I LOVE YOU SCHOLESY. YOU GINGER LEGEND. HAVE A BIT OF THAT BARCELONA.
Johanna and I flew to Canberra over the weekend to celebrate her brother - Moses' birthday. It was actually the idea of his girlfriend - Charis.
We arrived early in the morning by the new budget airline - Tiger Airways. It is really a budget airline compared to Virgin Blue - warehouse-like terminal, without proper walkway to the plane, very little leg room even though it's a brand new Airbus A320.
We were picked up by Moses, Charis and their "Chisel-Stone" friend Jonathan who is kind enough to allow us to use his car throughout the weekend.
The first place we visited was the War Memorial, which is also a museum. Johanna and I had visited it 2 years ago during our one-week holiday in Australia. But we didn't manage to visit the memorial itself as we ran out of time.
I am finding it so difficult to concentrate on my preparation for actuarial exams at home. The temptations to switch on my laptop and read news from my Netvibes, play Scrabulous with strangers from Facebook prove to be too much to handle. Or rather, it's the urge to avoid studying at all cost.
So, I had to come up with a desperate measure - study in my office over the weekend. And it worked. I studied for 5 hours continuously, a feat yet to be done thus far for this year's April exams preparation. Going there again tomorrow and hope to do 7 hours tomorrow.
Took the opportunity to snap a photo of my workstation with my handphone.
Can anyone who is using Bloomberg tell me why the historical AUD/USD exchange rates on 26 March and 20 March are different? The only difference between the two screenshots below are the date of the screen generation - one on 26 March and the other on 27 March. Both are from the same source (NY). The impact of using these rates can be quite serious for a multi billion dollar fund. I've never used Bloomberg before and these screenshots are provided to me from colleagues from AIG (AIA) Malaysia and Hong Kong respectively.
I've been hooked to both Scrabulous and Scrabble on Facebook lately. Scrabble is still in beta.
If you love the word game too, let's have a game.
It's time of the year where I'm going through the agony of studying for actuarial exams. This is the time where I play a lot of scrabble, surf the net a lot, watch more TV than usual, read news and refresh my Gmail every few minutes. Do you have this habit too?
It was my first football match for a long long time, maybe 4 months?
Even though the screen was only a few inches wide - I watched it over the Internet, United's form on the day was more than enough to bring me a lot of joy. Whether Mascherano's red card was justified were irrelevant. United controlled the game well and fully deserved the victory. I think Rafa's days at Anfield are numbered.
Meanwhile, in London, Arsenal's young boys seem to have crumbled under the pressure. A few draws in a row is good enough for United to overtook the leaderboard. The loss to Chelsea is akin to a nail in the coffin for the Gunners.
Yoohoo!
Malaysian politics have reached a new height. This time around we see UMNO taking on the King.
To be fair, the Sultan of Terengganu (our King at the moment) should not have appointed the Menteri Besar of his choice without consulting the winning party, according to the constitution. However, the Sultan has the prerogative to reject any candidate which is deemed unsuitable. The Sultan should have rejected Idris Jusoh and asked for an alternative candidate to be submitted instead. The Sultan must have strong valid reasons to reject Idris. UMNO, on the other hand, must have millions billions of reasons to stick with Idris. I'm sure it has something to do with "where has all the oil revenue gone?" since Terengganu is blessed with oil fields.
Ever since the huge defeats suffered by Barisan Nasional in the General Election, a lot of drama have unfolded, e.g. in Perlis. The monarchs have chosen to be more vocal about the affairs of their states and people. UMNO, on the other hand has been very bold to challenge the monarchs head on. It's too early to tell what will be the outcome. Within UMNO, there must be a lot of plots behind the scene by various opposing parties despite most leaders still trying to show their 'support' to their 'naked emperor'. Crisis is always an opportunity. The next few days/weeks are going to be very interesting.
When DAP did it, Utusan was quick to front page 'DAP Biadap'. Now, what about UMNO? Can't stand this sort of double standard by Utusan Malaysia!
A letter to Lim Kit Siang from Md Asmawi Md Nor says it all. Please read the context here and here. Also, interesting hypothesis on the whole issue.
Letters
by Md Asmawi Md Nor
Saya bersetuju bahawa Saudara telah tersilap dalam isu majlis angkat sumpah MB Perak tetapi saya juga sangat hormat apabila Saudara dengan cepat menyedari kesilapan tersebut dan dengan segera memperbetulkannya dan melakukan tindakan yang tepat dengan memohon maaf kepada pihak istana secara peribadi. Tahniah atas tindakan anda tersebut.
Nah, sekarang Terengganu pula menghadapi isu yang sama dimana 23 Adun dengan segera mengumumkan untuk memboikot majlis angkat sumpah MB Terengganu yang dijangka akan diadakan esok sebaik sahaja ayam tambatan mereka Idris Jusoh tidak terpilih sebagai MB. Seperti biasa, media UMNO Utusan Malaysia akan bersikap ‘double-standard’ dalam menanggani isu ini. Maksud saya secara spesifik ialah bila mana Saudara mengeluarkan statement dalam isu MB Perak dulu, Utusan Malaysia dengan segera dan ‘bold’ terus dengan muka depan “DAP Biadap’, dan dikuti dengan pelbagai rentetan propaganda dan provokasi lagi. Saya sebagai rakyat Terengganu mahukan perkara yang sama kali ini dilakukan oleh Utusan Malaysia dalam menanggani isu 23 Adun yang biadap ini termasuk Idris Jusoh. Tajuk yang perlu keluar dimuka depan mereka sekurang-kurangnya ‘23 Adun Biadap’. Mereka semua juga perlu memohon maaf seperti mana yang Saudara lakukan dahulu.
Saya amat berharap Saudara dapat memantau isu ini dengan diberi perhatian istimewa agar UMNO khasnya sedar jangan hanya pandai melihat orang lain biadap tetapi mereka sendiri boleh bersikap biadap dan bertindak sesuka hati mereka. Macamlah negara ini tiada undang-undang.
Sekian,
