SGD1=RM2.43

It has reach a new record yet again! A new high/low!

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IBRAHIMOVIC TO BARCA & ETO'O AND TO INTER

Wow! Barcelona are crazy to send off their top marksman of many seasons!!! Let's keep watch until the dust is settled!!!

Goal.com

BREAKING NEWS: Barcelona Sign Ibrahimovic From Inter For 40m Plus Eto’o - Spanish Press
The Catalan press has reported that Barca have completed the singning of Ibracadabra...

Barcelona have reportedly concluded the transfer of Zlatan Ibrahimovic from Inter for €40m plus Samuel Eto'o and Alexander Hleb on loan.

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SGD1=RM2.425

Another new record I see in Johor Bahru today! That means you can easily bargain for SGD1=RM2.445 minimum! Very close to the target of RM2.50. If this base rate stays stable, we can easily see a push to the target.

In Singapore, the exchange rate is SGD1= RM2.4420, I don't know how much you can bargain though.

Electricity rates will go up soon, bus and taxi fares to go up and a new fuel price rate coming soon that will further kill us consumers. Your pay never goes up, no bonus, bleak economy and the Ringgit value keeps falling. Maths and Science to go back to be taught in Bahasa Malaysia. Nobody on the streets trust the authorities anymore, even those who are suppose to protect us. These are good signs to give you a clear prediction of the future of the country.

Only good news? Any user who pays toll 80 times or more per month will be given a 20% discount. Use your brain and calculate. If you travel through the toll twice a day for 30 days a month (including weekends when you don't work), you can only reach 60 times. Even those lorry drivers who drive full time can't reach this target. This is only for users of the Touch and Go and Smart Tag systems, and not for those who use cash to pay for their tolls.

MALAYSIA BOLEH!

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PEKIN RESTAURANT 北京楼

We finally went to visit Pekin Restaurant to try the food after countless of people saying how good it is. My doctor friend eats there every weekend! Rich people....

This was supposed to be our first choice for holding the wedding dinner at Johor Bahru but I decided that the location will be hard to find for those coming from Singapore. The environment is also not nice and the place smells of oil from frying.

Pekin Restaurant has a few branches in Johor Bahru. You can check the website link for the rest. The one I gone to is rather old, probably had been there for ages.

RESTORAN PEKIN (SENTOSA)
No.38, Jalan Baldu Lima,
Taman Sentosa,
80150 Johor Bahru, Johor.
07-3332928, 3320902




Lala RM24 - yellow wine gives it a sweet taste which I don't really like. Coming from the Foochow background in Sibu, we are used to drinking our red wine not so sweet. This is the most expensive dish among all that we ordered.




Buns with pork RM12- when I first see the pork, I thought they serve us pork from the tin cans from China. They look so identical. Normally pork served with mantou ( 馒头) are darker in colour, almost pure black. However, once I tried the pork, it is absolutely great. Really damn nice! When I open the bun / mantou to insert the meat, I found out that they have sesame seed in them, which gives them all an extra nice flavour.


Pekin Duck RM23 - the sauce is way too sweet!!! In the end, we ate it without the sauce at all. This is the first time I saw the wrapper to be mixed with eggs to give it a yellowish colour. It tasted fine. The duck is well done, absolutely superb. I still miss the one I had in Kota Kinabalu, the one my 2nd granduncle brought us to eat.


Vegetable (Asparagus) RM8 - simple stirred fried version with garlic. Nothing to complain, well done.




Fu Zhou Yu Ni (orh nee) RM15 - my wife loves this yam dessert alot but we failed to find one here that is to our liking. Most people here like to present this dish with the oil with deep fried onions on top. It tasted weird, like having kampua instead. This one is great but they add glutinous rice as the cover for the yam. It tasted alright but perhaps we are too full already. This is also the first time where I see red bean to be used. I have seen people using pumpkin (as in our case too) and sometimes sweet potato. It is really good, not too sweet and yet tasted great. Next time we will see if we can order one without glutinous rice.


Nuts RM2 - average. I had tasted better ones before.

Tea RM3 - the Tie Guan Yin (铁观音) we ordered was miserable. There is no taste at all and is one of the worst things I had in Pekin Restaurant.

Rice RM1.20 - even the rice is well done.

Total RM88.20
GST 5% RM4.41
TOTAL DAMAGE: RM92.61

In the menu, I spotted the most expensive dish, Buddha Jumps Over the Wall (佛跳墙), to be priced at RM1,888. Mamamia!


View Johor Bahru Food in a larger map

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KOBE BRYANT ASIA TOUR

Yes, I heard it from the radio this morning. Here's your chance to see one of the best basketball players of this generation. I have interest to go but the timing is really odd.

There will be an exhibition match between The Singapore Selection Team VS. The ASEAN Basketball League Selection Team first and later The Kobe Training Clinic.

KOBE ASIA TOUR

22 July 2009 (Wed)
7:30pm
Singapore Indoor Stadium

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THE MOST 'IN' THING TO DO RIGHT NOW!

Alright, I have been seeing this commercial for weeks now. You will automatically try the Cadbury eyebrow but I can't seem to separate them. They always move up and down together. Haha! Maybe Rowan Atkinson can do it well.

So, you think you can dance, I mean do the Cadbury eyebrow? Challenge yourself and win prizes!



DO THE CADBURY EYEBROW

PRIZES

1st Prize (Worth more than $1,500)
S$800 Cash + $100 Cadbury Goodie Bag + a Canon Ixus 100i Camera + Selphy CP780 Compact Photo Printer

2nd Prize (Worth up to $999)
S$500 Cash + $100 Cadbury Goodie Bag + a Canon Ixus 95i Camera

3rd Prize (Worth more than $500!)
$300 Cash + $100 Cadbury Goodie Bag + a Selphy CP780 Compact Photo Printer

The other 7 finalists (solo or group) will each receive a $100 Cadbury Goodie Bag.
Video submission closes on 23rd August 2009.

Voting is ongoing and will end on 30th August 2009.
Results will be out on 31st August 2009 and finalists will be informed. The top 10 entries will have their videos featured here from 1st to 5th September 2009.

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H1N1 BORDER SCREENING

As of today, Singapore stopped the temperature screening entirely at the causeway but Malaysia is still doing it. Now, let's see how long they will keep on screening.

By the way, the Malaysian screening is flawed, they only screen bus and van passengers. They don't screen those drivers, they don't screen motorbike riders, cyclists, cars and any other drivers. In other words, they believe H1N1 can only be spread through bus and van passengers. In Singapore, they screen every human being going through the immigration border.

That's the difference between Malaysia and Singapore. One carry out things fully and efficiently, the other do it half baked.

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MAN UTD TO REPLACE C.RONALDO WITH OBERTAN

Alright, we finally heard of the man to replace the most expensive player in the world in Old Trafford. However, this player is news to me as I have never heard from him. He is Girondins Bordeaux's winger Gabriel Obertan. This guy is versatile, able to play both the left and right wings so he should be good. The Red Devils already have Antonio Valencia. Imagine Antonio Valencia playing for Valencia and David Villa playing for Aston Villa. We can get confusing statements like: Valencia/Villa scored winning goal to help Valencia/Villa win the match or Valencia/Villa moves to Valencia/Villa for a transfer fee of 20 million Euros.

Alright, back to Obertan. When I saw his face in the news early today, my first impression is he looks like Barack Obama. I guess it is just my impression and not everyone else's. Here's the comparison.


Barack Obama photo: http://www.geocities.com/robbi01/illinois.html
Gabriel Obertan photo: http://actualite.alvinet.com/article-2472110-foot-espoirs-angleterre-suede-3-3-5-t-a-b-a-4.html

I also believe Chelsea's legend, Gianfranco Zola, looks like Ben Stiller. Many will disagree too.


Gianfranco Zola photo: http://ngepress.com/sports/west-ham-vs-liverpool-watch-west-ham-united-vs-liverpool-live-free-online-stream-5-09-2009-english-premier-league/
Ben Stiller photo: http://www.webwombat.com.au/lifestyle/fashion_beauty/stiller.htm

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TIME TO GIVE UP ON MALAYSIAN EDUCATION SYSTEM

Everday as I go through the border, I see many children going through the immigration after school in Singapore. I would estimate that there are thousands of Johor Bahru children studying in Singapore. Well, though Singapore has one of the best education systems in the world, I pity the young primary school kids who are even shorter than the passport counters to go through such lengths to seek education everyday. I pity their plight and can't understand why their parents will go through such lengths. I told myself then that at least my children next time should enjoy their childhood and wait until secondary school before opting for the more quality, more pressurized education system. I don't want them to deprive themselves of their childhood.

With such a simple decision to teach Mathematics and Science in English to be dragging the Malaysian education scene for years now, the government finally came to a decision yesterday that they will revert back to teach both subjects in Bahasa Malaysia. That's the last straw for me, that to me is the end of the hope of the education system in Malaysia. I have thought that now those young children and their parents' effort to go through the immigration everyday tirelessly for better quality education is all worth it. You don't go to such lengths if you think the quality of education in your own country is good. You rather bet on a system that will always seek to improve and not changing its policies every year or two.

I had gone through the system myself and I must admit the ever changing policies in the education system, flip flop decisions for as long as I know when I was in the education system of Malaysia is destroying the whole system itself. There has never been a decision that is pushing the system to move forward. It is always entangled with tonnes of issues that is dragging it or moving it around in circles. There are lots of experiments with this and that and nothing positive have I ever heard that comes out of it. The matriculation education is one of those. One fine day they made a decision to change the Malay grammar to have a certain structural rule, two years later they changed it again to something else but another further two years later, they changed it back to the original. This is so common and I can recall many instances of such incidents arising in the education system.

So be it, I don't want the next generation to go through the same moving in circles system like I do. Those people making the decisions have nothing to lose since their children are not in the system anyway.

Reversal Of Policy Will Affect Future Of Children, Says Dr M

Scrapping Of Math, Science In English Not Easy - Hishammuddin

Move To Teach Science, Maths In BM, Mother Tongues Generally Welcomed

Abolition Not Politically Motivated, Says Muhyiddin

Government To Strengthen Teaching Of Malay And English - Muhyiddin

Science And Maths In BM And Mother Tongue In 2012
July 08, 2009 15:56 PM

PUTRAJAYA, July 8 (Bernama) -- The teaching and learning of science and mathematics in national schools will revert to the Malay language effective 2012.

Deputy Prime Minister Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin said the teaching and learning of the two subjects in Chinese and Tamil national-type schools would be carried out in their respective mother tongue.

Muhyiddin, who is also the Education Minister, said the cabinet today approved the suggestion by the ministry to empower the Malay language and strengthen the teaching and learning of the English language at all levels of schooling.

"This strategy was drawn up based on the study and monitoring carried out by the Education Ministry on the teaching and learning of science and mathematics in English since the policy was implemented in 2003," he said when making the announcement at the Education Ministry, here on Wednesday.

The first group of students who studied science and mathematics in the English language since Year One sat for their Ujian Penilian Sekolah Rendah (UPSR) last year.

Muhyiddin said the implementation of the policy of using the Malay language in the teaching of the two subjects would be carried out in stages in Year One and Year Four in the primary school and Form One and Form Four in the secondary school beginning in 2012.

However, he said, the change would not involve students in Form Six and matriculation class.

He said in order to ensure that the implementation of the new strategy did not affect the achievement of students who were taught the two subjects in English, the teaching of and examination for the two subjects would be conducted in both languages until the last batch of students who were taught in English completed in 2014.

He said the government made the decision after scrutinising the outcome of studies and surveys carried out on the teaching and learning of the two subjects in English which showed that it could not be implemented as desired.

"What is implemented is the teaching and learning of science and mathematics in English/Malay languages," he said.

Muhyiddin said monitoring by the ministry last year found that only a small group of teachers were using English language fully in the teaching of science and mathematics.

"On the average, the percentage of English usage is between 53 and 58 per cent out of the total time allotted for science and mathematics," he said.

In addition, he said, only a small group of mathematics and science teachers in secondary and primary schools who took the English language Proficiency Level Evaluation test last year achieved the proficiency level.

He said the precentage of students who scored grades A, B, and C for the science subject in the UPSR last year had dropped from 85.1 per cent to 82.5 per cent for the urban schools and from 83.2 per cent to 79.7 per cent for rural schools.

"For mathematics, the achievement of urban schools dropped from 84.8 per cent to 80.9 per cent while the achievement of rural students dropped from 80.9 per cent to 77 per cent," he said.

He said the gap in achievement between urban and rural schools in science and mathematics was becoming wider when the PPSMI (teaching and learning of science and mathematics in English) was implemented.

Muhyiddin said the Trends in Mathematics and Science Study 2007 also stated that the position of Malaysian students in the science subject had deteriorated from the 20th spot in 2003 to the 21st spot in 2007.

"For mathematics, the position of our students deteriorated from the 10th spot in 2003 to 20th spot in 2007," he said.

He said studies by local universities revealed that the level of improvement in the command of the English language by students was nominal, that is, not more than three per cent throughout the implementation of the teaching and learning of science and mathematics in English.

"The command of the English language among students, particularly in the rural areas, was still low making it difficult for them to understand the teaching of mathematics and science in English," Muhyiddin said.

Based on this observation, he said, the government was convinced that science and mathematics must be taught in the language that could be easily understood by the students, namely Bahasa Malaysia in the national schools, Chinese in the national-type Chinese schools and Tamil in the national-type Tamil schools.

-- BERNAMA

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OH, I'M SO GONNA MISS THIS!

Can they come to Singapore or something?!!



I like this part of the song:
Shopping Sprees, RPG's
Ecstasy
Atrophy
Genocide
Pimp my ride
Politize
Euphemize
Injustice everywhere
Apathy
I don't care
Hurricanes
Climate change
Huh!

Therapy, I won't tell
Rehab and LOL
Worldwide calamity
TV Reality
Euthanize, supersize
Death squads and boob jobs
VIP infamy
Gratify instantly

Some cool songs worth checking out in the new album:

You're Gonna Go Far, Kid - Now dance, fucker, dance....:)


Kristy, Are You Doing Okay? is definitely not punk. It's interesting to see the other side of Dexter here. Very different indeed but I still love them!

"Who decides what is and what isn't punk? I want to write songs that people hear and feel and I want to be successful and reach a big audience," he says. "I'm not trying to be the coolest guy in the world, I'm trying to write songs that mean something to people. As you get successful, sometimes you lose one set of fans and gain another."


Half Truism - nice song, reminds me of their good old days of aggresive punk rock!

If we don’t make it alive
Well it’s a hell of a good day to die
All our light that shines strong
Only lasts for so long

And it’s ashes to ashes again
Should we even try to pretend?
All our light that shines strong
Only lasts for so long


Hammerhead - the first song I heard from the new album. It is a good intro no doubt to what is expected from the album.


Finally, the Shit is Fucked Up song, the song for the concert tour announcement. I regret I have yet to get the Rise and Fall, Rage and Grace album. Shame on me.

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