43 dBm RF Energy

Take up the job to bring up one commercial base station and conducting performance testing on it. But first of all, should concentrate on how to do the system commissioning. Spent the whole night to figure out the E1 link. It’s terrible to work on the driver in the operating system that does not allow you to do low level configuration. I just could not find any configuration on the adapter card resided in the WinXP laptop. Anyway, using the trial and error on the other end, still manage to get the correct configuration.

Next, it was to bring up the cell. The signaling messages to setup the cell using customized power level refuse to work. My colleague tuned the maximum transmit power level to 43 dBm according to normal setting for outdoor environment. Then, everything seems alright. Half hour later, I started to feel the headache *~~*. I was not too sure whether I was too tired today or exposed to the RF energy. After an hour later, I decided to leave the room. My colleague left earlier. Anyway, I understand from Kamal that normal mobile phone transmits 1W of energy. 43 dBm is equivalent to 20W of energy. Can you imagine that…..

An Unusual Christmas Gift

We had organized a Christmas party in Dema House on the Christmas Eve. Around 22 persons joined the party and majority of them are those who involved directly or indirectly with Dema activities before. It’s good time to chit chat with those who I haven’t met for quite a long time. Bought the Christmas songs CD to create the atmosphere!

Those who came for the party were asked to bring along a gift worth < RM10 for present exchange. Guess what I get? See the picture…. “How UNSAFE Is Your Mobile Phone”, a CAP (Consumers Association of Penang.) guide costs around RM2.50. But it is actually worth only RM2.25 for 10% discount. So, who is the culprit? My little junior from UPM, known as Robert (Kanghui), bought three CAP guides for a total cost of RM10. According to him, he thought that anything below RM10 was acceptable. After all, the main reason he gave was that he just had RM10 left in the wallet. Pity!

He used to argue with me and said that, “I paid 100% from my wallet, so how much you pay from your wallet for the Christmas gift?” Maybe, this sounds correct but I am not too convinced.

See another picture. Robert put the signature on the guide on behalf of Simon. By the way, the other two victims are Peini and Jinho!

Mid-week Review

It’s almost approaching the Christmas and indeed today is “dong zhi”. My mum kept saying that I would miss the “Tang Yuan” but I really don’t think so. After all, she asked me to buy it in KL. Alright, perhaps she just wants to remind me not to forget to back home! Still conduct the performance analysis on my FP/ATM. Need to collect more information regarding my code and identify the strategy of optimization. Using RTI tools to do the profiling, tracing and finding memory leak in my program.

Watched the Carling Cup on Wednesday at 3.40 a.m. in one of the restaurant in PJ New Town. Almost 80% of the waiters there are from Burma. Most of them are ManU supporter. ;-) I found out that almost all the time they will stay late for ManU matches. Hah, but probably they are betting…. Anyway, the first Asian player in ManU team scored a spectacular goal that night. But Jinho missed it! “1st goal in England”….. the headline title in the Korea Times! “South Park” becomes “South Korea Park” (pic). It looks funny… Awaiting the critical next week…..3 games in a row!

Heard that Khai Loon continues his position as ASA secretary for another 3 years. I thought that he will back to Malaysia to start his “struggle” here. Felt very tired yesterday after the badminton games. It seems that my stamina is really bad recently. Nobody else in the office now and the background music is “Canon in D” performed by Academy of St Martin. The CD which I bought almost 1 years ago in Amsterdam Airport.

Kim Deuk-Gu

Probably, many peoples who are not a fan of boxing sport will not hear about his name. Yesterday, watched the movie named as “Champion” after the recommendation from Jinho. I am not keen on boxing and always find that this sport is cruel. The famous boxer during my early childhood was Mike Tyson. But because of his behaviour, I can not withstand with this sport anymore. Back to the movie, this movie was a real story about a South Korean boxer, Kim Deuk-gu. He came from a poor family and worked hard to achieve the status as the 1st challenger to the Lightweight champion Ray Mancini.

“Boxing is the fairest play in the world. Your opponent punches you 10 times. You can punch back 12 or 15 times as you want,” It all remembers me about a gangster who used to say that “the real man is those who can fight one on one but not as a group against one”.

Eventually, Kim Deuk-gu died 5 days after the match with Ray Mancini. Day before his death, he used to write the message “fight until you die” in the hotel room. It is indeed a self-motivation movie. Working hard, national pride, loyalty and never give up attitudes!

Actually, I just can’t accept that the referee allowed the match to go on. From wikipedia, I found out that after the match:
- Mancini went through a period of reflection, as he blamed himself for Kim's death.
- The bout's referee, Richard Greene, committed suicide in February of 1983.
- Kim's mother died four months later.
- WBC reduced the number of rounds in their championship bouts from 15 to 12. (Kim fighted until round 14)
- A tigh medical checkup for ensure fighter survival after the match.

It's a tragedy! I am pity to say that only tragedy will make peoples wake up!

The Matter that I Don’t Understand

It’s too much bad and sad news nowadays on the mainstreams. It’s time to switch to another alternative – Happy News. So, what is actually happy news? A different approach on publishing the news, no tragedy news…… ???!!!! My friend, Khai Loon who works in Hong Kong for an NGO is busy with the program to dump the WTO. Have a huge rally in the Victory Pak tomorrow. So, why dump WTO? Trade and investment agreements should not be used to serve the world’s most powerful corporation. Think about the peoples and environments! And then suddenly, our former PM, an outspoken one, talked about the internet must be used excessively as an alternative media. But I think that he asked us to stop reading Malaysiakini because of the alleged link to Soros.

What am I busy for now? Dealing with 1 and 0, for what….. for the sake of the national interest!

It’s Time for Change

Testing my RACH/FACH/DCH combination until 2 a.m. Watched the World Cup draw at 3 a.m. Followed my brother in laws and sister to Penang around 6.30 a.m. All happened on Saturday morning. Bought 2 DVDs with RM10 in Prangin Mall. The price is cheaper compared to Klang Valley. Here, it normally will cost you around RM9 per piece. The first movie was entitled “Kicking And Screaming”. This comedy story was surrounding a competitive father and a failure son. Benchwarmer!! It was all about how they coached two different “kids” soccer teams associated to their sons. I was touched when the son shouted at his father, ”I love you more whenever you scold me” and “I learned all the tricks whenever you put me on the bench”. Another movie was known as “North Country” but I haven’t had enough time for a look.

It is time for a change! ManUtd is going nowhere if Ferguson is still in power, No shape, no composure, no structure! Lost to Benfica! Knockout from Europe competition! Hold by Everton! A massive 12 points gap with Chelsea! Let’s forget about the pass histories. A manager who stays in a club for almost 19 years is not a healthy situation. He should step down and let the new comers to change the things around. ManUtd has enough talented players but Ferguson could not utilize them. He depends too much on Scholes, Giggs, and all the old folks. This time, there will be no Cantona to save you. If you talk about the transition period, then the manager should be changed as well. Step down, Ferguson for the sake of the club! You should regret that you don’t retire 3 years ago. This all make me remember my beloved prime minister. :-)

Penguins

Penguin.....What's for? Are you talking about Linux?

No…."March of the Penguins” the movie that we watched yesterday in MidValley. It’s all about the story on how the penguins struggle for their life and give birth. All those stuffs relate to human experience. It was filmed in Antarctica by a French Director. I just found out that the movie was the second most successful documentary in US box office history after Fahrenheit 9/11. Anyway, there were critics from some scientists. See the article. Sorry for Jinho because he thought that it was an animation. Anyway, thanks for your mum's kimchi. Xuzhuang mentioned that this movie was indeed a good motivation for those who struggle to live. Yes, I think so......

“Every week, the penguins surprise us”
So, do you think that Mr. Bill Gates with his families will watch this movie?

A Hectic Week…

A very busy week.... There were a number of commitments from my site and also on the ongoing project. First of all, have to complete the FP/ATM integration with the ideas of setting up several transport channels for UMTS networks. Functional correctness of the system has almost done and still need to study the performance issues. This is the trickiest part. Next, I had to draft a proposal. It’s not easy to find a way to do the explanation to those who are more concern on ROI. Ahh...had a short visit to Huawei Tech. to have a look on their products. They are going to expand their markets in Asia Pacific and Malaysia has been identified as one of the important hub. I always hear from my friends in China that Huawei is doing really well with the government support. They have a huge human resource with a very low cost that everyone will envy of. I bet that a lot of peoples heard this statement before.

“Huawei’s router software contains the same bugs as Cisco’s.”

They are labeled as “Copy Cats” same as the Japanese in the 70s and 80s. Anyway, I strongly believe that they are going to succeed with flexibility and bridging between its R&D and its customers. For your information, the 3G handset from Huawei Tech. will be launched in Malaysia next year.

Received a phone call from my friend, Chee Meng on Wed evening. He called me from his construction site. Guess where? Wembley Stadium!! When am I going to get an opportunity to work in Old Tafford? CM works as a civil engineer in London with a good salary. Just, the tax is relatively high there. If our government is transparent enough, I don't mind to pay more and let Malaysia to be a social welfare country. Announment! Liza, if you read the blog, please reply his mail….

While our local press is still busy with the “ear squat video” incident, it’s time for us to recapitulate this.

“No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.”
Article 5 of Universal Declaration of Human Rights

Asian Cartoon Exhibition

Went back late yesterday. Woke up at 12.15 p.m. and had my brunch with my roommate. We were having a very brief discussion on the Pengkalan Pasir by-election on Dec 6. He had to conduct the survey on this issue. I believed that BN stands a good change by promoting “Development if you choose BN”. But I hope I am wrong. We used to have our banana leaf in Archa Curry, home-made style India restaurant. Cost me around RM8 for one fried fish and three vegetables. After all, I had to find my way to the Asian cartoon exhibition. I am not really crazy about manga. But the topic of this exhibition caught my interest.

I went to the KL library near Merdeka Square, only to find out that the exhibition is held in National Library. Ahh…..had to pay for the RM2 parking fee for nothing. Then, I tried to find the way there. Guess where I was this time? National Art Gallery Center….. Since I was there, “why not pay a visit” I whispered to myself. Then, saw a signboard writing [Work in Progress]. Never mind, just had a snapshot on the painting about footballer (pic. 5). After that, I had decided to walk to the National Library. Not far way from where I was.

“How’s IT in Asia?”

This is the topic for the 9th Asian Cartoon Exhibition. I managed to take only 5 pictures until the security guard said to me, “Camera is not allowed here”. The Asian countries that involved in this exhibition are Malaysia, Japan, Korea, India, Filipina and China.

“Soccer Game” or “Soccer”….
Youngsters nowadays prefer to play soccer on the computer rather than on the pitch.

“Dream to be a Singer” (pic. 4)
Anyone can become a singer with the help of technology.

“WWW”
World Wide Web but peoples are actually all alone.

........ ^__^

Overall, cartoonists from Japan seem to be optimism that technologies or ITs are helping our daily life. Others have made a point that physical human interaction will be minimized due to the booming of ITs. With the sense of humors by the cartoonists, it is worth to pay a visit. I recommend those who stay in KL to have a look by yourself. It’s not too late to do that!

Never Say Never

Switched on the radio in my car this morning and heard the phrase "Never Say Never". Forgot about what the DJ said. Straight away I was thinking about my favorite football club since my childhood time - Manchester United. David Beckham, a golden boy in Manchester football history once answered the question from a journalist regarding the possibility of joining Real Madrid. For those who are not a football mania, Real Madrid is actually another famous football club in Spain but not so popular compared to Manchester United. Not before Beckham joined the club! Beckham’s answer was rather simple. “Never say never in your life”. After all, we all know that he is now playing for this Spanish club. His performance is well bellow par but his popularity has helped this Spanish club to sell its merchandises. The financial income for this Spanish club looks healthier than before. Thanks to Beckham! Thanks to ManU! He is a famous football icon in the world, especially in East Asia. Anyway, not in United State which football is known as soccer. Just to let you all know, Real Madrid has not won any trophy after Beckham joined the team. But it hardly matters at all, the club is making money. Real Madrid is going nowhere after watching the match between them and Barcelona. Ronaldinho could not help you to sell the merchandises but he wins you the match. Sorry, talking too much about football. I just wonder “when and where” to use this phrase. Time will tell!

Attended two training sessions on 3GPP stack last two days. The previous training session using web conferencing was not good enough due to the voice quality and the damned slow power point presentation in Netspoke. I don’t have any idea on how the mechanism of the conference call works. But, you really frustrated with the voice quality when various echo and noise coming from all the parties. The Internet connectivity was also too slow and not able to support the Netspoke’s features. The switching of one slide to another took more than one minute and worse if the slide contains a lot of pictures. Perhaps, the only way to solve this problem is asking for specific amount of bandwidth allocation prior to web conferencing. Recently, I have experienced that a technical support web page took almost 10~15 seconds to access. I think that this is because the security features have been put onto the server. I was not patient enough to wait for this and showed my unsatisfaction in the recent survey form. If I want to complaint next time, I mind as well complaint to the internet service provider…..

Alright, till now. It's time to back to my work…

Presentation in IEEE Conference

Did my first presentation in the IEEE MICC-ICON conference which was held in Berjaya Time Square, KL. The paper is related to “802.11 MAC implementation using SDL”. Not much scientific research contribution in this paper, but just to highlight the design methodology used by our research team. SDL has been widely used in the Europe, especially Germany and Scandinavia, but not so popular in Asia, except East Asia. It is particularly useful for modeling distributed and real time system, and a lot of protocol specification by ITU-T is written in this language. Another language, known as TTCN, is useful for testing and verification purposes. Few peoples in Malaysia heard about this…

There were more than 200 papers in the 2-days conference and hence it’s hard to put high expectation on this conference. I have been assigned to chair my first ever session in a conference. One of participants from Iran did not satisfied with too many parallel sessions at the same time, seven in a time! Able to meet new friends in this conference… Guillaume (Pic. 1) from French, asked me to bring him to Chinese Restaurant. So, we ended up in Nam Yong in Petaling Street and he bought the Chinese tea for his “wife” or more precisely "special girlfriend". Claus (Middle in Pic.2), a German who speaks fluently Mandarin after staying 5 years in China, kept asking me about alaysia during our dinner time. He amazed that majority of the Chinese here speak in Mandarin and condemned those Chinese in Singapore who give up their mother tongue language. He actually criticized a lot. He even said that “Fxxx off, Bush”. Ah, fyi, he is now working in California…. Met my seniors as well, Sum, who studied in Niigata University in Japan. He came back for the conference cum vacation. We spent our coffee time in Starbuck located in the Boarder Bookstore. See the picture!! A “pig” was surfing the Internet and looking for AV using his stylish VAIO…:-P

A birthday party for Siew Ling and Xu Zhuang on Tuesday night...... a small farewell for Jinho on Thrusday night as well! We all expect the girfts from him on 3rd Dec... Alright… it’s time to back to my FP/ATM work on 8260 board.

The Future of Telecommunication

Yesterday, attended the technical talk entitled "The Future of Telecommunication - Technologies and Disruptions" by Roberto Sarraco, Chairman of European Center of Excellence in Telecommunication of Italia. He is one of the IEEE Distinguished Lecturer. Yes, this is again part of the IEEE ComSoc activities. The whole technical talk was mainly emphasizing on the necessary of service provides to change their paradigms. To survive in the future, the service providers should put efforts on improving their value chains instead of just attracting more subscribers. I wonder whether the cellular providers in Malaysia have aware on this and do something to improve their services. They seem to keep on manipulating their subscription fees by offering plan A, plan B ….etc. but without any improvements on the services. I also frustrate with the advertisement of our local cellular providers that mislead our consumers. They keep putting the promising advertisement on 3G service, but I doubt the capabilities of them to deliver what they promise. Mr. Roberto also insists that telecommunication service providers have the wrong perspective regarding the broadband communication. Broadband communication is simply increasing the capacity or offering a big pipe to the customer but nothing to do with the speed. I think that majority of the consumers actually don’t care about what is broadband. They just want something that satisfy their needs and if possible, free of charge. “It’s free, so why I bother!” Overall, this was indeed an interesting talk.

For those who are interested in his talk, click on the following link:
http://www.comsoc.org/socstr/memprog/dislec/tut/saracco/saracco.html

A conversation between a 5 years old girl with her 60 years old grandmother:
“Maria! Your mum wants to talk to you. Come!” the old lady shouted.
“Coming now! Grandma,” the girl picked up the phone and started walking away.
The phone fell down and broke. The old lady scolded the girl.
Then, the girl asked, “Grandma, why you tie your phone on the wall?”

Engineer Rules the World

Sent my car to the nearby workshop in Petaling Jaya. The service center is known as Tayaria, which is quite famous in Klang Valley. I have sent my car to this service center for almost two years. I found out that there are different approaches between mechanics in Tayaria compared to those in my hometown, Penang. In Penang, the mechanic will use all the hard way to “fix and repair” the parts in your car whereby the mechanic in Tayaria always said to you, “We need to “replace” the XX since it has spoiled already”. At the end, I have to replace my spark plug and air filter every three months. Maybe, replace with a new one is easier and faster compared to fix and repair. Or maybe, mechanics in Penang have to first consider how to reduce the cost of services otherwise they will lost their customers.

Back to the today’s topic, engineers rule the world. Do you think so? Almost all leaders in this world are coming from the social science educational background. I still remember that one of my lecturers told me that engineers will always be ruled by those from arts stream. So, be prepared to work under them. However, there is an interesting fact which can be good inspiration for those who studies engineering and would like to become the leader of a country. For the first time ever, a country with 1.3 billion peoples and GDP per capita USD 5600 has its technocratic leadership in the highest tier in the only ruling party. Yes! It is China which is believed to go to shape the future world’s economic.

List of members in the China’s elite Politburo Standing Committee, the highest tier within the Communist Party.
- Hu JinTao, President of the People’s Republic of China, TsingHua University, Water Conservacny Engineering.
- Huang Ju, Tsinghua University, Electricl Engineering.
- Jia QingLin, Hebei Engineering College, Electric Power Engineering.
- Li ChangChun, Electric Machinery, Harbin Institute of Technology,
- Luo Gan, Freiber University of Mining and Technology, Germany.
- Wen JiaBao, Geology and Minerals Engineering, Beijing Institute of Geology.
- Wu BangGuo, Radio Engineering, TsingHua Univeristy.
- Wu GuanZheng, Power Engineering, TsingHua University.
- Zeng QingHing, Automatic Control Engineering, Beijing Institute of Technology.

Sound interesting!! China is pushing hard towards science and technology development. So, it’s much better to have those who have the knowledge on “know how”. Besides, I think that it is also to ensure the China’s society is still remained under the control of the only communist ruling party in the world now. They need those who have the knowledge on applying Internet censorship. Who would like to help them on this? US, the country which has the most sophisticated and centralized network infrastructure…

Finklstein:
“The Internet considers censorship to be damage, and routes around it. I say, what is censorship is in the router?”

"Peaceful" Gathering

Managed to sneak out the office around 10.30 a.m. to join a “Peaceful” demonstration in UPM. Just to show the support for the students who advocate "fair student election". They were going to attend the trials today. But, I’m not too sure that we should call it a trial. Do you think that the students will escape from punishments? No way! There will be no opportunities for the students to defend themselves from the beginning. Students’ rights are long been tied due to the notorious College and University Act (AUKU). Anyway, I believe that the universities’ authorities have acted smarter compared to my uni days. At least, they allow some “peaceful” demonstration or gathering to go on. No direct confrontation with the students. Simply ask the Special Agents to take the photos to create the physiological fear amongst the attendees. "Are you going to be caught next? Be prepared" Oppss….actually my old university were also doing the same last time. No different !!!

Small picture this time. Sorry.... So that there will be no more victims.

Restore Our Student Rights!

Please sign this petition and circulate the news. We need a pro-active and dynamic society.
http://www.petitiononline.com/poll2005/petition.html

Raya Break

A 6-days break last week. It was quite a long time since I last enjoyed such a long break. Back to Penang. Went to visit my colleagues, Syed and Aziz for Raya celebration. And thanks to Jinho. I had the opportunity to visit flea market in Batu Ferringhi after 27 years! Then, revisit Langkawi again. The only time that I visited Langkawi is 5 years ago. Flashed back to that time, those guys on the trip were Ah Kai, Choot, Sze Khian, Ah Puh and etc. Can’t remember all!!! This time, those on the trip were Jinho, Siew Ling, Chui Qing and etc. Then, the route was from Kuala Kedah to Langkawi, instead of Penang to Langkawi. I was “asked” to drive from Penang -> Kuala Kedah -> Langkawi -> Kuala Kedah -> Penang. It was my first experience driving in Langkawi and also driving a van. Ten peoples were brave enough to gamble their lives on me so I don’t mind to have a try. Just to remind you all, shifting from 2nd gear to 3rd gear of an “old” van is not a pleasant experience. It is much easier to shift the gear straight away from 2nd to 4th! Hmm… staying in the same beach resort… viewing the same scenery… experiencing the same journey in Langkawi… So, has my life ever changed since then? Or only keep on repeating the same thing again and again? Maybe nothing changes for me but just the peoples surrounding me.

Pic. 1:
Exactly the same seaside view 5 years ago but manage to capture the view this time. Why? I had already bought a Digital Camera!

Pic. 2:
New looks. Why? Meet new friends and getting older!!

Urgent Appeal - Campus Democracy

Show your support to our student movement !! Apply CAP (Cut and Paste) methodology and send to our Minister !!!

Y.B. Dato' Dr. Haji Mohd. Shafie bin Salleh
Minister of Ministry of Higher Education Malaysia
Kementerian Pengajian Tinggi, Blok E3, Parcel E, Pusat Pentadbiran Kerajaan Persekutuan, 62505 Putrajaya
Telefon : 03-8883 5000
Faks : 03-8889 5854
E-mail: webmasterkpt@mohe.gov.my
Sir,

Launch Free and Fair Campus Reelection Immediate at All Malaysia Local Higher Education Institute and Drop Charge against University Students

Refer to above title, I/ We _____________________ showing our deep concern to Malaysia all 17 local higher education institute campus election system and charging under UUCA over UPM's Lim Sok Swan, UPM Ridhuan Bin Othman @ Abd. Razak and USM girl for involving in Free and Fair Campus Election campaign.

The unfairness and faulty practice by the authorities was heard and I/ we was/ were told that it is a step to ensure the winning of the pro-authority or Aspirasi Team in the campus election, with this we feel disappointment and dissatisfaction on it.

As we know, campus election is a chance for the students to choose their representative regardless which camp/ team (pro-students or pro-authorities) the candidates was belong to, this was also tally with the principle of democracy. However the faulty and unfairness practice from the authority such as sponsoring pro-authorities, e-voting, threatening pro-students candidate and supporter and others malfeasance practice are violating the students' right to choose their representative freely and fairly.

At the other hand, students who are involve in this Free and Fair Campus Election should be recognized their right of assembly and right of speech and expression. Therefore charge over two university girl who distributed flyers, joint peace assembly and joint the memorandum sending process should be discharge immediately. Beside to respect the fundamental students' right, it is also to show your sincerity of promise on the parliament where you said UUCA should be review.

Therefore I/ we strongly urge the Minister of Ministry of Higher Education, Y.B. Dato' Dr. Haji Mohd. Shafie bin Salleh to:

Declare the invalid of current campus election

Give order to each university to conduct a free and fair campus reelection or else take responsible for the corrupted electoral system

Ensure every misconduct behavior is not repeated and take immediate action on individual/ group/ department who are responsible for it.

Ensure campus election in the future will be not violating principle of freedom, fairness and democracy.

Calling Minister of Higher Education to give direct order to respective university to drop charge immediately on all these students. At the same time, take no action on any students who are involved in the Free and Fair Campus Election campaign.

Stop any form of violation and recognize immediately students' right of peace assembly and right of speech and expression.

Abolish University and College University Act( AUKU)

I/ We sincerely hope the Malaysia Ministry of Higher Education will take responsibility to ensure and protect the students' rights and freedom to choose their representative, beside provide the student with all theirs pertained right and freedom as Malaysia citizen. At the same time keep respect and practice the principle of democracy in the campuses.

Thank you.

Yours faithfully,


_________________
Name:
Oranization:

C.C. : All 17 Malaysia local higher education institute's vice chancellor and rector.

The End of EIA German Class

At last, I completed my Elementary 1A of German language course. I need to resume another section of the elementary 1 before sitting the examination. Learning new language is always a fun and indirectly exposes yourself to a new culture. Get more and more information about Europe! We were having a photo session at the end of the Staurday's class and our teacher, Frau Lanse, wishing us "Schöne Ferien!".

Making several new friends throughout the 4 months of class duration, zum Beispiel,
- Calvin:- a secret agent who just attended 4 classes and then disappeared without any news.
- Ivan:- a Form-3 school boy who just finished his PMR exams.
- Daniel:- a Form-1 school boy who use to cheat in the German test. Ahh....watched movie with him once in Berjaya Time Square and bought him an "adult" ticket
- Vemal:- an Engineer who switched from Mitsubishi to Motorola
- Ashley:- always look serious during the class, and used to access my blog "once"
- many others.....

Looking forward to meet you all again in January next year!

Buka Puasa in My Office

I had no choice but to fast today. Skip my breakfast and my lunch….Busy! Anyway, skipping breakfast is a norm since I always wake up late. At about 7 p.m., I had to opt to follow my Muslim colleagues to “buka puasa” or breaking fast. They chose to buy the foods from Ramadan market at Padang, somewhere nearby to UPM, Serdang. We all had the dinner together in the table which we used to put our test equipments. My colleague, Syed had breaking the fast 2 to 3 minutes earlier, because he mixed up the “buka puasa” time between KL and Selangor. Anyway, nobody will go to scold him, expect the punishment from the God! Somebody else in our company kindly distribute the “bubur lambuk’, a kind of traditional Malay’s porridge with mixture of vegetables, beef and spices (Pic 1). The famous “bubur lambuk” can be found nearby Masjid Kampung Melayu, but I just doubt that any of my friends know about this place. Another special dish during fasting month is “nasi kerabu” (Pic 2). What make it so special is the rice is Blue in colour. Dare to try!

A Gentle Reminder

A Simple Notice for those "Coconut Drink" Lovers: -
Please don't take any coconut drinks around 11 p.m. at night, even though it is offered free for you. Otherwise, you will feel uncomfortable in your stomach in the early morning the next day.

World Exhibition of Children’s Art in KL National Library

The children's art exhibition with its subject "My house – my blue planet" was held in KL National Library. I went there yesterday and indeed this was my first visit to KL library. I first thought that the event was held in the national library and only found that the library is just beside the Merdeka square.

It is not a grand exhibition. But I think that at least the organizer should put all the paintings or drawings on the wall, instead of laying them on the floor. Anyway, my curiosity is still remained, especially to find out how the children think about the world and how they express their ideas and dreams towards their beloved place. A poster entitled "We are all children of the world. We are against hatred", caught my very first attention. Living without hatred, can we? The drawing of a Penangite is well portrayed the "harmony" situation in Malaysia. Six children with different races, Malay, India, Chinese, play a game happily in a small village or Kampung. I just whispered to myself, "Honest and sincere interaction between different races in Malaysia is always a big question mark". There was one painting which I don’t know the meaning. Perhaps, someone can able to tell me. The painting is from Berlin.

"I had achieved Raffael's technical perfection at the age of 18, but for the rest of my life I strove to succeed in painting like a child."
-- Pablo Picasso

Caffeine Addict

I just wonder how many cups of coffee that I took this year. Yesterday, I found out that I had finished 5 packages of Nescafe within 8 hours. Today, I have 4 packages. It seems that the only way to wake me up or stimulate my life is keep on drinking coffee. I know that it's not good for my health but I really "like" the drink. Anyway, my mum is really crazy about coffee. I still remember that she even used to chew the coffee powder one time. I always dream of getting one coffee maker in my home. Coffee makers are easily access in Berlin, German. But it's really hard to find one in Malaysia.

I used to spend the Sunday's night for Chui Qing's birthday. We were having steamboat in her house. She asked every single person who comes to join the party brings along the beers. Thus, we were having various types of beers there. I like the "Qing Tao" beer brewed in China. My "fatty" senior said that it is actually same with Wasser beer in German. He claimed that the China's beer is originated from German. But you just cannot trust what he said!!?? All guys were asked to sing a song to entertain the birthday's girl -- a silly demand. So, I had to sing the song named "fairy tales" from Quan Liang. Huh....... -(

A tired badminton match in PutraJ!!! Anyway, a tin of "100 Plus" - a gift from Goi's sister!!!

Saturday - Nothing Special

Es ist 8 vor halb 5. -- It's 4.22 p.m.

Sitting in front my desk, wonder what to do next. I am not going to miss the Man Utd match tonight. Is Ji Sung, Park going to start the match? Perhaps, my friend is asking this question now.

Just come back from my German class. The class is going to end this month. Start another new section in January year 2006. The "little" boy, sitting in front of me in the class, only finished taking his PMR exam. Penilaian Menengah Rendah (PMR), a term that I almost forgot. He borrowed my handphone to ask for a job as sales promoter this morning. So, why doesn't he spend his time doing more reading or preparing for his further study? I said to him "You don't need to rush yourself. You probably will work as a slave once you failed your exam!" Anyway, I think that he should be able to do well. At the same time, money for him should not be a problem. Why? FAMA will support him. FYI, FAMA stands for Father and Mother Association.

I attended a technical talk on WindRiver Workbench or IDE - Linux debugging on Wednesday morning. It seems that big company, such as WindRiver, also want to invest and break into Linux market. They have come out with a workbench which could support both the Linux and vxWorks (RTOS) at the same time. The major interesting point here is all the engineers can learn to use the same workbench and then can have multiple OSes support for doing their embedded system debugging. Hey, I am not a sales guy from WindRiver. Anyway, this is indeed a useful tool for those finding the difficulty using gdb for user mode debugging!

Locked in the PutraJaya Multipurpose Hall !!!

I first thought that I was going to stay over night in the Multipurpose Hall in Putrajaya. Once I finished my badminton matches with some MMU's stuffs, I went for a bath as usual. The person in charge there locked the entrance and switched off all the lights. Anyway, I still manage to sneak out. The windows were not locked !!! Lucky escape....

1st Technical Talk == Film "noir" ???

Huh, finishing the porting job.....

Yesterday, watched a movie called "A Bittersweet Life" - an action movie or film noir. Facing the difficulties to understand the intention and message by the film maker. Anyway, the first and second sentences from the actor brought back my memory in UTM - my first day attending the Buddhist Club. Hmm.... almost a two hours conversation during that time and then I decided to give up.

Today, the 1st IEEE Technical Talk entitled "Modular Platform for supporting UMTS IMS", had been successfully organized by IEEE ComSoc Malaysia Chapter. This was my first assigment after being selected as the Program Chair. There were 14 participants for today's event. It was not technically deep since the initial target was just to expose the paticipants on market trend in UMTS. The speaker was from Intel, Mr Toh Wei Yeang, one of my ex-schoolmates.

ATM in German

I am talking about Asynchronous Transfer Mode, not Automatic Teller Machine. Just wonder how to write the term, ATM in German. Taking the German class for almost 3 months already. But yet to feel confident to speak to German-speaking ppls. If one person speaks to me in German, I am only able to reply with these two sentences

"Ich verstehe nicht !"
"Noch einmal, bitte langsam"

Not so bad... ATM in German -- Asynchroner Transfer Mode. Look similar to English!! No, not English, I think that my German teacher will probably correct me and emphasize that "ATM" is an International word, not belonging to English (Englisch). Same as "Computer", it is also an International word. Nobody can claim that this word is originated from their language. Sound interesting..

Simple, but yet not so Simple

Tired !! Time to go back, just finish examining the test cases.

Out for lunch with a Prof from UCLA todays. He is very famous in the RF CMOS field. But I just do not have any knowledge and idea on what he did before. I brought him to a shop near Sri Serdang for head-set's adapter. After buying the adapter, he looked for "Simple" calculator. The shopkeeper pointed to the display area. But he said that "I need a calculator with "log, cos, exp..." functions". Then, the shopkeeper felt annoyed and said that "No, no....you are actually looking for scientific calculator, not a simple one." The Prof told me that TI has used to come out with some really complicated calculators last time. So, this one is just a simple stuff!

Having the "Portugise Baked Fish" in Petaling Street with Jin-Ho last night. As a friend, I think that it's part of my duty to show him some of delicious local cuisine here. Otherwise, he will back to his country without any knowledge on the variety of our foods since he spent most of his time in the Mama stall. Huh.... Later on, we had six different brands of beers in Dema house with the others. Jin Ho seems not so satisfied with his current workloads. He demands more. Anyway, I just forgot to tell him that some ppls will try to escape from the jobs here. There are also certain ppls who can sit in front his/her desk doing nothing the whole day. Anyway, he got the part time job from Siew Ling's offer. He's worth 46++ Sin dollar per night. Guess what?

Beginning of the Holy Month of Ramadan

Ramadan is the 9th month of Islamic Calendar. Muslims are going to fast from dawn to dusk. Since majority of my office/country are muslims, so it is a little bit quiet in my office early this morning. Before the dusk, Muslims will have their food and this practise is called Sahur. One of the good reasons for the fasting month is "Sharing the sufferings of the poor and developing sympathy for them". So how many politicians in our countries sharing the same view?

Normally, I have to fast as well, a good excuse for me to skip my lunch. But this time, I have to fetch one of the visiting prof from UCLA, to the Marriot Hotel for lunch. So, I have my lunch there as well. :-) Another great excuse for me !!

Really quiet now, everyone rushing home to prepare the "fast breaking" foods. Yesterday, my colleague behind me said that there will be no Devils during this month. She said "Tak ada syaitan pada bulan Ramadan". Do you believe this?

Michelle Wie To Turn Pro

A golf teen sensation Michelle Wie to turn pro next week. I am not a golf fan, but why bother so much? It's quite simple, the young girl aged 16 years looks pretty !!! Todays, if you are nice looking, no matter girl or guy, and know how to play the game, you are going to gain more publicity. Even the badminton game is looking for a change and ask the female players to wear sexy suit. why? to attract the sponsorship. Anyway, hope that Michelle Wie and Anna Kournikova are truly two different stories. Good Luck, Michelle Wie !!

Korea - a Country once I hate

Why would like to talk about Korea? Just because that I H.A.T.E this country.... No, no... not really, it's all because that I had recently visited it. Although just a short, short trip, but full of meaning in myself.

I always have a mixed feeling towards Korea. First heard about this country was back to 1988 Seoul Olympic Game. Still remember the Korean Tiger as the mascot and the chorus of the Official Song "Hand-in-Hand". We used to sing the song quite a number of times during our primary school. But I really hate this country at first. Why? Just because almost all the football (soccer) competitions, especially World Cup and Olympic, Malaysia would be drawed together with Korea. Have a guess. Yes !!! Malaysia got beaten no matter at home or away. But I just cannot believe that the Korea hockey team is superior to ours. And they just started to play this game before the Seoul Olympic Game. We have a longer history in this game than them, same to our soccer team. I just wonder why? I have to accept that they pick up things much faster than us !!!!

My very first Korean movie entiled "My Sassy Girl" starred by Jeon Ji-Hyun totally changed my perception towards Korea. Hi..hi... I started to fall in love with "Jeon". Kidding...... Once I started to watch more Korean movies, I learn more about their cultures. A successful cultural export by Korea!! Anyways, thanks to my housemate who is an out and out Korean movies fan. But he was too busy then, so he just can enjoy buying those movies rather than watching them. So I have to offer myself ;) Always heard ppls said that Korea is good in technology. Samsung Mobile, Samsung Memory Cards, Kia Motor, Hyundai, and etc. seems so synonym to our lives nowadays.

All of a sudden, I got the opportunity to visit Korea last week. I have quite impressed with the working culture there once I visited the company and also my friend's university. Korea is able to achieve the success in terms of technology due to their HARD works, discipline and dedication. Ppls here, especially those in the research area, should not take things for granted. Go through the pain process and struggle for that !!!!

Much better talk about other things that I had there. Food, so what I have during my two days trip there. The very first taste of Korean food there was the famous snack called Tteokbokgi (Dokbokgi), a kind of Rice cake with sweet and spicy sauce during my way to Daejeon. Japenese like raw fishes in Korean style, called Hoe was my first official lunch. One person costs around USD 35. Wow !!! The dinner time, we had gone to a traditional Korean restaurant for the dish known as "Shabu Shabu". Oppsss, sorry I think that this is a Japanese name cause I have forgotten the Korean name, but anyway it looks like steamboat that we have in Malaysia. The next day's morning, I went to a small restaurant by myself having a big bowl Beef Rib Soup with lots of rice. Name ???!!!! Huh... no idea at all. Just point my finger on the menu. The 2nd lunch was in the food court in Tesco/Samsung Shopping Mall. Having a very traditional meal called Jjigae. Guess what the last meal in Korea. Hi...hi... Italian food !!! Ooopppss.... don't forget to mention that all the meals there come with Kimchi. During my short stay there, manage to drop by the "Guan Yin" temple in the mountain site also. Not seeing any temples in the city, mainly are churchs. That area is called "Natural Muzium" - direct translation from Mandarin.

Das ist alles!!

Work Vist to South Korea - A Funny Story to Share

I had been assigned to visit one company in South Korea to study the possibility of collaboration. The company is located in Daejeon (3 hours time from Incheon Airport). Almost all the nearby hotels were fully booked for academic conference. At last, we need to stay in one of the expensive mortel like hotel in Yuseong-gu, called Tomato Hotel. A really funny name !!! I have long been heard from my Korean friend, Jin-Ho that Korea is a vey "open" society compared to Malaysia. Playboys or others porn megazines are easily accessable there. Oppss, should be called Playgirls since visiting the 7-11 shop in the area where my friend, Poh Kit studied.

I was quite suprised that the Hotel was fully equipped with all the necessities for One-Night stand. Oopppss... so, we were actually staying in the Red-Light area in Yuseong-gu. Anyway, I have to make my point here. I went there for technical discussion, not on other purposes. During the Friday night, I went to visit my friend, Poh Kit in ICU where he is doing his PhD. Thinking to ask PK to meet me at my place. But he has no transportation. Anyway, we met up at last after struggling to communicate with the taxi driver. The only way I did was showing the address to him.

After meeting with Poh Kit, we ended up to have a 2000 CC of Heite (Local Brand) beer in the nearby Bar. When it was time to get back to my hotel, Poh Kit showed his colleague a piece of word pad which I took out from my hotel (just beside the telephone in the hotel) . So, his colleague seems very reluctant to make a phone call for a taxi. He kept saying "there is no address in the word pad". So I asked him to make a call and asked for the address. But he said that this is for Massage Service and they can fetch you from anywhere you want. Shhiiitttt.......

Lucky for me, if I showed this to the taxi driver, I do not know where I am going to end up with.

Yeow's Life

Blog is still a new things to me. I heard about this at the middle of this year. During that time. still no desire to setup one because of heavy workload in my current position. Thinking about the way to "share" my life with my family members, my friends and etc. So. taking up the first step to learn all about Blog. To only way to learn a new thing is through practise. Practise makes perferts. But seem that I am actually a very introvert person. Still need times for adapting the "Sharing" concept!!


"If you think yourself clever, set yourself to do something, and you will have a chance of humiliation."

- George MacDonald