Nothing serious...

There have been some noise made about the upcoming Bersih 2.0 demonstration on July 9, and the responses (actually threats) by Perkasa and UMNO Youth, where these people are fighting for...

Actually, what is this demonstration for anyway? I know it's for something important...something to do with elections...

Anyway, what's the issue, again? Right to protest? What's so difficult? It's in Article 10 of the Constitution. Let the people protest-lah. I mean, Bersih 2.0 is basically doing the same thing everyone else (including UMNO supporters) is doing online: whine and bitch about the government, but this time, they're walking. And looking at some of Ambiga's photos, she needs the walk.

Hey, if Bersih 2.0 wants to demonstrate, that's their right. And if Perkasa and UMNO Youth want to demonstrate against the right to demonstrate (hey, don't ask me. Ask the people hailing "Don't Talk Shit" guy as their Dear Leader), it's also their right. I think.

But this whole street demonstration...I just had to ask a question: must it be 'on the street', per se? I mean, really? I know it's your right to demo and 'tunjuk power' on the street, Bersih and Perkasa, but you're not the only one using the roads. And you're not the only ones who paid taxes to build the elaborate road systems of KL. Other people paid taxes too. Especially those who have to work on that day. Or those who plan to the movies with their spouses and partners. in other words, people who have souls.

Yeah, yeah, some people might say it's going to be an important day, and people will remember it in the future when freedom rings and democracy reigns, and people should be considerate and sacrifice this one day for Utopia to happen...only, your right to protest this one day (which must provide you people with joy) doesn't provide you the right to ask other people to sacrifice their comfort. Riddle me this, Batman. If people can't use the roads the way they want, which is properly and without hassle, because you're exercising the right to use it the way you want, doesn't that constitute a conflict of rights? I don't speak lawyer. Maybe someone can explain this to me.

Maybe I'll get Lawyered, and they can provide justification for above question. Fine, then. If protesters like the street, they can go with it. Can't do much against masses of angry mobs (I mean, righteous fury of the rakyat). But they could seriously consider an option of protesting somewhere else. It's not that ridiculous an idea. Rather than summon the great spirit of Hyde Park when supporting their right to protest, it would be nicer if someone actually proposed a protest-model based on how it is done in Hyde Park, London.

They could, for one, pick a spot away from the main roads (where traffic is not hindered and small retailers can continue their daily business), like Lake Gardens in KL, for example. The protesters can march around the lake, clear their voices, get some exercise (while exercising their rights), then after demo, go to the nearest mamak store or coffee shop and minum-minum, talk a bit, bitch a bit, find romance in the process, sing and dance like HSM, then go back home.

And make a timetable. 10-11 AM: Bersih 2.0, 11 AM-12 PM: Perkasa, 12-1 PM: UMNO Youth, (and other groups who want to join).

See? Quite simple and straightforward, isn't it? What's so difficult about the whole thing? Bersih gets to demo, Perkasa gets to demo. Lawyers can pretend to do something meaningful. PAS and UMNO can pretend to do something useful. Anwar can pretend to be PM on Sept 16 again, Najib can say to the world that he's a democratic leader that allows dissenting protest...

Everybody's happy. The end.

p/s I still take swipes at Lawyers, but after 4 years, I'm admittedly warming up to this species. From No. 3 on my personal No-Like list, they dropped to number 11. Clap clap clap clap.

Heart and Soul

After watching series of random Simpsons episodes today, I stumbled on an old classic. A beautiful song that is quite popular, but I never actually got to know its title until now.

It's "Heart and Soul", a popular song of the 1930s, composed by Hoagy Carmichael and Frank Loesser. It was (and still is) a popular piano duet other than Chopsticks. This song has been covered by many singers and bands, but my personal favourite would be an amateur video of someone playing this song on a ukulele.

Lyrics to this song:

Heart and soul, I fell in love with you,
Heart and soul, the way a fool would do,
Madly...
Because you held me tight,
And stole a kiss in the night...

Heart and soul, I begged to be adored,
Lost control, and tumbled overboard,
Gladly...
That magic night we kissed,
There in the moon mist.

Oh! but your lips were thrilling, much too thrilling,
Never before were mine so strangely willing.

But now I see, what one embrace can do,
Look at me, it's got me loving you,
Madly...
That little kiss you stole,
Held all my heart and soul.

p/s-The Simpsons episode I referred earlier was "Gone Maggie Gone" (S20E13).

Some reading material

Saw this cover of the Time Magazine today. I thought it was quite interesting and bought it. Buy it. RM10 je.

Source: The End of Bin Laden, TIME Magazine Special Edition,

dated 20 May 2011.

http://www.time.com/time/covers/0,16641,20110520,00.html (Accessed 8 May 2011)

I flipped through the book, and at page 52-53, there was a map of the major activities of al-Qaeda and its affiliates in the World. I mean, this group is widespread. Other than their despotic rule in Afghanistan in the 90s, they have launched attacks on Tanzania and Kenya (1998), Yemen (1992; 2000), the USA (1993; 2001), Indonesia (2002, via Jemaah Islamiyah), Madrid (2004), London (2005), multiple attacks in Iraq and Pakistan and the Middle Eastern nations, support of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front and Abu Sayyaf Group in the Philippines.

I noticed something from this pattern of theirs. You see, in this video of Osama's reaction to the 9/11 attack, he stresses on how the attacks were a response to the suffering of the Muslim children in Palestine, Somalia, southern Sudan, Kashmir, Iraq, Assam...

And yet, most of his activities are not focused on these areas (except for Iraq post-Saddam and Somalia). I mean, Assam? Not even close.

In fact, the main crux of his struggle, the liberation of Palestine, wasn't even the focus of his attacks. What the hell, Osama? Your terrorist (ops sorry, 'freedom fighters') organisation has existed since 1988, and launched attacks in 20+ countries in 5 continents (including South America). Yet you can't hit Israel (excepting that half-hearted missile launch from Lebanon in December of '05), the area you considered the testament of Zionist-Crusader colonisation of the Muslim world, leaving Palestinian children to die as they throw pebbles at Israeli tanks, under the incompetent and disunited leadership of Fatah and Hamas, while you go bomb hotels and mosques...

Apa? USA tak ajar mujahidin basic marksmanship ke waktu lawan Soviet dulu? Mainly because of this, he will now be remembered mainly as a quite successful Stormtrooper.

Tapi tak apa. At least Osama won't be universally remembered as a despised terrorist. See? Nik Aziz thinks he's a "Lambang Keberanian." Ok lah tu PAS mengaku Osama sebagai hero.

Sigh

8th May: English and Japanese written test (Monbukagakusho)

9th May: Portuguese language paper (3pm)

11th May: Literature and Pop Culture paper (8.30am)

11th-14th May: Unplanned days

15th May: Check out of 9th College and go back to JB until Convocation

This is how I am going to spend my last week as an undergraduate in UM.

Sigh again.

Roy Zimmerman, satirist

Just found about this guy today by accident. Roy Zimmerman is a funny liberal satirist musician. Like Stephen Colbert, but with a guitar.

This is one funny song about Ann Coulter.

The Tilde (very short and random note)

Source from Wikipedia, that wonderful almost omniscient program after Google.

The Tilde, usually written as ~ has a noble history related to language and linguistics.

In European languages such as Portuguese or Spanish, ~ is used to mark nasalisation, such as informação (information) or razão (reason).

In Arabic, ~ is a maddah, used as a mark to lengthen the reading of "a", such as the Qur'aan (القرآن).

See? Very noble character. And it has uses in dictionaries, European languages, some Asian languages (such as Vietnamese), computer programming, mathematics...

.

.

.

.

So how did ~ turn from mentioned above into:

"Ayang~

caye lapaw~~

nak ais-tweem~~~"

How did a noble character used as markings in religious texts and powerful words gets reduced to being a part of vomit-inducing "gedik" SMS messages? -_-"

Responses to Japan's Tsunami: a rant

I haven't written a note in a long time. So the flow might be a little rusty. Well, here we go.

Japan got hit by a tsunami. It was bad. Really, really bad. The Sendai earthquake and tsunami is one of the worst natural disasters to hit Japan since the Great Kanto Earthquake of 1923. With over +2,000 dead and +3,500 missing, and the Fukushima nuclear reactor explosions bringing to mind the Chernobyl tragedy, the Japanese have a lot on their hands. I have friends and acquaintances in Japan, and though they are safe, I am still worried about them. My prayers (since I can't do anything practically useful) for the Japanese. They rose from Kanto, they rose from Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and they can rise again.

But there are some things that got me really pissed off, specifically Malaysian responses to the tsunami. Some of the responses really deserve more than a facepalm, okay? I got two things I'm angry about.

1) Berita Harian's cartoon and Fizz Fairuz's twitter post

-Yeah, we get it. Ultraman and Doraemon aren't real. Here's a little secret: the Japanese know about that too. Really? +2,000 dead warrants a comedic response? That cartoon characters are going to fly in and save them? What kind of ridiculous, sick mind would think to make fun of this? No one makes fun of the dead in the Holocaust, or the Rape of Nanking, or the Aceh tsunami, or the Palestinian dead. But it's okay to do it to the Japanese? Why? Because they happen to draw better cartoons than us?

(Note: I didn't know we Malaysians love black humour. I thought we only like sexual innuendoes in Raja Lawak or something that came out of Razak Mohaideen's untalented rear-end).

So the new standard is we can make fun of dead people, right? Nothing is sensitive, nothing is sacred, life and everything in it is a joke...so this means we should rescind the fatwa on Salman Rushdie for writing the Satanic Verses? Should we then forgive and accept the Danish cartoons then? I mean, if it's okay to make fun of those who died last week, then it's okay to make fun of the Holy Prophet who died 1400 years ago lah? Malaysians don't accept the latter. So why is okay for the former?

Even South Park gets criticised by fans for mocking Steve Irwin's death. And it's South Park. If basic propriety means you don't make fun of the dead, then you don't make fun of the dead lah!

But it is the second one is really too much:

2) Divine sadism

-This is not the first time that God's name is brought up whenever a disaster happens. And people with faith get mocked for it by atheists. And rightfully so. You know why?

The Holy Quran mentions the divine word "Bismillah ar-Rahman ar-Raheem" (In the Name of God, Most Gracious and Most merciful) 114 times. Not only in Islam. Other religions generally believe that the main characteristic of God is omnipotence, omnipresence, omniscience, benevolence, and MERCY. The Bible emphasises on God's unending Love: "Dear friends, let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love." (1 John, 4: 7-8)

So why is it that when a disaster happens, the mercy and love part is thrown out of the window, and the tsunami becomes God's divine wrath and judgment on the Japanese people for their sins on the world? What sins? We don't know. We just assume they are sinful. That's why they got punished. We'll make something up along the way, just so we feel better about it. We did it with the Acehnese. 'God punishes the Acehnese with the tsunami for being sinful (Muslim version), God punishes the Muslims in Aceh for not allowing the Christians to celebrate Christmas (Christian version).'

Why do we love to portray God as an angry, bloodthirsty, indiscriminate killer? (Atheists need not answer). Apparently, people like to portray God as just dishing out punishments just for the heck of it. And he kills children and the innocent too. As if He doesn't have the ability to distinguish between the innocent and the guilty. And we, in our limited understanding, dare to mock God by attributing such monstrosities to Him.

And we are arrogant about it too. Not for the first time this week, I heard someone say that the tsunami in Japan is God's way of punishing them for their crimes against the Muslims of Southeast Asia during WWII. I am quite disturbed by this. First, it took God almost 70 years to punish the Japanese for what they did to the Muslims? Really? The same God who in Surah al-Ra'd was referred to, "and He is Swift in reckoning"? (Surah 13: 41) And why only emphasise on the Muslims? The Japanese Army (yes, army. Not present Japan, a pacifist country, mind you) did more harm to the Chinese, in the Second Sino-Japanese War (20 million dead), the Rape of Nanking (300,000 dead, 20,000-80,000 women raped), and the Sook Ching Massacre (50,000 killed) in Singapore. Nobody talks about the tsunami as God's punishment for these atrocities. Why? Don't they deserve divine justice too?

And to punish the present Japanese people for what the army did 70-80 years ago. To punish a group of people for what another group of people did. Let's re-phrase that. To punish B, for what A did, and most people in the A generation, we assume, are already dead. So they won't be there to be punished. I think it's quite clear.

And to say that the tsunami is God's judgment upon the Japanese for their war crimes. As if, the Allies bombing on major towns is not enough of a punishment. As if, the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, where 200,000 people died and the hibakusha carried the effects of radiation throughout their lives is not enough of a punishment. As if, the 1995 Kobe earthquake, where 6000 died, is not enough of a punishment. No, no ,no. Apparently, according to the worshippers of divine wrath, the tsunami only shows that God is not done punishing the Japanese for their 'crimes'. And He keeps on punishing....

I do not like this view of God, and frankly, I am disgusted by people who came up with this view of God. Just because you people are sadistic, vengeful monsters, does not give you the right to paint Holy God in your image.

End rant.