Spirit and Opportunity: Still alive and kicking

On 2003, NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory sent two robots to Mars to explore the surface and geology with its primary mission is to proof water activities in past. It would be a bonus to find out if there is still water supply left for the future explorer to hold a long term expedition to the planet. I was so amazed with this achievement because this is the first time in space exploration that two robots was sent to explore a planet.



Mars Exploration Rover program has been running for about 5 earth years with the expectation life about 90 days. I am so glad to know NASA will not shut the two robots yet even with the budgets cut. There will be new rover heading for Mars next years and i would like to see this new robots working as tough as the two previous robots. The different with this robots is that it will not be power by solar panel anymore but with radioisotope thermoelectric generators.



There will be more mission planned in future to Mars. This entire mission will prepare the most important future Man Mars Mission to Mars. The second significant man space mission is the return to moon. Moon will be the next space station for man to explore beyond earth. Then, we will be looking back to the age where the first sea voyager too place. I can see that our future will be up towards to the sky.

Wedding Photos: Throw and catch the flower..!!!

These flowers throw and catch moment is the second if not the most important photo shot in a wedding. Every time on a wedding job, I will be in high alert and attention if flower throw and catch is to be happen. Most of the wedding will do this throw and catch but some didn't because the flower was rented.

For those wedding who do flower throw and catch, it is a great photo opportunity. Thou, one need to have a camera that can take a fast movement photo and as usual the dslr would be handy. Point and shoot not suitable because the slow shutter speed and buffer frame. I would like to share few selection of this shot because this is what wedding photo journal is all about.

Bad habit die hard

Is Anwar getting a bit greedy? The last election has shown us the people indeed want a change. Due to the large winning by the BN coalition in Sabah and Sarawak, they still own the right to govern the country. The opposition coalition BR collectively won 82 seats in Parliament and this is the biggest upset for the BN who govern Malaysia since the establishment of Malaysia Federation. Due to an extra ordinary achievement win in the Parliament that only gave a 30 seats majority to the BN, PKR leader Anwar is trying to persuade at least 29 MP to jump boat and join the opposition party. It was written in reuters,

"There is widespread talk of grumbling within Barisan's ranks on Borneo, especially in Sabah, but political experts do not feel Anwar could persuade as many as 29 of their MPs to defect."

This will be a good chance for Anwar to achieve his dreams of being a Prime Minister of Malaysia. The defection of MP is not a new thing in Malaysia politics scene. PBS election victory was stolen when most of his MP defected and jump to join the BN and they were denied a majority to create a government. Never do anyone know that this big migration by the MP believed to brain feed by yours truly Anwar himself. He is playing the same game that he did for last few election in which he managed to crumple the PBS party into its knees and get Sabah as its trophy. He was kicked out few years later.

I personally think Anwar is getting back to its own old habits. Indeed he is a change man, but I believe he is the same as he was in UMNO. The opposition did win even thou the BN try as hard as they could to make sure absolute win to them. One thing the BN didn't realize that they don't have that much tricks to break a good win to the opposition candidate. Most of the opposition candidate was won by a huge majority over the BN candidate. Rigging the votes using phantom votes and mail votes didn’t make any different because it will be so obvious to the public. One special obvious case that got passed the election defeat is at Rembau where Khairy was contested. Huge majority suddenly appears after a vote recount that only gave the opposition candidate a few hundred majorities win and slide to a few thousand majority votes to Khairy.

I believe many people don’t think it is a wise decision to Anwar to lure BN MPs to defect to opposition side. The big problem is the reason for the defection that due because of the unfair distribution of the Cabinets post to Sabah and Sarawak representative. I personally doubt that Anwar can get enough seats as he did to PBS last time without offering something to those greedy MPs. The MPs from the BN is the main problem to the people and reason to change and Anwar now want to take those people we're trying to get rid so badly. My fear is to see all the effort to changes will vanished to nothing when the old BN mentality appearing to the BR new ruling government. The different is now the new coalition government becomes even more unstable and this surely will make our life more difficult in future.

Chicken and duck talk in Parliment

I found this parliament clip in Youtube in which a simple question and answer session turn out to be a very nasty argument between parliamentary representatives Sothinathan, Lim Kit Siang and Fong Po Kuan. The opposition is very famous with their verbal skills in public in election campaign but easily gets misunderstood over some simple phrase uttered by their opponent.



This session i believe suppose to be a simple question and answer session where MP Lim Kit Siang try to debate an issue where the municipal raise the house tax and gave warning this act will upset the people and might drive the Barisan National to lost the next general election in which by now it true. Then i remembered a clip by two Indian comedians from comedycourt in which resemblance the parliament session as i mentioned.



The obvious thing i find is very similar in these two clips is the language. I have a problem to understand what they are saying in the first view until I replay it all over again. The parliamentary session between Sothinathan and Lim Kit Siang suppose to be a gentlemen debate but turn out to be a bit nasty when Lim Kit Siang cry out of the politic issue. The rest of the argument is purely a misunderstanding of what each other said.

I very appreciate to know the MP form opposition is so verbally active to voice out the public problem, but I find it so hard to swallow the language skills they have when spoke it in Malay. The debate that turns out to be a nasty argument again turns out to be a comical entertainment for all the MP. I hope that the Parliament will not be like the Taiwan nasty session especially now the opposition gains a great deal of MP seats in which I believe will create more heated session between the ruling government and the opposition MP.

I hope that all the Chinese and Indian MP especially in the opposition side resolved to hire a Malay language specialist or get tuition to improve their language and communication skills. I don't want the opposition and the government MP ended up misunderstands each other and ended up talking chicken and duck.

A joker who want to scrap all the mega projects

Yesterday, read a post from Peter Tan's blog titled "Screw you, Penangites!". It is about statement made by Azahar who is the Penanga assemblyman who on process of persuading the federal government to cancel the entire project planned to the state of Penang. The statement received a bad respond to all the people included the Gerakan President Koh Tsu Koon who urges the planned project to be continued. Azahar doesn't put it to considerate that tax paid to the federal government by the local. He act like he own Penang by birth right and can do whatever he want include taking revenge over the people who vote against the Barisan Nasional.

I understand, the development of this project is good. The problem is real purpose and who really will get the benefits from all this development. The Penang Chief Minister exposed to the public saying the second Penang Bridge project doesn't yet approved to be run. To the knowledge to the public, this project continues despite received many complaints from the public on some area especially the land dispute. This proof the project doesn't have a public approval to build and not really benefits the local generally.




I believe there will be no problem for the local if the bridge was scrapped. The most insignificant thing about this second bridge is the design. The two observation platform doesn't fits serve a real purpose of bridge building. Many countries around the world build bridge to ease the traffic congestion in a city. By having not one but two observation platform, this bridge going to be congested with people and cars who want to visit the bridge. In the same time, congestion will happen not only from the island but from the main land too. Why can't they build bridge same as other people around the world? This additional structure certainly will adding up the building cost of the bridge that believe to be whopping 3 billion ringgit Malaysia. I would like to see the extra cost spent on the observation platform well spent on the technology that will be able to accommodate more capacity traffic flow on the bridge and at the same time lower the congestion on the first bridge.

I would like to suggest that the Penang government to redesign the bridge main plan and exclude the observation platform that only serve a permanent grip hold on the bridge to specific interest corporation. The new Penang Government can try to take over the management of this bridge and distribute the contract opportunity transparently and fair. Never do Azahar know that Penang contribute a large portion of tax money to the federal government. Without the tax money, the governments don’t have any money to spend and to call it theirs. It doesn't matter if the bridge project scrapped by the federal government. If the new Barisan Rakyat willing to take the task, they can run the project themselves and show it to all Malaysian they can run a state and build a bridge by themselves, they certainly qualify to run a nation as well in future.

Different kind of Photography

I was out with my friend to have a drink and she took out something that she bought earlier and shows it to me. It is a key chain size doll that hooked with the hand phone thing. My friend likes all things that look cute and girlish, but I’m not saying that she is one. Then I remember Massy, we chat something about photography and she told me that she taking photo of this doll known as Pinky Street. I don't really know much about this Japanese doll stuff with anime thing although i almost become one myself by hanging out with one of my friend who like to do anything that Japanese include games, anime, comic and toys. It seems putting dolls as a photo subject and arranges it so it looks like posing for the camera is not photography but it is a trend. The growing interest of cute Japanese anime doll created a new trend where the collector put their doll into a position so well and meaningful it look like the doll is actually alive in the photo.

I ask my friend to take out her Canon G9 camera which she always brings it with her every day. Then i set the camera to aperture priority (av) and set the lens to macro mode to make the doll bigger and lively. Me and my friend take turn to take some photo with both dolls and i ended up edited only three of it.







The photo below was taken by my friend but I edited the color to give it a different feelings.

The Barisan Rakyat Dilemma..

Lim Kit Siang announced at his blog that he will not support the appointment of PAS Assemblyman Mohamad Nizar Jamaludin as Perak Menteri Besar. This caused shock to all the people around the state. I understand why Lim Kit Siang object this PAS appointment because they only got 6 seats meanwhile DAP won 18 seats followed by PKR in which got 7 seats. Technically, DAP hold the most seats in the coalition government and should have the rights to decide who to be the Perak Menteri Besar if the law barred non Malay to become one. DAP plan is to give the Menteri Besar post to PKR Behrang Assemblyman Jamaluddin Mohd Radzi if DAP representative not chosen, but the plan back slide.

The state of Perak has a unique problem where the coalition pack among the DAP, PKR and PAS only enough seats to deny BN from forming a government. If one of the coalitions packs break out from the agreement, this automatically put BN in a comfortable situation to government Perak for another 5 years. Technically, DAP not a majority holder in the state election, but BN. DAP cannot govern the state because they don't have the majority seats and most of the Malay votes went to PAS and PKR in which made 13 extra seats. DAP don't have any problem cooperate with PKR but they find it so difficult to do it with PAS due to previous experience they had. PAS already take hold of two states at the moment in which Kelantan and Kedah. They will add one state to their collection if PAS representative take the Menteri Besar post.

The problem now, DAP cannot break away from the coalition pack because this will automatically give BN a chance again to a 5 years rule at the state. The rules of law that prohibited non Malay to be a Menteri Besar is one of the problem that can be easily lifted if the Sultan of Perak exempted the law. I don't thing Sultan of Perak want a non Malay to be his right man as he will look so lame to his subjects if he did so. I don't really know why he didn't choose the PKR representative to be a Menteri Besar. I guess, maybe he didn't think that is such a good idea. DAP representative absolutely is out of consideration to hold a Menteri Besar post and with PKR and PAS, it seem that PAS is the favorite.

The Sultan of Perak decision seems not really troubling PKR at the moment. I don't see any official statement out from Anwar Ibrahim himself or his representative. Maybe PKR is having a big dilemma at the moment too and retain their status quo in this matter. I understand the complexity of this matter when a minority was elected as the leader of the government. This is not the first time it happens to a state. If anyone can remembers the rotation post of the Sabah Chief Minister. SAPP and LDP hold office for few years and both of them is the minority of the BN pack. I don't know if rotation can be done in this situation because of the indirect and direct involvement of the Sultan of Perak regarding to the state's legislative issue.

PAS can reject the Sultan of Perak appointment if they think this will not do any good thing to each others, but I doubt they will do that. Having to get the Sultan of Perak appointment is like getting a lottery ticket. It will not be as good as this in future if they run the state same as Terengganu last time. The application of Kelantan way of administration on a BN mind set doesn't work. It resulted lots of people change their mind on the way PAS doing their work. I don't meant to say that PAS way is bad, they actually far more better that how the BN government the country. The problem is to some liberal society who used to a liberal lifestyle such as gender mixing, free social lifestyle and doing other activities in PAS eyes is prohibited and against the teaching of Islam. Other peoples that do not live lifestyle as free and liberal will not have quarrel with PAS and happily can live their life. The reality is that most of the people of Terengganu are standing on the other side of life. BN fully utilized these differences and has taken back Terengganu in previous election.

I don't know if PAS will repeat his mistake on Kedah again, and in Perak if succeed in getting the Menteri Besar post. DAP could also call an end to this disagreement and let PAS take the lead in Perak. The least they can do is to manipulate the directive and agenda in the state's cabinet management. If they can get PKR to play along with the manipulation, PAS representative only will be sitting in a leadership post and take directive collectively or from DAP and PKR. PAS has the same stake to lose if DAP break out from the coalition. PKR and PAS coalition doesn't have enough seats to form a government and all will ended with BN again taken themselves for another next 5 years to be in Perak. Then all of them will lose everything.

RIP: Zakaria Deros

We done with him. Now, let GOD deal with him.

Malaysia 2008 Election: A brave new world for people's power.

Briefly, i would like to congratulate this three component Barisan Rakyat for an excellent win taking over some states in Malaysia from Barisan Nasional. Now, they're not an opposition for those states that they won. They have to start walking the talk as they promised to the people who voted them. I will not write about the result of the election as it can be found by google search or local news web.

The most interesting event of this election is the fall down of Samy Vellu. He is the hardest bull to be taken down and survive many attempts to topple him and at last an unknown candidate Dr Michael Jeyakumar from Parti Keadilan Rakyat. This old bull sure is a hell hard bull to be topple even by his own people in MIC and this event really sure a listed at the top of most exciting event on Malaysia 2008 Election.

We saw few key ministers who lost their parliamentary seat such as Sharizat at Lembah Pantai and Koh Tsu Koon who is the sadly lost his new contest in parliamentary seats. I always doubted in the beginning of the decision by the PM Abdullah Badawi to transfer him from holding a state portfolio to federal portfolio. With the retirement of Lim Keng Yek, former president of Gerakan Party, I do understand why he has to move to there. The problem is with the huge support to DAP, I think it is a political disaster for BN with Gerakan being pulled into its most major offset in their existence history.

UMNO dreamed for long time to take the Chief Minister post from Gerakan. It was mentioned many times during the UMNO General Assembly. The arguments are Chief Minister Post should be given to the most seats in component party and it is UMNO. As the races demographic in Penang i believe was surgically change in the worst way, the attempt to put Malay as majority race in Penang and win the Chief Minister Post is a one way ticket to defeat. PKR is fully responsible to pulled all the Malay votes from UMNO. The result is, DAP, PKR and PAS was able to get a good majority in Penang and to create a government for next 5 years.

The huge defeat of Barisan Nasional in Parliamentary and State election had shown us that most of the people especially the Indian, Chinese and Malay wants changes. The genius campaign propaganda plagiarized from Obama's presidential candidacy does really work. I'm sure that Obama will find it pleasant to know that his change campaign if it is not work in America, work in Malaysia at least. The changes attitude from the people of Malaysia does really get it from the America election. The frequent update from international news channel such as CNN, BBC and Al Jazera on America election does really influence and change the mind set of people around the world. The first we can see is in Malaysia.

In next five weeks, i expected to see some problem with the Barisan Nasional internal affairs and Barisan Rakyat coalition component. UNMO is the one to get the hardest hit with Abdullah Badawi struggling to retain his Presidency in UMNO and to be Prime Minister Malaysia. There are some parties in UMNO showing sign of disappointment of his leadership and the most outspoken is the former president Dr Mahathir. The Mahathir factor will be a big thing in UMNO since now Abdullah Badawi in a very weak situation of his power. I have some insight of why might be happening but choose to wait and see so that I would not ended up in some jail for spreading rumors.

Last, i would like to see the new state government can work as one with one vision. This will be a hardest thing to do because of the social contract that was implemented since the independent. Everyone want to have a piece of the big cake and the never ending lobbyist and corruption on the Barisan Nasional will now focusing to buy out some of the DAP and PKR representative as well. The challenge is now begin. As I type this word in my post, I sense the new Member of Parliament will received an offering call to be their guardian angel in any kind of clean and dirty work.