Old Town

A few days ago, I tagged along Ma Hen to Cyberjaya. She had a dinner appointment with her friends. I became somewhat of her escort.

Anyway, the place was called "Old Town". It has the ambiance of an old Chinese Kopitiam. Marble top table and chairs. As I sat there, I was wondering why none of the waiters came to take our orders. Then our companions told us that we were suppose to fill in the order docket and pay at the cashier ourselves.

Once paid, we got a number. The waiters would be sending our food based on the number. The food was great. For a person who has stomach with low tolerance for spicy food, I finished off the bowl of spicy prawn me.

Thank you very much Ma Hen for the great dinner and company.

Work and War
I was on a train. Two ladies sat near me. Over heard the ladies complaining about work:

"Too many generals and not enough soldiers. How to win the war?"

Yes. I think it happened in my workplace too. Didn't it in yours?

The little things

Arts makes you appreciate the little little things in life. It makes a miserable life less miserable. It makes unbareable things to be bareable. It makes you more sensitive to things around you.

The sound of a chirping birds. Flow of a river. The gust of wind. The colour of leaves bathed in the morning sunlight. The smiles and laughters of children at the playground. We should stop and listen to these wonderfull sound around us. To see the beautiful sights around us.

But then again, in a bustling city, all this sounds are drowned by the honking of cars, clanking of construction site. The murky river hardly flow. A gust of wind brings dust and smoke. Morning sunlight replaced by gloomy hazy morning. Playground are deserted.

When you feel too much, you try to shut everything out. You became a cold and insensitive person that isn't really you.

My Wish List

Some time in Jan 2007, I mentioned about my wish list that could possible increase the number of entries for this blog. Well...

I bought the bike first. Thought it cost a lot, it was suppose to save me some time (stuck in the jam), money (oil, parking fee and public transport fare); and let me cover more ground (at least in KL). The money saved was supposed to allow me to travel far and wide. In reality, the it was used to pay off credit card debt (I used credit card to pay for the bike). I glad I used the credit card and not the installment plan by the bike shop, for there was about RM1000 difference between cash price and installment price.

Soon after I settled the bike debt, I got into another debt: I bought a dSLR. I'm still learning how to use it. I'll post some pictures once I master how to use the dSLR. By the way, the new dSLR cost more that my new used-bike. Thus, it would be quite some time before I'm able to pay off the new dSLR.

It would be quite awhile before I could recovered from the financial state I'm in and start travelling far and wide again.

Disturbing Views

I'd found this website about the television series 'Heroes'. They have some sort of interactive comic on the website. What caught my attention was the chapter 13.

The wireless girl was depicted as fighting for her country independence. From the comic, we get the idea that her country is Israel and the bad guys are the Arabs. Needless to say, she is a Jew. Her grandma survived Auschwitz. Her mother fought in Six-day-war.

It makes me wonder, if this (fighting for independence) is the kind of view that young (Israel's) Jews have? If it is, it generates another question: is the comic on the website trying to sell the idea to the rest of the world. It is very disturbing. I'm no historian, nor hold any qualification in international politics, but if memory serves me right, this idea is somewhat flawed.

To begin with, the Arabs wasn't the one who torture the Jews during Holocaust. It was the Europeans. I'm pretty sure Auschwitz is not in Arab. When World War 2 (along with it, Holocaust) ended, the 'powers' involved in the war decided to 'send' the 'displaced' Jews to Palestine, an Arab land. Before World War 2, though there were Jews in Arab, the was no Israel (again, I'm no historian - check the facts yourself).

Really makes me wonder who was fighting for independence, the Jews or the Arabs? Was it James Dean who once said Jews control pretty much of Hollywood? If it's true, perhaps it explain the 'subtle' message the comic trying to send. Would that stop me from watching tv? No, there's too much Hollywood stuff on TV and silverscreen. I'll take them 'with a pinch of salt'.