Poppyfield/Prospekt March

This is the first time I’m writing an entry without drafting it first (straight from the horse mouth)

There is a haunting yet serene song in Coldplay, which is Poppyfields/Prospekt March.

I was working at Bangladesh on 2012 when this struck my mind.

Yeah, orang Bangla datang kerja sini, aku lak pergi gatal join project construction kat sana hahaha.

This EP came out when I was in Dubai in 2008, but that time, I wasn’t into this song yet.

I used take a walk back from my site towards house, when as usual, child beggars came towards me begging.

Kat Dhaka city ada 14 juta orang, yet most are homeless. But in the same time, di Gulshan area where I was working, banglo banyak..and the banglo houses here, kalah orang kat Malaysia.

Rumah besar yang ada 5-6 tingkat with lots of cars inside.

And yet at this street, which big beautiful houses on my left side and my right side, banyak homeless beggars yang tidur tepi jalan just like that.

During my earlier times, aku pun selalu bagi duit sikit kat beggars, but then what happen is, as time passes, the child beggars recognised me and when they notice my presence at the street, they start roaming.

Daripada satu budak, lama2 jadi satu group of beggars datang mintak duit.

We stopped giving money when one of our Malaysian guys got mobbed. Sampai hilang passport mamat tu.
So apa aku selalu buat after the incident ialah jalan straight saja and ignore.

Terpaksa, sebab safety, sebab sekali kau bagi duit, someone will know that you have money and bad things might harbour.

(kalau dah ramai2 kerumun kau, orang sekeliling boleh tahu, ini mesti somebody yang ada duit ni)
Bila dah sampai kat apartment tempat kami tinggal, the security guard will come out and chase away the beggars.

Sometimes I peeked behind, security guard tu did chase them, sometimes with excessive force.

Bayangkan child beggar umur 3-4 tahun, tak berbaju dan tak berselipar, kena pukul dengan cota guard tu.

It was during those walks, when one day, this song came out played kat mp3 player aku.

Satu perempuan miskin tidur tepi jalan, bertilamkan raised concrete floor dengan kain buruk koyak sana sini, dengan debu jalan bertiup dan masa tu musim sejuk, dia tengah baring peluk baby dia yang tengah menangis.
hati aku tersentuh bila chris martin menyanyi “here i lie, on my own on a separate sky”.

Aku teringat satu dialog, tak pasti cerita jepun/anime/korea/chinese ke apa, di mana satu awek dan satu balak yang duduk berjauhan, balak nyer bagitahu awek dia “hey awak tengok lah langit, sebab saya sedang tengok langit yang sama”.

Bullshit.

Aku pasti view langit aku tak sama dengan view langit mereka yang miskin itu.


Prospekt March/Poppyfield

……….Don’t you wish that life could be as simple,
As fish swimming round in a barrel.
When you’ve got the gun?

Oh and I’ll run
Here it comes
We’re just two little figures in a soup bowl
Trying to get some kinda control
When I wasn’t one
Chorus:-

Here I lie
On my own in a separate sky
Here I lie
On my own in a separate sky
I don’t want to die
On my own, here, tonight
Here I lie
On my own in a separate sky

Matthew Effect

Matthew Effect, sindrom Holden Caulfield dan kehidupan

I will write in Malay for this entry.

Sebelum aku mula menulis, aku seorang Muslim, dan tulisan ini bukan lah kerana popularise agama Christian/Masihi di kalangan Muslim.

(Di Timur Tengah, pengikut ajaran Jesus memanggil kaum mereka sebagai Masihiyun (ini bahasa Arab ni), bukan christiniyun, kita perlu tahu agama kristian di malaysia ini mengikut acuan pengajian di Europe, bukan directly dari Timur Tengah, walaupun Isa Al Masih itu sendiri lahir di Bethlehem, dan ajaran kristian di Timur Tengah ada difference berbanding ajaran Kristian melalui Europe, tapi ini semua scholar discussion in Christian theology).

Aku suka membaca tentang sociology (walaupun aku bidang mekanikal sebenarnya), dan apa yang aku tulis ini adalag mengikut acuan akademik tentang bidang sociology.

Ada sesuatu konsep dalam kehidupan ini yang dipanggil Matthew Effect.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_effect

Kepda yang malas bukak link tu, Matthew Effect ni adalah fenomena di mana yang kaya bertambah kaya, dan yang miskin bertambah miskin.

Robert K. Merton yang mula mula menulis pasal Matthew Effect ni pada 1968 dalam paper dia “The Matthew Effect in Science”.

Basically, Merton nak explain kenapa orang yang ada berprestij lebih mudah gain recognition dalam kajian science berbanding junior scientist yang baru nak up dalam bidang ni.

Atau seperti Merton quote dalam Bible surah Matthew,
For unto every one that hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance: but from him that hath not, shall be taken even that which he hath - Matthew 25:29, King James Version.

Maksud senang nya, kepada siapa yang diberi, dia akan dapat lebih lagi, tapi pada siapa yang tak dapat, even apa yang dia ada pun dia akan kehilangan.

Ok, aku tak mahu bincang dari segi agama tentang ini, mari kita lihat dari segi sociology.

It can be said that, one yang ada talent, kekayaan, atau apa sahaja kelebihan dalam bidang tertentu , kita boleh katakan dia akan ada cumulative advantage dalam bidang tersebut and will likely to gain more in that field.

Ini adalah sesuatu yang senang nak difahami.

Tapi macam mana pulak tentang part “but from him that hath not, shall be taken even that which he hath”? (hath = have) .

Untuk nak faham point ini, kita boleh tengok kajian dari Keith Stanovich dalam satu paper dia yang publish pada 1990.

Stanovich mengkaji tentang bagaimana seseorang manusia belajar membaca.

Apa yang Stanovich found out dalam researchnya ialah, kalau seorang budak itu berjaya mendapat skill membaca pada usia muda, ia akan memudahkan budak tersebut untuk acquire skill skill lain seperti mengira, berfikir secara kritis, dan lebih senang untuk dia untuk upgrade skill membaca dia melalui mengenali perkataan baru (upgrade vocabulary dia), yang mana selari dengan pertumbuhan fizikal budak tersebut.

Tapi yang uniknya, kalau budak tersebut gagal untuk acquire skill reading dia sebelum usia tiga atau empat tahun persekolahan, dia akan sukar nak acquire skill skill lain sebagaimana budak yang dapat skill membaca tu.

Senang cerita, kalau ikut environment di sekolah rendah Malaysia, kalau budak tu masih belum boleh membaca bila dah sampai darjah tiga atau darjah empat, budak ni akan mula mengalami problem.

Problem yang Stanovich jumpa itu ialah akan ada gap between budak tak boleh baca dengan budak boleh membaca apabila dah sampai darjah tiga atau darjah empat.

Dengan sebab ada gap ini, ini menyebabkan budak tak boleh baca lagi malas nak membaca, yang menyebabkan mereka lebih kurang membaca dan jurang antara budak boleh baca dan budak tak boleh baca akan menjadi lebih besar.

Dan bila jurang itu lebih besar, budak tak boleh baca ni akan menghadapi masalah untuk belajar subjek2 lain, dan mereka in the end akan drop out of school pada usia muda.

“This is because children who fall behind in reading would read less, increasing the gap between them and their peers. Later, when students need to “read to learn” (where before they were learning to read), their reading difficulty creates difficulty in most other subjects. In this way they fall further and further behind in school, dropping out at a much higher rate than their peers.” - Stanovich, 1990

Dengan kita faham kajian Stanovich ini maka kita boleh faham menyeluruh tentang Matthew Effect ni.

Matthew Effect ni boleh dijumpa dalam situasi ekonomi (yang kaya dan ber economic advantage akan lebih cenderung untuk acquire kekayaan berbanding mereka yang hidup susah), dan macam macam lagi.

Ya, aku juga ada terfikir pasal NEP, tapi aku belum cukup ilmu untuk bincangkan itu lebih mendalam, Malay Dilemma Mahathir memang pick up idea ini pun dalam nak cerita gap antara Chinese and Malay. Dan sekarang pilihanraya, so tak perlu nak bincang benda ni yang akan jadi bullet untuk satu pihak tembak pihak lain.

Sebenar benarnya aku menulis pasal Matthew Effect ni setelah aku mendengar seorang yang aku kenali, nak mengambil Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia pada tahun ini.

Cuma, umur dia pada tahun ini ialah 27 tahun.

Aku sendiri, setiap kali diajukan soalan tentang beliau, aku rasa susah nak jawab.

Sebab dia zaman mudanya adalah seorang school refusal. Bukan kerana tekanan ekonomi, tapi sebab main main masa mudanya.
Selepas SPM, dia on off bekerja (sebagai security guard), tapi nasib dia baik, kebetulan dia dalam family berada yang mana ibunya tak lokek bagi wang.

Aku rasa kesedaran dia datang setelah dia minat seorang gadis pada 2 tahun lepas namun sebab dia tidak berpelajaran (sebab school refusal/ponteng sekolah), dan tidak bekerja, jadi pinangan dia ditolak gadis tersebut.

Apabila aku fikir2 tentang Matthew Effect ni, aku mula sedari, yang menjadikan gap ruang antara kaya dan miskin, pandai dan kurang pandai, dan apa saja, adalah sindrom Holden Caulfield.

Sesiapa yang pernah baca Catcher In The Rye, mesti tahu tentang Holden Caulfield. Dia adalah watak protagonist dalam novel ni (Protagonist = watak utama)

maksud sindrom Holden Caulfield ini apa yang aku faham dari apa yang Mr. Antollini (cikgu English dia) nak sampaikan pada Caulfield.

“This fall I think you’re riding for — it’s a special kind of fall, a horrible kind. The man falling isn’t permitted to feel or hear himself hit bottom. He just keeps falling and falling. The whole arrangement’s designed for men who, at some time or other in their lives, were looking for something their own environment couldn’t supply them with. Or they thought their own environment couldn’t supply them with. So they gave up looking.” - Mr. Antollini, Catcher in the rye , 1951

Bila kita gagal buat sesuatu dan selalu gagal dalam percubaan itu, akan timbul lah perasaan losing out.

Tapi kecilakaan itu akan bermula bila give up. Dalam bahasa utara ialah “lantak pi lah!”

Bila stop tu, akan ada ruang besar antara kau dengan mereka yang tak give up.

Dan kau akan susah balik nak start sebab  ruang tu terlalu besar untuk dirapatkan.

Cuma, aku rasa rasa ada satu ubat untuk Matthew Effect/sindrom Holden caulfield ini.

Ubat itu ialah sifat membenci kelemahan. Sifat yang ada dalam kiasu person. Hahaha.

Aku terbaca tentang ucapan yang dibuat General Patton waktu Perang Dunia Kedua.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_S._Patton%27s_speech_to_the_Third_Army

“No bastard ever won a war by dying for his country. You won it by making the other poor dumb bastard die for his country” - George S. Patton, 1942

“Men, all this stuff you hear about America not wanting to fight, wanting to stay out of the war, is a lot of bullshit. Americans love to fight. All real Americans love the sting and clash of battle. When you were kids, you all admired the champion marble shooter, the fastest runner, the big-league ball players and the toughest boxers. Americans love a winner and will not tolerate a loser. Americans play to win all the time. That’s why Americans have never lost and will never lose a war. The very thought of losing is hateful to Americans. Battle is the most significant competitions in which a man can indulge. It brings out all that is best and it removes all that is base”. - George S. Patton, 1942

Kalau cerita balik pasal NEP, aku cuma rasa gap antara Melayu dengan Chinese dari segi ekonomi is more in the mind, it is because Malays are more melancholic about losing, while Chinese hated losing at all.

Aku teringat arwah ayah aku pernah buat joke, the real punca kekalahan Melaka di tangan Portugis ialah kerana masa nak start perang, orang Melayu memulakan perang tu dengan menghunuskan keris sambil berpantun dua kerat dahulu, yang mana Portugis menjawab pantun tersebut dengan bedilan meriam.

When you meet a master swordsman, show him your sword. When you meet a man who is not a poet, do not show him your poem - Lin Chi

http://www.sciencemag.org/content/159/3810/56.abstract
http://www.uri.edu/advance/files/pdf/matthewii.pdf
http://www.google.com.my/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=robert+k+merton+matthew+effect&source=web&cd=8&cad=rja&ved=0CFMQFjAH&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.gwu.edu%2F~uscs%2Fdocs%2FSlides_Matthew%2520Effect_YPrytula.ppt&ei=eX5tUaXnJsqOrgeev4DYBw&usg=AFQjCNG25H7fg0Iaeq0N9O5YSNt10NYAjQ&bvm=bv.45175338,d.bmk

Hear nothing, see nothing, say nothing

22. 

     

     “Is it ‘cause we like to hear the sound of our voice?” - Napalm Death, from the song Diatribes, album Diatribes (1995)
    
    Yes.
    We do like to hear ourselves talking.
    
    When we talk,the sound resonates through the bones, sinuses, cartillage, flesh to directly vibrate your inner ear.
    
    In the same time the sound travels through the air directly to your ear, and the two sources shall be deciopheDua sumber bunyi tu akan di-decipher oleh otak.
    
    http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2010/12/08/auditory/
    http://psychcentral.com/news/2010/12/21/brains-volume-control-system-helps-us-hear-ourselves-talk/22006.html
    
    ————————————————————————————————-
    
    And what makes it interesting is,
    bila kita berborak,
    ada dua activity yg going on which is talking itself and “passive” listening of what we talk…
    
    the brain is wired as such that the passive listening akan jadi “verb checker” untuk pastikan what we say is actually what we meant to say.
    
    tambah2 bila berborak hal politik, bola atau benda teknikal.
    otak terpaksa work lebih.
    otak kena pikir betul2 apa yang nak dicakap.
    otak kena produce words to express apa yg nak dicakap
    otak kena listen back to check apa yg di cakap tu sama dengan apa yang nak diexpress.
    
    that is the reason why mereka yg berborak ni akan rasa hebat dengan diri sendiri sebab memang multitasking dan rasa skillful.
    hebat hebat si abang borak.
    
    —————————————————————————
    
    and by then certain psychological elements will also influence how we hear ourselves.
    
    Untuk faham bagaimana psychological element sangat2 effect how we decipher the sounds, look at a phenomenon called McGurk effect.
    
    Cerita mudah begini, pada tahun 1976, Harry McGurk dan John MacDonald buat kajian macam mana infants boleh belajar bahasa ibu bapa.
    
    So dia mainkan satu video yang tunjukkan visual gerak mulut (lip movement) dengan bunyi audio percakapan mulut, and they want to study the infants reaction.
    
    Tiba2, technician terbuat silap, visual gerak mulut tak telly ngan audio bunyi mulut.
    
    What happens is as quoted below:
    
    “the syllable /ba-ba/ is spoken over the lip movements of /ga-ga/, and the perception is of /da-da/”
    
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGurk_effect
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychoacoustics
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auditory_illusion
    
    ————————————————————————————-
    
    jadi, your speech = music to your ears, noise to others.
    
    Sekarang,
    apa jadi kalau semua orang bercakap dalam satu masa.
    
    Yes, noise akan banyak…
    
    apa akan jadi bila semua orang mahu bercakap dalam wave of noise itu?
    
    Something called Lombard effect/Lombard reflex will happen.
    
    Lombard effect/Lombard reflex = the involuntary tendency of speakers to increase their vocal effort when speaking in loud
    
    noise to enhance the audibility of their voice.
    
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lombard_effect
    
    Didapati burung di bandar bercicit dengan frekuensi yang lebih tinggi berbanding dengan spesis sama di luar bandar, sebab nak
    
    overcome bunyi bising bandar.
    
    Aku ada sepupu sepupu perempuan yang lahir kampung,
    nak kata dorang ni sopan santun,
    ceh! aku pernah tengok dorang ni panjat pokok dan style gurau2 kasar.
    Tapi bila bercakap..halus je bebudak ni cakap.
    Bising2 pun x de la tahap memekak.
    
    perempuan yang lahir di bandar? (urban girl)
    perempuan di bandar..waktu kecil, mereka tend to campur group2 sendiri dan gurau2 ala sentimental (contoh : eh kau ni kan tak baik macam tu..bla bla)
    tapi bila berkumpul, boleh dengar suara masing2 kuat, bagaikan ada persidangan agung.
    
    Bukan sebab tak de adab, tapi ini adalah disebabkan Lombard effect.
    
    ————————————————————————-
    
    
    Habis tu, macam mana kita masih lagi boleh berborak dalam bunyi bising bila semua orang bercakap?
    
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocktail_party_effect
    
    In a way, otak kita boleh filter other noises and tune-in to apa yang kita nak fokus untuk dengar.
    
    The choice is yours.
    
    Dalam dunia construction, ramai orang suka mencarut pasal mencarut tu lah yang hari2 mereka dengar.
    lama2 jadi tabiat.
    Contoh, apabila pressure dan masalah meruntun, ramai akan cakap “b_b_!!”
    Seorang kawan aku, apabila pressure dan masalah meruntun, instead of four letter word, dia akan sebut “kambing!”
    
    “Ahhh kambing betul la pc ni..time ni plak dia nak hang…”
    
    Dalam construction, dia sorang sahaja yang aku tahu cakap begini time tension.
    
    Practice makes perfect.
    ——————————————————————————-
    
    Now, dalam Analects (yang ditulis Kung Fu Tze / Confucious)
    “Few are those who are filial toward their parents and maintain a proper attitude of respect toward their elder brothers, and yet are inclined to oppose their superiors. Never has anyone been inclined to cause civil disorder who is not first inclined to oppose their superiors”.
    
    dari sini aku summarise, orang yang tak dengar cakap ibu bapa dia, mustahil dia akan ikut cakap siapa2 dalam dunia ni.
    Ini adalah one of truth yang dapat aku saksikan dalam hidup.
    kalau seseorang itu tak mahu dengar cakap ibu bapa dia,
    kau expect dia boleh dengar cakap guru dia?
    adakah kau expect dia boleh dengar cakap superior dia?
    adakah kau expect dia boleh dengar cakap majikan dia?
    
    mungkin boleh, tapi sukar.
    mungkin dapat, tapi kurang ajar.
    
    kebanyakan orang kurang ajar ialah orang yang ada “masalah pendengaran”.
    
    ————————————————————————————-
    
    Antara buku yang aku suka baca ialah “What They Don’t Teach You at Harvard Business School” by Mark H. McCormack.
    Buku ni semua pasal common sense yg perlu ada untuk bekerja.
    Page 112 to 116 adalah dedicated untuk cara2 gunakan silence utk achieve target.
    
    “The tactical use of silence serves two purposes. It either lets the other person talk, or forces the other person to talk”
    
    1. Make The Other Guy Talk - diam saja, bagi kawan tu bercakap..dan kalau kau diam, lagi dia bercakap pasal dia cemas tengok kau diam.
    
    2. Get information by not asking - cakap sikit lepas tu buat muka pokerface abis. org akan sangka kau tak faham dan start elaborate. indirectly kau force him to elaborate.
    
    3. Bite your tongue - walaupun ada benda nak cakap, tapi kau tahan daripada nak cakap. first advantage ialah kau more collected in your mind. Second advantage, takut kau cakap lebih dari perlu.
    
    4. pregnant pause - kau cakap point kau lepas tu kau diam. tak payah reinstate case kau. masa ni kau main poker-minda ngan kawan tu. siapa cakap dulu kalah. basically the listener akan pikir betul2 apa yang dia nak reply kau dan lebih berjaga2.
    
    5. Once you’ve sold, shut up. - da abis cakap, blah! kalau kau push lagi point, satu kau bodoh, dua kau buat orang suspicious.
    
    All in all,
    Listen, listen well and enjoy the silence.
    

Conditioned fools always pay

Saturday on the last week of 2012, on a cool morning dusk, right after subuh prayer and writing the previous post, i received an email as per below.

“xD saya pon menyampah kat kamu :p cmne?
hee…apa pon take care..mmg tak berjodoh kta ni..asik stress je..bahaha :D tatata~”

with mood being spoiled, i replied something like below to her.

“oh thanks for the email. u really have a talent!..u do have a talent to make people feel like dirt! congratulations!”

then i continued back to sleep.
life’s like that, don’t bother so much.

on the next coming monday, i had to go to my previous employer’s office to settle “issues” regarding the previous project, so i had to make my mind sharp and focus on this issue.

in the same time, i need to take a stance, be serious and “cold-minded”
as to be firm on the reason why i resign the company and the project i was involved with.

Hence the cold reply for the email.

—————————————————————————————————

i ain’t the type who listens to radio.
Dear God blessed me by making me born to a sweet mother whom bought me a walkman after i got 4A for UPSR (mine taken during 1994).

Ever since, with pocket money (which quite a lot compared to food costs during those years), i managed to buy cassette tapes.

My 1st album was Duran Duran The Wedding Album.
Somehow by the introduction of Offspring - Smash in 1995, I’m more towards “speed music”.
Bought metallica -ride the lightning (1st metal album I bought)…hooked on to this kind of noisy stuff ever since.

After resigning from an oversea job last December 2012, i’m blessed again with a Kancil car. Hahhaha. Quite ok for a first car.

Having a car meant you got to listen to the goddam radio, because you cannot plug in to a mp3 player
(used to plug in to mp3 player while riding motorcycle hehe).

been listening to this TraxxFM from last december, reason being the first programme i listen was Altern Nation.

last monday there was programme UK Top 40..and suddenly they played Robbie Williams “Candy”.

Never bothered about music from Robbie Williams….until the moment i parked my car at Kajang’s Caltech station, when Candy was being played.

—————————————————————————————

I took the business of courting ladies quite seriously by the time i worked my first job in Dubai.
Before that I don’t think much about this despite having quite a number of crushes in university.

Money builds confidence.

But the bloody thing is, I’ve been failing ever since. Guess I ain’t talented for this kind of thing.

There was a time where I was attracted to a sweet Filipino lady in Dubai.
She was a secretary. It was love at first sight…but hush! I think it’s more like being attracted to a very attractive girl.

My seniors gave the approval for me to court that girl.

So what we did, was arranging a lunch at a seafood restaurant.

In order to ask her to come, we gotta ask the other lady staff to come along.
The filipino ladies there were quite happy to join. (there were quite a number of them..i do not remember the exact figure..was about 4-5 ladies if i ain’t mistaken).

She (the target being pursued) agreed to join. How happy I was.

What happened then was really dumbfounding.

By 12 afternoon, everybody, my seniors and I, including the filipino ladies was already in the van to go to the seafood restaurant.

but the cute girl was not in the van.

where is she?

the filipino ladies explained that roselle (the name of the cutiepie) bought along her lunch to office that day, so she couldn’t come.

we proceed to the restaurant, and the filipino ladies ordered LOTS of EXPENSIVE meals for the lunch.

I remembered paying quite a lot, with my seniors offering to split the bill, but I said nevermind, don’t bother.

Stupid Bloody stupid. (like in Sabbath Bloody Sabbath - Black Sabbath)

——————————————————————————————

There’s one theory of mine which I made up from experience of this.

A stupid do what a stupid does.

nevermind if the saying above is stupid..it’s my stupid words after all.

From 2006 to 2012 I did stupid things in the name of love and messed up.
Never got any return.

In Bahasa Melayu it is called “cilaka”. hhahaa.

There was also one time where I asked a girl working in the office to go out for a date as the next week I was going out for an oversea job.

As usual, I asked the friends in the office for advice.

They said “don’t do it, Firdaus, kitorang tak sampai hati tengok”

But then, a stupid do what a stupid does.

By the time I called her name, she basically run frantically to floor above then proceed to go to toilet.

yes. she ran. she didn’t walk.

Stupid bloody stupid.

———————————————————————————————

I was lucky to get a full settlement with my previous employer last Monday.
The discussion was good, I even shook the hand of my employer with a smile.

Then on Tuesday, I proceed to get a copy of Robbie Williams - Candy.

Watched the youtube video also.

I’m basically in deep thoughts when I heard the part “What are you doing it for?”

———————————————————————————————

The fault of my failure lies in the attitude of overeagerness.
In Malay we call it “ber ia ia sangat”.
For a guy, it’s looks more cool in not saying anything and delve in silence rather than saying things which make you look stupid.

You gotta remember, being nice doesn’t make one attractive.

How many times have we heard and seen bad guys gets the nice ladies?
Quite a number of times right?

Once, there’s a lady whom one day upon leaving the office, suddenly being nice to me.
She had a freak controlling boyfriend.
She lied to her boyfriend that there was no malay males in the office, for fear of her boyfriend jealousy.
Something like, her boyfriend gave her permission to work in our office because there were no malay males.

baru boyfriend, belum kawin pun.

Anyway, during her last day, she said something which dumbfounded me ever since.

“aku suka kat somebody tu..dia baik..tapi tak boleh la dengan dia..sebab dia baik sangat..”

Hah?
There,being nice doesn’t make one attractive.

————————————————————————————-

When I said being nice doesn’t make one attractive, no, i’m not propagating the agenda that guys should be jerks to get girls.

Nope.

I think that whatever you do, you must do what you SHOULD do.

Don’t do things because of being nice.

Do things because you should and required to do it.

Same like the 5 times daily prayer.
Now, we do it because we should and required to do it.

After doing it perfect on a number of occasion, then only the khusyuk, the sweetness, the sakinah will come.

But the first time carrying out the prayer, honestly, it’s not on the pretense of being nice.(kita sembahyang pasal kita nak jadi baik, itu agak bullshit)

It’s because it is something required to do.

If not you’ll end up asking “why the hell i’m being nice but those jerks/bitches did that nasty thing to me, bla bla bla”.

Not only religion-wise.

The idea of being gentleman also is like that.

Being a gentleman looks cool if it is carried out on the pretense “it is required to behave like this, etc.” rather than the pretense of being nice.

———————————————————————————-

Second thing to overcome eagerness is to comply to rules of reciprocity.

Now, reciprocity is actual law of nature. Remember Newton’s 3rd law?

When talking of reciprocity, i’m more inclined towards Taoism view.

(Islam pun ada benda ni ok, it’s the same idea/thing basically,
taoism tu delve in detail when comes talking about harmony in nature,
for me after reading taoism aku macam mula faham pasal qada qadar
and stuff of nature ok? so Muslim readers please do not look it
in negative way, the more u read the clearer u should be in life)

To simplify things, there’s one kungfu movie called Tai Chi Master which starred Jet Li as the hero.

By the middle of the movie, hero Jet Li then becomes insane after losing his friends in battle.

Then he found the kungfu, the scene where he push the ball into a pot of water,
then the ball bounce back…as per youtube link below.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDZqkJQADLU

 (push to 1:08 minutes, the scene when Jet Li found the reciprocity law in nature)

The idea is to act according to reciprocation.

In love/courting girls, u first do something to the girl. (intro or something)
Then wait for her reaction.
Then act according to the reaction, never more and never less.
In the same time, the action being carried out is on the pretense of a gentleman,
that is because the thing need to be done as it is..
not because u want to be nice or look nice to her.

The first benefit of doing like that is you maintain your self respect and self integrity.

You ain’t sure that lady will be your wife yet, or if she will at later times, then at least
you can maintain certain degree of respect.

The second benefit is if things do not work out, at least you can say to yourself, “well at least
i did what a gentleman should…don’t matter if the lady appreciate or not”.

To go beyond that will make one suffer.

With war happening all over world, and with palestinians suffered from phosphorus burns,
everybody knows that nobody wants to suffer for any reason whatsoever.

Chivalry?

Chivalry was practiced during the dark ages.
By Industrial Revolution times, man were smart enough to know that gentleman is all that is required.

————————————————————————————————————————————

Then one will ask, if the lady did something nasty to me, should i do something nasty back to her?

well it depends.

Act wisely and do what is logical to do at that time.

If you need to be nasty, then make it simple and don’t overdo it.
Don’t lose self respect.

People come and go, but your mind will be with you until you die..and until kiamat i think.
So respect it.

————————————————————————————————————————————

I’ll end this web log for today with below’s lyrics from the band Brutal Truth.

      Bite The Hand - Brutal truth, from album Need to control
    
     
      Point down on me
      As if you seek
      Look to yourself
      Think for yourself
      For what’s to be
      Will always be
      Why can’t you see
      Life creates its own decision

      Why point at me?
      Just say what you got to say
      Judging your actions
      Conditioned fools will always… pay

Yes, conditioned fools will always pay. Remember that.

Maths

I cannot do'th without counters - Clown, The Winter's Tale, Shakespeare

Edmund Landau tulis satu buku Grundlagen der Analysis in 1930, and the book
was translated to English in 1950 as Foundations in Analysis.

Dalam buku ni, dia buat dua preface yang berbeza untuk cikgu dan untuk student.

Preface Untuk Student:-

1. Please don’t read preface for the teacher

2. I will ask of you only the ability to read English and to think logically -
ni high school mathematics and certainly no higher mathematics.

3. Please forget everything you learned in school; for you haven’t learned it.

4. The multiplication table will not occur in the book, not even the theorem 2 x 2 = 4.

but I would recommend, as an exercise, that you define

2 =1+1

4 = (((1+1) + 1) + 1) +1 and then prove the theorem.



Preface untuk teachers:-

I hope that I have written this book in such a way that a normal student can read it in two days.

And then (since he already knows the formal rules from school), he may forget its content.

————————————————————————————————————

Biron : By yea and nay, sir, that I swore in jest. What is the end of study? let me know.

King : Why, that to know which else we should not know.

Biron : things hid and barred, you mean from common sense?

King : Ay, that is study’s god-like recompense.

Shakespeare - Love’s Labour’s Lost, Scene : Navarre.


———————————————————————————————————-

I thought of writing about the ideas of maths raised by pikir kool, sekali da sampai keluar Al Hujurat ayat 11, i guess something is wrong somewhere.

macam ni je la.

Let R be set of all sets of math knowledge.

R = {logic, finite state machine, mental calculation techniques, etc..}

so when it was written “tapi matematik ni bukan limited to kaedah…semata-mata”, then it meant that logic is subset of R and not the only set in R.

sebab if i insist logic is the only set in R, then it will defy the meaning of R which is to be set of all sets in math knowledge.

akan create something called Russell’s paradox there.

so tak perlu cakap pasal logic tu Maths semata2…aku da tulis “matematik ni bukan limited to kaedah..”

————————————————————————————————————-

Man usually counts, then calculates.

Apa beza counting dengan calculating?

Best explain in the fiction below.

Imagine zaman dahulu (5000 years before, hahaha)…where a village which prospers from cultivation tiba-tiba dikepung barbaric tribes yang nak plunder kampung tu.

King : Oh penduduk2, apa kah gerangan nya semua ini?

Penduduk : Kampung kita dikepung segerombolan penjahat, Tuanku.

Note that the word Gerombolan…it is to say a group of bandits..or a set of bandits is attacking.

I say that the act of counting has taken place, in the sense that mentally, the bandits are “grouped” into one set.

One set of things.
Satu bakul durian musang (actually kita tak tahu exactly brapa biji, we just group it into one bakul)
Satu cawan kopi.

english grammar ada separate measurable and immeasurable adjectives. This shows the concept of counting in English mindset.

(Note also Meleis are quite alike the serfs during zaman Gelap Europe, since they called their kings as Tuanku which literally means  my master, or my lord)

ok sambung citer kampung yang nak kena serang. Boleh dengar lagu Queensryche -Before The Storm untuk feel macam mana perasaan penduduk kampung yang nak diplunder.

King : Menteri, give me an assessment of the situation..

Menteri : Ninja spy kita dah pergi buat scouting Tuanku. (mcm citer naruto la plak)…based on the trails, they came from our southern border.

King : Apa strength of these bandits?

menteri : Ninja spy kita follows the trails, in between the way they notice the cooking pots left behind….lebih kurang ada 50 cooking pots tu. And they got no cavalry.

King : wah satu cooking pot boleh bagi makan 4 orang..eh 200 people je bandit tu…can we defend?

Menteri : No hal la Tuanku, kampung kita ni ada 1000 orang lebih, voluntary army je pun da 300..we take about 1 hour approx. to assemble our troops to fight those pricks!

The overall assessment is what I define as calculate.
To give in-depth meaning and analyse our action based on the counting taken.

Yes, zaman China dulu2,one of the way to assess army strength is by calculating the cooking pots (boleh cari kat Popular buku Romance of Three Kingdom… ni citer best)

—————————————————————————————————

So as history progress, men use counting and calculation as tools.

Sampai la zaman Greeks.

now, the reason aku cerita panjang lebar previously pasal serangan kampung tu semua, is to stress out one point the Greeks had in mind about maths.

That is all calculation should be countable and commensurable.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commensurability_%28mathematics%29
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Countable_set

senang cerita la..semua calculation mesti dapat satu exact number.

exact number as in 1, 2, 3, etc..

dan boleh express as fractions.

1 and a half.
2 suku.
satu per lapan. (kalau dalam construction, orang panggil 1 hon as 1 per lapan inch)

The element of determinism tu mesti ada dalam calculation, the Greeks said.

Then they ran into problems.

—————————————————————————————————

ikut cerita mitos dia, pada 428BC, orang2 Athens ni kena satu wabak.

so diorang pun pergi “sembahyang” ramai2 kat temple dia kat Delios.

temple kat Delios ni second important temple kat Greek la..1st temple kat Delphi.

nak dijadikan cerita, temple kat delios ni bentuk kiub (segiempat on all sides).

Then satu malam, paderi Greek tu bermimpi.

“kalau kau nak wabak ni hilang, kau kena doublekan size altar untuk Apollo”…gitu la mimpi Paderi Greek ni.

maknanya kena besarkan tempat sembahyang twice the volume.

Kalau isipadu temple tu 10 meter cube, kau kena jadikan temple tu sekarang 20 meter kiub, gitula citer senang dia.

so masa nak besarkan temple tu, puak2 paderi ni gi la jumpa Plato nak tanya pasal mimpi ni.

Plato tafsirkan mimpi tu as orang2 Greek ni jangan sibuk2 nak perang dan conquer tempat orang, sibuk-sibuk kan la diri belajar maths dan geometry.

sebab Plato ada gut feeling doubling the cube was not constructible.

Paderi2 tu pun leceh lecehkan Plato, ah pandai2 lak kau nak tafsirkan mimpi.

So what they did is besarkan temple tu.

Cara dia besarkan temple tu ialah, doublekan panjang, doublekan lebar dan doublekan tinggi temple tu.

So of course la kau dah doublekan semua side, mesti kau dapat doublekan volume tu kan?

Nope.

let say original length is s. being a cube, that means height and width is also s.

original volume = s3

sekarang what is the final volume.

Final volume is = 2s X 2s X 2s = 8 s3.

so kalau kau doublekan all sides, u get 8 times of the original volume.

Habis tu, berapa exact panjang, tinggi dan lebar yang kau nak panjangkan in order to get the cube EXACTLY twice the volume?

Tahun 1837, Pierre Wantzel je baru dapat jawapan tu. huhu.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doubling_the_cube
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constructible_number

—————————————————————————————————-

The greeks said all calculation should be countable and commensurable.

In the sense that calculation mesti dapat exact number..atau tak dapat exact number pun..kau mesti dapat summarise dia dalam bentuk fraction.

“Past Greek conceptions dictated that they necessarily must be, for whole numbers represent discrete objects, and a commensurable ratio represents a relation between two collections of discrete objects”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Squaring_the_circle

Apa yang Greeks buat untuk determine Pi ialah dia try bahagikan square tu to many squares, so that diorang boleh jumpa EXACT RATIO untuk nilai Pi.

Antara orang2 yang tak setuju dengan pandangan nombor ni kena discrete dan boleh describes as fractions ialah encik Zeno.

Zeno ni basically he wants to criticise pandangan “determinism” dalam Greeks math.

So that’s why dia buat Zeno paradox.

Zeno Paradox tu…matlamatnya bukan pada paradox main2 atau apa..tapi nak cakap yang

length/distance atau time…tak semestinya boleh di-determine on fractions or absolute value.

Aku stress point “tak semestinya” tu.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeno_paradox

—————————————————————————————————

Then the Greeks mula dapat the glimpse and idea when it comes to determining
square root of 2.

satu hari, Hippasus menggunakan theorem pythagoras untuk segitiga bersudut tegak yang ada equal sides.

then dia nak determine panjang hepotenus segitiga tu.

what happens is described here:-
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irrational_numbers

anyway sad story kat Hippasus, masa dia declare penemuan ni, puak2 Pythagoras tak puas hati lalu campak dia ke laut.

huhu.

anyway
from now onwards mathematicians dah jumpa 2 concept baru.
irrational numbers
and transcedental numbers.

pi tu is a transcedental number.

and that’s why Zeno paradox is taught dalam Maths syllabus as an introduction to irrational numbers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proof_that_%CF%80_is_irrational

———————————————————————————————-

cerita Gauss dengan cikgu sekolah JG Buttner ni agak famous.

what is the sum of 1,2,3….99,100?

Apa dia nampak is 100+1 = 101
99+2 = 101
98+3 = 101 and so on.

ada 50 pairs of number between 1 to 100. and each pair the sum is 101.
so 50 x 101 = 5050.

mental arithmetic la ni.

things is easy if you can see the patterns.

————————————————————————————————-

aku suka maths ni sbb maths ni seriously beautiful.

cuma nak menjumpai beauty of maths ni, all the mathematician ni mostly melalui

jalan yang penuh discipline.

dia ada study route dia semua.

ni bukan cerita mengolok-olokkan ke apa.

aih.

lotfi zadeh tu basically bila dia jumpa fuzzy theory,
he went at great lengths to study it, then he wrote a paper on it and publish it dalam peer review.

Sebab ilmu ni kan ada discipline dia.

bila ikut path dia tu..the world boleh dapat maximum benefit as the idea will be criticised and tested by many.

daripada paper set fuzzy theory, it was expressed at great lengths, ilmu dia berkembang sampai jadi teori fuzzy logic.

Mesin basuh sekarang yang boleh determine berat air, berapa cucian, berapa kali nak rinse semua tu based on fuzzy logic.

aku bukan child prodigy. as i wish i was.

Ini bukan mengolok-olok.

Tapi bila kau tengok non-muslims berlumba2 dalam ilmu dan benefit dia satu dunia dapat, tak kan kau tak rasa sedih?

sedih bila aku tengok satu child prodigy kata dia duk rumah main game x mahu pergi sekolah sebab speed CPU dia ferrari speed orang lain kancil.

sedih bila aku tengok satu prodigy gantung signboard kat diri dia sambil cakap dia adalah ketua saintis dunia.

sebab ke-prodigy-an diorang tu tak boleh di maximise dan dibenefit oleh semua.

kita perlu admit yang kita guna at this present time ialah hasil dari ilmu dan application by non muslims.

Lotfi zadeh tu pun masuk presbyterian school masa sekolah rendah weh.

Sedih, kita sibuk syarah sana sini, “Bacalah dengan Nama Tuhan mu.yang menciptakan.”..lepas tu citer pasal kepentingan ilmu, sejarah ilmu Islam tapi kita tak respect pun dengan ilmu dan discipline ilmu.

Tuhan tempelak orang yang tak buat apa dia cakap dalam Surah As-Saff ayat 1 sampai 4.

Macam mana nak jadi “tersusun rapat seolah2 bangunan kukuh? (bun ya nim mar sus) kalau cakap tak serupa bikin?

————————————————————————————

masa aku 1st kerja dulu, senior aku sound.

“wei kau engineer, tolong respect engineering ni bleh?”

senior aku tu dia x de paper, tapi dia terror dalam kerja sebab dia memang dedicated dalam construction.

aku faham la, of course dia sakit hati bila tengok budak ada degree tapi buat kerja engineering ni main main.

—————————————————————————————————

aku lahir 1982. so basically aku ambik Alam Dan Manusia during skolah rendah.

Alam Dan Manusia ni subject General Knowledge la kiranya.

anyway aku nk cakap pasal 3M.
Sekolah rendah dari darjah 1 sampai darjah 6, basically emphasise dan make sure the students empower 3M ni.
Membaca, Mengira, Menulis.
yes, there are people yg masuk form 1 tak ok lagi 3M ni.

so on what level of “Mengira” is needed before going to high school?

Time aku skolah rendah, syllabus maths is like this:-

standard 1 , the teachers objective is for kids to be able to handle arithmetics of plus and minus in terms of sa and puluh

standard 2 , be able to handle arithmetics of multiplication in terms of sa and puluh.
standard 3 , arithmetics in terms of hundreds.
standard 4 , arithmetics in terms of thousands.
standard 5 , arithmetics in terms of puluh thousands.
standard 6,  arithmetics in terms of hundred thousands to millions.

tapi perlu ke kita nak push bebudak ni buat speed mental arithmetic?

Adakah superior mental arithmetic needed for one to go to high school?

Aku focus kat point “push” tu.

Sebab, mental arithmetics will be an advantage to speeden things up. But merely an advantage.
Bila things speed up, basically easier for you to analysse the problem.
Sebab we need to teach the kids later to be able to “apply” that calculation.

but malaysia tak perlu seorang human-calculator.

Because by Form 1, the kids will taught Euclidean geometry (yang duk belajar sudut2 dan garis parallel tu la).
The emphasis is no longer on arithmetic.
Masa 12 and 24 jam kinda stuff is also taught.
The PMR (masa aku SRP da tukar kepada PMR)..the PMR syllabus..what is the emphasis of PMR syllabus?

Can I say that speed mental arithmetics is similar to teaching kids to write more beautiful?
Semua orang boleh menulis.
Tapi ada yang menulis cantik gila, ada yang menulis hodoh gila.
Tapi terlalu emphasize kan kepada “teknik menulis cantik”..ajar budak pegang pensil at 45 degrees..ada certain kedudukan jari…

The thing is, if the kid is “good enough” in writing and calculating in UPSR, he still have a good chance in PMR.
but the kid yang “excel” dalam writing and calculating in UPSR, not sure yet dia even boleh lulus PMR.

Kau kena faham concept “Matthew effect” to understand this.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_effect_%28education%29

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_effect_%28sociology%29

It’s best to read the book “Outliers” by Malcolm Gladwell to understand this concept.

the thing is mental arithmetic skill is an advantage to increase your chances to understand further topics at later stage.
increase your chance.
bukan 100% probability.

——————————————————————————————————

Something is wrong.
It’s the Malays perception of academic excellence.
Malays should focus on the kids to “think” rather than hafal.

dan academic excellence yang based on “thinking” lebih berguna dari academic excellence yang based on “hafal”.

syllabus tak salah.

all the syllabus in the Malaysian schools semua ada meaning, if you think in depth you will find it.

To be able to kaitkan certain dates with certain accounts, to prove your goddam point on certain issues ialah skill yang akan dapat kalau kau belajar Sejarah dengan betul.

Maths dan Add Maths in SPM is basically a “pengenalan” to the actual mathematical concept.

Same with Physics, Chems and Bio. kau kena pergi university degree level..and then look back baru kau akan faham.

syllabus tak salah.
how you perceive it might be wrong.

Having advanced mental arithmetic skill is like having good IQ.
but having these advantages only increase the chance for later understanding of more difficult complex.

—————————————————————————————-

Lastly, ada story yang aku nak share.

Story ni melibatkan jiran Chinese aku.

Ada satu kali, aku dan ayah tiri jalan2 sekali ternampak jiran ni dengan anak dia.

Pak Tiri : Wah you punya anak tak sekolah ka? Saya selalu nampak waktu pagi?

Jiran : Dia tak berapa pandai baca buku. So I suruh dia tolong2 dekat kedai motor I..boleh tolong2 sikit. kalau dia sudah pandai repair motor, at least dia tahu macam mana mahu cari makan..

Aku rasa kena tahu apa absolutely reason hantar budak pergi sekolah dan belajar.
(ya, selain dari diwajibkan oleh kerajaan la)

Nak berjaya bukan satu cara sahaja.

Tapi lagi satu hal.

Budak melayu kalau tak pergi sekolah, best assured dia memonteng melepak.

Budak Chinese?

Aku antara yang suka baca blog kak di (comatosewithbraindamage)..dia pernah cerita pasal saudara dia di Singapore.

Masa time cuti sekolah, saudara dia (masa tu umur dia 12 tahun) buat kad2 yang kiut lepas tu jual kat orang ramai.

In all, dari case KSD, Adi Putra, anak jiran Cina, ngan kak di ni, aku rasa masyarakat kita masih keliru apa meaning of education and academic.

Entah. Just my point of view.
huhu.

But then,
mcm dalam Ayat 12, Surah Al Hujurat, tak payah lah aku nak sibuk2 sangat cari fault orang lain dan masyarakat.
At least aku nanti kalau da kawin dan ada anak (hahaha mimpi siang!)
Agak2 anak aku tu blur2 dalam belajar ni..aku suh dia wat business ke apa..huhu!

Where is my friend when I need you most?

Where is my friend when I need you most?

(kisah fiksyen based on true story)

This happened sometime during my 4th year in UM, during my stay in 2nd College.

Nope, didn’t graduate, aku mengulang paper, time ni aku join juniors 3rd year amik paper 3rd year…haha.

duduk sana sini, 8th college, 12 college, duduk secara haram dan halal…
somehow being a lucky bastard and having “cables”, aku dapat plak duduk 2nd college time tu.

But God works in mysterious ways, rupanya ada hidden reason kenapa “dapat”.

It was in February/March, 2nd semester, time exam.

This fella, whom is dearest to me.
Entah macam mana, time tu, mamat ni masuk hospital plak.
It was so bloody serious, that during admission, Doctor terus masukkan dia kat ICU Hospital University UM.
Jatuh motor.
But turns out he had an uncontrolled diabetes.
By the time he got admitted, kaki bengkak dia dah mula keluarkan air.
Bukan darah…tapi air.
Bila dia duduk, ada pool of water kat tempat kaki dia.
Air kuning, air urea kencing tu rupanya.
That’s how bad his situation is.

That week bila mamat ni masuk hospital, aku tgh study paper “Heat Transfer”.

The catch is, aku study Heat Transfer ni sambil jaga mamat ni kat spital.
sebab aku duduk 2nd college.
naik motor 1 minit, parking kat 6 college..jalan jalan da sampai wad tu.

Tak susah jaga pun.
Time ni mamat ni macam dah comatose…masih sedar tapi x bercakap banyak like he used to be.

“aaa uuu aaa” sambil buat muka sedih…oh rupanya dia nak mandi.
so aku lap lapkan badan dia.

“aa uu aaa” sambil buat muka sedih (mana ada buat2, time sakit memang la sedih kan?)..oh aku tak tau apa dia nak so aku usap2 kepala dia je.
Should have read body language books that time.

Hari2 kena pergi buat dialisis.
doktor cakap buah pinggang dah fail. so urea tu tak boleh nak dibuang dari badan, so it circulates dalam blood stream. dan kat tempat luka jatuh motor tu, air urea tu keluar kat tempat bloated tu.

Relatives, friends, families came and visit with prayers.
Dan diorang selalu bawak buah.
Mamat tu mana boleh makan da…so aku la kena abiskan.
Tapi aku x berapa makan buah.
So aku pass kat bebudak class yg tgh study time tu.
Insyallah pahala dapat.

Di satu petang yang hening, dekat2 nak maghrib da time tu.
Mamat ni sedar.
Aku terusla dapatkan dia.
Tiba2 dia peluk aku tak lepas.
Dekat 2-3 minit.
memang sayu la hati..tapi sedikit hati kecil aku berkata
“eh busuk gak dia ni”
so lepas sesi berpelukan tu aku lap2 kan dia ngan kain basah.

Then dia tanya aku.
“…Nah, Nah dekat mana?”
Alamak..tanya awek dia la pulak.
Aku cakap la tadi Nah datang da tengok dia..esok dia datang lagi.
Pastu mamat ni pandang muka aku sayu abis.
“ha ha..aku call dia kejap..rilek lu oh”

Aku pun call.
Malam tu awek beliau tak dapat datang, keluar katanya.

Nasib baik, masa time aku datang nak bawa berita tu, mamat ni da tido balik.

Aku pun sambung la study aku kat wad tu menemankan dia.

Study2 sampai dah kul 12 lebih.
Oh tidak.
sebab 2nd college, by 12 midnight, gate da tutup, so motor x boleh masuk.
kena parking kat luar.
kalau parking kat luar, ada bahaya because banyak kes kecurian motor.
Aku pun balik la 2nd college.

Ceh! gate da tutup.
aku pun parking la kat luar.
balik bilik pandang roomate ngan muka selebet pastu tido.

sekali dekat pukul 3-4am, ada call.
Nurse call, cakap mamat da nazak.
aa sudah.
Kira Tuhan ada reason gak bagi aku terbalik lambat.
Nasib baik moto da kat luar.
Aku terus speeding la pergi hospital.

Sampai2 hospital je, Nurse cakap “sorry tapi encik xxxxx da x de, nanti bila da pagi baru adik uruskan ye”
Aku sampai2 je kain putih da tutup muka apa semua.

Time tu perasaan yang sangat blank menghujani diri ku. (ceh sastera la plak)

Ko bayangkan. tadi bercakap2, sekarang da x de.
Tapi yang hairan, aku tak menangis.
Aku macam blank sahaja., blank yang amat.
Basically aku duduk2 je tengok dia yang kini sudah tiada.

Aku lepak2 je tengok sekeliling.
Masa ni kain tirai da tutup area sekeliling katil dan tempat aku duduk.
oh. aku perlu baca2 sikit. baca la al-fatihah dan surah2 apa yg ingat.

sampai kul 5 lebih, baru aku call semua orang.
Basically patutnya ramai Muslim da bangun get ready Sembahyang subuh kan?
alhamdulilah ramai yang angkat call aku.
Aku pun panggil tentera2 seangkatan (member2 la) suh datang.

By 6 am, tentera dari 2nd college dah datang.
bagus2 semangat ini la yang kita mahukan.

Ok climax story nak tiba dah.
dalam time tu jugak, Nah pun datang.
Eh..ada satu lelaki datang dengan Nah.
datang2 tolong kami kemaskan barang..masa tu body mamat da dibawa ke bilik mayat untuk pihak hospital certify kematian dan keluarkan certificate of death
lepas encik itu tolong, tiba2 dia cakap kat Nah.
“Sayang..abang tunggu kat bawah ye”.

terkejut aku.

pas tu aku pun terus ikut body mamat pergi ke bilik mayat dan seterusnya urusan2 lain melibatkan kematian (ah aku malas nak citer detail, nanti2 la kot).

few days after that.
aku dengar lagu Duran2, Ordinary World. (lagu favorite aku dari aku darjah 5).
tapi aku struck dengan phrase
“where is my friend when i need you most”

Bolehkah kau tahu the real truth apabila kau menyayangi seseorang?
Apa bolehkah kau sure, apakah standing of that friend which you needed most, when you are dead and gone?

By this time, aku realised, manusia datang dan pergi.
kau hanya ada exact moment at the present time, untuk appreciate those who are your friends or loved ones.
tapi kau takkan sure whether reciprocated balik.
so just accept it as a part and parcel of life.
senyum sahaja, whether orang nak senyum balik atau apa, itu bukan lagi urusan aku.
no matter how much you persuade others to like or loved you, you’ll never know the real truth till the moment u dies.

sambung lagi sikit.

Ye, bila da exam habis..masa ni plak batch aku ramai akan graduate that year.
aku x dapat nak sama2 diorang haha sebab aku banyak kena repeat huhu.

masa di faculty engineering, ada sesi bergambar.

tentera2 batch aku semua ajak aku bergambar sekali beramai ramai.
i said “no thanks haha” and just walk away.
ada jugak dalam tentera2 ni buat ayat sedih ngan aku..”meh la bergambar sekali..kenangan, bla bla bla”
malas aku.
sebab aku tau diorang ni semua akan blah dan akan kerja, diorang akan buat hal masing2..so dunia mereka akan lain, aku tak akan fit that picture.

batch junior aku pun ajak bergambar.
lagi la aku malas.

so ini la reason kenapa gambar botak aku tak akan muncul dekat mana2 alumni mekanikal UM 2001/2002 or 2002/2003.
hahahahaha.
convocation bebudak ni pun aku tak pergi.

oh ye.
by this time around gak.
ahli tentera aku menginfo aku “eh ada awek ni suka kt ko la mike.”
basically minah tu budak bijak yang akan grad tahun tu..dengar kata beliau biasiswa petronas.
mmmmm…
eh, aku diri sendiri pun tak graduate lagi.
come on.
better aku resolve masalah hidup aku.
so aku cakap “haha mana bleh awek2, aku kan antisosial! ahhaha”

agaknya sebab aku reject tu la aku tak kahwin2 lagi sampai sekarang.
cis!

anyway,
akhirnya by next year, alhamdulilah berjaya gak aku grad ngan result yg ok.
hahaha.

result final exam keluar sometime bulan 4 or 5 (aku tak ingat)
lepas tu job hunting dan alhamdulilah dapat juga job kat satu firm.
ye aku pakai result final exam dan transkrip exam aku saja.

sekali, firm tu nak hantar aku ke dubai by that july.
convocation is sometime around september or october (aku tak ingat)..
dua orang offered untuk pergi ke dubai, aku dan seorang indian graduate UTM Johor.

masa tu GM tanya kami berdua, they need to send us soon, can you guys accept it?, how about your convocation?

aku cakap “oh saya tak pergi convo pun tidak apa, leceh la itu semua bos”
yang member indian aku cakap, dia nak pergi convo.

so GM decide hantar aku dulu, dan tanya aku again pasal convo.
aku cakap convo2 ni leceh, lagipun sijil aku boleh ambil kemudian hari.

finally GM decided hantar aku that july, then bulan october baru hantar that indian.

lepas aku da dekat Dubai sampai December, mamat indian tu tak sampai2.
turns out, kalau aku ikut gak nak gi convo, sampai bila pun aku tak akan sampai dubai pasal by October/November that year, project yang aku involve tu da complete construction phase, tunggu nak commissioning sahaja.
Commissioning pulak terpaksa tunggu power-on approval dari Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA).
Power-on approval pulak turns out be approved the next year (problem ngan power supply for that area of development)

turns out pulak aku ambil sijil aku tu betul2 next year lepas balik malaysia.

god really works in mysterious ways.

aku tak pernah regret tak pergi convo dan tak ada sekeping gambar aku pun di UM.

6 tahun dah berlalu.
macam2 cerita aku dengar pasal bebudak ni.
sailang kawan kat tempat kerja la..kenakan orang la.
ai..
mostly bebudak ni dan tentera2 ni masing2 dah ada life masing2.
kalau berjumpa pun, lepak few hours then they get back to their families and loved ones.
i was correct in not putting too much emotional baggage in my friends.
they are humans too.

The feeling of the above story is the same as per dialogue below between Aomame and Dowager in 1Q84 (Haruki Murakami).

Aomame : “It seems to be comfortable with you”.

Dowager : “This little person thinks of me as a friend”.

Aomame : “Is it possible to become friends with a butterfly….Do you give them names?”

Dowager : “No, I don’t give them names…..And besides there wouldn’t be much point in giving them names; they die so quickly.
These people are your nameless friends for just a little while.’
I come here every day, say hello to the butterflies, and talk things to them.
When the time comes, though, they just quietly go off and disappear.
I’m sure it means they’ve died, but I can never find their bodies.
They don’t leave any trace behind.
It’s as if they’ve been absorbed by the air…..they come out of nowhere, search quietly for a few limited things,
and disappear into nothingness again, perhaps to some other world.”

No wonder arwah JD Salinger becomes a reclusive.
He served in World War 2.
Banding ngan aku, he saw many butterflies..
Not only saw it, perhaps smelled it, touched it and God knows, how mega it he must have felt.

Hear nothing, see nothing, say nothing

“Is it ‘cause we like to hear the sound of our voice?” - Napalm Death, from the song Diatribes, album Diatribes (1995)

Yes.
We do like to hear ourselves talking.

When we talk,the sound resonates through the bones, sinuses, cartillage, flesh to directly vibrate your inner ear.

In the same time the sound travels through the air directly to your ear.

Dua sumber bunyi tu akan di-decipher oleh otak.

http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2010/12/08/auditory/
http://psychcentral.com/news/2010/12/21/brains-volume-control-system-helps-us-hear-ourselves-talk/22006.html

————————————————————————————————-

And what makes it interesting is,
bila kita berborak,
ada dua activity yg going on which is talking itself and “passive” listening of what we talk…

the brain is wired as such that the passive listening akan jadi “verb checker” untuk pastikan what we say is actually what we meant to say.

tambah2 bila berborak hal politik, bola atau benda teknikal.
otak terpaksa work lebih.
otak kena pikir betul2 apa yang nak dicakap.
otak kena produce words to express apa yg nak dicakap
otak kena listen back to check apa yg di cakap tu sama dengan apa yang nak diexpress.

that is the reason why mereka yg berborak ni akan rasa hebat dengan diri sendiri sebab memang multitasking dan rasa skillful.
hebat hebat si abang borak.

—————————————————————————

and by then certain psychological elements will also influence how we hear ourselves.

Untuk faham bagaimana psychological element sangat2 effect how we decipher the sounds, look at a phenomenon called McGurk effect.

Cerita mudah begini, pada tahun 1976, Harry McGurk dan John MacDonald buat kajian macam mana infants boleh belajar bahasa ibu bapa.

So dia mainkan satu video yang tunjukkan visual gerak mulut (lip movement) dengan bunyi audio percakapan mulut, and they want to study the infants reaction.

Tiba2, technician terbuat silap, visual gerak mulut tak telly ngan audio bunyi mulut.

What happens is as quoted below:

“the syllable /ba-ba/ is spoken over the lip movements of /ga-ga/, and the perception is of /da-da/”

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McGurk_effect
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychoacoustics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auditory_illusion

————————————————————————————-

jadi, your speech = music to your ears, noise to others.

Sekarang,
apa jadi kalau semua orang bercakap dalam satu masa.

Yes, noise akan banyak…

apa akan jadi bila semua orang mahu bercakap dalam wave of noise itu?

Something called Lombard effect/Lombard reflex will happen.

Lombard effect/Lombard reflex = the involuntary tendency of speakers to increase their vocal effort when speaking in loud

noise to enhance the audibility of their voice.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lombard_effect

Didapati burung di bandar bercicit dengan frekuensi yang lebih tinggi berbanding dengan spesis sama di luar bandar, sebab nak

overcome bunyi bising bandar.

Aku ada sepupu sepupu perempuan yang lahir kampung,
nak kata dorang ni sopan santun,
ceh! aku pernah tengok dorang ni panjat pokok dan style gurau2 kasar.
Tapi bila bercakap..halus je bebudak ni cakap.
Bising2 pun x de la tahap memekak.

perempuan yang lahir di bandar? (urban girl)
perempuan di bandar..waktu kecil, mereka tend to campur group2 sendiri dan gurau2 ala sentimental (contoh : eh kau ni kan tak baik macam tu..bla bla)
tapi bila berkumpul, boleh dengar suara masing2 kuat, bagaikan ada persidangan agung.

Bukan sebab tak de adab, tapi ini adalah disebabkan Lombard effect.

————————————————————————-


Habis tu, macam mana kita masih lagi boleh berborak dalam bunyi bising bila semua orang bercakap?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cocktail_party_effect

In a way, otak kita boleh filter other noises and tune-in to apa yang kita nak fokus untuk dengar.

The choice is yours.

Dalam dunia construction, ramai orang suka mencarut pasal mencarut tu lah yang hari2 mereka dengar.
lama2 jadi tabiat.
Contoh, apabila pressure dan masalah meruntun, ramai akan cakap “b_b_!!”
Seorang kawan aku, apabila pressure dan masalah meruntun, instead of four letter word, dia akan sebut “kambing!”

“Ahhh kambing betul la pc ni..time ni plak dia nak hang…”

Dalam construction, dia sorang sahaja yang aku tahu cakap begini time tension.

Practice makes perfect.
——————————————————————————-

Now, dalam Analects (yang ditulis Kung Fu Tze / Confucious)
“Few are those who are filial toward their parents and maintain a proper attitude of respect toward their elder brothers, and yet are inclined to oppose their superiors. Never has anyone been inclined to cause civil disorder who is not first inclined to oppose their superiors”.

dari sini aku summarise, orang yang tak dengar cakap ibu bapa dia, mustahil dia akan ikut cakap siapa2 dalam dunia ni.
Ini adalah one of truth yang dapat aku saksikan dalam hidup.
kalau seseorang itu tak mahu dengar cakap ibu bapa dia,
kau expect dia boleh dengar cakap guru dia?
adakah kau expect dia boleh dengar cakap superior dia?
adakah kau expect dia boleh dengar cakap majikan dia?

mungkin boleh, tapi sukar.
mungkin dapat, tapi kurang ajar.

kebanyakan orang kurang ajar ialah orang yang ada “masalah pendengaran”.

————————————————————————————-

Antara buku yang aku suka baca ialah “What They Don’t Teach You at Harvard Business School” by Mark H. McCormack.
Buku ni semua pasal common sense yg perlu ada untuk bekerja.
Page 112 to 116 adalah dedicated untuk cara2 gunakan silence utk achieve target.

“The tactical use of silence serves two purposes. It either lets the other person talk, or forces the other person to talk”

1. Make The Other Guy Talk - diam saja, bagi kawan tu bercakap..dan kalau kau diam, lagi dia bercakap pasal dia cemas tengok kau diam.

2. Get information by not asking - cakap sikit lepas tu buat muka pokerface abis. org akan sangka kau tak faham dan start elaborate. indirectly kau force him to elaborate.

3. Bite your tongue - walaupun ada benda nak cakap, tapi kau tahan daripada nak cakap. first advantage ialah kau more collected in your mind. Second advantage, takut kau cakap lebih dari perlu.

4. pregnant pause - kau cakap point kau lepas tu kau diam. tak payah reinstate case kau. masa ni kau main poker-minda ngan kawan tu. siapa cakap dulu kalah. basically the listener akan pikir betul2 apa yang dia nak reply kau dan lebih berjaga2.

5. Once you’ve sold, shut up. - da abis cakap, blah! kalau kau push lagi point, satu kau bodoh, dua kau buat orang suspicious.

All in all,
Listen, listen well and enjoy the silence.

Short Story - Spinney Supermarket

One of some short stories I’ve written in 2009, after resigning from Dubai job on February 2009.

 As per previous post, (Do U know how many roses does a women need), this was written when i was struck with JD Salinger “Catcher In The Rye”.

SPINNEY SUPERMARKET
————————————————

Firdaus Mike, 29 April 2009

It was lousy in Mirdiff, Dubai as far as I could remember.
It wasn’t too cold, but the sun still wasn’t out, and there didn’t look like there was anything in the Mirdiff Mall except dog crap and globs of spit and cigar butts from old men, and the benches all looked like they’d be wet if you sat down on them. It makes you think too much. It didn’t seem like Christmas was coming soon, or any other holiday this goddam Dubai may have, it didn’t seem like anything was coming.

But I kept walking around the Mirdiff Mall anyway, because that’s where Julia usually goes when she’s having a day off from work.

She likes to sit near the tree, somewhere inside the huge arena of outsideness, where you can see
those big Arabic people walking here and there, with their shopping grocery bag, with plastic labelled ‘Spinney Supermarket’.
Who knows what’s inside the plastic bags of those Arabics? Might be that rice yogurt that Julia and her colourful friends Sophie, Vera and Lemon, and not forgetting xiao-fei loves the most.

When I got there, though, I didn’t see her around anywhere. Not even the girls.

There were a few European guys with their chicks around, sipping coffee at that Coffeeshop where I seem to remember some time me and the big boss around discussing about some goddam tender or something. there were a lot of people, but no Julia.

Even though it was Friday, and Julia might not be here with her colourful friends or anything, and even though it was cold and all lousy out, I walked all the way through the arena over to the Spinney Supermarket. I knew that Supermarket route like a book.

Julia was working with me in the same stuffy office when I was in Dubai, and we used to  go to this Spinney Supermarket all the time. Sometimes, we had this wonderful van driver, the guy which name I have completely loss of memory of, which no short of wonderful characterof he is, i pardon, which would gladly drive us with the company van to the old Spinneys Supermarket near damn all the time.

Sometimes we look at the beautiful and good smell cakes that were placed at the entrance,
With lots of colours, rosemary, pink, and all those rosy stuffy things which girls and kids like on the cakes. Sometimes I would wonder at the cakes that was just being cooked seconds ago. I don’t know, but the aroma itself would have me bleeding to death just to get
the taste out of it.
If it weren’t to save money for the girls on those rice pudding
yes.
The cakes, the breads, in the stuffy straw baskets and stuffs like that. I get very happy
when I think about it. Even now.

Then the girls would be running down the aisle to look out for the rice pudding.
hell, till now, I could never remember what kind of brand of the rice pudding which the girls like.
I only know it’s rice yogurt, but god, look at those million types of yogurts
and puddings, and ice-creams and all those sweet frozen stuff you can think of.
Men might be born as a hunter, but these girls sure can hunt rice pudding better than me. i wonder. Maybe they could just remember the sweet taste as it melts in their mouth whenever they put their finger on each rice yogurts there.

One of the weird thing at Spinney Supermarket is it will always had a lot of candy and gum and all that sweet smell stuff, and the inside of the supermarket had such a nice smell.

It always smell like it’s raining outside, and even if it wasn’t, that you were in the only nice, dry, cosiest place in the entire universe. Might be that Heaven or Paradise would be like this. Might be even better.

Usually the girls will go there first, with me following from behind.
But for most of the time i wandered alone like an alien looking for the lost spacecraft inside the Spinney Supermarket. And most of the time I would be looking at Julia.

I always wanted to hold her hand, but my hand was always sticky or smelly the smell of
cigarettes or maybe just don’t wanna frightened Julia.
I might ask support from Vera and Sophie, and especially Xiao Fei though, after bribing them with those sweet sticky rice yogurt pudding.
But it didn’t happen though, and yet somehow strangely in this frustration, i’m glad it didn’t happen.

I still remember the last night I was in Dubai. My last flight back to Malaysia was 6 pm the next day.
The night before, I had this urgent surge through my blood.
I wanted to see her. I wanted to see Julia’s face.
Be it ever for the last time.
I checked my pocket, and what a disappointment, just a few bucks left.
It was the longest 3 minutes that I ever felt in my life. I wanted to see her,
please, let it be for the last time.
And God was so nice to me, reminded me I had a
spare hard disk in blue corduroy bag.
I phoned Kamel, a Malaysian friend, asking him
for few hundred, and I will spare him my harddisk. And the transaction happens so smooth like a robbery in the bank.

I called Julia, saying I wanted to see her for the last time and all those emotive lovey dovey things.
I called for a taxi and waited for her at the office.

The next thing we knew we were in that park again at Mirdiff Mall. Near the Spinney Supermarket.
I ran over inside the Spinney Supermarket to buy her that rice yogurt.
That last rice yogurt, I’m sure I’ll pay a million bucks if I had to.

And so we walk down the park. We exchange non-sense throughout, watching kids running here and there like mad. The bloody dirty bench seems like the most beautiful chair ever created on this goddam earth.

And then we walk together towards the Spinney Supermarket.
This time, I hold her hand.
She just kept silent about it.

We walk towards the aisle. As we reached the cake section, her phone rang.

She answered in Chinese. Then all of a sudden I feel the most strangest thing I ever felt.

Julia : Firdaus, the boss called. I had to go now.

I didn’t let go of her hand.

Julia : Firdaus, I’m sorry, but I really have to go. The boss is having a company dinner tonight. I have to be there.

I didn’t let go of her hand.

Julia (with icicles from her eyes) : Firdaus, you are my best friend. The best I ever knew.
 I wish you someday that you found the one for you.
 I know you would.
But really I have to go.

My clutches weakenes.
She had her hand let go from my clutches.
Then she put her fingers on her cheeks and place it on mine.

Julia (running) : Goodbye, hope to see you somewhere.
Write to me often will you?

I stood there like an idiot inside that Spinney Supermarket.
In that instant, the smell, the touch, all the five sensors stopped.
Everything stayed right where it was. Nothing moves.
The strangers, the shoppers, the cashiers, the workers,the sweet cakes, the rice yogurts, the sweet smell.
It just stopped.

And as soon as I realised, nothing ever changes.
Really nothing changes. 
The strangers, the shoppers, the cashiers, the workers, nobody was different.
the only thing that was different was me.

Short Story - Do U Know How Many Roses Does a Women Need?

i wrote short stories as a hobby of sort. Started this after reading Catcher In The Rye in 2009 after resigning from the Dubai job.

this short story is something i wrote in 2009. then in 2012, met online a gentleman by the nickname Lucifer (wahyuminda@gmail.com) and gave him this story along with other articles which i gave to him under ‘anonymous’. Decided to publish it in this blog, as I’m writing a short story as well at this present time.

DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY ROSES DOES A WOMEN NEED?                   

Firdaus Mike May 13, 2009

New-rene always spends time in the UM park. She remembers the way to the park, the way in the park and the way out of the park.

She remembers the park like a book.

If she got blindfolded, she could easily went round and round and out of the park, without hitting any trees, stones or obstacles.

 It’s been too long damn years she went to that bloody park.

But this time around, she went to the park with sudden urge in her blood racing her passion.
She miss him. She miss him sorely. She miss his face, that dearest face, that face she ever love for all that she ever cares.

She usually arrive at the park on a slightly late evening.

She often spends the time looking onto her reflection on the water.

It was yesterday she remember one story Zira told her quite long time ago.

Newrene : Hey Zira, what are you reading there?

Zira : Newrene, do you know the story of Narcissus?
      
It was this story of a very beautiful child, Narcissus, who is very beautiful
that everyone sees will feel so tender to him. He was so beautiful and lovely that one day, a timid and shy angel fell in love with him. Her name was Echo. But Narcissus, knowing he had this beautiful look, hurtfully rejected Echo.

Narcissus had played with her affection, so much that Echo prays with her cries,

“oh God, let Narcissus fall in love with another, but unable to gain his loved ones”.

And so one day, Narcissus went to a pond of water, he wanted to quench his thirst, and suddenly fell in love with a shadow of himself. And somehow, he was too astounded by his reflection, not moving nor eating nor drinking for days, that in the end he was dead, sitting down looking at his own beautiful reflection.

Newrene look upon the reflection in the water.
She couldn’t see her reflection.
All she could see is his face.
That dearest face of his.
Those angeleyes.

Icicles melt in her eyes.
Teardrops flows from her eyes down to her cheek.
She missed him sorely.

Her thought flows emotionless to that break-up time.
The same teardrop on the heat of a confession she once had.

Ex-fiance : Please, I have to go. You have to let me go.
She’s waiting for me there.
 I’m sorry but I have to go.

He let go of her hand.
Her hand drops dead and cold.
Under the spell of a break-up, her hand, her teary eyes, her heart all drop dead and cold.

She shouldn’t have look deep into those angeleyes of his.
Her heart drop dead and cold looking at those beautiful reflection of yesterdays.
Sometime she wishes she could drown there, like old poor Narcissus.

Everybody in the goddam Department notices Newrene’s eerie behaviour of walking around the park after work,
ever since she came back from her Masters study in Australia.

It was around that time however, my friend from the good old folks, Nash, took an interest in jogging.

Mickey : What? I suppose that we have a football game today. You want to change plans to go out jogging instead?

Nash : I don’t know Mickey. I guess football is too tough for my crippling legs. You know I once hospitalised for this injury, didn’t you? Hell, you were the one who sent me to UMMC, you forget ah, old Gorilla?

I just let it go. Swell, I don’t wanna waste time arguing with Nash. it’s tiring
to argue with someone who have Masters from Australia, they will always attack you back with facts.

It was after few days that I realised the timing for old Nash evening jog perfectly coincides with the time Newrene spends the time in the park sulking. i guess stars in heavens above does have a perfect constellation, perfectly aligning each other, just the way Nash and Newrene does.

And perfect aligning that was, when one day, Nash turns up in the room with a bouquet of roses.

Mickey : I suppose those roses are needed to supply you oxygen while you’re jogging ah?

Nash : Mickey, give me a break.

Mickey : It’s pretty weird for a guy to go for jogging to bring those anyway.
Anyway, if you want to bring that, you don’t need to bring that much.
Women does not need that much of roses, you know.

Nash : what do you mean? how many roses does a women need anyway?

Mickey : I won’t tell you how many. (I wouldn’t know either for godsake)

It was unlucky for Nash that day, he forgotten to bring those roses. He was pretty late for his usual evening jog though. He had trouble, as I accidentally put a glue in his hair gel. He always gel his hair when he went to those evening jogs.

It turns out it was unluckier for Nash the day after.

Somehow out of a blue, there turns out to be another Newrene’s admirer.
And this idiot somehow bend his knees and produce a bouquet of flower to her, in front of everybody in the goddam Eng. Fac. canteen. The situation normally occurs in Korean TV series, I presume.
To be honest, it was a sore sight.

Idiot : I don’t mean to embarass you or what. I’m really sorry for it.
Please don’t misunderstand me, Miss. I hope I don’t sound desperate.
 I suppose I am, really.

That dickhead turns out to be one of the most idiotic students in Eng. Fac.

Newrene politely reject the invitation. Everybody in this planet earth, except that moron, knew exactly what Newrene was feeling. It was embarassing, of course. She just wished that idiot had never been born.

No, women does not need a bouquet of flowers given to her at a stinking canteen. Noted.

If I was Newrene, I guess I would probably drop dead.

Nash almost give up knowing the news. Somehow, I suspiciously suspected he might do the same.
I think it was lucky his attempted self-assassination didn’t take place.
I wouldn’t told them he was a friend of mine if anybody asks.

Nash and I had dinner that night, and somehow we were watching this scene from a movie in the Mamak stall.
The movie was “Fall”.
There’s a scene in the movie, where the hero sends 1000 red roses to the heroine.
Oh great.

We procede next morning with that moronic idea.
It should be fun I guess, what the hell.

I called this shop in Kajang, where dear Mother always buys roses for herself at every lovely occasion she can think of. I manage to get a discount. Oh, this roses affair is making a big hole in our wallet. Basket.

We came out that night, with 1000 flowers, decorating the room for Masters student.
We placed roses here and there. If we had a ladder, we might glue it to the ceiling for godsake.
I even had an idea of becoming a red roses decorator for newly weds for future plans.
Damn, I should stick to engineering for godsake.

Nothing happens the next day. Newrene had a MC. I guess she still couldn’t stop vomitting after that red roses incident. Ah hell, I pity her as I wonder what’ll happen to her if she sees this.

The fact is, nothing happens either the next day. Newrene hardly notices the flowers when she enters the room.
old Nash has given up by this time really.
1000 flowers didn’t do the trick.
I guess we could not claim the money from the Dept for the red roses decoration of the Masters student room.

Time passes by, day by day, months by months.
She still sulks.

Then one day, I think God is sympathetic enough to answer our question, and probably wanted to stop that eerie sight of a girl sulking at the lake of UM park.

We received an e-mail from our friends the old folks.
To be honest, it was nothing grand.
It was just a picture of a hamster wearing a hat made from red rose.
It was lovely and cute for the feminist.

I don’t know what happens, but old Newrene laugh madly when she sees that picture.
She says it was cute and funny.
We were dumbfounded anyway.
But as friends, we were glad.
It was the first laugh that she had for months.
At least in front of us.
When she smiles that time, I couldn’t help but noticed both her eyes sparkled.
It was full of light.

She did stop going for her eerie walk at the park that day onwards.
I guess the sulking did stop.

And from the day onwards, everybody who enters the Masters Room couldn’t help but noticed
Newrene’s computer desktop.
It was that picture of a red rose glued to a head of a poor hamster.

And to the question, how many roses does a women need?
The fact is, the numbers doesn’t even counts.
Just enough roses to stop icicles melt from their eyes, I guess.

Beneath The Remains

This is a poem by Chairil Anwar, Yang Terampas dan Yang Putus (1949) which is written shortly before he died of Tubercolosis.

YANG TERAMPAS DAN YANG PUTUS
(The Seized and the Severed)

kelam dan angin lalu mempesiang diriku,
(the darkness and passing wind overtake me)

menggigir juga ruang di mana dia yang kuingin,
(and the room where the one I long for shivers)

malam tambah merasuk, rimba jadi semati tugu
(with night’s penetration; trees stand like dead memorials)

di Karet, di Karet (daerahku yang akan datang) sampai juga deru dingin
(but in Karet, yes, Karet Cemetery – my future locale – there, the wind howls, too )

aku berbenah dalam kamar, dalam diriku jika kau datang
(I put my room in order, and myself as well, in the chance that you might come)

dan aku bisa lagi lepaskan kisah baru padamu;
(and I may once again unleash a new story for you;)

tapi kini hanya tangan yang bergerak lantang
(but now it’s only my hands that move, emptily)

tubuhku diam dan sendiri, cerita dan peristiwa berlalu beku
(my body is still and alone, as frozen stories and events pass by)
(Chairil Anwar - 1949)
http://www.seasite.niu.edu/flin/literature/chairil-anwar_lat15.html

 ——————————————————————-

Kajang Muslim Cemetary yard, Sungai Kantan, near Masjid Jamek    

I went to visit my father last Friday.



Kajang Muslim’s Cemetary Yard (Sungai Kantan) - front gate   

My father’s physical village, January 2013.

Before going in, I gave a prayers and wish of peace (salam) to everyone here.

Wish of Peace to the occupants of this village, from the people of the believers and the saved ones. May God bless those who came before and afterwards. And truly, By God will, we shall follow you afterwards.

And so I walked in.


Walk on. I said to myself.



The other occupants of this village. May God bless them.



See the green building? That is where the folks prepared the necessary items needed to bury ones bodies during funeral.



My father’s final place is still far beyond this point.
I have to walk thru.



The small road leading to father’s final home.




And here lies my father.
He was buried here years before.
He didn’t achieve the age of 50 by the time he breathed his last.



The writing on the nesan stone has already blurred.
But lucky, it still can be readable.



The thing is, I knew where my father lies.
But, I will never know where on earth will my body will finally lies..


But we don’t know just where our bones will rest,
To dust I guess,
Forgotten and absorbed to the earth below.
-          1979 by Smashing Pumpkins.

I said a few prayers then, a few prayers as I always read here in this final resting place of my father.

O Lord, forgive me and my parents in the Hereafter.
O Lord, show mercy on them as they have nourished me when I was young.

————————————————————————————

I remembered when I was small.
My father took me and put me on his lap.
Then he smiled at me as I smiled back at him.

O Lord, show mercy on him as he have nourished me when I was young.

I remembered when I was small.
I was 3 or 4 years of age that time I think.
He was laying down and he asks
“tolong pijak belakang abah” (can you go up and walk on top of my back, as so to give me a massage? - rough translation)

O Lord, show mercy on him as he have nourished me when I was young.

Mom used to say that when I was of 3 years of age, I was able to read the newspaper.
The story was upon one day, I took the newspaper, look at the TV broadcast channel program, look at the watch at our house and immediately I ran to the TV set, switch on the TV, and switch on to watch the cartoons.
Mom and Dad was astounded to find that I could read..so they bought me lots of Gila Gila comics to enhance my liking to reading.
Dad used to buy those Gila Gila comics just for me to read.

O Lord, show mercy on him as he have nourished me when I was young.

Dad used to bring us to Stadium Negara, there was a park there before where my brother and I would play, running here and there, while waiting for Mom to finish her duties in Kwong Yik Bank Jalan Imbi.

O Lord, show mercy on him as he have nourished me when I was young.

All the good memories of him, glimpses, vision, all played in my head while I was standing beside him there.

 O Lord, show mercy on him as he have nourished me when I was young.

———————————————————-

Then for few minutes, my mind was taken by reflections of my small life.

Do you know, Firdaus..
In the end, we are just a mere fractions of this earth..
Nothing but mere fractions.

You got quite the easy path, Firdaus, rather than your non-malays friends..
After SPM, you went to Matriculation, then went to UM to study Mechanical..
Then become an engineer…then what?

Time after time, breath after breath, in the end your body will become one with the earth.

When? No one knows.

By the time I stood there beside my father, my mind is quite perplexed by the recent conflicts in life…

Family life = not so good.

Sibling relationship = not so good.

Work = recently resign from engineering job.

Love = no love life, all just mind manipulation of people needing attention and control. Got rid of it anyway.

Money = just enough to survive.

So where do I go from here?

I kind of realized, before I take a step to move forward, I must be careful where I stand.
Careful where you stand.
I realized that I’m not footing on solid ground, might slip here and there.
But all hope’s not lost.

Then I remembered the lyric in “For Whom The Bell Tolls”- Metallica.

Stiffened wounds test their pride.

Then I understood.

All this affliction, all this wounds are here to test myself.

Just like Churchill on his speech to the Commons during World War 2.

“We shall go on to the end….
We shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans..
We shall fight, with growing confidence and growing strength in the air..
We shall defend our island, whatever the cost maybe..
We shall fight on the beaches,
We shall fight on the landing ground,
We shall fight in the fields and in the streams,
We shall fight in the hills,
We shall never surrender!”

All this affliction, all this wounds are here to test myself.

I realized.
That you should do what you should do.  And let God decide what is the outcome.

Let God decide where I shall fall.
But upon myself I shall decide where I shall set firm my next footsteps.
And guide me through out this path of life so that the end will be blessed.

Amin.

I said a prayer again to my father, then I slowly walked out.
May God bless us all and place us among the pious and the truthful ones.

O Lord, forgive me and my parents in the Hereafter.
O Lord, show mercy on them as they have nourished me when I was young.
  
I slowly walked out upon the village and onto the living madness of the city of Kajang.

“People have round shoulders for fairing heavy loads”
– Ashes in your mouth, Megadeth

The weight of the world is just not on my shoulders, it’s on everybody.

——————————————————————————————————

I guess, by some point in life, anyone gets confused.

What if the world does turn and if London burns? * (Anyone can play guitar, radiohead, Pablo honey)

We can’t really afford to be Jim Morrison, grow some hair and caught drowning.

I just knew, you just got to stop for a minute.

Stop and look before you cross the street.
Use your eyes before you use your feet.
Look right, left and right again.
It will stop you from accidents and pain.

Then you don’t just stand there. Start walking.

Leave unto God’s what is God’s,
Just walk ahead.
Save yourself from the worry.

Because in the end, if everyone and everything is still broken, at least you did your best.
Because in the end, everything, everything is in its right place.
www.youtube.com/watch?v=onRk0sjSgFU