polling day

it's finally annouced when was the polling day. the nomination day will be happening on the day of Hitler's birthday. while the polling day 2 weeks after that. for those who are into the politic, I would say good luck. but for me, it will change nothing. I'm still without any luck. still without light at the end of the tunnel.

advising session

an interview session I attended yesterday turned into an advise session by the sole interviewer. strange. wait for the outcome.

teachers' corruption II

uh, there was a corruption case involving a university lecturer. basically, if you want to increase your marks, then just pay! it was just an old story.

I've wrote in this blog how a senior civil servant proudly and innocently announced that his son received government sponsorship. he claim that it was his right since he's a civil servant. how corrupt was that statement! it was so corrupt.

lies

Ok, one man lied to me. he said something about another man. I felt he's cheating. but he has a deformed face that will always show a smiling face, under any circumstances. so today I confronted this man he had lied about. outright, he denied it. he asked who drummed up the story. but, stupidly, I declined to reveal the name. my response was "from an acquaintance". that was stupid. really.

I was amused by the way the man lied to me. didn't he ever think that the truth will finally prevail.

there you go. he's as stupid I am!

religious corruption

a news broke last week that officers in a quasi-religious agency which handles pilgrimage, asked for money in return for express pilgrimage. what the heck! coincidently, two weeks ago a colleague in my office proudly told that he has relative in the agency that might lend his hand. my response at that point was, what a corruption.

all this reminds me to a phrase in a film directed by our country most coveted film director, "you are SO corrupted!". it's not only corrupted, but SO corrupted.

celebrating the difference

once again adults had to learn from children. last week I went to see my children's teachers to discuss on their development. the discussion seemed to go nowhere when suddenly I remember that individuals are different. we should celebrate and appreciate these differences. these differences give colour and flavour to our society. it is humanistic and real.

come on world, respect the differences!

the commoner and the railway

today I went to have a lunch at a small railway station. I took some fruits and cakes as my lunch. then I ordered a cup of tea from an old lady who was doing dish washing. while making my tea, she commented to a piece of news on the radio. she commented how lucky a person referred to on the news. she narrated how difficult her life started as a children of a big, poor family. then as a poor widow. nevertheless the support that she entitle as a people in a civilised society has never been given to her.

I love to be around people whose live revolve around railway economic circle. you always can find a story about human. not about things. when I back to the office that afternoon, again I faced the people who kept on talking about things. things do not make people happy, it's human being.

Soviet Union anthem

An unbreakable union of free republics,
Great Rus' joined together forever.
Long live the creation of the will of the peoples,
The united, the mighty Soviet Union!


above is the first part of the Soviet national anthem. forget the rest but the third line. I wonder why the inspiration in
such beautiful crafted sentence never make it into the real world. in what ever system that we have today, all the
dreams will remain the dreams. ordinary people will always short-lived.

new or used?

one of my responsibility is to check whether the material used in a new construction is new (it is always must be new due to contract's condition). two days ago I did exactly that. the picture above shows the material exhibits sign of being 'used material'. it is quite obvious, isn't it?

why in the world the constructor ever wanted to do this? is everybody else is blind? really I was disappointed. had the material had been installed, I would asked them to remove everything and redo it again. it was a foolish attempt of doing thing. foolish.

diary of a father XVIII - tin ore

I brought my family to see this monster last week. this is actually a tin ore dredging floating machine. the length is about 100m, width is more than 10m and depth is about 4m. this particular machine is 73 years old. once, this kind of machine was used by the colonial to steal our wealth. then it was handed over to the locals. and I really don't sure whether the locals were better than the colonials in term of sharing the wealth.

my grandfather worked in this mining activity: as a worker. I told my kids to imagine how he worked in such condition so that he could raised his many kids plus some more of his nephews. while not working he would do a lot more of part time works.

so while the machine symbolised the colonials grip on the locals economy, but it also was the place where my family was raised. there is always two sides of a coin.

diary of a father XVI - job

this is my office. the idea of publishing this picture came when we (family circle) had a discussion about our job last weekend. one of the participants said workers at his workplace were just paid August's salary - a two-month late. then several others joint the fray. mostly they blamed the employers. at one time I decided to enter the discussion. I reminded them how the largest workers union in the country disagreed with the recently  passed amendment on the worker's act.

yes, I agree that employers are greedy. but we, the commoners, somehow elect our representatives who in turn passed the law that affect us negatively. the people are always depressed, always.

Muammar Gaddafi II

he was once a leader but later he betrayed his own people. human being changes just because 'things' and of course 'power'. but power eventually leads to 'things'. so it is 'things' that destroys humanity. 'things' (or materialistic) kills people.

history and politics III

well, here in our country, we may have the history to be tried in court. and the guy who is to tried was charged under the 'defamation' title. wait and see...

state of emergency

'A state of emergency is a governmental declaration that may suspend some normal functions of the executive, legislative and judicial powers'
-Wikipedia


when the Arabs spring hit the newsstand few months ago, I learnt that several Arab countries still have state of emergency. the proclamation had been in effect for few decades. for example Egypt (since 1967), Syria (1963), Algeria (1992). but I never thought that my country has the same situation. in fact, there are three emergency proclamations that still not lifted from as early as late 1960s. three! in fact the other one proclamation (mid 1960s) was lifted only because there was another proclamation few years later!

British imperialism and Baha Mousa

so there were few people who had been indicted in the inquiry of Baha Mousa. Justice? I don't think so.

British was one of the powers that colonised and squandered my country for several hundreds years. what is interesting about the British, they colonised my country mostly through agreements. unlike Portuguese or Dutch. even one 'prominent' historian in this country even said 'legally this country has never been colonised, it's only the power of local rulers were exercised by others', or so, he said. what in the world he's trying to say?

currently there are debates whether local independence fighters, who clashed with British security forces, which were locals too, can be considered hero or terrorist. is it a very difficult question to answer? the head of the independence fighters was finally executed by the British.

the British way of colonisation, including mental colonisation, was so successful that after decades the local people still confuse on the fact that the British was actually COLONISING the country.

Libya - liberty III

as what I suspected, some party accused that there was Islamist element behind the uprising. yet the other bloc is suspecting Libya would fall into the hand of the west. in other words the nation will be taking the west instruction. so I say let the people of Libya decide through what ever appropriate channel, e.g. democracy. don't let anything like the previous Turkey experienced. the so-called protector of the constitution, the army that is, can over throw the elected government just because they thought so. let the people decide! leave the Libyan people and nation. give them hand, of course. but no string attached.

diary of a father VI - a story of integrity

yesterday I was driving alone when I started thinking about integrity. I was a staunch supporter of such attitude and I seek for the reason. suddenly I remember about a colouring contest I participated during my primary school. my father told me about this story:

there were two pieces of works finally made it to the top. which one of those was mine. each drawing bear the participant name. the judges wrote on a piece of paper and put it underneath each drawing. the paper wrote '1' or '2'. it simply meant whether the drawing was eligible for either first place of second place. when they counted the paper, the result was a tie. so my father, as a chief judge, need to make a final decision. he had not to chose mine. so I got no. 2 spot.

at that time what I felt was a proud feeling. yes, I'm at number 2. but it also meant that I'm not a number 1 just because I had an advantage. perhaps that's a reason for me to believe in integrity.

england on fire

so what triggered fire in england? racial cards?

Norway's tragedy

from the day the tragedy happened until now, media have painted the incident as 'attack to the core of Norwegian values' - freedom. so the road to freedom has a price. and having the freedom too has a price? who put that price.

people of Norway, I hope that you just be strong and persistent. it's all in your hand whether to give in or keep on.

regards,
human

Somalia

years ago my father used to show us pictures in newspaper showing hungry and abandoned children in Africa. I cannot recall whether the picture was taken in Somalia which today faced a serious humanitarian crisis - famine. and I believe most of us has seen Kevin Carter's picture of a starving toddler in Sudan. the picture won him a Pulitzer Prize. but like most of us, he finally realised that money is evil and the society is corrupted.

to see the picture, search on the net.

regards,
human