Nak Share Jugak!

You guys know I was in Penang, baru-baru ni, kan?

Dok terperuk dalam hotel jer lah... tak kuar ke mana-mana... except for the McD in front of our hotel.

I know. Such a waste. Padahal, aku sebenarnya baru kali kedua menjejaki tanah bumi Pulau Pinang.

Serious. Tak pernah melancong ke sana, tau.

Ada sesiapa nak bawak jalan-jalan tak? Hehehe.

Anyhow, stayed at Shangri-La Golden Sands... and I loved loved loved the rooms! It's so cute!!!

Seriously, I loved it. Rasa macam tak nak keluar dari bilik jer.

Oleh sebab itu... saya nak share jugak mende yang saya rasakan sangat comel berkenaan dengan bilik dia... hehehehehe...

Katil dia single bed yang besar okayyy... dan sangat best! Tapi bantal dia lembut sangat laaa...

bantal yang uber comel :p

obligatory key card shot :p

i love love love the toiletries. bawak balik mandi kat umah, hehehehehe...

Settling In

Yea, kami pun dah di unpack :)

Pejam celik pejam celik, dah nak 5 bulan aku kat Kementerian baru ni.

Tak boleh kata 'baru' sangat, lah, kan?

Pastu bulan depan nak gi QA dah...

So I've pretty much settled in ke bilik baru ni. Dah ada routine untuk solat, tidur semasa lunch break, nak makan kat mana. Tapi part nak makan kat mana tu tak berapa syok lagi la... tak de choices sangat. Nak melilau ke kementerian yang berdekatan pun tak best sangat.

Duduk kat kementerian lama dulu jugak yang best. Kafe okay, kalau tak suka sangat boleh pi kementerian lain. Kalau tidak pun gi Anjung, ada jagunggggggg... dan kedai makan gak. Or, jalan kaki gi Alamanda.

Nak gi Warisan pun tak jauh. Or Presint Diplomatik.

Ah, well. Can't spend time asyik looking to the past, kan? Must look towards the future, too.

Forward, ho!

Sudah Sudah Lah Tu...

Taken off today's theStar;

Singapore ex-judge: RCI into plagiarism claim a waste of time

By SHAILA KOSHY

koshy@thestar.com.my

KUALA LUMPUR: A Royal Commission of Inquiry into the claim that a judge here had plagiarised from a Singapore judge would be a waste of time.

G.P. Selvam, whose judgment in a 2000 case is the centre of the controversy, said this in refuting DAP chairman Karpal Singh's accusation of lying on the matter to Chief Justice Tan Sri Arifin Zakaria.

On Jan 6, The Star published a statement from the Chief Justice's Office saying Selvam had written on Nov 2 to say he had no cause to complain about plagiarism.

The next day, the daily quoted Karpal accusing the retired Singaporean judge of lying, as it contradicted his statement published in the Singapore Straits Times in 2000.

In that article, Selvam was quoted as saying a Malaysian judge had obtained a copy of his judgment through a lawyer and had “copied chunks from me without acknowledging”, and that the judge had backdated his judgment so “people will think I copied from him”.

In his rebuttal statement, Selvam yesterday said a mutual friend had told him on Aug 28 last year that Karpal would be contacting him about the Malaysian judge and gave him his number.

He said he called Karpal who said, in effect, that he wanted to move for the removal of the judge on the ground of plagiarism.

“He wanted a copy of the complaint I had lodged. I thought he was going to move the court.

“I told him, in effect, that I had not made any complaint to anyone, so I could not help.”

Selvam said he told Karpal there was a minor error in the 2000 report in that the Malaysian judge had “got my judgment before it was reported and not released.”

He said he told Karpal there was no cause for complaint for plagiarism but the lawyer did not agree.

Selvam said the original report was in relation to certain offhand reflections he had made while hearing a copyright infringement case, on the limits of copyright in relation to judgments.

Apalah masalah ni? Dah the person yang terkena tu kata dia tak nak ambik apa-apa tindakan, yang dia dah kata it's a waste of time, sudah ler! Dia tak nak, toksah la paksa!

Ke... ada orang ada rasa tak puas hati dengan orang lain pastu gunakan sebagai alasan?

Hmm... dunia, dunia... hanya mereka saja yang tahu apa sebenarnya yang terjadi...

Perghhhh Jalan..,

These past 2 months, I've been going from KL-Sabah-KL-Singapore-Putrajaya-Kuantan-KL-Putrajaya -Kajang- Cyberjaya-KL-Kelantan-KL-Putrajaya-Kajang-Ipoh-Tambun-KL-Putrajaya-Kajang-Penang-KL-Putrajaya-Kajang.

Gilalah. I've done more travelling in 2 months than I have in a year at my old ministry..

What a change!

It's A Small World After All...

Talk about small world!

Met up with a cousin of mine On Sunday. Got talking about something or rather, and one thing led to another and…

… it turns out that Mr.A used to date a certain lady I’ve been acquainted with since elementary school, who is currently married to a guy I once got on very famously with.

I was all “Him?? Really?? Dated her?”

“Well, that’s how I remember him. I remember he used to date her.” Cousin shrugged.

And a part of life’s little puzzle pieces clicked together.

I remember that friends were regaling us about how the lady whom I’ve been acquainted with since elementary school and the guy I once got on very famously with actually came to be.

“… she was seeing someone else at the time when he started to pursue her…”

Heh. Could it be? Was it he?

Ah, well. He’s heading towards a happy ending of his own soon, as well. So that’s all good :)

And Then There Were None

So I went to MdmSilent's son's wedding. Jumpa ramai member KKM kat sana - Alwi, Tan, Bibi, Reza... It was a mini reunion of sorts. Not to mention us exKKM - PnAzie, PnSafida... It was kecohhhh!

It was also good to see MdmSilent again. I've missed her :(

Semasa bersalaman, this conversation took place...

"Settle dah semua anak puan..."

"Itulah. Rin, terima kasih datang, tau. Nanti awak kahwin jangan lupa jemput kita, saya confirm datang..."

"Eheh. Insya Allah. Ikky pun dah kawen..."

"Ah, Ikhlas tu. Jauh sangat kawennyer! Menyampah!"

Dan I terkekek gelak meninggalkan majlis. Rupanya MdmSilent teringin nak tengok Ikky bersanding ek...

Pre-Christmas Trip: Singapore Ep.3

Read Ep.1 and Ep.2

So I've been to Sentosa. Went to USS in 2010. Didn't manage to explore the whole island coz was too exhausted in 2010.

Did I manage to explore the whole island this time around? No. But at least this time I managed to ride the train until the last station, jalan-jalan, pastu station hop kat Sentosa la.

This time, I decided that we had to at least pay a visit to that giant merlion on Sentosa.

2012, I'm planning to leave my footprints at Marina Bay. No, I've not sampai sana lagi. Ye, wajib pergi.

Shir with a chibi merlion and the giant one up above...

So we entered the merlion exhibit. They had like some pameran about legends of water creatures involving mermaids, Nessie, dragons, dugongs, blablabla...

Oooohhh... scary dragon...

They had an small theater where we sat in and watched this cartoon re-telling of how the merlion came about. Trust the Singaporeans to create a water creature of their own :p

Well, no one can say they're not creative...

Then we took the elevator up up up to the merlion's mouth and crown and this is what we saw...

Ships galore. Whattt??? Singapore's a port??? Really??? Heh.

That's USS you're seeing there.

The city, the city.

The really big Xmas tree in the middle of the square outside USS

The castle at Far, Far Away :p

The cable cars! I wanted so badly to get on them, but Shir is even more afraid of heights compared to me. Anybody want to go together?

At the mouth of the merlion, they had staff take our pictures to be made into those photos they try to sell you at the gift shop. We ooh-ed and aah-ed over the photos at the gift shop... and decided not to buy them. The salesgirl looked so disbelieving, and crestfallen. Heh. Sorry, dik, we never said we'd actually buy them. You kinda just forced us to take the pictures. We only wanted to look at the scenery. Whoops!

Outside the merlion they had a water feature that looked like some crazy, psychedelic water snake. I loved the iron tree below, though. It had a very LotR feel to it :)

The tree in question

psychedelic water snake

Chibi merlion!

We stopped over at Vivo to say hello to Page One. Y'all know our main aim is to buy books, right? Hehe. Right.

So ends my trip to Singapore. Agenda 2012: USS 2nd trip, and Marina Bay! Woohooo!

Pre-Christmas Trip: Singapore Ep.2

Read Pre-Christmas Trip: Singapore here.

So... this time around Shireen and I decided to visit the famed Singapore Zoo and the Night Safari. Shireen lah beria-ia. Me, I've not been to the zoo in ages, and have very little memory of them. But I remember cages. And being bored out of my mind. Oh yes.

But boy did the Singapore Zoo prove me wrong! I totally fell in love with it. I'd love to go back, honestly.

Their concept was more like 'animals in their habitat'. I don't remember seeing cages... maybe glass casings, can't have those creepy-crawlies suddenly appearing under your shirt... but it was lovely. We caught almost all the shows, except for the Pets Show held at the Kids Zone. My favourite show would've been the one with the elephants - they were so playful and gentle and cute! They also had an Animal Strikes Back show or something, and I adored the spider monkey featured, as well as the family of ducks that closed the show.

Shireen totally fell in love with otters, hehe.

The main draw would be the 3 white tigers. They were beautiful - and awesome - to behold. Kinda fascinatingly scary, hehe. I'd totally recommend a trip to the Zoo for just those tigers. It was that enjoyable. But I wouldn't recommend the boat ride yet. Seriously nothing to see. It was the slowest boat ride I've ever taken, and also the shortest. Go figure.

This is Omar the white tiger. I knew it was Omar coz he's restless and the description said he liked to play in the water, and this tiger jumped into the little river/lake soon after.

Winnie is lying down, and Jippie is being anti-social at the back :p

All 3 tigers. It was a wee bit unnerving watching Omar going to and fro.

Sleepy kitties.

Adoption notices?

They were so cute!

Taking care of them eggs

Entrance to the monkey/ape exhibit, of which we didn't really go through. Sorry, primates aren't my thing :p

Intricate!

Okay, I couldn't resist. I loved the statues in this series, placed along the pavilion for the elephant show. So cute.

A sleeping one

One of my fave elephant statues!

So pwetty!

Shireen managed to convince me to give the Night Safari a try. Apparently, it's really good. After overcoming my initial nervousness

I mean, c'mon, who knows what else might be lurking amongst them critters that's not made of flesh and blood

I enjoyed the trip tremendously. The Night Safari is located right next to the Zoo, it doesn't share the same space. Even the animals are different. They had some sort of a fairy thing going on at the time, which wasn't all that. But the lights were pretty, though.

We took the tram ride. It was well worth it. Our tram guide, Priscilla, had one of the smoothest voices I've ever heard. She's really, really, really good. The route was dark, with minimal lighting to guide our way as we sat in the tram. At certain footpath crossings you'd see Night Safari staff waving red light sticks that oddly looked like lightsabers saying hello to you. Priscilla's commentary was very informative, and we ooh-ed and aah-ed over the animals. And boy, you could definitely see the animals! They weren't hiding, they were going on with their lives, out in the open. Most of their enclosures were lighted with this muted green light that didn't hurt their light sensitive eyes.

The Night Safari allows pictures and recordings, but you'd have to switch off the flash function, for fear of hurting the animals' eyes. The flash is so glaring that animals can go blind when exposed. But sadly, after repeated warnings by the management, a number of the visitors blithely snapped away with their camera flash on. It was frustrating, and so very selfish.

Idiots, the lot of them.

We sat through the night show soon after. The animals were so cute!!! And the show was very entertaining. I like the part where they were looking for the snake, and this Malaysian guy was left alone onstage holding this ultra-long boa constrictor. Yeap, the Night Safari staff totally disappeared and that guy had this "oh, shit" look on his face, LOL. Priceless.

The MC was this guy named Mark who was ultra charming and cute. As in, very the ;)

We also walked around the enclosures for a bit - in the dark - but there weren't many people walking the footpaths, and it was a wee bit eerie, so we abandoned that.

Next up: Merlion!

Pre-Christmas Trip: Singapore

Hahaha... dah nak sebulan dah aktiviti ni dilaksanakan, la ni baru nak blog?

Tak kira! Nak gak citer!

It seems that going to Singapore will be a yearly event for me. In fact, Shir and I were wondering if we could make it a once-in-every-6-months thing, hehe. Honestly, sebab dah lama tak gi Singapore (konon!) dah tak mahir dah naik MRT.

Alasan.

Like always, we took the trusty ol' bus at Bangsar to Singapore. No trains this time!

Anyway, this would be our first time there to stare at the Christmas decorations. They were lovely, all those Xmas deco along Orchard. Also, they had these statues of elephants scattered along Orchard (and Vivo, and the Zoo) that were each painted differently.

There were snow globes outside ION Orchard. This was Shir's favourite - a town scene with a running toy train.

Now this one was my favourite. So gebu :p

The very big Christmas tree outside ION Orchard. Apparently, you're allowed to climb in and up to the top, but we didn't see anyone actually go in...

One of the elephants! Was taken at the Zoo, though. Pretty, ek?

Shir and I saw this elephant painted to look like a white tiger right outside the white tiger enclosure at the Zoo. It was freakyyyyy man. It looked like a demon of some sort - especially the eyes, since white tigers have blue eyes, and this statue had yellow eyes. No, it was too freaky for pictures, sorry!

See? Zoos are very educational. I *did* learn something, I did!

We stayed at the Royal Plaza on Scotts. Their kitchen is halal-certified, and there were loads of tourists there. The rooms were lovely - single beds were bigger than usual (to me), the minibar was free, we had a Nespresso machine in our room, and free wifi! I loved my hotel :)

I'm not sure if this carousel is a permanent fixture or just for the jolly season, but it was huge. I'd be afraid of it, if I was a small kid, though. Have nightmares. Yeessshhh.

The Carousel

Where we had our breakfast - Jollyland. Okay, the carousel, jollyland... am feeling a bit like Pinocchio...

Kinda pretty in a freakish way. It might be just me, I've been reading way too many twisted fairy tales...

Ni masak lemak sedapppp ni....

They have a stained glass skylight! Pretty, really!

Next episode: The Zoo & The Night Safari!

First Post Of The Year...

... and it's a filler post. Hehe. Whoops.

I'm typing this on Blackie. I love Blackie, please don't misunderstand, but I'm so used to MsRed that typing long long time on Blackie seems odd. Takes some getting used to.

Not to mention when I'm referencing something, and would like to attach pictures, then would I belatedly realize said pictures are unavailable, since they're allllll in MsRed. Blackie's memory is (almost) pristine, and I've not managed to transfer the pictures to Tera (yeap, my other HDD).

Haih. MsRed, get well soon! I promise to bring you to the doctors next week :(

Melayanglah RM aku...

Something totally unrelated: I am *so* Malaysian :)

KDa: Do you want some rendang?

Zyrin: Aaaaa... later. Let me finish one-one first.

Hehe. In hindsight, you'd have to be Malaysian/Singaporean/perhaps Indonesian or Bruneian for that to make sense ;)

Enjoy the new year, peeps!