China Frowns on Final Destination Joke

Photograph: Carlos Barria/REUTERS

Chinese internet users are rallying around a Beijing blogger detained by police after posting a joke on Twitter about the paramount Communist Party congress.

Zhai Xiaobing's tweet on November 05 suggested that the next "movie" in the "Final Destination" horror franchise would be about the Great Hall of the People (pictured above) collapsing on party delegates.

He had tweeted: "An earthshaking debut will be seen at the global premiere on Nov 8!" The congress began on November 08, 2012.

Family members had said that Miyun county police had taken Zhai away on November 07 and seized his computer. A Miyun county police officer who would only give his surname, Sun, confirmed that Zhai was being investigated for "spreading terrorist information". The charge carries a maximum penalty of five years' imprisonment.

Groan! The allegation is certainly silly, if not absurd. Obviously, China authorities have absolutely no sense of humor at all.

Note: For those of you who are not familiar with this horror movie franchise, Final Destination – please note that there are no fanged monsters, killer beasts, vengeful spirits or even the stereotypical slashers. It is about the Grim Reaper who manipulates the environment in deadly ways with the single-minded intent of "recapturing" those who somehow manage (usually through warning premonitions) to escape their fates the first time. Death is inescapable in the Final Destination universe. Check out the stills from the said movies below:

Also on Tuesday, SUBS students had their MKT2074 Marketing Research presentations and Jessica Ho and I banded together with their lecturer, Derek Ong to judge their works. One of the groups' client, Timo represented by Irrine Goh from BioFact Life Sdn Bhd, was also present.

     

     

Singapore Humiliates Malaysia

I don’t have any interest to comment on Malayisan football because it is wallowing in the scandalous depths of shameful ignominy. And it seems to be enjoying its oresent predicament. But when I saw the news on the back page of The Star yesterday, I stopped in my tracks to read about the embarrassing state of Malaysian football. Malaysians cannot hide their self-disgust. The national football squad was humiliated by Singapore after losing 0-3 in a Group B match of the AFF Suzuki Cup 2012 competition at the National Stadium in Bukit Jalil on Sunday night. [The AFF SUZUKI CUP is a biennial football competition organized by the ASEAN Football Federation and contested by the national teams of Southeast Asia].

I remembered vaguely the Merdeka Tournament that we hosted in days gone by. It used to be the premier footballing event, drawing participation from teams such as South Korea and Japan – in fact, it is Malaysia’s longest running international football competition. It was organized annually from 1957 to 1988, and after that it started to show sure signs of imminent death when between 1989 to 2006, it was held only eight times.

For those who are blissfully ignorant, Malaysian football has very rapidly gone down the drain and the FAM leadership plays a big role to ensure this. As the newspaper wrote, “This is not team Malaysia but team FAM. The side now masquerading as Harimau Malaya are the end product of those 30 years of incompetence and poor management. A team that keeps falling short, disappointing and cheating fans time and again” (p 60).

I checked the FIFA rankings this morning. This is very illuminating! In 1993, Malaysia was ranked, believe it or not, No. 79. By 2000, we have descended to an unenviable position at No. 107. In 2010, we slipped further to position No. 144. The following year, we decided to surpass ourselves and we tripped even more to land in position No. 148. This year, in November, we lost ground yet again and we are now settling down to a very lowly position at No. 163!

Can we see a glass that is half-full? If we can – we should be happy that Malaysia’s footballing standards is still better than the following countries: Turks and Caicos Islands, San Marino, Bhutan, Mauritania, Anguilla, Mauritius, Andorra, Djibouti, South Sudan, Kyrgyzstan, Macau, Cook Islands, British Virgin Islands, Comoros, Papua New Guinea, Seychelles, Somalia, Eritrea, Cambodia, US Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Timor-Leste, Brunei Darussalam, Mongolia, Swaziland, Montserrat, Bahamas, Sri Lanka, Guam, Pakistan, American Samoa, Tonga, Laos, Chinese-Taipei, Guinea-Bissau, Vanuatu, Madagascar, Hong Kong, Bangladesh, Nepal, India, Fiji, Afghanistan, Samoa, Indonesia and don’t forget, Singapore which is tied to Malaysia in position No. 163. 

I shudder to think how we will end up in December 2012!

As The Star wailed, “the only true salvation for Malaysian football is for Team FAM to go”!

Zombie Portraits

Yesterday I had blogged about the walking dead. Today, I came across this guy on the web named Rob Sacchetto who is a zombie artist. He claims to have illustrated, created and published about 5,000 original works of zombie art. And now he accepts custom portrait requests and zombie artwork commissions. Isn’t that cool?

Persons interested in commissioning a custom zombie portrait for themselves, as a unique gift for a loved one or as a one-of-a-kind wedding present can simply email their reference photo to zombieme@zombieportraits.com for a free estimate. It’s a full color painting, not a computer-generated illustration.

See, becoming a Zombie is DEAD simple!

Image credit: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2198774/Theyre-dead-good-The-Queen-Marilyn-Monroe-Will-Smith-Sean-Connery-youve-seen-before.html

My last three Toastmasters meetings saw me in the role of a General Evaluator – this includes last evening’s meeting in Klang. I was also the evaluator for Catherine Lim who delivered her CC speech # 7 Get Comfortable with Visual Aids. And I won the Best Evaluator ribbon too. Overall, I have enjoyed this particular meeting because the members of the Klang Bilingual Toastmasters Club are really genuine, unpretentious and down-to-earth. Thanks to Francis Vasanthi (below, second photo) for the invitation. We very nearly started on time – late by one unfortunate minute. Nonetheless, I would give this meeting a score of an 8 out of a 10.

                           

Catalonia Nationalists Win Elections

Image credit: http://go.bloomberg.com/euro-crisis/2012-09-26/catalonia-to-hold-election-seizing-chance-to-force-rajoy-on-autonomy/

Last Thurday, I made a mention about the Catalan elections in my blogpost titled “Two Catalan Brands”. Here’s the follow-up on the said elections.

Voters in the Spanish region of Catalonia have given their backing to nationalist parties – the governing centre-right Catalan Nationalist Coalition (CiU) led by Catalan President Artur Mas remains the largest party, winning 50 seats out of 135 (down from 62 last time) and the left-wing separatist ERC party came second with 21 seats (up from 10 in 2010).

Both these parties want to hold a referendum on independence from Spain. Already, Mas told the BBC he would consult the people on independence within the next four years.

Mas holds the position that the wealthy and influential north-eastern region gets a raw funding deal from the central government. His CiU argues a Catalan state would fare better as a member of the EU than a province of Spain.

The road to independence, however, is not that simple. It seems that a referendum would be illegal under the current Spanish constitution, and Spain's ruling Popular Party is likely to block any attempts for constitutional change.

Also other parties, such as the nationalist Ciutadans, the Popular Party of Catalonia and the Socialist Party of Catalonia are all opposed to Catalonia's independence bid.

Photos of work in progress for Sunway University’s new academic building taken this morning:

 

People's Meeting @ Dataran Merdeka

                                        

Picture by Choo Choy May

This morning, about three hundred and fifty people held a people’s meeting adjoining Dataran Merdeka – and passing the following resolutions which called on the government to:

■ stop Lynas;

■ close or re-evaluate all environmentally risky projects in the country such as the Bukit Komas gold mine in Pahang, the high-tension electrical tower in Rawang and the refinery and integrated petrochemical refinery project (Rapid) in Pengerang, Johor;

■ end the land grab of Orang Asli villages.

Among parliamentarians seen with the group this morning include Lim Kit Siang (Ipoh Timor MP), William Leong (Selayang MP), Tan Kok Wai (Cheras MP), Fong Po Kuan (Batu Gajah MP), Dr D Jeyakumar (Sungai Siput MP), Chong Eng (Bukit Mertajam MP), Liew Chin Tong (Bukit Bendera MP), Nga Kor Ming (Taiping MP), Loh Gwo Bourne (Kelana Jaya MP), Fong Kui Lun (Bukit Bintang MP) and Sim Tong Lim (Kota Melaka MP). There were also assemblypersons present: Ronnie Liu (Pandamaran assemblyperson), Ng Wei Aik (Komtar assemblyperson) and Khoo Poay Tiong (Ayer Keroh assemblyperson).

Anyway, do you think the prime minister is paying any attention? Nope! Nothing will change – that's why we must change the government!

UMNO Organizes Women's Protest

Somebody gave me a torn-off page from the New Straits Times (November 24, 2012, p 7) that also carried the news about the demo by the Selangor single mothers – read my blogpost dated November 25, 2012. It seems that five UMNO assemblymen (i.e. Abdul Shukur Idrus, Kuang; Mohd Isa Abu Kassim, Batang Kali; Johan Abdul Aziz, Semenyih; Satime Diman, Seri Serdang and Badrul Hisham Abdullah, Pelabuhan Klang) were at the forefront of the said protest. I bet you they gave the women more than just moral support. So now the agent provocateurs have revealed themselves. I had erroneously given Murtini Kasman credit that she obviously didn't deserve.

If Najib can assume the role of Women Affairs, Family and Community Development Minister, so too can these men lead a women's protest!

In the SPL match between Celtic and Inverness, Billy McKay’s 64th goal gave the latter a shock 1-0 win over lackluster Celtic.

And when Liverpool played yesterday, it was again a game of missed chances. When the final whistle was blown, the Reds could only manage a goalless draw against Swansea City.