Nicol David Lifts First PSA Tour Title Since 2015

Finally! Malaysia’s Nicol David lifted her first PSA World Tour title since the Hong Kong Open in December 2015 after beating Olivia Blatchford in the final of the inaugural Ciudad de Floridablanca tournament in Colombia. 

The World No. 7 scored an empathic 11-3, 11-4, 11-8 victory over the American, ranked No 27 in the world, in 70 minutes. 

“It feels great to win a tournament again”, David told the Professional Squash Association.

“It’s been quite a while and I think this is really special to have my first title here in Floridablanca. It’s going to have a special place in my heart”, she added. 

The Colombian victory was David’s 81st PSA Tour title in her 101st final.

This should serve as a big morale boost for David who will next compete in the British Open from March 19-26.

Perkasa president Ibrahim Ali (right) has told FMT today that he is a frog without color.

"Right now, there are a lot of frogs who jump from party to party, including green frogs and orange frogs", he pointed out. 

[Note: We can safely assume green frogs refer to PAS and orange frogs refer to Amanah].

He admitted that in the past, he too, had jumped from one political party to another.

He became an independent MP only when he won GE12 under the PAS ticket. And in GE13, he lost to PAS when he contested as an independent candidate for the Pasir Mas parliamentary seat.

Errrr...what was his point again?

China's Clampdown on Capital Outflows

© Provided by The Star Online

There is strong suspicion that China's clampdown on capital outflows may have forced Forest City's developer to close down all their showrooms in mainland China – and in the process, halting sales to local buyers.

The South Morning China Post said a spokesperson from Country Garden Holdings Co. Ltd. had confirmed that all their showrooms have been shuttered after its reporter found the company's flagship showroom in Shanghai locked and closed during a visit on Thursday.

But the spokesperson insisted the shut down was for renovation and not due to Beijing's capital policy.

The closedown came amid the Chinese government's ban on its citizens from converting yuan into other currencies for overseas property purchases. The prohibition order was issued in January.

In the same month, the general manager of Country Garden’s finance center, Wu Bijun, told SCMP that their projects in Malaysia had been affected by the government’s embargo on capital outflows.

The paper also quoted Raymond Cheng, a Hong Kong-based property analyst at CIMB Securities, as saying that Beijing's tightened measures on capital flows will gravely affect sales in China.

The Forest City project covering 14 square kilometers on four artificial islands is the biggest of about 60 projects in the Iskandar Malaysia zone around Johor Bahru in Johor – that was supposed to add more than half a million homes.

It is said that the development venture is one of the best-known overseas properties among mainland Chinese residents due to Country Garden’s widespread promotion, including heavy advertising on state-owned television.

The scheme has been successful in attracting Chinese buyers by offering affordable prices and access to Malaysia’s visa program for long-term stays, the paper added.

And ninety percent of Forest City buyers are reportedly China nationals.

I guess that’s the price you pay when you put all your eggs in one basket.

I was in Jalan Imbi, KL today, I was at Bankers Club to participate in the Area P5 International Speech contest as well as the Table Topics contest. Just four contestants from two Toastmasters clubs.

I didn't do too well in the former and so came in second place. I did better in the latter but I went over time and so I was disqualified. Not the first time!

 

A Second Chance for Scotland

A second Scottish independence referendum looks unavoidable.

Even ministers in the UK government have now concluded it is a question of when such a vote will be held, the Financial Times reported today. I certainly don’t think anybody can stop it from happening. It’s the logical next step.

The FT also said that the London government would fight to delay the vote until after the exit from the European Union.

If you recall, the results of the Brexit referendum had been divisive. England and Wales voted to leave the EU but Scotland and Northern Ireland voted to stay.

Those who argued in favor of leaving said that the EU has changed enormously over the last four decades with regard to the size and the reach of its bureaucracy, diminishing British influence and sovereignty.

Whilst those who wanted to stay say that a medium-size island needs to be part of a larger bloc of like-minded countries to have real influence and security in the world, and that leaving would be economically costly.

Anyway, Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon (right) had already stated that Scotland could hold an independence vote in late 2018 – just months before the United Kingdom is due to leave the European Union.

On the other side of the fence, Prime Minister Theresa May has repeatedly announced there is no need for such a vote.

Indeed, the prospect of an independence vote in Scotland could rip apart the United Kingdom.

As I have previously said, the Brexit vote can facilitate Scottish independence. Go, go, go!

On Monday, US President Donald Trump (left) signed a new executive order placing a 90-day ban on people from six mainly Muslim countries.

The revised ban bars new visas for people from Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. It also temporarily blocks all refugees.

The ban begins on March 16, with the White House saying it is "very confident" of winning in court.

Todate, five states have already filed legal challenges: Hawaii, Massachusetts, New York, Oregon and Washington. I am sure more states will join in.

The previous order, which Trump signed in January, was blocked in federal courts and sparked mass protests as well as confusion at airports. However, critics maintained that the revised travel ban still discriminates against Muslims.

This Trump fella just doesn't give up.

Clover Confusion

With St Patrick's Day nearing, are you able to tell your clovers apart?

US President Donald Trump's Irish spin on his signature "Make America Great Again" hat has caught the internet's attention... for being brilliantly wrong. He had featured the wrong clover!

The Donald J Trump online shop is selling the "Official Make America Great Again Green Hat" ahead of St Patrick's Day on March 17 – with a description that says it has an “embroidered four-leaf clover” on the back.

Many Twitter users were quick to point out that an Irish shamrock, used as a symbol for St Patrick's Day, is in fact a three-leaf clover.

A shamrock is a young sprig of clover and it is said that Saint Patrick used shamrocks to illustrate the Holy Trinity. As such, it has come to be associated with St Patrick's day.

On the other hand, four-leaf clovers are said to bring good luck and are rarer in abundance.

Image credit: http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-39191595

One marketing person called out the error by illustrating the difference between a shamrock and a four-leaf clover. She added: "Don't mess it up, #marketing geeks, for #StPatricksDay."

One user said the mishap made the president “culturally clueless”.

Another dubbed it a scandal, using the hashtag #shamrockgate.

On Thursday, I was back in Shah Alam – at the Zuellig Pharma venue – for their bi-monthly Toastmasters meeting. I evaluated two speeches, CC#5 and CC#10.

Three Liquid Gold Advanced Toastmasters were there to lend support to this Toastmasters club! In fact, members have been taking turns to help out regularly since January this year.

District 51's Program Quality Director Andrew Tan won a double: Best Table Topics Speaker and Best Evaluator.

A VVIP guest sat in throughout the meeting – he is Giuseppe Leo, Zuellig Pharma's Vice President for Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia as well as Chief Executive of Zuellig Pharma's Specialty Solutions Group.

Turtles Make a Comeback to Terengganu

Leatherback sea turtle (Dermochelys coriacea)

Green sea turtle (Chelonia mydas)







Hawksbill sea turtle (Eretmochelys imbricate)

Terengganu is well-known for turtle visitations.

Its beaches used to see up to 10,000 leatherback turtle landings in the 1950s. But over the years, turtle sightings had declined significantly.

Fortunately, Universiti Malaysia Terengganu stepped in and set up the Sea Turtle Research Unit (SEATRU) in 1993, with a station at Chagar Hutang on Pulau Redang – and getting themselves involved in conservation-oriented research on sea turtles.

SEATRU chief researcher Associate Professor Dr Juanita Joseph said Pulau Redang recorded less than 500 nests, with about 100 turtles landing, when the project started.

Turtle eggs. Photo credit: WWF-Malaysia/Lau Min Min

“We bought green and hawksbill turtles’ eggs from licensed turtle egg collectors at RM120 per nest,” she said. The eggs were for incubation.

In 2005, the state government declared the Chagar Hutang, Mak Simpan and Mak Kepit beaches on Pulau Redang as turtle sanctuaries.

Collecting turtle eggs for sale was abolished, allowing all the eggs gathered on the island to be hatched.

It worked. Nesting data showed turtle landings on Pulau Redang increased in 2010 – seventeen years after the research started.

In fact, at Chagar Hutang, for the first time, one thousand turtle nests were recorded and this number grew to 1,500 nests last year.

Indeed, a success story for the sea turtles.

I have earned a 5-member sponsor pin from Toastmasters International – for my sponsorship of at least 5 new members for Liquid Gold Advanced Toastmasters Club during this term’s membership-building program. Nice!

And that’s not all. My Toastmasters International’s Triple Crown report update is a revelation – only because it is very, very long!

According to this report, I have already earned 21 educational awards!

And why not? I am a very, very active Toastmaster!

Porno Chic Ad Campaign

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Photo: Twitter Screenshot

 

A Yves Saint Laurent campaign featuring "painfully thin models" in "degrading" poses sparked distressing disapproval on Monday, with strident calls to ban the imagery.

 

The poster ads of a reclining woman in a fur coat and fishnet tights opening her legs, and another of a model in a leotard and roller skate stilettos bending over a stool, caused incensed indignation on social media.

 

The Autorité de Régulation Professionnelle de la Publicity, the French advertising authority said most of the complaints they received were from people who saw the images as an “incitement to rape”.

 

Their director, Stephane Martin, told the AFP that the brand appears to have "incontestably breached" the national advertising code, which bars all "degrading and humiliating representations of people".

 

France's leading women's group, Osez le feminisme ("Dare to be Feminist"), called for the campaign to be pulled immediately. 

 

Raphaelle Remy-Leleu, a spokesperson for the group, said: "It ticks all the sexist boxes. The women are objectified, hypersexualised and put in submissive positions".

 

She added: "How do they think they will sell anything today (to women) with that? ,,,But you have to ask if that wasn't intentional, that this was all about creating a scandal so we would talk about them".

 

Anyway, the French fashion house was not available for comment.

 

Celtic and Rangers are drawn to meet in the Scottish Cup semi-final.

 

The former sealed their spot by coming from behind to beat St Mirren 4-1 on Sunday. Their goal scorers were Mikael Lustig (58), Scott Sinclair (59), Moussa Dembele (68) and Leigh Griffiths (78).

 

Last evening, I was in Bangsar, KL to attend the KL Advanced Toastmasters meeting. I presented my third speech ‘A Dramatic Talk’ from The Entertaining Speaker manual titled “An Early Morning Drive”.

 

 And for my ‘drama’, I was voted Best Speaker.

Public University Lecturers Lose their Jobs

Bad economic times are really hitting Malaysians hard. And academia is also not spared. 

Already there is a marked deterioration in the quality of our education, even affecting tertiary institutions. And yet public universities made the painful decision to terminate as many as 6,000 lecturers, including professors.

Thanks to budget cuts by the cash-strapped Malaysian government.

Malaysian Academic Association Congress president Prof Dr Mohd Idrus Mohd Masirin said public universities had been adversely affected by the allocation diminutions in 2016, by at least 30% to 40%.

It is estimated that the total number of public lecturers had dropped to 29,000, compared with 35,000 previously. 

Don’t expect our graduates to shine!

Liverpool embarrassed Arsene Wenger’s Arsenal when they beat the Gunners 3-1 in an EPL clash on Saturday.

On that day too, I had participated in the club-level International Speech and Table Topics contests at the Zuellig Pharma premise in Shah Alam.

Liquid Gold Advanced Toastmasters Club saw good speakers competing for honors. Five for the International Speech contest and six for the Table Topics contest. 

I was really very surprised to win the former because my preparation was pretty much last minute. As for the latter – I knew I had nailed it when I finished speaking. A double champion!

The winners will represent the club at the Area P5 Contests on Saturday, March 11. 

Dear Malaysians

Dear Malaysians,

 

Do you know that over 4 million eligible Malaysians have yet to register as voters? Most of them are in the 21 to 30 age group.

 

These Malaysians cannot afford to be detached, indifferent and unconcerned. They have to believe that when they step forward, they are already starting to make a change. And in the process, they exercise their right as citizens.

 

Many people are speculating that the fourteenth general election could be held as early as September this year. If that is so, eligible voters have only this month to register. 

 

I don’t believe Malaysians will want to risk their chances to vote, especially when we all know that the coming election is the most crucial one for all of us.

 

How do you register? Merely proceed to the post office or Surunhajaya Pilihan Raya (Election Commission of Malaysia) office and fill up a form. Of course, remember to bring your IC!

 

Yup, that’s all it takes! Only voters who are registered at least six months before the election can vote.

 

Malaysians who have not done so – do register!

 

And those who have already registered to please reach out to fellow Malaysians who have not.

 

We are Malaysians – let us do our duty to make a change. For Malaysia. For ourselves. For future generations.

 

At the 2017 Women’s Windy City Open Squash (February 21-March 01), Egyptian Nour El Sherbini beat Malaysia’s Nicol David 11-9, 6-11, 11-6, 11-4 in forty-five minutes in the quarter-finals. Again, David was stopped early.

 

I had two Toastmasters meetings on Wednesday.

 

The first was at Section 51A in Petaling Jaya and the second was in Jalan Imbi, KL. At both venues, I delivered speeches.

 

At the Standard Chartered (previously known as Scope) Toastmasters meeting, I presented an Advanced speech from The Entertaining Speaker manual. My speech title was "I Date Men".

I guess it was very entertaining because I was voted Best Speaker.

 

 

And at the ITC Bintang Toastmasters meeting, I presented my CC speech #1 titled “I Am the Present”. My forty-second round of the Competent Communication manual and my 533rd project speech todate – since I became a Toastmaster.

Aries Thinks About Death

I came across this intriguing Holly Riordan article (webpage http://thoughtcatalog.com/holly-riordan/2017/02/this-is-the-creepiest-thing-about-you-based-on-your-zodiac-sign/) yesterday.

It identifies the creepiest thing about me – based on my Zodiac sign. It says: “You’re always thinking about death.  On your way to class, you wonder what would happen if you stepped in front of a moving car and while you're driving, you wonder what would happen if you jolted your wheel to the right. You’re fixated on death”.

 

It explains why not a few of my Toastmasters assignment speeches were about death! I am an Aries, after all!

Anyway, didn't JK Rowling say: "Death is just life's next big adventure"?

 

On Saturday evening, I delivered an Advanced speech titled “A Missing Tooth” – it was from The Entertaining Speaker manual.

I chose the title because my audience are dentists who had assembled for the Malaysian Dental Association second demo Toastmasters meeting at D-2-1 in Jalan SS7/26, Parkland Commercial Hub in Kelana Jaya, PJ.

And yet another workshop is in the works: