Hong Kong's Time Square

From Sheung Wan, we took the MTR to Causeway Bay to meet some friends for dinner. This was our first underground journey since arrival and I had a bit of a bother trying to find the station. But eventually, we found the entrance. It was also the first time that we were using the Airport Express card to access the MTR network. The card didn't register any amount but all it required was for us to tap it on the card reader and the automated gate opened to allow us onto the train's platform. 

We ended here for dinner: a restaurant known as Crystal Jade located in the lower ground floor of Hong Kong's Time Square. The food wasn't bad but sorry, no pictures were taken at all of our dining experience.

According to my friend, rental rates at Hong Kong's Time Square are ridiculously high and thus there are huge overheads for the tenants. I really wonder how the shops here can make a reasonable profit with all the competition around them. Within the same block, I could sometimes find three or four identical outlets, possibly run by different owners.

 

As an aside, I was mentioning to my friend that I saw advertisement posters selling condominium units on the island for around HKD60 million. That's nothing, he replied. In the really high-end areas of Hong Kong, the price could go up to HKD200 million. Wow, that's really for the affluent, the rich and famous. Most ordinary people, even Hong Kong people, wouldn't be able to afford this type of high living.

Walking around Sheung Wan

I have to admit that the Ibis Hotel Sheung Wan and Central wasn't my first choice of hotel when my wife and I travelled to Hong Kong recently, but I am glad that I did choose it over many others.

Why wasn't it my first choice, you may ask. Well, in the first instance, I knew next to nothing about this part of Hong Kong island. I had only wanted to stay at a place which was near to the Hong Kong-Macau ferry terminal, and from the map, the Ibis was near enough.

In the second instance, I wanted a hotel that was on the route of the free shuttle bus service from the Hong Kong MTR station and I found that the shuttle bus would stop right at the hotel's doorsteps. How much more convenient could this be, right? The Ibis Hotel fitted both my needs.

The added bonus was that the price of the room was cheap enough. So that was where we stayed. And to our pleasant surprise, we found that the hotel was located right in the midst of old Hong Kong: surrounded by the Hong Kong that I had always imagined. A Hong Kong that is full of character and atmosphere.

After finishing checking into the hotel, we spent the rest of the afternoon walking around Sheung Wan. 

 

We came across traditional shops retailing dried seafood stuff like fish maw, abalone, scallops, shark fin, sea cucumber and salted fish. In addition, we found ourselves surrounded by traditional Chinese medical halls.

Everywhere we turned, we would find small shoplots selling all types of food. Nobody could ever go hungry here!

This lady was selling fresh vegetables by the roadside.

We found a coffin shop right in the midst of our walk. The coffins are all of the traditional designs, very unlike the versions we find here in Malaysia.

And suddenly, we found ourselves in Upper Lascar Row, also known as Cat Street. All types of antique dealers here.

When I saw this mask, immediately it reminded me so much of the British actor, Stephen Fry. Must be the prominent jowl.

And all too soon, we had reached the end of Upper Lascar Row and we descended the steps known as Ladder Street.

An interior of the Man Mo Temple, which is supposed to be one of the oldest temples in Hong Kong.

Anyway, it was built in 1847 and dedicated to the worship of Man Tai (文帝) and Mo Tai (武帝). That's how the temple got its name from.

Yes! We were in Hollywood. Hollywood Road, Hong Kong, that is.

Climbing further up Ladder Street, the roads became more empty and quiet.

And then we found ourselves inside the Sheung Wan Cooked Food Centre. The first floor was akin to a huge hawker centre with tables laid out in all directions. Patrons could sit anywhere they liked as none of the hawkers could claim any part of the floor to be their personal corner.

And these two pictures were taken on the ground floor of the same building. It was a market, actually, selling both dried foodstuff and fresh meat. Needless to say, there were rows of butchers even at this late hour but when we were there, they were like shaking legs waiting for people to come round to their stalls.

A compromised SureLoc?

These two SureLoc padlocks are standard equipment with me every time I go travelling. I had bought them about five years ago because of some assurances on their reliability. And, I've been pretty satisfied with their performances.

It wasn't any different when I used these two padlocks again on my luggage during my wife and I's trip to Hong Kong a few days back. Like what I normally do, I'd zip up my luggages, put the padlocks on and then throw the keys into my pouch, retrieving them only when I reach my destinations.

But after arriving at the Ibis Hong Kong Central and Sheung Wan, I discovered to my horror that I couldn't find the keys to the red padlock. Searched everywhere about my person but still I couldn't find the keys. Have I forgotten to bring them along with me? Horrors, what am I going to do with a locked luggage that could not be opened?

In desperation, I pushed the yellow keys into the red padlock's slot and started jiggling. Suddenly, I felt something had yielded inside. The mechanism must have fallen into place as lo and behold, the padlock snapped open. I gave a big sigh of relief as I quickly unzipped my bag.

However, I am puzzled as to how I could open a padlock with a key that doesn't belong to it. Whether of not both padlocks belong to the same manufacturer was irrelevant. The big concern here was how it could have happened at all. SureLoc is supposed to comply with some standards but I'm able to use a different set of keys to unlock this padlock.

When I got home finally, I searched through my cupboard and sure enough, I found the red padlock's keys there. They opened the red padlock smoothly enough. No jiggling whatsoever. Mmmm....

Goodbye, Laurence How

On the way back from Hong Kong this afternoon, my wife brought this obituary in The Star newspaper to my attention. "You know him, don't you?" she asked. I was shocked and devastated.

Laurence How dead? He was one of my fast friends. I had known him through chess since the mid-1980s. He was then the secretary of the Malaysian Chess Federation and we got on very well. But excellent organiser though he was, he was bad at documentation. As a result, I've known people who had moaned about having to tie up his loose ends at the end of every chess project. That's the Laurence How I knew.

Apart from chess, our interests also extended to the Manchester United Football Club. When he left the post of MCF secretary in the mid-1990s, he set up the MUFC Supporters Club Of Malaysia in Petaling Jaya.

Football was Laurence's other passion. He told me once that he used to play football but a bad knee put an end to his playing days. In the early days of the supporters' club, I helped him out with a mailing list and website. Often, he tried to interest me in going to visit Old Trafford but I never could make the trip. There will not be any more trips with Laurence How. Going to miss you, Laurence...

UPDATE (19 Mar 2014):  I was talking with one of his nephews yesterday. He told me that Laurence had been complaining recently about a lump in his throat and had been taking Chinese medicine. But about a month ago, he was persuaded to be admitted to a hospital where they diagnosed him with leukemia. He had undergone a course of chemotherapy and was in rather high spirits. Then about a week ago, some complications set in and he was placed in intensive care. Towards the end, his blood pressure dropped which was never a good sign. At the final moment, even the doctors knew that there was nothing more that could be done. Laurence passed away at about 1.45pm on 15 March 2014.

UPDATE 2 (20 Mar 2014): Apparently, I have just been made aware that I should know Laurence from way before the mid-1980s. If he was the first Secretary of the Chess Association of Selangor, then I should have known him from 1974. But yes, with my memory jogged, I do remember we talking a lot about Prof Dr Lau Kam Seng who was the CAS president before he migrated to Australia in 1976 or 1977.  Laurence had such high regard for Prof Lau.

Westlands Primary School mates

It may be easy to find old secondary school mates from among your group of friends but it is more difficult to come across old primary school mates. And it is indeed even more difficult to find them at the far corners of the globe away from your home town.

As such, it was a very pleasant surprise for me to meet up with three other people who happened to have our primary school education at the old Westlands School in Victoria Green Road, Penang. And to think that we four Westlanders met in Hong Kong this evening. Incidentally, we are all 60 years old this 2014.

And who are we, the Old Frees and Old Westlanders? That's Balakrishnan on the far left, Ong Charn Hong second from left and Cheah Cheng Hye third from left. I'm the one in the batik shirt, and the occasion was to celebrate Cheng Hye's birthday at the JW Marriott Hotel in Admiralty, Hong Kong.

Back to school

I was back to the old Alma Mater this morning. Brought with me Dr John Wu and his lovely wife, Margaret. Dr Wu had been invited to the Penang Free School to give a talk to the Sixth Form students and he touched on a subject matter close to his heart: his father, Dr Wu Lien-Teh, who would have been 135-years-old, if he were still alive today.

(Left to right: William Tan, Margaret Wu, John Wu, myself and the school's senior assistant for administration, Ho Nean Chan. Like myself, both William and Ho are also Old Boys of the School.)

And here we are, in the Headmaster's room for the first time in my life, prior to the start of the talk at the Lecture Theatre, Sixth Form Block. That's Jalil Saad, an Old Boy and current headmaster of the school.

Where it all started for the Wus

The Dr Wu Lien-Teh commemorative symposium starts this week and last night, there was a welcome dinner at the City Bayview Hotel for the participants of the symposium.

The biggest surprise was the homecoming of the Wu clan. I would estimate that of the 100-plus people at the dinner, about 85 percent of them were the descents of their patriarch, Ng Khee Hock. Dr Wu Lien-Teh was the eighth of 11 siblings.

From what I understand, this was the first time that the Wu clan had descended in such numbers for a family reunion and meeting with relatives that they didn't even know existed. And they came from the far corners of the world such as San Francisco, Belfast, Perth and Sydney. Nearer to home, some of them came from nearby Singapore, Kuala Lumpur and Petaling Jaya, Ipoh and of course, Penang.

As a committee member of the Dr Wu Lien-Teh Society, I was privileged to have witnessed this gathering at the welcome dinner which also saw the official launch of the reprint of Dr Wu Lien-Teh's own auto-biography, Plague Fighter, by Areca Books. I've no idea yet how much it will cost when it hits the bookstands.

The book last saw print in 1959, the year before Wu Lien-Teh's death in his house in Chor Si Kheng Road, Ayer Itam, Penang. Maybe, there was only a single edition then as I doubt that it had a wide circulation. I'm one of a very few people that still owned a copy of that first edition, but nevertheless, I am still glad that there is now a reprint of this book. With careful promotion, I hope that many more of the present generation of Malaysians will get to know how great this man was.

Welcome speech by Anwar Fazal, the president of the Dr Wu Lien-Teh Society

What's that behind the red cloth?

Plague Fighter, Dr Wu Lien-Teh's biography. The people behind the launch of the book were: David Yeoh (representing Star Publications which sponsored the re-printing of this book), Dr Alex Ooi (secretary-general of the Dr Wu Lien-Teh Society), Khoo Salma (chairman of Penang Heritage Trust and the woman behind Areca Books), Dr John Wu (Dr Wu Lien-Teh's last surviving son) and Anwar Fazal (president of the Dr Wu Lien-Teh Society)

Of course, how could William and I not miss the chance to show Dr John Wu that section of Fidelis, the commemorative book of The Old Frees' Association, that featured his illustrious father?

My old passports

I was digging through my cupboard and out tumbled all these old, expired passports of mine. Have been keeping them very diligently, especially the very first one. Some were used only once. Knowing how the latter-day passports had to be renewed after five years of usage, that shows how often I have managed to travel out of the country. Anyhow, I discovered that I did go to Hong Kong five times in the past 45 years, this former British colony coming a close second to Singapore.

The first time that I had ever set foot in Hong Kong was on 31 March 1978 when I was part of the Malaysian chess contingent that was invited for an official tour of the People's Republic of China.  At that time, there were no direct flights between Malaysia and China, the Malaysian government only allowed Malaysians aged 55 and above to visit their so-called "motherland" and our contingent of chess players were basically not more than 40 years old, and thus the Malaysian Chess Federation had to apply for a special dispensation from our government. Once that hurdle was overcome, our visas were issued by the Chinese Embassy in Kuala Lumpur. Our group entered Sham Chun (Shenzhen) in China through a train ride from Kowloon to Lo Wu. Click here for my take on his historic trip. Of course, when we left China, we had to exit through the same way we entered and I was in Hong Kong again on 16 April 1978. Technically two visits to Hong Kong in 1978 but for all practical purposes, it should be counted as only one.

My second trip to Hong Kong was in March 1979 when the Penang Chess Association took part in the first Asian cities team chess championship. It was a reward for having won the inaugural Malaysian team chess championship in the previous year. I remember that this trip was sponsored by Dato' Low Hooi Siah who was the patron of the Penang Chess Association. Low was a prominent businessman in Penang, chairman of the Board of Governors of the Han Chiang High School and could have been the president of the Teochew Association as well at that time, and owner of Lowe Motors in George Town that held the Mercedes Benz franchise.

In the first few editions of the Asian cities team chess championships, the Hong Kong Chess Federation was the host. The president of their federation was a private banker named Leslie Collings. I missed going to the second Asian cities team chess championship as I gave up my chances to some other chess players from Penang to go in my place, but I went to the third tournament in February 1981.

Somehow, this tournament stopped after a few editions but it was revived by the Hong Kong Chess Federation in August 1995. And that was where I found myself again for the fourth time, playing chess. I remember rooming with Ng Weng Kong, a good friend from our Ban Hin Lee Bank days and one day, he was taken violently ill after disagreement with some local food there. Anyway, with a lot of retching here and there, it wasn't a good trip for him or me.

We were walking down Nathan Road one evening and stopped outside a Haagen Daas outlet. For some time, we were debating whether or not to spend our money on this ice cream. Especially in those days, Haagen Daas was like the Rolls Royce of ice creams: very expensive. And we were reflecting on our peculiar position: rich people would probably come to a decision immediately because money was no issue to them. But for the two of us, we would probably have to weigh it up for some five to 10 minutes before deciding whether our money would be better spent here or elsewhere. I wouldn't want to disclose our final decision, though. It doesn't matter at all.

My last visit to Hong Kong took place in June 1998. Went there with my wife and aunt. Probably the only occasion that I ever took her so far away from Penang but I told her that I would want to take her inside Shenzhen so that she could at least step foot once into her so-called "motherland." How very old-fashioned her thinking was.

But there was one other reason why I wanted to make that trip with my wife. First, I wanted her to visit Hong Kong before the old Kai Tak airport closed down. I had always been explaining to her the thrill of landing at Kai Tak airport, how the aeroplanes would seemingly glide over the rooftops of Kowloon as they approached the runway, how we could practically look into the windows of the buildings. All these were very exciting to me. However....she wasn't very impressed with what she saw.

Oh, by the way, I was also mentioning a bit about Singapore earlier on. What a coincidence that both Hong Kong and Singapore were former colonies of the British empire. Singapore was founded by Sir Stamford Raffles in 1819 while Britain took possession of Hong Kong in 1846. And then I was thinking to myself: gee, my alma mater, the Penang Free School, is even older than either Singapore or Hong Kong, it being established in 1816.

The Journey

If there was anything that surprised me over the past weekend, it was to discover that when politics do not interfere with film-making, The Journey was indeed a very good film. 

My wife and I took time out to watch this movie with my daughter and found the cineplex almost fully packed with people even though more than a month had passed since it first started screening nation-wide on 30 Jan 2014. That's the eve of Chinese New Year.

Yes, it is still pulling in the crowds and as I understand it, The Journey has become the biggest box-office movie for a local Malaysian production, grossing RM15 million to date, and still collecting.

There are already way too many reviews of this movie on the Internet and I really wouldn't want to add my own opinion to all the accolades, but I think that I must still comment somewhat about it.

But first, to my friends in Singapore, I would like to urge you to catch the screening of The Journey in your local cinemas from the 20th of March.

The Journey is a story of many themes that I'm told are all so familiar to us: family, heritage, culture, traditions, expectations, forgiveness and acceptance. To which I would like to add nostalgia, sentimentality, life's impermanence, the ability to look hard at oneself and heart-warming old friendships that cannot be severed with the passing of time.

The film was shot in many locations around the country but it thrilled me to no end when the Penang Bridge loomed up on the big screen, followed by sequences at the Chew Jetty and one of the ferries in George Town. But my delight was somewhat dampened when the characters opened their mouths to speak and what came out was not Penang Hokkien but some other variation of the southern Hokkien language. For goodness' sake, why can't the movie's producer make the show more realistic by adopting authentic Penang Hokkien especially for the sequence filmed here? That was my main beef about the movie.

And another beef was that I couldn't understand half of the show because there weren't any English sub-titles. Besides, the Malay sub-titles flashed by way too fast for me. I finally gave up trying to read the Malay sub-titles, because it interfered with the developments on the screen, and decided to simply sit back and just enjoy the film.

Yes, I did laugh as the show progressed, demonstrating that you don't really need to understand the language when all unfolding before you are the daily, familiar aspects of our daily lives. (Actually, no, the hot-air balloon of recycled plastic bags doesn't occur naturally in our daily lives at all but what the heck, that was the director's creative licence if you know what I mean....)

P.S. Even if you don't understand the storyline at first, you will definitely enjoy the brilliant cinematography. And maybe, pine for your old hometown.

Again, fire them, don't hire them

It wasn't the first time that I had made a complaint to the Province Wellesley Municipal Council (MPSP) about the uncleared drains along the road where I'm staying and I very much doubt whether it will be the last time either.

In the not-so-distant past - actually, 22 days ago - I noticed a worker from MPSP, a REAL worker under the direct employment of MPSP, had come round to Lorong Jernih 4 in Bukit Mertajam to remove dried leaves clogging the drains that ran along the front of our houses. The MPSP had responded to my complaints through the #betterpenang application on my iPad. The worker said that he was just a back-up since the MPSP contracted company was not doing anything.

Three weeks passed. I saw the dry leaves building up in the drains again. Still water. Perfect condition for mosquitoes to breed. Dengue fever all around us, remember? Where were the MPSP contractors? Weren't they supposed to have been contracted to sweep the roads and clear the drains of rubbish? Where were they when you wanted them?

Then two days ago on 26 Feb 2014 as I was driving through, I saw these two fellas removing rubbish from a drain along Tingkat Muhibbah 7. Now, Tingkat Muhibbah 7 was just round the corner from Lorong Jernih 4. I was heartened. The contracted workers were here. They'd clear all the drains of rubbish, especially the dried leaves.

But I should have known better. When I came back a few hours later, a glance at the drain showed me that they had not come round to my road at all. I must also add that this was NOT the first time that these contracted workers have given us a miss. In fact, it made me think whether this was done on purpose since nobody was reporting on them and none of the residents, in their opinion, probably cared. But I do care. I pay my council assessment every year and I expect that whoever is supposed to do this job will do his job properly.

So yesterday, I sent another complaint to MPSP through the #betterpenang app, attaching a picture of the drain in front of my house.

This morning past nine o'clock, I heard some slight noises along the road. Two MPSP workers, not workers from the MPSP contracted company, were busily clearing the rubbish from the drains. Oh, they told me, they were here because the contract workers have not been doing their job. Same old, same old. Same old story. I could have said: told you so.

So what is the MPSP going to do in the long term? Have their own staff go round the mainland to clear up on a job which has not been done well or at all by the company that was contracted to do it in the first place? Wouldn't that be self-defeating?

If I were the MPSP president, I would have oiled the big wheels of action already. Heads must roll and I wish to repeat my assertion that the contracted company must be fired from this job. If a small task like this is beyond the company's control, they do not deserve to be on the MPSP's payroll any longer.

Last glimpse of the Chinese New Year moon

Okay, the last of my sky shots for this month, all taken with my little Fujifilm compact camera. It is quite a pain trying to use it when there are limitations to its so-called manual mode. At times like this, I so wish to own an SLR camera again, one that I can control the f-stop and the shutter speed manually.

The first moment that I walked out into the street at seven o'clock this morning, all I could see was this bright dot of light from Venus. I had to strain my eyes trying to locate the waning moon and finally, I found it skirting just above the rooftop of some houses. So low in the sky. And so dim too.

Actually, this was the first time that I had seen a moon so thin and dim. Tomorrow would be the new moon already. The last light from this disappearing old moon made it barely noticeable. As I didn't have a tripod with me, I had to make do with steadying myself against a ledge just to take its photograph. This seemed like the best shot, after it had been cropped; the rest was affected by a more severe camera shake.

I might as well show the other acceptable picture from the camera. The moon was so low in the sky but Venus was blazing higher above. In fact, it was so bright that at 7.26 a.m., I could still notice it in the morning sky.

  

Moon, Venus pulling apart

This morning's configuration of moon and Venus was not as spectacular as yesterday's. I guess yesterday was the highlight: the closest that we would ever get to see the moon and Venus together for quite a while. Those people in Africa would most probably have seen the positions of the two terrestrial bodies inter-changed, but not us in South-East Asia.

Venus should continue to shine bright in the morning sky for some time but seeing how fast the moon can move across the sky, I would estimate that the waning moon will be no-where near the planet tomorrow morning. And yes, I did strain my eyes but I couldn't catch a glimpse of Mercury. I thought I saw a glint of dim light to the lower left of the moon but I guess my eyes could have played tricks on me as well. Anyway, here are two snapshots from this morning. Time was at about 7.10 a.m.

Old Frees 1974/76

These fellow Old Frees are not from my years in school but I'm always very happy to see Old Frees coming together for a reunion. As we grow older, the spirit of the old Alma Mater still matters a lot to us. In this instance, they are from the Class of 1974 (MCE) and 1976 (HSC). I recognise a few of them....

(Picture "borrowed" from The Old Frees' Association group in facebook.)

Moon and Venus move closer

Okay, I made it a point to creep out of the house again this morning at about 6.45 a.m., the reason being to catch sight of the waning moon and the morning star. The good thing about a waning moon is that the moonlight does not overshine the other lights in the sky.

However, my neighbourhood is not exactly an ideal place for sky gazing. There are too many street lights and some of the houses tend to leave their porch lights switched on until morning. These interfere with anyone, especially me, who likes to gaze skywards every now and then.

This morning saw me share this incredible view with my wife. Like I mentioned yesterday, the moon would move closer to Venus. However, I could not visualise yesterday how close the two would seem in the dawn sky. We saw this view:

I should think that by tomorrow's dawn, the moon would have sank below Venus. Their relative distance in the sky may not be so close again but I'll have to wait and see. Who knows, there may be even a bonus to look out for tomorrow. Wish me luck!

Crescent moon and Venus

A wonderful sight outside the house this morning at about 6.50a.m. The crescent moon with a very bright Venus trailing it not too far behind. In the next few days, the crescent moon will get thinner and move even closer to the planet. Hope that I can wake up this early again to view this incredible sight. (Note: this picture has not been digitally enhanced; only cropped.)

Old Cathay

I came across this old picture of the Cathay cinema in George Town, Penang on facebook. The picture must have been taken sometime in the late 1950s or early 1960s. I am saying this because the film, Anastasia starring Yul Brynner and Ingrid Bergman, was released in 1956 and would most probably have made its way to our shores very much later, possibly by several years.

But it was not the film that interested me. Rather, what sprang foremost to my mind was an old coffee shop that used to operate beside the cinema. If one looks closely at this picture, one would see that next to the cinema were some trees. That was where the old coffee shop was operating from a bungalow. 

Of course, everything is gone now. No more bungalow, no more trees, no more coffee shop. And along with them, there is also no more satay babi, no more lor bak, no more koay teow thng, all of which were very good. And outside the bungalow but still within the compound near the gate pillars was an Indian hawker selling his pasembor and poh piah. 

Obviously, the coffee shop was very popular and during its heyday, it always had a ready clientele from the cinema patrons. Always hard put to find a seat, especially if one's party was big. I believe that the coffee shop was still around until sometime in the late 1970s. I miss it.

The Cathay cinema itself has stopped its business. The premises has now been turned into a supermarket. At the very edge of the picture, one can still see the exterior of the Wah Bee Co Ltd. This business is no longer there too and in its place is an eatery selling some fusion Japanese food.

JobStreet: The devil is in the details

Everyone makes mistakes; even news agencies make mistakes - and, unlike certain local newspapers, they admit their mistakes readily for accountability and credibility. (My own mistake here.)

For example, two days ago, it was widely reported by the local and overseas Press that Seek Australia, through their Asian entity known as Seek Asia, had launched a RM1.73 billion takeover bid for the 78 percent shares of JobStreet.com (Bursa Malaysia code: 0058) that they do not already own.

Two days are long enough for the dust to settle and it emerged yesterday that Seek Asia was not buying up the remaining 78 percent of JOBST shares in the Malaysian bourse but rather, they are buying the online recruitment business of JobStreet.com in Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines, Indonesia and Vietnam. The JOBST shares will still be available and listed, and that is the most important difference.

The online recruitment business of JobStreet.com in these countries contribute more than 80 percent of the JobStreet Groups profit before tax. Which means to say, once the online recruitment business of JobStreet.com are disposed off, what's left of the company will remain a small fraction of the present business. Interestingly, the operations in India have not been sold off together for whatever reason.

Almost all of the RM1.73 billion payment from Seek Asia, except for RM30 million to meet the administrative costs and corporate fees of this takeover exercise, will then be distributed to all existing shareholders of JOBST (including the 22 percent presently held by Seek Asia, which means Seek Asia is paying themselves back for the 22 percent that they hold of JOBST*) through a special cash dividend.  The news agencies worked it out to a price of RM2.72 per share. I've no idea how they came around to this figure but it must have been based on around 640 million issued JOBST shares.

(* It is a bit more complicated than my description because technically, the pro-rata special cash dividend that Seek Asia will receive will be netted off from the RM1.73 billion which they will pay.)

But in yesterday's filing with Bursa Malaysia, JobStreet.com had also mentioned that post-disposal and post-distribution, the JOBST shares would have increased to 708 million. I wonder whether the extra 68 million shares would be included in the payback to the shareholders. If so, be prepared for the share valuation to be less than the RM2.72 per share. Perhaps only RM2.40 per share.

Also, once the distribution is completed, we have to expect the value of JOBST shares to plunge off a cliff - shaving off perhaps 90 percent of its current value - because the company will no longer be supported by the ongoing online recruitment business. Already, the company is prepared for an eventual reclassification with a PN17 or PN16 status by Bursa Malaysia.
 
Anyhow, there should be an extraordinary meeting called for the shareholders soon in order to approve this disposal and distribution. I've never attended any shareholders meeting before but I think that I should try to make it for this one if my time permits. For old times' sake, I should be there to say a proper goodbye to the one company that was an exemplary success for Malaysia.  

JobStreet, Auld Lang Syne

I have a lot of mixed feelings today. I've just learnt that my old company, JobStreet.com, of which I was a close part for more than eight years of my working life, from 2001 until retirement in 2009, will never be quite the same again.

Oh heck, it may even no longer exist. It was reported by the Wall Street Journal's online edition that Seek Australia intends to buy up the remaining 78 percent of JobStreet.com shares that it does not already own. The same story has since broken out on the local online news websites.

I contacted my sharebroker and he confirmed that there was indeed a request from the company to suspend trading of its shares on Bursa Malaysia with effect from nine o'clock this morning.

I still have friends and ex-colleagues working at JobStreet.com and I am sure that they are all equally as shocked as I am. JobStreet.com has been so much a family to all of us, having gone through both the bad times and the good times together.

But back to this takeover exercise. According to Bursa Malaysia, there are altogether 635,124,860 JOBST shares at the present time. The 78 percent of JOBST shares that Seek Australia is buying is equivalent to 494,098,288 shares out there in the open market. The question is whether the RM1.73 billion that Seek is offering for JOBST shares will include the 22 percent that they already own. If yes, then the offer price should be worth about RM2.70 for each JOBST share. If no, the offer price becomes RM3.50 per share. Right now, trading in JOBST has been suspended at RM2.68. That's interesting....

Note: The Star reports it here and apparently, the RM1.73 billion will include Seek paying themselves back for the 22 percent that they already hold.

I remember way back in the mid-2000s when JobStreet.com was first listed on the Bursa Malaysia, the company's chief executive officer and founder, Mark Chang, used to tell me - and others - that his ultimate dream was to see the shares of the company touch RM5 per share eventually. At that time, the shares were traded at around RM1.20 only but I believed him and kept faith with him.

In 2007, the company announced a two-for-one bonus issue and a consolidation of two shares into one. And then in September last year, the company made a share split which effectively doubled the number of shares and halved the share price. Because of the share split, the target for Chang adjusted to RM2.50 per share instead of RM5. Thus, for the JOBST shares to exceed this target and touch a high of RM2.78 yesterday means that, yes, he did achieve his life-long goal.