New 50 ringgit note

Today at an ATM in Taiping, I was shocked when the machine dispenses out a different design of 50 ringgit notes. I wonder whether they were fake because there was no golden jubilee celebration logo (commemorating Malaysia's 50th Anniversary of Independence) on the reverse side of the notes. After successfully depositing the new notes into an ATM, I have no more hard time believing that they are real.

Obverse side (Release on January 2008)

Reverse side (Release on January 2008). Take note that the golden jubilee celebration logo is placed on the top right (This logo is no longer available in the new release)

I heard about the release somewhere last year and have seen the design of the fourth series in Wikipedia however I wasn't aware with the fresh new design which was released recently. I think the new design is interesting.

This is the press statement from Central Bank of Malaysia:

Bank Negara Malaysia Issues New Design RM50 Banknote

Bank Negara Malaysia today announces the issuance of the new design RM50 banknote from 15 July 2009. This new design of RM50 banknote is the first denomination of the Fourth Series of Malaysian currency notes which will be replacing the existing series in stages.

The earlier new design of RM50 banknote was issued in December 2007 to commemorate Malaysia's 50th Anniversary of Independence. This current series will no longer have the logo of the country's golden jubilee celebrations and will have, enhanced security features.

Source: Bank Negara Malaysia

When transboundary haze hazing our way...

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Haze in Malaysia is now an annual phenomenon. Malaysia no doubt is a new industrialized nation but factories and vehicles alone are not sufficient to generate the smokey haze. Satellite images from NASA confirm the occurrence of burning forest in many locations in Sumatra Indonesia. So it is a transboundary issue.

NASA’s earth observatory reports on the seasonal fires currently burning the forests of the Indonesian island of Sumatra. In the image above you can see hot spots detected using the infra-red heat emissions of the flames

Many entities blame individual farmers and commercial timber and plantation companies for causing the haze, rendering the search for the culprits or so-called fire starters. But the common question who starts the fire never solve this yearly problem. My question is what happened to the Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution signed by ASEAN countries in 2002? We Malaysians suffer more than any other ASEAN members. How many years more should we wait before this problem solve?

The smokey forest of Riau, Indonesia (Source: Greenpeace)

Interesting polyglots...

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I always admire those who speak more than four languages with high degree of proficiency. To me these people are amazing. I observed many European sport celebrities speak easily three-four languages. For instance, Roger Federer speaks German (mother tongue), English and French with high level of proficiency. Novak Djokovic speaks Serbian (mother tongue), English and Italian fluently and quite good German. Siblings Marat Safin and Dinara Safina speak Russian (mother tongue), Spanish and English. The question is how do they do it?

At the moment, apart from Roger Federer and Novak Djokovic, I admire Luca (Italian), Stuart Jay Raj (Australian) and Abou Jad (American) for being multilingual. No hard time believing, just watch these videos:

Luca speaks fluently eight languages (Italian, English, Spanish, French, Dutch, German, Swedish and Russian)



Stuart Jay speaks fluently English, Thai, Indonesian and Mandarin. He also speaks a few European languages and not least sign language



Abou Jad speaks four languages (English, Spanish, French and Lebanese Arabic)

I hope one day I can be like them. Currently I speak Malay (mother tongue) and English quite fluently. I also speak Jordanian-Palestinian Arabic and Bengali (Bangla language) but with low degree of proficiency. I used to learn French and Spanish in the end of 1990s but never practice (sadly). I hope to see improvement in my Arabic by the end of this year. I hope by Allah will I can. InshaAllah...

Secret Recipe

.Although Secret Recipe has established its brand name since 1997, I only knew about it when I moved to Kulim to work in a research organization in 2007. Only in 2009 I bravely hop into this cake cafe. Although Secret Recipe is more popular for its cakes rather than its food varieties, I still can see many customers have pasta or chicken recipe for their main course.

The first food I ate was Cordon Bleu Chicken, in which I had in Tesco Taiping. It got cheese stuffed in it. Interesting taste and not bad after all.

Cordon Bleu Chicken

I am not a fan of cakes to be honest. I used to hate them because some cakes taste 'so eggy' and the icings are just too sugary. The popular chocolate cakes sometimes taste 'so spongy'. But Secret Recipe had twisted my perception. Their cakes taste incredibly delicious make me feel like on top on a mountain. Sounds exaggerating but it's true.

So far I had tasted Chocolate Indulgence, Chocolate Strawberry, Chocolate Banana and Chocolate Chip Walnut. I may want to try Lemon Cheese and Hazel Cheese next time.

This is how I graded Secret Recipe:
Main Course Chicken - Taste: Good / Price: Reasonable
Cakes - Taste: Excellent / Price: Reasonable
Iced Blended Coffee Beverages - Taste: Good / Price: Expensive
Soft Drinks - Taste: Ordinary / Price: Very Expensive

Secret Recipe has been awarded 'THE BEST HALAL RESTAURANT OF THE YEAR' in 2005. Thumbs up to Secret Recipe! Halal is important for us and please maintain it. However I do hope Secret Recipe can knock down the price of their beverages to something more reasonable. What say you?

With Sudirman and my housemate cum food expert Shams at Secret Recipe Kulim
(Photo taken by Khairuldin)

My Toshiba Notebook WEI Score

.Yesterday I upgraded my RAM to 3GB (from 1.5 GB earlier). I replaced my 'extra' 512 MB RAM with the 2 GB. I wonder how's the performance like since the two RAM sticks are of different capacity (1 GB + 2 GB). Some computer experts consider this as having two different legs that will impair the computer performance. Well, is it really true?

I'm using Toshiba Notebook model Satellite M200 and this was my Windows Experience Index Score after upgrading to 3 GB RAM:

The detail of my Toshiba Notebook System (as on 20 June 2009):
Processor - Intel(R) Core(TM)2 Duo CPU T5450 @ 1.66GHz
Memory (RAM) - 3.00 GB
Graphics - Mobile Intel(R) 965 Express Chipset Family
Gaming graphics - 358 MB Total available graphics memory
Primary hard disk - 91GB Free (143GB Total)
Operating System - Windows Vista (TM) Home Basic
Antivirus - Kaspersky Antivirus 7.0 (Licensed user)

Although my Base Score only improved by 0.1 from the previous 3.4, I really feel my Notebook works much faster than before. The start up and refresh rate are relatively faster. Of course the Windows Experience Index off trust me a little bit, at least it tells how my notebook performs rather than not knowing at all.

By the way, I still wonder how the dual channel rules apply and works best using two identical RAM sticks...

Beauty: Love the natural

Is it so important to look beautiful? How attractive is gorgeous? How do you rate one's degree of beauty?

Different people always have a different view on beauty. No matter how much they try to put it into words, it will end up subjective, although describable.

In today's world, the need of looking beautiful has been a sense of obligation since a lot of people can be persuaded into believing that 'everybody can be physically beautiful' by the beauty industry, although their new look might just as plain as pikestaff or worse than the anticipated. Once ones bought the idea of 'looking gorgeous' by just putting layers of makeup, thick foundation or beauty cream, they may end up losing appreciation on their own natural beauty. People won't judge if celebrities, models and makeup artists are the ones who embraced the artificial because that's what beauty business wants them to be. But if the one that supposed to be a role model in religion, the one that clearly understand that religion denounces excess in beautifying oneself to the extent of altering one’s physical features as created by God, is the one who fails badly on stage. How can we put respect on what she preaches? I saw many the so-called 'ustazah' (female religious scholars) wear thick red lipstick and heavy makeup for accommodating the need of a TV show. I'm sure these ustazahs were never forced to wear such by the producers. It's their choice as they can choose to look more natural from the very beginning. If ustazah fails, how about non-ustazah and the rest of ordinary people?

I do blame cosmetic companies, fashion magazines and media for portraying the 'perfect skin' and 'perfect look' since not just because they make believing in artificial beauty, they might also impose hardships to those who embraced the lifestyle of 'biar papa asalkan bergaya' (translation: let be in style although we're financially unfit). It is a fact that many modern celebrities have their nose, cheeks or boobs done in order to look physically attractive, which is very wrong from the religious perspective. But to make oneself looks more doll-like than human, it's just too crazy to believe that it's real and there are people doing it!

Going artificial is a choice. There is no such thing as 'perfect skin' and 'perfect look', no matter how much makeup you put on, no matter how many surgeries have you undertaken. You'll going to notice the defects one after another. It is a fact that everybody wants to look physically beautiful, whether you are a woman or a man, who doesn't? But why to look for artificial beauty? Just be yourself. Remember being human is the most beautiful things God ever gave us. Have a heart, that's make you beautiful.

"I LOVE NATURAL BEAUTY"

Everybody has their own beauty. Just be proud of it.

Badminton Tournament: AMREC Closed

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Sudirman-Khairul Shakirin vs Bakri-Izha

Based on the original plan, the closed tournament should be held on May 11-12. After almost two weeks of postponing, the closed event was finally realized yesterday.

Randomly selected, I was assigned to Group A. I was partnering with Yusli in this solely men's doubles event. Interestingly we were drawn to meet Juri Che Hat and Khairul Shakirin. The good thing is we won 21-12,19-21,21-16. Tough match though. Thanks to my partner Yusli for covering some parts of my weaknesses. The most shocking result came out at the beginning of the match. Believe it or not, the formidable pair of Sudirman and Khairul Shakirin were upset by Bakri and Izha in straight game! What a match!

It was a mix fortune for my housemates. Khairuldin who was partnering with Khairul Nizan (aka Oun) lost to Lokman and Nizam in rubber sets. On the other hand my other housemate Shams, with his partner Cupin, were regarded as an easy prey by many, won over Mat Leh and Anas in rubber sets, another upset of the day. So never underestimate the underdogs!

Overall my team (Group A) was beaten by Group B in a close tie 3-4. Nothing to lose. We really enjoyed the game.

Overruled.. supporters are too close for comfort

Top seed, Sudirman@Lee Yong Dae and Khairul Shakirin suffered shocking defeat..

Last snap before going back home