RACONTEUR-ESQUE SCRIBBLINGS

Have you ever sat and ruminated over the thoughts about where your food comes from before digging into that scrumptious meal in front of you? I'm sure most of us would have heard of the urban legend regarding KFC and it's 6 legged headless chickens running around in cramped cages (no, that does not make sense upon reflection, unfortunately) before they're killed and marinated and then cooked into either OR or the Hot n Spicy versions. It is also said that it is called KFC now instead of Kentucky Fried Chicken because apparently, it is not chickens that we eat but the 6 legged, headless creatures! Of course once again, I need to stress that this is only an urban legend, and countless people still line up at their counters day after day... Anyway, the other day I had watched half a show on tv about chickens, and how there are free range chickens and non-free range chickens, based on how they are reared in farms. Obviously, free range chickens are treated better than non-...

If there is one thing that annoys me, it's the fact that some people just cannot seem to grasp the idea of privacy. Why don't they understand, if someone doesn't tell you something, then it means they don't want to tell you. Perhaps for obvious reasons. For some unknown reason, people seem to look at me as their secret keeper. They kind of pull me aside and say something and then add "it's a secret, you know". And I nod and acknowledge the fact. That makes me feel like Post Secret at times, but I don't mind. No doubt I have been able to keep people's secrets for years without it being leaked out at all. Ask my sister, she knows. Anyway, as I mentioned in a earlier post, my direct boss had sent in her resignation and it's official at the moment. Everyone knows she's leaving, but the reasons behind her departure and future plans are perhaps known to only a select handful, perhaps those of us who were particularly close to her. The day s...

Picture borrowed from onemanbandwidth.wordpress.com We live right here, on a planet called Earth where forests are green, and seas are blue. We are fortunate to be teeming with life, or are we? I was driving to work today at the mind-numbing speed of 8 km/hr (there was an accident along the way that caused a jam that stretched for miles) when I observed an old dilapidated wall covered with greens. It had once had a grand looking house in the compound, which was nowhere to be seen, and the gate too had disappeared (metal thieves?) I don't know when it was abandoned, but the compound itself had grown into a massive tangle of weeds ( not weed , hahaha ) which would probably be waist high had I ventured inside, with saplings growing wildly and looked pretty much like a secondary jungle. Now, I mention this because it is after all World Earth Day on the 22 nd of April, and for me, seeing those greens fighting their way through what was once a human domain is a positive sign tha...

After slightly more that 3 years of almost consistent procrastination via ramblings on life and things that surround life itself, we hereby announce that we have finally hit the 25,000 visitors mark, although admittedly the first two or three hundred were my own before I realised that I could block my own cookies (but I can't eat them, alas!) The number above shows the count as at 11:45 pm. If my backtracking is accurate, then the exact 25,000 mark was hit at around 4:00 pm earlier today. On a totally unrelated note, I got a kick out this funny line on a show just now.... "The pool's on fire! Someone get some water!" Ha! Ha!

Blame it on the media - an overexposure to the economic crisis that is currently plaguing the whole world apparently has it's effects, including inducing curiosity in people like myself, who as I have mentioned in a previous post lacks proper knowledge in this field due to the narrow scope secondary school education had provided. In a move to understand things better, I had gone on a search for a book that went by the title Freakonomics - firstly because the long lost friend who had recommended the book said it was pretty good and had in fact made him interested in Economics, so much so that he had actually contemplated doing his post grad in Economics. This was back in December 2006 and we had lost contact since. Secondly, this coming from someone who is a self-professed non-reader was quite interesting in itself, especially after hearing his sad encounter with books (apparently he was handed old copies of girlish boarding school stories by his older female cousins - this I ...

*Gorbachev asked me this morning as to what my immediate action plan regarding work looked like. I was quiet for a bit... somewhere in between being flummoxed and curious as to how and why this question could have arrived in the first place - it being an economically bad climate to move places when seniority is your safety belt of sorts. He theorised that our current situation in the department I'm in is like this (He's now in a different department, but still hangs out and works closely with some of us) There's one key person, and she's kind of holding us in place despite how bored/tired/annoyed/disheartened we are of the situation we are in, and mainly because she is quite the kind of boss that expects you to do your thing well and will support you 100% if help is ever needed. We don't see the results immediately (she's only been in that position for almost a year), but we can see ourselves moving - like glaciers if you may... slow but with impact. She...

In case you didn't already know there is a Robin Hood- esque blog out there, aptly named Sunday Stealing , where they go around stealing memes from the meme rich blogs to share with the meme poor blogs! Well, sort of anyway, cause the meme poor blogs actually have to do the stealing on their own... after all blog posts don't really write by themselves, do they? Anyway, I was checking out their blog week ago and found this meme, which I thought I'd steal because it looked like fun. Third Meme about Blogging 1. How did you come up with your blog title OR what does it mean? There is a movie out there that goes by the title Unfinished Business. I've never watched it, nor do I really know what it is about, but titles tend to stick in your head at times, so I used it. However, the reason it's used here is due to the fact that writing is my unfinished business. Another thing I ought to mention is that this particular blog had a different name originally for a very...

She was walking along a somewhat familiar path, well known and well worn, one she's been using for the past 6 months or so without fail. Suddenly, an arrow, unseen and unheard swishes swiftly by her right ear, narrowly missing her by a fraction of an inch and lands neatly into a pile of wood, quivering slightly due to inertia. She turns, surprised, and sees a familiar face. "Why are you using that path? he asks. Eyebrows raised slightly, she answers "This is the path. I've been using it all this while" "Well, it's wrong" he says. "You're supposed to use that path" he continues, pointing towards a different path. To her it looked like what once used to be a path. It was now all covered in brambles. He walks away, slowly. Before he disappears completely from view, he turns to her and says. "Remember, use this path the next time" She nods her head acknowledging agreement despite somewhat skeptically. Why does *life...

Random Scribblings On a Sunday Afternoon 1. My brains are more tired than I thought them to be. I can't figure out the reason just yet. Then there is also the fact that I there are quite a number of thoughts moving around in my brain and what better way to spend Sunday filing them up neatly on a blogpost! 2. Went for Nan's engagement function on Friday. When I went over to say hi (after the ceremony and stuff were over) she put away whatever she was holding to give me a hug and introduced her fiance. He's got a very soft handshake (as opposed to firm), but I've never seen her this happy before although she's one of those people who's always got a smile on their face. (Of course knowing her for the past 17 years, I can see the difference between genuine happiness and a normal smile) 3. I now suppose she (Nan) didn't tell me personally that she was getting engaged because she most probably was being the demure girl , the kind of behaviour a girl is expe...

Under normal circumstances, a zoologist will most probably faint at the very idea of anyone referring to orang utans as monkeys. Under *not so normal circumstances, the orang utan will most probably pulverize you to submission if you call it a monkey. We spent the final afternoon of our stay in Sarawak visiting the Orang Utan Sanctuary otherwise known as the Semenggoh Wildlife Centre. Most of the animals here were rescued from terrible conditions and are taken care of (given food) in the wilderness. Although they are in contact with humans and have all been given names, they are not exactly tame. For instance, according to the person who gave a briefing before we saw them, the orang utans (especially the young uns) are capable of being mischievous and might snatch shiny objects and run off into the forest, and chances are you might never see your things again, because the forests border the neighbouring country and unlike us who need passports to travel around, the orang utans and ...

It was a windy afternoon, and I, donned in the ugliest clothes ever (a school uniform) walked to the bus stop where a solitary figure sat, most probably awaiting the same school bus as me. We got to talking, and found out that we were going to take the same school bus and we were in the same school. That day back in December of 1992 marked the strange but interesting bond between me and Nan. Conversations in the school bus led to discovery that we were sort of kindred spirits, and without any of us openly acknowledging it, we were labelled best buddies. Moreover, we did have a not-so-secret language that we used among ourselves driving everyone else around us crazy. Ah, those were the days. As we grew older, though, we kind of drifted apart for no apparent reason. It reached a point only two years later that we stopped having stuff to talk about. Nevertheless, after school ended and we all went our own ways, we still kept in touch (via snail mail) followed by e-mails after the discov...

If there's one thing I can't get enough of, it's observing people. And because of that, the observation below was noted and now shared. Who knows it might come in handy sometime regardless if you're Malaysian or not... The best way to annoy a Malaysian living abroad is to talk about food. Local food. And you've got their goat. What would be the best way to annoy someone from your country who is living abroad? Anyone?

A few years ago, a friend said that a visit to an island is not complete unless you go to an ocean (that was Bali 2006), and hence a visit to a place that is famed for its forests is not complete without a visit to (yeah, you guessed it) a forest. Bako National Park was a 20 to 30 minute drive away from our hotel (I didn't keep time) and upon reaching there, we were first required to get the entrance tickets where the officer informed us of the conditions we were about to face, looked at our shoes and commented that JC's shoes might not be suitable, but it was. He then proceeded to tell us that seeing that the tide was low, we'd have to wade through the water to reach the park entrance, and there we may encounter jellyfish and some sort of scary fish, so we had to be careful. Gulp. We got on a boat that was supposed to take us to the National Park. The river was wide, and for me rather scary... only the knowledge that I had on a life jacket and the fact that the tide...

While the whole world hides behind their television sets appraising Mr. Obama as he moves about in his daily duties as one of the most anticipated Presidents of the United States, some quarters have started observing Mrs. Obama and commenting on every other thing she does. I was *watching the recorded news on CNN about 10 this morning which had the headings written at the bottom of the show regarding Mrs Obama and her Royal Hug, followed by the question "who made the first move?" Oh, come on! I had to stop and laugh, though. To be honest, the kind of scrutiny this woman is under surprises me. I don't recall any other first lady being commented about this much. I think the media should give her a break, so what if she hugged the Queen? I don't think the Queen would have minded it at all. Maybe hugging (or putting her arm behind the Queen's shoulder - as that is what I saw the other day) is just her thing, and protocol (if there was one) just escaped her min...

Where there is a river or straits, there is apt to be a waterfront. If you look at it from a cliched perspective, you'd say that the Kuching Waterfront is just a stone's throw away from our hotel, a row of stalls selling food and drinks, ethnic music playing in the background with an excellent view of the Sarawak River that stretches quite a bit. I do wonder though, if any of us actually stood right outside the hotel facing the waterfront and threw a stone towards it, would it have reached the waterfront, or would we have hit an unsuspecting victim on the head in our efforts to prove the stone's throw away theory? We never found out. It was 6 pm by the time we left the building again to check out the waterfront. JC and U who reached earlier had visited the place earlier that morning and wanted to sleep a bit, so PJ , JV, UM and myself headed out. It was getting dark fast (Sarawak is more East than Kuala Lumpur , hence it does get darker earlier although our clocks a...

History repeats itself. It seems as though each time I go off on a trip (holiday or otherwise) my muse rides along, which is not a bad thing (after all, I owe observing silly things like the pilot welcoming us to KL instead of Kuching because of the muse) However, the downside to this is that my muse kind of purposely stays behind to enjoy itself while I struggle with drafts and drafts of attempts to document the journey and experience I've encountered and everything else in between. In other words, I'm sort of having another 'block'. Damn! So, while I gather my materials, sort out my thoughts, get back ownership of my brain (it is currently held against it's will by the foreign advisors until Thursday evening), and await my muse, I leave you with these - a picture of 'us' and a diagram depicting how we know each other... Due to the semi private nature of this blog, we can only show you our feet... besides, it is admittedly difficult to travel withou...