Squidoo Here I Come!

Thanks to KC Lau, whose book I review in my alternate blog, http://wealthwellnessnetwork.blogspot.com.

I have started to write my page on Self Traveling,
http://www.squidoo.com/Travel-on-your-own?mb=lens_publish.

I have signed up "Lens of the Day newsletter" at
http://blogs.squidoo.com/lensoftheday/,

as well as received the official Squidoo recipe book,
http://sethgodin.typepad.com/changethis/files/TheJoyofSquidoo.pdf.

I will update with more pages.

Padi Museum

Fancy taking a bus trip up North to visit the magnificent Padi Museum? That was what I did over the weekend, 22 & 23 November 2008, with my community friends, most of them are my taichi-mates!

The Padi Museum is situated at the foot of Gunung Keriang, 8 km North of Alor Star. Gunung Keriang, locally known as Crystal Mountain, is an outcrop of crystallised stones, harvested by locals for sales just below the hill!

The Padi Museum was constructed in 2000 with six (or five?) cylindrical structures resembling padi stalks. The main structure high in the middle is where the attraction is.


Walking up the staircase, there is a circular movable platform for you to sit and view the beautiful 3-D painting on the wall facing you. The painting runs continuously as a cylindrical piece!

This circular mural measures 103 metres in circumference and 8 metres in height. It was drawn by 50 artists from North Korea.

The following shots were taken. A scene of a kampung community.


The padi field, may not believe that it is a painting indeed.


Note that the plants at the foreground are actually preserved realia.



A scene beside the Crystal Mountain. Again, objects at the foreground are realia.



The beautiful rainbow, this is most likable part of the painting.



One has to pay RM2 to bring in a camera. You will be given a small card with a rubber band to tie around your camera. There is this hard-working officer checking if your camera, particularly hand-phone with a camera function, is smuggled in without making any payment. She would stop you from taking photographs. This photo shows a person sitting on the revolving platform, while the officer stands on the permanent inner platform. Over her back, a group of spectators are viewing the painting facing the opposite side. The roof shows its circular structure.


There are four or five circular halls with fixed paintings at the middle level of the building. These paintings include of the history of padi cultivation and various scenes of padi field.



At the lowest level, there is a souvenir shop and a wide area of exhibition on anything related to padi, padi farming and rice, The "Tikus Bodoh" is the most attractive exhibit of all, a mouse trap!


It is educational, yet it is so cheap to visit as the entrance fee is only RM3 for adult and RM1 for children and student.

There is a canteen at the periphery of the Padi Museum compound, serving good local food and drink! The canteen operator's school-going children speak perfect English!

Bang Goes the MCA?

I have never been an admirer of MCA since the day I was introduced to politics by my late Father!

I could remember the day I was in USM arguing with the Chinese Language Society office bearers that Chinese Malaysians need a multiracial party to protect their rights. They did not agree. I further stated that Chinese Malaysians could only claim their rights once the Malay Malaysians are split into two major parties. They, of course, thought that I was day-dreaming! UMNO had seriously broke twice, if we do not consider PAS as a split. Once with Kuli's 46 and now with Keadilan's Anwar Ibrahim!

Off the Edge (OTE) Oct 08 issue carried an interesting feature as per title of this posting. Four MCA leaders were interviewed.

Chua Jui Meng

My vote (not as the MCA Pres, but the performance of the four in the feature) goes to Chua Jui Meng. I was surprised that he gives credit to one President whom I disliked most, Ling Loing Sik! Ling set up Insap think tank with Prof Lim Teck Ghee as on of the members. To side track, I could not recall MCA defending Prof Lim openly when he was slaughtered by UMNO over calling bluff the government's statistics on the percentage of Malays equity ownership in support of the failure of NEP! Two interesting stupidities here: MCA failure to appreciate the brains who helped the party, and UMNO admitting its failure over NEP as the ruling party !

Back to Chua JM, he spoke in the Parliament for two hours before he was stopped abruptly by the Speaker over UMNO's declaration to extend NEP beyond 1990. Instead of been sacked by Dr M, the latter set up the National Economic Consultative Council (NECC) in which he was an active member. As a result, Dr M presented the National Development Policy to replace NEP, which saw the liberalisation in economy and education post 1991.

He blames the present outcome squarely on Ong Kah Ting, my inference. UMNO youth (Hishamkeris & KJ SIL), endorsed by UMNO (lame Pak Lah), post 2004 was vocal in reviving NEP instead of rewarding the Rakyat for supporting BN. MCA kept quiet; hench its downfall in 2008. It is also interesting that he talked about debating NEP with KJ in 2005 and telling him that the government statistics needed to be relooked. Khairy agreed with him for a review, but MCA never followed up on that.

Chua also talked about other illnesses such as corruptions in UMNO, negotiated tenders for government projects, ineffective ACA and the Societies Act which prevented governing political party members from having recourse of law against acts of injustice by their leaders, a case of party above the law of the nation!

Chua's conclusion: MCA must change! To the last question 'To pull out of Barisan?', Chua said, 'If it comes to the crunch and UMNO refuses to change, we cannot be pulled down by a party that refuses to change. Even an animal knows how to fight for its survival.'

Ong Tee Kiat

Though I personally think that Ong would be the best person to lead MCA now, I am disappointed with this interview. There is too much talk on the service centre the Michael Chong-style, though the OTE is of the opinion that complainants should be able to avail themselves to the services of the government itself.

Ong also mentioned briefly on his role in NECC, that MCA insisted that we must go for merits and needs, and not ethnicity. However, certain quarters (I am disappointed that he failed to name them) seem more keen to resurrect past practices of the NEP days in recent years.

On the question 'should the MCA pull out of BN', the first question of the interview, Ong replied, 'Opting out is one of the options but not the only option'.

I was hoping that Ong could have given a better overview on his refreshing view on MCA going multiracialism.

Chua Soi Lek & Fong Chan Onn

There are nothing to shout about for these two... more comments later may be.

Conclusion

MCA is at the mercy of UMNO unless one leader, preferably the President, needs to speak the language of the grassroots loud and clear, whether MCA remains in BN, be an independent or just join the Pakatan Rakyat.

1MALAYSIA

Najib sets up his site today, click here.

I have written three comments to him using my REAL name, email address and mobile number, with the subject called ISA.

FIRST

PLEASE USE YOUR POWER, if you still have any, TO RELEASE RAJA PETRA & TERESA KOK.
The Malaysians have lost faith in you & the UMNO gomen.

SECOND (After I found out that the comments are not published in the site)

I have just sent you a comment on the above subject.
Are you going to publish my comment in your web site? If YES, TERIMA KASIH! If NO, I feel I was cheated!
Please comment on my comments!

THIRD

This is my third comment. I am happy that you set up a website. This is not too late, because if you lose your job as the DPM, you will be able to play with the website all days & nights, you will then know why Dr M has all the time to write web to scold people. My advice is, don't scold RAKYAT like me, but play lah some games like "counter strike"!

Eravikulam National Park India

On Merdeka Day 2007, I made a trip to a wonderful national park in India. It is the best managed national park I have ever visited, the 97 square km Eravikulam National Park in the state of Kerala. It is 2000 meters above sea level, with the highest peak called Anamudi (2690 m).

Eravikulam National Park is famous for two species, a fauna and a flora. The Park holds the largest viable population, estimated at about 750, of the endangered (IUCN) Nilgiri Tahr (Hemitragus hylocrius).



The special flora is a shrub locally called neelakurunji (Phlebophyllum kunthianum). We missed the spectacular mass flowering which takes place in the grasslands in cycles of the 12yrs. The last neelakurunji 'outburst' was in the year 2006. However, there are some small flowers spotted.

Why did I say it was well managed?

1. The park is closed to private vehicles. Tourists can only board one of the six mini buses up to the plateau.



2. The tourist guide on the bus briefs the tourists as the bus negotiates itself up the plateau. In our case, the bus stopped mid-way to enable us to view a herd of elephants about one kilometre away.



3. There is an educational centre called "Story of the Park" at the peak area.



4. Littering is banned inside the park. This may be normal for all parks, but there are security guards asking you to open your bag to check and ensure that you do not bring any plastic bag or bottle into the park.



5. Well formed security wing is working to protect the park day and night.

It was an enjoyable trip. We put up a night in the town of Munnar, a beautiful getaway landscaped with tea plantations, hills, lakes, forests and winding walks located at an altitude of 1,829 metre before desending the Eravikulam National Park the next day.

The mini bus

The bus stop up the plateau

Dr Tneoh high up with clouds

More Nilgiri tahrs

Petrol Price Up Again!

[I find this article simple, direct and meaningful. It is written by YB Fong Po Kuan (冯宝君), MP for Batu Gajah. http://pokuan.blogsome.com/ ]


Petrol and Diesel Hike, “For the Best Interest of the People” - Suggest PM and Ministers Cut Their Own Pay and Allowances

I received a call about 11 pm yesterday and he asked, “What does the deny 2/3 majority in Parliament means? Why did the petrol increase by 40 percent?”

I told him that I am equally unhappy too with the petrol hike. Then, I explained that BN is still the government of the day and petrol is a matter under Federal government. He then asked, “The government do not need to go through Parliament for the increase of the petrol?” I said , “No, because this does not requires the passing of law, for the increase.” I also told him that Lim Kit Siang will hold a protest in Ipoh the next morning. (today)

I am expecting the same remarks will be made by the leadership of BN. Let me start by listing these few familiar lines:-

1. Change lifestyle
2. Spend wisely
3. The petrol is still cheaper than other countries
4. The government could not be further burden by the subsidy

What has happened to the RM 4.4 billion, an amount of subsidy which would be saved (we were told), when the increase of 30 cent in February, 2006 was announced? Please let me know if the public transport system has improved?

What about BN leaderships spending lifestlye? I am only concern of public funds, your money and my money.

Look at how they spent
1. RM 100 million on renovation of Parliament building and leaks thereafter;
2. National Astronaut Programme - RM 40 million;
3. National Service Training Programme - yearly an estimate of RM 500 million;
4. Eye on Malaysia -RM 30 million and another RM5.7 million of free ticket
5. RM 4.6 billion, ’soft-loan’ to PKFZ
6. RM 2.4 million of indelible ink

Where have the profits made by Petronas spent? Can we get a specific figures for specific projects which were for the interest of the public at large?

I am also expecting the Minister of Consumer appealing to the traders not to increase the prices of their goods, then, we will see the Minister making his rounds in the market. This will be followed with action taken against traders.

Other public transport may be requesting for charges to be increased.

We may read something along this line too in the next few days, “which is better, increase 78 cents at once or 40 cents twice in a year? ”

Why are we reacting angrily to this hike announcement? I am not an economist. I am not trying to be unreasonable by refusing to understand. Is just that I am not convinced that what the minister’s collective decision is “for the best interest of the people.”

Is the PM and Ministers willing to have their pay and allowances cut? Is the PM and Ministers willing to reduce their visits to overseas? Perhaps, cut down on the number of delegations? Also, stop holding meetings in 5 stars hotel.

It is about poor governing, lack of transparency and accountability. Oh! I should not miss out this important factor, - Leadership Crisis.

Transport in Ho Chi Minh City - Motorcycles

I was in Ho Chi Minh City for four nights.

One thing that strikes most visitors to this prospering city in Southern Vietnam is its modes of transportation. If you walk in the city, you have to be careful that you are not knocked down by a motorcycle. However, the swarm of motocyclists seem to have the highest order out of the disorders on the streets! Over the five days, not a single accident was sighted.

You would see ladies on scooters going to work, well dressed as well as well proected!

Rain? There is no problem at all. All kinds of raincoats are being used. You can see skirt-wearing pillion riders sitting sideway which is illegal in other places!

I went for a round-the-city trip on a motorcycle. The driver-on-hire has a management degree and used to work with a Japanese company.

There are more funs on the motorbike than on the tour bus, you can bet!

An Email to Chandra Muzaffar

[On 24 April 2008, I wrote an email to Dr Chandra Muzaffar. There is still no response from him a month later by now. Reproduced here my letter and extracts from two related articles.]


Dear Prof.,

Greetings from Poh.

I read with interest your article THE 2008 MALAYSIAN ELECTION - AND THE BN DEBACLE . [Please read Dr Chandra's article here]

I would like to refer to Q3 and your answer and offer my humble comments.

Though your analyses of the dissatisfaction of the various ethnic groups are reasonable, I find that the key issues in the last election are not these. I used to think like this before the election. However, as I talked to more and more people of various groups and walked the ground a bit during the election period, I find that these issues were not the main ones bothering the general mass. I was surprised to find that my original analyses were out of date and out of place!

The Rakyat as a whole was angry at how the leaders of each ethnic group could be so ethno-centric to stir up their respectic community's hatred; when they are actually the leader of the NATION! How can we have Ong fighting for Chinese schools; Samy claiming that Indians cannot do without him, and Hisham threatening the non-Malays? They are national leaders who should be MALAYSIANS in perspectives, words and actions!

I was surprised but definitely happier that more and more common people are having an alternative perspective of seeing the various issues from the NATIONAL point of view. The opposition parties under Anwar had capitalised on this perspective well for their political gain.

I am very interested to know exactly how big the relative proportions of the rakyat having these two opposing perspectives, ethnic vs national. Perhaps you should scrutinise what the various surveys including those by Merdeka Centre and write about this with your personal strength as the leading political scientist.

Politics has been my personal passion and you were one of my earliest teachers, thanks for the lessons and Terima Kasih for your time.

NB: the article in theStar, Sunday March 30, 2008, How the tables have turned, Sharing The Nation, By ZAINAH ANWAR is quite reflective of what the general public thinks. [Please read Zainah's article here]

http://thestar.com.my/columnists/story.asp?col=sharingthenation&file=/2008/3/30/columnists/sharingthenation/20776545&sec=Sharing%20The%20Nation

Rgds,
Poh Swee Hiang

Penang ferry services to be upgraded

[The following is a piece of news from the Star, related to my earlier posting.
http://thestar.com.my/news/story.asp?file=/2008/5/20/nation/20080520162808&sec=nation. I did forward my last posting on ferry to Jeff Ooi and have not received any reply yet.]

Tuesday May 20, 2008 MYT 7:24:02 PM

Penang ferry services to be upgraded
By ZULKIFLY MOHAMAD


BUTTERWORTH: Penang ferry services between here and the island will not be scrapped despite losing over RM50mil over the past four years.

State Public Works, Utilities and Transportation Committee chairman Lim Hock Seng said that the Finance Ministry, which owns Penang Port Sdn Bhd (PPSB) that operates the services, had made it clear that the services must not be stopped for whatever reason.

“We will instead upgrade the ferry services. We may also introduce catamarans to complement the existing services.

“However, the catamarans will only be used once approval is given by the Federal Government,” he told reporters Tuesday after attending a briefing on the ferry services and a visit to the ferry terminal here.

PPSB chief operating officer Mohd Niana Merican Abd Kadir Merican had said recently that the vehicular ferry service would be scrapped on completion of the expansion of the Penang Bridge in September next year.

He had said the company planned to operate a speedboat ferry service, as it was cheaper and more efficient.

Second Finance Minister Tan Sri Nor Mohamed Yakcop then said any decision to scrap the service between Penang island and Seberang Prai will be made only by the Federal Government.

He said both his ministry and the Transport Ministry would make such a decision if it proved to be viable.

“We have not decided on anything. The matter has not even been tabled to the Cabinet for consideration. At present, as far as the Finance Ministry is concerned, there is no issue over this."

Lim said the ferry services were running at a loss due to many reasons, including fuel increase and low passengers and traffic volume.

PPSB posted a loss of RM12.11mil for its ferry service operations in 2004, RM13.4mil (2005), RM10.73mil (2006) and RM14.69mil last year.

Presently, six of the eight ferries are used to ply between here and the island while the other two are on standby and under maintenance.

The six ferries ply 120 trips daily. Each trip cost PPSB RM772 and the company makes RM421 for each full load trip resulting in a loss of about RM350 for each trip.

Lim said an average of 4,000 cars, 5,500 motorbikes, 500 lorries and 6,000 passengers used the services daily.

“All in, 110,560 cars used the ferry services last year compared to 1.24mil cars that crossed the bridge during the period,” he added.

He said PPSB could not raise the ferry fares without the Government’s approval despite suffering annual losses.

He added the services might face a greater challenge when the expansion of the Penang bridge is completed in September next year and once the second bridge was ready in 2011.

On the upgrading exercise, Lim said the passengers waiting area at the Butterworth side would be improved.

“New fans will be installed and the floors will be tiled for easy maintenance and cleanliness,” he said.

Revive the Penang Ferries

Have you been to Penang? Even better, have you taken the ferry?

When I was a kid, Penang was not only an entreport, but also a duty-free island. We kids were asked by our parents to be small-time smugglers! However, of all the things, we only smuggled shirts by wearing extras and hiding away sundries like Colgate. The Custome Officers on Butterworth checked adults thoroughly, but usually let loose on the kids!

The map above shows how the Penang Island was connected via ferry to the Mainland town of Butterworth. The Mainland part of Penang used to be called Province Wellesley (PW), a term now overtaken by Seberang Perai (SP), which RTM at times ignorantly equate it with the name of the town called Prai!

Ferry used to be the only means of getting across the Penang Channel. The ferry is double-decked. The upper deck is for pedestrians who walk to and fro between the ferry and bus stop. The bottom deck is meant for motored vehicles including the lorries, cars and motorcycles, and also bicycles. Later part of the history, a second wharf was constructed for each side of the channels, with the upper deck meant for cars also; and thus another type of ferry was introduced, with both decks for motored vehicles only.


I was told that our Penang ferry modelled upon the Hoog Kong equivalent, but I have never taken the Hong Kong one to confirm this.


I enjoyed taking the ferry both as a pedestrian as well as a motorcyclist. There used to be a small shop on the upper deck, and the 20-cent ice-cream was my favorite!

Lately, I have tried taking the ferry too, just to reminisce.

The breeze, the short break after a tiring traffic jam and the walking-up-and-down the decks would have make one happy with travelling on the ferry.

However, there are three problems about choosing the ferry over the Penang Bridge:

1. You are not sure about the timing of the ferry, you may have to wait a long time as it not only depends on the density of the traffic, but also the number of ferries in service at taht particulat time.
2. For pedestrians, connecting means of transport after taking the ferry is also a headache as buses were not regular, taxi is expensive and trishaw-beca was not popular. I am not sure if this problem has improved with the introduction of Rapid Penang, can someone advise me on this?
3. For cars, you may have to face the long queue waiting for the ferry, I am also not sure how bad is this problem now.

For regular travellors who know the above problems, proper scheduling would save a lot of time.

I know of my kampungmate, Mr Low the accountant, who is taking the ferry every day. He must have some clues. Hope to hear from him too.

We voted in the new Gomen (I played my part as I have voted for the State Deputy Speaker), let's hope our Guan Eng and his team can do something on improving the ferry service, while waiting for the dilly-dally vengeful decision on whether to build the 2nd Link and how much should UEM profit from it...

Related links for reading:

http://www.penangport.com.my/english/facilities/ferry_cruise.htm

http://anilnetto.com/2008/05/03/bridge-near-shanghai-works-out-cheaper-per-km-than-second-penang-bridge/

May Day & V David

Today is the May Day!

One personality whom I know as a First Class Politician while growing up is V David, and I am glad that Raja Petra Kamarudin (RPK) writes about him in Malaysia Today, May Day 2008, the day I start this blog!

I admire V David for three reasons:

1. He has a humble beginning but serves the nation proudly
2. He is instrumental in developing the multi-racial politics in the earlier part of Malaysia especially in parties namely Gerakan and Pekemas
3. He speaks a simple language the men in the street particularly the workers understand!

Below is an extract from RPK's column "No Holds Barred" entitled V. David, the man who made ‘May Day’ possible, Thursday, 01 May 2008. This extract was written by K George in Aliran Monthly Vol 25 (2005): Issue 6, a magazine that I have been subscribing and I could even now remember reading it back in 2005! If you wish to read the whole article, click here.

Please read on:


Youngest MP at 26

In the 1959 General Election, David, already a member of the Labour Party, which formed a coalition with other opposition parties known as the Socialist Front, contested and won, becoming a Member of Parliament for Bangsar as well as Selangor State Assembly member. At 26, he was the youngest Member of Parliament – bold, vigorous and committed.

By mid 1960s, the registration of the Labour Party was cancelled. Its leaders like Dr Tan Chee Khoon, Veerappan, Tan Pock Kin, David and others decided to seek the registration of another party. I was then the General Secretary of the Federation of Armed Forces Civilian Staff Union as well as Vice-President of the MTUC and of CUEPACS. Like David, I too believed that trade unions had to involve themselves in politics. It was not an unusual phenomenon but a fact that was visible all over the world.

I was invited by the group to join and help with the formation of Gerakan. It was during this period that I grew closer to David. I am proud to claim that both of us knew what poverty was and that our commitment to struggle for the welfare of workers became a passion. David stood on a Gerakan ticket in the General Elections in 1969 and was elected to Parliament as MP for Datuk Keramat in Penang. However, being a civil servant and father of three young children, I decided to carry on with my job and union activity.

Gerakan became a very popular party and received multiracial support. In the May 1969 General Election, the party captured the state of Penang and formed the government with Dr Lim Chong Eu as Chief Minister. But within two years, it was embroiled in a leadership crisis, resulting in Dr Lim taking full control of Gerakan. Professor Alatas, Dr Tan Chee Khoon, David and other leaders left Gerakan and formed Pekemas, which contested in the 1974 General Election. Out of over 90 candidates, only Dr Tan Chee Khoon retained his seat as the MP for Kepong constituency. Pekemas did not last long. Subsequently, David joined the DAP.

He was elected to parliament on the DAP ticket in 1978 for Damansara and was successfully returned in 1986 and 1990 for Puchong. But in 1995, David did not contest because of health reasons.