Mystical crap

There is this one friend of mine spreading a news of a place where he would get a treatment for his diabetic and liver problem. I am not sure how chronic he is (I presume not that life threatening else he would not have the time to spread the news). He referred the place as pusat perubatan traditional – as it is not a recognized hospital or medical center with qualified doctors or medical specialists. The place offers treatment with supernatural medication and numinous surgery to all kind of illnesses. Cost-wise, a treatment is charged at an average of 1 to 2 grand!

I would imagine a place manned by a sick-psycho whose childhood dream was to become a doctor but failed miserably, dressed only in sarong with untrimmed moustache and beard and huge stoned-rings worn at every other finger. Waiting for his prey….ready to con…

Well I don' tknow what to say here …. but personally I’d rather spend that much money getting the right treatment at the right place. I heard there are just too many of these traditional crap centers nowadays (flip Bacaria, centerfold, you’ll see one big ad...and try Mastika too!). Ironically they are all surviving recession-proof up till now. Do these places need to be registered with some ministry or whatever requirements there are?

OK, may be, they are people who actually went there and coincidently recovered thus strengthen their belief in craps they have been prescribed by these centers and off course the most all-time-popular authenticity indicator – when buses of Singaporean thronging the place ..I don’t know why Singaporeans presences at these places justify the genuineness.

I am not totally discounting the genuineness of these sorts of treatment and what wonders they can do (though I truly believe the only traditional way of cure is to go for conventional way of treatment – revert to proper diet and exercise) but there are just too many of these places nowadays... like at every kilometer you go.

Free ride.. no more

Months ago, I registered my interest on-line to one seminar that will be held in KL. It's a 5-day seminar and scheduled in mid May.

The website says crap like “...it is an event that you can not miss.... past seminars were held with great success in Los Angeles, London, Tokyo and Frankfurt…bla bla bla… hear what past participants have to say…it enriches your knowledge in …ba bla bla…"

Yeah right…gimme a break you blood sucking leech profit oriented organizer…all you care is sucking money legitimately from big corporations who do not bothered much about spending money on lunatics who yearn for once in a while be away from their boss or wives. Truth is, nobody wants to sit and listen to something they already knew for 5 straight days if not for the free vacation with food and accommodation that go with it– believe me Mr Organizer! (well…like you care, anyway).

Not that I reaaaalllyyy want to enhance my already rusted brain with this seminar, but the timing of this event coincides with my scheduled trip to KL for some personnel affairs. So it is kinda free flight for me to fly there. I didn’t tell my boss when I made this online registration, until recently when the organizer e-mailed and called me to confirm my participation. So, as a good asswipe employee that I am, I forwarded the email to my boss with a fancy fiction justifying the need for me to attend the seminar. I hope he would read and understand my dire need to enrich myself with additional super knowledge garnered from this seminar, which in turn would be poured down to other poor soles in the company.

That was a week ago, but up till now, no news from boss yet. I kinda wondering what is holding up his decision, (either he bump into my blog and found out my real intention of going or he just don’t feel like letting me go this time).

I know my boss, he’d normally reply to e-mails within seconds he receive them. He is very good at this electronic communication - even if you cough or fart he will reply with an email asking “what’s that?” that’s how fast and efficient he is in replying an email, but not this time…I felt like seeing him personally but again, I detest the situation where I have to orally justify the trip…I guess I am just so spoilt with the marvel of electronic communications.

Whatever it is, I hope he'll reply soon else I have to buy my own ticket. My left hand itch lately…. …*sigh*

Diversification

My brother left the country and moved here last week presumably looking for greener meadow. He’s here taking over the running of a small company owned by this one sheikh. Bro of mine is one heck of a character - the most apparent is his boldness to take risks that are sometime completely avoidable and his bluntness of bludgeoning any damn thing crossing his path. He relented 9-5 job years ago after giving a good punch on his boss face before started his own business.

He was doing fairly ok for the first few years, but suffers badly in recent years, with less and less business secured. I have been observing his progress over the years and feel sorry for him. Though on the surface he seems pretty much independent as compared to me who sometime has to cream boss asses, life is actually shit-tough for his wife and kids… I hope it’ll start changing soon.

The other day I was talking-cock with a colleague about businesses and what actually makes one really succeed. So we, the smart-asses, kinda concluded that one of the thousand principles for success is one ability to fully master the trade he is in, I mean really master it to the extend that if you are into condom manufacturing business, you should not only be acquainted with the very aspect of that rubber such as the elasticity, the grip, the rim, the sensitivity and flavor, the ‘watch-that-pubic-hair-when-rolling-down’ dilemma, but also the market and other external factors that could affect the market. This mastery could only be attained by years and years of doing only that and being only there – yes, we call it specialization!.

In a real business world, specialization provides you with the aptitude to be familiar with the surrounding variables influencing every corner of your business - the complete supply chain that includes market, suppliers, sub suppliers, customers et all. Only with this knowledge gained from specializing that we could sail through various predicaments, adeptly identify the opportunities and the threat, and hence knowing the precise time to strike or to retreat for the business to leap a step forward.

On the other hand, diversification, though it normally associated with an act of business expansion, is actually a risk that could either make or break you. Every business entity envisages to diversify as part of its development – so as to be one big momma conglomerate with seemingly growing turnover and income, but untimely, premature or misdirection to this vision may twirl it the other way around.

Check out big corporations back home who went eagerly on diversifying in unfamiliar playing field only to be backfired a little later with more mismanagement and losses.

I am no couch patato

I don’t really watch TV, beside the fact that TV falls within our little ones territory of control, there is just nothing much to see on TV. Though there are over 800 channels on my cable set to flip, 80% of that comes in languages I don’t speak. Good thing that I am subscribed to Showtime, which avail some 50 channels of an understood language.

When we, me and missus do watch (that’s after the kids sleep), our favorite stations would always be Movies, News and some Arabic music channels. But off late, we experienced a radical shift to our favorites. We are now tuning in to BBC Food channel at every possible opportunity we have. BBC Food is the BBC's international food channel and broadcasts in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. This channel is packed with the best-known chefs showcasing the best food program from around the world.

Watching these great cooks or chef mixing ingredients and turning them into some exotic dishes enthuses me. Everything seems to be so simple (but believe me, it is not as it seems though)! Their finished products are like a masterpiece. My favorite is James Reeson, others that I admire includes Ainsley Harriott, Nigella Lawson, Delia Smith, Jamie Oliver, Antonio Carluccio, Antony Worrall Thompson, Rick Stein, Sophie Grigson, Ken Hom, Madhur Jaffrey and Gary Rhodes.
From my trivial observation, there are these three values that appear to be the common denominators for all these great chefs… swiftness, creativity and presentation skill.

1. 1. Swiftness - they seem to be kicking ass (..amplified by good editing), they are quick in action with ideas come in a flash and almost spontaneous, orders of preparation are well synchronized so one act doesn’t wait for the next, rather some can actually run simultaneous. Not to mention the slicing, cutting, mincing and moving around the kitchen – they all go zas zas zas…done!.
2. Great chefs are creative; they’re practically inventors – crafting something new. You’d never believe the geographical origin of some ingredients thrown in their foods. They must have been scouting around for ideas and inspirations, tasting and trying the whole lot under the sun in their hunt to explore.
3. And most evident, these people are exceptional artist they are so artistic in presenting the food to drool you...

I am hungry....

My all

I am giving my all to my beloved company, wholeheartedly .. ..*wink wink*.

Employees just got a circular announcing few changes and amendment to the company policy. Among others, the one that electrify me is the Car Entitlement for employee of a certain grade and above. Our dear company is generous enough to fork out a free 10% down payment for brand new car purchased up to a certain maximum limit and to increase the monthly transportation allowance by 400%!!...yes thats 400%, you read me right!

I am thinking of selling my Prado and exploiting this perk. The brand new E280 that I just checked out recently fits just fine within the entitlement, without me having to pay a single cent out of my pocket! Yes…I am beginning to fall in love with this company

The Ultimate Secret Revealed

I have just discovered the secret of being an annoying and infuriating asshole from hell.

First, just be your self-centered self, totally pay no heed to others, use only your words (or saliva) to get things moving and expect others to do the grunt works, act like you're ruling the whole universe and the fact that without you the whole universe will fall into pieces and collapse (and not to forget taking up licking boss’ balls for free time hobby). There..you have it!

Credit to one of my fellow colleague here who is generous enough to reveal such a secret indirectly to me (wish you rot in hell!).

Free dinner for some

My mind was soaring and I was about to doze off last night, when I heard some kind of uproar somewhere outside my room. I thought I was dreaming but the noise was getting louder and it appeared coming from our kitchen. Shit…I hate that feeling, you know the shit-scared-but-yet-you-have-to-find-out-what’s-that-all-about kinda feeling. I got out from the bed to find out

Phew…it came from the building just behind our apartment. So I went and opened the window, and there … the restaurant on the ground floor of that building was on blaze. There were like trillions people crowding the place, struggling to put off the fire, dragging hose from nearby building, splashing water and spraying with extinguishers. O'boy..it was a big fire as I could sense the heat from my window. I was thinking about my kids and important document that I need to clutch just in case it spread to our building. Things were fucking chaotic with the hollering and outcry, people were everywhere, some were actually did something and some were mere bystanders. A view from my apartment was like a first class seat, so I kinda saw all in action.

I woke missus up just in case. I was wondering and speculting how long would the Fire Fighting team take to be there. Man, the blaze was flaming higher with more water splashing on it, as if you were spattering gasoline to it. It was quite frightening just to look at how the fire was getting bigger and bigger, dark smoke coming out from the building and shit. Not until half an hour later, the fire squad came and put out the fire for good.

That brings me to ponder about our HSE or all these Fire Evacuation manuals and policy that I bet we all have at our work place. I am sure they're all written perfectly with detailed procedure and process stipulated therein. But in reality, when real shit happens, rarely things are going as per plan. We are all subject to instantaneous reaction to things, despite what we have theoretically learned. That was what actually happened last night. All acts were spontaneous. There were no systematic evacuation process, nobody come to alert other tenants of the building, patrons running outta restaurant in total chaos, people crowding the place instead of assembling at a safer place and all the havoc (that was what I observed from my first class seat).

p/s I'm just wondering how many patrons were actually spontaneously reacting to the incident by just leaving the restaurant with free dinner.

a good smack or two will do the trick

Yesterday missus called from our daughter play-school telling me that our little precious just refused to get into her class, she was pleading her mom with trillions ‘purr..lizzzs’ at every sentence uttered by her to just go home. Missus was a bit upset because our daughter has never acted like this, she was always looking forward to sing, paint and color. I told missus just to take her home, I kinda sense what the dilemma was.

You see there were times when missus was a bit stretched and thus asked me to fetch our daughter from school. So whenever I took her, driving home I’d always posed her with these ‘how-was-school-what-did-you-learn-at-school’ kinda questions, just to keep a conversation. More than once she told me about her friends picking on her – like pulling her hair or hit her. I wasn’t showing a reaction though, but it sure pissed me off!

Ok not that I was irrational or anything but I mean there are adults there that could’ve at least kept an eye on some little devils who like to pick on other kids. I wanted to tell the teacher but thought better of it.

Well, I mean kids are kids (though a smack or two will do the trick!), but teachers there should be more observant of some kids’ mischievous behavior. Being in that profession, they should be very familiar with kids’ sorta tribulations. And they should damn well know that at this tender age, it is very fundamental for the youngs to be appropriately molded. I guess that’s the whole purpose of us parents sending our small ones to this play school - not to learn rocket science and algorithm, but amongst others to acquire the very basic of proper behaviour in development, like socializing so these little brats will not turn into some scumbags that can bring the whole civilization down in the future.

May be I am taking this a little way to hard, but I deem I have a point or two here.

Jamboree

When I was in KL, I was breathlessly juggling my time between getting my things-to-do list done and meeting friends (hey..I need to write this just in case missus read, she knows that her good hubby was not just fooling around in KL). I met few friends over cuppa latte at one of those café/bistro at KLCC, and being there rendered 99 percent chances of meeting more and more friends, so I ended up spending more time hanging there than what I had initially planned.

Anyway, I came to know that there will be another gathering of old boys, and this time it would be a grand one (for unknown reason) and would be held at our old college premises. Well… I sure am gonnal miss this again…

No… the truth is, I never want to go to this limbo jamboree. I don’t know if it’s just me but up till now I’m falling short in comprehending the benefit of turning up. The alumni association is a down right waste of, if not time, money. It is just so bizarre that an association with some influential members in it is going nowhere after all these years. It is a shamble with no clear goal other than getting together and borak borak kosong, hu ha hu ha and repeating stories of old days over and over again. But again, if you think about it, ... what do you expect from a big association with members coming from all level of intellect and mentality….from the extreme ‘keris’ mentality, liberalized pro, lay back ass, childish pathetic yuppy to complete looser - It'll take decades to lay out a simple plan.

I’d love to see an alumni association with a strong networking and clear vision for members to carve up and benefit from it.

I have gone to the website, it was half-baked and outdated.

Policy...my foot

Landed KLIA on time, dashed my way out, swapped my SIM card, and called the guy whom I have earlier made an arrangement for a rental car. Good ol’regular was there waiting. Got in the car and headed to KL. It was raining real heavy, I mean REAL heavy, so traffic was a bitch, it took me close to 2 hours to reach hotel. My intention was to settle down well before the closing of business hour, so I could accomplish my business as much as possible that day, and spare the other day for other errands, before routing back to my hometown. I only had like a thousand things to do.

So I was at the hotel reception, there was this young overly “make-up” lady (resembling Chinese Opera Lady) manning the counter. Told her my name, and yes my room was ready. So this ‘super-slow-motion lady’ asked for my credit card. Gave her the card and 'slow-motionly' she keyed in the details in verifying machine. For some unfuckingknown reasons my credit card was not read well by that stupid machine. Well, I told her that I knew my card was ok, it was just her machined that fucked up. But I needed the room for I have not slept since I left.

Chinese Opera Lady (COL) : Ada card lain tak encik?

Me : Tak de, apa pasal?

COL : Card ni tak boleh pakai la.

Me : Tak ade. But can you just check me through fisrt and later I will go out and withdraw money and put a cash deposit. (I didn't have a local currency, and had earlier asked her whether she could accept foreign currency, I mean the ones that I have, not USD or Pound Sterling, to which she said no)

COL : Tak boleh ini polisi kita, we cannot release the room unless ada deposit. So encik kena keluar kan duit la.

Me : Cik pergi check with your boss dulu.

Come on…the room was reserved via corporate booking, not personnel, and the fact that I have been loyal to the hotel (believe me at one point of my career years, I was putting up at the hotel at least once a week for about two years), I was sure that the system will bear my details, my employer details et al, and yeap....I thought the COL would consult her supervisor and they would say "oh.. this good guy is our regular here and he would not steal RM300 worth of a night stay... heck let him in.... and don't forget to send a bouquet of fruits to his room"

But NO...COL came back with "Ini polisi kita cik….Encik kena keluarkan duit and bagi cash deposit" For crying out loud, was I talking to a machine or a soul with a heart here??? I was so pissed off, I could not fucking believe that young bitch made me walking to the nearest ATM after I told her my pathetic tale of needing a room immeditaly (I was not sure what trouble she'd give to people when she develops into a full grown super bitch later!).

Policy my ass!! Luckily the ATM was just around the corner, I withdrew and paid her the deposit.