Do good any way

One day you will just be a memory for some people no matter what good you have done. Just do your best to be a good one so that they can keep you in memory for the longest time.

The best medicine

Yes! Laughter is definitely the best medicine.

I don't mind taking it everyday and I would surely add that to the top of my medicine prescription. However the big problem is that as you have to manufacture it yourself you can't buy the prescription any where off the shelf.

Hello and Good Morning!

My wife asked me how come I seemed to know all the walkers and joggers who passed by us on our morning walks. 

I told her that in the beginning I didn't know them but after waving and greeting each of them with a warm friendly "hello!" and a cheerful "good morning" a few times we sort of warm up to each others presence and even exchange small talks. 

"I believe strangers are friends that we have yet to meet," to quote someone who wrote the above line in his blog.

Happy New Year 2014

Tue 31/12/2013 New Year Eve

The stunning night time view of a suburb of Kuala Lumpur seen from the balcony of Chin's apartment.

The two fingers of white light rising from the hills in the distance are the twin towers of KLCC. The glob of light on the right hand side of the twin towers is exploding fireworks display illuminating the skyline.

According to Chin this year's fireworks show is less spectacular and more subdued than previous years, a reflection of the bad time that this nation and its citizens are enduring.

The Gift of Time

The greatest gift that you can give someone is your TIME because when you give your time you are giving a portion of your life that you will never get back.

Dear Mommy thank you for giving your TIME to the family.

On this special day the family honours you with happy birthday wishes and may you always stay happy and healthy.

Clinging on to the past and placing expectations on the future?

Some things in the past need to be left there. As simple and profound as that, yet some people continue to cling on, unable to let go. As for the future let's leave it as "just round the corner" because if you pay attention to the present moment the future will have arrived at the doorstep.

You shouldn't chase after the past.
or place expectations on the future.
What is past
is left behind.
The future is as yet unreached.
Whatever quality is present
you clearly see right there,
right there.
Not taken in,
unshaken,
that's how you develop the heart.
Ardently doing your duty today,
for - who knows? - tomorrow
death may come.
There is no bargaining
with Death and his mighty horde.
Whoever lives thus ardently,
relentlessly ,
both day and night,
Has truly had an auspicious day:
So says the Peaceful Sage.

- Bhaddekaratta Sutta: An Auspicious Day

Wishing Nicholas and Amy a happy and everlasting marriage

For a father I considered this as one of the most manly act that I have ever accomplished.

On 7/7/2013 at the wedding reception in Melaka, walking hand in hand with my dear daughter and escorting her up the aisle I was very pleased to give her hand to the groom, the new man in her life.

I and my wife wish Nicholas and Amy everlasting happiness in their marriage.

A poem to celebrate the return of blue sky and fluffy clouds after enduring days of pungent haze permeating the air

The view of the sky above in TPJ

Clusters of white fluffy clouds floating in a blue sky.

What a magnificent sight after living with depressive days

Caused by the haze turning the sky into a canvas of grey.

I know about the bad, but I look for good things

Alice Herz Sommer, the world's oldest survival of the Nazi Holocaust and author of the book "A Garden of Eden in Hell" says " I know about the bad, but I look for good things." 

She wrote "A garden of Eden in Hell" when she was 104 years old. Through the horrors she has witnessed and the mental and emotional anguish that she has experienced during her internment in a Nazi concentration camp she attributes her love for music that saves her life.

“When you are optimistic, when you are not complaining, when you look at the good side of your life, everybody loves you.”

Today at age 110 Alice lives quietly in England. An accomplished musician she continues to play on her piano three hours a day.

Coffee adventure on a hot and hazy afternoon

My wife is never a coffee connoisseur. She has no preference for any particular type of coffee. Most of the time she drinks the regular 3 in 1 types that you can buy off the shelf in any store.

However today while sitting down in the air-conditioned comfort of the Inhouse Cafe in Sunway Giza Kota Damansara she surprised me by ordering iced vanilla flavoured coffee. She seldom take cold drinks because iced beverages don't go well with her stomach.

Perhaps the hot and hazy weather had affected her mood. Or perhaps she wanted to try something adventurous for a change.

As I don't like iced beverage I ran my fingers down the colourful menu to look for something that suited my taste amidst the bewildering range of coffee drinks.

One item caught my eye: caramel coffee. I have never tasted caramel coffee before and I thought why not?

As we sat down to sip coffee and enjoyed the ambiance, all around us we noticed a lot of shoppers hanging out around the mall's concourse. Even the Inhouse Cafe was half full of patrons.

At 3pm on a Fri afternoon we wondered why there were so many visitors there. Shouldn't most people be at home or working in their offices?

As for both of us we have retired from full time work and therefore have plenty of spare time to occasionally indulge ourselves when the opportunity arises.

Today was such an opportunity. We didn't drive so far all the way from our home in TPJ just to taste the coffee. Anna had to go to a bridal shop in Sunway Giza for a fitting out of her gown for our daughter's wedding dinner do. After we were done at the bridal shop we found ourselves some spare time to chill out.

With about one hour to spare before the parking ticket ran out of credit time we savoured every moment of our time to enjoy each others coffee and company. It was a most pleasant experience as both of us had never tasted vanilla and caramel flavoured coffee before.

Happy Mid Autumn Festival

Since my childhood preschool days growing up in a remote New Village in Perak it has been a long long long time since I played with a tanglung. I have forgotten how it felt lighting up and parading a lantern with my childhood buddies in celebration of the Mid-Autumn festival. Am I missing something here? By the way no Angry Birds tanglung for me please. Happy Zhongqiu Jie or Mid-Autumn Festival.

Letting go

Some of us think holding on makes us strong,
but sometimes it is letting go
~ Herman Hesse

That's why I'm getting rid of the past; residual bits and pieces of memories imprinted in the old books and documents gathering dust, stuffs that is of no use to me in the present and the future.

Bye bye past. It's over. Got to move on. As for the future it probably won't be like what I think. So why hold on and worry?

Have a happy weekend.

Happiness

Regardless of our status and station in life everybody is entitled to happiness.

"Whether we are rich or poor, educated or uneducated, whatever our nationality, color, social status, or ideology may be, the purpose of our lives is to be happy." - Dalai Lama

Supreme happiness

After a hectic day happiness is leisurely sipping a cup of coffee and enjoying its aromatic fragrance. However for me the brew must be black, steaming hot, no sugar and cream, or nothing. It matters not whether the coffee is prepared from roasted arabica, robusta, or whatever beans.

In fact I'm partial to local coffee called kopi-o that is prepared by roasting liberical beans with a mix of margarine and sugar. Many people consider kopi-o as a poor man's drink because the liberical beans used are considered to be inferior to the arabica and robusta varieties.

Giant clam shell in the sky

Ihear the incessant buzz of a roaring engine overhead. Curious I look skywards. In the distance I see a suited man in his motorised para-glider flying about above the roof line in the sky. Superimposed against a blue and white background the bright orange-yellow coloured chute looks like a giant clam shell in the clear sky.

Good weather, clear sky, breezy, lots of fresh air, little white clouds floating in the sky. It's a great day to fly.

Coklat

Coklat..

This brown and white beauty is the most friendly street dog that I have ever encountered. He seems to like to be around humans and have absolutely no fear of them or even malice toward humans. I have seen him hanging out with children and even allows them to pat him on his brown and white furry body.

Whenever he sees me he would just come over wagging his tails, playfully running around me in circles as if to say Hi! I have never heard him barked at me even once before, and because of that I sometimes wonder if he is speech-impaired.

This morning when I went to collect my car he came over as usual and even stood motionless in a cooperative posture to pose for pictures. In the picture below you can see that he was actually peering into the lens of my camera phone.

I don't know where he came from but I noticed him hanging around the street where I live since two months ago. He doesn't appear to have a master but I see him sleeping in one of the corner houses rented by an Indian family. I don't know if he has a name. Since he has a elegantly slim body like a sausage and neat and tidy brown and white fur I will name him "Coklat" or brown colour in Bahasa Malaysia.

Hi "Coklat" I'm very pleased to meet you.

Last night in the dimly lit street and under a slight drizzle together with your other doggy pals I was overjoyed to hear you barked for the first time. That means you are not speech-impaired as what I had assumed.

Have a nice day moving around with your other doggy pals "Coklat."

Squirel crossing

About 15 m away where I was standing on the asphalt in front of my house, a squirrel was making its way across the road. Scurrying half way across the road, it stopped momentarily on its tracks to look left, right and behind, as if weary of oncoming traffic and other threats to its survival.

With brownish fur, big tail, small black beady eyes, and a slender body it looks like a sausage with wheels from afar. I don't think it saw me as I was too far away from his limited vision. Then when it perceived that the coast was clear it jumped off the road onto the flat tire of one of the two rear wheels of a long-abandoned rusting truck and then disappeared into the dark shadows of the truck's innards.

I wonder in the urban landscape where it came from and where it was going. Thanks for the showtime Mr Squirrel and have a good day yourself too. By the way beware of the many stray dogs roaming the streets in my neighborhood.

Happiness is like a butterfly . . .

Happiness is like a butterfly; the more you chase it the more it would elude you, but if you turn your attention to other things, it will come and sit softly on your shoulder. . . by Thoreau

So long, goodbye and thank you so much for the beautiful music and songs, Whitney Houston. RIP.

Happiness in daly life is punching the keypads...

All the labels in the keypads of this Shell station petrol vending machine are completely missing, thus unreadable. However relying on my imagination and instinct I was surprised and extremely delighted to be able to top up the almost empty fuel tank of the Kancil at the first attempt by punching the keypads in the correct sequence.

More importantly it takes so little to find simple happiness in doing mundane stuffs in daily life like punching keypads in the correct sequence