-sex if you were to accuse him of being gay.

But still MC is gay. Oh ok, I pray your son would be a lot smarter than you and join MCKK. That’d make your son a gay.

Still gay. So is the 2nd Prime Minister, Perak’s Sultan and these guys below. Happy?

ps: Am I gay? Fuck NO.

1. MENTOR
   -noun
   1. a wise and trusted counselor or teacher.
   2. an influential senior sponsor or supporter.
   –verb (used without object)
   3. to act as a mentor: She spent years mentoring to junior employees.
   –verb (used with object)
   4. to act as a mentor to: The brash young executive did not wish to be mentored by anyone. ↩

Bought a domain but don’t have the time for a cool landing page. Landing pages are like really cool movie teasers, they create excitement and curiosity around the movie and pull in the crowd. The movie might have sucked but you ended up paying for it anyway.

Crappy movie teasers and crappy landing pages don’t pull in the crowd. You could hire a web developer but that would cost you money, doing it yourself might take forever or you’re just plain lazy. Fortunately there’s help.

LaunchSplash provides free web 2.0 landing pages for your domains. RSS feeds and mailing list are also bundled so that your visitors stay updated with your site’s progress.

Getting the landing page up is simple. Sign up for an account, fill in your site description and summary and finally from your DNS registrar’s control panel have your DNS point to LaunchSplash’s DNS servers.

Pretty cool service, save time and effort. Give it a spin.

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I found another Chinese dictionary plugins for Firefox, it work with the latest Firefox 3.x, is DictCN. DictCN, dictionary plugins for Firefox When you move the mouse cursor to the english word it will display the explanation as floating tips display, it support simplified chinese and traditional chinese. It support english audio as well. It can be configured by the right click on the 'D'

Linux Media Center Demo

Have fun!

Microsoft ISA Server 2006 Service Pack 1 have been released!

The new features focus on configuration change management and enhanced troubleshooting designed to help you identify and resolve ISA Server configuration issues within the ISA Server Management console.

The service pack includes the following new features and feature improvements:

• Configuration Change Tracking—Registers all configuration changes applied to ISA Server to help you assess issues that may occur as a result of these changes.
• Test Button—Tests the consistency of a Web publishing rule between the published server and ISA Server.
• Traffic Simulator—Simulates network traffic in accordance with specified request parameters, such as an internal user and the Web server, providing information about firewall policy rules evaluated for the request.
• Diagnostic Logging Viewer—Now integrated as a tab into the ISA Server Management console, this feature displays detailed events on packet progress and provides information about handling and rule matching.
Improvements for existing features, including:
• Support for integrated NLB mode in all three modes, including unicast, multicast, and multicast with Internet Group Management Protocol (IGMP). Previously, ISA Server integrated NLB-supported unicast mode only.
• Support for use of server certificates containing multiple Subject Alternative Name (SAN) entries. Previously, ISA Server was able to use either only either the subject name (common name) of a server certificate, or the first entry in the SAN list.
• Support for Kerberos Constrained Delegation (KCD) cross-domain authentication. Credentials from users located in a different domain than the ISA Server, but in the same forest, can now be delegated to an internal published Web site by using KCD .
• Support for client certificate authentication in a workgroup deployment. This removes the requirement to map each client certificate to an Active Directory® directory user account.

For more information about this service pack, see Microsoft Article 943462.

For general information about installing ISA Server updates and hotfixes, see Microsoft Article 885957.

Who would’ve thought Star Trek doesn’t have the monopoly on technobabble? Watch this poor marketer try to understand engineers spouting endless technical jargon:

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Datexx knows there are lots of hand-cranked chargers out there, so they’ve thrown in “4 cell phones tips” (Nokia, Motorola, Samsung, Kyocera, and LG says the Amazon product page, but that’s five!) and “a USB adaptor” to sweeten the deal.

The manufacturer says that this cranky powerhouse promises enough juice to let you yap on your cell phone for 4 hours, keep it on for 36, and 5 for iPods. 2 minutes of hand action will provide 6 of talking.

For those who own hand-cranked chargers, how well have they served you? Are they really useful, or just a gimmick of the gadget world?

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I like eating crabs because before they are cooked, they are still alive. ;)

The lack of blogging recently had a lot to do with me trying to finish up my new short film, FLEETING IMAGES before the deadline of a certain Japanese short film competition.

When you're sleeping only 2 hours, and spending most time of the day editing and shooting, writing a new blog entry is the last thing you have in mind.

The idea for FLEETING IMAGES came to my around two weeks ago. My Japanese short film was temporarily put on hold, so I was a little bummed out that I couldn't submit anything for the aforementioned short film competition*. I'm a person who needs deadlines to motivate myself into finishing something, does that mean that since YUKI's (title of that short film) is in limbo, I'll have to just sit on my arse and wait? Not an appealing idea.

So I started wondering what kind of short films can I conjure within two weeks. When I have a lack of cast and crew? Ideas started swimming around my head, and one was clearer and more doable than the others. After watching the first ten minutes of Chris Marker's Sans Soleil last year at Ming Jin's place, an interesting film that's part travelogue and part documentary (in the end, I guess the more accurate label for it would be a 'film essay'), I've once remarked: "DAMN, I could've used my holiday videos and try make something similar!"

I was thinking of my many tapes of holiday video footage I shot during my early 2007 spiritual trip in India, where I went to cool places like Bodh Gaya (place where Buddha attained Enlightenment), Varanasi, crossing the Ganges River, and then visiting a school of blind children and a nursing home for old Tibetan refugees. Although I returne from India back in Feb 2007, I NEVER touched any of the tapes. The reasons are:

1) I don't like editing holiday videos, it's a hassle. It doesn't challenge my creativity that much.

2) I don't like things that are shot by myself because I always believed that I suck at cinematography.

3) I'm more a narrative guy than a non-narrative one. A holiday video can barely do justice to what I actually experienced. It might trivialize my trip. Not cool.

So all these while, I do have lots of unused video footage waiting in tapes, covered in dust.

Back in March, a week after shooting CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY, I also had a quick advertorial shoot with Thomas, May Zhee and Nicole. It was a fun shoot that lasted only a few hours. I did the shooting myself. But unfortunately, the ad was never used in the end.

I remember telling Sebastian then that perhaps I would use the stuff I've shot and turn it into something artsy. I would just combine previous stock footage and other stuff. Of course, I was only semi-serious, and the idea never really came into fruition.

Until two weeks ago. In my desperation, I excavated again this idea I had. Examined the videos I've shot, and was a little surprised that my India footage, despite being shot on my cheap consumer camcorder, actually came out better than expected. So I kicked into gear the development of this project. It would be a video essay of sorts, driven completely by voice over narration.

The internal monologue was swiftly written, then I had friends helping me with the Chinese translation (while I can write adequately in Chinese, translating my own stuff is still beyond my own skills) My buddies Chloe and Vanes of Dian Bang helped me a lot with this.

I borrowed a DVX100 from uni last week to capture some shots of Tokyo, namely places like Shinjuku and Shibuya. It was also the main reason why I went to Odaiba last week to catch the sunset.

Funny that after the biggest short film production I've ever gone through (CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY), my follow-up would be me returning to my 'one-man filmmaking' roots. It's a good learning experience and practice. I came to realize that my own cinematography skills might not really suck as much as I've thought (well, I know how to frame shots, focus on stuff... but no, still don't know much about lighting)

I finally finished editing, and once of the biggest difficulties I faced was music. The easy way out would've been to use Debussy again. But I've been using his stuff in three productions I was involved in (my student film GIRL DISCONNECTED, Ming Jin's KURUS and my previous CHICKEN RICE MYSTERY). It'll be too much.

I tried composing, but while the soundtrack I did for THE ELEPHANT AND THE SEA was pretty good, I couldn't seem to find the right music for my own film.

So in the end I succumbed to Satie. I used Erik Satie's Gymnopedie No. 2 (No. 1 and No. 3s were used in GIRL DISCONNECTED). Note to self: I will NOT use piano music in my next film.

Synopsis of the film:

A young woman receives a series of emails from an old friend traveling in India and Japan. Some mundane, some rambling, some philosophical. He is seeking life's meaning in his travels, but perhaps all he wanted to do is to view the sunset. An experimental essay-film.

Now, some screen captures.


Title Screen


The young woman receives an email


Varanasi


Tokyo Sunset


Beggars on a hilltop


Blind children singing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star


The young woman in a car


In a near-future short film project, I'll probably conjure something out from May Zhee and Thomas' scenes in that unused ad.


* Name of competition withheld so that I won't feel embarrassed when I don't win anything, I'm really not the type who makes announcements on every single film festival I've submitted my film to, so that I won't have to deal with questions of why my film didn't get selected.

A recent Malaysian film had a lot of film festivals listed on its poster, but upon closer glance, you realize that it didn't win anything, nor get screened at these festivals, it's just that the film was 'officially SUBMITTED' to these places. Like, wow.

My friend asked how much I was paid as a kindergarten teacher. “Wonder whether I should apply,” she said.

‘You can’t”.
“Oh why?”
“Need a Diploma in Education, at least, if not a degree.”
What education? You don’t need education to teach kindergarten ma”.
“MAJOR in Education”

Actually, I was being mean. You don’t always need a diploma to teach kindergarten in Malaysia. But let’s not limit ourselves. Malaysia has no standard, but we don’t have to succumb.

She could have asked how I taught then. I was just 18, with nothing but the SPM certificate.

Trust me, you don’t want to teach children without proper training. Until this day, I still can’t shake off the guilt for imposing my adult ideals onto those children, without regards to what they really need.

On the eight floor of Segi College, Subang Jaya, hung a portrait of Maria Montessori cradling a child. It read, “The first responsibility of an educator is to recognize the personality of the child and respect it”.

Respect for the personality of the child. Sounds easy enough. But no one can do that without first experiencing some kind of training or education, whether formal or informal, that brings us close to the intrinsic parts of life that so many choose to avoid. Because it would nag at your own.

When we speak of personality, we think of those personality fads that can be found in lifestyle magazines. But here, we are talking about the personality development of children, the very first stages of life, that pre-determines whether a child would grow up to become emotionally congruent, whether the child will always feel an underlying peacefulness or dysphoria, whether sane or psychotic. On the milder edge, early childhood experiences pre-determines how big your brain would be, how many neural connections will be pruned, whether you will make it through school, score in Maths or limited to handiwork.

In other words, the livelihood of young children are in your hands. And that’s not far from the truth.

It sickens me now to think that I once took up the role without any prior training in childhood education. Like so many Malaysians seem to think, I assumed that you need only the ability to read and write, in order to teach little children. What a notorious assumption!

It became worse when the principal forced children of multiple age groups into one class because there were not enough teachers. And screamed at them when the kids did not behave the way she wanted.

Young children are highly dependent on caregivers, not just to fill the tummy. They need us to provide for their physiological needs. Our attention helps regulate their emotions, to mirror them, so that they would know whether to feel happy or sad, or whether to feel at all. They need our attention and validation when children learn autonomy and start exploring the world, or they may harbor inferiority. Children must not be silenced, but need to have their behaviors reciprocated with positive response for desirable behavior and not so positive for less desirable ones. If they are merely silenced, they would start keeping quiet, but not because they know what was wrong. They merely feel inferior., forever.

These are just among the many things I discovered through my readings and personal experiences. Managing a group of young children at once is no easy feat. Even qualified teachers need a lot of training. Because we, as the educator will be tested, pushed to the edge of sanity. We would be dealing with another human being so dependent on our providences. we CANNOT snap. If we snap, the child might snap along. Or the child may repress the trauma we create, but sink into depression or worse still, psychosis much later in life. Imagine that, without first testing our own boundaries through proper training in childhood education. It is so tedious that state laws in the U.S. legislate provisions that require childhood educators at public institutions to meet stringent requirements.

It’s very sad to deal with friends and acquaintances with some form of psychological and behavioral problems knowing their reasons may be traced back to early childhood experiences. There is little I could do, but say a little prayer and wish I could turn back time to make their childhood better.

Unqualified educators should be shot.

But guess what? We have Malaysians saying those who cannot earn a degree should become Play Therapists.

Yet the rest of the world needs to earn professional licenses in play therapy on top of their masters or doctorate degrees.

And Psychiatrists cannot perform psychotherapy without license in counseling psychology. Run far far away when you meet one who pretends he can.

Bukankah ini biadap, memandangkan kes ini sudah menjadi kes polis? Anda nilailah sendiri. nuffnang_bid = "419e2f082e421243b9577d422606c45d"; SHARETHIS.addEntry({ title: "Cabaran Saiful Bukhari kepada DSAI", url: "http://www.menj.org/polemik/cabaran-saiful-bukhari-kepada-dsai/" });

This is a little shot notice, but I receive an email about a free seminar on Final Cut Studio 2 and Final Cut Server that will be held at Kuala Lumpur. These are both high-end Apple pro apps.

Details of the seminar: -
Date:
8 July 2008 (Tuesday)

Time:
9:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m.

Vanue:
Prince Hotel & Residences Kuala Lumpur,
Level 3 - Prince 1
Jalan Conlay, 50450 Kuala Lumpur

Click here for more information.

I’m prefer not donate charity money through BN government, how about you? Why? Honestly, I don’t have faith that they will manage those money well. Here is the example, Narzi said China doesn’t want any humanitarian aid for Si Quan earthquake victim. I beg your pardon?

Government explains aid delay

The government has contributed RM3.3 million to Burma and China following their devastating earthquake and cyclone experiences two months ago.

In response to Tan Seng Giaw (DAP-Kepong), Minister in Prime Minister’s Department Nazri Abdul Aziz said that the government had responded quickly in lending a hand to the affected parts in those two countries.

He said procedural requirements have delayed Malaysia’s efforts.

“It took us a long time as we had to respect their regulations. Such as Myanmar (Burma), they did not allow us to land our helicopters freely in their area and China did not want any humanitarian aid, so we had to respect them,” said Nazri.

If he told us Myanmar military government is very arrogant and refuse humanitarian aid from the world, I buy it completely. You can find a lot of international media reported on this matter.

However, when he said China refuses to accept any humanitarian aid for earthquake victims, I really can’t believe it. In fact, this excuse is hard to accept. If China does refuse humanity aid as his explained, why many non-government