Inconsiderate people

I went to an Indian wedding dinner last Sunday held at about 7.30pm in a hall in Taiping. The owners of the hall were Chinese. I mean Malaysians of Chinese roots. 

Actually, the sole purpose of the hall was to cater to the various functions of the Malaysian Chinese. Hence, the writings on the wall above the stage were only in Chinese. I suppose it said, ‘Welcome’ or something of that sort, as had been the case in the halls belonging to the Malaysian Indians. 

The Indians hold their functions in the Chinese halls, mainly because of the inability to get Indian halls for the purpose at the required time, due to all of them being taken up. But being true Malaysians, the Chinese accommodate the Indians gladly. Such things are common throughout the year. 1Malaysia indeed!

Putting aside the unity chatter to one side, we – my wife, my son and I – were sitting at one of the many clothed round tables in the hall, waiting for the prelude to the dinner to start. The prelude means, the walking in of the newly-weds amidst an ovation, and the cutting of the wedding cake by the couple, and feeding each other, to the loud approval of the crowd.

Guests were slowly streaming in. And then I saw a middle aged couple walk by our table and sit at the table next to ours. When I saw the face of the male partner I was taken aback. Half of his face below the nose down was pinkish; he had some sort of a skin disease, the skin had peeled out. I was very touched for his misfortune. Sad though I was, I admired his brevity for coming to this occasion where he has to mingle with the crowd. Inwardly, I saluted his companion for the faithful wife she was, to walk along with him, indifferently. In these days of fault finding among the spouses, this act of camaraderie was really great. I smiled at them, respectfully, and they smiled back.

I should have been happy, except for the next turn of events. A family of five came in and went and sat at the table where the misfortuned couple was sitting. And I thought everything was well with the world. People are understanding and do not care how a person’s face looks. Alas, I could not never have been so wrong! The head of the family, suddenly, pretended that he had seen someone at a table far away and the whole family got up and moved away, The couple, especially, the man, tried not to show any embarrassment.

I am sensitive guy by nature, and uncontrollably, I sat there sulking. I did not like the dinner that day.

Malaysian coaches - hockey

Today (14th Nov 2010), Malaysia played Japan in women’s hockey of the Asian Games, being held in Guangzhou, China. 

I discovered that Malaysia had two of the best hockey coaches in Malaysia, in the two hockey commentators, who were commenting on the game’s proceedings. They complemented each other, saying that 'this player should have done that, and that player should have done this'. And if they had done this and that there sure would have been goals! 

Well, Malaysia lost 4 -2 to Japan. You know what they said? They said there had been a vast improvement in the hockey team, because the last time, in Doha, they lost 7-0 to Japan. Wow! What an improvement! It brings a lump to my throat!

Money for Malaysians!

Today I felt like knowing what the Malaysian LinkReferral bloggers are blogging about. So I signed in and entered the LinkRefferal page and chose Malaysia from ‘Geographical location’.

The page stated there were 4066 blogs from Malaysia. So I eagerly started scrolling down the blog rolls. What I saw was very disappointing. Of 250 rolls I saw only about 3 percent was blogging about the general aspects of things. The rest were all were advertising about making money online!

I did not know Malaysia had so many online business people!

Monkey tale

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I am a monkey. A macaque monkey, from the forest of Malaysia. Last week, on Wednesday 6, October 2010, something nasty happened in Malaysia, in the town of Seremban, in the central State of Negeri Sembilan, that took front page news of almost all the newsprints. If I am a monkey that can talk, then, of course, I can read the papers, too!

The papers mentioned that one of my kinds, the macaque one, carried a four-day-old human baby away from the living room of a house in Seremban, bit it, and dropped it from the roof, only to be found lifeless, on the ground. And that, the killer macaque monkey was spotted near the area, and was shot to death by officers of the Negeri Sembilan Wildlife and National Parks Department.

I did not know what came over my friend to have, so cruelly, killed a child. Only later on, the next day to be exact, did I know that the house had a caged-in female macaque. Then I understood. We, the macaque kind, as well as, most of the other kinds, do not like any of us to be caged in or tied up. My friend most likely thought the baby was the one responsible to have caged one of his species.

Now, what would the humans do if one of them was caged? Say congratulations? Of course not! They would try the utmost to free him or her. That’s what my friend had tried to do! Sadly, the stupid clown picked on a helpless child. He should have tried to attract attention by picking on someone his own size……er…….or may be bigger.

I hope the humans get some sort of a lesson from this. We should, too. I feel very sorry for the parents of the child and also feel sadness for my friend.

God bless the Chilean miners

May God have mercy on the 33 miners of Chile! It has been exactly two months and 4 days now, and the poor Chilean miners are still stuck 700 meters underground, in the San Jose mine, in Atacama Desert of Chile. The copper mine collapsed on the 5^th August 2010. But the miners were, thankfully, alive. However, contact was only able to be made on August 22. How panicky and desperate they would have been!

Rescue experts and other personals have been working around the clock, to bring them up, but, unfortunately, it seems to be a tough job due to the huge distance below the ground level. Fortunately, the men below are able to receive food and other necessities, through the cup sized bores drilled through. The rescue people are saying that it will just take a few more days to bring all the 33 miners up. Drilling pilot holes, for rescue shafts to be sent down, are underway. Hopefully, everything goes without mishaps, and the miners are able to see their loved ones, once again.

Maid in malaysia - an apology.

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Indonesians do have some basis to be sore at Malaysians. Pushing aside other issues, the news of one of their citizens being abused by other individuals would surely make them angry. 

 I am talking about the frequent news of maltreatments metered out to the Indonesian maids, by some narrow-minded employers. 

Not to indulge too much into the various disgusting treatments the maids receive, here is the problem. The employers think just because they are paying a few hundred ringgits for the maids’ services, they can treat them as they want. And that, they must get back the amount of services, befitting the sum that have spent. 

Does that mean washing the cars, tending to the gardens, climbing up the ladders to clean up the fans and bulbs? 

When one mentions ‘maid’ the first thing that comes to the mind is a woman doing the cooking, cleaning up the house, washing the clothes, tending to the children, or the aged, and other domestic tasks befitting a woman. Not washing cars and climbing up ladders! The employers must realize that the maids are not slaves and will never belong to them. Neither, are they some robots they can own. 

 Luckily, though, the majority of the Malaysians do not have such brainless mentality. We, sincerely, apologize for the idiotic few that have this rotten mentality.

Muses amuses - Funny question, Exotic meat

“Now that you have won the competition, how do you feel?”

The above question is one of the most often asked questions by hosts of reality shows to the winners. It is really an irritating and pointless question to me. Of course, the answer would be, “Oh, I am so happy!” or “I am so excited!” And so on.

Who, in his or her right mind, is going to say, “Oh, I feel bad. I wish I hadn’t won!” Or “This is the saddest day of my life!” Or to that effect! Ha! Ha!

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Just about a month ago, Malaysian, Anson Wong was apprehended for trying to smuggle out some wild animals for sale. A lot of hues and cries were made by the authorities and media, that things need to be improved to arrest this type of situation.

So it comes as a surprise and shock to me to read in The Star, today (October 4, 2010), that the Johor state Veterinary Services Department is encouraging and campaigning for people to consume exotic meat! The VSD said the meat includes deer, ostrich, rabbit and turkey. But encouraging the eating of exotic meat may result in poachers going into the jungle. God knows what meat they will come out with!

Animal Rights and Protection groups! Where are you?