Finest Malaysian Of All Time

Ever since the March 8 elections we've been bombarded with the resumption of service in the aspect of politics as the ruling coalition and the opposition carried on where they left of before that date. All sorts of bickering, name throwing, fault-finding etc fill the pages every day to the point that I no longer really care about what either side is saying anymore.

Besides, whoever wins in Parliament I am still going to be earning what I am doing now or more, depending on my performance as well as waiting for the train at the station at 7:40am every workday.

Part of the soul-searching by the badly mauled government brought about certain politician who just had to resort to the old chestnut of racial politics although the previous damage done to the grip of the ruling party was that of the majority of the people in the country rejecting the concept as being outdated. Obama's recent victory as the first ever African American to lead the most powerful nation on Earth put further pressure for reforms in the situation of 'adapt or die'.

Strange enough, I am not here to become a Jeff Ooi MKII or something but rather to look back in time when the country wasn't even formed yet. This was the time when a certain Teuku Zakaria bin Teuku Nyak Putih was born (precisely in the year 1929).

If that name sounds familiar than you've went through the same period of growing as I did, or schooled your own children to his movies and music. Timeless movies such as Tiga Abdul, Madu Tiga, Sarjan Hassan, Labu Labi series and the famous Ibu Mertuaku is sure to light up the eyes of those who grew up watching his shows.

I was very, very young when I first saw his movie when the family sat in front of the telly to watch this exceptional man direct, act and sing in his productions. You'd imagine that a Chinese family like mine would be watching the Legend of the Condor Heroes or something, in which we did (they did, not me though) but there is always time for this man's movies. Add Saloma's lovely voice to the picture and not to mention the wacky plot devices and you have a winnner.

There were times when I would visit another Chinese friend's house to watch Labu Labi together and such were his influence to my generation (and the ones before) that we even apply some of the dialogues from his movies for daily usage until today; "Aku lesiiiiinnng karang!" as a response to a bad joke or the famous, "INI TIDAK ADIL!" normally to poke fun at various situations when we're at a disadvantage. One of my ex-colleague's favourite phrase was "Lobang hidung engkau tatap manjadi po-jaan hatiku".

Still no idea?

Then I feel really sorry for you for this man is pretty much the best example of the finest Malaysian ever.

As Sheila sang in possibly her magnum opus,

Patah tak tumbuh lagi
Hilang belum berganti
Kerana kau tersendiri

is the truth.

Tell me of any seniman nowadays who dare to claim to be a better actor-cum-director-singer as this man.

Tan Sri P Ramlee may be dead but he's immortalised in history.

Image taken from http://seniman-pramlee.tripod.com/

Certain Things In Life That Are Not

There are certain things in life such as taxes and death but definitely not the arrival time of the KTM trains. I'm typing this entry from the comfort of my home because this morning's train service had a major disruption that caused only one single train from Sentul to Port Klang and one from Port Klang to Sentul, meaning that there only be one to each destination for the next one hour or so from end to end.

This is not the first time. In fact the disruptions before were much less severe this. Earlier last month there was a disruption to the power line at Pantai Dalam causing the track towards Port Klang to be unusable but the response was quick enough by diverting them to the next track with all trains going in one direction. As most people are actually going towards KL to work rather than the opposite, I suppose 3/4 of the passengers managed to arrive just slightly before 9. I feel sorry for those going to Port Klang though - they were definitely late to work that morning.

At the end I decided to go to *TPM by myself to help my colleague out with his presentation today because the scheduled time was at 10.00 am and it will be quite impossible to arrive at office by 9.30 am, the latest when we have to leave.

*Had a call from him been told that the meeting place had been moved to God knows where.

As I walked away to my car shaking my head, the number of people waiting increased three-folds, so you can imagine how these people would try to get in to the already jammed packed train from the previous stations. I decided it was not worth the wait even when it was supposed to arrive in 5 minutes by the time I reach the turnstiles, as the next one would be there in probably an hour should I miss it.

These are such things that make people vote for the opposition regardless of who they are as the discontent with the present government gets magnified by daily essentials getting disrupted. I said it many times to my friends and colleagues that I don't really care who the Prime Minister is as long as the KTM arrives and departs on time as I partially depend on it to get to work. The hike in fuel prices is already bad enough as it is and here we have the the public transport working in sketchy condition.

In short the KTM deserved all the bad reputation it is having.

Just a couple of weeks ago I had a colleague from Singapore who took the train with me from Subang to KL Sentral, taking the 1:36 pm train. I told him that ever since the price hike the trains had 'miraculously' arrived on time (subjectively 'on time' meant no more than 5 - 30 minutes that is previously was notorious for). Well what do you know, it came almost 9 minutes later. I told him that such things are still expected as the consortium is currently having its train sets upgraded.

To be honest with all of you, I am not sure if I actually believe that anymore.

Old facilities and equipment? That is no excuse as the KTM Berhad is under the jurisdiction of Prasarana Nasional which is in control of the Ministry of Finance. Let me repeat that slowly: Ministry-of-Finance.

Surely they don't transport Bank Negara notes on KTM?

The Prime Minister himself just took a ride and saw for himself how 'amazing' the whole experience of the train ride to work the morning was and I could only wonder if the service would improve if more big wigs are forced to take it work daily. The scenario is endless. The only reason why things remain as it is because the consortium had no reason to since people depend on it and there are no competitors - "What will you do if you don't take the KTM eh? Drive or take the bus then". If another private train system were plying the same route you'd imagine KTM Bhd bosses sweating to see people no longer lining up to wait for their trains and having the ministers breathing down their necks to explain the red figures in the accounting books.

I don't blame the Prime Minister, his Deputy or the Minister of Finance or Minister of Transport. The daily operations of the KTM train service has been delegated as per required to the people who actually run the service. The ministers have no time to go down and ask if the coupling at Stesen Serdang is working or if the toilets are in good condition at KL Sentral or to check if train arrived on time this morning at Rawang.

BN kah, PR kah, Anwar ka, Badawi ka - who the hell cares - where is the damned train?

Blame the people who run the operations.

Why are there technical problems?
Where are the backups?
What will KTM do to ensure this doesn't happen in the future?

Yeah yeah, Murphy's Law and all that, even Singapore's famed MRT services experience disruptions once in a while (yes, my Singaporean friend told me - I didn't make that up) but the difference in terms of the punctuality and the amount of disruptions is incomparable.

I'd be embarrassed if I were the person in charge.

The first heads to roll should be those who manage the operations as stated above.

Even the public announcement this morning had problems (not grammatical as mine isn't perfect either):

"Due to technical difficulties at Sentul Station, the train service to all destinations had experienced delays. KTM Berhad would like to apologise for any inconvenience cause".

It should have been:

"Due to technical difficulties at Sentul Station, the train service to all destinations had experienced delays. KTM Berhad would like to apologise for all inconveniences cause".

Don't spam me with the rakyat this rakyat that malarkey as the MPs and ADUN from both sides don't take the public transport themselves to the assemblies or Parliament.

More KTM Stuff

If I were to note down everything there is to say about KTM Berhad this place would be called the KTM Blog instead of the sumptuous noodles that I am currently craving so much for (note to self : get some this coming Saturday). Besides, being new to the whole environment - I began taking the train two months before the fuel hike - there's bound to be new things to write about until I get bored of it eventually.

I already am considering that I am taking it on a daily basis to work so my input on the matter is just as valuable as the veterans and newbies alike who squeeze in and become part of the proverbial sardine community every day.


Canned Sardines

There's something about Friday that makes causes an unexplainable surges in the number of passengers who try to board the train home. On normal days, by 7:00 pm the rows of people who wait for the train at the KL Sentral platform would normally thin down to two until eight. On Fridays however, it stays at four until 8:30 pm.

One feasible explaination that I can think of is possibly the coming of the weekend. Nobody is in a hurry to get back so everybody decided to arrive around 6:00 pm or so.

I was caught in one of those last Friday and sufficed to say the word 'packed' doesn't do justice to the situation in the train. People kept pushing in when there is already space so much so that I could actually hold on to nothing and not fall forward/backwards when the train stops. Everybody is caught in the 'wave', especially those in the centre without support so when the train stops, everybody become everybody's cushion.

It came to mind that I pity the ladies on trains of such. There is pretty much no protection for them from men who think of taking advantage as they have little choice but get squeezed to the person in front, beside or behind them. Of course there are guys who only care about getting off at their destinations but I could only imagine the risks the women are taking when they get on the train as such.

In Japan they have women-only coaches to help reduce the number of incidents and better protect them and I do feel like such coaches would be useful here considering how much more conservative we are in this country.

And then you have women who either enjoys it e.g they push closer - yes, I was the 'victim' a couple of times, considering there is actually space for them to stand away from me; or they really don't bother and use taller guys as their 'pillar of support' by leaning in.

As a normal heterosexual guy, I would be expected to enjoy this but there's just this little voice inside that appeals to the gentleman in me, so I try to always have a bit of a space between me and the women in front of me (sorry about those at the back and the sides - you are the one(s) pushing me around).

Hard to believe I know, yeah, like what Roy of the IT Crowd bellows into the phone, I am from the past. I can only imagine the thoughts going through the heads of their parents or husbands.

The ride home was pretty bad but being a Friday evening, everybody were in a good mood as perfect strangers were actually joking with one another. The loose cannon was a KTM Officer who was hitching a ride to Pantai Dalam, making fun of the situation. The first stop at Angkasapuri had him joking about it being the stop for future artistes and the second at Pantai Dalam being the destination of future Prime Ministers.

Then it was all up close and personal all the way to where I got off. It was so 'up close and personal' that half of the train would probably be certified married by the time it reaches Subang.

At least the air-conditioner was strong though as the heat generated from the masses of sweaty bodies and breath would have caused it difficult to breathe.

Got off 30 minutes later and the number of passengers thinned down by almost half, giving much respite to those on their way to Port Klang.

You could almost hear the collective sighs of relief when the door opened.


Scatological Stories

... is but a scientific term to describe topics related to... solid toilet by-product.

One advice to prospective commuters: make sure your bowels are not acting, in the process off or not well dealt with before hop onto the next ride to wherever you are going.

Imagine having something threatening to push out from your backside, coupled with being squeezed from every direction and the knowledge that a proper toilet is still 15 minutes away - you will literally feel like the weakest person on earth hoping for deliverance to come. The train would also stop at times to allow another one on the same path to leave, so that few minutes of waiting will make the most atheist of us a believer.

It happens to me (to everybody, in that matter) once in a while, thanks to my 'toilet training' that seems to pretty accurately have... things... waiting to be expelled around the period of 7:00 - 7:30 am and 9:00 - 9:30 am.

Sounds amazing that you can actually control and tell you bowels when to act up, but it is true. Even if you don't feel like going at all, try going to the loo, sit on the throne or squat, try to ... push. At first it would be ridiculous to be doing so without nothing coming out, but in time your body will start to adjust itself and become regular.

Enough of this crap.


Thank You

... is still pretty regularly heard nowadays in these times no thanks to the advent of political correctness, but how many of them actually comes from the heart rather than from the head (of the departments) ?

Imagine my surprise and amusement (in the good way) of being greeted with a thank you by an attendant of KTM at KL Sentral this morning after touching the TnG card to the reader. He seems to be in a good mood and thank every single person who presented him with the ticket.

I don't know whether it all came from his heart or head, but to do so will need more than an instruction from the departmental leads to keep doing amidst hundreds of people passing through.

I salute you sir.

Anomalous Materials

Quoting from Half Life might not be the right thing but the second installment of the HL universe began with a train ride that was heading towards City 17 with nobody but you (Gordon) and two guys, all three presumably on their way to becoming thralls to the Combine overlords.

Anyway, this morning was somewhat weird in itself that the KTM train that arrived at Subang looked almost like that. Well, an exaggeration that seeing that KL is nowhere near as bad as City 17 and we are only becoming thralls to our careers.

I missed the 7:37am train thanks to my tummy that has been trained to let go at that kind of time in the morning, so I sat down and waited for the next one that will arrive in 20 minutes' time. In between waiting I read the Malaysian edition of *The Sun left by somebody (I left it to the next lad or lass to read when the train arrived).

* Lest I am branded a clueless Red by my fellow Kopites - the publisher for this one have no connections to the UK version bar the publication name and I don't really like it anyway.

As usual, the commendable improvement in KTM's delivery saw the arrival of the train right on time (or slightly late - as Capt Price of Call of Duty 4 said, "It's not hard to improve on garbage"), I stood up and waited for the door to open and suprise surprise - it was almost empty. Of the 6 x 9 rows of seats, an average of two are filled per row meaning that to some of us regular commuters God decided to throw some sunshine to our morning.

Took my seat uncustomarily, wondering what was going on as the train would normally be some 75 - 85% filled up by the time it reaches Subang station and that wasn't the end of it.

It arrived at Setia Jaya, another one of the busy stations along the way and only three to four came on - into the coach that I was on.

Huh?

Seri Setia, maybe two to three.

Hmmm.

Kampung Dato Harun, same amount of passengers like Setia Jaya - NONE.

Hmmmmm.

Jalan Templer, a little more than Setia Jaya - NONE.

Petaling, same as Jalan Templer - three or four.

Pantai Dalam - six to seven. For the first time every single one of the passengers there managed to get on, and sit down.

Angkasapuri - as usual NONE.

So what's going on today?

* Fuel prices fell dramatically thanks to the kindness and generosity of OPEC and G8 members that people decided that it's cheaper to drive than to take the public transport? (Hahaha, that was funny. Come on give us another one).

The PM announced a holiday at 3.12 am this morning?
(He may have to work like a bull as the Prime Minister but that will be ridiculous as nobody watches TV at that hour of the day).

Half of the working population taking MC or going to an Opposition sponsored rally?
(I wonder what will they take off this time).

Alien motherships hovering over the Petronas Twin Towers? (I wonder over which one as there are two).

Answers on a postcard.

One Thing After Another

I was off work yesterday for the reason that I woke up with a splitting headache. The feeling was that of a post-migraine attack (they are known to happen sometimes when one is sleeping), the throbbing pain at one side of the head that moves from one point to another. It felt like having little people in the head hammering at the wall of the skull whilst the eyeball felt like it was threatening to explode - sleeping does little to alleviate the problem as you can hardly sleep with the pain!

Got an MC and some painkillers from the doctor, took some and eventually managed to get some rest at around 10:00 am, waking up some six hours later feeling like I've never went to nap.

And thanks to this sleeping stint I stayed awake until 2:30 am or so, making waking up this morning at 6:40am a gargantuan task to undertake. Nevertheless I managed to drag my carcass off the bed and prepared myself for work, knowing that it won't be longer before I get to rest again for the weekend.

Went to the station early I normally do with the increasing number of people taking up parking space ever since the fuel hike, visiting the toilet in the process as I had a rather big dinner the night before due to skipping lunch. Timing it right, I was ready to leave to take the train only to find the (most elementary) bidet to loosen its grip on the water pipe.

Voila, water splashing to my feet resulting in soaked socks and shoe.

Things couldn't get any worst eh? Well, I missed the train by mere minutes. The next thing you know my belt gave way again as I walked to the office from KL Sentral and it began to rain (albeit droplets). Oh, did I mention that I forgot to bring my MC and claim slip too? Ah yes, I also forgot to bring my TnG card.

Stopped by the GME Factory outlet to get three pair combo of socks to change with the wet one that I took off at the station (so I rode the train without socks - how funny that would look).

Ah, what a nice start to the morning.

Note to self - secure rubber hose to pipe before using.

Kindess To Strangers

This morning I took the train like any other workday, pushed between people but it isn't as bad as the later train that I normally take as many people have probably just left their homes or woke up. There was space all the way until Pantai Dalam when it really becomes full but that is not what I am writing today about.

An unusual number of people embarked the train from the Petaling Station which would normally add less than three or so per coach. The shuffle in positions meant that I ended up two places deeper into the coach though for the better as I can now breath easier without the need to actively keep a space between me and the young lady in front of me who seem to have no problems falling into a guy, hence not holding to any of the bars.

Anyway, a middle-aged man came on and eventually stood behind me in which he tapped gently on the my shoulder. I turned to look at him and took off my right earphone which was nearest to him*. He spoke gently asking about where to take the train to Nilai. I answered him a short 'KL Sentral' of which he ahh-ed in understanding, saying that there is where he should take the next train. I nodded and he thanked me.

Now, perhaps that is nothing new to all of you but somehow I felt like I was being impolite to the man for just giving him a short 'KL Sentral' answer without telling him which way would the train be going.

Throughout the rest of the trip, I wrestled with the thought that perhaps I have been pretty aloof and decided to explain to him better once we get off the train. It eventually arrived at KL Sentral of which he asked where are we of which I answered him again, 'KL Sentral'. This time I pointed to him that he should take the train going towards Mid Valley and Seremban, whilst we waited for the stuck door to open (everybody ended up going out using the next door).

As I walked up the stairs, I couldn't but help to look back and search for him. The man stood at Platform 4, probably waiting for the train which would bring him to Rawang instead or for the mob to go up the escalator before taking it. Either way, I stopped at the stairs, beckoned to him to go to the other side of the platform where 5 and 6 were, of which the latter would go to Seremban, hence the direction he was heading to. He seemed to have nodded though the look on his face seems to be somewhat slow in registering.

As I queued to touch my TnG card to exit the platforms, I heard the announcement that of the arrival of the train to Seremban and I wondered if he managed to get on it.

To many of you, perhaps this story is nothing but a boast of my supposed 'kindness' but every time I think about it, perhaps it's the least that I could do to pay my 'debt' to people whom had been kind to me in the past.

Or perhaps the following verse in the New Testament was what that prompted me to care if he got on his way to Nilai or not:

Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it (Hebrews 13:2).

No one knows for sure in this cynical and impersonal world of ours but personally, I would like others to show me the same kind of consideration should be in the same shoes.

It's not about trying to get Brownie points from the Big Man Upstairs, either.

Somehow I just felt like doing it.

Who Dares Wins

Call of Duty 4: Modern Warefare brought my attention the above motto from the British Special Air Service regiment (SAS). Playing as a British SAS operative in this excellent game that I rate above Crysis, I became somewhat enamoured by the team's efficiency and organisation that I began reading up on them. Apparently the SAS was formed during the WW2 under the directive of then then Prime Minister Churchill for special operations behind enemy lines. They were so succesful that Hitler once commented that the SAS must be destroyed in order to tip the balance.

The motto came from a Latin origin, [i]qui audet adipiscitur[/i] and was first used by the SAS. I suppose what it meant is that being special operations in nature, the SAS are required to do unconventional work in enemy territory which I'd imagine would be important enough. I'd imagine if they don't [i]dare[/i], then nobody wins.

A good motto to live in life with but it has to be applied at the right times of course. Hardly proper if you're up against odds that you know is impossible to beat - I'm pretty sure the SAS would fallback and try to formulate something else if they get overwhelmed in numbers. Getting killed in the line of duty due to stupidity and foolish bravura is not an option.

In life I'd imagine it'll also mean fighting for your rights. As is going in the country now, if nobody dares to speak up on the petrol hike, we all lose. Perhaps it resulted in the weird punctuality of the KTM trains in the past five days. Took the train three days this week (more on that later) and in five times so far, they arrived right on the dot or just a minute or two later.

Amazing stuff considering that the KTM is notorious for being overcrowded and rarely on schedule. We'll just see what happens in the next few weeks. Occurences of more than 6/10 will be a remarkable improvement.

As for the other two days, took the LRT thanks to another stupid puncture on my left back tyre.

Now I'm quite sure some pothole or somewhere are nails to catch the unsuspecting. It was fine when I took the car on Wednesday but was flat on Thursday morning, so it's probably the KTM station parking area. But that doesn't seem to explain how I got two front flats the first time though.

Anyway, gotta get it fixed on Saturday morning.

Still, sometimes you dare, but lose. It's a part of life really as nobody wins forever. Going into a fight expecting to win doesn't justify the motto though, just that only those who dare, will have a chance to win. Those who don't dare will lose for sure. Sometimes you gotta stop dreaming and start trying to make it real, otherwise you won't know if it's a dream or a reality.

Who Dares Wins.

My favourite new motto after '

Double Bogey

It was a long day today for me as I followed the Technical Consultant and the Business Development Manager to a POC (Proof of Concept) demo downstairs from our office to an ISP to showcase the ability of our network appliance to do traffic shaping and probably help to develop new subscription package as well.

Came home around 10:30pm - thought I've missed the last train but the next one came at around 10:06pm at KL Sentral, giving me just some 7 minutes of waiting time. They were also showing Final Fantasy VII : Advent Children on the telly, probably on TV3, making it la rather 'enjoyable' waiting period.

Arrived at Subang station around 10:30pm and was looking forward to that McDonald's Mcvalue meal as I was hungry like mad and just plain relieved that the day is over.

Got into the car, strapped in my seat and started driving home.

Or rather, tried to drive home.

You see, the front two wheels of my car suffered punctures again. Came out of the car and had a look and I can't believe myself. How exactly did a puncture happen to both tyres at the same time?

I suppose that's nothing unusual being that sometimes it does happen to the best drivers out there. Nails, screws et al, get punched into the tyre and voila, flat.

Now here's the bit that got on my nerves:

Both my left sided tyres were also punctured on Monday evening. Noticed this after going out for a dinner and on my way back to the car, a guy who was also walking to his parked next to mine pointed to the wheels, mentioning that it was flat.

I pumped some air into the tyres using the portable pump, thinking that it was probably a case of being my luck to have the tyres go flat like that. Drove all to the nearest petrol station to have the tyres filled to the correct amount of air pressure and went home.

The next day, it was flat.

I was going to be really late for work anyway and you can't trust the KTM to arrive right on time, so I called in to ask for an emergency leave. Being still under probation, it will be an unpaid leave. Damn.

Drove to the nearest tyre service centre to have the tyres checked and hopefully fixed. The mechanic took out the tyres and knew immediately from experience what to look for. They found two nails some 10cm long embedded into the tyres, straight down.

Honestly at that point I could only consider the probably of foul play.

Surely my parking outside the kerb of the housing area has nothing to do with this - it was out of the driveway's... way and was away from the house.

Well then, finally got it fixed, parked at Carrefour and arrived at the office at 1:30pm.

And just now, again.

KTMB, if you're reading this, you have one angry customer here. Probably not your fault since you don't hire people to go hammer nails into tyres (trying to keep the station running is already hard enough) but that wasn't supposed to happen. Add that to the 'sterling' effort of keeping to the travel schedule, who can't be more pleased?

And to whoever did this, your comeuppance will come.

WCIT 2008

Day 0

If anything going to work on Sundays can be quite disruptive to the hibernation schedule but it's not too bad at least if it doesn't happen every single weekend.

It was a day of purely loading and display as the things had already been packed for transport to the KL Convention Centre for this major event of global proportions. Was home by 4:30 pm amidst Agnes' messages if the dinner was going to happen. To be honest I was way too tired from the thing as well as the lack of sleep that it would be a mistake to not stay back and rest up to prepare for the next three days.


Day 1
Arrived 'really early' around 8:30 am for the thing as every got ready with the thing in their red shirts sporting the company URL and logo. All things were already setup on Sunday so it was a matter of just setting stall.

For the next 7 - 8 hours everybody were on their feet, either to explain the items on show, carry goodie bags around, collecting name cards or just look pretty. In a nutshell that sounded easy but it really wasn't. By the end of the day the calf muscles and soles sore like hell.

The PM did pass by our booth after his conference upstairs, zooming by in a rush somewhere. He was at the convention hall again in the evenings as mentioned in the papers so I suppose the functions with other delegates had ended only then.

So much for that.

Oh, did I mention that Burger King lunches were awesome? Had the cheese mushroom burger with lots of Coke to wash it down with. That's approximately RM10 gone then.


Day 2

Some of us still arrived ahead of time, some 45 minutes before the halls are open for exhibitors so we ended up sitting along the corridor, reading the paper or just people watching.

It's same ol' as Day 1 but with a lot more visitors this time as the convention was open to the public, so cue half the time more talking and standing throughout the day.


Day 3

The long awaited day for everybody as we all could not wait for the exhibition to finish. The cumulation of the last two days worth of standing and walking caused myself to walk abnormally due to the inability to lift my feet without aching but for the greater good of all mankind and foot massagers, I soldiered on...

Had another Burger King for lunch with one of our most colourful sales dudes and it was an hour's worth of belly-aching laughing to help take the soreness away a little.

Our way back from lunch was somewhat slowed for the reason that more people happen to arrive on the last day as well as exhibitors themselves walking around for the 'final assault' or just plain visiting.

One such bottleneck started along the main entrance around the state department booths where tourism as well as technological blueprints were unveiled to the public. My colleagues and I were wondering what the hold up was about with so many suits in place, cameras and police. I turned out that some guy by the name of Mr Lim Guan Eng made a visit and walked right in front of us to the autograph book to sign his name...

Back at our booth the Crown Prince of Pahang walked by on his visit along with his bodyguards, looking all dignified, sporting his usual serious look as he walked down the red carpet. It seems like most of the VIPs make their way to the MSC multi-booths without stopping much at the individual companies, except for a select few, like Mr Loh Gwo-Burne for example, who came by with probably one of his aides to talk to our head product manager. Someone mentioned Datuk Ali Rustam was around walking earlier during the day.

Going home: now that is the fun part.

Our transport lorry was supposed to have arrived at 6pm when we finished with the thing. We packed up double time and were awaiting eagerly to go home only to find that the lorry had not arrived.

All right, it could be the jam, most of us thought. It was caught in the jam but for some weird reason never showed up. It was at Jalan Pinang for a good two hours if the phone calls were to be believed until it was no longer contactable, not to mention they said they weren't too sure about how to get there either.

Right.

We at least have a joker to keep us company with his barrage of funnies to keep us entertained for the next two hours, mentioning that the lorry could actually be in Komtar instead. The sour faces were a lot less sour. Alas our HR Manager decided not to wait anymore and ask for the contractor he used to work with to come with some guys.

They arrived in less than 20 minutes, some time when over 50% of the WCIT hall had already been taken down and these bunch of guys and gals in red are still sitting around waiting for something.

Finally reached home at about 9:30pm, all tired, sore and exhausted. Thanks to Jason for the ride.

Wheels Rants

All the women who are independent
Throw your hands up at me

I hereby today declare myself the member of the growing of men who consider women behind wheels as a mismatch. Why, you asked? Just a moment ago I had another experience that seems to show that a car in a woman's control is a dangerous thing.

I was driving down the road after lunch of nasi kandar next to the infamous highway towards Summit-USJ at the first junction from the roundabout before entering the road. People would normally turn in here to escape the jam if they want to go to Sunway as the other way through NPE is quite jammed in front of the Mentari Business Park, or to the vicinity of SS13 for example me, today, or just think they have the right to be first if they paid more road tax by jumping queue to the junction out back to the highway some 100m ahead.

Anyway, normal people who want to turn into any junction, let alone this one, would slow down, check if there are any incoming traffic from the left or right before making their way in. Today, one of the many I myself and several ex-colleagues at a nearby office can tell you, had another car coming out without even looking if anybody else is coming down the road. The car just drove in when I was coming down at 60kmph, causing me to brake some 1m or so behind it. Good thing I am used to such eventualities as I worked in that area for more than five years so I am normally a lot more cautious when I come towards that junction.

I shook my head and thought, "There's another one".

Again, it was a woman. From my glance at the driver as the car made a turn down the curved road, she doesn't seem to notice anything at all while talking to the passenger besides her.

This seems to lend more evidence to the theory that a woman behind the wheels develop a certain problem of 'tunnel vision' that causes their perspective to be narrowed dramatically to include just the windscreen. Furthermore, this complication causes their necks to become stiff, further aggravating the problem of this 'tunnel vision'.

The experience that had me wondering if it were true (I spoke about this with many guys before) happened less than six months ago at the Pyramid parking lot. I was again travelling down the path to the exit and was following the main queue towards the exit barrier. From the left were cars who would come into the lane and exit as well.

Surprise, surprise, another sufferer of this 'tunnel vision' syndrome drove ahead of me when the right of way was mine - I wasn't slow enough to allow anybody to come out anyway - and yet this woman just jumped in as if there were miles of space between my car the one ahead of me. Being a cautious driver as everybody should be, I braked in time with space to spare after noticing that this one might just do the stupid thing.

Those two were just one of the many myself and other guys could tell you about. My cousin once told me of him waiting for a parking bay as a car was on its way out. As soon as he was to take the space, a car just came and drove in. He stopped and asked the woman what was the problem as she, I don't know if being shamed or something, confronted him back saying that she saw nobody and the parking space was hers. I assumed that the 'tunnel vision' causes her eyes to missed his car on the right side of road with bright yellow signal lights blinking.

And the countless stories of women parking - the problem of making an arc to park instead of a direct turn that causes them to maneuver the car in and out before its in - at the same time causing the entire road to halt. That's not too bad compared to those who take up 110% of parking space by putting their cars on the line.

And did I tell you about how dangerous women are on the road? Some are better racers than Raikonnen or Capirossi but lacking in terms of positional awareness.

The ladies are welcomed to flame me for this post with all sorts of feminista replies calling for justice against sexism but you would just be barking up the wrong tree. Guys do such things too but it had never been more glaringly frequent than when it involves women drivers.


Car Size vs Brain Size Correlation

Another interesting bit of theory I had was that regarding the inverse relationship between the price of the car to the brain of the driver. It says that a driver who drives pricier cars ie. Mercedes, Accord, Camry, BMW etc have less civility on the road compared to those driving cheaper ones.

Throughout my life as a driver on the roads of Klang Valley, I have encountered the usual problem of people jumping queues, speeding and tail-gating, pretty often with me being the one being bullied.

In queue-jumping for example, the (impatient) guy from the back would drive out of the queue towards the point the road would split from where they want to go, signal and force their way in. Some, if not most, don't even signal. And whilst waiting for the row of cars to move, you can see their faces - they wouldn't even look at you, noses high, seemingly oblivious of their little stunt there.

And I observed that the people who normally do this are drivers of big, expensive cars, and women.

All right, I admit I do speed some times especially if the road is clear but you have these big cars going at over a hundred, weaving in and out of the traffic like they're Pro License holders of the FIA. I don't really mind them speeding if they do find the road to be too slow for their liking, but what's the problem with using the other free lane to overtake if we're being too slow.

It's ridiculous when you consider that whilst you drive at a 'leisurely' pace of 85kmph on a 90kmph highway, one of them big cars would just have to come within breathing distance of your neck and flash their highlights telling you to get out of the their way. Sure, I know I should but what's the problem with overtaking my car using the left lane which had no cars coming? There were times when I'd feel like hitting the emergency brakes hard to teach them a lesson - cars hitting into the back of another had always been the guilty party - it would wreck the back of my car too but his repairs will be many more times costlier. If I were lucky he'd have to pay mine too; but I've always inherited Dad's attribute of 'stir no hornet's nest', and just let them through.

I don't believe this has anything to do with the lack of education as being able to drive vehicles that costs a decade of my salary would normally mean they would be able to afford top class education compared to us peasants, otherwise how would you explain about them being paid such salaries for what I assume are important positions in corporations? Better still, having children inside those cars learning from their parents.

And we decry the lost of civility in our society. :rolleyes:

The theory is still arguable though, so feel free to join the feministas in your flames.