Strong Wind Hit KK

When I went to the GCC carpark at lunch time yesterday, I saw an unusual amount of broken tree branches strewed all over the car park as well as on top of my Camry. In fact, an old dried up wood branch of approx. one inch diameter still rested on the rear windscreen. I spent some time removing all the debris from the car top surface. I said to myself, "It's fortunate that the windscreen is not broken!". At that point of time, it still did not dawn on me the severity of the strong wind.

 

The severity was only made known to me by someone thousand of miles away in Perth - my wife and Serene :(. That's excusable because I work in a windowless office!

 

The havoc wracked by the strong wind was published in the local papers today. The incident was much worse than I had imagined!

 

 

I was surprised that the papers only reported a wind speed of 74 Km/hour and not higher. This is still much lower than what we normally design our buildings to withstand: 120 Km/hour. Had it been higher, I would probably have known this havoc much earlier because of the sound of broken windows at my front office.

Pen vs Sword

 

Words of wisdom from a 16-year old, Malala Yousafzai spoken at the United Nation:

 

"Let us pick up our books and pens, they are our most powerful weapons."

 

"One Child, one teacher, one pen and one book can change the world. Education is the only solution. Education first."

 

Her statements reminiscence what English author Edward Bulwer-Lytten wrote in 1839: "The pen is mightier than the sword".

Privilege of Aging

While greying and aging may not be welcomed by a lot of people, it nevertheless offers many other benefits and status. Becoming grandparents is one of such privileges.

 

 

My second grandkid named Grace was born on 11 July 2013 and she looks truly adorable!

Reunion of Old Friends

Meeting up with old friends somehow always needs a reason. The best reason is when someone who has moved to another country returns to home town KK for a visit. This time, Ah Miao who now resides in Hong Kong came back for a holiday.

 

Of all friends, it is still the friendships that were developed in the secondary school and the university that last a life time.

 

When we are now in the greying process, the frailty of life and the transience of time is felt so very real by all. Since some of us met up some five years ago (Read here), we have now decided to meet up again in November, sooner than originally targeted.

While the men all show sign of greying and balding, the ladies prefer to conceal this aging process. Thanks to the technology of hair colouring!

 

Some may wonder what do these "old people" talk about:

One ex-classmate told us of his recent catchup in a meeting with another friend of the same class. When he mentioned names of some of the classmates, this other guy simply said that he had no recollection of them. Then the wife of another ex-classmate complained that the husband just simply forgot to close the main door and front gate whenever he left the house. That led to a lot of heated squabbles and harsh words because of the wife's concern on the security of the house. Then there is the wife of yet another ex-classmate who told us of a frightening incident just before the husband's health deteriorated. He insisted on driving the car out when the wife told him not to. Hardly 200m away from the house, he rammed into a stationary container truck.

These stories may be laughable but the painful truth is that they all reveal the fact of life.

Wimbledon 2013

 

Andy Murray ( a player who is not my favourite) finally won his Wimbledon men's single title, a result which I did not expect. I have to admit that Andy rightfully deserved the championship because he played a superb match - straight sets against world No. 1, Novak Djokovic.

 

Novak was powerless to neutralise the powerful groundstrokes from Andy. Novak did try other tactical moves liked slides and drop shots but they too had little impact on Andy.

With this win, Andy Murray is assured of his place in history. No matter how he is going to perform in future, he will from now on be declared a sports legend as far as Great Briton is concerned!

The women's double was won by an unlikely pair: Peng Shuai of Communist China and Hsieh Su-Wei of Taiwan. This augers well for the sports partnership and even diplomatic relationship of these two neighbours.

 

 

Sabine Lisicki, the giants killer failed to live up to the expectation of her many new found admirers and succumbed to the might of Marion Bartoli who went on to win the women's single.

Becoming an Adjudicator

I flew to KL on 4 July to attend the Launch of the Malaysian Society of Adjudicators and the Dinner for the Class of 2012/2013.

There were only four of us from Sabah out of the first batch of 300 graduates. In fact, 20 from Sabah passed the exam and made it to the list of the Adjudicators.

The CIPAA, the Construction Industry Payment & Adjudication Act 2012 has already been passed by the Parliament well before the recent GE13. The implementation of the Act however is still pending because the Minister has yet to sign the document on its actual implementation.

In the meantime, all the adjudicators are still unsure when will be their first test as the actual adjudicator!