Interlude

I know I promised my readers the next part of the story published in the previous post... but there is this extremely funny thread started by my friend Captain Norhisham Kassim on his Facebook wall which I wish to share. The following was copied from Norhisham's wall without his permission... but I'm certain he wouldn't mind.

Kenangan bersama adik beradik masa nak tidur….

Pak Pandir panjat pokok pisang. Pokok pisang patah. Pak Pandir panjat pulak pokok petai. Pokok petai pun patah. Pak Pandir pun panggil Pak Paiman Polis. Pak Paiman polis pencen. Polis pencen pun pakai pistol? Pak Pandir pikir… Pak Pandir panik. Pikir punya pikir, Pak Pandir... pengsan. Polis pencen pulak panik. Panik punya panik… polis pencen pulak pengsan. Pinish…

The thread was started yesterday 29 July 2010 and is continuing with contributions by friends who have posted stories where the words all start with the same letter. The original story above starts with P. Since then, there have been those starting with J, S and K. Totally hilarious!

Someone watching over me (Part 1)

He looks down hard at the piece of paper the doctor has handed to him. It is a form of some kind… neatly printed out with check boxes alongside lines of text that explains the choices available. He has been requested to tick his option and sign at the bottom of the form.

'Can you give me some time, Doc… please..,' he says.

'Okay,' the doctor replies. 'But don’t take too long. I am sorry to have to ask you to do this.' The doctor gives him a gentle squeeze on his arm as he leaves the room.

The room in the Intensive Care Unit is quiet now except for the rhythmic beeps coming from the life monitoring machine. Tubes and wires are connected all over the patient who is now in a deep state of unconsciousness.

Amir looks at the pale-white face of his wife Maryam lying on the hospital bed… and his eyes slowly starts to well up with tears.

He speaks to her in that soft and gentle voice of his. 'Yam, I don’t know what to do… they have asked me to choose. I know I made a promise to you that we will save the baby… but I can’t do that. Yes, we have waited for ten years to get him. But… I can’t let you go. I just can’t…'

'It no longer matters to me that we might not have another baby… because I don’t think I can find another you. I am sorry to break my promise… but I want you to come back. Please.'

He wipes away the tears that have wetted his cheeks. He ticks a box on the form, signs it and leaves the room to pass the paper back to the doctor.

The doctor takes a look at the form and then nods in agreement.

'We will try our best to save them both,' he trys to reassure the man who has just signed the consent.

The doctor then directs his surgery team to move into action. The clear and specific instruction being that in case of any life-threatening emergency, the mother's life comes first.

Blooms and blossoms

A flower and garden festival is currently being held at Putrajaya. Officially named Floria `10, the event is organized by the Putrajaya Corporation at Precinct 2 along the lake waterfront. I became aware of this festival after reading a post in Mamasita's blog.

Having been to such events before in Johor Bahru, I knew that it would be a good place to experiment with some digital photography skills. The splash of colours is wonderful to see. Almost everybody was snapping pictures at all sorts of angles... here, there and everywhere. From the simple camera-phones, the compact digicam to the high-end DSLRs of the pros... the full range of cameras can be seen in use.

Previously, when I took photos using a point-n-shoot compact, I envied the guys snapping away with those classy DSLRs. Now, with a Nikon DSLR myself, I envy those who have the long telephoto and short macro lenses... never can we be ever satisfied. Anyway, here is a sample of my effort from yesterday.

The festival ends tomorrow 18 July 2010. I end this post with the opening lines of Afternoon On A Hill, a lovely poem by Edna St. Vincent Millay :

I will be the gladdest thing

Under the sun!

I will touch a hundred flowers

And not pick one.

A new addition to the family

On Saturday, my brother-in-law (my wife's youngest brother) got engaged to a sweet young lady from Bagan Datoh in Perak. I was part of the `rombongan meminang' which included four elder sisters, two elder brothers and an assortment of in-laws, nephews, nieces and friends. It is the first time we are all to meet the young lady in person.

We assembled at my brother's house at Shah Alam very early in the morning and it took us nearly three hours to get to the young lady's place by way of the coastal road via Kuala Selangor and Sabak Bernam. My brother's fiancee hails from a kampung in Hutan Melintang. This prompted some of us to jest that my brother would be marrying an `orang hutan', hehehe...

God willing, the wedding would take place in February next year. We welcome Cik Nurul-huda Ismail as the latest addition to our extended family.

Part of the gifts from the gentleman's side, Godiva chocolates. The name comes from the legend of Lady Godiva of Coventry in England. Google the name to read about the interesting legend.

Nine trays of gifts from the lady's side in return for seven

A happily smiling bride-to-be

The song of a nation

I watched the football World Cup semi-final match between Spain and Germany early yesterday morning. Before each game starts, the national anthem of the two countries are played. I had not previously paid any attention to the anthems played at the previous matches but this time round I was quite captivated by the national song of Germany. It has a beautiful melody and to my mind, is the best anthem I have heard so far.

This prompted me to do a bit of online reading on this subject. According to Wikipedia, a national anthem is a patriotic musical composition recognized by a nation's government as the official national song or by convention through the use by its people. They are played on national holidays and festivals, and have also come to be closely connected with sporting events. Most of the best-known anthems were written by little-known or unknown composers. For example, the author of the British national anthem `God Save The Queen' cannot be verified or is disputed.

In rare cases, there are anthems of some countries that were written by famous composers. Germany is one such example. Their anthem titled `Das Deutschlandlied' (The Song of Germany) was written by classical composer Joseph Hadyn. No wonder it sounds so lovely.

By comparison, our national anthem Negaraku, is based on a folk song called Terang Bulan. This song is said to be adopted from a French composition titled La Rosalie written by Pierre-Jean de Béranger. It was originally popular in the Seychelles islands, where the Sultan of Perak was living in exile. I am a bit amused upon reading how the melody came to be the Perak state anthem which later got selected to be Malaya's anthem upon independence. Even well before that date, a version of the song was commercially recorded under the title of Mamula Moon with a distinctive Hawaiian tune. You can google the title for a Youtube video and listen for yourself.

I then read up on the anthem of Spain, the other country in the second semi-final game. Interestingly, Spain's national song La Marcha Real (The Royal March), has no official lyrics. No wonder I didn't see any of the Spanish players singing when their anthem was played. Imagine that... a national anthem with no words. If Negaraku was a wordless song, then we would be standing still during weekly school assemblies just listening to it being played, with no need for our voices to be heard.