White Noise in a band

A blast from the past....Couple of days ago, I got some old photos from my days in college from one of my friends. It was a photo of a time when we performed in a band!! That's rite the ol aerodynamic one performed in a band. If you haven't performed in a band and in public, let me just say that it is one of the most memorable events you would ever do. I believe everyone should at least have a go but if will be a heck lot more memorable if you were good. Also nothing beats performing on stage and in public. But only if no one is throwing beer bottles at you!

Check these photos for days of yore. Just one question....one the heck is "yore"??

Our band was named "White Noise". We made some noise initially but we managed to get ourselves opening for Zainal Abidin. That's right...the "Hijau" guy. We met Sheila Majid and we sang "La Bamba" on stage. How cool is that!!! It's also the day I first met my wife. It was love at first sight.

The second year, we sang "Winds of Change" by Scorpion, "Walk of Life" by Dire Straits, "Wonderful Tonight" Eric Clapton, "Bad Moon Rising" by CCR and "Manis" by Zainal Abidin. It was SOOOOO Cool!!! I a lot of phone numbers that night (just my luck that I met my wife too...DAMN!).



Oh, we did do a banggara as well. Got costumes and all and it was really cool! You know what is even more cool? WHEN YOUR SARONG IS NOT FALLING DOWN!!!!

When you're young and in love

My first born, Michael turned 13 last Monday and hence he is officially a teenager. That makes me feel extremely proud, wary and more importantly.....old! One of the benefits of having your kids early is that you get to hang around people your age and hear of them doing things that you already did with their 9 year olds or 10 year olds. You get to tell them, "Hey I already did that!".

We threw him a Lok-Lok party last Sunday with his friends from primary school and also his new secondary school. For those behind the times, Lok-Lok is prepared by skewering uncooked fishballs, beancurd skins, prawns, bacon, sausages and anything you can think of. You then put them into pots of boiling water to cook them and then eat them with sauces. That's called steamboat if it's in a restaurant but if it's mobile and you eat behind a van, it's called Lok-Lok. Lok it up...HAHAHA!

On Sunday morning, they hung out at the mall, watched a movie, played video games, ate junk food and read comics until it was time for the party. Melissa and I sent them to the mall and then like good parents, we tried to be invisible. Of course being a dad, I can be cool around my son so I had to literally drag Melissa away from peeking at them and allowed them their freedom.

After dragging her away with a forklift, we went our way to prepare for the party. I picked them up later and they have bought stuff, had more junk food on them and were just going on about the movie the watched. The party was a hit as we had our XBox which was always a teenage boy magnet.

This year though, we bought Mikey a pool table which was SUPER COOL! It was almost tournament size and was very solid. The kids....on excuse me...the boys had a wonderful time. Only drawback was that my kitchen was that big to make shots from all angles but we made do.

Being a teenager means you outgrow certain things. One of them was a fancy cake. Last year we had the cake with Iron Man on it. This year, he just wanted a plain chocolate cake. Signs of being cool! As a teen, he has also noticed the opposite sex and he told me that he had this crush on one of his old class mates. But as with all teenage boys, they will show that affection by totally ignoring the girl.

I remember my first crush. I was 12 and she was a Chindian from another school. We were in the same school bus and her name was Linda Teh. She was gorgeous and I had the biggest crush on her. Being me though, I showered her with a lot attention and made her laugh a lot. We were great friends but I didn't think of keeping in touch and email or mobile phones were not invented yet. Sad to say I have not seen her since we were 12. I doubt I would even recognize her.

Ahhh....to be young and in...err...crush?! Anyway, like all things when you are young, they will pass and new and better experiences take their places. I will ensure he enjoys his childhood and his teen years. And I will make sure he enjoys going out, having fun with good friends and not be too attached to home. That's because I want him out my house when he goes to college so that I don't have to kick his butt out!!

Man's best friend is not all that's cracked up to be

After much pestering and persistent begging, we finally got our kids a dog. You see, kids love dogs because dogs are loyal, bring unconditional love, not shy to show you their love and tell (or bark) as it is. But primarily, like all things that influence a kid, the main reason is TV.

You see, TV takes you to a magical world where all is possible. You put on glasses and immediately people won't recognize you from being the strongest man in the world. You get bitten by a radioactive spider, you don't die but you have super powers! It's a world where dogs are smart, loving, pulls you from under the falling tractor or quicksand. It's a world where dogs have this really cool and intelligent and funny expressions when you interact with it.

While I really love dogs, 90% of dogs are stupid! It's that simple. You can call a dog by its name 3000 times and it won't recognize you calling it. Everything in the world to a dog is about one magical thing and it's something they have in abundant. The world to a dog is all about PEE. The moment they are born, they immediately start engaging in a pee fest with the rest of the dogs. Everything is about peeing and peeing is ON everything. Trees, cars, your shoes and you inhaler. The PEE is their way of communicating with the other dogs. Every PEE signifies some world event to them.

My sis-in-law in Kuantan had some mix-breed stray dogs that she adopted and the pair had a litter of 4 pups. She was giving them away and I thought it was a great way (and cheap) way for the kids to learn about higher responsibility in taking care of a dog. So I chose the best looking mutt and took him home. We put 3 month old Boomer in a box at the back of the car and it was probably the poor dog's worst day in his short life.

The trip must have been nauseating for him as he threw up the bread into the box. The bread looked like mashed potatoes. Now that's an image for you!

So good ol' Boomer lives outside now and almost every evening we will take him for a walk and he immediately starts some kind of PEE fest of the universe. Sniff, sniff, PEE. Sniff, sniff, PEE. The same goes for every dog and the more amorous ones will sniff each other's butt.

Boomer is a lot more weird. He sniffs EVERYTHING! Including poop. He even licks his own poop!! I have been having a hard time toilet training the little mutt. He just PEES everywhere. I tie him on a leash on the porch where there are water hoses, flower pots, contraptions for drying our clothes, etc. and he manages to get himself entangled around the porch items!

He doesn't answer to his name. He doesn't know where he should be PEEing, he doesn't know he is not supposed to eat rocks and SHIT! He barks whenever I leave the house and it's not like a dogly bark like a German Shepherd or a Retriever but this little whiny, wimpy, wuss kinda squeal that makes you wanna walk over and drop kick the guy.

So to all those movie shows like Lassie, Rin Tin Tin (Gen Y going "What the heck are those?"), Bolt, Dr Dolittle and all those love stories where the dog is sympathetic, funny and comforting, TO HELL WITH YOU! You have given us dog owners VERY, VERY false hopes.

The next time I see a dog looking forlorn and sympathetic towards their owners and have wonderful sense of humour timing, I am putting an axe through the TV!

Day 2 of Oz

Day 2 began very lazily. We stayed at a nice motel where we just dropped into a deep sleep the moment we touched our pillows. Today we were driving up to the Grampiens National Park to a small village called Halls Gap. So after a quick breakfast, we drove up to Warnambool to see what a small quaint Australian looks like. The answer compared to a Malaysian town? A LOT CLEANER! Though the people were not exactly very friendly towards foreigners.




The quaint town has some small roundabouts that were decorated with very colourful flowers. So naturally the 2 ladies got all "flower-crazy" and made us stop the van right there in the middle of the street so that they can jump out of the van "Starsky and Hutch" style to take a few pictures of the flowers. Coz goodness knows we can find flowers back home! I find that endearing but somehow the Aussies didn't think that stopping in the middle of the street to snap pics of their beautiful town was. I wonder.








Thank goodness they didn't have Jackie Chan type of husbands, so we parked our car by the side and then we got out to stop traffic to get the pics. They were lovely and was worth the embarrassment. We drove past some really nice coastal towns and came to a place called Cape Bridgewater. There was supposed to be a seal colony offshore and we were to take this speed boat that looked like it the puke machine from hell for 45mins to this colony. Of course we HAD to see it but when we got there, the boat had left and we were would have been late getting to Halls Gap. (soft YEAH)





So we had stopped by Cape Bridgewater and decided to have lunch here. The burger WAS EXCELLENT!! It was called "The Lot" which meant it had EVERYTHING! Juicy beef patties, crispy bacon, soft sliced ham and salad on it. Let's not forget this is Australia so definitely there are FRIES! Enough to feed a small village in Rwanda.




The trip to Halls Gap was extremely boring. Being a flat country, the country side was nothing but flatness and miles and miles of sheep grazing grass. It's like God came down with a giant lawn mower and just mowed the whole damn country side. So we slept a lot and nothing much happened until Grampiens except for a slight detour to a Lavender Farm. It was Lavender everything. Lavender flowers, lavender scent, lavender perfume, lavender grass, lavender tea and we had to pay AUD2 to get in, take pics and use the bathroom.






When we finally got into Grampiens, we saw wild kangaroos and wallabies by the side and OF COURSE we HAD to stop and take pics. Truth be told, it was a pretty cool experience. Halls Gap was a really nice and tourisy (read expensive) village. At least things weren't cheap. But we got here before dark seeing that the country side of Australia is devoid of streetlights so best to get anywhere before dark.




When night came, we could see billions of stars from our motel and had wild kangaroos grazing by our motel lawn. So another tiring but fun filled day. Today we learnt about the "The Lot" which was going to be KLY's and my diet for the many days in Australia.

Land of Oz - Day 1

It was budget airline time again. We hoped on the budget airline, with budget fair, budget seats, budget food, budget taste, budget stewardesses and budget services airline bound for Melbourne. It was our second year in a row to the Land of Oz but we thought, "What the hell. AirAsia flies there and we are cheap so let's go for it."

We also thought that Melbourne offered a bit variety than Gold Coast. Gold Coast was very "theme parky" and "tourisy". Also holidaying with the Khor family is also very "zooey". You just gotta see some animals for goodness sake!

So, we all piled into our flight and arrived at Melbourne airport at midnight. Initially we thought we would rough it out in the airport, you know like sleep on the bench or the by the wall thinking that 10 people including 2 teenagers, 3 hyperactive kids and a toddler that will can speak to bats using it's high pitch sonic boom that will wake up all the neighbourhood dogs and some bats from out of town, will go by unnoticed. You know it turns out that Melbourne Airport is not like those of 3rd world countries where you can loaf around. They will kick you out or worse, lock you up.

Staying in the airport hotel was not very advisable either seeing that it was an Hilton and with the exchange rate the way it was, it would probably have cost me some pints of blood for that one night stay. Fortunately, I have a very good friend who is in Melbourne and has a very comfortable and nice place. Some of us roughed it out on the floor in the living room. Just like old times....at least for us adults. For the kids, it was a novelty and hence it was fun. Win for all. So Chee Keong and Mimi opened their house to 6 kids and 4 adults, one of which snores loud enough to turn on mating hippos.





We woke up early and was driven to the van rental place and got our ride. We piled everyone on board and away we drove. We stopped at the rest stop, when both drivers were totally zonked out. It was so bad that I fell asleep WHILE talking!! So we pulled over, slept, woke up, had some really delicious coffee with whipped cream and ice cream and sandwiches. You know when you purchase coffee from Starbucks and they give you this white thing to COVER the coffee cup for you to take away? Do you know what that white thing that is used to COVER the coffee cup called? You would think it's call a "COVER" and you would be an language impaired imbecile! It's called a "LID" in Melbourne. Remember that!

We drove south and took the Great Ocean Road which is the coastal road that took us East to Warnambool. We were passed many really cool sceneries and even saw wild dolphins. At one juncture we took a spontaneous turn to visit a lighthouse and saw a wild koala posing for us. We suspect it's a professional koala hired out during tourist season. After enduring strong winds from Antarctica, we decided to visit a popular tourist attraction call "12 Apostle" where 12 (now only 7 is left) rock formations jut out from the sea, to encounter winds strong enough to strip you naked. The wind here is so strong that toddlers will find it remarkably difficult to walk.




My chopstick son had to hang on to me for his dear life. Nobody's laughing at the aerodynamic one now!!! It was evening then and our van was running on fumes. We finally found a town that had one diner (but didn't have a washroom), which was also a petrol kiosk which was opposite a convenience store that double up as a take away pizza place.






We arrived at Warnambool and dinner was really expensive and bland! Can't complain since every bloody restaurant kitchen closes at 9pm and since it was summer, darkness only came after 8pm. No one eats dinner when it's light out right??? It was a nice motel that we stayed in as our holiday got underway.

Quotes from Dave Barry

"Look, in particular, at the people who, like you, are making average incomes for doing average jobs--bank vice presidents, insurance salesman, auditors, secretaries of defense--and you'll realize they all dress the same way, essentially the way the mannequins in the Sears mens wear department dress. Now look at the real successes, the people who make a lot more money than you--Elton John, Captain Kangaroo, anybody from Saudi Arabia, Big Bird, and so on. They all dress funny--and they all succeed. Are you catching on?"



"In fact, most home projects are impossible, which is why you should do them yourself. There is no point in paying other people to screw things up when you can easily screw them up yourself for far less money."



"Then along came the first Electrical Pioneer, Benjamin Franklin, who flew a kite in a lighting storm and received a serious electrical shock. This proved that lighting was powered by the same force as carpets, but it also damaged Franklin's brain so severely that he started speaking only in incomprehensible maxims, such as 'A penny saved is a penny earned.' Eventually he had to be given a job running the post office."



"I disapprove of the F-word, not because it's dirty, but because we use it as a substitute for thoughtful insults, and it frequently leads to violence. What we ought to do, when we anger each other, say, in traffic, is exchange phone numbers, so that later on, when we've had time to think of witty and learned insults or look them up in the library, we could call each other up:
You: Hello? Bob?
Bob: Yes?
You: This is Ed. Remember? The person whose parking space you took last Thursday? Outside of Sears?
Bob: Oh yes! Sure! How are you, Ed?
You: Fine, thanks. Listen, Bob, the reason I'm calling is: 'Madam, you may be drunk, but I am ugly, and ...' No, wait. I mean: 'you may be ugly, but I am Winston Churchill and ...' No, wait. (Sound of reference book thudding onto the floor.) S-word. Excuse me. Look, Bob, I'm going to have to get back to you.
Bob: Fine."



"I argue very well. Ask any of my remaining friends. I can win an argument on any topic, against any opponent. People know this, and steer clear of me at parties. Often, as a sign of their great respect, they don't even invite me."



"Ever since prehistoric times, wise men have tried to understand what, exactly, make people laugh. That's why they were called 'wise men.' All the other pre- historic people were out puncturing each other with spears, and the wise men were back in the cave saying: 'How about: Would you please take my wife? No. How about: Here is my wife, please take her right now. No How about: Would you like to take something? My wife is available. No. How about ...'"

2nd Oz Vacation

It has taken me a while to write down my holidays and since joining IBM, I realized that I didn't have that much time for myself and my writing. In my previous company when I started blogging, I had TONS of time. Where has it all gone?? Story of my life anyway.

Last December, our family together with my cousin KLY's family were at it again. We went on a holiday to Melbourne! That's right! That's 2 Aussie trips in 2 years. Looks like we can get enough of the sheep, billy tea and their G'day! This trip was for 11 days and we spent most of it on the road, traveling around the state and making a big round trip back to Melbourne.

We took the Great Ocean Road which was a coastal road with fantastic view and scenery of the ocean. A lot of people don't realize that the southern part of Australia opens up to the Antartic Sea, which means when it wants to, it can get FREAKING cold! We drove down Geelong and entered the Road and traveled along Apollo's Bay, Lorne and some other small coastal towns.

We ended up in Warnambool, spent a nite and then drove up to the Grampiens National Park. We stayed in the quaint tourist village of Halls Gap where wild kangaroos graze in front of your chalet at night and the night sky is littered with stars. The rock and mountain formations are in perfect harmony with the forest and rivers.

Halls Gap and Grampiens was a very good outdoor experience. We got nature, wild animals, good food, forest, brooks and most importantly, running water, TV, air conditioning and a proper bed. There is only so much wiping my ass with leaves or taking a dump by the river, that I wanna do in my lifetime.

After that we drove back to Melbourne via Ballarat. Other areas we came across was the "Puffing Billy" which is the only steam train in Australia and Philips Island where we watch the tiny penguins going to their burrows from the sea.

It was a good trip with a lot more variety and not just theme parks and zoos like the last trip. However, there was more traveling and transfer of hotels and that was a bit tiring. The currency exchange didn't help either so there was minimal shopping. Thank goodness we found some REALLY good Malaysian restaurants coz Aussie food really sucks. Only Aussie food I enjoyed was their "The Lot" burger which had everything but there is only so much burger you can take! I will be sharing our daily trip and some photos in the next few postings, so stay tuned!!

Elementary my dear Watson and some American sexiness

I don't know how many of you read Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes and for those of you who have, I am sure you share my sentiment that his stories are SUPERBLY boring! Even my favourite "Hound of Baskervilles", was a relatively slow moving piece despite it having a large hound, horror and suspense to say nothing of a twist in the end.

I am not averse to slow detective fiction as Agatha's Christie egg-shaped Belgian, Hercule Poirot, is one of my favourite fictional characters. Maybe I have become very brain washed by American TV, Hollywood, wham-bam,thank you maam type of buckaroo movie styles.

So enter a VERY Hollywood Sherlock Holmes. I would not nearly have gone to see it, if it wasn't Iron Man...err....I mean Robert Downey Jr as Sherlock. In true American fashion, this version gave a very much alive, sexy and absolutely witty version of a supposedly very Victorian Sherlock Holmes. I give this 3 thumbs up and a fat toe....if I had 3 thumbs. It was a very enjoyable movie and while Downey Jr can be a very funny man, they did not overdo the wit and humour. They still gave glimpses of Holmes' uncanny eye for the detail and his amazing inhuman powers of observation and deduction.

I was not very impressed with Holmes' love interest and her role was really almost unnecessary. With or without her, the story will continue...well! Also Jude Law was just as interesting and successfully killing the stereotype of Dr. Watson as an elderly, slightly portly, gentleman. Jude was nothing of that of course and he managed to go toe to toe with Robert.

So all in all, a very enjoyable movie while I thought the story was relatively simplistic but then again Avatar was SOOOOOO much more lame in the story department. So do make the time for Sherlock and I can't wait to get my hands on the Hi-Def version. That's another blog for another day....Oh, Happy Belated New Year by the way!

Christmas, Christmas, time is near....and gone

It's another Xmas come and gone. This year, I didn't get to enjoy Xmas as much as part of the celebration and Xmas feeling came from the present-buying, clothes-shopping and the totally freaked out feeling that you have left out presents for someone. Which is just next to the anxiety of being TOTALLY broke.

Hey, Merry Xmas!

All said and done, it is a very special for me, always. Ever since I met my wife, Xmas gave me a new meaning and when I had kids, it was in a totally different stratosphere all together. This year, we had a BBQ party for my family members who visited from Kuantan and Singapore. We had something like 20 people putting up for 2 nights in my house. I have yet to check which part of my house is broken from the mayhem!

Despite the hassle and inconvenience of having my home invaded, I wouldn't have had it any other way. I love having them around and they are a lot of fun. So the party was also a great success with really well BBQ'd lamb, chicken, prawns and squid, with the normal stuff like rice, desserts and our Malaysian favourite, cendol! I had a cendol machine at my party! Quite cool hor!

I didn't get to take many pics since the BBQ smoke made the pics very fuzzy. Either that, I am not very good with my camera. I was also very pleasantly surprised to see the lights along Sunway Resort Hotel. Though it was not better than Orchard Road, it was a marked improvement definitely. The decor at Mid-Valley, Sunway Pyramid, 1Utama and Pavilion was also very creative and very warm. I am kinda sorry that I didn't get to see KLCC's decor.

Anyway, this year, I was more caught up with work. Having just came back from our family holiday, I had some work to do and was working until late on Xmas eve and almost miss Xmas mass. I am glad, I was still able to make time for my family during Xmas.

In this time of nostalgia, I wish that the worst of your tomorrows is like the best of your yesterdays.

Merry Xmas and Happy New 2010!!

Avatar - 15 years in the making

This was a real interesting movie and it was reported to be in the making for 15 years. Reason being the technology was not available for James Cameron to realize his story. I think that is just horse shit. I think James Cameron just got lazy and probably forgot about it because the story line was so predictably...well predictable. It was probably the year's most predictable and readable movie. You just knew what was going to happen next.

The bad guys cutting down the forest over some rare and expensive resource. Hero sent in to win over the locals who don't want to have anything to do with these short-ass, weird coloured and dress-funny creatures from the skies. Hero is part of the whole program until he meets and falls in love with native who JUST happens to be the chief's daughter and promised to another really cool and can-kick-your-ass dude!

He then turns and tries to save the locals and you just know he will fight the bad guy and you just know they will win.

That is not to say, the movie is without it's moments. The concept of the new planet and its inhabitants alone is very creative. These 10-feet tall, blue creatures can connect with most beings and trees in their planet. It's like they have this USB port that connects their beings with their surrounding animals and trees. Pretty cool on that! All in all a very enjoyable movie. There is a 3D version but I am not sure if that's a good idea as there are lots of movements, flying, running through forest real fast and action fighting.

The animals that they thought up was also very cool and superbly interesting. At least for me....or I could be just easily amused. Most of the ground animals have 6 legs. I am not sure what is the problem that they evolved to 6 legs.

With 3D, you may just barf all over the seat in front of you and just provide them with a shampoo of semi-chewed pop corns and still fizzling coke. So be strong if you wanna 3D. Otherwise stick to the conventional baby.

The CGI rendition did not replace the acting. In fact, CGI only provided the make up but the actors still moved and acted using motion sensors that captured their movement. That made the CGI rendering very realistic. So tech wise, it was pretty impressive.

So saddle and ride into the world of Pandora and the Ormaticaya (spelled something like this).