My Haiku:I wrote this haiku
with the hope that just maybe.
It blows you away.
Introduction:The name is irrelevant.
The person is male.
The age is older.
The stories are true.
This blog is mine.
Stuff to surf:o Rage against the machine
o This Modern World
o Footie
o Toon Army
o Kaki Seni
o Alanis Morrisette
o Makcik Oprah
o Anything 80s
o Michael Moore
o AlterNet
o Wiretap
o Bernama
o Internet Movie DB
o Project Petaling Street
Blogs to read:o Kai
o Pon
o Nona
o Afti
o Sue
o Naddywoman
o Poe
o Borro
o Kuman
o Chit Chat Bola
o Maverix
o The Datin Diaries
o Kengster
o Chics
o AG
o Nik
o Nadia
o Affy
o Mooke
o Idlan
o Dhilia
o Shapeng
o Ninie
Contact:o Send me stuff
Archives:
- o December 2003
- o January 2004
- o February 2004
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- o April 2004
- o May 2004
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Credits:o francey design
o blogger
DVD Clubs
2004 and counting...
What's in a name?
Tsunamis Hits Home
The Dashing Dozen
My IMAX Experience
Malaysia's Merry Misadventures
Writer's blog
The Toothless Tiger
A Year Ago
Sharifah Angin
so i would say 2004's resolution was pretty much settled. ye ke? atau itu saje nak kasi aku sedap hati. in any case, i've came up with my list for 2005, my silver jubilee year. here goes...
i would like to improve on 3 things in my life: spiritually, financially and career-wise. spiritual-wise, i think my relationship with Allah has gone from bad to worse to 'oh-my-God!!'. i can't even remember the last time i actually prayed 5 times a day without a miss. mesti ada tinggalnya. and reading the Al-Quran...lagi la dah lama. my cousin asked me a couple of weeks ago, 'Engkau mengaji lagi tak?' to which i replied sheepishly, 'Hmmm..tak la.' and he went on about how simple it is to take some time to read the Al-Quran in a day. and it was true...bukannya lama. even a page a day is enough, for starters. bila dah biasa...u can improve on that. i feel ashamed actually. it's sad that as u grow older and wiser, u tend to forget the basic things that u did when u were smaller. i mean...those days...it didn't seem HARD. it was easy, basic stuff to do daily. and it's what holds one of the 5 pillars of Islam, the Rukun Islam. and i can't even hold on to that. Allah have mercy on me.
on the second matter, financially....i want to invest my money into my future. currently, i have no investments whatsoever except the usual EPF and SOCSO and crap. my money is for entertainment purposes only and other stuff i deem 'spendable'. although i admit..i do stash away a few quids for emergency...it's not actually smart savings, so i'll have to improvise on that. on the short term, been thinking of investing in insurance and those ASB loans. hope things work out for the better...
and finally....career-wise. maybe some of u are thinking...laaaaaa...tukar kerja lagi ke?? well..i see it as expanding my opportunities. i wanna work where i feel secure and being at a place i see myself in 10-20 years. it's not easy really, but i hope to nail it this year. it's not that i hate my current job, it's just that well...u gotta move on, u know. if the opportunity arises, why not?insya-Allah.
so i guess that's my so-called resolution, on the record. i dunno if i can hold on to it, but i really hope that i do. they're not exactly life-changing promises, but i guess on the 25th year of my life, i could use some reshaping and some life arrangements. i hope the coming year will be good to me as 2004 was. i wanna wish everyone a Happy New Year and may we be blessed always. i'm looking forward to the new year, many things will be coming up in the next few months. in the family...insya-Allah, i'm gonna have a brother-in-law soon and who-knows-how-many new cousins. who knows what suprises are in store for me next year. just hope that good or bad, i'm gonna get thru it unscathed and better than i was before. and as i end this, let us say a small prayer for all the thousands that were perished or affected by the tsunami disaster. as we end 2004, let us not forget those who have gone before us and how lucky we are to usher in the new year with our friends and family. to better days ahead. Amin...
Monday, December 27, 2004
a couple of weeks back, i trumpted Mind Blowing's 1st year anniversary. it was a lavish party, with some friends of mine lending their support, held at the Waldorf Astoria. thank you Mr. Trump, Bob DeNiro, Jay, Julia and oh yeah...Brad too. his wife Jenny couldn't make it, but it was still great. great, of course...if all this was true. sorry...couldn't help myself there. sucker for celebrities, i am.
okay okay...actually i just wanted to reveal how i got the name 'Mind Blowing' in the first place. mind you...i'm particular about these kinda things. i don't just name something just for the sake of naming. since this was my first 'official' blog...i had to give it a good name. something short and sweet, just nice, not too long and simple enough. kinda like me, except i'm not that short, but long? hmmmm.....
anyways, i liked the name Mind Blowing coz it signified something soft and mellow and yet it could mean something outlandish and totally out-of-this-world at the same time. i like to think Mind Blowing as in blowing the mind. tiup otak if wanna visualize it. can u just imagine that? it's so tender and gentle.
on another hand, most people will probably think of Mind Blowing as something outrageous, so korky, so screwed-up that it's just well....mind blowing lah. i never thought of this blog being like that, and that's something i'd liked to be clear about here. even though the entries are sometimes insane and totally f***ed up (like this one u're reading now), i don't see it as mind blowing or whatever. it's just what i wanna write at this moment and second in time. i'm meniup otak if u can see it that way.
some of u may be lost here somewhere...but who the hell cares, rite? i assure u that this won't come up in the PTD exam or even your next job interview. another thing i'd like to point out is that i intentionally wanted the word 'blowing' to be included in the name for higher web traffic reasons. alaaaa...we all know sex sells, rite? u can see it for urself. and it works, too. there's too many times that i've checked from my web counter statistics that people searching for the phrase 'mind blowing sex', 'Siti Nurhaliza blowing' (tak tipu!), 'lesbian blowing' (??!) and countless other 'blowing' activities ended up at my blog instead. hehhehehe...kesian diorang. maybe i'll make it up to them by showing a picture of me blowing......errrrr....something.
so there u have it. a small insider info about Mind Blowing. now u can go boast to all your buddies about this, while i continue grasping at whatever life i have left....
since the news was fresh then...i guess TV3 were still updating on the casualties, and so it wasn't highlighted during the 1.30 broadcast. i didn't think of it much...the image of Sharifah Aini was still fresh in my mind from watching Melodi then. but then...after watching Jay Leno that afternoon...i switched over to CNN...and there it was...Breaking News.
correspondents were piling in their reports from Sri Lanka, India, Phuket and Indonesia on the latest development. it seemes like each time they reported in...there was an increase in the death toll. then images started to come...it was like a hurricane went through Phuket or something. cars were all over the place and people were scurrying for their lives.
honestly...i never thought tsunamis could be this horrible. last i heard on this morning's news bulletin...the death toll has already reached 13,000 and counting. and for the first time in a long time...Malaysians too felt the awesome power of Mother Nature. natural disasters are a rarity in our country and to actually be involved in such a tragedy really hits it you in the face. suddenly, the images and reports u hear on TV are places familiar to you, and to know that fellow Malaysians are suffering from this tragedy really strikes you more.
i would say this tragedy being like a silent killer. there's no indication that huge, crashing waves are coming. u could just imagine it...sunny day at the beach, Christmas weekend, relaxing by the sea...and out of nowhere...comes these 3-storey high waves. there's no storm, no strong winds blowing and certainly no lightning to indicate eminent danger.
and as the search and rescue operations go on...my thoughts go out to everyone involved directly or indirectly to this tragedy. may Allah protect all that is in need and to let this be a small reminder to all of us not affected...no matter what we believe in...that something so catastrophic can happen within a blink of an eye.
Monday, December 20, 2004
Ocean's Twelve certainly doesn't dissapoint. the story is by far, no way better than its predecessor, Ocean's Eleven. but the way the story is told just keeps me begging for more.
the plot is simple enough, with a bit too many twists for my liking though. but if u wanna talk about the movie, u can't help but notice the long list of A-list celebrities on show here. Pitt, Clooney, Garcia, Damon, Don Cheadle (always on my A-list) and not to mention the used-to-be-my-fantasy Julia Roberts plus the hot Zeta-Jones. just typing out the list makes me drool.
maybe the movie lacks in story, but it sure doesn't dissapoint in style. i mean..u could have been forgiven for this being a GQ TV special or something. and we all know Pitt looks mean in anything he wears. (even the stupid, pink bathrobe in Fight Club). and how men all over the world really prays for a detective like Zeta-Jones to nab 'em into the slammer. yummy....
i guess all these big movie stars get paid well coz they really do the business. not all of them, though. but the ones in Ocean's Twelve just oozes with on-screen presence. the way they talk, the way they walk, how they move, eat and sleep. there's only one word to describe it: cool.
add to that, Soderbergh's style and eye for class, u get one hell of a slick ride. so to hell with the storyline, see it for coolness's sake. coz they don't get any cooler than these 12.
went to see the new Robert Zemeckis movie/animation, The Polar Express last weekend. and to experience the movie in IMAX and oh yeah...not to mention the 3D effects...what can i say..i was in awe. firstly, the movie doesn't dissapoints. it's a Christmas children's tale, what would you expect? well written and as an adult with a kid's imagination, i was of course...impressed. the movie was in 3D, so u had to wear these big (what's not huge in IMAX??) out-of-this-world 3D glasses. i guess they made it big so that it could fit just about anybody and also to avoid people from taking a piece of 'memento' from their IMAX experience. the glasses kinda suck for people who wears spectacles like me. so u had like 2 pairs of glasses perched on your nose. really irritating, i would say. another thing i noticed is that since the movie was in widescreen format, they didn't utilise the huge screen thoroughly. during the Preview snips before the movie starts, it was really huge since they used almost the whole screen. so u had these awesome views of the Earth and Michael Jordan's sweaty ketiak. but since the screen is wayyyyy bigger than your average GSC cinema, it was still big and impressive. (brapa kali aku ulang the word huge and big in this entry?)
these things aside, it was an awesome experience. movies should be experienced like this. everything was crystal clear and u could see the minor details, which was really cool for animation. u could literally see the kid's eye pupil and every strain of hair he had. such was the clarity. and how could i not mention the 3D? it was as if it was snowing in the theatre or something. the scenes just jumps out to grab you. it was funny too...seeing and hearing the reaction from the crowd, especially from children.
and at the end, i enjoyed the movie plus the experience. mannn..really hope to see The Matrix in IMAX soon. the thought of seeing Neo kick ass and dodging bullets on IMAX just keeps my blood running. next time, i'm hoping to see a non-3D flick. it's more easier on the eyes..my eyes that is.
Wednesday, December 15, 2004
but i really hope that this victory will be the start of a revival by the national team to regain our past glory. but how many times have we seen a Malaysian team (and this includes all sports) go from a moment of triumph only to fall at the last hurdle. i'm not trying to spoil the mood here or anything. it's just that 10+ years of dissapointment has taught me not to get easily carried away by something such as this. i'm hoping for the best and let this victory over Thailand be a moral-booster for us to believe that anything is possible. there's still a long way to go, but rest assured i'll be there all the way.
Monday, December 13, 2004
Dear Matasepet,
last weekend was a blast. come to think of it, each weekend after Raya was cool. there was always something to do, places to go to and people to meet. but last weekend was exceptional. it was like a web of stories all stringed together. it's pretty jumbled up, but heck...that's pretty much how my life is right now. we welcomed a new member of the Haji Tahir family last week, little Imani Sofea (i hope i got that right). my, my, Dil dah ada anak dah. and to think that we used to play and share dirty jokes together when we were growing up. Dil even caught the whole delivery on video too. kesian Kak Izah, the whole family watching her strain and suffer, but without the vital organs involved, i might add. it's the first time i ever watched someone i know being born on tape. mannn...memang aku takleh jadi doktor. the sight of a newly-born drenched in blood isn't something i'm ever gonna get used to. but despite the queesy moments and gut-wrenching scenes, it's really beautiful watching the miracle of birth. damn i'm lucky being born a guy....hehhe..
Lut and Among finally tied the knot yesterday. and so another friend selamat kawin dah. this month has been filled with weddings. that's why weekends haven't been a bore lately. and if it's one thing i discovered lately, it's that i enjoy shopping for wedding presents. don't laugh lah. u're my blog, so just listen. and buying Lut's wedding gift was an adventure itself. it was one thing after another. bukan nak mengungkit, tapi memang aku struggle gile. firstly, the credit card line was down for the entire One Utama (or possibly the whole country) that day. nasib baik Jusco ada manual. why can't everyone be like JJ? (this is my second time praising them after the toilet tale.) so okay...got the gift, got the fancy wrapping paper and cute card, now's the easy part, right? just send it to the Gift Wrapping counter. WRONG. the girl at the counter wrapped the present like shit. and i really mean shit. it looked so horrible that i blew my top off, and asked her to redo it. butoh apa wrap macam tu? aku yang tangan keras ni pun bole wrap lagi lawa. dah la rugi wrapping paper aku beli coz she spoiled it, and in the end...another staff finished the job using the cheap stupid wrapping paper supplied by Jaya Jusco. bole tahan temper aku...hehehe...
and last night, went to watch Malaysia play against Myanmar at Bukit Jalil with Jibam, Hafez and Jasim. and what did i get from watching that match? well, Malaysia won't ever progress in football FOREVER if that's the best we can offer last night. malas aku nak cite panjang2. we suck and we suck big time. somebody up there in FAM should seriously consider stepping down kalo muka tau malu. what the hell man...there's no improvement at all. and to add insult, the few thousand Myanmar supporters were even louder than the whole Malaysian crowd. u could have been forgiven if u thought we were playing in Yangon or something.
and oh yeah...Kuman had his annual food festival a.k.a Hari Raya open house. my house was the closest, yet i was the last to arrive. ini semua wrapping paper punya hal lah ni. (read: above). anyways, his open house never dissapoints. ask anyone that came that day. aku je yang tak buat makan2 tahun ni. maybe next time...if something doesn't screw up the day macam ari tu.
so that was pretty much the weekend all jumbled up in a few hundred words. i'd also like to add that i met a lot of people yang aku dah lama tak jumpa during the last few days. Lut's wedding was like a miniature reunion for Bantingers and 5th Collegians alike. and to add to that...time tengok bola kat Jamal last nite, the whole Collegian clan was there. gosh...i miss my uni-days. the days of 'lepak kat Lobi' and playing footie sampai azan are long over. that's why i love seeing old friends. for a second, u step out of reality into days gone by and when u realize it...u have work staring at you in the face. sigh....
Wednesday, December 08, 2004
i don't know why i bother...but i really love going to football matches involving the national team, even though i know they play like crap and i'll spend most of my time at the stadium shouting obscene language. i mean...they're all i got, rite? i'd rather be spending my time and money on my own national team rather than some country thousands of miles away who don't give a damn about me. i guess there is that bit of patriotism in me, one which is non-existent the moment the team plays like schoolboys.
sometimes i wonder whether i'm the one jinxing the team. it's because in the 10+ years i've been actively following the national team, malaysia has yet to win a single trophy. it's always a close shave, we're that close but we lack that extra edge to win. and in the end, it's back to the drawing board. another coach comes and goes. and while they move on with their lives, we're the ones still stuck in the rut. so that leaves us malaysian fans waiting....waiting for that magic moment, biarlah main negative football pun, what the hell....just win something!
i'm an emotional person. i like dissing the national team. i give them every dirty word in my vocabulary at the stadium. but i love them. and it really pisses me when people who've never even watched Malaysia play, easily underestimates the team even before the team steps on the field.
"Malaysia main cam taik."
"Boring gile tengok Malaysia main."
"What?? You're going to see Malaysia play? Hahahha...get real."
these are the types of comments they give out. and my message to them:
fuck you and that fucked-up greedy club that u support.
it's quite an irony that the Malaysian team, once dubbed 'Skuad Harimau Malaya' during the golden age of Malaysian football has yet to win the 'Tiger' Cup. come to think of it, why don't they call us Tigers anymore? maybe coz it'll be the butt of jokes everywhere looking from our latest FIFA rankings.
so tonite the show begins. i really hope they play well against an unpredictable Timor Leste team. some of their players play in the lower leagues in Europe, so i don't think they're the whipping boys here. i'm really looking forward to the match. haven't seen the team play for a while...and it'll be a first for me seeing Bertalan Bicskei (betul ke eja tu) work the team, after the departure of Allan Harris (now that's easier to spell). let's hope for some magic, or i might seriously consider having a layoff.
Sunday, December 05, 2004
anyhow, after one year and 125 posts later (not to mention 1 draft copy that i never got down to publish), i really hope that i'll never get bored with this. maybe as time goes by, the frequency of the posts will wear down but i really hope the site will stay on so that when the urge strikes, i'll be blogging again. but for now, it's just the 1st anniversary and i'm just happy that it survived one whole year without me giving up halfway, as so most of my so-called 'projects' in life.
it's a great time to be blogging too. the word 'blog' just topped this year's Webster's dictionary list of words of the year. so if u're not on the blogging bandwagon yet, why not set up one now? there's tons of sites that offer this service. i think it's a good thing too, especially in this country of ours. with not much channels for your voices to be heard, weblogs offer this unique oppurtunity. i think everyone has something to say, whether it's on the crisis in the Middle East, or just about how you love your shining new car. who cares what u write about. and in contrast to life, there are no rights and wrongs in blogging. just you and the keyboard.
i'm beginning to sound like a spokesperson for Blogger or something, so before i end this... happy 1st anniversary to Mind Blowing. and a big THANK YOU to all who's visited here and spared the time to read my crap. honestly, without the readers, this blog is just a bunch of letters floating around in cyberspace. like the sound of a tree falling in the jungle without anyone around to hear it. really appreciate all the comments and critics given. here's to a lot more years and posts ahead....
Happy birthday to you,
Mind Blowing dah satu,
Semoga sampai seribu,
Happy birthday to you.
Thursday, December 02, 2004
so today's revelation that Sharifah Aini will be charged in court for spreading those vicious emails about Malaysia's No. 1 darling was in a way...a suprise, yet it was expected. people could point out that this case is nothing, but since the name Siti Nurhaliza is involved...well, u're playing with fire my friend. whether the case is substantial or not is a topic for another day, but heck...it's fun to read, isn't it? the next 'in' thing vs. the old guard. now THIS is the real celebrity deathmatch.
of course, she's innocent till proven guilty. yeah, yeah, wateva. she's guilty in my eyes. don't get me wrong, i'm no Siti fan, but u gotta admit what she did was bad. not to mention ugly, the way she did it. i mean...u would think only some nutcase would do such a thing. spreading those dumb emails was one thing (which i didn't even bother to read...skang baru la nak cari balik), but the fake attack on her? what was she thinking? ingat polis tu budak-budak macam aku dulu ke yang sebut Sharifah Aini pun tak betul.
honestly, i pitied her when people doubted that she was attacked. i was like....kesiannya..u get beat up by some a**holes, then people said u lied about it. who wouldn't be pissed?? but when the police reported that there was no evidence that she was attacked...i was really stunned. did she honestly believe she could get away with this? i was then instantly transformed into a sharifah aini basher. Siti pun siti lahhh...
then i started to learn about the 'dark sides' of sharifah aini. there were numerous stories, of which i will not mention here for fear that i would go on trial pulak nanti. hehhe...
i know that u shouldn't believe everything that u hear, but from reading today's The Star report, her mother once testified that Sharifah Aini wanted to stab her with a knife. what the f***?? stabbing your own mother? isn't that something from Psycho? oh yeah...she is psycho.
and when i recalled an interview she gave on Melodi (yeah...i watch the show, so sue me) during the height of the email scandal, she said something which goes like this, "Sia-sialah saya hantar anak saya belajar di Mesir, sia-sialah saya hantar meraka belajar Al-Quran kalau saya buat perkara macam ni." what the hell was the point of that statement? who gives a fuck anak ko belajar kat mana. if u're really sincere, u wouldn't say a word about those things. u send them to study Islam because u want to and to make them better people. not so that u can say on national TV that because u send them there, u're exempted from all the laws in the universe.
and the guy who was responsible for spreading those emails...well, the rumours turned out to be true. he was Sharifah Aini's 'adik angkat'. but the interesting fact that i didn't know was that he was also the president of her fan club. hmmmm...a wee bit fishy don't u think? i didn't even know such an organization existed.
so as the trial gets way, whether she's guilty or not will be decided by the courts. one thing is for sure, though. it'll be one hell of a media circus. and we're all invited to come along for the ride. stay tuned.