A rural scene...

These images was taken sometimes ago when I went back to my spouse's village in Ketari, Bentong... It shows the neglect of the rural areas and what's left are old folks after their children have left for greener pasture in search of a better living conditions...Bentong is a small town about thirty five minutes drive from Kuala Lumpur...With the Highway to Kuantan this town is now bypassed and not as busy as before... Any ways it is still a great place to be.. With its rural landscape where some of the largest Rubber plantations were and the primary product of the country in the era gone by...With Malaysia now one of the top trading countries, in some areas Rubber plantation has been replaced with the now Golden crops, The Oil Palm...Today Malaysia is the largest exporter of Palm Oil... Well my idea of posting these images is just to give the visitors to my blogs a change of scene.. Hoping that these scenes would bring back memories of the past.. As for me it was a memories of my childhood and the growing up years...It was real nice to play around in the bush, catching spider as pets. Nowadays kids no longer do that.. Today they are on with the computer and wondering in cyberspace and playing virtual games, unlike in our times.. The real physical world was our space to play games... What a world we live in... In such a short space of time we are into another world of cyberspace, which our forefather would not believe that it exist..What would come next!!!. Well we have to just wonder and be there when it arrived... Have a nice day...[I blog this from Malacca ]

The AGM of MMBR Owner's Association...

The AGM of the Owner's Association of the Merak Melaka Beach Resort [formerly Mutiara Melaka Beach Resort] at Pantai Putri [formerly Pantai Kundur], in short is known as the MMBR would be held on Sunday, April 30, 2006 at 11:00 Am, at the Resort...All association members have been invited to attend this meeting...Some members could not be contacted, probably because of change in address...So if anyone knows of members that did not received the AGM notification, do inform them to attend this AGM..Two members one from California, USA a Mr.Robert John Kunst and another from Hong Kong, a Mr Michael Tse Chi Hung could not be contacted at all, so if you are reading this blog, do contact me.. I am one of the owner helping on the AGM and my email address is on this blog. The resort is been managed by a new management company and they are doing well and soon I believe the Resort would be back to the days of if former glory...Have a nice day.

Things of beauty....

I love and enjoy things of beauty and I believe everyone love anything beautiful.. Great scene, great landscape, beautiful works of arts, beautiful living space, and of course those gorgeous people that we enjoy watching and be with.... Our species indeed a great creation....

Well, with love, passion and ingenuity we could create any objects and space to be things of beauty.. Enjoy doing it and Enjoy with the result of your works of arts...

Just takes some times to ponder the images above and I am sure you would enjoy these works of Art...The subjects were simple objects and with some creativity and a digital camera...Voila you get a postcard of sorts...

I took these images using my cell phone, thus the images look rather different, unique in a way.. Something that I love to do whenever and wherever I find an interesting objects or subject to immortalized... The cell phone with a camera makes it a brisk to get great images in instance... The cell phone do changes our lives....

A thing of beauty is a joy forever!!!Enjoy..

Mee Kari [curry noodle]

Now that with our second home in Malacca, we ply the north south Highway at least once a month to the south to Malacca and to the north on our return to Kuala Lumpur... It is now only a brisk to Malacca on the Highway.. A pleasant drive that one could enjoy driving all the way..On the way there are a few Rest areas where we could take a brake and have drinks or meals before proceeding onward... One of our favorite place to stop is the R & R at Seremban and there would get our drinks or foods at the cafe call the Shalala, an up market cafe which served freshly brewed coffee and other Malaysian specialties...One of my favorite is the Mee Kari above...It taste real good and that is why we always stop at the Shalala either on the way to Malacca or on the way back to KL...The R & R are on both sides of the Highway...Well that is life, Enjoy.. [image taken with a cell phone]

Marriage between culture.....

I thought that I would discuss about Marriage in this posting, a very important institution of ours or most appropriately that of our Asian Society. In this case I would discuss on the Malay/Moslem Marriage...In Islam marriage is a very important institution, for it is this institution that would ensure our species would flourish on this planet. It is a very sacred institution and not to be taken lightly or just for granted.

Last week I was involved in a Marriage function of a friend's daughter in Malacca..I was requested by the Bride's parent to be the Grand Master of Ceremony of the Akad Nikah [solemnized of marriage] ceremony for the wedding...This particular marriage is unique in that it is between a Malay Lass and a Foreign Lad from the West, so the ceremony had to be conducted unlike the normal one where the ceremony would be conducted in our own language [Malay language] and Arabic..In this case the whole ceremony had to be conducted in English together with the usual languages [Malay and Arabic]..

So as soon as the bridegroom arrived...We all sat on the floor, the Malay traditional way of sitting whenever we have a traditional or religious function.. The bridegroom was lead by a member of our Parliament, a friend of the bride's family and knew this Foreign Lad..I greet them with the usual greeting of welcome and than proceed to conduct the ceremony...Everyone was dressed in their best colorful traditional Malay dress, which consist of the Malay Baju[top] and Seluar [trousers or pan] wrap with the traditional Malay hand woven Songket [brocade] sarong. The women all dress in their best traditional dress, that of the Baju Kurong and other traditional dresses. The are some that came is their best western dress... Turning the ceremony into a riot of colors, indeed a very colorful scene, the like that of a theatric production....In a wedding of this nature the bridegroom came with the Hantaran or Marriage gifts...These beautiful and well decorative gifts were accepted by the host and place beside the gifts from the bride that had already been displayed on a special raised platform. Making its a glittering array of beautifully and artistically wrap gifts of all sized and color....

We had decided to make this ceremony as simple as possible since the bridegroom is not use to such a ceremony and also do not understand the Malay language, as well as not accustom with the Malay culture...For such ceremony to be legal under the Syriah law, the Registrar of Marriage had to be present..In this case the Local Imam is the Registrar and He is present..Since the local Imam could not speak English, another religious official who has the command of the English language were also present, to recite the Marriage Sermon. For today ceremony the Bride's dad had decided to the solemnization the marriage himself. This procedure is allowed only with the presence of the Registrar of Marriage. I start the ceremony by leading all presence in reciting the Al fatihah [the first surah of the Koran]. With that I informed everyone that for this marriage to proceed in order and according to the Syriah..There are four factors that had to be in place first... The presence of a Man and a Woman to be married, both must be of the Islam faith, and the Mas Kahwin in the form of cash amounting of RM40.00, an amount regulated by the Malacca Religious Department. The Mas Kahwin should not be confused as a dowry, there is no dowry in Islam. Dowry is a cultural or a tradition aspect of a race and has nothing to do with the religion.. The Hantaran in the form of gifts that includes money are mere gifts from the bridegroom to the Bride and it is not mandatory. The forth condition is that of the presence of the Khadi or the Registrar of Marriage...In this case the local imam is present...Since every thing are in order, I request the official from the Religious department to recite the Marriage Sermon. With that done and clearly explained to the Bridegroom..The father of the Bride is then request to solemnized the Marriage..Before this is done He is requested to ask the Bride [His daughter] whether She agree to Marry the Lad present today.. She replied Yes and the father solemnized the Marriage in a ceremony of what we call the Akad Nikah....With that the Lad and Lass were proclaimed as Man and Wife...Immediately after this the religious official read the Taklik to the Bridegroom and explain in detail the meaning of the Taklik. It is follow with the handing over of the Mas Kahwin from the groom to the bride and exchange of Rings between the couple. With the formalization of this marriage, I then call upon the Imam to recite the Doa or the Prayer of thanks to the Lord for having graced this auspicious ceremony...

Marriage is the binding of two lovers and we should remember that love is not always sunshine all throughout or bed of roses all the ways...Friends, getting married is the beginning of a relationship between two person..It is in fact the beginning of a journey together...Like I had often said love alone would not makes a marriage successful, understanding and wisdom would...It is not going to be an easy journey but with wisdom the journey would be as colorful as ever... May the newly married have a great life always... Have a nice day.

The Bagel...

No this is not Donuts. Well it look like one but it is not that you usually get a Dunkin. It is actually the Bagel... For those of you who have been to the New England States, especially those that frequent NY or Boston would surely know of the Bagel, that the easterner loved...The images that you see above is not taken in NY or Boston.. It is taken in our kitchen at our habitat in Ampang Jaya, Malaysia... It is homemade and the look and taste is perfect as the one you usually get in NY or Boston or anywhere else in the states... Well Bagel is yet to get popular in Malaysia, so it is not that easy to get, even the frozen one. Sometime if you are lucky you could get it at the supermarket.. It is at last catching up in Kuala Lumpur at least...I am told you can get good Bagel at an outlet in the new Avenue K..The sprawling shop lots beside the KLCC, just as you get out of the KLCC's LRT underground station...... Well the one you see in the image above was done by our daughter, who is back from Boston.. She is good at cooking and baking... And since all in the family have tasted Bagel before when we were living in Boston, we actually yearned for this Donuts shape special that had that unique taste..Take it with Cream Cheese, it is simply delicious.. It is not like what Donuts taste..It is simply unique..Having a taste of its own.

Well when you travel the world you would sure come across foods from various culture and when you are back home, you sometime yearned for it.. Now that knowledge about foods are aplenty in the internet and Cook Books, you could actually do it yourself, except of course you must have that love for cooking or it is already in your gene, like some people do...The next day our eldest grand daughter tried it and it also turn out perfect...So I am sure the gene part is a factor that had to be reckoned with as a very important ingredient in the process of making a great foods.. Personally I love to cook as well and I know that you must have that special in you to create a great food that everyone would love...Have a nice day..

From Causeway to Bridge, back to Causeway...

The Malaysian government today decided not to proceed with the building of the new bridge to replace the Causeway as planned... Many Malaysian have voices their concerned with the building of this bridge to replace the Causeway, joining Malaysia with Singapore that was built by the colonial government before independence. This is because the negotiations with Singapore have not been fruitful so far.

I am glad that the Malaysian government had decided to scraped this project totally and with that would save Malaysia billion of Ringgit, which I believe would be used for other economic projects in Johor... Anyway with the present Causeway and the Link Kedua Bridge, both citizen of the countries could still travel to and fro, thus it would not create a problems with the traveling Malaysian public...

Indeed a great and wise move by the Malaysian Government. In a way Malaysia has more to gain in making the decision to scrap the project totally...Thanks to Pak Lah [Abdullah Ahmad Badawi, the Prime Minister of Malaysia] for the wise decision...

The Gospel of Judas...

Last night from 10 pm to 12 midnight [Sunday April 9, 2006] I watch with interest a documentary on The Gospel of Judas presented by National Geographic..I believe the rest of the world watch that too.. I love history and had always tried to follow the development in science and technology in seeking the truth.. For History is the product of the Victor.. Even if you had Time Machine to get back in time and seek the truth of our history, it would still be just too difficult to record everything that happen twenty four hours in a day...So your guess is a good as mine of how much of history are the truth, until we get more facts and in this case about another Gospel. The Gospel of Judas. For more then two thousand years we have been made to believe in so many views and for the belief of it we often then not really believed in what we have been told.. Our species have been always an inquiring man, so we never fail to seek the truth..In an era of the internet information get disseminated fast..The truth or false get to every corner of the earth in mere second..Like tonight we all watch with great admiration the amount of works and resources in the quest for the truth...If not all the truth at least we are surely getting there in one way or the other..In the case of the document of the Gospel of Judas, the documentary shows the dedicated works of those involved for years in seeking the truth and documenting the process in this great documentary by National Geographic...With that I thanks all those that made this possible for us to open our mind to other possibilities in the not too distance future..So that our history is put into a better prospective with the truth eventually prevailed.. May our species continue to progress and prosper... Have a nice day.

Goreng Pisang [Fried Banana]

Well let talk banana!!.. No, we are not talking about monkey even though the monkey and us human do love among other things, this tropical fruit the Banana... Anyway I am not talking about what the monkey like or dislike although both are of the same species...Well I am talking about is about Eating or Makan, the passion of all Malaysian...For we Malaysian love to eat, no..Not just love to eat but Enjoy to eat as well...This is a country where one could go on eating all day and night long.. Food are available all the time and everywhere across the country...If you could not find it at the restaurants, Fast Food outlets, roadside stalls, surely there are foods at the twenty four hours Mamak shop or at the coffee house at major hotels that open twenty four hours.. In another word you just could not go hungry in this country. Remember for less the US one dollar you could have a hearty and nutritious food in the Roti Canai & Teh Tarik...I could talk all day long about food but today what I had on my mine at this moment in time is about that other special of ours..The Goreng Pisang or Fried Banana..It is another favorite of mine..Hot steamy Goreng Pisang that came straight form the Frying Wok of the Goreng Pisang seller. Goreng Pisang sell fast when it is hot after frying thus the Malaysian saying "Macam Goreng Pisang Panas" which mean anything that sell like hot cakes...At tea break nothing taste better then hot Goreng Pisang..The images about is a plate full of that delicacy of ours, a traditional snack that still there to remind us of our past...The Goreng Pisang... Have a nice day.

Dip in...

So what do you do with fruits that has yet to ripen!!! Well, you either wait for it to ripe and eat it or find another way of enjoying the fresh fruits as it is just before it is ripen. Most tropical fruits have that sour salty taste before its ripen. It is only when it is fully ripen that it get that delicious sweet taste...In the old days Kampong [village] folks would gather around and enjoy a cicah session during the fruits season...It is actually enjoying the young and as yet to ripen fruits and eating it with a specially made hot and spicy sauce...The other day on our way back from Taiping, a city to the north of the country,we stop at the R & R and bought some fresh fruits and this weekend our grandchildren came over and as usual the elders among them would be at the kitchen helping the grandma.....Without been ask, the eldest girl decide on an idea of cutting these fruits and prepare a plate full, and artistically arranged it all for the dip in session...It look like that traditions do run in the family...The images above is Her works of arts...Well it did not last long. Everyone took to dip in and enjoy the fresh tropical fruits...Well life is like that...Enjoy

Belief.....

Belief .... Well do take a pause and think hard....We all believe in so many things and just accept it as fact and never ask question...Well, it is good once a while we took stock of the situation and think!!!... Perhaps we would look differently at things as we move forward..We do not live in a perfect world and as such we have to learn to live with it.. One of the best way is to take a middle course and always do Good..Like the Day and Night, we have the opposite of Good.. That is Evil.. As a person who have gone through life and now enjoying life in the golden age, my advice to the young that they should always think hard and be smart in whatever endeavors they took, for the world is full of challenges and if we act smart we would conquer all and would reach our destinations with satisfaction...A reward for a job well done of which no amount of money could buy...So Never, Never ever think of Evil...Always be Good and I believe you would have a successful journey of life always... Have a nice day....

The 9th Malaysia Plan..

Yesterday the Prime Minister of Malaysia launched the 9th Malaysia Plan.. A five years plan for the development of the country... It is hope that this five years plan would continue to improve the quality of life of all Malaysian...Like all the previous Plan for the economic development of the country,this Plan is an on going process to improve the quality of life for all Malaysian...This Plan is special in that it is geared to prepare the country to a Developed status come the year 2020, thus the Vision 2020. I have help in the planning of the earlier Malaysia Plan and have seen that over time it has succeeded in providing for the Malaysian people a better quality of life...It started with the first Malaya Plan in the fifties and later became the Malaysian Plan when the country became Malaysia...