Voting and Winning

Let’s do philosophy talk today. The life is a competition. The nature of animal and plant is to compete to survive. Human is the most competitive who can win the world and destroy other challenger. The high level of competitive makes us love competition. From Gladiator time till Olympic, it prove man like to watch competition. The competition rule is to win. Losing means you are not a good competitor.

The competitiveness can be measured. Which is the highest tree in compete for sun light? Which predator gets most meat? Which sprinter is fastest? It’s very understandable because there is a general guide. How about a contest can’t be measure? Yes, we can have juries and judges. They represent the guidelines. The average score from them are the guide. The winner is to get the highest average marks. Pretty simple rule of competition is.

In current era, competition can be measure by popularity. How? Look at American Idol, is the winner most talent and have the best vocals among others? Definitely not everyone will agree. Why not? Because the result is based on audience votes. Why audience votes are not fair? We can’t say it is unfair, the number one position is decided by people, it’s democracy, it’s freedom, or it’s human rights (or something cavemen not understand). The votes might come from a person who just like the candidate and not bother how talented candidate is. It’s Idolism, it’s fanboyism. There is no guideline in this matter. You like it, you vote it. You dislike, don’t vote it. The question is: Since there is a vote for like, where is the vote for dislike? They might be 100 examiner, 40% like A; 20% like B; 25% hate A; 5% hate B and 10% hate both and quit voting. Do some maths,

A Score : 40 (like) / 15 (hate) = 2.6

B Score : 20 (like) / 5 (hate) = 4

The A got most likes and dislikes same time, but average just 2.6 is the earned score. B behaves to be more acceptable by minority although there are hate votes too. This is just a quick example. When the vote is majority, A will still win. I like this system which is more transparent. The hate votes should be count anytime. When there is no hate vote, all we see is A winning by 40%. Since we have created system for most like, why not most hate and not like anyone?

In reality, audience vote doesn’t mean score or achievement but popularity. Why popularity is so important? Because pop can sell, pop means money. Which company wants a good singer but cannot sell? It’s not to pretend watching American Idol as a fake show. It already tells you by its title, American “Idol”. Sorry for using American as an example, it’s just an example. There are plenty other examples.

tin mining

I found this tin mining ship at Dengkil, next to ELIT expressway. It was so majestic till now since I seen it two years ago. However it was kinda hidden and not easy to discover. Google Earth guided me to this treasure. I was grown up in tin mining town, Batang Berjuntai. At age 11 I’ve been to mine with good friend – Kah Keat. I remember we cycled 8km to visit friend at Berjuntai Bestari. The road was covered by white sand and stone. Adult always tell us that mining area is dangerous and don’t go for swim cause it will drown you. The statement has made the mining area myterious to me. The ship like a floating castle. I wonder what people do with the ship and how it operate.
This Dengkil Ship is not abandoned. There is a Indian living with his guard dog there. After I taken few shots, the dog was noticed me from far and bark at me. I was scared and left immediately. If there is group of hounds, I may get killed since it a restricted area. Then I met a guy who is visiting this ship guardian and I follow him to take close shot. I have to walk inside because the bad road condition. Being alone and mind alert me to be extra careful. I shot 100m from the ship. The hot sun telling me to go back and try my luck next time to enter the ship.

From kapal korek

Oil Palm

I passed by the Dengkil-Putrajaya raod and seen this nice scenary. The old palm oil tree was dried and the new generation is planting next to it. Some how there is still a old tree stand tough. I believe this tree was more than 20 years old, eventually might older than me, I guessed. The new generation usually are shorter which about 3ft height. Old days the palm fruit collector has to use a long cutter in order to cut the fruit from tree top. They must have a very good eye sight to perform this. Not forget to mention the strengh in control the long knife. Cuting fruit of 20 trees would taken whole day. Old generation has gone, now with technology everything is more effience. The new species of oil palm is shorter resulted from bio-genetic research. But some facts remain: The fruit still cut by man with knife.

Recap of H@pp3ning March 2008

March 2008 is a exciting month. I was so call ‘busy’ and no time to blog. Now let’s recap what happen in this month…

1. AMC Gathering
Having a good hobby is great. Having a group of people with same hobby even great. I was joined my first gathering with Sony Alpha user. The venue was at Starbucks Pavillion. This latest KL trademark has a very grand main entrance. It’s look like a fashion walk bridge. Of course Pavillion KL is the flagship fashion mall. The fun part of this gathering is able to test and trial many lenses. Some so expensive up to RM7,000. But the there is always a reason to own it – professionalism. These high quality lenses can take breath stopping photo. For those who are not afford to buy it, there is always a well say behind “The photographer skill is more important than the pricey equipment”.

From AMC gatherig …

Me and the Zeiss 135 1.8.

2. General Election
What a surprise Penang , Perak, Selangor, Perlis, and Kelantan all felt to opposition hand. There are many underground news prior the GE and rakyat has vote for change. This is the first time in our history with such composition, no one can conclude about good or bad, time will tell.

3. Aja’s Wedding and Honda F1 exhibition
A morning call from Thana invite me to Aja’s wedding. It’s was unplanned and luckily I am available in the morning. The wedding is simple, but best wishes from friends and families fill up the house. I have taken few shots using my old school flash light. It is old tech but not disappointed me. Check out the album to find out more.

From Aja’s Wedding

After the wedding lunch break, I rush to Sunway Lagoon for model shooting. There is only one F1 car, two video game simulators and piece of V10 engine. Lucky thing is there are 4 models, woohoo! The LowYat.net photo club was there to do outing as well. Shutter clicks.. clickss.. clickss…. The tricky lighting setup in exhibition booth fool the photo colour accuracy. There are few great shots from me and I was very enjoy.

From Honda F1 Raci…

Me look like secret agent

4. BMW F1 Live Telecast
This is a exclusive invitation for whom signed up the contest. I assume BMW must has spent half million ringgit to setup this event. The outdoor temporary lounge is great with good food and air-conditioned. No hot chicks and BMW families are the host. We was served with many finger foods and drinks. First time experience VIP class of F1 telecast. It’s way better than SIC which is far from town, hot and jam pack.

From BMW F1 telecast

5. Yeah! I got laptop.
This baby is from lelong.com.my auction. I bid for fun and never expect to win it. It is a hot notebook which feature Pentium 4 processor, not Pentium-m nor core duo. Hot air is ventilate all time. I like the design which is light and slim. The battery last about 100 minutes because P4 is power drainer.

6. Surf with U
This u.com.my mobile broadband is the latest 3G broadband in town. Back by celcom 3G network, it only available in major Klang Valley hot spot. After 8 days trial without detecting any signal in Sungai Buloh and Nilai, I have returned it to U. The modem cost RM799 by ZTE. It is smaller than Hua Wei E220 and featured dark chocolate bar look, nice!

7. Minolta 28-75 F2.8
I saw this lens from a HK user groups. It was ranked top 10 of Minolta lenses rated by Dyxum users. I am so itchy to own it since Carl Zeiss 1680 is price at RM2500. I still waiting the delivery while writing this paragraph. The telegraphic transfer to seller was happen to be HKD200 shortage. Next week I am going to bank to question this. This bad experience has answered my question about the popularity of PayPal.
Minolta AF 28-75 F2.8 D 2696-810

8. Motorbike
My brother is working at Kelana Jaya and need a transport. At BolehLand public transport is the worst thing and that’s why all Malaysian like to drive. Unpunctual schedule, terrible route, inconvenience waiting stop, lousy interconnection between destination, crazy fare… (the list can go on) He got a Honda Wave 100 today. It is a used bike with 80km mileage done by previous owner in 3 months. What???? 80km in 30 months?? Yep. No typo here. The lady ex-owner don’t know how to kick-start the bike, so it was left static until trade in. It is very bargain to get this at RM3200, it almost like NEW!!! I ride it from BB to home. The bike pick up is almost same par as my Wave125. It has smaller body which lead to easy cornering. My bike is RM1000 expensive than Wave100 but doesn’t translate the performance accordingly.

9. A confession
Im very keen in leaning new thing n teach ppl how 2 do itnicely. Itz pain whn failure n error happen in learning curve. Doing my best to guide ppl away from d hard path. End up ppl bcom lazy or make used of mine. My bros no 1 is better n oways run in same circle. Im helping thm jump out. Just lijke 6yrs ago i guided u. But my failure transfom u 2 a wide accept person. U try to restrict my resource. Im fair 2 avone. Bros oredi 20+ yrs with me n i didnt guide thm in early age. Now is d time. Pls dun calculate tis bcos itz a process. Know d best u hv gain frm me n live on. f im wrong. Itz another mistake in my learning life.

10. AT&T Williams F1 Team
Nico Rosberg and Takashima visited to AirAsia LCCT office. I was intended to win hill stand ticket in lucky draw. Thus the poor lucky draw fate still with me. I never win when come to lucky draw. The luckiest thing could be the two F1 drivers signed baseball cap.

From William F1 Team at LCCT

A Series of Unfortunate

Sunday horoscope said I’m on bad luck through out the week. It’s is very worse described, from my health till my owning.
Then, the devil visit me on Wednesday. One by one till today. I rather hide at home and not going out although I am on duty leave.

1. No rebate for my summons (caused by the fucking police entrapment during CNY)
2. My car bumper was hit and cracked (it was too dark while I was reversing)
3. My camera flash malfunction (after using a cheap imitation adapter)
4. My hand was itchy and while I am scratching more

Earl said: Do bad things and bad things happen. Do good things and good things happen.All this are karma from my bads. I shouldn’t speedy and need more patience when following stupid cars on kampung road. I should always use the side mirror and not to rely 100% on reverse sensor. Don’t be so confidence and human is prone to mistake. Save more money and invest in good camera equipments. Go and apply lotion on my hand now and stop typing this boring paragraph!

CJ7 and Amargeddon

The most thing I done in this New Year is movie watching. There are plenty of movies in TV. However I still join the crowd for a CNY blockbuster – CJ7.

CJ7 is not a ordinary Stephen Chow’s comedy. Don’t expect to see much new funky tricks. He has made the most dramatic movie of his career. The story is fairly simple and plan. But it does success to capture the crowd heart. A poor father died when same day his son pass the exam he ever dream of. I don’t think the movie can sell high, but the after-movie effects would remain for few years if they play it well. The CJ7 is a very potential merchandise. Almost every CJ7 scene I heard the boys and girls scream and laugh. I am sure anybody girl friend do love it too. Awaiting more CJ7 products such as doll, video game, comic, animation, theme park… It can be the challenger to Hello Kitty, certainly. Do you knows the Lord of The Ring merchandise sell more than the movie collections?

At night TV3 shown the 1998 Armageddons, which I have missed to watch it many times! Overall not a bad movie, just the Michael Bay’s science more look likes comic fiction. Too many unpredictables while the crew landed on the meteor in order to blow it up. This has make the story become boring and wonder how can NASA made so much mistakes for humanity rescue?? But that’s Michael from 10 years ago. He didn’t repeat his mistake in Transformer, you can tell that.

Windows Messenger Service Down

Few days ago my windows messenger was unable to online after installed office update patch

I whack the google for solutions. No method os work for me. I just like the simplicity o windows messenger, although someone may recommend to go for live messenger. I am upset and give a final try, install the third party messenger – Miranda. A very simple multiple IM client, it allow your yahoo, msn and icq all come into same bowl. After few attempt connection still failed. It does mention that my IE is work offline. I turn IE online then. Bingo. Messenger back to work even not using Miranda.

Fried Arrowhead Chips

My finger was injured while slicing the arrowhead to chips.
Lost some gain some. I spent my time in frying pane and my skill just got better. The perfect timing will deliver delicious golden arrowhead chips. The tips is: Fry till the arrowhead chip stop bubbling in the hot oil. Arrowhead chip is delicious but the preparation work os slow and boring. That’s why it’s seldom available for sale in market. Not a easy task leh.

Food Guide

I went down to Puchong to find a pork noodle stall. It’s a recommended place by Popular Food Guide.
Since I am having late lunch at 3pm, my desire call a large bowl. Yes, it’s really large and only cost RM4.00.
For me the food should impress by it’s tastiness and not only price factor. But this time it only turn out to be the second one.
The best pork noodle i ever had was in Sungai Buloh where I have lunch. Crunchy pork meat ball and tasty soup just nice. Not too oily and at perfect cook timing. I would rate the Puchong’s with 2 out of 5 stars.

Nickee ordered the prawn mee, another recommendations from the guide. No that impressive as well. 2 stars given.

Conclusion is the food guide author write up just to fulfill the pages. Else it would read like Puchong area got no good food to eat.
I believe there is many more good food in Puchong which is not documented by him. Also many good restaurants are not listed.
Perhaps the guide was written based on author experience or his friend recommendations.
When you go out with friend, everywhere also could be a good eating place if everyone have the same taste.
Food is very personal. It is art.

AirAsia’s People Day

“Finally! The new girls are in town!”

That is the headline of today. Finally AirAsia has linked up Kuala Lumpur and Singapore. Finally the dream come true after 6 years of waiting. Finally it’s no more waiting. Finally…

Tony said that Kuala Lumpur-Singapore flight was virgin flight of AirAsia. They even made an ads in Singapore press with tag line “There are new girls in town. Twice the fun and half the price!” However thing not always turn out smooth in last minute. The first AirAsia’s destination was called off a week before it depart. Now having the route in AirAsia’s map meaning we had won it back. Tony mentioned “Always fight one more round… Don’t give up.

As a reward and thank you to staff, Tony declared AirAsia Holiday. Not to forget CNY is near by, they also give angpow to staff. Some lucky guy got RM100 for it! What a memorial day.