Melaka; City and State 1

Go get an atlas, GoogleEarth whatever. Seek out the Straits of Malacca... It is between the Peninsular of Malaysia and the Indonesian island of Sumatra. Wow, Malacca should be a huge influence to have its name all over the waterway. But unfortunately that was hundreds of years ago. It is now only a small state by the West coast of the Peninsular. *sigh*

Oh ok, I don't do historical talk much. In fact I hate History in school because it was such a boring subject (a thousand apologies to my History teachers, where ever you are). I found this picture in my camera, which a friend snapped last October. It is a place I visited at least once a month. The Dataran Pahlawan Mall (literally means Warrior's Square Mall).

See the row of short and brown shopping outlets? They are actually lower than the street level, by half, I think. And get this, ABOVE the mall, there used to be a football field. The field is still retained because it is the first place the Date of the Malaysian Independence (31st August 1957) was first declared. 

The Malaccan Municipal had cobbled streets all over the major tourists spots. I think it's rather pretty, and you cannot DRIVE FAST ENOUGH on such uneven surface :)

Look at that unsightly huge, concrete and steel needle on the left of the background. That's Taming Sari Tower. The red doughnut thingy around it can go up and down, bringing hundreds of people to watch the city from above. It's one of the new major attraction here, other than the Eye on Malacca (a smaller version of the London's Eye). I've never been on both.

Oh lookie! See the Golden Arches? That's the second 24 hours McDonald's we have here. My friends and I occupy the place whenever it is not too crowded.

Hate the burgers. But love the fries and apple pies. Yummy. 

My Very Own Carpet Sharks :)

Look at my pair of ferrets. Be jealous / happy / disgusted / warm-inside / bewildered (chose your appropriate feeling, depending on your disposition).

The ferret on the left is Disco. And the smaller, yet older ferret is Kaos. Kaos is almost a year old, and Disco is younger by three months. Disco is a lot bigger because he's a glutton!

Both are males and neutered. I prefer my ferrets huge. Females (also called jills or sprites) are so small, yet cute. But I love bigger ferrets (males) as their bulky bodies make them look like cats.

Major chick (and kiddies) magnets :)

Bad Seed and Illegitimate Child

My mom eldest (and now only living) brother and his wife visited us a few hours ago. They made themselves comfortable in the living hall, and as a dutiful son, I had to make an appearance and involve myself in ' the family talk'.

It seemed that the son and daughter of my mom's late younger sister was at 'it' again. Their father died a couple of years ago and my aunt cared for the girl, while the boy stayed with his half-sister.

FYI, this particular female cousin of mine had delivered a baby out of wedlock 6 months ago. (Baby was given away to a family far far away, the address even torn apart). And her brother is a suspected drug addict.

My uncle and aunt told us that the girl was going wild yet again, like she never regretted her bad deeds before. My aunt said she was tired of her lies and one day she'll throw the girl out of the house for good. I applauded her decision, and added that she must thrash the girl properly soon. I just hate ingrates. Especially orphans.

The last time I met my evil male cousin was two years ago, when he stayed with us for a month. At the same time, I also had my adopted son (one ex-student of mine) living with us, and both of them were of the same age. It greatly stressed me to see them together because I did not wish this particular cousin to poison my son trusting mind.

I slapped my son twice to remind him that some of the things my cousin implanted in his head were rather bad for the soul. (I should know, I am bad to the bone too. But I do not wish to see someone I love fall because of it).

My late aunt (the evil duo's mother) was one of the nicest women I ever met. Polite, soft spoken, shy and tidy. Unfortunately her children were the exact opposite. I blame their late father. He was not known as a good man and had many despicable tendencies which I will not mention here.

To me, my cousins are a lost cause. They will not heed advice and will continue their nefarious lives as they see fit.

So I told my mom, aunt and uncle that opinion - cut them loose when they make trouble again. We do not need such people in the family.

And then I continue to the kitchen and make french fries - yummy!

p.s. - I even had a wager with my youngest brother that the b*tch shall be pregnant yet again, come 2010, of course out of wedlock (again).

Family Moments

This is a picture of my mother and her two grandchildren, during my cousin's wedding function sometime ago. The boy with the sunglasses is my nephew Dzarif and the girl in the middle is his older sister, Dzara.

My youngest brother put on the sunglasses and Dzarif was really enjoying the attention from relatives.

Please note that the boy is slightly fairer than his sister. Even their mother, my sister is a bit darker than the rest of the siblings. Viva genetics!

It's Raining Water. What do you expect?

So much water... So cold.. I love it.

Today, it rains all day long. Everything is wet and the weather is cold. I LIKE IT!

I attended two wedding ceremonies this afternoon (in the rain). There were huge puddles of dirty water everywhere and of course, it never stop raining. I walked in the heavy drizzle without an umbrella, with my miserable and very wet cousin in tow.

I love rainy days, so I do not see the sense of umbrellas. Unless it's very hot in the afternoon sun.

And I NEVER got a fever even after a full drench. I always wonder why people got sick easily.

Hurm...

p.s. - In the end of 1980s and the early of 1990s, Sesame Street (the children tv series) had a short song about rain. It's called 'It's A Rainy Day.' I love that song still.

I Am So Sorry I Woke You Up - NOT!!

Am I too loud for you? Go ride a bicycle then!!

To celebrate the months of not touching a game console, I played one of my fav Playstation 3 games - Burnout Paradise. It's all about racing, stunt, destruction and crazy driving around the virtual Paradise City. Oh and with the soundtracks of alternative, hip-hop, techno whatever.

And of course I must plug in to my new home theater set...

The sound of screeching rubber, twisted metal grinding against asphalt and wholesale destruction was so real, very much like you are sitting on the tracks of a racing derby :)

My handicapped younger brother showed his sour face to me after my gaming session, he couldn't get any sleep. My youngest sister (the one with the HUGE radio) also commented how loud it was (that's a first from her). My mom complained that I have set up a cineplex in the middle of the house. I have not met the next door neighbours, they might want to add more.

I am just so happy my hobby TOUCHED people's life. (Evil laugh)   

UPDATE - I suddenly remembered my years living in the teacher quarters next to school years ago... I played my Playstation 2 every evening then, with the volume cranked high. The new principal asked around WHO was driving loudly with a lot of accidents near school.  Priceless :)

Life in Hi-Definition

My tv, home theater set and Playstation 3 (ignore the bookcase and assorted toys)

I bought a 32 inch Toshiba Regza flatscreen tv (RM 1 900) a year ago, so I could play my Playstation 3 with its highest graphic ability. Love the tv, very much the same par as all the LGs and Samsungs in the market. Sonys are so damn overpriced, even with the same specs.

My Playstation 3 malfunctioned a few months ago, that made me abandon gaming for a long while. I still have my dvds to entertain me (using my old Playstation 2 as the player).

And yesterday, the Philips Home Theater Set (RM 1 088) I ordered arrived in heavy rain, via a lorry. It took me 45 minutes to carefully study the manual and connecting the thing to my tv. I DO NOT watch my tv for the programmes. My tv set is in my little room, in the middle of the house, purely for gaming or movie dvds. (We have three other tv sets, the one in the living room has cable, another in the kitchen for my mom and the third, unused in the guest room).

Anyway, the sound system was phenomenal, literally quaking the metal grills on our windows. Fortunately, my younger sister who has a BIGGER (the thing is thrice the size of all my speakers combined) and more powerful hi-fi next room was not always around to retaliate. 

Erm.... I had derailed far from my original tale in mind.

I just found out that the hi-def cable supplied with the home theater set can also be used by my Playstation 3. I plugged the cable to the abandoned machine and.... ta dah, I can play again! The video output component on my game console was busted, and the hi-def cable remedied the problem. I think I'm back in the GAME, baby!! (Too bad my birthday had just passed, or I'll ask for new PS3 games instead).

Oh what fun it is to kill thousands everyday. Ho ho ho! 

Will you look at this JVC monstrosity in my younger sis room?! (It is BIGGER than it looks, mind). Girls should be forbidden by law to have bigger speakers than their brothers.

I Was Tagged by The Alien et !!

  

Erm... The Eternal Thinker @ et, awarded moi with these three awards. Mucho gracias.... And with those come two sets of questions.

Oh, Ok, I am running out of new ideas for my entries anyway.... 

The first tag : Tell 7 things about you, unknown to others

#1 I prefer duck, rather than chicken (for food, not pets, ok?)  

#2 I have a very sharp switchblade in my car glove compartment. Used mainly to puncture tyres and make scratches upon people's (who really deserve) cars. Ask me if you are interested to know who and why. 

#3 I am older (my birthday was last week) but I feel the same as always.  

#4 I love to sleep. I need at least 10 hours of sleeping daily.

#5 I love rainy days and very cold weather. The colder it gets, the happier I am.

#6 I have witnessed supernatural phenomenon before - but people just wont believe me.  

#7 I have 14 watches. :)


Here's the second tag....

1.What is your current obsession?
Squeezing money and gifts from friends

2. What are you wearing today?
My boxers.

3. What’s for dinner?
Duck in coconut milk, rice and assorted veges.

4. What’s the last thing you bought?
Dvds. 'Pondorum' and 'the Perfect Getaway'. Both sucks.

5. What are you listening to right now?
Nothing. The sound of the fan whirring.

6. What do you think about the person who tagged you?
et. He's weird. I think he's part alien. Very creative though.

7. If you could have a house totally paid for, fully furnished anywhere in the world, where would you like it to be?
Somewhere in the vast realms of my mind. It's more beautiful in there.  

8. What are your must-have pieces for summer? Do we have summer here?

9. If you could go anywhere in the world for the next hour, where would you go?
Beijing.

10. Which language do you want to learn?
Russian.

11. What’s your favourite quote?
"I warned you about it."" I told you so."" Who? Me?"

12. Who do you want to meet right now?
Dr Mahathir Mohammad

13. What is your favourite colour?
Blue

14. What is your favourite piece of clothing in your own closet?
My jeans.

15. What are you going to do after this?
Sleep.

16. What inspires you?
My Bu :)

17. Give us three styling tips that always work for you:
Pretend you like it, Pretend you know it, And Make it happen.

18. Coffee or tea?
Tea person me.

19. What do you do when you are feeling low or terribly depressed?
Sleep.

20. Favorite Season?
We don't do seasons here.... but winter if you must.

21. If I come to your house now, what would u cook for me?
Depends on what I have in store, dude. :)

22. What is the right way to avoid people who purposefully hurt you?
Avoid them, forget their existence.  

23. What are you afraid of the most?
Failures and ............

24. What is the first thing you do once you've booted u'r system?
I pretend not to understand this question.

25. Black Cat or White Dog?
Black cat.

26. Where do you put ur private stuffs? Iron safe.

Rules for those who are tagged:
Respond and rework – answer these questions on your blog, replace one question that you dislike with a question of your own, and add one more question to the list. Tag more people.

* * *
These awards and the tags NOW goes to...
- Aizan

- TechnoBabe

- Spencer L Casey

- Rock Chef

- Firhamzah

Happy Tagging! :)

I Karaoke-d Today. There.

I promised myself to NEVER acquaint myself with a karaoke machine. Karaoke had ruined many hours of sleep when I was stationed in the rural area - first reason. Second reason? People SLAUGHTERED perfectly good songs with their abysmal voices! Once I witnessed a girl with a stupendously bad voice singing Celine Dion's "My Heart Will Go On" at a bar. It was both an EDUCATION and excruciating TORTURE. Never before I have heard the English language pronounced that bad and people were actually listening to that very very horrible karaoke session - with mouths agape, some with drinks halfway to the mouth the entire time and better still, a few left the place in a hurry!  

Anyway, my friend Apis, who was accompanying me this afternoon, has a beautiful voice and I decided to bring him to a Kbox Karaoke place to hear him sing. We selected five songs and he sang the first three wonderfully :)

But I cannot help myself to join the singing of the two later songs - because they were old songs that reminded me of my schooling years, 15 years ago. I do not have a voice like an angel, but we did rock the place. :) Truth be told, I enjoyed myself immensely.

p.s. - Apis had never heard of the Carpenters.... Young people today... 

Belated Birthday Party and Cold Cold Heart

We celebrated my birthday at Nani's house this afternoon. I arrived quite late and we started a fry-up; chicken nuggets, mini sausages and french fries. My cousin Pozi arrived later, bringing a large dish of baked curry-flavoured macaroni and some caramel cakes. He's VERY GOOD in cooking.

Aizan, a fellow blogger, bought a chocolate-cheese birthday cake for me. Well, this is the third birthday cake I got this week... well, I hope they keep on giving more :) I didn't wish for anything when cutting the cake because most of my wishes are rather private.

Anyway, the food was GOOD and the company was FUN too. We talked, we laughed, making vicious jabs at each other, stuff ourselves silly and there are a lot of leftovers. Nani and Aizan were joking when they said they want to bring the nuggets and fries while watching a movie later this evening. I thought the idea was fantastic anyway. Wish I got a larger handbag :)

Anyway, 4 hours later, as I was driving towards my aunt's house, I got into an accident. A motorbike hit the front right side of my car as I was turning right. Obviously the rider was too fast or didn't see my car's signal blinkers. He literally flew over the front hood, his motorbike made 2 somersaults before crashing by the road side.

Inhumanely, I was calm, only a bit irritated by this. I knew it was not my fault the stupid bugger hit me. I parked my car by the roadside, exited it, and calmly walked to the prone body by the roadside. I took him by the hand, and hauled him into a sitting position;

"Are you ok?"

The boy was still dizzy and fell on his back again. I shrugged and collected his stuff, which fell all over the place. Meanwhile, a car stopped and two Indian guys went to inspect the motorcycle (which was so weird, why they didn't even look at the boy first?) After stuffing the items into his bike basket, I talked to the boy again.

"Are you ok?" He said yes.

"Where do you live? Where are you from?" He is from Rembia (5 minutes away from my home) and just arrived from the capital city.

"Do you want me to call your parents?" No, he will call his mother himself. His father had passed away. And he is sorry because of the accident. But I can call the police if I want.

Apparently he realized it was indeed HIS fault.   

I just waved it all away and told the boy that I have things to attend to. Good luck and be careful next time. The size of the dent on my Kia is about a palm length. If it was a lesser car, the damage would be worse (viva Korean manufacturing quality!) Oh well. I left the crime scene.

I didn't feel bad for the boy. Emotionless. Just making sure he lives so I don't have to make a police report. How would you react?

Today is My 31st Birthday *sniff*

I was born on a Sunday evening, 31 years ago in the Malacca General Hospital. To be exact, I was born at 5.32 pm. And also a Sagittarian and (Chinese zodiac) an Earth Horse. For the internal balance of the soul, I am 65 % evil and one of the unknown accomplished actors the world have ever witnessed. There.

So I went to school this morning to look after some students who are sitting for their SPM exam, Physics papers today. I laughed at them, and told them it's rather too late - when they ask me for help. (see what I mean for evil teacher?) I told them it's my birthday today and just left. I will not see these children again next year, so let's move on with life shall we?

I fetch a friend from his house and then went window shopping in the city. Somebody promised me a metal choker for my birthday, but I want to see the item myself. 

NOTE TO ALL EVIL MINIONS; We, of negative persuasion, cannot wear silver. Silver easily tarnishes against our skin / scale / slime / ectoplasm etc. This is rather true in my case. I have many silver bangles when I first put them on, gleaming like pure souls... but after a couple of hours in contact with me, lost their sheen, and looked rather like cheap accessories. So wear STEEL instead. It's cool and shiny too. And a lot stronger than silver if you are thinking about heavy wear at work / battles etc. :)

And them my mom called up and asked me to buy her an accumulator @ car battery. Wot? Her car cannot start and as a dutiful son, I bought one for her - those maintenance free battery. I even set up the damn heavy new battery with the help of my amiable friend, Adi.

But the car still wouldn't start.... oh Hell.

Called up a mechanic to sort the problem and another friend, Pozi visited at 6.10 pm. He asked me and  Adi to have dinner near the beach, which was mighty fine with me.

Some 20 minutes later; we had lamb steak, fried kway teau, kebabs, grilled stuffs-i-don't-know, lychee drinks and chicken. The food was good and the company was fun. :)

Tomorrow, I have another friend who wanted to take me out for treats. :)  :)

And my low-key belated birthday party will be celebrated this Saturday evening at another friend's house. They'd be so much fried food on the planned menu the Cholesterol Police should pay a visit. :)

I am older, a bit wiser, but mostly unchanged. A bicarbonate of History. :)

Driving License Long AWOL

I had my license much later than my younger sister, mainly because of the different make of cars they use in the on-the-road test. (I learned driving a Nissan, but got a Proton Waja on my test). So I failed my first on-the-road test and aced at it a couple of years later, when I really had to get a license, or be cursed-to-walk-forever by my parents.

Anyway... this is rather embarrassing... I just found out last week that I've been zooming around the country WITHOUT a driving license for so long! Oh don't get me wrong, I am LEGALLY accepted to drive by the Department of Transport, my name and stuff they got keyed in the database. The problem was, I ACCIDENTALLY took my license slip (a pink card telling when my license is due) as the real thing, and put the REAL license (with my address, pic etc) elsewhere.

And it does not help if I only renew my license once in three years...

So that's why the cop asked me where my license was, when I showed him the pink slip... 

But all is remedied now. I got my new license yesterday (complete with an ugly recent mugshot of me) and made for it to be renewed next year. I might forget to renew it in three years...