Avocado

My wife and I bought some avocados from the supermarket at the lower ground floor of The Gardens when we were at the Midvalley in Kuala Lumpur last month. Turned out that the fruits weren't good. It took the avocados ages to soften and when they did, we found quite a lot of fibrous tissue inside them. Moreover, the seeds were humongously huge. Quite a disappointment for us, considering that we paid about RM5 per fruit.

But we love avocados. And just a few days ago, we couldn't resist buying another batch from the AEON supermarket at the Seberang City Prai Shopping Mall in Bukit Mertajam. They went for a song: three avocados for only RM9.90 and what's more, they had been brought in from Australia.

This evening, I sliced open one of the fruits. They were already in various stages of ripening but there was one which was decidedly soft. Bearing in mind the disappointment of the avocados from Kuala Lumpur, I was delighted to find a soft, creamy interior. Now, that's more like it! Oh yummy, excuse me while I go scoop out the flesh now....

Anecdotes from the Japanese Occupation years

I was born about a decade after the end of the dark period in Penang's history known as the Japanese Occupation.

When they were still alive, my grandparents and parents never talked much to me about the Occupation years but I could gather from their brief comments that those were brutal years indeed. Family fortunes were lost in the process when people headed to the hills to escape the bombardments from Japanese aircraft.  I suspect so too were my ancestors' fortunes because by the Second World War's end, my grandparents ended up renting a double-storey house in Seang Tek Road. Still, I reckon that they were luckier than most other people.

On my maternal grandmother's side, her siblings originally numbered seven in all, including herself. Every time when they visited us or we visited them, I had to call them (apart from my grandmother, of course) as my Ku Kongs and Ee Poh. However, there was always one of them missing: my second Ku Kong. His name never came up for mention and nobody ever wanted to say how he died except that he died young. Even today, I wonder whether he was a victim of ill health or the Second World War.

As I write this, it struck me that there were many people who preferred not to bring up memories of the war years again; as if the lesser said, the lesser the pain. But it is important to document all these verbal memories for the sake of the present generation and the future.

Therefore, it was with some joy that I came across a thread on facebook recently where someone had posted up a picture of a group of Japanese soldiers relaxing by a ditch and...smiling into the camera! It was as if these soldiers actually knew who it was that was holding the camera and approving of their picture being taken.

The comments below were taken from the thread. Not everything is reproduced here except the very pertinent ones. I have to thank deeply the people mentioned in the parentheses for sharing their anecdotes with me without their knowledge.


(Azman Shaari) I lost an uncle in WW2 who was captured by the Japs and forced to build the "Bridge over the River Kwai" railway. That's where he died. My grandma (father's mom) also died during the Japanese occupation. At that time grandpa was a clerk with KTM in Gemas, Negeri Sembilan. According to dad, tapioca was the staple during those difficult times. It happened while grandma was digging for ubi kayu that she accidentally struck her foot with the changkul. With no hospital or medical facilities available, grandma succumbed to tetanus (lock jaw) and passed away.

(Goh Kek Seng) Azman Shaari, I lost an uncle too in similar circumstances - my mum's brother was conscripted to build the railway link from Thailand to S. Myanmar.. Apparently he escaped from his prison camp, wandered back towards Malaya but died somewhere along the way back. Someone related the news to my mum after the war.

(Goh Kek Seng) My parent grew up with foster family during the war because my grandparents died early. But the foster family had Thai blood in them, were Buddhists and had the house adorned with pix of King Bhumipol. The Japanese respected that King because Thailand was considered a friend then. So when the Japs came into our family home they did our folks no harm and instead bowed to the pix of the Thai King.

(Willis Teoh) My maternal grandfather was killed by Japs but we moved on. My father saw what happened and told me first-hand what actually happened. In war you are either a man or a sell out.

(Potent Flower) My aunties and dad had to run into the jungle to hide. Some hid in chicken coops. Some were quickly got married off by my grandpa (he had 10 girls and two boys). Grandpa gave away his watches so that they didn't throw my dad into the air and stab him with the knife at the edge of their guns. I always see and feel the fear in him whenever he tells us about the war.

(Avan Khoo) My dad had a first-hand encounter with Japanese. He was still a little kid when the Japanese invaded. He saw them marching into the village but didn't know what happened, so he watched. A Japanese soldier saw him, picked him up and gave him a few kisses on his two cheeks, and then put him down. Probably that's why he didn't hate Japanese so much...

(Muttaqin Othman) My late grandma told us many stories about the Japanese occupation and a police constable called Latif. He was a Japanese collaborator and yes, a sellout. He lived easy during those days, and not through his pay or other stipends. He preyed on the villagers who was afraid he'd tell on them to the Kempeitai. He never did pay anything when he went to the market. Let's say he met a fitting end when the war ended during the transition period.

(Azman Shaari) My dad was still a young boy during the Jap Occupation. He told me that he befriended the Jap soldiers so that they wouldn't harass his father and sisters. They taught him basic Jap words, phrases and also some Japanese songs. Whenever he sang to them they would reward him with army ration chocolate bars that he'd take home to share with the family. In those tough times you had to learn to adapt for survival.

(Ba Asp) I recalled my late granny telling me tales of those gatai Japanese soldiers who'd go from house to house to look for young girls.When her house was searched, she and her sisters ashen their face with ash and pretended to be maids.

(Avan Khoo) Ba Asp, yeah, I heard that too. And saw it in many reports. They just satisfied their lust, and then blamed it that these were filthy animals worthy of humiliation. I can imagine it happening during wars when laws and rules are sitting on a thread. But to hear it in our current society that some officers misuse their power to threaten foreigners who came illegally to "pay by body" if they don't want to be arrested is really heart wrenching.

(Ba Asp) The Japanese Occupation caused so much fear among the Chinese. That fear caused my great grandpa's diabetes to worsen and he died a few months later. Coming from Toisan, China, he of course had a collection of old Chinese literature. He burned all that for fear that the Japanese would behead anyone owning Chinese literature. So sad.

(Saifol Shamlan) My late father was 20 when they invaded. His mother's big house on Chamberlain Road/Jalan Kampa had many girls due to the many relatives and foster children who lived there. He learned the language and was the one to face the "inquiring" soldiers that came to the house sniffing around for young women. My aunties told me that they'd hide and he would talk the soldiers out of a search.

(Lizzie Slothouber) I'll add my little bit here so all the info is in one place for reference. Re the WW2 bit ... my Mum was about seven or eight when WW2 broke out. Her Mother cut off her long hair and dressed her up as a boy. Later when her body started to develop, her chest was bound very tightly so that nothing showed. Fortunately her second brother's wife intervened and taught her to remove the bounds and Mum was always proud of her C cups (where the other two in the family were flat as pancakes). Mum told us that the raw rice that you HAD to buy from the Japanese - the price of it changed from day to day - had to be very carefully sorted through as the Japanese would add white cement powder and other stuff to make the rice heavier and you pay more. Had to use a DULANG to toss it into the wind. The powder flew away and rice came down. Then washed the rice between your hands with running water - sometimes six times - until the water ran clear.

(Lizzie Slothouber) They grew UBI KAYU and peanuts outside their family home in Pudu. Harvested the leaves of ubi kayu to fry to eat. And she loved eating steamed ubi kayu dipped in sugar but in her adult life - she NEVER touched/ate ubi kayu ever - because it reminded her of the hard war times. Her father died when she was four, died of burst appendicitis, and her mum died when she was 12 due to ill health and diabetes and lack of medical access during the Japanese occupation too.

(Lizzie Slothouber) Reposting the reply from Dato' Hj Mohd Nuri SaLatiff: Yes, the Japanese soldiers could never see girls; they just grabbed the girls for their own use. That's why at the house near Simpang Pulai, my mother's cousin sister, being desperate, jumped from upstairs to the ground to flee from the Japanese soldiers. She was lucky she didn't break a single bone - that was a miracle! We had our rice mixed with tapioca, sweet potatoes or unripe bananas to make up the volume/quantity.

(Saifol Shamlan) I was told by my mother that some of the "Japanese" soldiers were actually Manchurians and those were the ones you really should avoid.

(Muttaqin Othman) Many Manchurians were the ones tasked with occupying Malaysia and other nations conquered by the Japanese while the Japanese troops would fight on the front lines. An old Malay Regiment member (still alive) told me the "Japanese" soldiers his village had were actually Manchurians, not Japanese. Germany did the same during WW2. They used Hungarians, Romanians, etc, to occupy countries they had subjugated while their own soldiers went to the front lines. For them it was also a question of competence and loyalty!

(Raja Shah Idris) It was mostly the Officers who were the Japanese...

(Winter Soon Chak) A true story told by my late father. During the Japanese occupation, life was tough so most people had to find ways and means to earn a living. One day, my late uncle was taking fruits to the local pasar in his bicycle and he was carrying a load of mangosteen. Along the way, he was stopped by a Japanese soldier and he demanded to know what it was. Upon being told by my uncle that it was a fruit, the soldier snatched one, quickly placed it in his mouth and was just about to take a bite when my uncle immediately told him to stop, with good intentions of course. Taking this for a refusal to give him the ‘free’ fruit, he slapped my uncle and subsequently took a big bite of the mangosteen, skin and all!! As we all know, to eat this fruit, you’ll have to remove the hard, bitter outer ‘skin’. The end result… my uncle received two more slaps as gratuity from this soldier. At least it was not a bullet!

(Lean Siang Yew) Someone from my mother side of the family was killed by machine gun after the first few days of Japanese invasion of Penang because he went to check the condition of the shop. Family members tried to stop me but he would not listen. They went to the hills to hide from the Japs. My father's side of the family had to live on wild vegetables and shellfish (siput) collected from the seaside. I regularly heard the stories from my late father, late aunts and late grandma. All of them were very strict on food wastage because they went hungry during Japanese occupation - I could not understand them when I was a kid but now I understand why. My father actually smuggled rice from Thailand before during WW2 - he could get his head chopped off if he was caught. I still have a Japanese certificate issued to my dad - he worked in the railway station as a fireman (not fire brigade but the one that looked after the train's steam engine).

(Lean Siang Yew) My family members and former teachers used to tell us stories of how Japanese tortured the people by pulling their finger nails, fed them with water from a water hose followed by placing a plank on their stomach...then the Japs jumped on top of the stomach leading to water coming out from the nose, mouth, ears, eyes...etc. Very brutal!

(Leon Tan) My uncle was 12 in Kota Bharu when the Japanese landed in December 1941. He distinctly remembered that a large number of the invading force were actually Taiwanese conscripts, and could communicate with the locals in Hokkien and Mandarin.

Chan Mun Fye

I just learnt of the demise of Chan Mun Fye yesterday. He would be about 67 years old. Mun Fye was a chessplayer who represented Malaysia twice at the Chess Olympiads in 1972 and 1974. (In this picture, that's him on the far left.)

At the Skopje Olympiad in 1972, Mun Fye was formidable enough to play on the second board behind Dr Foo Lum Choon and that was an indication of his relative stature among chess players in the country. He played 20 games (+6=7-7) and scored 9½ points.

Two years later at the Nice Olympiad, he displaced Dr Foo on the top board. Despite his magnificent efforts, he scored only 5½ points from 19 games (+3=5-11).

The year 1974 was about the same time too that I first got to know him from the Selangor Open events although our paths on the chessboard did not meet until decades later.

Yesterday, I read a moving tribute to Mun Fye in facebook. I would like to reproduce here the tribute by Doris Wong. It shed some light on a very private person.

He looked much older than his age. Hair all white, placid mien and toothless. He was never intrusive, shy and barely audible when he spoke. Walked in shuffling steps. For many years, he worked at a petrol kiosk. Gave no troubles and was often overlooked, overworked. Made to the night shifts. But he took it all in stride.

Never judge a book by its cover. He was quite sharp and a tough nut to crack at chess. A very simple fellow whose other passion is calculations of numbers. He was quite lucky in 4D. One time he struck special prize, first prize and was almost a millionaire (all within weeks of each strike)! He missed a single digit and so had to settle for second prize in Mega/52.

The last couple of years, a kind hearted philanthropist took him under his wings. All he had had to do was play chess with him. I heard he gently faded away last night. Rest in peace, Mun Fye. I shall miss you.

Yes, Mun Fye and I did meet eventually over a chess game. And of course, it had to happen two years ago at the Malaysian Chess Festival in Kuala Lumpur. Rest in peace, old chess warrior.

Breakdown: the Tengku and his car

I came across this picture from facebook. The man on the right should be a familiar sight to most of all. I can't imagine this situation happening again in this time and age, can you?

George Town's heritage postboxes

This story was posted originally on this blog on 15 August 2012 which makes it almost exactly one year ago. Since then, I have uncovered one more cylindrical postbox on Penang island. I deem this new find to be significant enough for me to bring my original story up-to-date. So here goes, an update on George Town's heritage postboxes.

--- UPDATE ---
 
After I had posted a story here about the Royal Mail in Great Britain painting some of their postboxes gold in honour of their athletes at the London Olympics, I remembered that about five years ago, I had written in passing here about one old postbox in George Town, Penang.

It struck me that there are actually several cylindrical pillar postboxes on the island, remnants of our long colonial past. Frankly, I find them quite awesome from the heritage point of view. Regardless that George Town is now a UNESCO world heritage city, it is imperative that these postboxes must be preserved as markers of our remarkable history and culture. So where are these old red postboxes, almost all of which still bear the royal cyphers of the old British monarchs?

It was during the time of Queen Victoria that the cylindrical postboxes were first designed and installed in Britain. Penang being part of the Straits Settlements then, it was only natural that these postboxes would also be used here eventually. However, I have been unable to find any documentation from the Internet when the first such postboxes were introduced into Penang or British Malaya. 

This one above, bearing the VR royal cypher of Victoria, in the banking sector of Beach Street, George Town, must be one of the earliest postboxes around. This prominent postbox is quite well known to both residents and visitors alike. At the base of the pillar is the name of the manufacturer, Andrew Handyside & Co Ltd.

Interestingly, the only other similar Victorian postbox is located not in the city but up at Penang Hill. I took the above photograph in July 2007, never thinking that it would come in useful five years later but here it is. I can just barely make out the Handyside name on the base. As the letter slot is sealed, it is quite obvious that this postbox is just for display. Visitors will have to walk quite a distance from the upper hill railway station in order to find it, but it is there by the roadside. I understand that this postbox used to sit near the fire brigade station in Beach Street. In 2005, Pos Malaysia presented it to the Penang Hill Residents' Association.

Back in the city, I found this postbox which bore the EVIIR royal cypher of Edward VII who succeeded Victoria to the British throne in 1901. This is also quite a well-known sight, being located outside the Customs building (originally the Federated Malay States Railway Station building) in China Street Ghaut. This is the same one that I had mentioned in this blog five years ago. It is curious to note that the postbox looks fat and squat not from design but because its base is buried deep in the ground. When roadworks raised the road level, nobody dug up the postbox to reposition it higher. Worse, when the pavement was added later, the authorities must have thought it more convenient to build the pavement around the postbox. Definitely, a short-cut solution. So who was the manufacturer of this postbox? It's impossible to know without digging it up. (When I was still working at Ban Hin Lee Bank, I used to pass by this postbox almost everyday during the 1980s and early 1990s. At that time, there was no pavement yet and the postbox just stood there by the side of the road.)

After Edward VII came George V who had ascended to the British throne in 1910. I could find only two cylindrical postboxes that bore his GR royal cypher. The first one (above) is located along Upper Penang Road, directly across from the E&O Hotel. The Handyside name appears on the base. The second postbox (below) is found along Residency Road, just outside the gate into the Penang General Hospital's compound. As the base is also buried deep in the ground, there is no way of knowing its manufacturer.

Edward VIII was British monarch for only a few months in 1936 before he abdicated and there doesn't seem to be any postbox in George Town that bore his EVIIIR royal cypher. I've been reading that even in Britain, it is quite difficult to find an Edward VIII cylindrical postbox.

I also discovered two cylindrical postboxes along Ayer Itam Road. The first one, shown above, is located outside the Post Office building and the second one, below, can be found directly opposite from the Kampung Bharu market.

I was surprised not to find any royal cypher on the door of either postbox. Could it be that some over-zealous person or persons had filed away all the marks after 1957, or were they ordered without any royal cypher in the first place? In any case, what interested me was that the postboxes were supplied by a different manufacturer, Carron Company.

The last cylindrical postbox that I know of was ordered for Penang possibly during the time of George VI. Here it is above, located along MacAlister Road, and just across the road from the Madras Lane junction. Accordingly, it bore the GVIR royal cypher. This postbox was supplied by yet another manufacturer, McDowall Steven & Co Ltd, as could be seen from their name on the base.

I haven't been able to locate other cylindrical postboxes in Penang, including any that bore the EIIR royal cypher of Elizabeth II. Maybe these are all that can be found on the island but it won't stop me from searching further.

Incidentally, I did locate a unique standalone rectangular postbox at the junction of Dato Kramat Road and Siam Road that bore the GR royal cypher. Initially, I was puzzled over this design because it was unlike any of the heritage postboxes that I've seen in Penang. But having thought it over, I now believe that this was just a plain wall postbox encased in a rectangular concrete structure. When the pavement was raised up later, the base of the postbox became buried in the ground too. Maybe for this one, it was really impossible to reposition. I will always remember shoving my letters through the slot in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

Penang Free School's relocation to Green Lane

I'm attempting to revisit the history of the Penang Free School's relocation from Farquhar Street to Green Lane.

This has been something that has been bothering me for quite a while because there are a number of anomalies that do not add up. The accepted stance, taken from the School Magazine 1966 which was compiled by Mr Leong Yee Foong and edited by the History Sub-Committee, was that:

"Construction of the new building commenced in 1924 with the quarters for the senior staff. Meanwhile, at the request of the Board of Trustees, the member of the Old Frees Association convened a meeting during which it was decided to rename the old buildings of the School in Farquhar Street as Hutchings' School and this was to serve as a feeder school. The new Free School buildings in Green Lane were officially declared open by the Resident Councillor, Penang Mr Ralph Scott on 9th January 1925 during the Headmastership of Mr DR Swaine." 

However, I do doubt the accuracy of the facts here for three reasons:

1. DR Swaine was not the headmaster of the school in January 1925. At about this time, with RH Pinhorn sick, the school was in transition and the acting headmaster's role could already have been taken over by W Hamilton (Headmaster 1925-1926). The school magazines specifically stated that Swaine was Headmaster in 1927-1928. 
2. Ralph Scott was Resident Councillor in Penang only from June 1926 to 1928. In January 1925, the Resident Councillor's position in Penang was vacant. Stewart Codrington was Acting RC until October 1924 and William Peel was appointed RC from July 1925. So there was a period of eight months where Penang did not have an RC, acting or otherwise. 
3. It was also peculiar to me that the buildings in Green Lane would be officially declared open at the end of a week. The date "9 January 1925" was a Friday. I would assume that if any function was held it should be on a Monday which is the start of any school week. A bit more checking showed that "9 January 1928" was indeed a Monday. It was also possibly the first day of the new school year. 

With these three reasons, my educated guess is that the school only moved to the present premises in Green Lane in January 1928 and not in January 1925. This is more than a hunch and definitely will need to be verified, which I shall intend to do so very soon.

As a final comment, we all know that it is quite easy for anyone to misinterpret the numbers "3", "5" and "8" when writing or typing. Could have happened when the History Sub-Committee was trying to edit the compilation of the school's history. A typographical error since accepted as "fact", I would say.

Home-made chicken pie

Would you believe that my family has been craving for home-made chicken pies for a very long while? It has been quite some time since we embarked on this baking expedition.

It wasn't for lack of time that we hadn't done so. The reason was that it was now almost impossible to find ready-made pie pastries in the supermarkets.

Previously all that we had to do was to stock up on the pastries and whenever we felt like it, my wife would cook the filling and I would roll out the pastry.

So for at least three years now we hadn't been baking any chicken pie at all. It reached a stage where I was being pestered continually by my 22-year-old son till the point where my wife and I agreed to make pies today. But frankly, we were yearning for the chicken pies ourselves....

The first challenge, however, was to learn how to make the pastry from scratch. Our chicken pies are all double-crusted, by the way. The usual self-doubt questions nagged at us. What if the pastry flopped? What would we end up with?

I found a pastry recipe on the Internet. Actually, the Internet was full of pastry recipes and I had a rather difficult time deciding which one to use. Eventually, I did end up with one but now, my refrigerator is filled with excess baking material such as flour and shortening.

There's one lesson to be learnt from the experiment today. I discovered that if the recipe asked for a cup of *anything*, I've to make sure that the cup was filled to the brim with it or otherwise, like what happened to me, I ended up with not enough pastry.

Apart from that, everything else went smoothly and we had a real satisfying and filling lunch today. Burp....

  

Old news is better than none, actually!

It has been about three months since the Jawi signboard at the entrance into the Penang Free School was replaced by this new signboard but only now has it been reported by one of the local newspapers. Better late than never, I suppose.

And oh yes, the other newsworthy news about the school is that its name remains officially as the Penang Free School and not by some bastardised version like Sekolah Menengah Penang Free. Horrors!

Extraordinary meeting requested under extraordinary circumstances

Am I missing something or is something quite not right with Malaysian chess?

I may be out of the chess picture for a while now but developments such as this still do catch my attention. This "something" referred to above had been brewing for quite some time now and about three months ago at the Malaysian Chess Federation annual general meeting, it was thought that the elections of a new set of office bearers would see the shortcomings addressed and then a new course of progress for chess charted in this country.

Unfortunately, not. The elections -- by itself already stormy when there was a dead heat in the first round of voting to choose the MCF president and which resulted in a second round of voting that saw the incumbent pulling through -- have proven not a watershed. It was just a reprieve brought by several of the old team members to get themselves re-elected or re-appointed.

Three months into the MCF elections, I have been hearing whispers that the MCF has fallen back into its old unchangeable ways. And the old ways were not good. Always, everything boils down to money. Or should I say more bluntly, the alleged misuse of federation funds.

I mentioned whispers. Yes, two days ago on facebook I was puzzled and curious by a brief one-liner that said that seven state chess associations had requisitioned the MCF for an extraordinary general meeting. Then yesterday morning, I received a scanned image of the EGM request letter itself:

Startling. Never before have I known of any circumstances that warranted public calls for an incumbent MCF president and deputy president to step down or be removed. No less, a vote of no confidence in the duo. No MCF state affiliate had ever requested for such an EGM no matter how inefficient the national federation had performed. And I can tell you, there have been instances when some of the affiliates had been downright unhappy with the MCF.

So for this to happen, well, what can I say? What can I conclude? The unhappiness and the rift must now been running very deep within the MCF and has come to a head. This is a chasm that can no longer be plastered over. No turning back? I don't think there will be one. 

The allegations against the pair are wide-ranging and I quote from the EGM requisition with my comments offered in brackets:

a) The president and his deputy have failed to carry out their duties to ensure the smooth running of the federation and this has affected the entire chess community in Malaysia. (But in my opinion, this allegation is rather vague as there is nothing specific given as an example of "having failed to carry out their duties.")

b) The president has appointed undesirable persons into the main committee before the elected main committee members were given opportunity to deliberate on the appointment.

c) The president and his deputy have so far failed to provide proper financial account and the same old method of accepting monies from players and bank into personal account still prevailed today. This is evidenced in the 2013 Asean Age Group in Thailand. The appointed treasurer has no knowledge to the monies collected and their whereabout. (In my opinion, this is a rather serious allegation. By right, all monies for events arranged through a registered organisation should go through that organisation's bank account, and I'm not talking about chess alone. So what term would best describe this mode of operation? Conversion?)

d) The president has failed to maintain a good financial standing with FIDE and arrears in June 2013 has led to all Malaysian players to be delisted in the FIDE rating list on 1-7-13. (Not the first time it has happened to us but it should not have happened again. Why can't our officials ever learn not to take such things lightly?)

e) More importantly, the president and his deputy have failed to respect the wishes of the majority state delegates and advice given to them by senior committee members to rectify the situation has been ignored completely.

And what would happen should this motion of no confidence be passed? For one, there will have to be an election for a new president and deputy president by the delegates in the EGM. And with the new persons on board, the delegates are asking for all appointments by the past president to be rescinded.

From what I understand, the extraordinary general meeting will have to be carried out within a month of receiving the requisition from the state affiliates and delegates. That means the EGM must be held by 23 August 2013 latest. From what I also understand, the honorary secretary of the Malaysian Chess Federation will have to give 21 days notice to the affiliate members. That means, the notice of EGM must be date-stamped by 2 August 2013 latest. All this, I hear, are stipulated in the MCF constitution.

And what if the president and his deputy choose to ignore the call for the extraordinary general meeting? I would then say that there is recourse through the Commissioner of Sports. The COS will have to come in to mediate. That is the ultimate. But before then, I would hope that with so many state affiliates and delegates already ganging up again the duo, they should do the honorable thing and stand down.

After all, in registered bodies such as clubs, societies, associations and even this federation, all elected positions are filled voluntarily. The elected officials should know that they are there because they are voted in to work for the common good of all members sharing in the same cause. And finally, I'd like to mention that an elected position is not a kingdom unto itself. And neither should it be the means to all ends. But you'll have to digest those statements yourself.

Buah keluak curry again

We just felt that it was time for buah keluak chicken tumis curry again as the daughter was expected back and we still had several of the black nuts lying around in the kitchen. So after soaking them for several days - traditionally, my mom would soak them for at least a week, which my wife still does diligently, while others say that two to three days would be enough to rid the nuts of the poisonous arsenic - it was time for the cooking pot. As can be seen in the second picture below, the curry came out glorious and delicious. Yummy!

It's not necessary to do this but if you must, crack the buah keluak open, remove the kernel and mash it up with chopped prawns and a little salt, and restuff everything back into the keluak shells.

If the curry looked a little dark, it was because the colour was imparted by the keluak. To give the curry an extra tangy taste, just add enough tamarind water according to personal preference.

That's the last of the batch of buah keluak. Will have to hunt for them again. Problem is, they are not available in Penang. We had to ask a friend in Malacca to buy them.

Long road to KL

I can't exactly remember the last time I ever drove to Kuala Lumpur and back. Must be quite a long time ago. Possibly more than a year because if I were to go down to Kuala Lumpur nowadays, I'd prefer to take the inter-city train.

Just the last weekend, I found myself having to travel to Kuala Lumpur again but since the train tickets for the sleeping berths were all sold out, I decided that this was perhaps the time to take the Prius C for its first long-distance spin. Finally!

So on Sunday, my wife and I set off from home at about eight o'clock in the morning. We filled up the tank at the petrol station near Simpang Ampat which was to be the reference point for our petrol consumption.

I must say that it was a most leisurely, pleasurable and smooth drive with us working the cruise control on the vehicle so that we could take our foot off the petrol pedal most of the time. The interior was so well insulated from the external noise that I really enjoyed my type of music all the way, wife's complaints not withstanding. By 12.30p.m., we had reached the Cititel at MidValley.

Similarly for the return drive, we left the hotel at 2.30p.m. on Monday and reached the same petrol station in Simpang Ampat at seven o'clock in the evening.

All in, we covered a distance of 666 kilometres and spent RM55 on petrol and RM84 on highway toll. Another RM3 on toll along the Sprint highway. I still remember moaning away that the cost of petrol with the Avanza was something like RM120 every time that we drove to and fro Kuala Lumpur. Thus, the RM55 spent on the Prius C was a revelation. It worked out to be something like 23 kilometres per litre of petrol.

IMO, government doctors ARE professional

I was a bit upset when I read this news item in Malaysiakini last week. It pertained to an allegation made in the Penang State Assembly by an UMNO opposition member that there were Chinese doctors at the government hospitals in Seberang Jaya and Kepala Batas who were not treating Malay patients fairly.

It just can't be true. A bumkum of a statement. Drivel. I had a first-hand experience of the professionalism displayed by the doctors at the Kepala Batas Hospital when my late aunt was sent there last May in critical condition. It was by fate that she ended there.

If anything at all, I have to commend the doctors there for their dedication attending to so many patients in the Critical and Non-Critical Wards. There were three doctors on shift work everyday at the Kepala Batas Hospital and I could see that they were overworked even on a Sunday. The line of walk-in patients was long and between attending to them, the resident doctor had to rush to check on the patients that were wheeled into the Critical Ward.

I don't even know how he managed to find the time for his dinner, for his shift started at 2p.m. and would presumably end at 10p.m. When I went back to the hospital the next morning at 11 o'clock, there he was back at work on another shift.

Although the patients were mostly Malays at the Kepala Batas Hospital and apart from my aunt, perhaps there were only three or four other Chinese or Indian patients there on that Sunday, the attending doctor saw them all and took the time to attend to them to the best of his ability. This is more service than one or two doctors I know in private hospitals who wouldn't care two hoots about their patients' welfare. But not this doctor in government service. Maybe it was only one doctor that I noticed but I was hanging around long enough in the Non-Critical Ward and at no time did I sense any unfair treatment as had been claimed in the State Assembly sitting.

Normally, I wouldn't like to mention names but in this case, I would like to thank this resident doctor, Yong Shin Shen, for the good work he had done at the Kepala Batas Hospital. It is people like him whose tireless work should be acknowledged, not criticised.

Forty-nine days tomorrow

I can't believe that tomorrow is already the 49th day since the passing of my aunt. Time does fly, doesn't it? Anyway, we shall have a busy full morning's programme ahead of us, starting with a visit to the columbarium at the Batu Gantong cemetery where her urn of ashes has been placed next to those of my parents.

We don't intend to spend too much time there. Just some minutes of prayers before we make our way to the Buddhist Triple Wisdom Hall in Pangkor Road. That's where their memorial tablet is located. Thanks to the ingenuity of the temple monks, each memorial tablet can actually accommodate more than one person's name. And so back in 1985, my father had ordered a tablet with all three names and pictures engraved.

For a long while, only my parents' pictures were displayed; that of my aunt was covered by a piece of red paper. But this paper was removed when the temple's monks recited prayers to commemorate the seventh day of her passing. I thought it would be some sort of ceremony involved to remove this piece of red paper but the monk just coolly took the tablet without much of an "excuse me", ran it under the tap to soften and wash away the glue and then placed it back on the stand.

From Pangkor Road, we intend to make a detour to the Kuan Im Temple in Pitt Street before we proceed to the Sri Mahindarama Temple in Kampar Road. The short trip to the Kuan Im Temple will be to distribute some food and fruits to the vagrants there. We shall be wiser now, and we shall repackage the food and fruits before going there. When we first did this six weeks ago without repackaging the items, it caused a little stampede there as the vagrants simply grabbed everything from us before we were ready.

After that, we hope to be at the Sri Mahindarama Temple before the dana offerings start at about 11.30a.m. Just some prayers by the monks to acknowledge that 49 days had really passed by. By 12.30a.m. or so, everything should have completed and my family can then spend some quality time together before heading back home.

When I was reflecting on my aunt's passing recently, it struck me that while tomorrow is the 49th day of her death, we will not have her around us for 60 days already. Where did the extra 11 days come from? I now consider the 11 days that she spent at the Institut Perubatan dan Pergigian Termaju (Advanced Medical and Dental Institute) in Bertam to be a sort of practice for us to prepare for the time when she would no longer be with us. True, we had visited her often at the IPPT but we still had to return home every night to an empty and quiet house.

When she was alive, every afternoon and evening would be her quality time in front of the television set. Whether she was watching her favourite serial shows or simply dozing off, the television set would be turned on. Nowadays, the TV set is more often switched off than on. That reminds me, I shall need to see the satellite television provider soon in order to readjust my packages. Time to unsubscribe from the Chinese channels.

Old friends

After a long while, I managed to catch up with some of my old school mates yesterday. The occasion was the Penang Free School Homecoming Carnival 2013 at the school field. Bumped into so many people that I knew but the icing on the cake could only be meeting those guys whom we had happily bummed around with since some 40 or 50 years ago.

This picture below was snapped in front of the pavilion. The banner was supposed to have been held up by balloons but it was my fault that I inadvertently released them. Oh, well....

Just take a look at that Subra, will you? At first, we thought that he had dug out his old school uniform and played a oneupmanship game on all of us but on second thoughts, no. But it would have been hilarious if he had actually donned the old school tie as well.

That's us again at lunch. Among the seven of us, I do meet up with Oon Hup, Andrew and Kah Theang occasionally since we are all moving around in Penang but certainly less often meeting up with Abu Huraira or Abdullah Sani. As for Subra, the interval has been even longer. If I'm not mistaken, the last we saw one another face-to-face could be in November 1972 when we were all nervously sitting for our Higher School Certificate examinations. Yes, it was actually that long ago. But he has a good memory. He actually remembered the old apom seller beside my home in Seang Tek Road.

Moon's blurry perigee

There seemed to be a bit of a flurry on facebook last night over the incidence of the so-called super-moon, a natural phenomenon when the orbit of our terrestrial neighbour moved it closest to our planet. 

Let me repeat: this is a natural phenomenon but inorder to understand it, one must realise that the moon's orbit around our planet is not circular. It is elliptical which means that sometimes, the moon is farthest away from the earth (apogee) and sometimes, the moon is nearest to the earth's surface (perigee).

Well, this time on 23 Jun 2013, the moon happened to be skirting round nearest to us. When conditions are right - when moonrise is at night and moonset is in the morning, and also when the sky is clearest - we should be able to see the moon in its fullest glory. Unfortunately, with all the haze around us in the past week or so, the issue of whether or not we could see a clear moon became a matter of interest.

Some people in the country said that they saw a red moon which was not improbable because the dust particles in the air do contribute to light refraction and absorption. There were others who said that the moon was all blurry. We in the north could have been slightly luckier because there were photographers who managed to get pin-point sharp images.

As for me, my old Konica Minolta Dimage Z5 has never been able to give me a sharp resolution because it is such an old camera already. Even if I put it on a tripod, I can get anything better than a grainy image at the longest focal point. I thought the newer Fujifilm F500EXR would serve me better but I am also disappointed with it. Perhaps the only solution is to buy a third-party long telescopic lens with the biggest aperture to go with my son's Nikon D5100. But it has to be within budget too. However, all things considered, this is only wishful thinking because why should I get such a lens if I'm not going to use it for anything else? Must be practical with my expenditure.

Yesterday morning, I was woken up at about five o'clock by the bright moon shining through the window. The only thought that came to my mind was, gosh, what a bright moon. Not again! Then I turned over and went back to sleep.

This morning, it was almost six o'clock when I noticed the moon again. For the second time, it disturbed my sleep. But since it was almost time to get up anyway, I decided to grab both these two cameras - the Dimage and the Fujifilm - and tried to make do with the best of the situation. Unfortunately, with me holding the cameras without any support, almost all the images turned out blurry. This image below was the best I could get away with. Mind you, I've got better moon pictures elsewhere on this blog.

The MacAlister Road tragedy

This Penang Island Municipal Council (MPPP) video below gives a technical explanation of what could have happened when the concrete structure at the Menara UMNO broke loose and punched the ground below.

From what I understood after watching the video, the concrete did not fall flat on the road because the impact area was relatively small. Rather, it drilled straight into the ground like a nail. As the original structure was about 38 metres high and only about 10 metres of concrete laid exposed on the ground, the MPPP believed that there was still about 28 metres of concrete below the surface. When it fell, it dragged the right side of a car, including the driver, into the ground as well.

There was no way to recover the man's remains beneath the remaining concrete. Heart-breaking news for everyone, especially the family members of the victim.

The MPPP also believed that the design of the top of the building could have a contributory factor to the concrete structure breaking off. Because of the shape of the wall and the direction from which the gale was blowing, the flow of air around it became strong enough to attack the weakest points on the rooftop. All the forces added up and they tore off the lightning arrestor and supporting concrete.

In my opinion, this is the latest evidence of how global warming and climate change are going to affect our daily lives. I would expect that from now on, strong winds and gale-force winds will be regular features of our tropical weather here in the northern part of the peninsula. As the polar icecaps start melting and the ocean temperatures go up, the wind patterns will change around the world. It's a global phenomenon. We may live far away from the melting icecaps but there is no way that we won't be affected too. This tragedy in MacAlister Road on 13 June 2013 is just a warning sign of more natural disasters to come.

 

Penang public library

I decided to visit the Penang Public Library in Seberang Jaya, Province Wellesley on the mainland of Penang today. Haven't been there for quite a while. Despite it being the middle of the week, there were people inside. Mostly doing their reading but there were a few who were nodding off on the easy chairs. Don't blame them, of course, because the library was so darn conducive for this kind of activity.

As for me, I headed towards the mini-exhibition on the upper floor of the building. The library had put together some interesting facts on the Governors of Penang.

Prior to Independence in August 1957, there was a whole list of people who had been appointed Resident Councillors, Resident Commissioners, Governors, Lieutenant Governors and even a Military Governor. Some were appointed only in an acting capacity. There were those who served for several years but there were also those whose tenure lasted only for a few months. Interestingly, during the period of Japanese Occupation in the Second World War, several Japanese military bigwigs assumed this post in Penang. They might have brought terror to the people here but to their credit, crime was at a minimum level.

Francis Light was, of course, considered as the very first person to govern the Prince of Wales' Island, as Penang was called initially. He was the first Superintendent of the island from 1786 till his death in 1794.

From the upper floor of the Penang Public Library, I wandered downstairs to the Lincoln Corner which was set up in 2008 as a collaborative effort between the Library and the American Embassy in Kuala Lumpur. This is only one of several Lincoln Corners in the country.

If the aim was to share information on Americana with Malaysians, I must say that I wasn't much impressed by the current collection of books and magazines. It was really very modest. I really believe that the United States Embassy could have done better. Surely, there is a wealth of cultural information to share with us through your books. And surely too, your magazines can do with better up-to-date copies. The latest copy of any magazine I saw was dated October 2012, and this was already June 2013 when I visited.

But I know that there will be people who will say that my criticism is unwarranted. Perhaps they are correct because I am actually measuring this little Lincoln Corner against the original yardstick which was the immensely grand USIS Library that used to occupy India House at the corner of Beach Street and Church Street Ghaut for about 18 years until November 1970. Walking into the place then was like walking into a very august institution with all sorts of hallowed traditions. Really missed that place.

Bullock cart express: 10 days for letter from Singapore

Something to ponder about. Are we living in the 21st Century or the 20th Century? I just received this letter from Singapore which had been sent by registered post. It was postmarked 7 Jun 2013 in Singapore but the postman only came to deliver it today, 10 days later. Some more, it was by special delivery because I was asked to sign for it.

It makes me wonder why the letter had taken so long to cross the causeway. It is not like Malaysia and Singapore are worlds apart. In fact we are separated by only a narrow sliver of water and are extensively connected by air, road and rail. In the case of this letter, it was very clear that though the "Air Mail" sticker was affixed, "bullock cart express" was the preferred mode of transportation.

Just dunno who has to take responsibility for this absurdly long delivery period: the Post Office in Singapore or the Pos Malaysia here? No other date stamp apart from the Singapore mark. But on the reverse side of the envelope was a sticker marked "RS16 110 635 1MY". A bit of an irony, actually, because of the "1MY" at the end of this string of identification number.

Relatives @ Bao Sheng

Busy day for me yesterday. Had been arranging an afternoon trip to the Bao Sheng Durian Farm in Sungai Pinang - 10km driving distance from either Teluk Bahang or Balik Pulau town - for my far-flung, some long-lost relatives from the Oh clan (my mother's side of the family). Some had driven all the way from the Klang Valley just for this mini-reunion.

Oh yes, after driving down from Sungai Pinang, I stopped by the Eurasian Fiesta at the St Xavier's Branch School in Pulau Tikus. Had a whale of an interesting evening, stuffed with good food and good entertainment.

When Mother Nature visited Penang

So where were you when the gale-force winds hit Penang yesterday evening? 

Just like the Indian Ocean tsunami that affected our shores on 26 December 2004, this latest tragedy is a reminder that Mother Nature is still the greatest force to be reckoned with on our planet. We can plan all we want but Mother Nature will still know how to expose and exploit our weakest points.

As for the strong winds that ripped apart the concrete and lightning arrestor at the 21-storey UMNO building in MacAlister Road, George Town, we should grief for the unfortunate victim that died and hope that those injured would recover quickly. They were simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.

When the storm broke at about seven o'clock, I was at the Sentosa hawker centre in Bukit Mertajam, buying dinner for my wife and I. Just as the hawker finished cooking the food, a huge deluge of rain descended on the town, followed by huge gusts of wind.

Obviously, as it was impossible for me to even run to the car, I decided to wait out the storm at the hawker centre. Right in front of me, lamp shades were swinging wildly. I could also see the weighted bamboo awnings flap around in the wind. They were blowing open and then blew shut again. Nervousness showed on the faces of the hawkers nearest to the awnings. Nothing like this had been experienced before.

One of these huge awnings even flew up on the roof of the hawker centre and stayed there for several minutes. One moment it was there flapping away but the next moment, it was gone. Actually, I thought the wind had torn it away but no, the part of the awning was still fastened securely to the building and the awning had swung up to rest on the roof. Only after several more minutes did the strong gusts of wind finally send it swinging down again and crashing on the side of the building.

Just as fast as the winds came, they died down rather quickly. The rain also eased to a trickle, long enough for me to walk back to my car and drive back home. Soon later, word reached us about the disaster that had hit George Town. The rest, as we all know, have already been reported in the news and social media.