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All the world's a stage

Not had much time to blog nor bloghop these past few weeks -things have been even more hectic than normal.

Have however managed to catch up on the news (guardian weekly, guardian online, malaysiakini, malaysia today and other alternative malaysian news sites). seems like there is much to be depressed about (environmental damage, food shortage, fuel crisis etc) particularly if one is a Zimbo, a Malaysian or both.

Re: Zim - Its been in the world news for months(?) now and has anything changed? Newt.  We have all read/seen how farcical the whole election has been and the number of innocent people who have been killed just because Bob and his gang wants to hang on to power. Never mind that the Zimbos are starving due to the lack of food or because  economic situation there is beyond bad or that the currency is worth less than bog roll. Its all about some despotic men wanting to stay in p-o-w-e-r.

And then.. across the Indian Ocean there is La Malaysie. Mired in scandal after scandal. First a Mongolian Model/Translator gets blown up to smithereens in a jungle by explosives belonging to the police. (None of this gets reported until her friends lodge a missing person report at the Mongolian Consulate in Thailand i.e. outside Malaysia). A couple of policemen and close associate of the Deputy Prime Minister gets arrested and charged for the murder. The trial is protracted, the trial judge and public prosecutors are shuffled about without apparent reason. Word on the street is that these are scapegoats and that the real perpetrators remain unchecked and free to shop walk the streets of London, Paris and NYC. A year(more?) on, nation-famous-maverick-blogger reveals in a statutory declaration that he has been 'reliably informed' that Mrs Deputy Prime Minister was there that night in the jungle when the C4 was being strapped on. Lady Macbeth refutes the allegation -lies lies she cries.. but nonetheless refuses to sue for she has better things to do like cut ribbonsserve the people.  Mainstream press remains silent; alternative media sees their readership rise (though number of subscriptions remain the same). Days later, opposition leader finds himself accused of buggering his 23 year old aide in posh condo (sodomy is a crime in la malasie sigh). Oooh its dejavu for the masses (at least for those above 10 years of age). MAinstream press spend columns on constipation and anal fissures; alternative press questions the timing and the whys. The plot becomes murkier  -aide is revealed to have had access to Macbeth. Macbeth first denies than latterly admits to have met him in his private residence day(s) before the police report was lodged. "He was traumatised and his hands were cold" Macbeth said (how he knew how cold they were, I dont really want to know). Then just when you thought things couldnt get more complicated they do. Opposition Leader holds a press conference and reveals 'tadah'  that the Private Investigator hired by close associate in the Mongolian case has something to say (via statutory declaration)- Mongolian model/translator (interesting that one is tagged by job(s) that one did when alive) had sexual relations with Macbeth; was owed money for submarine deals and close associate had received text from Macbeth to stay cool. And that he had told sting and his bandmates all of these but none of it were retained in his final witness statement. Then hang on before you can spell c-o-n-s-p-i-r-a-c-y n-u-m-b-e-r-o-n-e-h-u-n-d-r-e-d-a-n-d-f-i-v-e, the PI reappears next day (no doubt after spending the evening with his chums from the station) defensive and generally unhappy-looking to retract his statutory declaration. Great play folks.

General response from the conservative, pro-establishment camp: Ah the opposition is trying to destroy the country, that bugger. Why do this, why open the can of worms; she wasn't a nice girl anyway.

General response from the masses: We're not stupid stoopid; Its all conspiracy conspiracy conspiracy from the top to the bottom. 

Response from me: Its a worrying state of affairs. For a country that seem so obsess with the affectations of a particular religion (which ironically substantively ranks honesty and equality as prerequisites) and oxymoronly- supremacy of a race, the system pervaded by that one race seem so bereft of moral, ethics and plain honesty. Something smells rotten in the state of Denmark Malaysia and I dont think its the food. If we dont watch it, Malaysie is so capable of turning into a today Zim.

Where are Mulder and Scully?

 

mid week offering

Tolerably early in life I discovered that one of the unpardonable sins, in the eyes of most people, is for a man to presume to go about unlabelled.

The world regards such a person as the police do an unmuzzled dog, not under proper control. -Thomas Henry Huxley, biologist and writer

(1825-1895)

melayu. cina. india. dan lain lain.

malay. chinese. indian. and others.

islam. buddhist. christian. hindu. sikh. free thinker. komunist.

muslim. buddhist. christian. hindu. sikh. atheist. communist. (dont ask me why communist is regarded a religion in malaysia)

lelaki. perempuan. perempuan cantik. perempuan tak cantik. perempuan cantik bertudung. perempuan cantik tak bertudung. perempuan rambut bercolour. perempuan rambut berinai.

man. woman. beautiful woman. non beautiful woman. hijabbed beautiful woman. non hijabbed non beautiful woman. woman with dyed hair. woman with hennaed hair.

remaja. dua puluhan. tiga puluhan. empat puluhan. muda. lima puluhan. pensener. tua.

teenager. twenty something. thirty something. forty something. young. fifty something. pensioner. old

berbahasa melayu. cakap inggeris/orang putih.

speaks malay. speaks english/white man's language.

pandai. bodoh

intelligent. stupid.

miskin.sederhana. berada. kaya-raya

poor. middle class. rich. rolling in it.

umno. mca. mic. barisan nasional. pas. dap. parti keadilan.

umno. mca. mic. barisan nasional. pas. dap. parti keadilan.

temporary insanity

Past 2weeks was traumatic. the return to ringing tones, flashing messages and hundreds of emails after 2 weeks of being non-communicado under the blue sky and fluffy clouds (so fluffy, it made me want to reach out and squeeeeeeze it silly).

3rd week and am slowly sliding into the old routine again. constant flicking of emails and attachments. comments, views and opinions. rgds, regards, kind regards, best regards, best wishes? all urgent, all now.

xxx

have not been getting the required zeds in.  mind is busy working overtime pondering (again!) the meaning of life, the randomness of birth any why la malaysie remains the mystery that it is.

the authorities-that-be consisting of  dunces prancing on hot air who consistently make ineffectual statements whilst the over zealous masses on the ground continue to bay for blood of those who dont believe and those who dare  defend the rights of those who dont believe.

band of  bearded men running around arresting couples in parks. hotel rooms. homes.

communities pointing fingers and accusing wife's display of hair to be the cause of husbands stroke/heart attack/cancer.

(seemingly) respectable men who runs a tight ship at home and prohibit their wives from socialising, holed up in kareoke lounges (with ina, ida and ita) or massage parlours enjoying their 'happy ending'.

but please, dont ask - questions are for the infidels. and everyone knows what happens to these types.

xxx

its hard to reconcile the above with the modern KL International Airport, towering KLCC, the monorail, shiny new buildings and multiple banners that read Welcome to Malaysia 2007.

changing times?

Crime is contagious. If the government becomes a lawbreaker, it breeds contempt for law. -Louis D. Brandeis, lawyer, judge, and writer (1856-1941)

Malaysia has risen in the corruption ranking.  No surprises there given that everyone knows that the way to  get things done (ranging from avoidance of parking ticket to getting a permits) is to grease palms with numbered notes.

What is surprising however is that there have been lots of column space (cyber and paper) devoted to investigations on alleged corrupt practices by senior officials. this would never have been allowed 3 years ago.

Perhaps times are a changing.

who are they?

i found a brilliant blog today, written by a wife in the north.  it was so delicious that i had to go through her achives and read them all at once (lucky, she only started blogging recently).

what fascinated me, apart from the quality writing, is the reaction of others to her posts once she started receiving the hits. not to mention the column space as well as the book deal. there were those who were hip hip happy for her.  and then they were those who werent and felt it necessary to let her know that her writing is crap, that her outlook is crap, that the husband is crap, that her kiddies are crap; her plans to build her home they way she wants to is crap and that everything she is about and is, is crap.

funny, there just seem to be so many characters out there with enough anger and negative energy in them to log on as a user, type in their vitriol, key in the anti-robot spammer code and press enter. how do they manage it? to hold on to their wrath whilst they go through the motions of adding their comments. do they feel satiated afterwards and go about their merry surfing ways until they read another blog they cannot identify with and build their hatred all over again or do they just then sit there, drumming their fingers on the table, waiting for a response from the blog owner so that they can continue the vicious cycle.

why do they bother reading sites they cannot stand? why do they continue to engage these writers they pan. why do they lurk and go tsk tsk tsk? why do they bother sending hate mails?

where do they get their corrosive disposition from? do they chew on spite bars? do they drink spleen juice?

who are these people anyway? with poison in their guts and acid in their fingers. are they the same ones who talk (loudly) over others in any ongoing discussions? or are they the tailgaters who cannot bear to drive behind another even if the traffic is  stationary on a choc-a-bloc road. do they scream and slap their child's head when his chubby fingers reaches out for a kitkat at the tesco counter?

what do they look like? pinched thin with lips pursed tight. or abnormally normal, whatever that means.

those self righteous idjits

one of the most frustrating things here in la malaysie is the quality of the newspapers  (i.e. lack thereof) and the self righteous idjits who are prominently featured in them.  now if these two together are not bad enough, scout the readers page and you know just how much in trouble we all are.

for those unexposed to (or unable to obtain) the local pulp, heres a summary on whats been featured in the news lately:-

1.  Kelantan (Islamic state in the east of Malaysia) State Government issuing new laws about 'dress codes' for all women irrespective of faith. No belly buttons and short skirts.

2. The on-going exchange between an ex PM, the present PM, their families and some rice bowls.

3. The antics of a "Youth Leader" who brandished his Malay dagger in a political gathering.

Meanwhile, the readers have been busy sharpening their pens and sending in such profound comments such as:-

1. These women ought to cover up anyway, all the display of flesh makes them susceptible to rape.

2. Shut up your face you old geezer, your family benefitted from the loot so what the.... and you Mr. Nice Guy, whats wiv the son-in-law, the loan and the shares purchased and sold...

3.  Why cant the council fix the third lampost on the fourth road in Taman Maluri.  I have written to them 5 times but nothings been done.

To round it off in six words:

Malaysian newspaper stinks, say no more.

somefink like that

cone of the things i like about the people-interaction process is when a random discussion/chit-chat results in a shift of a paradigm or causes an idea to germinate within.

xxx

e.g  was talking  to a souffle about relationships.   and how am attracted to intelligence, or in the absence of, talent. and probably used that as justification as to why i decided to get married to the uber photographer who lived in a different planet to me some years back.

souffle said that he couldnt really understand that. he explained that for him, the attraction would be one's virtues. i.e.  a person could be robbed of their intelligence and or talent at any point in time; but  not virtue for  virtue is innate and would remain with the person till whenever.

have been turning it over in my mind for some days and must say that i rather fancy this rationale and will therefore adopt it. 

now all i have to do is to figure out how i can go about establishing ralph fiennes' virtue. certainly the column spaces in the tabloids and even broadsheets in the past month have not depicted him in any virtuos light.  harumph.

xxx

whilst i like the cross fertilisation of ideas and modification of what was once unalterable paradigms i do abhor to the Nth degree the lecture or imposition of ideas of one to the other. when someone older than say 28 (i.e.  28 being the age to my mind where one would have suffered enough hard knocks and gained sufficient maturity and enough salt) tells someone  else that things must be affected in their set ways or that thoughts must  be fashioned in a certain way, or to be more specific - in their way.

Q: why must it be so? because these lecturer(s) are more knowledgable? (hardly -  didnt the greatest  philiosophers have more questions than they did answers)  more successful? (how is success measured - by the amount of dosh in a bank, number of kids sired, or the frequency of frownlines on their forehead) or perhaps because they are safe   and snug , ensconsed in their homes, societies and networks - also ruts.

amazing grace jones. each time i am in the position where i listen and they drone, all i want to say (but dont as dont fancy getting into an arguement) is that: i am me and will never be you.  i dont want to be you, which is why i am me; if i were to decide things according to your template, right from the beginning, when i had the autonomy to decide, my life would probably mirror yours and i would be in your image. yikes.  i dont even want to be you, let  alone your clone. i am me. and though mistakes are made along the way, at least they're mine and at the end of the day, i am still me.

didnt morrisey in one of his songs, made the point so clear:  i am me and no matter what you say and what you do, you will never be me.

or somefink like that?

sigh

lately much of my energy and effort have been directed towards chasing up on others' tardiness and or dealing with incompetent and rude service providers.  it is quite an exhausting feeling and quite dispiriting considering its supposed to be quite the festive and joyful time of year.

in most if not all of the circumstances above, the institutions i.e.

• bank (fund transfer missing in space),
• big electronic shop (refusing to provide refund  nor  a replacement for faulty scanner purchased weeks before)
• huge book shop (declining to swap a CD still in its plastic wrapper even though they had agreed to such an exchange at time of purchase and had even noted it in the receipt)

have been unpleasant, bereaucratic and snooty in their dealings. their dealings with a  customer (!).  a customer that they have wronged.

sigh.

the funny (strange as well as ha ha) is that save for the bank* (who is no doubt resting on the interest whilst the funds are being located) the others are only willing to backtrack and make amends when:-

words like

• 'consumer tribunals'
• 'refuse to leave until'
• 'happy to discuss the matter with other customers here like that guy who is about to purchase a scanner and those folks with multiple cds in their hands'

are being bandied  in extreme posh tones.

3 lessons learnt:-

1. how amazingly powerful pursed lips and squaring of the Os can be;
2. how convincing affectations are; and
3. how influential class is.

does this perhaps explain the abundance of hot air in KL despite the rainy season?

______________________________________________

* the banks doesnt discriminate according to accents and mannerisms, they just do so via length of digits resting in accounts. the more zeros they are, the longer the protruding financial tongues are to lick the arses.

bird's eye view on tax

I DONT MIND PAYING HUGE AMOUNT IN TAXES AS LONG AS IT GOES TOWARDS BETTERMENT OF SOCIETY AND NOT DEEP POCKETS BELONGING TO GREEDY SELFISH BASTARDS  FURTHERING THEIR AMBITION AND FULFILLING THEIR  NEEDS.

men in uniform

something smells rotten in the city.

after a late finish and some dinner, my friend  drove her sister to her office so that she could pick up her car. it was past

midnight

and they  were both knackered and eager to get to their respective beds.

they turned a  junction and immediately  got stopped by a bunch of goons skulking just around the bend.

these law enforcers alleged that they had passed through a pedestrian red light without stopping.  they  didnt get to discuss whether it was indeed a red light, nor the fact that  even if  the lights were red, there were mitigating factors such as it was VERY LATE and that the roads were VERY EMPTY.

they didnt get that far.

because as soon as Starsky and Hutch  got these cool dudettes  to roll down their windows, they were busy insinuating that the gurlies would be in GREAT TROUBLE and that unless they  agreed to settle, they would receive a HEFTY FINE.

not content with the threats of HUGE PENALTIES, our men in uniform then proceeded to ask odd questions like why these two girls were out in the middle of the night (working the driver said though she  did not add that it was none of their business), and what her (the driver's)  HUSBAND thought of her being out this late. Also, what  does her HUSBAND work as.

Her  answer of I AM NOT MARRIED was met with snorts of disbelief. They examined her  ID and concluded that surely she was more than beyond the MARRIAGEABLE age.  Our trusted public sector workers  announced that they found it hard to believe that an attractive woman could remain unmarried even at the age of  THIRTY EIGHT (38).

this was clearly the last straw.  she  didnt t mind being 38 and unmarried but  WHOLLY RESENTED their adding 4 years to her  age. PARTICULARLY since she and her sister had spent all of the weekend wondering WHERE THEIR YEARS HAVE GONE. to have lost 4 years without anything to show for was she felt,  outright INSULTING if not DEMEANING.

it was at this point that she  politely  suggest  they look again at her  ID and take note of the date of birth. then,  why not try subtracting 1972 from 2005 to reach to the right conclusion.  starksy blinked ferociously trying to work the math, amd then hutch  admited defeat - it was too late in the night for them  to be counting years.

and then they tried to invite the girls  to settle the matter once more.

the driver  insisted that they issue her  a ticket if they thought she had breached the law.

starsky and hutch  had a little huddle, glancing over at their  direction at  intervals.  who were these girls? were they important? would they get into trouble. quick cost benefit analysis.

my friend later recounted: if it wasnt so infuriating, it would have been comical. pitiful too. these young men  (can you imagine what they'd be like when they're older?) in their recognisable outfits, pulled off just after a pedestrian traffic light, to catch late night (arguably) errant drivers just to get some 'duit kopi' ( coffee money).

the gurlies  didnt get out of the car to 'settle'. and so the matter was finally settled.

Starsky and Hutch came over, sighed and said, normally there were ways of dealing with such situations but seeing as the girls  were insistent on  playing  it straight, they didnt have any other recourse but to issue a ticket.  and so: a ticket was produced  requring the driver to present thyself at a magistrates court  to answer charges  for transgressing the road transport act 1987.

now we are all well aware that these dudes  are stressed this festive season. theyre not only underpaid (800-1200rm a month) theyre also overworked with plenty of  bills to pay and tiny mouths to feed attached to little bodies which need to be  clothed in the shiniest of outfits.

however, surely a line must be drawn somewhere. where is  that "ethics"  that politicians refer to repeatedly and leaders shout about?

if the  state is serious  about eradicating corruption then they must prevent the  average jane from being asked  for dosh and harrased by virtue of her gender (by those who ought to PROTECT rather than TROUBLE)  in town at midnight.

forget about improving the country's standing in the transparency index  or the launch of the integrity plan, lets start small.  lets start by guaranting safe passage for lone unattached women trying to get home late in the night.

lets also deal with those difficult issues and answer those hard questions like  why this practice is prevalent.  how effective is our education system if we fail to establish the clear delineation between acceptable and non acceptable  behaviour?  the higher price we ALL pay for the lack of fixed rules and order.  we pride ourselves on our asian values but where exactly are these  values/religion parked off when these activities are carried out?

in addition, lets consider how do these guys survive on these meagre incomes in the city  and how can we ensure that theyre not in the least tempted to obtain side incomes through alternative means.

NB am curious to see what the courts make of this.

NEXT ENTRY: HOW I DONT MIND PAYING HUGE AMOUNT IN TAXES AS LONG AS IT GOES TOWARDS BETTERMENT OF SOCIETY AND NOT DEEP POCKETS BELONGING TO GREEDY SELFISH BASTARDS  FURTHERING THEIR AMBITION AND FULFILLING THEIR  NEEDS