Jalan What?

Location: Study room

Mood: Shocked

Sights and sounds: Sound of Zoe barking downstairs

Even Kuala Lumpur may soon loose it's name forever in a matter of time if authorities are not concerned over the concept of preserving history.

The recent controversy over the name change of Jalan Alor to Jalan Kejora is another, in my point of view attempt made by some 'somewhere-ranked' officers 'Upstairs' to do some publicity work. Too similar to the entertainment industry, minus the elegant and handsome faces, replaced by some rotting and restless politician uncles. Namely Uncle Mohd Amin Nodin Abdul Aziz. Now, the whole Malaysia and beyond recognizes him! what a successful marketing plan.

Although i've never fancied eating along Jalan Alor, but i'm sure it somehow portraits the exotic Malaysian cuisine. It is a vital part of Kuala Lumpur's history and that title doesn't come easy. The sudden change of it's name after being recognized as the eating place for more than 30 years now by both tourists and locals is certainly unfair and ridiculous. To make matters worse, the authority actually secretly changed the road sign overnight without proper notice and agreements with the locals!

Uncle Amin quoted :"Names are changed to avoid confusion of postmen." Well, very thoughtful of him over our postmen; but how about our tourists? Nobody will be delighted if Eiffel tower is renamed something else in order to 'stay align with the themed neighbourhood', as proposed by City hall to name streets in neighbourhoods according to themes. i.e. Stars, Fruits, Animals...etc. Where on earth did someone came out with such idea?

This shows that Malaysia has very little history background and is not interested in preserving any in future.

FAYE

I've been listening to Faye wong's songs rather frequent lately; not only does it made it's way to the 'top 25 most played' list in my iTunes in no time, I've even started to resemble her as the asian version of Madonna! Thanks to Stevie for playing her songs on almost every trip on his car and whoalla..I'm her new fan!

Lately i've been admiring all these 'older artistes' and my friends started to complain whenever they borrowed my iPod or while playing around with my phone. Well, perhaps i've just grown older! (wiser too, i hope)

One of my favourite:
Heard it before back in the 90s i think. I felt so excited listening to it again a few days ago :)



Prefer the canton version as the mandarin version sounded weird.

Penang

Yep! That view from a jacuzzi is worth traveling 300km north for the weekend!

It was pure excitement as I stepped out of class at 12.30 and headed straight to the airport to catch my plane at 4.30 to join vie vie for the rest of the weekend. However I was turned down by some cold that I caught days ago and to never ever catch a cold before a weekend escape, I ended up popping various dietary supplements from now on to keep myself healthy; special thanks to vie vie for the supplements.

It was a long and stressful week with 8 hours of lectures daily and to actually fly off to heaven on north was indeed very appealing despite some minor health glitch.

The place we stayed was Gurney Hotel and vie vie got some really great deals and they upgraded us to this 2-bedroom suite which at first was kinda freaky coz there's too many vacant spaces in the room! (you know what i mean). But just before that interfered with my mind, the stunning view from the room literally blew me away and the best part was ofcourse...the bathroom!

Gurney Drive infront of the bed

Penang Brige outside Queensbay mall

On our way back to KL, we've stopped by Ipoh and had lunch at the original Old Town white coffee house next to Ipoh Tourist Information Center. It used to be some typical chinese kopitiam ages back and eversince some great minds expanded and franchised the business, the coffee house was then refurbished to this modern-colonial theme similar to those you can find along Heritage row in KL.

Often enough, I felt that these franchising work creates a rather generic and uniform appearance regardless of which part of the world you are in. Old Town white coffee for instance, have the same menu at their originated store in Ipoh as it is at those other stores in KL, which I'm abit disappointed cause I don't wanna feel at home so soon! haha.

To my surprise, busses in KL and Penang are operated by the same company called Rapid KL and Rapid Penang. Okay, perhaps the word 'Rapid' is their company's name but can't they modify the appearance i.e colour and design of the bus abit for the sake of giving a different identity for both cities?

So, is franchising doing more good or bad? Good for business, bad for tourists...I think.

The field or 'padang besar' of Ipoh and it was yesteryear's Trevvy and Axcest before the internet came into service. Foreground was Michelle Yeoh's secondary school (Convent Ipoh i think)

SEX + CITY = Sex and the City (Manhattan only)

SATC style: Strutting down Fifth

I swear I felt so bad being one of the last SATC fans in the world, plus all the uncountable cuts, to watch the girls on the screen again after a looooooong wait since last December when I first got to know that the movie will be coming mid year 2008. And while every other countries are showing (including Mars) in May, I was so upset that this low efficiency, low key, low sense and everything low except taxes and temperature country we called Malaysia is not bringing this movie into local cinemas until July!!

While having a morning jog with my family at KLCC Park, I figured an opening sentence to express my feelings when one fine day if anybody ever interviewed me: "To the Censorship,Media Development Authority and whoever's responsible for this unreasonable delay, I cursed the day you're born! (Sounds familiar heh)"

While cursing the day he/she was born seemed to be too dramatic as how Charlotte had played her role in this movie, I find this movie relating what life is when you grow up. After not seeing those girls (or women) on HBO for 2 years, I feel that their change and even what they preserved in their lifestyle is directly reflecting myself. While being dramatic is how we as being gay express ourselves, staying calm and the ability to forgive is a very important and priceless lesson to learn through hard times and breakups.

Take Carrie as an example, the hardship, shame and the unbearable losses that she faces when Big left her on their wedding day, especially when her marriage being made a 'famous celebrity wedding' after she's been featured in Vogue could easily made her going stagnant without the help of some really, really good friends.

As relationships are becoming more and more 'disposable and replaceable nowadays especially in the gay scene, having some really good friends like Carrie's deemed very important.

Like most movies, SATC comes with it's soundtrack album called "Sex and the City Original Motion Picture Soundtrack". Although some of the songs are not featured in the film (i.e. Mercy by Duffy), but generally I think it's worth buying it (RM40-50, not so sure coz vie vie bought it for me) if you're a die-hard SATC fan like me.

Here's the tracklist:

1- labels or love

2- All dressed in love

3- Mercy

4- The look of love

5- New York girls

6- All this beauty

7- I Like the way

8- It's amazing

9- How deep is your love

10- The heart of the matter

11- Auld Lang Syne

12- Kissing

13- How can you mend a broken heart

14- Walk this way

15- Sex and the city MOVIE THEME

And for those who still adore the series and been watching it on DVD repeatedly, This book may just be your thirst quencher for SATC. Kinokuniya, RM28.10 ISBN: 2110446617682

Equality is the limit, Sister

If you're gay, bi or transsexual, equality would be the last thing in mind that could happen in the near future, Asia especially as here's another sexuality-related issue happened in Bachok (somewhere in Kelantan,Malaysia) that left us wonder, are we going anywhere further?


Transsexual pageant raided

http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2008/7/27/nation/21935260&sec=nation

This is another obvious case of persecution by the government against a marginalised group of it's people who have done no real wrong.

They (to a certain extent, we) have hurt no one and cost taxpayers of this country not a single cent by living the life as they choose. The report on this Sunday paper cited: 'Men dressing up like women goes against Islamic Law'. Many, including myself would argue that it is even more inhumane to force these men to dress like men if they feel it goes against their true nature!

It's even greater shame when we compare this with the corruption and wrongdoing rife in most government institutions today.

Take telebroadcasting as a classic example, one of the reason the Media Development Authority banned scenes that project the lifestyle of gay, for example the programme that showed a gay couple and their adopted baby is because it "normalizes, glamorizes and promotes a gay lifestyle." Again, how inhumane and how far it degrades a society's moral values in terms of Islamic law, for instance it is to adopt and raise a child?

But at the same time, as the authority approves hundreds of movies and drama series daily featuring all aspects of crime like murder and terrorism to be aired, are they now "normalizing, glamorizing and promoting these lifestyles" in the country? Another equality myth busted.

And yet we say nothing and do nothing, while this country continues to vilify and punish transsexuals and those who are 'not straight' in general whose only "crime" is to live honestly and dress honestly to express how beautiful they feel about themselves and their life is.

Avilion Admiral Cove Port Dickson

It took me weeks, well atleast 5 weeks to be close to precise for me to have this post posted on my blog. Since 'busy' seemed to be a lame excuse, another reason for that would be actually i stopped blogging months ago until recently I found myself reading some really good journals of my friends and the 'kiasu' instinct inside myself made me think: I should have one too hor.....- Just kidding.

Avilion Admiral Cove Port Dickson

Huge rooms and our superior sea view room has a king sized bed, a sofa, a working table, LCD TV...can comfortably fit up to 4 person.

We were supposed to check in at 3:00 pm and we arrived 10 minutes before the check in time in hope that we'll be able to get to the room as it was so hot! (lobby not air conditioned). But unfortunately there's this Singaporean family who checked out late so our room won't be ready until 50 minutes later! A very bad first impression.

Soon after we checked in, we were so exhausted and while i was sleeping, vie vie took a pic of me sleeping!! (not posted here) Later in the evening, we went to the marina (since there's no beachfront) and took some very cool photos, but soon after that we were asked "enough ahh?" by this unfriendly indian guy because that area supposed to be restricted to yacht owners only but c'mon, the door wasn't locked okay?

We thought dinner will be kinda expensive and not so much choice as well so we headed out to this seafood restaurant about 2km away and the salted egg crab was better that i expected! food was inexpensive, lots of meat, vege and a crab for only rm70+.

The seafood restaurant

The next morning we headed to my former NS camp in Blue Lagoon (Tanjong Tuan) for a visit from the outside, a place I swear I won't come back the day I stepped out more than a year ago. haha. Before we leave, we went to the Tanjong Tuan Forest Reserve for a walk up to the lighthouse and the view was fantastic. Along the way, vie vie imagined how's his hike to Mt. Kinabalu would be and I can tell...he's kinda nervous coz he too is obviously a city boy :P

The light house after a 25min 12pm-under-the-sun walk

avilioncovehotel.com

http://www.blogger.com/www.portdickson.net

Standard of Living increases, is that all?

Ironically, increase in standard of living is consistently related to the stress level of a society.

A major source of stress in our society is the constant pressure to do more, see more, learn more, buy more, read more, and become more. Many of us, in fact, most of us including myself are often not contended with what we currently have. For instance, this moment i'm not satisfied with my breakouts and I HAVE TO get the most expensive skin care product tomorrow!

As we progress (or at least in the name of progressing), we tend to expect and ask for more in life the materialistic way, and conveniently forget basic values such as courtesy, friends and family values. As we turn more and more desirable items and label them into our necessity list, have we ever wondered, "Are we progressing for the sake of the name of progressing?"

Of course, competition that leads to progress does makes life different the nice way for a lucky few. Perhaps lucky isn't the right word, - the wise few in fact, is. These are the few wise people who treasure success, embrace family relationship and friendship and most of all, appreciate life. Unfortunately, this Indian lady who shouted and yelled over a train seat (for whatever reason, even if she's right initially) is clearly making fun of herself.

But it's indeed an entertaining train ride provided if you're in the mood :)