As some of you might know, last Saturday was my trip to Heidelberg. It was really great!!!! I considered last Saturday was the luckiest day of my German life because i finally met Malaysian students. Not 1, not 2 and not even 3.....but a whole train full of em!!! It was really a historical event. They were on their way to a Malaysian student gathering in Heidelberg, which i later joined. Did u know that UKM has a program where u can complete your final year in Germany!!!! I met a girl from UKM doing her practical here in Germany...i think she is also doing her practical in Mannheim. Thats way cool man, i wonder y UTM doesn't have this kindda thing... FYI, Mannheim is the place for many big factories such as Daimler Chrysler, BASF, EvoBus, Mercedes etc....its a good place to do practical, so if any of u guys wanna do practical, u can ask me, i can ask around...
By the way, about my trip to Heidelberg, you will be able to read about it in my travel blog at mytravelism.blogspot.com . i decided to separate the different experiences into their own segments . So this blog is my general blog and mytravelism is my travel blog. Please take note. However, the Heidelberg blog has not yet been written. My be in a day or so, since i have been sick since sunday and just getting better now...so stay tuned!!
Monday, 30 April 2007
Talking about food......
Talking about food, and since I've been in a daily close encounter with pork, i want to share with u guys a website i found. It was done by a Christian organization, and its about why Christians are not allowed to consume pork...well basically the reason is very much the same as why Muslims can't consume pork. Actually, I have long wondered, if Jews cant consume pork, and Muslims too, so theoretically Christians should be the same. so finally i got my answer...
http://www.realtruth.org/articles/263-apt.html?gclid=CMyokY6m64sCFQXAXgod3HnvPQ
So if you are wondering why our 3 religions prohibit the consumption of pork, check it out....
http://www.realtruth.org/articles/263-apt.html?gclid=CMyokY6m64sCFQXAXgod3HnvPQ
So if you are wondering why our 3 religions prohibit the consumption of pork, check it out....
Thursday, 26 April 2007
Food & rations
Food has been a worry for me before i came here. "Where would i find halal food? would i have to go vegetarian?" are the few questions poping through my head a few weeks ago. About halal food, i think theres not much worry on that part since there are a few Turkish supermarkets and restaurant's around my area. However there are not many of them near my office. There are some but usually my colleagues and i choose to go elsewhere because kebabs are not a good idea of a proper lunch. Kebabs are impromptu meals. A proper lunch is the most important thing of the day and you can only afford it during lunch hours where the dishes are cheaper compared to dinner which is utterly, insanely, expensive. A typical lunch dish is usually 5-6 euros and a dinner dish might cost you up to 19 euro (more than RM80).It is also a good idea not to order drinks because u will be quick to notice that there is something wrong with the menu when it displays 1.6 euros (about RM7) for a 200ml bottle of coke. U might be offered beer once in a while (its cheaper than soft drinks) but u'll learn how to say no in a polite manner real quick, since u will have a lot of practice. But, if u happened to somehow accidentally order a drink, just pray that they misplaced your food order. If this happens, although it might take some time to finally get your order, they will usually give the drink for free or some form of compensation since they make u wait. Happened to me once.
Now you might be thinking what do i eat at these German restaurants? Well for me there are usually a few choices...U can go vegetarian and just eat salads or u can be an organic unisel organism by eating organic foods or u can also be a spaghetti-junky by eating spaghetti that does not contain meat in it, which i found out that there are a lot of them. There is also an option to be a fisherman's friend where u eat seafood. I have listed out these options because I had already made these relatively easy choices. I can ask my colleagues what the dish consists of but basically its a trial and error in the taste department, since my colleagues couldn't really say if its a delicious dish or not....in this situation a concept of "try it first, if u don't like it, don't order it again" has proven to be adventurous and risky yet quite effective. Sometimes you get lucky and sometimes u don't. yesterday I ordered something vegetarian, of course with no meet, but it turned out to be an organic soup with some organic microorganism floating in it. I didn't really enjoy it. But today i got lucky. this restaurant faxed its menu to my office, and we decided to go there. Well, i was quite happy since they were serving a seafood dish with salmon, calmari rings, and lotsa salad and olives (i don't like). It was quite good, and i didn't expect any restaurant to have a seafood dish since the sea is so far from Mannheim. The fish would have to swim upstream to the Rhine river to get caught and end up happily on my plate...
Cooking...hmmm. well we bought a frying pan on the first week so we could cook some food on it, but we didn't want to buy a pot..yet, since we wanted to se how much our salary for this 1/2 month before we bought it.. it costs around 14 euros for the cheapest....so we decided to wait till next week when the gaji masuk, takut nanti we got the pot but no money to buy things to cook in it...haha. Earlier, I mention that there are Turkish supermarkets around my area didn't i? Well for some reason each time i come to buy some chicken to cook there are so many people and the fact that not many turkish immigrants know English, i always end up buying processed meat such as sausages... Don't worry they all have chop halal, just that its not from JAKIM..(Jabatan Kemajuan Islam Malaysia). Still OK lah. However, not having a pot to cook in really limited our creativity. We only have a rice cooker...and cooking seems to be more and more routine by the day. Thats why i came up with nasi rebus and kettle boiled eggs... well, thats me......U cant give me a routine job, ill always make it "un-routine".
Speaking of food, my rations of maggi mi and instant Brahim's gravy has almost depleted. However i still have a tonne of Seri-Aji fried rice powder (chemistry formula : S2A5OH) which i will conduct experiments with. I hope to get a PhD in Food Chemistry majoring in Powdered Gourmet Masterpieces. I also still have Tom Yam paste and Sup Tulang spices which i couldnt use in absence of a cooking pot (not to mention beef tulang or ekor). but i will be cooking em for my colleagues soon. Oh ya, do you guys know the type of fish that McDonalds use for Fillet o Fish? well, those fish are quite cheap here and i uualy a bag of 1 KG(8-10 fillets) for about 3.5 euros. so i have been cooking fish for the past 2 weeks...even had a Fish BBQ the 1st week which was quite lame coz we didnt have salt, pepper or any flavoring for that matter. but the XP was good enough.
enough of food....makes me miss Pak Ali punya fried mushrooms... However as a conclusion, i can say that i have adapted to the food by now....actualy i never got any problems whatsoever.. didnt feel as if i have to adapt to anything.... anyways i think i should be sleeping now, so im signing off for now...
tchuss....
Now you might be thinking what do i eat at these German restaurants? Well for me there are usually a few choices...U can go vegetarian and just eat salads or u can be an organic unisel organism by eating organic foods or u can also be a spaghetti-junky by eating spaghetti that does not contain meat in it, which i found out that there are a lot of them. There is also an option to be a fisherman's friend where u eat seafood. I have listed out these options because I had already made these relatively easy choices. I can ask my colleagues what the dish consists of but basically its a trial and error in the taste department, since my colleagues couldn't really say if its a delicious dish or not....in this situation a concept of "try it first, if u don't like it, don't order it again" has proven to be adventurous and risky yet quite effective. Sometimes you get lucky and sometimes u don't. yesterday I ordered something vegetarian, of course with no meet, but it turned out to be an organic soup with some organic microorganism floating in it. I didn't really enjoy it. But today i got lucky. this restaurant faxed its menu to my office, and we decided to go there. Well, i was quite happy since they were serving a seafood dish with salmon, calmari rings, and lotsa salad and olives (i don't like). It was quite good, and i didn't expect any restaurant to have a seafood dish since the sea is so far from Mannheim. The fish would have to swim upstream to the Rhine river to get caught and end up happily on my plate...
Cooking...hmmm. well we bought a frying pan on the first week so we could cook some food on it, but we didn't want to buy a pot..yet, since we wanted to se how much our salary for this 1/2 month before we bought it.. it costs around 14 euros for the cheapest....so we decided to wait till next week when the gaji masuk, takut nanti we got the pot but no money to buy things to cook in it...haha. Earlier, I mention that there are Turkish supermarkets around my area didn't i? Well for some reason each time i come to buy some chicken to cook there are so many people and the fact that not many turkish immigrants know English, i always end up buying processed meat such as sausages... Don't worry they all have chop halal, just that its not from JAKIM..(Jabatan Kemajuan Islam Malaysia). Still OK lah. However, not having a pot to cook in really limited our creativity. We only have a rice cooker...and cooking seems to be more and more routine by the day. Thats why i came up with nasi rebus and kettle boiled eggs... well, thats me......U cant give me a routine job, ill always make it "un-routine".
Speaking of food, my rations of maggi mi and instant Brahim's gravy has almost depleted. However i still have a tonne of Seri-Aji fried rice powder (chemistry formula : S2A5OH) which i will conduct experiments with. I hope to get a PhD in Food Chemistry majoring in Powdered Gourmet Masterpieces. I also still have Tom Yam paste and Sup Tulang spices which i couldnt use in absence of a cooking pot (not to mention beef tulang or ekor). but i will be cooking em for my colleagues soon. Oh ya, do you guys know the type of fish that McDonalds use for Fillet o Fish? well, those fish are quite cheap here and i uualy a bag of 1 KG(8-10 fillets) for about 3.5 euros. so i have been cooking fish for the past 2 weeks...even had a Fish BBQ the 1st week which was quite lame coz we didnt have salt, pepper or any flavoring for that matter. but the XP was good enough.
enough of food....makes me miss Pak Ali punya fried mushrooms... However as a conclusion, i can say that i have adapted to the food by now....actualy i never got any problems whatsoever.. didnt feel as if i have to adapt to anything.... anyways i think i should be sleeping now, so im signing off for now...
tchuss....
Monday, 23 April 2007
New innovations
Global warming is a major issue that is haunting the world nowadays. One of the causes of pollution that leads to global warming is the production of electricity through the burning of fossil fuels such as coal. Its well known that we can't stop the production of electricity through fossil fuels overnight, but we can reduce the usage of electricity, so, indirectly the world ill need to burn less fossil fuels to suit the consumers need.
towards that, i have formalized some methods to save some energy. It works while in Germany, but im not sure about Malaysia. Well, as a Malaysian, i cook a lot to save my food expenses in Germany. So, to cook, it is expected for me to use a stove. However the stove in my hostel uses electricity and as you know, heating elements use up a lot of energy to heat up. So i decided to be a little creative in my cooking. Well in a normal stove, u will need a lot of energy to heat up; 1st the stove itself, 2nd ull need a couple of hundred kilo joules of energy to heat up the frying pan or pot, and 3. ull need a few more kilo joules of energy to heat up the food itself...
to solve this problem I have stumbled into a couple new recepies...1st. instead of nasi goreng i have come up with nasi rebus. Thanks to a whole box of perencah nasi goreng Seri Aji generously supply to me by our sister Nico Yip, i was able to experiment with the nasi rebus recipe where instead of cooking the rice and then mixing it in the frying pan, i put in the rice, onions, some sosej cuts, the perencah nasi goreng, some margerine and some vegetables into the rice cooker, mix it together and cook it alltogether. this way no energy is wasted on heating up the frying pan....cool huh? hahaha...But i still need some time to perfect my technique.... another thing is i learnt to boil eggs in the kettle. 1st wash the eggs thuroghly and put some water into the kettle and put in the eggs. switch on the kettle, leave it to boil, after it has finish boiling, leave it for about 6 minuites and voila!! boiled eggs. No need to heat up the stove that heats up the pot that heats up the water that heats the eggs....just kettle>water>eggs......
well ...hahaha...please dont take this too seriously...its just a joke because im a bit lazy to wash some pots and pans.....hahaha...but the energy savings are REAL.....you can actualy save a lot on electric bills if u do this in Germany (the stove in malaysia uses gas, which is cheaper than electric)
So, if i come up with other energy saving tips, i make sure it will be written here...tchuss!!!
towards that, i have formalized some methods to save some energy. It works while in Germany, but im not sure about Malaysia. Well, as a Malaysian, i cook a lot to save my food expenses in Germany. So, to cook, it is expected for me to use a stove. However the stove in my hostel uses electricity and as you know, heating elements use up a lot of energy to heat up. So i decided to be a little creative in my cooking. Well in a normal stove, u will need a lot of energy to heat up; 1st the stove itself, 2nd ull need a couple of hundred kilo joules of energy to heat up the frying pan or pot, and 3. ull need a few more kilo joules of energy to heat up the food itself...
to solve this problem I have stumbled into a couple new recepies...1st. instead of nasi goreng i have come up with nasi rebus. Thanks to a whole box of perencah nasi goreng Seri Aji generously supply to me by our sister Nico Yip, i was able to experiment with the nasi rebus recipe where instead of cooking the rice and then mixing it in the frying pan, i put in the rice, onions, some sosej cuts, the perencah nasi goreng, some margerine and some vegetables into the rice cooker, mix it together and cook it alltogether. this way no energy is wasted on heating up the frying pan....cool huh? hahaha...But i still need some time to perfect my technique.... another thing is i learnt to boil eggs in the kettle. 1st wash the eggs thuroghly and put some water into the kettle and put in the eggs. switch on the kettle, leave it to boil, after it has finish boiling, leave it for about 6 minuites and voila!! boiled eggs. No need to heat up the stove that heats up the pot that heats up the water that heats the eggs....just kettle>water>eggs......
well ...hahaha...please dont take this too seriously...its just a joke because im a bit lazy to wash some pots and pans.....hahaha...but the energy savings are REAL.....you can actualy save a lot on electric bills if u do this in Germany (the stove in malaysia uses gas, which is cheaper than electric)
So, if i come up with other energy saving tips, i make sure it will be written here...tchuss!!!
Some info updates
I guess i was too excited about the whole German thingy that i forgot to introduce you guys to my hostel. Well basically I'm staying in a student hostel, where people from different parts of the world stay. there are Tunisian, Afrikaans, Brazilian, Chinese.....u name it, we got it.... Its very near to the Mannheim University. It's kindda like any other hostel such as KSDS, K9, K10 and so on, but it has 2 shared bathrooms and a shared kitchen per floor.the room is quite small, the size of KSDS rooms. For you guys that have not stayed in KSDS, the room size is just like 3m x 5m or so...small but i think its fine with me, as long as it has fast internet..kindda like that Sun Yan Zi song...Wan Mei De Yi Tian, where she wants a house and one of its room has fast internet....haha. The rent is 203 euros per month which is RM900++. its not too far my office, a 15 min walk every morning.
I think the coolest thing abt my hostel is the elevator. The 1st thing is it has 2 doors. well its not a normal 2-door elevetor. Usually some places like the hospital have elevators with the door in the front and the back, but this elevator has doors in the front and the right. U enter the elevator on the ground floor through the front door and exit the 3rd floor(my floor) through the right hand side door. But there is a primary door and 2ndry door.the 1st door is like a normal door which opens outwards exepet this door is metal(see the pic on the left). The 2nd door....well this is when things get in
teresting, you enter the elevator and press the 3rd floor button, but nothing happens. u press it again, yet nothing happens,then start to panic.Now you just notice that you cant even find the close door button, u panic even more. Then as u want to get out of the elevator, the door closes. When the 2ndry door closes you really feel like going into one of those Alien Resurrection movies, with the black and yello
w stripes on the door frame and the sound of the door closing, it getting spooky now.... But, then u find a reassuring sign on the elevator wall. So the elevator is on its journey up to the 3rd floor and u start wondering what other surprises await you.. maybe an Alien will come out of the roof or maybe the elevator will stop and thousands of aliens will come down on you...? 
So, you arrive at the third floor. the elevator stops and the right hand side door opens....as a finale to the whole Alien Resurrection experience, you see the 3rd floor primary door with a crack, on the window.....i guess it was from the previous battle with the aliens.........What kindda ppl stay here u ask urself...
My office.....
My office is quite cool, a really modern looking office, very nice people and a really cool boss. However im starting to realize how hopelessly left
behind i am in programming, and im starting to get blurr when my colleagues are talking. Looks like i have to ganbatte!!! Its kinda like a PSM topic you have chosen and you think you cant do it, but u just have to finish it if you know what's good for you. However we have a real kick a$$ coffee machine which grinds fresh coffee beans to make the coffee.... its like the machine in Starbucks.... And we have a really gigantic colleague which is maybe 220cm tall, i think he is at least half a meter taler than me. he hast mind his head when he comes into the office... but i really cant remember his name..im bad with names:P
Honey I shrunk my pants!!!
I washed my clothes for the first time last saturday. I had to buy a token for the washing machine but the drier is free. So i went and put my clothes in the washing machine and put in the soap and stuff..no problem.... an hour later i came by and put the cloths in the drier, i put it at the driest setting and 1 hour later i came back to pick up the cloths with out any suspicion that anything went wrong. Today i got one of my pants and put them on, to my surprise i could not fit in them,,,, they shrunk.....it shrink at least 2 inchs of the normal size, so i have to shed 2 inches before i can wear it again:P.....oh well, why not...?hahaha..
OK... i think thats all for now....hope u enjoyed my stories...see you guys....
teresting, you enter the elevator and press the 3rd floor button, but nothing happens. u press it again, yet nothing happens,then start to panic.Now you just notice that you cant even find the close door button, u panic even more. Then as u want to get out of the elevator, the door closes. When the 2ndry door closes you really feel like going into one of those Alien Resurrection movies, with the black and yello
w stripes on the door frame and the sound of the door closing, it getting spooky now.... But, then u find a reassuring sign on the elevator wall. So the elevator is on its journey up to the 3rd floor and u start wondering what other surprises await you.. maybe an Alien will come out of the roof or maybe the elevator will stop and thousands of aliens will come down on you...? 
So, you arrive at the third floor. the elevator stops and the right hand side door opens....as a finale to the whole Alien Resurrection experience, you see the 3rd floor primary door with a crack, on the window.....i guess it was from the previous battle with the aliens.........What kindda ppl stay here u ask urself...My office.....
My office is quite cool, a really modern looking office, very nice people and a really cool boss. However im starting to realize how hopelessly left
behind i am in programming, and im starting to get blurr when my colleagues are talking. Looks like i have to ganbatte!!! Its kinda like a PSM topic you have chosen and you think you cant do it, but u just have to finish it if you know what's good for you. However we have a real kick a$$ coffee machine which grinds fresh coffee beans to make the coffee.... its like the machine in Starbucks.... And we have a really gigantic colleague which is maybe 220cm tall, i think he is at least half a meter taler than me. he hast mind his head when he comes into the office... but i really cant remember his name..im bad with names:PHoney I shrunk my pants!!!
I washed my clothes for the first time last saturday. I had to buy a token for the washing machine but the drier is free. So i went and put my clothes in the washing machine and put in the soap and stuff..no problem.... an hour later i came by and put the cloths in the drier, i put it at the driest setting and 1 hour later i came back to pick up the cloths with out any suspicion that anything went wrong. Today i got one of my pants and put them on, to my surprise i could not fit in them,,,, they shrunk.....it shrink at least 2 inchs of the normal size, so i have to shed 2 inches before i can wear it again:P.....oh well, why not...?hahaha..
OK... i think thats all for now....hope u enjoyed my stories...see you guys....
Thursday, 19 April 2007
Malaysia vs Singapore
Untill today, i have met 3 germans with experience traveling/staying in malaysia and singapore. a colleague of mine is one of them and the other two are a friend of a friend of mine, and an fellow AIESECer. Well, i was quite suprised on all of the comments they made about Malaysia and Singapore but i can say that the three share simillar views of malaysia and singapore.
well basicly they like Malaysia better due to a few facts :
tchuss!!
well basicly they like Malaysia better due to a few facts :
- Nice ppl.
- beautiful islands/nature parks.
- nice food?? not really for them...
- great night life and night clubs.
- safe streets....?thats what they said.
- great mix of culture. in fact they were really astonished on how Malaysian ppl got along very well (Malay/chinese/indians)
- great all-round experience
- Too strict, you cant do anything there, even more strict than germany.
- well thats abt all they can say abt singapore.
tchuss!!
Wednesday, 18 April 2007
Temperature drop
Temperature has fallen drastically. If yesterday you could go out without any clothes and still wont get sick, today you would have to endure the bitter coldness. I thought it was just for the morning, but i was wrong! it stayed till night! well i guess the weather is unpredictable here. 1 day without sunlight might mean a temperature drop between 5-8 degrees, or maybe more. Guess i have to be ready next time.....
Tuesday, 17 April 2007
Quick facts
Quick fact about my internship in Germany so far.
1. Im probobly the shortest guy working in the company.
2. German lifts dont have door close button, so u have to wait for it to close itself.
3. A bear is cheaper than water in the restraunts.
4. There are 1 cent,2 cent,5 cent, 10 cent, 20cent, 50cent, 1 euro, 2 euro coins, so offten u will end up with a tonne of coins if u pay large notes to buy stuff in the supermarket.
5. u can buy 1. 5 liters of fizzy drinks for as lo as 40cents per bottle (but you have to add 25cents for the bottle)
6.there are probobly 12 different nationalities living in my hostel and probobly more around Mannheim.
7. Mineral water taste like tap water (which is drinkable), which taste like zam-zam water.
8. All shops are closed at 8pm and on sundays.
9. So far i havent seen a single petrol station near by.
10. The streets are clean during weekdays, but the opposite during weekends.
1. Im probobly the shortest guy working in the company.
2. German lifts dont have door close button, so u have to wait for it to close itself.
3. A bear is cheaper than water in the restraunts.
4. There are 1 cent,2 cent,5 cent, 10 cent, 20cent, 50cent, 1 euro, 2 euro coins, so offten u will end up with a tonne of coins if u pay large notes to buy stuff in the supermarket.
5. u can buy 1. 5 liters of fizzy drinks for as lo as 40cents per bottle (but you have to add 25cents for the bottle)
6.there are probobly 12 different nationalities living in my hostel and probobly more around Mannheim.
7. Mineral water taste like tap water (which is drinkable), which taste like zam-zam water.
8. All shops are closed at 8pm and on sundays.
9. So far i havent seen a single petrol station near by.
10. The streets are clean during weekdays, but the opposite during weekends.
Monday, 16 April 2007
1st day on the job
Today was the first day of my internship in TIM consult. No TIM is not the name of the founder, it stands for Transport Interchange Motor or something...anyway it was a really great introduction to the German working culture and how the staff had always had internationalism in mind in every decision they make.
We (me and LiuShu) went to TIM consult at around 9am with the VPICX, Kathrin Schlutz. As we arrive through the door, we were greeted by the CEO who happened to pass by and I was really surprised when we were addressed by him as "Gentelmen!!"...I swear that was the first time anybody addressed me with "gentlemen". you know lah, in malaysia, when u r a normal worker, u dont imagine people treat you with that kindda respect...haha... anyways obviously they had the whole day planned out for us. For the whole day it was about the company and what they were doing. TIM Consult is a consultant company.they consult on all kind of things such as town planning logistics comissioning, They advise various companies on which carrier to use to transport their goods, get bids from the carrier companies such as DHL, Maersk, MISC, Evergreen etc and get the best service versus cost for their transportation needs. So our job is to create a web based software that lets the client search for the prices on his own rather than asking the consultants to do it for them. So that was the job...looks quite challenging but nonetheless exciting. they were explaining eveything to us as if we were the client itself...it was a full throttle orientation day...My hard disk was full the first day till i couldnt think anymore.. my chemical computer had jammed up.
what i noticed is they address their workers as colleagues, everybody is a colleague except for the CEO lah..it shows how they appreciate the workers(or coleagues) and shows they all are at the same level. Another thing i noticed is the quite relaxed working pace. I mean i thought that germany was supposed to be like Japan where ppl walked fast and were constantly under pressure.. here you could take as many coffee breaks u want as long as you finish ur work within the given time and do not "steal bones", if u know what i mean. My colleagues are really great and friendly. they are way friendlier than i expected. We had a great laugh together during lunch hour.Mr. Henning, our superviser turned out to be AIESEC Alumni too. I really respect his believes that everybody is not perfect and should be given chances to improve and develop themselves. and he believes in young people. Young people + more young people from many countries = The best team the world can offer....
all in all, it was a great 1st day. I loved it very much. came back so tire i couldnt write the blog... thats why it 1 day late...and i think the future blog will be even shorter i guess....haha see how things go....
We (me and LiuShu) went to TIM consult at around 9am with the VPICX, Kathrin Schlutz. As we arrive through the door, we were greeted by the CEO who happened to pass by and I was really surprised when we were addressed by him as "Gentelmen!!"...I swear that was the first time anybody addressed me with "gentlemen". you know lah, in malaysia, when u r a normal worker, u dont imagine people treat you with that kindda respect...haha... anyways obviously they had the whole day planned out for us. For the whole day it was about the company and what they were doing. TIM Consult is a consultant company.they consult on all kind of things such as town planning logistics comissioning, They advise various companies on which carrier to use to transport their goods, get bids from the carrier companies such as DHL, Maersk, MISC, Evergreen etc and get the best service versus cost for their transportation needs. So our job is to create a web based software that lets the client search for the prices on his own rather than asking the consultants to do it for them. So that was the job...looks quite challenging but nonetheless exciting. they were explaining eveything to us as if we were the client itself...it was a full throttle orientation day...My hard disk was full the first day till i couldnt think anymore.. my chemical computer had jammed up.
what i noticed is they address their workers as colleagues, everybody is a colleague except for the CEO lah..it shows how they appreciate the workers(or coleagues) and shows they all are at the same level. Another thing i noticed is the quite relaxed working pace. I mean i thought that germany was supposed to be like Japan where ppl walked fast and were constantly under pressure.. here you could take as many coffee breaks u want as long as you finish ur work within the given time and do not "steal bones", if u know what i mean. My colleagues are really great and friendly. they are way friendlier than i expected. We had a great laugh together during lunch hour.Mr. Henning, our superviser turned out to be AIESEC Alumni too. I really respect his believes that everybody is not perfect and should be given chances to improve and develop themselves. and he believes in young people. Young people + more young people from many countries = The best team the world can offer....
all in all, it was a great 1st day. I loved it very much. came back so tire i couldnt write the blog... thats why it 1 day late...and i think the future blog will be even shorter i guess....haha see how things go....
Sunday, 15 April 2007
Good idea vs Bad idea Ep.2
5 Good and bad idea when you are staying in a foreign country :
1. Good idea : Bring a laptop computer.
Bad idea : Everything inside the laptop is pirated.
2. Good idea : Bring thick, fluffy winter clothes.
bad idea : Not checking the current temperature/season in the country.
3. Good idea : If your english is too bad, sms
Bad idea : Making a call to a friend telling him your whole weekend plans when he cant understand what you are saying.
4. Good idea : Cook instead of eating outside, it saves a lot of money.
Bad idea : Eat Maggi mee everyday.
5. Good idea : Learning a little bit of the country you are going.
Bad idea : Not learning about your own country.
1. Good idea : Bring a laptop computer.
Bad idea : Everything inside the laptop is pirated.
2. Good idea : Bring thick, fluffy winter clothes.
bad idea : Not checking the current temperature/season in the country.
3. Good idea : If your english is too bad, sms
Bad idea : Making a call to a friend telling him your whole weekend plans when he cant understand what you are saying.
4. Good idea : Cook instead of eating outside, it saves a lot of money.
Bad idea : Eat Maggi mee everyday.
5. Good idea : Learning a little bit of the country you are going.
Bad idea : Not learning about your own country.
.:: Good idea vs Bad idea - Out every fortnight ::.
Saturday, 14 April 2007
Mannheim
For the past few days, since i have not started working, i have been traveling a lot around Mannheim. My arrival to Mannheim was at a transitional time where spring meets summer (or rather spring meets global warming). With temperature soaring to 29 degrees and rising, Mannheim has been officially declared as the warmest city in Germany.
Despite that, everybody seems to welcome the warm climate with arms wide open. One activity German people like to do in this weather is having a BBQ picnic. In fact i am just back from a BBQ picnic myself. Families would gather at the park beside river with their BBQ sets and have a jolly good time playing football in the field. 
The Rhine river is one of the longest river in Germany and has been a centre of attraction for family picnics each summer (or in this case spring). And why not, its a really nice place to be in. However due to the popularity of this place, whenever there is a bright sunny weekend, it sems that the whole population of Mannheim will come down to the park thus depriving the park of its precious parking spaces. When this happens,one might be presented with scene similar to a day during Friday prayers in UTM (minus the motorcycles).
Mannheim has also a number of churches. The number of churches are comparable to the number of mosques per square feet in Malaysia Some of them date back to the post world war era. And some of the churches are still under reconstruction in conjunction with the 400th "birthday" of Mannheim city. It not only the churches, but the whole Mannheim has been under a total makeover for the past few years in celebration of the anniversary. All over the city one may see constriction going on and a handful of beautiful flower beds and not to mention a majestic fountain in the city center behind the water tower. 
All of this for the celebration of the 400th anniversary of Mannheim city, or so they say. However I wouldn't say the makeover is just a way to get rid of the years
budget or a way to win voters hearts. Mannheim has now become one of the most beautiful cities i have ever been to. Forget Singapore, KL or Bangkok, this city is filled with the best architectural buildings Europe has to offer. No wonder the government spent so much money on building restoration and maintainence.
Talking about Mannheims' buildings, its really not hard to get around Mannheim since the buildings and streets are arranged in such way, it seems like a Battleship game board.
The way you search for a building or street is pretty much how you bomb a battleship in the battleship game where you launch your torpedo's to a specific coordinate such as C1, D5, L12, being the alphabet is the longitude and the number is the latitude. So if you ever loose your way in Mannheim, picture yourself playing a game of battleship. Don't worry of starving to death when you loose your way too as each block of apartments has some kind of shop or restaurant on the ground floor.
Getting around Mannheim is also not a big problem. Because is a small city, you can easily cover the whole of Mannheim by bicycle in 1 day.
Alternatively you can take the tram or taxi but that would cost precious money, money that is better spent elsewhere. The tram systems travels around the city and moves to areas outside the city too. I was told that it could take up to 1.5 hours for a tram to complete its round trip. I guess it covers quite a lot of ground. Because the tram rails run through the city and along roads that usually people walk, i was once asked by my friend "isnt that dangerous?". Well the trams usually have a driver, brakes and a bell to alert people of its presence. so far i haven't came across a tram accident. thats a relief.
In the next post maybe i will make a coverage of the Mannheim University that previously was a castle that was destroyed in the allied bombings during world war 2 and rebuilt to be a beautiful University campus. So stay tuned...
Despite that, everybody seems to welcome the warm climate with arms wide open. One activity German people like to do in this weather is having a BBQ picnic. In fact i am just back from a BBQ picnic myself. Families would gather at the park beside river with their BBQ sets and have a jolly good time playing football in the field. 
The Rhine river is one of the longest river in Germany and has been a centre of attraction for family picnics each summer (or in this case spring). And why not, its a really nice place to be in. However due to the popularity of this place, whenever there is a bright sunny weekend, it sems that the whole population of Mannheim will come down to the park thus depriving the park of its precious parking spaces. When this happens,one might be presented with scene similar to a day during Friday prayers in UTM (minus the motorcycles).
Mannheim has also a number of churches. The number of churches are comparable to the number of mosques per square feet in Malaysia Some of them date back to the post world war era. And some of the churches are still under reconstruction in conjunction with the 400th "birthday" of Mannheim city. It not only the churches, but the whole Mannheim has been under a total makeover for the past few years in celebration of the anniversary. All over the city one may see constriction going on and a handful of beautiful flower beds and not to mention a majestic fountain in the city center behind the water tower. 
All of this for the celebration of the 400th anniversary of Mannheim city, or so they say. However I wouldn't say the makeover is just a way to get rid of the years
budget or a way to win voters hearts. Mannheim has now become one of the most beautiful cities i have ever been to. Forget Singapore, KL or Bangkok, this city is filled with the best architectural buildings Europe has to offer. No wonder the government spent so much money on building restoration and maintainence.Talking about Mannheims' buildings, its really not hard to get around Mannheim since the buildings and streets are arranged in such way, it seems like a Battleship game board.
The way you search for a building or street is pretty much how you bomb a battleship in the battleship game where you launch your torpedo's to a specific coordinate such as C1, D5, L12, being the alphabet is the longitude and the number is the latitude. So if you ever loose your way in Mannheim, picture yourself playing a game of battleship. Don't worry of starving to death when you loose your way too as each block of apartments has some kind of shop or restaurant on the ground floor.Getting around Mannheim is also not a big problem. Because is a small city, you can easily cover the whole of Mannheim by bicycle in 1 day.
Alternatively you can take the tram or taxi but that would cost precious money, money that is better spent elsewhere. The tram systems travels around the city and moves to areas outside the city too. I was told that it could take up to 1.5 hours for a tram to complete its round trip. I guess it covers quite a lot of ground. Because the tram rails run through the city and along roads that usually people walk, i was once asked by my friend "isnt that dangerous?". Well the trams usually have a driver, brakes and a bell to alert people of its presence. so far i haven't came across a tram accident. thats a relief.In the next post maybe i will make a coverage of the Mannheim University that previously was a castle that was destroyed in the allied bombings during world war 2 and rebuilt to be a beautiful University campus. So stay tuned...
Sun Yan Zi
Since i don't start working till Monday and I have very fast internet, i thought, this is a good time for youtube...
I have always been a fan of Sun Yan Zi's songs since I accidentally stumbled into her songs during my 1st year of University. since then i have been constantly searching for her songs. Although don't really understand what she's saying but I somehow feel the feelings she's conveying through her songs. However recently i have stopped listening to her songs in favour of J-pop songs. But for some reason i searched for her video clips on youtube. It kindda reminded me why i liked her songs. Her video clips are interesting and she always has a story to tell through her video clips. It always brings this nostalgic feeling that no other singer can bring. I guess now i know the difference between a good singer and a legend..
I have always been a fan of Sun Yan Zi's songs since I accidentally stumbled into her songs during my 1st year of University. since then i have been constantly searching for her songs. Although don't really understand what she's saying but I somehow feel the feelings she's conveying through her songs. However recently i have stopped listening to her songs in favour of J-pop songs. But for some reason i searched for her video clips on youtube. It kindda reminded me why i liked her songs. Her video clips are interesting and she always has a story to tell through her video clips. It always brings this nostalgic feeling that no other singer can bring. I guess now i know the difference between a good singer and a legend..
Technology Backfire
If u noticed the first time you buy a computer and surf the internet with IE or Mozilla it somehow redirects itself to the regional website. for example, when u enter www.google.com the google website will be the Malaysian one (if ur in malaysia) and u can choose it to display in Bahasa Melayu.
As superb and magical that may seem, it prooved to be a pain in the a$$ when you go abroad, particualy non english speaking countries, like Germany, for example. Believe it or not im writing this blog from blogger where the interface is all in German. Now i know "Veroffentlichen" means "Publish" and more important "Loschen" means "Delete" (in case you don't want to accidentally delete your posts). And the most superb and awesome thing is, there is now way to switch it off because it automaticly detects the location of your ISP server, i think. So even if I change my location in Windows regional settings, it still doesnt work. The only way is to physicly go back to Malaysia if u want Bahasa Melayu and english websites to be your standard language.
So ladies and gentlemen, make sure u bring your dictionary when you go abroad. Who knows it might be very useful
As superb and magical that may seem, it prooved to be a pain in the a$$ when you go abroad, particualy non english speaking countries, like Germany, for example. Believe it or not im writing this blog from blogger where the interface is all in German. Now i know "Veroffentlichen" means "Publish" and more important "Loschen" means "Delete" (in case you don't want to accidentally delete your posts). And the most superb and awesome thing is, there is now way to switch it off because it automaticly detects the location of your ISP server, i think. So even if I change my location in Windows regional settings, it still doesnt work. The only way is to physicly go back to Malaysia if u want Bahasa Melayu and english websites to be your standard language.
So ladies and gentlemen, make sure u bring your dictionary when you go abroad. Who knows it might be very useful
Friday, 13 April 2007
Top 10 - Ep.3
Top 10 interesting things in Deutschland :
1. Carbonated Mineral water.
2. 1.5 litre Carbonated Mineral water costs 19cents, but the bottle cost 25cents (refundable if you bring back the bottle for recycling)
3. 20% of German population are Turkish
4. Instead of collecting tin cans, you are more likely to collect plastic bottles.
5. You will be sent to the back of the queue for jumping it.
6. Hair cut cost 20euros (almost 100 ringgit)
7. Your bicycle must have a electric lamp on the front and back to be road legal.
8. Pedestrians can get a summons ticket for running the red light.
9. 1.5 litre bottle of coke costs under 1 euro in the supermarket, but a glass of coke costs over 2 euros in a restaurant or bar.
10. Vegetables cost far more in the open market (aka pasar malam) than in the supermarket.
1. Carbonated Mineral water.
2. 1.5 litre Carbonated Mineral water costs 19cents, but the bottle cost 25cents (refundable if you bring back the bottle for recycling)
3. 20% of German population are Turkish
4. Instead of collecting tin cans, you are more likely to collect plastic bottles.
5. You will be sent to the back of the queue for jumping it.
6. Hair cut cost 20euros (almost 100 ringgit)
7. Your bicycle must have a electric lamp on the front and back to be road legal.
8. Pedestrians can get a summons ticket for running the red light.
9. 1.5 litre bottle of coke costs under 1 euro in the supermarket, but a glass of coke costs over 2 euros in a restaurant or bar.
10. Vegetables cost far more in the open market (aka pasar malam) than in the supermarket.
.:: Top 10 list - out every now and then ::.
Willkomen in Deutschland
I arrived on wednesday 11/4/07 and it was a great 1st day.full of supprises. I departed from KLIA at arnd 12am that day and arrived at Frankfurt at 6 something the same day. Try guessing how long was the flight? 6 hours? you wont get to japan in 6hours. the flight was 12 hours long. You have to add a 6 hour time difference to get the correct flight time.
Sitting beside me was a German who has a permanent residence in malaysia, TIna. She worked in a Wood export company in Mont Kiara. she has been in malaysia for 5 years now. She was a nice girl compared to the woman in the German embassy in KL who was a bit intimidating. haha. well when we arrived at frankfurt airport, Tina said he thought that frankfurt airports looked so old and so small compared to KLIA. No comment on my side...She liked KLIA better and she liked Malaysia even more. she said she liked malaysia as it had better weather and nice people. For a moment there, I felt proud to be malaysian. Yet we malaysians still complain a lot about malaysia..
At Frankfurt airport i was supprised on how the security was very loose. U can get past the immigration with 10KG of drugs without getting caught. Wait a miniute..... in Germany, the drug addicts are given injection needles and drug for free...so there is no need for drug dealing...something our government wanted to implement in malaysia, but trust me, it doesn't work.
anyway, my next destination was the train station. Due to the confusing signboards, i was forced to ask the information counter. At first i was reluctant to ask because i kindda underestimated the level of english of german ppl and according to past experience in Japan, if you ask directions from someone that does not know english, your bound to get lost!! however it turned out OK. so i took the monorail to the train station. At that moment i could for the first time see the vast size of the frankfurt airport. it was huge!
As the monorail stopped, i thought i was at the trainstation, but no. i had a marathon in front of me. I had to go through a network of walkways and escalators with confusing signboards. So again, im forced to ask. By now i had a better impression of level of english of the German ppl.
OK so now im at the train station.The first thing a normal person would do is buy a ticket, isnt it? Well, there was just a tiny problem.The ticket machine were totally in German....i was like, oh OK, now i need to find a German language class, graduate and come back here to buy a ticket. haha.
Little to my expectations, i was saved by a salesman. Yes, a salesman. U know, the kind of people you ignore at the shopping complex and occasionally you let your dogs loose to eat them alive... Well this guy was selling credit cards and since i dont qualify to sign up for one, i asked him for some help. Turns out that there is a ticket counter nearby to buy the tickets manually. I was, like, oh OK, i hope their english was ok...
at the ticket counter, something happened that quite impressed me. I was a bit blur on which counter to go to. In that confusion, 2 guys potong my queue to the counter. To my suprise, the clerk at the counter asked the guys to get in line behind me because the have jumped the queue. i was ..wow, thats new!!.... so i bought the train ticket and i was on my way. By the way the ticket costs 21 euros, which was close to RM100!!! there was a cheaper one for 14 euros but i had to take it at another train terminal which was far away. because i didnt want to go through all the trouble of going to the other train station and also changing trains half way, i just took that train.
The train was 5 minutes late, so much for german punctuality. It was a half hour journey to mannheim and it was a quiet an comfortable one. the trains were quite advanced with the speed of KTM kommuter, it was 80% more quiet, 100% more comfortable and it had WiFi internet!!
So i arrived at the mannheim train station at about 11am and what a beautiful day it was. Sunny day, cool breeze.
Now i had to find Henrik, the reception coordinator. So as i was going to stay here anyway, i bought a Vodafone simcard...My h/p number..? well i will SMS Tina Koh and what comes out will be my h/p number. Ask her for my number. you guys are welcomed to sms me anytime. i tried sms-ing my parents and it works.
So the 1st day was spent settling down at my hostel, going around mannheim and the AIESEC office. by the way the AIESEC office was HUGE...it basicaly was an apartment, with a office, meeting room, kitchen and store.
later that night Henrik and i went to a bar watch a champions league match between Bayern Munich and AC Millan. We were joined by Anna, an ex trainee and one of henriks friends which i dont remember his name. lets call him John... Well, John was a very interesting guy. He did an internship under Bosch in Penang. I cant believe my luck, meeting a guy that has been in malaysia for 3 months. Well we had a lot to talk about. He always praised about how malaysians were really nice people and how Penang was lame and dirty....(sorry Penang people). there was once he and his friends went to the beach in Penang (which was dirty and with a lot of jellyfish). One of his friends jumped into the sea and got stung by jellyfish... .so what they did was collect urine and put it on the wounds..haha it was really funny.. by the way, if u get stung by jellyfish, u should put alcohol on it (got this from Mythbusters) . Anyway, we continued on chatting about his trips to perhentian island and KL.really loved Perhentian Island and basically fell in love with it. He loved KLs night life very much!! he partied all night long when he was there and it was really funny when he told me his encounters with "Bapok's"... it was basicaly the only word he remembered in Malay...hahah. I enjoyed talking to him. He really loved Malaysia (not the food) mostly(according to John) because the people are nice, places are beautiful and its really safe walking the streets of Malaysia(is it??). It's sometimes suprising what foreigners say about our beloved country, but as long as they enjoyed their stay its good enough...
Well the first day was a blast... what will the following days have in store for me?
Sitting beside me was a German who has a permanent residence in malaysia, TIna. She worked in a Wood export company in Mont Kiara. she has been in malaysia for 5 years now. She was a nice girl compared to the woman in the German embassy in KL who was a bit intimidating. haha. well when we arrived at frankfurt airport, Tina said he thought that frankfurt airports looked so old and so small compared to KLIA. No comment on my side...She liked KLIA better and she liked Malaysia even more. she said she liked malaysia as it had better weather and nice people. For a moment there, I felt proud to be malaysian. Yet we malaysians still complain a lot about malaysia..
At Frankfurt airport i was supprised on how the security was very loose. U can get past the immigration with 10KG of drugs without getting caught. Wait a miniute..... in Germany, the drug addicts are given injection needles and drug for free...so there is no need for drug dealing...something our government wanted to implement in malaysia, but trust me, it doesn't work.
anyway, my next destination was the train station. Due to the confusing signboards, i was forced to ask the information counter. At first i was reluctant to ask because i kindda underestimated the level of english of german ppl and according to past experience in Japan, if you ask directions from someone that does not know english, your bound to get lost!! however it turned out OK. so i took the monorail to the train station. At that moment i could for the first time see the vast size of the frankfurt airport. it was huge!
As the monorail stopped, i thought i was at the trainstation, but no. i had a marathon in front of me. I had to go through a network of walkways and escalators with confusing signboards. So again, im forced to ask. By now i had a better impression of level of english of the German ppl.
OK so now im at the train station.The first thing a normal person would do is buy a ticket, isnt it? Well, there was just a tiny problem.The ticket machine were totally in German....i was like, oh OK, now i need to find a German language class, graduate and come back here to buy a ticket. haha.Little to my expectations, i was saved by a salesman. Yes, a salesman. U know, the kind of people you ignore at the shopping complex and occasionally you let your dogs loose to eat them alive... Well this guy was selling credit cards and since i dont qualify to sign up for one, i asked him for some help. Turns out that there is a ticket counter nearby to buy the tickets manually. I was, like, oh OK, i hope their english was ok...
at the ticket counter, something happened that quite impressed me. I was a bit blur on which counter to go to. In that confusion, 2 guys potong my queue to the counter. To my suprise, the clerk at the counter asked the guys to get in line behind me because the have jumped the queue. i was ..wow, thats new!!.... so i bought the train ticket and i was on my way. By the way the ticket costs 21 euros, which was close to RM100!!! there was a cheaper one for 14 euros but i had to take it at another train terminal which was far away. because i didnt want to go through all the trouble of going to the other train station and also changing trains half way, i just took that train.
The train was 5 minutes late, so much for german punctuality. It was a half hour journey to mannheim and it was a quiet an comfortable one. the trains were quite advanced with the speed of KTM kommuter, it was 80% more quiet, 100% more comfortable and it had WiFi internet!!
So i arrived at the mannheim train station at about 11am and what a beautiful day it was. Sunny day, cool breeze.Now i had to find Henrik, the reception coordinator. So as i was going to stay here anyway, i bought a Vodafone simcard...My h/p number..? well i will SMS Tina Koh and what comes out will be my h/p number. Ask her for my number. you guys are welcomed to sms me anytime. i tried sms-ing my parents and it works.
So the 1st day was spent settling down at my hostel, going around mannheim and the AIESEC office. by the way the AIESEC office was HUGE...it basicaly was an apartment, with a office, meeting room, kitchen and store.
later that night Henrik and i went to a bar watch a champions league match between Bayern Munich and AC Millan. We were joined by Anna, an ex trainee and one of henriks friends which i dont remember his name. lets call him John... Well, John was a very interesting guy. He did an internship under Bosch in Penang. I cant believe my luck, meeting a guy that has been in malaysia for 3 months. Well we had a lot to talk about. He always praised about how malaysians were really nice people and how Penang was lame and dirty....(sorry Penang people). there was once he and his friends went to the beach in Penang (which was dirty and with a lot of jellyfish). One of his friends jumped into the sea and got stung by jellyfish... .so what they did was collect urine and put it on the wounds..haha it was really funny.. by the way, if u get stung by jellyfish, u should put alcohol on it (got this from Mythbusters) . Anyway, we continued on chatting about his trips to perhentian island and KL.really loved Perhentian Island and basically fell in love with it. He loved KLs night life very much!! he partied all night long when he was there and it was really funny when he told me his encounters with "Bapok's"... it was basicaly the only word he remembered in Malay...hahah. I enjoyed talking to him. He really loved Malaysia (not the food) mostly(according to John) because the people are nice, places are beautiful and its really safe walking the streets of Malaysia(is it??). It's sometimes suprising what foreigners say about our beloved country, but as long as they enjoyed their stay its good enough...
Well the first day was a blast... what will the following days have in store for me?
Saturday, 7 April 2007
Top 10 List - ep. 2
Top 10 things you can/cannot buy :
1. You can buy your way out of jail, but you cant buy freedom.
2. You can buy the best medicine but you cant buy health.
3. You can buy food but you cant buy appetite.
4. You can buy votes but you can buy loyalty.
5. You can buy certificates but you cant buy skill.
6. You can buy curry puffs but you cant buy Mak Jah*.
7. You can buy Proton Savvy but you cant buy Proton Bhd**.
8. You can buy your PSM but you can buy your PSM presentation.
9. You can buy 4D but you cant buy luck.
10। You can buy streamyx but you cant buy good service.
* Mak Jah = Cafe N24's Curry Puff Tauke.
**Its a GLC . Nobody can buy GLCs
1. You can buy your way out of jail, but you cant buy freedom.
2. You can buy the best medicine but you cant buy health.
3. You can buy food but you cant buy appetite.
4. You can buy votes but you can buy loyalty.
5. You can buy certificates but you cant buy skill.
6. You can buy curry puffs but you cant buy Mak Jah*.
7. You can buy Proton Savvy but you cant buy Proton Bhd**.
8. You can buy your PSM but you can buy your PSM presentation.
9. You can buy 4D but you cant buy luck.
10। You can buy streamyx but you cant buy good service.
* Mak Jah = Cafe N24's Curry Puff Tauke.
**Its a GLC . Nobody can buy GLCs
.:: Top 10 List - Out Every now and then ::.
Friday, 6 April 2007
Off to Germany
After an agonizing month of arranging documents and visa, im finaly set to go (S.E.T.T.O.G.O) to germany. Although 2 unforseen holidays set me back RM100 and postponed my flight to tuesday (10th april) but it didnt stop me from being excited about the trip. Thanks to all that supported and wished good luck to me. I really appreiciated that!
Germany is quite a good country to be in. Although one wouldnt consider it as a destination for their honeymoon, but its a great place to learn about the best of european engineering and working culture. As an added bonus, because of its central location in europe, it has great access to other European countries such as france, italy, switzerland etc.. so will be looking fwd to that too...
Anyway, this wont be the last post about Germany. Stay tuned for more.... good luck!
Germany is quite a good country to be in. Although one wouldnt consider it as a destination for their honeymoon, but its a great place to learn about the best of european engineering and working culture. As an added bonus, because of its central location in europe, it has great access to other European countries such as france, italy, switzerland etc.. so will be looking fwd to that too...
Anyway, this wont be the last post about Germany. Stay tuned for more.... good luck!
Monday, 2 April 2007
Harapkan pagar, pagar makan padi
Among the controversial environmental issues arising in Malaysia, river pollution is one of the most interesting issue that has finally come into spotlight in Malaysia. Count all the "swim-able" rivers in Malaysia and you will find out that you have more fingers. OK, maybe I'm exaggerating a bit, but each year it becomes less and less. If you were swimming at Kota Tinggi waterfall a few years ago, now you might be suprised by the rising number of unidentified floting objects in it.
Last weekend i read an article on the front page of the Mingguan Malaysia newspaper. One of the causes of river pollution are ammonia contamination. Ammonia contamination comes from the discharge of sewage water a.k.a. sh#t water into the rivers. Usually a small amount of ammonia can be tolerated but when it comes to a certain level, water processing plants have to be closed to keep the public from drinking their own waste. The article exposed that ammonia contamination which happened in a major river in Selangor was in fact caused by discharge of sewage by Indah Water. I broke out into laughter. Indah Water is the company in charge of all the sewage systems in Selangor and yes, they are in charge of the sewage water treatment before it is discharge into the rivers. Given the date of the article (1st April) I thought it was all a joke and i still do. How can the very organization that is supposed to keep our waters clean end up doing the opposite. I still remember their (indah water) kick ass advertisements on TV a few months past and can't stop laughing in disbelief on what is happening. This is the best joke i heard since the invention of Proton Tiara...I guess "T.I.M." (This is Malaysia). Malaysia is a country constantly entertained by th never ending real time jokes cracked by unsuspected individuals and organizations. Thats why we are a happy and friendly nation.
"Harapkan pagar, pagar makan padi"....its like hiring a shepherd that eats lamb chops for diner.
Last weekend i read an article on the front page of the Mingguan Malaysia newspaper. One of the causes of river pollution are ammonia contamination. Ammonia contamination comes from the discharge of sewage water a.k.a. sh#t water into the rivers. Usually a small amount of ammonia can be tolerated but when it comes to a certain level, water processing plants have to be closed to keep the public from drinking their own waste. The article exposed that ammonia contamination which happened in a major river in Selangor was in fact caused by discharge of sewage by Indah Water. I broke out into laughter. Indah Water is the company in charge of all the sewage systems in Selangor and yes, they are in charge of the sewage water treatment before it is discharge into the rivers. Given the date of the article (1st April) I thought it was all a joke and i still do. How can the very organization that is supposed to keep our waters clean end up doing the opposite. I still remember their (indah water) kick ass advertisements on TV a few months past and can't stop laughing in disbelief on what is happening. This is the best joke i heard since the invention of Proton Tiara...I guess "T.I.M." (This is Malaysia). Malaysia is a country constantly entertained by th never ending real time jokes cracked by unsuspected individuals and organizations. Thats why we are a happy and friendly nation.
"Harapkan pagar, pagar makan padi"....its like hiring a shepherd that eats lamb chops for diner.
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