Welcome back to Malaysia

The ugly side of Malaysians - Opinion | The Star Online

YES, I totally agree that Malaysians are “ugly”.

Having just returned from abroad after 25 years, I am shocked by the attitude of some Malaysians.

Whether it’s on the road, the sale assistants, the government servant, the general public in a shopping mall or the people living in my condo, I have found Malaysians to be selfish, indifferent and some downright rude and aggressive.

Whoever said Malaysians are warm and friendly probably came from another era or another planet!

Malaysians litter, slam doors in your face, steal car parking bays under your nose, give you a bitchy attitude when you enquire about a product in a store and that’s if your are lucky.

If you are unlucky, they swear and use profanities at you, resort to violence if they cannot

win a verbal argument and resort

to crime to exact their revenge on you.

It’s like being a cowboy country, the way some behave.

Compared to the neighbouring country Singapore for instance, Malaysians have a long way to go in terms of etiquette, civility and basic good manners.

Singapore might have their own set of problems but at least their citizens are courteous and respect other people’s space and feelings.

RETURNING MALAYSIAN

Kuala Lumpur


@HushandPuff: author obviously haven't hung out in SG for awhile. It's the same!

Me: maybe the rude people in Singapore are Malaysians ;)

Europe CNY 2012 - Day 2, Part 2 - Westminster Cathedral

Europe CNY 2012
Day 2 - 20th January - Westminster Cathedral (Part 2)

I then went to Westminster Cathedral, the Catholic Cathedral. I might've been there before, but I didn't find the inside familiar. Also, entry was free unlike Westminster Abbey.


Westminster Cathedral


Frontage. As you can see it's done in Byzantine style.


Ad for their kitchen.


"Please switch off all mobile telephones and personal music players"
There go my plans to offer an audioguide to the place


"Gentlemen - please remove your hats"
I suspect this gender discrimination is to avoid nuns being placed in an awkward position with respect to their coifs.


Nave


Holy Souls Chapel


Body of St John Southworth, a 17th century martyr


Chapel of St Joseph - even at ISO800 it's very clear and there's very little noise


Beata Joanna
This probably belongs to the Chapel of St Joseph


Chapel of the Blessed Sacrament


Main Sanctuary


Constantinople Mosaic
The mosaics inside were really fine, if probably a bit more intricate than the Byzantines were able to produce


Chapel of St Andrew and the Saints of Scotland


Chapel of St Gregory and St Augustine


This looks like the Judgment of Solomon


"Not Angles, but Angels". St Gregory (Pope Gregory I) in the Roman Forum


For some reason I found the idea of a Holy Water tap amusing.

Having earlier been invited to "come & enjoy the delicious selection of food & drink being served in our cathedral kitchen", I headed "down the spiral staircase".


What struck me about the cafe menu was that it was extremely cheap. So I ordered a soup of the day - Krispy Kreme didn't last long in the stomach; the hostel had had breakfast but it was toast and cereal and so not worth wasting stomach space on. So I just had a cup of 'juice' (I was scammed - it came out of a dispenser and tasted like kordial).
Spaghetti on Toast sounded disgusting.


The soup was not bad, especially in winter.

Conversations - 25th July 2012

Someone: "are u attached?"
"do u have a bf?"

Me: hurr why are people so curious about you
how come no one asks me
HAHA

Someone: EXACTLY
i hated being asked about every little thing ALL the time

Me: people love you :P

Someone: either that or they're plotting my downfall

Me: simi plot your downfall
haha

dont be so paranoid can

Someone: so i decided to ignore that possibility
stop overthinking
etc

Me: I should be happy no one is plotting mine then

Someone: how u know no one is?
maybe they're just more sophisticated
cos u're smarter than me
hahahaahah
:p
and less nice also

Me: hurr hurr
thanks
less nice = be more secretive in plotting downfall?

Someone: yup
or perhaps u just give people less reason to be jealous of u
which also means ure smarter than me

Me: hurr hurr

why are people jealous of you?
successful ***?

Someone: aiyah
the usual la
they think im always travelling living the good life have a good job
good family not poor attractive etc
whatever lor

that\s my point
how i know what they're thinking right

it's very puzzling when people try act like they're my bffs
when i barely talk to them in real life

Me: you talk to me quite a lot but I dont try to act bff hahahaha
see being friends with guys is so much easier

Someone: exactly

Me: the only thing you have to worry about is if we're trying
to get into your pants

Someone: my GOOD friends i know who they are

and u're one of them!

that last line was a continuation of the good friends NOT trying to
get into my pants hahahaha

hmmm that's a pretty accurate, comprehensive summary of the
heterosexual boy-girl friendship

Me: this is why girls love gay guys the best. You don't have to worry about upstaging attempts and the increased drama and histrionics are compensated by not having to worry about if he's trying to bed you

Someone: Noleh
I like heterosexual male attention lol


'Ken': ur ex is pretty

really

by sg girls standard

Me: hahahahahaha
damning with faint praise


Someone: Is she pretty?

Me: I should go for an ugly girl

Someone: Well perhaps
I notice the average looking girls are much nicer more kinder
Better character

Me: nicer than ugly?

Someone: Not sure
Don't talk to ugly ones much

Me: tsk tsk


Someone else: someone told me i shld date a japanophile

Me: yeah a lot of people tell you that I'm sure

Someone else: but most female japanophiles look freaky and dream of having Takuya Kimura as bf

Me: and the male ones?

Someone else: there's a wider range

some r freaky and wish to marry jav stars
some travel to japan 15 times in 3 yrs

luckily i dun belong to these categories
=P


Me: http://starcasm.net/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Kate_Upton_bikini_nun.jpg

Frigid Girl: HURHUR
she's v hot in brit news now
cos of her great tits

Me: she's american

Frigid Girl: what's she famous for/
i cannot remember anything else except her boobs

Links - 25th July 2012

Hungry piranha seeks good catch - "A zoo is appealing for a new mate for a female piranha after the fish devoured her previous one"

The mental illness industry is medicalising normality - "a staggering 164.8 million Europeans – 38.2% of the population – suffer from a mental disorder in any year... Such reports are worrying. They may draw attention to a rising toll of human suffering, but they pinpoint the imperialising tendency of the mental health sector. Our ills and unhappiness are squeezed into a package labelled "disorder" and an ever-proliferating assortment of supposedly objective diagnostic categories. A cure is somehow promised, though it rarely seems to come, certainly not for everyone or for ever... On the subject of women's greater susceptibility, it's just as well to remember that women go to doctors far more than men, for all kinds of ills: indeed the way the stats add up, women's greater incidence of mental ills just about equals their greater number of visits to the doctors... doctors could recommend group running for depression, proved to have far better effects than SSRIs. Reading groups, too, offer a definite lift"

Chinese Woman Kills Man By Squeezing His Testicles

Frustrations Of An Asian American Whedonite - "The most familiar blinders for your average Whedon fan involve gender. Joss is well-known as a crusader on behalf of women’s rights... It’s very, very admirable that Joss is able to grasp and articulate the reasons why gender equity is something that is valuable and important to everyone. This is something that a very, very large number of creators would be incapable of doing. It’s even more admirable that he’s become such a vocal and active champion for feminism. It’s also unfortunate that he doesn’t see the overlap with the ongoing racial inequities in America"
I was going to make a snarky comment, but this apparently sincere comment says it all: "joss whedon needs to write a show where the main cast includes the following: women of varying sizes, more than one asian main character, more than one character who isn't straight, and fewer white people than people of colour in the cast overall. toss in a few people who are disabled in a manner that is irrelevant to the plot of the show (and is just a part of their lives). i'd peg that the perfect show". He just forgot to add that they need ugly people too.

Gun control or carry permits won't stop mass murder - "Tighter restrictions on gun purchasing -- for example, eliminating multiple gun sales and closing the gun-show loophole -- may help reduce America's gun violence problem generally, but mass murder is unlike most other forms of violent conflict. Mass killers are determined, deliberate and dead-set on murder. They plan methodically to execute their victims, finding the means no matter what laws or other impediments the state attempts to place in their way. To them, the will to kill cannot be denied... in the chaos of the moment, few gun owners would be prepared to mount an effective counterattack. And in a crowded setting, such as the movie theater clouded with tear gas and smoke, it would be virtually impossible to distinguish the bad guy with a gun from the good guys with their guns"

10 things foreign guys do that make Japanese girls fall head over heels - "1. A real proposal
2. Flattering text messages
3. Makeup flowers
4. Mornings just like in the movies
5. A flower for every occasion
6. Leaving his love in a letter
7. Saying “I love you” on the phone
8. The first and last bite
9. Eat, sleep, breathe, kiss
10. Pet names"
Substitute "Western" for "foreign" and "East Asian" for "Japanese" and we get a broader understanding

Anything But Engineering by Derrick Ko - "Singaporeans don’t want to become engineers... if they do remain in the engineering world, they seek out non-engineering positions such as project managers or analysts. Basically, anything but engineering... Whenever a top independent consultant gives a quote for a project, the first question that’s asked is “why so expensive?”, followed by a reference that outsourcing is much cheaper... for tech companies, business plan competitions are meaningless. People are better off spending time learning to build a better product than a better business plan. As a friend wisely said, “competitions should be about building things rather than talking about building things”... As seen in an exchange I had with a NUS student computing society president, we are a long way off...
“Ok. So do you at least help or encourage students to seek out internships during the break?”
“We are a small faculty so that makes competing in Rag and Flag (a school float parade) tough. So we actually rather the students stay back and help out instead.”"

The Simpsons Theme Song (Vocal Cover) AS HEARD ON THE SIMPSONS!! - YouTube

Old women don't swim, young ones have no career on Twitpic

Liak Teng Lit: Why the dung beetle is his hero - "The human body is designed to die eventually, he says. Fighting death hooked up to ventilators and fed through intravenous tubes results in the patient having 'unnecessary procedures which do nothing but extend pain'. 'But it's easier to overdo than to underdo, because if you overdo, nobody is going to scold you'... He frowns upon how subsidies have inflated the demand for health care and led to shortages: 'The truth is when we go for a buffet, almost all of us eat a little bit more than we normally do. If you subsidise something, at the margin, there will always be more demand'... His fear for Singaporeans today is that they clamour for their rights but disown their responsibilities. 'In cyberspace, there are howling monkeys who scream, shout and demoralise others. 'My worry is that everybody is screaming about his rights as a citizen to get subsidies, but he doesn't feel he has a responsibility to contribute or pay his taxes. They have the right to treatment but don't have a responsibility to take care of their health,' he says."

前奖学金得主治性癖　要将性欲转女友身上 - "教育部前奖学金得主，希望将性欲转移到女友身上，并声称他的主治医生，已经征得该女友的同意"

Thank You for Work Flexibility, Now Let’s Reconsider? - "So what is the answer? Perhaps it is a return to more rigid work hours with a clear delineation between work and home? Perhaps it is simply having two separate email accounts and cellphones? Perhaps it is blurring the boundaries between work and home and accepting the overlaps happily as an inevitability? Perhaps it is being much clearer about objectives and motivations with oneself and one’s employer? Perhaps it is lowering expectations slightly and being content with a little less than absolutely everything we want to absolutely perfect?"

The 11 Most Unintentionally Hilarious Religious Paintings | Cracked.com
Cracked.com's Progressive bias is clear here - it's okay to be offensive towards religion, but just a hint of a joke about women...

Oldest male stripper - Dedication - Explore Records - Guinness World Records - "Bernie Barker (USA) ( b. 31 July 1940), began his career in 2000 at the age of 60 as a way to get in shape after recovering from prostate cancer. Since leaving his previous job of selling real estate, he has won over 40 contests. Sadly Mr Barker died on 21 March 2007, aged 66 years 233 days."

Bovine Boarding at Pakistan’s Traditional Bull Races

Friday - A Rebecca Black Themed Choose-Your-Own-Adventure Book by Daniel McCoy - "Inspired by Rebecca Black's infamous song of the same name, Friday is a choose your own adventure book involving secret societies, Egyptian pyramids, and maybe even an explanation for Rebecca's poorly received contribution to the world of music"

Study: People view information on Twitter as less credible than on news websites - ""Despite the official New York Times ‘‘stamp,’’ these stories were still viewed in a more negative light when posted to Twitter. Participants even saw the larger news organization as less credible"... It’s also possible that greater familiarity with Twitter leads to increased skepticism about the accuracy of information shared there"

Kit Kat Facebook fail - "The picture of the nut brown-coloured bear was used briefly to promote Kit Kat Bars on the Facebook page of the Nestle-owned chocolate bar. The company said it had no idea that the image matched that of “Pedobear”"

Police issue warning about 'Pedo bear' - "At one convention of IT enthusiasts the San Luis Obispo County Sheriff's Department issued a notice warning parents about a man dressed as a bear... "Recently, pedophiles have adopted the bear as a mascot. Although there have been no reported sightings of the image on the Central Coast, individuals dressed in the bear costume and car decals have been seen in Southern California." It remains unclear whether the warning was intended to be taken seriously"

macarons: ladurée vs pierre hermé

#levitationSG - "Inspired by Yowayowa girl, fueled by the Singapore spirit"

Milk was the world's first superfood - "The success of the milk drinkers meant they went on to inhabit most of Europe and explains why everyone who lives on the Continent is tolerant to the milk sugar lactose – unlike 65 per cent of the globe. It could also be why Europe became the first superpower"

You know anot? Whitepaper: Private Tuition in Singapore - "For Singaporeans with kids currently enrolled in tuition, 1 in 2 spend more than $500 a month per child Almost 1 in 3 Singaporeans (23%) think kids should start tuition in pre-school, before they begin formal education Two-thirds or 67% of Singaporeans with kids currently have or have previously enrolled their children in tuition 46% of Singaporeans think tuition is necessary for kids to stay competitive with their peers"

Intellectually disabled teenage girl raped by half-brother - "He then pushed the girl down on the mattress and told his wife to grab her legs. The wife held on silently as he forced himself on the victim... His wife has not been charged. The punishment for rape and sodomy is up to 20 years in jail and either a caning or a fine."
This is even better than claiming you are depressed and getting probation

Europe CNY 2012 - Day 2, Part 1 - Walking around London

"Man created God in his image : intolerant, sexist, homophobic and violent.” - Marie de France (attr - they didn't have the concept of homophobia in the 12th century, methinks)

***

Europe CNY 2012
Day 2 - 20th January - Walking around London (Part 1)


"Are your skills in demand overseas? visit the emigrate show... Australia. Canada. New Zealand"
Emigrate to the Colonies!


"Transexual Pre-Op. Real Photos. HOT! HOT! HOT. Active-Pasive. Domination. First Time Welcome. She-Male. Full Services - Call Me!"
"New Ebony. Nice and Discreet. In/Out Calls. Hotel Visits 24/7"
"Tall Leggy. Busty Stunner New. All Services. In/out Calls. Hotel Visits."
Saucy phone booth ads.

I was intending to queue for the exhibition, 'Leonardo da Vinci: Painter at the Court of Milan', "the most complete display of Leonardo's rare surviving paintings ever held". My reservation wait time was 2 hours, but I showed up at the 1hr 40min mark (before it opened). Apparently some people had come at 4am, and you needed to be in the queue by 6am to get in. Hurr.


Queue for Leonardo

Thwarted, I put on my dumb tourist hat and looked at other things.


Trafalgar Square


National Gallery, St Martin in the Fields


Statue to Charles James Napier


The Malaysian tourism (Tourism Malaysia) office was blocked by some construction fence. This was no loss. Also it was beside Uganda Housem appropriately.


Nelson's Column


Admiralty Arch


Admiralty Arch


The Mall


Back of the Duke of York's Column


This should've been the War Memorial at St James's Park


Crimean Memorial




Commonwealth House


Victoria Memorial, Buckingham Palace


St James's Park

There was a barracks or some other Guards military installation. Outside they had relatively candid recruitment material:


'Join the army,' they said! 'See the world,' they said!


"The Guards. Be the Best"
Guards poster. If everyone is the best, who is second?


On the Queen's Life Guard and the Queen's Guard


Footdrill

This was the final rehearsal for a 11am ceremony. I was amused that there was no "knock it down". I asked the guy at the gate, and he said they wouldn't do it in public. Oh right. It'd be funny seeing people doing pushups in those tall hats anyway.


Footdrill 2


Pret a Manger
Apparently this is where the fad started (their first outlet)


"Brunette Size 8/34C. Barbie Girl!"
"Brunette. Stunning Slim & Sensual. Elite VIP Fun & Fantasies"
"Young Hot Exotic Pre-Op Transexual. Beautiful Body. Sensual. Busty and Friendly. In and Out Calls. Mins from Victoria Station"
"Nikki. 30yrs Sexy Slim & Leggy. Fabulous Swedish Blonde. Best Girlfriend Experience 4 U" [Ed: This is what Sweden's feminist laws have done - driven prostitutes out of the country!]
"Thai Sweet Chili. Pre-Op Transexual. Busty, Excellent Body. 1 Min Walk Victoria Station"
"Sexy Latin Top Model. Beautiful Figure. Leggy & Busty. Friendly & Sensual."
Saucy phone booth ads are not as fun without pictures