Goodbye 2009; Good year, 2010

If you have the time, read the various article in malaysia today, and malaysia insider websites. Lots of the things that had gone wrong in Malaysia (yes, at the moment, only looking at the issues in Malaysia) and the various authors had given good accessments to those issues close to their hearts.

The most serious issue that probably is the basis of all the other wrongs is the issue of corruption and the perception of corruption in Malaysia. Over time, most of us have become immune to, if not subscribing to corruption.

In fact a most recent example is this PhD Muslim convert (no bigot) is not only corrupt. He tries to corrupt fellow Malaysians too with his half-baked thesis. Since this fellow can teach at the University of Defense, I wonder how many Malaysians had been moulded into idiots by this chap. Fortunately we have people like blogger 'Art Harun' who writes really well. You should take a peek at his Open Reply to this bigot.

On why I think 2010 will a good year, at least in the political arena. It is the growing support of the opposition as is cleverly worded in my favourite article for today, The indispensable Opposition by blogger 'masterwordsmith'.

Have a great new year.

Multicultural event

I was at a Buddhist event last week (yes, on an assignment), where I saw this -

Where our government gives lip service about multi-cultural society, 1Malaysia and all those sound bites without any intention to follow through with action, this is one where a private event (Buddhist) involves Indian cultural dance. Nice

This dance precedes the Indian dancers

and of course, we see lots of this action

Another Malaysia Boleh - Gadget to measure 20 litres of petrol

Just heard over the news that foreign vehicles cannot leave Malaysian soil with more than 20 litres of petrol in their fuel tank.

I just wonder how this can be done, and why this requirement of 20 litres.

Maybe, just maybe our government has acquired a technology, biotechnology, that can give exact measurements of petrol remaining in a fuel tank. I do not know of any make or models of cars that have a fuel gauge that gives precise measurements of fuel in the tank.

Or, maybe our custom officers need an indirect bonus.

Or maybe our government just do not want tourists and visitors from neighbouring countries, ie Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia and Brunei.

Let's see if our Tourism Minister has some comments on this. After all, maybe another ministry is trying to make back the money that our Tourism Minister has given to the various foreign ambassadors.
 
Just heard that for Singaporeans, since they cannot leave Singapore with less than 3/4 full tanks, the custom officers will only make sure that they do not fill more than 20 litres at the gas stations. How silly.

Inflation rate in Malaysia vs GDP

A couple of friends sent me this link on the Real financial situation in Malaysia

How true. I read this article in the morning and was just thinking about this subject when the emails came in. The situation will not change in the short term.

Why? Because politicians are definitely NOT in the MIDDLE INCOME group. They are paid a lot of money to serve their constituencies.

Environmental Protection, the Malaysia way

This advertisement in The Star newspaper yesterday caught my attention. Laudable exercise by Sime Darby. But then again, would their money be better spent working on having more of these coloured bins scattered all over Klang Valley?

Anyone who can read Star would be able to see and read the labels attached to the bins as to what is to be thrown into them?

Let's do some calculation. They have four recycling centres. wonder how much each cost. Would definitely be less than the adverts. Probably at RM40k per page?

and if you were to go into their website, you will first see

Help us reduce the amount of garbage disposal by reusing and recycling everyday items such plastic bags, bottles tins and other recyclable materials. You can take part and make a difference by going to the nearest available recycling centres in your area.then you will see

Sime Darby 'Don't Drive to Work Day'



Thank you for your interest in helping us play a part in environmental conservation. However, the participation period for this campaign has ended. Visit the website soon for more exciting campaigns.



interesting....