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| Blessed New Year 2005 |
| 12.31.04 (3:48 pm) |
May all of the citizens of the world look forward in hope this new year. May there be less wars and more peace, less hate and more love, less I and more We.
May all know that we are mere men/women living together under one sky.
Peace
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| Malaysia's reaction to the Asian Tsunami |
| 12.29.04 (3:50 pm) |
Picture of Gurney Drive courtesy of The Star. Wifey 2nd aunty works in a hotel just down the road from this location. My wifey and Ryan were in this area three days before the earthquake. I'm getting stories from friends who felt the tremors during church service on that fateful day. Some church services were stopped mid-way as people started rushing out into the streets fearing that the building would collapse.
Our PM has offered aid to Aceh. I believe we owe it to Indonesia to give as much aid as possible since Sumatera took the full force while sheltering the west coast of Malaysia from the tsunamis. Malaysians reaction to the crisis has been heart-warming. Donations are flooding into the various funds setup by newspapers agencies and television stations. As of the time of writing The Star Earthquake/Tsunami Relief Fund has gathered RM1.4M while the Malaysian Tsunami Victims Fund has collected RM10M.
Malaysia has also sent personel into Aceh to help out in the rescue work there. A team comprising medical personel, SMART rescue teams, army personel and volunteers arrived yesterday in Aceh.
Jeff Ooi has put together a collection of news paper headlines which I found moving.
The death toll is still expected to go up once the figures from Myanmar are taken into account. The military junta has been silent since the crisis began, in fact the junta has refused to acknowledge that the eartquake has affected the people of Myanmar. People have been killed in Myanmar according to the Democratic Voice of Burma website from the tsunamis and also earthquakes that followed the tsunamis.
For up-to-date information on seismic activity, check out the IRIS seismic monitor.
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| Malaysia holds strong |
| 12.29.04 (5:20 am) |
Malaysia will rebound.
There are fears that the tourism industry will take a beating in the wake of the tsunamis disaster. Thailand's tourism industry makes up 6% of their income would be heavily affected but I believe they will rebound in the following year.
Asia has always had a good revound record. We survived the 1997 financial crisis and the SARS outbreaks. Both crisis were ear-marked as factors that will bury the tourism industry but neither did.
There will be no New Year celebrations this year in Malaysia, the Prime Minister has asked that such celebrations be cancelled in respect to those who have lost loved ones.
As of tonight the death toll stands at about 77,000. There are estimates that it will reach 100,000 once all missing people are considered as dead.
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| South Asia tsunami victims |
| 12.28.04 (5:23 am) |
I'm still shocked.
All my family members in Penang are accounted for.
Many of the Malaysians killed were holidaying on the beaches in Penang on that fateful day.
The closest to the action was wifey's second aunty. She works in a hotel overlooking Gurney drive and saw the waves pound the beach.
Gurney drive is currently closed to traffic. The area has been laid waste with debris from several boats scattered all over the popular eating area. Gurney drive's popular eating stalls are closed in the morning, only opening in the late evenings. If the tsunami struck in the afternoon or late evening, I believe that the death toll could have been higher.
As of an hour ago the death toll has reached 44,000.
One of the saddest things to me is that most of the people did not carry insurance and even if they did, death by natural disaster is not covered. We dished out thousands of dollars of our hard earn cash into an insurance policy only to find out that they do not cover natural disasters.
But even sadder would be the psychological effect this event would have on the people of this region. Would Asia recover from this disaster? Hope will carry us through.
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| Warm Wishes |
| 12.24.04 (5:02 am) |
My family and I would like to wish all who know us a "Merry Christmas" and may you also have a great New Year.
Peace.
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2 Comments
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| SMS Malaysian Usage |
| 12.21.04 (4:43 am) |
Only in Malaysia do people cancel weddings using SMS.
I've heard of people being left at the alter at the last minute cause one party got cold feet and decided not to marry but here in Malaysia they do it with SMS.
The current hot news is that this footballer dude left his bride with just a SMS saying that he was sorry. Full news here.
Now, the poor guy is taking the rap from all quarters, with the press, several ministers and the general public. There's even a guy who offered to hitch the bride with a friend who is looking for a wife.
Poor bride had to attend the wedding dinner with 1,000 guests without any of the grooms family in attendance.
A few months back it was the case of the guy divorcing his wife via SMS which sent the religious courts up in arms.
Yup, SMS in Malaysia has become a malice to one-on-one conversation and the family institution.
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| Christmas wish |
| 12.19.04 (10:14 pm) |
All I want for Christmas is ....
1) More leisure time with wifey and Ryan
2) The CANON 1Ds Mark II digital SLR
3) All the CANON "L" lenses
4) A National Geographic photo assignment to Nepal
oh...and world peace.
Whats your list like? Send me a comment.
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| The Band is playing |
| 12.14.04 (2:47 pm) |
I'm gonna miss a major concert.
I was invited to cover my brother's band at Rock The World 5 in Kuala Lumpur this saturday. Got the pass and everything. It's the big time for me but alas I can't go.
I've got a pre-booked event that same day which I can't back out off. Bummer....
eBay's band-music has hit the shores of Malaysia since the 2nd of December. With the gomen tooting e-commerce, this is a step forward. Only with a step forward you might be stumbling backwards.
E-Commerce in Malaysia will always be akin to a night market (pasar malam) as long as proper payment systems are not in place. I may win a bid on ebay.com.my but I have to contact the seller personally in order to arrange payment and delivery.
I think lelong.com.my has matured a rather good payment system that ebay can follow. Let's wait and see before we actually purchase that car on ebay.com.my.
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| The Brides Flowers |
| 12.13.04 (5:23 am) |
[image]objectzero_3637217 98.jpg[/image]
The most beautiful things can sometimes be the most fragile and short-lived.
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2 Comments
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| Hands Photography |
| 12.11.04 (9:02 pm) |
[image]objectzero_9906398 27.jpg[/image]
I've started a new genre for photography. Hands photography. Yup, on seeing my work one of my buddies wanted this shot.
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| Christmas season |
| 12.10.04 (5:10 pm) |
Why do we have to work during this period?
It's almost Christmas - two weeks to go,thats 14 days and I've got no mood to work. My office mates are playing their Christmas mp3s and my mum has the tree set up in the middle of the house.
As always Christmas this year will be a wet one. It has been like that for as long as I can remember. In the west they have snow, we have rain-drops the size of cats.
This Christmas all I'm asking for is world peace. Seriously, we need that now. There is so much going on in the world today, 2005 looks bleak. At times I beginning to think that these are the end times.
O well, Happy Christmas people...
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| Burden released |
| 12.07.04 (8:19 pm) |
I feel really light headed in a good way.
I've been struggling for the past few weeks to finish some oficce work which involved reading and writing a report. Report writing is not one of my strengths plus I was really not motivated to write at all. Anyway this has dogged me and has caused internal stress especially when my free-lance work mounted up and I spent more time on them rather then the report.
This morning I finally managed to finish it off. Now it has to be reviewed and endorse. So I'm really feeling liberated.
I now realised I need a bigger dry box to keep my lenses and cameras. I also realised I have lost my tripod. For the life of me, I can't find it at all at home. So buy new tripod or dry box?
"Santa please drop me cash rather then sweets, shirts or stuff toys this year. So that I can buy a tripod and dry box."
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| The good and the bad. |
| 12.05.04 (4:40 pm) |
The weekend was both good and bad.
I had a photoshoot on saturday afternoon for a high profile personality family gathering. I thought I was shooting backup with another photographer and ended up playing the main role.
I was not prepared and was not comfortable with the photoshoot and it showed in the pictures. I totally bombed the photoshoot. Only when I viewed the pictures on my iMac at home did the full extent of the damage hit me. Most of the pictures were out-of-focus (a photographer's nightmare) and the lighting was all wrong.
Photography, some say, is the art of capturing light. Light that reflects of animated and in-animated objects that are captured at a stand-still. A photograph is always a one-off affair. No two pictures are ever the same even if taken in succession. The light properties of any picture can never be copied or replicated perfectly. Thus, when you bomb a photo session, there is no way you can repeat it. I couldn't recall the family members for another photo shoot, thats akin to serving my head on a platter.
Facing a lethal combination of out-of-focus and bad lighting I was on the verge of committing hara-kiri. But with some tweaking in photoshop, two sleepless nights and after paying USD45 for a fix out-of-focus blur software, I managed to salvage some of the images. Hopefully they will turn out well in print - I'm kinda praying for a miracle.
Last night (Sunday night), I had another photoshoot featuring a music band. That one turned out just as I wanted it to. The lighting was great, images were sharp and the band-boys were cool. This time I was prepared and more relaxed. I was more comfortable with my subjects and with the environment. I guess promotional shoots or advert shots are my cup of tea. My own little niche in the photography world.
As for family gatherings, I'll leave that to the experts.
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| Touching wedding moments |
| 12.02.04 (9:08 pm) |
[image]objectzero_1303923 679.jpg[/image]
135mm,f5.6,ISO800
[image]objectzero_2146303 90.jpg[/image]
50mm,f1.8, ISO800
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| Flu-fighters |
| 12.02.04 (8:34 pm) |
Everyones got the flu.
I'm am slowly recovering from this bout of flu. My nose has finally cleared up and my bones don't hurt that much.
Yesterday, I covered a malay wedding for the first time.Was 2nd cameraman to a friend. He captured the main stuff while I kinda moved about to get the normally-missed stuff.All this while under the influence of flu medication.
My fav lens, 50mm f1.8 along with my new 28-200mm f3.5-f5.6 were my workhorses for the night. I'll post two images for you all once I've done some editing to optimize them for the web.
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