FlashMob

Saw this flashmob by Pizza Hut in front of their store. Cute. 

My take on the General Election 13 Counting Process.

While everybody still emotionally charged calling foul of the SPR ballot counting process, I would like to make clear to those who are unaware of the GE13 ballot counting process. I do not speak for SPR or anyone - below are the opinions of my own.

Too many wrong information and rumors being shared around and it makes us look like sore losers. Worse, some takes matters in their own hands up to the point of attacking EC officers who are just carrying out their duties. Then what makes us different from the BN macai's?

I too, was sorely disappointed with the results.

While I am not sure how the postal vote counting process are done, the claims of magical ballot box appears during blackouts are very difficult to prove.

Compared to GE12, I would like to say that SPR did try to close loopholes in ballot counting process - though not all of it.

I am one of the Polling Agent (PA) and Counting Agent (CA) and this is my experience. And the counting process goes like this.

1. At 5 p.m., the Ketua Tempat Mengundi (KTM) will close the door, no more voters are allowed to go in and vote. He will then seal both the ballot boxes, both DUN and Parliament, tied it securely with cloth strings and further secure the strings with a sticker. He will then sign on this sticker and the PA will sign on the sticker as well. At this point, the CA takes over. Alternatively, the PA can be the CA himself.

2. Then, they will rearrange the room for the counting process. This takes about 30 mins. CA are allowed in the room throughout the process.

3. Then the ballot counting begins, until the end of the results. Depending on the stream, we can get the results by 8pm by tallying our votes with other CA.

So the issue of magical ballot box appearing does not make sense to me. There were only two boxes in the room at all times. Claims of ballot boxes being intercepted to the tallying stations are complete hoax. We count the vote in the classroom itself.

But why the results announcement took so long? Why there were disputes in some other polling stations?

My opinion is that -

1. We do not have enough PA and CA. DAP in Negeri Sembilan and Penang has the fastest results (we knew DAP won all the seats in N9 by 8pm by tallying our results at the DAP center) because we have plenty on PA/CA on team. I hear that some other states has trouble getting volunteers so probably problem does arises from there.

2. PA and CA are not properly trained or not aware of their rights. After the counting completed and CA of all candidates satisfied, they are asked to sign a form called BORANG 14. Each CA are supposed to be given a copy of the BORANG 14. This form is the proof of the total figure of the ballot counted for the stream. CA are supposed to request for a copy of the form and stand up and protest for it should the KTM refused to do so. Without the Borang 14, results can be altered and nobody can prove it.

Contrary to popular belief, there were no recounting votes at the tallying center. All counting and recount are done at the polling stations and results are recorded on the Borang 14.

CA are also supposed to be present to witness the resealing of the votes in their respective envelopes after counting and sign on them. Many CA were not aware of this as well.

Why then the unofficial results differ so much from the official ones? In my humble opinion - rumors. In the height of ones emotional excitement, any rumors that favors them are taken as official tally. Some streams do take longer time to count the votes. Disputes over procedures between an inexperienced KTM (hey, they only do this once every 5 years!) and CA could further lengthen the counting process.

So what can we do? In the next GE, everyone should volunteer to be a Polling Agent or Counting Agent. Get yourself trained. Read up the SPR procedures. Aware of your rights. This way we could minimize future election fraud.

I also would like to highlight that the KTM and the SPR team at my stream is extremely cooperative and professional at all times. It was a pleasant experience working with them. Being a PACA opened my eyes to many facets of the election process that the general public does not know of.

Utusan Malaysia is a big liar.

Saw this cover photo by Utusan Malaysia this morning. What caught my eye is not the photo but the number of attendees reported for the UMNO event at Bukit Jalil last night.

Why I say Utusan Malaysia is a big liar? Because the fellas over there claim that MORE than 120,000 attended the event. A quick check reveals Bukit Jalil has the seating capacity for 87,411 people only. And the stadium is only half full. Further proof is as below.

The seats at the front stage are not full.

All the seats at the back of the stage is empty

I give it a maximum 50,000 people plus those seated on the field attended the event. But where the heck of another 70,000 people came from? I think the 70,000 are the phantom voters in the electoral roll. Watch out Malaysia!

Manglish

Spotted is road sign offering International English Language course. Good grief! My country's English has dropped to an international low and even the tutor don't realize it!

Hello 2012!

Happy 2012 to all. It's a little late but what the heck...better late than never.



Am at a garage servicing my car and I thought this would be funny to start off a new year on this blog.



There are many who enjoyed my heritage trail blog post and thank you all for following me. Thank you as well who contributed on infos that I never knew before. I promise there will be more so stay tuned. Till then have a good year and a good CNY as well

FAIL Sign

A signboard spotted around Seremban

My church member spotted this sign somewhere in Seremban and share it with me. It's so funny.

Signboard Fail

Spotted this signboard near the Labu road. 

Welcome to Negeri Sembilan signboard - FAIL

Upon closer inspection one can see that the website url were haphazardly corrected.

The URL were haphazardly corrected.

What I don't understand is that this signboard is not that complicated and such error should not have occurred in the first place. Moreover, the correction done made it even worse! Saw the two periods in the url? 

I wonder how much taxpayers money were wasted to pay on such a signboard? One word: FAIL.

Inconsiderate Drivers

This lady just conveniently parks at the disabled bay and walked out to the bank ATM

Today I saw a lady driver who conveniently parks her vehicle at the parking bay meant for disabled drivers in front of Standard Chartered Bank.

I stood there waiting for her to alight from the car and pointed to her that her vehicle was parked at the bay meant for the disabled. Her reaction to me was "Just for a little while" and walks off to the bank ATMs.

Malaysians are basically bunch of selfish people. We have legs but we all want to park RIGHT IN FRONT of the bank. Just look at our schools during the mornings and evenings. Parents are not willing to park further down the road and walk to the main gate but willing to double or triple park and cause traffic congestion to the road.

The lady "just a little while" response would cause great inconvenience to the disabled. Imagine if you are a disabled driver and had to park further because someone needed the parking bay for their "just a little while excuse". They had to wade the dangers of fast moving traffic to just perform a simple banking task that all of us - the able bodied people taken for granted.

For the lady to park inconsiderately today.... remember..... 

YOU COULD BE A DISABLED TOO ONE DAY.

Don't throw motolov cocktail. Read Seremban Ads.

Seremban has a few advertisement magazines where the publisher delivers massive ad mag to all homes at a cost to the companies who wanted to advertise. There are 3 companies that do such business, but I saw this on one of the magazine.

If those racist fellas had these mag on their hands, I think there would be world peace...

Seremban Vandals

Snapped this photo at Bukit Xmas traffic light today. This fella were putting up illegal ah long bunting all over the place.

Seremban has too much illegal buntings that really are eyesore to our beautiful town.

Happy Deepavali!

At midnight sharp the skies were filled with fireworks and fire crackers non-stop for a least 10 mins like all hell broke loose.

I didn't know our Hindu neighbors too burn firecrackers to celebrate Deepavali. Guess the Chinese culture here of burning firecrackers to signify the Chinese New Year has rubbed on them too like to the Malays as well.

So I think we are all one Malaysian underneath before the 1Malaysian slogan were created.

Happy Deepavali to all!

Loving Mee

Saw this stall nearby my wife new working place.

It's a new loving dish on the menu. Good for those who are lazy to move around.

Science In Bahasa Malaysia

Now we are going to teach Science in BM

The whole world uses the language as an information and/or technology
language. How dangerous it will be if we try to use Bahasa, especially
in school. See example below:-

Hardware = barangkeras
Software = baranglembut
Joystick = batang gembira
Plug and Play = cucuk dan main
Port = lubang
Server = pelayan
Client = pelanggan

Try to translate this:

ENGLISH:
That server gives a plug and play service to the client using either
hardware or software joystick. The joystick goes into the port of the
client.

Now in BAHASA:
Pelayan itu memberi pelanggannya layanan cucuk dan main dengan
menggunakan batang gembira jenis keras atau lembut. Batang gembira itu
akan dimasukkan ke dalam lubang pelanggan..

Now you know the problem.. coming in 2012.

Kajang Satay - Restoran Malaysia (Part 3)

Halfway through our lunch, one beggar came to our table to ask for money. Knowing that this beggar are a part of a syndicate from China, we ignored him. But he is quite persistent and stood there for about 2 mins (usually these people will leave in 30 secs if there is no response from us)

So I decided play a prank on this counterfeit beggar. I spoke in Mandarin with heavy mainland accent. I asked where is he from. From mainland? I said "I am also from China. The Malaysian Chinese are poor so it's better to go back home". While he was listening he was oblivious that my wife was snapping photos.

I told my wife in Cantonese that I am going to pose and she snap a photo. The beggar, of course did not understand what I was saying, therefore it's proven that he is a foreigner. And below is the result.

Sensing something amiss, he turn his back and saw my wife with the camera. He quickly left the restaurant.

Tips to all who are pestered by this kid of syndicate with you are enjoying your meal. Take out your phone or camera and start snapping photos. They will leave you immediately.

Kajang Satay - Restoran Malaysia (Part 2)

I tried to order some drinks with one of the foreign worker and he pretend not to hear me. Another grumbled that I ordered with him. I guess all of them here are a bunch of overworked and underpaid people who has no choice but to stay in order to support their family back in Myanmar.

We ordered some otak otak. RM0.70 per peice.

This is me eating the otak-otak. It was grilled on a electric grill, therefore it does not have that 'grill fragrance' on the otak-otak. The taste is so-so only lah.

Our satay came! Mutton satay RM0.90/stick, Beef RM0.70/stick, Chicken RM0.60/stick. A bit pricey for a stick of satay, and Seremban satay tasted way better. In other words, Restoran Malaysia is nothing to shout about.

Mutton Satay

Chicken Satay

Would I return to this place? Nope unless someone willing to pay for me (hahaha. Can't say no to free food!) The place is noisy, hot, congested, workers are rude and I doubt the cleanliness of the food!

But something funny happened while we are eating. It would be tomorrow!

Kajang Satay - Restoran Malaysia (Part 1)

Last Sunday we went down to Kajang to take a look at the church where we were invited to perform our Christmas drama on 18th and 19th December. Of course after that we went to stuff our face with what Kajang is famous for - Satay.

So we ask the local where is the best satay in town. They recommended us 2 place. Restoran Malaysia and the one near the stadium. We decided to go to Restoran Malaysia as it is just opposite the police station and we would pass by it on our way home.

I was quite suprised to see Restoran Malaysia is owned by Chinese! I thought by the name of it is a Malay satay stall. The boss is Chinese, but all the workers are Myammar right down to the satay griller. I counted there is at least 20 workers there not counting those on top preparing the raw satay.

Myanmar worker grilling the satay.

There is a total of 3 satay grilling station.

Part 2 - Tomorrow!

What a bunch of bull!

First it was the keris. Now it was the bull head. I think Hissamudin has cow brains. Below are the excerpt of the Malaysian Insider.

Hisham defends cow-head protestors

Hishammuddin ... why would we want to penalise anybody?

By Asrul Hadi Abdullah Sani

PUTRAJAYA, Sept 2 – The Home Minister today defended and justified last Friday's cow-head demonstration after meeting with Malay-Muslim representatives of Shah Alam's Section 23 at his office here today.

Datuk Seri Hishammuddin Hussein pointed out that the residents felt victimized and had no intention to stir racial emotion.

“They are not getting off scot-free. They felt victimised and feel that there is another valid explanation on their part. There was no intention on their part to cause racial divide. They, the organisers, who are sitting left and right of me, didn’t even know that somebody was going to bring the head of the cow during that demonstration.” he said.

He added that the residents only wanted their voices to be heard but it was unfortunate that “the publicity they received was negative because it was linked with racial and religious sentiments.”

A group, claiming to be Muslim residents of Section 23 in Shah Alam, the new site of a Hindu temple, held a demonstration outside the Selangor state secretariat last Friday, dragging a severed cow-head, an animal sacred in Hinduism, which they stomped on and spat at under the gaze of the riot police.

The act was carried out by a group of 50 protestors who oppose the relocation of the Sri Mahamariamman Temple to Section 23 from Section 19, claiming the area is mainly occupied by Malay-Muslims.

The 150-year-old temple was built on a plantation which over the years was developed into housing estates by the Selangor Development Corporation (PKNS). No provisions were made to relocate the temple, which is now in the middle of a Muslim majority area.

Hishammuddin told reporters that the police allowed the demonstrators to proceed because the numbers of protestors were small.

“They said that they were very conscious and all that they wanted to do was to voice their unhappiness about the willingness of the state government to listen to their requests. I was told that even the Hindus there are not so passionate that it is built there (section 23),” he said.

Hishammuddin refuted claims that the protest was organised by Umno and said that the location allocated by the state government is not suitable because Section 23 is predominantly Malay.

However, a check last week showed the neighbourhood was multi-racial, with Indians making up more than a quarter of those who live there.

“If I wanted to use the issue to create chaos in Selangor, I can but we didn’t take such actions,” Hishammuddin said.

He tried to play down the cow-head incident by pointing out that there were previous incidents where a pig-head was used.

“I have it in my records to show there were cases where a pig-head was used by irresponsible parties including leaving the head in front of an Umno building covered by an Umno flag,” he said, but offered no details of such an act.

The Umno vice-president warned irresponsible parties not to provoke racial sentiments because it goes against the concept of 1 Malaysia.

Hishammuddin told reporters that the residents had met with Hindu Sangam two days ago and both parties will be releasing a media statement tomorrow.

“If it can be resolved quickly and can be done with both sides understanding each other ... why would we want to penalise anybody?” he said, suggesting he was not in favour of legal action to be taken against any of the protestors.

Copyright © 2009 The Malaysian Insider.

Loading...

The response from Caterer.com.my

A few days after my email to caterer.com.my, they responded to me with an email as below.

Dear Kok Hon,

First, thank you very much for your letter dated May 8, 2009. We highly appreciate you taking the time to write your story in a detailed manner because it enables us to really understand your concern.

We are sorry that your overall recent experience with caterer.com.my
hasn't been a pleasant one. Delighting our customers has always been at the heart of our business. The website is our way of enriching the customer-ordering experience as customers are empowered to take charge of their event.

There are 2 things I would like to address which you have highlighted in your letter:

1. Payment of full amount upon ordering

It is our company policy for customers to pay the full amount before a function is confirmed. This is being implemented so we can focus on the customer's event and not spend too much time following up on remaining partial payments. For your info, we have had a lot of cases like these in the past which prompted management to implement the "Full Payment" policy. Allan did submit your request of paying half the amount first especially since the total amount of your function is quite a sum. We did decide that we won't be able to make an exception to the policy because this can be a precedent and we may potentially get more requests like these from our other field sales people.

Now having said this, we fully agree with you that you should have been properly informed about the decision regarding your request... which leads me to the second point below.

2. Failure on company's part to properly inform you about the outcome of your request

We are deeply sorry that you were made to wait for days and days after being promised that you will get a call from us. We have called Allan's attention on this issue and have reprimanded him on this. Allan is one of our top field sales personnel but we are not making an excuse for his actions. We acknowledge that it was unprofessional on our end to have kept you waiting and we would like to apologize for the manner the communication was conducted.

We have also noted your request to cancel your initial order.

Again, we are sorry for any stress and inconvenience we may have caused you. We hope to still be of service to you in any of your future events and we sincerely wish you success in your upcoming wedding and happiness in your marriage.

Respectfully yours,


Hasmah Hassan
Administrator Caterer dot com sdn bhd

Ok lah, at least they got an answer for me. I wonder how they reprimand Allan? Hehe. Apology accepted. Case closed.

I just want to rant.... about caterer.com.my

This is a rant post. It might not do good to your mood. Posting it here so that anybody googling for a review for the mentioned company below can be warned ahead.

Still reading? Ok here goes.

An Open Letter to Caterer.com.my

To whomever it may concern,

I writing to complain the poor service that your company and staff/manager are giving me. About two months back, I stumbled upon your company website while searching for a western caterer for my upcoming wedding in Seremban in the end of May. Both my fiance and I liked your website, and I emailed to your listed email to ask some questions. However nobody contacted and I decided to call after a few day. I spoke to Alan, and he sounded professional and attentive.

About a month ago. I booked for a wedding buffet dinner for 200 pax. The next day a lady called me up to confirm the details. She called me around 6pm, by then I am already on my way home and asked that I called later.

I called a few days afterward to confirm my order and only to find out that I need to pay the full amount ahead first. The total amount of my orders is about RM7000. That is fine with me, but however I asked if policy can be negotiated, as there is no guarantee on my side for the deal if I paid the full amount first. What if your company didn't come? Or they come a day late? Or an hour late?

The lady directed to me to speak to Alan,. I spoke to Alan, and explained my situation, and proposed your company and I meet halfway. I would pay 50% as the deposit, and on the day you arrive I will pay you the balance in cash or bank draft before you setup. Alan was attentive to my proposal, and he explained that it was the company policy to receive the full amount. However he would consider it and take a look at my order and he was without internet at the moment . He promised that he would call me the next day for an answer.

I waited 5 days and Alan, did not call. I call up Alan, and he forgotten about my request and promised to call me up the next day. I waited for another 3 days, and Alan, did not call me up also. I call him up again, and he forgotten about my request again, and promised to call me up the next day. I waited to the end of next day, and I called Alan, to prompt for an answer. He told me that he already submitted my request to the higher management, and he would call me up the next day.  He, of course he did not and that was 2 weeks ago, and since I have found a even better caterer and gave me an even lower price.

I am utterly disappointed with the service that was given to me. Alan, should have call me and gave me a definite answer, either a yes or a no. Your company or Alan, should not kept me in the dark even if my request is being denied. This is totally unprofessional. You got a great website, unfortunately with a lousy team of workers. By me an active customer and you a passive company, I felt like I am begging so that I can give you money in your pocket.

Therefore I would like to cancel my order of which I don't know what order number, because your website doesn't auto feedback and email at all back to me.

May you will improve and take heed from my unfortunate experience with your company.

TNB

I snapped this pic at Seremban TNB main branch. Can you tell what is wrong with this photo?