Good job I'm not a web designer innit. I thought my blog was looking quite nice and swanky, but the problem is I organise the new layout on my laptop, which has a lovely widescreen monitor. So whenever I've been looking at it it looks all lovely and nicely laid out, but now I see it on a regular common or garden desktop monitor then I discover the youtube videos are half cut off. Oh dear, this don't look so nace at all now does it. As per Sheryl and Vanessas advice I have got rid of the black background, cos they both said it makes their eyes go all spastic in a Steven Hawkins stylee. Did you know that in Malaysia it's quite acceptable to call brain-cripples "Spastics" in the newspapers? Bet you didn't eh, well they regularly run articles that show mongs in workshops making stuff (less of a sweatshop, more of a droolshop I suppose) with a headline such as "Just because their spastics doesn't mean they can't have their uses sometimes". Really, this is very true, I'm not just being a contraversial bugger. They normally have a very patronising by-line saying things like "these sweet underpriviledged souls" etc. Brilliant. Call a spade a spade and that, that's the Malaysian way.
I mention this because I've been fliking through the old papers as I got my recycling done today, I came accross some brilliant articles - such as the woman in America who got killed by an Eagle Ray (bigger than a Stingray, smaller than a Manta) because she was on the deck of a small speedboat, the boat scared the Ray which jumped out of the water and smacked her in the head at 60mph. Ouch. What are the chances of that happening though? I feel more upset at the loss of the Eagle Ray than an american though, as Eagle Rays are endangered species, and unfortunately americans aren't.
The other article that had me in bits was from the run up to the election here, and I can't believe I've been so slack as to not mention it before. It was from the Malay Mail, and a page regarding the 2 female candidates competing for the area where I live. Their surnames were, and this is no joke "Chew" (Barisan Nasional) and "Kok" (DAP). I don't know how I never mentioned walking down the streets and seing alternating posters shouting CHEW KOK CHEW KOK KOK CHEW KOK all the way down like some stroboscopic sado-masachistic homosexual pornography. Kok won by the way, so I suppose the headline must have been "Victory for Kok", or "Kok is number one" or something else equally squallid. The thing that made me laugh my balls off though came at the bottom of the page (as if it wasn't already hilarious enough) was a photo of Theresa Kok, and a little caption below it that read, and I kid you not
"Kok: It's a gender issue".
Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaahahahahahahhahahahhaahhaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa.
Waaaaaaaahhh
Waaaaahahaahhhahaaaaaaaaaaa.
Yes, I may be nearly 30, but I have been wetting my drawers over that for the last month. I took a picture of it, but am having a few photoshop issues today, so I'll get it uploaded asap so you can all chuckle too. Maybe one of you can send it into Have I got news for you, if it's still going.
28 Mar 2008
The fun begins
This week is a very exciting week for me. I went on a location recce on wednesday, all the way up to Ipoh (about 2 or 3 hours drive from KL, the other side of the large mountains of Genting and Cameron Highlands) to check out the subject matter of my documentary. Adam (the D.o.P) came with me, and it all went amazingly well. We met up with our main contact, who wanted to suss us out before he agreed to go ahead, as I rekon him and the other people we're going to interview have been burned by vulture journalist types and put off by lots of shoddy local production houses offering to come and make a big pile of crap. So the fact that we're both very nice and honest professionals, thoughroughly decent chaps and a good deal more intelligent than the average Malaysian who works in TV production sold it to him.
We're going back in a week or so to meet the lady he has been protecting from us (and all the other chancers)and to set a date within the next couple of weeks to start shooting our interviews. Yes.
Adam looked really excited with the locations, and now and again I could see him scooching down and squinting, a good sign that he's getting into shooting mode, selecting lenses and angles in his head.
He has a crew of lads he works with all the time, and like myself he refuses to hire crap people, or work with them twice if they aren't up to scratch - all these boys have done stuff for National Geographic, big adverts, Discovery channel and a lot more besides, so we are on with a top-notch crew. And everybody is not only doing this for free, but we're all going to pool our money together to make this the best we can possibly make it.
Aren't I the lucky one? Mega excited, and more than a little bit tense to make sure it all go's well. Palms sweating. I've managed to track down a few more octagenarian interviewees, and am in the process of convincing them that it is essential that they do these interviews. I am refraining from saying "come on love, you're 85, you'll be dead soon so what harm can it do, eh?" as I feel this is the last resort in Timbo diplomacy.
So, there we go. Everything is going much, much more smoothly than I could ever have hoped for. Adam and I were talking in the car on the way home, and I was a bit worried that it's all just going too smoothly so far (touch wood, I have no desire to jinx this) and we came to the conclusion that we're so used to dealing with utter, utter arseholes (TV people, advertising people, theatre people) that it's just become alien to us dealing with people who are actually nice human beings. How jaded we become hey.
So this is going to be the first of many Timbo documentary productions, the first of many indeed. Watch this space and love to all
We're going back in a week or so to meet the lady he has been protecting from us (and all the other chancers)and to set a date within the next couple of weeks to start shooting our interviews. Yes.
Adam looked really excited with the locations, and now and again I could see him scooching down and squinting, a good sign that he's getting into shooting mode, selecting lenses and angles in his head.
He has a crew of lads he works with all the time, and like myself he refuses to hire crap people, or work with them twice if they aren't up to scratch - all these boys have done stuff for National Geographic, big adverts, Discovery channel and a lot more besides, so we are on with a top-notch crew. And everybody is not only doing this for free, but we're all going to pool our money together to make this the best we can possibly make it.
Aren't I the lucky one? Mega excited, and more than a little bit tense to make sure it all go's well. Palms sweating. I've managed to track down a few more octagenarian interviewees, and am in the process of convincing them that it is essential that they do these interviews. I am refraining from saying "come on love, you're 85, you'll be dead soon so what harm can it do, eh?" as I feel this is the last resort in Timbo diplomacy.
So, there we go. Everything is going much, much more smoothly than I could ever have hoped for. Adam and I were talking in the car on the way home, and I was a bit worried that it's all just going too smoothly so far (touch wood, I have no desire to jinx this) and we came to the conclusion that we're so used to dealing with utter, utter arseholes (TV people, advertising people, theatre people) that it's just become alien to us dealing with people who are actually nice human beings. How jaded we become hey.
So this is going to be the first of many Timbo documentary productions, the first of many indeed. Watch this space and love to all
25 Mar 2008
Work begins on my first Documentary Film
I am now well and truly geared up to make my first documentary. I just had a meeting with a bloke who used to be an MP who knows a lot about the story I'm making. It turns out his mother used to know the woman the story is about and he's going to ask her to do an interview for me. He's also going to be an interviewee and it's possible he has the email address of a lost family member, who now lives in America. So he's going to ask her if she is willing to get in touch with me.
Tomorrow I'm going north into Perak to meet with my main contact, Mr Law Siak Hong, who owns the house where my story takes place (and has turned it into a memorial/museum to the events the film is about), I also get to meet the last surviving family memeber (a lady who is now 87 years old) and we're going to take her off to the beach for the afternoon and try and convince her that I'm actually a nice guy and not a journalist vulture (yes, convincing her I'm a nice guy may be a bit of a hard task, but I always like a challenge, never know all those years of acting lessons might finally pay off).
I have secured the services of a friend of mine, an excellent Director of Photography (who has shoots for Discovery channel and National Geograohic amonst many others in his portfolio), who makes beautiful pictures and has a beautiful camera, Panasonic P2 which shoots in full 1080HD (and has very large CCD chips that are a broadcast quality in UK and USA). He's going to bring along his 35mm adaptor and box of Nikon 35mm lenses, so we going to shoot this in the proper stylee and not just rock up with a standard fixed lens like a lot of documentarys. Yes indeed, he's convinced a lot of good crew members to do the job for free, and he's providing his services for free too - well, as a profit share if we ever manage to sell it. I've got in touch with an english bloke who has an audio studio here, and used to work for BBC and ITV, who is very interested in the project. I got to pay this fellah cos he has overheads, but he's willing to give me a very nice discount and provide other services (editing etc) for free because he likes the project.
Yes indeed, I should write a book "the art of blagging" and it would make millions.
I'll let you know how my trip to Perak goes in a few days, and provide you with some lovely photos of me with jolly nice people getting our teeth into a proper meaty project. Watch this space, this is the first of many projects in this realm I assure you.
Everybody say "Mat Salleh Boleh!!!"
Tomorrow I'm going north into Perak to meet with my main contact, Mr Law Siak Hong, who owns the house where my story takes place (and has turned it into a memorial/museum to the events the film is about), I also get to meet the last surviving family memeber (a lady who is now 87 years old) and we're going to take her off to the beach for the afternoon and try and convince her that I'm actually a nice guy and not a journalist vulture (yes, convincing her I'm a nice guy may be a bit of a hard task, but I always like a challenge, never know all those years of acting lessons might finally pay off).
I have secured the services of a friend of mine, an excellent Director of Photography (who has shoots for Discovery channel and National Geograohic amonst many others in his portfolio), who makes beautiful pictures and has a beautiful camera, Panasonic P2 which shoots in full 1080HD (and has very large CCD chips that are a broadcast quality in UK and USA). He's going to bring along his 35mm adaptor and box of Nikon 35mm lenses, so we going to shoot this in the proper stylee and not just rock up with a standard fixed lens like a lot of documentarys. Yes indeed, he's convinced a lot of good crew members to do the job for free, and he's providing his services for free too - well, as a profit share if we ever manage to sell it. I've got in touch with an english bloke who has an audio studio here, and used to work for BBC and ITV, who is very interested in the project. I got to pay this fellah cos he has overheads, but he's willing to give me a very nice discount and provide other services (editing etc) for free because he likes the project.
Yes indeed, I should write a book "the art of blagging" and it would make millions.
I'll let you know how my trip to Perak goes in a few days, and provide you with some lovely photos of me with jolly nice people getting our teeth into a proper meaty project. Watch this space, this is the first of many projects in this realm I assure you.
Everybody say "Mat Salleh Boleh!!!"
23 Mar 2008
F1 Hits town and everybody gone crazy mad
Yes today is the F1 Malaysian Grand Prix (the big willies as some might call it)and the whole of KL went bonkers last night with dozens of pre-F1 partys all over town.
Vanessa got invited to a huge corporate BMW car launch (cos of her work) where they had free booze all night for several thousand people. BMW have had partys on every night for the past 6 days with free booze all night, and I didn't get to go to bloody any of them. Typical.
So her party involved some bloke driving around doing some nifty tricks in an F1 standby car, pretty sweet, and a bloke on a BMW superbike doing stunts as if he were on a BMX. Sounded pretty sweet.
I on the other hand went to a hard house rave, at the bottom of the KL tower. Some very banging music went on until about 4am. It was brilliant, very very loud. This was the Ferrari pre-F1 party and I have to admit, whilst free booze would have been good, the music was pumping and I had a great night with friends. Vanessa joined me about 1am, so we both got to dance very drunkenly together. The dance floor was a very shoddy wooden construction, evidently bashed together by Indonesian illegal workers (who are without question a bargain) - the construction did manage to last a good few hours, but with people dancing on it the floor resembled a trampoline, which 3/4 inch plywood is not the best materiel for. So yes, large portions sort of collapsed a bit, but nobody got hurt and it was jolly entertaining.
As for me, I managed to sneak in half a bottle of vodka using an age old technique that evidently hasn't filtered down to malaysian bouncers. Go into venue, buy bottle of water, exit venue holding bottle, empty water, fill vodka, enter venue with bottle in hand. Amazing, I really didn't think they'd be so blur not to check, but there I went not a bother. Good job because they only sold beer at the bar and to get drunk on cans of tiger is virtually impossible, as you get very bloated and have to micturate copiously throughout the night.
Oh yes, and at one point I accidentally shoulder barged one bloke in the face, as it was very busy and I'm a clumsy drunken oaf. I turned around to say sorry, and would you believe, it was a flipping policeman!! I clattered a copper right accross the jaw with my shoulder and got away with it, I went "ooh sorry" and he just looked shocked and put a hand up to his sore chops feeling sorry for himself.
Waaahahahaaaaahahahaaaaaaahhaahahhahahaaaaa, I've never seen something so funny in all my life.
I got to assault an officer of the law for the first time in my life, got away with it, and you know what? It felt gooooood, so good I might try it again someday.
Vanessa got invited to a huge corporate BMW car launch (cos of her work) where they had free booze all night for several thousand people. BMW have had partys on every night for the past 6 days with free booze all night, and I didn't get to go to bloody any of them. Typical.
So her party involved some bloke driving around doing some nifty tricks in an F1 standby car, pretty sweet, and a bloke on a BMW superbike doing stunts as if he were on a BMX. Sounded pretty sweet.
I on the other hand went to a hard house rave, at the bottom of the KL tower. Some very banging music went on until about 4am. It was brilliant, very very loud. This was the Ferrari pre-F1 party and I have to admit, whilst free booze would have been good, the music was pumping and I had a great night with friends. Vanessa joined me about 1am, so we both got to dance very drunkenly together. The dance floor was a very shoddy wooden construction, evidently bashed together by Indonesian illegal workers (who are without question a bargain) - the construction did manage to last a good few hours, but with people dancing on it the floor resembled a trampoline, which 3/4 inch plywood is not the best materiel for. So yes, large portions sort of collapsed a bit, but nobody got hurt and it was jolly entertaining.
As for me, I managed to sneak in half a bottle of vodka using an age old technique that evidently hasn't filtered down to malaysian bouncers. Go into venue, buy bottle of water, exit venue holding bottle, empty water, fill vodka, enter venue with bottle in hand. Amazing, I really didn't think they'd be so blur not to check, but there I went not a bother. Good job because they only sold beer at the bar and to get drunk on cans of tiger is virtually impossible, as you get very bloated and have to micturate copiously throughout the night.
Oh yes, and at one point I accidentally shoulder barged one bloke in the face, as it was very busy and I'm a clumsy drunken oaf. I turned around to say sorry, and would you believe, it was a flipping policeman!! I clattered a copper right accross the jaw with my shoulder and got away with it, I went "ooh sorry" and he just looked shocked and put a hand up to his sore chops feeling sorry for himself.
Waaahahahaaaaahahahaaaaaaahhaahahhahahaaaaa, I've never seen something so funny in all my life.
I got to assault an officer of the law for the first time in my life, got away with it, and you know what? It felt gooooood, so good I might try it again someday.
22 Mar 2008
At last, you get to watch my first adverts innit
Now I have had chance to put my adverts onto Youtube. The ones what I was producer of. Yes, this is my first offering to the sick world of advertising. I'm not proud. But have a look.
My favourite is the Hot FM, frankly I think Fly FM is quite poo.
Here's a breakdown of Hot FMs malay so that you understand it
"Tidak" = No
"Sarang" = Attack
"Anda terkena panggilan hangit" = You have been prank called/You've recieved a hot call
"Setiap Isnin - Juma'at" = Monday to Friday
So, as I say the content wasn't my choice, for some reason the radio station thinks it's funny to prank call people in the morning. But what with Malaysias very strict censorship they can't actually say anything funny. To me a prank call is something along the lines of phoning a married man and saying
"hello is that Mr ?. Yes hello I'm calling from ? police station, we'd like you to some in for questioning regarding a double homicide" then proceed to tell him that it's his wife and kid that have been butchered.
Now that's funny right? When he breaks down in tears, says he's going to end it all, weeps uncontrollably and then you go "ha ha ha only joking"
Right? That's real comedy. No, these people phone up and say "I'm doing a survey, do you mind telling me how much you earn. Oh wow so much, can I borrow a few hundred, oh go on, you've got loads, please? Just 50 then" etc until you fall asleep at the wheel. Then of course the guy says "anda terkena panggilan hangit" and the man on the phone laughs like you just told the worlds most amazing joke.
It's kind of sweet that Malay people will laugh at anything, but that's the process of years of only being allowed to watch slapstick comedy because anything slightly intelligent/satirical might break the bonds of your religious and political indoctrination. In fact I'd go so far as to say Malays are a bit like homosexuals - as in they'll laugh at anything no matter how brainless (ie: graham norton)
Now that I have a youtube account and have figured out how to upload stuff and get it on here (yes, I am a computer luddite I know it well enough) then you can expect more such gubbins as I make it. I'm working on my new showreel and I got a few other bits and bobs to get uploaded here - but some of them are too long so i need to make trimmed down web versions for your viewing pleasure.
As for my poll, it has answered a few questions for me. Namely that ONLY my family members ever read this blog, because nobody I know over here would ever consider eating a marmite sandwhich over their own feet.
ho hum
My favourite is the Hot FM, frankly I think Fly FM is quite poo.
Here's a breakdown of Hot FMs malay so that you understand it
"Tidak" = No
"Sarang" = Attack
"Anda terkena panggilan hangit" = You have been prank called/You've recieved a hot call
"Setiap Isnin - Juma'at" = Monday to Friday
So, as I say the content wasn't my choice, for some reason the radio station thinks it's funny to prank call people in the morning. But what with Malaysias very strict censorship they can't actually say anything funny. To me a prank call is something along the lines of phoning a married man and saying
"hello is that Mr ?. Yes hello I'm calling from ? police station, we'd like you to some in for questioning regarding a double homicide" then proceed to tell him that it's his wife and kid that have been butchered.
Now that's funny right? When he breaks down in tears, says he's going to end it all, weeps uncontrollably and then you go "ha ha ha only joking"
Right? That's real comedy. No, these people phone up and say "I'm doing a survey, do you mind telling me how much you earn. Oh wow so much, can I borrow a few hundred, oh go on, you've got loads, please? Just 50 then" etc until you fall asleep at the wheel. Then of course the guy says "anda terkena panggilan hangit" and the man on the phone laughs like you just told the worlds most amazing joke.
It's kind of sweet that Malay people will laugh at anything, but that's the process of years of only being allowed to watch slapstick comedy because anything slightly intelligent/satirical might break the bonds of your religious and political indoctrination. In fact I'd go so far as to say Malays are a bit like homosexuals - as in they'll laugh at anything no matter how brainless (ie: graham norton)
Now that I have a youtube account and have figured out how to upload stuff and get it on here (yes, I am a computer luddite I know it well enough) then you can expect more such gubbins as I make it. I'm working on my new showreel and I got a few other bits and bobs to get uploaded here - but some of them are too long so i need to make trimmed down web versions for your viewing pleasure.
As for my poll, it has answered a few questions for me. Namely that ONLY my family members ever read this blog, because nobody I know over here would ever consider eating a marmite sandwhich over their own feet.
ho hum
20 Mar 2008
Time for a bit of spring cleaning
I got bored with looking at the same old blog layout (plus looking at white screens isn't very good for your eyes) so I have had a bit of a fiddle around with the settings as you may have noticed.
I hope this layout pleases you all.
You may note the survey I have added on the right of screen - please cast your vote here as I feel this is a very pressing subject, and your contribution to this survey (and others that I may add in the future depending on whether anybody other than myself clicks on a selection) will add greatly to the richness of human knowledge. Don't tell me you've never considered such a question before.
Results will be published upon survey conclusion.
Today is a public holiday, so I actually get to spend a day with Vanessa. It's something or other to do with Prophet Mohammed, his birthday perhaps I'm not sure. This week I've been working as a location sound recordist for an amazing new groundbreaking production, oh yes, it's been beyond fantastic. Now I can add to my lengthy CV the glorious prestige of "malaysian daytime TV mother and baby chat show". Yes oh yes, my career is truely at its peak, doing interviews with women talking about epidurals, labour pains, breast feeding, farting, morning sickness, c-sections, stitches, seepage, cravings and all the accoutrements of the very messy process of birthing. Well, isn't that just great, I'm so happy for myself I could slit my wrists, but it's a job and it got me out of the house.
Again I got to slight several malaysian "celebritities" by going around to their houses to interview them and just sort of blanking them (not intentionally) because I've never heard of them. Lets face it, the only real malaysian celebrity that anybody has ever heard of is Michelle Yeoh (crouching tiger hidden dragon, tomorrow never dies, memoirs of a geisha, rape of Nanking and a good amount of other ones) but I bet you didn't even realise she was Malaysian - or in fact care, neither do I I'm just trying to illustrate a point. Erm what was my point, I did have one. Oh yes here we are.
Malaysian celebrities make me laugh, they think they're so great and so talented, but really they got all the talent of a dead hamster and nobody outside of the remote villages (the ones who watch the really appalling local TV channels) would ever be remotely impressed by being in the prescence of them or even remotely moved by their performances. The acting standards in this country are so vomit inducingly poor it really is embarrassing to watch, it's even more embarrassing to watch a totally dire director try and "coach" a performance (i.e: reading straight from the guidebook to "the worlds most hammy and uninspirational acting, and how to make a point by over-emphasising the completely wrong words and syllables"). Then when the "actor" has made what I would consider a poor performance for an infant school nativity play the director is going "yeah, wow great, but can you be a bit more, you know natural, perhaps start the line with 'phew' or 'waaah' or something, you know, like you're talking to your friends right" so of course the lame attempts that came before seem akin to an oscar winning performance from Kevin Spacey when they try again, but trying to naturally begin a sentence with "phew". Ho ho ho, these people are truly hilarious, even moreso when they try and behave all diva style, as if they have actually earned the right to behave like an important person, waaahaahahaaa. Natuarlly I have made a few enemies by saying things like "do it yourself, what you think I'm here for you?" and "perhaps in this take you could try and, you know, act. It's what actors do".
When oh when oh when will somebody with even a hint of talent get on screen here? When oh when will somebody who has any idea what they are doing open an acting school here?? When oh when.
Erm, not much else to report except I just got soaked walking the dog because we're having freak monsoon downpours in the dry season. Oh and I want to spend quite a bit of cash on a professional video camera and have been hemming and hawing about it, but a fortune cookie I ate this afternoon told me that "an investment I make will pay off more than you had ever imagined". So I rekon I'm gonna just go for it. Well, a bit of paper in a piece of savoury confectionary can't be wrong now can it.
I hope this layout pleases you all.
You may note the survey I have added on the right of screen - please cast your vote here as I feel this is a very pressing subject, and your contribution to this survey (and others that I may add in the future depending on whether anybody other than myself clicks on a selection) will add greatly to the richness of human knowledge. Don't tell me you've never considered such a question before.
Results will be published upon survey conclusion.
Today is a public holiday, so I actually get to spend a day with Vanessa. It's something or other to do with Prophet Mohammed, his birthday perhaps I'm not sure. This week I've been working as a location sound recordist for an amazing new groundbreaking production, oh yes, it's been beyond fantastic. Now I can add to my lengthy CV the glorious prestige of "malaysian daytime TV mother and baby chat show". Yes oh yes, my career is truely at its peak, doing interviews with women talking about epidurals, labour pains, breast feeding, farting, morning sickness, c-sections, stitches, seepage, cravings and all the accoutrements of the very messy process of birthing. Well, isn't that just great, I'm so happy for myself I could slit my wrists, but it's a job and it got me out of the house.
Again I got to slight several malaysian "celebritities" by going around to their houses to interview them and just sort of blanking them (not intentionally) because I've never heard of them. Lets face it, the only real malaysian celebrity that anybody has ever heard of is Michelle Yeoh (crouching tiger hidden dragon, tomorrow never dies, memoirs of a geisha, rape of Nanking and a good amount of other ones) but I bet you didn't even realise she was Malaysian - or in fact care, neither do I I'm just trying to illustrate a point. Erm what was my point, I did have one. Oh yes here we are.
Malaysian celebrities make me laugh, they think they're so great and so talented, but really they got all the talent of a dead hamster and nobody outside of the remote villages (the ones who watch the really appalling local TV channels) would ever be remotely impressed by being in the prescence of them or even remotely moved by their performances. The acting standards in this country are so vomit inducingly poor it really is embarrassing to watch, it's even more embarrassing to watch a totally dire director try and "coach" a performance (i.e: reading straight from the guidebook to "the worlds most hammy and uninspirational acting, and how to make a point by over-emphasising the completely wrong words and syllables"). Then when the "actor" has made what I would consider a poor performance for an infant school nativity play the director is going "yeah, wow great, but can you be a bit more, you know natural, perhaps start the line with 'phew' or 'waaah' or something, you know, like you're talking to your friends right" so of course the lame attempts that came before seem akin to an oscar winning performance from Kevin Spacey when they try again, but trying to naturally begin a sentence with "phew". Ho ho ho, these people are truly hilarious, even moreso when they try and behave all diva style, as if they have actually earned the right to behave like an important person, waaahaahahaaa. Natuarlly I have made a few enemies by saying things like "do it yourself, what you think I'm here for you?" and "perhaps in this take you could try and, you know, act. It's what actors do".
When oh when oh when will somebody with even a hint of talent get on screen here? When oh when will somebody who has any idea what they are doing open an acting school here?? When oh when.
Erm, not much else to report except I just got soaked walking the dog because we're having freak monsoon downpours in the dry season. Oh and I want to spend quite a bit of cash on a professional video camera and have been hemming and hawing about it, but a fortune cookie I ate this afternoon told me that "an investment I make will pay off more than you had ever imagined". So I rekon I'm gonna just go for it. Well, a bit of paper in a piece of savoury confectionary can't be wrong now can it.
13 Mar 2008
Democracy at last
Well, it seems that I have been sitting here smack bang in the centre of a major event in malayisan history. I speak of the 12th General Election that took place on Saturday. It has been a massive event, that now seems to be the herald of the first democracy that Malaysia has ever possessed.
What happened was this: Up until this point (since Independance was granted in 1957) the country has been ruled by 3 parties, formed into an Alliance. I speak of UMNO (united malay nationals organisation), the MCA (malaysian chinese association) and MIC (Malaysian Indian congress). Along with a few other parties (Gerakan, PPK and some others in Sabah and Sarawak) they all went under the banner of Barisan Nasional (BN for short).
UMNO have always been the ruling party, and have their methods, that are a little heavy handed and discriminatory against anybody not a Malay UMNO voter. They looked after their own to keep themselves in power.
On Saturday UMNO got their biggest shock ever. 5 of 12 Malaysian states voted in favour of "the opposition" - the States of Penang, Kedah, Kelantan (all northern), Perak and Selangor (which surrounds Kuala Lumpur) all voted away from the BN. UMNO faced heavy casualties, with several of its cabinet members and old boys getting the royal boot. The head of the MIC (a very unpopular man, responsible for millions of toll booths on highways) got voted out, as did the president of Gerakan.
Where BN stood unchallenged was in Sabah and Sarawak, and they got their seat not a problem, however UMNO didn't get voted in there, because they don't stand.
So the long and short of it is this - the BN are still the ruling allience, but they have always needed a 2 thirds majority to rule as they wished, and UMNO was always by far the biggest party. But the problem for UMNO is they didn't get enough votes. It wasn't just the chinese and the indians voting against them, but many of their hard-core malay constituencys said "No" and didn't vote them in.
It's been a massive week, because the thing is everybody in the whole country knows what the results mean. Even the very newspapers that last week were "UMNO UMNO UMNO BN BN BN" because they have no choice, have had the choke taken off them. The Star yesterday said "the days of UMNO dominance are over". Dominance? Last week it was almost divine right to rule. It's amazing. The MCA also got slashed to ribbons, by the mainly Chinese opposition party of the DAP (democratic action party), and the very upset Indian hindu community who has been the target of a lot of bad media recently told the MIC to roundly get lost.
People are now very interested to see what happens. Despite scaremongering that the economy is going to collapse, that investors in the KL stock exchange are grabbing their money and running to escape from this unstable government. This is a good amount of bullcrap, and the people know it, and they know that any attempts to take the publics decision away from them rests in the hands of a very weakened UMNO. The people really have spoken, and it's hurt the ones they spoke to.
The Prime Minister on election night (abdullah bedawi, otherwise known as Pak Lah) said, I paraphrase "well that's democracy isn't it".
A nation awaits what is to come.
In fact the former minister of Information (a well known gibbering bigot, by the name of Zainnudin Zainal, who made a total tit of himself of Al-Jazeera interview, click here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1_GQ-K7P_w to see the interview, it is embarrassingly funny - this man was the INFORMATION MINISTER) who got well and truely voted out. Made some obscure comment yesterday about "young turks" in UMNO who I think he suggested were all in favour of trying to seize power on election day after parliament was dissolved, but for some reason they didn't and now we all hope that the slow and difficult process of genuine democracy (or at least as close as anybody ever gets) is underway.
So there we go, sorry to be all poltical, but it needs to be said, a dark path has led to a fork, and now lets hope Malaysians can guide themselves into the light. Let's hope.
Let us also hope on a footnote, that the tolerance period where the media has slackened, isn't just a bit to lure free thinkers out into the open, then promptly arrest them all when they decide to slam on a military + police rule, slamming us all in jail under the ISA, cos I may be a bit buggered innit.
love to all
footnote: as Malaysian are absolutely in love with acronyms, especially within politics, allow me to explain a few to you
UMNO - united malay nationalist organisation (BN)
MCA - Malaysian Chinese Association (BN)
MIC - Malaysian Indian Congress (BN)
DAP - Democration Action Party
PKR - Parti Keadilan Rakyat (peoples fairness party)
PAS - Parti Al Islam (Islam fundamentalists, very iffy, but party of "the oppostion", it's one of those unfortunate things that the DAP and PKR have been forced to side with a bunch of crazy nutters to make any form of sway in a political opposition alliance)
BN - Barisan Nasional. An allience of UMNO, MCA, MIC, SNAP, Gerakan and some others. The ruling party for 50 years.
What happened was this: Up until this point (since Independance was granted in 1957) the country has been ruled by 3 parties, formed into an Alliance. I speak of UMNO (united malay nationals organisation), the MCA (malaysian chinese association) and MIC (Malaysian Indian congress). Along with a few other parties (Gerakan, PPK and some others in Sabah and Sarawak) they all went under the banner of Barisan Nasional (BN for short).
UMNO have always been the ruling party, and have their methods, that are a little heavy handed and discriminatory against anybody not a Malay UMNO voter. They looked after their own to keep themselves in power.
On Saturday UMNO got their biggest shock ever. 5 of 12 Malaysian states voted in favour of "the opposition" - the States of Penang, Kedah, Kelantan (all northern), Perak and Selangor (which surrounds Kuala Lumpur) all voted away from the BN. UMNO faced heavy casualties, with several of its cabinet members and old boys getting the royal boot. The head of the MIC (a very unpopular man, responsible for millions of toll booths on highways) got voted out, as did the president of Gerakan.
Where BN stood unchallenged was in Sabah and Sarawak, and they got their seat not a problem, however UMNO didn't get voted in there, because they don't stand.
So the long and short of it is this - the BN are still the ruling allience, but they have always needed a 2 thirds majority to rule as they wished, and UMNO was always by far the biggest party. But the problem for UMNO is they didn't get enough votes. It wasn't just the chinese and the indians voting against them, but many of their hard-core malay constituencys said "No" and didn't vote them in.
It's been a massive week, because the thing is everybody in the whole country knows what the results mean. Even the very newspapers that last week were "UMNO UMNO UMNO BN BN BN" because they have no choice, have had the choke taken off them. The Star yesterday said "the days of UMNO dominance are over". Dominance? Last week it was almost divine right to rule. It's amazing. The MCA also got slashed to ribbons, by the mainly Chinese opposition party of the DAP (democratic action party), and the very upset Indian hindu community who has been the target of a lot of bad media recently told the MIC to roundly get lost.
People are now very interested to see what happens. Despite scaremongering that the economy is going to collapse, that investors in the KL stock exchange are grabbing their money and running to escape from this unstable government. This is a good amount of bullcrap, and the people know it, and they know that any attempts to take the publics decision away from them rests in the hands of a very weakened UMNO. The people really have spoken, and it's hurt the ones they spoke to.
The Prime Minister on election night (abdullah bedawi, otherwise known as Pak Lah) said, I paraphrase "well that's democracy isn't it".
A nation awaits what is to come.
In fact the former minister of Information (a well known gibbering bigot, by the name of Zainnudin Zainal, who made a total tit of himself of Al-Jazeera interview, click here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A1_GQ-K7P_w to see the interview, it is embarrassingly funny - this man was the INFORMATION MINISTER) who got well and truely voted out. Made some obscure comment yesterday about "young turks" in UMNO who I think he suggested were all in favour of trying to seize power on election day after parliament was dissolved, but for some reason they didn't and now we all hope that the slow and difficult process of genuine democracy (or at least as close as anybody ever gets) is underway.
So there we go, sorry to be all poltical, but it needs to be said, a dark path has led to a fork, and now lets hope Malaysians can guide themselves into the light. Let's hope.
Let us also hope on a footnote, that the tolerance period where the media has slackened, isn't just a bit to lure free thinkers out into the open, then promptly arrest them all when they decide to slam on a military + police rule, slamming us all in jail under the ISA, cos I may be a bit buggered innit.
love to all
footnote: as Malaysian are absolutely in love with acronyms, especially within politics, allow me to explain a few to you
UMNO - united malay nationalist organisation (BN)
MCA - Malaysian Chinese Association (BN)
MIC - Malaysian Indian Congress (BN)
DAP - Democration Action Party
PKR - Parti Keadilan Rakyat (peoples fairness party)
PAS - Parti Al Islam (Islam fundamentalists, very iffy, but party of "the oppostion", it's one of those unfortunate things that the DAP and PKR have been forced to side with a bunch of crazy nutters to make any form of sway in a political opposition alliance)
BN - Barisan Nasional. An allience of UMNO, MCA, MIC, SNAP, Gerakan and some others. The ruling party for 50 years.
8 Mar 2008
Ha ha, the jibber master returns
Top of the morning to ye, and sorry it been so long since wot I wrote sumfink here.
Yes, I am indeed one lazy blogger, on top of that I have been tied up trying to organise a new project, add to this the need to reformat my computer (due to lots of reasons, not the least of which was a deep seated registry virus that was just getting right on my nerves).
So, I don't really know what has happened since I last saw you. I've read a lot of malaysian history books though, and that has led me on to a new project which I'm about to start this week, all done by myself and at my own expense, which is a bit poo, but I can't be bothered to grovel to a load of numties for financing cos then they'll just start stomping their idiot ideas around and changing the whole thing. So I keeping this one all to myself.
First step however is forking out a boat load of money on a new video camera. Tomorrow I shall be purchasing a Sony HVR-A1, which is a lovely little thing, and at the entry level of professional HDV cameras. It ain't cheap, at around £1500, but I figure that it's a definite investmant. Mini DV cameras are cheaper, but basically, MiniDV is utter stink innit.
So, that's mondays job, then I go north to Ipoh to start my new career move as documentary film-maker, we'll see how that one goes (and yes of course, how long it lasts).
What else? The sodding taxman stung me for a £100 fine, cos i didn't fill in my taxreturn on time. Arse!!!
Oh and I missed mothers day, even though dad sent me an SMS saying "mothers day on sunday, don't miss it". Ooops, not sure how that one slipped the net, I was fair convinced that it was this sunday coming up. My only real excuse is that I generally haven't got a clue what day/date/month or in fact what year it is these days. Floating along in my own little bubble of blur.
So there we have it, I'm gonna go and start being a film-maker this week, I gonna send you photos of my first recce into the shooting territory.
love to all
timbo
Yes, I am indeed one lazy blogger, on top of that I have been tied up trying to organise a new project, add to this the need to reformat my computer (due to lots of reasons, not the least of which was a deep seated registry virus that was just getting right on my nerves).
So, I don't really know what has happened since I last saw you. I've read a lot of malaysian history books though, and that has led me on to a new project which I'm about to start this week, all done by myself and at my own expense, which is a bit poo, but I can't be bothered to grovel to a load of numties for financing cos then they'll just start stomping their idiot ideas around and changing the whole thing. So I keeping this one all to myself.
First step however is forking out a boat load of money on a new video camera. Tomorrow I shall be purchasing a Sony HVR-A1, which is a lovely little thing, and at the entry level of professional HDV cameras. It ain't cheap, at around £1500, but I figure that it's a definite investmant. Mini DV cameras are cheaper, but basically, MiniDV is utter stink innit.
So, that's mondays job, then I go north to Ipoh to start my new career move as documentary film-maker, we'll see how that one goes (and yes of course, how long it lasts).
What else? The sodding taxman stung me for a £100 fine, cos i didn't fill in my taxreturn on time. Arse!!!
Oh and I missed mothers day, even though dad sent me an SMS saying "mothers day on sunday, don't miss it". Ooops, not sure how that one slipped the net, I was fair convinced that it was this sunday coming up. My only real excuse is that I generally haven't got a clue what day/date/month or in fact what year it is these days. Floating along in my own little bubble of blur.
So there we have it, I'm gonna go and start being a film-maker this week, I gonna send you photos of my first recce into the shooting territory.
love to all
timbo
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