It's A Man's World

If you think we rule the world and that we’re so special, big brains, bigger ambitions and probably the biggest personalities, check out what these creatures can do. 

The thorny devil lizard from Central Australia has an amazing feature that it’s born with. Only reaching the solid length of 20cm, and having to reside in the scorching deserts of Australia, it somehow needs to find enough water for its body. So what these little fellas have are feet with absorbing powers that allows it to absorb water from whatever surface it touches and during the odd occasion when it rains, capillary action allows it to absorb water from all over its body. Which I think is a pretty handy trait to have, especially when you’re thirsty.

From the same part of the world, residing more in the coastal areas of north Australia also lives the Taipan snake (Oxyuranus scutellatus). It can grow up to 3m in length, and one drop of its poison can easily kill a 6 footer. Imagine what it can do to an average sized human. In these kind of environments food doesn’t come by easily. It’s not Jalan Alor on a Tuesday night. So, anything that decides to stroll by this snake, can be potentially taken out in one nibble.

 

As humans, being the most dominant species on this planet, next to mosquitoes, the way we’re built is basically almost the same as most mammals when talking about the placement of organs and what not. The only gift, if you want to call it a gift, is the complexity of our brains. I suppose you can say it’s the most vital part of our bodies. Having been given this gift, we have the ability to think a lot quicker and more in depth than other living things. Although, sometimes our decisions and actions may contradict that whole statement completely.

As time has proved, the more we progress into the future, the more unaware we are of our insignificance in the world. What are we to the amazing redwood tress in California or the majestic blue whales in our oceans? Not a lot really if you think about it. So what gives us the right to log down a forest that’s been around for longer than our ancestors? I’m not even kidding those trees have been around for millions of years. Which I’m pretty shocked about myself.

If creatures like those mentioned above that have such amazing “super powers” are put on this earth purely for surviving, shouldn’t we do the same and not play the Dr. Evil game and try and destroy our beautiful planet with just one push of a button. I’m probably exaggerating, but that’s what it’s leading to slowly. If it means using our brains to create deadly and destructible substances against each other, then maybe we should find another planet to do so. Just like a fight at a bar. If you’ve got issues with one another, take it outside.

 

Check out my weekly column, TGIF, on Loyar Burok.
Also if you have the same problem as me figuring out what to wear everyday, and trying to justify that by telling yourself you've got no clothes to wear,  well, Loyar Burok would've solved your problem. They've just printed brand new t-shirts. Pictures and info on where to buy should be up on the website soon.

GOOD MORNING MALAYSIA!!!

Ah Ouiiiii!!!! Bon Jour!!!

Since I got back to Malaysia in 2009, my domestic and culinary skills have been dying down gradually. Being on my own for about 4 years in the UK, kinda forced me to learn how to cook, clean and all that jazz, and before I knew it, I was a domestic goddess!!!! (I'd like to think so)

Recently, and by recently I mean 2 days ago, besides making inconsistent cookie dough, I've managed to whip out a loaf of BEAUTIFUL banana bread. I think it was inspired by the Chimpanzee documentary I was watching on Nat Geo Wild :)

Unfortunately, this recipe was not created by my innate cooking skills, but cheekily stolen from an amazing banana bread website. It's a website devoted solely to banana bread. It has any banana bread recipe you can think of. But the one I chose was the "Ultimate Banana Bread Recipe". It even has a recipe for curried pineapple banana bread. I think that's taking "fusion" a bit too far. Well, check it out anyways.
http://www.banana-bread.biz/

The other thing I came across was a measurement for butter. Normally you would say 200 grams of butter, or if you want to work with melted butter, you'd say half a cup or something more realistic. This one just said "One STICK of butter". I stared at the sentence for a good ten minutes trying to make sense of this measurement in my head. One stick... does that mean a horizontal stick, a short fat vertical stick (No... that will make it a square), or just the whole slab of butter, which i thought would be a bit too much for just one small loaf of banana bread. Lo and behold, it is an actual American measurement for butter. It equals to 113.5 grams of butter. Oh yes!! I would've guessed 113.5 grams!!! That is a perfect stick of butter. Oh well, it's nice to learn something new everyday.

Anyway, I tweaked the recipe slightly. After finding out that this was an American site, I immediately reduced the sugar amount to half. And of course, ignored pecans in the ingredient list. Well, below are some shots of my pride and joy.

 What a beautiful perfect loaf :)

 

Everyone needs a profile shot.

Looks good, but it tastes better. Pah!!

About Me.. Hopefully with relevance

It's not that I had no intention on doing the "About Me" section on this blog.. I just thought I'd take my time and do it when I actually know what to write about myself. With all the relevance in the world still intact, just a small heads up to all the 13 faithful followers that I have (now), LoyarBurok has invited me to write a weekly column for their website. I believe it's going to be called TGIF regardless the day I submit my post and I have to do an 80 word write up about myself. So, instead of crowding my dashboard with applications, I'm using this as a writing platform. Ahoy! This is me on a mission to attempt to kill 2 birds with one stone :)

Well, these things are never easy to start... So this sentence will be a full paragraph in 5 hours.

(Content below edited and added on the 8th of Dec 2010 at 6:10PM. So 5 hours was definitely a lie)

 URRRGHGHHH!!! Have no idea what to write about myself. Anyway, gonna give it another try.

Well, these self description things are never easy to start, so don't judge my first sentence. I have a very strong hatred towards raisins, celery and YAM!! The worst is YAAAMMM.. If it had a heart, I would stab it with a butter knife, curse in its presence and feed it to my hungry pet bullfrogs. Urgh. Vicious yam. Besides that, I'm pretty much cool with everything else, like my umbrella not opening in a thunder storm and what not. I've got better things in life to worry about, than moan and whinge over small incidences that happen to me once in a while. Maybe every alternate day would sound more realistic. I actually believe that is what's fueling my passionate and positive drive about life. If you can create a problem, you can solve it, so there's never really anything to worry about.
I'm a Jack of all trades, but master of none. The only thing I'm pretty good at is dancing. Well, if I'm not, my parents will have my head on a stick, as I chose to go to dance college in the UK. Very expensive ballet shoes, reaching RM8 to 1 Sterling Pound, 4 years. Enough said. Well, I'm back in KL now, and loving life and all the commotion that goes on everyday. I've also got an "up and coming", I hate those words, Dance Theatre Company that I've set up with a really good friend of mine, it's called Dark Fabel Theatrics Sdn. Bhd. I promise you'll see more of that name in the future.
My next non edible love (second to dance) would be music. I know "favourite" means the best choice or something that is most loved, but I have to say my favourite bands are The Red Hot Chili Peppers and Sublime. At least I'm not like some people who list down all the artists they like, from 10 different genres of music.
So that's about it really and I've sooooo gone past my 80 word limit!!


Cocobananas!!! That took me 2 hours to write.

Game of The Year??

PAH!! To Arkham Asylum!!! Game of the year.. REALLYYY???!! Fair enough, it has pretty cool graphics and you can detect life signs through walls and what not, but I think LEGO Batman : The Videogame is so much better. Not only can you be the good guys and put away all bad in Gotham City, but after you unlock certain levels, you can become the baddies and create the havoc!! So, you can either obtain a Super-hero or a Super-villain status. I have to say the characters itself in the Lego version look far more exciting than the ones in Arkham Asylum. The story that comes before each episode is hilarious. The comic value in the game wins Arkham Asylum hands down. Yes, I am aware Arkham Asylum is not supposed to look cartoony.

LEGO Batman : The Videogame is not just some silly Lego game, to gain accomplishments and the effort it takes to unlock a suit upgrade or an extra is pretty tough. One accomplishment is to get Robin to do 20 backflips in a row. Trust me, that was quite a task.
Maybe it's just me, but every level I pass, I HAVE to collect every single minikit and most importantly, that bloody red Lego brick that's sometimes almost impossible to find. I'll rake every corner of the room before I move on to the next. Which can be quite annoying if you're playing it multiplayer and the person sitting next to you is looking bored to death.

Poison Ivy : One of the highest jumpers.

The other amazing perk in this game, even though it's not a big one, are those silly rides you get on. Some are shaped in a Lego bird, or a Lego seal. You have to use the direction stick to swing it back and forth to the music. Which I found soooo amazing the first time I got on one. ANDDD... if you continue to swing back and forth for a good amount of time, and mind you, the music gets faster. Lots of coins explode out. COLOURFUL COINS!!! That's the other thing the Lego Batman has that the "serious" Arkham Asylum doesn't have. How are you supposed to get rich without any COINS???!! At the moment, I'm standing at 293 million coins. I'm a high roller!! YEEHAAAA!!

Hahahah.. Robin's done something wrong.

I suppose when I do something for leisure, it has to either make me smile or laugh otherwise it's no fun to me at all. This Lego Batman game is perfect for when I come back from work or when I have a bitter day.

SO GET THOSE BATARANGS OUT!!!

More Trash Talk...

I did a tiny intro, about a post ago, about the amount of solid waste we produce in Malaysia. After a nice chat with the very informative and lovely Suchen (Photographer of Wonderland... Beyond The Bin), I've managed to gather quite a bit of information regarding the Solid Waste Management in Malaysia. I've got a number now!!! We actually produce a surprising amount of 24,000 to 26,000 TONNES of waste a day.

Honestly, I've never thought about where exactly all this waste goes to, until now. So without having to think of how to phrase things, I'm going to write down the whole process of solid waste disposal in Malaysia in point form. Starting from the generation of this waste.

1. The generation of solid waste.
We don't actually think about how much waste we generate and what actually gets generated to waste. It's everything and anything! Literally, from glasses to boxes to plates from restaurants, to electrical wires and CDs.

2. Collection of solid waste.
Special thanks to our hard working friends behind the scenes from Alam Flora, other collection companies, and even random rubbish pickers.

3a. Recycling to products
Only very little of this trash actually goes to the usual glass/plastic/paper/metal recycling plants as a lot of our trash is wet. A box drowned in unwanted curry and many other graphic examples I wouldn't like to describe :)


3b. Recycling to compost or enzymes.
This is more for what our wet rubbish is accustomed for. There's a compost production in Subang Jaya called Projek Pengkomposan Sisa Makanan MPSJ. So a few hawker stalls actually bring their unwanted/our wasted food there to be made into compost for fertilisation.
Wet waste can also be made into enzymes to create soap, washing up liquid and other things that enzymes do :)

3c. To the landfills!!!
Now, we have about 200 landfills all around Malaysia but only a handfull are worth mentioning, which are the sanitary landfills. Normal dumps like the one in Sungai Seminyih (which got shut down September this year) do NOT dispose of the trash the proper way. As I said earlier, living in this country and eating the food we eat, most of our waste is not dry. Now, the yummy juices that come out of our rubbish is called LEACHATE. For quite a few of these landfills, the leachate seeps into the soil and makes its way to our rivers and this may be why our tap water is undrinkable.
Hopefully soon most landfills will become Sanitary Landfills. A fine example would be the one in Bukit Tagar, opearated and developed by KUB and obviously Berjaya. Now this is a special landfill that covers 1700 acres of land, not only is it lined with plastic to act as an irrigation system for the leachate, the poisonous Methane gas that is created by the stench of the rubbish is then converted into energy!!! Not very well explained, so you can check out KUB-Berjaya Enviro Sdn. Bhd. 
Two thumbs up to you!!

At least we know something's being done about the future.

Photography by Suchen SK

Party Like A ROCKSTARRR!!!

This post has no relevance to the title whatsoever. Just a small post on my recent furniture finds for the new place. Got a really old Mongolian antique chest/table/miscellaneous counter top. Has a matte finish and it's BEAUTIFUL!!!!

You can find many similar items at Eastern Charms in Great Eastern Mall along Jln Ampang. The lady that mans the shop is Shirine and she's lovely. Sooooo many nice things in there and they're mostly one off pieces. I also bought a lamp from her :)

Discovered that Isetan has more to offer than just being Japanese. The Isetan in KLCC and ONLY the Isetan at KLCC carries this fantastic range of kitchenware products called TYPHOON, ranging from bread bins to drizzles to weighing scales and even garlic crushers?! For people who are reading this outside of KL (not that there are many of you), and would prefer not to fly to KL just to buy a couple of kitchen accessories, the online shop is http://www.typhoonhousewares.com/

Also, for Ampang people who are constantly tearing their hair out deciding what to have for breakfast. (More for people like me who don't work in the mornings and ACTUALLY have breakfast.) Well, KLCC is only an AKLEH away and I bet most of you thought that Harrods on the 1st floor was just a shop. Well, I thought it was, obviously not considering the massive sign above it that says "Restoran". It's been around say for almost a year now and I've never had a reason to go in until one day. I decided to stroll in. And low and behold, there was a full on bar and a small cafe/restaurant toward the back. So couple of days ago, mom and I decided to have breakfast there. If you want a good English fry up, that's the place to be!!!

Big "Restoran" sign above the shop.

The tinsels made me realise Christmas comes too soon every year.

That was a good sausage.

Held the waitress at gun point for this photo. haha just kidding!! :)

All in all a good day :)

Can the grass possibly be GREENER on the otherside?

Most of us are very much unaware as to where our trash goes. Does it hide behind the beautiful facade of our city? Or does it hide behind an imaginary wall that we've created?

As a KL-lite, I know we have a lot of trash scattered all across the city, but I automatically block it out when walking down the streets. I've learnt to accept that this is how it is and that corner is a fine place for a big black bag to settle in. And I believe I'm not the only one who does this.

Recently, well not that recently, say half a year ago, I ran into this interesting character. Tall fella who hails from KK, with dreadlocks and only wears shorts to whatever occasion he attends. Not knowing what to expect, he pulled out these fantastic shots of trash in Malaysia. Suchen's the name, and the shot below is from his book that is sadly not going to be in bookstores. 

It's also one of the shots from his article in The Star.
http://thestar.com.my/lifestyle/story.asp?file=/2010/10/25/lifefocus/7256810&sec=lifefocus

Do not fret as an e-book will be coming out soon, Wonderland ... Beyond The Bin is what it's called. Probably on his website www.suchens.com

The grass probably isn't as GREEN as we'd like it to be now, but if we start by implanting the awareness around us internally. I'm sure results will bloom to make a much greener Malaysia.

What do I mean to say??!!!

Ah oui.. this is my first post and I'm pretty new to this whole blogging thing. So.. bear with me. I've never really saw the point in sharing my life or anything for that matter with the virtual public, except for a few cheeky photos on facebook :) But after I set up this blog, I got soooo into it. Like choosing the templates, changing font colours (I like), taking more photos with my new powerful Canon EOS 550D (I'll sing you the song), and of course, waiting for sponsors :)

Well, I like eating, listening to music (Red Hot Chili Peppers, Pink Floyd, Dire Straits, Prince, The Rolling Stones, Live, No Doubt, SUBLIMEEEEEE!!! and many more to be named), shopping for furniture, reading my Collins Pocket German Dictionary, baking cookies, tending to my ever blossoming farm on Farmville, shopping, traveling and rolling in my mountain cash when I'm sad. As we all know, that last "like" of mine has never ever happened before.

I suppose I can say it's huge benefit living in Kuala Lumpur as it offers many traveling opportunities in itself. I can choose to start my day by going to a VARIETY of places, like have coffee at the skanky Imbi market (Curry laksa there is AMAZING), or some coffee on some lorong behind Petaling Street, OR be stupid and drive to Petaling Jaya for coffee, or perhaps go somewhere slightly more hygenic like Pavillion for a nice cup of coffee before work. (People working from 9am can start writing my name on a piece of paper and ripping it up into tiny pieces as I only start work at 2pm today and finish at 6:30pm!! Yahoo!)

So instead of going down the floral smelling streets of KL, I'm going for breakfast and going to start on some Christmas shopping with my mom at KLCC. We'll see how that goes, I'll probably end up shopping for myself and jumping into the wading pool by noon. Well, nature calls and it says I need a new computer. My macbook is hanging on to a zimmer frame for its dear life and is hooked on Prozac. So Au Revoir.

Pretty lengthy for a first post :)