The Baby Elephant Syndrome

cute baby elephant syndrome

Hi, here's a quick one.

I need to start doing my assignments and catching up to my studies. I just hate it when I spent too much time on having dinner with my guys. No offence, but it's kinda waste of time sometimes. 2 hours for dinner every night, sigh...there are truckloads of works to do..

Anyway, have u guys heard about "baby elephant syndrome"? My Electronics 2 lecturer, Dr. Marinah brought it up this morning in her lecture. Quite a good thing to share :) So, have u guys heard about it?

No? lemme explain.

Imagine a circus, the usual fun fare we have around. In there, lived a baby elephant. This baby elephant has been living in captivity since it was born. During the captivity, it is tied to a small tree with a thin rope every night. Due to its nature to roam free, instinctively the baby elephant tried with all its might to break the rope but it wasn't strong enough at the time to do so. For years it tried and tried until at some point, it realized its efforts are of no use and it finally gave up and stopped struggling. After that point, the baby elephant never tried again for the rest of its life.

Years later when it grew bigger, it was still tied to the same small tree with the same thin rope. It could easily free itself by uprooting the tree or breaking the rope but because its mind has been fully conditioned by its prior experiences, it never made the slightest attempt.

Poorly, the powerful gigantic elephant has limited its own present abilities based on its thought on its limitation of the past - the Baby Elephant Syndrome.

yes yes yes

We, as human can be exposed to the same condition except for one thing - we could choose to re-discover our own abilities and believe in ourself and break free from our thoughts on the limitation of the past. Be honest to yourself, when we put our mind into it, there are many things we might have wished to do in the past but at that time, we were limited by external factors of some kind. We stumble into things in daily life and for a few seconds, we wanted to do something. Seconds later, comes the thought "...I can't do this because in the past.." - you realize you have been in the similar situation in the past. That's it.

Now that you have heard about the Baby Elephant Syndrome, take some time to find out your list of reasons why you are not having or doing what you want.

Are any of them merely excuses rather than legitimate reasons?
Is any of them just an elephant rope holding you back?

P/S : It's an analogy used by Dr. Marinah to persuade us to realize that Electronics subject wasn't that difficult. That's true. It is not naturally difficult, you see. But, when we don't study...

hey

The girl with the white black scarf,

I know you'll be reading this.

I'm telling you, my past is the past. I have moved far away from them.

Trust me.

At least, try. I know, it's gonna be difficult. Hang on there.

You know me better than anyone right now, I'm sure of that :)

and thanks. I'll give you more. Promise.

Sorry

I'm sorry. I am. I'll work it out okayy.

Dah la.

Not in the mood. Esok la sambung electronics. Not that I did anything pon tonight. Aiya.

Kenapa takut sangat ni? :(

Old but still awesome

If you are a fan of old Malay movies like me, you would probably know this song. I was heartlessly doing my electronics assignment when it hits me, why do some people would chase antiques over the new modern stuff? Why eh?

Well, my 2 cents do not constitute the world's opinion but to me, it's kinda like the same way I feel about this song.

It feels "nostalgic". It brings some kinda feeling of "peace". It makes me wonder how the people in those era feeling about how good the song was, about the way it's played, about the way the singers sang it, about anything at all related to those people's perceptions towards the song. And I can't help to think that those people must have loved the song. And when I think about that, I can't help but to love the songs too.

Try imagine the same kinda song played by a decent modern young singer. Not the same feeling, eh?

Random ramblings, my bad. Now, what the heck is h-parameters?

Do I believe?

Senang2 jadi heartless je kan?

I'm not sure what to think after last night, really. All what she said were true. Well, because all of that is from her point of view. She feels mad when I said I love her because she thinks that I'm just making it up and trying to be romantic with her. I guess she feels like being cheated on. She said all the words of love coming from me is the same thing that coming from me when I was in love with my ex before and thus, it is nothing special.

It hurts hearing that from her.

But I never cheated on expressing my love to them. And  I'm most certainly not fooling around with her. I am just being as honest to her as I am to my ex before. Heck, they are the one who taught me to be honest with my feelings.

About what's she doing.......I'm not sure if I can live with that. I mean, this are the little things that perhaps I shouldn't be worried about. But...what if from these little things, I can see the way she really is and have a change in heart? Ya Allah. All I'm holding on to is this straight-forward optimistic thought of mine. Yes, I'm not sure to even call this "trust". But if this is trust, I am definitely gonna hang on to it.

What am I thinking? what should I do? I have no idea.

After all, there's only one thing in my mind though. I would probably never again be crossing path with someone as awesome as her. Life have taught me to appreciate what I currently have. Life taught me if I want something so much, I should work for it.

And trust me, this is one of the most wonderful thing that ever happened to me since years.

I really really wanna work this out.

Love you, pancake :)

Merry Xmas 2010

An attempt to create a snow angel

The holidays are here. There are Christmas decorations in almost every window. It's freezing outside and the huge amounts of snow is glittering in the sunlight. The park is all white. Snowmen are everywhere. People are throwing snowballs. It's not just another day in London.

When I was a kid, I've always thought that celebrating Christmas means celebrating a Christian's festival. It kinda feels like I'd be part of them, part of the religion. Well, why not. At that time, all I know is that Christmas Day is a Christian holiday celebrated on Dec the 25th every year to commemorate the birth of Jesus Chris. Celebrating it would make me conflicting against my faith as a Muslim. To me, celebrating Christmas was wrong.

But that was then.

After two years in London, I kinda understand now how those people feel about Christmas. Some practicing Christians are really honoring the birth of Jesus. While for some, celebrating Christmas is not really about participating in the religious traditions. It's a great day to spend with their family and friends. It's just the way we Muslims celebrate our Eid. Friends and family. Great foods. Chats and laughters.

While being particular with what we do in relation to our faiths is good, rejecting everything that sometimes actually bring good is not. That's what I think. Ah well.

Merry Xmas. Ho - ho.

Arduino

Been looking around to land my hands on some actual electronics devices outside the lab and I found this.

Arduino Uno

I want one! RM175.00 Anyone wanna give me this as a gift? :D

Midterm exam finished

It's my 4th semester here in MMU and everything is just fine. Alhamdulillah :-)

The Electronics 2 test we had just now was pretty bad, haha. But lets face it, no hard work, no gain.

Today was awesome. Because I spent the entire 12 hours with an awesome girl. No, not a date, not yet. We were studying, really. And that what makes today really special, kinda.

She's awesome. I wish I could let her feel what I'm feeling now.

comeback

Kinda busy now. Just to put a note : All headers are not linked correctly for now. Will fix them later.


Fixed. and now with my bro's pc, I can start writing again. Yessss! :D

Get it

If someone seriously wants to be a part of your life, they will seriously make an effort to be in it.
All you need to do is to 'see' it.
And pray.


Thanks god :-)

10-10-10

It's 0018 of 10-10-10.


I did something just now, something I either will regret or be grateful for. It was a text, the kind I that I didn't send for long to anyone.


Wooooaaaaahhh. Gemuruh. And malu, at the same time.


Esok kene ball, kalau tak mesti asyik fikir. Or jog. Whatever 8-)


p/s : Some people had better chance in everything they do. We, as muslims, are obliged not to curse the world for that. The movie, The Pursuit of Happyness came to mind and I think I could still remember somewhere the guy was saying something like this - "It's called The Pursuit of Happiness because happiness is something we have to pursue". It is probably would never come with us wondering around without doing anything. Pancakes :)

rewards

I want to talk to you right now. But I can't, so I'll say it here.

Hope you had an awesome, awesome day.

Because I do :D

Forget about those messy things, it's a break now

ahh, I'm sure you'd do just fine!


- pchg

p/s: I hope this clears your mind why I'm not texting or calling - Can't wait for the next breakfast

good night text

thinking of you I couldn't sleep


don't want another uncertain dream, it's already hard being a thoughtful


there is no good night text, no call


i don't really mind being called abah, you seemed to enjoy it

Pedih

Pedih.


but we move on. I think. I guess.


I need to.


It's a sunny day ahead, I promise you :)

floating in the air

hurtful than not. Let's do this, lets fix me :(


it's aint easy.

Ipish

He stepped down, trying not to look long at her, as if she were the sun


yet he saw her, like the sun, even without looking.


yet he felt her, like the sun, even without looking.

Hey you

When you are tempted to stray off track, stop and take a moment to consider where you're going. Remember why you originally began traveling the path you're on. Yeah, it's not actually far from the way you wanted it before, right?



When it seems that nothing is going your way, STOP and make some time to adjust your perspective. Fight those bad feeling!




I'm telling you, think about this real hard : Only positive actions will indeed have good and productive results.


It's not too late. Lets do the positive. 'Puasa' all those negativity.


When you find yourself too caught up in the frustrations that surround you, try to think of the treasures you value around you. There's gotta be something around you now, look around. Or someone? or a couple of them :)


Smile, will ya? :-)

miss

You've successfully navigated a lifetime of challenges.


You've made it through countless difficult and demanding situations.


You're an all star.


Go out there and play your game!

dudette

Scrolling through and read this..

"I don't like you saying all those things to me"

It sounds familiar. Just like it was, 3 or maybe 4 years ago.

The bad day just never ends. Bad day, bad mood, bad feeling.






Be calm, Raf.



Heck, I'm not sure where I'm going from here.

Dudette, what's in your mind, is probably the same thing as what's in my mind.

You tell me, I'll do.



p/s : want you at the ball game. really.

problems

the greatest pain could lead us to our greatest strength.

the focus is on maintaining composure and staying calm.

ya Allah

yeah

My "carefree" attitude isn't just an act, neither it's really me. It's something I've developed from years of being hurt so much. So, I guess you don't really know me ;) stop saying that, okay? and no, I'm not mad, I'm just clarifying :)

and sometimes being playful helps to hide that you are actually being serious.

fallin

when you like someone, start it with friendship. get to know her, get her to know you.

that's the best thing that could happen :)

leave the rest to God. He is indeed the best planner.

our home

A very nice movie

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqxENMKaeCU

Sigh

Letting go, stepping back, doing less.



...but I don't give up. Not yet.

Emil's :
"Some things are worth trying. We'd never know it until we really tried. Because some chances will never come again. Remember, everything will be okay in the end. If it's not okay, then it's not the end"

Dare something worthy

It doesn't look good but I did give a try

Live in the moment. Seize the day. 


I'm happy now :-)

Mac OS

I'm trying to install mac on the old advent.

Mac Clone HD Image
http://www.warez-bb.org/viewtopic.php?t=1992604&start=0

Paul's guide
http://netbooks.modaco.com/content/msi/270099/pauls-complete-guide-to-installing-osx-leopard-on-your-msi-wind-advent-4211/

Leopard
http://www.warez-bb.org/viewtopic.php?t=2057093&highlight=
http://www.warez-bb.org/viewtopic.php?t=1158879&highlight=

12 words of the second half of 2010

Hi, how are you? Yup, I'm fine too.

Note : Into a good studying mood now. Feel free to bump and say 'hi'.

C'est la vie!

It's rather a tiring week for me. I didn't do much of serious studying in my own time and I was pretty much being occupied by other things other than books and calculator. I'll just sum them up into 4 things, okay? Randomly.

Go green team! 

Quakes is to clinch our second round place in a couple of matches to come (if you know nothing about NCBL, you might wanna check out www.pemainbolakeranjang.blogspot.com) and despite all the dramas, we are actually doing fine. I just came back from our usual last minute practice a couple of hours ago at Prima Avenue, Cyberjaya (Oh ya, I witnessed the most stupid thing in the 2010 World Cup - Brazil lost to Holland). Overall, I think we have a lot of rooms for improvements. I have seen the results of being too demanding and it wasn't good. As Mr. Trey said, build up your repo first (I actually took a while to figure out 'repo' refers to 'reputation'), prove yourself to them and then get to the points. That's true. I'll take the chance.

Secondly, I am pretty busy with IEEE (read I-Triple-E) stuff too. In case you don't know what IEEE stands for, it's the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. It's kinda like a professional world wide institution for engineering related people - including students. The weekly meeting, the registration week, the company visit, the C programming workshop - these are the kind of activities that will keep me occupied in this trimester. Although, to be honest, it's a good thing.

The third is the Writer Workshop that I attended last Saturday. The workshop was pretty interesting. I really admire the guy who conducted the workshop - he spoke very fast yet he made it very clear the points that he wanted us to get. It's like 'This guy speaks so freaking fast but I get everything he's saying'. The workshop was for those MMU students who want to be the writers for MMU online journals and possibly the hard copy one too. We were taught how to write the articles from scratch. Overall, it was very beneficial.


and of course, my mom's convocation day. Congratulations Mom! 

My family

Dad and the rest. He really is a shy guy sometimes, you know :-)

p/s : It feels weird when my ex(s) somehow contacted me about the same time. It draws memories, the good ones. It makes me smile as I'm taking my steps forward. Au revoir, girls!

Easy way to help Gaza

Aman Malaysia (People's Alliance For Peace Malaysia), a Non-Governmental Organization (NGO) recently launched an easy program for anyone in Malaysia to help Gaza. As you can see in the picture next to this, all you need to do is to text GAZA to 32928. A text is your 50 cents donation.  


If you're a student or you're just busy with life to do anything else, this is a good way to prove that you care. All I hope now is that they're putting the money into good use.


Meanwhile, lets keep praying that Israel will end the inhuman blockage on Gaza soon.


-

Najib on 10th Malaysia Plan (10MP)

KUALA LUMPUR, June 10 -- Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak on Thursday outlined five key strategic thrusts under the 10th Malaysia Plan (10MP) to enable Malaysia become a high-income and developed nation by 2020.

The prime minister said that to move in that direction, Malaysia had to draw up a new approach which emphasised quality human capital, innovation and creativity, and the government had to operate as a competitive corporation.

When tabling the 10MP in the Dewan Rakyat, Najib said Malaysia could no longer depend on a low-cost structure to remain competitive internationally because globalisation, liberalisation and the emergence of countries, such as China, India, Brazil, Russia, the Middle East and countries in the region, had intensified the competition for trade and investment.

Elaborating on the thrusts, he said the first was to design government philosophy and approach to transform Malaysia using the methodology of the National Key Results Area (NKRA) and the Key Performance Index (KPI).

The second thrust was to create a conducive environment for unleashing economic growth, while the third was to move towards inclusive socio-economic development, he added.

He said the fourth thrust was to develop and retain a first-world talent base and the fifth was to build an environment that enhances quality of life.

The 10MP, which carries the theme "Towards Economic Prosperity and Social Justice", allocates RM230 billion for development expenditure during the five-year period from 2011 to 2015.

In his speech tabling the plan, which took about one hour 40 minutes, Najib said that to transform the nation towards achieving Vision 2020 of becoming a developed nation, the plan was based on 10 ideas which had been translated into 10 main premises.

He said these were internally driven, externally aware; leveraging on the country's diversity internationally; transforming to a high-income nation through specialisation; unleashing productivity-led growth and innovation; nurturing, attracting and retaining top talent; ensuring equality of opportunities and safeguarding the vulnerable.

The 10MP, which carries the theme "Towards Economic Prosperity and Social Justice", allocates RM230 billion for development expenditure during the five-year period from 2011 to 2015.

Concentrated growth, inclusive development; supporting effective and smart partnerships; valuing the country's environmental endowments; and government as a competitive corporation.

Najib, who is also Finance Minister, said the 10MP had been formulated with various new approaches towards enabling Malaysia to become a high-income and high-productivity economy, in line with the New Economic Model (NEM).

He said that during the 10MP period, the gross national income per capita was targeted to increase to RM38,850 or US$12,140 in 2015.

"This requires achieving real GDP growth of six per cent per annum. Growth will be led by the services and manufacturing sectors, in addition to revitalising the agriculture sector towards higher value added as well as the adoption of ICT, biotechnology and other relevant technologies," he said.

Najib said that under the 10MP, the government would focus on efforts to develop non-physical infrastructure, including human capital development such as skills development and strong innovation capabilities.

Meanwhile, he added, the 10MP allocation for non-physical infrastructure would be increased to 40 per cent, compared with 21.8 per cent under the ninth plan.

"Focus will be given to skills development programmes, R&D activities and venture capital funding geared towards promoting a higher level of innovation in the country," he said.

Najib said the approach was also in line with efforts to encourage the private sector to invest in physical infrastructure and provide services such as skills training.

"To support this objective, the government will shift its focus to the private sector for procurement of services. This means that the private sector will compete to offer skills training services at competitive costs," he said.

The prime minister said the 10MP would also focus on raising the income and quality of life of the bottom 40 per cent household income group, where bumiputeras form the largest number - 73 per cent of the 2.4 million households in the group.

He said that in order to enhance competitiveness and market efficiency, as well as ensure more optimal utilisation of resources, it was necessary to reduce price controls and subsidies in stages to eliminate market distortions and abuses.

"However, any subsidy reduction will only be undertaken after taking into consideration the feedback from the people.

"I wish to give the assurance that the lower income group and those who are most vulnerable will continue to be given assistance to mitigate the impact of any subsidy reduction on their cost of living," he said.

Najib also said that in line with the "Greater Kuala Lumpur" NKEA (National Key Economic Area), the government would further enhance the public transportation network in Kuala Lumpur with the implementation of the high-capacity Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) system.

He said this was an iconic project in the capital city which would be highly beneficial to commuters and have large spillovers to the economy.

"When completed, the system is expected to cover a radius of 20km from the city centre with a total length of about 150km, and when fully operational, will serve up to two million passenger trips per day from the 480,000 trips on current urban rail systems," he said.

The prime minister said focus would continue to be given to the bumiputera development agenda in line with the concept of growth with distribution under the plan.

He also said that beginning with the 10MP, the implementation of programmes and projects on a rolling plan basis would be introduced.

With this approach, he said, allocation for programmes and projects would be provided on a two-year basis beginning 2011-2012.

He said this allowed commitment to be made based on the financial position of the government and provided flexibility to respond to new priorities and changes in the global and domestic economic environment.

"The detailed list of the programmes and projects for the first rolling plan will be ready by the end of August 2010. To carry out the 10MP development programmes, the government will make available an allocation of RM230 billion for development expenditure.

"This will comprise 55 per cent for the economic sector, 30 per cent for the social sector, 10 per cent for the security sector and five per cent for general administration," he said.

(Source : Bernama)

If only all of Quakes play like this...

we'll hand UBSA some fights for sure.

Life

1. Tough but needed loss.

2. Something that's really hard to live by. But I promise to give something better and in a better way.

Loves, mom, family and friends.

Friday Sermon

You do not do evil to those who do evil to you, but you deal with them with forgiveness and kindness

THE CRIME OF DRAW MUHAMMAD DAY; MANAGING THE INSULT

My fellow muslimin, place the best efforts and strive for the highest level of taqwa in our lives. The strives and the passion on doing what is ordained, must be complemented and supported by the prevention and precautions on what is forbidden.

My dear muslims

The world’s tolerance is again tested when it comes to the confliction between religion, religious principles and the freedom of expression. Whilst the Social Networking such as Facebook and top social medias You Tube, promoting the freedom of expression with their insensitive taunt to muslims and declare the May 20th as the Draw Muhammad Day, the only things appear is that the world is now seeing the upside down of the intellectuality level, scratching and denting their intellectual with irrelevant actions and morale misbehave. Muslims, just like others, should be the first to defend anyone’s right to express their own opinion, no matter how offensive it is. The reason it happen is due to the lack of knowledge surpassing their actions, or the ignorance that they’re practicing, intentionally or unintentionally. No matter where we are living, be it in a majority scale or minority would it be, the world and the human sense believe and respect values and diversity. But on top of that, on any reasonable and understood ground, freedom of expression does not create an obligation to offend or to show disrespects to the religious beliefs or revered figures of others.

Despite the cartoonist's and the Facebook seemingly attempts to distance themselves from the fake event, the extremists against Islam and those who promoting Islamophobia made sure the call to draw Muhammad went viral on the Internet. They are hoping to offend Muslims, who are sensitive to created images of the Prophet Muhammad or any prophets. What they need to know, of most possibly that they’ve acknowledged the matter long ago, as for muslims, we believe visual representations of not just our beloved Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, all prophets are inappropriate in that they distract from God's message and could lead to a kind of idol worship, which is obviously forbidden in Islam. For all we know, what exactly happen to other religions which allow drawing, sketching the visual figure of their Prophets, it’s not just the false idolization, but they’re free to insult their own religions and its teachings. They expressed their frustration towards their own religions by mocking their religious leaders and even the Prophets and the God! It is strongly suggested to any other religions that their scholars and leaders sensitively look into this matter and might as well joining the aspiration and the stand of Islam in banning these types of visualizations. Bible didn’t approach its readers to visualize Jesus or their religious leaders. It can never be the good way to make people close to their religions, rather it does succeed in distracting people far away from their own beliefs.

So, what will be our best reactions? Firstly, it must be made clear to muslims and non muslims that Islam teaches us about the value, freedom of speech and have no desire to inhibit the creative instincts of cartoonists, comedians, artists or anyone else. What other religions and their leaders need to do is, positively pull themselves on the same discussion table with muslim leaders in their region. Let the intentional ignorance attitude washed away to the drain, based on the freedom of expression factor. If this can be done, they will acknowledge that people is free to practice their religious beliefs, and this freedom must be engaged with morale, respect and responsible acts. Should you say that you’re free and wanted to express your freedom in expression in all things, including religion, then you must let muslim women for example, to feel free wearing their burqa. It’s their personal choice, it’s the dressing style that they personally chose. Belgium who banned it, simply on the basis of its contradict with the culture of the country. Ironically, the country claimed to hold a tolerance, respect and diversity as the core culture.

That’s why rationally and truthfully, freedom is defined with responsible acts and not just totally free. Nobody is allowed to trespass other’s land, nobody is allowed to enter other people’s property, nobody is allowed to hack other people’s bank account. They’re free to buy lands and property and doing the transaction with banks, but they simply are not free to touch other’s rights. If they can accept this fact, why can’t they rationally accept that Islam forbids the visualization of Prophet Muhammad, peace be upon him, in any ways?

Secondly, Muslims and non muslims must examine how the Prophet Muhammad himself reacted to personal insults. Our Prophet has been abused, have it in words and actions from the pagans of Makkah and in Madinah too. He has been labeled with so many inappropriate names and calls. Islamic traditions include a number of instances in which the Prophet had the opportunity to retaliate against those who abused him, but refrained from doing so. He said, ‘You do not do evil to those who do evil to you, but you deal with them with forgiveness and kindness.’ Even when the prophet was in a position of power, he chose the path of kindness and mercy. When he returned to Makkah after years of exile and personal attacks, he did not take revenge on the people who had reviled him and abused and tortured his followers, but instead offered a general amnesty. With the strength of patience in preaching and deliver good messages, instead of reacting negatively to the bigoted call to support the Draw Muhammad Day, we should use that and every other day as an opportunity to reach out to people of other faiths and beliefs to build bridges of understanding and respect.

Barakallahu li walakum

Mohd Erfino Johari

Note : This is only the first part of the sermon by Ustaz Erfino on 21 May 2010 at UK Malaysian Student Department, London. You can read the whole sermon here.

Google TV

Playing with CSS

...bila dah bosan nie, macam nak mintak new term start awal sket la plak

Actually I really wanted to learn Python as soon as possible but the whole redesigning thing took all the time up until now. With the weather taking the devil's side, I was here in the living room the whole day being a geek tweaking this blog.

I was reading a lot too. If only I have the writing skills, I'd have written some good summed up articles but nah maybe later.

So, wanna know what have I changed? First of all is the whole layout size. Having a netbook, it has been a must for me to make sure that this blog is viewable via my netbook as normal as it is viewed on the other expensive computing crap (no offense). So, I made it just so that it fits both just nice. Secondly, the whole typography thing. I used mostly Georgia. Looks appropriate for any long article.

Then, I added the "pullquote". Not sure what that is? Is the thing there on top right of this post, where I used mostly for quotations. That one is inspired by BBC News for its neat looking. I also modified the "blockquote" a little bit. See it below, so now you know I don't just make up my own story, hehe.

A teenage engineer has scooped several awards at US science fair for a device which could be used to save lives.

The design of James Popper, 18, from Wiltshire, detects kitchen fires without setting off false alarms.He was inspired to develop the device after an elderly friend with dementia had a devastating kitchen fire.About 1,600 students took part in the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair in San Jose last week.

The CookerSmart design detects the infrared in flames, reducing the likelihood of false alarms.
The Marlborough College student won accolades including the best of category award for Electrical and Mechanical Engineering, and an invitation to the Stockholm International Youth Science Seminar.It sees 25 of the world's best young scientists and engineers meet during the Nobel Prize ceremonies.He also came first in the US Government Patent and Trademark Office Society Award and was the winner of the United Technologies Corporation Prize.

James received cash awards, two scholarships, company shares and a grant for his school.

(Source : BBC News)

Note : This kid is awesome. How would you know those little daily observations can help you to achieve something like that? Okay, next time we stare at things with thought more than our eyes alright?

There is also the whole sidebar thingy. Not much but that's all to it. The last one is the "menu bar" above. That one is pretty tricky. I wanted to make something like the menu bar here (see it at top right) but I just couldn't make it work right. Maybe I'll try again later.

That's all folks. There are a few new things to be added, I guess maybe next time :)

What dya think?

Happy Holidays!

...err, to some of you

...and Happy Fishing LeGone!

(Credit : Basketbawful) 

Survived

This trimester in short :

1. Started the trimester with a mistake.

2. Put the blame on myself. I put my trust in someone I barely know and believed.

3. Suffered a great loss. It hurt.

4. It affected my life since then, in a good and bad way.

5. This time around, instead of with friends, I stood on my own.

6. It was a roller-coaster road. Avoidance helped.

7. Started believing. Life went on.

8. Life went on. Basketball was the best therapy. And oh yeah, friends too.

9. Life went on. Feeling good. Feeling great. Studying.

10. Finished exam. I think I survived this one.

Thanks god :-)

Stay strong

I'm just right behind ya, Panny

Invest with caution. Invest with extreme caution.

For those who are happened to miss this.

...it was too risky for an ordinary worker to decide on the type of investment

PETALING JAYA, May 12 (Bernama) -- Invest with extreme caution.

This is the impassioned plea from the Malaysian Trades Union Congress (MTUC) to Employees Provident Fund (EPF) contributors intending to invest in unit trust funds.

A wrong decision could wipe out their investments in such unit trust companies, despite approval by the EPF Board, said MTUC general secretary G. Rajasegaran.

He said the MTUC had received many complaints pertaining to workers not benefitting from their investments, with some even losing their investments due to price fluctuation.

Rajasegaran was commenting on the increase in the number of withdrawals by members to invest in unit trust fund companies.

He said the EPF should provide special consultancy services to members who wished to invest in unit trusts.

"In the absence of such expert advice, it was too risky for an ordinary worker to decide on the type of investment," he told Bernama in an interview Wednesday.

Rajasegaran said, while MTUC appreciated the board's move to provide opportunities for EPF members to invest their savings for better returns, he felt this should be done very cautiously as the majority of the members were ignorant about the risks involved in such investments.

So far, the board has approved 16 unit trust fund companies. Another 25 would be appointed later.

According to Federation of Investment Managers Malaysia president Tunku Yaacob Tunku Abdullah, the number of EPF contributors investing in unit trust funds in 2007 was around 300,000.

The figure is expected to increase to a million by 2015.

(Source : Bernama)

Gold Investment

The interest was brought up alive again by a friend. Here's a good news :

Kuwait Finance House Malaysia Launches KFH Gold Account-i

KUALA LUMPUR, April 30 (Bernama) -- Kuwait Finance House (Malaysia) Bhd (KFHMB) aims to sell 50kg of gold under its newly-launched KFH Gold Account - i by year-end, says its Retail and Consumer Banking Head Attar Salleh.

He said since the soft launch of the account two-and-a-half-month ago, the bank had received more than RM1.08 million and transacted nine kilogrammes of gold.

"The KFH Gold Account-i, is the first Shariah-based gold account offered in Malaysia, where KFHMB sells physical gold to the customer," he told reporters after the official launch of the account here on Friday.

"Through the account, customers are able to purchase and invest in gold in a convenient and secure way. Customers have a choice to either collect the gold or keep it with the bank for safe custody at no charge," he said.

Attar also said customers can start investing from as low as 10 grams of gold and must maintain a minimum balance of two grams.

He said the gold price is about RM125 per gram.

"Customers can always sell or withdraw their gold at the branch based on the bank's daily purchasing price. The physical withdrawal of gold can be made in denominations of one, five, 10 and 50 grams," he said, adding that the account is available at all its seven branches nationwide.

Attar said the bank also plans to launch automobile financing in the second half of this year.

He said the bank has target its consumer business to constitute half of its undertakings by 2015.

"We plan to form business alliances with several third parties. I can't reveal their identity at the moment. We believe such alliances are important to growing the business," he said.

(Source : Bernama)

So far, I've known 4 banks who offer Gold Investment ;

1. Maybank : Kijang Emas and Gold Savings Passbook Account
2. Kuwait Finance House (KFH) : Gold Account-i
3. Public Bank : Gold Investment Account
4. UOB Bank (Not much info I've got so far)

Interestingly, there were arguments on the little advantage of Gold Investment in term of gaining revenues. Even my friend's dad said ASB is better in generating revenues. I'll dig some info on this.

Mom

A shoulder that keep lifting works for us

Hands that are always overwhelmingly open

Eyes that sparkle with heavy care

A mind filled with amazing things

A smile that can jump right into our heart

Laughters that can wash our pains away

Mom,

I may not pray much and I may not pray often

but when I do,

rabbir hamhuma kama rabbayani soghiroh

I love you mom. Happy Mother's Day! :-)

Basketball in MMU? Just forget about it.

Wrote this last night out of anger. Thought I wanna reward myself with ball game of one or two after a not-so-okay exams paper but those 'unbelievable' people are just unbelievable. Scrolled through the website last night and found this one liner from Mr. Director's page :

          Everything we do here begins and ends with students

Excuse me Mr. Director, you might wanna evaluate your current department's work vision. Otherwise, you might wanna stop making people confused and change that one liner to something like this;

          Everything we do here begins with students' money and ends with more students' money

It sounds a little bit childish and 'really' serious which later made me thinking maybe I shouldn't send this in. Not that it matters to me soon - I'll be staying off campus next semester. But it freaking does now! I do ball for stress-relief. Now that you've taken those away, should I exercise other things like smoking, 24 hours gaming, clubbing and other stuff people find pleasure in? Gimme a break you unreasonable punk!

Ok, here's the letter. Sorry about the grammar, I'm not good in writing official letter thingy. It's good that I paid attention to the late Tech Comm class.

Dear Sir,

I would like to make a formal complaint regarding the sports facilities provided by in Multimedia University Cyberjaya Campus and to be specific the use of the indoor court for basketball.

First of all, this is my first year in MMU Cyberjaya and I found my student life here is both challenging and enjoyable. Both the system and the campus environments have been really helpful.

To make the matter clear, I would like to describe the events that lead to this complaint. Yesterday, May 3rd, at approximately 6PM, me and one other friend went to the indoor court with the intention to play basketball. At first we found out that the indoor court was being used by the staff for badminton and hence we decided to wait as we understand they could have booked the indoor court. We came back two hours later at around 8PM and discovered that they were still using the court. We figured that the indoor court would be closed at 10PM and so we decided to go ahead to play on our own there. We started to use the basketball boards and there were no indication from the staff who were playing badminton at that time that they booked the court for themselves. As we are aware, anyone is allowed to use the court as long as no one booked them.

At about 8.30PM, one of them confronted us and complained that we should not be using the indoor court for basketball. She then added that the indoor court can only be used for basketball tournament and not for the regular basketball activities by students. We continued to play as we were not informed with such rules before and the fact that we have been using the court for some time as well as the fact that the indoor court is the only available facilities for us to play basketball in the campus at this moment. To pay some respect to the staff, we continued for just about half an hour and decided to get the correct information about the matter soon.

Unfortunately, today at around 6PM, we went to the indoor court and shockingly found that basketball boards have been kept aside and the rims are taken out. In other words, the facilities for us to play basketball in the indoor court are no longer available and that is very frustrating.

I believe as an MMU student, I have the right to address this issue and kindly demand proper explanation from the right personnel over this matter.

As I see fit, I would also like to address the issues regarding the hostel basketball court. First of all the rims are broken and in my view, the sole reason behind this is because they are low quality rims. I want to clarify that they were no act of misuse present as the cause of the condition of the rims. The rims are simply easy to get defected and would not last long. I believe this has been the case before and the only reasonable resolution is to replace the use of the low quality rims with higher quality rims that will last longer. For your information, the basketball court has been in this condition for several months now and I have waited and saw no efforts done in improving it by anyone.

The other issue I would like to mention is the condition of the floor of the court. Unlike the nearby futsal court, the basketball court is very unusually slippery and hence presents higher risk for students who use the court to get injured. I would like to suggest the need for improvement in the condition of the floor of the court such as to use the same kind of materials that are used for the nearby futsal court.

I have attached some photos to show the current conditions of the court.

I am not filing this complaint to benefit only me, but I am filing it on behalf of me, my colleagues and others whom the issue might concern in any form.

I would really appreciate it if you look into this issue as your office has helped provided solutions to lot of students’ problems and I look forward to your reply. Thank you for your assistance in this matter.

Yours sincerely,
Mohd Rafsyam Hasyemi bin Serilanang
Electronics Engineering majoring in Telecommunication (ID :1091105796)
+60145281378
mrafsyam@gmail.com

This is just an example of how poor MMU management is. I could list a couple more but you know, sometimes being grateful works better...What are the odds of me getting kicked out of school for sending this letter to the management?

Thoughts on Flash - Steve Jobs

Apple has a long relationship with Adobe. In fact, we met Adobe’s founders when they were in their proverbial garage. Apple was their first big customer, adopting their Postscript language for our new Laserwriter printer. Apple invested in Adobe and owned around 20% of the company for many years. The two companies worked closely together to pioneer desktop publishing and there were many good times. Since that golden era, the companies have grown apart. Apple went through its near death experience, and Adobe was drawn to the corporate market with their Acrobat products. Today the two companies still work together to serve their joint creative customers – Mac users buy around half of Adobe’s Creative Suite products – but beyond that there are few joint interests.

I wanted to jot down some of our thoughts on Adobe’s Flash products so that customers and critics may better understand why we do not allow Flash on iPhones, iPods and iPads. Adobe has characterized our decision as being primarily business driven – they say we want to protect our App Store – but in reality it is based on technology issues. Adobe claims that we are a closed system, and that Flash is open, but in fact the opposite is true. Let me explain.

First, there’s “Open”.

Adobe’s Flash products are 100% proprietary. They are only available from Adobe, and Adobe has sole authority as to their future enhancement, pricing, etc. While Adobe’s Flash products are widely available, this does not mean they are open, since they are controlled entirely by Adobe and available only from Adobe. By almost any definition, Flash is a closed system.

Apple has many proprietary products too. Though the operating system for the iPhone, iPod and iPad is proprietary, we strongly believe that all standards pertaining to the web should be open. Rather than use Flash, Apple has adopted HTML5, CSS and JavaScript – all open standards. Apple’s mobile devices all ship with high performance, low power implementations of these open standards. HTML5, the new web standard that has been adopted by Apple, Google and many others, lets web developers create advanced graphics, typography, animations and transitions without relying on third party browser plug-ins (like Flash). HTML5 is completely open and controlled by a standards committee, of which Apple is a member.

Apple even creates open standards for the web. For example, Apple began with a small open source project and created WebKit, a complete open-source HTML5 rendering engine that is the heart of the Safari web browser used in all our products. WebKit has been widely adopted. Google uses it for Android’s browser, Palm uses it, Nokia uses it, and RIM (Blackberry) has announced they will use it too. Almost every smartphone web browser other than Microsoft’s uses WebKit. By making its WebKit technology open, Apple has set the standard for mobile web browsers.

Second, there’s the “full web”.

Adobe has repeatedly said that Apple mobile devices cannot access “the full web” because 75% of video on the web is in Flash. What they don’t say is that almost all this video is also available in a more modern format, H.264, and viewable on iPhones, iPods and iPads. YouTube, with an estimated 40% of the web’s video, shines in an app bundled on all Apple mobile devices, with the iPad offering perhaps the best YouTube discovery and viewing experience ever. Add to this video from Vimeo, Netflix, Facebook, ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, ESPN, NPR, Time, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Sports Illustrated, People, National Geographic, and many, many others. iPhone, iPod and iPad users aren’t missing much video.

Another Adobe claim is that Apple devices cannot play Flash games. This is true. Fortunately, there are over 50,000 games and entertainment titles on the App Store, and many of them are free. There are more games and entertainment titles available for iPhone, iPod and iPad than for any other platform in the world.

Third, there’s reliability, security and performance.

Symantec recently highlighted Flash for having one of the worst security records in 2009. We also know first hand that Flash is the number one reason Macs crash. We have been working with Adobe to fix these problems, but they have persisted for several years now. We don’t want to reduce the reliability and security of our iPhones, iPods and iPads by adding Flash.

In addition, Flash has not performed well on mobile devices. We have routinely asked Adobe to show us Flash performing well on a mobile device, any mobile device, for a few years now. We have never seen it. Adobe publicly said that Flash would ship on a smartphone in early 2009, then the second half of 2009, then the first half of 2010, and now they say the second half of 2010. We think it will eventually ship, but we’re glad we didn’t hold our breath. Who knows how it will perform?

Fourth, there’s battery life.

To achieve long battery life when playing video, mobile devices must decode the video in hardware; decoding it in software uses too much power. Many of the chips used in modern mobile devices contain a decoder called H.264 – an industry standard that is used in every Blu-ray DVD player and has been adopted by Apple, Google (YouTube), Vimeo, Netflix and many other companies.

Although Flash has recently added support for H.264, the video on almost all Flash websites currently requires an older generation decoder that is not implemented in mobile chips and must be run in software. The difference is striking: on an iPhone, for example, H.264 videos play for up to 10 hours, while videos decoded in software play for less than 5 hours before the battery is fully drained.

When websites re-encode their videos using H.264, they can offer them without using Flash at all. They play perfectly in browsers like Apple’s Safari and Google’s Chrome without any plugins whatsoever, and look great on iPhones, iPods and iPads.

Fifth, there’s Touch.

Flash was designed for PCs using mice, not for touch screens using fingers. For example, many Flash websites rely on “rollovers”, which pop up menus or other elements when the mouse arrow hovers over a specific spot. Apple’s revolutionary multi-touch interface doesn’t use a mouse, and there is no concept of a rollover. Most Flash websites will need to be rewritten to support touch-based devices. If developers need to rewrite their Flash websites, why not use modern technologies like HTML5, CSS and JavaScript?

Even if iPhones, iPods and iPads ran Flash, it would not solve the problem that most Flash websites need to be rewritten to support touch-based devices.

Sixth, the most important reason.

Besides the fact that Flash is closed and proprietary, has major technical drawbacks, and doesn’t support touch based devices, there is an even more important reason we do not allow Flash on iPhones, iPods and iPads. We have discussed the downsides of using Flash to play video and interactive content from websites, but Adobe also wants developers to adopt Flash to create apps that run on our mobile devices.

We know from painful experience that letting a third party layer of software come between the platform and the developer ultimately results in sub-standard apps and hinders the enhancement and progress of the platform. If developers grow dependent on third party development libraries and tools, they can only take advantage of platform enhancements if and when the third party chooses to adopt the new features. We cannot be at the mercy of a third party deciding if and when they will make our enhancements available to our developers.

This becomes even worse if the third party is supplying a cross platform development tool. The third party may not adopt enhancements from one platform unless they are available on all of their supported platforms. Hence developers only have access to the lowest common denominator set of features. Again, we cannot accept an outcome where developers are blocked from using our innovations and enhancements because they are not available on our competitor’s platforms.

Flash is a cross platform development tool. It is not Adobe’s goal to help developers write the best iPhone, iPod and iPad apps. It is their goal to help developers write cross platform apps. And Adobe has been painfully slow to adopt enhancements to Apple’s platforms. For example, although Mac OS X has been shipping for almost 10 years now, Adobe just adopted it fully (Cocoa) two weeks ago when they shipped CS5. Adobe was the last major third party developer to fully adopt Mac OS X.

Our motivation is simple – we want to provide the most advanced and innovative platform to our developers, and we want them to stand directly on the shoulders of this platform and create the best apps the world has ever seen. We want to continually enhance the platform so developers can create even more amazing, powerful, fun and useful applications. Everyone wins – we sell more devices because we have the best apps, developers reach a wider and wider audience and customer base, and users are continually delighted by the best and broadest selection of apps on any platform.

Conclusions.

Flash was created during the PC era – for PCs and mice. Flash is a successful business for Adobe, and we can understand why they want to push it beyond PCs. But the mobile era is about low power devices, touch interfaces and open web standards – all areas where Flash falls short.

The avalanche of media outlets offering their content for Apple’s mobile devices demonstrates that Flash is no longer necessary to watch video or consume any kind of web content. And the 200,000 apps on Apple’s App Store proves that Flash isn’t necessary for tens of thousands of developers to create graphically rich applications, including games.

New open standards created in the mobile era, such as HTML5, will win on mobile devices (and PCs too). Perhaps Adobe should focus more on creating great HTML5 tools for the future, and less on criticizing Apple for leaving the past behind.

Steve Jobs
April, 2010

(Source : Apple)

Potentials

What makes you different from the others?

Did you ever take some time to analyze your potentials?

Did you ever take some time to think of ways to utilize these potentials?

How far have you pushed it?

and,

How frequent do you analye your weaknesses and put efforts in overcoming them?

Mistakes bound and intrinsically motivated, I am. And I shall be.


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPod

Comedy

Renung-renungkan dan selamat beramal

Hi

I woke up to a good humorous video this morning posted by a friend on facebook. I'll post it here later. It was a compilation of videos of an actor making parodies of the famous Malaysian councellor, Mr. Fazilah Khamsah (my apology if I spelled it wrong).

It was quite funny, haha.



Just now, while browsing through a book trolly (you know, the trolly that the librarian asked people to put the books they read on, instead of putting them back straight to the shelves themselves - I have this habit of checking them out sometimes just to see if I could find anything interesting). So, I found this book entitled Comedy Writing Secrets by Melvin Helitzer.

My eyes caught this one liner;

Plagiarism : the unoriginal sin.
-Roy Peter Clark

I thought it was kinda cool. I know I can't come up with something like that. Creative people.

I had breakfast with a couple of good friends about an hour ago and one of them was talking about the book he's currently reading - something about a study on the successful people.

There's more to it, but in short, apart from efforts, there are many other reasons for one to become successful in one's particular field. Interestingly, the book sounds like these 'factors' are even more important than the efforts you put in. Be it wealth, physical condition, birthday, the connections to the people around - there are many kinds. And they were discovered statistically.

Being smart helps you, but being little less smart and having these right 'factors' helps you more.

Good thought.

 

Teh Tarik

I'm having a conversation with 2 creative friends over 2 teh tarik at Mak Teh.

10 years from now, if I still can remember what we talked about tonight then I am awesome.

On a seperate note, I've got one of the highest coursework marks for the subject Engineer and Society.

Yeay, I'm awesome.

P/s : Mengarut gila. Jangan tertipu. Jangan koya. Jangan perasan. Belajar Raf belajar!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Shisha

I don't smoke and I don't do Shisha. The last time I smoke most probably during the primary school. This is a call for those who smoke and definitely for those who do Shisha.

To me, no it ain't cool. It's a waste of my money and bad for my lung.

none of the tests we did showed anything other than shisha is hazardous to health

LONDON, April 27 (Bernama) -- Smoking a shisha pipe is as bad for people as smoking tobacco, the Department of Health and the Tobacco Control Collaborating Centre has found, Qatar News Agency (QNA) reported Monday.

The research revealed that people who smoke shisha, or herbal tobacco, can suffer from high carbon monoxide levels.

It found one session of smoking shisha resulted in carbon monoxide levels at least four to five times higher than the amount produced by one cigarette. High levels of carbon monoxide can lead to brain damage and unconsciousness.

Shisha is a water-pipe in which fruit-scented tobacco is burnt using coal, passed through an ornate water vessel and inhaled through a hose.

The Department of Health said it is difficult to know exactly how much carbon monoxide one cigarette produced, due to the differences in smokers' inhalations.

But measuring carbon monoxide in exhaled breath showed a normal non-smoker's level to be three parts CO per million parts of air (ppm) (less than 1 per cent of blood not working properly), a light smoker to have 10 to 20 ppm (2 to 4 per cent of blood not working properly), and a heavy smoker 30 to 40 ppm (5 to 7 percent).

The study found shisha smokers had 40 to 70 ppm of CO in their breath - affecting 8 to 12 per cent of their blood.

Dr Hilary Wareing, director of the Tobacco Control Collaborating Centre, told the BBC's Asian Network she was shocked by the results of the research.

"Our mouths opened at the level of harm - none of the tests we did showed anything other than shisha is hazardous to health."

Paul Hooper, regional manager at the Department of Health, said the findings made the dangers of shisha a "major issue".

He said many people regard shisha "as not even smoking".

(Source : Bernama)

Copyrights, trademarks and patents

Found an interesting articles while doing my revision on Engineer and Society. Thought it's a good read.

Some people confuse patents, copyrights, and trademarks. Although there may be some similarities among these kinds of intellectual property protection, they are different and serve different purposes.

What Is a Copyright?

Copyright is a form of protection provided to the authors of "original works of authorship" including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works, both published and unpublished. The 1976 Copyright Act generally gives the owner of copyright the exclusive right to reproduce the copyrighted work, to prepare derivative works, to distribute copies or phonorecords of the copyrighted work, to perform the copyrighted work publicly, or to display the copyrighted work publicly.

The copyright protects the form of expression rather than the subject matter of the writing. For example, a description of a machine could be copyrighted, but this would only prevent others from copying the description; it would not prevent others from writing a description of their own or from making and using the machine. Copyrights are registered by the Copyright Office of the Library of Congress.

What Is a Trademark or Servicemark?

A trademark is a word, name, symbol or device which is used in trade with goods to indicate the source of the goods and to distinguish them from the goods of others. A servicemark is the same as a trademark except that it identifies and distinguishes the source of a service rather than a product. The terms "trademark" and "mark" are commonly used to refer to both trademarks and servicemarks.

Trademark rights may be used to prevent others from using a confusingly similar mark, but not to prevent others from making the same goods or from selling the same goods or services under a clearly different mark. Trademarks which are used in interstate or foreign commerce may be registered with the Patent and Trademark Office. The registration procedure for trademarks and general information concerning trademarks is described in a separate pamphlet entitled "Basic Facts about Trademarks".

What Is a Patent?

A patent for an invention is the grant of a property right to the inventor, issued by the Patent and Trademark Office. The term of a new patent is 20 years from the date on which the application for the patent was filed in the United States or, in special cases, from the date an earlier related application was filed, subject to the payment of maintenance fees. US patent grants are effective only within the US, US territories, and US possessions.

The right conferred by the patent grant is, in the language of the statute and of the grant itself, "the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, or selling" the invention in the United States or "importing" the invention into the United States. What is granted is not the right to make, use, offer for sale, sell or import, but the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, selling or importing the invention.

(Source : Lawmart)

Let bygone be bygone

Actually I'm not really sure if that is grammatically correct. Not gonna check it out now :P

Opportunity cost. Picking an option meaning letting go the others of 'some' value. A very simple term, yet carries deep meaning. I like it. Too bad it's economic's.

Exam is just around the corner, very close, in less than 2 weeks. I'm not even at 20% done with the preparation. God bless me.

Consciously realizing that there has been little time I spent on having thoughts on you, Almighty, is giving me a deep sense of guiltiness. I'm all yours and I always will be.

Life is treating me good. Family are far, but close, and it has been 2 months. Friends are around and enemies, well, not that I know of  :) Nurul is somewhere out there. There were times when I wondered if she's okay. Lets be honest, I have moved on. I appreciated you friends who asked me to put more efforts in this, I really do, but I'm not doing it. Not for her good. I saw her a couple of times this week and I was sure I don't miss her anymore. The other thing I know is I was wooing at that one cute chick next to her :D (Cocu. Dancing Performance, a few days ago, Indoor Court). Ahh....life's fun.

I really need to continue downloading the past years, why the heck am I blogging?

To Radzi, Selamat Maju Jaya. Majulah jejaka untuk negara. Kudos on completing your degree. (Read this again after the graduation, your welcome)

p/s : I make the blog public again. Hate the re-login thing..haihh.

Sape rase dia hebat?

Tiba2, tengah2 buat keje, kol 6:31 AM, Adhwa tanya aku : "Ko rase dalam banyak2 tempat kat MMU tu, kat mana yang orang rasa dia hebat?"

Aku jawab : "Entah. Aku...ko....entah".

WTF??

Few months back

This are my writings when I was working as a replacement teacher at Sek. Keb. Seberang Tayor a few months ago. I have some free times during the time and I wrote some notes just for fun. Recently I just found this note and decided to put it up here. Sweet memories are meant to be kept.

29th July 2009
Today is my third day of 'teaching'. Well, not exactly teaching. The students are having the every-two-months exams, the OTI. I don't quite remember what OTI stands for. I was in one of the earlier batches who had been introduced with this state-synchronized exams years ago. To me, it was and still a good idea. It would make the works of those in authority over these kids education a lot easier. At least, it would be possible to note any troubled schools and extra attentions can be brought to the school. I must say it is a good effort done by the state educational department (We call them PPT here. It stands for Pejabat Pendidikan Terengganu).

I must admit dealing with kids aged 10 - 12 is quite difficult. For people that lacks communication skills like me, it is already hard enough to start a conversation what more to make it interesting. However, they are kids. The fact that I'm comfortable being around them does help me and it is getting easier. My bro, who is now 11, doesn't speak to me the way these kids do. Of course, I'm his older bro. There are some respects, some affections, but it is in totally different way than what these kids at school give me.

Teaching. Since the exams lasts until this Thursday, I won't be doing any of them this week. My first official class will start on Sunday (In the East Part of Peninsular Malaysia, the week starts on Sunday instead of Monday. Likewise, weekend starts on Friday). As for now, I haven't been given the exact timetable yet. However, I know I'll be teaching Malay Language to Standard 4 and Science to Standard 5. Teaching Science is cool because I have the idea of what it is. Malay Language? I have no idea. But since it is for standard 4, I don't think I would have any real problem.

30th July 2009
Some people don't really appreciate their primary school teachers. I'd think I'm one of them but I hope I'm wrong. I still remember a few teachers' names and visited a few of them (actually just one, and that is Cikgu Fazidah Hanim! HAH! You're bad student, Raf!)

Haha I felt bad. When we were at the canteen this morning, the teachers, Cikgu Siti, Cikgu Azman and Cikgu Khairul talked about how their grown up students greet them. It's quite funny. Mostly, the ones that they scolded the most back then greet them in the most friendly way. The ones that were quiet back then surprisingly don't want to greet their teachers at all!

While we at it, the teachers brought up the stories about the bright students with troubled families. Althought not so many, it is sad to know how a kid's life can be destroyed at that earlier stage of life where this is the time the kid needs help the most. Some parents are drug addicts, some are just irresponsible, and worst, some just don't care. The stories so much reminds me of myself and I hope I'd change, god willing.

This writing will be dull without a line or two about basketball eh? hehe Due to the worsen level of spreadness of Influenza A (H1N1) among the students, most universities and colleges across the country are having about a week break. Unrelatedly, my friends are here at Kemaman so I got a bunch of people to ball with :D Since the public basketball court was replaced with a goddam hall (as far as I know, there is no basketball court inside), the only place to ball now is at Taman Muhibah. Normally there are only Chinese, and thick-faced me playing there. I have no idea how it happens but the Chinese are pretty comfortable of having us there and pretty welcoming. Sweet country! I don't know what's wrong with me, but I just don't play very well at this moment. Having too long break at home is the excuse as usual.

All the smiling faces - bright sunny days

It's for the best. Thanks God for this. I'm willing to take this, honestly and sincerely.

For you, I'll work out my way to that stop.

Waf Raf Waf!

yeah!

I must admit, I do feel better a little bit. Honesty works, while secrecy hurts - trust me.

Now, how the hell did I let my life to get this freakin' unmanageable??

The ugly truth

I wouldn't hesitate to say that these few days have been bad times for me. Yeah, you're right. It was about me and Nurul. It was on my mind almost all the time.

Today, I couldn't stand the no-contacts, so I dropped her a message through YM. She was on, so a message then led to conversations.

I asked her 3 questions that I've been meaning to ask for long. The questions that would have changed how I deal with this thing that kept bothering me in these few days.

1. Could she still see a future of me and her? She had me believe in her in this dream I thought we had. I remember the words "We'll work this out together" and for such nice words, I fell for her again and again.

She answered : "I couldn't even see my own future". Meaning, no. It's no longer there. (It occurred to me to ask since when, but that wouldn't make any different, so I let it go)

2. Does she still have same feeling for me? I made it clear, if her feeling for me got less in anyway, that means it's not the same anymore and it's a NO.

She answered : "NO". Without hesitation, I guess that came without thinking about my feelings. This is the one that I need to know most. Is she worth it? Is she not like other girls? Is she different? was this thing real? or just temporary thing that got into her cloudy mind?

Yes she is the kinda girl I thought she is. This thing was temporary. This isn't real. She had me believe in her with the nice words and I had my heart opened for it. For this answer, I know she's not worth it for me. She's not supposed to be the one I'll sacrifice myself for.

Thanks God for the acceptance. It was huge for me, and eliminating the bits in the heart is the work needs done.

3. I was actually going to say something instead of asking question. It was something like "I don't care about your boyfriend, or anything. I just care about your feelings for me and how inside you, there are bits of you that want me and wanna have a future with me. I care about that. For that, I'll work out ways for us. Okay?"

Unfortunately, it can also be the exact other way around.

And so it was.

Sorry guys, I know you guys love to see me and her. But I can't feel the worthiness anymore. She is brilliant, definitely, but not the kind of brilliant girl I'll share my life and love with.

And for you, Nurul, I wish you find the one that can fill you with loves and the rest you need. Please keep in mind, you're one of the best girls I know. There are many things keep me not liking you, but I have been and I would rather still cherish those things that keep me liking you more. :-)

I'm really sorry for the times I hurt you, even one bit. I really am.

Penn off, bloggy.