what the hell?

cheddar cheddar cheddar!! that's all I see nowadays in supermarkets.. carrefour, giant, the store, isetan, cold storage all selling nothing but cheddar.. come on.. it's on the only cheese there is in the world.. who buys all these cheddars anyway?

and why is retails outlets keep stocking up cheddar? what there's going to be a flood of white bread later this year and we need all the cheddar we can get to clear the bread?

or

are you all trying to kill us lactose-intolerent-malaysian with your high lactose cheddars... Die you and your cheddarness!!!

damn you people.... let me have my ROMANO!

oh yeah and petrol pice up 30 cents today, 30 FUCKING cents... 15% increase... I'm sure the government is going to use all that money saved from petrol subsidy to make sure our biggest cities is flood-proof. No? damn! who elected these people!

Langkawi pics and video up an a short while.. still playing with my coppermine picture gallery installation.

Back from Langkawi..

This was the view from the balcony of our beach challet in langkawi..
Below is a short video of our Eagle Feeding Trip for your preview

More pics and videos coming up soon.. let me catch up with KL time first ok :)

Send that rubbish back to the kitchen!

Ok, this reminds me of a rather recent terrible experience I had at American Chilies Restaurant at Mid Valley Megamall.. Don't worry, I was not fed rubbish there.. just that my order of ribs became a piece of rubber!. The portion looks minuscule not because it's a smaller portion, but because the meat had shrunk due to excessive heat.. mangsa kebakaran!

I didn't want to be such a fuss but I'm not paying RM 45.95 for a piece of crap on a warm plate. I called up the waiter and asked for the manager. A nice malay lady came over to our table and apologize profusely upon seeing what I was trying in vain to cut with my dinner utensils..

I was offered a replacement dish, but with munchkins half way through her favourite steak, I just opted for the same steak that she was having... Who cares, my evening was destroyed.. I was in no mood to eat but I was so hungry having no meal all day long.. so I decided to wait for the replacement dish anyway.

Here's where American Chilies won me over again. From my table I could see the manager herself brought my dish back to the kitchen, talked to one of the kitchen staff and WAITED at the kitchen entrance until the dish is complete some 15 minutes later.

She personally took them to my table and get me a new pair dinner utensils. She waited by the table to make sure that I was happy with the dish, with a friendly smile all the way. The steak was done nicely, medium, just like I ordered it.

American Chillies, the food quality maybe going down the crapper but the service is still top notch in my book.

PAU-blish responsibly, please..

I was forwarded an email today by a friend that seems to imply that the local Pau Manufacturer Pau Ahmad is actually produced by chinese and named after the Company's driver.. OH THE OUTRAGE!!! Especially because it's about the food that we eat, our halal and haram concerns..

You can do a search and see a lot of places on the net that this email/ article is posted by webmasters/ contributors. What's even more scary than the possible fact that Pau Ahmad (that I had on numerous occasions while on the road) could be non-halal is that how we, malay, muslim community would spread news without even consider validating the piece of news/ information first.

The article about Pau Ahmad looks like it was written by somebody who went with a Dato (which Dato'?) and an Ustaz Ridzuan (which Ustaz Ridzuan?) to the place where they produce the said food item and found that it is being being run by a chinese enterprenuer. The article claimed thet they found out that Ahmad of Pau Ahmad was actualy the driver of the taukeh.

Like most rumours, very sketchy details but as we see it gets forwarded and posted all over the internet by people who think they are doing the muslim community a service. Kinda like those people who keep forwarding you the damned danish caricatures of our Holy Prophet (Peace Be Upon Him). Don't they even for one second think that what they doing could be wrong?

ok enough lecturing, on to my story... before I even consider forwarding the email out, I decided to ran a quick check on the net if this is at all true.. see what other people are saying about it. Sure enough I saw it's posted to a lot of local online muslim/ malay communities such as here and here..

One most important and effortless finding I found was an explaination by Jakim on the said issue. The link is here.. and below is the answer from Jakim for your reading.

assalamualaikum, untuk makluman, memang pau Ahmad bukan dikeluarkan oleh pengusaha Melayu, towkey kilang yang mengeluarkan pau tersebut memanglah Cina. Syarikat ini berdaftar sebagai P.A Food Sdn. Bhd, kilang ini beroperasi di Taman Teknologi Kajang, Syarikat ini telah mendapat pengesahan halal dari JAKIM dan pekerjanya di bahagian pengeluaran produk sebahagian besarnya adalah Muslim. Syarikat ini tidak sahaja mengeluarkan pau tetapi turut juga megeluarkan produk lain seperti roti paratha frozen, roti canai frozen, karipap frozen serta beberapa lagi makanan frozen yang lain. Memanglah terdapat kekeliruan disebabakan oleh Ahmad yang digunakan oleh syrikat ini tetapi berdasarkan maklumat yang telah diperolehi, JAKIM mendapati Ahmad itu bukanlah pemandu towkey kilang tersebut, JAKIM dimaklumkan bahawa Ahmad itu ialah salah seorang sahabat baik keluarga towkey tersebut sebelum dia mengkomersialkan produk pau keluarganya. Inilah serba sedikit maklumat yang boleh dijelaskan mengenai produk pau Ahmad ini, berdasarkan pemantauan dan pemeriksaan yang telah dilakukan oleh JAKIM, produk ini tidak menggunakan apa-apa bahan yang tidak halal dan sentiasa mematuhi syarat dan peraturan halal yang ditetapkan oleh JAKIM. nn

Please people.. validate your sources before forwarding/ posting / passing news anywhere.. Publish Responsibly..

Tak reti bahasa? mak bapak tak ajar jgn tolong sebar khabar angin/ fitnah?..

ahhh good bowl of risotto!!!!

Fuhh.. tough day today at the office, I must say... you can tell from my previous entry that I was pissed.. but at 5PM I got the call that the Purchase Order was out after I made calls and complants. The movers are nice enough to agree to get to work although it's 2 hours past the agreed moving time....

oh well, enough of the daily battles at the office.. I came home to the most loveliest dish! Munchkins on soft food diet this week due to her braces tightening session on monday so she made RISOTTOOOOOOOO!!! phew some risotto she made!

OK very quickly.. Risotto means rice in italian.. well not that glamarous you say but trust me..this dish will make you lick that spoon clean! Here's how it looks like.. and I'll get to describing more in a while..

Ok, almost like the one that munchkins made minus the prawns.. Munchkins made chicken risotto with mushroommmmmmmss that's plenty of mushroommmmss and may I say that it was the best italian dish I have ever had.. after la sup la fungi at picollo mondo years ago..

OK Risotto looks like bubur lambuk to you and me but imagine this.. bubur lambuk with the best cheese you have...

The main difference of risotto is how you cook it.. and my friends this is how my most adorable cute super talented cheft most wonderful wife and made her officially world best chicken risotto with LOADS of muchroomsss yes.. MUCHROOMSSS...

1. Saute garlic and ginger root in olive oil ( in hot pan of course..)

2. Add in the chicken and let that work through... the stock from the chicken shoudl came out by now..

3. Add in the washed rice grains.. and stir the ingrediants in the pan , the rice grain should be well coated by the oil, keep on stirring for 2 -3 minutes.. munchkins made an interesting addition of adding some potatoes in addition with the rice being sauteed..

Some people seems to think it's against the law to have rice with potatoes but boy they couldn't be so wrong..

4. Now you're ready to add more liquid .. Warm chicken stock would do nicely.. Keep on adding warm chicken stock little by little as you're stirring the rice.. This is key in preparing good risotto.. seriously... oh yeah, You may also add your mushrooms now...

5. Once the rice is el dante, time to add in alittle potato starch to thicken up any liquid you still have..

6. Lastly in goes your best cheese.. parmesan would be best but munchkins knows that I love romano more, it's a little strong for some but it's definately my favourite cheese. Salt to taste and you're all done!

* Whats the difference you say? parmesan is made with cow's milk while romano is made with sheep's milk.

7. Serve hot with a spoonful of butter!

* Note that you may also add the cheese before you serve them if you are to serve them later..

Seriously, it's a whole new world of taste having rice with cheese.. go head give it a try...

I fucking hate paper pushers

For a service request to move some equipment, I've been told (scolded actually) by my purchasing department that they need 2 weeks atleast to come out with a Purchase Order to the moving company.

With million of dollars of IT systems in place and you need 2 weeks to look through my purchase request which has been fully approved by the management.

Fucking lazy, in 2 weeks time you should be replaced!

oracle purchased maker of BerkeleyDB

An interesting move by oracle recently when they decided to purchase Sleepycat, the maker of opensource Berkeley DB embedded database. I wonder what's going to happen with Berkeley DB. Some may say that oracle trying to diversify their solution being Berkeley DB more of a file based database..

I dare not think that this is another case of killing the competition, just like what happened to Cobalt Network when bought over by Sun Microsystems and murdered almost instantly.


Yes folks, Bill Gates is not the only evil in computer world.

Brutal Video of British Army Savagely Beating Iraqi Protesters..

This video is shot from a balcony in Iraq, showing British soldiers first moving a group of protesters (some throwing rocks and stuff) out of an area.

Then, the camera guy focuses on these troops pulling some people down the street, they drag these people behind a large wall, and beat the crap out of them.

And the camera man (also a Soldier) is a disgusting psycho, who seems like hes getting off on it.

THIS, is a EXCELLENT example, of why this "war" is a horrible thing. It has become nothing more than an INVASION. US & its Allies, staying around, enforcing our laws, on these people, our presense, creating a reason for more bombings.

Resistance attacks in Iraq arent aimed at civillians, their aimed at the troops. But civillians die as a result. Just like with the US bombs.

Civillians are dying every day in huge numbers in Iraq. And it is a direct result of US occupation. And this type of sick behavior, is going to do nothing but encourage more violence towards our soldiers, and as a result, the innocents in Iraq.

* I found this on youtube.. my doa for all those all iraqis, may their suffering ends soon, insyaAllah..

I expect the UN to turn a blind eye again on this video.. and OIC will say Ooh.. I Seee... again... talk all you want but if you don't have money and firepower to go to war, you don't matter... law of the jungle prevails sadly...

langkawiiiiiiiiiiiiii

oh man I can't wait to get to langkawi!
Flight - Booked, Fully paid for!
Hotel - Booked
Car Rental - Booked
Island Hopping Trip - Booked
Cable Car Tickets - Booked

I feel like like like strippign down to my undies and runnign around the office and yellinggggggg 5 more days to my holiday!!!!!

hahaha

now back to work getting the hong kong server up!

it's the wrong way

This one for fitt and john...

My Review of Airasia vs Malaysia Airlines

We're going to LANGKAWI next weekend for our anniversary this year.. and we're looking forward to soem relaxing time.. plan for munchkins to spend a whole day at a spa there while I doze off by the beach.. yes I love dozing off on the beach.. under cool shade of coconut tree and the sea breeze.. that would do me more good than any spa..

but first we have to deal with flight and accomidation and I would like to use this opportunity to review 2 airlines that could fly you there. The world famous MAS (Malaysian Airlines) and local favourite AirAsia. This review is from my experience booking, boarding and flying the 2 airlines in the last years..

Round 1. Flight Booking
Air asia definately know what they're doing with the online booking system via web. The website is both fast and secure but what is mroe important is that the system is very userfriendly. You select the departure location and your destination, dates and you'll be presented with available flights AND TICKET PRICE.

The budget traveler in me loves this as I can adjust my traveling schedule to best meet my budget. Payment can be made online with credit cards and also maybank2u directly from the website which is very good to those who don't use credit cards.

Let's look at Flight Booking at Malaysia Airlines.. They started the online booking last year. Same intuitive interface, select your departure and arrival airports, dates and you will be presented with available flights ONLY. There's no indication of the ticket price so I have no idea which flight would save me more money. BAD BAD BAD!

Winner : AirAsia

I have the uncanny impression that the ticket prices are all the same for any flights on Malaysian Airlilnes. Ok sure, I selected the flight that I wanted and then only I could get the ticket price on the next screen. Which brings us to second part of our review.

2. The Money
OK here is where the most important part of this review is. My return ticket to Langkawi for 2 person on AirAsia comes up to RM159.96. I was lucky enough to found a very good price for the tickets at RM9.99/person/way plus taxes. I wasn't very sure that this was the best deal I could get until I checked on the price on Malaysian Airlines webpage. The same return trip for 2 person at same time frame would cost me a whopping RM 892.00.

Winner : AirAsia

3. Services
Next would be another important factor to consider. The quality of service. The experience factor and I will base this review on the following experiences that I had.

1. Flight from Kota Bharu to Subang Airport
(before all domestic flights moved to KLIA)
2. Return flight KLIA - Kuching Airport
3. Return flight KLIA - Kota Bharu

1. I took the flight on Malaysia Airlines from KB airport to Subang airport returning from my grandparent funeral. Services byt the cabin crew was of expected by a world class airline. The flight took about 45 minutes and it was too short to have any much experience. The seating arrangement is fixed with the seat number clearly stated in your boarding pass. I opted for the aisle seat due to I was flying alone and it was almost dark. We were served an orange cordial which tasted like vitamin C tablet. Strangely enough, nothign much for me to remember except for the terbulance we had in mid air. Hehehe I guess I was nervous because it has been a while since I last flew on a plane then.

2. Last year me and munchkins booked us return ticket to kuching for our anniversary. The return ticket was RM235.96 (I have this figure from my Airasia past travel information). It was free seating so everyone sort of rushed to get the best seats on the plane. It felt like I'm boarding a mini-bus but we only have ourselves to blame for that. I was glad to see that pregnant women, children and the elderlies were let boarded first before the rest of the passangers.

On AirAsia flights, you buy your baverages from the flight attandance. The price is a little higher from ground price but you get to choose. No vitamin C tablet water for me. I opted for a canned drink for both me and mucnhkins. About 10 minutes later the flight attandance came around again collecting any rubbish you had after finishing your drinks/ snacks.

3. Last holiday my family decided to spend the week in Kelantan. We're going to take that 8 hours drive up there but I had concern that it would be too much for my aging mother. I booked return flight for her to Kota Bharu and have her brother pick her up there so that the travel would be a short and pleasant one for her.The ticket price was RM200 for return flight for 1 pers0n due to the festive season.

The departure in KLIA was at 7:30am and we arrived at the checkin counter at 6:45, just minutes before the counter closes. If you have been to KLIA, you know that the walking distance from the immigration counter to the boarding gate is quite far. A normal person would take about 15 minutes of walking just to get there. I had concern that my mother would not make that walk in time before the boarding gate closes. I seeked help.

AirAsia counter had assistance service where their staff would bring elderly or disabled passangers in wheelchairs to the boarding gate. It's not free but I guess not everybody needs this kind of assistance. So I gladly pays RM12 (official rate from airasia) for the staff. My mother made it to the boarding gate with time to spare. She was pleased that I arranged that for her.

Winner : AirAsia simply because I get to choose what to drink on AirAsia flight.

Conclusion
I would have to say that AirAsia is doing a better job at serving domestic customers. I have never been on Malaysia Airlines international fights but I heard so much good comments of them. My somewhat limited domestic flight experience so far shows that AirAsia is cheaper, and in par with Malaysia Airlines domestic services.

Malaysia Airlines need to improve on their online booking services. AirAsia wins by allowing users to plan the best flight to pick for their budget.

Allowing passangers to choose what snacks and drinks to have during flight is another good step by air asia. People appreciate that kind of freedom even if it would cost them few extra ringgits.

Looks like we're flying on AirAsia again this year and this time to Langkawi. I'll write up some more review hoperully of my great experience holidaying in langkawi.

Good day everyone!

danish cartoons

a lot of heated discussion on the danish cartoons... it's very unfortunate that we have to have this kind of issues when much of the islamic world is stereotyped as terrorists, extremist and the most degrading.. islamist.. and unfortunately we muslims falls to this kind of traps very easily..

johnkar has this to say on the issue
and pyan wrote quite a bit here and here..
wawa burned a danish flag in his heart for fear of the "main bontot" activities if he goes to jail for flag burning.. :P
even ron who is in the US talked to me about it as well..

my take is that aku rasa dari zaman Rasulallah lagi orang dok buat camnie.. eg seingat aku , Rasulallah penah kena lontar dengan taik oleh si kafir quraisy...tapi takde lak Rasulallah ajak sahabat semua gi bakar rumah si kafir / kota makkah tu..Rasulallah sabar, doakan supaya diberi petunjuk pada si kafir tuh..

apa nak risau, balasan derang nie dah di guaranteed di akhirat..

jgn kita lak jadi bodoh, stoop down to their level,pergi bakar harta benda / bendera denmark..

ingat.. Rasulallah tak ajar kita buat macam tu..nabi suh kita hormati jiran jiran kita.. walaupun dia kafir..

ingat that our media pun sama gaks, just because we're so called negara islam, how many times has we radicule other religions? tgk cara kita buat kartun yahudi, bush, etc..sekali jadik kat kita, kita nak melatah? come on, what goes around comes around..

so protest, tell them that we are hurted and very angry.. write letters, call the embassy saying that we condems their media's actions, and the fact that their government is too proud to just say sorry.. boycott their businesses.. hit them where it hurts the most.. I think we can survive without their products and businesses, rite?

and if we hate the jews so much why are we still proudly wears Levi's and dockers?

video awek bertudung..

great video... used to think lowly of bebudak mmu.. can't really blame me.. coz all the mmu students that I have as interns sucks.. all talk but cannot deliver... that was the last time we ever took in mmu students as interns ls..

btw awek tudung hitam yg smoking tuh cun giler siot... perghhhh
something about her so sexy to me..
something makes me wanna say.. "Strong woman, I'll break you yet!!"

who read books?

Apparently I've been tagged.. so here goes..

1. What is the total number of books you own?
- since childhood? loads..

2. What WAS the last book you bought?
- erm this book about making juices.. I mean seriously.. there's juices recipes in there that will knock your socks off.. eg like watermelon juice with star anise (bunga lawang) in them..which reminds me I'm making some ice blended guava juice today.. perfect companion to our nasik lemak we're having today..

3. What WAS the last book you read?
- the juice book!

4. What are the 5 books that mean a lot to you?
- i. Hikayat 1001 malam (Arabian Nights)
My arwah dad used to buy me a few books from the collection of 12 books each time he goes on assignment in KL. ( We were in kuching then, I was 10). Means a lot to me.. The book flew me to places unimaginable to the 10 years old me. I had almost all of the 12 books... in my mum's place.

ii. Wargames
The book that started my interest in computers and the fantasy that one day I will fuck a girl-machine who looks like brooke shield. I read the book which could have been adapted from the movie.. hmm book adaptation of a movie.. kinda terbalik don't you think... :P

iii. The juice book.. I forgot the exect title.. will update later
OH MY FUCKING SOCKS!!! this book rules! the recipes are mind blowing! I bought a blender just for this! ok not a whole blender, but the juicing mill coz I already had a blender..

iv. Incident Respond and Computer Forensics
A OK.. good book on the subject.. but I left it on the dashboard of my car in a hot hot day.. the glue that binds the pages melted and the book was destroyed.. very very sad.. it's important to me because it reminded me to take good care of books that I buy.. since very seldom that I do buy books and more than often it's expensive!

v. an old system V handbook I found in the uni's library
my first unix experiance.. and read up on smtp and wrote my first utility to send out anonymous email. Used it to sent out a birthday greeting from the King (Yang Di Pertuan Agong) to ET.. hehehe remember that? . Oh second utility I wrote was a mail bomber that used to overloaded Edaureen Muhammad Nor's email account with Big Ed's Jokes Mailing list. 50000 email.. SWEET!!! . She started to call me That Yellow Bustard since then. But we've been friends since so good thing do come around from being nottie.. :P

hmm ok, I better stop mentioning stuff I did in univ before terpecah tembelang here...

5. What book(s) do you wish to buy next?
- erm.. Anthony Bourdain's Kitchen Confidential.. erm my birthday's coming up next month ehemmmm :P

6. What book(s) have you owned for so long but never read them?
- erm.. Panduan Fardhu Ain... I'm ashamed!

7. Who are you going to pass this stick to (3 persons) and why?
erm what stick?
ok I like to tag the following persons
1. ET coz I like recursions..
2. JAWA coz I want him to stop watching smallville for a few minutes.. hehehee
3. SAMSU coz he has not wrote anything in ages.. dok sibuk bercinta dengan dentist dia tuh.. pathuiii..

8. Your books collection in one picture:
- ermm you're kidding rite?

wormed again?

I was going over the news sites when I saw this little popup box by the system tray.. seems that my antivirus has detected an outgoing pop3 connection (port 110) to some unknown and unfamiliar hosts. AVG checks for outgoing pop and smtp connections in order to detect email viruses..

I'm guessing that this would be normal except that I'm not checking any emails... and I don't have any email clients on.. no outlook/ thunderbird/ eudora, etc.. I checks my gmail via the web gui and that's it..

hmmm have I been wormed again?

this time I'm prepared with my tools.
I have packet capturing utility loaded , with specific filtering set to capture port 110 data.. I'm going to leave it overnight and analyze the packet data tomorrow...
I'll let you guys know on the outcome..

P.O.D , a christian band trying to be jew

make no mistake, while you're humming of singging P.O.D latest and greatest hit, you could be singing prayers from the Bible or the even Torah!

I found this very recent article about P.O.D on the web, and interview with P.O.D front man, Sandoval. I heard a lot of stuff about P.O.D being pro zionist. I started to suspect it's true when I saw their drumset has the word ZION | NOIZ written on it while performing on Jay Leno show recently.

taken from the article..

But one new song doesn't take any guessing: "Strength of My Life" is clearly a straight-up worship song.

Sandoval: It pretty much turned out that way. When Matis [Hasidic reggae singer Matisyahu] came in, we told him to just freestyle, and we came up with a little reggae dub. I wanted him to open up his book and sing some Hebrew, but he just took some Scripture and one of the Psalms from King David, and ended up singing it. He wrote some lyrics, and after that, I went in and put in my own lyrics

So be careful, don't sing or hum their songs if you don't intent to worship! because you know your actions in this world is Payable On Death..

oh yeah, check out who else on the list...