Endangered....

These chimpanzees are from a zoo in Sierra Leone where the authorities are ordering people taming chimpanzees in their homes as pets to give them up as part of a drive to save the endangered primates.
Yes...endangered. Endangered primates. Endangered chimpanzees. Endangered monkeys.
Endangered.
(Picture by AFP taken on Wednesday August 15 2007).

Love Thy Country!

I do, I do and I do.
That's why I am so pissed.
I'm looking around me and I am so desperately disillusioned at what I see and what I know.
At first, I thought it was just plain gossip and rumour-mongering. Gradually, I realised that there is a lot of truth in all those things they have been saying about how badly the country is being run.
I mean screw-ups are not anyone's figment of imagination.
Take a look at a certain individual who has got to be so powerful by just being married to the PM's daughter.
I remember how people were so upset when it was learnt that the three sons of Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad (then Prime Minister) were involved in business.
How the foreign media had a field day whacking Dr Mahathir.
I think the campaign against Dr Mahathir was so blistering that it did affect his popularity.
Fastforward today -- I think it is so unbelievable and so unacceptable that this person who is married to the PM's daughter is where he is today.
I read the Sunday Star article by Joceline Tan and I almost threw up. Actually, a bit of my breakfast got, er, barfed.
What a load of crock and ass-licking crap J Tan's article was.
Umno Youth is made up of ball-lickers and lily-livered cowards whose interest is money and position so that they can make more money and gain higher position.
Umno cannot be representative of the Malays anymore.
How can anyone like what-his-name-and-face get himself in such a powerful position?
What does it tell our young Malaysians?
You can get to be so powerful in this country by marrying a daughter of the Prime Minister.
But the Prime Minister has got to be like the one we have.
So, let's all be making sure that we get Prime Ministers like that so that our sons need not contribute anything to the country and still get to gain those millions and occupy those important seats.

It tells us that it is okay to be greedy. It is okay if you are actually worthless. You can still be a leader.
And pray tell me, why the foreign media is not getting at this administration's case?
If you ask me there are so many questions to ask, so many things to write.

Pity.... we deserve the leader we choose!

Power and Purpose

"Wise people delay eating. Devout people do not satisfy their appetite. Hermits take only enough to sustain life. The young eat until the dishes are taken away. The old eat till they sweat.
A wise person who engages in controversy with fools, should not expect to be treated with honour. And if a fool should overpower a sage with eloquence, no one should be surprised: a common stone can break a jewel.
Do not be surprised that the dissolute do not heed the words of the devout; the music of a lute is drowned by the beat of a drum.
A natural talent without training is pitiable: training without a natural talent is wasted. A wise person is like a tray at a pharmacist - in silence it manifests its own merits. An ignorant person is like the drum of a warrior - loud and useless.
Friendship takes many years to establish: so do not fall out with a friend over a single disagreement.
Reason is captive in the hands of passion - just as a weak man is captive in the hands of an artful woman.
Purpose without power is mere weakness and deception: power without purpose is emptiness and insanity." - Sadi: Gulistan 8

Tyranny

"Of all the tyrannies on humankind The worst is that which persecutes the mind" -- John Dryden.

I remember how Iraq's Saddam Hussein was hated. How Indonesia's Suharto was hated.
Their children's shenanigans did not help.
Made it worse for them.
Their children were equally hated.
And their people prayed for their leaders' fall. And that of their leaders' children.
And when they fell, the people rejoiced.

Love and Lovers

"The lover is a monotheist who knows that other people worship different gods but cannot himself imagine that there could be other gods" - Theodore Reik : "Of Love and Lust".

Vuitton's Gorbachev

Now, if Louis Vuitton can have former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev as the French luxury label's new face, I don't see why they cannot have our very own Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad.
I'd really like to see that happening!
It goes to show that nothing is impossible, Yeah, I always believe that.
I need to just look at home, here in Malaysia.
You think it's damn impossible for some people to be where they are, high-flying and all, when you and I know very well that they are really good-for-nothing and they're there not by the grace of God but by the stupidity of people in power. There, I've said it.
Now, read about the new face of LV. Click here!

Made In China

In those days, China-made goods were usually not of good quality. It's not that I am prejudiced but more often than not, such products ranging from toys to kitchenware -- most anything and everything -- were really of inferior, sometimes sub-standard quality.
We would even be worried about foodstuff that came out of China, wondering what they contained because China was not known to be strict in enforcing laws covering food production.
But, they were cheap.
After the fall of communism, China had to come to grips with, confront and then embrace capitalism, laissez faire and the open market.
The journey was slow, a little heady, but steady. Everyone braced themselves for the new emerging China.
Now, China is the new economic power. Everyone wants to have a go at dancing with her.
Everyone wants to have a piece of China.
She seemed to be handling all this popularity pretty well, convincing the once-powerful west that she's made the cut.
Perhaps, too weary to sustain the "high', she is showing signs of reverting to her bad old ways.
Could it be the West is bad-pressing her, fearing her growing strength, and fighting back by playing a little dirty?
Still, can't deny that China offers gargantuan possibilities.
And China-made goods are still cheap.
But today, things are not going too smoothly for China. Products from China are not only poorly made but are found to be dangerous.
And there is proof of China's recklessness in quality control. But, was there ever in the first place?

Check out this story about Fisher-Price having to recall some one million toys because their paint contains excessive amount of lead.
These toys were made by Fisher-Price by a Chinese vendor and sold in the United States between May and August.

Read the story here.