Hahndorf!

A wise man said that those who forget history are condemned to repeat it. Being a huge fan of history myself, but not so much into the museum visit stuff, so one of the highlight during my three-week long stay at Adelaide was an escapade to a historical suburb by the name of Hahndorf. Let me give you a healthy reminder first and foremost that even though I love this place, I cannot guarantee that it would be the same case for the others because on second thought, I remember that there was not that much of stuff to do there. Probably if you bring some friends or perhaps your loved ones, then it would be an opposite case.

A little bit on the history. Well, from what I read, Hahndorf is an early settlement site for the Europeans, the German especially, in Australia. The rest is a somewhat typical historical stuff; while some chose to go back to their home country, the others decided to stay and started a family with local folks and there you have Hahndorf as it is at present. Of course, this European bit can be seen from the architectural style of the small town. On another note, Hahndorf in a way also reminds me of Cameron Highlands, probably because of the similar geographical attribute for both areas, which is on the hill. So a good guess would be if you like Cameron Highlands, then Hahndorf would suit you just well.

Hahndorf is also a perfect place to experience autumn or winter Down Under; the scenery looking at the trees down the road is just awesome while the atmosphere is too chilly you find it difficult to breathe.

Just as I mentioned earlier, there was not many things to do apart from casual sightseeing there, and thus, limited stories to share here. But I did capture some nice photos, which I wish to share with you guys here.

Oh anyway, the suburb is not that far from the city, probably 30-40 minutes bus ride via Princess Highway. Because it is located on a hilly area, expect a rough bus ride. It is also essential to note here that I did not encounter any halal food outlet there, so a good reminder is bring some food along or simply do not go while your stomach is empty. Worse comes to worst, fret note because Hahndorf is not that big a suburb you would probably be able to walk from one end to the other in less than one and a half hour and go back, provided that you do not stop at a particular shop for too long. Again, I guess I should stress here that it is not that great a place, but still I would say your stay at Adelaide would not be complete if you do not visit Hahndorf.

Till We Meet Again

Good times
Bad times
Nothing lasts forever

Can we ever say goodbye?
No, we never can.
The only thing we can say is
till we meet again, someday..

New Books

I bought two nice books few days ago from BORDERS; the first one being Jared Diamond’s Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Survive, while the second one is Lance Armstrong: It’s Not About The Bike which is an autobiography of the cycling legend himself.

I read the review of the first book from a local newspaper in the wake of its inception into worldwide bookstores some years ago and put it on my wish list since. The author, for the record, is the one who wrote another international bestseller in Guns, Germs and Steel, a very important book which is said to have revolutionized the study of global human history. Well, as the title of this book that I bought suggests, it deals with mysterious falls of ancient civilizations and how we can basically learn from them as not to allow similar fate happening to the humankind in the future. Sounds boring? I admit that I was yawning through the first few pages of the introductory section, but it gets better and better though as the content goes deeper. Perhaps this is not kind of read for most of you guys- it was not my kind if you ask me few years back either- but I guess sometime we need to divert from stuffs that are already common, especially it triggers you forward. Pondering on this critique for the book makes me want to read through its pages more and more;

'Collapse is probably the most important book you’ll ever
read’- The Age

The second book, as mentioned earlier, is a life journal of Lance Armstrong, a seven-time our de France champion as of today. I have been sneaking a peek at this book for quite sometime before, the most notable one being at the bookrack of Kinokuniya during the time when I was still in Malaysia. I remember the reason I did not pick it for purchase was first, the price was somewhat mind-boggling, and second, even though sports icon biographies have always been my favourite, Lance’s life story is a fairly different case because he cycles. Deep down I still hope that someday I would read that book though. Anyway this book was published somewhere in the year 2000, during the time his Tour de France won were only accumulated to three albeit already legendary enough. I have to admit that I was hugely marvelled by this fellow, because the reason I was keen to read his story was solely based on his reputation as a true champion, but later only I discovered that he is also a cancer survivor, and is now an activist who set up his own foundation. Talk about a champion who never stops to inspire.

With these two much-anticipated books already in possession, expect not to see me shopping for new ones anytime soon. Nonetheless I am still browsing through Ebay time and again in search of a good bargain for Orwell’s 1984 anyway. I already have the online version however; the problem is I cannot see myself holding on in front of the notebook to read it. In the meantime I will try to finish up Collapse while gearing up for the new semester. Wait, that sounds like winter holiday is going to end soon. Oh, my.

Plagiarising Samy

This is way too much.

We cast our votes, put our trust in them, and this is what they did to us. Just when we thought things would not go any worse, it does.

I do not know you guys, but only recently did I discover this daunting truth. Well, remember that I blogged about Samy Vellu’s tribute poem to Pak Lah in conjunction with the latter’s marriage sometime ago? The thing is that poem is a sheer work of plagiarism, full stop. Terrible, right? This was first revealed by Malaysiakini, from a letter sent by a reader which can be viewed here. I might be late in getting to know this, but hey, they always say that it is better late than never, and I guess to be an ignorant is as bad as not knowing it at all.

I remember as an 18-year-old learning how bad a crime plagiarism is in writing, and that we are so inclined to plagiarise sans proper guidance and knowledge. Nevertheless after awhile, once we get used to it, avoiding plagiarism comes naturally and in fact coming out with our own sentences word by word and not merely sticking with another person’s entire work is not that hard. This makes me wonder why in the first place our Samy Vellu did such a stupefyingly silly, shameful act. At the very least, he could always change the words from the original piece a little bit, and that is not difficult, is it?

Anyway, joke has it that at least he knows how to use a couple of functions on a PC; copy and paste. Come to think about it, I reckon it is not too much to wonder if all those paperwork on new highway plan or toll hike and all were also plagiarised, who knows?

Vibrant Melbourne!

I know I should have posted this earlier, but well, as usual, we humans are always prepared with excuses. This time around, please give my early excitement of arriving in Adelaide and subsequent laziness forgiveness.

So my winter holiday started right after Physics paper on the final week of June, with Melbourne being my first holiday pit-stop. I took the bus from Sydney Central at 7pm together with another two friends, my mind was full of anticipation of what’s there in Melbourne awaiting my arrival. Before anything, anyhow, next to me on the bus couch was a friendly pak cik. So the first couple of hours were pent chit-chatting, exchanging point of views with him. It could easily be elongated anyway, but I pretended to sleep after that as not to give him anymore chance of asking me more questions and before long, he himself fell asleep. Excellent. However, looking from the positive side, that pak cik essentially passed me pretty much a handful of insight. And yeah, if it was not because of him, I would not know up until now that Australia is actually less populous than Malaysia, though the former country covers a significantly broader ground on the world map. To cut the story short, let us jump into the next morning; Southern Cross, Melbourne, here I am.

For those of you who are still quite equivocal about the city, Melbourne is the capital of the state Victoria, located at the southern part of Australia about 12-hour ride from Sydney by land. Apart from the scope of being prominent for being the home for 3.8 million people thus making it the second most populous city in Australia and annually organizing the world-famous motoring event in Formula One, little are aware with the fact that Melbourne is in fact the first capital city of the country, before the title was handed over to Canberra.

Amongst university students, Malaysians in particular, three tertiary educational institutions stand out when the name Melbourne city echoes, namely University of Melbourne, Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology which bears a more-known acronym of RMIT, and Monash University. The first are located in the middle of the lively city, whilst Monash University covers a number of campuses which are spread around the Victoria state if I am not mistaken, the famous one amongst Malaysian students being the one in Clayton, a suburb area of Melbourne city about 40 minutes by train from the city hub. For a personal reason, I chose to stay with a friend in Clayton. I was nervously contemplating on the amount of cash I needed to fork out during my stay in Melbourne initially but thank God the public transport system was somewhat economical that the only drawback for staying there was the time spent travelling back and forth to the city.

One word I chose to describe the city- vibrant. If people talk about places on earth where there is no huge difference between day and night, Melbourne definitely fits in the bill as such place. Perhaps it was because of the extensive tram network in the heart of the city that the city looked more crowded and busier, but throughout my visit to the city I failed to see a single place or road where there were less than hundreds of people strolling, coming in and out from one contemporary building to another. And yeah, talking about the tram, it was simply awesome. Imagine in the middle of a hectic road where dozens of people squeezing in between the cars that made the traffics, suddenly this tram came and at once those movements turned into standstill, giving ways to the moving tram. And there are not merely three or four of them, I believe there are hundreds, connecting the entire city of Melbourne. Going back to the issue of public transport system just now, I found it rather remarkable that the whole extend of bus, train and tram are all set under a uniform regulation, which means that one ticket bought for any one can be used for the rest, albeit under the time limit. So if you have just arrived at the city from Clayton and wishing to sightsee around but are too tired or lazy to walk, there is always the tram to bring you around town. The best part is the frequency of this tram is fabulous, albeit not all of them go to the same destination; some sway to a different branch at a certain place. But mind you, those who do not hold the valid transport ticket as I mentioned earlier but choose to gamble taking a ride are sometimes busted and required to pay heavy fines. This is already experienced by a friend of mine there. A little bit about the transportation cost. Well as I mentioned, I found it somewhat economical, but I do not know, perhaps it was for me who came from Sydney. Those from different parts of the country, especially where the living cost is considerably low will of course find it the opposite way. For the record, the daily pass for the public transport in Melbourne which brings you anywhere around the city zone in he space of 24 hours is AUD$6.30, which is only a little bit higher than the total cost to go to merely one place in Sydney and come back home.

All in all my days in Melbourne even though brief, was splendid. Absolutely looking forward to come again next time!

Today's Friday Prayer

The mosque was not too spacious to be able to lodge hundreds of people, but large enough when the fact that its location is in a non-Muslim dominating region is put into perspective. There was some make-shift tents prepared as to give extra space for overload crowds who devotedly attended the ritual weekly congregation. Forecasters earlier said that the day’s temperature was 11° Celsius, but the heavy downpours were believed to have reduced it somewhat. Those seated under the tents were apparently freezing, but they stayed anyway. Nothing in this world seemed to bother them from remaining there.

The pouring rains were too loud that they eclipsed the sound of sermon from inside the mosque. Periodically, a bloke or two were seemed entering the mosque ground, covering their heads with a piece of cloth or bare hands and dashing to get to the nearest roofed space. They were a bit late that most of the spaces were already occupied, but nothing could stop them from attending the congregation. Soon, the sermon was finished, and the crowds stood up in unison to prepare for the prayer. Those who could not initially find empty spaces tried to squeeze in. Amidst the chilliness of the day, the sound of the rain, and the over packed mosque and make-shift tents, they started praying, led by the Imam. In a little while they finished. Miraculously, the downpours also stopped, as if it understood the problem it would lay for the dismissing crowds.

As the congregation was inching to the end, a proportion of the Muslims stayed chatting with fellow countrymen or even strangers who had just become friends, while some left straight away, perhaps to continue working. It was only their lunch hour after all.

That was the scene during today’s Friday prayer in a small city Down Under that is Adelaide, as seen by my bare eyes. I believe, a typical scene as such can be seen anywhere around the earth where Muslims reside. We might live a totally different life from others, or speak different languages, or perhaps drive different cars, but when it comes to how we are seen by Him as embodied by the act of performing our obligation such as this Friday prayer, unequivocally, we are all the same.

Footnote: My apology for the second-class photo, I had to basically snap pretty quickly as to avoid eye-contact from the crowds. You do know it is not appropriate to take pictures in such situation don’t you.

The Future Is Red!

Once in every few years, there will be a player whose arrival at a football club is greatly anticipated, highly celebrated. Barcelona acquired Ronaldinho long before. Manchester United has got Cristiano Ronaldo to pen down contract for them a few years back. Now, Fernando Torres has decided to become a Red.

"I am dying to play in front of the Kop"- Torres, from the
exclusive chat with Liverpoolfc.tv

The future is bright, the future is Red!

Now who says the offseason isn't interesting?

After Tsunami, He Went to The Casino

Just when I finished a brief phone chat with a Malaysian friend while on my way to the Central Station last weekend, a guy sitting next to me in the bus made it a point to start a conversation.

‘From Malaysia?’

I nodded, and he revealed that he is from Indonesia.

A series of words were exchanged afterwards between us, before at one point he claimed;

‘I’m from Acheh anyway.’

Now when u listen to that, one word immediately comes to mind- tsunami.

I was not sure whether I was struggling with shock or sympathy upon listening to his revelation, or perhaps it was the mix of both, but I somehow could not come out with nice words to get hold of our conversation so I chose to remain silent until we both arrived at our destination.

When we were about to go separate ways, I asked him where he was going. His initial response, however, was vague to me.

‘Don’t you know? It’s a casino.’

Dumfounded I was, but still I gave him a forced smiled. Before long, I realized that my sympathy was nothing but futile.