Tranquil Maelstrom

Consistently inconsistent

2009-11-13T04:51:00.000-08:00

I'm extraordinarily ordinary, with an amazingly mundane ability to talk circles on the subject of squares. I swear politely at wonderful idiots and am one of the many to be able to clearly speak gibberish.

My wonderfully articulate mumble has charmed many. Those who are angelically bitchy are treated to a graceful extension of my perfectly malformed middle finger. I then walk away, glancing back and ignoring their hurt expression at being praised.

I always leave them wanting to smother me with disaffection. On my bad days, I allow myself to treat them like the princess that they aren't. One of us always end up joyously unhappy but I can always figure out who.

First posting for 2009! Happy new year!

2009-05-10T07:08:00.000-07:00

Ok, so I missed the new year mark by a few days (weeks, months). That's still not a good enough reason to not celebrate, so pop the champagne and drink up!

Yes, I'm extremely lazy to update my blog. Penning (typing) down my thoughts are not exactly high in my list of priorities. Heck, I do this mainly so I can laugh about what I was thinking a few days (weeks, months, years) ago!

Hmm...how about some updates, eh?

Let's see...Japan trip was an utter snooze-fest. There I was, a highly-trained network consultant (ahem!) and as I went for my first meeting with the project team, they provided me the detailed network design, configuration script and acceptance document. All neatly typed and formatted. My role? To do acceptance testing for 2 new network nodes. Timeline? Oh, about 3 months! To be honest, all projects should have this sort of buffer and I have to say that I was quite lucky since no major problems were experienced during the project phase. It was still boring though.

Important Japanese words I learnt:

kyukei = break (ie. let's take a break)

omori = large (ie. gimme large portion of food)

okawari = refill (mainly used for whatever free refills they give at that place)

kawaii = female human with wonderful personality (used when complimenting a girl, focusing only on inner beauty and not touching on any physical aspect at all)

With those 4 words, my stay in Japan was made so much more pleasant. I also didn't die of boredom (lotsa kyukei, conflict in middle-east and an Israeli Jew colleague made for interesting discussions in between those rare moments where I actually do work) and safely returned to my motherland where the first thing I ate was nasi goreng and some bbq stuff while surprising my dad with my return on his birthday.

It was awesome. I finally got to say "My presence is your present!" in real-life. That's one less item in my list of things to do before I die. I'm still having trouble with "Have a threesome with identical twins". Anyone here knows anyone who can help me with this?

No rest for the wicked though. About 1 month later, I'm off to Hanoi, Vietnam for some actual design work (instead of losta kyukei where the common topic of discussion was conflict in middle-east). Fortunately, a colleague of mine got married and I managed to satisfy my cravings for a decent nasi minyak before I'm stuck for 2 months in a country where dogs are considered a delicacy and pork's the main source of protein. For those who've never tried nasi minyak tanam before, I pity you. You have no idea how heavenly the taste is when the dish is done well. That wedding didn't disappoint at all. Succulent beef cooked in special gravy and spiced hard-boiled egg buried in special rice, all cooked together in one pot. Ahh....the aroma...

Bloody hell! I'm getting hungry! I guess I'll continue writing when my stomach's not complaining.

Cheers!

Disclaimer: Due to past track record of the writer's amazing ability to procrastinate, do not expect a continuation anytime soon.

I am evolving!

2008-12-07T01:18:00.000-08:00

I just vacuumed my apartment. Ok...you may stop laughing now. C'mon! I'm not THAT spoiled! Sigh...

Anyway, I just cleaned up my apartment. Notice I said 'clean'. My apartment is still untidy!

I also bought fruits for myself. I have to admit that the quality of food I'm eating here is close to garbage. Ok...I'm exaggerating but seriously, I'm used to way better quality of food back home. The sushi's fine I guess but the good stuff is more expensive than I'm willing to pay. Sure, you can get a meal for 500 yen. However, that meal will consist of rice and some meat or fish (being cooked is optional). No vegetables, which means no source of vitamins and minerals. A really crappy diet. Hence, me with my bag of grapes. I'd buy apples or oranges next time once I find a nearer fruit stall to my apartment. I'm *not* going to carry a big bag of apples/oranges across 10 train stops...

As the food is generally cheap and horrible or good and expensive, I'm now spending my free time checking out search results for "cooking for 1" on google. Yup, I'm independent, standing on my own two feet and all that crap.

I think I might be succumbing to the dark side and actually become a 21st century man who cooks and clean. Holy shit...

Selamat tinggal Malaysia!! Konichiwa Japan!!

2008-12-03T06:18:00.000-08:00

I'm now in Japan. Assuming everything goes according to schedule, I'll be here for the next 80 days or so.

The last time I came to Japan, I was 13 years old. I learnt how to use chopsticks and developed a taste for green tea while I was there.

15 years later and I'm here again. Time sure flies! This trip should be interesting. Hopefully I have some extra time to do some sight-seeing in between my work. Don't expect much photos though. I don't have a camera. I *may* buy one over the weekend though. :)

News quote of the moment!

2008-11-13T05:30:00.000-08:00

Reaction of the world after Obama was voted as President:

Within minutes of the results, American television viewers were treated to what have become rare images from abroad: large crowds happily waving - rather than burning - American flags.

I laughed out loud when I read that paragraph! :D

Read the whole news article over here.

Sia - Breathe Me

2008-11-04T03:37:00.000-08:00

I love music and I love discovering amazing music that is not well-known. Check out the video below. Amazing voice and atmosphere!

Handlebars

2008-10-23T09:30:00.000-07:00

I was chillin' at the living room earlier when I saw/heard this excellent song on MTV. Amazingly enough, MTV now don't really suck and play stuff besides boyband crap! Anyway, thought I'd share it with everyone. This is not the original video though but I think it fits the song very well.

Woohoo!! Vacation time!!

2008-08-11T21:03:00.000-07:00

I gotta admit, I haven't been as excited about traveling for a long time! In 2 days though, I'll be drinking in the sights at south america. :D

Flight leaves sometime tonight (not sure exactly when...) and I'll have a stopover at Amsterdam (not sure how long...) while waiting to catch my connecting flight to south america (not sure which country...).

Hmm...I've a feeling I should've paid more attention to the itinerary! Now where did I put the damn piece of paper...Sheesh, I'm not even sure when I'll be back! All I know is that it'll be before fasting month.

Anyway, I've got a new pair of boots for the amount of trekking I'll be doing. The old one is literally falling a part. Served me well though! Heck, I did a lot of shopping yesterday so I should have enough clothes to last me for 3 weeks or so.

I think the highlight of the trip for me is probably Machu Picchu. If you have no idea what the hell that is, check out the following link:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Machu_picchu

I won't be bringing a camera as I figured I've spent enough money yesterday buying clothes and didn't feel like spending the same amount on a camera. Not to worry though! My sister's a shutterbug and a few days back in Malaysia, you'll probably see me tagged in some photos in facebook.

Cheers!

Well...I had nothing to do the other day so I decided to take a personality quiz!

2008-07-30T04:57:00.000-07:00

You Are An INTP

The Thinker

You are analytical and logical - and on a quest to learn everything you can.

Smart and complex, you always love a new intellectual challenge.

Your biggest pet peeve is people who slow you down with trivial chit chat.

A quiet maverick, you tend to ignore rules and authority whenever you feel like it.

In love, you are an easy person to fall for. But not an easy person to stay in love with.

Although you are quite flexible, you often come off as aloof or argumentative.

At work, you are both a logical and creative thinker. You are great at solving problems.

You would make an excellent mathematician, programmer, or professor.

How you see yourself: Creative, fair, and tough-minded

When other people don't get you, they see you as: arrogant, cold, and robotic

What's Your Personality Type?

The Square Root of Three

2008-07-20T07:35:00.000-07:00

I’m sure that I will always be
A lonely number like root three

The three is all that’s good and right,
Why must my three keep out of sight
Beneath the vicious square root sign,
I wish instead I were a nine

For nine could thwart this evil trick,
with just some quick arithmetic

I know I’ll never see the sun, as 1.7321
Such is my reality, a sad irrationality

When hark! What is this I see,
Another square root of a three

As quietly co-waltzing by,
Together now we multiply
To form a number we prefer,
Rejoicing as an integer

We break free from our mortal bonds
With the wave of magic wands

Our square root signs become unglued
Your love for me has been renewed

- Dave Feinberg

And I was craving for pasta the other day...

2008-06-01T10:12:00.000-07:00

Went to 1920s in The Curve a coupla days back. I wanted something Italian but with a spicy twist. Hence, an arrabiata would be perfect!

I called the server to order and the conversation went something like this:

Me: I will have the penne ala arrabiata.
Server: You'll need a tray...
Me: Do you know who I am?
Server: Do you know who *I* am?
Me: This is not the game of who the fuck are you...for *I* am Vader...Darth Vader...Lord Vader. I could kill you with a single thought.
Server: You'll still need a tray.
Me: No, I will not need a tray, I do not need a tray to kill you. I could kill you without a tray...with the power of the force, which is strong within me.

(The rest of the conversation can be seen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sv5iEK-IEzw)

PS: Btw, I really did get the penne ala arrabita. ;)

I YAM AH MAAN!

2008-06-01T08:09:00.000-07:00

I just reaffirmed my manliness. After a year of driving a car with an automatic transmission, I drove a stick shift earlier tonight. No stalled engine makes me a happy man. :)

Random thought for 15/05/2008

2008-05-14T20:29:00.000-07:00

I'm currently attending Cisco QoS training and this training involves some mathematical formula to calculate stuff. Outta the blue, it made me think about maths.

What is zero divided by zero? Is it zero, one or infinity? :P

April!

2008-05-13T05:10:00.000-07:00

Ahh...April has come and gone. I keep planning to write a blog entry but work, WoW and procrastination kept me from doing so. Ah well...

Anyway, some updates are required I guess.

I celebrated my 28th birthday (grudgingly!) but some friends were determined to make it an event to remember. Thanks a lot! I haven't received a balloon since I was 10! :P
Lotsa happy memories for me that night, though I gotta admit that things got a bit blurry after a certain pink cocktail!

My car has acquired a new battle scar as I combat Malaysian roads (and road users!). It's painful, but I keep telling myself it's necessary. It help build the car's character. Heh! The car's still a wonderful drive though. One of the best ways to de-stress for me. Music and long drives...nice! I think once I've got some extra cash, I'll make my car look beautiful again. :)

Work continues as usual. Sometimes I get damn tired though. Working nights is taking a toll and I don't seem to recover as fast as I used to. I think I'm just getting old! I continue learning new things, though I gotta admit it's at a slower rate then I'd like. I keep wondering if I'm getting stagnant. I'll be spending some quality time deciding how I want to proceed with my own career and professional development for the next few weeks or months.

Can't think of any more personal updates so I guess I'll end it here. Cheers!

There are days...

2008-03-30T10:46:00.001-07:00

...when I wished Lacuna Inc. really existed.

How happy is the blameless vestal's lot!
The world forgetting, by the world forgot.
Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind!
Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd;

Hello there...

2008-03-30T10:39:00.000-07:00

I'm still alive.

Maybe I should write a bit more, eh?

Recent highlights (in no particular order)

I saw Incubus live. Let me say that again. I SAW INCUBUS LIVE!! :D
I have an original Real Madrid jersey with Zidane's name on it. It's a bit pricey but then, it's not like I have anything better to spend my money on...
I now have a CCNA. Go on...laugh!
I now have a PDA phone. Nope, I'm not better organized. Dammit, I thought technology solves everything! >.<
I've become a semi-addict of World of Warcraft. It's an excellent way to escape from the real world.
I've been catching up on my reading. Fave genre is still sci-fi and fantasy though I've been reading some other stuff. Reading's such an excellent escape for me. (Hmm...I'm beginning to detect a pattern here...)
I've been listening more to trance music. Melodic, hypnotic and euphoric! When you close your eyes, you can just forget about everything, even if only for a moment. (Yup...definitely a pattern!)
I'm still going to futsal. One of these days, I shall have the stamina as Edgar Davids and the skill of Zidane in their prime. Uhh...this is a 50 year plan, by the way... ;)
I haven't been going to the gym lately. Can't seem to summon up the mood. The fat dudes get all the hawt chicks anyway so I should work on getting the right shape. >.<
To add to my growing library of books (thanks for the bookshelf, mom!), I bought a hard-bound book containing the complete works of Shakespeare. I'm currently going through A Midsummer Night's Dream. I wanna see what Shakespeare has to say about the folly of love...

Have a good life

2007-09-02T10:11:00.000-07:00

Relief. Sadness. Disappointment. Longing. Acceptance.

Ahh...what a myriad of emotions. Was I being an idiot? Some say, the signs are obvious and are for all to see. Perhaps I was blind. Perhaps I wanted to be blind. Wise people once said, Hope was the worst thing that came out of Pandora's Box. I'm inclined to agree.

Regret. Bitterness. Malice. Anger.

Such pettiness...such idiocy. May I never succumb to those. Given the same choices and opportunities, I'd still do what I did. Maybe I'm just stupid. Maybe I'm just naive.

I'm trying to put on a brave face but I can't deny the truth. I am sad, but I'm not bitter. I am disappointed though I have no regrets. Despite the situation, I'm not angry nor do I have malice in my heart. There is a sense of relief as I'm no longer somewhere in between. I don't think the longing will ever go away completely. Above all though, there is a sense of acceptance. Perhaps this is how it's supposed to be.

Thank you for the memories. Thank you for those moments of happiness. Thank you for making me feel alive.

May happiness envelop this garden of clarity, purity and nobility.

The dice has rolled. The decision has been made. This chapter is now closed. It's time to begin a new one. Have a good life.

Oog...

2007-09-01T08:40:00.000-07:00

I've come to this wonderful conclusion. The best drink in the world is water. Plain 'ol H2O. Nothing beats water. It only took 4 trips to the toilet bowl for me to come to this revelation. I'm a fast learner.

Sadly, I'm also a fast forgetter! :P

Graphic novels anyone?

2007-07-18T09:58:00.000-07:00

I have a confession. If I see anything with the name Neil Gaiman on it, I tend to buy that stuff without a second thought.

My latest purchase? Neverwhere and Marvel 1602. Both of them are graphic novels and wonderful graphic novels at that! Neverwhere allowed me to re-visit one of my favourite books of all time, in its illustrated glory. If I thought Neverwhere was good, Marvel 1602 blew my mind away. The story and art is simply stupendous! Brilliant! I think it fully deserves winning the 2005 Quill Book Award for Graphic Novels.

Ahh...wonderful stories and wonderful art. I'm happy! :D

6 weird things about me

2007-07-11T10:42:00.000-07:00

A friend of mine tagged me to write 6 weird things about me. If you're curious, his blog posting's at http://championloser.blogs.friendster.com/loser_club_president/2007/05/6_weird_things_.html

I can't think really think of any weird things about myself. I'm probably weird in some ways but I just don't know it. As such this list is going to be a list of things about me not many people know. Hopefully that's good enough for you, Zaki!

In my profile, I put one of my interests as "books". That may be a slight understatement. I'm an avid reader and I literally devour books. For those who've visited me at my place, one of their first comments are "Wow, you have a lot of books..."
I play the guitar. To be honest though, I was never really that interested in music when I was younger. I did take organ lessons when I was much younger but I got bored with it. I wanted to play songs that I heard on radio and my tutor was telling me stuff about a bunch of black dots. Suffice to say that my motivation level to practice organ wasn't very high at that stage. Anyway, when I was Form 2 or Form 3, I took up playing guitar. I was very much in love (hey, we all went through those puppy love stages so cut my some slack) with this girl and wanted to impress her. She had such a beautiful voice. She could sing The Cranberries very well. I decided to take up guitar playing. My first song on the guitar? Zombie. ;)
I almost got into a fight in a bar. I was chillin' around Q-Bar quite some time ago when I saw this girl sitting kinda alone at the bar. She was talking with some guys but it didn't look like she was with any of them. She had a sad, wistful smile that sorta tugged the heart strings. Ok, so I have a White Knight complex. Don't worry though, I'm looking for therapy right now. Know anyone good? Anyway, I approached her, we started talking and laughing when suddenly this guy came outta nowhere and started pushing me. I was getting a bit pissed. I'm not a violent person but the temptation to push the fella back was quite strong. He kept saying "What the fuck are you doing? She's my girlfriend!". As for the chick, she was getting a bit hysterical. I swear they did not look like they're a couple. They're not holding hands. They're not touching each other. For god's sake, about the only thing they did was share a cigarette. C'mon, I've done that before with some of my girl friends. That doesn't mean I'm in a relationship with them! Oh yeah, cigarettes. Maybe that's item 4. Heh! Anyway, I decided it wasn't worth it. Well, actually some stranger nearby persuaded me not to. That stranger's words? Something along the lines off "C'mon bro, it's not worth it la. Relax la. Chill!". So I walked away. I gotta admit it was a bit fun glowering at the so called boyfriend while the fella was pushing me. He's shorter than me so I was looking down at him when I was glowering. Sometimes being moderately tall is useful. God...I can be so petty sometimes...
I used to smoke. Not anymore though but there's nothing really stopping me from smoking again. I even bought a bunch of cigars from Langkawi which I plan to smoke sometime in the future. Haven't found anything to celebrate yet though so the cigar pack stays unopened. Oh, the main reason I stopped smoking? It gave me a funny feeling at the back of my throat and messed up with my sense of taste. I like food WAY more than I like cigarettes. Heck, I could barely tolerate smoking. Don't really understand why people would wanna smoke...
I drink booze. Yes I know it's haram. Yes I know I'm going to go to hell. My reasons for drinking is personal and pretty much none of your business. Of course, I'd also like to point out that I fast, I hardly ever miss Friday prayers, I pay my zakat and I'm completely and utterly faithful to the concept that only Allah is my God and Muhammad is my prophet. I know, I'm a blooming hypocrite. I prefer to refer myself as a wonderful mess of contradictions though. :D
I've dated many women, all of them wonderful people. Among the memories I have, some of the best includes ice-skating, eating some weird dessert in the middle of the night somewhere in KL and pizza session in Taman Tun. Of all the women I've dated, I've confessed my feelings to only one person. Shocking, eh? I know, it's the new millennium. I should be expressing my love to everyone. Don't worry, I'm also looking for therapy options on this one.

There you have it. 6 things about me that not many people know.

Daemon?

2007-07-06T13:33:00.000-07:00

Hands Down

2007-06-28T09:18:00.000-07:00

Wonderful song by Dashboard Confessional.

"Breathe in for luck
Breathe in so deep
The air is blessed
You share with me..."

Let the dice roll...

2007-06-25T09:02:00.000-07:00

Savour every moment
of light-hearted laughs.
Savour every moment
of shy gentle smiles.

Let not one moment pass
without fondness in the heart.
Let not one moment pass
without cherishing her soul.

Look for the space
between the heartbeats.
For glimpse of clarity,
purity and nobility.

Let the dice roll
while serenity sets in.
Forever savouring,
cherishing, loving...

Mustafa got married!!

2007-06-04T00:46:00.000-07:00

Congratz to Mustafa and Leila! Here's to the two of you getting kids soon (which I hope will look more like Leila since you're an ugly bastard, Mus!).

When we received the wedding invites, we initially planned to take the bus to Singapore for the wedding. After some more discussions though, we decided to go there in 2 cars.

In my car will be me, Shah, Anand and Sulo while in Jeremy's car will be Jeremy and Sangheeta. While we planned to leave at around 2.30 pm, we ended up leaving KL at around 3.30 pm due to someone's amazing grasp of Einstein's theory about time being relative (*cough*Anand*cough*).

It was a nice leisurely drive down to Singapore, which took us about 5 hours or so. Ok, I lied. It wasn't nice and leisurely. The highway was a bit jammed and since I just got my car, I wanted to put it through it's paces. I *may* have driven a little bit faster than normal. Heh heh!

(The car handles exceedingly well at speeds up to 170 kmph. Couldn't really go faster due to the amount of vehicles on the road. Excellent handling and mileage is about the same as my old car.)

Reached Johor Bahru at about 8.30 pm. Jeremy's friend apparently booked us at some hotel but we couldn't bloody find it. In the end, we stayed at this rather dodgy-looking hotel. Later on, we discovered that the place we're staying was actually a brothel!! On the bright side, the room rates were quite cheap. They probably make their profit somewhere else. Hahahahaha!

Still, the beds were decent and the place had an in-compound car park so all in all, the hotel was perfect for our needs (no not *that* needs! sheesh!). Despite our hotel being perfect, Sulo decided to abandon us and stay with her relatives. I mean why would anyone want to sleep anywhere else? Within the same hotel compound is a pub and a 'health' spa! Talk about the perfect holiday getaway. Hehehehehe!

Woke up about 10.30 am the next day because Shah and Anand were basically jumping on me. Guys, don't disturb my sleep! Oh, and keep the damn TV volume down. I woke up to the sounds of a damn infomercial about a magic bullet and the feeling of being crushed by 2 heavy suckers...

Later in the afternoon, Suthesan arrived at the hotel since he'll be following us to Singapore. Macha, my turn is right after yours! Hahahaha!

We left for Singapore at about 4 pm and arrived at Mustafa's wedding venue at around 6.30 pm. It took longer than expected since we took the scenic route (we go lost...).

Mustafa and Leila's wedding had REALLY good food! I really liked the mutton. Damn...I'm thinking about it right now...Anyway, sadly the food was not quite enough for us. While the girls were maintaining decorum, the guys were definitely pigging out. The dishes finished a bit too fast for our liking. Next time round, we plan to spread ourselves around the hall, sitting on different tables. We have 6 men with huge appetites on our table while other tables were generally filled with women eating barely a plate of rice! We're not being greedy. We just don't like to see good food being wasted since other people don't eat as much. We're such thoughtful people.

Mustafa's younger brother, Hamoodi was also eating with us. We all wished it was Mustafa's younger sister, Zena who joined us instead of Hamoodi. Hamoodi eats a lot, leaving less food for all of us to share. That's the only reason why we prefer Zena instead of Hamoodi to join us. I'm serious!

We left Singapore at around 11.30 pm and reached KL around 3.30 am. It was a relatively uneventful drive. I had to stop by for a bit to power-nap since I was too tired but other that, it was uneventful except for one incident. Some idiot driving a VIOS fell asleep on the wheel I think. The car he's driving started drifting into my lane while I'm overtaking him. Arse. Remember, if you can't drive, don't! You'll endanger other people's lives. Not just your own.

With the trip to Singapore, my car has now reached 1000km. Woohoo! First service!

Greetings!

2007-05-31T20:04:00.000-07:00

Dear Honda Civic 2.0,

Hey beautiful! Welcome to my life. I'm sure we'll have an excellent time together. :)

Regards,
Amir

Farewell...

2007-05-24T00:14:00.000-07:00

Dear Proton Wira 1.5M SE,

I'm really going to miss you. We've had some really good times together and you'll always be in my mind. Have a good life. :)

Regards,
Amir

Stardust by Neil Gaiman

2007-05-20T06:16:00.000-07:00

Have you ever wished that you could stay a kid forever? As I get older, I do get more wistful about my childhood. Some of my fondest memories as a kid were reading books. My favourite author at that time was Enid Blyton. I think I finished reading the Wishing Chair when I was 8 years old. I LOVED that book. I remember bringing that book everywhere. Each time my family would 'balik kampung' during Raya, I'd somehow managed to find a niche in the luggage to store my book so that I can read it when I arrived at my grandparent's place. The Wishing Chair was a wonderful fairy tale book.

Neil Gaiman's books can often be described as fairytales for adults. It's not quite your typical fantasy ala David Eddings or Robert Jordan. Instead, Neil Gaiman takes our childhood memories of fairy tales and nursery rhymes and somehow incorporates them in a story that is both exciting and enchanting.

Stardust is a story of a young man who is completely besotted by a young woman who doesn't seem to be interested in returning his affections. To prove his worth to her, he journeys into the realm of Faerie to bring back the falling star that they both observed while walking together.

Yes, I know. A little bit cliche. Read it though and I think you'd probably agree with me that Neil Gaiman is one of the best storytellers of our time. I thoroughly enjoyed my time reading it! Among his other books are Neverwhere, American Gods and Anansi Boys. He also wrote a comic or graphic novel called Sandman. Wonderful storylines, all of them. I still rate Neverwhere as one of the best books I've ever read in my life!

I love lazy Sundays. They're simply perfect for enjoying a good book. I wonder what I'll be reading next Sunday. :D

FA Cup

2007-05-19T13:28:00.000-07:00

Based on an earlier arrangement, me and Kenny were planning to watch the football match at Laundry Bar. Then another colleague, Kheng Loon was supposed to join us.

Due to some weird circumstances, me and yet another colleague, David ended up at TGIF to watch the match. We have no idea where Kheng Loon disappeared to but at TGIF we met another colleague, Sharon and her husband, both also watching football. Kenny arrived late, somehow manages to find a table at Laundry despite my and David's best efforts to find one earlier and then tells us that we won't be able to join him because he's with his friends and the table's for only 4 people. There's no more space for us to join him. Our reply to him?

"Dude, if you don't want to intro your girl friends to us, just say so la!" Hahahahaha!

Anyway, Kenny goes back to his (girl) friends at Laundry while the group at TGIF is joined by another person, my ex-colleague Gerald. Hence, the group at TGIF consists of the following:

Me - Barcelona and Juventus fan, supporting Chelsea to spite David but ended up cheering for Man Utd 'cos their playing style is nicer.
David - Man Utd fan, hoping that every Chelsea players suffers a broken leg that night.
Sharon's husband (whom I didn't get his name) - Chelsea fan.
Sharon - Apparently supporting Man Utd just to give her husband some competition but ended up cheering for Chelsea.
Gerald - Found the entire game boring 'cos there are no goals until the 116th minute.

We got a spot at the bar in TGIF. While the match was on a WAY smaller screen compared to Laundry, since we're at the bar it was WAY easier to order drinks and food. Anyone who's been to Laundry knows that the service there is pretty much crap. You'd order a drink there and if you're lucky, it'll arrive 45 minutes later. Of course, to grab the attention of the waiters there, you'd need to wave your hand up in the air for at least 15 minutes. All in all, about 60 minutes of wait for a bloody drink if you're lucky. Unlucky means the drink never gets to you, you give up waiting after 2 hours and go home.

Munchies for the night were 2 orders of chicken nachos, 1 regular size and 1 large size. I had a Jim Beam with coke and banana milkshake, David had 2 vodka limes while Gerald had a mudslide. We all had ice water to wash it all down. Sharon also passed us a slice of cheesecake but I'm ashamed to say that between me, David and Gerald, we only managed to finish 1/3 of that slice of cheesecake. I know! 3 virile men, renowned for their tremendous appetite in food (and other stuff!), couldn't even finish a bloody slice of cheesecake! We will forever remember this day in shame...

All in all, a pretty good night out. The game was decent enough (no penalties!), the food great and the company excellent! A slight let down about Man Utd losing since I thought they were the better side but Chelsea somehow managed to squeeze in a winner. Still, I'm more interested in the Champions League Finals this Thursday morning at 3 am. Any cup finals with Liverpool in it is bound to be a classic!

Metropolitan car thingy

2007-05-19T12:26:00.000-07:00

Ahh...Saturday! Words cannot even begin to describe how much I love you!

Woke up at 1.00 pm today. Vaguely remembered that Sulo called me earlier in the morning. Had to call her back since I can't bloody remember what we were talking about. Heh!

At around 3 pm, my stomach complained of hunger. I was hunting for a late lunch kaki when Shah suggested that I drop by Metropolitan College to check out some car exhibition thingy.

Me: "Any food over there, Shah?"
Shah: "Sure, some mamak stuff."
Me: "On my way!"

When I arrived there, I'm a bit impressed. While it's not a really big exhibition, it seems to be quite well organized. Decent sound system, decent decorations and some really nice selection of vehicles! Most of my drooling was reserved for the Nissan Fairlady 350z. That is one SWEET car!! I also saw a Honda Civic with Mugen bodykit. Very beautiful! Mugen equipment costs a lot though...

The exhibition also featured some booth babes. They're quite pleasing to the eyes but I find them to be a bit on the thin side. While some guys like the stick thin look, I kinda prefer women with a little bit more flesh. Mmm....yummy...ok, enough of that mental image! Back to blogging!

While checking out the exhibition after having my lunch (which consists of a nasi goreng kampung, 2 roti canai, 1 milo ais, 1 teh 'o' ais and 1 ais kosong), I
found a booth selling magazines. Was browsing them for a while when I realized that booth was also selling Archie comics quite cheap. I *may* been a bit overzealous here. I bought 12 comics. The booth people were quite pleased with my patronage. Hahahahahaha!

Besides the comics, my purchase also includes 2 Red Bull drinks. I'm not really a big fan of Red Bull but Shah said it's for charity so what the heck. Red Bull booth was manned (womaned?) by a rather pretty girl but she was busy with something so I got served by 2 guys standing nearby. Ah well, there's always next year's exhibition!

Left Metropolitan College at about 6 pm. It was a rather fruitful outing! KKLau's booth gave me some ideas for my ICE (In Car Entertainment) while a stop at Magnum's booth makes me definitely want to get their safety and security film. To top it all off, I've got 12 new Archie comics!

Live Music @ Laundry!!

2007-05-11T10:26:00.000-07:00

Don't miss it!

http://laundrybar.blogspot.com/2007/05/volume2-this-saturday.html

See ya all there!

A pause for thought...

2007-05-08T08:55:00.000-07:00

While I was chilling after dinner with my mom and bro yesterday, something my mom said got me to re-evaluate my life. At the very least, it got me to realize what an ungrateful bastard I am.

My mom was buying stuff at the wet market. While she was choosing some fresh fish, another person next to her was also choosing stuff. Then my mom realized something. That person was choosing the smaller crabs. After making selecting those crabs, that person asked for the price. Hearing the price, that person then returned back those crabs and moved on.

The price? 9 bucks. 9 bloody bucks and that person returned back the crabs. Shit...

I feel like such a bastard. I spent almost 500 bucks on booze while in Langkawi and this person returned back crabs that costs 9 bucks. That just doesn't seem right...

Karrimor!

2007-05-06T09:36:00.000-07:00

W00t! I've finally gotten myself a proper backpack. I'm now a proud owner of a Karrimor 75 litre backpack. Talked to a few friends and they recommended either a Deuter or a Karrimor. I couldn't find any shops selling Deuter so I went ahead with the Karrimor. No regrets though. A little bit pricey but hey, I doubt I'm gonna buy anymore bags anytime in the next 10 years or so. It's a worthwhile investment, I think. It's also a motivation for me to work harder, make more money and go traveling more! =D

I <3>

Angry

2007-05-04T10:12:00.000-07:00

I'm still pissed off. Must think of happy thoughts...

Honesty

2007-05-01T05:12:00.000-07:00

Of all the principles that I value in life, honesty probably ranks the the highest. Honesty builds upon the foundation in which trust can occur. Without honesty, there is no trust. Without trust, there is no real friendship.

Some people prefer not to know things. Knowing certain things could make life complicated and less perfect. I respect that. Everyone should have their own say in how they want to live their lives.

Not me though. I want the truth. If it's bad, then it's bad. Nothing much you can do about it. If it's good, then wonderful! At the end though, it must be the truth. I did not choose the words in my friendster profile description because it sounds nice. I am a seeker of truth. I can deal with the truth. What I can't deal with is living in a lie.

Langkawi, here I come!

2007-04-27T05:32:00.000-07:00

W00t! I'm off to Langkawi! 3 days 2 nights of escape from the world. Heh, these days I look for whatever break I can find!

Will be back Monday, 30th April 2007.

A break between the storms, a moment of contentment

2007-04-12T10:59:00.000-07:00

It was a long, tiring and stressful day at work today. I have to admit I didn't exactly manage to keep my coolness. Raised my voice a bit occasionally today and was swearing at the network a coupla times too. Must remember to keep my emotions in check. Sigh, damned fiery passion's getting the better of me! Typical Aries... Don't get me wrong. There were no shouting matches or anything like that but there there ain't no sea of calm too! Again, don't get me wrong. I might swear at the network but the core packet backbone network (my responsibility) hasn't been the culprit for any service disruptions yet. It's *my* network and by the time I hand it over to the network management team, it's gonna be bloody clean, easy to maintain and has no single point of failure. That's my Aries pride speaking, I guess... I really should be more humble. I can be such an arrogant bastard sometimes. Heh!

Reached home about 8 pm again. Was checking the news when I discovered that Kurt Vonnegut passed away yesterday, 11 April 2007. For those who don't know him, Kurt Vonnegut is widely regarded as one of the greatest authors in the 20th century. His famous books include "Cat's Cradle" and "Slaughterhouse-Five". He's one of the authors I keep hearing about but never read...until today. I guess when I heard that he passed away, I felt that I should at least *know* him by reading his works. I actually heard about him a few years ago when during a discussion about books and authors, one of my friends mentioned his name and gave a glowing recommendation to try out Vonnegut's works.

Hence, after dinner I went on the net to check out some of his works. I managed to grab a copy of "Cat's Cradle" and MAN! I was amazed by his writing! Brilliant prose! It's kinda hard to describe his style. It combines wit, satire and black humour. I'm looking forward to finding the time to read more of his works. I need to check with my bookstore owner cousin. I wonder if the store has Vonnegut's works... I plan to buy them all! :D

I'm a bookworm. Reading less in terms of quantity these days due to ever increasing work load but I'd like to think I'm reading more in terms of quality. My last books were Trudi Canavan's "Black Magician" trilogy and before that were the four books of George R.R. Martin's "A Song of Ice and Fire". All in all, a pretty decent read though I enjoyed "A Song of Ice and Fire" over "Black Magician". "A Song of Ice and Fire" has a more gripping storyline and plot twists!

"Cat's Cradle" is an excellent book. I practically devoured the book. Finished it in about 3 hours! Ahh...it's been a while since I've read such an excellent book! After I finished the book, I felt relaxed and at peace. Heh, one of those rare moments of contentment. It's been a while. I'm ready to face the world again. :)

As a tribute to this great author, let me end this blog posting with a poem about 'religion' by Kurt Vonnegut. All hail Bokononism!

I wanted all things
To seem to make some sense,
So we could all be happy, yes,
Instead of tense.
And I made up lies
So that they all fit nice,
And I made this sad world
A par-a-dise.

YES!! I'm back!

2007-04-04T11:45:00.000-07:00

After serving faithfully for the past 4 years or so, my computer died on Monday earlier this week. Well, to be more precise, it's either my motherboard or video card that died. I'm still not sure which. Doesn't really matter though. My computer's old and spare parts are very difficult to find sp I decided to buy new video card, processor, motherboard and RAM.

Ladies and gentlemen! Feast your eyes on the (important!) specs of my gaming machine!!

2.4 GHz Core 2 Duo processor
2 GB RAM
Nvidia Geforce 7950 GT

Please excuse me while I laugh maniacally in pleasure. :D

Besides oozing with pure g4m1ng l33tn355, I'm now connected to the Global Village (ie. da Internet!) again thanks to this baby! W00t! More pr0n and warez! Uh, I mean more 'educational' stuff and 'intellectual' growth and all that. ;)

On a totally unrelated subject, don't forget! Speedzone Tour 2007 rave party is on Saturday evening 07/04/2007 at KL Tower. The next evening is Kanye West concert at the National Stadium. See ya there!

Migration crapness

2007-03-15T03:21:00.000-07:00

I'm generally an easy going sucker. I don't think I get angry very easily, though I admit that I can get from being happy to being angry in an instant. Becoming angry happens rather rarely though.

Anyway, about 2 days ago I was involved in a network migration. From a single network, the traffic will be split into 2 networks, each handling a different role. Obviously there'll be network topology changes, with configuration being done on the firewalls, switches and routers. Arrived onsite to do pre-migration checking at around 3 pm. Final design documents arrived at 5.17 pm and migration begins at 9 pm. Fun! Sure, it'll be a bit challenging but nothing me and my colleague can't handle. Hell, if shit really happens, we could rebuild the entire network if we need to. We're THAT good! Well...ok, maybe not me. I'm barely average but my colleague's really REALLY good. He's the Jedi Master while I'm just the Padawan. Heh!

Anyway, we completed our configuration about 2 am or so. After that was the network verification part. Initially we had some problems with voice calls, video calls and sms but it was all sorted out in the end. Remember my colleague? Well he's the one who sorted it out. Me, I can handle the packet-switched networks pretty decent, I guess. Him, he's way more than decent at handling packet-switched network, circuit-switched network and radio access network. I have a looooooong way to go...

Once we verified the core network services, we proceed with verifying the value added services. Sure, there are some hiccups here and there but it was all resolved in the end. All in all, the migration was a success!

Of course, no good deed goes unpunished. Apparently connection to the billing domain wasn't up. They had some issues with connecting and running services to some of the network nodes. We've been working more or less non-stop for the past 24 hours so understandably we're all rather tired and worn out. For this issue, which is probably a minor routing problem, I asked another of my colleague to take a look at it. Despite my best efforts, I didn't really managed to get much rest. Sigh...too many phone calls from work.

Next day, I woke up late. Didn't go to work in the morning since I've got another night of activity later on anyway. Logged on to work from home and checked my email. All the feel-good factor of a successful migration disappeared in an instant. Imagine getting an email with title like "IMPORTANT: ALL NODES DOWN!! (CRITICAL)", and that email is cc'ed to practically the whole world. Bloody fuck!! It's only a minor routing issue which was resolved in about 2 hours anyway. Issue was raised around 12.30 pm yesterday, connectivity was restored around 2 pm. For God's sake, it's not even a LIVE network! Ok, fine. Just someone making a mountain out of a molehill.

Normally, I'd laugh this off but the part that REALLY pisses me off is the person who sent out that email. This is the same sucker whom when he needs help in resolving some networking issues, he comes straight to me. No emails, just a "Hi! We're having some connection problems. Can you assist us?". Now in this particular situation, he shoots of an email informing everyone that "all nodes down". Bastard!! When it's his problem, he wants to keep it quiet and approaches engineers directly. When it's other people's problem (in this case, mine), he shoots out email informing EVERYONE in the project.

Fucking hell!! Bloody two-faced bastard!! Grr... It's not like this is gonna reflect badly on me anyway. My scope was to migrate the network and make sure that the core and value added services are working as expected. Billing is not part of that scope. Dammit, I'm still pissed. From now on, no more charity work. If my routing, switching and firewall policies are fine, billing people can sort out their network themselves. I'm not going to do any traces or do any analysis on THEIR network. Let them do it themselves, assuming they even know how!

Down with the sickness, a reunion and fortune cookie strangeness!

2007-03-10T13:13:00.000-08:00

Ugh...I hate getting sick. I always know when I'm gonna get sick when I get this strange crappy feeling at the back of my throat. Woke up on Friday with that lousy throat and by the time I got back from work that day, I was already having a fever. Argh...crapness!

To make matters worse, I was due to chill at my friend's place on Saturday night. I was really looking forward to it and getting sick threatened to derail my plans! Fortunately though, I was feeling better by Saturday evening so the chillin' part went on as planned. Hmm...I suspect I got sick by eating too much keropok lekor. I had 2 huge plates of it on Wednesday night so that's probably it. I think the last time I got sick was because of over-eating keropok lekor too. Dammit...I hope I'm not allegic to it or something. Keropok lekor is probably one of my favorite food! Must remember not to overdo it with the keropok lekor next time...

Anyway, on Saturday night I went to Jeremy's place. Sulo was kind enough to drive me there so I didn't have to drive to OUG in my current sick condition. As for my return trip, Joe sent me back. Thanks a lot, you two!! The turnout for our chillin' session was pretty good! Most of the usual gang I hung out in college were there. Heh, despite graduating more than 3 years ago, we're all pretty much the same suckers. Haven't met up with a lot of them for quite some time so it was really cool to catch up with each other's lives!

One of the items on the menu for that night were fortune cookies. Apparently they come in two flavors, orange and strawberries. I can't seem to find any strawberry flavored ones though so I had to settle for orange. It's pretty decent I guess but then, I think fortune cookies are the same everywhere. My fortune? "Stop searching forever. Happiness is right next to you." My friends' reactions? Oh, nothing much. As if choreographed, they all burst out laughing at the same! Yeesh...thanks a lot, you all! Interestingly enough, I got the same damned fortune 3 times that night. While I don't put much stock into those kinda stuff, I could do with a little less wisecracks!

We also played 21 that night. Me personally, I don't gamble as a matter of principle. If it's a game of chance, I'm not interested. Of course, under my own personal definition, poker is a game of skill and not of chance. Don't believe me? Go watch Casino Royale! Anyway, Jeremy managed to persuade me to join in by passing me his money. Hence, if I win, the money goes back to him. Since he's also the banker, if he wins the money STILL goes back to him. It sounds reasonable enough so I agreed. I think at the end of the night, I got a profit of 10 sen (which of course went to Jeremy). Heh, our bet per round is almost always 10 sen so I guess the value of my win is not that much. Then again, I started out with 1 buck so looking at it in perspective, I gained a 10% profit! Woohoo! Hahahahahaha!

I think we all went back home at around 3 something. It was an excellent night. I managed to meet up with a few of the old gang which I haven't seen for ages! It was really cool chillin' together again! It was excellent to see ya all, Shah, Niradj, Anand, Joe, Jeremy, Sangeeta, Ummi, Sulo and Deebha! Oh, and a thank you to our special guests, Murni, Azmiel, Hamdan and Dyana! Cheers!

Disturbed...

2007-02-22T09:46:00.000-08:00

Been in a slightly pissed off mood lately. Y'know sometimes you feel like you're one with the world, that you are in the 'zone' and can feel the heartbeat of the universe? When it's during one of those moments where everything feels right and you feel good? Well, what I'm feeling right now it pretty much the complete opposite from what I've just described.

I can't really put my finger to it. Looking at it in a completely factual manner, life has never been better! After about a year and a half in my current company, I'm no longer the FNG ('effing new guy for the completely clueless) and amazingly enough they trust me to fiddle around with live mobile networks and build from ground up a totally new mobile network. I know! What the heck were they thinking, eh? Haha! I've been going out way more than before too, whether clubbing or just hanging out. Ok, been getting a bit more intoxicated too but hey, it's fun! I'm also more active in my hobbies, reading more books and regularly going to gym. It looks like a balanced lifestyle but somehow I don't feel balanced.

Crap, I have no idea why I feel so restless. I need to chill...Heh, I've been listening to Disturbed quite often lately. Their music probably fits my mood the best right now. It's been a while since I've listened to metal/hard rock music. I think I'm going back to my rocker roots, at least for the time being. Last time I listened to anything this heavy, it was Metallica! Whoa, that was in secondary school!

One particular phrase keeps ringing in my head from a Disturbed song.

"Quivering now, shivering now, withering..."
- Want by Disturbed

PS: Check out the song and the band. Excellent music! It has a lot of anger, making it an excellent song to de-stress and also as gym music. I've already updated the MP3 playlist in my phone to play this band.

Really LAME jokes

2007-02-15T09:49:00.000-08:00

What's the difference between a dog and a switch? One goes arf while the other goes ARP!
Why is RIP like a woman? 'Cos they both talk all the time!
Have you heard of OSPF women? They come in stubby, not so stubby and not stubby sizes!
Why is the Linux box very friendly with the Windows box? 'Cos they both do the samba!
What did one daemon say to the other when they're both fighting? Fork you!!
Why are the relationship between DNS servers considered kinky? 'Cos they practice a master-slave relationship!
What do the police and hard disks have in common? They both do RAIDs.

For the clincher, here's the lamest of them all!

What do switch ports and women have in common? When they're empty, they are "ready" and when they're filled, they are "active"!

PS: This blog post is dedicated to all engineers, who at one point in time or another, had to spend their night(s) stuck in a room with temperatures barely above freezing instead of hanging out with chicks. ;)

Clubbing oddity

2007-02-11T10:14:00.000-08:00

On Saturday night, a friend of mine was having her birthday celebration at her place. The plan was to gorge ourselves on delicious food, then head out to Heritage Road for some fun. The food was very very good! Perfectly cooked beryani rice, mutton curry and stir-fried vegetables. I have to admit that I over indulged on the food...slightly! ;)

Anyway, after food we all headed to Bed, this club opposite Loft on Heritage Road. I have to admit, I've never heard of that place before. Turns out, Bed is a pretty decent place. I think Loft is more happening though. I dropped by Loft for a moment and the party was in full swing! While Bed is quite nice, it was a little bit sad when on the dance floor, the guys outnumber the girls. Next time it's a Saturday night and I feel like clubbing, I'm heading to Loft! They have better guy to girl ratio. ;)

Anyway, while chilling out at Bed I noticed that my friend managed to grab this Mat Salleh's attention. They were talking and dancing on the dance floor when outta the blue, I noticed that they seem to be gesturing to each other a lot. I was wondering, what the heck was going on but since she didn't seem to need any help, I let them be. Later, when I was at the dance floor, out of the blue she asked me who do I think is gonna win the Champions League. Was it Barcelona or Real Madrid? Of course, I answered Barcelona with no hesitation. Heh! I have to admit though that normally on the dance floor, those are not the sort of conversation I'd expect to be having!

Later on during the mamak session after clubbing,I got my curiosity satisfied. Apparently while dancing together, my friend and her Mat Salleh friend got into an argument about football, of all things! The dude was apparently a Spanish who's a staunch supporter of Barcelona while my friend is a Real Madrid supporter. Yeesh! Of all the things a guy and a girl can do on the dance floor, arguing about football was probably the last thing I'd expect them to do. This gets my vote as the oddest thing 2 people of the opposite gender can do while clubbing! Hahahahahahaha!

Boyz II Men Concert

2007-01-28T09:23:00.000-08:00

As some of you might know, Boyz II Men came down to Malaysia to perform for 2 nights in Genting's Arena of Stars. Since we're quite big fans, me and some friends decided to watch them live on Saturday night.

So here we are, me, Anand and Murni all raring to go. We all agreed to meet at my place since I'm the designated driver.

Agreed meeting time = 3 pm
Actual arrival time = 5 pm

Heh, Malaysian timing! =)

The drive up the Genting slopes was rather uneventful, the peace only broken by the occasional moan of pain from Anand. Heh, the dude gets carsick! Hahahahaha! Sorry bro, just had to share your pain with the world. Next time, we should try some crazy roller-coasters! ;)

We reached Genting at about 6.30 pm, I think. The way up was a bit slow. Moments like this increases my desire for a sports car! I was driving a Wira 1.5 and the car was carrying 2 big fellas and 1 little lady. I'm 75 kg while Anand is between 85 to 90 kg. Murni's weight? She'd kill me if I post it here. Heh!

Man...Genting is HUGE! Each time I go there, I keep getting lost...When I was checking on the status of our concert tickets, I actually walked one giant circle! If I took a right turn instead of a left turn, the ticket counter was actually about 10 metres away. Sigh...I need to get a bloody map for this place!

Anyway, after a quick dinner at KFC, we're picked up our tickets at the Arena of Stars itself and got to our seats. As I looked around, there was a lot of people! The venue was closed to full. Only the really crappy seats to the far left and far right of the stage was empty. No way in hell am I gonna embarrass myself so I planned to act cool and distinctly nonchalant when Boyz II Men were performing.

All those macho plans went out of the window once Boyz II Men started their performance with "On Bended Knees". Oh MAN! As soon as I heard the opening melody to that song, I was on my feet, cheering like a mad man with a huge grin on my face! Ahh...those music sure brings back nostalgia. I was listening to them when I'm in my secondary school! That's like more than 10 years ago! I have to admit I behave shamelessly like a little kid. I don't think I sat down much during the show. My throat was hoarse from all the shouting and my hands were a little numb from all the clapping. Heh, the show was REALLY good! I thoroughly enjoyed all the 1 hour and 30 minutes the concert! :D

The Boyz II Men ended their show with the song "End of the Road". It's an excellent song and a rather appropriate ending to an excellent show. Of course, when they left the stage after that song, none of the audience were ready to go back yet. We were all shouting for an encore! Being wonderful people that they are, they obliged with an excellent funky number. I have no idea what's the title to the song. Heck, maybe it was just some jamming but the effect was electrifying! Put a funky dance song and a HUGE audience who's out to enjoy themselves together and you'll get one MASSIVE party! Everyone was grooving to the music. It was EXCELLENT! I was very satisfied with the 100-odd bucks I spent for the tickets. :D

The drive back from Genting was rather tricky though. It was drizzling so the roads were a quite wet. Coupled with some thick fog and the fact that it's already night-time, driving down was way more challenging than driving up. Visibility was so bad, I think I could only see about 5 metres in front of me, max! For the next 30 minutes or so, I think I was only driving using the 2nd gear with a max speed of about 40 kmph. This time though, no moans from Anand since he was sleeping while we're all heading down the twisting road of Genting Highlands. Heh, smart fella!

We all reached my place at about 12.00 am, bringing back some really wonderful memories of a truly magnificent performance by Boyz II Men. :)

Heavenly objects!

2007-01-25T09:07:00.000-08:00

God is truly the greatest artist. As we move through our daily lives, we are blessed with visions of one of God's greatest masterpieces, women! ;)

Of course, that's a story for another time! Heh heh! When I mentioned heavenly objects, I'm referring to celestial ones, not the angels (and devils!) on Earth.

Tonight as I came back from dinner with my cousins, the sky was rather clear above my house. Not missing this opportunity, I dumped my gym bag in my room and proceed to chill at my balcony. I dunno about you all but stargazing is actually one of my hobbies. I'm forever fascinated by the possibilities presented by the stars.

The size of the universe boggles the mind. I find the concept that Earth is the only place supporting life in our universe to be rather ridiculous. To me, that sounds like a massive waste of space! Somewhere out there, I bet there are sentient beings just like us looking at the stars and wondering who else is out there. While it'll never happen during my lifetime, I keep dreaming that one day the human race will initiate peaceful contact with another sentient race. Blame the Star Trek fanboy in me, I guess!

Star gazing also gives me a sense of connection with humanity's ancestors. The stars we see tonight are the same stars that Muhammad, Isa, Abraham, Moses, Buddha and many others gazed at during their quiet moments of contemplation. These are the same stars that the Polynesians used as a map while they guide their rickety boat of weeds across oceans, the same stars that the Chinese used as they explored the entire planet. These are the same stars that populated the skies as the human race left the African continent and ventured outwards, populating deserts and tundra, tropical forests and temperate forests. These are the stars that bore witness while the dinosaurs reign supreme during the age of reptiles. Finally, this are the very same stars that our very first ancestor (Adam and Eve or some evolved monkey, depending on your beliefs!) gazed upon in wonder as they claim this world as their own.

If the stars could talk, imagine what stories they would tell!

Whew...

2007-01-25T08:40:00.000-08:00

Man, I had a close one today!

Earlier this evening, I went to gym for a bit of workout. Heh, part of my new year's resolution to get a Baywatch body by the end of the year! ;)

Anyway, arrived at gym at around 7 pm or so. Did my usual routine of stretching, cardio, stretching and weights. I finished about 9 pm or so and headed to the showers. After changing back my normal clothes, I discovered that my wallet and car keys were NOT in my locker. Ever had that sinking feeling in your stomach when you realized that you're totally screwed? Well, that feeling washed over me during that time. Earlier on when I arrived, I was using a different locker but I found out that I can't seem to lock that locker. I then moved my stuff to a different locker. However, I apparently forgot to also move my wallet and my car keys to that new locker. Argh!!

My mind was already running through the list of stuff I have to do. Cancel credit cards, report lost IC and driving license, report lost company tag, get a new access card to customer site, apply for new bonuslink...ugh, the list was endless!

With not much hope, I approached the gym counter to see if they found any wallet and car keys. Amazingly enough, some guy DID find my stuff and passed them to the wonderful gym people at the counter! Man, I was ready to treat the fella to a drink but the people there just told me the person who returned it was just some honest gym member. Well, to whoever you are, I'll be donating to some charity or something in your name! Since tomorrow's Friday, I'll also be praying for your long and healthy life, great happiness and whatever good things I can think off during Friday prayers! Thanks a lot!

Damn! I was sure away from office for a LONG time!

2007-01-15T07:47:00.000-08:00

My presence was so rare in the office for the past 4 months, some of my colleagues actually thought I left the company! Hahahahahahahahahaha!

WoW stuff

2007-01-09T23:15:00.000-08:00

Recently I was at Zaki's place for some free food (his sister's b'day actually). As usual, meeting the sucker will always involve him telling me WoW rox and asking me to join. Anyway, during our conversation he mentioned the following which made me double-up in laughter! :D

"Amir, I've created a new guild! Name of guild - DownDiagonalFront Punch. Name of guildmaster - Hadouken. It rocks, man! Hahahaha!"

PS: Only people who played Street Fighter will understand this one. ;)

Wonderful...

2007-01-06T09:11:00.000-08:00

Ahh...what a way to start the year! Ladies and gentlemen, let me now inform you that me and a close friend of mine has something new in common. Hmm...how shall I start?

For the past 2 years or so, I've been seeing this girl. Well, not continuously for the entire 2 years. It's more of an on and off kinda thing. She's into rock music and japanese anime, which was what got my attention initially. Heh, I guess I have a slight weakness for rocker chicks. Start talking about rock music and I'd probably worship the ground that the girl walks on! :P

Anyway, this girl I'm seeing keeps giving me inconsistent signals. She blows hot and cold. I mean, ok. It happens all the time for every single guy out there. Women are weird creatures, no? But in this particular instance, it's so extremely hot and cold, it's beyond normal women behaviour range! This is also the main reason for the on and off thing between us.

Anyway, I haven't heard from her for quite some time and was happily enjoying my less complicated but duller life when I met up with that close friend of mine for lunch about two days back. Anyway, after talking crap for a bit, the topic veered and we started talking about my love life. We couldn't really talk about his since he's a married sucker. Heh! Anyway, the conversation was something like this (relevent parts only!):

"Eh Amir, remember ?"
"Sure. Man...she's weird. I could never figure out what the heck was going on..."
"Yeah well, during that time she was a very confused person."
I look at him blankly. "Huh?"
"Anyway, she's now fine. No longer confused. She has a significant other."
"Oh, good for her! Lucky guy, I guess."
"Girl..."
"WTF!?"

An interesting start to the year, eh? If this is any indicator on what this coming year's gonna bring, at least I'll be laughing as much as I'm crying. Heh heh!

PS: No offense meant to all alternative lifestyle people out there. I don't really give damn which direction you all swing. It'll be nice if you could decide before hand which direction you wanna swing though. It'll save people like me from unnecessary headaches! ;)

A new year, a new beginning.

2007-01-03T00:04:00.000-08:00

Woohoo!! New year! Actually, maybe I shouldn't be celebrating too much. Last year was a pretty decent one for me. I mean it could be better but then, every one of them for the past 26 years of my life could be, eh? Still, last year wasn't so bad. I've had worse!

Here's some summary of last year:

Proudest Achievement - I'm WAY more fit now than beginning of last year. When I first joined gym, my stamina was SO bad that I lasted for only 4 minutes on the treadmill at gradient 0 and speed 4. It was THAT bad. I'm seriously not joking! These days though, I'm doing speed 8 to 10, with gradient varying between 3 to 6. I do those for at least 15 minutes non-stop and generally continue up to 30 minutes.

Saddest Moment - My cat passed away late last year. Heh, I really loved that cat. Been a constant companion for me (and the entire family) for the past 17 years. Some might ridicule the feelings people have for an animal but that cat shared a helluva lot of history with me. Rest in peace, cat. We'll meet again in the next life.

Best Purchase - A bluetooth headset which I connect to my handphone. Allows me to listen to MP3s while jogging and also acts as a handsfree for my phone. Simply terrific!

Worst Purchase - Signing up for a personal trainer at the gym. The gym has excellent facilities and the personal trainer is very professional. The only stumbling block is that I HATE being tied to some schedule and I prefer to go to gym when I feel like it, not because I have an appointment with my personal trainer. I need to do something about this though since I still have TONS of sessions left in my contract...

With all those behind now, I guess I do have some changes I wanna make for the coming year (sorted based on how difficult I think it'll be).

Not so difficult/Doable with a little bit of effort

I plan to watch more plays at theatres, go for more concert and attend more rave parties. Theatrical plays for the *ahem* cultural growth, concerts to feed my great love for good music (NO DANGDUT!!) and rave parties for the chicks wearing bikinis (oh, the music's pretty good too)! Oh yeah, I should add going to the MPO into the list too. Some of the classical music by those long dead composers are quite good and MPO has an excellent orchestra! Hmm...I might need to cut down the clubbing part a bit to balance my accounts if I do all this though. Besides, traveling all the way to KL is kinda tiring and I keep getting lost coming back home after clubbing!

Next on the list is to get even more fit. I plan to go to gym very regularly. I'm hoping to reach a pulse rate of low 70s or high 60s at rest by end of this year (very ambitious but doable, I think). It's true about what people say. The healthier and fitter you are, the more prepared you are to face life's challenges. While it's true that my line of work doesn't really require strong muscles and amazing stamina, a fit body keeps the mind alert. With the coming year, I think I'll definitely need an alert mind. As I grow with my current organization, I suspect more responsibilities and challenges will be coming my way and I plan to be prepared when that happens.

Moderately difficult/Might need a bit of luck

This coming year, I plan to prove myself beyond any doubt on my abilities as an engineer and reach for the coveted title of Senior Engineer. Ericsson don't hand out those titles easily and the Senior Engineers in my department are all REALLY good! Not sure whether I'd achieve it or not but I'm really gonna give it a go. That means no more muddling around. It also means that when it comes to my competence area, I know what's the issue. "I think I know" will not cut it. I must really know my area, inside out, backwards and forwards. Not only that, I must also really know not just my current competence area, but also another area such as radio networks or transmission. My technical knowledge must not only be deep, it must be broad as well. I'm still not sure about this part so I guess I probably need to talk to my manager about my path. Beyond the required technical competence, I must also demonstrate sufficient leadership qualities since Senior Engineers are expected to lead and mentor other engineers. A heavy responsibility, but one which I'm aiming for.

Next on the list is probably getting to know my religion a bit better. By better, I mean a helluva lot better. Nope, I don't plan to be those sanctimonious bastards who are purer than pure and whiter than white. To be honest, I think I've got better things to do than to go around telling other people how to live their lives. I've got my own personal demons to deal with anyway. By getting to know my religion better, I plan to focus on knowledge. Some people do Bible study. Me? I plan to do some Quran and Hadith study. There are many reasons for this being one of my plans for the new year. Partly, I've always been curious about the world around me, both in the physical and metaphysical sense. Secondly, there seems to be too many idiots calling themselves religious leaders and spouting nonsense about the faith. I hate those people and I plan to arm myself with the correct knowledge to avoid being misled by stupid propaganda and also present a more accurate interpretation of Islam during any discussions. Thirdly, if I continue going around screwing up my responsibilities as a Muslim, I might as well find out exactly what I'm screwing up at. Heh! Nope, the plan does not include me being a better Muslim. If that was part of my new year's resolution, I'd put this plan in the category below. :)

Very difficult/Needs divine intervention or a miracle

I need to be more honest with myself and start dealing with certain issues that I've been purposely ignoring/avoiding ...Y'know? I don't think I'm ready to write this part of my blog posting. Maybe some other time.

Happy new year 2007, y'all! :D

Caution, speed bump ahead...

2006-12-26T09:23:00.000-08:00

"Awas, bonggol di hadapan."

'Nuff said!

PS: Ok, so this blog might not make sense to everyone but I swear, the moment this divine phrase was uttered, it was as if time stood still, the wind stopped blowing, the birds stopped chirping and the Niagara Falls stopped frothing. Then me and Anand laughed...hard...very very hard! =)

Malay as a second language...

2006-12-18T10:34:00.000-08:00

Do I really talk Malay like a foreigner? If I do, man...that's so sad...

I mean c'mon! My vocabulary in Malay language is excellent! Ok, so I don't have any Malay accent but whaddya expect from someone who's born in PJ and lived in KL/PJ area for pretty much his entire life? I can't really have a Kelantanese accent now, can I? ;)

On the other hand, when I speak English people think I'm a native English speaker. I get a lot of "Hey, you're English is pretty good!" statements from people.

Of course, the puffing up of my ego is tempered by the fact that I apparently speak Malay in a funny (as in weird, not haha) way. Sigh...

Just a quick post...

2006-12-18T10:33:00.000-08:00

...about a joke I just HAD to share. ;)

We've all heard about people having guts or balls. But do you really know the difference between them? In an effort to keep you informed, the definition for each is listed below...

GUTS - Is arriving home late after a night out with the guys, being met by your wife with a broom, and having the guts to ask: "Are you still cleaning, or are you flying somewhere?"

BALLS - Is coming home late after a night out with the guys, smelling of perfume and beer, lipstick on your collar, slapping your wife on the butt and having the balls to say: "You're next."

I hope this clears up any confusion on the definitions.

Medically speaking, there is no difference in the outcome, since both ultimately result in premature death.

Weekend, going...going...gone! (plus some year end reflection)

2006-12-10T10:32:00.000-08:00

Argh...there goes my weekend, all THREE days of it.

On Friday, I left work at exactly 5 pm. Heh, I was looking forward to the 3 day weekend and couldn't wait for it to start! I arrived at gym at about 7 pm and was happily jogging when I got a phone call from my manager.

"Amir, what are you doing tomorrow? We need you to attend a technical meeting with customer. It should be between 2 pm to 5 pm only. See if you can find out what's causing the problem."

2 pm to 5 pm? It didn't sound so bad. Even though it's a Saturday, the problem seems like an interesting challenge so why not? Did some preparation, played FM2007 to relax and had a good sleep. Next day afternoon, I went for the meeting. To keep a long story short (and also avoid giving confidential information!), meeting was from 2 pm all the way to 8.30 pm. So much for a short one. After all the discussion, we've arrived at an action-plan which involves me working from Monday night entering Tuesday morning. To make things more interesting, I then have a meeting (on a completely different issue) back in office at 10 am Tuesday. Heh, no rest for the wicked! Hmm...maybe I can claim emergency allowance...

So, Saturday technical meeting, Sunday emails and planning, Monday night work. Oh, and Tuesday morning meeting and Tueday afternoon more backbone fun! While I love my work (it's challenging and never boring!), it does get tiring. As soon as I'm done with my current project, I'm looking for a nice break next year. Maybe go to some beach or something and enjoy the seaside. Then again, if there's something interesting on, maybe I'll postpone my vacation and work some more. ;)

Hmm...looking back, I've been doing a lot of stuff this past year. I've done implementation and integration on SGSN, GGSN, Juniper routers, Extreme switches, Funk RADIUS servers, Bind DNS servers, Netscreen firewalls and SUN Solaris servers. I've also done backbone integration with VAS nodes such as SMS, MMS, WAP, Video Gateway and Video Mail. Beyond that I've done a large number of network trace analysis on Sigtran traffic for Video Gateway (H.323 and Megaco protocols mainly). All in all, I'd say it was a rather productive year. I'm looking forward to what next year will bring. :)

PS: Warning, bragging ahead! Did you know that I set up the first GGSN in the Ericsson world that handled HSDPA in a commercial network? I did that last year in Philippines. :D

Ryan Star is amazing!

2006-11-18T10:32:00.000-08:00

This guy rocks! I'm definitely buying his album once its out.

Channel[V] had a party at Zouk on Thursday night, with the main attraction being Ryan Star's performance. I was so excited about it, I even took the next day off from work! :D

The performance was amazing. Ryan Star sings with intensity other musicians rarely exhibit. Ok, the performance was occasionally marred by technical issues. Not sure how that managed to happen though. I'd think professionals do sound tests for this sort of performance. Anyway, despite those setbacks, I'd say the performance was a success. Beautiful music, wonderful vocals and amazing intensity! Too bad it was only for about 40 minutes or so. But man, it was 40 minutes of pure musical inspiration!

If he comes to KL to promote his album, I'm gonna get him to sign my cd!

I got sloshed at Ee-Lyn's b'day bash!

2006-11-18T10:31:00.000-08:00

Oh damn...what a party! I got completely wasted! Can't do this too often though or I'd die of kidney failure. Heh!

I have to say, the night was a blur to me. Let's see...what do I remember?

- Oh, my name was Sanjay since that's the only way for me to get the free Guinness stout.
- May Li makes a better Muslim than me. She drank Sprite and water only.
- Julie got high faster than me, though I'm pretty sure I got more wasted than her.
- Some of Anand's colleagues came by. The chicks were pretty hawt! :P
- Laundry Bar suddenly stopped serving. Not quite sure why but that was my cue to leave the place and head to the hotel Ee-Lyn was staying for the night. I was already a bit high but I wanted more booze...
- Had more booze and talked a lot of crap in the hotel room. Aaron and Ee-Lyn were perfect hosts. Ee-Lyn got wasted. Julie wanted to see guys kiss each other (there is no amount of booze that will *ever* make me do that, my dear). Me and the toilet bowl became intimately acquainted.
- Slept over at the hotel room. Reached home about 9.30 am I think. Massive hangover...

Man...what a night!

Oh yeah, when enjoying nights like this, remember:
1. Never drink and drive.
2. Friends don't let friends drive home drunk.
3. Getting drunk with friends is fostering bonds of friendship (a very important part of Islam!). Getting drunk alone is just sad and could turn you into an alcoholic so don't do that.

PS: Yes, I'm fully aware that booze is not a respectable beverage for a Muslim. In my defence, that's about my only vice and I do plan to stop in the future. On the other hand, I believe that religion is about the relationship between me and God. I make my own choices and let God judge me when I die. I do appreciate all the well-meaning people who care about my soul. Don't worry though, I'm doing fine. When I decide to stop, I will. Thanks for caring. :)

Rest in peace...

2006-11-18T10:30:00.000-08:00

My cat died about 2 weeks ago. Ah...she was 17 years old and lived a long and happy life so I guess it was time. You will always be remembered, Puss.

My cat started getting all sick and weak about 5 days before she passed away. That's one thing about cats. It happened so fast. One moment we're bewildered and worried, next moment me and my family are mourning her. It's said that cats seem to know when their time is up. My cat spent her last few active days before getting sick visiting all the favorite haunts. Normally lethargic, she actually jumped up onto the cars parked under the house porch to laze about there. It was slightly odd but we felt happy she's feeling active again.

When she got sick, my family sent her to the vet. The diagnosis wasn't good. She's old and her body systems are slowly shutting down, one by one. She was so weak at that time. She passed away about 4 days later at the vet. At first, we wanted to take her back but during the journey back home, she was very agitated so we felt it was best to leave her at the vet again. She passed away later that night.

I remember hearing that when approaching death, cats like to be alone. That must've been what she wanted, instead of coming back home with us. She was part of my life for 17 years. She stayed around long enough to see my brother finish his degree and my sister come back from England.

That night when she passed away, I dreamt of her. She was healthy and active again. She was also walking normally instead of limping. Normally a bit snobbish, this time she was very affectionate, nuzzling against my hand and letting me pet her. I miss you, Puss. Until we meet again, take care my dearest cat...

It's been a while...

2006-11-18T10:29:00.000-08:00

Yup, it's been a while since I typed my blog. Various reasons for this really, but among other things, it's been a quite hectic life for me.

What can I say? At the start of October, I'm fully involved with a project to build up the entire backbone for a new mobile service provider. It's a rather massive job which I'm doing together with an expert from Australia. Now let me say again that it's been an absolute pleasure working in my present company. Ericsson has some of the finest engineers around and it's been an absolute privilege and honour to work with them. I think I can consider myself very lucky since I'm learning a lot of things that I can't get anywhere else by talking and discussing stuff with them. I'm sure you all already know. The best way to learn is not from books or classes, but from the people who has actually done it.

The first stage of the backbone was completed after 3 days, first circuit call (voice & video) after 7 days and first packet call (data transfer & web browsing) after 8 days. Imagine, all that accomplished in a total of 8 days! Until now, I'm still amazed at how we managed to accomplish all that. Keep in mind, we started the implementation with unconfigured hardwares and softwares and after 8 days, the core network was essentially completed. What was missing are external connectivities such as connections to other mobile networks (Celcom, etc) and to the international gateway. I love working with amazing people! :D

Right now I'm still involved with the project but now it's mainly integrating the core network with VAS (value added services) nodes such as SMS, MMS and WAP. I think I'd be quite busy all the way until the end of January. It can get tiring and there are plenty of challenges but on the bright side, at least I'm not bored. Besides, building up a network from scratch and integrating it with various components certainly looks good on my resume! :)

On non-work related matters, I'm now a proud owner of a 20" widescreen LCD monitor. The monitor is simply beautiful. I plan to do a marathon session of anime and tv-series one of these days. I've just got my hands on "Ghost In The Shell 2nd Gig" and "Lost" season 1. Ahh...perfect timing.

After spending a lot of my time on Neverwinter Nights online play, I'm now taking a break from it and am now enjoying "X3 - Reunion". The game is simply beautiful and space has never looked so pretty! I love the feeling of vastness that is present in "X3 - Reunion" and it's wonderful to go exploring the various space sectors in the game. Sure, it's a single player game but it rocks! Check it out at http://www.egosoft.com/games/x3/info_en.php

My POS router

2006-09-21T10:28:00.000-07:00

A coupla days back I sent out an SOS, asking anyone if they've come across a stable router that performs well under heavy network load. The response were not very encouraging. The most stable connections are apparently when a PC directly connects to the modem. Sadly, that defeats the entire purpose of Internet sharing using a home network!

After some more research, I've discovered this:
1. All home routers suck monkey balls. Doesn't matter if they're D-Link, Aztech, Belkin, Linksys or Netgear.
2. The best home routers are PCs which have been re-configured to work as a router. Grab some old PC, dump in Linux and some software (IPCop seems to be decent) and you're now a proud owner of a DIY router. Problem is, this kind of routers use up helluva lot more electricity than the normal box routers.
3. For good stability and performance, get a business level router. Doesn't matter if they're D-Link, Aztech, Belkin or Netgear. I removed Linksys from the 'cos I'm pissed off at the stupid router. Division of Cisco my arse...I'm NEVER buying any gadgets based on brand name again and I'm NEVER touching another Linksys product.

Based on my findings, I've decided to get the Netgear FVS318. It's a VPN capable firewall/router with an 8-port switch and 1 WAN port, 200MHz processor with 2 MB flash and 16 MB RAM. It should have plenty juice! On the bright side, with this router I can actually VPN to my home network from anywhere in the world, as long as I've access to the Internet. Way cool!

In summary, if you're an avid downloader who opens up thousands of simultaneus connections (read: BitTorrent), please expect your tiny, pathetic home router to die. Grab a router targetted to SOHO instead.

You can check it out the router I'm buying at the Netgear website: http://www.netgear.com/Products/VPNandSSL/WiredVPNFirewallRouters/FVS318.aspx

For those who feel that looks matter when buying a router, here a picture of the router.

The world has got me wondering...

2006-08-29T10:29:00.000-07:00

Where Is The Love?

What's wrong with the world mama?
People living like aint got no mamas
I think the whole worlds addicted to the drama
Only attracted to the things that bring you trauma
Overseas yeah we tryin to stop terrorism
But we still got terrorists here livin
In the USA the big CIA the Bloodz and the Crips and the KKK
But if you only have love for your own race
Then you only leave space to discriminate
And to discriminate only generates hate
And if you hatin you're bound to get irate
Yeah madness is what you demonstrate
And that's exactly how anger works and operates
You gotta have love just to set it straight
Take control of your mind and meditate
Let your soul gravitate to the love y'all

People killing people dying
Children hurtin you hear them crying
Can you practice what you preach
Would you turn the other cheek?
Father Father Father help us
Send some guidance from above
Cause people got me got me questioning
Where is the love?(where is the lovex3)(the love2x)

It just ain't the same all ways have changed
New days are strange is the world the insane?
If love and peace so strong
Why are there pieces of love that don't belong
Nations dropping bombs
Chemical gases filling lungs of little ones
With ongoing suffering
As the youth die young
So ask yourself is the loving really strong?
So I can ask myself really what is going wrong
With this world that we living in
People keep on giving in
Makin wrong decisions
Only visions of them livin and
Not respecting each other
Deny thy brother
The wars' going on but the reasons' undercover
The truth is kept secret
Swept under the rug
If you never know truth
Then you never know love
Where's the love y'all?(I don't know)
Where's the truth y'all?(I don't know)
Where's the love y'all?

People killing people dying
Children hurtin you hear them crying
Can practice what you preach
Would you turn the other cheek?
Father father father help us
Send some guidance from above
Cause people got me got me questioning
Where is the love?(where is the lovex3)(the lovex2)

I feel the weight of the world on my shoulder
As I'm getting older y'all people get colder
Most of us only care about money makin
Selfishness got us followin the wrong direction
Wrong information always shown by the media
Negative images is the main criteria
Infecting their young minds faster than bacteria
Kids wanna act like what the see in the cinema
Whatever happened to the values of humanity
Whatever happened to the fairness and equality
Instead of spreading love, we're spreading anomosity
Lack of understanding, leading us away from unity
That's the reason why sometimes I'm feeling under
That's the reason why sometimes I'm feeling down
It's no wonder why sometimes I'm feeling under
I gotta keep my faith alive, until love is found

Song by Black Eyed Peas

Palestine...

2006-08-29T10:27:00.000-07:00

They are not terrorist. They are soldiers, fighting for their lives, their livelihood, their culture and their freedom. Every day, Palestinians are being violated mentally, physically and spiritually. Every day the oppression continues and every day another spirit is broken.

A Palestinian mother once said, "I saw my husband die. I saw my children die. There is nothing left for me in this world. When I die, let me take a few with me."

I am Israel
By Hashem Said
The Daily - Washington State University, Feb. 25, 2002

I am Israel - I came to a land without a people for a people without a land. Those people who happened to be here, had no right to be here, and my people showed them they had to leave or die, razing 480 Palestinian villages to the ground, erasing their history.

I am Israel - some of my people committed massacres and later became Prime Ministers to represent me. In 1948, Menachem Begin was in charge of the unit that slaughtered the inhabitants of Deir Yassin, including 100 men, women, and children. In 1953, Ariel Sharon led the slaughter of the inhabitants of Qibya, and in 1982 arranged for our allies to butcher around 2,000 in the refugee camps of Sabra and Shatilla.

I am Israel - carved in 1948 out of 78% of the land of Palestine, dispossessing its inhabitants and replacing them with Jews from Europe and other parts of the
world. While the natives whose families lived on this land for thousands of years are not allowed to return, Jews from all over the world are welcome to instant
citizenship.

I am Israel - in 1967, I swallowed the remaining lands of Palestine - the West Bank and Gaza - and placed their inhabitants under an oppressive military rule,
controlling and humiliating every aspect of their daily lives. Eventually, they should get the message that they are not welcome to stay, and join the
millions of Palestinian refugees in the shanty camps of Lebanon and Jordan.

I am Israel - I have the power to control American policy. My American Israel Public Affairs Committee can make or break any politician of its choosing, and
as you see, they all compete to please me. All the forces of the world are powerless against me, including the UN as I have the American veto to block
any condemnation of my war crimes. As Sharon so eloquently phrased it, "We control America".

I am Israel - I influence American mainstream media too, and you will always find the news tailored to my favor. I have invested millions of dollars into PR
representation, and CNN, New York Times, and others have been doing an excellent job of promoting my propaganda. Look at other international news sources and you will see the difference.

I am Israel - and you Palestinians want to negotiate "peace!?" But you are not as smart as me; I will negotiate, but will only let you have your municipalities while I control your borders, your water, your airspace, and anything else of importance.
While we "negotiate," I will swallow your hilltops and fill them with settlements, populated by the most extremist of my extremists, armed to the teeth. These
settlements will be connected with roads you cannot use, and you will be imprisoned in your little Bantustans between them, surrounded by checkpoints in
every direction.

I am Israel - with the fourth strongest army in the world, possessing nuclear weapons. How dare your children confront my oppression with stones, don't you
know my soldiers won't hesitate to blow their heads off? In 17 months, I have killed 900 of you and injured 17,000, mostly civilians, and have the mandate
to continue since the international community remains silent. Ignore, as I do, the hundreds of Israeli soldiers who are now refusing to carry out my control
over your lands and people; their voices of conscience will not protect you.

I am Israel - and you want freedom? I have bullets, tanks, missiles, Apaches, and F-16's, to obliterate you. I have placed your towns under siege, confiscated
your lands, uprooted your trees, demolished your homes, and you still demand freedom? Don't you get the message? You will never have peace or freedom, because...

I am Israel.

Note 1: The original author of this poem was later forced to apologize due to pressure from 'certain parties'. Freedom of speech and rational discussion does not exist in US when it comes to Israel.

Note 2: This post is partially inspired by a fellow blogger. http://anasnajmie.blogs.friendster.com/salam_bicara/

Check this out!!

2006-08-21T10:27:00.000-07:00

http://www.thebuzz.fm/

'Nuff said! :D

A quick tour of my room

2006-07-19T10:26:00.000-07:00

I've finally included pictures in my blog, as you may have noticed with my previous post. Words are boring and since blogs can also include pictures, I figured I might as well bore people with pictures. It's economical, y'see? After all a picture's worth a thousand words. :D

Anyway, since I figured some of you are interested in pictures of this tiny new hut I'm staying in SS3, here are 2 pictures. What can I say? I'm a lazy photographer! I don't even have a proper camera. All pictures are taken by the 1.3 megapixel camera of a Z800i Sony Ericsson phone. This is not an endorsement for you to BUY a SONY ERICSSON phone. In fact, do not BUY SONY ERICSSON. Ahem!

This is my room. The bed's probably the best feature in this photo. As you can see from the box, I haven't really unpacked yet. Yes, that's a 'sejadah' that you see at the bottom left corner of the picture. I may be a bloody sinner but hey, I do pray...sometimes! Anyway, it's the heart that counts. By the way, that's my official line when I'm to be judged in the after-life. I'll keep you all posted if it works. Heh!

My favorite section of the room. That's my gaming rig!! 'Nuff said. :B

Oh yeah, I do plan to get a new chair. I kinda threw away my old chair when I moved so right now that chair is about all I could find when all the stuff arrived. It probably belonged to someone else...

The rooms do look a bit big compared to the outside photo that I posted previously. While the house is rather tiny, it's not so bad when you come inside. Y'know what they say about objects in the rear view mirror look closer than they are? Well...think of it this way. Photos of housing interiors look larger than they are...or something! ;)

I LOVE my new place

2006-07-12T10:25:00.000-07:00

Travelling time to work now is less than 30 minutes. Yes yes yes!!!

The house a little run-down but every little minute saved on travelling time makes it really worth it. :D

You're beautiful...

2006-06-06T10:24:00.000-07:00

My mental thoughts have been behaving rather abnormally for the past 1 week or so. Of course, I'm still mentally alert and capable of being productive at work, performing analysis of network traces, etc. No worries, I haven't suddenly gotten forgetful or scatterbrained. Yes, yes. I know. Debateble. *rolls eyes*

No, as far as that aspect is concerned, I'm functioning normally. The weird part is that out of the blue, the song "You're Beautiful" by James Blunt has begun making regular appearences in my head. Perhaps a bit of background info will help.

A long time ago, in a galaxy far away...oh wait. Wrong story.

About a month or two ago, a girl started working in the same area as my department is located. She's definitely not an enginner, or else I'd already have her name, address, phone number and we'd probably have watched a coupla movies together already. Well...maybe just her name and phone number, but those other stuff are strong possibilities! Heh! Anyway, she's kinda cute I guess. My first impression is that she had damn nice legs! She was wearing some sort of power-suit kinda thing and after seeing lotsa girls wearing jeans these days, the medium skirt was a very nice change of scenery and I gotta admit that her ankles are rather shapely! But I digress. Besides, my thoughts were all pure!

Anyway, getting back to the story, at that time her hair was tied in a bun. Let me put it this way. She was the model image of a professional woman executive. As the weeks pass, while the image is still maintained, the dressing became less severe and more on the gentle and feminine side. Me? I'm enjoying the view while cracking my head trying to solve some issue or another.

I think James Blunt started singing in my head about a week ago or so. As I recall, she dropped the bun and let her hair loose. Ahh...such transformation! It's like seeing the blossoming of flowers right after the rain. Now each time I catch a glimpse of her, the song resonantes in my head.

"You're beautiful. You're beautiful. You're beautiful, it's true."

Bird shit...

2006-05-23T10:23:00.000-07:00

I hate bird shit. Each time I go to Jasima (a mamak nearby my place) at night, the only parkings are all under the trees and those stupid birds sleeping in the trees shit all over my car. I mean, I don't shit when I sleep. Why the hell can't those birds extend the same courtesy?? Sigh...

Light at the end of the tunnel...

2006-05-15T10:23:00.000-07:00

Woohoo! My packet core network is now connected to Internet! I'll be bringing up HSDPA feature by end of this week. Ahh...surfing at 2 mbps... I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. I anticipate my project to finish by June, just in time for World Cup! :D

Man...after this project's over, I'm definitely looking for some time off. Hmm...maybe I'll go do my SCUBA license...

Gym, music and Neverwinter Nights.

2006-05-14T10:21:00.000-07:00

Ahh...I'm finally back to the gym. Was insanely busy during April, was insanely sick 2 weeks ago and was insanely busy again last week. Hopefully now I'm back to my normal routine. I still plan to get my baywatch body before I go for my island holiday! Heh heh!

Y'know, going to gym is good. You sweat like hell and get tired like hell but at the end of it, you really do feel refreshed. With my current work schedule, I'm thinking of going to the gym in the morning rather than the evening. Of course, know my usual laziness, this plan will remain in the drawing board for a long time...

I also did something else that haven't done for a long time. I took my bro's amp (I know, I keep planning to buy my own but keep on postponing that), dusted of my extremely nice ESP custom guitar and played it for a bit. Ahh...the pleasure. Reminds me why I learned guitar in the first place (well...besides trying to impress some chick, I mean!). I jammed a bit with some bluesy pentatonic scales. Tried some major scale too but sadly I'm way rusty. I think I need to re-read my bloody scales book! Pentatonic is easy. 2 notes per string! The other scales is a little bit more complicated. Heh!

My guitar is simply amazing when it comes to rock sounds. Wonderful, wonderful pickups! Fat and chunky when doing power chords yet with a flick of a switch, pure clean sounds for those bluesy bits. I really need to buy some new equipment for my guitar. It deserves better! Hmm...a new 50 watt amp and a Zoom multi-effects board should do the trick! Oh wait, I need new cables too. I probably need to cut down on my spending for clubbing (hell, probably skip clubbing for a month or two!) but it's for a worthy cause. Next, I need to get the band back together. Mus, Ahmed, expect a call soon! Eh you guys, do we even have a bassist yet?

Lately, I've been playing Neverwinter Nights a lot. Heh, it's about the only way I can get my fix for D&D. Even after 4 years, that game is still amazing. Once you're done with all the official campaign (3 in total, including all the expansions), there are literaly THOUSANDS of user-created adventures available for free online. Some of the user-created adventures rival the official campaigns in terms of quality! I generally play as a sorcerer in the game but lately I've been playing as a weapon master. Heh, I simply love the blademaster concept by Robert Jordan in his Wheel of Time series. My current character now is this kickass greatsword specialist, a direct inspiration from the character Lan Mandragoran, the uncrowned King of Malkier, warder to Moiraine Damodred. Yes, I know. I'm a Wheel of Time fanboy. Heh!

Jeremy got married!

2006-05-11T10:20:00.000-07:00

Recently, a close friend of mind got married. I think he's both braver than me and stupider! Haha! Seriously though, it was a cool wedding. The food was delicious and the wedding costumes beautiful and exotic. The ceremony was insanely boring though. It was freaking long! I was already a bit sleepy since I had to wake up early to go for the wedding. I have to admit my parents were shocked.
Y'see, I happen to belong this this religion where it's sacrilege to wake up before noon on public holidays. If I'm awake before 12 pm on holidays, I go to hell. For this wedding, I actually woke up at 8 am. Man, you won't believe what elaborate rituals I had to perform to cleanse myself of this grievious sin!

Anyway, there was I, one sleepy sucker in a rather long and tedious wedding ceremony, in another Malaysia state at 10 am. The wedding finished at around 2 pm. Apparently, Indian weddings are like this, very formal and very ceremonial for the next 4 hours. Man...if I had to go through an Indian wedding, I'd probably elope!

Anyway Jeremy, congratz on the wedding! You're a braver man than most of us, and I think luckier too. Not many wives I know tolerates a bunch of suckers hanging out at your place, getting drunk, eating pizza and watching a stupid action movie! Cheers, mate! Tell me when you guys are expecting a baby. I really hope to the kid takes after the mother rather than you. God knows you're such an ugly bastard! Heh!

Sucks!!

2006-03-22T10:20:00.000-08:00

This past 2 weeks, I've been busy with an update that is to be done on a network. I've now failed to update the node twice. Life sux...

PS: Don't bother trying to guess which network. Service is completely up so no one will notice anything.

Clubing 'scene'

2006-03-19T10:19:00.000-08:00

I just had a fairly interesting night at Q-Bar in Sunway Pyramid yesterday. Me and a friend, feeling extremely bored, decided to grab dinner and catch a flick on that day. Both of us haven't had good fish and chips for a long time so we decided to have dinner at Fish Market. Ahh...the food there continues to be as delightful as I remember. Besides, seafood is probably the best food around to have with all the reports concerning bird flu and mad cow...

V for Vendetta was a pretty decent movie, though people who are looking for action-packed movies might find the dialog a bit lengthy. Anyway, after the movie, we both decided to just grab a few drinks and enjoy some scenic (ahem!) views at Q-Bar. Who knows, both fo us might even get a few new phone numbers! =)

Here I was, enjoying my drink when I saw this girl enter the bar. She seems to be alone and wasn't talking much to anyone around her. That was what intrigued me. Such solemn expression does not belong in a club. She was certainly beautiful, yet she wasn't smiling or laughing. Ahh...what can I say? She seemed like a damsel in distress and my knight in shining armour instincts kicked in. I vowed that before this night was over, I'd see her smile!

Of course, approaching the most beautiful girl in the club requires a bit of strategizing. I don't approach women just for the sake of approaching them. I approach women with the intention of getting a positive response! As I thought about it, 3 guys approached her. The first one got a polite shake of the head, the other had a very short conversation but the third guy was slightly better. He managed to get his arms around her but from the posture, it seems like he's unsure whether the arm is welcome or not. Besides, no real man would hold another girl around the NECK! Sheesh! No serious competition here. =P

I make my move. She seemed wary at first but after a while she was friendlier. Somehow or other, I managed to get her to smile and laugh. Ahh...a beautiful smile and a musical laugh! I was getting high and it wasn't from the booze. I asked whether she was alone. She said she was with some friends. Hmm...no mention of boyfriend! That's a good sign.

Then outta the blue I got grabbed from behind and pushed back. As I looked, it was the previous guy who had his arms around her neck! I mean, wtf? Is he her boyfriend or something? The way they were interacting that night, no way in hell would anyone think they're together! I love female companionship but I'm not such a bastard as to try for women who are already in a serious relationship. Besides, if both of them are happy, I have no chance anyway!

As I look at that guy, he pushed me again. He seems to be gearing up to fight. Me? Heck, I didn't feel anything. I'm a very non-violent person. If I don't feel that I or anyone I care for are in danger, I don't fight. Besides, it won't be an even contest. He's about 165 cm and a bit thinner than me. I'm 173 cm, 75 kg and I do go to the gym. I wasn't in the mood to put anyone in any hopsital but I was a bit annoyed. Why am I suddenly pushed by this guy outta the blue?

1- She said she was with friends. There was no mention of any boyfriend.
2- Based on previous observation, he doesn't know how to or is unsure of himself when he holds her. He has short conversations with her, she lights up his cigarette and he wonders around the club with her sitting alone at the bar. They don't dance together, they don't drink together and all physical contact seems awkward. Any guy watching this would think she's out with a bunch of friends and that she's single.
3- She was smiling, laughing and did not tell me to go away when I was talking to her.

As I took a step towards him, another fella blocked me and told me to let it go. Hmm...should I make a scene? Let's see, 5 guys against 1 and the girls was looking a bit scared. Sure the odds are not so good but who cares? I'd probably go down, but I can guarantee all of us would be sporting bruises the next day. I'm not that small nor am I that weak. Still, my non-violent personality and the girl's scared look made my decision to let it go.

I have to admit that after all that has happened, the main thing on my mind is puzzlement. I have my own ethics too and I don't entertain girls who are already in a relationship. That guy's probably the boyfriend but the odd thing is that he sure doesn't seem to behave like one, at least the way him and the girl was interacting. On whole though, it was a pretty interesting night. I got the most beautiful girl in the club to smile and laugh (too bad no phone number, though to be fair, my conversation was cut short!) and I'm apparently such a threat that the other guy, instead of pulling me aside and telling me politely she's his girlfriend, began to push me and asking me what the fuck am I doing.

Man...I didn't think I was THAT good! =P

Crap...

2006-02-28T10:18:00.000-08:00

Petrol prices goes up again. Sigh...

Damned if I know...

2006-02-26T10:17:00.000-08:00

One of the hardest thing about writing a blog for me is choosing an appropriate title. How exactly do you condense an entire thought that covers a wide-ranging subject and come up with a one liner. I took Comp Science, not Journalism! Perhaps there's a secret to this blog thing that I haven't figured out yet. Hmm...damned if I know...

Anyway, I've been a bit busy lately. Hence, the lack of blog postings! =)

I just finished a migration project. Man...that was tiring. All the work was at night and the next morning I'd get phone calls asking for a short report on how's the migration going. To make matters more interesting, it was a multi-vendor migration so there were *ahem* special interests to take care off. Sad to say, I kept being handed the short end of the stick. Due to some difficulties, most of the blame were sent to my direction. Certain parties claims that due to problems in the IP Core network, the migration results were not too impressive. Let me set things straight. There's NOTHING wrong with the IP Core network. It's been working fine for the past 2 years. It'll continue to work fine. Of course, convincing the parties involved takes some work. I had to show network traces, discuss RFC documents, highlight 3GPP implementation methods and debate how GTP protocols are being implemented on a router. Still, it's an interesting experience and will be an invaluable part of my professional growth.

Next up will be an update of a network application backbone. 4 Solaris node patching in a 4 hour maintenance window and it's all on a live network. Fun! And that's only the first phase of the update! Should be ok though. Initial testing indicates that patching should take around 2 hours and I'll be patching them all at the same time and monitoring it via a terminal server. Next phase is a bit easier. I'll be transferring update packages to each node of the application backbone and it'll be using some sort of GUI. It's all about clicking the mouse button.

There's one upcoming project that I'm a bit excited though. A trial network is being planned and I'll be handling every aspect of the IP Core network. Now THAT should be fun. Every single node in the IP Core will be set up by me. Switches. Routers. Firewalls. GSNs. All of it. Me. Yeah!

Of course, with all this stuff happening, I haven't really had much time to go out to party. I'm actually amazed at how much extra money I have by NOT going out to party! I kinda miss partying though. The drinks....the chicks....well....mainly the chicks!

Things should settle down by first week of March though so I'm sure my partying will start again!

Oh, I've finally succumbed to temptation. I'm now a member of the MPH Reader's Circle. Since I've started working, I no longer rely on my parents to buy me books. After spending a total of a few hundred bucks on books, I figured it's only wise for me to join the MPH Reader's Circle. At least I get to accumulate points!

I've also recently bought 3 new books. Heh, I know. I could go to gym, I could party all night long, I could play guitar and I could go to rock concerts but deep down I'd always be a geek. I can just imagine myself. I'd be 50 years old, white hair and all that and I'd still head to the bookstore and pick out a few books, with at least one of them being either a science fiction or a fantasy book. Hell, hopefully by that time the 7th book for Dune would be out!

I've currently a fan of this author by the name Alastair Reynolds. He's British (spells armour instead of armor) and he writes DAMN good science fiction! The book I just bought is called "Century Rain" and next on my list would be "Pushing Ice". I already have all his previous books before that. =)

As I get older, I also realized that my reading habits have...for lack of better word...matured. I'm no longer exclusively reading science fiction and fantasy novels. These days I'm exploring different authors, some which I've never heard before but which the synopsis at the back cover of the book looks interesting. I'm also more into non-native English speaking authors. My recent favorite book was by a Spanish author by the name Carlos Ruiz Zafon. Check out his book called "The Shadow of the Wind". It's REALLY good!

My latest book by a non-native English speaker is called "Out" by a Japanese author by the name Natsuo Kirino. As an added bonus, the author is a she! In one book, I get a different cultural AND gender perspective compared to the one I'm used to. I haven't started on the book yet but the premise looks interesting. It's about a woman who killed her husband, the 3 friends who helped her conceal the body and the inevitable consequences. Sounds fun and it's the type of book I'd never picked up 5 years ago.

Finally, looking for a good drama, I picked up a book by Wally Lamb which is called "I Know This Much Is True". According to the book's synopsis, its a story about a pair of twins, one who is schizophrenic and the experiences they both go through as they go about their daily life. Yeah, yet another type of book I'd never touch 5 years ago. Heh!

New Year!!

2006-01-13T10:13:00.000-08:00

Ok, so I'm about 2 weeks late. I guess I spent more time living life rather than writing about it, these days!

New years eve was rather excellent. Celebrated the countdown at Heritage Road, next to Sheraton Imperial. Can't remember the name of the bar though. Me, Seng Leong, Anand and Anand's relatives from Singapore were all there, getting drunk and celebrating the new year with gutso. I was a bit tipsy that night, I think. The vodka lime wasn't so bad but the graveyard was a killer. I'm definately ordering the graveyard again! Heh heh! Hmm...need to look for an excuse to party again though. I need to remember to check the events calender for this year and plan my partying!

Oh yeah, always party responsibly. Do not drink and drive. =)

The year's been starting rather slow for me. Not much work yet. Companies everywhere are still in the planning stage I guess. Unfortunately, that means I spend most of my time at work feeling utterly bored. I fill that time by reading up design documents on mobile networks. I'm almost embarrased to say that I find them rather interesting. I know...despite my best efforts, I think I'll forever stay a geek! Still, I find it fascinating to discover how all the network nodes inter-operate with each other and provide the service that we all take for granted. Next time you use your mobile phone, spare a thought to all the people who worked hard to make all of it work. It ain't easy! =)

My new years resolution this year consists of 3 simple improvements that I feel I should undertake in my life.

1. Arrive to office earlier (and leave earlier, hopefully to avoid LDP jams)
2. Save more money in the bank (rainy season and all that)
3. Engage in more cultural events (my pathetic attempt to stop being such a geek and an excuse to tear myself away from the computer)

Resolution 1 is currently an abject and utter failure. On average, I'm now in the office 5 minutes earlier compared to last year. Heh, so much for leaving earlier and avoiding the LDP jam...

Resolution 2 is also currently a complete failure. After gym, I no longer go to mamak. These days I go for steak at TGIF or something. Well...my personal trainer did say something about the importance of protein!

Resolution 3 has a slightly brighter outlook than the rest. I'm currently going through the list of events in MPO to see whether there's anything interesting. Anand has also introduced me to Actor's Studio so I guess I'm going to support the local performing arts scene soon enough! Oh yeah, I was watching the play Pune Highway earlier tonight. It's a pretty good play actually! Good story and good acting. The only thing that wasn't so good was that they had some dialogs in Hindi or something like that. While I can insult like a native, understanding civilized conversations is beyond me. Heh! All in all though, it was quite a good play. I definitely plan to add Actor's Studio in my list of places to go regularly. =)

G Rock Radio!!

2005-12-11T10:13:00.000-08:00

Lately I've been getting my rock music fix by listening to this Internet radio station. Apparently this station is a real station somewhere in New Jersey. Check out http://www.grockradio.com

Wonderful rock music and great DJs! If I'm living somewhere in New Jersey, I'd definitely be going to this Kringle Rock concert they've been advertising lately. C'mon, it's Staind performing LIVE!!

About the only other radio station I listen to these days is FlyFM. The music selection is far superior compared to Hitz and Mix by Astro. Too bad FlyFM broadcast reception is not as good as Hitz and Mix. I get 'blurry' sound sometimes from FlyFM. Maybe it's just the area I'm listening in. Still, the music selection makes tuning in to FlyFM worthwhile! Tune in to 95.8 fm. =)

The Shadow of the Wind

2005-11-26T10:12:00.000-08:00

One the habits I have while travelling is stopping at a bookshop in the airport. I find reading to be one of the best ways to spend time while being stuck for hours in a bloody tin-can 30,000 feet up in the air.

I've recently had the fortune to purchase a rather remarkable book titled "The Shadow of the Wind" written by a Spanish author Carlos Ruiz Zafon. The book is about the life of a boy who acquired an obscure book which somehow attracts a lot of attention from other people. While the premise does not seem much, I assure you that the book oozes literary style. Zafon writes with compelling wit and charm. With a masterful style, he brings all the characters in the book to life. I felt I was really walking on the streets of Barcelona during the period after the second world war. The feeling was simply...for the lack of better word, magical. Perhaps I'm being a little melodramatic but I find it rather difficult to find of book of such quality in recent times. Then again, maybe I'm such a book lover! Still, whether it's political intrigue, drama, murder most foul and even romance, you will find it in this book.

No, I haven't finished reading this book but after the first 200 out of 506 pages, I seriously doubt I'm going to be disappointed with it. I know, it's taking me longer than usual for me to finish this book but sometimes, you find books that should be enjoyed like wine, sipped slowly, rather than taking it like vodka shots. Hmm...bad analogy but oh well...

Cheers!

Edit: I've now finished reading the book and I have to say that the conclusion of the book was not a disappointment at all. This book is highly recommended for anyone looking to enjoy a literary adventure!

Back for a bit

2005-11-01T10:11:00.000-08:00

Ah...home sweet home! I got touched down in Malaysia on Sunday and man, I'm sure glad to be back! Philippines is a rather nice place but there's no place like home. Besides, Filipinos don't really eat vegetables and they're favorite meat is pork. Kinda hard for me to enjoy my meals there!

Filipinos are rather friendly people but like every bloody ASEAN country, whites get preferential treatmet and better service. Sigh...still in the colonial mindset, I guess. Malaysia's also not immune to this syndrome. I've got nothing against whites. I just would like to receive the same type of service. I pay equal amount of money, I should deserve the same service, right?

Anyway, I think I watched more tv during my stay in Philippines than I did in Malaysia for the past 1 year. Heh, after work I don't really have much to do. Since it's holy month, I didn't go partying at all. Watched a few movies though. I personally think that the cineplex I went to is superior than the one in GSC 1 Utama. It had excellent seats and amazing sound system!

Sad to say, due to work commitments I didn't really manage to visit the countryside. My days were spent in a concrete jungle! On the bright side, with all the fasting and INSANELY bad food in Philippines, I came back home thinner! YES!! Heh heh!

I'll be heading to Ireland after this for some training. Since it's not a holy month, I chose a hotel that's in the center of Dublin. It's well within walking distance to many bars and pubs. =)

Overseas

2005-10-19T10:10:00.000-07:00

Yay! I've finally got the green light to head out to Manila. My flight will be tomorrow morning. Heh, I'm rather excited. This is my first official working trip overseas! I'm framing my boarding pass stub.

I won't be in Malaysia for about a month. I'll be back for about 2 days for Aidilfitri but after that I'll be flying straight to Ireland. I should be back in Malaysia 20th November onwards.

Sigh...I'm gonna miss all the Aidilfitri open houses. Still, I heard Irish pubs are pretty decent! Heh heh!

Heaven

2005-10-16T10:08:00.000-07:00

Been listening to a lot of music lately, particularly of the alternative genre. Stereophonics, Spoon and Ivy are kinda nice! I'm also rediscovering Garbage.

Y'know, heaven could just be sitting on a comfortable chair, with eyes closed and listening to REALLY excellent music. Cheers! =)

Sigh...

2005-10-16T10:05:00.000-07:00

Life is weird. These days I'm actually doing my prayers more regularly. On the other hand, I'm also getting drunk more often!

Been feeling kinda down lately. I'd like to attribute my feelings to the lack of a divine being guiding the universe. The sad fact is that I honestly believe in God. I just think he's a bastard. Do you know how surreal it is to finish praying, then during the doa part say "fuck you" to God?

Preparation is very important!

2005-10-04T10:07:00.000-07:00

Let's see...within 12 hours before the first day of fasting month, I've consumed:

1/2 a tin of Pringles (The tall one)
2 mug of Choc-O-Cino (Some VERY rich chocolate drink)
1 plate of rice, chicken with dried chillies, baby kailan in oyster sauce and fried japanese tofu (Lunch)
2 bars of mini Krispy (Chocolate with some rice cereal filling.)
1 bar of some unknown chocolate (Had a pink wrapper.)
2 plates of rice, mango chicken and kangkung belacan (Dinner. Each dish was supposed to be shared between 2 to 3 people but I just finished gym and was famished.)

I guess I'm fully prepared for fasting. =)

Argh and yay!

2005-09-29T10:06:00.000-07:00

Argh!! I just spent RM 150 on taxi fares for 3 1-way trips to and from office!

Sigh...coming back from the company team-building event, I actually left my car keys in Bukit Tinggi. I only realised I left it there when the bus stopped at the main gate of Ericsson. Obviously by that time is WAY to late to ask the bus to turn around! To keep the story short, I managed to contact the event organiser and she got the hotel to send my car key to their KL office. To get back home from Cyberjaya, I took a cab. RM 50 gone.

2 days later (didn't go to office the previous day since I got night work at that time), feeling rather happy with my spare car key, I took a cab to work. Another RM 50 gone, but it should be the last! Besides, at least I'm not the sucker driving in the bloody jam on LDP! =)

Come lunch time, I wanted to eat out so I went looking for my car. I even offered to be the driver for 2 of my colleagues. Found the car, unlocked it then sat on the driver's seat. My colleagues were also already seated and buckled up. Then I noticed my steering lock. I looked at my spare key. No steering lock key included in the key chain. Then I remembered. Both steering lock keys are attached with the key I left at Bukit Tinggi. Crap...Suffice to say that my colleagues were laughing like mad at this stage. I'll probably never hear the end of it. I was laughing too, and banging my head against the steerig wheel. Heh! So, I went to lunch on my colleagues car, and spent another RM 50 to go back home later that day. Sigh...

On the bright side, I've got a project in Phillipines! The project should last 1 or 2 weeks. Yay!! I'm now in demand in the South East Asia region! I'll be framing the ticket since that's the first ticket overseas for me that involves work. =D

I'm scheduled to start my work there on 17th October 2005. After spending 1 or 2 weeks there, I'll fly back to Malaysia for Aidilfitri. Then on the second day of Aidilfitri I'll be flying off to Dublin, Ireland for training. Scheduling is a bit tight but it should be fun! I'm gonna miss all the open houses though. Ah well...

Team-Building!

2005-09-27T10:05:00.000-07:00

I just got back from my company's team-building event and I have to say that it's actually rather good. It was fun interacting with my colleagues in a non-office manner and I have to admit that it did a good job in diverting my attention towards something more positive. Life still sucks but I feel it's a bit more manageable now. The sad fact is that now I have more names to remember. Heh! I'll manage, I guess.

On a totally unrelated news, James Blunt's album "Back to Bedlam" is actually quite nice. The current hit song from him is "You're Beautiful" but the rest are just as good I think. His style is rather relaxing and his voice can really express the emotion of the song very well. Check out "High" and "Tears and Rain". Cheers!

Things I realized after joining the gym

2005-09-10T01:16:00.000-07:00

1. Stretching/warm-up is EXTREMELY important. Skip this part and don't expect your body to function the next day.
2. If you haven't exercised much previously (guilty as charged!), don't be a superhero and push yourself too much. Do this and don't expect your body to function the next day.
3. While jogging, concentrate on your running and not the chick's butt in front of you. Staring too much on butts will just tire yourself faster! Hahahaha!
4. Chicks who wear makeups to gym are not going there for exercise. Well...maybe exercising their eyes! =P
5. Chicks who go to gym with tight clothes play a very vital role in a gym. They motivate guys to go to gyms more often! =P
6. Guys who over-exercise their chests muscles are freaky. They got bigger ones than chicks!! Whoa...
7. The most popular sitting area is the one facing the classes section. The class will have a glass wall. When it's aerobics class, you'll get a huge crowd of guys 'resting' there. Heh!
8. Finally, you know you've got a good workout when your biggest accomplishment after it is shampooing your hair during shower. If you can do it easilly, you're not exercising enough! =)

Video Gateways

2005-09-10T00:48:00.000-07:00

Woohoo!! I've got a new responsibility! I'm now in the process of being trained up to be a Video Gateway expert! To date, I'm responsible for Gateway GPRS Support Node (GGSN), Serving GPRS Support Node (SGSN) and now Video Gateway (ViG). I'm also responsible for other stuff such as Netscreen firewalls but these are not considered a major part my responsibility since they're 3rd party products.

Maybe it's just me being such a geek and all but I find working with all these technology to be really fun! The 3 areas I'm responsible for are all core network solutions. They are the area in the network where traffic HAS to flow to provide service to the customers. Essentially, no core network = no service!

Video Gateway is an interesting solution in which they provide a way for customers to access video content such as video streaming and video calls without going through an IP network. In general, when you talk about streaming via the Internet, you receive your streamed content using the TCP/IP protocol stack. For mobile users, this requires you to be attached to a GPRS network to enable you to receive IP content. With the ViG solution, the IP content is translated into a diferent protocol, which will then be used to carry the content to your phone. Instead of using your IP to determine the destination, it uses your phone number. This means that even without GPRS, you can still receive video content. Cool, ain't it? =P

Should any of you be interested, please drop me a message and I'll put you in contact with the sales team, who can probably explain all this to you better, with nice presentation slides and all! Heh!

Traffic strangeness...

2005-09-10T00:23:00.000-07:00

This past one week, there seems to be this very odd traffic jam on the way back from Cyberjaya. Most times, it takes me 40 to 50 minutes to drive back from work. This past week though, the time has increased and takes me 60 to 75 minutes! Heh, I have to say that my vocabulary during the drive back is definitely NOT meant for civilized ears! =)

Apparently, the reason for this abnormal traffic behaviour is due to an albino King Cobra which found its way into a Hindu temple and has managed to wrapped itself around a statue of one of the deities. This is seen as a good omen to believers and from reports I've heard, for the first 3 days of this occurence a total of 30,000 people went to visit the temple. Which of course, explains the weird traffic jams along the stretch where none exists perviously. Just my luck to take this road, I guess...

Merdeka!!

2005-09-02T09:57:00.000-07:00

Yay!! Independence day!! Ok ok, so I'm a little late in posting this but I guess I was celebrating to much on the eve itself!

For those who are completely clueless, every year Malaysia celebrates its Independence Day on 31st August. This year me and a bunch of my friends celebrated Independence Day in Bar Karma in Hartamas. It was quite fun! It's been a while since we all met up, with us working and stuff. Getting together is insanely difficult lately. Still, it was fun to catch up with the same bunch of suckers who skipped class with me in college. Man! Looking at how we behave in college, it's hard to believe we're now actually respectable professionals!

Let's see, Anand's a consultant (emphasis on the word 'con'!!), Mus is an engineer (whether he's a systems engineer or a network engineer depends on what time you call him), Shah's in management (we all bow down to him but the bastard still hasn't treated us to lunch. Bitch! =P), Jeremy's also another engineer (doing a lot of support work for some pretty nifty security products!) and Niradj is the resident Oracle expert (still no lunch from this guy too!). It's amazing when you consider that each of this suckers I mention are the same jokers who played Dungeon Siege (Niradj the champion with 24 hours of playing continuously...or was it 30?), Counter Strike (Jeremy's deadly with the assault rifles!), C&C Renegade (Shah whooped our arses and it was him vs 3 of us), Ghost Recon (Mus kept killing the bloody hostage!) and Alien vs Predator (I was deadly as the alien! =P). All this cybercafe sessions were obviously done during time when we're supposed to be in class. Heh heh!

I guess books can never be judged by its cover. =)

Fitness First

2005-09-02T09:33:00.000-07:00

I've always known that my fitness level is bad. ICT industry doesn't really require a very high level of fitness. Coupled with a sedentary lifestyle that revolves around computer games and diet that consists of a significant portion of junk food, my fitness level isn't amazing. Still, I figured as long as I'm not suffering from any illness, it should be fine.

Then I had my first shock. During a medical checkup, the doctor said I had high blood pressure. Man, was I shocked!! While it turned out to be caused by lack of sleep (was working day and night those 2 weeks), I figured a healthy body should be able to handle such things without reporting high-blood pressure.

My second shock happened when another doctor told me my pulse rate is a bit high during rest. While she said it's not dangerous, it shows that my fitness level is WAY below average and this shouldn't be happening to someone in my age group.

The last straw came when I'm shopping for new pants and my waist measurement is beginning to match my dad's! Heh, sorry dad! I love you but some parts of you, I don't think I want to emulate! =P

When I heard Fitness First was having a Merdeka promotion in which they waived the joining fee (and saving me RM 500), I woke up while it's still daylight on a holiday (*gasp*) and signed up for a Fitness First passport package. 6 months from now, I'll be so fit and buff, Baywatch will be falling over themselves to hire me while my work rate will be better than Davids when I play futsal! Heh heh!

Futsal!!

2005-08-25T09:28:00.000-07:00

Argh!! I'm gonna die...I got a futsal match this Friday night and I'm unfit like HELL!! Sigh...ok. You all can stop laughing now. I know, I know. I'm the EXTREMELY lazy sucker cum coach-potato cum insane gaming addict cum anti-social bastard who always stay at home YET I've apparently got a futsal match to participate in. Y'know, it's really not funny. I'm really gonna die!! ARGH!!

*searches for "how to kick a football properly", "how to build stamina in 24 hours" and "futsal do's and don'ts" in google*

Sigh...

Haze, 3G and Beck

2005-08-13T12:43:00.000-07:00

Air quality is much better today, thank god. The past 1 week, the haze situation was very bad. In fact, air pollution index was at dangerous and hazardous levels all week until Saturday. This haze thing really pisses me off. If it happens once or twice, it's understandable but this is becoming a yearly event. It is ridiculous! My perception is that the government is not doing anything concrete to handle this problem. Every single message from authority seems either pointless or ridiculous. A ban in open burning and a request for people to cut down on smoking are actions that are born out of desperation, ignorance and incompetency. Saying that schools will be closed and a state of emergency to be declared if the air pollution index reaches 500 is absolutely idiotic when at 300, it is already classified as hazardous to health.

Seems to me that national productivity seems to be a higher priority than national health. Personally, I think that's the wrong approach and it's also morally corrupt. Lately I'm very tempted to vote for the opposition. Sadly, the 3 major opposition groups have serious issues that makes them bad choices. Parti Keadilan is being led by the wife of the former deputy prime minister. The actions of this former deputy prime minister during the last economic crisis leads me to believe that he's been bought over by a foreign power and does not have the nations interest in his heart. It'll be a cold day in hell before I give my vote to that party. Next, we have PAS. Their main focus is bringing an Islamic way of life. Unfortunately, their interpretation of this beautiful religion is rather...'creative' would be the polite term, I believe. Imagine a painting that is an absolute masterpiece. Normally, you'd judge a painting by the picture. Sadly, people from PAS will focus on the frames of the painting. Hence, their viewpoint in the Islamic way of life is rather...bizarre.

Lastly, we have the DAP. Their manifesto seems to be the most sane but I worry about the intelligence behind it. While they have a vision, there are a number of factors against them. Firstly, I'd prefer to have a Muslim to lead this country. It's a personal choice. You're all welcome to disagree as much as you want. Heh! Secondly, while I'm quite supportive to most of their objectives, I'm concerned about the implementation of it if this party ever gets into power. To be blunt, if they ever implement their objectives involving changes in widely held societal values, I'm afraid there would be social upheaval and unrest unless such changes are implemented in a proper manner. I highly doubt they are capable of doing so. Hence, my backup plan. If my disgust with the current party in the government continues to grow, I'd either form my own opposition party (hahahaha!) or migrate to somewhere else and change my citizenship. I hear Canada and New Zealand are wonderful places to live. There's always demand for skilled professionals.

Alright, enough haze bitching and political crap. =)

I just got my 3G phone activated on Saturday. I'm now connected to a third generation mobile network!! That's so cool!! Heh, ok. Maybe it's just me. I know, I'm such a geek...I gave my old phone to my brother. He seems very happy about it! Finally, all members of my family have camera phones. I'm also happy I'm not the only one now using Sony Ericsson. Down with Nokia! Anything that uses Real Player is automatically crap to me. Heh heh! I was tempted to sign-up for the unlimited data usage plan but figured RM120 is too much to pay each month when I won't even be using mobile internet that often. I'd probably activate the unlimited data usage plan if I have to travel a lot though since I'd want the flexibility of having internet access anywhere there's Maxis GPRS coverage. Oh yeah, with 3G I can now get live streaming of cartoon network. Heh, I will never miss an episode of Johnny Bravo again! There's also live streaming of news channels like BBC and CNN but who cares about that, right? It's the cartoons that matter. Heh heh! Another useful live streaming that's available is the live traffic conditions streaming. Then again, I use the LDP for work and it will always be jammed. Who needs live streaming to confirm that, eh? =)

I've finally finished watching Beck about a week ago. I also watched it again just now. What can I say? It's a brilliant anime! It's a story about a boy and how he matures as a musician. The animations is magnificent. The people involved in this anime have an excellent eye for detail. A concert scene in the anime will look, sound and FELL like a concert! The drawings are top-class while the songs are superb! When you watch the anime, check out the Dying Breed concert scene and the Greatful Sound concert scene and you'll understand what I mean. Oh yeah, I'm in love with Maho. Watch the anime and you'll also understand what I mean. =D

A day of rememberance

2005-08-06T10:29:00.000-07:00

On 6th August 1945, the a nuclear bomb was dropped over the city of Hiroshima, the first time ever that nuclear energy was ever used in such manner. Incinerating 60,000 people in an instant and causing the death of a further 90,000 people due to radiation, this event is widely acknowledged as the main factor in ending the war. Let is give a moment of silence as a form of respect to those who died then. When wars are fought, sadly it's the innocents that suffer the most. The 150,000 people who died in Hiroshima are generally not soldiers.

There are many views concerning the Hiroshima and Nagasaki incident. Debating them now will be pointless and won't change anything. I myself am divided over the issue. The fact that 150,000 people died, 90,000 of them slowly and painfully horrifies me to no end. The fact that most of them are non-combatants makes things even worse. Yet, it ended the war fast and probably saved more lives than if an invasion of Japan took place.

I hate wars. I think they serve no purpose at all. I think my former Prime Minister Tun Mahathir Muhammad was right. We as a human race should ban wars. As a civilization, we must move beyond our murderous instincts and deal with issues challenging us in a mature manner. Each successive wars only brings more hatred. Right now we have the war on terrorism. What would motivate a bunch of people to blow themselves up just so that they could kill a bunch of other people? I keep wondering about this, yet all I hear is more restrictions being put in place to the community that these suicide bombers belong too. Such measures will only breed discontent and marginalise the very people you need to reach out to.

I'm a Muslim and I'm proud to be one. I strongly believe in my religion, yet I do not force my beliefs onto others. Let each choose their own way in life. Yet with all these events happening worldwide, even in Malaysia I feel a little choked in and defensive. I love UK and London, yet now as a Muslim, I don't think I'll be very welcome there. The entire mass media seems filled with articles who are all anti-Muslim, which is very sad. Islam is a very beautiful religion. Sadly, the followers are not necessarily so. If you talk about living in peace and harmony, it's everywhere in the Koran and Sunnah. If you talk about gender equality and respect for women, it is also there. Yes, Pakistan might have honour-killings (a disgraceful way to use the word honour, I believe) and Saudi Arabia doesn't allow women to drive. Please understand though. No where in the teachings of Islam does it tell followers to do as such. These are cultural values rather than Islamic values.

Perhaps I've deviated from my original subject but to me, war and Islam seems inescapably linked at the moment. I keep hoping that tomorrow will bring a better future for the entire human race but I get more and more discouraged every day. At the moment, I can only pray...

Argh!!

2005-08-02T09:38:00.000-07:00

Oh my god! What a way to start the week. First, the 'wonderful' government of Malaysia increases the prices for petrol by 10 sen on Monday. Apparently the subsidy is costing them valuable money that can be put aside for development. Frankly speaking, I think the excuse given is bollocks. Increased petrol prices will mean cost of living will be higher. Even development funds will be affected by this. Of course, the papers published a stupid table comparing the prices of petrol in the region. Some bloody 'genius' then commented that despite the price increase, Malaysian petrol prices were still among the lowest in the region. The wonderful part was that no weighting was done to take into account the average income of the region. Sheesh!

Next, on Tuesday we have 'wonderful' Indonesia doing their annual forest burning. Morning was a beautiful day of clear skies (and traffic jams but that's just my luck). Then around 5.30 pm when I left my office, for a moment I thought I was on a different planet. The haze was SO bad that visibility was probably until 100 m at most. At 50 m, it was already very blurry. Indonesia can burn all the forest they want but for god's sake, DON'T let it affect any other country. Right now, Malaysians are enjoying a lungful of absoulutely crappy air but as far as I know, Malaysia does not get any form of compensation from Indonesia due to this. Sigh...I hope the air clears up by tomorrow!

On a happier note, I've recently finished watching Scrapped Princess, an anime about a girl who's destined to destroy the world. While the storyline was nothing amazing, it was enjoyable enough. The characters in the anime all have rather distinct personalities and the interaction between them was really wonderful! I really liked Raquel's character. She's generally a very blur person yet when her sister becomes threatened, she's a real lioness. The interaction of Shannon and the Scrapped Princess was also really heart-warming, with Shannon being a really protective elder brother who's determined to shield his younger sister from all harm.

Right now I'm in the middle of watching an anime called Beck. It's quite interesting so far. One thing for sure, this anime REALLY makes me wanna get back to being serious with my guitar. I'm saving up money now to buy a good amplifier and a multi-effects board. =)

A new beginning and other stuff

2005-07-24T09:04:00.000-07:00

Ladies and gentlemen, as of Friday 22/07/2005 I'm no longer a systems engineer. I'm now a network support engineer in a new company. I leave my previous company with many fond memories and experiences. I'm gonna miss those jokers! =)

As for my new company, I have to confess that I'm slightly overwhelmed. I'm now in a large multi-national company and to make matters even more interesting, apparently I'm the youngest engineer in my department. The second youngest is 4 years older than me. Heh, everyone here is a veteran in the industry. Man...I can't wait until I'm no longer clueless! Still, I'm looking forward to the new challenges I can expect to face in my new role. I'm now in the global arena. That's so freaking cool to me! =P

A while ago, a friend of mine introduced me to the music of Damien Rice. Essentially, she said that 'The Blower's Daughter' is a bloody amazing song. After listening to it, I have to agree. The raw emotion that Damien Rice manages to pour inside the song is absolutely amazing! Such bittersweet feeling when you listen to it. The rest of the album is also quite good. Songs by him that you should also check out are 'Amie' and 'Cold Water'. Anyway, I found out that the song 'The Blower's Daughter' was the theme song for this movie called 'Closer'. I've finally managed to get my hands on it about a week ago. After watching it, I have to say that the movie was amazing. It's a beautifully crafted piece of cinematic masterpiece in which you can actually identify and feel for each of the character in the movie. Natalie Portman's performance in that movie was simply...magnificent. If you ever get the opportunity, please watch it. While your opinion might differ on whether the movie is good or not, you will agree that acting (especially by Natalie Portman) was amazing and this movie, at the very least, is different from the standard Hollywood fare (which are all crap, IMHO) which we are inundated with in our daily lives.

While we're on the topic for movies, 'Garden State' is also another movie in which Natalie Portman acted (and performed beautifully). It is also a debut movie for Zach Braff as a director. While I feel that 'Closer' was the better movie, 'Garden State' is also a decent movie. Maybe I'm just so sick of the usual Hollywood crap that anything that's different is good to me. LOL! Oh yeah, the soundtrack for the movie 'Garden State' is also quite good. I really liked the songs by Frou Frou. I know, I know! Frou Frou is electronica and I'm a rocker. I have to admit though. The blending of Imogen Heap's vocals and Guy Sigsworth's musical arrangement is hypnotic and has an ethereal feel. I guess you could call it a mood music and the music defnitely fit the mood of the movie! Check out 'Let Go' and 'Shh' by Frou Frou for some electronica music which doesn't sound like music for robots. =)

Back to work

2005-07-12T09:46:00.000-07:00

The worst part of any holiday is when it ends. Sigh...

Still, the holiday was quite fun. I spent my time constructively in UK by sleeping at least 12 hours each day (sometimes 16!) while in Greece, I took a tour everyday, covering all the nice tourist spots in Athens and nearby areas. Time well spent, I'd say!

London continues to be my favorite city. It's probably the most metropolitan city in the whole world. You can find literally every single major ethnic group in that city. Regardless of where you're from, I'm sure you'll feel right at home once you reach London. My standard activity when I reach London is to buy a few books and enjoy a reading holiday. Heh, I guess I'm an avid reader. For those who are interested, Alistair Reynolds is a BRILLIANT sci-fi writer. He's also British so if you plan to improve your spelling (since Malaysia uses UK English), his books would be a good choice for reading. Check out his book titled "Revelation Space". Brilliant imagery supported with a strong cast of characters.

It is sad that some people feel the need to destroy the soul of London by detonating a series of explosives recently. I weep for the innocents lost, yet wonder what sort of madness would drive a person to do such an unspeakable act. Again, due to this event, fingers will be pointed to the Muslims around the world. I just hope the course of justice is not swayed by propaganda and emotions and the real culprits behind all this are dealt with following the rule of law.

Greece is a unique country of beauty and ugliness. I've travelled quite extensively and have visited many places. I can't remember an uglier city than Athens. The city is rather...worn down is the word, I think. When you look at other modern cities, you see skyscrapers, shining steel-and-concrete buildings and astonishing architectural designs. None of that are present in Athens. Heck, KL looks more modern than Athens. Move beyond Athens though and Greece will showcase a mesmerising vista of beautiful landscapes. From rolling hills and rugged mountains to crystal blue lakes and expansive flatlands. I think Greek islands are amongts the most beautiful in the world. I know for sure I enjoyed the island-hopping cruise the most compared to the other tours I took while in Greece. As for my souvenir, I bought a mini statue of Aphrodite, the goddess of love according to Greek mythology. I now have a 12 inch tall statue of a naked chick in my room. I know, you're all jealous! Hahaha!

The workload after my vacation is madness. I've got pending projects wherever I turn my head. Actually, I even got a few calls while still on vacation about work. Sigh...I didn't think I was THAT important! The 2 weeks after my holiday is the busiest 2 weeks in my entire life. I didn't even have a weekend for that 2 weeks. I'd say my stress level at that time was at an all time high. Still, I'm proud to be associated with those projects. Each successful completion gives me a sense of accomplishment. In fact, when I look back at what I've learnt and achieved for the past 1 year, I myself am amazed. 1 year ago, I'm a clueless fresh grad. Today I'm still clueless but somehow people think that I'm an expert in Solaris, DNS, DHCP, RADIUS, data protection design and implementation, clustering design and implementation, enterprise storage design and implementation, NTP servers, SGSN, GGSN and 3G networks. Go figure!

All this work is cutting into my free time though. I miss my college days where I can go to the cybercafe with a bunch of friends and play Dungeon Siege for 12 hours straight and skip class the next day! Heh heh!

Vacation Time

2005-06-02T08:02:00.000-07:00

Woohoo! Time for my holiday!! Ahh....2 weeks of carefree bliss in UK and Greece! I plan to completely waste my trip by grabbing the nearest bed to the heater and snuggling under some pretty thick comforters. I can feel my stress level going down just by imagining this...

Sigh...the crapy part is that I'll be heading for my holiday completely and utterly BROKE! Living expenses has certainly risen since I started work. Petrol charges has gone up quite a bit and I just finished paying for my road tax and car insurance. Bummer...no money to spend. Fortunately, I got VISA, *in a deep, accented voice*, "the world most prefered card". =P

I'm supposed to leave my house at 9 am tomorrow. Sheesh! I'm actually waking before 2 pm on my freaking holiday. That's sacrilege!! I probably have to atone this gravest of sins by sleeping for at least 14 hours and waking up after 5 pm in UK. Heh heh!

Ahh...good 'ole UK. I'm gonna enjoy checking out the bookshops and eating fish and chips by the tube station. What can I say? I'm a man of simple taste. =)

Greece should be interesting though, especially since I've never been there before. Should be fun checking out the architecture of the Ancient Greece scattered throughout the country. I plan to pose next to every single naked women sculpture I can find and get my sister to take my picture. There should be plenty there! Hahaha!

I just had to brag...

2005-05-24T09:10:00.000-07:00

I just have to brag to people about this. My freaking handphone now has 23 java games installed! Count 'em baby! TWENTY-THREE!! Yay!! I now officially have no life and spend my free time playing idiotic java games on the tiny screen of my S700i. Some of the more excellent games that I have includes rainbow six 3, splinter cell pandora tomorrow AND chaos theory and midnight pool. Hell, I even have FIFA 2005 and Tiger Woods 2005, which I recently downloaded yesterday. In FIFA, argentina (me) lost to japan 3-0 and in Tiger Woods, I shot 10 above par cause I kept hitting the trees. Not to worry though. Soon, I can show off some spectacular results once I master the controls! =)

Speaking of games though, I'm thinking of getting the PSP. The reviews seems quite positive and the game selection is growing by the day. The PSP should be useful during some projects where I have to be at a site in the middle of the night yet have nothing to do since another section is doing the work. I just wait for them to finish and make sure everything's ok. During that time, I could play games on the PSP and actually unlock a few stuff! =D

On a totally unrelated subject, I just finished reading The Da Vinci Code. Whoa, that's one EXCELLENT story man! The story grips you right till the end. Nice ending too! It gives a good closure. I highly recommend it for an entertaining reading experience. Some Catholics might feel offended over the potrayal of their beliefs in the book though. Some of the themes introduced in there are quite controversial.

Yup...a blog!

2005-05-02T08:46:00.000-07:00

'Sup, all! Welcome to the space where I post my weird ramblings and other stuff that goes through my head.

Hmm...what to post...

I'm still busy as hell with work, with 8 projects running concurrently and 2 of them are kinda big. Oh yeah, incidently I'm finally a Veritas Certified Professional in Data Protection. If for some weird reason you have a 100 million bucks worth (or more) of data (your pr0n collection or em-pee-trees) to protect and don't know how to proceed, feel free to contact me. Initial consultation advice is a mamak session if we've known each other for more than 5 years. If not, I'm afraid it'll won't be cheap since my time is precious. Ahahahahahah!

Oh yeah, I got this really cool ESP guitar recently. My parents got it for me when they were in London. They probably felt guilty abandoning me in Malaysia all alone while they and the rest of my siblings were enjoying themselves in UK. Still, it's a cool guitar so I'd sorta forgave them. Hahaha! Anyway, this guitar has a sustainer and an EMG-89 active pickups. This baby is SWEET!! Wonderful clean jazzy sounds AND meaty rock sounds all in one package! The problem is this thing is powered by THREE 9 volt batteries. Sheesh, my previous guitar needed only one 9 volt battery. Now all I need is some free time to go jamming with my band...

Ok, enough crapping for now. I do need to get some work done actually. I'll post more when I'm bored enough again.