Parting shots ~good civil structure of HK [ despite needing fine tune]

Last couple of weeks back, the WTO was held at Hong Kong which turn out to be a real test for the Hong Kong's police force as it's seemed that they had done an excellent jobs in suppressing the Korean farmers who were out to undermine the WTO event. Not that i fully agreed witht the corporate and global greed to poorer nation, i do not believed that Korean farmer's [who ever instigated and funded them for the full 2 weeks of planned riots] actions ever strike the messages across. No? Corporate greeds had corrupted the world....

As quotes from Gordon Gekko [Wall streets];

The point is ladies and gentlemen that greed, for lack of a better word, is good. Greed is right. Greed works. Greed clarifies, cuts through and captures the essence of the evolutionary spirit. Greed, in all of it's forms - greed for life, for money, knowledge - has marked the upward surge of mankind and greed - you mark my words - will not only save Teldar Paper but that other malfunctioning corporation called the USA. Thank you.

The Korean farmers have been practically going to places where WTO held and as usual strike at every opportunity. Singapore media of course will sing to the high tunes how chaotic Hong Kong is and how peaceful Singapore could have been if WTO is held here. [Papaya need self praise to justify their existance and paid slips]

However, the local elites and media did missed a major point on nurturing people to handle crisis. Which is one critical success of a greater society and nation. Drilling down to Corporate survival skill, this crisis management skill is a great asset. Trust me, you need one moment in time to soar. Likes Micheal Owen, he can be suppressed in throughout of the game, however give him a chance on the goal mouth, he will made that a special moment by scoring. That's life folks. Just that quality moment. :)

Hong Kong as i always admired for it's civil exercisation of it's own rights and responsiblity [leave the Hongie's attitude out] illustrated that democracy still can work in an ASIAN mindsets and philiosophies.

Again the Hong Kong Police has done an excellent job is maintain civil and authority order from restraining the Korean farmers.

Insteads of taking mugshot at them, why not we learn from their success values? Likes Bruce Lee's quotes, take the good one and discard the bad one.

Stories at Police side
What we can learn from Hong Kong Police force?
What Mainland China can learn from this experience? [Mandarin]

Happy reading and see you all soon.

Wish me luck :)

Sawasdee, away for vacation :)

Yes, today is the day where my vacation begins. V.A.C.A.T.I.O.N till 2nd Jan 2006. Guessed i won't be able to spend the count down in Singapore for this year with friends.

Well, it's ok after all i seemed to be Singapore most unwanted child. haha ;D [chuckles]

With the latest fiasco and civil decisions, i believed i had seen enough of what good is in store for the few good hundred thousand of people in the island, therefore i guessed a vacation is no better way to align my future vision and lay down objectives for a new year.

Since this is my first trip to North Thailand, i would like to see how life goes on on the upper edge of Thailand since i heard so much about them yet unable to see it myself. This should be an excellent opportunuty when Thai friends asked me along.

My trip will involves me flying to BBK, then drive up to Chiang Jai for two days and later enroute to Chiang Mai till 1st Jan and finally land Singapore on 2nd Jan.

Of course the next day, normal routine resumes..

See ya :D

12:22pm, 27 Dec

My flight is 3pm enrouting to

Wow, watch this!

I not a firm believer that Sept 11 in NYC is the work of some organisation aimed at terrorising another nation. However, if you have a kin that is rated as world's public enemy, man life is hard.

This drill down to the girl in the picture below.

She is Aradic, she California born, she scantily dressed, she posed for CQ and she is Osama's niece. So dun mess with the wrong gal huh! :P

Wafah Dufour, as she known adopted the maiden name after Sept 11 is the daughter of Bin Laden's half brother, Yeslam Binladin.

However, she did not catch much of my attention. But knowing that Yeslam and Osama are among the 54 children of the late Saudi contruction magnate Mohammed Bin Laden. He had in facts married 22 wives!! And it not surprisely that by now, the whole family of 2 generations could have exceed 100s!!!

haha :D

Full Monty here

BeingStussy 2005

Found on the beinghunted website that Stussy is releasing a design of variety of artists to celebrate it's 25 years anniversary.

Check it out at beinghunted and order from The-Glade.com

Rare Export Inc, A tracker, A marker & A Sniper

Check out this cute little clip

Crazy Frog found Guilty of Deceit

Told u i hate Crazy Frog music, absolutely lame music.

Die die, you frog!!

Taken from The Inquirer

<<THE COMPANY which resells the popular Crazy Frog ringtone in the UK, mBlox, has just been fined £40,000 by the industry regulator, ICSTIS.

It has also forced mBlox to provide refunds to at least 338 people who had complained about the Crazy Frog adverts as being misleading.

These encouraged TV viewers to sign up to a ringtone club - rather than just being a one-off payment for a single ringtone.

Consequently many consumers found themselves paying for additional ringtones - at £1.50 a time - which they didn't even realise they had ordered.

Thus consumers were being duped into paying for something they didn't really want.

Industry watchers - including analysts, Juniper Research - have called for an end to the policy of offering subscription services as this practice has tarnished the image of the entire mobile content industry.

The problem is that the industry is currently self-regulating and ICSTIS has no powers to regulate Jamba which actually owns the Crazy Frog brand.

Since Jamba doesn't sell direct, it falls outside ICSTIS's current remit.

Considering how difficult it is to find ICSTIS, 338 is an amasing high number of complaints. µ >>

Nice T-Shirt Neh...& nice butt :P

Check this site out for nice fashion movments, Ai =Love Ko=child -love4everyobe everywhere

Protecting your iPod Nano

iPod Nano is a little baby which requires constant tender caring..hehe....However, the iPod Nano seemed to be a perfect X'mas present gifts as it sisbling's iPod Shuffles ran out of stocks and no further retails restocking until Feb 06. iPod Nano usually regards as a scratch magnet due to the new material Apple is using is a little softer and a tendency for people to put in shirts pocket riddling with coins and pen due to it's small size.

SwitchEasy has devised using a high impact plastic for space technology called polycarbonate resin(GE LEXAN ®) to prevent scratches from finding the surface of the iPod Nano.

The design philosophy not only aimed to deliver a hard shell but also a Wow factoring with the neck sling design approach with numerous colors to deck.

If only i have an iPod Nano..

Walking toplessly?

Ever picture yourself walking toplessly? Well, what were you thinking? It's a topless sandal from topless-sandal.com priced at USD14.50 and made in variety of design and colors.

Claimed to be made with a sticky surface and even guarantee that no residual effect on your foot after wearing it.

Fashion whore, this is your topless statement of the day. :P

What's on my ear bud?

Yearning for some inspirational music for the unrest mind? Hee..

Check out DJ Tiesto's latest Mix, In Search Of Sunrise 4 ~ Latin America

Featuring artistes from Solarstone, Tilt, BT, Allure, Blank & Jones, L.S.G and many more, the album is pretty progressive driven.

If you happened to love the works ethnics of DJ Nick Warren, Timo Maas, Armin Van Buuren, PVD and Kelvin Saunderson. This CD will not disappoint you.

:D

Merry X'mas eve gathering

These few days were the most sleepless nights i had gotten into, because i have been doing my research for a digital camera which suit my complex requirement of having a camera which is portable, scalable and loads of features. Finally, i had come to a cross road with Fujifilm 9500 [a bit big], Olympus CZ8080, Panasonic FZ30 [Len too long], FZ5, LX-1 [ i quite like], Sony R1 [too huge]. Finally i settled on the Olympus 8080 [2004 era] to end all my headache as it's offers superior image quality, not too overly huge for a prosumer camera. Only caveat is, it 's magnesium alloy body is quite a weight to lug. Then i headed off to have a nice 2nd half afternoon with Paulyn whom she had returned from Beijing before i headed to Gary and Denise house for a pre-X'mas cum House warming gathering.

Coming back to the topic, i went to Pat & Jimmy's place for X'mas gathering which is quite an annual thing altogether. Despite our dear friend, Leocadia was off to Switzerland to complete her bible studies we did missed her commanding presence, i would said. However it won't be long that she will return to "papa" side soon. haha [Darth Vader's breathing noise]

Some of the foods were prepared by Rebecca, Agnes and Patricia while i only contributed red wines on my little part of the night. However, the evening did indeed kick off to a good start....i betcha. Hiak Hiak :p















That's Lorraine absorbing my blow, Lorraine is Leocadia's 2nd elder sis. And Rebecca the youngest sis among the Koh family is the chef wannabe who has immerse interests in cooking. As usual her kah kia [Sidekick cum buddy], Agnes is out to assist her. Agnes also happened to be an ex-colleague of my part-time UCE University classmate Thomas at Cable & Wireless.















And every year, the star of the X'mas eve is usually snatch away by Luzisa [Lorraine & Van Onn] who is the youngest of the house seemed to have more of the X'mas Gifts [she got a new Nintendo Gameboy from daddy!!], she 5 yrs old this year. Too bad, Melvin [Agnes's nephew] did not come this year. I actually was trying to matchmake Melvin and Luzisa to earn some ang boh money, guessed i have to bribe Agnes next year. hahahaha















See how happy daddy is? [Van Onn hugging his beloved daughter]

And this year we have a new addition, Rebecca brought along her Korean counterpart to join in as well. Her name is M J, aiya not Micheal Jason lah. But dunno what M J means. Only Rebecca knows. She from Seoul and will be stationing Singapore Dystar [Rebecca's company] for a six months assignment.















And our lovely host, Jimmy and Patricia's friends also turned up to round up a pleasant evening. Greg, Gilbert, Chris & Luzisa [hogging the lime light again]















So it all began and end with a nice evening at Jimmy and Patricia's X'Mas hospitality.

Hopefully, this year absensees will be made available in 2006 X'mas. Leocadia & Melvin below.



:D

The Chronic of Narnia Rap

Hee, i almost cracked when i saw this....

Folks here we areEeee

Full Body Project

Guys, i think this is way too coolz. Check out Leonard Nimoy's gallery

On the contrary, who said fat is ugly? :P At least they are merry merrying now :)

Will be away again after X'Mas to Thailand again

Rebecca and Sisters Patricia will be inviting me to their house for X'mas eve gathering. This time the only omission is Leocadia Koh who will be under taking her bible course in Switerzland. Due to the fligth fare and her course is due to complete after Chinese New Lunar Year, Leo decided to save the air ticket.

However soon after X'mas, i will be heading to Chiang Jai and Chiang Mai for a 5 days vacation. Hopefully, i will be gotten my digital camera and happily snapping away.

Just too excited to get a vacation again. :D

News that i gathered while lazing

iPod Shuffle, the step children of iPod Nano new breed again made the head line when the 1GB Shuffle sold out completely and will not be replenish the retail stores until Jan 06. According to Apple Insider.

And the holiday seasons is coming, i hope if you drink dun drive. Else you end like Santa Claus lying on the floor half naked with the frontal tail sticking out.... haha :D

:)

Life has never been the same

Since returning from Bangkok vacation, part of the my life has never been the same haha :D Well, beside having seen a barrage of ancient siam, i'm pretty amazed the culture preservation has been so well that you can't seemed to imagine what life was in the early century of south east asia.

Unfortunately Singapore did not have much to talk about in those 17th century days since it's all began in an island with a couple morons caught sight of a lion dashing across the bush shouting "CB"! %#%$%&%$@#

Anyway, what has been loading in my ear bud lately? Well, it's seemed that i am in flavor with progressive music again. In deed, DJ Tiesto's latest album "In Search Of Sunrise 4" has simply revitalised the progressive music for a long time.

If you lack the Omph factor in music appreciation, DJ Tiesto the Dutch DJ Master is hard to miss.

The real reason why Manchester United's form blip

Why Martial Art is for Asian

Pretty funny video clip to remind us that why non asian should'nt be learning martial art.

Back from Thailand :(

Haiz...heart's sank when AirAsia's Flight FD 3503 touched down at Changi Airport runway. It's was a nice vacation that i yearned for a long time this year. My Thai friend have been doing an excellent job showing me to places that i have never been before. Now my Thailand's insight grew tremedously as i trekked around the perimeter of Bangkok city.

1st day, we drove to Pattaya city where the beach lies, while we were getting the beach mood setting in, we had a little breakfast near her house. We ate pork soup, which taste tremedously wonderful. Despite i am not some one to eat intestine, i ate the meat and blood cube only.

Then we set off to Pattaya which span about 2hrs drive away from our location of speed 140kph. We made our 1st stop at Mini Siam which display all the great wonder of the world in a minature fashion. I even caught the Merlion minature....

And finally we reached Pattaya, quite a lively town with plenty of ang moh dragging the hands of a thai girl they just "negotiated" anyway, stroll to the streets and see see look look and even we book ticket to the Chabaret to watch Ah Gua lancing. Darn, all tall and busty...i have to keep my hands off them, darn! haha

On the second day, we made way to Ayuthaya, an ancient capital city of SIAM. The city is quite full of relics and ruins as the whole city was burned and destroy when the Burmese attacked the city in 17 century. Went to the Temple and prayed for good fortune and $$ luck :P i even contributed a roof brick with my name on it. Hopefully my prayers come true. Then later in the night we went to Indonesian Bali theme restaurant called Kulu Kulu Balong which served some delightful food. Again we munched like no tomorrow. haha Aroi mud mud.

Ops, I forgot our lunch was taken at a Boat Noodle outskirt of Bangkok, i had beef noodle dry and a soup. Definitely one of the best beef noodle i had taken at Bangkok for a long while. It's was quite a leisure eating since we both were beef eater. Of course me being a lesser being dun eat chicken [Mai Kin Kai] kinda felt left out on other recommendation. Anyway, the beef is aroi mud mud again.

On the 3rd day, we went to eat seafood outskirt of Bangkok, Samut Pharakan. The black pepper crab we ordered is simply top notched, full of spicy and not forgetting the Tom Yum Ngon is heavenly cooked. Manz, i am getting hungry as i wrote this blog. After this, we headed to the ancient city for a walk and went straight back to Bangkok city to meet another Thai friend, Taro. We arranged to meet at the new biggest shopping center called Siam Paragon, a joint venture with Singapore Paragon. Touted as one of the largest shopping centre decked with a big brands and even built the salt water biggest aquarium at the basement. Darn grand, and watching the opening ceremony is likes going to a world of joy. Spectacular!!

All in all, i did enjoyed my short vacation and it's amazingly hard for me to adjust back to Singapore lifestyle. I think my prayer is slowly being answered......

Mai Pen Rai...i will be back. But before i do so...i need to shred some weight off me haha :D

Can Hong Kong people get their democracy?

Democracy in it's true form allows people to decide and be responsible to their decisions, however democracy in a modern world is a politician's word to derail other forms of social model and always it was full of distortion at it's own best interest at the expenses of the mass.

Hong Kong today see 10 thousand people marching on the street fighting for their democracy from Mainland China. Do they really able to get it? I always been an admirer of Hong Kong with the amount of freedom given to each and every Hong Kongers the chance, the freedom to speak for themselves before the take-over period. And even merging back to China, every Hong Konger still seek the greater freedom, because this freedom is something that cannot be taken away from them. Sadly, every Singaporean do not able to grasp the true meaning of freedom and democracy, for many who did, left for the greater land. For those who forsaken, left to enjoy the best they could afford knowing that ignorance is a bliss. The political stalemate we had now is the very own making of Singaporean who unable to stood on it's ground, who unable to voice it's inner desire to build a better society than to leave to some eliteist who what 's good for the nation is what's good for the people. Apathetic as it seemed.

Here are some comment taken from BBC's forum

Hong Kong is a modern world city with a very well educated, well travelled, peaceful and astute population. To insist - as its pro-China hacks do - that people are too 'immature' for democracy is highly insulting.
Of course 'mature' in China's eyes means subservient to the whims of the CCP. 'Mature' for Hong Kongers means able to exercise informed, independent, well-balanced judgement.

Phil Glenwright, Hong Kong

I attended the amrch. i am so proud of Hong Kong and its people. - We do deserve universal suffrage. But reality tells us what we fight for will not easily be given.

BUt I would like to say firmly to those who propose "HK dependence" that the majority people, while disapproving measures implemented by Beijing, also DETEST the idea of independence - there is no doubt that HK is part of China. What we fight for is what we have been promised in the Basic Law, NOT INDEPENDENCE.

Chris Lo, Hong Kong

Is the british governor in Hong kong elected by their people before 1997?

william chow, nottingham

I support you Hong Kong protestor! I am so proud of you all. I am so proud to be born and raised in HK, a place in which its future should be decided by its own residents, the HK people! I fully support universal suffrage in HK; HK people deserve to be given at least a timetable of when it will happen. Democracy in HK is inevitable! Way to go protestors!

JJ, Vancouver

I feel pride with the courage shown by my fellow countrymen in Hong Kong.

For those who said it's a "mob's politics" to press the government for universal suffrage, please stage a street demonstration of such a comparable scale to substantiate this statement for me to be convinced of.

The message from the members of the public cannot be more clearer now. Pleas listen to the voice of the Hong Kong people who have acquitted themselves with flying colour this afternoon.

E. Ng, Singapore

Heading for vacation soon ~ Sawasdee Kup

Heee, guessed this new week will be a good week for me to take work off my mind. Which i will be looking forward. I will be heading to Pattaya, Bangkok for 4 days with a Thai friend. My vacation time will begin at Fri till Tue, therefore i will not be absolutely doing anything related to computer. Eventually i will also try to see if i can meet couples of my Thai friends along as well. I think they missing me also.

In addition, this trip i will be taking Air Asia budget airline for the 1st time, heard their service is very good. Therefore it will be a good chance for me to experience how good they really were, however it might be the last chance as well, as Air Asia won't been stopping in SG soon as the negotiation for landing rights broke down with CAAS, Singapore sometimes two weeks ago.

So it another rounds of Sawasdee Kup again. :)

At least he is being honest ~ reflection

This two days, really suay and threw myself in confusion. Apparently, Ivy and May asked me to help them with computer stuffs on the Sat, oh well. Actually i did'nt want to do anything with computer any more as i wish to take a break from them. However i was tempted to build a new computer with Windows 2003 and Linux on it. Maybe i was thinking of building a ftp server and centralized file server at home, so i dun have to store duplicate files across multiple pc. Anyway, even today visit to Sim Lim Sq, i end up buying nothing. So i guessed i may have to re-think what i am going to do with them later.

Meantime, i just need a little break from computers.

However everything in life always come to a delight somehow, while scouting for hardware for the girls, i stumbled on a senior co-worker in my National Semiconductor, he was the guy who introduced me Linux which ultimately lead me to transit to IT industry after serving my 7 yrs stinct there. Without little assistance, i did managed to get my spare computer running on SuSE 6.2 Linux which i duly paid for SG$75 at Techdrome. Since then, i have been pretty versatile between the Unix and Windows environment. I still owe it to him for kickstarting everythings as i do now.

We chatted for a while, understanding that the whole plant is going to be closed at Toa Payoh Lor 1, some many of the staffs were leaving in stages. Mr Sim played quite a role in his Test department so i dun think he will be among the 1st batch to retrench. Anyway, our friend here is pretty blessed that he had finished paying his house and 5 more yrs for him to withdrawn his CPF amounted after paying his flat. And on top of that he will be given 100++ K of renumeration for his long service, so looks like our friend here is going to enjoy his life. And if he is smart, insurance brought for his children during their infant would probably paid off their University school fee easily. So planning in life is very important. Trust me.

So, flashing back in times and moving forward to the years ahead. I still have greater grounds to conquer while old comrads, some survives and some got to worry for their livehood when the plant shut down for good. And it's will be even tougher for them to land the same job as the manufacturing industries in SG diminishing slowly....little by little.

Just another honest day, i guessed.

Rolex Sea-Dweller

While u kept salivating over the Omega Seamaster, Rolex has a new Submariner introduced. Nice boh?

Fashion sense...sniff sniff

I can smell that the latest fashion crave is heading back to the 80s. Yes, the 80s where i played my marbles and listens to WHAM!, Tears for Fears and so on.

I noticed that many sport manufacturers Nike, Addias, Onitsuka Tiger, New Balances & Puma are all heading back to the design archive to re-introduce their 80-90s fashion, i beginning to get caught soon.

Coming back today, i found some new sites on watches. And would like to show you some of the watch i think is nice can carry a great sense of nobility especially for an un-beng Singaporean. Haha :)

While doing my daily dose of surfing, Elaine Ang popped in from the thin wire and had some nice little chat on msn messenger. Hee, as usual we exchanged what is going with our life recently. Hope she kept her promises...

















Above is a Corum's Golden Bridge, noticed the mechanism is constructed in a single line. Amazing piece of art. In fact, it was voted as watch of the year 2005.

Seiko has been one of the longest Japanese watch manufactuer, in facts. I used to love their old Super 5 watches. However their new introduction of a flexible liquid crystal watch is a significant committment to the watch industry. The watch is called Spectrum.















Omega has released a new Seamaster, noticed the James Bond engraving on the face of the watch? :P Does he resembled Ralph Fiennes? :P

Cactus Friend

It hard to resist the cuteness of such toy called "Cactus friend" from Tokidoki, each bored a name Sandy, Bastardino and Sabochan. Created with STRANGEco. Availability is now.

LED watch

Beside living a humble life, i also quite an avid watch lover. But me no $$ to play branded watches now, however this little LED watch called DIODE might be a therapy for me.

From Japan's Tokyo Flash comes a LED watch that does nothing but telling you the time in a different manner. Using LED lits to display time does requires some practise. However i mastered the art of reading it's time in no time.

Yes, i am unshamely intelligent. And if you have the aptitude to match me and would like to be in style, stop going Baby G. Hahaha

Read the review here.

Nike iPod Nano Armband

Nike released an armband for iPod Nano user and possibly iPod Shuffler as well. Speaking of which, APPLE has released a new software updates for iPod user. According to the release note, it update only the iPod Shuffler to 1.1.3

Coming back to the topic, Nike has been trying to get into the Digital Audio Player [DAP] for quite sometimes, in facts they did had an alliance with Philip Electronic to made active portable players, sometimes introduced in the Diamond RIO's era. However the sales number could not match the onslaughtering of iPods, the alliance went south this year. So since u can't beat them, joining them seemed to be an logical answer to it's DAP's misadventure.

The armband is made of high compression fabric similar to Dri-FIT apparels and only available in two color combinations (gray/orange and black/gray) and two sizes, (small/medium and medium/large)

If you willing to part US$40 bucks for being sport cliche, this arm band is definitely swinging in style with you, and who know u might catch the attention of a lady gym goer.

News taken from iLounge.