The executive director of Grand Saga Sdn Bhd was the ex OCPD of Dang Wangi in KL. His name rang a bell. Now that there’s a picture of him with these articles, I definitely know him. He was a corrupt cop. I saw him once. It was on an application which required his approval and my boss asked me to see him. During the meeting, he first asked me if we provided housing loan. He then moved on to car loans. He kept telling me a particular make of car (the Jeep Wrangler) was a really nice car. The hint was unmistakable. I had no doubt in my mind what he was getting at – that if my boss wanted that application approved, we would have to contribute for that “dream car” of his.

To add insult to injury, later on in the meeting, he received a call from one of his subordinates. A raid had taken place in an abandoned building and an addict had apparently fallen off maybe the 4^th floor, and died. OCPD Zainal Abidin Ali’s remark was that that deceased deserved it and it was good the community had one less of such characters to deal with. What a champion. A shamelessly corrupt cop who is a moral buffoon. Grand Saga’s bloody minded tactics are no surprise given such leadership. No consultation, no civil approach. Just bulldoze (literally) away and place thugs to smother all resistance.

I don’t know why police was deployed to control the crowd. The police should have been acting against the thugs who were “guarding” the barricade because they were obviously armed and ready to assault (and did assault) anyone who would try to remove the barricade. If I drove on a road and had to stop because an object was blocking the road, I would remove that obstacle and if anyone tried to stop me, I had the right to get the police to act against that person. In this instance however the police acted against those who were trying to remove the obstacle, but not against those who committed assault (probably aggravated assault).

I see in this the police attempt to suck up to an old comrade. The ex-OCPD of Dang Wangi was no doubt made an executive director for his construction prowess – not. It was his police connection and bloody mindedness which qualified him for that position, no doubt features which the ex-OCPD put to use unashamedly. I wonder if what the ex-OCPD sought to receive when in service, he now dishes out when out of service, to create a “win-win” situation, ie he now serves his new master well and his ex-colleagues and comrades continues his legacy of corruption. This ex-OCPD belongs to the Zakaria Mat Deros basket case of corrupt officials and should be not be given any roles. That companies like Grand Saga would give such a person any role at all is symptomatic of what ills Malaysia. Khalid the CM of Selangor is of that breed who is not affected by such issues. He would not have experienced most of the battles of those Cheras residents go through every day.

 

 

 

4 minutes gone; cautious start.

Scholes has of course, started. Sparky is however, disappointingly not playing tonight at all.

15 min – midfield has been crowded so the first exciting move was from Evra over the heads of the boys in the middle of the park for Ronny who beat Essien to cross which Hargreaves just missed.

I’m nervous, its cold – just over 4 deg.

First conner from right. Hargreaves takes. 20 minutes gone now. Somehow United players appear to be enjoying themselves more than Chelsea.

Scholesy is booked – and bloodied. Chelsea’s first conner – looked dangerous but Terry adjudged to have pushed Brown. Scholes is back on field after treeatment but Andersonis warming up. Scholesy still looks a bid dazed and still bleeding.

Goal!!!!! Ronny rise to put a header onthe far left hand corner from a pass from Brown after a 1-2 with Scholesy!!!

What a breathtaking moment – Rooney out muscled someone in his own half, pumped a crossfield ball up to Ronny, who laid on for Tevez to get a great save from Cech who pushed the ball out and Carrick arrived to invite another fantastic save from Cech. Almost 2-0 and United is well and truly on top.

Rio fouled Lampard on the edge of the box and was booked. Dangerous position but Ballack missed.

EDVS slipped and Lampard scored. 1-1. 😦

 2nd Half

If Essien moves to midfield it’d be a lot trickier for United. He was playing right back and Ronny was beating him easily. In the closing moments of 1st half he moved up midfield and made the difference which led to the goal, I think.

Game is a lot more even now – even in Chelsea’s favour as Essien and Ballack gets in on the act a whole lot more. Edgy stuff.

 My laptop is running real low on battery…

Droggy just hit the upright out of nothing… man… 

United needs a bit more bite in midfield. The muscle of Chelsea has been holding sway in the second half.

 Go Giggsy – score a memorable one. On your 759th appeafrance!

 ————–

Had to leave for work just as the first half of extra time was finishing. I followed the rest of the game via text messages from a mate in Malaysia!

What a finale to a fantastic season – will have to watch it all on replay tonight.

Champions!!! 🙂

 

I was chatting online with an ex-colleague recently, on an all too familiar issue. It relates to striking a balance between doing work which one enjoys and feels is meaningful, and work which is expected of you. Many of us do work which is expected of us – work which we went to university to be trained for, and work which brings home the level of remuneration – money, yes… – which provides us with more than the bare necessities in life. It is work which tells others we are “normal”, part of the crowd, and keeping ourselves honest by keeping our heads down instead of chasing our dreams. It is work which sees us battle each day and let the stress and little niggling unhappiness build up to become, some 10-20 years later, a pile of diseases. The often repeated saying that “one never lies on the death bed wishing he had spent more time in the office” is very true but seldom seems to have any effect on the valiant corporate trooper who trudges into his cubicle each day and crawl out 12 hours later, looking and feeling like a zombie.
 
Blessed is the person who loves the work he is expected to do and continues to have a buzz and unmovable belief that it is his calling in life to do that work. Many don’t.  Many ask this huge question after a while.
 
When I was in Malaysia I often asked myself if it was worth it – the long hours, the stress over unfinished work, unresolved issues and retention of clients. In Malaysia work issues often extend to matters which aren’t really work matters. There was a period of time when I was constantly harassed by government officials who had an agenda to pursue. Regulators came knocking on my office door not to check on the state of the bank but in a witch hunt, to canvass data to for use against persons in the course of a political putsch. That was extremely stressful and I wanted so much to throw in the towel.
 
I distinctly remember planning a holiday with the family, only to be denied the trip because these mongrels impounded my passport. When I confronted them and demanded that they return my passport as I had not breached any relevant (or any) laws and there were no ostensible grounds for their action, they just shrugged. Their excuse was they were in the middle of various investigations (read: they still needed to get more data to nail their master’s political opponent) and they needed me to be around to provide data, information or documents. Malaysia at that time (and to a large extent, in the present day ell) is simply lawless. There is always someone bloody inded enough to do as he will and he will get away with it no matter how unlawful his actions may have been. So, unreasonable or illegal as it may have been, they kept my passport and for a long time too. I recall going away on a trip to watch United play in Old Trafford, I was shaking when I approached immigration, not knowing if I was cleared to leave the country.
 
They may take my passport but unless they threw me in prison on some cooked up pretence I wasn’t going to let them have the pleasure of my company. I promptly checked into the National Park (Taman Negara) where I knew mobile reception was going to be next to non-existent. I stayed there several days, knowing I could in my own little way, get back at them by ignoring them. No one knew I had gone – Tress and Kiddo were on some cruise liner somewhere in Hong Kong and didn’t even know I wasn’t at home. My mother called my home number and my mobile but couldn’t get me on either. I must have been there for a week – walking jungle paths everyday and making friends with a guide. I returned to the park resort everyday however – no mood to be camping. No TV, no telephone, no internet – the only human contact was with foreign tourists, local guides and resort staff. That went some way towards relieving the stress.
 
Even without these distractions, work in Malaysia was always stressful. Unfortunately it is becoming like that here in Melbourne as well.
 
So that ex-colleague contemplated leaving the profession, perhaps for just a while. I don’t know if it would become a permanent move. I doubt it because this person is a good practitioner. It would be a loss not just to the profession but also to the community if the move becomes permanent. Still, it is a gain to the sort of work that would be temporarily be carried out, during this “sabbatical”.
 
 
Someone was sending around Anwar Ibrahim’s recent keynote speech in a business/investment conference in Singapore. He was his usual bombastic and flourishing self, not at all economising on words. His ideas were broad brushed, sound-bite grabbing yet, the delivery was very impressive. It was such a refreshing and novel thing to have heard such a speech from a Malaysian politician. He must have had read widely and perhaps in depth, during his time in prison.
 
Alternatively, someone must have helped him with that speech.
 
And so a mate (who is also an ex-colleague) and I started to exchange emails about the possible source of that assistance. We both thought along the same line as to who might have provided that help. Truth be told, I am so removed from the ground zero that there can be no reasonable guess, but we both toyed with the idea that a formal employer may have had something to do with it. After all, the idea/theme running through that speech sounded like the sort of thing that employer would have written about.
 
Purely as a matter of coincidence, about a couple of hours after that email exchange, I received another email from another ex-colleague. The news was that this former employer was in town and as he usually does, got a few former employees together for a meal. I used to enjoy being at such dinners – it was a great forum to swap gossips and poke fun at various business or political figures. Of course we ribbed each other as much as we do public figures and often, the food would be great as well. Apparently the last one took place just a week ago, where of course the topic abuzz was whether given the current political scenario, this former employer would consider investing in a financial institution again.
 
The ex-colleague who sent me that email sounded very excited. The dinner must have been one where the atmosphere was extremely positive. Apparently they talked also about the new member of parliament of a constituency in KL who recently got extensive press coverage for standing up for ordinary folks.
 
This new MP is a family friend. When he told us he was going to run in the recent election, I immediately put up my hand to support the campaign. Against all expectations, he won. I suppose no one really knew how badly the people wanted to register their protest against the government. Someone mentioned that even if you put a donkey to stand against some UMNO or MCA candidate, that donkey would have won. Well that family friend was no donkey. His late father was a firebrand and he is also proving to be one. When a road concessionaire put up road blocks to force residents of a certain neighbourhood into toll traffic, he stood up for them and fought the concessionaire to the extent of forcibly and personally removing those barriers. For his efforts, he was beaten up by the police. I’m sure the dinner amongst my former employer and my ex-colleagues wasn’t the only one where that brave young MP was the topic of conversation.
 
So, all these are positive stuff for Malaysia. Anwar’s recent speech had pointed out how far down Malaysia has gone in recent years, to the extent that politicians are comparing statistics with African basket cases to show how good Malaysia still was. Having people on the ground being positive is therefore a good fight back, and an essential one. I don’t know however, if conversations like the one my friends had would go anywhere apart from providing everyone with a good time. Nothing wrong with that for sure, but unless such sessions lead to a sustained drive to turn things around, good time among friends would be all that would be served.
 

We went to the Melbourne High School/MacRobertson Girls High joint production of the West Side Story last night. It was in MHS in South Yarra and it was a cold and rainy day so travelling there (by train) in itself was a bit of a mini adventure. It was all worth it though.

It was so much more professionally done and enjoyable than I thought it would be. So glad to be so wrong. The production was very good and the performers all gave their 110% – you could see it in their faces. It was also the final performance so the energy and commitment was all the more impressive.

Since the cost of 3 tickets was the same as a family package which was 2 adults and 2 kids, we took along a friend’s kid. Olivia enjoyed it too, except she forgot her glasses, so that was a bit of a shame. Thankfully her “power” wasnt that high so I hope she did get to see most of the performance. We even stopped at Macca’s for a bite, as we missed dinner after attending a mate’s son’s birthday party in the afternoon..

It was a great night and to top it off, when we got back at nearly 12am, the FA Cup between Portsmouth and Cardiff City was just about to kick off. It wasnt a classic final by any means but Cup Final is always fun. Crawled into bed at 2am last night…

Good behaviour often disappears or takes on an unimportant role, when it comes to dealings on the internet. When we deal with a person in person, we tend to be more conscious about good behaviour. We greet each other properly, we smile, ask questions to ascertain what has been going on in the other person’s life and how they have been travelling along. If we are meeting for a specific reason, after exchanging those pleasantries we talk in a civil way, about the issues we were meeting to discuss. We then part by wishing each other well and exchange some vague statements about meeting again.

Faced with a computer screen, a keyboard and a mouse however, it is easier to dispense with those niceties. We are less reserved about being abrupt, rude and dispensing with civil behaviour. We are more prone to letting our mood dictate how we behave. I’m sure some psychologists or social scientists somewhere have made the necessary research and published their findings on why this is so. It’s not difficult however to imagine why that may be so.

I imagine internet dealings – and I mean by this, simple email exchanges, making online journal/blog entries, commenting on articles and entries, chatting on forums and online communities, social networking and even short messages (SMS), although I understand SMS is not an internet medium. I imagine dealings through the internet in fact require more, not less, civil behaviour. You need to be nicer on the internet, not more rude and abrupt.

The reason for this is simple. For one, it is a more open medium. When 2 persons have coffee and chat, at worst you have the 1-2 tables near you eavesdropping on you and you’d have maybe up to half a dozen people observing you and you’d have to be on your best behaviour to avoid sounding like an uncouth mongrel. Even if one was rude in that meeting and word of that bad behaviour spreads, it would only spread in a limited circle.

On the internet however, an email can be forwarded and make its way around the world very quickly. The infamous sandwich thief in a law firm in London CBD became notorious all over the world within a couple of days. Likewise, the lawyer who behaved badly towards his PA via email and the young investment bank intern who was the embodiment of a spoilt brat in an invitation sent in an email, all graced the pantheon of rude people through the medium of the internet, very quickly. It is a very public medium and deceptively so because it is easy for the originator of a rude piece to think it was just between the computer screen, the keyboard, the mouse and the recipient. It was in fact visible to the world at large.

The other reason is of course, the “paper” trail. When you are rude to your companion in a café, you could easily deny it afterwards. The 1-2 tables around you would soon forget or couldn’t be bothered. Very soon, it is forgotten. Your companion may spread the word of your rudeness but the exact version of what actually transpired would thin out every time it is shared with the next person. There is no smoking gun or bloody trails to forever remind you of how badly you behaved. On the internet however, there is no such luck. It is often a case of shooting oneself in the foot because the evidence that is created by the rude person himself or herself is likely to be found in many computers and can always be traced or retrieved. It is written material that can easily constitute a record of events. All you need is computer forensic to prove the writer (computer) and the date and you pretty much nail it. From the perspective of evidence, you’d be much better off being rude in person rather than on the internet. Unless of course, you either do not mind being or appearing to be rude and you do not mind continuing to be perceived as rude.

Which is why, I had in the past, shied away from blogs which could only appear interesting if it is rude and crass. Never mind that it is popular – if the price of popularity on the web is crass language and rude write ups, then it is too high a price. Maybe I’m a prude. But then again maybe I’m not. I sincerely think rudeness and crassness, when used sparingly and discriminately, can be funny, given the right context. However if there is no basis, context or cause for it and if it is the persistent theme that gives it the attractiveness, it should be tossed out in a hurry. Likewise for comments.

 

Won the EPL again – sweet. I am however, down with a cold which is threatening to be a flu. So much for the flu shots I had recently…

It has been yet another heads-down and burrow ahead sort of a week. The entire week has been go, go, and go. This coming weekend promises the same level of activities so I’m not really looking forward to it. Friday night sees the usual home group meeting of the church. On Saturday I need to get the usual vacuuming and cleaning done by 10 because we have a training session to work with disable young adults. That goes on till 3, then I have to return to mow the lawn before cooking for a dinner over in a mate’s house. Half the weekend’s gone and Sunday afternoon looks like the only available time left for some R&R but there is work to be turned around by Monday so I’d probably have to spend some time on work on Sunday afternoon.

I wonder why our weekly activities have become such a blurred and rushed cycle. I have not had a good and relaxing weekend for so long now. I want to be able to sleep in, do housework, then spend Saturday afternoon cooking leisurely, preparing a nice dinner Tress and kiddo can sit down to, with a very nice glass of red of course and watching a delectable movie on television. I want to drift away to slumberland after the movie, with Stacy Kent or Diana Krall in the background and the red refilling my glass constantly.

There’s a lot to be said about relaxing at home. I find that to be eminently more restful than being somewhere else, even if the activities are the same. I like spending time with friends, chatting over some food and wine but that’s different to unwinding at home. I want to do that regularly and spend time with friends once in a while, more than the other way around. Or maybe I just want that once in a while, with time spent with friends being more regular. I don’t know. It is just that at this point in time I really do want some chill out time. I miss a good movie. And a quiet evening before a day off.