Avoid Times Square, man.

I knew I had it coming. The first (and supposedly last) time I went to Berjaya Times Square (BTS) when it first opened, I swore I wouldn’t go there again. Well, I had to break my promise last weekend.

On my first visit, I was stunned. Other than Debenhams (which is pretty small, and too overpriced for me), the whole place was so Ah-Beng, man. I was as if Sungei Wang Plaza transplanted itself and moved there. Hundreds and hundreds of shops selling Hong Kong fashion rejects, ladies shoes, DVD/VCD pirates, it was just too much for me. Even Sungei Wang had its redeeming qualities, BTS had none. There was no decent place to get a meal, not a single bookstore, not a single specialty shop of note. Just rows and rows of pigeon-hole shops (11 storeys, if I’m correct). And the top 6 floors are practically unoccupied.

So last weekend, my sis-in-law and her son came over from JB and wanted to try out the indoor roller-coaster park. OK, I needed to window-shop for a camera phone. So let’s give it another try, I said. Big mistake. Did you know that there isn’t a single phone shop in the thousands of shops there. I specifically remembered on my last visit there were plenty. I couldn’t believe it. There were many places selling phone accessories, but none selling phones. Is there is crackdown on legal phones now???!!

There still isn’t anywhere to get a decent meal, the upper floors are still totally empty, the 1000 Ah-Lian boutiques are still flourishing, the DVD pirates are still doing rip-roaring business. Interestingly, Borders are opening soon. I hope they really did a good market study.

Another Credit Card Horror Story…

Well, it isn’t really a horror story, but it won’t be something the manager of credit card sales would want to read. Here’s what happened actually. I’ve been a card customer of this international bank, which I shall not name (but some of my pals call it Sillybank… oops, did I say too much?) for many, many years.

I must emphasize here that I’ve mostly been a one-credit-card guy, no matter how many sales people approach me at shopping centres thrusting free cards in my face. (That’s another rant for an upcoming blog).

OK, so about 6 months ago this bank sends me this additional card with 3 years free annual fee. Usually, I’ll cut these cards up immediately and throw it out, but when I call them about it, they told me that if I accept this free card, they’ll waiver the annual fee of my other card, the one I’ve been using all this while. That seemed a good deal, since I didn’t have to use the new card, just accept it.

Then when my statement came last month, my annual fee was not waived!! So I called them up today. After going through that annoying computer voice 3 TIMES, I finally got through to a human. He then put me on hold for like 5 minutes (‘computer is down’). Finally, after for like an eternity, this guy there said that there was no mention of it in the computer (whoa, did this ‘computer’ just come up?!). And then he said, ‘Who did you speak to regarding this last time?‘

Well, excuse me if I can’t remember the name of Indifferent Telephone Personnel #3432AF299 (KL branch).

Long story short, I’ve canceled the card. I’m going back to being a one-credit-card. And if those Sillybank sales people ever approach me again when I’m in Tesco…

What Mags I Read…

Here’s a list of magazines I read on a regular basis. Please note, I don’t buy all the mags here, most of them I read at the library or mooch off my philanthropic friends. If I did buy all of ‘em, I’ll probably be living off biscuits everyday.

Empire: It’s a British international movie mag. I used to read every single word of this rag (including the spine quote) but I’ve gone off it a bit since they changed the format and streamlined it (puh-leez…). ‘Too commercialized, now’, I would say, with a hint of arrogance.
FourFourTwo: A must read. I love Sam Allardyce’s coaching tips and David Platt’s tactical analysis. Although I skip the bits about Spanish local rivalries and League One news.
The Edge: It’s gone up to RM5!!! PER WEEK!!! And we’re paying for all those useless pull-outs like Options and Netv@lue!!! @#$%!! But I’m addicted… (Thanks Pat, or else I’ll be reading it at the newsstand…)
Forbes & Fortune: Polished, American, informative, biased and both obsessed with the China market. Although I can’t really tell the difference between the two.
Personal Money: I’ll only buy it if the articles interest me. When it was first launched, I thot I could write better articles!! But it’s now better than Malaysian Business and Personal Investor.
Investor Digest: It’s always outdated by a month, the layout and design is crappy, the writing is amateurish, the paper quality is only slightly better than toilet paper, but the tables and charts alone are worth the nine bucks.
Touch: Comes free in the mail every month. No idea why.
Torque: Bought it when I was car-shopping. I think I’ll switch to Hypertune.
Hello! & New Woman: Only read them when I’m waiting at the mamak barber. It’s either them or Stardust (the Bollywood mag).
Esquire, GQ, Arena: Only when I’m bored at the British Council.
Professional Fishkeeping, Majesty: Only when I’m REALLY, REALLY bored.

When are they coming out with a mag for people who read too many mags?

R.I.P., Canny Ong…

And so another chapter closes in Malaysia’s social history. The murder case of 29-year old Canny Ong has finally concluded. The accused, an aircraft cabin cleaner, has been sentenced to caning, 20 years jail and death.

The media has carried this case with their usual fanfare, sometimes not without the sensationalism.

While life and death are mere phases in the great passage of the spiritual form, I cannot help but stop to reflect each I read about a murder case in the Malaysia. Somehow, for a brief moment in time, we are reminded of our own mortality, of how our nation has descended into such levels of moral depravity, of how insignificant are our petty little problems in the grand scheme of God’s plan.

To the murderer, I hope you make peace with yourself and your maker before your time comes. It is perhaps the last humane thing that you can do.

To the family and friends of Canny, my deepest sympathies lie with you. And so do anyone on earth who has a sister, a daughter, a wife or a mother.

And to finally Canny, if it is in any way possible, rest in peace.

I dun read paper one lah…

Circulation nos. obtained in the press today (no. in brackets show previous survey):

The Star – 1,109,000 (1,045,000)
Malay Mail – 132,000 (137,000)
New Straits Times - 322,000 (323,000)
The Sun – 173,000 (165,000)
Sunday Star – 987,000 (1,003,000)
New Sunday Times – 303,000, (282,000)
Sunday Mail – 153,000 (134,000)
Harian Metro - 1,218,000 (1,275,000)
Berita Harian - 1,473,000 (1,491,000)
Utusan Malaysia – 1,510,000 (1,010,000)
Kwong Wah – 271,000 (261,000)
China Press – 741,000 (730,000)
Sin Chew Jit Poh – 1,109,000 (1,099,000)
Guang Ming Daily – 381,000 (347,000)
Tamil Nesan – 144,000 (140,000)
Tamil Namban – 247,000 (242,000)

Some observations: totaling up the weekday papers for all languages (excluding the Sun), we get 4.725 million rags sold daily. Assuming the population of Malaysia is 30 million, at an average household has of 4 people (one of which is below reading age); we thus have 7.5 million households. Which means 2.775 million households across Malaysia DO NOT access newspapers. In reality this number is far higher because:

• A lot of families buy more than 1 paper daily.
• This is also not taking into account the millions of newspapers subscribed by offices/ schools/libraries. My office subscribes 4 daily.

So I can roughly say 3 million homes do not read newspapers everyday. Or put it another way, 9 million people (of reading age) do not read newspapers.

Malaysian-Style Reality Show

In line with the reality shows craze on TV these days (as opposed to fake or make-believe TV that we’ve been watching all this while), I’m compiling a list of things that might feature if Malaysia were to make our own show. For ease of thought, I’ve broken down the listing into 3 groups:

Do Physical/Frustrating challenge: Like Amazing Race’s Roadblock. Designed to test the contestants physical & mental strength to the limit.

Eat Disgusting Stuff: Like on Fear Factor and MTV’s I Bet You Will every week.

Do Scary Thing: Like on Fear Factor also. Fight crocodile, stay underwater, play with scorpions, the usual thing.

OK, this is what I’ve come up with so far:

Physical / Frustrating Challenge:

• Scale rock face in Sarawak and collect bird’s nest with bare hands.
• Stand in line at 7am and renew passport or make myKad at the government department. On a non-working Saturday!
• Board the LRT at KLCC station at 5.30pm on Friday. And carrying heavy luggage.
• Collect RM100 in donation money by going house-to-house in Damansara Heights or Bukit Bandaraya.

Eat Disgusting Stuff:

• Drink down one jug of the infamous SS2 Coke susu (Coca-Cola mixed with obscene amount of condensed milk).
• Durian milkshake mixed with bat guano.
• 1 large tray of mamak maggi mee goreng, cooked with VERY generous servings of oil…

Do Scary Thing:

• Run the convenience store at Bukit Bintang during Chinese New Year period, right in the middle up the Bangladeshi/Indonesian/Pakistani/Burmese/Thai workers get-together.
• Cross Jalan Tun Razak on foot at peak hour traffic in 7 seconds or less. No second chance.
• Go for dental check-up.

Your suggestions are most welcome.

Bob the Malaysian Builder

My daughter loves to watch the cartoon ‘Bob the Builder’ on cable TV. Its quite entertaining, kinda reminds me of the stop motion claymation of the old days, although this one probably uses far more advanced techniques.

If you’re not familiar with this show, it’s about a construction guy called Bob with his blue cat, talking machinery (cement mixer, forklift, excavator, you get the picture) and a young girl named Wendy. Each episode usually features the gang facing a ‘construction’ problem and how they work together to solve it. Together with the talking and moving machinery.

Having worked in the construction line for many years, I would like to point out a few differences between what is portrayed in the show and with real life for the benefit of you and your children, in case they grow up having a warped view of our local construction industry:

• In the show, the ‘building’ work is done by Bob and Wendy the teenage girl, and sometimes with the help of the talking machinery. In real life, the actual work is done by chain-smoking & swearing Chinese sub-sub-sub-contractors. Actually, they seldom do the work. That job is for the Indonesian/Burmese/Pakistani labourers. The Chinese bosses usually drink tea and swear loudly on the phone.
• Bob’s machinery talk, dance, sing and move by themselves. They are brightly coloured, clean and new all the time. Whereas in real life, the machinery don’t talk, they just snarl and scream, leak hydraulic fluid and engine oil, look like they survived the Second World War and are usually coloured yellow and caked in mud. The smoke emission from these machinery can kill birds.
• There’s a live scarecrow on the show. I’m not really sure exactly what he does. In our construction world, the stink from the portable toilets and temporary labourer camps scare away the birds and attract health inspectors.
• At the end of each episode, there’s always a neat lesson to be learnt, usually about teamwork, friendship or something goody-two-shoes issue. In real life, the only lessons I’ve heard so far are: “Wah, that day this supervisor got killed by a falling bricks, lah”; “DBKL coming! DBKL coming!”; “Next time, tell your children all don’t work in construction-lah”; “Today got overtime, aah?” etc…

  Despite the shocking inaccuracies, I still enjoy the show. But I just wonder when is someone going to make a kiddie show featuring these real life elements…

In Cold Blood

BOUTIQUE OWNER FOUND MURDERED

PETALING JAYA: The 26-year-old co-owner of a children’s boutique was sexually assaulted and stabbed to death in her shoplot at a newly opened shopping complex in Mutiara Damansara here.
Goh Lee Fang, 26, who had multiple stab wounds on her body, was found by one of her partners at 1.15pm yesterday sprawled in a pool of blood at the back office of the Ovo – The Difference boutique, located on the first floor of the Curve.

_______
What is our nation coming to? A woman is murdered in cold-blood, in what is perceived to the up-market, high society area of PJ. And the Curve is hardly even a few months old.

Looks like a crime of passion. I dunno. Everyday seems to bring more and more of these stories.

Some of My Favourite Discs

I haven’t bought a CD for awhile. Due to some cost-cutting measures when I was getting married, I had to stop this luxury. And till today, I buy like max 1 a year. My pal Dave the Slayer still buys RM300 worth of tapes and CDs a month (Including Ker-rang and Metal Hammer magazines). I think he is personally supporting 50% of the revenue of that music store at Campbell Plaza. Headbangers around the city will know that middle age lady store owner very well.

The last CD I got was 2 years ago, Our Favorite Things by Tony Bennett, Charlotte Church, Placido Domingo & Vanessa Williams. Very disappointing. At that time I was really impressed by my pal’s copy of Charlotte Church’s Voice of an Angel. Anyway, randomly, here are some of my favourite discs in my vast collection. All of them represent a certain phase in my life, and they really help me get through some bad patches much easier (and still do).

Metallica by Metallica – the legendary ‘black’ album, and the one that started the whole metal thing for me. I first heard Nothing Else Matters and Enter the Sandman on Singapore radio and it blew me away. I’ve since bought many other of their older and newer albums. Nothing beats old school Metallica. My favourite song, though is not on this album is Fade to Black (on Ride the Lightning). No, it doesn’t make me wanna commit suicide.

Triumph of Steel by Manowar – You can have your Megadeths, Whitesnakes or Testaments, but nobody makes album like Manowar. In fact, there IS no other band like Manowar. (their first track Achilles: Agony & Ecstasy In Eight Parts runs for 28 minutes). Plus, there is Master of the Wind.

Triumphal Return by Whitecross – Aah, Christian metal (a.k.a white metal), so misunderstood, never accepted, now forgotten. But this has to be the pinnacle of that strange music genre caught between two worlds of the secular and spiritual. My RM8 cassette (from Kingdom Rock in SS2) is now koyak already, but the memories still remain.

Fire & Love by Guardian – A far better engineered album by a more talented group than Whitecross, Guardian delivers this masterpiece that I still play today.

Discovery by Pet Shop Boys – Heart, It’s a Sin, West End Girls and my favourite track, Rent.

This article will be continued. When I feel like it. Watch this space.

Watch This Movie!!!

Here’s a movie you must watch : “Dodgeball – the True Underdog Story”.

Now, before you go on to tell me that the reviewers gave it a bad rating, saying that it’s a formulaic, juvenile, run-of-the-mill movie, I’ll say this. It’s funny.

I won’t go into a fanboy play-by-play review here, there’s many places on for the Net where you can get it. And besides, I don’t want to give out any spoilers to ruin it for you, just my intellectual views.

Why? Firstly, it’s funny. I know I’ve said that before. I have a tendency to repeat myself, sometimes. I have a tendency to repeat myself, sometimes.

Secondly, it tells a story of a laid-back little guy battling the mega-corporation bad guy. And the little guy wins, against the odds. But he doesn’t get the girl, although there’s a funny story why. Must watch it yourself to appreciate the joke.

Thirdly, the little guy is surrounded by a bunch of social misfits that are his friends and double-up as his dodgeball teammates. There’s this guy who thinks he’s a real pirate. A high-school loser who dreams of making the cheerleading team (he’s a guy). An accountant type middle-age guy with a Russian mail-order bride. And a few others too funny to mention here.

Fourthly, it promotes team spirit and fairplay in competitive sports. No, I’m joking.

Fifthly, there’s this line in the movie that goes, “I want you to meet my team – Blaze… Laser… Blazer…” Still laughing thinking about it.

And lastly, two words for you – Ben Stiller. Need I say more?