Anthropologists! anthropologists!

Gary Larson's cartoons are hilarious and after years of enjoying them, I only found out who drew the comic strip. I've read his collection book when I was 15 and there are more hilarious ones than those shown here. I just couldn't find it on the net (It's copyrighted anyway). His comics are called "the far side".

End of thermal adventure

After our epic tour of White Island, we quickly sped off to Taupo and spent the night there. The next morning we head off to Wellington and on the way we stopped by at Wanganui for lunch. We took a route that was luckily just reopened after a recent landslide (the photo below is from one of the lookout stops on this route. Would have been unfortunate to miss out on such a view). Nothing much happens during our journey back. So after 12 days, 4000km and almost $1000 spent, the travel finish. What did I get from this adventure? I have no idea really. The thing that really matters - making yourself closer to your Creator - is not something that I had achieved during this trip. Despite this, I'm an avid traveler and has so long to travel and finally got someone to travel with me. The trip didn't dissapoint a bit (apart from Huka Prawn Park) and I thouroughly enjoyed it.

Whakatane & White Island

I don't really remember how far exactly is Whakatane from Rotorua but it was close to 2-hour drive north. Read more about Whakatane here if you want. The top photo is some panoramic view of (1) Whakatane and (2) Whakatane beach. We only went there so that we could go to White Island, one of the 3 active volcanoes in NZ. Last year, Lonely Planet rated White Island as a must-see attraction for those in NZ, so we decided to have a peek. There were couple of tours going there. The cheapest is the White Island Tours at NZD160. It involve a boat ride to White Island, which is 46km offshore from Whakatane, and a guided tour of the White Island itself. Morning tea and lunch are provided (they were halal as they were vegetarian meals). Alternatives were tours involving helicopter ride but the cheapest were around NZD300. I recommend the boat ride as while I was on the boat ride I got to see whales doing their breathing thing! Anyway, I imagined the crater of White Island filled with molten lava but instead it is filled with hot steaming coloured water (bottom photo). I was a bit dissapointed, only a bit, as the island is still intriguing. I forgot why it was called White Island but it certainly isn;t white. It mostly consisted of grey rocks that are sometime interrupted by coloured rocks, mud pools, and fumaroles. The coloured rocks are from residual minerals that flow out of the belly of the volcano. Amazingly there were lots of seagulls there (and lots of bridshit too - perhaps that is why some has called it white! :D) The island has a fascinating history itself. In the past, people has thought that it had abundant of top quality sulphur and so some has mined it. It turn out that the sulphur there were of poor grade and the living condition were too harsh. Factory equipments rusted too quickly and frequent earthquakes and landslides has taken many lives. Eventually the mining companies become liquidated and the lawyer who processed the liquidation brought the island off the company and his family remain the owner of the island to this day. Today, White Island is used as a tourist attraction and scientific studies.

Rotorua Part 3

Rotorua is only 1.5 hrs drive up north from Taupo and is part of the volcanic band that ran across North Island from Taupo to Whakatane. 2 things I noticed once I arrived there: (1) the air had the stench of rotten eggs and (2) there were considerable presence of Maori culture compared to other towns I’ve been before. (1) is because there were plenty of sulphur at Rotorua and (2) Rotorua is a cultural tourist centre of NZ. If one would like to see Maori culture but have limited time, this is the place to go. One can see and experience kapahaka (Maori dance), powhiri (greeting ritual) and tangi (feast) at the Maori village located just on the outskirt of Rotorua. I didn’t go there because I had enough of Maori culture after 4 years here in NZ. :D Anyway, we stayed at the Funky Voyager backpacker, a Rotorua backpacker accommodation which had the highest BBP rating. The facilities were good and the managers were really friendly too. We went to:
(1) Rainbow Springs & Kiwi Encounters: a nature park displaying what NZ jungle has to offer. Also, this is where we got to see the Kiwi bird, an almost extinct bird that NZ has adopted as one of it national icon.
(2) Wai-O-Tapu: Has hot water pool, geyser (we missed this as we arrive 1 hour late from its usual time of eruption – 10am), terraces (silica rocks in a river-like formation – this can form rice paddy-like formation and creates ladder water pools), mineral pool (coloured water pool), fumaroles and mud pools. (second bottom photo)
(3) Waimangu Volcanic Valley: Arrived beyond 6 pm so was not allowed to enter but from the outside looked really lovely. This is the site of a volcanic eruption that destroyed surrounding villages during the 1800s. (top photo: top-left is one of the farm surrounding the valley)
(4) Burried Village: A preserved excavation site of one of the village that was destroyed by a volcanic eruption during the 1800s (top photo: bottom-left)
(5) Blue Lake, Green Lake and Lake Tarawera: top photo: top-right
(6) Redwoods: A park where Californian Redwoods were planted. These were massive tree (height up to 30 meters and diameter of main trunk up to 1.6m). In NZ, these trees grew much faster than those in their native land. (top photo: bottom-right is the fern bush located on the outskirt of this park) (first bottom photo: me standing underneath an average size Redwood).
Next stop is Whakatane.

Hauora Maori

Taking a break from my ramblings on my North Island Trip to write something about the 3 day course on Maori Health I just participated a few days ago. It’s like killing two birds with one stone as one might put it, as I could do revision as well as sharing this knowledge with the few readers of my blog here. The photo above is the marae (local hall for Maori) where I stayed for the course.

The course on Maori Health is part of my medical training. It aimed to train physicians that could practise in a culturally safe and competent manner. Such course was developed mainly due to (1) the health disparity that exist between Maori and non-Maori (ie NZ European) and (2) the NZ government obligation to honour the Treaty of Waitangi. The health disparity is such that Maori life expectancy is 10 year less of that of non-Maori. Some have associated this to lower socioeconomic status but statistics showed that when adjusting for socioeconomic status, the disparity remains. Others have associated it with the “warrior” gene or “diabetic/heart attack/etc” genes to explain the disparity. For them, Maori are just inherently vulnerable to diseases that plagued modern society. However, such thinking is non-constructive and only serves to push the disparity further. Another explanation is that the health system itself is constructed in a way that “institutional racism” was practised. This is not to say that the practitioners are bunch of racists, far from that, but the system itself is formed to cater for one particular ethnic group and thus leaving another deprived. Even if the practitioners were compassionate indiscriminately but the system they are working in does not favour the patient, it will remain a stumbling block for the patient to accept such practise and thus refuse to use it. Hence, Maori has the tendency to use less of health services compared to non-Maori. This often leads to late presentation and higher mortality. With this fault in mind, the whole health system needed a revamp and thus a few steps were taken. For instance, Maori health workers were introduced and their role was to advise practitioners on how to effectively deal with Maori patients. Maoris were also appointed to as members of District Health Board, the regional governing body of the health services in NZ, in order to ensure practices do not leave out Maoris. Furthermore, practitioners were also trained to be culturally safe and culturally competent in order to effectively engage with patients. Thus a course on Maori Health or “Hauora Maori” (Hauora = health in Te Reo, the Maori language) was developed. One aspect of the teaching is the introduction of the Maori Health model known as Te Whare Tapa Wha = the four cornerstone (Whare = building, wha = four). It basically means that Maori health is not only focused on the tinana (physical) aspect but also on hinengaro (mental), spiritual (wairua) and whanau (family) aspects. In order to engage Maori patient effectively, these four aspects must be taken into consideration in diagnosis process as well as the management. In addition, the approach to a Maori patient is different to non-Maori. One can develop better rapport if one engages in whakawhanaungatanga (building connection). This involves sharing your origin to the patient before proceeding to kaupapa (reason/cause of consultation, literally = reason). A practitioner should also be aware of Maori beliefs, values and experiences (MBVE) and how to handle these. One example of MBVE is the use of Te Reo and research has shown that acknowledging Maori patients use of Te Reo result in a more satisfactory consultation. One of the classes in that course that I just did thought us some Te Reo. Here are what I learnt:

Vowels:

E pronounced as better
I pronounced as feet
A pronounced as apple
O pronounced as whore (my tutor used this example)
U pronounced as food
AU pronounced as no

Consonants: H, K, M, N, P, R, T, W, NG, WH (pronounced as fart)

The syllables end when a vowel meets a consonant. Here is some Te Reo:
Tena Koe = hello to one person
Tena korua = hello to two people
Tena kotou = hello to more than two people
Kia ora = hello, be well.

Rotorua part 2

I'm back from Akaroa and am tired. However, I still managed to complete more panoramic photo of my North Island trip and the top one is from Waimangu Volcanic Valley and the bottom one is Lake Tarawera, both of which is several kilometers away from Rotorua. I'm pretty novice at producing panoramic photo and there were several failed ones. I'm not sure if this is true, but it seemed that large body of water, ie lake, is not suitable for such photography technique. Another problem I came across is that item up close can interfere with item up far if the item up close is too close. Then there is the problem of one of the photo component going off at an angle. I think I could overcome this last problem by using a tripod. Before anyone takes advice from this entry, I would like to reiterate that I'm a complete idiot when coming to taking panoramic photo.

Rotorua Part 1

In an hour time, I'm off to Akaroa for a 3 day course on Maori Health. So in the meantime, I present to you a panoramic photo of Lake Rotorua. I misjudged one of the photos and the angle went off horribly and my attempt to get 360 degree panoramic photo of Lake Rotorua failed. The quality of photo was considerably reduced to reduce the size to less than 200kb.

Taupo part 3

The final edition of this entry and I just want to summarise what I did at Taupo in chronological order as not to confuse anyone:

Night 1: Visited the Tokaanu Thermal Park and walked the hot pool trail that was behind it. Tokaanu is a few kilometers off Turangi, which is a few kilometers south of Taupo on State Highway 1. Later, we drove around Taupo, stopping at several lookout points there (photo of Lake Taupo during dusk at bottom of entry). We stayed both night at Rainbow Lodge Backpackers. I highly recommend that place, it deserved the highest BPP (an organization that organize discounts for backpacking accomodation) ratings they had.

Day 2: Went to Tongariro National Park (photo top-left), Whakapapa, Mt Ruapehu Ski field (photo right-bottom and top), a Maori redoubt (photo bottom-left), and Lake Rotaia. Finished the day with a hot pool bath at Tokaanu Thermal Park

Day 3: Went to Huka falls (photo in previous post), Huka Prawn Park (not worth visiting unless you only plan to dine), Huka falls jet boat ride (good fun), and Craters of the Moon thermal park (photo in previous post). The rest of the day spent traveling to Rotorua.

End of holiday review

Yes, sadly my holiday has ended eventhough it was an uneventful one apart from the epic 12 day adventure i had early on. It was meant to be uneventful as I only planned the following for my holiday:
1. NZ north Island trip - checked. See my ongoing chronicle of thermal adventurer
2. Meet family - checked. I realised I wasn't that close to my extended family, at least not what my parents had expected. I blame the generation gap, my 4 years at UK and away from them during my formative years, and my inept social skill for that.
3. Meet old friends - not really checked. Did meet some old friends but could have put more effort in it. Most of them are working now, some even got hitched, which made me think it wasn't appropriate for me to ask them to hang out a lot. That did get in the way but I could have at least visited them. Again my inept social skill comes to haunt me. Anyway, I would like to thanks those who managed to squeeze some time to hang out - Haarith for the soccer match, Mus & Syakir for the Sg Tua swim, Moezz for the BBQ. There were more but I only met them in weddings, lots of weddings, in fact almost every weekend I attended one. My peers are getting hitched one by one which meant one thing - everyone going to ask "when is yours?"
4. Shopping - checked.
5. Invest - not checked.
6. Self rehabilitation/improvement -broad category but I can safely say not checked. Some of the things I wanted to improve:
i) normal body clock - wake up early, sleep early: Hardly achieved, looked like my body is a night-type.
ii) stop video gaming: Played games when bored during the holiday. There were lots of boring days. I did however uninstall all games in my laptop and so once I arrived in NZ, this would come to realisation. I need it to be.
iii) rejoin usrah/da'wah: Didn't do it. Was too lazy.
iv) relearn swimming: Didn't do it. Day was spent sleeping (see i)
v) gym workout: Didn't do it. as iv
vi) read more: ii and i prevented me from this
vii) learn Arabic: as vi
7. Dental - checked. I went to the government clinic and it cost me rm2 for a checkup and a scaling. There was a one month waiting period though between the checkup and scaling.
8. Kinabalu/travel Malaysia - not cheked. Didn't really plan this at all and was just something that came up while I was getting bored at Malaysia. Due to lack of planning, it never matearilised even though I initially rallied up some people for it.

Taupo part 2

The chronicle blabla title is a bit too long so in keeping with my lazy attitude, I'm sticking with the simpler version from now on. We spent 2 nights here at Taupo though originally planned for one, but there was much to see and do here. For starters, Taupo lake is stunningly beautiful. This blue lake was once a huge volcanic crater belonging to a volcano that is thought erupted 25,000 years ago and gave birth to North Island itself. I think, I might be talking crap here (about giving birth part, the rest I'm sure is true) and couldn't be bothered checking my facts about it. Unfortunately I don't have any personal photo of the lake (there's plenty of that on the net) but here are some photo (top 2) I have taken on the Taupo bungy, which is located at the river flowing from the lake:

So, no, I didn't do the bungy. Reason: I already did it 2 years ago on a more spectacular paltform. My take on bungy: do it. If anyone come and live in NZ and never does it, they are missing out. Taupo Bungy is one of the cheapest in NZ but bungy is not that cheap. At Taupo it'll cost you NZD 140 for the first jump. Subsequent jump for that day is NZD 40. The one I did, the Nevis at Queenstown - a mere 143m drop and 8 second freefall, compared to this one, just less than 50m - cost me nzd 200. The night prior to the jump, I thought "wtf was I thinking? If it goes wrong, its suicide." and "200 dollars for an 8 second jump that may kill you, are you serious?". I don't know, or bother to go looking for, about the casualty rate of bungy jumping but it should be pretty low because it remains a commercial activity and so what the heck, I did it but not without fear. I looked back at my jump, which was caught and immortalised on DVD, and the look on my face had fear in every inches of it. I rationalise by thinking how safe it would be, but my, when you fall, the speed of your fall is tremendous as the grounds seemed closer and closer in mere seconds, and you don't feel any pull of the rubber that prevents you from going splat. Lucky I didn't wet my pants - the other thing I was afraid of but just to get the facts straight, I never ever did in my life -and the jump went well - hey, I'm still here. Before the jump, the operator told us that the rubber was from Malaysia, he even said "this better be good". It was good, as one would say Malaysia Boleh. Anyway, I was there at Taupo Bungy because my traveling companion did the jump. When asked what he felt, his answer was "confused" due to "mismatching between perception of movement and sense of movement". Weird.

Back to the photo, the bottom-left is from The Craters Of The Moon, a thermal park where there is a self-tour walk through a park filled with numerous fumaroles, craters and some mud pools. The bottom-right is from Huka Falls. Thats taken from one of the lookout point there. One can also go on a speedboat ride in which the boat does 360 spins or just go on a slow cruise. I opted the speedboat ride and it was plenty of fun. That was nzd 99. Now I'm off to Asr.

How many 5 years old Could You Take In A Fight?

16

Chronicle of Thermal Adventurer: Taupo Part I

Finally, we arrived to Taupo, the start of the "thermal adventure". Don't quote me on this (who does???) but I reckon this is where the volcanic strip that runs across the North Island starts. This volcanic strip features various hot pools, mud pools, geysers, fumaroles, terraces and volcanoes. As with many stunning natural formations in NZ, they become tourist attractions. Fortunately most are cheap/free as most consisted of self-tour. Our first stop was the Tokaanu Thermal Park photographed here in the first three photos from top left going clockwise:

The top left is a boiling mud pool. I heard the mud is good for the skin but I didn't test that theory out. There is a place in between Taupo and Rotorua where one could bath in mud (among others such as hot water pool bath...) for a cool NZD 99 but I didn't bother going because of the price and time. Anyway, Tokaanu Thermal Park charge NZD 8 for a 20 minute hot water bath and then as-long-as-you-like bath in a public swimming pool. That was the cheapest that we ever stumbled on, but also has the most modest facilities. The water is a warm 40 degrees which one need some time to adjust to. And I must admit, 20 minute in a hot water pool is long enough as after 15 minutes I got light headed and needed some time out. Oh, and I did dip my head into the pool and you're not supposed to because one can catch amoebic meningitis that way. Anyway, I only read the warning signs, which was posted on the back of the door to the pool!, after several dips of the head. I'm totally fine by the way, no Kernig sign, no neck stiffness whatsoever after. Continuing with the photo, top-right is the river that flows infront of Tokaanu Thermal Park and bottom-right is one of hot water pool found outside the park. Finally, bottom-left is a photo of the Tongariro River. A river full of rainbow trout thus a popular angling spot. There is even a National Trout Center there where the rainbow trout is farmed.

Cronicle of Thermal Adventurer: Manawatu

So, at the end of the 4th day at Wellington, we headed off to Palmerston North, which is located at the region known as Manawatu. This place was a mere stopping place on our way to Taupo, famed for its beautiful Lake Tuapo and cheap outdoor activity. Taupo (and Rotorua) is the North Island equivalent of Queenstown and Wanaka but more on that later. Anyway, Manawatu has its attraction as well. One of them is the Te Amati Wind Farm, photographed here on top right of the photo:





There are various places to view the wind farm, but the best is the one underneath where the car park is literally beneath one the wind turbine. Wind as a renewable energy source sounds very ideal with its almost non-existent pollution and relatively cheap cost, but practically it is hard to be viable. A place need to have winds that blows frequently enough and strong enough and must also be not too far from its beneficiaries. Anyway, we didn't stay long because we can't. It's too cold, the wind chill is just too much even in spring (1st December is "officially" recognized as start of summer in NZ). The other three photo from bottom right going clockwise: some random valley in the Manawatu region; typical NZ highway - 1 lane with not many cars punctuated by 2 laned "passing lanes" at certain intervals; Mt Ruapehu - one of the 3 active volcanoes in NZ, I heard it just recently erupted some time last year but I am certain that it did erupt in 1997.

Into the wild

This entry contains spoiler of the movie Into the Wild (2007). A brief synopsis first: Based on true events of Chris McCandless, who after graduating from college at the age of 24, donated all his college funds to charity, left his family and set off to live in the Alaskan wilderness. He hailed from an affluent suburban family, which nevertheless is a disharmonious one and is the reason extrapolated by the moviemaker as why the person hated the society he is in and as to why he had wanted to live self-sufficiently in the Alaskan wilderness. This reason is perhaps accentuated by the influence of the works of Leo Tolstoy, Henry David Thoreau and Jack London, which some say shaped his ascetic personality. The movie portrays his journey, the encounters he met along the way and some explanation of the reasons of his journey. I wouldn't say this movie a classic, but the story of this man did intrigued me somewhat. His ascetic personality is what made me intrigued at a time when I myself are so indulged in my own whims and is searching for a revelation to conquer it. However, it has to be said that his measure was extreme and that pure asceticism is not what is ordained in Islam. To borrow the words of Sayyid Abul A'La Maududi, a great thinker of Islamic revivalism in his book ethical viewpoint of Islam: "this (ascetic) attitude is in radical violation of the entire scheme of nature and is virtual revolt against the Will of God as immanent of His Creation. The greatest harm done to humanity by this wrong concept is that it has removed from practical life some of those individuals whom God had endowed with high moral qualities, thus leaving the field or worldly affairs mostly for the persons of inferior moral calibre." What was ordained in Islam is moderation and what it is that a man to do and don't is clearly written. My problem then is due of something else...

On another note, the idea of secluding oneself either to escape from society that has indulge itself in vices or out of the pursue of internal peace is not new. It was one of the practice of sufism, known as khalwa, and it was based on the fact that Prophet Muhammad (p.b.u.h.) secluded himself from the idolatrous society of pagan Meccans. However, one must remember that this occurred prior to his prophethood and such is not considered a sunnah.

Chronicle of Thermal Adventurer: Wellington

And so the journey continues with our 4 days & 4 nights stop at the capital which was named after Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington, the victor of Battle of Waterloo. Here we were graciously hosted by our friends from the medical schools who chose/forced to go here after their third year. Here, our typical day goes like this: morning breakfast with free hot chocolate at med school - sightseeing - lunch - sightseeing - dinner hosted by one of our friend/PSD officer/MSD attache. This part of the trip was more on meeting friends/recruiting people than seeing the city but the city itself is certainly beautiful, much like the rest of NZ, with plenty of attraction to go to. Some photos:

From top left clockwise: NZ parliament with the executive wing affectionately known as "the beehive" on the left; Maori moko (face tattoo) display in NZ art gallery; NZ parliament balloon; Wellington Mosque; Wellington from Mt Victoria Lookout.

From top left clockwise: NZ parliament library; 2 guys "jiwang"at Wellington beach; Wellington Zoo; Massey University.

Chronicle of Thermal Adventurer: Chch-Picton

I'm gonna totally ignore my previous post and start this 4-part series chronicling my 12 day adventure at North Island.

The journey began with a 5 hour bus ride to Picton . We took off from Christchurch at 0700, on an Intercity coach. On the way to Picton, we stopped by at Kaikora, a town famous for its whale-watching cruise and Bleinhem, a town I don't know anything about. The bus ride wasn't particularly spectacular in itself, mostly because I slept the way through - a product of a purposely sleepless night. It's something I would not replicate nor would recommend anyone to do. Catching up on sleeping in a long-haul bus ride in New Zealand is definitely not enjoyable as you will never get enough deep sleep or the REM phase of sleep to refresh your body. I attribute this to one main reason: The seats isn't comfy enough. When compared to Malaysian coaches (those that goes to Malaysian East Coast from KL), the seats are tiny (NZ: 4 seats per row compared to 3 per row for M'sia), and doesn't recline as much (according to my memory) which leaves your head exposed to those embarassing 'bobbing' and 'hanging' positions. Anyway, it was the cheapest (??) way to get to Wellington at that time. The total cost from Christchurch per person was:

Intercity Bus ride Christchurch - Picton: NZD 23.00 (on web saver option - only available when purchasing tickets online using credit card, and on certain days, student price = NZD 41)

Interislander Ferry ride Picton - Wellington: NZD 52.00 (standard price. Web saver option = nzd 45.00 but departs at 1300)

Total = NZD 68.00

Alternative:

Drive yourself: Interislander Ferry ride vehicel x1 = NZD 60.00 + (1 person = NZD 52.00) = NZD 112.00 + estimated feul (NZD 60.00) = 172.00. A cheaper option if you can get at least 4 people going on the same car.

Flights: ~NZD 90.00 (Blenheim/Picton - Wellington). As of 12 November 2007, Fly Pacific Blue will start operating from Chch-Welly and fares could be as low as NZD60 (inc tax).

Kaikora:

Picton:

pointless rambling

I just wanted to write something, just to get my head going. Its been 3 days now, I'm still feeling nauseated from this fever/unknown disease that I'm currently infested with. It's an awful feeling, a feeling that leaves you debilitated to a point of lying helplessly, just waiting for it to pass. I actually planned to write about how I think my state of health is deteriorating but then it got me thinking, what do i get by reading this? (in the future, when I'll look back at my works & get embarrassed by it, lol) But seriously, I have no serious issues to write about, and perhaps it just goes to show how pointless my life is at the moment. I mean look at my previous ramblings, the getting youtube thingy etc., pointless really. At 23, I have yet to achieve anything concrete, any lasting legacy that would one day when I breath my last, I wouldn't regret anything. Maybe some people call it inner peace. Perhaps that is unachievable, or just a state of mind, I really don't know, and confused at the moment. So what do I do?

Oh and the word "thingy" is also another formally recognised colloqial term. Apparently it originated from Australasia for a slang of "thing" but I would not be wrong to say that it is now widely used words. Yet another useless point written here.

pics

Collections of photo found at this particular website. Some of the photos on the website are NSFW (Not Safe For Work).


now, that's cunning...


Septic truck









imagine blogging with those..




You trust CNN now?


Infaq at Pakistan







What's this? Highlight between x's to reveal answer
x candle wick x


lol

entertainment insidiously kills you from inside

Youtube cant be viewed in a Windows Mobile 5 (and I heard version 6 as well) which kinda sucks because iPhone can. At the moment, Youtube is redirecting its traffic to m.youtube.com, which converts their flash video into 3gp format that some pocket PC can play, albeit only a proportion of its massive video database being available for this (and poorer quality). But news have come through that a version 6.1 is on its way which can correct this serious flaw. In the meanwhile, while waiting for it to come out (don't know when) and for those who cant afford to upgrade at the moment (like me), one can try these steps: (taken from WMexperts)

1. Install TCPMP player (version o.72RC1). Uninstall previous version if there is one.
2. Install FlashVideoBundle.cab (version 1.4.3) at the same directory folder as TCPMP
3. Soft reset
4. When surfing Youtube, it will redirect to m.youtube.com as described previously. just scroll to the bottom and there is link for "classic view" which will return you to the original Youtube
5. What the software does is it will ask whether to view, save or link the video. Clicking on 'view' will automatically play the video in the TCPMP player which will open automatically and stream the video.

Recent test showed disappointing quality (=lots of lag), may be attributable to my crappy broadband at the moment.

Anyway, another foray in the net had me stumbled upon some site offering streaming video of tv shows (mostly American):
videohybrid.com
alloftv.net
megavideo.com
They beat waiting for torrent to finish downloading. Does watching streaming TV shows considered pirating? Its free on TV anyway...Oh, and apparently the word "kinda" is a proper word. Never knew that it is a formally recognised colloquial term.

Filling my time

I'm stuck at home for these couple of days, still trying to get accustomed to Malaysian heat. A few minutes outside and I'm drenched in my own sweat. A bit hyperbolic I must say, but it is hot. So, I used up my time at home clearing the clutters I accumulate in my trusty 4 year old laptop. So, I stumbled upon a couple of Internet bookmarks I kept aside for future reading/browsing and I'll just place it here so that if I get bored I can go through them:

Sneaker Freaker Magazine - Newsflash - GUIDE TO LACING

bush hid the facts - Google Search

Dietwater

Blogger: Bits & Pieces - Post a Comment

http://www.medsafe.govt.nz/profs/Datasheet/DSForm.asp

YouTube Video Download Tool

i'm Back yeaah

After a near-2-months hiatus, I'm finally back. Back from my Ramadhan sabbatical, and a 3200 km (and a cool NZD 1k) journey of North Island. The photo above is taken at Tongariro National Park, a dual-listed World Heritage Site (nature and culture - latter is particularly due to its sacred ties to Maori beliefs). At the top left, which is unfortunately cut, is Mt Ruapehu, one of three active volcanoes in NZ, which, if Allah permits, I intend to return to and hike up there....

Camels

Bits and pieces

I came across this blog which compiles funny photos, vids, stories, qoutes etc. URL: http://bitsandpieces1.blogspot.com/ Examples:

Is this a problem?


Hunting:

A father and son went hunting together for the first time.

The father said, "Stay here and be very QUIET. I'll be across the field." A few minutes later, the father heard a blood curdling scream and ran back to his son.

"What's wrong?" the father asked. "I told you to be quiet."

The son answered, "Look, I was quiet when the snake slithered across my feet. I was quiet when the bear breathed down my neck.

But when the two squirrels crawled up my pant legs and said, 'Should we eat them here or take them with us?'

"I guess I just panicked...."

Supersize me

A fortnight ago, I watched this Academy Award-nominated documentary, SuperSize Me, in which a healthy 32-year old man went on a 30-day McDonald binge to see if such diet would be detrimental to health. The documentary was largely inspired by a lawsuit from 2 obese teenage girls against McDonald for causing their obesity problem. More info at IMDB and wikipedia. The movie got me wondering about the prevalence of obesity and cardiovascular (CVS) disease in Malaysia. Here is what I found:

1. In 2005, CVS disease is the 4th (7.07%, 130,965 cases) most common reason for hospitalisation. It is 2nd (14.31%, 5668 cases) most common cause of death in hospitals. [1]
2. An observational study published in 2007 found that overall national prevalence of obesity among Malaysians aged 15 years old and above was 11.7% (95% CI = 11.1 - 12.4%). The prevalence of obesity was significantly higher in females (13.8%) as compared to 9.6% in males (p<>= 18 years old has markedly increased by 280% since the last National Health and Morbidity Survey in 1996. [2]
3. A review in 2002 found that the prevalence of obesity was clearly greater in women than in men. In women, obesity rates were higher in Indian and Malay women than in Chinese women, while in men the Chinese recorded the highest obesity prevalence followed by the Malay and Indians. Studies on normal healthy subjects indicated that the energy intake of Indians was significantly lower than that of other ethnic groups. In women, Malays recorded a significantly higher energy intake than the other groups. Urban male subjects consumed significantly more energy than their rural counterparts, but this was not the case in women. In both men and women, fat intakes (%) were significantly higher in Chinese and urban subjects. Men were moderately active with the exception of the Dayaks. Chinese women were considerably less active than Chinese men. Chinese and Dayak women were less active than Malay and Indian women. The escalation of obesity, once thought to be an urban phenomenon, has now spread to the rural population at an alarming rate. [3]

There's more papers out there but I couldn't be bothered reading more. Conclusion: Obesity and CVS is a problem in Malaysia. Duh.

---------
[1] MOH (2006) Health Facts 2005 pamphlet
[2]Rampal L, Rampal S, Khor GL et al (2007) A national study on the prevalence of obesity among 16,127 Malaysians Asia Pac J Clin Nutr 2007;16(3):561-3
[3] Ismail MN, Chee SS, Nawawi H, Yusoff K, Lim TO, James WP (2002) Obesity in Malaysia Obes Rev 2002 Aug ;3(3):203-8

no idea for a topic

Its midnight right now in Christchurch and I am winding down to go to sleep, waiting for my electric toothbrush to be recharged. Tomorrow, OSCE, 2nd last for the year, yippee and this one will make or break my year so everyone pray for my success..please. And on Friday, I have this case presentation but here I am with no case. My house surgeon decided to do the topic I was planning to present. curse her..ahahaha...its about malignant meningitis anyway. Presented with excruciating headache and neck pain associated with sweating during attacks. MRI and MRA of the head and neck showed no abnormalities and so my team were quite puzzled by the presentation. Lumbar puncture were performed and was subsequently found to have neoplastic cells. Subsequent CT was made and showed a subtle oesophageal carcinoma. The man deteriorated fast, and after 10 days since he presented with the headache, he passed away and became the 2nd person to die while under management of the doctors I am attached with.

just taking a breather from studying and I thought of experimenting putting a youtube vid here.


so it works. its a nice song i used to like ages ago and stumbled upon just a few day ago. "Everybody's Free (to wear suncsreen)" by Baz Luhrmman. It did reach #1 in the UK charts back in '99. More info

Blunders?

Paying through the nose for tools

So on the news today was the revelation of how the Ministry of Youth and Sports paid RM 8.39mil more than the market price for equipments. One of the items were screwdrivers, which retailed at RM 40 was brought for RM 225! Other mishaps identified:
1. There was no evidence that any effort in reducing the prices were made.
2. Unauthorised person managed to approve funding
3. A supplier managed to get an extra RM 1.25mil compared to another supplier for supplying identical equipments.

More news:

Spend, Spend and Overspend

Ahh, so Ministry of Youth and Sports weren't alone in this. In fact, I could safely say this sort of corruptions blunders have happened in the past. Yet it continue to be perpetrated. Why? Some say attitudes/immorality - that some government officials up there were not at all concerned that this money belong the taxpayers. Its not their money, so what eh. Just spend it. We can make our friends rich while we are at it.
Others may point out to lack of accountability. Will there be any repercussions, ie someone get the sack or better jail. Past experience teach me there won't but then again the time is close to election so I hope the government get cracking and clean up their acts like they usually do once every 4-5 years. :D

PDA

It seems like my blog is turning to be a private diary of some sort, not close to what I envisage it to be, a medium to share my knowledge with some good well researched discussion on matters that mattered. And so, this entry is hoped to be the first of many that will follow...

Those rare few who have followed this blog might remembered my PDA-phone review. So after several months of usage, I have came across several PDA software that was and still is useful for me as a medical students:

1. iSilo: an e-book reader with useful functions such as search capability and hyperlinks jump. Puts your thick humongous textbook in your palm. This is easy to use and read once u get the hang of reading from small LCD screen and lots and lots of scrolling. Those drawbacks are its main con I guess but it is very handy when you need to check your facts when on the wards and no computer in the vicinity. It is not free though but cheap at 12 USD. I have found various e-books out there in the Internet, the best remains Harrison Principle of Med 16th Ed found on torrent.

2. Skyscape: Is not a software but a company who develops medical software for PDA. I've tried '5-minute consult' which one of the function helps list your DDx. I haven't had a full go at this software, since I have not actually found a working cracked version yet :D. But the software put out by this company is getting rave reviews in forums so I'm guessing it's worth a try. I will try this software again next holiday.

3. C4PDA: Not a software but website. just add www. and .com as prefix and suffix respectively for the URL. I won't say much about this website because its ...

holiday

A much needed break is coming to an end. Managed to squeeze in a day of snowboarding and sightseeing in Akaroa in an otherwise an unremarkable 1 week of holiday. I need to study anyway after months of slacking off and get that Maori assignment out of the way. For years I was the diligent type, studying consistently through out the year, churning out good results when exams come. But in recent 2 years, I thought, screw that. Friends and classmates around me has managed to get as good result as me just by 'last minute cramming' and I adopted that approach. Year 2 was fine. Year 3 was fine too. Then, this year came and finally I felt the repercussion of the 2 years of slacking. I was behind in group discussion and had to struggle to keep in pace with my classmates and assignments. Long has it been since I felt this way. Maybe never perhaps..And so it dawns on me, I am cursed to be the diligent type in order to succeed. Success has it price, so cliche yet so true.
Is the photo cool or what? See the reflection on my goggle..

im back wohooo

Finally, I have recovered. I was struck down by organism small enough that microscopes can't see them. Most people would call my previous 3 day experience a 'cold'. It all started with a sore throat at the endocrine clinic leading up to cough at the lectures then a fever after bedside teaching followed by chills early evening and culminates with headache and lethargy later on. What makes it worse was the timing. I was ordered to finish a textbook during this week and have to hand in my patient report on Friday. The report is easy peasy to get a passing mark but my consultant want a distinction from me, so he wanted a report of a textbook standard. He could be just fooling around when he said that to me, but I have to be safe. Taxpayers money is at stake. hahaha. More stress to weaken my immune system.

GP

Time flies and another run is coming to an end. GP run was interesting and it did gave me quite valuable insight on the workings of GPs in NZ. It does cast a stark difference between GP practice in Malaysia and NZ. The former is more impersonal, detached and more of a quick-fix approach while the latter tends to be the opposite. Which one is better? I dont know. Circumstances are different for both countries. NZ is only 4 mil people compared to 25 mil of Msia, which translates to different time and resource pressures. But anecdotal experience suggest the NZ approach brings out better patient satisfaction and this measure is perhaps the best in demonstrating which system is better.

bored

In the highly unlikely scenario where someone would have read and remembered anything from this blog, you may recall that I blogged about how my time managamenet was f****d messed up. Then one day an old friend asked me, do you still play video games? Sheepishly I replied yes. Because in that instance I remembered how I vowed to cut down the games yet i did the reverse. It got me thinking, ' now that is the culprit behind my bad time management'. At least one of them anyway. So, the instance I got back home, I flicked on the laptop and uninstall my games one-by-one until there was one. Dota/WC3 remains. Its a multiplayer game anyway so I figured it wouldn't be that often I can play that game. So 1 day later, I suddenly found myself with ample of free time. How boring was my life, a life entertained by computer games and when that is gone I find myself bored because no computer games to keep me entertained. Ive grown dependent on it I guess. A substitute hobby need to be found. Movies, books, arts, writing is the way for me I guess. Getting back in da'wah field would be good too (well its a must actually hehe). Having said all this, is going cold turkey good or should i had eased it off gradually? We'll see. Stay tune.

Lonely

Hahaha. Looks like Im the only one visiting this blog. Sooo lonely. I am a quiet guy so it is a consequent of that I suppose. Yet I hate being lonely. Damn. What the f**** Im blabbin about, being soppy and sh**. I will look back at this entry and would think, damnnn, I need to delete this.

bandwidth eater

Everybody should think YouTube is great. It's now my source of pirated music. A firefox plugin called videodownloader and a software called flvsplitter then allowed me to download the videos and be played with windows media player along with files of other format. So thats pretty cool. But if you have just got an mp3 player installed in your car, they wont play flv and all your latest musics needed to be converted to mp3. Flv to mp3 converter? I found an online version: vixy.net Paste url of the video on vixy.net, it then convert the video to mp3 and downloads to your PC. Cool eh. This is a pretty long entry just to say: check this website out. haha

Regression

I'm not that busy. Just poor time management. Then, it suddenly struck me, I wasn't like this back in college, nor was in high school. Always got my assignment done, prepared well for tests and yet still manage to nick in time for soccer, games and minor socialising. I thought, with age and experience, there's always one way to go, that is improvement. But yet, here I am, regress to a point where I live like I was in lower high school years. Indulged in feeble entertainment such computer games, TV series and excessive soccer, I found myself lacking in areas I should be investing more time in. Academically mediocre when distinction should be aimed for, disengagement in da'wah when it is fard, distant when socialising is better, these are the norms for me for the past year. So, this is like a wake up call for me. Change and be like a 23 year old Muslim should be.
As I am keying in this post, my mind sort of wandered on how did I regress like this. But, then I figured, its better if I pondered on how I was able to function at higher level before. And the first thing that came to my mind was the effect of people around me. I always had people who would push me, or rather inspire me. Friends at school or my parent, they were there and the inspiration could be subtle, but it worked. I guess here in NZ, I have grown out my friends here and have got used to them to be no longer inspired. No offense. But then again, my social circle for the past 2-3 years here have been rather limited. Since I would be stuck like this for the next 2 years, an alternative must be reached, though I do think friends influence is only one component of the factor of changes. A good alternative I reckoned is books/reading material. Quran will always be the best bet. And I guess, returning to read books on deen is the way too.

useless post

Transformers rockk. awesome movie.

idle

Dah jadi balik. Kejap semangat nak blog, kejap tak.

Developing

2 weeks away from another OSCE and just finish the latest one last Friday, but I couldn't push myself to study tonight so I ended up writing an entry for this blog. So...what to write? well what about the issues that my friend moeh points about in his blog, on how the standard of service in Malaysia is appalling and how creativity of workers are stifled for 'stability' sake if that is actually can be achieved through that method. I couldn't really comment on the latter issue and the reason being I am at least 3 years from getting the qualification to get me drafted in working for a government agency. However, the former is quite familiar to me as it is I would expect be familiar to most Malaysian. In his blog, moeh points out to these example:
"I had to ask my uncle, who works in TM, to speed up the transfer process of my home line and sluggish streamyx connection. Just because my uncle is high ranked in the organization, they respond to the request quickly"
Beforehand, he was waiting for months to get a simple repair done. It could be high demand some people say? But months is pretty long, and it reflects the inefficiency that TM is handling their repair service. Honestly, I couldn't really recall any bad experience. I attribute that to the fact that I am an apathetic guy, who doesn't regularly reflects on problems of the community and someone who would happily circumvent problems because of not wanting to bother anyone when it is actually helpful to complain. But, I do feel that these frustration is vented by many Malaysians, not just my mate here. And if it is true then I see it as one of the major stumbling block in Malaysia achieving that developed status in 2020. I feel that a characteristic of a developed nation should be that it has efficient services that can cater its citizen. That is more important than having the tallest building in the world or having a man-made lake in a city purposely built for administration.
Lets take a look at New Zealand a small country of 4 mil. Nothing flash there in terms of man-made infrastructure such as the tallest building in the world but they are not considered developing because they have the services that are efficient and sufficient to cater for their citizens. How is that achieved? I think they have better accountability, healthy competition between providers, and better attitudes among workers.
My point is that I think some people had this idea that infrastructure is what defines a country status when in fact the services and the attitude and thinking of the citizens that truly defines it. Infrastructure will come later. Whats the point in having the tallest building, when hospitals are overcrowded, and trains and buses unpunctual? Hmmm couldn't really think of good example..but you get the idea. I think.

more updates

The new run, Health care of the elderly, is a bit busier than I thought. A bit busier than surgery I reckon. But, I managed to nicked off some precious study time to get more rest and update this blog. Added is new links - Alumni Hira' and blogs to people I know. Will get back to posting on blog on the weekend. Till then, here is a link for hadith database that could be useful. Please read the warning first and think about some of those interviews, documentaries and articles that had used hadith or quran out of contexts:

Hadith database

O2 Atom Pure

Enough of the random ramblings. I will start some serious post with this review of the newly acquired O2 Atom Pure. After 4 years of reliable service from iPaq 1930, I finally decided to upgrade to the pdaphone when my handphone of 2 years, Nokia 6610i finally succumbed to the unintentional abuse I inflicted upon it. I was pretty fed up of carrying both phone and pda all this while, so pdaphone was the logical upgrade. What I was particularly looking for in a pdaphone is that it must have Wifi capability and is compact enough to actually fit into a pocket. It must also fit my meagre budget of NZD 500. So, after some searching, 2 fit the descriptions: O2 Atom and iMate K-Jam. O2 atom were the slimmer version so that give it the nod for the purchase.

Pros: It is really compact. The smallest pdaphone on the market at the moment. And no more carrying a separate handphone and pda.

Cons: Vibration can be sometime annoying because it vibrates rather loudly and last quite a while. Not good when you are in occasions such in the middle of lecture. Text messaging is slower due to lack of keypad/keyboard. Windows Mobile 5 can't access certain features quickly like a handphone menu.

I found text messaging quite troublesome with the software given. One way I got around that problem is installing a third party software, SPB Full Screen Keyboard. It turns the whole screen into a qwerty keyboard, and you can just use your fingers instead of that fiddly stylus to key in texts. In fact, to get the most out of your pdaphone, I suggest installing the following software:

SPB Mobile Shell: Converts Win Mobile 5 into easily accessible handphone-like menu and enable you to use the pda-phone with one hand, just like normal handphone.

Pocket Islam: Includes prayer schedule, Quran with complete tashkil, Hijra calendar, qibla direction. Its free too.

SBSH PocketBreeze: A today plug-in that displays multiple appointments on the today screen. Also display tasks, notes, and messages.

post-advertisement

I got lonely. So I put up a link to this blog on my YM status and, voila, an increase of 30% hits for the past 24 hours. It is more impressive given the fact that the previous hits counted were hits taken for a 2 year period (roughly 100 to be exact). If the same marketing scheme is continued to be implemented, we can extrapolate that hits will be increased by 100% of the current hits by the end of week. By using the same logic, at the end of the year it is expected this blog will have an estimated 7560 visits.

If you are looking for some Muslim-flavoured news, look no further. Try this link: News

post-OSCE

As mentioned in the previous posts, I will continue the rambling about WW1 or rather specifically the fall of the Ottoman Empire and how that epoch should be pondered upon by fellow Muslims and take heed its messages after I've sat my OSCE. Unfortunately, I think the topic is too hard for me to explain. I need to do extensive reading before I embark on writing such topic. Plus its kinda serious. Intrigued? I hope you are. Read up on the topic and leave a comment. I would like to know too.

In case you are not associated with medical student, then its probably right to say that you do not know what OSCE is. OSCE = Objectively Structured Clinical Examination. It consists of a number of stations where in each station a participant would perform a task/answer quiz and after completing that particular station, he moves on to the next one. That is the common way medical student are examined. Apparently, OSCE also means = Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe. For those who dont know me, I do not have any association with that OSCE. Having mentioned that, I remembered an anaesthetist pointed to us in a lecture of a common but neglected health problem: acronymophilia. Those afflicted with such condition suffers from excessive use of acronyms and abbreviations. Symptom usually depends on the person's occupation. For vets, they will utter words such as: BDSD, DSTO. The latter is more serious = Dog Smarter Than Owner.

Updates

Just one actually. The tag board has been lengthen to 300 instead of 200. Should allow people to read posts on the tag without too much scrolling. By a bit. Hehe

Reminder

No. I haven't sat my OSCE yet. Just taking a break from study. I'm not those type of person who can concentrate on one task for ages, I really need a break once a while. If not my mind wanders around aimlessly while my body hold a book looking like it is studying. So this time around, while reading up on Peripheral Vascular Disease, I was really thinking about what I really did in the surgery run, like how I would have made it more worthwhile and such. And so, since I wont get another chance to do the run again (hopefully that is the case), I thought other people should learn from my mistakes or ideas. Plus, I have now one more idea for an entry for this nascent blog. Hope this post acts as a reminder. Even better, I think the other people from the other runs should do the same. Med School do have a function for that, called an end-run stein, which unfortunately involves beer that I'm not keen of. Note to self: Must make a Muslim-friendly version.

Random post

Anzac day is almost coming to an end. The day commemorate the involvement of Australia and New Zealand Army Corps (hence Anzac) in the WW1 in which on that day, they fatally landed on wrong terrain at Gallipoli. For us Muslim, we should remember that this war was when the Ottoman Empire fell. It is when we squabble with each other and driven by British propaganda of nationalism and their army we tore ourselve apart. We lost Palestine in the process. We also were separated to smaller and weaker nations. That has remained the status qou since. But, might one ask, should we bother with such information?

OMG its midnight already..I need to sleep. Cant miss ward round tommorrow. Will continue post another day. I think after OSCE (sometime next week). Please post comment of your ideas on the topic above...

Insomnia antidote

I initially wanted to write this post in Malay, but it took me wayyy to long to finish 1 sentence, so I ended up doing it in English instead. Could have picked the easy way out, using 'rojak' but I believe it would've beat 1 purpose of blogging - practicing composing. Anyway, this is not the topic I wanted to blog about. What I wanted to do was to remind me, and perhaps some rare readers out there, that I will try to rejuvenate this blog. Not that I think its essential to do one, but I personally think it is a good alternative for freetime hobby/activity than playing computer games which I am unfortunately indulged too much in. Talking about that, I am now currently into DoTA, a variant of WarCraft III. Im not goin to talk about it much, but its load fun. Quiet addictive too, which is a problem. I do think that computer games is a good way for recreation, but only if it is played in minute quantity. Anyway, i would like to reiterate that this blog will be continued. The plan is to post at least once a week. If you happend to have read this far, then good job. The previous post did not turn out as I expected. Just showed how long I've stop blogging. I didnt even know they had those features to post photos. I should stop this random rambling now. Wondering whats the title mean? I cant sleeppp...luckily its Anzac day tomorrow. Holidayyyy....then OSCE next week.

Easter 2007 roadtrip (West Coast - Wanaka)

Photos taken from easter 2007 roadtrip. From top:

(1) Lake Pukaki with Mount Cook (highest point of NZ) at the background.

(2) Me, Abu and Zack posing on observer area of Arthur's pass viaduct (at the background).















(3) NZ have some of the strange bridges around. This has only one lane even though it bridges a 2 lane road, and share a railway track. Almost all bridges encountered in this trip were of this kind. Must be something to do with saving money...




















(4) Ice climbing. Unfortunately indoor as we are amatuers and did not have time to do it on the real galciers.