The Trip to Kota Bahru

Its been quite sometimes I haven’t been to KB though I was born in KB. My parents have migrated to Ipoh where as myself, I have become the so-called permanent resident of Subang Jaya, Selangor. There are of course some differences, the most notable is traffic jam. The so many cars on the road and the traffic system is not properly managed. No police traffic officers or city council enforcement officers to oversee the flow. People just park cars where ever they like disrupting traffic flows. In addition, the roads are narrow and most roads are one-way as well as pedestrian crossing the roads with no over-head crossing bridges.

The driver took me to the Pasar Siti Khadijah, telling me I can buy what ever local delicacies from there. The market is dirty as usual and most of them doing business there are women. Where have all the Kelantanese men have gone, I was wondering….

The town is dirty as usual. Rubbish thrown everywhere and drains are cloaked. May be this is one of the reasons for the easiness for flood to take place. The meeting that was asked to attend with Tok Pa was regarding the development of Kelantan. One of the issues discussed was pertaining to the conduct of Kelantanese football fans burning chairs during the final match against Negeri Sembilan team at Bukit Jalil stadium.

The Kelantan Government under PAS rule doest not bring much changes to the state. Old friends whom I met say that the Kelantanese are happy under PAS rule. They don’t want to be rich but earn enough to support their daily lives. Anyway this is their personal opinion. As for me more needs to be done. Infrastructure facilities are so far behind. Changes required to take place fast if the state want to be on par as other states. Islam does not forbid its ummah to progress and developto achieve success in this world. Success in this world will bring success in the hereafter.

My Trip to Kota Kinabalu (2/4 to 4/4/2010)

This is my trip to KK after 10 years. There has been tremendous progress with new high rise buildings including shopping malls, hotels and eateries. However, you can still see the poor living tilted houses built along the coastal and estuaries. These are mostly fishermen. My trip there was to attend the FELCRA board meeting and visit Pulau Banggi and some other projects tasked to Felcra to be implemented.

I took a plane from KLIA at 3.00 pm on Friday 2/4/2010 and arrived at 5.30pm the same day. I was picked up by felcra officials and taken on a four drive cruiser to Kudat. Kudat is about 180 kilometers from KK. Arrived in Kudat at about 8.45 pm and taken to a restaurant called Terminal Tom Yam owned by a Kelantanese army officer and his wife. The food was ok but not that fantastic. After the dinner, we checked into the Marina Golf and Beach Resort. The next day we have to assemble by 7.00 am to take a speed boat to Pulau Banggi cause we want go early during low tide and come back by 2.00 pm before the sea gets rough. I was told there were incidents where boats capsized due heavy sea currents. It took us one hour to reach Pulau Banggi. We boarded on the jetty and walked towards the mainland, saw the signboard written Kpg Karakit ( I was told this is the main town where kampong people gather for any major activities especially during dignitaries visits. There were some buildings which look new including shopd, a small hospital with wards amd a new medium sized masjid.

I was told the total population of Pulau Banggi is 14,600 and they are scattered all over the island which is bigger than Pulau Langkawi. More than 90 percent of the population are fishermen. They are very poor and some senior citizen doesn’t even speak Malay. There are 14 primary schools and one secondary school. It seems last year, three schools nobody passed the UPSR exam. Durlng Pak Lah’s time, he gave special attention to Pulau Banggi in Sabah and Gahai in Pahang. Now continued attention need to be given, if not these places will be left out. We have achieved independence more than 50 years but these places are like pre-independence days. Something drastic needs to be done

A srong and dedicated team

I'm lucky i'm heading the economics and international division (BEA). I consider this division is the heart of treasury. Though the division doesn't deal with public or handle so-called glamorous stuff like contracts, privatisation, budgeting or loans but it deals with crucial stuff like the formulating of national budget speech, the economic report, monitoring of the economy, international negotiations and meetings. It sort of pull together what the other divisions are doing. I told my officers if they have served in BEA then they can survive anywhere in the civil service and even in the private sector companies. The officers are dedicated and often work late hours. English is the main language in the division both for communication and paper works.

I said I lucky earlier because i have officers who are knowledgeable, hard working, high caliber, with team spirit and helpful. i'm not saying this because my officers read my blog but it is from my sincere feelings from the bottom of my heart. Its difficult to have this kind of high quality officers. Some of them i call "world class officers" because if you put them anywhere in the world they can work and survive.

Thanks for all of your support and without which i won't be where I am now. Mind you one day those of you who have contributed to my success and BEA excellence will be rewarded.

You don't have to proof, put ice or jack me. Sincerity and your hard work will automatically reward you.

Presentations by KEs and PEs

Every year we in economics and international division (BEA) organize presentations by Principal assistant secretaries (KEs) and assistant secretaries ((PEs.) The topics covers a wide range usually pertaining to current economic development in the country. The presentations are tailored to the issues to be addressed in the upcoming budget.

This year's presentations ( the third one since it started in 2008) showed great improvements. especially in terms of confidence level and communication ability. of course, the new officers were a bit nervous and some old ones still didnt show any improvement.

I would like to suggest that BEA officers should communicate in english. ENGLISH should be the language of comunication in BEA.

so touched

When I broke the news that i was not going to MOE and stay put in MOF. There was a big clap by most of BEA officers instantaneously. The sincerity really touched my heart. Thank my fellow officers. I wont be where I am today without all of your support and ideas.

I love all of you

Disheartening and irritating incident

Being quite sometime i didn't write in my blog. Last Saturday was a bad day. Went out with my wife at about 5pm. Nobody was in the house. Did some shopping and came back home at 8.30 pm. Upon opening the front door, my wife spotted that the chairs were not in their position...moved a bit. She asked me i said i didn't pushed anything.I called my daughter she said she didn't come home from that morning. My wife rushed upstairs, she shouted we have been robbed. i rushed to the kitchen and found the window grill being damaged and back door forced open.

in my master bed room everything is in a mess like being striked by a hurricane. All the cabinets and drawers opened. Clothes,shirts, pants, underwears are pulled from the cabinte and thrown all over. all the jewellery were gone including wedding and engagement rings which was kept intact for the past 25 years.

apart from the jewellery worth more than RM70k, camcorder, laptops, external harddisk and thumb drive were all taken. Total lost aabout RM80k.

Its a disheartening incident. i pity my wife. all her lifetime savings in the form of jewelery were gone.

We always say it happens to others not us. When it happens to you, you will feel the trauma and disappointment. When my officers like Loy and Nirmal were telling their own house and apartment being broken in, i felt sad for them but i didn't experience the real feelings. But when happened to me, i can feel how they felt then.

Its been sleepless night for my wife for at least three days. Any noises heard down stairs she will ask me to go and check. She kept a long pointed knife under the bed. I hope she wont stab me mistakenly. She even asked me to get license to own a gun.
The point i'm driving is that how break-in incident can affect peoples life.

The MCA Tusssle - Who is right? Who is wrong?

In politics frens can become enemies and enemies can become frens. We have seen in UMNO and MIC; now its happening in MCA. Tee Keat, the MCA president was all out against Chua Soi Lek. When Soi Lek wanna make a comeback, Tee Kiat even said how can a person who had commited immoral activities be accepted into the party. On the other hand the one of vice presdent, Ng Yen Yen supported Soi Lek. Even then Tee Kiat was not willing to support Soi Lek and other leaders stood by him including Tiong Lai.

When money politics were linked to MCA top leader Tee Kiat by MP for Bintulu, the MCA drama becomes more interesting. Chua Soi Lek demanding Tee Kiat to step down, and tee kiat demanding Soi Lek to let go the deputy president post. Situation become worst when in MCA EGM Tee Kiat was given vote of no confidence and Soi lek didnt win the majority for deputy president. The third group under Tiong Lai emerged demsnding for second MCA EGM. Where as, realising the emergence of a third group, Tee Kiat imediately patched-up things with Soi lek and announced a unity plan. The unity plan, however, is opposed by Tiong Lai and followers.

In politics anything can happen. Those who manage to grab the right chance at the right moment will win but not for long, since there will emerge another person.

The same goes to our daily life.
We never know person whom we love the most for now..
Can be the person we hate the most in the future...
This is what we call LIFE