Sharing a birthday

To celebrate our GM’s 60th birthday, today, we gathered in his office to give him a surprise. At this time of economic uncertainty, even a cent is important to us yet we contributed RM12.00 each to put a smile on his face. (A packet of rice with two vegetables costs RM3.00).

While some American bosses were concerned about their own pockets, Japanese bosses helped hurdle their company’s financial losses by unselfishly sacrificing their own payrolls.

I hope Mr. Wong is still not upset over his low profit sharing and will not deduct my salary in the future.

Famous Trees

After eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good & Evil which God forbid them, Adam & Eve were banished from the Garden of Eden and denied access to the Tree of Life (left) whose fruits gave everlasting life

God spoke to Moses and gave him the Ten Commandment out of the Burning Bush at Mt Sinai.

The Bodhi Tree at Mahabodhi Temple where Siddharta Gautama (Buddha) achieved enlightenment.

A Christmas tree is decorated with Christmas lights and colourful ornaments during the days around Christmas. An angel or star is often placed at the top of the tree, representing the host of angels or the Star of Bethlehem from the Nativity story. The tree represents Life in winter, Light in Darkness, Hope of coming Spring.

Tree of Democracy
Pakatan Rakyat state assemblymen attending a state assembly meeting under a raintree after they were denied entry to the State Secretariat building in Ipoh on 3 March, 2009

Human slaughtering in China

Received through my email.

"Horrible custom of slaughtering women during Chinese New Year for a feast in a remote village in China. Single woman especially back-packer who happens to stay a night at the village will be detained there. She will be fed with good food till she puts on enough fresh. Then she is slaughterd during Chinese New Year. One family will only slaughter one 'new year pig' as they say. Those families who have no luck because nobody chooses to stay at their houses will get a share from their neighbours. The photos were taken by a male visitor who happens to have a good friend living at the village. He happened to drop in during the Chinese New Year and was invited to have a 'human meat' feast."

Living in an igloo

When I think of igloos, I think of the Eskimos. On your knees you crawl through the L-shaped tunnel to reach the main room. A dwelling, void of beds but carpeted with thick animal furs where you cuddle up to keep from freezing to death.

Time has passed. You need not go to the Arctic Circle or the North Pole or their nearby neighborhood to get invited to stay in an igloo anymore. We can now sample living in an igloo thanks to Adrian Guenter, a Swiss snowboarding fanatic. He is the owner of Iglu-Dorf, a 15 igloos hotel in Davos.

If you asked me where Davos is, I honestly do not know at all until all the hu ha about the world climatic changes and the world’s recession which every country is panicking about. Davos is the capital city of the World Economic Forum. Annually, world leaders and corporate big shots convene there to talk about money problem.

The Swiss weather is conducive so this enterprising guy, presently lords over four igloo hotels in Switzerland, one each in Germany and Andorra in the Pyrenees. If you do not mind the piercing cold seeping into your bones during the night and can tolerate the minus 20ºC temperature during the day, then pamper yourself silly in a “standard’ igloo that costs €119. For the "romantik-iglu plus" you part with €339.

"We built the complex in five weeks using giant inflatable balloons which were then covered with snow," disclosed a staff at the Davos igloos. Not real igloos. "Building in a traditional manner would have taken us all winter” he revealed further. But the cluster of igloo villages are fully equipped with saunas, whirlpool baths, bar, restaurant, an even a conference room!

Job opportunities are open for those fluent in Spanish or German. It is a great pity when I speak Spanish, the Senors and Senoritas have difficulty understanding me and my German is half past six to qualify me a job at the Igloo Villages.

Work there? No way. I think the deep snow reaches my chin!

Piggy Tale

Looking at these pictures I have mixed feelings. I just could not believe what I am seeing. I hope anyone viewing these photos will agree.

Those who are religiously inclined will raise unreasonable lots of noise and are ready to bring the heavens down. They will regard the actions as repulsive and excessively humiliating to their religion.

On the other hand, some will brush it aside rationally and accept it as okay. If one would take time to listen to the explanations, one will understand these photos of a Muslim student from University Putra Malaysia cuddling a piglet in her arms is harmless.

Muslim students are not excused from handling dogs and pigs as part of their veterinary assignments and practical studies. Coming into contact with all types of animals, is compulsory regardless of religious beliefs. Dogs and pigs are part of our Malaysian life and to draw a line is probably silly.

Will someone take advantage to create trouble for her? Will society subject her to punishment? Will someone politicalize it and create uneasiness among the people?

Visa Card® / Msn® INTERNATIONAL MEGA JACKPOT

Received the below announcement through my office email. It claims its origin from MSN. I am supposed to be excited and honoured to be selected to win £500,000.00 from my usage of Visa Card. And later, no doubt, they will ask me to deposit some payments into their banking accounts to facilitate the Jackpot Winnings transfer before I get to touch a cent of my winnings.

By the time I ‘receive’ my winnings I would surely have lost a few hundred thousand pounds to them. People are so desperate for money that they go to so much length to sacrifice their souls by cheat unsuspecting and naïf individuals out of their hard earned money.

What that does not belong to you, does not belong to you. I hope the senders and their group of cows will rot in prisons, never to be awarded an appeal, never to get pardoned, not in this world, not in their world after.

I am sorry if I sound so cruel but it is crueler to inflict misery on others.

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Notification Date:13/1/2009
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AMOUNT WON:500,000.00GBP (Five Hundred Thousand GreatBritain Pounds).
This email address has brought you anunexpected luck,Your e-mail address was selected andconfirmed by our co-sponsor Msn International,throughtheir latest internet software.You are therefore beenapproved by Visa Card Int./Msn UK the sum of500,000.00 (Five Hundred Thousand Great Britain Pounds).
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Spare Rib Soup

The most delicious part of a pig is probably its spare ribs. It is free of fat. It is tender and it is sweet. I like mine cooked with salted bean paste, chili padi, laced with a little lime juice - steamed until it is soft & tender and sprinkled with spring onions and parsley. Wow, this is delicious.

To me, it will be a waste as a soup base. But now, it is a craze in south-east China to order ‘Spare Rib Soup’. This is a special soup where customers can’t order off the menu. It takes 8 hours to double-boil the soup to draw out its effectiveness. This ‘spare rib’ together with chicken meat and a concoction of expensive herbs are specially prepared to boost the vigor of a man’s sexual strength and stamina. Sounds interesting. Mmm Good N 7up.

This palatable dish which originates from China is better than synthetic Viagra for it is natural. But the catch is, not anyone with a faint heart dared to enjoy it. For these ‘spare ribs’ are actually unborn babies or premeditated aborted babies.

Eating fetuses is nothing strange to the Chinese. According to old-wives’ tales, fetuses have nutritional properties which include cure for asthma, kidney defects, a beautiful skin and most important to improve sex drive.

One would asked, where from do they obtain a steady flow of supply to cater to the demand. There is no other obvious place but from state hospitals. They have abundant supplies. Some hospitals even give them away free. Hospitals staff frequently take home fetuses and placentas to make broth to maintain poor health. As fetuses and placentas are now widely known, enterprising individuals have started to sell them to restaurants, research centers for the development of vaccines for polio, hepatitis A, chicken pox and rubella and cosmetic companies in the manufacturing of creams or Botox-like injections.

How much is a fetus worth? The price of a dead fetus (which died a natural death) costs RMB2,000. Aborted fetus goes for only a few hundreds. If couples do not wish to sell their dead babies, the placentas can fetch for a couple of hundreds.

This is the result of China’s family planning policy of ‘one child to one family’. Right from our ancestors, a son is preferable to a daughter. A son carries on the family name and the family legacy. A daughter is a ‘loss’ and is looked upon as an outsider after marriage.

With their dislike for female children, abortions are the only way out to acquire a male in the family. In China, abortion is an ongoing affair, nothing new, nothing to frown upon, and nothing to be afraid about. Li Wei once shared that in the urban areas where the population are saturated; the one child policy is effective. In the rural prefectures, they are allowed to have two or three children depending on the population density. And government officials can be very ‘strict’ about this policy.

Idi Amin, the Ugandan military dictator fed on testicles of young boys, like wise the Chinese have a meal of placentas and fetuses. And I can’t bring myself to swallow any of them. Cannibalism is very disheartening.