M.D.A --> Malaysia's Diversified Attributes

Russian is famous for Vodka...
US is famous for techy stuff...
Argentina is famous for beef & leather...
Japan is famous for electronics...
Italy is famous for design & fashion...
AND....

Malaysia is famous for ....check it out...

These are some of my observations of Malaysia's lifestyles in the past years....

1) Yellow Light means Green Light. Red Light means ....Green Light also!

2) General Parking means Public Parking. Handicapped Parking means.....Public Parking also!

3) Bargaining like mad in Pasar for 10 or 20 cents discount but later spend more money in KFC than what is being saved!

4) Receiving people's wedding invitation card means receiving a SAMAN!

5) Wearing helmet is "optional" when riding a motorbike!

6) Sometimes, Malaysian motorbike is meant for 4 person (2 adults, 2 children)! A Sandwich Approach!

7) Malaysian Version of "K.I.V (Keep In View)" => "See how lah"!

8) Malaysian Version of "I think it can't be done" => "Cannot meh?"

9) Some people thought pressing the Lift button for more than once will result in the Lift moving faster!

10) Breakfast is taken during Lunch time. Lunch is taken during Tea Time. Dinner is taken during Supper Time!

11) Ipoh Chicken Rice, Penang Laksa, Muar Otak-Otak EVOLVING to Myanmar Chicken Rice, Vietnam Laksa, Indon Otak-Otak. WHY? Coz it is all done by foreign worker nowadays!

12) You can spot an Indian restaurant easily as they are always ended in the "Corner"!

13) Do you know "Kacang Putih" is not white in color?

14) New Year is a celebration for Drinking & Spraying people's car on the street!

15) How do Malaysian Chinese educate their children? Through Counselling, Advice, or Brain Development? NO, NO, NO..... It is through "Rotan braised with Pork"!

16) I can only think of one word in which reading it the other way round would have a direct opposite meaning: Tuhan => Hantu!

17) We order "Maggi goreng" eventhough the mamak only has "Cintan"! Same goes with "Milo panas" despite the mamak serves u Ovaltine!

18) "Buffalo's Eye" => 1/2 cook broiled egg!

19) Bahasa Malaysia is our main national language. FOOD is our second national language!

20) To weigh fruits & vege in hypermalls, people never Queue-Up, they Crowd-Up!

21) Indian kind of Bahasa Malaysia is just rearranging the word structure from a Malay sentence. Eg. Malay says, "Eh, kasi sikit wang lah". Indian says, "Eh, wang sikit kasi lah"!

22) Instead of saying "Duit kopi", we should change to "Duit kopi putih" as White Coffee is the trend now!

Welcome to Malaysia.....

Plan Ahead but Enjoy the "NOW"

Got to know a friend that really appreciate life & not planning in details of how her life is going to be.
She knows the life direction but not really hoarding after money & wealth. She can work really hard and play really hard too.
She told me "What's the point of planning so detail & suddenly the next day, we die!"

In the beginning, I just listened & not really agreeing but later as I thought about it, it has some truth in it.
Not that we don't plan our life but not to forget to enjoy "NOW" & appreciate "NOW". The worst day in our life is regretting what we didn't do, who we didn't appreciate & love and places that we didn't go.
I think the worst of the worst is not eating the FOOD that we wana eat!!

Okay, let's move forward, smell the roses, move forward & smell more roses!
We have to keep on keeping on.

Let us enjoy, talk to people, call-up somebody that we haven't been contacting & make new friends.
Continue our Malaysian culture, Let's go Yam-Cha!

A Unique School

2 days ago, I went to a property forum entitled Rethinking Property, organised by BFM radio station. There were 3 prominent speakers.

It was an eye-and-mind-opener! One of the speaker that striked me the most was John Hardy, the founder of Green School in Bali, Indonesia.

I do not know there is such school that existed.
My first impression was .... yeah, another school teaching about green stuff, recycling waste, saving energy, blah blah blah...etc.
It is much more than that. Of course listening to the founder himself talks about his vision of creating "Green Leaders" in the future who cares about what happens to the world, put my grasshopper mindset in the backburner!

John Hardy & his wife Cynthia sold off their jewellery business to set this green school up.
The whole school was made of bamboo! No air-conditioning, but natural flow of air and no toxic building material but "organic" material. What a building!

The students can learn basic skills such as reading, writing and I like the fact that they focus more on the practical side instead of boring-standard-Teach-N-Go-curriculum like most school did. They even learn art & music and most importantly, interaction skills.

All of us are Rice-Consumers but the students learn to be a Rice-Producer!
They plant, grow & harvest their own paddy & vegetables.
There's no computer software of any kind that can do a better job in teaching children about the Law of Sowing & Reaping than planting with their own labor, knowing that "If they don't work, they don't eat" principle still exist in 21st century!

Moreover, they get to interact with students from all over the world. They learn, adapt, communicate & build projects together. It reminds me of the word GLOCALIZATION instead of GLOBALISATION.
What a great example of a local village with global society in it.

In my opinion, the skills & the talent that the students potentially build up with will enable them to be more holistically balance in the aspect of mental & emotional strength.
I can't imagine our future generations are still following the status quo of going to a typical school and scoring all the As that their parents dreamt of and expect them to have the adaptability and competitiveness in the global marketplace!
It is not the sole issue of competitiveness but also the morality & respect that we need to nurture the future leaders.

Well, be sure to check the website and find out more at http://www.greenschool.org.
Thumbs up and a big salute to John Hardy, Cynthia and the team that run that place.