“Professor” D

(Still remember Geordi La Forge from the famed Star Trek the Next Generations with his high-tech eye-wear? We may be seeing technology catching up on the low profile eye-wear with Google’s Glass Project and that could be start of things to come. Who knows, perhaps we can even replace our human eyes with its limitations with a high-tech robotic eyes? Image source: http://resourcemagonline.com)

This year could mark an important year in my son’s life – it is the year he started to wear a spectacle. It was something we did not expect to happen so soon but since he had complained that he could not see what is being written on the blackboard from the back of the class and thus missing to copy down some assignment, we knew we need to act fast. We had talked to his teacher and got him to sit in front but in the long run, it was not that helpful. It is either we play ignorant whilst he continue to fall back on his studies and his eye-sight get worse or get him to see a eye doctor and then a proper spectacles.

It was the same dilemma that probably faced my Dad when I said the same thing many, many years ago when I too had the same problem. But back in the 1980s, wearing a spectacle seemed to be a big taboo sort of. Perhaps it is due to the size of spectacles back then – it was not small, looked ugly and came without added technology such as multi-coating, high index and light sensitive lens. Contact lens was almost non-existence. And given the fact that no one in the family (and that included those at my uncles and aunties side) wears a spectacle, you were looked at like an alien when you wear one in front of them.

It took some sound advice from my class teacher to get my Dad to “see things from my point of view” and we were off to see an optician. Let’s just say that things gotten clearer since then. And my son remarked the same when he got his “stylist” spectacles. And things have changed too – instead of the usual weird looks from our relatives, it seemed more acceptable now for one to wear spectacles especially if you read a lot of books. One even remarked that my son now looks like a professor.

Perhaps there is another point on view on why we should not be wearing spectacles:-

The problem with glasses and contacts are that they are crutches. Just like using leg crutches to help you walk when you are recovering from a broken or injured leg, glasses give you the instant gratification of being able to suddenly see clearly with eyes that have lost the ability to focus well on their own.

Glasses are a quick fix indeed! However, they don’t address the root cause that allowed your eyes to get out of shape in the first place: deformation of the actual shape of the eye. Myopia (near-sightedness) is caused by elongation of the eye; hyperopia (far-sightedness) by the eye becoming shorter in length.

And just as one’s leg would never fully recover, but would actually become weaker, if you continued to use crutches indefinitely, the use of corrective lenses allows your eye to become progressively weaker — either more myopic or hyperopic, as the case may be. The use of laser surgery may seem to be the best of all fixes, by permanently re-sculpting the cornea. But the risks and complications can be significant, and continued bad vision habits can result in the need for repeat surgery.

(Source)

It does makes some sense but it takes a lot of practice and patience to maintain the “eyes exercise” and get on with daily activities without wearing any spectacles. Certainly it is not an easy thing to do. Otherwise many opticians would have gone out of business fast. But moving forward, things may change in the near future – we one day may not need to wear spectacles:-

Short-sightedness, or myopia, which makes distant objects appear blurred, often begins in childhood, and it appears to be growing in the UK – now affecting about one in three British adults. But a scientific breakthrough announced this week could start to reduce that number within a decade.

Scientists based in London have identified a gene that causes myopia and are confident that drugs could be developed to halt the distorted growth of the eye that brings about the condition. In about 10 years, short-sightedness could be cured through eye drops, says Dr Chris Hammond, who led the research at King’s College London.

(Source)

Coming back to my son wearing one, we do try to get him to be less dependant on his spectacles by getting him to do some basic eyes exercise and to use his eyes unaided if possible. Not that we have anything ugly against him wearing spectacles – we just worried that it will deter him from his usual active activities. But he proved us dead wrong the very next day – wearing a spectacle however did not deter him from his usual active activities – he still flies through his swimming practices on the weekends, setting faster pace every week and remains active in school as well. Of course, that causes us to constantly reminding him to be careful with his spectacles. He do forgets that he is wearing one especially when he high-jumps on the bed whenever he comes to our bedroom.

Related articles

• Does wearing glasses make you feel cooler? (earth.co.uk)
• Genes that cause short-sightedness are uncovered by scientists: Discovery could pave way for drug to stop the condition (dailymail.co.uk)
• Making a Spectacle (preppyobsessions.wordpress.com)
• 24 Genes Responsible For Short-Sightedness Identified (medicalnewstoday.com)
• Are You Nearsighted or Farsighted? (everydayhealth.com)
• How to make a spectacle of yourself… wear Google Glass (thetimes.co.uk)
• Google Glass spotted at MWC (reviews.cnet.com)

So It Ends at Lahad Datu? Part 2

(Now it is a whole different ball game in Lahad Datu once the military steps in with its might with surgical air strike and armoured infantry mopping and search exercise – Photo sources: the Net)

The number of our fallen heroes went up to 8 before the Government decided to end their passive approach to the whole situation and came to their senses and finally brought in the might of our trained military power as how it should have been probably after the first 24 hours deadline to surrender unconditionally.

The fact that the Government pushed the military to be second liner to the situation perhaps caused more confusion and suspicion (one that Tian Chua accidentally got entangled for the wrong reasons when he questioned the passive action by the Government) and even ex-military men started to ask questions. First from Capt (Rtd) Hussaini Abdul Karim (http://hak55.blogspot.com/):-

News photographs show some troops in bullet-proof vests but no helmets; others in T-shirts and “soft” headgear; and many not wearing bullet-proof vests. This is wrong. However, soldiers guarding the area were wearing helmets and bullet-proof vests. There didn’t seem to be any trenches or bunkers with sandbags to protect troops keeping watch.

Some of the militants have SLRs using 7.62 mm bullets and 81mm mortars. These are deadly. A hit on the arm from as far as 600m, because of its sheer power, can kill. This is unlike the bullets used by our troops which are the 5.56 mm type where sometimes even a direct hit to the body may only injure and is not strong enough to kill. If I were the commander, I wouldn’t want to position my men anywhere nearer than 200m of the enemy.

Malaysian troops, police and the army, with our strength and superiority in numbers, equipment and logistics support, should be fully ready. Strafing from the air, harassing fire using high explosive ammunition from mortars, the light and even the medium guns of the artillery regiment should have been carried out. Tanks should have been deployed.

And another from Major (Rtd) D.Swami (http://7rangers.blogspot.com/)

We should have struck using the Malaysian Armed Forces with great audacity and at will to bring terror into the hearts of these Sulu pirates who think themselves hardy warriors.

The Police did not have the assets to destroy them. Those Sulu pirates were with automatic weapons and mortars, which killed two of our people. They had frigging mortars, for f***sake!! Najib and company were handling these terrorists with kid gloves, using the Police who are trained to handle internal security situations like the Bersih or Hindraf rally.

The Police are not trained to launch attacks on enemy locations, where the enemy fires back. It is not a Bersih rally. They do not have Mortars, Artillery, Infantry Fighting Vehicles or Special Forces skilled in Reconnaissance, Air Force and Navy. One of the principles of attack is, “the momentum of the attack must be maintained”. There will be more casualties as they did not observe this principle. I doubt the Police have any inkling of that. I guess more Policeman have to die before the sheep calls in the Military.

The Military knows that. It should be their job, as it is an external threat, they are equipped and trained for this. I am sure any soldier worth his salt is raring to go. This should be handled by the 5th Brigade Commander without sparing all the niceties. In fact there is a Tank Regiment in Kota Belud, that would make it all the more easier, minimizing the Malaysian casualties and maximizing casualties amongst the Sulu pirates. We can even use the FGA’s located in Labuan. A couple of sorties with them, followed by a mortar and artillery barrage, would be nice. After which the Infantry mounted in Stormers, accompanied by tanks can finish the job. We should use these assets which are there, instead of throwing away the lives of our brave Malaysian men.

But thankfully all that nonsense that went on for 3-odd weeks (which was way too long to be dealing with a foreign force claiming a stake of the country and asking everyone to buzz off) ended when Najib called in the military and told the intruders that there is only one way out for them – unconditional surrender.

First there was the surgical bombing using laser guided bombs using the F/A 18 jet fighters and BAe 200 Hawks and then pounding of the area with artillery to clear the area for the police and the armed forces to move in and do their mopping and search mission and with that managed to stop further casualties and in the same process managed to kill off up to 52 of the armed intruders and x number of arrested/caught. More battalions were moved up to Sabah and the naval blockade tighten to prevent more intrusion from taking place. And more recently Najib also issued orders the set up of special security areas to maintain high military presence – it makes a lot of sense, we do not want another wave of intrusion taking place soon after we had finished with the clean up of the current intrusion.

The fact that we are getting more of the intruders dead or caught whilst at the same time suffering no causalities of our own simply points that we are doing the right thing at the moment. But there is still room for improvement and lesson to be learned when it comes to dealing with foreign armed intrusion.

The obvious one would be the role of the military and the police in dealing with such armed intrusion? Semantics aside (one may argue that it is still considered as an internal affair and that is why we have the police in the lead), we would not seem a positive improvement to the armed intrusion stand-off if the military (with all due respect to the brave & skilled police commandos who had endangered themselves for the country and still fighting in the front-line) have not move in with their powerful assets in land, sky and sea. It is clear that there is a confusion as who to take the lead when such incidents happened (which may have explained the 3 weeks delay nonsense) – on whether the Home Ministry or the Defence Ministry should take charge.

In this instance, the answer is crystal clear – the police may come in to cordon the area and negotiate with the intruders to surrender themselves but once the order has been issued to wipe the Sulu terrorists, they should have fallen back and leave the military to do their job. Press releases thereafter should only come from the Chief of the Armed Forces, Gen Tan Sri Zulkifeli Mohd Zin or in some instances from the Defence Minister or the Prime Minister. The police will still have vital role to play with maintaining rule of order in other areas (they still have their normal policing work to do), with forensics of the dead bodies and to interrogate & process those who have been caught (and already cleared as not holding any vital information to the on-going military mission) by the military.

It will be even better if politicians with limited knowledge of military tactics and skills stay clear from the on-going military exercise and leave it to the experts to get the job done. This kind of confusion needs to be cleared before we face a similar intrusion in the future (although we hope this would be the last one). The amount of confusion (and unfounded rumours) generated at the first 3 weeks of the intrusion (and no thanks to strict media blackout) is simply astonishing.

Then we have this – one that well observed by Capt (Rtd) Hussaini Abdul Karim above and another by Singaporean former defence correspondent:-

During the three-week long standoff against a force which claims has 200 gunmen and even after blood was shed, Malaysians deployed for security duty do not seem to care much for their personal protection. Body amour is rarely seen.

When worn by some officers, the body amour appears to be of the soft body amour type which is not designed to withstand full metal jacket projectiles discharged from firearms or mortar rounds. Headgear in the form of ballistic helmets is almost never worn. And let’s not even go into protective eye wear like goggles.

(Source)

The American foot soldier in the Iraq and Afghanistan theatre of war complained the same thing at the initial start of the battle – the lack of body amour when facing a more determined insurgents and when the body counts started to rise, it took some time for the Government to act before the troops on the ground getting the right body armour. Coming back to the scenario in Lahad Datu, due to the media blackout and lack of details on the actual mission on the ground, it is possible that those in the front-line are actually have the right body armor but then if what we see on the news and media is reflective of what is our troops are using to face the heavily armed intruders, we need to revisit this if we are going to face a more sophisticated and trained foreign troops (remember, everyone with military interest in the region is looking at us on our tactics and state of readiness).

And finally there is a small incident of the media in Philippines (quoting their military intelligence) tying the culprits behind the armed intrusion with an opposition party in Malaysia. Utusan and TV3 (given this sweetener) wasted little time and jumped the gun and named Anwar was the one. I don’t think any Malaysian in their right mind (more so a leading politician at the time of general elections) would be dared to do that because it meant high treason and rightfully Anwar have denied the same and is now suing Utusan & TV3 for RM100 million for gross defamation. He should now raise the same concern to the same Philippines media and should demand them to name the opposition politicians. After all, Anwar is the Opposition Leader in the Parliament and any implication of the opposition with the armed intrusion (even if the media there did not name any names) is the last thing that the Pakatan wants at the moment. He should get this thing done and over now instead of just waiting out for the defamation suit trial date which will come over after the general elections.

In the meantime, whilst the rest of us would be looking forward to spend our time with our families on the weekend, our prayers and hopes remains entrenched with our security forces in Sabah to bring the armed intrusion to a swift end and without any casualities.

Related articles

• Hunt on for Sulu stragglers (hornbillunleashed.wordpress.com)
• Malaysia bombs Borneo to expel squatter sultan’s private army (guardian.co.uk)
• Malaysian Army takes on the Lahad Datu Invaders (dinmerican.wordpress.com)
• Fresh attacks, explosions in Sabah (rappler.com)
• ‘Royal Army’ comes under fresh attacks (manilastandardtoday.com)
• Najib is shaking, has he lost Sabah (hornbillunleashed.wordpress.com)

So It Ends at Lahad Datu?

(Just look at the fire-power in the back. Why it took so long to end this conflict? It is clear that these men were ready to defend their intrusion to the end and had push the authorities to back off until their demands are fully met. Why now? Why the sudden armed the intrusion after the Sultan getting payments from Malaysia for years now? Image source: http://news.abnxcess.com)

It has been almost 3 weeks and after the country’s sovereignty was molested by a couple of armed men and forced our mighty and well trained security forces to do “jaga” work – you know, the usual patrolling the perimeter to keep the unwanted media out whilst the armed men and his old Sultan continue to make undue demands on Sabah, it finally ends (well it is not the end of the armed men in Sabah though but rather the end of the passive treatment from the authorities – unfortunately no thanks to the armed men making the first move) today:-

The Prime Minister has confirmed that two police personnel were killed and three others injured during the clash between Malaysian armed forces and Sulu gunmen in Tanduo village near Lahad Datu, Sabah. Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak said the armed Philippino group had ventured 1.5km from their holed up area and opened fire at the Malaysian security forces.

“I have given the full mandate to the ground commanders, namely the Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Ismail Omar and the Armed Forces Chief Tan Sri Zulkefli Mohd Zin to take necessary action deemed necessary,” he said.

Meanwhile, in Lahad Datu, Sabah police commissioner Datuk Hamza Taib told reporters that 12 Sulu gunmen were killed in the clash between Malaysian General Operations Force members and the gunmen. The number of injured among the Sulu group is unknown.

(Source)

Since the waiting has ended and unnecessary blood (at Malaysian side) have been spilled, I hope that the authorities would not waste any more time sweeping up / kill off the rest of the intruders and tighten the borders to avoid future incursion from remaining rebel members in Philippines who may now hold grudge against Malaysia. It may not be the end but could be the start of more armed conflicts with the rebels in South of Philippines and who now have a reason to create trouble in Sabah as well.

It is unfortunate that we had 2 of our men died in the conflict and they will forever be remembered for their heroic action defending the country. We probably could have prevented this tragedy if we had acted earlier and with a larger and stronger show of force with aerial and artillery bombing first before the military instead of the police move in to finish off these intruders – the use of mortar bomb by the intruders seems to be suggest a change of tactics and use of the military (with a couple of PT91 MBTs leading the way)  instead of the police would have been better option but it is too late to discuss about it now.

Of course, in the meantime the pro BN blogs are trying hard to do some damage control on the inaction of their politicians over this intrusion of national sovereignty.

One conveniently linked the armed intrusion with some mumbo jumbo conspiracy theory that implies the involvement of the US and get this, some fellows from PKR (ya, why not – general elections is around the corner) mingling with the CIA and some hidden hands making Sabah Ground Zero. Perhaps it is true but it does not explain inaction to use the military and the passive treatment by the Government for the past 3 weeks and of the various extensions of the deadline that was given to these armed men that expired with no positive outcome. If the rebels did not start the shooting, who knows, another extension of the deadline would probably been thrown for the pleasure of the armed men and time would have passed by with a part of Malaysia in the hands of foreign rebels.

Another said it is a good “PR” work and any move by the armed forces would cause massacre of “old and starving men and women” and that would be bad for protection of human rights in this country. Huh? Are we supposed to take pity on the armed intrusion just and abstain from any action just because there are old and starving men and women in the rebel group who not only cross into Malaysia heavily armed but also demand their share of this country? Or are we suppose to defend our country at all cost and show that Malaysia is not a place where anyone can simply walk in and poke their finger at the sovereignty of the country, no matter what their excuse or mission may have been. No one negotiates with terrorists and so remains the same here. The moment they walked in the country with arms and claim a stake on it – it is an act of war.

Certainly with the end of the initial fire-fight, there is no longer the question of granting the intruders more time and extensions of deadline to leave the country – rest assured, that one would have gone unheeded and died a natural dead too. In the meantime, the world is laughing at us for leaving our front doors open and do nothing when a group of armed men enters and refused to leave and claim a stake on the place. It’s time to get tough all around and ensure that it does not happen again. Sovereignty of this country cannot be taken for granted for anyone – in or out of the country.

Related articles

• Malaysia’s New Approach to Foreign Armed Intrusion? (balajoe27.wordpress.com)
• 10 killed, 4 injured in Sabah firefight (globalnation.inquirer.net)
• Gov’t intel eyes 3 groups abetting Sulu sultan’s claim (newsinfo.inquirer.net)
• Gunshots heard in Borneo standoff with Filipino invaders (nzweek.com)
• Philippines Press: Stand-off is Malaysia’s ‘karma’ (dinmerican.wordpress.com)
• 10 dead, 4 wounded in Sabah – Sultan (rappler.com)
• Malaysia hints use of force as last resort not ruled out (manilastandardtoday.com)
• Malaysia raids Sabah village to end standoff (aljazeera.com)

2013 – Expectations & Targets

(The overloaded book cabinet that is long due to get a “partner” – the sign was obvious when we started to see books all over the place. And we have targeted this year to get one and reorganise the area into a mini-library )

Happy New Year to all and welcome! So, what’s I am expecting in 2013?

We will have the big Boss’ 1st year birthday to celebrate this year and compared to the one we did for our son (the other Boss) many years ago (although we made it up for his 2nd birthday), we were thinking of doing it on a larger scale with friends and family and probably save the trouble of cooking for all by just engaging a proper caterer. The problem is to find the right place to have this celebrations – doing it in the house is the obvious option for now but it may not be enough to accommodate all if we are going to “formally” do this one (parking would be chaos too). And if we are going to do one for new Big Boss, we also need to do a similar one for the other big Boss, just to be fair (we might combine the two celebrations to cut cost & time and make it a lot easier for guests too). Anyway we still have a couple of months to decide and plan for this birthday bash – we just need to pull our resources to finalise them. I am sure we will get plenty of suggestions. And we can’t wait to share the new Boss’ experience of growing up in the same manner we had with our son (we still do and we are loving every moment of it).

My son has moved up into the “first class” this year and we are all well aware of the intense competition and high expectations (from the teachers) in that class for the top places. We are also well aware of the fact that if he did not do well this year, he will be moved out from the “first class” to other “lower class” next year. Actually we are not very concern with this “first class” – “lower class” issue. Education can come in all forms and manners and the status of class means nothing to any students who are hard-working, all rounders and well understands the subject matters. And we are more than happy if son gets good marks (to go to college) and the education that will be useful in his future. And we know that he can keep up with his friends in the same class if he wants to if he spends more on school books than on his comic books & games. So this year, a small change of strategy needed in making sure he spends more time on his writing, school books and homework and us spending more time to check on his school work and tutor him if we find any weaknesses.

For this year, we are also intending to add another book cabinet before end of the year and turn the small family area upstairs into a mini library (we already calling the existing book cabinet “the library” but it would be better if we can get the books more organised). My son has been stacking up more books in his room and because we don’t have enough space in our current book cabinet, it is taking up precious space at his cabinet where he is also keeping his school books. And it has come to a stage where we are now stacking up books in 2 rows and on top of each other in the book cabinet. So another book cabinet is a must before we have the 2013 Big Bad Wolf Book sales starts at end of the year (another event to look out for in 2013), otherwise my wife is going to see more books lying all over the place and I know how much she hates me making the house “dirty”. Creation of a mini library would also mean that we need to rearrange the prayer altar for the book cabinets & maybe a couple of soft sofas and work on better lighting to make the reading more pleasurable (to make it an ideal corner for reading).

(2012 may been the Mayan’s end of the calendar year which thankfully did not happen but hopefully this 2013 would be prepper’s year to be one notch better than last year. Picking up from the news report on last year’s doomsday excitement, it should not be the end of prepping and getting ready for disasters in the future)

2013 would also be my target year to be a complete prepper where I hoped that we will be self-sustaining on food, water and others (maybe with improvements on security as well) for at least couple of months. Think about it – we barely into 2013 and we already facing a serious disruption of water supply – a basic need for all living things and despite it has been raining cats & dogs for some of the days, there seems to be plenty of finger-pointing as to who to take the blame (in this case, the contention that Syabas should take the complete blame for poor maintenance of the pumps makes a lot of sense). I have a colleague who did not have running water in his housing area for the last 2 weeks and he has 2 school-going children to take care and things are not getting any better even now (the latest news reports states that this situation is going to last way in February – imagine the havoc on Chinese New Year celebrations and then we had warnings of typhoon Sonamu hitting the East Coast states with a possible spill-over to West Coast (so, another round of flash floods?). Anyone recall when was the last time we had major warning on the some tropical storms hitting our shores? And I am not talking about the yearly “musim tengkujuh” warning. Is it going to be sign of things to come? Would prepping be part and parcel of our normal routine in the coming months? With a constant threat of water disruption (and now the weather), perhaps we should start with prepping of water for a longer time period and that is what I am targeting for this year.

Oh yes, we will likely to see the general elections to be held this year and it will be interesting to see on whether Pakatan can still to hold on to the states of Selangor and Penang which BN lost back in 2008. After all, they have been pretty “busy” for the past years since 2008 campaigning Pakatan as a bad choice for Selangor instead working themselves to be better choice for the people. It will also be interesting to see whether BN can regain the lost two-third in the Parliament (a place where they have been kept on their toe by the increased and well coordinated oppositions). However the fact that the Selangor State Government resisted the implementation of AES in the state (with dumb politicians failing to see the bigger picture) is more than enough for me to turn to the dark side and vote for BN. The Pakatan fellows may have their merits in resisting the AES implementation but the longer they resist without a solution in sight meant lawlessness on Malaysian roads will continue with dire results. Whatever it is, we need to be prepared for face dirty politics as part of our daily life until and perhaps after the dust had settled after the general election (we saw the same thing in 2008 – remember the Perak fiasco? I hope you still remember it – it was a case of law of the jungle at the highest order).

One thing is certain at this point of time in 2013 – we will not be a developed country by 2020, not in the next short 7 years that we have (there are too many things to be undone and done and I don’t see the political will-power to take drastic actions), not when we don’t have broad minded politicians who can see the bigger picture (some still living in the Stone Age and insist on others to follow them too), not when we are still lack in areas of enforcement & management of resources and certainly not when we continue to segregate the people by race and religion (unless something drastic happens in this year). The ex-PM, Tun Dr M can go to his grave knowing that his vision 2020 remained as a vision and nothing more.

Counting down into the 8th year of blogging, it has been one a good way for me to relieve stress and provide a good mental exercise (another has been reading a good book). And speaking of stress, 2013 seems to be a good year to relook into the topic of health and well-being. It is something I started at the end of last year – eating less outside and bringing food from home. Since the birth of the baby and until the time is right for my wife to go back to work, (since she had to wake up in morning to make milk for the baby) she decided to prepare food for my daily lunch. Nothing special or difficult – last night leftovers and something simple & hot in the morning and with less oil, salt and carbohydrate and more protein. Money saved from daily lunch (and breakfast) is re-used to buy fresh vegetables and fish (which is not getting cheaper by the way), so in a way I am getting a bigger boost for health from the same amount of money. It is not about me going for dieting (it will not work) but rather eating more balanced, healthy food, something that sometimes is difficult to get in your local mamak stall. The other aspect of getting healthy is exercise and that is something I have not really planned on anything specific other than take up more time to play badminton with my son in the evening on weekends and do more housework (cleaning & painting the house).

Let’s see how things moving on as we proceed further in 2013…

Related articles

• Umno-BN, stop the lies against Selangor (hornbillunleashed.wordpress.com)

Flashback – 2012

Read past flashbacks

• 2006
• 2007
• 2008
• 2009
• 2010
• 2011

(One for 2012 – the year ended with a blast from DAP. Some call it as lame, some call it desperate and some call it cheap but for me, it is simply brilliant. Forget the political message in the video – look out for the funnier side of it. The scene with the “fat momma” was a gem)

There has been a significant change for this blog in 2012. For one, I have decided to focus more on the content than on quantity of posts per week. But then again, the number of post have been dropping since 2011 but in 2012, I try to do one at least a week. Having not enough time (at most times) to draft up something for the blog was the main reason for this – yes, it would be great if I could one post a day but who has the time when one has 2-3 projects running at the same time (and managing the family at the same time).

The second change has been the shift in focus from politics to prepping. Of course one cannot run away from talking politics especially with the general elections coming up soon but admittedly this is getting a bit tiring with not much changes to both sides striving on trivial issues rather than real one facing the nation (come on lah, surely the issue of a truckload of Nigerian “students” coming over and turning the country into a global drug distribution centre must be far more important than who some aged politicians screwed last night). And talking about prepping, I ventured on it not because the world was ending in 2012 (although it was a good excuse to use) but rather it is fast becoming reality of things especially after we had welcomed a newest member of the family this year.

With that, let’s glance through the various issues that this blog went through in 2o12

January 2012

Anwar acquitted from Sodomy 2.0 but still not free from scandals (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

• It was indeed a year of reckoning in 2012 within the end of the world “scheduled” at end of the year. If it is true, then how we are going to face it in December, would dependant on how we taking the first steps in January.
• The Opposition Leader, Anwar Ibrahim was acquitted from Sodomy 2.0 and saved him from sleepless nights before the next general elections
• A review on Shankar’s Nanban – a local version of the hit “3 Idiots” which I personally thought was a poor executed despite it being a complete cut and paste of the hit version in Hindi (p.s. I accidentally saw it again last week and I realize that it was worse than I had initially estimated but thankfully Vijay redeemed himself in Thuppaki).

February 2012

• Nokia brought the much needed firmware update to its ageing Symbian 3 OS which propelled my struggling N8 to be in par with Android and iOS phones. It was not perfect though, the apps store was in a sorry state and some of the hardware was still of the old specifications but at least it made it worth to hold on to the N8 (it still has the best cameras and it has a great aluminium body) for a couple more months.
• Award winning singer and actress, Whitney Houston passed away this year
• The much anticipated MCA – DAP political debate unfortunately turned into a circus show reflecting quite badly on the organizers and MCA

March 2012

• I wrote about my observations on what I saw after my son insisted on going to the playground and I still could not understand why anyone would bring along their big blurry dog to the playground where some small children running around, playing without any parents in sight
• Part 24 of the Childhood Memories Series saw a blast from the past on the various radio sets that we had since I was young

Ubuntu’s major update – version 12.04 Precise Pangolin (Photo credit: melenas1414)

April 2012

• The fact that some matured, experienced politicians can act pretty dumb is not new but the question is for how long we going to tolerate one especially after in 7 years time, we suppose to be a developed nation. Elections is around the corner – forget winnable candidates as the key criteria for picking the right one to represent you. Start with one that think and speak intelligently.
• Ubuntu released their next major update to their popular Linux distribution (the 12.04 was later upgraded to 12.11). The changes was not so drastic but as in case of any updates, I did the necessary to ensure my “backup OS” have moved up accordingly and learned a thing or two on what need to be done when the internet gets disconnected half way through the update and a reboot shows update errors.

May 2012

• DAP have always claimed themselves as multi race party but it still lacked a bigger and active participation of the Malay party members and having it labelled as a Chinese chauvinist party by some was not helpful either. It’s catch-22 situation for DAP with them finding hard to get more Malay members and without a large Malay member base, finding it tougher to find to find more Malay members. So when the respectful Tunku Abdul Aziz Tunku Ibrahim to leave the party after a dispute on Bersih 3.0, it was considered as a major setup to DAP’s effort to attract more Malays to its wings
• Ugly side of racism and religion intolerance shows up in school and it is sad that some of us are still tolerating this nonsense and even worse, instilling the wrong values to our children. When will some people grow up and realise that they don’t have a monopoly on the thing called race and religion.

June 2012

• Are we better off in Malaysia or another country when it comes to point where we need to prepare for the end of the world as we know it? We do have some shortcomings when compared to some other countries like America (it is not easy to get automatic assault rifles here in case you are wondering) but we should also capitalise on advantages that we have in Malaysia – we have very few natural disasters at hand and politically we are still stable (even though there’s a dire need to clean it up)
  

  No it is not a picture of Pandas screwing each other but of a Government screwing its people (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

• No end to wasteful endeavours by the Government – this time, planning to blow millions just to keep some mainland Chinese happy. Ya, ther have a huge economy to tap into but what’s the point spending millions when our own economy is still finding it’s stable grounds. There was no end to dumb politicians as well – telling that pretty girls dislikes indelible ink on their fingers and thus becoming inappropriate to use it in the next elections
• There were indeed plenty of surprises at the Astro Vaanavil Superstar 2012 – was it due to the participants talents or judges’ misdirection? But still it was refreshing and we can’t wait to see the singing contest in 2013.

July 2012

• The lovable “Sheriff” from The Andy Griffith Show passed away – it was one of the shows that we often see when we were still young
• Have the number of crimes in this country have really reduced or increased? The statistics seems to suggest that there has been a drastic reduction of crime in the country but that is not what the public perception seems to suggest. The same echoed by the oppositions and it took some time for the Government to understand that whilst statistics is important, public perception is equally important before one can say that the crime rate has gone down
• This probably a serious indication that the state of Selangor is going to face a serious disruption of water supply leading up to the general elections (or longer if the State remains in Pakatan’s hands). First they said it was lack of raw water, then it rained and now they are saying that it is due to lack of treated water but no matter who is right, the citizens are the one who is going to suffer for it
• It seems that the season of dumb politicians has not ended even as we near the Merdeka month. One smart politician decided to hijack the Merdeka theme and turn it into a political election song and that did not went well with netizens. It was deemed the most disliked Merdeka theme song ever.

August 2012

The next destination for mankind – the red planet (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

• Another disguised attempt to control what is being said and done in the net? It seems to be so and the greater concern now is of the presumption of guilt (instead of innocence) entrenched in the act and that could lead to sabotages and control of what is said on the net
• The famed badminton star and well known sportsman, Punch Gunalan passed away at an age of 68
• Would this be another step closer to a manned mission to Mars? NASA celebrates the successful landing of its Curiosity Mars Rover, joining 2 other active rovers on the red planet. It is going to be interesting in the next few years as we focus on the red planet as a possible 2nd home for mankind
• The family welcomed the new “CEO” to the company – now the big boss had another boss to report to and us trying to recall what we did right and wrong when we had the first boss
• This probably be the last Symbian^3 update from Nokia before it goes full steam ahead with Windows OS for its smart phones. I personally felt bad about this as Symbian was still a robust and easy to use firmware. It’s death was probably fuelled by a serious lack of apps, less powerful hardware and poor marketing.
• The first man on the moon passes away – Neil Armstrong who said the famous words “this is one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind” opened a new series of explorers and possibilities for all mankind

September 2012

Doomsday Preppers – National Geographic Channel (Photo credit: audiovisualjunkie)

• The number of foreigners namely the “students” from Nigeria who come over and run drug business may been due to the loopholes of the current immigration laws and lax in proper screening but given the high number of them caught for drugs and fraud related cases in this country, it is high time for one to look at a more drastic and stronger measure to stop them from entering the country
• Pakatan proposed a lower cost of cars if they are voted into powers but there seems to be unjustified resistance to the proposal. And it was surprising that the majority of resistance comes from BN politicians who seems to be doing so because they don’t have all the facts or doing it because the proposal came from the opposition and not them
• My chronicles of being a prepper in Malaysia starts with this post and it is likely to run as a series as my prepping will not end in 2012 but beyond that

October 2012

• If some people were resistance to the call for cheaper cars, unfortunately there seems to be a similar resistance to the automatic enforcement system that will work to reduce the number of deaths on our roads
• It was déjà-vu all over again with the new baby wide awake at night and we taking turn to keep watch until the baby go to sleep and we can have our peace and sleep for the night

November 2012

• MIC’s inaugural street protest against the State Government on the commercial development that threatens the famed Batu Caves back-fired when it was revealed that it was work of their own 3 of their councillors who were involved in the approval of the said development many years before Pakatan came in power
• The lovable Larry Hagman who played the ruthless, iconic JR Ewing from the 1980s show Dallas passed away

December 2012

It did not come true but we are still faced with disasters that would the end of the world as we know it (Photo credit: Ted Van Pelt)

• My sister-in-law got married, hence an opportunity for me to do up a post for the blog and for my son to take rein of being the main photographer in the family
• My most favourite time of the year – the record breaking Big Bad Wolf Book sale and this time, we went on a rampage! We went twice and at a time when most people are sleeping and got ourselves enough books to last us for the next couple of months
• The end of the world prophecy comes to an end on 21.12.2012 and thankfully nothing happened but it was on a good note that I closed the year as a prepper

Have a good year ahead!