Stepping aside for Reality

This coming weekend is going to be a long weekend with two public holidays. Many folks will be going on vacation. And flights will be full. I don't quite enjoy being on a full flight. It is not so bad with MAS, but with Air Asia you are not allocated a seat number, so you really need to be among the first to get onto the plane if you and your families intend to sit together. That is why Air Asia allows people traveling with young children to get onto the plane first....so they can grab the seats before the rest of the thundering hordes.

There was one local flight that I was on and it was full. People were talking and joking so loudly that we could not hear the announcements. The air hostesses were trying to demonstrate the emergency procedures, but through the noise we only heard garbled messages like;

"Should the cabin lose pressure, oxygen masks will drop from the overhead area. Please place the mask over your own mouth and cover up your ugliness before you frighten anybody.......Make sure you know where the emergency exits are, so that you will be able to help our numbskull crew members locate them in case of a real emergency......To open the emergency doors, you will need to first remove the rubber bands and duct tape that have been holding them shut all along...... As you exit the plane, make sure to gather all of your belongings. Anything left behind will be divided up evenly between the pilot and flight attendants....... Thank you for flying with us. We hope you enjoyed giving us your business as much as we enjoyed taking you for a ride. And remember, nobody loves you, or your money, more than us."

Yeah, nothing like a full flight to put you in a holiday mood.

I seldom go into western restaurants. If I do, I frequently check if they serve fish. You see, I've always had trouble ordering steak. I could never decide whether to order it medium or rare. And if you ask the waiter what the difference is, you may get some smart alec waiter who tells you that "six inches is medium, eight inches is rare." And he expects me to tip him?

I once had a Greek waiter in some obscure part of England who made what looked like a very obscene gesture with both his hands. Like he was asking me if I wanted a hand-job to go with my steak. I thought to myself that it was strange that he used both hands for such a simple task. Must be a cultural thing, I thought. It turned out that he was trying to ask me if I wanted some ground pepper with my steak ....and his hand motions were supposed to be pepper grinding motions. He did not know that I spoke decent English. Hey, dickhead, if I could read the menu, then I could speak English!

Suffice to say, if I find myself in a western restaurant, I normally order grilled fish. Sheesh...suddenly I feel hungry!

Of course I know that there is no voting in the preliminary rounds. But this is my version of things leh...

In the preliminary round of Group B of the Malaysian Idol competion, there was a surprise candidate. An old man in his late seventies, was seen making his way to the microphone. Nobody knew who he was although somebody in the crowd whispered that he could be a retired doctor, a former VIP, or both. He took hold of the mike, smiled at the audience, and started singing his favourite song, "My Way".

"And now, the end is near;
And so I face the final curtain.
My friend, I’ll say it clear,
I screwed you all, that much I’m certain.

I’ve lived my goal to see
A toll on each and every highway;
And more, much more than this,
I did it my way.

Regrets, I’ve had a few;
But then again, this one I'll mention.
I did my enemies in
And jailed them all, without exception.

I planned those awful plans;
My cronies used along the byway,
And those, taxes you paid,
I used it my way.

Yes, there were times, I’m sure you knew
When I really, didn't have a clue
But through the shit, when there was doubt,
I simply bailed my cronies out.
I spent it all, before I fall;
And did it my waaaaaaaay................."


What the judges said

Highway Hair:
"You the man! You the man! This is almost religious da! I felt my hair moved when you sang! It's pure inspiration! I see the light....yeah I see the light!"

Kak Fida:
"Yo yo ! I felt the spiritual upliftment of my soul when I heard you sing. Omigawd....omigawd....what a rush! Amboi. In my books, you can do no wrong. Encore, encore!"

Saliva Lim:
" Ni nao hiah....what kind of crap are you singing? When I go to the market, I can find salted fish that sing better than you! Just because I am tone deaf doesn't mean I don'ch know anything 'bout moosic. What lah.... I ought to get paid more to sit here!"

Ryan Watercress, the emcee, respectfully led the contestant to a corner of the stage and told the audience,
"Blog audience, you must not let talent like this go unnoticed! If you think this fella is your Malaysian Idol, vote for him by dialing 12155-4444."

During the preliminary rounds of the Malaysian Idol, the emcee, Ryan Watercress, was having trouble organising the singers.
Suddenly, a short chubby ex-politician walked up to the mike, and without waiting for the musicians, started singing his favourite recruitment song:

"......It's fun to profit so try-M-C-A
It's fun to profit so try-M-C-A
We have connections, for you men to enjoy,
You can hang out with the big boys......

It's fun to profit so try-M-C-A
It's fun to profit so try-M-C-A
You can make yourself rich, you can cut a shrewd deal
And you shit wherever you feel......"

At that moment the mike started to give trouble....

*...crackle.....hissssss......KABOOOOM!!!"


Judges' comments

Highway Hair:
I say man! I love your song da! I feel your energy! I feel your passion! But then I like songs about shrewd deals! It is a pity that the mike exploded. It was not your fault. It was an act of God! Yes, dei, an act of God, certainly! I have instructed my engineers to put up netting around the mike so that it won't happen again! Good performance, man....you raised my hair!

Kak Fida:
I agree with Highway Hair! Your choice of song was very, very appropriate. But I would rather you didn't attempt to shake your booty. That one tak begitu sesuai lah for a man your age. Pity the mike exploded. I don't think it was very clever of you to spit into the mike just to see if it would short circuit. Still, it was very well sung. You raise my hair orso!

Saliva Lim:
I disagree with the other two judges. Frankly, you sounded like a cow. Not an ordinary cow, but a cranky cow having a bad case of constipation! Ni nao hiah....I have to sit hear and listen to your irregular noises which you call singing! They should pay me more for this! The only thing good tune about your song was the sound of the mike exploding!


Ryan Watercress, the emcee, took the contestant to a corner of the stage and started to address the audience.
"Come here Ah Sik....and don't spit into my mike. This is the only working mike we have left......budget constraints lah. Blog audience, if you want to vote for this contestant, please dial 12155-6969. Those of you still suffering from nausea after seeing him shake his booty on stage may want to call the nearest hospital."

Theories abound on how American Idol contestant Jennifer Hudson did not receive enough votes to enable her to remain in the American Idol competition. The latest theory is that most voters are in the 12-16 age group, and they tend to vote for teens. I find that believable. Often, in a case like this, many voters dialling in will be greeted with a "number engaged tone" when they try to vote. The adults will often give up. The kids however, will redial until they get in to vote. In other words, kids' votes determine the results. If that is the case, then those competitors who are 'old'(like Jennifer, age 22) may be in for a rough ride.

The lesson here will be repeated in the upcoming "Malaysian Idol" programme. Malaysian teenagers will determine the winners. It is not much use of the judges saying who are good or not. Have you ever known teens to listen to adult judges? Hello?

Who will be the Malaysian judges for Malaysian Idol? We know that they will comprise of two men and one woman. They will be people who can't stop talking.. And they will be people whom the teens will not listen to. Now which 3 people are so free to become judges for Malaysian Idol?
Maybe, soon-to-be-retired ministers will be given these appointments.
Three names come to mind: Highway Hair, Kak Fida, and that ol' man Saliva Lim.

This one's for American Idol fans.

Last night, I watched American Idol on NTV8. I had been on the web to find out who got voted out earlier, so I already knew it was going to be Jennifer Hudson. She gave quite a decent performance that night. Thus it was a surprise to see her get the boot by American viewers. Jennifer Hudson really had powerful vocals, which is more powerful than La Toya and Fantasia. La Toya's performance on TV last night was boring. Fantasia's version of the Barry Manilow song turned it into something very different from the original, and I thought it was trashy at best. Although the judges did not think highly of John Steven's rendition of "Mandy", I thought the song suited him and he would sweep the ladies with that song. Jasmine Trias did quite well as usual. I did not see her flower in her hair this time because it was on her ass or somewhere thereabout. Diane's performance was nothing to shout about. The worst performer for the night was George Huff. He sang like he had just ejaculated five minutes before his turn to sing.

In this news article, judge Randy Jackson commented on contestants Jennifer Hudson, Fantasia and La Toya. "I don't think there's a question that they're the three best singers," Jackson told us. I disagree with him. But then again, Randy Jackson is not a very good judge. And the American public must have seen something the judges didn't.

This article reported on how the voting went:
In what the producers say is the closest vote in the show’s history, "AI’s" three divas, Fantasia, Jennifer and La Toya, received the least amount of votes, forcing one of the three off the show.

So what really happened? Okay, the Midwest storms and the power failure may have cost some votes for Jennifer, but it still does not explain how Fantasia and La Toya are in the bottom three. If anybody should have been voted out based on their performance, it should have been George Huff. He was boring and "made a mess of the song"(as judge Simon Corwell commented). Still , it was a pity to see Jennifer lucked out. I will miss her powerful vocals. But someone has to go.

The American public voted not on the merit of the particular song but on who they rather see in the finals. I guess they may have found Jennifer a trite boring. She hardly moved on stage and she always had a shocked facial expression(like she had just seen a multiple bukakke or something). We have to remember that the judges look at the whole performer but TV audiences look mostly on the performer's face because that was where the TV camera was focused on most of the time. I think the TV audience voted for interesting screen personalities.

I had not read the papers for many days, so coming back to the Klang valley after my vacation, I started reading yesterday's news.

This little snippet of news caught my attention. Remember the case where the Taiping zoo tried to import 4 gorillas illegally?

Well, according to the article:
The four young gorillas illegally sourced from Nigeria have been safely sent from the Taiping Zoo to Pretoria, South Africa, in a hush-hush move aimed at dodging the media.......
.....The former Science, Technology and Environment Minister Datuk Seri Law Hieng Ding had said he was misled into signing the import permit, believing that the animals were imported from a captive-bred facility in Nigeria.

Fact number 1:
We wrongly imported the gorillas because the "minister was misled".

Then, to rectify the minister's mistake, the gorillas were sent to the Pretoria zoo in South Africa....which was yet another act of idiocy.

Fact number 2:
We sent the gorillas to the wrong country.

According to this other article, Rick Allan, spokesperson for the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals(a South African animal welfare group) said the Pretoria Zoo had one gorilla. "Five others have died there. The Taiping Four are in quarantine. South Africa has no native gorillas." The Star, too, carried a similar article a few days ago.

What....was the former minister misled again or was he just plain stupid? And was 'supreme stupidity' the main reason he was dropped from the current cabinet?

Some background info on the former Science, Technology and Environment Minister Datuk Seri Law Hieng Ding: he was an accountant by qualification, and he has been the Minister of Science, Technology and the Environment since 1990 until he was dropped this year. Get the picture? They put an accountant in charge of science!

What I want to know is, how did an accountant ended up in the Science Ministry and not the Trade or Finance Ministry? Isn't this a mismatch of abilities? Which super duper genius came up with this grand idea?

It is quite obvious that this former minister knew nuts about gorillas. Did he bother to find out that gorillas don't come from South Africa? He probably thought that gorillas were overgrown monkeys with their tails bitten off. The right thing to do is to stop treating these gorillas like numbers. This is not accountancy. We imported 4 gorillas, so credit Africa 4, debit Malaysia 4. Then we sent the gorillas to Africa; credit Malaysia 4, debit Africa 4. Problem solved. I may not be an expert in animal science, but I think the situation involves more than this. It goes to show how little our Datuk Law knew about science or environment.

Let us appoint ministers whose special skill is more suited to the specific ministries. I admit that this can be a problem as most politicians' area of special skill is in 'Mindless Bullshitting'. And we don't have a proper ministry for that. (Doesn't seem to stop them from practising their speciality though.)

How is the nation expected to progress when the minister knows less about science than a school kid? And is it fair that the fate of four rare protected gorillas was decided by monkeys? The next time I see that old monkey, I'll feed him a banana. Maybe not.......he may not know how to peel it.

I have not watched much TV when I was on holiday. So last night I switched on the telly to find out what I had been missing. As I suspected, nothing much.

While channel surfing before going to sleep last night, I came across this local programme(can't remember the name) and this local stand-up comedian commented about the news report that policemen will respond to an emergency call within 15 minutes. In order to do that, he said that the policemen would have to undergo training by the Domino Pizza delivery boys. What, the boys are gonna train the cops to run red lights, go the wrong way along one-way streets and make illegal U-turns?

In the same TV programme, there was an interview with Joanne Kam Po Po, who is the most well-known female stand-up comic in Malaysia. Joanne, who hails from Penang, commented that girls from Penang are humsap(lusty) and guys from Penang are kiamsiap(stingy).

I used to know somebody who was BOTH humsap and kiamsiap.
Oh I get it......that person must have been a bisexual.
I switched off the TV and went to bed.

It had been a great vacation the past few days. I was in the state of Terengganu, expecting to see great changes now that the Barisan has won the state. No I did not spot any migratory Big Breasted Bed Trashers, so obviously things have not yet improved. Damn, and I had such high expectations. The Barisan talk, talk, talk, but is slow to deliver. Still, I did see some bikinis. Couldn't tell if they were of the Bed Thrasher species.(Didn't get close enough).

The KT airport was packed with holiday makers. The airport was almost like a beach resort, with people wearing shorts and sandals and carrying backpacks. At the market, the makciks spoke a smattering of English to us. They could tell that we were easy marks as we hardly bargain, and bought anything that they said was "very good". A lot of the stuff they sold were actually from Thailand.

Saw more PAS flags than Barisan flags. In fact, the green flag was almost everywhere. I walked by a warong that has 3 huge green flags planted outside the compound. Must be a big PAS supporter. Inside, there were no Malay customers, but there were two Chinese customers eating noodles. What is it with PAS that they like to plant flags everywhere?

Stopped somewhere in KT town for some nasi dagang. It was superb! A friend of mine order chicken briyani and he said "yeccch!". The traffic police in KT was busy conducting daily operations against motorcyclists who don't wear helmets.

Where did I stay? That's a secret, but it is somewhere by the beach. The water was clear(unlike PD) so I swam a lot. The weather was hot and I got a bit sunburned on some parts of my legs. Ate fish everyday. People are friendly. It could be my imagination, but I felt that the locals actually do expect the future to be better. There seems to be an air of optimism around. Did not read the newspapers so did not keep abreast of the news. Left my handphone back home as well.

Yeah, that was a great holiday.

I will be going on holiday and therefore will not be blogging for the next few days. I am in need of some rest and recreation. All that sleeping in the office has given me a stiff neck so I really need some time away to recover!

I think I'll do some restful birdwatching. I expect to see more than just chickens and ducks of course. With luck, I may even spot some migratory Big Breasted Bed Trashers. I am told that they like to hover around the beaches at this time of year.

Malaysian-born model Sarah Marbeck, who is in the centre of a sex scandal involving England soccer captain David Beckham, has been described by the Star paper as "a model pupil and head prefect of her primary school, SK Sri Petaling" in yesterday's story.

The Sun(UK paper, not Malaysian Sun) ran a less flattering story on her and described her as a high-class hooker who earned £400 an hour as a call girl.

That's a lot of money. Many of our graduates don't even make that much in a month. Is that why the Star described her as a "model pupil"? But then the Star is such a trashy paper(unlike the classy 5Star) so we will have to make allowances for what we read.

I just came back from the back. I cashed a cash cheque, and the lady teller at the counter gave me RM200 more than she should. I couldn't believe my eyes but there it was.....the extra 200 ringgit. I gave the extra 200 ringgit back to the lady. I lost count on what word she said more profusely...."sorry" or "thank you". And no, I am not making this up. It really happened just now.

People should always exercise caution when counting banknotes. I can't explain how it could have happened. Maybe she used to work for the Election Commission. And we know that they really can't count. I know I blogged about the vote count this morning.....what a coincidence.

This Malay Mail article about the high number of spoilt votes in the recent elections caught my attention.

"Rashid said there were 164,252 spoilt votes for parliamentary seats and 134,362 for state seats. They represented 2.29 per cent and 2.11 per cent, respectively, of votes cast at polling stations.
In many cases, the "X" had been correctly marked within the box but voters had scribbled obscenities or drawn lewd pictures around the name or party symbol of the candidate they did not choose, Rashid said."

What? More than one hundred thousand people in Malaysia do not know how to vote? I do not believe that that many people spoiled their vote deliberately. If they had taken the trouble to mark the "X" then obviously they wanted their votes to count. Instead these votes ended up as spoilt votes because of the obscenities. Deliberately spoiling your vote is a political statement, but getting your vote disqualified because of childish impulses is an act of idiocy.

We have more than a hundred thousand idiots in Malaysia,.....and that's not even counting the candidates. Disappointing, no?

Iraqi blooger,Abdul Hadi must have made one of the funniest observations on the going-ons in Baghdad. Reproduced here is the interesting part of what he blogged last Saturday:


I must mention a little episode I saw the other day which must be uniquely Iraqi. Baghdad is full of flyovers and bridges. There is this flyover which has a car park below it. The car park boundary is the wall which covers the area underneath the flyover. This car park turns out to be Baghdad's lovers lane. The park against facing the flyover wall. Unknown to them some 20 feet up it is possible to look down from the flyover to see the car parked directly below.. you get to see through the windscreen enough of the front seats. Get the picture? Now couples are forced to use the car park during day hours for safety considerations. As soon as a car uses the car park, you get a few people stop their cars on the flyover and get out of their cars to look down for a spot of free peep show entertainment! Other cars driving by toot to ask if its worth stopping to look.. we did that too and one of the audience turned round and told us it's not worth it.. "these two are hopeless amateurs!"

I guess hormones will be hormones irregardless if there is peace or not.

Azalina seem to get a better press coverage than most ministers. But I think we are expecting too much out of her too soon. I am not doubting her abilities, but sports goals take a very, very, long time to come into fruition.


You know why Malaysia don't do well in sports?



We don't have sophisticated training methods, that's why.

On Saturday, I blogged about how the power of the Shia that is being weakened by the current Shia unrest in Iraq. It may be just my opinion, but I think I called it accurately enough. It just got more interesting. The fighting, although appearing to be against the Coalition forces, is shaping up into a battle about who should control the Shias: Grand Ayatollah Sistani or the cleric Al-Sadr. Al-Sadr's long term plan is to supplant Sistani. But he is smart enough not to challenge Sistani directly. So he sacrificed followers to attack the coalition soldiers instead. Sistani too, does not want to put down Al-Sadr directly. So he issues a fatwa to Shias to cooperate with the ruling coalition. Both men are pussyfooting around each other. Sistani has the advantage: he outranks Al-Sadr in the religious hierachy, commands the majority Shia support and is grudgingly tolerated by the Americans.

And yes, the Iranian connection just came out into the open.

This story which was also carried in the Sunday Star yesterday, tells how Iran's influential former president, Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, is calling for support for Sadr. By extension, we can take this to mean that the ruling clergy in Iran is backing Sadr as well. Meanwhile, Iran's top dissident cleric, Grand Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, is backing Sistani. The current ruling clergy in Iran have no reason to love Sistani. Before the Iranian elections this year, many reformist politicians in Iran crossed over to Iraq to seek counsel from Sistani. Simply put, you have Sistani/Iranian reformists/Montazeri, on one side and Sadr/Iranian ruling clergy, on the other side. This does not bode well for Shia unity of course.

Sadr just made an unwise move. By linking up with the Fallujah insurgents, he hoped to broaden his support base. But this could cost him support among the Shias. The Fallujah insurgents were after all the same Bathists who had been buttkicking the Shias during Saddam Hussein's time.

The Iraqi Shia people have been following the dictates of their clergy all this while. If the fighting continues much longer, they may just decide that the people and not the clergy will determine their future. This is quite possible and probable as such a feeling is already taking place in neighbouring Iran.

My Iraqi friend tells me that everybody was surprised that the main resistance to the Coalition came from Fallujah, a poor town, rather than from Tikrit, Saddam's birthplace. Actually it is not that surprising. Under Saddam's rule, Tikrit received priority and obtained an advanced infrastructure. If the Tikritis fought the Coalition in Tikrit right now, much of it would be destroyed in the fighting. And they know that they would not get much funds to rebuild their city under a Shia-dominated government. So it is better to go and fight in somebody elses' town. It's a case of "let's shit in someone elses' backyard instead of our own" syndrome. I know I do sound cynical. My friend from Baghdad was right when he said that in Iraq, everybody think only for their own self-interest. I would hate to see Malaysia get mixed up in this and do crazy stuff like calling for an OIC conference over Iraq. Because I know we will end up footing the bill so that delegates can come here to have a good time.

Meanwhile, the chess game in Iraq continues with Iran showing its hand now. Let's see if any more surrounding countries will show their hands as well. There could well be a civil war, which is not necessarily a bad thing. Countries have been known to come out of a civil war with greater peace and a sense of purpose.

A Kurdish friend once told me that how he could tell an Iraqi Shia and an Iranian Shia apart.

"The Iranian Shia are more handsome," he said.

The Shia muslims in Iraq were originally from Persia(Iran). But because they have settled in Iraq for a very long time, they were considered as Arabs. Actually, they spoke both languages; Persian and Arabic.

At the moment, the Iraqi Shia dominate the Governing Council of Iraq. There are two groups of Shias: the majority group who listen to Grand Ayatollah Sistani(called "Shit-stani" by one Sunni blogger), and the small minority group who follow the cleric Al-Sadr. The Shia representatives on the Governing Council take their orders from Grand Ayatollah Sistani. On June 30th this year, when America hands over power to the Iraqis, Iraq will be governed by politicians who have to be democratically elected. In actual fact, Ayatollah Sistani will be calling the shots. The Shias form the biggest voting bloc and the new Iraqi government will be the first Shia Arab government in the world.

Then why are some Shias fighting right now? For some share of the power, that's why. The Shia cleric, Al-Sadr, has been sidelined from power by the Americans and he wants his share. So he makes trouble. He would have loved it if the Americans had favoured him over Sistani.

It's all a chess game. And Al-Sadr is making his move now. Al-Sadr cannot win and I think he knows it. His game plan must be to get the Americans to negotiate with him. Meanwhile, the Kurds watch quietly from the sidelines and slowly tighten their grip on Kirkuk.(Kirkuk sits on the biggest oil reserve in Iraq.) As my Kurdish friend remarked, "This is a good time for the Kurds now."

I have few predictions on how this chess game will play out. If the current unrest drags on, Sistani will find his support eroded. One thing is certain: the Kurds will grow greatly in strength. The Kurds already have the strongest fighting forces in Iraq. The Shia have the weakest. But Al-Sadr is willing to sacrifice his followers to achieve his aims. His actions will only weaken the Shia. My friend commented, "In Iraq, everybody wants to think only of their own interests...nobody wants to think about the others." Hey, that's the same with many countries in the world.

Last night on TV, I heard our foreign minister suggesting that he should call for an OIC ministerial meeting to discuss the Iraqi situation. That must be the wierdest suggestion I have ever heard. We had an OIC conference in Malaysia last year and nothing was achieved, as usual. What will the OIC do? Can the OIC come up with a better power-sharing formula between the various groups in Iraq? And would they be willing to send soldiers to Iraq to implement their formula? I think not.

The chess game continues.

The Star article that Iraq would turn into a Vietnam is not a possibility for one very important reason: war is fought with money. That's right.....money, money, money!

During the Vietnam war, China and Russia spent huge amounts of money bankrolling North Vietnam. Guns an ammunition were arriving in North Vietnam through a railway route that runs from Russia through China to the Vietnamese. Russia was providing the bulk of the weapons but they need to ship them via China by rail as it was being used up at a rapid rate. So it's not just money, but logistics as well.

When, America started to bomb the Taliban in Afghanistan, my former neighbour who was rabidly anti-American, stated gleefully that Afghanistan would be Bush's Vietnam. I told him that for a Vietnam to happen again, he would need a superpower on the opposing side willing to put up good money to fight the war. I did not see Russia or any other power showing any sign of willingness to do such a thing. So a Vietnam did not happen. Latter events in Afghanistan serves only to prove the theory that modern wars are fought with money. Gone are the bow-and-arrow days when wars can be cheaply fought. Modern warriors want an allowance in order to fight. And when they are not fighting, they want to watch TV.

Now, the Coalition forces are battling the Arab Shia and Sunni elements in Iraq. Will it turn into a Vietnam? Of course not! Wars are fought with money, remember? Let's look at the three main grouping of people in Iraq and see if they can get the money:

Arab Shia - currently the majority(65%) in the country. Can they get the financial backing to fight a war? Yes, to a limited extent. Iran will support the Shia because of common religious background. But Iran's help would only be a trickle as Iran is not rich and really cannot spare a lot of money. The other neighbouring Arab governments are run by Sunnis who have been kicking the Shia butts around for as long as they can remember.

Arab Sunni - the minority in their country and supported by some surrounding Arab governments like Syria. The Arab Sunnis form only around 15 % or so of people in their country. They may be able to get some money, but only from the poorer Arab states.

Kurds - Kurds currently form about 20 % of the population but this can rise pretty rapidly when the mass migration of Kurds to Iraq is in full swing. See this February article for context. The Kurds sit on the largest oil reserves in Iraq. And they are allied to the Americans. In fact, the Kurds are hoping that America will help them establish a homeland. (During the football brawl in Syria in FebruaryMarch 12 in the town of Qamishli this year, the Arab supporters were holding up pictures of Saddam Hussein and the Kurdish supporters were holding up pictures of George Bush.)

If a Vietnam type of scenario is to happen, it will have to come from the Shia. But they have a lot to lose if things go wrong. They may end up getting their butts kicked by the Sunnis again, like they were under Saddam Hussein.

The Iraqi society is much more complex then Vietnam. Financial backers for a Vietnam-type resistance cannot be found for a simple reason: there is no guarantee of a return on investment even when the Americans leave the region.

Like I said, it all boils down to money.....money, money, money.....

We are told that size does not matter and it is the performance that counts. If that is true, why then are there so many penile size enhancement scams? Obviously, there must be a demand. Following my very intelligent blog yesterday on....uh.....intelligence, let me introduce you to this humour site that claims to be able to do wonders with a bit of duct tape and a rock. Now I know where the term "well-hung" should be applied.



Important Notice:
Please do not try this at home.
In fact, please do not try this anywhere at all!

That http://alt.org/longdong/ site is the creation of people with a sense of humour and is not meant to be taken seriously. I am not expecting any idiot to try out this method unless they are very desperate or really fucking stupid. And the string may break at any time causing the rock to land painfully on the toes.

And oh, do you know why the penis was created with a big bulbous head?
I think it is to prevent the string from slipping off.

I wonder if we are overly obsessed with being clever. I still remember the commercial on Malaysian TV where this guy was trying to teach a kid the word "Flower". The kid responded by saying "Orchid lah...". So krever!

In this news article, a top German researcher, Werner Habermehl, has claimed that

".....love making not only excited the body but also the brain and the increased amount of adrenaline and cortisol hormones that are produced stimulates the grey matter....."

Not being very good at biology, I don't understand what this researcher is talking about.

But I remember a story I once heard:

There was this couple who brought their eight-year old son to a nudist beach. The son soon noticed that not all penises had the same size.

So he asked his dad, "Dad, why do some guys have bigger penises than others?"

His dad, being quite well-endowed, replied, "Hehehe! It's related to the size of their brains! The ones with small tiny pricks are the stupid idiots. The people with huge cocks like mine are the intelligent ones!"

Dad then went off for a swim, and when he came back, he asked his son, "Where's your mom?"

The boy replied, "Oh....I saw her on the beach talking just now to a really stupid man. And as they talked, the idiot became more and more intelligent. I didn't know that intelligence can grow that fast!"


Now......that I understand.

I was given a new computer yesterday. And that meant work, work and work.

The biggest amount of work lies in the transferring of selected files to the new computer, and junking old files which I no longer want. After that I have to install back my old "personal productivity" programs. By "personal productivity", I meant software and games that amuse me so that I can make it through the day meaningfully without feeling personally unproductive.

And then I have to wipe the old computer hard disk clean of any embarassing downloads as well. You never know what the next user may be able to recover from your old hard disk. Luckily, there are a few freewares available on the Internet that are able to do the job.

The management claims that I am getting a new computer because they value my quality work and they want to ensure that I have the best possible environment to do my job. But I know better. They are trying to get a higher workrate out of me. Isn't it enough that my snoring in the office keeps my collegues awake and conscious? Geez.....some employers are never satisfied.

I was driving along the highway just now. Then I saw the driver in the middle lane holding his handphone against the steering wheel and tapping away. We were driving side by side and he was tapping away on his handphone. It was tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap,......... Yeah, he was tapping out an SMS message while driving at high speed. Since I did not find it amusing anymore, I quickly drove faster to get away from him before he cause damage to surrounding vehicles. The nerve of some idiots!

From the news reports and the SMS messages that have been going around, one would think that NS trainees have nothing better to do than fight in the camps. Just why are they trying to beat the shit out of each other? And why can't the authorities solve the situation?

To be fair, this is the first time that we are organising National Service programmes, and there are bound to be some teething problems. But if something is not done quickly, the NS camps will degenerate into anarchy.

Frankly, I do not think the authorities have a fucking clue as to what is going on here. As usual, I will have to help those dopes sort out this unholy mess. Sometimes I wonder why I even bother. The love for MY land, that's why.

First, let us try to reason out why the trainees are fighting. I do not think it is caused by the terrible cooking at the camps. Teenagers will eat just about anything that is not nailed down. No, the reason is hormonal. Let me spell it out....H-O-R-M-O-N-A-L. Many NS trainees are physically soft because they have maids at home to do the chores for them while they themselves watch TV. In the camps, trainees have to do lots of exercises like running, hiking, carrying dirty laundry and other tough shit. By the end of the day, their arms are dead tired, but their hormones are not. Finding the physical stresses too much for them to cope, they need to have a good wanking session to end the day.

Whose fault is it anyway? The TV has been telling them to "Choose feel good, Choose to vote". They are not old enough to vote, so the only other way to feel good is to "Choose to wank". However, in the camps, by the end of the day, they are so tired that they have no more strength left in their arms to "move it". They could try to use their feet, but hey, their feet are fucking tired as well. (Don't ask me how this is done, because I've never tried!) Can you imagine what happens to all those teenage wankers if they don't get in their daily "Choose feel good" session? They become highly irritable and frustrated. Sooner or later, they will start to fight among themselves. Man, I can't believe nobody saw this shit coming.


The solution

Now, now, we can't really get these guys' maids to come to camp and help them wank, can we? Of course not! Don't even think it! We would have to pay traveling allowances to the maids which will cost a whole fucko lot of money. No, no, we have to think of more productive and efficient methods. I believe the answer lies in machines. That's right....WANKING MACHINES!

Why machines? Because machines wank without getting fatigued. They are available 24 hours a day. And they don't complain about the gooey mess you make afterwards.

Okay, let us first look at one Japanese design.





Trust the Japanese to come up with practical solutions for everything. Those who can read Japanese may want to visit the manufacturer's site at http://daimaoh.kir.jp/ho/menssom.htm. (Those who can't read Japanese can still get a pretty good idea on how the thing works by looking at the pictures.)

What we really should do is to install these machines at strategic points around the camp preferably close to the toilets. They could be coin-operated to bring in profits to the camp. This income will help to defray the expenses of running the NS programme. It's a fucking brilliant money-making scheme, I tell ya. You can bet that some crony will try to steal this idea and get a monopoly on installing these machines in all the camps. For those of you who read my posting on December 3rd, 2003, you may interested to know that I have not yet got a reply to my application to become a crony. I don't know why, 'cos that was a damn good application letter. Fucking slow bureaucracy, that's why.

There may be some nit-picking nerds who may argue that the machines are not suitable for Malaysia because our electrical voltage is 230 volts whereas the Japanese wanking machines run on 110 volts in Japan. So what if our electrical voltage is double that of the Japanese voltage? My business mind tells me that this is yet another plus point. With double the voltage, those wankers will get double the pleasure, I say!

Of course, this idea works only if the trainees fighting are all males. Had it been the female trainees fighting, I would have to come up with another new novel money-making idea involving mud. Heck, I should have been a crony.

Last night an beautiful angel appeared in my dreams wearing a coat, and she said, "Viewtru, you have lived an blameless and honourable life. I have come to make your wishes come true."

Waving her wand, the angel said to me, "Your land shall be totally free of corruption. Politicians will tell the truth. And your ministers will be competent."

And I replied, "Gee, do you always go around saying things like that?"

She said, "Nah, only on April the first!"

And so I said, "In that case I shall not believe you."

Then she asked, "Can't fool you, can I? Would you like to see me wearing a pink bra and lacy underwear instead?"

I answered, "Pink bra and lacy underwear? Oh boy, yeah!!!"

Pulling her coat wide open, she exclaimed, "Hahaha! Got you! I'm not wearing anything underneath! See? April Fool!"

I woke up smiling.