Royal flush?...

or Royal fart?

Using medical science to solve a simple problem...

Two medical students were walking along the street in Minneapolis when they saw an old man walking with his legs spread apart.

One of the students said to his friend: "I'm sure he has Petry Syndrome. Those people walk just like that."

The other student says: "No, I don't think so. The old man surely has Zovitzki Syndrome. He walks just as we learned in class."

Since they couldn't agree they decided to ask the old man. They approached the old man and one of the students said to him: "We're medical students and couldn't help but notice the way you walk, but we couldn't agree on the syndrome you might have. Could you tell us what it is?"

The old man said: "I'll tell you, but first you'll tell me what you think"

One of the students said: "I think it's Petry Syndrome."

The old man said: "You thought.......... but you're wrong."

Then the other student said: "I think you have Zovitzki Syndrome."

The old man said: "You thought......... but you're wrong."

So they asked him: "Well, what do you have?"

And the old man said: "I thought it was a fart............. but I was wrong."

White on the outside, yellow inside...

With the rise of China as an economic giant, its presence cannot be ignored in world affairs. However, most people would never have imagined a Sinophile to takeover from Howard, a strong US ally and self-acknowledged Deputy Sheriff in supporting US’s role as policeman of the world.

The Australian people, like those in the US and Britain, must have realised the folly of maintaining troops overseas, fighting wars which do not concern the ordinary people and risking lives in the process. Should have learnt from Vietnam.

Ktemoc has some interesting tales to tell:

On race issue, regarding John Howard losing his own seat of Bennelong in Sydney, I read what SBS chief correspondent, Karen Middleton wrote about the behavior of some Liberal Party supporters on the night of Australia’s general election at the Wentworth Hotel in Sydney, which the Liberal Party used as its convention centre for that night.

When the polling count confirmed the predicted disastrous outcome for John Howard and his Coalition, some Liberal Party supporters went verbally feral.

Middleton wrote that “a prominent one-time senior Howard government official could not contain himself, even with media representatives standing around.”

That frustrated bigot spat out “Those f**king Chinese”, blaming the Chinese voters in the constituency of Bennelong for voting Maxime McKew instead of the erstwhile PM.

If you have read Australian political history, 60 years ago, PM Arthur Calwell in a 'Whites only' Australia had made an insulting comment against a Chinese resident named Wong. Calwell made a sneering pun: "Two Wongs won't make one white."

So to those diehard Liberal Party ultra conservatives, it must have been just too much to take, where today Chinese Aussie voters were significantly powerful enough to kick their favourite leader and PM out of office. How they would have wished Calwell was still around. But wait, there's more and it's about Wong again ;-)<

Giant killer Maxime McKew, who defeated John Howard, was seen during the campaign dressed in Chinese collared blouse ;-) and even cutting a ... guess ... no, not a cake or a ribbon ...c’mon ... yes, a roast pig ;-) together with several Chinese community leaders.

Hmmm, I wonder how it was done? Maybe they ‘prepared’ it by sawing through the bones but not the skin, so that when McKew and several Chinese blokes jointly cut the roast pig, they did it as if it was like a ... cheese cake ;-)

Needless to say, there were the obligatory lion dances etc. Alas, there was no Penang-style Chingay banner throwing ;-)

It didn’t help the ultra conservatives' anger that when mandarin-speaking new PM Kevin Rudd walked up at a Brisbane Hotel that night to claim victory for the Labour Party, he was accompanied by his family and Chinese son-in-law, Albert Tse who’s married to Rudd’s only daughter, Jessica.

The Star Online said: Rudd’s elder son, Nicholas, is studying at Fudan University in Shanghai, while the younger son, Marcus, is still in high school and is studying Chinese already.

An ardent Sinophile, Rudd’s love of things Chinese started when his mother gave him a book on Asian civilization when he was 10 years old. By the time he entered the Australian National University, his obvious choice was Chinese language and history. One report even claimed that Rudd has the Chinese character “solidarity” tattooed on his arm.

Chinese Premier Hu Jintao is said to have liked Rudd so much that he invited the latter and his family to be his guests at the Beijing Olympics. And this was even before the election. When the results rolled in signalling the end of Howard’s era, Premier Hu was among the earliest to congratulate him.

Then there is the report of Malaysian (Sabah) born Penny Wong in a Sydney Morning Herald report which talked about the "rise and rise of … Penny Wong".

Yes, this is the Wong of today that i mentioned earlier. It said:

Penny Wong, a Chinese Australian, is a huge winner.

She has ministerial responsibility for Australia's international stance on climate change. But fresh water is Australia's critical domestic issue. It is drying up. The issue will remain critical for the next decade, at least. Wong is the cabinet minister whom Rudd has given the power and authority to "co-ordinate" with eight state and territory Labor governments to "fix" the problem. A dozen or more of her colleagues would have done practically anything to get hold of the portfolio.

It has gone instead to a woman senator of five years of mixed heritage. Wong, from Adelaide, came to this country at the age of seven with her grandmother from what was colonial British North Borneo before World War II (well, it’s Sabah now). Hers has been a remarkable political career so far. Her handling of the water issue will make or break the rest of it. It is a massive responsibility.

Like Julia Gillard, the mega-ministry deputy prime minister from Melbourne, Wong is aligned with Labor's Left.

Then in another news article showing Rudd’s greater trust in Penny over high profile Peter Garrett, the Environment Minister, where he (Rudd) stripped off a key part of the environment portfolio, namely climate change (including managing the signing of the Kyoto Protocol) and water resource from Garrett, and created them into a new Ministry for Penny to handle, the Sydney Morning Herald in its article Wong set to take on the world talked about Penny being Australia's lead negotiator at global greenhouse talks beginning next week.

The elevation of Penny Wong directly into the cabinet confirms her rise to prominence one of the top performers during the election campaign. By naming her as Minister for Climate Change and Water, Rudd has responded to concerns about Peter Garrett as the Minister for Environment, Heritage and Arts.

Yes, it has been quite a long march for Chinese Australians since PM Arthur Calwell's infamous “Two Wongs won’t make a white”.

Today, Australia not only has a PM whose son-in-law is Chinese, or where Chinese Aussie voters were purportedly significant enough to vote John Howard out, but the cabinet has its first ethnic Chinese cabinet minister, Malaysian-born Penny Wong who has been selected on merit to be Australia's Tsar on climate change and water resources.

I wonder if Calwell was still alive what would he have made of "One Wong has made it all ‘right’"!

(My comment: In our Malaysian context, we have an almost namesake, Dr. Ng Yen Yen, who is the MCA Wanita Chief. She is a Minister in the BN coalition government which often touts the formula of power-sharing and which critics refer to us Umno-powered sharing.

What is significant is the fact that Penny Wong did not need a racial party to have got to where she is now. Ng Yen Yen's racialism compared with Wong Ying Yen's racial favouritism?

When I watched Devamany on national tv, I cringed at the way he has to ‘ampu’ to get out of his momentary bravado in Parliament. As far as I am concerned, and I am sure there are many out there who will agree, he is ‘history’.)

Some obscure laws relating to sex...

wonder how they got into the statute books!:

In Romboch (VA), it is illegal to engage in sexual activity with the lights on.
(relevant now with the possibility of hidden cameras)

In hotels in Sioux Falls (SD), every room is required to have twin beds. The beds must always be at least two feet apart when a couple rents a room for only one night. And it is illegal to make love on the floor between the beds.
(an insult to bed manufacturers?)

In Alexandria (MN), no man is allowed to make love to his wife with the smell of garlic, onions or sardines on his breath. If his wife so requests, law mandates that he must brush his teeth.
(no problem where there is no kissing?)

In Los Angeles (CA), a man is legally entitled to beat his wife with a leather belt or strap, but the belt can’t be wider than 2 inches, unless he has his wife’s consent to beat her with a wider strap.
(a haven for sadist-masochist relationships)

In Ames (IA), it is illegal for a husband to take more than three gulps of beer while lying in bed with his wife – holding her in his arms.
(be more focus mah, what an insult to the poor wife)

In Washington, D.C., the only acceptable sexual position is the missionary position.
(I bet many offenders but how would they know?)

In Newcastle (WY), it is illegal for couples to have sex while standing inside a store’s walk-in meat freezer.
(must be due to many people feeling hot)

In Detroit (MI), it is illegal for couples to make love in an automobile unless the act takes place while the vehicle is parked on the couple’s own property.
(must be kinky otherwise, if on own property, is there a necessity for that?)

In London, it is illegal to have sex on a parked motorcycle.
(because it can be seen and will offend others?)

In my humble opinion...for the one with big ears

When I read the write-up on the new Sime Darby, I was almost convinced that now we have an almost invincible entity that can prove its mettle in the global scene.

But being the world’s largest oil palm grower, and the largest public listed company in Malaysia in terms of market capitalization, its fortune depends to a large extent on the world demand and resulting price of palm oil.

While the going had never been so good because of the unprecedented growth of the economies of China and India, we should not be too smug about being continuously successful. I believe our economy has yet to feel the total effects of a major downturn in the US economy and a possible collapse of China’s overheated stock market.

According to S Dali’s article in The Star’s Bizweek, ‘New ‘lenders’ of the last resort’, since the beginning of this year, Citigroup’s shares have lost almost 45% of their value, wiping away US$124billion in market capitalization. This goes to show that even the world’s largest bank was vulnerable to market forces, which was due to the damaging effects of sub-prime loans. As a comparison, Sime's market capitalization of Rm66 billion is only US$19 billion, probably equivalent to an amount to be written off their portfolio.

As an example of the unreliable basis of ranking a company based on market capitalization, before the listing of new Sime, IOI was the largest for a number of days. Many people just could not get over the fact that it was bigger than even Maybank!

In fact, I still believe that the merger to create the largest plantation company, which turned out to be the largest company, had something to do with Malay pride. Before that, IOI and KLK were leading plantation companies, well ahead of GLCs like Guthrie and Golden Hope. Now that Sime is on top, does it in any way affect the Bumiputera’s ownership percentage? No way. Not until a Bumiputera becomes the richest man in Malaysia, and that is the new criterion, set by Pak Lah.

Let’s just forget about the biggest for a moment and look at matters at my level, which is basically, ground level. Recently, I was told about an Indian contractor for weeding, who had worked for a local plc for more than 10 years. He was informed by the company that their new policy required a Bumiputera contractor. Later, he was approached by a company official, that he will be the new contractor, but he is willing to let him continue, if he could have a cut of Rm2 per acre. For 3,000 acres, it translates into Rm6,000 per month, for doing nothing. The deal fell through because of the problem of the sub-contractor having to wait for payment from the contractor, which can be dicey, as many government sub-contractors have experienced. If the policy were to have more Bumiputera contractors, then a serious contender willing to put out capital and sweat it out would have been more palatable. Wouldn’t this Indian feel marginalized?

We were approached by a broker about some 2-acre lots for sale at Rm30,000 in Perak. For agricultural land away from the main road, the price seems at least 20% below market rate. Upon closer look at the copy title, it was clearly stated as for ‘dusun’ (or orchard) and ‘tidak boleh di pindahmilik atau dipajakkan’ (cannot be transferred or leased). When we pointed out this fact, the broker said a certain lawyer has been handling such cases without problem. The likely scenario is some Chinese businessmen, who do not mind taking the risk, so long as they can work on the land for a number of years, hoping that none of the landowners would die during the period. Here again, it defeats the original purpose of giving it to those who have no inclination to work on the land.

I am still unhappy over how Southern Bank was ‘forcibly taken over’ by CIMB under the pretext of globalization. Yet the rules were changed to allow more than one negotiating party, after the take-over. The best part was the allegation that the books were cooked just prior to the take-over! I still remember how Tan Sri Tan tried so hard to fight off and many believed SBB’s real motive for taking over Asia General was in fact a poison apple to make the bank unattractive. It is like raping and then suing the victim for spreading VD to him!

Instead of reducing the number of banks with mergers and acquisitions, we now seem to have all kinds of banks to serve different purposes like SMEs and Islamic banking. I happened to be one for having niche banks like Phileo Allied but then again, politics had its way of changing the scenario. More recently, we have ECM Libra taking over Avenue, which was like a python swallowing an elephant.

Meanwhile, it looks like we have to direct our anger at super rich people like Robert Kuok, Lim Kok Thay, Francis Yeoh and Ananda Krishnan (not necessarily in order of wealth) for taking up a large part of non-Bumiputera shareholdings which made the NEP a never ending policy. But to be realistic, I am stuck with shares in delisted companies like Mbf Corp, Crimson, Datuk Keramat, Metroplex and so on, which according to the government’s criterion (nominal value instead of market value), I am fairly rich!

If Pak Lah does not wish to listen to a nobody like me, at least listen to experts in relevant fields like Dr. Lim Teck Ghee on share ownership and Wong Chin Huat on the electoral system.