You're Getting Married?

Today I went to town late evening to check out the new Delta Mall not far from Muhibah on the east side of town. The place was crap because there were still ongoing constructions at every corner and only 5-7 shops on the 3 level mall were operational, and to add insult to injury it reeks of intoxicating wet paint smell, it seemed the whole mall air con was put to the coldest temperature and there was nothing purchasable. Sure there was Cindy (Sissy stuff -__- I don't even go there unless forced to), Seno (nice plasma TVs, laptops and washing machine but no thanks), uh Boulevard IT, what else, some more IT shops and yeah that's it. Honestly everyone there wanna check what's all the hubbub about but really all us patrons did was walk around see stuff and like "Oh" then went home. The opening ceremony concert was just so-so, but still okay.

I'd give it some more time to improve. For now the would be shops there are Popular and KFC as I saw their signboard at their shop lot partitions. Hopefully more good shops will come in like Burger King, Dunkin' Donut or San Francisco (dream on Ham). It's kinda small for a mall and the thing that I find uncomfortable are the escalators. They're kinda narrow probably because of the mall design and the optical illusion trick, but bottom line is whenever I use the escalators I get the feeling I can fall off to the side at any time, Final Destination style. *Splat!*

After Delta Mall I went to downtown for a fitting because I needed a new custom-made coat. The tailor, out of the blue, just asked "Are you getting married?" And I was like beyond wtf:

My stunned/blur/beyond wtf look after the tailor asked the question

LOLZ... a "Hah no, I'm still studying" reply was sheepishly given. Nuts, I used to be so pissed off a year ago when people asked what Form am I in now when I was already in university (yesh, I sometimes feel offended being dubbed still young, well that's another story). Now the incident this night was a bit of an unexpected scenario and I'm not sure what to feel. It's like trying to react upon seeing Bush and Ahmadinejad being friends and sit down together to watch Malaysia playing in the FIFA World Cup.

Come on lah a young man making new coat doesn't mean he wanna get married, especially at this kind of age. Right now I'm still a confirmed bachelor and not looking forward to tying the knot this time around (hey, doesn't mean I'm gay or anything, it's just a Libran Earth Dragon nature). Still got loads of stuff to do like taking over Sarawak, or buy a land lot on the Moon, or get a PhD first (okay maybe not PhD, at least MBA, but right after my degree), or even more important; buy a Sony Playstation 3 ^^ Careful world this Ham is mundian to bach ke wahaha.

It's a Durian Life

After lunch it's durian. After dinner it's durian. And whenever the bosses come back from short trips to Durin it's another durian fest at home. Fuh I can't get enough of those horny fruits (sh*t that sounds so wrong XD)... But yeah, been enjoying perhaps too much of the king of fruit but I want to cherish them now as I won't be seeing them until next season next year.

This is what normal healthy durians should look like, rotten sick durians will have orange-brownish patches on the contents, with occasional purple durian worms crawling around. So be careful, but no harm in accidentally eating the worm though, I think. (Pic from nealford.com)

So what's up with durian in Kampua Town apart from the fact ang mo find it as a terrifying biological weapon of mass stinkyness?. Well it's a durian runtuh right now even though it's monsoon and flood season so the price is dead dirt cheap compared to the ones sold in Oil Town (but that was when there was less durians and they have to sell it by kilos instead of bundles like now). So after experimenting with various D24s (the nick for durians lol) on almost a daily basis on the holidays, I found some durians that I would like to recommend. As you might know not all D24 are the same, as they a split into more 'specifications' that makes each durian sold by different vendors unique. For example some durian have nice thick mushy layer but small seed, some thin layered with big seed but have nice 'stinging' flavor, while some is just pure crap and waste of good RM10 for 8 biji.

And here are the durians in and around the outskirts of Kampua Town that might pique your interest. First the main and closest source of D24 are around the tua pek kong where vendors from outside and local sit there from 6am till as late as 11pm selling their D24s. The best ones are sold by the Iban vendors from 6am-8am (by 9am sold out and/or she had to catch the express back to e.g Kapit) Those are 4 stars D24s which is rather small with equal seed/layer ratio but has a nice firm solid layer (not mushy so you won't get messy when you eat it) with stinging smell and flavor. Try it out and she will give RM10 for 7 at first, but if you might get lucky to bargain and get 8 instead.

Another spot is at Kingwood area near Lanang. Have not tasted it yet personally but a neightbor recommended it and it should be uber nice.

The next spot is in Sibu Jaya. Fuh this is where another 4 star D24 is sold. The durians there are fat, with small seed but mushy. Damn nice and it's also good to make tempoyak (something like whip cream, except it's made of D24 but I don't like them).

The last and best spot is Durin, just beyond Sibu Jaya. For those who haven't been there it's where the Durin ferry point used to be, with small shops selling handicrafts, jungle produce and katanas on the ferry point across the river. But now the area is kinda dead after the completion of the !@#$%^&* bridge I've ever seen, the Durin Bridge. So the vendors moved near the end of the bridge, and here you'll find the best of the best D24 Sibu has to offer. Here you'll find the durian tembaga, durian emas and other non-kahwin durians (durian kahwin or hybridized D24s are a bit 'inferior' in terms of quality). I can't describe them in words honestly, but those are full 5 stars uber best D24s that's worth your 50 minutes drive there. You can find both mushy and firm layers, and I found the emas D24s to be the best (it's not made of emas/gold, it's just the contents are golden).

My advise though; don't eat too much and definitely don't eat it before you attend a function, a dinner, elevator, pak to or queuing up at the bank. You're officially a walking biologically hazardous material with those durians digested in your wee little belly. Those excess digestion gas is not pleasant when released both from the front and the back door, ESPECIALLY FROM BACK DOOR. If you do, gerenti 100% the person 10 feet radius around you will siang at you. Pooh!

I Forgot What to Post

Walao my 5 weeks holidays almost over already. Felt like almost last Monday I was craving to go back home to Kampua Town, and now I'm just going to enjoy my last week and prep everything for next week. So anyways I was supposed to post something 4 days ago regarding something which sadly, I have forgotten about. Sad. But one thing for sure I have to post something here to talk about, so here it goes.

Ok so last week was Eid ul-Adha or Hari Raya Haji to commemorate Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son Ishmael. Celebrated in mediocre level, and yup to make things special had a reunion with kamchengz. Again instead of talking more about what we're up to now, we're more to eating and drinking, mostly drinking XD.

All the bachelors of their respective fields enjoying happy hour. Yeah yam seng!

Catching up with friends is nice, considering we all somehow know we'll end up meeting again with more stories and s*** to share. But life's like that. And I need some sleep. My head is not complying well after my biological clock was thrown off-balanced 4 days straight (blame on online gaming episodes), and the rainy nights here is not helping at all thus making this blog post a cliff-hanger and dull. Swear all you could for having me wasting 1-3 minutes of your life reading this. As for me I need time to recuperate and think of what to do in the limited time.

Sirim (that's me, sitting) and XVIII posing out of boredom in RF Online

Darn it, I still couldn't recall what was the issue I wanted to blog about. All thanks to procrastination, laziness and games, mostly online games. Looks like I have to say vamos for now until the next post.

True Gangsters

Gangsters here do all kind of crazy stuff and s***. But not as crazy as these two Western thugs...

What the hell am I?

During the holidays while helping out with the businesses I always get the question above from other people. Not only during the holidays, but it pops up now and then whenever I meet new people or when I'm getting acquainted with someone. Lolz I don't mind actually being asked what am I all the time but at certain point some people do make me and the questioner him/herself confused in the end, which left both of us with no choice but to start a new topic to talk about. A couple of conversations that I could still remember not long ago:

Conversation 1:
XXX: Ok so you mix what? Chinese Malay?
Ham: No, Melanau Chinese Japanese, dad Jap-Melanau mom pure Chinese but got adopted by my Melanau grandma
XXX: So that means you're 1/4 Chinese, 1/4 Melanau and 1/4 Japanese
Ham: Huh wth? 1/3 Chinese 1/3 Jap and 1/3 Melanau la how can be 1/4
XXX: But you said your dad Jap-Melanau oo, then mix mom so 1/4
Ham: No it's still 1/3 how the... still 1/3 la what 1/4?
XXX: But how come, correct lo if you dad mix already 1/2, plus your mom become 1/4 lah!
Ham: No no no... 1/3 dude, confirm 1/4 eh-eh-eh 1/3
XXX: But... how come... correct la 1/4 nah ni kan (while calculating fingers) this your dad mix edi, plus mom 1/2 become 1/4 de...
Ham: I lost you...
XXX: Haiya correct de 1/4 edi!
Ham: ......... so anyways that leng lui over the next table look nice
XXX: Na li?
Ham: Neh, the one in the red shirt, c'mon XXX go ask her number! Jia you!
XXX: You sot ah, where got leng that one, not even student, that one cleaning lady la! Chiu!
Ham: Wakaka!

-----[END]-----

Conversation 2
ZZZ: So you're Malaysian Sarawakian?
Ham: Yup
ZZZ: You don't look Malaysian to me
Ham: Lolz, what do you mean?
ZZZ: Well for one thing you look more like Chinese to me
Ham: Lolz you see, Malaysia got a lot of race here, Chinese, Indians, Malays.
ZZZ: So you're Chinese or Malaysian?
Ham: Uhh... I'm mixed actually, Chinese Melanau, one of the Sarawakian natives here.
ZZZ: Ok so that means you're not original Malaysian is it?
Ham: Uhh... I am Malaysian
ZZZ: Ok you making me confused here, you said you were mixed Chinese earlier and didn't mention mixed with Malaysian
Ham: ................
ZZZ: /:???
Ham: I think I will confuse us both even further if I continue to explain... hey there's a bug in your food

-----[END]-----

Haihz those were the moments :]. Well that's that about ancestral confusion, let's move on to a related topic. After 19 years living here I can see how people tend to mix up about people's origin most of the time, not only among locals but foreigners as well. For one I noticed people who are muslim are tend to, ok maybe not tend, usually will be called Malay even though he/she could be Iban, Kenyah or Chinese muslims. Sometimes I do feel a bit offended and annoyed not because people keep asking "Are you Malay?", but because of the stereotyping and pure ignorance. There seems to be a confusion between race and religion here, which should be cleared up in this kind of day and age where stereotyping does not apply well anymore. Frankly speaking on the subject I stumbled upon a fellow blogger who shares my problem which could give you an idea of wtf I'm talking about (click here). Few Chinese converts I know in Kampua Town including myself experience this "If you are a muslim, you must be Malay" situation. Haihz... look at Zheng He, he's a Chinese muslim and a fleet admiral for China, but he lived life like any other mainlander would at that time (ok well technically he spent a lot of time on sea voyage expeditions instead). So no difference from me living a modern Melanau-Chinese family life where we do not forget our roots' traditions and customs of both cultures (well the Japanese side inheritance died down here, but that won't stop me mastering nippongo from my aunt and uncle who're coming over this week ^^)

As for foreigners (especially the ones who just came in) some of them quite often got confused over the concept of bumiputera and non-bumiputera, hence explains the confusion in Conversation 2 above. In other words it's just a confusion of nationality and race. But yeah, if a foreigner ever ask what am I, I'd just stick to "I'm Malaysian" reply to avoid more confusion and debate...

Sorry if this topic offend, but I did not intend any malice towards any party and I just wanted to express the issue above, just as one of the voice of non-Malay muslims nationwide. Fuh, how many times did I use "confuse" lolz

The Little Things Give You Away

I love models. The pleasure of plucking the parts from the kit, assembling the model piece by piece and see the final work satisfies my urge to create something with my own hands as opposed to my lust for destruction in games. It's a ying yang thing i guess ^^ But last nite I bought these mini model kit of insects from Thai Choon as I haven't assembled kits for a long time. All was fine until I saw something that was seriously off. Click on the image and try to see what the genome soldier is laughing at.

Sinking of Sibu 2007

The Central Market area by day, by night there is no more Central Market. I can't even differentiate which one is the road and which one is the river by sundown. Don't be surprised if one of those express boats is seen floating near the Tua Pek Kong at 2am, the peak of the king tide. Oh and this area is a good spot to fish for ikan buris and floating durians left by vendors who were caught by the rising water lol

Once again Kampua Town is below sea level on the annual king tide flood. But what makes this year's flood special is that it is as bad as the big über flood in 2002. But still, this is nothing compared to the 1967 über flood that literally sunk Kampua Town around 10 feet below sea level (lol, I have no credible source to support this, I just took a wild guess how deep it was based on the old '67 photos and how my past grandma used to talk about it).

The annual flood usually last for a week with peak king tide at the mid-week, so '07 flood is scheduled to last from 11th - 17th December. And this year the peak time is around 2am (How I know? I always play online till 3-4am, and my room is overlooking the neighboring Kampung Abang Barieng and see the water rising every time I glance outside the window while waiting for the loadings to complete)

So anyways the area affected were almost 85.7% of Kampua Town by night 2, 25.3% more than what I've estimated. Apart from the flood hot spots such as Lanang and all the 3 kampongs along the Sungai Bidut, areas towards the inland were also affected as shown on the map below.

To non-Sibuian here's Sibu composition: Southern part we have Upper and Lower Lanang and Pedada, above that is downtown area where Sarawak's tallest building is located, then its Tun Abg Hj Openg and moving on northward... ah heck this is going to be loso, come down Kampua Town and will I give you a personal tour around town ^^

From the map we can see all the areas along Sungai Bidut are in red (that means it's affected by the flood la, I would've put it into different colors to show the level of the flood but it's so ma fan so I just put them all red). No need to say much about the southern part of Kampua Town, as Upper Lanang and Lower Lanang was below sea level like usual. The same goes to Kampung Dato', Jackfruit Village (argh, hilfe!) and Kampung Abang Barieng along the river. Inland a bit we have Central Market, Brooke Drive, Delta, Deshon and Jln Tun Abang Hj Openg sunk by the second night. More inland we have Oya and Pedada, and anything beyond that I have no news of. But words of mouth confirms that areas at the outskirt of town like Teku to the north and Sibu Jaya to the northeast were also below sea level. Global warming at its best...

Well my area in Jackfruit Village IS flooded, but not severe until the level where the water seeps into the houses. I can see why the ancestral Melanaus settled at this part of Sungai Bidut during the exodus ages ago as this area apparently is the highest point closest to the river, or in engineering terms we have high foundations. The only homes that sunk in Jackfruit village were those in low lying area (on second night I counted only 4-6 houses had water seeping in, and only 1 totally sunk 18 inch deep).

I meant to put up more pic, but have to forward my sorries because the quality isn't that good (unless you are charitable enough to donate a good hp camera). So anyways, the flood was bad yes, but only for the early 2 nights and then the teh c peng water returned to the Bidut River. And Borneo Post is seriously exaggerating it when they post a flooded rural area and then post a title "Sibu is flooded" on top of it. So misleading... Well yeah Sibu division is flooded, but not Kampua Town itself, just some areas outside town that is badly flooded.

Well the experience during the flood was new this year, considering the Rescue forces were noticeably in action (finally?). You might have been woken up by the Rescue sirens and helicopters (i know I did, crud...) and can say it's something ala Katrina rescue ops in New Orleans, only smaller in scale. Oh yeah, I heard the rescue forces evacuated their families first on the first night, and then they rescued the other victims the next day (ain't it suppose to be the other way around? Lol haihz... -_-)

Now that it's the 16th, I can't see how the town can be flooded again after Borneo Post headline was "Brace for the worse" yesterday, unless the post was late by 2 days... So I guess that's the end of the 2007 flood, which almost match up to the one 5 years ago. To those still in areas that are still flooded be careful of the flood refugees like scorpions, snakes, car thieves (especially those who had to park cars by the roadside), lipan, cholera etc. and finally, don't play-play in the water. You KNOW what is in that teh c peng waters... :)

Ham in Conflict

WORLD IN CONFLICT: I love the sight of a nuke in the morning (3am in the morning by then M'sian time :p). 27 minutes of defending the Typhoon docks and 95 Tactical Aid points later, I decided to help my other comrades by calling in a tactical nuclear strike (mahal oo, 80 Tactical Points) on the assaulting NATO forces. For the Motherland! Click pic to enjoy full view, I'm playing support role for the CCCP because I enjoy bombarding the enemies with my 2S1 Gvozdikas^^

Quotes from the game:
Ham: "Jaja I knw I'm n00b 4 fightin far away frm the frontline, bt that's MY nuke shrooming in the sky there whr ur 1337 armored battalion used to b, so bite me... no0b 0.o"
XXX: "lolz at ham"
XXX: "ja dieses saugt, verliert zu den Neuen -__-"
XXX: "w00t! 4 mother russia!!!!oneone"
Ham: "4 cbu!!!"
XXX: "/??"
XXX: "wad...??"
Ham" "w00t!"
XXX: "lol"
XXX: "OWNING!!!!"
XXX: "my eyes hurt.., whree did i put sunglases lol"
Ham: "p/s: its x my fault u cnt pinpoint my artillery coordinate lolz"

23 seconds later I was carpet-bombed by 3 NATO B-52s who were on a desperate and vengeful attack runs on my position...

What a jolly frigging boring holiday this is. Well technically it is my own fault since I didn't plan well for the holidays. Apart from helping out with some real estate business out of town in Mukah, I'm in serious mental degradation. And the lack of new innovative games doesn't help improve the situation, so I'm stuck in a zombie mode playing games repetitively such as DotA, Sims 2 (shaite, I reinstall it to replay it then uninstall it the next day) and World in Conflict (pic above). I think I'll head down to town to scout for new games AGAIN and hopefully can find something that appeals to me, besides something that can be supported on my machine. If I can't find one, then I'm in a conflict myself fighting another 4 weeks of boredom.

Speaking of conflicts, If you guys noticed the peninsular sounds like they're having problem almost everyday. From the BERSIH riot to the recent Hindraf protest. I know I have to stay away from such issues or else risk having Kampua 4 Life banned, but seriously, someone needs to voice out something.

As an amateur conspiracy theorist, I theorized that these conflicts happened at the right time. If you noticed, all these riots and protests begun when THE EVENT happened. And that event is the increase of oil price. All the rights violation protest are merely to distract the minds of the peninsular folks from the oil issue. It's the same cliché tactic as the US used to blur her people's worries away from the price increase, by going to war and ironically trying to get more grip on the most dangerous weapon of mass destruction; oil.


Well that's that on the western side's story. Apparently whatever happens on the outside doesn't really bother the people in Kampua Town much lol. All that is noted is that the price of foodstuff here have increased greatly in a time period of less than 6 months. Hell, RM2.20 for a kampua? This is bullshit. By CNY next year maybe the price will go to RM3.00 and I'd rather eat at Singapore Chicken Rice. One day I guess my kids will not believe me if I say kampua used to be RM1.50 or RM1.70 when the kampua at their time might be RM125.00. Haihz... I better play a new game by then, Wallet in Conflict. And I better find newer things to do to kill the remaining 4 weeks holidays.

In loving memory of Arsenal FC's beyond godlike winning streak (August 2007- Dec 2007)

Black Project

Finally I've decided to blog on my Black Project after 2 years of procrastination! Yesh! Check it out

Back Home 2007

Hah I'm back home again, for my 1st year 1st semester break. Nothing special, and like usual I have nothing planned (mostly) for the 5 weeks holidays. Well there is some 'minor' plans here and there (black ops level^^) but that's it.

Oh and finally I'm back blogging normally for Kampua 4 Life. Usually this blog is almost inactive most of the year probably because of the hectic semester and mostly due to the fact I blog personally in Kampua 4 Life @ Friendster.

Back home nothing much, nothing change, much. Managed to meet up with some of my old kamchengz and update myself. I'm kinda surprised hearing some of the people I used to know are now married and heck, some even have kids. I guess they "oops" somewhere during the past 2 years. Haih cannot say much about people nowadays, just sitting drinking at Oasis in Sanyan and I saw a few bunch of teens, barely 20 of age, already carrying babies. I guess they are too eager to become parents, or maybe just "oops".


Speaking of "oops", I'm kinda shocked but also 50% not surprised someone really closed to me "oops" already. Can say he's a happy father now, but I just hope he can manage his new family well without much close support. Haihz... this incident has changed my mom a lot lately. During my finals she keep calling asking my whereabouts, which I'm cool with knowing she's worried about my safety. But then after awhile I realized she's actually worried I'll "oops" too. Haihz again... I just hope she remembers that I have a strong iman to resist such temptations, heck as proof I'm 19 and how many times I reject girls just for the sake of my superiors respect and my study? Almost 93.7% of the time...

Not to say I'm agitated or anything and I respect my superiors' demands, just that I hope she will have more faith in me (We Believe - Good Charlotte playing in the background). Haihz one last time... hopefully this 'phase' of terror, quite similar to Americans' phobia of terrorists, will dissipate and thus making my networking activity fluent again regardless of gender. As for now everything is underground. Yeah holidays! Zzz....zzz..xyzzz..