My New Casio

Comes together with a box, warranty card and user manual.



The Back of The Watch. Don't know if the replicas have these as well.


See Here For The Test.
Casio GShock Mudman Hammer Test
Drop Test

Type GShock Mudman in youtube for more.


The information above is for my new watch, the Casio GShock G9000 3V Mudman. I bought this last Thursday at City Chain Jusco Bukit Raja. I paid RM 305 (10% discount) and comes with a year warranty from Casio, Box and user manual. I chose GShock because I want a tough watch. My previous Bonia Watch had sapphire glass on it which would scratch only with diamonds. I expect this GShock watch to last 5-10 years. According to Casio.com :-

There's a reason why they call G-Shock the toughest watch in the world and these are just some of the many examples. Mud & Shock Resistant, 200M WR, Super Dual Illuminator and 48-city world time...the mission is on. Green resin band digital watch with black face.
Source : http://www.casio.com/products/Timepiece/G-Shock/G9000_Series/product/G9000-3V/

The price stated at the time of view is USD 99 and according to live rates from www.xe.com, 99.00 USD = 306.454 MYR.

A friend of mine told me why I bought this Casio as there are plenty of replicas being sold around RM 30. I told him, I want the toughness and durability of the watch, and I don't mind if people mistaken my watch for the replica.

Maxis Wireless Broadband

I registered my Maxis Wireless Broadband at 4.30 pm today at Maxis Center, Giant Shah Alam and was told the earliest my internet would be activated was 3 hours, the latest will be 24 hours. I reached home at 5.30 pm and just tried the usb modem and to my surprise it had already been activated. I received the blue light connection which is 3G, which is fast for me. Few of my friends had been using this BB and I had tried their Maxis BB before, the speed is reasonable.

Here is the result of Maxis BB inside my bedroom using speedtest. I received almost the same speed for my 512KBPs Streamyx package, which is for me is quite good. I don't download movies, only MP3's and sometimes You Tube. There's always some friends out there who would copy for me movies they downloaded, or I'll sometimes ask them to find titles for me.

I took the Lite 1.5GB Package although the Maxis girl told me to go to at least 3GB but when I told her I already had Streamyx, she stop persuading me for the higher package. This mobile BB is purely for mobility especially when I'm travelling or when my office's network is slow or with limited connectivity.

My neighbour works with a company that handles Maxis and Celcom project in upgrading their communication tower, mobile system and he told me Maxis Data Plan has a more comprehensive future planning with one of them being the separation of phone and data. It means broadband data will be aired separately from phone and it promises a more faster connection, that's what he told me. I even know about the YTL Broadband few months before launching.

MAHA Agriculture Show 2010

I visited MAHA 2010 during weekdays and it’s still full of people. First of all for those of you who do not know what MAHA is, it is Malaysia’s leading agricultural show. It is one of the largest show in South East Asia and some say maybe in Asia. It is being held currently at MAEPS (Malaysia Agro Exposition Park Serdang) and MAEPS is inside UPM (Universiti Putra Malaysia), Serdang.
I have never ever been to this MAHA and being someone who’s not interested in agriculture, it’s just of being a driver to my wife and both my parents. This changed once I entered the Exhibition Hall. There were plenty of agricultural products to choose and my interest is on their food product. I bought homemade chocolates, chips and some traditional cookies in modern packaging. The price was okay. I bought pepperoni and salami local products which is cheap, 3 product for RM 10 compated to the usual price of RM 5.99.
This exhbition is so large with 4 big halls (it was really huge) with the Agro Bazaar at Hall D being my interest as it sells food products. Those 4 halls are only one of the area at MAHA. The other area are State Pavillion, Fishery showground, Vegetable showground and Floriculture showground. Between the Big Halls area and the State Pavillion and showground, we need to take the available FREE trams as it will cut down walking time.
One of my first cousin has an exhibition booth at Hall C. She deals with organic fertilizers. For those who wanted to visit this MAHA, I do recommend you to visit during weekdays, even weekdays there were so many visitors. Weekends are so packed up with people and according to my cousin, people who arrive at 10 am at the Halls actually arrived and parked their cars around 7 am. For those who parked their car within the MAEPS area could catch the Free Trams to the Exhbition Hall. During weekend, you can park up at UPM parking area and catch the Free Shuttle Bus. I don’t know the exact distance but I do think its more than 2 KM from MAEPS. Visit the MAHA official site here for more information. Oh yes, MAHA started on the 26th November 2010 and will end on the 5th December 2010. Opening time is at 10.00 am and closing time is at 10.00 pm. Entrance is free, Tram Ride is Free.

I forgot something, the air conditioner inside the halls are cool and provides relief from the heat outside and the toilets inside the halls are big and clean as well.


The congested traffic leading to MAHA (Weekdays).



Lining Up to board the free transportation at MAHA



Inside one of the exhibition Hall. It was a relief as the air conditioner is functioning properly.

My ASTRO History

image from Astro.com.my

I could not remember the exact date I started subscribing Malaysia's leading satellite tv, ASTRO. I even couldn't remember the exact year whether it was 2002 or 2003, but definitely not 2004 or 2001.
I was living with two housemates and when I installed the satellite tv, both began to contribute as well, one bought a sofa set and the other one bought a new refrigerator to finally complete the housing appliances.
The price to buy an ASTRO during those days was expensive but I could not remember whether its 899 or 1299, I guess it was RM 899, which was bought from an electrical shop at section 18 Shah Alam (the shop still exist).
My first ASTRO package was Discovery,News and Sports, Sports was still one of the mini packages and the monthly bill was below rm 50. During the first month Astro gave a free all package viewing. A year later, I add Variety because I wanted to watch comedy shows at Star World and I was paying RM59.90 per month for all the 4 mini packages.
In 2009, I add the Movie Package and during this time the Sports Channel has been a special package on its own with an increased subscription price. I was paying RM110 per month. For the sake of my daughter and so that she won't disturb her mother so often, I add the Cartoon package, removed the Variety as I had never watch it anymore (the MTV are bored and Astro Free channel has its own music video channel, I lose track of the Sitcoms, I don't watch Anime) and realizing I'm missing the Crime Investigation Channel, I add the Metro Package. Now I'm paying RM 125 per month. The first week I was hooked on the CI channel but after that I moved to Turbo channel. Last night, I realize the Hallmark channel was not there anymore as they had replaced it with Diva which seems more interesting. To compare Astro during 2002-2003 and now, there's a lot more channel today but the the cost had rise. I'm thinking of getting a B.Yond perhaps.
Do you know what I hate most about Astro channels? Most people hate their repetitive programs but I do have a strategy on how to overcome it. What I do hate is there are still commercial breaks and Astro Promos between programs (minus Movie Package)although we had pay the subscription, which justify that they could cover the commercial income.

Eid Ul Mubarak 2010

Eid cookies, Malaysian's specialty when celebrating Eid. This is an example of a row of Eid cookies on the table.
Happy Eid to all muslim readers.

My Wife's New Mobile Phone

Her C510 SE mobile phone had some serious problem with the speaker. She couldn't hear anything, the speaker had gone dead, she needed to activate the loudspeaker and it's something annoying to speak with someone with the loudspeaker on in public places. Even at home I do found it ridiculous.
It had been going on for the last few months, but during that time it was kind of on off problem.
I bought her a Nokia X2 from the Nokia shop at Plaza Masalam. It costs me RM 430 but after some bargaining, I got RM 400 with 1GB Memory Card FOC. It wasn't a Zitron set, but an Avaxx set. Avaxx and Zitron is the official distributor for Nokia (read here).
I personally decided not to choose an AP set although I could get a lower price. The C510 SE was an AP set and it had various problems with it where sometimes it would suddenly freeze (a hard reboot by removing the battery is required) and the speaker problem and the warranty was not covered by SE service centers, I need to send it to the shop(actually it was just a small kiosk).
I had some reliable sources (who had actually done the raid)saying to me that some AP mobile sets are actually clones from China which looked exactly the same, had the same brand embedded on the phone but with a physically plastic and fragile appearance. My sources suggested to buy mobile phones from the original distributor as chances getting a cloned or REFURBISHED phone was very slim.
With the this so called original Nokia, I could use the nokia.com support to the max.
According to Nokia.com.my, X2 is built for music lovers everywhere with its FM radio, music player and powerful speaker. I agree with that. The speaker is so loud that even putting the volume to slowest level couldn't do the job. We could see everything clearly on the 2.2” colour display, which seems to be more crystal clear than my E71.

The best thing is it comes with a screen protector for the display and lense (maybe only available for Avaxx set, MAYBE !)

The Nokia web says that the Talk time is up to 765 mins (12.7 hrs)
and the Standby time: up to 530 hours (22 days). I never trust this facts though, not only from Nokia but also from other manufacturer as well. The phone has the capability to serve as a Modem, uses the same battery charger as my E71, has bluetooth but not Wifi and 3G. The 5 MP camera is not up to the standard it says, the C510 has a more better quality in terms of pictures, but the lens speed is quick.

Waking Up Early

Waking up early in the morning (around 5 am) during Ramadhan is must for me to have my Sahur (meal taken just before the start of the fasting day). Although my eyes are shut like being glued, but the sweet smell of my wife's cooking makes my body woke up for the sahur.

It's wonderful to see so many houses in my area with their lights on during this wee hour, and hearing sounds of cooking, but without so much talking, everybody was busy doing their own business. I will usually wait for the Subuh prayer before taking a short nap, then woke up to go to office. Just a few more months before I'll be on a long study leave.

The EPL has begun

Hi readers, just drop by to say hi and I am still breathing plus the EPL season has begun and right now Chelsea is taking MU.

ESQ is HARAM?

I saw the headlines in Berita Harian, one of Malaysian's main newspaper.

Mufti Wilayah Persekutuan isytihar modul motivasi seleweng akidah, syariat Islam

KUALA LUMPUR: Majlis Agama Islam Wilayah Persekutuan mengharamkan modul program motivasi anjuran ESQ Leadership Center Sdn Bhd (ESQ) yang sudah disertai lebih 65,000 orang termasuk orang kenamaan, tokoh agama dan korporat serta pegawai kerajaan kerana ajarannya didapati menyeleweng daripada akidah dan syariat Islam.

Google translation reads like this :-
Federal Territory Mufti declared motivation module not according to Islamic faith

KUALA LUMPUR: Federal Territory Islamic Religious Council is to ban module motivational program organized by ESQ Leadership Center Sdn Bhd (ESQ), which had been attended by more than 65.000 people including dignitaries, religious leaders and corporate and government officials because of his doctrine of faith and found to deviate from the tenets of Islam

I've heard about this ESQ training when they came to my office to do a promotion. One of the trainers came and did a demo version of their training on us. I do not have much to comment except I feel the trainer's way to convince us a bit strange and won't have any effect on me, I've heard the fees is quite expensive. I do not know the exact fees amount but for sure it's more than RM 50 for the whole session.

I've known few friends who attended the ESQ training.

The Historic Pudu Jail

Pudu Jail is a historical building situated in Kuala Lumpur, it is a prison built in 1891 and fully completed in 1895 by the colonial of Malaysia then, the British. Read the full story of Pudu Jail here.

Recently Pudu Jail was demolished by the authorities to make way for new development, which many Malaysians found very frustrating as Pudu Jail could be conserved. I personally feel that the buildings should be maintained and we could use it as a shopping center or a theme park? or any other commercial purpose, but use the same old building (they could always add modern features without jeopardizing the historical structure). A lot of examples could be found at UK.

Few friends of mine told that using at commercially while retaining the old building was not feasible as there was a lot of ghost there. This is the mentality of Malaysians, always putting elements supernatural above everything else. If there's a ghost or ghosts there, make it a tourist attraction then, I've seen plenty of signs at England's historical site saying that the place is haunted by spirits and tourists seems not scared, in fact some decided to take pictures at the spot.

Here's some stories I took from The Star Online regarding Pudu Jail's supernatural incidents.

Sunday June 27, 2010
Close encounter with spirits and a headless woman

THE older the structure, the more likely it is to be haunted. Given the chequered history of Pudu Prison – which dates back to 1895 – you can be sure it has more than its fair share of ghostly tales.

Abu Bakar Juah says it was common to hear things at night – footsteps where no one was supposed to be, chains rattling, and even hearing someone or something taking a bath when everyone is locked in.

“We normally shout out loud that we are merely trying to make a living and tell whatever that’s out there to leave us alone,” he says.

Haji Aziz Haji Idris tells of an encounter while on duty at one of the guard towers when he was still a young officer.

“It was shortly after midnight and I was on night duty with another person when I saw an officer approaching. As we had been trained, I banged my rifle on the floor and shouted out ‘Everything all right, sir!”

Aziz says the figure said nothing but raised his hand, and then suddenly disappeared.

He also remembers one particular bunk in the warder’s dormitory which everyone tried to avoid.

“Anyone who slept there would be sure to feel an unseen force pressing down on his chest. They may try to shout or move but will be helpless to do anything,” he says, adding that some would rather sleep on the floor than use the bunk.

Abu Bakar also recalls a weird phenomenon – a ball of fire the size of a football that suddenly appeared and rolled out of sight.

“It happened every once in a while, and in cycles. Everyone would be talking about it for a while,” he says.

But the scariest tale is that of a recurring apparition of a woman. Aziz believes it was the ghost of a woman who was hanged there.

“She had tried to kill herself previously by slitting her throat. She survived but before she was fully recovered, the execution order came,” he says.

“She was brought to the execution chamber and hanged – but because of the injury, her head was literally torn off. It was a gruesome death and that is the ghost that many people have seen.”

He recalls an encounter with this apparition.

“I was on duty at Block D, where death row is located, and directly above the execution chamber is a huge anchor stone.

“Out of the corner of my eye I saw a figure sitting on this stone. Malays believe ghosts’ feet do not touch the ground, and when I bent over to look, the figure disappeared,” he says.

But a fellow officer’s encounter was even more shocking.

“Once, a police officer was interviewing prisoners and it was getting late. However, he said that he could interview one more, and I went down to bring another one.

“As he was filling in some forms he saw a figure sitting down. Thinking it was another prisoner he looked up, only to see a headless woman with blood flowing down her chest. The officer ran down the stairs as fast as he could,” he says.

Aziz believes Pudu Prison is a very “dirty” place and in some places is a giant graveyard.

“During World War II, the British buried Japanese soldiers there, and when the Japanese took over, they buried the British there.

“The ghosts here are real,” says Aziz. --- Yes Mr.Aziz, the ghosts are real, my office has ghost as well and its real but who cares about it.







Sunday June 27, 2010 from The Star Online
Executioner tells of eerie goings on

DESPITE his humble and polite demeanour, Kesavan A. Arumugam (pic) is a man who can strike fear in the heart of the most-hardened prisoner. The reason – he was an executioner who spent the first month of his working career on attachment in Pudu Prison.

Although he spent much of his career in the Kajang Prison, he was recalled to Pudu Prison whenever there were executions. He said he had performed about four executions in Pudu before the department started to carry out the sentence in Kajang.

He remembers Pudu Prison as it was there that he both witnessed and carried out his first execution.
He explains that there was a team involved, and his task was to handcuff the prisoner, place a hood over him, escort the condemned from their cell to the execution chamber, where their legs would be tied and the noose placed over their neck.

“Basically, I did everything except pull the lever (to release the trap door). That was another person’s job,” he says.

The hangings at Pudu Prison, he says, were eerie affairs.

“The corridors were narrow and the lighting was dim, adding to the eeriness of the execution. There was a chill about the place.”

The gallows he says, were very old as the trapdoor worked with a pulley system and the creaking made it all seem unreal and scary.

The execution chamber at the Kajang prison works on a hydraulic system which is quieter and more efficient. And the place is much brighter, he adds.

Taking a human life is not for the faint hearted, but Kesavan says he has no regrets about having carried out the job.

“After an execution you do feel tense. Usually I would avoid people, and an adjustment of the mind was needed. But after a few days I would feel better,” he says.

“I believe that I did what I did for the benefit of the nation. Those people had already exhausted all avenues of law, and I only did the final bit.

“Since I was able to interact with the prisoners, I learnt what they had done and I do not feel bad,” says Kesavan.

He has his own scary tale to tell, involving Mohd Affandi Abdul Rahman, who along with his bomoh wife Mona Fandey, had been sentenced to death for the murder of Batu Talam state assemblyman Datuk Mazlan Idris.

Affandi, he says, had asked him to bring him a rose bud.

“When I eventually did, Affandi put it on his palm and recited a few words. And the rosebud flew round and round,” he claimed.(Wow! Fuyoo Magic !)

“I know it’s unbelievable but I saw it.”

He says Affandi then asked for a bottle of water, tore the rosebud into bits, put it in the bottle and gave it to him as a magic potion.

“However, I did not want anything to do with that. And I left the bottle at the officer’s area,” he says.

World Cup 2010

The FIFA World Cup is nearing its last final group stage game and my body is beginning to takes its toll from late night stay up. In Malaysia, games started as early as 7.30 pm until 9.30 pm. Then there's the 10.00 pm - 12.00 am game. After that there's a 2.30 am kick off. While waiting for the 2.30 am, I would browse the internet or watching HBO movies. Managed to watch almost all the live games. When I didn't watch the 2.30 am games, the first thing I would do is to watch the World Cup News at 7.00 am to catch the highlights of the game.

In this World Cup edition, we have several goalkeeper blunders due to the Jabulani's too hot to handle. And then we have the red cards, and of course the unexpected results, such as the All White draw with Italy, Swiss win over France. We also have the dressing rooms incident and team rows such as France refusal to train after Anelka's dismissal from the team and England's Terry comments on Capello tactics. It's hard to manage a superstar team full of egos but lack of comitment.

Take a look at England, big names playing for big clubs that could do plenty of magic. But they fail to deliver, seems physically inferior compared to their opponents such as the game against Algeria, lack of motivation. They played is if they are reserving their strength and energy for a semi final showdown, what a dream because they could not go that far, they just thought they could.

In my opinion, I think that those England players lacked the commitment to play for their national team, they only commit to their clubs because their clubs pay huge wages, they could not be bothered to win a World Cup because a domestic league title or an European Club Championship is much more better, it promises them better salaries, and maybe their club managers had told them to avoid injury so that they won't mess up with their respective club plans.

Next time select Championships players to play for England because Premier League big stars are all just for publicity stint.

Restaurants Using Re-Using Straws

A report from The Star Online today.

Friday June 11, 2010
By ANN TAN
anntan@thestar.com.my

Penang Municipal Council officers were horrified when they saw a worker washing the straws during a spot check on eateries in Pulau Tikus on Wednesday.

“He told us they were going to reuse it. We were shocked and gave him a stern warning,” its public health standing committee member Ong Ah Teong said.

They returned to the restaurant later to verify that their instructions had been followed, he said.

He warned that restaurant owners who committed such misdeeds could face closure.

Several people who have come across such situations said people should look out for signs of bite marks on the straws to make sure that they were not “recycled”.

It is learnt that some restaurant workers would even resort to cutting off the tips of straws and reuse them again

Communication manager Josey Wong, 35, said she found bite marks on her straw while having her meal at a popular food outlet.

“I asked a waiter about it and he admitted that the restaurant would recycle drinking straws.

“This is unhygienic as some people use the straw to pick their teeth,” she said.

Sales executive Adeline Goh, 27, also faced a similar situation when she was dining at a seafood restaurant in Butterworth.

“The tip of the drinking straw was flattened after being bitten by someone else.

“I confronted the waiter and he just replaced it with a new one. It was just so disgusting,” she said.

-- Damn, I've long suspected that straws had been re-used by some(Read: Some or Almost All?) restaurants, they could cut cost. They was a time I was so paranoid about this thing that I did not order any cold drinks such as Ice Tea or Ice Nescafe as it is odd drinking those without straws, unless canned drinks.

World Cup 2010

The world will stop this weekend for the biggest game in the world, FIFA World Cup held at South Africa. What team I will support? England for sure although I don't have any confidence they could win the tournament. They have the best players, but only at club level, they don't have the best goalkeepers, and their players are always injured. They have the Italian Capello. So let's see how long could England stay in this World Cup.

According to this website here, it will be winter (not like the Scandinavian winter)during the tournament, which is a good advantage for European countries as they tend to play much more better under this conditions.

So, will it be the South Americans or the Europeans? A new world champion from the Africans perhaps? I doubt the Africans, they have great players but one must remember they are great when they played with their Europeans clubs, along with Europeans and South Americans teammates. Same goes to England, their club is bigger then their player.

Police Force Pressure

I saw this news at The Star Online today. It was actually taken from several major Chinese dailies.

A policewoman literally threw her uniform away on the day she resigned from the force, major Chinese dailies highlighted.

Corporal Dai Bao Xiang, 51, tendered her resignation letter to her superiors at the Gombak district police headquarters in Selangor on Monday, citing unhappiness with the hectic workload and little increment.

She threw her uniform into a dustbin and shouted: “I am finally free. I’m not a policewoman anymore!.”

Dai also had a meeting with OCPD Asst Comm Abdul Rahim Abdullah for 15 minutes before leaving the police station.

“This was not a hasty decision. I had given it a serious thought,” she said.

She said she had lost 20kg since she was promoted to corporal and transferred to the Selayang police station as an enquiry section head last year.

Dai said she only received RM50 increment after her promotion, however her other wages of up to RM500 including a motorcycle allowance were discontinued.

“That means my actual income is lower than what I had received before,’’ she told the media.

Dai said among other reasons for her leaving the force was that she witnessed her colleagues suffering permanent injuries or even being killed in the line of duty.

“Our income as police officers doesn’t commensurate with the workload and risks that we face,’’ she said.

Police force not only in Malaysia suffered tremendous pressure from workloads, life threatening risks and subjected to abuses from certain quarters of the public. I could tell a lot about police life because I have lots of friends from the force and even rent a house together with them before I was married.

One of my housemate had injured his hand badly when he fell from his motorcyle at Klang while trying to catch a suspected drug pusher/addict. Another had just arrived home after a 12 hours work when his mobile rang, he needed to get to a petrol station because there was a report of an indian gangfight. These two examples are only a very small example of their sacrifices and workloads.

Fake MC

Fake MC is a way out if you're too tired after watching live football early morning. Face MC could be used to extend our holiday, it could also be used when someones afraid of doing something at work for example if you're not prepared for a meeting or was forced to present something to a large audience, or maybe because you haven't finished doing something and could not meet the deadline. I've seen these fake MC's produced to me, I even caught a few of them. The simplest way is they like to recycle the MC's just by altering the date and chose to give the photocopy version (this is a popular tactic among students). We could usually catch them based on the serial number of the MC. I've heard stories that someone even produced MC for two weeks, with different clinic for every two days of MC (this happened to a worker of a private sector company).

The Star on 25th May brought this news of Fake MC :-
PUTRAJAYA: About 36,000 civil servants are estimated to have submitted fake medical certificates (MCs) that have the logos and addresses of legitimate hospitals, said Cuepacs president Omar Osman.

He said MCs from Hospital Kuala Lumpur, Hospital Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia and Hospital Putrajaya were being sold by syndicates.

Now this is new to me although I have long suspected that every single thing in this world could have a fake version of it.

Sunway Giza

I was at Sunway Giza the other day, it was a new shopping complex with a new concept at Kota Damansara. Listings of shops is available here.

As it is new, not many shops are available, some are still under renovation. Village Grocer is the anchor here. I do not know whether this Village Grocer has any relation with this Ontario's Village Grocer which can be found here, the logo is nearly the same.


MBG is here as well. Click here for details

Avanza Repair

I was travelling to the East Coast when I noticed a thud sound whenever I turn my steering, so when I was back to Shah Alam, I send it to a tyre shop for a repair. I was slapped with a RM 350 bill. It seems that I had problems with my front right arm wheel (I don't exactly know what it is, it's stated on the bill and I don't have the bill with me right now). Now the sound has stopped.

I could ignore the problem but the effect of it could quickly damage my new tyre and I've seen cases where people just ignore those sound and after a year would end up damaging the whole front rod thus needing so spent nearly 1k for the massive repair.

I chose to act early.

Tyre change and Battery

Since I bought my Avanza, (refer to my post here), I had never changed the tyre, do an air conditioner service, and change my battery. The last was a surprised not only to me and friends but also to the Toyota SC staffs and other mechanics from independent workshops, the battery is going strong even after 2 years and 4 months.

I had my scheduled service at the Toyota SC today which costs me RM 190 for changing the semi engine oil + gasket + oil filter and another RM 340 for a full air conditioner service.

The I went to CN Auto Tyre located next to the SC to buy 4 new Dunlop SP10 185 70 r14 tyres for RM 170 a piece. I also installed a new Century MF12 battery for RM 170 although my old battery is still working fine, but I do not want to risk any battery failure.

The total cost today was :- RM 1380.

A lot of money spent to ensure a smooth journey, I will be on a Road Trip to the East Coast next week with my wife and baby.

Wish me a safe journey


The MF battery picture taken from Century's wbesite




Dunlop SP10 Tyre

Hard Week

This week will be a hard and busy week, I've was away for a week to attend a training session and now I need to finish everything because I'll be away on holiday next week.

The Water Filter System

The water quality supplied to houses in Selangor are considered undrinkable even after boiling. For the past one year, my routine is going to Tesco to buy few 5 liters of drinkable water and a carton of 1.5liter drinkable water. I found it more cleaner than our supplied tap water. The costs of buying these drinking water amounts to nearly RM 50 per month.

After a year of using Tesco's drinking water thus spending RM 50 monthly, I decided to find a water filter system and pay the same RM 50 monthly installment. Finding a seller that can give me that low monthly installment is difficult and finding a seller that agrees to receive the installment without any financial charges is a gruesome task.

Finally, when I heard that a friend of my mom is a Bio Aura Hai-O agent, I asked my Mom to persuade her to sell to me the water filter under my payment terms and condition.


So, here I am with the water filter system fitted through my kitchen water pipe, which means that I could drink straight from the water tap, just like when I was in the UK. You can get the information regarding the Bio Aura Water Filter System here.

When I searched through the Internet, there's a lot of water filtering system in the market and there's a lot of marketing hype going around but most of my friends are using Bio Aura Hai-O and their feedback is good. I've never tried any other water filter system and could not compare but this filter that I bought seems good enough.

Mom told me her friend agreed to sell the water filter system for RM 1700, the retail price is RM 2080 and if you search through the Internet you will find people selling this Bio Aura Hai-O for as low as RM 1200 (good luck searching, and it's COD, no installment). I thought that her friend was kind enough for letting me pay RM 50 monthly interest free, but actually it was my mom who paid a full RM 1700 to her friend, so I ended up paying Mom the installment, which after knowing decided to pay mom RM 500 upfront and continue paying the monthly installment to her.

Busy

I'm busy, busy at work, these are critical times. Blown my money away again, this time I took it by paying monthly interest free.

Malaysian DJ and Comedian Passed Away

KUALA LUMPUR: Popular comedian Din Beramboi (pic), 43, died of haemorrhagic dengue fever at the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of the Selayang Hospital at 12.30am Friday.
Din Beramboi who was in critical condition died after his liver and kidneys failed.
Born Mior Ahmad Fuad Mior Badri, Din Beramboi is also a popular radio presenter.
He was admitted to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU) of Selayang Hospital on Tuesday of haemorrhagic dengue fever.
Din Beramboi and popular presenter Aznil Nawawi entertained Radio Era listeners on the morning show ‘Riuh Pagi Era.’
His remains will be buried at Taman Ehsan Muslim cemetery in Kepong before Friday prayers. -- Bernama

-News and picture from The Star Online-

* Din Beramboi was one of my favourite comedian.The last time I saw him live on TV was during the Raja Lawak reality show where he was one of the jury.

Asus eeePC is mine

I bought this eeePC 1001p for MYR 1099 plus an upgrade to 2gb RAM that costs me MYR 130. It's small, lightweight and can fulfill my purpose to write,surf the internet,watch videos and listening to music. For picture editing I still have my year old Toshiba Notebook.I've read some reviews saying this is the cheapest and yet could satisfied most user.This is what they say about this eeePC 1001p.


"That’s why we like the ASUS Eee PC 1001P. At $299, not only is this machine $50 to $100 less expensive than many netbooks, but it looks the part of a luxury netbook while lasting more than 8 hours on a charge." (http://www.laptopmag.com/review/laptops/asus-eee-pc-1001p.aspx)

"Overall, the build quality is quite good for a netbook, with solid plastic used all around. The palm rests are resistant to flex and the keyboard is firm, a rarity when it comes to budget netbooks. The lid is also very solid and doesn't bend easily. Putting pressure on the back of the screen shows no rippling on the LCD, meaning the screen and backlight are well protected. While no one would mistake this for the rugged ThinkPad of the netbook world (that'd be the ThinkPad X100e), the 1001P is definitely a well-built machine that should age well for a road warrior.Compared to most other laptop displays, the 1001P has a very high contrast ratio, which is a definite bonus in a budget system such as this one." (http://www.anandtech.com/mobile/showdoc.aspx?i=3770&p=2)

Battery life = 8 hours.

Disadvantage? I haven't fully tested it yet, but bear in mind if you buy a netbook there will be no optical drive, you need to purchase a separate external DVDr drive.I found out that the keyboard feels very plastic, and some minor touchpad issues where sometimes I need to tap a little bit hard on it.

After buying the eeePC, went out to do the groceries. Below are the list.

Jack N Jill Potato Chip - rm 1.99
Cap Junjung Milk - 2.55
Garbage Bag Medium 30 - 2.50
Tesco Dehumidifier - 1.99
Prego Pasta Sauce - 6.79
Tesco Pink Guava Juice - 3.50
Grade C 10 Eggs - 2.70
500ml Drinking Water - 4.15
Whole Chicken - 6.88
Tesco Choice Babywipes - 3.75

Alice in Wonderland

The movie Alice in Wonderland is scheduled to be released on the 11th of March 2010 and it is said that this movie is in 3D mode. While I was at Mid Valley, there was a promotion about the movie and a wonderful set of Wonderland had been temporarily built inside the Mid Valley.

I haven't gone to Mid Valley for almost 10 months and my I was surprised to see changes especially regarding the parking system. They still uses the Autopay but I realized there's a lot of gates inside the parking lot. When I asked one of the security guard, he told me that if you are in Zone A, you can't simply go to zone B to park your car as there will be barriers to prevent you from entering and the barrier will be automatically lifted if there isn't any space left in Zone A. This is to prevent people from getting lost inside the car park. No wonder I spent nearly 15 minutes to find my way out from zone A until I finally saw an hidden empty space. This is especially disturbing for someone who's not familiar with Mid Valley's parking lot. I ended up parking my car below The Garden (I think it's a new extension to the Megamall), it has Borders in it.


The flower in Wonderland !

The AFS 35mm 1.8

image from Nikon USA website


Finally, I bought the Nikkor AFS 35mm 1.8 lense for my D60 at Photo Selangor, Pertama Complex Kuala Lumpur. You can read the review here.

According to Nikon USA website www.nikonusa.com, the lense is perfect for low-light conditions, travel, environmental portrait and general photography, and according to the Nikon Malaysia website, this lense was been released for the Malaysian market on February 2009.My camera felt lighweight when using this lense, and it's perfect for portrait photos as well, with a perfect natural blur effect for the background.

After using this lense for a few days, I could point a few things. The advantages of this lense are :-

1. Could easily capture pictures in low light condition especially if trying to capture childrens, the shutter speed will be reasonable, although sometimes need to set the ISO to 800, I've tried ISO400 and it still produces decent pictures.

2. Lightweight and small, easy for travelling.

3. Natural Blur effect, Bokeh.

4. Manual Auto function which enables me to manually overide the auto focus if the need arises.

5. Could use Autofocus when using it with the D60.

6. It's cheap.

Sadly, I also found some drawbacks for the lense.

1. Not so fast Autofocus.

2. I seriously think it has a more longer minimum distance for capturing images (you can't snap the picture when the subject is inside the minumum distance from the lense) than my existing kit lense 18-55mm VR

3. No VR (maybe because it could boost up its shutter speed), I do sometimes captured blur images due to shaky hands.

4.Very plastic feel, in fact the focus ring seems so fragile.

5. Fixed focal length (not to worry because all prime lense are fixed focal)

So a 5 goodies versus 5 baddies. Here are some examples of the images I took with the new lense



All images taken during the night using ambient light.

Photo Selangor is notorious (should I use this word?) for giving incredible low price to their customer although I had been warned that nowadays their services are poor. So, me and Amzari from Amzari.com went to Photo Selangor to buy our lenses and other gadgets as well. Amzari bought himself a good Tamron 70-300 telephoto lense,Nikkor 50mm 1.4 and a camera kit bag. I was looking forward to buy the 35mm lense and also to just survey the price for a decent point and shoot camera.

We did not encounter any poor service and the Photo Selangor staff named May was very friendly. We got a few free items and the best thing is, she gave me the most ridiculous prize for a Nikon Coolpix L21 ! So I end up going home not only with a lense but also a new digital camera as well, and I don't mind that it's an 8MP camera, it still shoots images. I couldn't reveal the price she gave me, but it's bloody cheap. Maybe because me and Amzari bought a lot (combined together).



Taken from Nikon Malaysia Website.

This is the Nikon Coolpix L21. And this is the exact colour,Pink for my wife, she wanted a small camera (after realizing her 3.2 Sony Cybershot camera is a cam phone, not a digital camera after all). She was happy, especially when the Coolpix could be tucked inside her handbag. I was surprised to see that it was only launched last month in Malaysia. Below are some useful information about the camera taken from Nikon Malaysia website.

# Effective pixel count of 8-million pixels and a 3.6× optical zoom NIKKOR lens. 2.5-in. TFT LCD monitor.
# Optimized image processing engine based on EXPEED, Nikon’s exclusive image processing concept

# Easy Auto mode for simple operation

# A variety of functions that ensure consistently beautiful portraits

# 3 features that effectively prevent or reduce blur caused by camera shake and subject movement
1) Motion detection: The camera detects camera shake and subject movement with shooting, and automatically compensates by increasing shutter speed and ISO sensitivity. Blur is reduced to a level equal to a roughly 2-step increase in shutter speed.
2) Nikon’s own BSS: The camera automatically shoots up to ten sequential frames and saves the one with the sharpest focus
3) Electronic Vibration Reduction (VR): Digital compensation is applied with image processing to images in which the camera detects blur

# Powered by AA-size batteries readily available anywhere

# Compact body with an elegant design and improved operation.

Malaysian Groceries Price

A glimpse on the price of goods in Malaysia, based on my spending last night at Econsave.

La Boost RO Water 1.5L RM 0.69 per item
Econsave Choice Baby Wipes 80 RM3.95 per item
Huggies Dry Super Jumbo M80 RM32.85 per item
Potato Holland RM0.92 per packet
Fusipim Breaded Prawn Nugget 500 grams RM3.55 per packet
Ramly Burger Beef 700g RM5.95 per item
Cendol 600g RM1.20 per item
Adabi Tepung Cucur Ikan Bilis RM2.25 per item
Mango Elephant Tusk RM5.30 per item
Melon Honeydew RM2.80 per item
Econsave Choice Cordial Rose 1L RM3.25 per item

The Malay Feast

It's a long holiday for Chinese New Year this year and for me,I started my holiday early from Friday the 12th. I need to go back to my hometown in Muar, Johor because both my Mom dan Dad had arranged a special ceremony for my baby girl, Humaira.
We will be holding a kenduri or a Malaysian feast on Sunday the 14th.
Both my parents wanted this feast as an Akikah ceremony for Humaira as she is 9 months old now.

On Thursday, I went to Foto Selangor with Yamin and his niece, a cheap photography shop selling cameras and accessories at Pertama Complex, KL. The traffic in KL was congested as always. We went there with Yamin's modified MyVi Turbo.





Going back after Friday prayers, the highway southbound seems clear, but suddenly when we arrived near Nilai, there was a massive traffic congestion due to a road accident. It took me about nearly half an hour crawling 20-40 km/h.




That night I took some pictures of the backyard.


This is our storeroom.





On Saturday, we woke up early because I wanted to bring my baby to watch the lamb being slaughtered.


The sunrise view.



My baby and my wife were together with me at the slaughterhouse




The surroundings




The process.




Smiling in front of the slaughtered lamb.




The Feast Day (Sunday the 14th)

Humaira's Grandpa [The main sponsor for the feast]





Time to eat


He's late ! (My cousin's eldest son)



Almost 200 guests attended the kenduri that includes berzanji and marhaban. The menu
were nasi beriani with lamb curry, chicken sambal merah, beef curry, plenty of ulams
with sambal belacan, telur pindang, wajik, plenty of cakes, baulu. Only baulu was
bought at a Batu Pahat shop while the rest had been prepared by my Mom and my Aunts.

Mosque attacked again

This few weeks in Malaysia had seen attacks on places of worships such as churches and mosques. Although damages done were minimal (the first attack on a church at the KL suburbs was damaging enough), but the way these attacks occurred could be seen as to try to incite racial tensions among Malaysians. Take a look at the latest attack today on two mosques in Dato' Haron and Taman Sentosa, on the suburbs of Kuala Lumpur. Pig heads were thrown into the mosque compound and this two mosques were situated in an area where racial clashes happened nine years ago.

Taken from The Star Online :-
PETALING JAYA: Police will meet with all religious groups here to seek their assistance to cool things down following two incidents, where pig heads were thrown into the compound of a mosque in Taman Dato Harun and Taman Sentosa respectively.

Inspector-General of Police Tan Sri Musa Hassan said police would investigate the incidents in Taman Dato Harun and Taman Sentosa thoroughly and bring those responsible to book.

“I have directed that extra patrols be conducted at places of worship throughout the country.

“We will not compromise as far as peace and security is concerned and will do everything within our means to ensure no untoward incident happens. I warn the culprits behind the attacks not to stoke racial tension.

“We will also meet with heads of all religious groups in the district to seek their assistance to cool things down,” he said while appealing for information regarding the two incidents.

Musa added that they have not ruled out the possibility that people behind the two incidents were hired to carry out the acts.

Friends

I've managed to reach old friends via facebook, especially this guy named Fadzly Shukor, his my guitar sifu, he taught me lots of techniques in guitar and inspires me a lot in guitar playing. From him I found out that playing guitar (not simply just by taking an accoustic guitar and playing some chords), i mean playing proper guitar with technique, does have a relation with studying and living a better life.

Than, there's my old friend back from my PG days at Leicester, UK. Norazman from Singapore, whom I contacted until now, it's been 10 years now. Until now, his the one who always visited me at KL, but I promise one day I'll visit him at Singapore.

Friends.