Category: Article (Page 2 of 3)

Ayam… Bermacam ayam
Ada ayam kampung, ayam hutan, ayam siam, ayam peti, ayam belanda
Macam-macam, perihal ayam
Hangat-hangat tahi ayam, sabung ayam, nasi ayam, telur ayam

Ayam hutan boleh terbang
Ayam kampung dalamlah reban
Ayam bandar di dalam pasar
Kadang-kadang ada harga, naik harga, turun harga

Ibu… Si ibu ayam
Telur sebiji riuh sekampung
Ohhh ibu… Oh ibu ayam
Telur dieram, anak sereban

Kata di jalan berkaki ayam
Kalau makan, ajak-ajak ayam
Kalau nak tidur, tidur-tidur ayam
Kalau tak nampak, itu rabun ayam

Makan leher ayam nanti bersanding kepala teleng (yeah!)
Makan tungking ayam nanti mulut tak reti diam
Makan kaki ayam kais pagi makan malam
Makan cakar ayam sakit gigi siang malam

Ibu… Si ibu ayam
Telur sebiji riuh sekampung
Ohhh ibu… Oh ibu ayam
Telur dieram, anak sereban

Kata di jalan berkaki ayam
Kalau makan, ajak-ajak ayam
Kalau nak tidur, tidur-tidur ayam
Kalau tak nampak, itu rabun ayam

Makan leher ayam nanti bersanding kepala teleng (yeah!)
Makan tungking ayam nanti mulut tak reti diam
Makan kepak ayam, peha ayam, dada ayam
Satu tak boleh makan, jangan makan bulu ayam

Makan leher ayam nanti bersanding kepala teleng (yeah!)
Makan tungking ayam nanti mulut tak reti diam
Makan kepak ayam, peha ayam, dada ayam
Satu tak boleh makan, jangan makan tahi ayam

Sememangnya ku lelaki
Penuh kelemahan diri
Tak boleh nak mengatasi
Keinginan semulajadi
Lapar ku ke kedai kopi
Mencari horlicks dan roti
Terlihat si gadis sunti
Hirup teh bak bidadari

Aku pergi sekolah tinggi
Ada diploma dan degree
Tapi nampak gadis lawa
Cair otak bak… bak… bak… mentega
Ku hilang daya berfikir
Pertuturan ku tercicir
Gatal-gatal dah melanda
Aku mesti bertemunya

CHORUS:
Aku lelaki, Ada keinginan semulajadi
Aku lelaki, Jangan daku dipersalahi
Daku dicipta begini

Ku rapat menghampirinya
Lalu terus ku bertanya
“Adakah nama you Lina?
Teman kolejku yang lama”
Terus dia menidaknya
“Encik salah orang agaknya”
Sememangnya daku tahu
Ia sekadar taktikku
Ku pinta duduk bersama
Konon semua kerusi basah
Lalu ku perkenal diri
“Hi, Saya Afdlin, nama saudari?”

“Nama saya Nurhaliza
Datang dari Parit Buntar
Kalau ingin berkenalan, duduk bang dipersilakan”

CHORUS:
Aku lelaki, Ada keinginan semulajadi
Aku lelaki, Jangan daku dipersalahi
Daku dicipta begini

Hormon daku tak terkawal, ku tak jadi balik awal
Baik terus mengayatnya, mungkin ku dapat nombornya
Datang si penjual bunga, yang nampak kita berdua
“You want buy rose for your girlfriend ah?
Only fifty ringgit sure can ah”
Terus si Nur mengambilnya, aku tengok tak percaya
Daguku jatuh ke meja, di kocekku RM5
Oh mati diriku kini, control hensem pun tak jadi
Kartu kredit ku diberi, “Ahh already expired lah, Mr. Afdlin Shauki”

“Oh nama you Afdlin Shauki, penyanyi popular kini
Tapi bukankah you kini, sudah mempunyai isteri?”

This is the text of the Commencement address by Steve Jobs, CEO of Apple Computer and of Pixar Animation Studios, delivered on June 12, 2005.

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I’ve ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That’s it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: “We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?” They said: “Of course.” My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents’ savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn’t see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn’t interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn’t all romantic. I didn’t have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends’ rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn’t have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can’t capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, its likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn’t know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down – that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn’t see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple’s current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I’m pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn’t been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don’t lose faith. I’m convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: “If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you’ll most certainly be right.” It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: “If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?” And whenever the answer has been “No” for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure – these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn’t even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor’s code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you’d have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I’m fine now.

This was the closest I’ve been to facing death, and I hope its the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don’t want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life’s change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960’s, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: “Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.” It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much.

by Suzieana Uda Nagu (New Straits Times, 29 Oct 2006)

You do not need to know how to read musical notes to write songs. Just ask composer and producer Audi Mok.

“I never had any formal music education and I cannot read music,” says Mok, who has written and produced hit songs for local music industry’s heavyweights such as Ning Baizura, Ferhad, Jaclyn Victor, Vince Chong, Zahid and Radhi from OAG.

Even without music education, Mok has been composing songs since he was in school. At 18, one of his songs was selected for the solo album of the late Seha or Norsehah Abu Bakar, former lead singer of ‘80s group Freedom.

Writing songs fulfilled Mok but he never saw it as a potential career.

After finishing secondary school, he went to the United States to do business studies and worked for a software development company in Malaysia upon his return.

After three years, he left the company to set up his own business in the information technology field.

“But work was boring me to death so I started writing music again for fun,” he says.

Soon, one of the songs Mok wrote for Ferhad entitled Pernah became a chart-topper. That and other events which followed made Mok realise that making music truly made him happy.

“After Pernah, I was fortunate to have the support of Ahmad Izham Omar (then Positive Tone managing director) who gave me opportunities to showcase my talent. We did remixes for Innuendo and I also worked with (then upcoming) artistes such as Reefa.

“The experience boosted my confidence and gave me a sense of what the market needed. I also saw the areas in the industry which needed variety. From there, I became more active and involved in the music business,” says Mok, who recently wrote the original songs for Suki, Faizal and Alif, the three finalists of reality talent show One in A Million.

To Mok, knowledge of music is not the be all and end all of making good music. He believes that his lack of formal music education is an advantage and not a handicap.

For one, it has made him more open to unconventional ways of making music.

“I have had other (composers) tell me that I cannot use this or that chord. To me, music is all about the melody. It is not a technical process and we should not let knowledge of music limit our creativity,” he says.

Mok does not play any particular musical instrument so he creates his music using a computer.

“Technology has helped me transform my ideas into music. These days, people can create an entire album using computers. I think now is a liberating time for anyone to express themselves musically,” he adds.

As a composer, Mok requires a lot of patience and creativity.

“It is a challenge to convince people to like your work. So, I have to keep my music as well as my personality interesting.

“As for being a producer, you have to be a ‘people person’. This is important because you want the experience of working with an artiste to be pleasant. If you do things wrongly, the artiste may not want to work with you again,” says Mok, explaining that a producer is the person who arranges songs submitted by a composer and puts the final touches to an album.

Mok believes in understanding the personality of the artiste he is working with.

“It is not just about identifying their vocal ranges. Composers and producers must know the singer’s personal style in order to write songs that fit their characters. Songs that best suit the singer tend to do better on the charts.”

Mok advises budding songwriters and producers eager to break into the music industry to have a clear idea of what their brand of music is.

“To make it in the music scene, your product must be different and outstanding. So ask yourself these questions: why do you think you are a good composer and will it be easy for you to sell another ballad in this industry?

“Starting out is always tough, so never give up.”

* Audi Mok welcomes questions from budding songwriters and producers. He can be contacted at [email protected]

by Afdlin Shauki

I do so many things that sometimes I forget who I am. A quick peek into my wallet reveals that I have no money to buy my daughter’s pampers, as well as confirming that I am Afdlin Shauki the man. A quick peek at the poster of my debut album ‘FUUYO!’ on the wall of my office reveals that I am Afdlin Shauki the product. A funny, weird, big kid who loves entertaining people and making them happy. Being the man and the product under the same name however is not exactly a good thing for my personal life. People can find out where I live just by looking up the yellow pages, It’s almost impossible to get any privacy when you’re out and about with your family in public places, it’s easier for the income revenue services to find me (not insinuating that I am avoiding them!) and most tiring off all is I can never stop being Afdlin Shauki.

Ignorance of the workings of the entertainment industry, while I was younger, made me to choose my own name as my stage name. However, I cannot deny that to a certain extent, the uniqueness of my name has contributed to my success. I have yet to meet another person whose name is Afdlin Shauki and this makes me feel kind of special (like the kids in special ed). A great honor was bestowed upon me last year when a fan named their first born after me. Another Afdlin Shauki was born! That’s really wild. Who would have thought that a once insecure overweight boy from the DBKL flats could have reached the heart and minds of so many people, I sure didn’t. But life is funny like that.

Personally, I didn’t enjoy being a kid. My childhood seems like a big blur somehow. What I can remember is that, being the eldest; I had to take care of my younger siblings and become the man of the house. There was no time for fun and games and I had to take on a lot of responsibility early in life. Looking back, I guess I am the man I am today because of it and I am thankful.

As a grown up and being able to afford all the things my family couldn’t get me as a kid, I allowed myself to be a kid again, maybe to make up for the supposed lost years. I thought then that I could be a kid forever, but I soon found out that things would change, if you let it.

When I was in my late teens I thought I had a good grasp on what the world was all about. I was very brash and believed that I would never change any of my ideals and ideas about life. For example, being a music lover, I used to love clubbing and remember telling myself that I would still be clubbing even when I’m old and grey, with all my teeth fallen out and even when I’d have to use a walking stick to enamor my adoring public with my dazzling display of break dancing and Solid Gold inspired dance moves. What was I thinking? At present, clubbing doesn’t make any sense to me anymore.

Among my reasons for this are:

1. You can’t really enjoy yourself because they don’t play music anymore, just an eclectic mix of mind-numbing loops of ambient banging noises, which you can get without a RM35 cover charge, if you live next to a high-rise construction site, like I do.
2. The girls you want to try and pick-up are mostly there with their ever so affluent dates, sporting cars that you can only get to touch by flicking through the pages of your borrowed copy of the Malaysian Motor Trader, and the girls that are left are mostly semi-conscious or drugged up.
3. You somehow always end up smelling like you’ve just fallen into a huge ashtray and your clothes stink to high heaven.
4. The prospect of getting vomit on your good self isn’t as exciting as it used to be.
5. The clubs are mostly filled with oily men, (where are all the oily women? One wonders.)
6. We all look like the cast of Children of a lesser god (a movie about the deaf) when we try to have a conversation over the loud music.

Personally, I don’t think that my ideals have changed much but with all the knowledge and experiences that I have acquired within the last decade, I have formed some new, stronger ideals which now takes precedence over the previous, leaving them to be mere secondary objectives. I am a firm believer that people don’t change, but rather, they adapt to change. The older you get and if you open yourself to new experiences, the wiser you will be.

There is however a difference between growing older and getting wiser. At one point in my life I actually just did the former. I moved along in my life without opening myself to new experiences. My career had taken off; I had a great family, a nice apartment and a kickass car, in short, everything I ever dreamed of. That’s when it all happened. I became content with what I had, I lost my playfulness, I didn’t push myself to reach greater heights anymore, I stopped dreaming, my career which has always been a fine balance of fun and work, had now become just work and complacency became my best friend. In short, I had become bland. No longer the childish, fun loving crazy guy of old, the kid in me had disappeared.

I have always loved kids. Kids have an innocence that is quite endearing to me and I’m sure to many adults too. I guess that could be one of the main reasons why people open up to me so easily and are comfortable with my ramblings and quip comments, for to them, I am childish, a kid trapped in a grown ups’ body (And what a beautiful body it is too). And who’s to say I’m not. I take that as a compliment. I think the child’s mind is a wonderful thing, full of maybes, what ifs and most importantly whys. I often ask myself when was the time that I stop asking these questions, because then I would remember the first day I had stop growing and begin my journey into the great abyss called normality.

I believe I am a grown up kid because I still think like a kid. I am still constantly asking the questions. Still curious about the new things and stuff I have yet to encounter. I am not shy to make a fool of myself in the name of fun and experimentation, much to the horror of my wife and family members. I have learned that the only way to solve a problem is by facing it first; running away only prolongs the inevitable. For example, I’m sure many mamaks had to go through a bunch of pagoda t-shirts and suffered many minor third degree burns, before they finally mastered the art of tea pulling or teh tarik making. I have learnt that the only way to get my wife to stop nagging is to talk to her calmly and find out what’s bugging her. Yelling at her or pretending she isn’t there would only makes her nag twice as fast at a higher armor piercing pitch while hurling an inanimate object towards my person.

Jokes aside, my wife is my cauldron of strength and the love of my life. She provides balance in my life and grounds the man-child when he gets a bit out of hand. She is also the mother of my children, Mia Sara Shauki and Anais Shauki, who are like little cherubs that constantly bring me joy. Having children, I think, is the best thing that I have experienced in my life, second only to the actual act of making them.

I thank the almighty for blessing me with the two little reminders of what it is like to be free of the constraints of a mind which has been weathered down by experiences that closes it up and set certain beliefs based on the standards set by society. The kind, which says things like, fat, is ugly! And their idea of looking normal is to look like Brad Pitt or Heidi Klum. If you trained a dog often enough to play dead, eventually it will think that playing dead is a normal part of life. This is called conditioning.

I realize that the way I am is very closely related to my experiences in the past as certain habits were starting to form. Three years ago, after attending the Asiaworks Training program, an experiential self-awareness course, I realized that to move forward in life, we must forgive and let go of the shackles that hold us back in the past. Everyone says, “Aiiya, I know that already-laa!” and that they are familiar with the saying, but not many actually take any action to live by it. Unless you have actually experienced the feeling you get from letting go, I live it hence I am free.

Stuff:

1. 1/2 a bag of corkscrew macaroni
2. 1 can of tuna spread (Ayam brand)
3. 1/4 of a carrot stick
4. 1 small onion

Steps:

1. Cook that half bag of macaroni till al dente. Rinse with cold water when done and drain.
2. Slice that quarter of a carrot stick (about an inch and a half or so) and that small onion into fine slices.
3. Now mix them all (macaroni, carrot, onion and tuna spread) in a bowl until they’re all evenly coated.
4. Stash them in the nourishment storage server (otherwise known as a refrigerator) for a couple of hours (or if you’re like me, days) before consuming.
5. If it’s a bit bland for your liking, you can always splatter some Maggi chilli sauce or better still, some Arizona Hot Sauce. If all fails, nick a bottle of that Thai sauce from your nearby KFC outlet.
6. “Fresh Oren” can always be used to get that drama swasta effect.

Lagu: Johan Farid Khairuddin
Lirik: Omar Khan

Mengapa langit nan biru
Mengapa daun ‘kan gugur
Oh mengapa dunia kelam tanpa mentari
Mengapa bertahun lama kau pergi
Haruskah diri membenci
Namun hati terus rela menerima
Kedatanganmu

(Chorus)
Kau kembali
Membawa sinar cahya
Ayahanda
Kau pulangkan sinar mata di Bonda
Ayahanda
Kau terangi sudut hati yang kelam
Usahlah dikenang kisah yang lama lagi
Ayah, kau kembali

Ku ingin mendakapimu
Tapi langkah masih kaku
Namun aku
Teguh mengorakkan senyuman
Oh Ayah
Mengapa bukan dahulu
Kau hadir dalam hidupku
Ku keliru
Namun ingin sekali ku
Mengenalimu

Repeat chorus

(Bridge)
Tiada kata yang dapat ku gambarkan suasana
Pahit getir namun aku telah sedia
Untuk rela memaafkan seribu dosa lama
Dari hidup sesaat lagi tanpa mu
Oh Ayah

(Repeat chorus)

Original article from: Mukeh’s Website

1. Your father wears bush-jackets, sighs a lot, and has a heavily lipsticked secretary whose only purpose in life is to say, “Ini dia fail yang encik minta tadi.” (This is the file that you asked for.)
2. Your mother wears jewels around the house and is always asking you to “sabarlah” (be patient). At opportune moments she will worry that you’re not eating enough, place a hand on your forehead and say you need to see a doctor. You decline politely but firmly. You don’t quite trust your mother because she looks only five years older than yourself.
3. An entire conversation (encapsulating but not limited to introductions, exposition, and the dawning comprehension which come out of life-changing revelations) can be held while waiting for the lift to arrive in your 10-storey office building.
4. You spend an awful lot of time getting in and out of cars and putting on seat-belts.
5. You enjoy saying the most obvious things. When a bunch of relatives turns up at your doorstep with enough luggage to see them through another world war, you say, “Eh, dah sampai dah.” (Eh, you’re here). They somehow resist the temptation to say, “Nah, we’re just holograms.”
6. Shopping complexes not only offer you a dazzling array of commercial goods but have free Infidelity Checks. Hang around one long enough and you will find out whether your loved one is cheating on your sorry ass. You will spot the scumbag/tramp in an intimate moment with a third party as they share an ice-cream or leave a shoe-store. While you make this discovery the shopping complex will arrange for you to be hidden behind a convenient pillar.
7. Board meetings tend go very easily because only two out of the dozen people in the room ever have anything to contribute. The others exist only to nod furiously. This is understandable because they all look too young to know anything. The signal for a meeting to end is when your handphone goes off.
8. At cafes you only ever order “fresh orange” juice and when it arrives it will have a whole jungle of sprigs and twigs sticking out of it. The profuse vegetation between your mouth and the drink will frustrate any attempt to take large, comfortable gulps, so you merely sip. If the chat you are having at the cafe does not go well you can storm out after an average of two and a half sips, leaving the other person to pay for everything.
9. There are night-time moments along an alley-way when you will surrender to an inexplicable urge to get beaten up. You will know when the time comes because blue smoke will appear out of nowhere.
10. The proper protocol when visiting a hospital is to >pace restlessly up and down the corridor and then grab hold of the nearest white-coated specimen to demand, “Bagaimana keadaan dia, doktor?” (“How’s s/he doing, doctor?”) You will persist in this line of questioning even after he patiently explains that it is too soon to tell. You don’t suspect the guy of being an imposter even though he seems awfully young to be a doctor.
11. Hands are an important guide to character. You know who your enemies are because they always crack their knuckles loudly before summoning the blue smoke. You know who your friends are because they always snap their fingers and say “Alright!” when you come up with some bright idea.
12. Your surroundings frequently come alive to the sound of muzak.

by Raja Fernaliz Raja Harris University of Warwick

Original article appeared in The Sunday Star on September 12, 1999.

No, I’m not talking about long-distance learning, a growing trend in higher education today. I mean relationships, and romantic ones specifically. While other students studying abroad might feel obliged to tell you about choosing the right university or just generally about life abroad, I’ve decided to take to share an aspect that is close to my heart. Relationships. Yes, the ones that go on between the two sexes. Or if you prefer, even the ones that go on between people of the same sex.

I remember that sultry afternoon in August 1997 when I was at the airport sending my boyfriend Wan off to the US. He was going for two-and-a-half years, while I was set to go to England for three years. We had been an item for little more than a year. Emptiness, desolation, a sense of being abandoned–these feelings washed over me in a blur. It was surreal, but the day we’ve dreaded for months had finally arrived.

Shakespeare sums it up so beautifully, “Parting is such sweet sorrow.” I’d promised Wan that I’d be brave. Quivering chin and all, I tried my best to stop the tears. After all, what’s a little distance? We’d have the telephone, the e-mails and letters. I was pretty sure that a couple of good old-fashioned letters would make me feel better.

But I caved in as soon as he started to say his goodbyes to his family. I couldn’t help it. My brother swears I didn’t cry as much when my cat died when it was unfortunate enough to position itself in the path of the car as my father was backing out of the garage. The cat was as flat as a pancake, but I didn’t cry as much as I did that day at the airport.

Those farewells were said just over two years ago. I’ve survived and live to tell the story. And contrary to popular belief, long-distance isn’t as bad as some people make it out to be. It’s just been subject to bad press, probably the exaggerations of the jilted lover. Like normal relationships, a long-distance one can either fail or succeed. To fail in this type of relationship is taking the easy way out, succeeding in one is the real challenge.

Judging from my own ups and downs of the past two years, I have developed a list of criteria for long-distance relationships that work. To do so, the relationship must match at least two of the first three on this list (item four is a must):

• BEHAVE like responsible adults. Be mature. Childish behaviour like extreme jealousy is a big no-no.
• HAVE a firm foundation. Is your relationship based on friendship and genuine affection or just the fact that you think he or she is cute?
• HAVE open communication. Do tell the other person what you expect, what your limits are. Outline the basis of your relationship clearly.
• RESOLVE to make it work. Do you both want it to work? That’s the real question.

The advantages (yes, you read that right) of a long-distance relationship, drawing from my own, do exist. It served as motivation to save up for a ticket to cross the Atlantic. I’ve been to America twice since I’ve been in England and covered the East Coast.

While he’s been over here, we’ve visited interesting places in the country and in France and Italy. If we were studying in the same place, we might not have the means to travel as much in two separate continents.

And another one, which I think scares most people out of their wits, although they’d rather not admit it, is the fact that a relationship like this is a good test of commitment. Distance weeds out the unfaithful among us and tests the endurance of true love.

Problems definitely start even before you leave. Some of us are just so wrapped up in preparations, special dinners or kenduri with relatives and friends (and relatives’ friends and friends’ relatives), last-minute runs to the corner shop for some forgotten spices and so on, we often overlook one of the most precious people in our lives.

Preparation is important, I admit, but making your significant other feel significant in your time of major transition is imperative if you want to establish a positive long-distance relationship.

When you first get to university, you would inevitably feel lonely, possibly even a little lost. That’s normal, you’d feel just as lost at a local university. I was quite distressed when I didn’t see a familiar face for the better part of my first week here.

I was meeting new people, trying to get things in perspective and living on my own. I was friends with the outrageously fun-loving Brits on my corridor before the week was out. It’s understandable that you won’t have the time to keep in touch with anyone from home in the first week or so. Make this clear to your partner before you go to avoid the invariably hysterical You’ve-found-someone-else confrontation.

Then there’s the how-many-times-a-week-on-the-telephone agreement to be sealed between the two of you. Be reasonable, agree on days or times to call and stay within your budget. There’s no use running a huge overdraft to pay for a massive phone bill. You could just as well spend all that money on a ticket home for Christmas. Or go on that European backpacking trip you’ve been dreaming of ever since you can remember–together. And appeal to your partner’s sense of flexibility. That’s to avoid the You’ve-been-out-all-night-with-another-bloke-and-forgot-to-call-me fight.

A cheaper option to calls would be the Internet, that wonderful technological invention that’s been one of the major factors that I’ve not jumped on the single bandwagon when faced with the challenge of distance. There are chat rooms where you can chat for as long as you like without breaking the bank. Do make use of e-mails to communicate as well, they’re almost as good as letters.

Having said that, I do treasure something tangible like the cards and letters I get in the post. Nothing replaces the feeling you get holding a piece of something he had thoughtfully written for your pleasure. And nothing tops an I-miss-you-much card he has sent simply because he misses you.

Choose your words carefully. The strain of being apart and not seeing each other for a long time may result in the both of you reading too much in a few spoken or even worse, written words. I remember the spectacular fights we’ve had in chat rooms and over the phone because I over-analysed the things my poor unsuspecting boyfriend said. He swore that he didn’t mean it like I had interpreted it.

Most of the time, I’m sure he’s telling the truth. But I just can’t help it. It’s the distance, the frustration of being so close yet so far over the phone lines. When he forgets to mention just how much he misses you it doesn’t mean he doesn’t, so don’t start the You-don’t-miss-me-so-you-are-over-me argument just yet. The obvious need not be said all the time, although it’s nice to hear it once in a while (read everyday).

Getting too carried away with preserving a relationship has to be the silliest thing you can do. Do not go to extremes and make unreasonable demands on each other. You’ll wear each other out long before you graduate. The idea is to love and be loved in return, don’t let that turn into something ugly with petty arguments that are blown out of proportion into a bitter quarrel.

Learn to let go. This has to be the hardest bit I have had to learn but the fact that Wan has a separate life from mine was quite unbearable at first. You have to accept the reality that you’ll have separate sets of friends and he might go out with other people while you’re not there. Having fun does not have to include you, so accept that graciously and make sure you go out and have fun too. Set your limits. Some couples are exclusive while some work better in an “open” relationship, although I doubt I’d be able to digest the latter. Different couples have different ideas and priorities, make sure both of yours don’t greatly differ.

Try to earn money part-time. This is your passport to seeing each other often. Part-time jobs are lucrative over in Britain and the United States, so do try to get a weekend job. I estimate that working six weekends for 16 hours pays for a ticket home, and I’m not joking. You could set it aside for a holiday to wherever that tickles your fancy. Going on holiday with a group of friends is great, especially if he is there with you too.

Finally, don’t set out thinking it won’t work. I thought mine wouldn’t and I am ashamed to admit it. It’s the thought that you’ll be apart that drives most people crazy. I know it drove me crazy. Once you’re apart it’s easier to deal with.

Give it a chance, it might just work for you as it has for me. My friends are amazed at how well everything has turned out for me. Who am I kidding? Even I’m amazed!

In a funny way, I think being apart has actually been very healthy for our relationship. It’s made us focus on the best things about each other and we’ve dealt with the tough times by learning to communicate our thoughts, fears and hopes so well to each other. So for those of you in a long-distance relationship, don’t despair, be strong for it can turn out to be an exceedingly rewarding experience. Isn’t love supposed to conquer all?

by Nungsari A Radhi

(Article originally appeared in Malaysiakini, Sunday July 22, 2001)

The universities have found themselves in the limelight of late, mostly for the wrong reasons. The wrong reasons have also focused on the wrong things that are ailing our campuses.

Discussions of these issues made me recall my undergraduate days at a typical mid-western university in the United States (US) during the late 1970s. I was one of the fortunate ones who won a scholarship to study overseas. It was a fun and difficult time, being thrown into a foreign country at 18 after the tightly controlled environment in Malaysia.

As with most universities in the US, there is a daily campus newspaper – a rather extensive student-run newspaper manned mostly by the journalism majors on campus. The campus community depends on the daily for information and news about the going-ons on campus as well as a sprinkling of local and international news.

Once there was a, probably well-intentioned, editorial on the lives of international students. Among others the piece focused on the social life, or rather the lack of it, of international students.

Things like isolation and not being invited to parties and all that came with them during the weekends. Somehow, the Malay machismo in me took it as an affront to all able-bodied, hot-blooded Malaysian males on campus.

As trivial as it seems, I was energised enough to write a long response. As if that was not enough, I also solicited as many signatures I could get from people who shared my sentiments. The honor of Malaysians was at stake here – these condescending Americans are implying we cannot get dates on weekends and end up among ourselves watching TV! How improperly truthful their allegations were!

Jingoistic explosion

I did a lot of other non-academic activities when I was an undergraduate, some of which I would rather not share with the public, but they remain etched in my memory and form the most memorable part of those years. They were certainly more memorable than constructing splines or computing Fourier transforms.

Lest people get the impression I was only concerned about trivial things, let me also share an experience where I actually was driven by nationalistic pride of a different, perhaps more substantial, kind.

Once, I was so emotionally disturbed by all the negative news on Malaysia – it was the height of the Vietnamese boat people saga – and the endless heated discussions I had in my sociology class that I wrote an article titled ‘The Rape of My Motherland’, a jingoistic explosion of nationalistic pride. I must have sounded very Third World-like, but who cared?

Unlike those who ended up in politics, I was not actively involved in students’ associations or political activities which would have made me OK by our present standards. I was, however, busy making all sorts personal statements in rebellion against anything Establishment. A rebel with too many causes. Had I been a student at University Malaya (UM) today, I might have gotten myself into real trouble!

Instead of joining the Malaysian students association, I decided to launch a new association because the existing one was just too bland, populated by colorless individuals. That failed miserably, so I decided to get into this ‘creationism versus evolution’ debate after attending a public debate on campus on the subject.

How I was torn between my religious convictions which pulled me towards the creationist camp and my own sense of inquiry, that is a result from my learning, which pulled me in the opposite direction.

There were also a lot of other memorable moments like the 1980 US Presidential Election between Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan. I fancied myself a Democrat and got really involved in the elections.

Enduring passion

Of course, I had to also study, hard sometimes, to pass my exams and graduate. It was through the classroom that I learned my mathematics enough to graduate in the subject and proceed to graduate studies in the same subject. That I am Malay, supposedly not endowed with the capacity to do mathematics, did not really cross my mind.

I did not have to listen to the kinds of gibberish we hear nowadays. The subject I chose also colored me as a person as well. By the time I was done with my studies, the idea of a perfect evening was candlelight dinner, a can of Coke and a nice theorem! It was too late to realise that girls did not go for mathematics majors, except mathematics majors who were girls.

Sure, I was not around during the colonial days, but I had to suffer the indignities of being discriminated as well when I was there. Just because I was not the same. Sort of put things in perspective but I never developed a racist view of race relations.

I learned to look at individuals as individuals. Age and experience has taught me that individuals, even those of your own race, can do more serious things than just discriminate against you.

What is the point of all this nostalgia? Exactly that. They are the fond recollections of an over- forty-year-old man. Of the time when he was an undergraduate in university – a young adult discovering himself and learning about life and himself.

My skills as a human being, beyond the specific knowledge of my study area, were honed during that period. I learned to manage my own affairs, deal with people, relationships and situations, and discovered the wealth of knowledge.

It was then that I developed a view of the human condition and the enduring passion for some issues. I would like to think I was educated, not merely trained.

Control freaks

Students must be allowed to learn, for they are students for only a limited period of their lives. After the study years, everyone will be burdened with responsibilities and the real world. I am today a father and husband who has to worry about work, mortgage payments, bills and the future of my children.

The idealism and innocence of youth is the nation’s treasure. Their activism must not be constrained along partisan lines.

The process of learning is more than just grades and what occurs in the classroom. With a six-course load, a student spends only eighteen hours a week in lectures and tutorials. The rest of the time is spent living, and learning as well. The broader process of education.

So what if a student is driven by his convictions to believe in something? So what if that something is against the existing powers that be? Should not politicians of all stripes be given a chance to expound their views on campus so that they may compete in the marketplace of ideas?

So that they are forced to properly articulate their views beyond rhetoric. The ignorance and innocence of students do not make them easy crowds but therein lies the challenge. Those in the game of influence should relish the challenge.

What kind of adults are we producing if our university students are merely kiasu types who selfishly worry about their grades, their livelihood, their successes, their lives, their future, and their problems; theirs and theirs only. What about compassion, sacrifice and the sense to serve the nation and make a difference?

There was a period in my life when I was a lecturer at a local university. For some ten years, more than fifteen years ago. What control freaks we, Malaysians, seemed to be. Local universities treat young adults, twenty-year old freshmen, like school kids.

We love uniformity and implement measures to prevent deviations. And we wonder why our graduates lack imagination, confidence, initiative and a sense of independence. It saddens me to read the kind of stuff that comes out from our so-called senior educationists. The lack of academic leadership at our campuses. The vulgarisation of the idealism of learning.

Real enemy

It is therefore a sad day that the Internal Security Act (ISA) has to be used against our students. A law from the legacy of the communist insurgency used against our own children. As a parent, a teacher and a citizen, I am deeply saddened that the most draconian of the nation’s laws is used against the future leaders of the nation.

Shame unto all. Shame on us all. We have indeed failed, but the authorities have, by their action in arresting these students for supposed threats to internal security, acknowledged their own failures.

If anybody cares about the universities, they should instead worry about the lack of space for students to grow and learn on campus. These have nothing to do with whether students are sympathetic with a particular political view.

We have to learn to live with our differences. Those differences are part of the national treasure, not a curse. I am a believer in that we have lived with ourselves throughout these years. The present generation has also managed to exorcise some of the ghosts that haunted our older generations.

The Malaysian house is a bigger place to wander about since previously forbidden, haunted places are now accessible. My worry is that the big house is increasingly housing sectarian rooms occupied by those who lack the courage and confidence to go beyond the comforts of familiarity.

As a father I sometimes wonder how I am going to let my daughters go, when the time comes. Nevertheless, I know I have to do it – it is their turn at living their lives. Their futures here on earth are longer than mine. I have to let go.

I can only comfort myself that I have done the best to provide them with the tools to survive. But I will forever love them, and if they go about doing some silly things, I will not blame their upbringing or their genes. They are me.

As the great Indonesian writer, Pramoedya Ananta Toer, said, we are not living in heaven. There will always be problems here on this earth. Maybe we should just look at the problem squarely in the eyes. Maybe the real enemy is us.

— DR NUNGSARI A RADHI is a father of two daughters whose futures he had in mind when writing this piece. Despite doing many things, he stills think of himself as a teacher foremost, his first profession.