There are many conspiracy theories in this world. Loose Change is likely not one of them.

I had a conversation with a friend last night and inevitably high fuel prices came up.  We had a bit of mass hysteria here in Kota Kinabalu on Tuesday as a rumour spread that the petrol stations would be closed for 3 days due to some or other strike.

There were some talks of unhappiness about petrol commissions and losing out due to credit card payments, but no firm plans to strike (which is apparently illegal anyway for petrol kiosks, a seller of controlled items).

Nevertheless, the rumours spread like wildfire and by 3pm on Tuesday the roads started jamming up as people rushed to fill their cars.  KKliens, whenever there’s more than 2 people participating, seems to throw all rules, traffic and otherwise, out the window and quickly petrol stations were jammed from all sides as people pushed and shoved and tried to cut their way to the front.

The queues into the petrol stations spilled onto the roads, blocking single lane and, in many places, double lane roads and by 5.30 when I left worked, the entire city was grid-locked.  I passed petrol stations where people had entered from both the entrance and the exit and with the stations jammed, nobody could go anywhere.

I eventually made it to Julia’s where we hung out at the pool until about 7.30pm waiting for the traffic, passing at glacial speeds, to clear.  Police drove around town broadcasting over loudspeakers that the rumours are false.  I received a text message from The Star at 7.51pm also announcing this.

So back to our conversation; we spoke about how gullible we as humans sometimes are and that if enough people believe something, whether it’s true or not, it will be perceived as truth.

Governments manipulating this gullibility and herd mentality came up.

There are many governments today that lie to their people, but none are under the spotlight quite as brightly as the American government.  I’ve read many articles calling George W. Bush the worst US president and biggest liar in history and starting wars under false pretenses to benefit in various ways, most notably stakes in oil.

But the lies and deceit go much further than fabricated evidence about Iraq’s real threat to the world. Much, much deeper.

I’m not sure why I haven’t stumbled across this before, or even heard of it prior to my friend bringing it up last night.  Loose Change is a documentary looking at 9/11 from an angle you never contemplated. Or perhaps you have.

It’s an hour and a bit long, but the time will pass in a flash.

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It was with a dent in my heart that I just read AFP’s article reporting on Arthur C. Clarke’s death.

The praise they sing of him I cannot do justice, so I will not try.

I can add though that I grew up with Arthur C. Clarke and often lost myself in his works of science fiction. He also thought me the love of words and how powerful they could be as the building blocks of worlds of fantasy.

I do not pretend to be a writer, but I do dabble, and if sometimes my stories are wordy and very descriptive, I credit the great Arthur C. Clarke. Even now, when I find my vocabulary being stale and mundane, I turn to my favourite Arthur. C. Clarke book, Expedition to Earth, which is a collection of short stories, to reignite my imagination and rejuvenate my vocabulary with colourful palettes of descriptive words.

Through stories like The Sentinel, which is the story that inspired the one everybody remembers him for, 2001: A Space Odyssey, I find inspiration. It also contains many of my favourite stories, some because they were the clever prose that only a master could produce, and some because they were so descriptive that you could vividly imagine the colours and even smell the fragrances he wrote about.

Arthur C. Clarke was way ahead of his time and much of his earlier science fiction works actually became reality, such as satellites, space exploration, landing on the moon, and in the not so distant future, perhaps setting up colony on the moon or Mars.

Most of his books I’ve read I’ve read twice, or in the case of the one mentioned above, many times over. Rama II was another one which I’ve read over and over, each time being able to imagine the world he created inside the alien spacecraft even better than the first.

Arthur C. Clarke has left behind his legacy as a writer, the way he wanted it to be. And although his earlier novels are showing their age, referring to technology the younger generation might not even know about (vacuum tubes anyone?), the fantasy worlds they contain will entertain generations to come.

May your spirit explore the worlds you knew existed. I will never forget you Arthur C. Clarke.

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There’s this little skit from Monty Python’s “Travel Agent” where there’s a joke about this guy who can’t pronounce the letter C, so he replaces it with the letter B. Had Jane Fonda kept this in mind before she went on the Today Show, she might have been spared from a storm in a tea cup.

The conversation, obviously with some parts before and after, is between a customer and a travel agent and goes like this:

Agent: Anyway, you’re interested in one of our holidays are you?
Customer: Yes thats right, I saw your advert in the bolour supplement.
Agent: The what?
Customer: The bolour supplement.
Agent: The colour supplement?
Customer: Yes thats right. Im afraid I cant say the letter B
Agent: C?
Customer: Yes. Its all due to a trauma I suffered when I was a Sboolboy. I was attacked by a bat.
Agent: Ah, a cat?
Customer: No a bat.
Agent: Well can you say the letter K?
Customer: Oh yes, Khaki, Kettle, Kipling, Kuwait, Kings Bollege Bambridge.
Agent: Well why dont you say the letter K, instead of the letter C?
Customer: What, you mean spell bolour with a K.
Agent: Right.
Customer: Kolour.
Agent: Yes.
Customer: Ah thats very good. I never thought of that before. What a silly bunt.

So there Jane Fonda was not quite talking to a travel agent and not quite with the same speech impediment on the Today Show, appearing with Eve Ensler, better known for her work The Vagina Monologues. One thing lead to another, and invariably Jane Fonda spoke about how she was asked to appear in a monologue called Cunt.

The Today Show is broadcast live, and in America, you can do and say whatever you want, but heaven help you if you do it on live TV. Needless to say, immediately a storm in a teacup erupted when seconds later the host, Meredith Vieira voiced an apology on behalf of NBC and Jane Fonda.

I’m not sure whether the producers prompted her because somebody in the control box noticed and said “Oh fuck! She said cunt. You can’t fucking say cunt on live TV!! Make her apologise, quick!”, or whether perhaps a disturbed TV viewer phoned in to say “I’m terribly offended. I was watching your broadcast and these women speaking about vaginas and monologues, when the one on the left suddenly said a despicable word - the C-word. I’m terribly offended”.

Poor Jane Fonda. She should have sat up and said, “Hang on, I didn’t apologise - the monologue was called Cunt. That’s the name of the monologue.” Perhaps she should have pulled a Prince and referred to it as “I was asked to this monologue call a crass name for vagina“.

Well, as far as I know, the Vagina Monologues are controversial by design to bring attention to the plight of women, so yah! for Jane Fonda and big old boo for the Today Show and American Live TV. Surely the live TV watching audience are not morons and can appreciate the context of certain situations and words.

Either that, or they’re a bunch of silly bunts.

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It’s been a while since I stumbled across such a variety of interesting news articles. To take a break from my Ubuntu Adventures and whats-going-ons in Kota Kinabalu, herewith snippets I picked up from the net today - sorted in order of intellectual stimulation from most to least.

Elections: Malaysia does in 1 month what takes the US a year

Just as you think you can’t take anymore Election news, especially of American Elections where people from the same party are cutting each other’s throats in their race to becoming America’s Number One Citizen, the Malaysian Parliament gets dissolved. This usually is closely followed by the announcement of when the next elections will be. This is not controversial politics though, it’s an actual process.

So, if all goes well, within a month from now the Malaysian Elections will be over and a new (but probably the same - alternatives are slim pickings, I’m told) Government will be ruling Malaysia. How’s that for shortening the agony of the voting public?

You Threaten Me, I Ridicule You

Tactics we acquire on the school playground clearly escalates in life and are eventually used on life’s big stage. Just ask Israel and Palestine in their tit-for-tat war. But it’s not just them, all sectors of society play this game, religions, big businesses (Microsoft annoys Google, Google does the same), marriage, you name it.

The last, very unnecessary retaliation is the Newspaper Cartoonist vs. Muslims. In 2006 some Danish cartoonist offended the religion when their newspapers published cartoons offensive to Muslims. After what turned out to be a global outcry, things quietened down - on the surface at least.

In the dark underbelly of religious fundamentalism, terrorist attacks, bomb making and retribution must have been the main topics of conversation at many a Terrorist Fundamentalist party. Eventually a plot to murder one of the said cartoonist where uncovered. The cartoonist retaliated with a printed bomb by publishing the cartoons again.

Can somebody please call the school yard monitor?

Microsoft, Google, Linux, Symbian - Spoilt for Choice

Clearly the Bill Gates Foundation has money to spare, as it seems Microsoft is running down the acquisitions isle grabbing companies off the shelf left and right. In their latest move, whilst waiting to smother Yahoo! with cash, they’ve acquired ominously named Danger.

Planning world domination in the smart phone market William will face stiff competition from not only the established crowd, but a host of new entries as well.

Linux finally made it to the mobile market. Previously unpopular because it was comparatively slow, the little penguin embraced by more every day, has grown up and is playing with the big boys. LG and Samsung will shortly be releasing phones running on Linux. Likewise, Google’s Andriod operating system, also based on Linux, is gaining ground and has reportedly signed up over 50 manufacturers and vendors to play nice with their OS.

The makers of Symbian, growing strongly with a comfortable market share, is not worried. Whatever the outcome, the consumer can only win.

Heroes Will be Back Shortly

Finally, after 3 months of Heroes withdrawal, the Writers Strike has ended and the creatives who fuel Hollywood will be returning to work.

If you were puzzled by having to watch reruns of your favourite shows over the last three months, and an inexplicable increase in reality programming, it’s because the people who write your shows have been on strike.

This was courtesy of the fat cat studios, who where trying to apply 1980’s payment formula’s to the 2008, wanting to pay writers on a model they got shafted with and tied to 20 years ago (nutshell - get the clamshell).

Lucky for us, the viewing public, the people involved managed to sort out the differences and will be able to go back to work. Heroes Season 3, here we come!

Siblings Do It Better… no wait, Worse!

Britney Spears has one. Jessica Simpson has one. Hell, Bill Clinton and George Bush have one. Siblings, that is. And not just any old siblings, but siblings who manage to upstage their more famous siblings for better or worse - but usually for worse.

The latest celebrity sibling to join the fray is Paris’ little bro, who, by the looks of it, is a brother from another mother. Named Barron Hilton (why is Nicky normally named?), he dubiously shot to fame for an incident which seems to run in the family. DUI. And clearly Paris has been a fine role model, as little B.Hilly was also banned from driving when he got caught. The boy is only 18 - nice start to life - if he had to get a job like the rest of us, that little smudge on his record would have sucked.

Maybe the Hiltons can convert one of their hotels into a lavish, 5-star prison… for special citizens like Paris and her Brother. Nicky and Conrad, watch out, you know how these celebrity mishaps appear to be contagious, go on, just ask Jamie Lynn.

Never Be Out of Touch… Ever Again

If you thought Facebook couldn’t get more invasive… well, it just did. Gypsii is set to launch soon and it will enable you to broadcast to the world where you are, exactly. Thankfully, it only will work on top end phones for now, which means even if I lost my mind (completely) and wanted to use it, my lag in technology will keep me out of Big Brother’s clutches a little while longer.

Stay Virus Free This Valentines Day

And, last but not least - if you want to stay virus free this Valentines Day do just two things: don’t open email messages wishing you a Happy Valentines Day… and wear a condom, k?

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I whip out my 1 mega pixel wonder at random times to snap pictures. The quality isn’t great, I know, but it’s so handy. I carry it around with me everywhere anyway (mobile phone, remember?) and I just need to press a button, aim press another button and hey, presto! Plus, it can be accurately operated with one hand, which makes it ideal for snapping on the go.

I do sporadic downloads, and because I think everything that I find amusing is also amusing to anyone that might stumble across the website, I post it. Little do I know I’m easily amused. Anyway, here’s what I discovered on my cellphone today:

24-hour Automated Bill Paying

There’s a growing amount of 24-hour pay stations (watch this post show up in Google under ‘play station’) here in Kota Kinabalu. I support this concept, because I work on the fringe of town and only have a an hour lunch, which is carefully timed. I pay most of my bills online, because frankly, I don’t have enough time to pay it during office hours. The fact that I’m a mere 5 minute (theoretically) drive from town, has nothing to do with it. If the traffic jam doesn’t get you (but it will), the lack of parking will. So don’t even think about using your lunch hour for something so trivial. The paystations are therefore handy for people in my predicament, but without online banking (bless their backward souls).

Telekom Malaysia recently integrated their phone bill and ADSL bill. Why they were on two separate bills before I wouldn’t be able to explain, but now they’re on one bill. My bank hasn’t yet updated their online banking system to accommodate the new account number’s format, which is unlike either the phone or ADSL format. This means I can’t register the account online and has taken away the convenience of paying my bill in the timely manner I am used to. So the bill went unpaid.

I’ve delayed before, and even though they took a month to install my line and then another 3 weeks to actually get it working after they installed it, they will you cut off my ass if I don’t pay 5 minutes after the bill due date. This has happened before and I feel like a jugular gets cut when my internet connection gets cut. The urgency of finding a way to pay was thus apparent.

That’s why, flying in the face of conventional wisdom, I ventured out into the mean world of traffic jams and too little parking, to pay my bill. I hate the Kedia TM (or TM Shop), because the queues are long and slow moving. God knows what people’s problems are, but they take forever to get solved - when I eventually make it to one of those service reps I always take no more than 2 minutes.

I had a reason to smile though when I stood around with my bill in hand trying to work out the mathematical probabilities of which queue would be faster, when an elderly security guard shuffled up to me and asked in Malay if I wanted to pay my bill. I said yes, wondering how he was going to solve my problem. He led me into a little space where something akin to an ATM stood and proceeded to show me how to pay my bills without inefficient customer service rep intervention.

1. push a button to start (could have cut this out in my opinion - activate on scan);
2. slip the bill through a scanning cradle;
3. insert money totaling nearest or over the billing amount (more gets credit on the next bill, no change)

Done. I was in and out, bill paid, receipt in hand in less than 5 minutes and even had time for lunch. Best thing is, the terminal is accessible 24-hours a day, so if I can’t get registered online before the next billing cycle, I will just go at 2am and avoid the traffic as well as the queues. I love technology.

Nelly the elephant packed her trunk…

… and hung out in my trousers! This cute little elephant made an appearance at a recent fancy dress. It’s still underwear (oh yes, did I mentioned that it’s elephant underwear? Elephant thong to be exact ), so it didn’t get much stage-time - but the rest of costume was a patient’s robe ala hospital style, so it did peak out every now and again (mainly when I bent over to get a beer from the ice-bucket). Once the other party revelers discovered what I was wearing under the robe I did get molested a few times, but I didn’t file any charges. For the same party, it was a pot luck (or bring-and-braai, or bring-your-own thing), I made a fresh veggie salad. One of the ingredients was a cucumber and I had to stop and gawk at it for a bit, dirty images flashing.

Cracked ribs. Well, as painful as.

I reported a few days ago about the mysterious crack in my computer monitor - the mystery of how it happened is nagging at my mind more than the fact that my screen is broken, but ponder is my only option. On the pics the damage is apparent, as are the points of impact. Perhaps one of the little lizards was flying around radio controlled rocks…

Lights out

I recently overhead a chat between a local and international journalist and the international one asked whether they reported on traffic jams and blackouts. I laughed so hard. If they did, the newspapers would only feature traffic reports and black out reports, because both are viciously prevalent. The blackouts don’t much bother me at work as we have back-up generators and my computer is one of a few selected units that has a UPS. This means power surges and interruptions at least doesn’t cause me to loose any work.

At home it’s much more annoying though. No UPSs there. The other night I was bunked down and ready for a night of serious blogging when “zooop” the entire neighborhood powered down. The first appliance that’s going to conk out will be my fridge. The thing isn’t a year old yet and already it’s making the sounds of a 20-year old, two-stroke motorbike engine. My computer is more resilient (but how much more?).

Anyway, so what to do when you were about to be creative and the power goes out? Well, you make do with what you have I guess.

Sustaining Flabby Gut

Pete’s Corner is my bliss and my bane (more specifically, my bane, Flabby Gut’s bliss) - good food, good prices. I go to town for lunch every so often and then have a single helping of food, but every now and again, I gorge. When I have lunch with Julia, she doesn’t help much as she can often not finish her own helping and then I am left to take care of it. On the occasion pictured I really have only myself to blame as we really ordered too much food for a simple lunch. Burp!

Underparking

Here’s a little variation on the theme of parking problems. This is one of the parking sections at work. A huge space, see? The irony here is that this section is in fact only divided into three. So space enough, thought whoever painted the lines, for only three cars. Sure, Land Cruisers are popular and prevalent, but you can park even four Land Cruisers in this space. Every now and again you find a progressive thinker (or three) who parks way to the one side, which then easily allows 3 more cars to park there. This doesn’t happen often and usually I just have to stare at a nearly big enough space as I drive past a all the occupied spaces.

And if you think that space is big enough to facilitate another car, you are wrong. This space will remain empty, because nobody who cares for their car is going to squeeze in there and risk having the other cars open their doors against their car bodies - because the other people can. And they will.

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