theBluesman*

˙·٠•● Staffetta dell'amicizia ●•٠·˙

2011-06-01T23:48:00.002+08:00

My very dear old friend Nokta L , the Pink Panthress, from the far end of the world @the Antartica (really?) tagged me recently into posting this piece.

And in respecting the passing of the friendship baton, we shall observe the following rules.:

a) Create a blog post, and please use the IMAGE of the relay friendship race...
b) In your post, answer the Eight questions...
c) Pass the baton of friendship to 10 bloggers, if possible and link them in your post...

And the questions:-
1. - When small you were asked, what you wanted to do when you were big; What did you reply?
2. - What were your favorite cartoons?
3. - What were your favorite games?
4. - What year was your nicest birthday and why?
5. - What were the things you absolutely wanted to do, and not yet done?
6. - Which was your first love? sports? or what not?
7. - Which was your first musical idol?
8. - Which was the most' beautiful sought (and eventually received), christmas or any gift?

And my answers to these Eight questions:-
1. Will figure it out when i reach that stage

2. the road runners

3. games? the space invaders & sokoban

4. never had any (celebration), never believe in one

5. travel the globe, it’s going to be unfulfilled though as i’ve not made my first billion yet

6. (pretty boring) just sleeping

7. Bob Dylan and the old blues singers

8. never had one and so never received any

I will pass along this tag to the following bloggers, though you are not obliged to do them, since you might already have been tagged in the past with this.:

1. Aswani 2. Dyeve 3. Mia's mom 4. Diyas Aryani 5. Jenie Ortiz 6. Jo 7. Nitu 8. An 9. Mala 10.Agnes 11. Galatea 12. Mystique Earth

Thank you for reading & being part of this.. & have a wonderful weekend, wherever you are!

away from it all

2011-03-16T01:05:00.000+08:00

I just got back from a week's trip to the beaches of the eastern coastal part of the country. It was sort of a "just pack & go" kind of trip which i usually undertake once every few months. Somehow i just needed to get out of the city and just lie down by the beach doing absolutely nothing. In all i traveled over 2000km. It was very tiring but i felt very refreshed after the trip. Just to let you guys have a mental picture of the beach, here goes.....

I avoid going to the beaches during the weekends or public holidays. I usually prefer the normal weekdays and by so doing i get the whole beach to myself.

hello blog

2011-03-05T19:50:00.000+08:00

Oh hello blog, it's been quite a while since i last said hello to you and to all my friends and followers alike. Life's been quite hectic for me during these last few months. Looks like 2011 has been a slow starter for me. Some friends told me that i should have written the usual new year resolutions. I've actually lost faith in making any new year resolutions. Why can't life be so simple. Just forget about those stupid resolutions!

I've posted more entries in my other blog or photoblog. It's more fun to post just pictures as compared to words. I can go around snapping pictures and then edit some in Picasa and in a matter of minutes i can post something in my photoblog. Pictures, as they say, sure paint a thousand words. And so i'm more into photoblogging these days (read as "i'm just being my usual lazy self").

Bye for now, love you all.

a short update

2011-01-26T23:52:00.001+08:00

You may have noticed that my blog posts are getting shorter these days, just don't ask about the frequency of posting. What's been happening to me lately? Big fat nothing, that's the problem. Am i reaching the sunset in my blogging activities. Hopefully not. How have i been filling up the time which was taken up by blogging those days? I think i just got bored.......that's all. Since i took up photography sometime in the4th quarter of 2010, i spent a bit of time in my other blog or some called it "plog" @http://thebluesmansnapshots.blogspot.com /

I'm not about to hang my boots just yet as i'm just taking a breather. I love you people.

r.i.p. Daria

2011-01-24T00:38:00.000+08:00

a dear blogger friend from Canada, Daria, has just passed away after suffering from cancer
r.i.p. Daria....................

happyNEWyear2011

2011-01-01T00:01:00.003+08:00

A touching story of an old father, son and a sparrow

2010-12-29T00:53:00.000+08:00

As we're ending the year 2010, let's pause for a moment and watch this touching video

is there no 2nd chance in life

2010-11-18T22:54:00.001+08:00

Received this advice from an old friend ............

is this just another bulls***? let's have a look....

There No Second Chance in Life

TO THOSE OF US WHO ARE ALREADY THERE

AND TO THOSE WHO WILL SOON BE THERE

The Secrets of Old Age

Before middle age – Do not fear!

After middle age – Do not regret!

Enjoy Your Life While You Can!

Do not wait till you cannot even walk just to be sorry and to regret.

As long as it is physically possible, visit places you wish to visit.

When there is an opportunity, get together with old classmates,

Old colleagues & old friends.

The gathering is not just about eating; it’s just that there is not much time left.

Money kept in the banks may not be really yours.

When it is time to spend, just spend, & treat yourself well as you’re getting old.

Whatever you feel like eating, just eat! It is most important to be happy.

Food which are good for health – eat often and more - but that is not everything.

Things which are not good for health – eat less but once in a while

Do not abstain from them totally.

Treat sickness with optimism. Whether you are poor or rich,

Everyone has to go through the birth, aging, sickness and death.

There is no exception, that’s life. Do not be afraid or worried when you are sick.

Settle all the outstanding issues before hand

And you will be able to leave without regret.

Let the doctors handle your body,

God handles your life & loves you,

But be in charge of your own moods

If worries can cure your sickness, then go ahead and worry.

If worries can prolong your life, then go ahead and worry.

If worries can exchange for happiness, then go ahead and worry.

Our kids will make their own fortune.

Look After Four Old Treasures

1. Your old body – pay more attention to health,

You can only rely on yourself on this.

2. Retirement funds – money that you have earned,

It is best to keep them yourself.

3. Your old companion – treasure every moment with your other half,

One of you will leave first.

PERFECT LOVE

4. Your old friends – seize every opportunities to meet up with your friends.

Such opportunities will become rare as time goes by.

WITH FRIENDS, EVERYDAY YOU MUST LAUGH, DANCE & BE HAPPY !!!

Running water does not flow back.

So is life, make it happy!

ENJOY EVERY MOMENT OF YOUR LIFE

~~~~~~~lets be merry then~~~~~~~~

is this another bull****? you decide !

"A well written life is almost as rare as a well spent one."

"Life is a succession of lessons which must be lived to be understood."
~Thomas Carlyle

If all the world is a stage and life is just a play upon it, get me two seats in the stalls." ~ Robert Browning

catching up with my old "slaves"

2010-11-01T02:38:00.000+08:00

It was a hot Sunday afternoon. I almost forgot that i was supposed to meet up with some old staff/colleague today. I used to joke with them by calling them my old "slaves". These two guys used to work with me in the good old days as my support staff. Today only two turned up for an afternoon tea.

The purpose ~ just to catch up with each other and trade some current gossips over drinks. And since i brought along my camera, i just snapped their picture.

I left them some 8/9 years ago to venture into other things in life but we still keep in touch from time to time over drinks. There's always one thing good about catching up with old friends i.e. we get to laugh over many of those silly things that we did together. Oh yes, we had a good laugh and we chatted for over three hours.

Someone used to say that "Friendship isn't a big thing - it's actually a million little things". This is indeed very true. And also there was this old Sicilian proverb which says "Only your real friends will tell you when your face is dirty".

All the very best to you my old "slaves"......continue working and be happy working!

life is like a cup of coffee

2010-10-18T00:00:00.001+08:00

I was a bit bored early this morning and wandered around the city after a late breakfast. Then i dropped by at the National Art Gallery to check what's the latest offerings. I brought along my DSLR but was told that taking pictures was not allowed inside the gallery. Oh sh** i forgot. Anyway it was a boring tour of the gallery today.

After an hour's tour i went straight home. There were string of messages awaiting my immediate attention but i was not in the mood to reply. Instead i decided to explore the youtube and i found this inspirational video.....now i can sit down, relax and slowly sip my coffee undisturbed....

long distance lover

2010-10-16T00:37:00.001+08:00

Listen to the sound of the blues by Sue Foley, message to my "Long Distance Lover". I'm getting a bit sentimental over this weekend. I posted another number by Sue Foley on Facebook wishing my friends there a great weekend and i'm taking time off to catch up with my sleep.

p.s. If there's somebody who's going places in the next week or so, have a good trip & safe return.

YOU WILL HAVE AN EXCELLENT WEEKEND. YES. YOU WILL

'patin' revisited

2010-10-12T21:53:00.000+08:00

In one of my earlier post which i posted in April'09, i mentioned about the 'patin' fish (sci.Pangasius sp). This post is about a revisit.

I woke up late this morning, grabbed a quick breakfast and decided to do some driving. I drove east 140km one way to revisit an old favourite joint for lunch of 'patin' fish. It took me 1.5 hrs with moderate speed. Managed to reach there just about lunch time. The crowd was building up. I quickly ordered my lunch and the rest was simply beyond words....It was well worth the trip. I've not been back to the place for more than a year. And i must remind myself to revisit the place soon.

p.s. Sometimes i do have this craving for food, luckily it's not so often that i get this attack nowadays. I've to watch my weight closely as my BMI has exceeded the normal bound by a few pointers. It's easy to add on calories these days as the food are just too inviting.

@Xroads

2010-09-22T22:07:00.002+08:00

The title says it all. I'm at a crossroad....

I've been wondering as to whether i should continue with writing in this blog of mine. I'm kind of getting tired and coming to a bored stage already, so soon eh! I wonder whether the life cycle of this blog of mine is about to come to an end. But then again i've many friends who are always keeping in touch with me, some are very dear friends too, oh dear.

Why am i at the crossroad then? Lots of reason. Time. Time. Time. Laziness. The list goes on, including my new passion in photography (BTW, have you guys visited my SNAPshots @ http://thebluesmansnapshots.blogspot.com/).

I'll give it another shot. Maybe i'll sleep on this blog for another week or so and see where it goes!

Meanwhile gimme some lifeline guys...

oh what a joke...

2010-08-30T01:29:00.002+08:00

There were some 52 responses from the "pandora bracelet peddler" @hangeng, against 51 blog posts of mine (see earlier posting). That was the price i put paid for having an open invitation for anyone to respond to my blog post without my prior moderation. I was trying to be opened and indeed it was opened to abuse by the notorious pandora bracelet peddler. Peddling a bracelet to me? Oh my, how sexy could that be. Oh what a joke! Gimme a break sis'. Other macho thing's okay but not bracelets.

And tonight i managed to delete all those messages/responses except one under McDonald vs McCurry. I want to keep this last piece, just for the sake of remembrance. It was quite an exercise to delete each one of those messages.

And to that dear bracelet peddler @hangeng, if you are reading this, my advice to you is to go and play elsewhere or peddle your wares some place else. I love you girl! Goodnight. Sleep tight with your bracelet from head top toe.....God bless. (p.s don't forget to have your sweet dream my dear girl...)

i just couldn't resist this

2010-08-28T11:41:00.002+08:00

I happened to recently receive an email which i would like to share the contents here in my blog. I don't know who had originally written it but i hope we all can learn something from the write up. As i've said, i just couldn't resist this .....

just like i couldn't resist parking in front of the PM's office like this

This is a very good article. Read it. Those who are still single may learn something from here....Those who are already married may take it as a guideline to improve your
marriage.... here goes.........

The issue: DID I MARRY THE RIGHT PERSON?

During one of our seminars, a woman asked a common question.
She said, "How do I know if I married the right person?"
I noticed that there was a large man sitting next to her so I said,
"It depends. Is that your husband?" In all seriousness, she answered
"How do you know?"

Let me answer this question because the chances are good that it's weighing on your mind.

Here's the answer. EVERY relationship has a cycle. In the beginning, you fell in love with
your spouse. You anticipated their call, wanted their touch, and liked their idiosyncrasies.

Falling in love with your spouse wasn't hard. In fact, it was a completely natural and spontaneous experience. You didn't have to DO anything. That's why it's called "falling" in love...

Because it's happening TO YOU.

People in love sometimes say, "I was swept of my feet." Think about the imagery of that expression. It implies that you were just standing there; doing nothing, and then something came along and happened TO YOU.

Falling in love is easy. It's a passive and spontaneous experience. But after a few years of marriage, the euphoria of love fades. It's the natural cycle of EVERY relationship. Slowly but surely, phone calls become a bother (if they come at all), touch is not always welcome
(when it happens), and your spouse's idiosyncrasies, instead of being cute, drive you nuts.

The symptoms of this stage vary with every relationship, but if you think about your marriage, you will notice a dramatic difference between the initial stage when you were in love and a much duller or even angry subsequent stage.

At this point, you and/or your spouse might start asking, "Did I marry the right person?" And as you and your spouse reflect on the euphoria of the love you once had, you may begin to desire that experience with someone else. This is when marriages breakdown. People blame their spouse for their unhappiness and look outside their marriage for fulfillment

Extramarital fulfillment comes in all shapes and sizes. Infidelity is the most obvious. But sometimes people turn to work,a hobby, a friendship, excessive TV, or abusive substances.

But the answer to this dilemma does NOT lie outside your marriage. It lies within it. I'm not saying that you couldn't fall in love with someone else. You could.

And TEMPORARILY you'd feel better. But you'd be in the same situation a few years later. Because (listen carefully to this): THE KEY TO SUCCEEDING IN MARRIAGE IS NOT FINDING THE RIGHT PERSON; IT'S LEARNING TO LOVE THE PERSON YOU FOUND.

SUSTAINING love is not a passive or spontaneous experience. It'll NEVER just happen to you. You can't "find" LASTING love. You have to "make" it day in and day out. That's why we have the expression "the labor of love."

Because it takes time, effort, and energy . And most importantly, it takes WISDOM . You have to know WHAT TO DO to make your marriage work.

Make no mistake about it. Love is NOT a mystery. There are specific things you can do (with or without your spouse) to succeed with your marriage.

Just as there are physical laws of the universe (such as gravity), there are also laws for relationships. Just as the right diet and exercise program makes you physically stronger, certain habits in your relationship WILL make your marriage stronger. It's a direct cause and effect. If you know and apply the laws, the results are predictable...you can "make" love.

Love in marriage is indeed a "decision"... Not just a feeling.....

theBluesman has nothing more to add to all these but go and seek out "the spark in your relationship" before it's too late........

just a note to all my kind Followers

2010-08-19T00:28:00.000+08:00

<<< The following piece was published in my Facebook Notes on Aug 17th and i'm sharing it here in my blog for records only. To that concerned sender, i wish you every success, but do Go & play somewhere else. In view of this development i must apologise to all future commenters that much as i hate it, all comments received by this blog would be moderated before i published them. It's just a small security inconvenience only. Your kind understanding is certainly appreciated. And as always i love you all very much >>>

I got bombed, WatchOut guys!

by Bluesman Hans on Tuesday, August 17, 2010 at 12:47pm

I had a late night last night. And i thought why not i sleep in late today.

My cellphone has been set to switch off everyday at 1:30am and on again at 6:30am to conserve the battery (at the same time supporting the campaign for greener earth, heh heh....i doubt it). When the cellphone was automatically switched on this morning it started to beep indicating that messages were coming in. I've programmed it to alert me when my email inbox (main emailbox @ bluesmanhans@yahoo.com) get filled with messages from my friends. The beeping continued for a few minutes and it woke me up since the cellphone was placed beside my pillow. I screamed. Why is this BlackBerry disturbing me so early in the morning. Is it in retaliation to the announcement made by some governments of the world to block the usage of BlackBerry services in those countries. Hell no, this is more serious!

I woke up angrily and i felt like throwing the new BlackBerry against the wall, oh no, I must not be that crazy, i kept reminding myself.

I checked the messages and saw strings of messages coming from ONE SENDER posting messages against MY BLOG POSTS at my blog (www.thebluesmansays.blogspot.com). These are long messages and the same messages are being posted against many blog posts of mine. I immediately knew that 'm getting bombed by some sick person.

And when i read the mesages again i realised that it came from ONE SENDER, who two days earlier had posted his/her message selling some stupid BRACELETS against one of my best posting # "McDonald vs McCurry" which had also been picked up by Global Voices at one time . I had immediately deleted that message post two days ago. And today he/she came back with a vengeance and bombed my blog with trhe same long stupid messages. Imagine trying to promote his/her stupid bracelet to me, i don't neded no bracelet bro'.

When the Blacberry sounded the alert this early morning, i swiched on my PC and went online and saw string of messages from the same sender. What am i going to do as the messages were still coming in against my blog posts. I logged into my blog and it confirmed my worst fear. I had a total of 53 messages and still counting! So what to do to arrest the problem. I went to HELP for guide. Ah simple, Go to the Dashboard and take the blog to HIDE. Then i went to Setting and de-authorised any access to my blog, take it off the shelf. For how long, let it cook for a while or maybe set up another blog and transfer some or all of my blog posts on another day.

To all my faithful blog Followers, i'll miss you all very dearly for a while.........please bear with me............

The SENDER's name is "hangeng" and it happens to be a she. She came with a site address of
http://www.pandora-jewelry.uk.com/About-US
I'm NOT trying to promote her or her bracelet business here BUT to remind/warn my blogger friends of this person. Just be very careful lest your blog get bombed too.

The beep has just stopped and the message count is now 62 very long 'sale' messages, same stupid messages. Oh what a stupid morning, racing against time to stop the menace!And that's not all......what?

p.s (1) At first count, the messages were at 53. Whilst i was figuring on how to stop the onslaught of messages, my Anna suddenly alerted me of her diabetic condition as she was feeling the symptoms of Hypoglycemia. I moved away from the PC and grabbed the Glucose Meter and checked her glucose level. It was v low @ 3.0. Oh what a bad timing. She was doing all fine these last few weeks or so. Her medication last night must have acted strongly coupled with the higher cut in sugar intake lately, resulting in the steep lowering of the blood glucose this morning. I mixed some sweet syrups and gave her to drink up. (And one hour later she's back to 6.5 slighly overshooting the normal level but stabilising. Oh what a scare, a 2nd scare so early in the morning. Of course you may know that if the Hypoglycemia condition is alllowed to slip even further a diabetic person can go into a coma and we may have to visit the hospital or some place else...).
p.s.(2) You might have noticed that despite all these huha, i still tried to maintain some level of humour in this write up. This is just to maintain some sensibility and certainly some level of sanity as i lived through the morning.....I hope you guys have a nice day too!

All my love to you.
Who else but me,
Hans

the art of choosing

2010-07-30T16:21:00.000+08:00

This was posted by TED to my Inbox today and since i liked it very much i reposted it here in my blog. Watch, Think & just Enjoy the video ~ "Sheena Iyengar on the art of choosing"

Sheena Iyengar studies how we make choices -- and how we feel about the choices we make. At TEDGlobal, she talks about both trivial choices (Coke v. Pepsi) and profound ones, and shares her groundbreaking research that has uncovered some surprising attitudes about our decisions.

Sheena Iyengar studies how people choose (and what makes us think we're good at it)

and she's given me a nice piece of a**

2010-07-27T01:26:00.001+08:00

A short message was sent through feedback on my last blog post. There's "an award waiting for me" at my dearest friend's blog dyeve, and so i visited her blog tonight. Oh what a nice surprise and what a nice piece of a** which i received. And look at dyeve's comments herein:

TheBluesman - The Most Sweet Person!..shhh! Who Still Likes Chicks! Special Person!

Thanks for being a sweet person Dy and your award is certainly appreciated (including the wiggling act too). And I love you dearly as always.

Oh oh i forgot too, another dear friend Aswani also requested me to share his award (another award) altho' i told him that i don't deserve any award, this is to record my appreciation, thanks bro', small correction though, it's versatility award...

It's really sweet to receive these awards. Maybe some day the government of the day could set aside some funds to build a museum to house these awards in honour of me huh......!

a new challenge.....just shoot, shoot & shoot......

2010-07-22T18:36:00.001+08:00

pic taken from a wall mirror

I’ve been having my Lumix compact for the past one over year. One morning two weeks ago, I woke up and decided that I needed an upgrade. I’ve been eyeing a DSLR camera for quite some time. I’ve even resorted to a coin tossing in helping me to decide as to whether or not to include myself as one of those lucky DSLR camera owner, which I must admit that I knew next to nothing about a DSLR or anything close to an SLR. This has been going on for some time. It’s not the money but more of the “fear of the machine” itself, it’s the same feeling which I got when I first bought my desktop PC many moons ago.

a visually self taught book on photo editing

And so I went shopping for books, sourced the internet and asked some of my dear blog friends (esp. Muza-chan & Susanne van Hulst) for their kind info & advice and finally I settled upon a Nikon DSLR D90, not so down the line amateurish and neither it is at the higher pro level. So what do I know about this camera. Absolutely next to nothing! What’s the first book for reference, of course the Nikon D90 for Dummies. I just love these Dummies books as they are all written with only one thing in mind i.e. a dummy like me will usually end up reading them.

And yesterday, I officially became a DSLR owner, a beautiful Nikon DSLR D90. As usual I’m always terrified of reading the manual. Fortunately the dummy book gave me the usual dummy tuition and within just a few hours I was already snapping around. Not so intimidating after all.

Now what do I want with a DSLR camera? It’s really not about owning one but for me it’s all about the challenge, I like the challenge. A challenge keeps me busy. A challenge keeps me in focus. A challenge simply keeps me going. But the only thing bad about this challenge of mastering my new DSLR is that I won’t get pictured, it’s always about some other things or someone else. And as my friend Muza-chan was saying, if you happen to come across a white girl wandering the streets of Tokyo with a camera in hand, then it’s likely that it’s her. Sorry, you won’t be catching me lugging a DSLR around like that as I’m a still very much a newbie when it comes to digital photography. Maybe in ten years time, who knows…..

ps: Sue's very sound advice which i'm going to follow is to just shoot, shoot & shoot....and later decide on which one to retain, that's the beauty of going digital.

and now back to the old life

2010-07-15T09:00:00.000+08:00

One thing I hate after taking a ‘long’ leave of absence is to open the email inbox, OMG when am I going to finish reading the emails let alone replying them. And look at the strings of emails coming from my mailing lists & subscriptions, pictures, jokes, daily news, various updates and other online journals. It’s going to take weeks just to skim through every one of them. Fortunately though the guys were less productive during the world cup period, probably they were busy watching the live or recorded matches, betting or maybe catching up with their sleep and recovering from the coffee overdose.

This world cup series had been fun for me. I didn’t quite like soccer so much initially but became a convert as the tournament progressed. BUT I DEFINITELY LOST INTEREST when the matches ended at the semi final stage as my favourite teams got bundled out, Brazil, Argentina, England and later on Germany. And then Paul the octopus, came to mess up the whole thing and coming out with all kinds of turned out to be true predictions. And my last favourite orange Holland lost to the boring Spaniards. Now I think I would prefer to have my old life back again. And I’m back to hating soccer again for good until the next world cup series in Brazil when the time difference would be annoying since I’ll be having an early breakfast with soccer as a must added menu. See, i'm also predicting that i'll hopefully be around during the next world cup series.

Now I am slowly trying to recover my old life back. Kind of depressing after all the fun has gone. Fortunately I’m not into betting as some of my friends did and so I do not have any wounds to lick. My money is safe and sound. I remember during the last world cup series a friend totally disappeared from the scene, ran away to another country after being chased by the bookies after he lost very heavily. Still no trace of him & his family till today and I heard that he escaped to Canada with his entire family. He lost close to a million bucks. Never should one gamble the life away just on some stupid soccer games. But humans will never learn their lesson. I hear quite similar stories this time around too.

And the only thing that I’ve lost this time around was coffee & more coffee, that too is not good for health but I can bear with it for the time being as caffeine is my savior in time of need as well as excitement, bluurrrggh!

pic source: The Star

a baldy appeared in between the world cup matches

2010-07-08T01:43:00.001+08:00

Looks like I’m still continuing with the series on the life & happenings during this world cup. Frankly speaking I never quite like the world cup, never before until now. I’ve never before watched so many world cup matches until this current 2010 series. It’s actually a no choice situation as the remote control around the house has been “directed” to the world cup channels only. I couldn’t have the freedom to switch to other channels, it’s soccer, soccer & more soccer all the way. Fortunately I don’t need to clock in the office the next day after watching the “graveyard” live matches @2:30~4:00am and so I get to sleep till midday in time for lunch. And so the days pass on with soccer & more soccer and of course with more coffee along the way. What kind of stupid life is that. It’s FUNNNNNN!

BTW did you guys notice that I’ve changed my profile picture. My head is now completely bald! Kojak has come to pay a visit! There’s a story to tell as to how I ended up getting my head completely shaven. And I guess it’s nice to be bald once in a while. Why not huh!

I happened to recently come across an elderly guy who could perform a “Bekam” (not D.Beckham) treatment on my head & body at a nominal cost ( I’m unable to find what’s the correct English equivalent for “Bekam”, which is a popular alternative kind of treatment in SE Asia but not as common as it used to be nowadays). Not many people can perform such a treatment and some specialised clinics (or private practitioners) may charge a bundle to get it done. The procedure involves cupping and bloodletting on energy point systems, such as the acupuncture, anatomy, chakra and lataf points. It is almost painless and conducted in a strictly clinical environment using sterile instruments and apparatus.

According to a local website Akubekam , I quote: “ ‘Bekam’ focuses on getting rid of blockages in the blood circulation and restoring the vital energy and body functions. It treats diseases directly by eliminating the root of the problem by drawing out the toxic (surface) blood. Following the treatment the body recoups quickly and naturally and attains normalcy speedily. The procedure leaves no cross infection, hardly any pain or side effects or mishaps and is very safe”.

So what do you get after the treatment? You’ll experience lightness and pain relief for migraine headaches, sinusitis, backache, neck ache & stiffness and other body aches and a host of other body ailments. The above website gives a long list of such relief. (But don't expect the treatment to boost the libido).

And so I went for the treatment and since a portion of my head has been shaved bald i might as well shaved the whole head. The rest of the story are better told in the following pictures.

shaving & "Bekam" process begins

surface incision & suction done

cupping & suction on body

suction in process

toxic blood sucked out

suction marks remained visible for a few days

my beautiful hair gone, sob*

both sides of the head grazed

... & the baldy guy appears

I'll stick around with my bald head for a couple of months and then i'll go back to the previous style so as to look less intimidating, what do you think.....

it happened when i was still having the cup blues...

2010-06-22T15:13:00.001+08:00

Demolition work in progress

I did a short post sometime almost a year ago about our Pudu Jail, an iconic 115 year old prison right in the heart of Kuala Lumpur built by the British and completed in 1895.

And last night the authorities decided to knock down the walls to make way for some developments in the area. Construction on the 4.5 metre wall, also known as Pudu Goal, started in 1891 on Jalan Hang Tuah and it was fully completed in 1895 at a cost of RM15,360.90 (less than US5K), the whole complex cost RM138,000 (less than US45k) with materials brought in from Britain and India.

Demolished

When i visited the exhibition last year, i secretly took some pictures of the so-called going-ons in the prison then. I didn't post the pictures at the time as i didn't want to breach the exhibition rules and i'm still abiding by the said rules. Some of the pictures maybe outright offensive to some people esp images of the convicts getting caned and the frightening gallows with the dangling noose waiting to hang some unfortunate souls. These pictures will remain in my private collection and may be released maybe some hundred years later, by whoever descendent of mine who may be able to decipher or unlock my password leading to my fast growing picture collection. Oh boy did i sound so....never mind, just wait another hundred years.

According to the press report, hundreds of onlookers watched as excavators broke through the eastern wall of Pudu Jail on Monday night, leaving many heritage lovers aghast at the loss of an iconic structure for commercial development. Authorities last year began tearing down structures inside the sprawling complex on the edge of Kuala Lumpur's most famous shopping area Bukit Bintang. But that was done away from public gaze and did not attract as much attention as the demolition of the famous mural wall which could be seen as one travels past the prison along Jln Pudu.

The world longest wall mural (@384meters, faded) as seen along Jln Pudu

Pudu Jail is notorious for housing Allied prisoners during the Japanese invasion of the Malaya peninsula. After World War II, the prison housed common criminals and some were executed there. Many prisoners with artistic flair were deployed to paint murals depicting scenes of nature on the outside of the wall, creating a wraparound work of art around the jail. Despite fading because of age and the elements, the murals remained a tourist attraction for many years.

The prison complex

A grim reminder of the death penalty for drug trafficking

The City Mayor was reported as saying the City Hall asked the contractors to leave the main entrance to Pudu jail intact for "its historical significance." But The Heritage of Malaysia Trust dismissed it as a futile gesture, saying conservation of just a small part of the jail will make a "mockery of heritage."

The main entrance to be retained

And where was i at the time of the demoliton. I was watching the world cup matches, completely oblivious of what's happening at the very site which is about a few kilometers from my residence. It goes on to show that there were important things for me to do, what a sinful and selfish act on my part, boy the world cup comes once in 4 yrs. Did the authorities decide on the date & time of demolition to coincide with the world cup matches being played. Hopefully not but they sure knew how to attract less attention, intentionally or otherwise.

ps: i remember once which happened up north in Penang when a heritage building was intentionally demolished by the contractor during a weekend when the enforcement dept was not working and not able to enforce the rules. The contractor gladly paid the small fine and got away with it.

an aerial view of Penang, Malaysia

pic.source:

(1) http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hAHKxQx5PQziZ0Jn29dUlVRHVq6QD9GG3VGG0

(2) http://www.google.com.my/imglanding?q=pudu%20jail&imgurl=http://www.malaxi.com/kuala_lumpur/images/pudu_jail_door.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.malaxi.com/kuala_lumpur/pudu_jail.html&h=335&w=500&sz=133&tbnid=dgJm0yC8ejNLXM:&tbnh=87&tbnw=130&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dpudu%2Bjail&usg=__PlZ65xHonsjlPhiMt8R8dVEuAKk=&sa=X&ei=8EwgTOrcOo27rAeFlr1_&ved=0CDcQ9QEwBg&start=0#tbnid=8VCZ852EurhOnM&start=53
(3) http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2010/6/22/nation/6519729&sec=nation

(4) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penang

still with the cup blues...

2010-06-18T00:26:00.001+08:00

Still coping with the deafening environment, day & night. I couldn't even watch the other programs on the telly as the remote control seems to be automatically programmed to locate the dedicated world cup channels. So without a properly balanced life at the moment due to the cup fever, somehow my urge to write a decent blog post is somewhat stifled. And so the extended break is set to continue. Btw, the streets were deserted when Argentina took on South Korea this evening , my time which is six hours ahead of South Africa. It was as though one could just safely lie down the middle of the road as the traffic was almost non-existent. That's the magic of the world cup fever...nobody wanted to do anything productive except watching the soccer games.

And for quite the first time in weeks (or is it years), i cooked dinner tonight. Don't you guys laugh. I can cook too and i'm also capable of handling a few other household chores like washing the clothes (exclude ironing) and house cleaning. And of course brewing my own pot of fine coffee!

pic. source: http://www.toxel.com/inspiration/2010/06/16/creative-fifa-world-cup-advertising/

the cup blues

2010-06-15T00:53:00.000+08:00

Didn’t I post something about a friend’s warning statement recently about his preparation to welcome the world cup. Well the cup fever is on now and it looks like many of those warnings are already set in place, all at the expense of his loved ones.

The cup fever is already into it’s 5th day and the whole neighbourhood or rather the whole country or even the whole world are talking about nothing else but soccer. Frankly I’m not much into soccer although I do watch the games esp when I’ve nothing else better to do. Watching these current world cup soccer matches is just like watching a bunch of grown-up men in shorts chasing a stupid ball, now called Jabulani, up and down a 105m by 68m grass pitch somewhere in South Africa. And some of these grown-up men are millionaires as a result of chasing similar kind of balls in many other grass pitches elsewhere. Sorry, oh oh, I’m going to get clobbered for saying this.

As I’ve said above I’m not so much into soccer. If I’m having my usual coffee at the café and there’s a game on then I just watch. Or if someone is watching the game at home, I may just join in too sometimes. I’ve no particular team to shout for but I always end up with the champion team as I tend to choose my team on the 89th minute of the final day play off. And so I get to be with the champs every time, be it the world cup or any other soccer leagues including the EPL.

This world cup fever is on till the 12th July and so it’s an agonizing world cup blues for me as everywhere it’s all about soccer. There are those who have never kicked a ball in their entire life, are also talking & discussing soccer like an expert. Bluurrrrgh! Even the blind men are also discussing about soccer, they must be ‘seeing’ with their ears or their brains maybe.

I bought 2 pieces of short sleeve shirts at the mall today and I got a free soccer ball. The shirts were never related to anything close to soccer and yet they gave me a free leather ball. I refused to take it but they insisted that I took the ball home. Oh, ok let’s see whether it fits into my dustbin at home. The malls are selling all kinds of world cup items and they even sell world cup undies too. How creative can that be.

The last world cup there was this coke ad which mentioned something like “eat, sleep, soccer but drink coca cola”. This time around, please allow me to have my coffee in peace…..and just watch the soccer matches as and when i feel like watching not in South Africa but at some southern corner of my sofa.

i was given the finger...

2010-06-09T01:46:00.005+08:00

I was rushing home after an appointment in the city today and stopped by a T-junction quite near my residence. As soon as the lights turned green I pressed the accelerator and moved forward. A motorcyclist came from the other side and turned into my path. He was obviously ignoring the red lights and doing so at a great risk to his life. Fortunately for him my feet wasn’t on the accelerator fast enough when the lights turned green in my favour.

I honked him hard and jammed my brakes. The guy turned to look in my direction and immediately gave me the finger. I gave him the punch sign in return. Never did he realise that I was doing him a big favour by not knocking him over. Ungrateful fellow!

This has been going on for far too long on our city roads. These motorcyclists usually have no regard for other road users. Sometimes we motorists have to look at all angles at all times, left & right, front & back, as these motorcyclists like to zigzag through traffic and beating the traffic lights seem to be their norm. No wonder the injury and death toll involving the motorcyclists and pillions are on the top of list of road accidents in the country.

And so I got fingered today eh. It’s all part of the days happening anyway. Hopefully tomorrow promises a better day.

an x-smoker's tale

2010-06-08T02:35:00.004+08:00

I was once a smoker. Who isn’t anyway, there’re many who does smoke and are still at it. Even the ladies too. There’re many reasons as to why people smoke, friends are the most likely source of inspiration for many smokers. Same with me. Easy, just blame it on friends rather than on our ownself. They are the easy ghosts to put the blame on. It takes the guilt out of smoking, well at least so for me. And the sin of smoking too.

Likewise there are many smokers who stop after some years of contributing towards the cigarette manufacturer’s coffers. And to the government coffers as well. Likewise there’re many reasons as to why people stop smoking too. But friends were never the excuse mentioned when people decide to quit smoking, funny but true, well at least so for me. They just disappeared from the list of reasons and so they never get to claim the credit. Sorry friends…

Did I ever mention as to how and why I stopped smoking some years ago. Maybe or maybe not. Anyway to refresh, I was visiting a friend who was hospitalised for a heart bypass one day and upon leaving the hospital ward and whilst walking to the carpak, a sudden thought came to my mind …….. “hey bro’ why don’t you stop smoking”. I thought about it for less than 30 seconds and decided that it’s time to quit smoking. And so without further ado, I just threw my pack of 20 less 2 sticks and the beautiful lighter right into a nearby drain. I took a few steps forward at the same time assessing whether there were any regrets. None whatsoever and I felt very good and drove home whistling. What an achievement. I must admit later that there was this very very tiny bit of regret for stopping so suddenly without any notice or any cooling down period. The next one week or so I got the blues, the nicotine blues I call it. After the week was over, I never looked back. Good bye fag(gy)! You’ve been an expensive nuisance to me.

To all of my friends who are still holding on to the habit, you better quit. Don’t think. Just quit. Altho’ there has never been a direct proof between smoking and death, your body could just be suffering without you knowing it until it’s too late. And furthermore, smoking is fast becoming quite an expensive habit too nowadays.

And may I share some stories here which I could still remember, a recollection from my smoking days

~ Upon disembarking a no smoking flight at the Narita Airport enroute to Tokyo, I rushed out and grabbed a smoke at one corner before the immigration clearance. Halfway through my puffing, a security personnel approached me and pointed to the No Smoking warning written in Japanese characters. I pretended stupid by saying I couldn’t understand as I’m a kaijin, a foreigner. He got a bit startled and then he pointed to me the No Smoking picture which was hung about 3 meters away. Oh oh, he got me there. Any stupid foreigner could easily understand what the picture message was all about. The whole process took a few minutes and by the time he finished with me, I had completely smoked the whole cigarette and handed to him the butt as I indicated in sign language that I didn’t know where to throw it. I bowed to him. He was sporting enough to smile and even apologised for causing trouble to me. So much about the Japanese courtesy!

~ Upon disembarking at Frankfurt Airport and at about 5am, I was at a loss to look for the check in counter for my connecting flight to Hanover. I couldn’t understand the signs as they were in German. So I sat down at one corner and started smoking whilst waiting to ask someone. A group of German girls approached me. Nice girls. I couldn’t understand what they were saying. But as usual the sign language cuts across all barriers. They were asking me to spare some cigarettes as it was quite cold then. One good turn deserved another. They held my arms and happily showed me to the right counter for checking in and even stayed on with me until I boarded the plane some two hours later. Of course it did cost me three packs of twenty. So much about German hospitality!

~ Upon disembarking at the Changi Airport Singapore once, one security personnel approached me and said ‘Welcome to Singapore’ and asked whether I’m bringing in any cigarettes. I said yes but only one packet not one carton. He wanted to search me but I confidently refused him as it was not necessary and he backed off. Never even bother to say sorry. So much about Singaporean obsession with health/security/or whatever!

~ Upon disembarking at the Jeddah Airport and queueing up for the immigration clearance, the counter was suddenly closed as the officer decided to take a smoke and he did it right in the full view of those waiting in line. Didn’t give a damn about it. Some 15 minutes later he opened up the counter again and continued with his duties as if nothing had happened. So much about being rude. And so much about these Arabian respect for others!

~ Upon disembarking at the Hanoi Airport, north Vietnam at about 1am after taking the last flight out from Ho ChiMinh City with a Japanese colleague, a group of soldiers approached us whilst we were smoking at one corner. They were holding guns. We thought that we were in trouble as we’ve heard about the nasty stories about the Vietcongs, courtesy of those Rambo and other Hollywood junks. It turned out that they wanted to exchange our cigarettes with their local ones and they offered us coffee as part of the exchange. Their coffees were not as good as their counterpart in the south in Ho ChiMinh City but it was something to cushion the freezing temperature at least. So much about fearing the Vietcongs!

~ Cruising along some streets of Manila with a few Filipino friends and we were short of cigarettes. And my friends said not to worry. True enough when we stopped at a traffic light, I was surprised that I could buy lots of things not only cigarettes during that few minutes stop. The same thing happened to me in Jakarta. So much about being enterprising!

~ There were many other experiences at other airports, unfortunately there’s nothing much to tell as I’ve already stopped smoking by then.

BTW why did I write this post? I was having my coffee today at a nearby café and the cigarette smokes from a nearby table kept heading towards my direction. I got annoyed and told the young guys seated there to blow their smoke somewhere else and spare me the annoying tobacco aroma. They felt guilty, quickly settled their bill and quietly left the scene. My coffee certainly tasted so much better after that.

pic. source: http://www.fotosearch.com/clip-art/smoking_2.html

indecisiveness can sometimes be a pain...

2010-06-03T01:58:00.001+08:00

We eat out on most days. Often it’s more economical to do so. What more there are plenty to choose around. And so, day in day out, we drive in and out, to look for meals and seeking different and sometimes new kinds of food experience. Sometimes three times a day and at some other times four or five times, especially when we decide to have some snacks in between. So living must be about eating then, eh! Don’t get me wrong, i still believe in the golden rule of ‘Eating to Live’ rather than ‘Living to Eat’, although sometimes I do conveniently have some lapses in memory. Oh boy, there’re just too many good food around, should never allow them go to waste.

(ps: Taking smaller meals 4 or 5 times a day helps in spreading out the glucose in the body system and this is actually a good advice to heed for diabetics or even for pre-diabetics).

The worst part in eating out is not so much about the cost or the venue but what kind of food to consume. Eating alone is never a problem but when the two of us (or when the son also decides to come back and join in) then the problem starts. The three of us have kind of different preferences when it comes to food. Anna is more traditional in her taste of food, I’m more open whilst the other guy prefers all the time chicken only menus. Even the UN general assembly can easily come to certain compromise on many conflicting issues. We need to choose a venue where all the three party’s tastes are catered for in the menus. (If we were to cook at home, there’ll certainly be almost three sets of menus on the table, hence my mentioning about economics above).

A short discussion is usually convened prior to driving out for our meals. The main problem is always one of indecisiveness or sometimes delays in wanting to make a decision. It can be a pain when we cannot come to a common decision. Fortunately, this happens when it comes to deciding on what to eat. Democracy is allowed to prevail when deciding on what to eat for the day. However in almost all the other matters, the big boss of the house has got the final say & veto!

Certainly, being indecisive can be a pain….. but then life by nature is quite confusing. Indecisiveness has nothing to do with intelligence or something. Usually it’s only when they are choices available then the problem starts to come in. When one “refuses” or “delays” in making the decision, these could be categorised as being indecisive also, at least in my own interpretation of indecisiveness.

Why I sometimes regard indecisiveness as a pain….is because I dislike taking too long a time to decide on certain things. Same thing applies when a person simply refuse to decide, whether to choose what food to eat or whether to buy or to do one thing or another. To be able to make a decision and a quick one at that, it requires training and discipline. If the options are too many, just restrict them to not more than three. A more systematic way which I always favour is by drawing a list and assign ratings against each entry. A decision may be easily made by a process of elimination, just like how the criminologists handle their work at the crime scene.

And you think that I’ve not given these lectures to my household members? Sometimes I ended up feeling like I’m talking to the walls. Still, since life can be quite confusing at times, I’ve no choice but to persist in giving the same lectures. Don’t you find life interesting despite all the shortcomings! *Sigh!

writing & thinking skills

2010-06-02T01:14:00.005+08:00

Did it ever occur to you that thinking skills could be further developed by writing and more writing? Of course we could just sit down and work on puzzles and try to solve something like Sudoku or other brain stimulating games but writing is an even more powerful tool to further develop our thinking skills. I’ve begun to realize this after I accidentally started blogging my nights away for the last one year or so.

In schools those days, the subject I hated most was English grammar, oh, okay 2^nd most, the top most being English literature. Both subjects were not so boring. I guess the dreary old teacher must have added fuel to the whole boring English classes. Imagine assigning an old lady to teach both the subjects during a usually hot afternoon. No wonder I just scraped through in my language exams.

I later tried to improve through my own reading. Writing to pen pals & to the girls especially, was the order of the day during the snail mail days. Kids these days never get to experience using snail mails as even the very announcement of their birth are often made known by emails or some other e-services. Anyway letter writing was how I started to learn how to write. And when I had to sit for some of my law papers, I had to be stopped from writing too much by the invigilator and in one instance my fingers became stiff and had to be massaged for two days before I could straighten them out. And I continued to enjoy writing and lately blogging gives me an excuse to write and to continue writing.

Now what’s writing got to do with developing one’s thinking skills? I got too engrossed telling about my old English teacher just now eh. The Education Ministry should consider assigning beautiful & sexy ladies to teach boring subjects like languages especially to science students like me. Such beautiful beings are equally appreciated by both male & female students, the females are looking for role models and the males ~ for the usual fantasies inside their head ~ not sexual ~ no never ~ we males just happen to appreciate beauty ~ trust me huh!

Writing tends to actually clarify my thoughts. The thoughts become clearer when I can express them esp through writing. At least that’s how i feel after having written something like this one. I try to make the other person understand and by so doing i bring myself to that understanding. It’s like what some people say about “thinking aloud”. To me, writing is like talking to the paper or nowadays to the LCD screen and the thinking skills are developed through the process of explaining things as i write along.

When i write even for my blog, there’s always the tendency to reopen some old memories as i go along. And so writing helps to reinforce old memories as well as creating new ones. When attending any talks, i like to write notes, i do that a lot too. This is just to help me remember them. Writing has certainly helped to reinforce my memory and my thinking skills at the same time.

My said old teacher once said that when we want to learn about something, try writing them out and build up on what’s been written earlier. I used to write quotations or wise men sayings in my small booklet and it has helped me in understanding about life and about people too. Writing has helped in organizing my thoughts before actually putting them on paper, but nowadays it’s even better as i can easily use the keyboard backspace whenever i make any mistakes and i can do cross referencing if i happen to be online at the same time. And it’s fun too.

So where do we go from here. Just you start writing and we get to see the results at the end of the day. You can even start by offering your valuable insights on what I’ve written above…Why not huh!

we said hello to the prince of persia

2010-05-28T01:01:00.000+08:00

It was a hot thursday afternoon and i didn't feel like staying home talking to my Arowana who has been refusing to eat for the past week or so due to some stress maybe. The arowana is a bit jealous as i just placed another smaller aquarium beside it with a new fish, the Flower Horn.

And i told Anna, to please get up and stop lazing around the house and let's go see some movies or something. And so we went to the nearby mall and watched the Prince of Persia. Not bad and it's quite entertaining for me as i have always loved (reading and) watching the arabian nights in action but Anna managed to snore for a while as she wasn't feeling too well or maybe she was intoxicated by the popcorn.

That's us, when things are a bit bored at home we just hit the cinema circuit, which is now even more conveniently located very near to our residence. Just last week we saw the Robin Hood movie but as usual i never quite like Russel Crowe in the leading role (didn't he always mumble his words) and the story line was quite boring to me unlike the previous Robin Hood adventures. Why can't they make a picture to our liking, my liking. This movie was shelved after a week's showing.

I happen to like watching movies a lot and since Anna also shares the same interest, it's a bit easier to plan our assault on the cinemas. In fact we do share many other similar interests EXCEPT the Japanese enka. Sometimes i played my enka CD collection just to "irritate" her a bit. And that was what happened when we got back from the movies this afternoon. I told her that's the price for the bit of snoring in the cinema today!

and yet another enka...

2010-05-21T08:46:00.000+08:00

I woke up very early this morning and since i had nothing much to do before breakfast i surfed around looking for some inspiration. I don't feel like doing any serious blogging or commenting today. The mood is just not there. And so i turned to music to nurse my sentimental soul for a change.

One of my favourite blog by Muza-chan has always been my inspiration when it comes to anything Japan or Japanese and talking about Japan i just can't escape mentioning about enka songs. By now some of you already know that i'm quite a crazy fan of these Japanese enka songs, a passion which i picked up when i was feeling quite lonely and getting the blues during my stays in Tokyo some years back.

I posted an enka song yesterday and this morning i'm posting another which was also referred to by Muza-chan. The singer is Shiro Miya and the song is Onna no Michi ~ (The Way of a Woman) was the debut single of Shiro Miya and tells the story of a woman abandoned by her husband. Relax and just listen to the melody and you'll "get" feel of the meaning behind the song. Enjoy & have a nice day!

another cool enka selection...

2010-05-20T15:35:00.001+08:00

This Japanese Enka song isn't so torturing like the previous ones posted by me. This young guy could really sing the enka. I'm enjoying my afternoon coffee with a dash of cinnamon as suggested by someone before. Enjoy your day with my enka selection! (this enka song was recommended by muza-chan ).

Please don't ask me what he is singing about as i don't speak Japanesel. Just listen to the melody and as always music cuts across all barriers.....

a warning/notice we can do without...

2010-05-20T13:13:00.000+08:00

Imagine my disbelief this morning when i discovered a Warning/Notice appearing in my mailbox sent by an old friend who happens to be a soccer fanatic. I knew that he likes soccer very much but i didn't know that he is that crazy about soccer, crazy enough to draw such a Warning/Notice and sending me a copy of it. If this is supposed to be a joke then it must be the joke of the century for me.

At the same time i do admire about some people who are crazy over something especially when it comes to sports which are supposed to be a healthy pastime. But then again although sports are considered to be indulging in something healthy, excessive craze by some is but another nothing altogether. My response as usual, it takes all sorts of people to make this world!

For the full texts please read further. Be a sport & be open or even have a good laugh and oh, oh since you're already here perhaps share with me your views on the matter!

Dear

Wife/ Sweetheart/Girl Friend/ Partner/whomever it may concern,

1. Between 11 June and 11 July 2010, you should read the sports section of the newspaper so that you are aware of what is going on regarding the World of Soccer, and that way you will be able to join in the conversations. If you fail to do this, then you will be looked at in a bad way, or you will be totally ignored. DO NOT complain about not receiving any attention.

2. During the World Cup, the television is mine, at all times, without any exceptions. If you even take a glimpse of the remote control, you will lose it (your eye).

3. If you have to pass by in front of the TV during a game, I don't mind, as long as you do it crawling on the floor and without distracting me.

4. During the games I will be blind, deaf and mute, unless I require a refill of my drink or something to eat. You are out of your mind if you expect me to listen to you, open the door, answer the telephone, or pick up the baby that just fell on the floor....It won't happen.

5. It would be a good idea for you to keep at least 2 six packs in the fridge at all times, as well as plenty of things to nibble on (excluding your body parts), and please do not make any funny faces to my friends when they come over too watch the games. In return, you will be allowed to use the TV between 12am and 6am, unless they replay a good game that I missed during the day.

6. Please, please, please!! If you see me upset because one of my teams is losing, DO NOT say "get over it, it's only a game", or "don't worry, they'll win next time". If you say these things, you will only make me angrier and I will love you less. Remember, you will never ever know more about football than me and your so called "words of encouragement" will only lead to a break up or divorce.

7. You are welcome to sit with me to watch one game and you can talk to me during halftime but only when the commercials are on, and only if the half time scores is pleasing me. In addition, please note I am saying "one" game ; hence do not use the World Cup as a nice cheesy excuse to "spend time together".

8. The replays of the goals are very important. I don't care if I have seen them or I haven't seen them, I want to see them again, Many times.

9. Tell your friends NOT to have any babies, or any other child related parties or gatherings that requires my attendance because:

a) I will not go,

b) I will not go, and

c) I will not go.

10. But, if a friend of mine invites us to his house on a Sunday to watch a game, we will be there in a flash.

11. The daily World Cup highlights show on TV every night is just as important as the games themselves. Do not even think about saying "but you have already seen this...why don't you change the channel to something we can all watch?" because, the reply will be, "Refer to Rule #2 of this list".

12. And finally, please save your expressions such as "Thank God the World Cup is only every 4 years". I am immuned to these words, because before and after this comes the Champions League,, Premier League, Italian League, Spanish League, KPL, FAA Cup, Euro Cup, etc.

P//S: By the way if you get stuck on the road, call the Police or AAA.

Thank you for your cooperation.

a crazy behaviour nonetheless...

2010-05-20T12:13:00.001+08:00

I've been lazing around the house these past one week or so doing nothing. So much concern about my being productive at all time and here am i just lazing around doing nothing better. That's quite unusual. Not for a whole long week. I was supposed to make a trip down south and then to Batam Island, Indonesia for a short holiday last week. It did not materialise due to some technical problems. Frankly i hate having setbacks like that but then again these things do happen from time to time. I was looking forward to that short trip. When it was canceled my stress meter shot up to the orange zone level, the same as it was the week before.

Funny thing about me is that whenever my stress level clawed back to the higher zone level, i have this tendency to spend money unnecessarily. At first i couldn't understand why is this happening, i mean about spending money just like throwing something away. Later i realised that stress was to blame for it. Yeah, go and blame it on stress! Not too long ago, when i was a bit upset over something, i just went out to buy a new digital camera and discarded my old one. On another occasion i traded my stereo amplifier and opted for a new one with a much better specs. although the old one was still churning good music. Throughout my personal history, this has been happening all the time.

And what happened this time. Aha, there was this sudden urge to change my cellphone, from a 2-week old locally cloned Blueberry to a much better Barrack Obama's inspired piece, the Blackberry Bold II, which cost five times more. My stress meter dropped down to the blue zone level immediately after the said purchase. (p.s: btw, the local boys sure knew about making their products sound marketable).

So what is happening here. Is it the stress level being the root of the problem or just my old plain craze for something electronics or both? Over the years, i've come to realise that whenever my stress meter goes up, the magnetic influence of electronics seem to be the order of the day. Anything electronics huh, you poor miserable soul!

Other people may resort to some other behaviour when they find themselves in a stressful situation or in the orange or red zone level. Anybody cares to share their piece here.....!

as one grows older.....

2010-05-13T00:32:00.000+08:00

In my last post i mentioned about having a severe blog over (~hangover). Looks like it was a short attack, hopefully. I just received an email from an old friend and he posted me with the following story which i'm glad to share it with my friends through my blog here. It's a short amusing story about life itself and how things tend to change with life as we grow older.

Hopefully when you readers progress in your age later on, you'll keep this story in mind and have a good laugh as you go along. Here goes:

A group of 40 years old buddies discuss and discuss where they should meet for dinner.

Finally it is agreed upon that they should meet at the Ocean View restaurant because the waitress's there have low cut blouses and are pretty.

10 years later, at 50 years of age, the group once again discusses and discusses where they should meet for dinner. Finally it is agreed that they should meet at the Ocean View restaurant because the food there is very good and the coffee is good also.

10 years later at 60 years of age, the group once again discusses and discusses where they should meet for dinner. Finally it is agreed that they should meet at the Ocean View restaurant because they can eat there in peace and quiet and the restaurant had a beautiful view of the ocean.

10 years later, at 70 years of age, the group once again discusses and discusses where they should meet for dinner. Finally it is agreed that they should meet at the Ocean View restaurant because the restaurant is wheel chair accessible and they even have an elevator.

10 years later, at 80 years of age, the group once again discusses and discusses where they should meet for dinner. Finally it is agreed that they should meet at the Ocean View restaurant because they have never been there before.

That was the end of the story, Why? Something must have happened to most if not all of them...

blog over & the cup fever

2010-05-12T23:06:00.002+08:00

My last post was last Wednesday. Since then I’ve been just visiting other blogs from one end of the world to the other and checking on the current situation on my Facebook account. And this week I’ve a severe blog over, something like a hangover or a headache or simply too much blogging. And so I decided to have a short break and coincidentally the cup fever is on now.

The whole of this week, the country is gripped with the cup fever. We are hosting the badminton tournament, the Thomas Cup and the Uber Cup . I dislike going to the stadium as it would be too much of an excitement for me and I also dread the mad scramble of the traffic after the matches are over. I would rather stay home and watch the live telecast starting from 6pm and ending till almost midnight.

Just for this week only, all my activities cease at 5:30pm and by 6pm I’m already glued to the TV screen, stopping for meals/snacks & prayers in between the games. If you were to ask me whether I like the sports, my answer is maybe no. I guest it’s just for the adrenalin rush. I like watching the fighting spirits of some of the world class players in action. In the earlier years, such sporting events came with the usual small friendly side betting among friends, just for the fun of it and to add some excitement to the whole thing. But those days are over for me as I would now rather watch the matches in the comfort of my home.

See you guys next week…..when my blog over is really over by then, hopefully.

ps: come this June, the fever goes to Capetown, South Africa, for the soccer world cup.

just a thought.....

2010-05-05T02:51:00.002+08:00

This is a reblog based on my comments at my dear friend Aswani’s blog on Style Blogging…

Blogging is simply the act of posting entries in a weblog or a web-based publication. It also includes posting comments on someone else's blog too. A weblog or simply a blog, is different from that of a website since a blog tends to get updated very often, sometimes even on a daily basis. A blog is used more when we want to allow our viewers to communicate with each other, or with us in a more casual manner.

The other key word is style which is the way in which something is said or expressed. Some people may say, oh, you may need to work on your writing style, that must be the way you put together a sentence or group of sentences. The problem with style is that it can be quite subjective. People have different ideas about what constitutes good writing style just like in fashion or the way some people sing their songs. I may like my style whilst others may not be sharing the same preferences. By this I would say that each person has got their own style of doing things.

Now what is a good style then? This is quite a difficult question to answer but if I may say, when I see that it’s a good style and you agree with me that it’s a good style and the rest of the people out there are having the same opinion too, then THAT is a good style. I can’t answer the question in definition mode style, heh3x.

What more can I say? If I may repeat, a blog entry or a blog post should be casual in nature. What makes a blog to appear interesting is the quality of input and how the messages are put across to the readers. Call them creativity or whatever, I call it giving your readers what they want as against what you want all the time The number of followers or the number of commenters in a blog are not the criteria to conclude that the blog is of high standard or even of it’s popularity as widely perceived. I’ve seen & read many blogs which are of very high quality but with very few followers or without having any commenters at all. It’s actually quite easy to accumulate the number of followers and likewise when certain keywords are used, readers are tempted to leave some comments behind if a comment is just what a blogger is looking for. If one is familiar with the idea of body language, there is also such a thing as a talk language or how a word when said is analysed to mean another thing or which could be used to draw attention or whatever we wish to have. Any book on talk language is worth reading. And I believe those in advertising lines are using this approach all the time besides conveying the subliminal messages at times.

In conclusion, just say what we mean and do remember that our goal in writing is not to sound intelligent or interesting, but to get our intelligent or interesting points across. We should write or post in our blog just like we speak to our friends over a meal. Now isn’t that easy to do? Not really, as even when talking to friends we must remember to observe our manners & also be courteous at all times.

Ciao!

ps: i didn't write all these, he did........>>>

weekend @the movies

2010-05-03T03:04:00.000+08:00

Oh what a weekend. Over the weekend i decided to take a break and went out to watch two new movies. It was shown in a less than two days old brand new cineplexes which is just a walking distance from my residence.

On Saturday we watched Ironman 2

And on Sunday we watched a kungfu movie IP Man 2

Hence, there were no blogging activities over the weekend. IP Man 2 was very much better & more entertaining than the first movie whereas the Ironman 2 was much of the same stuff as before but the fighting scene especially at the Monaco racing track was just awesome. The conclusions are always open ended, probably there'll be other sequels in future. As they always say, there's no business like show business. Watching movies is another favourite pastime for me too. Although i usually wait for the DVD copy to be released, it's nothing like watching movies on a bigger cinematic screen.

some thoughts on blog response

2010-04-30T00:41:00.000+08:00

( This blog post was based on my comments or response to another post posted by my dear friend Aswani in his blog Future Perfect )

".....When we post something in our blog it is always nice to receive a response. What is a blog post without receiving a response at all unless we are not bothered as to whether or not we receive a response to our post, that being the case why bother to invite for comments in the first place. It's always nice to receive comments from our readers even just for a one word response.

Response can be positive and sometimes they can be negative too. It's always very nice to receive positive or pleasant comments from readers. It's only human to dislike reading negative response. It can be tempting to respond likewise when receiving negative comments but what's the point, just accept it, neutralise it or simply ignore it and move on.

There's just no simple solution to this problem. If we ever get "stung" by these negative comments, then my advice is to disappear from blogsphere for a few days and return when the"poison" wears off. This advice is based on my experience when i was involved in the discussion under soc.culture newsgroups previously. Often the negative comments from the participants under some of those political groupings can be outright nasty and hence if we are not careful we can easily get "stung" by their comments and may ended up feeling moody for the whole week. So taking a walk away from it all helps to soothe or cool down the wounded soul. And after a period of time, we get to learn to tolerate differing viewpoints. Remember that it takes all sorts of people to make this world. Life's too short to brood over some negative comments. So move on.

Sometimes i wonder as to why we get negative comments to our blog post. If it's just sort of a differing viewpoint, then that should be perfectly acceptable for the simple reason that we do invite comments to our blog post in the first instance. But then if the so-called negative comments are very much way off the mark, then it's better to ignore them or just take a walk as i mentioned above. Deleting the comments is an easy way out but it should be done as a last resort esp in cases where the comments are against public policy or against the rule of natural justice, what ever that means nowadays......"

I reproduced this just to share with my readers/followers in my blog here. Maybe they have other views on the matter......what say you huh...

some thoughts about life

2010-04-23T00:49:00.000+08:00

When I was younger, I heard some elders mentioned that actually life begins at forty. What they meant was that people start to feel life when one reaches the age of forty. It also means that life begins to be better in one’s middle age which nowadays is rightly pegged at the convenient age of forty. I repeat, conveniently pegged at age forty, not a fixed thing btw.

From the people at the phrase finders, i quote them saying “the notion that 'life begins at forty' is a 20th century one; prior to that it was more accurate to say 'death begins at forty' as most people didn't live much beyond that age. Life expectancy in mediaeval England was around 25 years and only reached forty sometime around the turn of the 20th century. By the 1930s many, in western societies at least, could expect a decent spell of reasonably affluent retirement, free from work and the responsibilities of childcare. Household gadgets like washing machines and vacuum cleaners were becoming more widely used and had begun to relieve women's drudgery and offer them increasing amounts of leisure time as compared to their Victorian mothers”.

When a person reaches the age of forty, about half of his or her life has passed. I remember someone else told me once that there are few packages in life. The first twenty years of our life we get to grow up and study as much as we could. The second twenty years of our life till the age forty, we get to apply what we’ve learned. The third twenty years of our life till the age sixty, we get to enjoy the fruits of our labour. And the fourth twenty years of our life till the age of eighty, we get to enjoy further bonus in life. And anything beyond is quite a miracle to some people. I’m just talking about the average people like you and me. So it’s quite true that one should start to feel life upon reaching the age of forty. These so-called 20yr packages are just a rough guide plus (or minus) a few years maybe.

So to my friends out there who are still below the age of forty, my advice is for you to enrich your life while you still can and make them more meaningful in your later years. On the other hand, to those who may have exceeded that middle age limit, life is just beginning my friend, do take time to enjoy your life while you still can otherwise you’re just wasting them away for nothing. So did my life begins at or after forty. It certainly did!

Just a footnote: The worlds longest lived peoples are the Okinawans in Japan, the Hunzas of north Pakistan and the Vilcambans of southern Ecuador. And how do they do it ? It ranges from a combination of healthier living habits, less exposure to toxins and prevention of chronic illness, high activity level, keeping the body lean, balanced diet, eating more chocolates, drinking red wines and to having more sex (mercy!). Take your pick.