About That Keris Incident....

How many years has a certain national leader been raising and waving the wavy dagger? For a stretch of time, it seemed that every year, the wavy dagger (known as a "keris" or a "kris") was sure to make its appearance at a certain political body's general assembly, and some people in the cheering crowd would make insensitive remarks, encouraging the national leader to use it. The question was, who were these people encouraging him to use it against? He rose from the "M" group (conveniently referred to as "M" after this) which seemed that, they were encouraging him to use the dagger against the non-M's.

Of course, the "non-M's" that make up part of the fabric of this great nation became afraid. Yet it seemed there was nothing that could be done about it. The raising of the dagger continued every year, leading many to think that: (1) It is acceptable in the eyes of the law to taunt and threaten the non-M's; and (2) The non-M leaders were not protesting against this threatening act. The non-M's in this great nation became abuzz with disdain for the dagger; it seemed that it would only be a matter of time before the dagger became bathed in crimson liquid.

This raising of the dagger continued as part of an illustrious ceremony, enshrined and sanctified with divine blessing from above; no one could squeak a peep in protest. Eventually it was televised. To the non-M's, it was unknown whether the M's in general were all in approval of it; but it did seem to reduce the idea of this great nation, born out of shared adversity and great hardship, to a laughing joke. The idea that many peoples, from different creeds and breeds, could be inspired to unite under one umbrella, and in unity free themselves from colonialism, was one that inspired many to believe that there was a future in this land. In the year of liberation, 1957, many proudly called themselves patriots and citizens, after the long and arduous journey fraught with many pitfalls. Many sacrificed their savings, pledging all they had, to support a cause that they believed in. A great many people pawned their jewelry to buy passage for national leaders to make their way to the land of the colonial master. Finally, hand in hand, the M's and the non-M's together, liberation was won! Unjoined states became joined under one banner. This land was born out of a shared struggle, one that envisaged a future where diverse peoples of various creeds and breeds would be united and forging a brighter future together.

Over time, untoward incidents, planned, provoked and performed by certain selfish perpetrators, have served to slice up, and destroy, the fragile bonds of that original society. Over time, we have become accustomed to living a life of segregation, discrimination, and polarization. The same people who were living at the time of liberation (1957, or 1963, depending on his/her geographic location) may still be alive, yet their views of what is possible for this great nation today may be less ideal, and less hopeful, than the views that they held in their youth. With the passing of time, painful experiences become dulled, and eventually, acceptance of unacceptable matters, becomes the norm. While it is true that certain incidents and certain policies may have benefitted this nation as a whole, but the Machiavellian manner in which things were executed have caused a great many families (and individuals) to suffer needlessly, to the extent of which the scars which remain to this day still manage to evince a sense of loss and bitterness.

What is amazing is that, in a bid to play up his persona, this national leader could raise the wavy dagger, to shouts of approval, forgetting that those who had lived through those darker days surely tremble with fear to look upon the aggressive manner in his campaigning. I am sure that violence is not the solution to our present day problems. M or non-M, we share many problems. It is no longer true that the C-community lives in urban areas, the I-community in the rubber estate, and the M-community in the rural areas. Many of us are now urbanized. M's should realize that they are statistically speaking, numerically superior to non-M's. If anything, the M's should realise that whether they succeed or fail, is ultimately up to themselves. Can vanquishing a non-M make the price of petrol go down? Or the price of trust investments go up? Or stem corruption and create a better, cleaner, and more transparent government? Is it possible, that by extirpating non-M's, societal woes can be solved? Will the police be able to solve long-unsolved robbery and fraud cases? Will "wanted" dangerous criminals be suddenly caught? Will the authorities suddenly protect whistleblowers, prevent unfair competition, magically reduce inflation, and dramatically decrease unemployment? These are real problems that should be addressed.

Our learned DPM (courtesy of Agenda Daily) said:

"Sebenarnya maruah orang Melayu tidak bersangkut pada soal keris, maruah orang Melayu hanya akan terbela kalau sekiranya orang Melayu berjaya dalam pelbagai bidang, politik, penguasaan ilmu, ekonomi dan sosial, segala-galanya mesti memperlihatkan kemajuan orang Melayu pada tahap kecemerlangan.

"Kita boleh bersaing bukan sahaja di persada negara tapi antarabangsa, pada masa itu orang Melayu akan dilihat sebagai bangsa berjaya. Jadi keris ini semata-mata soal simbol sahaja, tidak dikaitkan dengan soal kecemerlangan, kecemerlangan dalam realiti dunia ini bergantung kepada kejayaan kita dalam bidang strategik."

A rough translation would be:

"Actually, the honour of the Malays does not depend on the keris, [and] the honour of the Malays would be upheld only if the Malays succeed in various fields, politics, excelling in knowledge, economics and society, everything must see the progress of the Malays at the stage of excellence.

"[If] we can compete not only in this nation but also internationally, at that time Malays will be seen as a successful race. This keris is merely about the question of symbols, not relating to the question of excellence, excellence in the realities of this world depends on our success in strategic fields."

The use of the word "terbela" (upheld) regrettably implies that there is an "other", one that needs upholding against. Again, the implication (from the context) is that success must be measured by comparison against the non-M's. But if this is the case, then in the long run it is harmful to the M's and the non-M's. Firstly, in this nation, M's must work with non-M's, and vice versa, to succeed. Yet at the same time, M's are encouraged to compete with non-M's. Is it possible to both compete (sometimes harmfully) and at the same time co-operate with our potential business partners? That is a tall order. Things have to change. The M-community should realise that non-M's are their partners. A destructive relationship can only cause unhappiness. M's and non-M's should co-operate, and communal politics should change to take into account the aspirations and hopes of all communities. Issues like poverty, health, national policies, etc. should be tackled as problems that pervade all levels and sectors of society. Every one, no matter whether an M or a non-M, should be given equal opportunity and benefit. And most importantly, M and non-M relationship should be nurtured.

Further reading

• Wikipedia, "Kris" - link
• Agenda Daily, "Maruah Melayu Bukan Pada Keris" (26.4.2008) - link
  
• Malaysia Today, "Kerismuddin Apologises" (27.4.2008) - link
• Malaysia Kini, "Najib: Keris Apology Won't Derogate Malay Unity" (26.4.2008) - link
• The Star, "Hishammuddin Urged To Quit Over Keris Issue" (27.4.2008) - link
• The Star, "It Takes A Big Man To Apologise" (27.4.2008) - link
  

Number Two (Or Three ... Or Four)

They say they want to be our voice!
To vocalise our thoughts;
Will they dare to walk the talk
And speak on our behalf?

This is a time for men, not boys!
To lead us from our woes;
Now they roar behind closed doors
But will they peter out?

They say they must protect our rights!
Why now? Not earlier?
Why were things so strained before:
Were we accomplices?

I say to them, now raise your voice!
Despite your inner fears;
Ask for number two! (or three)
Instead of none at all.

Number two: shared by rotation!
(We give you number one)
Don't you say you care for us?
Then prove it by your deeds.

The coalition stands for all:
Inclusive of the non's?
So you say, and still I doubt;
I see things otherwise.

From top to toe, its exco team
Is controlled by one group;
Great leaders! Where do you sit
And what posts do you hold?

You have nothing, this I'll wager:
Not two, or three, or four;
Shouldn't you sit on the group
To represent us all?

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Not too long ago, I had a discussion with a friend.

Here's a paradoxical question.

If our ruling coalition is inclusive of all races, why are the minority shareholders in the coalition not given number two, three or four? The problem is that number one, two, and three are from the same group. A fair solution is to rotate the number two position among the "other" groups, which form part of the coalition. The alternative is to appoint more number two's.

What is important is that number one remains with the "main" member of the coalition.

Starting A Law Office

Soon, my new office will open in Kepong.

This link is proving quite useful in getting tips on how to run a law office:

Resources - Start and Run a Law Firm

Starting A Law Office

Soon, my new office will open in Kepong.

This link is proving quite useful in getting tips on how to run a law office:

Resources - Start and Run a Law Firm

A Cheerful Little Message

A friend forwarded me a message to cheer me up. It's good to learn Mandarin, so I decided to learn a few new words.

小天使是幸福的邮差，
他能替我把幸福送给我珍惜的朋友，
你也许听不见也许看不见，
但愿你能感受得到，
我那真诚的祝福~
希望你快乐每一天！

Here's a breakdown of the words.

1.
小天使是幸福的邮差.
xiao3 tian1 shi3 shi1 xing4 fu2 de you2 chai1
The cherub is a happy postman.

2.
他能替我把幸福送给我珍惜的朋友.
ta1 neng2 ti4 wo3 ba3 xing4 fu2 song4 gei3 wo3 zhen1 xi1 de peng2 you4
He can represent me to send happiness to my cherished friend.

3.
你也许听不见也许看不见.
ni2 ye2 xu3 ting1 bu4 jian4 ye2 xu3 kan3 bu4 jian4
You may not hear and may not see.

4.
但愿你能感受得到.
dan4 yuan4 ni3 neng2 gan3 shou4 de2 dao4
If only it were possible for you to feel it.

5.
我那真诚的祝福.
wo3 na4 zhen1 cheng2 de zhu4 fu2
My sincere blessings.

6.
希望你快乐每一天.
xi1 wang4 ni3 kuai4 le4 mei3 yi1 tian1
[I] hope that you will be happy every day.


So, to all my dear visitors, I wish you all happiness every day as well.

Try Photoshop Express

Adobe's Photoshop probably ranks as one of the most popular image manipulation programs today. It has a large market share. So it is with some surprise that I learned that Adobe has made a version of Photoshop available online. Its name is Adobe Photoshop Express, and it looks like a stripped down version of Photoshop.

According to the LifeClever blog, Photoshop Express lacks manipulation of image layers.

Back from the Clouds

A few days ago, we went up to the clouds,
And left behind all of our doubts,
For the promise of time spent together,

We cosily huddled in rainy weather,
Hoping it would all get better,
And whiled the time watching a show,

About a girl upon an island grow-
ing up with love, and unlikely friends,
"Nim's Island" had a pleasant end.

We traipsed around the casino halls,
Watched some people win and some people fall
To the lure of winning even more.

Pleasant days where our emotions soared.
Coming home, I felt that my live was wonderful
To have her next to this fine fool.

Note: I just came back from a short vacation at Genting Highlands with my beloved sweetheart.

The Cleaner And The Bomb

Sometime last week, I read a piece of news that remained embedded in my mind. It is not often that a news article is so memorable. The story? A cleaner found a bomb and brought it immediately to the police station! In my mind, he was a great patriot. I wonder how many people would have done the same? The great majority would perhaps have run away first from the scene before calling the authorities to disarm the bomb. (If the bomber was located nearby, perhaps he would "strategically" set the bomb off.)

Here is the short piece of news:

Man runs with bomb to police

KUALA LUMPUR: A cleaner ran carrying a box containing a mortar bomb and ammunition to the nearest police station in Kenanga, without thinking of the danger.

L. Eamanathan, 28, who found the explosive, decided to “take matters into his own hands” and shocked police personnel at the station.

Police immediately called in a bomb disposal squad, which arrived within minutes to remove the box.

“I wanted to avoid chaos at the scene so much that I did not take into account my own safety,” Eamanathan told reporters.

"Taking matters into his own hands" indeed. IF that bomb had exploded, I doubt that he would have had his hands to do anything useful in the future. But, on the plus side, he averted a danger. Bravo, Mr. Eamanathan! If the Government does not give him a medal for his good deed, it would really raise a few eyebrows.

Today, I read that another good patriot reported his find of RM1.2 million in a gym locker. Now, a few things must be noted. He found the RM1.2 million on the job. But, so did Mr. Eamanathan. So how do they differ? For one, the mysterious finder is the supervisor of the gym outlet. It goes logically that he is entitled to inspect gym lockers to weed out unlawful contents. The strange part of the newspaper report is that the person remains unnamed. And the gym also remains unnamed. Possibly, the gym supervisor wanted to avoid trouble from the person who deposited the RM1.2 million. And the gym management wanted to avoid scaring away customers who may unknowingly be sharing exercising room with robbers. (Or, perhaps they were afraid of scaring away future "deposits" in their gym lockers?)

Here is the article:

RM1.2m find in gym locker

By LOURDES CHARLES

PETALING JAYA: How much money would you have on you when going to the gym or fitness centre for a workout?

Only sufficient for drinks or a meal after a hectic workout, right?

Wrong! Someone apparently had other plans when he or she went to a gym in Subang Jaya last Friday.

A supervisor at a well known fitness centre there found RM1.2mil in a bag in one of the lockers when closing for the day. The centre closes for business around midnight.

Scared and dumbfounded the supervisor contacted his manager who then called the police. Police were equally shocked to find such a huge amount of cash in the locker.

Initial investigations centred on the April 9 KL International Airport heist, where two moneychangers were robbed of RM3.5mil after being shot by six armed robbers.

However, police ruled out that possibility as the money in the bag was in Malaysian currency and British pounds. The KLIA heist was in Singapore dollars.

Selangor police have questioned several suspects in connection with the KLIA heist but have made no arrests.

However, for the gym find they have yet to ascertain where the RM1.2mil came from or who was assigned the locker that day.

Selangor CID chief Senior Asst Comm II Mazlan Mansor would only confirm that police were investigating, and declined to elaborate.

RAM for my IBM ThinkPad R51

My trusty old IBM ThinkPad R51 has been with me for quite a long time now. When I joined my dad's firm in 2003, I was using an old PC which was so slow that I used a different shell for Windows, just so that it would load faster. In those days, I was happy with Windows 98 with GeoShell on top. Most of my friends who dropped by my little cubicle were surprised to see that my Windows was "different". I guess, it was quite a good feeling being "different". At least I could show my IT background friends a thing or two about computing.

And then one day in 2004, my desktop PC at work died. The cause of death was "fried by lightning" -- lightning had shot through the wires and fried the power supply, the motherboard and the hard disk as well. They say that three is a lucky number, and so with that I set out to buy a new computer. As luck would have it, I decided to further my studies at Universiti Malaya, to pursue the Masters in Law (LLM). My dad offered to get me a laptop because my work would probably extend beyond office to the lecture hall. For PowerPoint presentations, a laptop would be ideal. (Imagine bringing your PowerPoint presentation on a USB disk and finding out that the computer at the lecture hall cannot access your USB disk?)

Anyway, the point of this long rant is that the ThinkPad R51 that I got at the time had only 512 MB of RAM. It still has 512 MB of RAM, because I haven't had the time to go upgrade it. One of these days, I'll bump up the allocation of RAM, because programs these days are quite RAM hungry. An example is GIMP, which I used to use. Its data files also require quite a lot of hard disk space. In the future I'll be good to myself and upgrade both the hard disk and the RAM. Ha ha.

Here's a little bookmark from me, to me.

IBM ThinkPad R51 (1829 1830-xxx) Memory Upgrades

Looking through the options and the various questions posted online, it seems that I have to get PC 2700 DDR RAM (and not DDR2 RAM). This is confirmed in a forum.

Pligg Envy...

Once, an enterprising young man decided to create a Pligg-based site. He duly downloaded version 9.8.0 and installed it on his website. Unfortunately, due to his unfamiliarity with the CMS, he was forced to content himself with hacking the header.tpl file and putting up his very own logo. As time went by, he learned to change the "language" of the site, customizing words. But as time went by, the enterprising young man did not manage to learn how to hack the template. Hence, he was stuck with the default template "YGet" and a slight few modifications.

One day, the enterprising young man looked online for the "best pligg sites" and found a page with the title "Top 30 Pligg Based Social Networking Sites That Are Worth Your Visit". It was an excellent read. (Here is the page for your personal reading and enrichment.)

Personally, I quite like the following Pligg-based sites: CSS Reboot, Sphinn, Sk*rt, and PlugIM.


There's also another great link that I discovered.
SEOmoz.org's 2007 Web 2.0 Awards

Who Is Geert Wilders?

An interesting person to know about. A Dutch politician, he has caused a furore in the Muslim world with many people demanding for his death and denouncing him for a recent film called "Fitna". The film is interesting and it worth watching, but bear in mind that it is purely for personal knowledge and is bound to stir up controversy if you raise it as a topic of discussion.

Found via the (A)berração blog.

According to many texts that I have read, Islam is a religion of peace. Most Muslims agree that Islam is a beautiful religion and it is the few bad apples that tarnish the name of Islam. Terrorism is a long-standing issue that gives a bad image to a peaceful religion, and this needs to be resolved.

In the meantime, while surfing about on the Net, I found the trailer for a nice Portuguese language movie. It's called "Os Desafinados". I don't suppose it will come to Malaysia anytime soon, but it's worth a watch... I know many Malaysians would rather avoid "thorny" topics, as I have many friends who would rather talk about trivial topics... like movies. "Os Desafinados" seems to be "quite a good movie", so it's quite a pity that I don't speak Portuguese.



Found via Jacare Banguela's blog.

Complaining About A False Profile

Someone I know wanted to complain about a false profile on Friendster. Apparently, someone put up a fake profile of her, with old pictures taken from another site. She had tried to complain to the management of Friendster, but this was no easy task. I found this intriguing and decided to find out more.

According to the "Help" section, there is supposed to be a link for to report an abuse of content on a profile, it's at the bottom of the page, between the "Help" and "Terms of Service".... But strangely, this "link" seems to be non-existent! [The link to the FAQ page detailing the missing "link"]

Here is a quote from the page I mentioned above.

To report abusive behavior on Friendster>open the profile of member you wish to report>scroll down to the lower portion of the page and CLICK "Report Offensive Content" between the help link and the Terms of Service link.

On the next page check the box(es) that reflect the violation you wish to report> then click "report". Your report will go to Friendster's Abuse Department for review.

There is no such link known as "Report Offensive Content". The links at the bottom of the page are:

About Us | Contact Us | Events | Promote My Profile | Help | Terms of Service | Privacy Policy

I wonder what happened to this "missing link"? The one that says "Report Offensive Content"? Strange! The aliens must have taken it!

Another thing is, there is supposedly a system to handle enquiries. You can ask Friendster at a certain page, the question is typed into a text area box. [The link to the Question page]

Now, perhaps someone can use this enquiry system to ask them what happened to their system.

Ashop commerce

Sometimes we find, surprisingly, it is possible to earn money online. How many self-made millionaire stories have you heard where the bloke earned his income online? Well, I don’t know the number but such people do exist. One such way to earn income online is by opening an e-commerce website! Selling products online has become an accepted mode of income. There are companies like eBay whose business model is helping people to sell their items online via bidding. Locally, Malaysian upstart Lelong.com.my is also helping people sell items online via bidding or sales.

There are advantages to selling products online. There are huge savings in terms of shop rental, since there is no need to own a physical retail shop (which can be expensive). Secondly, all products are equally prominent and as easily located. Good software enables the potential customer to see what is on offer. This is in contrast to an actual retail shop, where items which are placed on the back racks are often hidden, or obscured from view. This leads to poor sales. Like they say, out of sight, out of mind.

However, today I would like to write about Ashop Commerce, which is a ecommerce software. How is ecommerce software different from eBay or Lelong.com.my? Quite simply, if you desire to sell online from your own homepage, you will have the liberty of customizing your selling method. A powerful ecommerce software, hosted on your personal server, can help immensely by creating a customized look. If you have ever used eBay or Lelong.com.my, things start to look the same after a while. The interface is too similar between products. With a shopping software that can be customized, the “shopping page” can be “themed” to look similar to the rest of the merchant’s website. On the plus side, it means that your e-commerce website can be linked to other informational pages on your site.

In my opinion, it would not be a bad idea to give them a try. Here are six promises taken from the Ashop Commerce website (words have been paraphrased):

1. Good customer service.


2. Search engine optimized so that your e-commerce website will appear in search results.


3. Easy to set up.


4. Affordable pricing.


5. Customizable look by using templates.


6. They host the site for you, design your site for you, provide email services and promote your site on top of it all.