Chocolate by Yasmin Ahmad

One of the last films by Yasmin Ahmad, presented as one of the short films in www.15malaysia.com Project.

Sunday. Afternoon. Latte.

Finally revisiting my blog.
It's been a while since I got connected, with my laptop, at my leisure.
Finally, spending a Sunday afternoon, out at a coffee place, taking a breather.
So many has happened, things are changing, the world is still spinning, yet I'm still here; stagnant.
After having to live in my own world for the last couple of months, finally I step out of my cocoon, observing the bustling city life, basking in the liveliness that surrounds me.

Creative juices exchanged over coffee table;
Plans formulated on napkins for the next trip;
Mommy playing her daughter's hair, wondering when she will grow up;
Old friends reminiscing their jolly old times;
Lone ranger chatting furiously over MSN, hoping to end singlehood in the shortest time possible;
Glances exchanged over coffee cups, yearning for cupid's arrow to strike them;
In-house magazines being flipped frivolously, wondering when this boring afternoon going to end;
Gossips flying over shopping bags, oblivious to the sounds of crying toddlers;
Jazzy music playing in the background, overpowered by the sounds of grinding machine;
Such a small coffee joint, yet bustling with life. More than I have experienced for the couple of days.

I shall do this more often, while awaiting your homecoming.

Political Grasshoppers

What is the hottest drama in the local political scene these days? Party-hopping leading to a state-governmental change! How else could it be more dramatic?

What a way to grace my blog after a 2-month hiatus. I guess my personal life will never get that dramatic to motivate myself penning it down. That's simply because my home state Perak has never gotten such grandiour media attention for decades (or even for centuries I bet!) Imagine, the work Perak appearing on the cover page headlines of ALL the national newspapers, for consecutively one week! As a Perakian, should I be proud of all these sudden attention that my home state is receiving? Certainly NOT!

I shall not pain myself by writing down the dreadful details of the process of this political shift in the state government of Perak, even though it is not materialised just yet at the time of my blog entry. In a matter of hours, a new Menteri Besar will be sworn in, representing the new formed Barisan National-led state government, replacing the previous Pakatan Rakyat formation. But believe me, the matter will not be put at rest as the previous state government will retaliate till their last breath. Who would give up so easily when they are just warming up their state assembly seats and the leather seats of their Toyota Camry cars are still new!

We must thank the creators of the drama for enabling us to witness such historical joke in our politic scene, i.e. the 4 grasshoppers who hopped on to the weighing scale that is anything BUT balanced! (They claimed that they would remain independent of any alliances for the time being but had expressed their support to BN)

This "Grasshopper Strategy" is nothing new as Pakatan Rakyat had explicitly expressed that they would implement this strategy to trash the current government time and again since last September, although their attempts proved futile. I guess they could not have imagined this ingenious strategy of theirs would work against them, causing them to lose a quarter of their foothold in Malaysia.

So to the geniuses who are planning to put their legal know-how into practice and weaving their way through the judicial system, good luck thrashing the royal ruler's decision and getting your dissolution of state assembly. I'm sure the voters will be faithful still in the next state election, if there would be any. Funny thing that the most popular profession in DAP is likely to be lawyer!

To those who managed to convince the grasshoppers to hop by, your actions are deemed "highly moral" because there is no law exists to go against that. But I am already hearing voices to suggest passing an Anti-Hopping Law.

For those who are just simply enjoying all these antics by our highly intelligent politicians, please sit back and relax as I'm sure there are more to come!

Goodbye, JWM

Access card. Checked.

Pedestal key. Checked.

Uniform. Checked.

Name tag. Checked.

Locker key. Checked.

Employment ID. Checked.

All duly returned.

Yesterday was the day I bade farewell to a place I called second home for one year and nine months.

No hard feelings. Just a breather of fresh air and rejuvenation, leaving memories behind.

In a week's time, I will have my new second home. Hope it will be all good. Although I'm sick, exam is in a few days' time and I have got tonnes yet to study, that won't crush my hopes! *sniff sniff*

Typealyzer

This is another interesting online test specially created for bloggers. This test would analyze the content of your blog and deduce the type of writer that you are. The funny thing is, a disclaimer has been included in the webpage.

Note: writing style on a blog may have little or nothing to do with a person´s self-percieved personality.

Anyways, I still went for the Typealyzer and I got this.

The analysis indicates that the author of http://tomoharuka.blogspot.com is of the type:

ESTP - The Doers
The active and play-ful type. They are especially attuned to people and things around them and often full of energy, talking, joking and engaging in physical out-door activities.

The Doers are happiest with action-filled work which craves their full attention and focus. They might be very impulsive and more keen on starting something new than following it through. They might have a problem with sitting still or remaining inactive for any period of time.

Active and play-ful? That is so wrong! Impulsive and keen on starting something new than following it through? Maybe.

Well, at least part of the analysis is still reliable. And no, I'm definitely not in denial!

Bangkok Dangerous

Things havent been great recently. The economy downturn. The Mumbai Massacre. The Bangkok Emergency State. My credit crunch. Among other things.

The negativity around is so prevalent that it numbed myself to spur any thoughts in response to the recent happenings. Exam is coming but I barely touched my book. At the same time, I'm counting down my days left with my current employer. A concoction of weird emotions, thoughts and feelings is always brewing in my head, that the effects of such negates any sensation. I'm numbed to the core. Soul-less.

Then came along a surprise MSN session with a net pal. He is one of the poor souls who got stranded in Bangkok since the airports there were force to closed down due to demonstration. Gosh! It never occurred to me that I could be the one who got stucked in a foreign land when all I want is to go home! (of coure, being blasted off in a Mumbai street would be far worse than this!) It suddenly hit me that things are really BAD these days that I should start noticing them, attentively.

So there he went, having this unwanted extended version of his BKK holiday with his brothers. They have no where to go, but to stay in their hotel, where food and room are paid by the government (well, they should have!). They have nothing to do, but to make calls to the airline and their embassy, getting updates on their flight info and the status of the airport and the city (and of course, occasional MSN chats). Poor thing! Unlucky bunch! I couldn't imagine myself facing similar situation, for someone who doesn't even take down the embassy address or number before I travel out of the country! (but then again, who really does that?)

On another note, imagine the economic adversity that this incident could spin off. Endless compensation by the government and the airlines. People turning away from the city. Airlines cease to generate revenue due to flight suspensions. And the list goes on. Are these people out of their minds?

Anyways, my heart goes out to you, Hori. May you be safe and be able to leave the country ASAP.

Unexpected Calamity

After much anticipation from myself and my fellow ex-colleagues, I had finally tendered my resignation two days ago. I anticipated for obvious reasons, but for my ex-colleagues, they were more interested to find out how my VP would react to "betrayal" (as some has put it), especially since it was short after my promotion in July.

To my surprise, besides the subtle cold treatment that my VP gave me, nothing much "hype" had been created in the office. Entering day two since the letter had been submitted to my immediate superior, no "meet-up sessions" had been arranged, just yet. Somehow this unnerving "tranquility" is causing much anxiety. My immediate had been on leave ever since that day (what a coincidence!), making me wonder whether my letter has been passed on to the final authority (luckily I made a carbon copy for Human Resources). However news has been seeping through the office as some of my colleagues kept throwing questions at me discreetly. That made me the more confused. So is my resignation "official" yet? My VP is not doing anything to at least acknowledge that? Or my presence in the organisation is that insignificant, contrary to most of my ex-colleagues' belief? Could it be because a steady throng of people had been leaving the organisation since June that they had become so immune to "brain drain"?

All this is causing much unrest, which is far from what I had expected. I was imagining myself jumping in relief when the letter was finally off my hands. I was imagining myself counting down the days to enter a new working environment, meet new people, deal with new challenges and eventually lead a new life. Little did I know that transcending from an old to a new territory is that difficult.

Anyways, my heart still skips a beat whenever I think of my new job. Can't wait for 10th Dec 2008 to arrive.