RIFLE RANGE BOY

Pendatang (Malaysian Cantonese, Malay, Newcomer; 2023) Director: Ken-Kin Ng In the old days, most houses will have a single bathroom. Two, if you are in the upper middle class. Bedrooms were hardly to go by, usually reserved for the female members of the family for modesty. The males would usually rough it out wherever there was space. This was especially so when relatives visited the household. Everywhere they lay their pillow, it was a sleeping place.  Fast forward to 1990 and beyond. Even siblings find it difficult to share living space. They talk about wanting personal space and wanting privacy. The concept of her sharing and accommodation for a fellow roommate or a sibling has suddenly become an alien concept. Hell hath no fury for a person whose personal toiletry or cosmetics are used without consent.  Outside the confines of the home, we were a tolerant lot. We did not tolerate but instead accepted each other with each other's idiosyncratic ways of eating or worshipping...

There I was, minding myself performing my daytime duties, when someone approached me. "Excuse me, where can I meet Mr Rajeev?"  I scratched my head thinking, "Rajeev, Rajeev…?"  "Sorry buddy, can't help you there. Don't know any Rajeev."  Then it hit me. Of course, Majid. Before Majid was Majid, in another life, he was known as Rajeev.  "Oh yes. I remember now. Ranjeev is on the 1st floor. He is now Majid." I told him.   Then I left the place thinking…  A name is for the convenience of others to pick us out of the 8 million people on Earth. If Majid is comfortable with his new name, so be it. We should respect it. It, in no way, changes who Rajeev or, for that matter, Majid is. In the imagery of Avicenna's flying man, he is who he is.  A new name does not exclude the follies of the previous past, just as Pakistan came to discover. Wanting to carve itself out of the perceived vagaries of its motherland, it realised it could not disenta...

Manto (2018) Netflix We always try to portray the world as a place of hope, of joy, dream, and the sky is the limit of our achievements. This is just hogwash. In the real world, Mother Nature is particularly hostile towards its creations. And we, the products, are no different towards each other. We sugarcoat the world around in perfect harmony with apple trees, honey bees and snow white turtle doves. In reality, it is ruled by bigots and kleptocrats who use their Machiavellian techniques to hoodwink everyone to fill up the world with their preset agendas. They paint an image of heaven on Earth, but deep in their pockets, they have conceived a plan of chaos and entropy. But still, these flag-waving jingoistic cabals have only one thing on their agenda - control and the power that comes with it.  As if to entice its followers, they create an imaginary enemy and a promise of an unproven paradise. Consequently, the conforming automatons think with their brain; not with their hea...

© Manuel Strehl What is in a font, you may think. The choice of a font could be a matter of personal picking. Some may be pertinent in a formal setting (e.g. Times Roman ); other in a jovial environment (e.g. Comic Sans in a birthday party).  Ever since printing became a reality in Europe in the 15th century, blackletter typeface like Fraktur and Antiqua were the mainstay chirography. Most publications were in Latin. Over time as people become more educated, local languages developed and the seed of nationalism was planted. Reformation works of Martin Luther and collection of fairy tales of Brothers Grimm created a need for the schism between Latin and German works. Antiqua was the default script for Latin and Fraktur for German.   All through till 20th Century, Fractur typesetting continued in Germany and many Scandinavian countries. Most of the Europeans had theirs set in Antiqua. The Fraktur-Antiqua difference   persisted till 1941 when the N...

The Russian Protocols of Zion in Japan (2009) Author: Jacob Kovalio One assumes that Japan, being a homogenous country practising Shintoism and Buddhism, would not have issues with Judaism. Surprisingly, Jewish Peril (Yudayaka) has had its roots in Japan's late 19th and 20th-century history. Only when the Japanese aristocrats landed their eyes on Commander Perry's navy fleet in 1858 did they awake from their slumber. At first, the Japanese thought that the American ships were the mythical celestial dragon that they had heard so much in their legends. This became their wake-up call as they realised that the world had passed them by. Emperor Meiji opened the floodgates for modernisation. For a start, his army was no longer hostile to damaged American whaling boats. Business flourished. Cultural exchanges took place. Loans from American banks (owned by Jews) started trickling in. The Japanese noblemen and intellectual's first exposure to the Jews must have been Shylock...

Fritz Haber Of late, some of my friends and I have been engaged in lengthy conversations about religion and science. Many insist that what the world needs is science, not more religious sermons. They surmise that science and rational thinking could change the world into a peaceful place. Anyway, religion has been getting a bad reputation of late as the single cause of mayhem in the world. Logic, critical mind and the courage to question the status quo has been hailed as the only saviour of mankind. This is not the first time in history such a predicament had come to the fore. In the latter part of the 19th century, there was a real concern that the then expanding world population would outrun our the ability to feed them. As the population growth grew exponentially and food production on a linear path, leaders appreciated the relevance of Malthusian theory and foresaw the impending doom. Nutrients in the soil were being depleted and the guano, the natural fertiliser was hard to co...

https://mybukz.tumblr.com/post/175292906152/poem-the-roost-by-farouk-gulsara Credit: FB group: Rawthers Penang circa mid-1960  There was once a time, a few years ago, there was a spate when many of my relatives had given up on their motherland, turned their back on Malaysia and started looking around for greener pastures. I wondered how Mother Malaysia would feel to see one by one, her children, after years of nurturing them, after growing so big and strong, feel compelled to fly away from their roost. Like a proud mother seeing her kids having a mind of their own, she must be immersed in a kind of bitter-sweet feeling. Like a flight of swallows, you came all stocks and barrels, from Swatow, from Coimbatore, Looking for a peace of mind, you scaled the high seas and brine. You were hungry, I fed your soul, you had shivers, I showed you warmth. you were homeless, I gave you home. you were stateless, I was your hope. Under the yellow umbrella, and a piece...