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VMY2007: Happy 50th Birthday Malaysia!

Posted by narrowband - 31/08/07 at 12:08:38 pm

Malaysia celebrates its 50th independence anniversary today, and Team Japan’s fireworks performance doubled up as a ‘Merdeka fireworks display’ last night as the organizers postponed it from 10pm to 12am. It would have been perfect if there was a countdown to go along with it.

I arrived around 9pm with HC at the Cyberjaya Lake View park (I’m not sure exactly what’s that place called, but it sure has a nice lake view), which was already packed with a good crowd. I was there hoping to get good reflections of light – I told a friend I wanted to try and capture the fireworks plus reflections from the lake.
Continue reading VMY2007: Happy 50th Birthday Malaysia!…

Are We Really a Friendly and Kind Lot?

Posted by narrowband - 21/08/07 at 08:08:55 pm

You know that the traffic conditions in Putrajaya after the fireworks show on Saturday was horrendous right? So there I was, stuck for more than 40 minutes trying to get out of Putrajaya alone. As I had two cameras with me, I wound down my window and started to take pictures of the scenic surroundings. No one else was with me in the car (nobody was enthusiastic enough to tag along, unfortunately!).

Suddenly, a pair of foreign couple who were walking along the sidewalk (carrying small backpacks) yelled “Excuse me!”, and started to walk towards my car. The traffic was really bad and all the cars came to a halt. The man then asked me if I was going to Kuala Lumpur. Well, I was indeed following the road signs that say ‘Kuala Lumpur’, in order to get out of that confusing administrative capital. So I blurted “Yeah?” without much thought, even though I wasn’t actually going to KL.

He then asked if he and his girlfriend could hitch a ride from me, as they couldn’t get a cab. He added that he would pay me RM50 per kilometer or something, just as long as I could take them to some place where they could catch a cab. At that moment, I tried to put myself in their shoes and indeed, I understood perfectly that it was difficult to get a cab at that time, in that traffic conditions. Heck, I don’t think there was even any cab at all!

So, I was ready to offer them a ride, but hadn’t invited them in. I was silent for a while, and tried to think where I could drop them. At that juncture, a torrent of other nasty thoughts also came to my mind. How could I be sure if they were telling the truth? Mind you, they did not look suspicious at all. In fact, they even looked friendly. I really wanted to help. It was definitely not about the money – I don’t think I’d even take a sen if I had really agreed to give them a ride. It was about security.

I think if I had at least another friend in the car at that time, I would have agreed. But no, I was all alone and if anything happened, I’d be in deep shit. I had too much to risk. In the end, I apologetically uttered “I’m sorry…”, and I suggested that they tried some other cars behind. I felt so bad, I honestly did. They left without saying a word, and I drove forward as the car in front had already moved.

I wound up my window, and proceeded to SMS a couple of friends what had happened. Most of them said they’d do the same thing, almost without a doubt. But if only they could see the disappointment in the couple’s eyes… I even worried about giving them a bad impression about this country! A friend, Toong, joked that I had ‘let our great nation down’ (exact words), but went on to say he’d probably have done the same.

I wish I could tell everyone that we Malaysians are really a kind and friendly lot… but now I don’t think I’m even qualified to say that. If you were me, in such a short span of 1 minute, would you have decided to give them a ride? Actually, I’m starting to regret that I refused to help…

Edit@1034hrs: Zewt asked about their nationality. If you’re wondering too, I’m sorry to say that I don’t know. They looked Hispanic, though.

VMY2007: Malaysia International Fireworks Competition

Posted by narrowband - 19/08/07 at 02:08:34 am

I was in Putrajaya for Day 1 of the Malaysia International Fireworks Competition. Our home team, Team Malaysia had the privilege to kick-start this 9-day event. I arrived at about 9:40pm, just in time to find a good spot and set up my camera. Here are some photos that I managed to take:

Note: You may click on the images to view them in full-size

That was taken in the beginning of the show, when the sky was still clear of smoke. I love the clean background, and the mixture of colours!
Continue reading VMY2007: Malaysia International Fireworks Competition…

Faculty of Engineering: Class of 2007

Posted by narrowband - 12/08/07 at 11:08:47 am

It was a wet, wet convocation day at MMU Cyberjaya today. Shortly after exiting the Grand Hall, it rained cats and dogs! Having been confined to our seats for more than 3 hours straight, we couldn’t wait to put our cameras to good use.

Those are among my closest friends when I was in university. If they look familiar to you, that’s probably because you’ve seen them in this video I made a coupla months ago.
Continue reading Faculty of Engineering: Class of 2007…

Friday Yak

Posted by narrowband - 03/08/07 at 10:08:10 pm

Crap. I decided not to publish the entry I was drafting, again! It happens, haha :). That leaves me with almost nothing to write now. Been out for the past 4 weeknights. Company annual dinner was an eye-opener. I’m looking forward to tomorrow’s PC Fair, where I hope to get my new harddisk. Although I’m happy with the laptop I’m currently using (newer, higher-spec and faster), nothing beats using something which you can claim is yours. Haha.

Came across this from Rinnah’s. Only 78% addicted lah me! That’s a good sign leh, not so serious yet. In fact, I haven’t been updating my site as frequently as I used to, no thanks to not being able to blog in office. Not that there was any restriction; it’s just me. But I do read my feeds ;). Google Reader has been wonderful. Nevermind the slow updates, I simply love the Gmail-like interface. Oh, I just found out that my colleague keeps a blog. I don’t know if anyone was supposed to know, but I accidentally caught a glimpse of his screen, lol! I was trying so hard not to blurt that I’m a blogger myself. I succeeded. Heh!

And then I’ve been going online using my phone lately. That explains – to some of you – why I couldn’t open the URLs you sent me. I tried opening both applications (web browser and MSN) simultaneously but after a while, the MSN automatically exits. I guess my phone hates to multi-task.

By the way, using MSN on phone is made possible by Fring. Have a great weekend, peeps. If you bump into me at the PC Fair tomorrow, dun shy shy yah?

P/s: Convocation next weekend!! *Excited*

Edit@Sunday, Aug 15 Aug 5 (Oops, thank you HC!): Finally bought a new internal drive for my laptop! Got it for a little over RM200 (120GB capacity). Spent the whole night formatting, re-installing OS, security apps and drivers. And because the PC’s relatively empty, it’s blistering fast now! *Whee*

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