A post for Mama

I don't know how many of you out there actually read newspapers, but if you have read The Star newspaper in the past weeks, you would probably have noticed an article written by a certain Elaine Dong titled 'The Beauty of Ordinary Lives', which can still be viewed here. It was actually a review of a book titled 'Gilding the Lily' as seen through the eyes of writer Liew Suet Fun and photographer S.C. Shekar.

I have personally not seen the book, because, well, you know where yours truly is at, at the moment. But basically from the article, the book's objective is, i quote the author:

"to focus on human values, the values of these women. All the women we interviewed worked, they faced daily challenges. These challenges are universal challenges faced by women, whether they are in big cities or small towns. They worry about the household, their children, their livelihood. Therefore, we try to highlight the values that these women bring to the table in carrying through the challenges.”

I think the effort is just magnificent and it truly reminded me of my mum who have struggled to keep the family up and running through the years until me and my siblings are now grown up . Since the days when my father had his first stroke attack which made him unable to work, my mum have gone a long way from holding multiple household cleaning jobs to being a kindergarten teacher today, even though she only managed to finish her education until Form 3. She managed to put food on the table and provide for us despite the struggles, being the sole breadwinner for the family after what have happened to my father.

(Mummy dearest n me all smiles)

Her determination and courage that she had while having to put up with the crap that we were dishing out to her while we were growing up never failed to inspire me all these times when i am learning to live my life.

Now she may not be internet savvy enough to be reading my blog (sending an SMS out from her mobile was already an achievement enough in her ways), or being featured in the book i mentioned above, but in my world, my mum is a hero that i look up to for inspiration, the extraordinary person in this world that, if not for her, i would not be where i am today. I love you mum!

Bonjour Liban

If a picture is worth a thousand words, surely being there is worth a million words. The last few days of my off days was occupied with a trip to Lebanon, Beirut being the main destination and other places along the way, Byblos, Bekaa Valley, etc. Despite all the security concerns and political bullshit and what nots running everyday in the news now, me and Charles were pretty sure that everything was ok.

(Beautiful snow capped mountains and the first big sign of civilization!)

So with the million dollar assumption made, we packed our backpacks and duly hopped onto the service taxi that took us across the Syrian-Lebanese border through snow capped mountains for the 3 hours journey to Beirut. Our first stop for what would be an unbelievably nice trip.

The first moment we crossed the border onto the Lebanese immigration office, we were truly caught by surprise by how the world on the other side of the fence was different to the many middle east countries i have been to. The immigration officers were so friendly and throughout the 4 days in Lebanon, the hospitility that was bestowed upon us by all walks of people that we came across made us feel like we were not in a middle east country with war threats looming at the window sills.

Although the streets in Beirut were littered with police and army personnels every 50 metres armed with tanks and M-16's, i think the main job of those guys were mainly to become guide to lost tourists or being a mobile sophisticated interactive map and city guide. Every one of them that we chanced upon never failed to give a smile and greet us in either English, Arabic or French.

Beirut is also well known in this part of the world as the Paris of the middle east and walking through the streets of the city truly verified the claim. Suffering from civil war that hit the country till the 90s, the city was left with a bunch of Ottoman era buildings that were badly damaged leaving behind structures with only supports and holes in walls. Since then, the city have been rebuilt to something that you would have to see with your own eyes to believe.

(What was the Holiday Inn hotel that was left as it is after the war. It was never rebuilt unlike the adjacent buildings and now is one of the landmarks in the city centre)

Although there is no war, we were trying hard at attempting suicide with the amount of McDonald's, Burger King, Starbucks and what nots we were indulging in for the 4 days. Mind you, we were deprived from all these life necessities in Syria for the past almost 1 year :p

(You can only imagine my jubilation!!!)

Shopping was the main agenda when we were there considering the sale that was on and the lack of avenue to spend our hard earned money in Syria. Every new day was a new quest to another shopping centre to find the things we need and conquering virgins...ermm..Virgin Megastores i mean.

(Hard Rock Cafe: Spreading early Christmas news)

Of course i also visited some other places, when the shopping centres are not open. Nothing much to shout about, a few small towns here and there, one being Byblos, one of the oldest continuously inhabited town in civilization. Also had the chance to visit and tour a winery in one of the mountain areas. Chicks serving free wines, gotta love 'em!

(No, they don't sell them wines by the barrels..)

I may seem full of praises for a country others would probably view as a shithole and would pretty much avoid at all costs, but well, the main reason i enjoyed the trip so much was probably because we went there expecting so little but then actually got so much in return. Certainly was not what I expected for a country in the middle east where terrorists are said to breed like mosquitoes.

One sure thing is that this is a country where i have seen the most number of Porsche's in a day and where 6 cars out of 10 on the road are BMW's. If the world thinks that Lebanon is run by screwed up people who just wants to go to war in the name of religion, i surely hope that one day they will stop by in Malaysia and tweak things up a lil bit! I would surely love to have one of them nice cars in my garage!

2 Wheels, 72 Spokes

(Last one to McDonalds in Hill Star Road buys the Happy Meal rounds!)

















The Tour De Langkawi just ended 2 days ago...and this was a hell of a nice shot..

I miss my bicycle, miss going mountain biking, miss going at absurd bone breaking speeds through the jungle on 2 wheels with testosterone infused balls, miss being chased by overly friendly wild dogs with big and sharp teeths and miss the high fives given by village people when we pass by them.

I miss my life back home.....

Bomberman

So maybe some of you readers actually have a life besides ogling at my blog and noticed that there was a car bombing incident in Damascus on the 12th of Feb, last Tuesday that is. Which was, i suppose, showing on some news channel, everywhere. A senior Hezbollah (read: Lebanon-Israel politics/war) leader was killed in the attack they say was initiated by Israel or maybe some angry taxi driver with a spare bomb in the trunk.
























The fact that the bombing happened about 10 minutes from my place made it quite the interesting. Dangerous, yes, interesting, more. These Arabs have adopted a weird population control concept as we have observed from recent times. I wished they would've just let me buy them a bottle of insecticide to do the population control job and then spare me the car.

It's kinda tiring having to walk around the city all the time and not really knowing how to handle the public transportation system that well here in Damascus, or rather in any funny language country that i end up in. I don't understand what's written on the buses, for all i know, they might drive me all the way to Baghdad, and when i take a taxi, as customary for taxi drivers all over the world, they try to rip me off at every chance they get. Honestly, do i by any chance remotely resemble Uncle Scrooge?

I see these events come and go in the news all the time, but this time when it happened so near to me, at a range where the blast could actually be heard from my apartment, i got all excited and actually wished it was near enough for me to go and watch. Not near enough to get blown up as an accessory though, i know some yours truly out there would actually wish otherwise :p Anyway i was sleeping at that time. Didn't find out about it till the next day and it was my friend living nearby who heard the blast and thought it was just another fireworks show.

As interesting as i thought it would be though, life and business in the city went on as usual the next day. In fact, half the town was painted red, literally, poor trees, to welcome St Valentine's day. Bombing or no bombing, love wins the heart of the people. Bravo to the people for not succumbing to fear induced by these bloody municipal population controllers. Cheers to that!

And on that note, i'll hand over you guys back to your worshipping of YouTube, Friendster, MySpace and what not. That's all from the idiosyncratic satirical Farm Man, your unreliable Middle East correspondent, reporting from you, delayed, from Damascus, Syria.


(CUT! Ok guys, thats a wrap, now let's go grab some shawerma before they blow them stalls up as well!)

Celebration Time!!

First of all, Happy Chinese New Year to all friends and families back home, here in Syria, over there somewhere and also those who are everywhere else. Well, this is my second year that i'm celebrating CNY away from home and i admit that i'm really homesick at the moment and it's not fun to miss CNY. Trust me on that one. Just to make things better and not admit defeat to being away from the celebrations, i managed to cook up a feast and invited some friends over for a 'Reunion dinner' which we actually had on the first day of CNY cos i was working the day before and i had my off day on the first day of CNY.

It was truly a memorable and interesting one. We had a nice dinner, lotsa booze to wash it down with and then moved on to a club downtown where we had a hell of a party. Well, you just never thought that clubbing in Middle East would actually be that fun. But all and all, still no angpow =(

And then i spent the rest of the next 4 off days lazying around, getting over hangovers, reading and crashing cars on the PS2.

Today is Valentine's Day. Although i never believed in celebrating it and having an opinion that it's just a a day overhyped with expensive dinners and lavish gifts and flowers, you can never truly run away with it if you're in a relationship. Of course, unless you're a few thousand miles apart you can't. Hehe. When that is, a phone call would normally suffice. The rest then goes into the 555 book.

It is a wee bit weird though today, i have my guy friends here in Damascus going out for dinner together, and a bunch of my girl friends here having also dinner together among themselves, and then i had a date with my dentist, whom duly fixed all of my nibbly toothly problems of course. Thank you very much! So much for Valentine's Day.

And no, i'm not getting all political with my previous post, just venting out some of my boxed up opinions and frustations on how my beloved country is being ruled into a mess, plus, this is my space, if i would, i can write about how my underwear got discoloured when i washed it in the washing machine the other day. But i guess i won't, cos i know if i do it, i will be swarmed with interview requests after that. :p So all that being said, have a ratty rat year ahead, Happy Valentine's Day, take care, have fun, go mad!

Nuff said. Lets vote for no more racial segregation, discrimination and monopoly. My beloved Malaysia for Malaysians! Not Malay, Chinese, Indian and Dan Lain Lain.

I am not an opposition supporter nor am i a supporter for the current government. I am a supporter for a change for the better.

Whinefest

The calender new year have passed for exactly 1 week for the rest of the world at the time I’m writing this. Not for me at least. I’m still trapped in the slavery slump we named work since before the end of last year. Yesterday was the 24th consecutive day I’ve been working since god knows when, you do the maths, brain too screwed up to do it at the moment. Well, all I can say is that working nights straight for the past almost one month at a rate of 14 hours devoted to work every day, surviving with an average of 4 hours sleep, during which, I was accompanied by idiots hammering on god knows what in the apartment above mine, have not been really fun. Today is day 25. The last day of this madness, and then I’m going to celebrate my new year during the 5 days off that I’m going to get after this. A decent cooked meal, sleep and some meditation with the PS2 is in order. Maybe no fireworks, or maybe I can just make something explode in the house, hmm, interesting thought and the rantings above pretty sums up the situation I’m kinda in now.

The weather have been exceptionally cold here in Syria, on average, dipping down in the minus regions every night with the lowest so far of -7 degrees. Kinda cool to be experiencing this at first, but then it gets freezingly cold. Conclusion is, not cool nor fun, period. Not for a tropical kid at least. If you wanna know how it feels like, find yourself a freezer big enough for your size, and then live in it. Pretty much covers the experience. From the freezing fingers to the numbed nose. And a note for the cyclists, cycling on frozen ice ala ice skating is not recommended. Although this may or may not have been proven by extensive Nobel prize winning research, however fun it may be, I found this activity to be a tad dangerous. Let’s just say the thing we call friction, well, it’s kinda not there when you are cycling on ice.











(Brrrrrr..cold)







For those whom have been asking or wondering, I still don’t know when I will be back in Malaysia yet. Not in time for Chinese New Year at least. This dumpsite still have works to be completed before it can be passed on to the idiots who own it to generate some electricity to light up their houses. Till that moment comes, I will be stuck here, with the ultimate powers of not being able to do anything about it. I know i sound bitchy, i blame it on the hammering idiots.