From virtual to true friends

Used to be that making friends through the world wide web would simply gives me goose bumps. In fact, I've lived with this notion that people are not really who they truly are on the other side of the virtual world. Most of what is said on the net are either purely made-up, or tweaked to suit the user's imaginary thoughts. Which explains why I refused to chat or interact with strangers on the net.



But that all changed when I logged on to Yahoo! Answers Malaysia (which we fondly called it YAM, which I will get to it later).



It all started when I was seeking for answers for a matter which by now I couldn't recall what it was. I think it was two years or so ago. Yahoo! Answers came up, clicked on it and thought, not bad. Some of the answers were live and direct. Most of the answers given were crappy while some can really be very useful. After much browsing and clicking and answering as well as posting questions, I finally arrived to the Malaysia section (in the Travel/ Asia Pacific/ Malaysia section). Though its in the Travel category, I can assure you that none of the questions posted are related to Travel. And it is more like a chat forum than it is a Q&A session.



After few postings here and there, I got hooked. And I'm not ashamed to admit that I had fun and had become a regular. I made a lot of friends from all parts of the country and we even had one regular hailed all the way from Britain and the Philippines. And some also became my "enemy". Eventually, some of us who had developed a "cliqued" unofficially called ourselves the Yammers. We even created a Facebook group by that name consist of the regulars who, like myself, grew out of Y!am and eventually stopped visiting the site.



The Yammers continued to communicate via Facebook and its about time that we decided to meet up. We discussed and we planned and eventually, we met. There was only five of us ladies and thought that maybe the guys were a bit too shy to meet up. I was a bit nervous and don't know what to expect from the meeting but I have to say, it was all well worth it. We spent hours talking and giggling and there was never a stranger feeling to it at all. It felt as if we had been friends for ages.



That was a precursor to a good and hopefully a lasting friendship and decided to do it more often. That was when we decided to call on more Yammers to join in and chose a bowling tournament as a fun reason to gather and get to know each other outside the virtual world.

As the picture shows, that's me (white shirt holding the red ball) and some of the Yammers having a ball of a time at Alamanda Putrajaya Bowl. Some brought their boyfriends, husbands and children along and just like the first meeting, we never felt awkward with each other at all. We were like long-lost friends who had a hell of a good time. We had gifts-exchanging activities and later, dinner at Alamanda food court.
(Picture from left: Yantie, Ayn holding her daughter Aira, Suraya and boyfriend, me, Akma, Gigi, Zeeda, Mastura, Borhan)

Looking back, I have to say that I am glad that I clicked on to Yahoo! Answers (Malaysia). I had fun interacting (and quarelling also) and most of all, I made new friends.

What turns these sexual predators on?

I'm trying to find a logic here. How is it that a father can ever rape his own daughter? It seems that this sickening trend has been making waves and splashed all across the newspapers. Even after reading so many stories on them, I just still couldn't comprehend other than feeling utterly disgusted.

It was only recently that I read about a father who had sexually assaulted and raped his 16-year-old daughter since the girl was 12. The daughter would have suffered in silence if it wasn’t for her mother who had detected semen stains on the poor girl’s clothes and the confrontation with the daughter. The poor girl broke down and had to spill the truth to her mom even telling her that daddy had threatened her if she were ever to tell a living soul about his sick trysts with his daughter. Imagine if the mother hadn’t bothered to question her daughter. The father would have probably continue to rape her or worse, impregnate his own flesh and blood. Just like what happened to another teenager whose predicament was far beyond anyone’s imagination.

Now this girl was just like any other school-going teenager where having lunch with friends at the school court yard is interlaced with gossips and incessant drooling over the latest heart-throb. And when all her friends are practically running to the waiting school busses or screaming in joy towards their parents who have been patiently waiting to pick up their children from school, this teenage girl was dreading to go home. For what’s waiting for her at home is a sex predator waiting to devour the innocence out of this 15-year-old woman. And the beast is no other than her own father.

It was reported that the girl had been suffering in silence since she was 12-years-old. Her father, who is a 45-year-old lorry driver had probably started out by molesting his daughter before going out on a full fledged raping. And when his appetite grew stronger, he thought that it would be okay if he could share his daughter with his 52-year-old plumber friend. The father would repeatedly rape her in their house while his sick friend will do it at other locations.

Her predicament went on for another 3 years when she finally got pregnant. It didn’t say who impregnated her but she was well in her seventh month when the girl finally told her aunt about the whole saga. Imagine her aunts horror to learn that her brother or brother in-law had raped his own daughter and even shared her with his old friend. However shocked and disgusted the aunt was, it was nothing close to the trauma and pain that her niece had went through. Its sadder to gauge that the minor is now heavily pregnant planted by an unlawful, unwanted seed. Giving up school is one thing but the lifetime trauma that’s weighing on her is too much to bear. Even us adults find it difficult to comprehend such a situation, let alone for a young girl of 15.

This is not an isolated case. There are other similar cases which is even harder for us to digress. What do these sex predators see in their prey especially if the target is their own daughter? How can you ever get turned on by your own child? Even animals would go all out to protect its brood and yet we have people like these who thinks its some kind of a fetish, a kinky adventure of doing something that are against the norms.

Who’s to blame. Childhood upbringing? Porno DVDs? Drugs and alcohol? Or just plain sickos. Its no wonder that incest and child rapist get beaten up when they are locked up in jail. Even some hardcore criminals couldn’t condone such acts committed by these animals. Its about time that these sexual offenders get what they deserve as punishment: death.

There is absolutely no point of jailing them and nourish them with free taxpayers food. These are psychotic criminals and it is more than likely that they’ll do it again if they are released. I don’t give a hoot if a bunch of human rights activist screams in justice to abhor such punishment because if they do, I’ll shove them the young victims right in their faces and ask them if its right for these girls to live with the scars for their whole entire existence.

NEW CABINET LINE-UP IS NOT SO NEW

I was gluing myself to the news this evening eagerly to learn of the PM, Datuk Seri Najib spilling out the new cabinet line-up.

There was much brouhaha about who's in and who's out in the line-up. Every one was talking about it and I was not exempted from giving my own guess of who would be chosen and who would be kicked out. I was told that even punters out there were busy making a beeline at their usual joints, betting on who would take the position of a second Finance Minister and what not. Go to any mamak stalls and you're bound to eavesdrop on few conversations regarding Najib's so-called major overhaul. Great anticipation but little or no information. It was, by far, Najib's deliberate intentions. He wanted it to be discreet until the April 9 when he will disclose the much awaited news.

So there I was, glued myself to Buletin Utama with high hopes that this new PM can really awe the people with his so-called 'fresh faces' line-ups.

But I was left disappointed.

Only God knows what he meant by 'fresh faces'. All I see was the same old faces holding different positions. Except for the consolidation of few ministries, the line-up failed to awe me. I was surprised that Khairy Jamaluddin did not get any ministerial post despite the fact that he was chosen as the Youth Chief. So what if he was allegedly involved in money politics. Give me one politician who is clean from money politics and I'll show you what a tight slap means. Khairy (or KJ as he is fondly known) may be a bit cocky but let's not deny that Umno needs young guns in their administration. I am no fan of KJ but we can't overlook his presence in this funny world they call politics. His only mistake was making a hard entrance which just doesn't seem to strike the right chord to some 'veterans', minus the fact that he is the former PM's son-in-law so people have this notion that he was there because he was a somebody. But Hishamuddin Tun Hussein was a somebody also but did it matter to anyone? Truthfully, I rather bet my dime on KJ to lead than Hishamuddin.

*Sigh*

Anyhow... the cabinet line-up has been disclosed. KJ was sidelined. Even his deputy get to be a deputy minister. Even Mukhriz Mahathir gets a deputy minister's role despite the fact that he lost the Youth Chief seat to KJ. So it was a great surprise for me when KJ did not get any minister post at all. Either he's not qualified for it professionally or 'they' just hate him.

I guess we are still long way ahead towards the change that the government tirelessly shout about. To me, what change? Obama's change, yes. Our change? No. If change to them is recycling the same old faces albeit different ministerial post, then I think our government is retarding the nation's growth and should just stop yapping about change this and change that.

I reiterate... I am so bloody disappointed.

Rihanna: To come or not to come?

Hmm... it seems that another super duper concert might get cancelled. I'm talking about Rihanna's much awaited concert which was supposedly to kick off this Friday. The organisers says that its a mere postponement and urged ticket buyers to hold on to their tickets until further notice. But if you read the news about what happened to Rihanna and her abusive boyfriend Chris Brown, it's most likely that she would just had to cancel the whole thing off. She even cancelled her Grammy appearances what more with a concert in a country where she's probably not sure how to spell.

This is not the first case of international artists cancelling their appearances in this little country. If I can recall, David Copperfield had to cancel his show due to some alleged FBI investigations. Peter Cetera had to cancel his also due to reasons that we have no knowledge of. And who could ever forget the much publicised Kings of Tennis fallout? Mariah Carey almost axed herself from coming here all because the authorities asked her to dress decently. She came eventually but boycotted by wearing only one boring attire. Stupid ass... that's what she is. And now Ms Rihanna postponement? With a case she's in right now? I think cancellation is in the brink.

But for thousands of Malaysian fans out there who have been waiting for this golden moment, I hope Rihanna would do the right thing. Good thing I'm not into concerts and Rihanna otherwise I wouldn't be spared from the disappointment.

Ayo... not another election!

The state of Perak has fallen into BN's hands again....yadi yadi yada.... It's big news. I'd say it's huge. For some who only gave a wee blink to Malaysian politics will just consider the whole things as "duh" but for the other lot (me included) will probably spent the whole day at coffee shop talking about it incessantly.

I couldn't say that I'm glad of how things came out for Perak. Though I was not born in Perak, my parents are. I wish I don't have to take sides but somehow, we all know that the longevity of PKR's ruling over one of the largest state of the country is shortlived. The current MB is known more as a puppet than a ruler. His hands are tied and his movements are binded by his DAP counterparts. Nizar need not to deny this as even school children can tell that he can be quite an idiot himself. Poor guy but he should have known this coming and he was given the power to change both the state and himself when he was elected as the state's MB but he failed big time at doing so. You only get one big chance and he'd blew it.

But Nizar is the small issue here. The big one is the act of the 2 ADUN members who frogged out from PKR to BN. Then few others follow suit. Everyone smelled bribery but their actions has left the state's DUN to be short numbered thus a calling for disbandment and a new state general election is deemed necessary.

Again, this country will have to bear witness to another election. It seems that the March 8 last year's general election did not managed to put anyone at ease at all especially to the losing party, BN. We've just finished with Terengganu's by-election and BN lost again. And now Perak's election.

It seems that the government is busy raking power than focusing on the people's plight and the looming economic recession. People are losing jobs by the minute and crime is on the rise, but it seems that planting their seeds of power at every constituencies is more pivotal than the cries of the people.

This country has lost its glory that's for sure. Gone are the days when our fore fathers can think of nothing but to bring change and improvement to the country. They eat and sleep for the people. They fought and die for the people. But nowadays, things are shifting in reversal mode. The people have to fight and die for the leaders to be able to eat and sleep well.

I tell you folks, I have no bloody clue as to whom should I be casting my penny worth vote for the next general election. No freakin' clue...

REASONS TO CROAK ABOUT


Frogging is the new buzz in this small country called Malaysia. We are referring it to some MPs who thinks frogging is the new trend. Jumping from one party to another has not only becoming the fashion but is also creeping up on a lot of people's nerves. Especially to the loyal voters who have voted for their favourite rep only to be rewarded with a major disappointment.

I have to ask, what is it with this bunch of dimwits who calls themselves state reps? The idea is so very simple. You think you can change and improve your people's lives and so you signed up and later contested. People buy your story and thus voted for you HOPING that change will come as promised. Little did the poor people know, the politician jumped party just because few things doesn't come his way in his present part or most likely, he was bribed by the other party to join them. For whatever reason, only they themselves and God can only tell.

I'm beginning to feel that election is fast becoming useless so long this frogging persist. People's votes has been betrayed and don't blame us if we start to distrust our very own government. There's no such thing as chivalry in governance. When they talked about making frogging illegal, are they just croaking around or do they really mean it? It should be made illegal not for the party's integrity only but for the country's overall governance as a whole.

I'm beginning to feel that it was never about the people. It's about money and power.

And maybe they can add the award for who will be knighted as the slimiest toad in Malaysian political history.

Bush's Goodbye Gift

Here's what I think. I believe that Israel couldn't have chosen a better time to conjure up the demon in them when they invaded Gaza and kill innocent Palestinians along the way. However way you look at it, you just can't dismiss the fact that the demonic invasion points back to the Bush's administration. When Cheney repeatedly denied that Israel asked for their approval for the attacks, I'd say, bollocks! You see, the President-elect Barack Obama will take the seat on January 20 and this is what I think. I think that Israel decided to go all out and invade Gaza while Bush is still in power because they worry that Obama would exercise a different stance with the Jewish country and probably might quash their diabolical plans. In a way also this is probably Bush's way of saying goodbye. He has war under his legacy and it doesn't hurt to add one more and what better way than to have Israel as its idiotic proxy to do it. Bush has already lay the grounds for Israel after he had dismantled Iraq and killed Saddam and now Israel is safe to invade Gaza.



No one knows what Obama has in store when it comes to international relations. Including Israel I presume. So that's why the Zionist might as well go ahead with their long time yearning to oust and kill the Palestinians and invade Gaza altogether. Hamas was just a bystanding issue to legitimize the attacks. There's no point in pointing fingers to neither Israel nor the Hamas over who's the terrorist in this matter. If Hamas hadn't act on behalf of the Palestinians then I wouldn't know who would. The Arab league is dumb as usual while the OIC is just using its "oh-I-see" attitude. Maybe they are only good at throwing shoes.



I hope that Obama can do something to help the Palestinians for a change. Besides, who could ever forget the “Change We Need” motto which has garnered him incredible support from people across the United States and to which has secured him the President’s chair. Just make sure that the change just doesn’t stop in his home country but throughout the global economic and political avenue as well. And I’m hoping that he can bring change, if not peace for the Palestinians.



And to the Israel government… go to hell.