Road Trip 2022 - Part 3 ( Taiping )

 

The sounds of the croaking cockrel woke me up early that morning. The nice hard bed makes the waking up easier amidst the cool and early morning of the day. Santokh and I had a good sleep that night as we shared private jokes before dozing off. Afterall, it had been a long day too but meeting Rajeswaran, Suma, Raj, daughter and Suma’s family made it all worthwhile. After a good bath and cleaning up, we went downstairs and there to meet us was the ever-smiling Suma who had some yam cake ready after her morning exercise with her sisters. We tried to encourage her to join us for the evening meeting with Mr. Indran and Mr. Bernard but her dedication to her school work were indeed applaudable. I guess, there are still good teachers like her around as I have mentioned earlier.

Anyway, Raj took us for breakfast at a nearby Chinese shop where I had curry chicken wan tan mee, half boiled egg toast and 3 types of sandwiches. Santokh had the same meal as me minus the half-boiled eggs toast while Raj had the sandwiches and the half boiled egg toast. It was a good breakfast and it wasn’t expensive at all. It was rightly priced. I really loved it especially when I downed it with a good dose of kopi-o gelas that morning. It started raining when Santokh and I departed Batu Gajah with our sights heading towards Taiping, the rendezvous point for our gathering that night at about 10.00am. Raj had informed that he would be travelling later to Taiping. I drove steadily towards Taiping as we continued our conversation on what had happened thus far. The ride was smooth and the scenic scenes at the small road access and towns were fabulous. I guess, Malaysia still has much more to be discovered as one travel north bound. We finally arrived at our homestay at about 11.30am and there to greet us was our friend, Surasvaran ( I would call him Suresh, anyway ). Here was this tall chap on his bike and he looked the same except for the streaks of grey like all of our friends are. We warmly greeted and hugged each other enthusiastically as it had been far too long we’ve not seen each other. As we got the keys to our homestay, others began to arrive at the homestay. Raj, Gopi and Ragu came within minutes and our usual comradery mode was on immediately. 

By this time, we were informed that Mr. Indran, Mr. Bernard and their wives are in Taiping for lunch with Eddie and Ramesh. We were also told that we would have tea at Ramesh & Indra at their home. So, we headed off to Larut/Matang food court or commonly known as Cashier’s Market for our food. I decided not to eat anything as I was full from breakfast in Batu Gajah. Instead , Santokh encouraged me to get a local specialty namely Gula Putih drink, a concoction of maize, peanuts, evaporated milk and sugar/gula melaka which was refreshing indeed. Super yummy,actually!

From here, we proceeded to the new club to meet up with Mr. & Mrs .Indran, Mr. Bernard and Auntie May ( really sweet ladies ) before proceeding to the homestay. Our ex-lecturers and their wives occupied two rooms while the third room was open to anyone who wants to snooze there. After settling down a bit, Thuruvan came by and I really respect this old friend of ours. Santokh had invited him that morning while we were in Batu Gajah and by afternoon, he was already joining us at the homestay. Truly a gentleman and one that I respected a lot as he is a quiet man but a very respected one with good attitude and very pleasant personality. After our greeting with one another, it was soon off to Ramesh & Indra home for tea time. Indra Ramesh had prepared some fried noodles, kuih muih and fruits for tea. Again, the atmosphere was one like a busy morning market. There was so much buzz, laughter and fun. That’s what a get together is all about. I just want to thank Indra & Ramesh for opening their house for a tea session and for accommodating us. Soon, we headed out back to our homestay for some much needed rest and relaxing time as everyone had travelled far and wide to get here in Taiping. Soon, Puspagaran and Nagaiah arrived at the homestay in the evening. Suresh, Raj and Gopi went to town to get us some dinner as we pooled our resources to pay for the food and our accommodation for the day.

Some of us stayed behind to talk, laugh and even made fun of each other while waiting for dinner to be served. When dinner finally arrived, it was rather late due to extensive and massive jams in town. We ate what was served and the families had a good time too. We talked as we munched and ate our hearts content. We then adjourned to the living room area and started our re-living of memories. It was again full of laughter and much loved felt at heart. I guess, re-living the memories and conversations like this certainly put much joy to our hearts. Even Mr. Indran and Mr. Bernard spared no punches in their jokes and sharing of stories. That night everyone had something to say no matter how quiet you have been in your life. It was so good to see smiling faces and happy faces as we walked down memory lane that night. For me, I reveled in the fact, my friends are alive and they could still remember what they had done in their lives and laughed at themselves. That’s a rare privilege in a world where all these doesn’t matter except success, success, success. These were times we failed and yet we stood up and fight another day. The tenacity to stay strong and to survive was the foremost in our minds. It was revealed that I was the only one transferred to Sabah to start my career as a teacher while Sandran, Iswaran and Puspagaran started their teaching career in Sarawak. The rest were scattered in West Malaysia at various places.

That night we slept at about 2.44am after much fellowship and fun. As always, what happens in Taiping stays in Taiping. This is usually what we do in gatherings like this. It is respectful and the right thing to do. Overall, we really had a good time but most important of all, we get to spend time with our beloved lecturers, Mr. Indran and Mr.Bernard who had been inspirational to any of us during our teaching college days. Their passing down and imparting of outdoor skills and knowledge played a vital role in enriching us in our own life walk. Their advices and sound wisdom are an asset to us indeed. So, to Mr. Indran and Mr. Bernard, thank you so much and God bless you both abundantly. No matter how we turned out in our lives, you both made some dents in our lives with that expertise of yours. For me, it helped me to establish and run the Royal Rangers Ministry in my church ( an outdoor Christian ministry with the aim “To Reach, Teach and Keep Children for Christ”.) and the numerous outdoor outings with children and youth spreading the love for outdoor activities, camping, abseiling, flying fox, waterfall climb, river crossing, waterfall hike and caving activities. I could only thank the both of you for the enormous volume of teachings on safety standards, organizing a great outing and enjoying the beautiful nature in our country. I believe those skills and organizational skill helped me to where I am in helping to bring the lessons of nature to the young ones. Thank you so much, sirs. BTW, the little safety line incident with Mr. Indran during the flying fox incident helped me to be really cautious and put emphasis on safety procedure during the outings and activities done with the children. I treasured that memory very much despite my failure that day. It helped me bounced back stronger when I did the same activity with the children/youth during any outing.

 

That early morning, as I slumped on the hard flooring, it was the best place to sleep as it was cold, breezy from the air conditioning and with mates from all over the country ; spread-eagled at some corner, huddled near the TV cabinet and even cocooned near the sofa set. What a lovely sight! Nothing beats that, actually. That’s what gathering meant to me. Fun, obnoxiously loud, larynx given some great exercise while the lungs and liver were overworked with concoction of drinks and stories from the yesteryears. Nothing could beat that feeling and fun. You should try it from time to time with your own group of friends and see the great results of things. For far too long, we are too conceited and too obsessed with the acquirement of wealth and success in our career path kononnya for our future. Have a good mixture of good friends , gather without expectations and believe to have a great time and it will be great. For far too long, we are so self-centred in our own world, wallowing in our own sorrows of situation and forget to live life to the fullest. We say things like these but never ever fulfilling them as we hide behind that pretense of busyness. Go, smell the flowers, take the family to a hideaway, love them and cherished the times out. Stop being bossy or a pain in the ass with the authority invested in you as a father, a husband or even a friend. Take off the covers of your egoistic ways, peel off your dumbness of actions and live life to the fullest because we do not know where or how we are the next day. Someone asked me the other day, “ All your friends are Indians and one Punjabi fella, how do you come to that?” Well, these fellas were my college classmates, accepted me, befriended me - the one and only Chinese guy in the class together with another Chinese girl called Tin Hooi Lee, taught me a lot about friendship and what it meant to survive and had a merry time living life. It didn’t matter if they were Indians, Punjabi, Malays, Sarawakians or even mixed race – Kelab Kembara of MPLP , under the leadership of Mr. Indran and Mr. Bernard ensured that we taught each other about life when others doesn’t even bother about us nor raise a finger to help us in our lives. We chart our own lives to be where we are. Sure, we are different but that spirit of love, respect , honor and attitude meant a lot to us. That’s what it meant to me. I don’t know about you but these mates of mine are truly different yet diverse in attitude, altitude and character. Like I always say, to me, the essence of the heart matters a lot me. I am a sentimental idiot when it comes to memories but these fellas do shape my life in some small simple way despite our voluminous differences in thoughts, works and even deeds - agree to disagree in a good way. No one is perfect in this bloody world but we can make it a little better and bearable if we try our best to be a better & bigger person in life. Not in terms of physical size "big" but in the size of our hearts. Not the dick head,okay? For that, 40mg of zinc will do just fine! For the dick head, I mean! 

Road Trip 2022 - Part 2 (Bandar Puteri - Batu Gajah -Sitiawan)

My biological clock in my head sounded at 6.30am that morning. It was time for me to get up and get ready for another day of road journey from Bandar Puteri to Batu Gajah, Perak. Greeted Jane and Santokh that morning and noted that Jane was getting ready to go to school. I have known Jane since our teaching college days and she is still a fine looking woman and truly a lovely person. Smiling, warm and vibrant – that’s Jane.  I am very grateful for her hospitality and great kindness extended to me. So grateful and thankful to be able to eat and spend a night at their home.  

That morning, Santokh took me for breakfast at the nearby Indian shop and I got my awesome fix of roti canai and teh tarik. I got myself the roti canai banjir la…..what a way to start the day! We headed home and after clearing up my stuff and getting our stuff in the car, Santokh bade farewell to his girls and we hit the road to Batu Gajah. Along the way, I filled up the car with fuel and started out our journey. It was raining that morning and Santokh reminded me with extreme caution that I was to be absolutely concentrating on the road and observing the traffic rules on the road. Like I said, the KL drivers are hell drivers and at one of the road junction near Santokh’s housing estate, he was already in his element of flowery language as our car was trying to make a right turn at the junction of a busy street. This was a good start, indeed! I love it! A courageous way to exercise our vocal chords in the early morning! I joined in too from time to time as these leaky brains motorists made their way around the roads and highway. Afterall, I also need to practice my vocal chords pitches and excellent amalgamation of flowery nouns and verbs to my wording vocabulary as prescribed by the doctors. It doesn’t matter if it was in Hainanese, Hokkien or Cantonese for that matter. The most important part was to propel and articulate the words clearly, precisely and in great intonation! For starters, I would use phrases like  “tuna fish mother”which is appropriate for certain motorists of “complete bebalness”.

Anyway, despite these initial expressions of intonation and words, we arrived in Batu Gajah, Perak at about 11.30am , Friday, 22nd April, 2022. Using Waze application and calls, we landed ourselves at the home of Sagayaraj @ Raj & Suma Devi’s home. It is a quaint double storey simple house in a quiet housing estate. As both Raj & Suma were in school, we waited for Raj’s arrival. A few minutes later, Raj arrived and we exchanged hugs and some nice slaps on the backs. Here is Raj, handsome Indian fella who had survived a heart attack, recovered and playing the best golf in his life. Except for some white streaks of his hair, he looked awesome and fit as a fiddle. After exchanging some pleasantries, Suma came back and she was the same too. Athletic, cheerful, smiley and a wonderful personality. We unloaded our stuff from the car and put our things on the 2nd floor. We even met with their grown up daughter and exchanged pleasantries. Raj & Suma took us for some nice tasting Indian food at a food court in Batu Gajah. In between meals, we catch up on things that had happened in our lives and when we learned that Suma’s family had uprooted and migrated from Johor Baru to Batu Gajah, we had to meet the family. Afterall, Santokh and I had been eager to meet with Mr. Sathasivam, Suma’s dad. You see, we have heard of him and we had imagined that this was a burly , muscular and sporty man. Instead, we found a small size but muscular , rather fair Indian man with a lot of working experience under his belt. He is pleasant, honorable, spoke well and truly looked as one seasoned man indeed. It was an honour to meet him, Suma’s mom and Suma’s sisters in that beautifully built house of theirs. The wooden roofing interiors were a great architectural design and truly unique in many ways. Incidentally, they were just back from a sight seeing trip in Penang. I could not help noticing the beautiful vegetable plots and plants, fruit trees such as papayas, lemons and some herb plants. I guess, their lands are fertile and ready as there was plenty of cow dung fertilizers around which could be used as fertilizers for the plants and trees.   

We took photographs with Suma’s dad and visited Raj’s sister before departing for Raj’s home to send Suma and daughter home as we had another destination to go to that is Sitiawan. We were also shown the ample land available around Batu Gajah area and at affordable prices too. Certainly their plots are truly big and spacious too. So, we were off to Batu Gajah to visit our college friend, Rajeswaran, a quiet and lovely fella in our class in those days. Incidentally, Rajeswaran is the good friend of our late Iswaran. I guess, it must have been devastating got him to lose a friend in Iswaran. 

It had got to our attention that Rajeswaran is single and stayed in a 2 ½ storey house in Manjung, Sitiawan. He was looking forward to meet us that day. When we actually met up that day, he was the most passionate greeter I’ve ever seen in my life. We shook hands and hugged each other. He was that happy to meet us and we were also very happy to see him. As usual, we asked about him and how he is coping with his school work and so on. The floodgates of emotions and passion flowed out and I really felt for him. 13 years in a Chinese school and a single person handling the SPBT section does take a great toll on a really great person like him. I could not help feeling very sorry for him for what the school had done to him.  It was pure abuse and unkindness at the highest level. This is a truly soft spoken man and a good person genuinely. To see him in a state of unwanted stress and fatigue was heartbreaking. I could not help releasing some flowery words at these people who had caused much distress to this friend of mine. This is one lovely individual who just loves to teach but ended up doing works and responsibilities that aren’t associated with teaching in the first place. I guess, his grouses are indeed valid. 

Being a former teacher, every teacher that I had meet in schools had lamented on the non-teaching responsibilities that are taking a big toll on their lives and hence, the high volume of optional retirement. The strain on their mental side is unbearable and confusing. But alas, the numb skulls and dimwits in Kementerian Pelajaran Malaysia are as guilty as hell as every program implemented was to benefit certain people and made certain promotions! Shame on you, KPM for your lousy treatment on teachers and you still ask the bloody questions on why the high volume of optional retirement?  Shame on you too, NUTP for not taking care of teachers better and just playing along for some bloody pingat pinned on your bloody coat and ass sucking ways at the expense and blood of teachers around this country. Stop procrastinating and help these teachers. Stop playing politics and do some actual work! The teachers  are drowning and in great distress. The teachers are frustrated and very tired of this yearly charade of wayang kulit plays! The teachers are tired and sick of idiots who are not working at all are promoted while the genuine ones are being tortured and abused at every level in school because of your racialistic, unfair and unrealistic treatment. Look around you, good teachers with honorable degrees are being pushed down, moved about with reckless duties and responsibilities, heckled and frustrated to their core due to non-recognition and couldn’t care less attitude!  The education system in this country is flawed and a big disgrace! If no one dares to say it, let me say it out loud and clear – This education system has FAILED the people in this country and also the TEACHERS...genuine ones! 

If you , the Minister of Education and your cohorts, the KPM is serious about a revamp of this education system or even have any balls at all between your legs , then, TALK/Go to the teachers at the ground themselves, ask them to speak freely without action being taken, speak without prejudice or fear and see for yourself how the education system had failed this nation and for the next few generations to come. Speak without prejudice or fear, stand for revamp , lessen the load of genuine teachers and get rid of “operasi isi penuh” mentality and create jobs simply for the unqualified and unwanted. Don’t ask opinions and views from those at the top who are only interested in the KPIs and their ass at the seat they sit. Go to the genuine teachers at the ground and talk to them. I bet, you’ll get some pretty nice tongue lashing and ideas from them too. 

Every government servant is at the mercy of their top authority or people above them as each of them paints a rosy picture only to cover their ass and their rice bowl. If you only want to listen to what you want to listen, then, I regretfully tell you, Mr. Minister that you are going to have a brain drain in education system and this nation is heading towards damnation and destruction just like the economy of our country. BTW,  If you and your fellow ministers plus the high ranking officials in the ministry are sending your children to overseas for their education, doesn’t it simply signifies that this system is way warped and failed? I remembered a long time ago, I, together with good batches and thousands of aspiring young teachers a long time ago had promised to be good educators but the administrative system and the unwanted /unnecessary paper work of the education system failed me and failed miserably because of racism, unfairness and religious fanaticsm. The rot started long time ago from the school system and it had not stop till today. A great teacher once said to me that racism starts from the school education system and school today are the breeding ground of racialistic minds! Take a good hard look at the mirror and say that you are not the product of it! Hmmmnnnnnnnn……..interestingly that teachers are dying out there doing their jobs while administrators and people of the higher level of the system are still dining and siphoning off these teachers. Have some balls if you have any in the first place and do the right thing la........people are drowning and dying out there....

Anyway, what do I know, I am just an ex-teacher visiting a friend in Manjung, right?

Road Trip 2022 - Part 1 (Melaka-Bandar Puteri)

I remembered distinctively early this year, my good buddy from college days, Santokh Singh called me and mooted the idea to visit our college friends as we ain’t getting any younger and it’s been quite a while since we’ve seen each other. ( We’ve not seen some of our college mates for about 33 years! ) There was a long silence on my part as sometimes the creaking body parts and the leaky brains don’t go hand in hand at certain times due to advance man-made problems that required more attention, nearing festivities or even simply putting perspective of life in order before considering such a proposal. It is not that one could wrapped up our sarong, tuck our bananas in between our legs and make a dash to our country’s state borders, yunno. However, news of the tragic death of our teaching college class monitor, Mr.Iswaran ( his heart pacemaker ran out ) hastened the idea that it would be a good time to visit our friends before anyone else decided to change their address permanently. I must say with much love and all humbleness that I have to be thankful to Santokh for this. It was Santokh who would encouraged me a lot to take that step of faith to hit the road and visit our friends before anyone else lay down in that 6’X4’ plot or get scattered somewhere in the sea or flowing river. So, thank you, Santokh@Toki for the trust and encouragement you gave me for this trip. I am deeply thankful for the honour to travel with you for this road trip.

Santokh planned the simple itinerary earlier, made calls to our friends for the gathering in Taiping and even planned a last minute get together with our former lecturers, Mr. Indran and Mr. Bernard to be held in Taiping. I must say that I couldn’t do much except to confirm that I am going to drive him around for the entire trip using my trusty “lorry”, Proton FLX  and I would surely make it for this trip. I am so thankful that our friends were also willing to meet and able to gather together in Taiping for all the plans to get through. It wasn’t easy for Santokh as he had to do all the coordination with our friends and the success was largely due to his great diligence and ensuring that everything was on track with human touch skilled precision. 

I started out my memorable journey from Melaka on Thursday , 21st April, 2022 at about 8.00am on that lovely morning. After saying goodbye to my wife, Soon Ling, daughter , Shwu Yuen and sister-in-law, Ting, I was in my trusty old car and started my very journey of the day. I had ensured that the trusty car was serviced, cleaned and fervently telling my mechanic that I do not want any parts of the car falling off at the roads , by-ways and highways! My mechanic was telling me in return that if I wanted to make sure that the parts won’t fall off, I would have to wash the car first as he was convinced that somehow that the dirt on the car were holding the parts together in place effectively! Jokes aside, I had made sure that the car was safe and road worthy before carrying out this journey. No human lives were sacrificed nor compromised during this entire journey la…….I wouldn’t say the same for the bugs or flies that committed hara-kiri on my windscreen and radiator tank! That is totally out of my hands.

Coming back, by the time I arrived in Bandar Puteri in Klang, it was already about 10.20am. Arriving at the front gate of Santokh’s house was a memorable one as I have always hated to drive in KL or anywhere else in the city as the traffic is way crazy. It was such a nice feeling getting to meet my college buddy, Santokh and Jane as I have not seen them for a while. His two daughters were also at home and welcomed me into their home. I was shown to my room and the lovely/delightful Punjabi bed was beckoning me to sleep on it. I could feel my old body acclimatizing itself lovingly on the bed. I must say that it is one of the best bed sleep I’ve had for some time now. His two daughters were lovely and had great mannerism; signaling and confirming great upbringing and respect. Lunch was at a nearby shop serving lovely Indian food in which I would come to sample for many days ahead. After some rest and catching up on the latest developments of our lives, we were off to visit our former lecturers, Mr Indran and Mr. Bernard in PJ. Again, we had to wade through the maddening streets of Klang and PJ to get to Mr. Indran’s house. It was such a nostalgic and wonderful feeling to be able to meet these two great fellas. My heart welled up with much gratitude, joy and humbleness in seeing these two lecturers who had inspired my walk in the outdoor outlook, outdoor survival and organizational skills. I am so thankful that God has sustained these two lovely people and their families thus far. It was such an honour, pure joy and pure admiration for these two individuals whom I shall call legends in their own right. We catch up on our college days and the nature/outdoor expeditions that we had carried out over the years and during our college days. The unravelling of the outdoor stories were spontaneous , fun and great laughs. Though our meeting was a short one, many stories of our adventure were told and re-visited with much joy, enthusiasm and laughter. Promising to meet up again in Taiping for a gathering which had been planned, Santokh and I left for dinner of chapatti (my total favourite food) and chicken curry at Santokh’s home, courtesy from Jane’s lovely culinary skills. That night, over dinner with Santokh’s two daughters and Jane, there were indeed great conversations and so much laughter plus great food. I really enjoyed myself that night, making myself at home and reveling the fact that I actually survived the KL traffic and the madness along the way. Resting at the living room, we spoke on many matters and as I got ready for bed that night, I am glad that I have had great time with this lovely family. 

As I staggered into the room as I was overwhelmed with tiredness for the day, I looked forward to our journey to Batu Gajah and Sitiawan the next day. Said my prayers and sleep came easily as I lay my head on the pillow on the Punjabi bed. Batu Gajah, here we come!

A Walk....

Today like any other morning of the week, I had a walk in the park. It’s the Melaka Botanical Garden and yes, I have been exercising and trying to get myself not to collapse somewhere and give hard times to the family. ( Yeah, I have tried very hard not to be morbid for heaven’s sake but I can’t help it. Sorry!).  Yeah, I have been conscious of my health some time back and ever since retiring, it has been good being able to exercise after such a long time of lockdowns, shutdowns and whatever downs that had been implemented.

Since hearing the sad news of a friend being in great sickness, I guess, my thoughts are with my friend and the family. Though I have not seen the family for quite some time, due to the lockdowns and so on,  my silent prayers are always with them eventhough,  I, too, struggled with my own set of worries, daily fixing of problems and struggles in my heart and mind. ( Do you realized that sometimes, life problems and circumstances just piled on you after you finish solving one? Arrrrgggghhhhhhhhh! )  I guess, I have hidden a lot of my struggles to myself and that’s why I do a lot of things in great silence. I guess, hearing the sad news earlier does prick my heart a lot and I really struggled today. I guess, walking down the route in the park today, being physically tired and chalking up more steps and distance were the furthest from my mind. Even though I know that I would be tired at three quarters of the way of my walk but today, I was still full of energy and posing lots of questions in my heart and mind to God. At the end of the walk, I was physically and mentally drained, I must admit. It was supposed to be “free and easy” but somehow, it didn’t feel like that but I still chalk up my distance, though. There are still positives, though, about the walk today. 

As the morning breeze glided past my chubby face, receeding hairline and ruffling my already short hair, I could not help but admire the beauty of my surrounding. Sure, it’s a secondary jungle and almost barren of wild animals but the tall trees, rustling leaves and the gentle morning dew does invigorate your soul, yunno. I guess, my walks in the park had always been praising God, prayer of blessings for my family and friends while occasionally, putting up “ I want” list to God. Feeble-minded human, right? I must say that walking in the park experience haven’t always been good always. During the walks, sometimes, you get the opportunity to smell a lot of ammonia like smell (usually from animals) , dead wood smell and sometimes, unpleasant body odor from fellow walkers! But there are times, you get sweet smelling perfumes, cut grass smell ( I love that smell! ) and even some real nice scent of raw plants. So, it is a sight, feel and smell experience when you take a walk in the park or a botanical garden, on this occasion. To me, the lush green and majestic trees are a sight to behold. I guess, in years to come with the present government we are having, we will one day experienced all this in a museum only! So much cutting down of tree even in a secondary jungle or so-called jungle lar! Of all the experiences thus far, listening to the chirping of the birds had been the most soothing for me amidst the call of the monkeys and the rough rummaging of the wild boars. There was once, about a few months back, I saw the sight of a mama wild boar and her two small babies and I really believe that it was a rare sighting indeed.

Coming back to the walks, I must say that the terrain ain’t a bad one nor challenging but it can be for some. To me, I do struggle a bit from time to time but I do genuinely enjoy the walk as I could sort of “throw” off my questions to God. I guess, I am eccentric in the sense that I would lift my hands to praise God whenever I reached a certain destination and at the end of the destination. I would always proclaimed “ God, you are so good ! Thank you for allowing me to finish my walk today and getting you off the hook for listening to me today!“ at the end of every walk before I meet up with my their other half of my challenge in life! Hahahahahaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa. Naughty! Naughty! Definitely NO breakfast today! All in all, I would fulfil my walk quota of 1 ½ turn round the park equating about 6km walk, I believe. To me, that is liberating and fun at the same time despite the huffing and puffing!

Jokes aside, walking in the park is just not for the exercise your body needs but somehow, it can be quite enriching in life too. I realized a good smile, a greeting of “Good morning” and a simple nod of acknowledgement of fellow walkers does brighten up not just their day but yours too. Somehow, it is a simple gesture of politeness but the echoes of that humble act rings and ripples far and wide results. It just warms the heart and I guess, a lot of us failed to realise that, right? So, come on, put a smile on your face and make it a good day for someone else, will you? Take out the sulkiness and replace it with a great big warm smile the next time you are walking in the park or any park for that matter. It doesn’t matter if these walkers or joggers are strangers. Some of them might just need a little kindness or some form of positivity for the start of the day. So, go out there and give them one, you hear?

Some of the questions that I keep asking God in my walks are, “ Why are you taking the good people away and leaving us with the “not so good “ ones to deal with, huh?” , “why does evil  thrive in our society today?” and “what do you want from me, God? “ Boy! I do have loads of questions , I tell you. I guess, these are my own genuine questions. I am not a scholar nor a genius in any way but just another simple minded man who do have questions like that in my mind. I am passionate about those questions and yet, I do feel that I am so far behind in understanding of the Lord’s domain.  In every of my sinful nature, I still humbly ask forgiveness from God every day of my life. Maybe, you will say that I am just being silly but I genuinely want to know. I guess, I will only get the answer when I get to above, right? Well, the fact remains that these are questions that are so relevant in our lives today. I couldn’t care less about money and that’s the furthest thing from my mind, if you know me but I can’t get around these questions. 

Yunno, I often marveled when I read the Bible of how God used to commune with the people directly and some people hearing from God directly during the ancient times. Is it happening in our generation? Yunno, how my soul longed for that audible voice from God ! I often asked the question too, “Am I that sinful and wretched, Lord that you won’t even whisper to me?” Yeah, it bugged me a lot and I start to pour over the internet searching for commentaries, reading the Word and reading more. I truly want to listen to God and hear from Him alone rather than going through all the nicks, turns and corners of questions and more questions. I guess, we all always wanted quick fix solutions, right? Yunno what, I came to realise that Mary did the right thing- sitting quietly and listening intently to every word of the Lord. Sometimes, we “rushed” so much and we failed miserably. We really need to wait patiently and pour over the Word again and again seeking the real meaning of  the Word and scripture. More often than not, we pick out the Word or scripture that suits us and our understanding when we should understand the purpose and intention intended by the Lord. We are a generation of laziness! Laziness in our reading and understanding of the Lord’s Word. We need to really ask the Lord to help us understand and deepened our soul to the Word and open our mind to think deeper and with more understanding of the context. That’s why I am grateful to be able to do my searches and teaching of the Word whenever possible as it gives me the opportunity to look up further and learn the Word with better understanding and in better depth of realization to the Word. Yes, I would suggest you do the same indeed. 

Right, that’s my thoughts after a walk in the park. It ain’t Einstein eureka moment, yunno but just another passionate walk in the park with a very passionate God too, I guess.   

Explanation satire

People say that “new year comes with new hopes” and with high hopes stacked heavily against this Tiger year, a lot of people are hoping to have a better year in terms of health, prosperity and daily living. Well, I hate to burst their bubble and I do intend to be “positive” in the best way I can be but I am really very skeptical. Excuse me for being a rebel rouser if I must but I really do not see any further improvements of the quality of life we are going to have. I can see only the rich getting richer while the poor getting poorer while the middle income getting down the brackets to the lower income. 

Like I said, you can throw all the knives and axes at me but it doesn’t take away the fact that people in power are fattening their pockets and lining up their banks with lots of ill-gotten gains these days. Worse of all, there is simply no shame nor any sign of remorse in what they are doing like plundering the nation’s coffers , stealing money from public funds and laughable feeble defence for such corruption and plundering ways. Get to the courts and make a mockery out of our justice system too. Corruption seemed to be the way of life and it’s okay to be corrupt, man. What a great justice system and fundamentally sound government. Our corruption buster agency is exemplary and the finest in the world indeed while our justice system is simply marvelous in ensuring the band of robbers stays on the path of robbing and plundering.  We are definitely the model for corruption practices. Simply no need for remorse and no need for shame at all! So, what does it leaves us , the general moronic public of this country? Let’s go vote these morons into office again! Yay! Bravo! Good for you! Back to our cavemen mentality, fight for our “agama and bangsa” arrogance and let’s put our country into the 3rd World country bracket and live up to our ”kais pagi,makan pagi ; kais petang, makan petang” mentality! 

So, what is the formula to stay positive for 2022? We steal everything from every living persons we have in this country and call it “ours”. We shout for blood and take a portion of everything in this country and feed our supporters till they choked and gurgled in death with ill gotten ways. In that way, we stay in power indefinitely and make sure , we sapu everything before the next moronic team takes over and try to make us live like paupers or at least, try to send us to the courts only to come back in power and make us free to plunder again. Only thing to be reminded is that :-  let’s be careful and not be killed by the Orang Utan who are damn fierce killers from the forest! Ah! By the way, our Malayan tigers like human meat as they grow older; so, we also have to be very careful as we grow older, chop trees down or play near the jungle. It is alright to cut trees down; the bigger the better but this time, let the young people do it. Old people cannot cut trees in jungle as tigers like old people meat. We should send our whole cabinet ministers in the jungle so that the tigers can eat them up. Yeah, our old Cabinet Ministers are more buttery, I guess. In that way, our tigers can get well fed, have their bedroom games and re-produce to re-stock our tiger stocks in the country. Yeah! It’s because they ate too little older people and that’s why they can’t re-produce faster. Also, I was informed that cleared areas makes it difficult for the tigers to do their Hindustan courtship dances around the trees and lest, the shortage of tigers. Maybe, just maybe, Musang King durian trees may excite the senses of the tigers and the Orang Utans these times. Afterall, we are all out for their conservation, are we not? Heaven forbides if we should lose our tigers with the shortages of trees! Maybe, we should cultivate taugeh trees to ensure the right camouflage for the tigers to mate! I dunno, you never try , you never know , right? 

Aunties & uncles, if you have not woken up from your slumber of corruption daily living, please be informed that the leaders of this country are skinning the hides off your asses as you turn over from your sleep. That is very normal of them to do it because their video equipment and recording while skinning your asses can be very blurry at times. Cannot see clearly who is doing it and what is it for. You get it or not?  Everything is taken from you under the pretense of “for the good of the country”. Wake up lar! Go and have a bowl of noodles and see how much it cost you today! Better still, go to the market and see how much does the chicken or beef cost! I don’t want to even touch on the fish prices as I deemed it as luxury these days to even eat ikan kembong/ selar or even kerisi. ( BTW, it is RM 17 -RM 22 a kilo ( retail ) , depending on where you are staying unless you catch the fishes yourself lor! ) BTW, tilapia fish also increase in price these days because their feed also too expensive and a lot of people use their feed to go fishing and catch other fishes. So, freshwater anglers and fishermen are also to be blamed for the increase in fish feeds which indirectly caused the costs of the freshwater fish to increase also ! Yeah!Yeah! With strong winds and tsunamis these days, boats cannot go out to sea and so, catch is small and therefore equates to small quantities and prices increase lor. Also, fishing nets are also very expensive these days while boat engines needs petrol/diesel. This one also equally expensive together with fish tongs, ice, transport and labour all add in to make the costs go up lah! You don’t know the hardship of the fisherman. Their jetty also kena reclaimed already. The sand kena korek and sold too. That’s why the fishes don’t come into the nets because no sandy area to mate and release eggs for reproduction which leads to less fish and more expensive lah.  Haiyah! Assam pedas ikan pari also RM 15 these days! Cannot complain because ikan pari needs sandy area and no sandy area how to catch them, right? Lay net, catch small fish equals cannot cari makan lor. Just like our MACC also – catch small fish but big fish let go. Hah! Something like that lar!

What about vegetables then? Please lar, please go to the market and get those greens and see the big increase. It is even more ridiculous when you see the prices of onions and garlic. It’s all explainable. The floods had caused a lot of vegetables to be destroyed and so, re-planting needs to be done. A lot of labour involved and nowadays, Banglas also want big money to work these days. So, costs go sky-rocket and now you know why the vegetables costs go up! That’s why we need to cut down more trees , open up new lands to plant vegetables and make vegetables cheaper lor!  If not, vegetables will be more expensive. Same with chicken also – we also need new lands and new labour to work in farms but at least, the chicken shit can be use as fertilizers. That’s the good point for the country to generate more production of chickens. But by the look of things, the two legged shapely chickens are flooding into the country more rather than the two legged featherly chickens!  Ah! By the way, the two legged shapely chickens no need to be prayed over , so not much cost involved – Open legs ; money come in / Show “half ball”, all senses go haywire – money come in!  ( Go to Thailand border and get the licence enough) while the other chickens needs to be prayed over, cut the throat, washed, cleaned, packed, transported and have certificate some more. All these are extra costs and so, that’s why chicken cost goes up too, brother! Also, feed costs also go up because the jagong they feed the chickens in our chicken farms are best in the world one and so, that costs also go up. The jagong are so yellow and good that our chickens meat looks slightly better looking  than the man lying in the iced box! So, they now try to get cheaper jagong or feeds to feed the chickens. If cannot , then maybe add more “fertilizer” to the chickens through magic chemicals and magic potions! All these are extra costs, yunno. It will shoot up the cost of poultry indefinitely! 

So, bottom line, with these clearly defined explanations,  I feel very “positive” for country  in the year 2022. NIAMAH!

Aftermath......

PRN Melaka 2021 ended yesterday evening and I guess, what is there to say, right? Except that the echoes of disappointment, a tinge of hopelessness and despair rings loud and lingers on. Everyone knows what the results were and all of the Melaka people would have to accept that decision made whether we like it or not. I guess, while some of us feel down, disappointed and agitated but let us not forget that there are others who are celebrating and revelling in joy and rightly so too. If there are winners in any competition; then of course , we have to be gracious in defeat too. For me, I congratulate the winners for they are chosen on the ballot paper. Whether they did it in the right manner or not the right manner, the results speak for themselves. Sure, we can all be sore losers , sour grapes and talk loudly at coffeeshop; straining our neck muscles and neck blood vessels by saying this and that but what is the point if we ourselves, do not even understand the fundamental basic of what voting is all about. If you do not turn up for voting, then, you are as guilty and as dumb as a piece of ass because you chose not to exercise your right as a citizen of this country. Then, you do not have the right to make any comments on the election process or even how good or how bad the state government if going to be. In all truth, you do not even have the right to make any noise because you did not even lift your bloody finger to the mark the ballot paper nor have the guts to do so. You are as good as an empty vessel with all your excuses and what not that is only known to you. 

Please, spare me your excuses of “what’s the point to vote if the assemblyman/woman would then jumped to another party?”, “what is there to vote for?”, “ Aiyoo! Covid-19 lah. Can you guarantee my family members would be safe?” (Dumbass, we will all die eventually and it is all in the hands of God, dumbass! ) ,“Ah! This fella will sure win in this constituent! “ bullshit etc etc.  My answer to you is :-  So what! These excuses are flimsy and irresponsible. I want to tell you that irrespective of all these excuses, first and foremost, you are to exercise that right to vote - Who you vote is none of my concern but just come out to vote and the next thing is to do the right thing on who you place your trust in for your vote. Then, that is called a democratic process and even if our preferred candidate losses, at least, it is a fair duel, got it? Never mind if the opposing candidate blatantly uses the influence of money ( Cash is King slogan! ) or goods or even essentials for his/her campaign; the important thing is that you just do your duty as a citizen. 

I am appalled of the low turnout for voting. It is either we are overly concern of the hyped up Covid-19 scare to deter people from coming out to vote or simply assuming the seat is safe for this candidate and that candidate. I’ll tell you what I did on the election morning. I woke very early that morning. I sent my daughter to vote at the nearby centre at a different constituent. It was all done in less than 20 minutes. Then, we proceeded to my voting centre together for another constituent with my wife to vote. The SOP for voting was super relaxed, safe and good. Within 20 minutes, we got our verifications done, collected out voting papers, marked our preferred candidate and both of us were done. It was one of the fastest voting process I have ever done in my life though there was good control of crowd and voting process was early. It wasn’t like in 2018 whereby the crowd was big but very controlled under a very hot sun then.  We weren’t thinking of who is going to win and so on. Sure, we have our own preferred candidates to win but what was important is that we did our citizen’s duty that morning. We casted our votes and that was important. Then we went for breakfast and looking around the noodle shop, we could see so many abled bodies and people enjoying their meals and not even having their fingers marked meaning they have not voted that day. Overhearing conversations that some of them are not going to vote this time sickens me in the gut. These are able young/old bodies. Hey, even the handicapped and the wheel-bound tried their best to cast their votes while these morons won’t even go to the centres. That sickens me that morning.

As we proceeded to the mall as it was our usual way to spend some time as a family, I noted many young people were without markings while there were some older /middle-aged people were without ink dipped fingers. That indicated that they have not voted. I guess, I had to be thick faced and I approached these strangers and normal able bodied folks if they have voted and that they should vote and exercise their right to vote. Though I received dirty looks, unhappy responces and glaring looks, I was undeterred because voting is the right of everyone and every vote counts to make or break for a candidate.  I really did my best that morning and I even made sure that I sent out Whatsapp messages to friends and family in the afternoon to continue to ask their friends and loved ones to go out to vote. I guess, some people just couldn’t be bothered. I wasn’t ashamed to approach strangers as you might have thought because this action of voting will make or break the future of state and country. There is no such thing as protest and no voting or whatsoever. If you don’t vote because of your protest, you are even dumber than the bloody rat on the street as state laws and legislation will continue to be passed whether you like it or not. With voting, we can, at least , put our voice representative in the House via the elected representatives, to prevent unfair, not good laws or even unbalanced laws to be passed. That’s what voting rights does and means – elect a representative who will bring our voices to the House. Look, this is not ideal talking or things that cannot happen,ok? If our elected representatives are not doing their job to represent our voices, we have that power to vote them out the next time and we should.  That is the power of our vote. Hence, it is essentially important for us to go out to vote in the first place. We may say that our vote is only one vote but when the rest joins in, that, my friends, becomes a majority. Think about it diligently, shall we? Yeah, the elected representatives may screw us this time, but the next time around, we will vote him/her out. That’s the power of voting, ladies and gentleman! You are not insignificant as people paint you to be. Singularly, we may not be strong but in mass, unity is strengthened!

Personally, I really felt very sad for our state and nation. It is that ignorance and stupidity to continue to put the same corrupted people into power by giving them our vote of approval that sickened me. The reflection and implications of the election horrendously sickened me. It also appalled me that people, in their whatsoever excuses, chose to sit this one out. It is always a wrong thing to take yourself out when it comes to elections. This time, by choosing to sit out, we virtually allowed crooks, robbers and thieves to creep right back into the administrations and public office. I am appalled that the public still do not realised nor recognised how seriously failed our state and nation are these days. We are billions in deficit and all the “you scratch my back and I will scratch your back” remunerations will kill our society effectively. Sure, these ill-gotten monies and remunerations will help you short term but in the long run, we will all suffer as a society. I am most frustrated. Are we going to accept corrupted ways and corruption as a norm of our lives now? It sure seemed like it! What a perverse generation we are! Our leaders in high places shout at the top of their voices till their blood veins at the necks almost burst, condemning it but in reality, the opposite occurs and occurs to corrupt from the young to the old as if it is a daily thing in our lives! It’s shameful and it’s a disgusting culture! A disgusting culture exists only to make the corrupt and the corruptors stay in power to loot and plunder the state and nation’s wealth to oblivion.   

I guess, that’s the ugly truth of what is happening and totally my own personal view, totally. Whatever your reasoning, I hope you are happy with it now that you have got your wish. So, stop complaining that life is hard or unfair when you are at the coffeeshop or eateries or cafes or anywhere because you are the main reason all these are happening. I am reminded of a story whereby a newspaper publishing house asked the scholar, G.K. Chesterton ,” What is wrong with our world today?” Chesterton simply wrote back and answered, “ ME “. That’s what is wrong with the world today – ME/ YOU! You could have made a difference and what did you do with that opportunity? Well, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! 

Ladies and gentleman, that’s what wrong with our world today. Evil triumphs when good men/women does nothing! Think about it! However, Hope gives us light and enough reason to continue to fight on, persevere and strive for goodness. Pick up the broken pieces, re-coup, find solutions, encourage and let's start again, shall we? 

Let's re-build our country again and let's be very sure about one thing : Public Enemy No. 1 in this country is CORRUPTION not drugs!  Make no mistake of this! 

Your Vote Counts!

Come 20th November, 2021, the state of Melaka will hold her State General Elections to elect her 28 seats assembly to govern the state of Melaka for the next 5 years. Presently, torrid, fast & furious campaigning from all sides of the front were carried out ceaselessly but with very strict SOP from the Health Ministry, SPRM and even the MKN. Notwithstanding, if you look at the SOP for this state elections, you could have laughed and fall off your seats with some of the idiotic rulings. Sure, the rules are in place to safe guard the people from the re-occurrence of Covid-19 but seriously, who are you trying to kid la….There is definitely the predictable rulings to adversely affect all sides of the parties involved. However, it is definitely not an easy process to carry out a campaign if you are unable to meet with the people. That’s where the multi-media and electronic media platform will come into place. I must say, it is definitely quite interesting to see how these political parties will take part in this election. 

As for the political parties involved in this unnecessary election, it is interesting to note that there are 118 candidates from Pakatan Harapan ( PKR, DAP, Amanah ) , Barisan Nasional ( UMNO, MCA, MIC ), Perikatan Nasional ( Bersatu, Gerakan & PAS ) , Putra , independent candidates and one Indian Muslim Party  (IMAN) are involved this time around. As for the candidates, there are some familiar faces while young stalwarts are definitely at the forefront this time as political parties are moving uptrend towards a blend of young and old. I am most disappointed that I won’t be able to see and hear the “political ceramahs” this time as there won’t be any. I guess, in the last election, I would travel from one place to another to hear the candidates speak of their aspirations and points for the candidacy. So, I guess, it would be quite different this time as ceramah gives you an opportunity to gauge the strength and weaknesses of the candidates. Their body language, their intonations, their presentation of ideas and the way they bring forth their salient political points are the early indicators of what type of leaders you would be expecting. Anyway, of late, I’ve been seeing some campaign ceramahs on Youtube and I must say that the experienced candidates are quite eloquent but the younger ones are not far behind. I guess, there are some rising young leaders which I do find interesting in terms of aspirations, work done so far and their achievements thus far.

For me, I am still very appalled that there are people who will still support a corrupted government. To me, I would be not hesitated twice to vote out a corrupt government without blinking an eye but somehow, there are still people who are of the view that corruption is okay as ALL politicians are corrupted anyway. I begin to think if we, as society, had begun to “accept” such practices in our daily life and lost our bearing and real life compass of our lives. Luckily. I do still find many people hate the thought of corruption in any form in our society today. I believe many of us are against any form of corruption, racism, nepotism and blatant disrespect for the law. All the more for us to cast our votes to vote in a legitimate and good governance government. 

I have said it many times that our country is not poor and our people are a unique blend of people. We are different in our culture, our way of living, our religion and our way of thinking but we are Malaysians. This is our land. This is the place we call HOME.  We must stand up together to preserve goodness, good will and mutual respect for all of us to thrive and survive not just for ourselves but for our future children, grandchildren and generations to come. 

Let us continue to fight against penyamun, penyangak and pencuri who steal our nation’s wealth away and lived like some pompous asses around the world while most of us scrapped through our days with little essentials we have. It is dirty politicians like these that we have to put a FULL STOP! Politicians who get easy money and couldn’t care less about the Rakyat should be voted out. We need to do this by voting these people and out. Really, it doesn’t take a genius to understand this. If we continue to vote these people into office, we are shooting ourselves in our assess every single time. Until and unless we see these people out the door, we would have to continue to vote them out each and every time. True, there is no perfect political party in our country today but we can definitely see ( nor are we so blind !!! )  who are the genuine ones who work for the Rakyat and who are the ones that play lip service only. 

This is not a political rally nor a support campaign. I am fed up of politicians stealing our nation’s money and go SCOTFREE! Aren’t you fed up of such criminals still running around as though nothing has happened even though the courts had found them guilty while many had still court proceedings ongoing? This is truly embarrassing for a nation like ours and there are huge banners that say “Bersama Kami Lawan Rasuah” or “ Abah Sayang Melaka” or “Bersama ke Syurga” ( To be in syurga, you have to die first la, ngok! Who wants to die yet? Pening! Pening! ) when all the leaders on the poster are in one way or another involved in major corruption scandals and mismanagement of the country!!!!!! 

Thereby, I want to exercise that right as a citizen of this country to cast my vote. You should vote too. Please do not let the Covid-19 situation stop you from doing your duty as a responsible citizen of Malaysia. We can always take precaution such as double mask up, face shield and even have a distance so that we can be safe to vote. Sanitize our hands and body after voting while ensuring that we clean ourselves after coming back from voting centres. Do not let evil triumph in this land of Melaka. 

So, I appeal to my fellow orang Melaka@Malaccans, please come out in full force to vote. Your EVERY vote counts in every way. Let’s vote, shall we?