26 January 2020

Unless you’ve been living under a rock these past week, the deadly Wuhan coronavirus is the hottest topic and news being debated online right now. As expected, many Malaysians especially the pro-opposition type is going mental about the alleged lack of preventive measures taken by the government to contain the spread of the disease. We are already restricting access for travellers from Wuhan but still man are calling for blanket bank which does not work anyway.

Curious, did u read the whole report? It says most are modelling, not observational & not recommended for pandemic control. Which means, it doesn’t work. https://t.co/lru38LzDhm pic.twitter.com/PwsurQP0HX

— Yoong (@yoongkhean) January 26, 2020

Instead of thinking rationally and trusting the medical professionals at the ministry to do their work, they were quick to be racially prejudiced against Chinese nationals. This is unmistakably the side effect of being racist towards chinese people in general which is usually associated with the DAP party. Imagine if the roles are reversed, a deadly contagious disease is found in Malaysia and citizens of foreign countries started to demand blanket bans on Malaysians from entering their country. Wouldn’t be nice right? Imagine if you a Malaysian, infected by the virus on a flight to some country and instead of getting treatment at arrival, they stop you at the airport and send you back on a 12 hour flight back to Malaysia. Sucks right? So whenever you feel like demanding something stupid against somebody, just think first if that were to happen to you.

To make matters worse, some were quick to associate this virus as a punishment from God against the Chinese government for their treatment of ethnic Xinjiang people. Funny thing is, this virus has already started to affect citizens of Xinjiang themselves so that accusation sounded pretty stupid right about now. You simply cannot associate any diseases or natural disasters within a particular community or state as wrath of God. The Acheh tsunami disaster which killed over 200,000 people struck a particularly religious part of the country. Did the Achenese incur the wrath of God as well?

The Saudi MERS coronavirus caused 375 deaths. No a peep from people to ban Arabs from coming here or any cries to halt hajj and umrah to their cities. Selective discrimination much?

10 January 2020

This year my company has decided to combine the annual Christmas dinner along with the annual dinner and possibly Chinese New Year. The venue - Botanica and Co near Bangsar South (a.k.a Pantai Dalam). The theme - Sequins, Glam & Glitter. They let us go home early for the dinner, about half an hour early. However since the dinner starts after 6:30PM, I was left hanging around Low Yat Plaza until 6:00PM. Can’t hang out at the office cause boss is around.

We had delicious food, free-flowing drinks, raffles and party games. Half the time I was thinking of my bike parked at the dispatch parking, wondering whether they have clamped it. From a dozen IT staff in the company for both campus, only 4 showed up. This is not uncommon, we rarely got enough quorum at every gathering. I don’t know whether they’re anti-social or have other commitments, it is disheartening nevertheless. I left the party right after they did the last raffles. No need to mention my luck with that.

1 January 2020

Welcome to the start of the new decade. I wanna say time flies but I cannot really say that because some time early in this decade I felt like time grinds to a halt. At other times, time does fly, especially at the later stage of the decade. When I’ve settled down with my current job and devote most of my time to my family.

What’s my resolution for this new year, new decade? Like many people lose weight of course. I know I’ve ballooned myself between my ideal weight to currently mild obesity. Time to put a stop to that like seriously. Starting January 1st, I’m turning myself into a semi-vegetarian. Over the years, I learned the fastest way to lose weight and be healthy is to reduce meat intake in your menu. I would highly recommend you watch The Game Changers documentary on Netflix or wherever. It's a real eye-opener.

Being a vegetarian/vegan in a world of meat eaters is easier said than done. The first two weeks proved to be quite challenging. Most days I only managed to reduce my meat intake to half. Fully vegetarian meals? Only occasionally. I could have gone fully vegetarian if the vegetarian shop is nearby and easily accessible and the food is affordable. Presently I’m not willing to spend more than 7-8 ringgit per meal like I usually spend for lunch. That said, my wife tries her best to cook as many vegetarian food as she can but you know how they don’t last long and usually I’m left with chicken and egg. Besides, I hate to bother my wife to cook a separate vegetarian meal all the time. Let’s hope this fad last longer than it used to.

Here’s to a productive and happy decade.