Earth Hour

 Yes... it's the talk of the world... Earth Hour.

Tonight, people all over the world will switch off their lights for one hour, from 8.30 to 9.30pm in an effort to tackle our world's climate issue, particularly global warming. But I can't help but wonder:

Does Earth Hour actually bring any effect to our climate?

 Okay, let's look at it this way. There are 365 days in a year, and 24 hours in a day. 365 x 24 = 8760 hours in a year. Does turning off ONLY our lights (yes, if you aren't aware, this campaign only says switch off your LIGHTS. Not your TV, computer, washing machine, rice cooker, etc) for ONLY 1 hour of those 8760 hours make any difference to our world's climate? sure, people would say "DUH, it's like, a global thing? So like, billions of people all over the world will off their lights too? And they can like, off their appliances too, duh." Of course, but ask yourself, will EVERYONE switch off their lights and appliances? Within our country alone, many, many people will think "Aiya, just one hour only. No point oso." or "Aiya, I one house dont off nevermind lah". What they dont realise is that perhaps a quarter, or maybe even half the country is thinking this way and wont off their lights. So what about on a global scale?


Next, this campaign is only done once a year. Will it actually make people put in effort to change their way of life to reduce electric, or should I strictly be speaking, LIGHT consumption? For just 1 out of 8760 hours a year, people will say "Hey, lets switch off our lights and save Earth!". Will they maintain this mindset throughout the rest of the year? Surely our lovable KIASUS and NERDS will be up till 3 in the morning studying for PMR/SPM/STPM or any test or exam. What will they use? LIGHTS, fan/AIR COND (hah, even worse). This will just cancel out what they did for Earth Hour. Even if not that, during weekends or holidays, people will be staying up late, using LIGHTS, fan/AIR COND till what, 1-2-3 in the morning?  Goes beyond what they've done for Earth Hour doesnt it? I can go on; look at our (Malaysian) weather. Its so freaking hot. Does it look like Earth Hour has made any improvement? And in this hot weather, what do people do? Fan on full blast, air cond on freeze settings... What does that do? Use electric, release CO2, CFC gases, thinning our ozone layer, more UV rays and stronger greenhouse gases. How about the rest of the world? Hmm? Earth Hour? Will that make a change? Doesnt seem like it.

 Earth Hour. Does it really help? If it's just for one hour a year, definitely not. This kind of thing has to be done on a regular basis if anybody is expecting any positive results towards our global climate. But for now, a lot, A WHOLE LOT of people will be just living (for an hour at least) in false hopes and making feeble, futile efforts to save Mother Earth.

Cockroach

How would you usually wake up from sleep? It would either be:

Your own biological clock telling you to wake up

Your alarm clock

Your parents shaking you up because you're late for school

Your annoying brother/sister/cousin/grandmother/grandfather/uncle/aunt/friend/uncle's-sister's-son's-third wife's- dead mistress disturbing you for fun or for some other reason you deem stupid



Right? Let me ask, when was the last time, or have you EVER, been awaken by one of these:

That's right. Cockroaches. The small, smelly, scary, itch-inducing, f-ugly things that can survive these

but never survive these

So what happened? I was sleeping ever so syok-ly, and then I felt this tingling sensation on my neck. Thinking it was just some mosquito, with one swift move of my left hand it went *SWOP*, and just a split second after my brain was telling me "OH F*CK THIS IS TOO BIG TO BE A MOSQUITO" and soon followed by another *SWOP* away as I brushed it off. I turned on the lights, sure enough it was this brown abomination scurrying around on the floor. I rushed downstairs to wash my neck, took my trusty can of Moooooorteeeiiinn

and when I went back up, it was gone. *Poof*. Vanished.

No not that Vanish...... *Tag Chuah for Lamology*

Why do we have cockraoches for anyway? What purpose do they serve to us? Yea sure they can survive a nuclear blast but apart from that, apa gunanya mereka di muka bumi ini?!?!?!?! Do they help the police?

I dont think so.... Do they help pollinate flowers?

I dont think so either.... Do they help with work in the office?

I'd like to wonder how....

Seriously, if I had one wish right now, I'd wish for every single cockroach, no matter male, female, boy, girl, lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual, whateversexual, young, old, disabled, mentally challenged, mutated, live, dead, even right down to every nest, every egg, and every cockroach sperm and ovum (Whatever it is, im not into biology) to just die (DIE DIE DIEEEEEE!!!!!!!) off and vanish from this planet. Sheeeesh! Useless pests!


PS I know my photo editing skills are below noob level, so just keep quiet on that okay?

PS.S This is the second time I've been sleep-roached (having sleep interrupted by a cockroach), and I jolly well wont be happy if this happens a third time.

BSMM Camp 2010

My last camp for BSMM..... But I'm not sure how to put it in a way that would be interesting to read...

14 March

We start gathering at 7.30, the turn up rather small compared to previous years; 50 something in total. We were supposed to start at 8, but the teacher holding the key for the classrooms came 30 mins late.... tsk tsk tsk. After we opened up the classes and arranged the groups, we got underway with the cooking. We cooked our own noodles with sausages, chicken, fishballs and eggs. We could call it Mi Sup BSMM. =P Ironically we AJKs were the last to finish cooking compared to the members. xD But still, our lunch was satisfying, and the samples of meals from the members werent too shabby either. After lunch we had Fear Factor, but not in the sense we make them eat bugs or anything like we used to see on the TV show. Just some simple, safe challenges that would make them squirmish. The best one was wiping melted chocolate on their hands while they faced the wall, so they couldnt tell what it was. Lots of girls were squealing in disgust only to find out they could actually eat it... nyeheheheh....

Later in the evening we had a short ceramah (yawn, I know) on first aid by Mr Shanmugam, our BSMM district officer. At night, we had our first barbecue in 4 years (but my first). We had chicken wings, sausages, fishballs, crabsticks and some leftovers from lunch. Demand was so freakishly high at first we couldnt wait long enough to cook the food properly... Myself I had to wait till 10.45 to finally have my dinner. It was hot, it was sweaty, but under the bright lights set up by the scouts, it was truly a genuine barbecue experience.

15 March

Started the day with morning exercise by Naren, Chin Siang and myself. Then we had our customary Chicken Dance... I remember my first camp in 2008 they already had this song, I was thinking "What the hell, I aint gonna dance to that", but now, I'm gonna miss it. Then came marching practice, while me and Krishna were cleaning up the barbecue site. After lunch we spent a little while for the groups to create a logo for themselves, followed by telematch. Me, I didnt take part, I went around taking pics instead. Poor Chuah terlecet-ed his foot, shredding off the hard skin, but luckily not the soft skin and flesh underneath
.
At night, we had our first ever campfire. *punches air in victory* and Malam Imaginasi, a small twist on the old Malam Kebudayaan where members were given totally unrelated points, and they have to link them together to form a sketch. Most of them came out quite well, although short. But definitely much better than last year because they didnt know how to make a sketch from the one topic they were given. Since we gave them the points, their work was much easier, Doing it around the open campfire was a new, and most memorable experience. After that we played a short game of "duck duck bang", kinda hard to explain by typing, but lets just say I lost, and did a tribal dance to the tune of Discovery Channel's "Boom De Yada" song. x)

16 March

Simple first aid and marching test... Then... err.... we cleaned up the place, had one last gathering to give away the prizes, took our group photo, and that's it I guess...

The special thing about this camp wasnt what went on during it, but the "journey" we AJKs went through to put it together. There was so much uncertainty whether this camp would see the light of day because of  complications with *ahem ahem*, then there was Chinese New Year taking away 1 week of preparation, our school tests, sports day, other co-curricular stuff in those 2 weeks leading up to the camp. In reality it only felt like a few days since we were so busy. But nonetheless, we've pulled through and gave them a camp unlike any other in the past.

I wont upload that many photos, you can check the video for most of them.

Disappointed.

I've discovered one thing about myself, I absolutely hate it when I put in so much effort and yet nobody cares, notices, or appreciates it. Am I living in a society of teens that dont really give a rat's ass of how much work people put in for the benefits of others? This upcoming BSMM camp is where I'm starting from. Sooooo susah payah I've been telling members about our camp, and announcing it so many freaking times through the PA system.... and then came the entry forms... we printed 100 of these, and all 100 were taken... "wow, what great response" I thought..... and our notice board.... so susah we redecorated it, and i put up the details of our camp..... and what do i get?

1) My own ajk "didnt know we have a camp". I mean WHAT THE FARK?! So many times I had made announcements, and you tell me YOU DIDNT KNOW?! YOU ARE AN AJK FOR GOODNESS SAKE, HOW COULD NOT BE ALERT ABOUT YOUR OWN SOCIETY? And not only that, every time I have a meeting and make announcements 2 or 3 times a week, members STILL ask me "eh, got meeting ah? eh, what time ah?" When I ask them why dont they hear the announcement, they say "class very noisy la". YOU GOT LEGS RIGHT??? SHIFT YOUR FREAKING ASS OUTSIDE WHERE IT'S NOT NOISY AND LISTEN LA!!!!!!

2) The entry forms. 100 taken. How many returned? 50. HALF! HALF!!!!!! Then why bother taking in the first place if you dont go?! There might be others who really wanted to go but cant because all the forms were taken (which also implies registration is full). But then you dont bother to AT LEAST RETURN THEM AND SAY YOU DONT WANT TO GO?! WHAT IS THIS?!

3) Notice board... Why is it there? For announcements right? So logically members will go there to check for updates of meetings and what not right? WRONG!!! THEY DONT BOTHER!!!! People ask me "eh what time's the meeting ah?" or "eh where's the meeting ah?" CHECK THE F---ING NOTICE BOARD LA!!!! WHY DO YOU THINK WE PUT IT UP THERE IN THE FIRST PLACE?!?! And for the camp, I put up the details of our camp there, especially things to bring for the camp, people still ask me "eh, what to bring for camp ah?" WHAT?!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!???????!!!!!??????!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Seriously, if this is what I get after putting in effort for BSMM, I might as well put no effort, bersikap lepas tangan and just randomly pick the new AJKs; especially considering the newer generations of BSMM members are nothing like 4-5 years ago, or back to my brother's time; strict, tough, dedicated. Now everything's the opposite; soft, pampered, and having a meh-attitude (save a few who are responsible and active, and also my current AJKs who are doing a fine job). And with only 50 members (including 17 AJKs) coming for the camp, it's quite clear that unless the new AJKs have something godly in them, BSMM will be reduced to nothing.

More so, BSMM is what I feel in general the most noble of the uniform bodies in the school's co-curricular system. Our main priority is learning first aid, learning to save lives. Marching is just some obligation from *ahem*. Whenever there's a major event, the organisers come to us for our emergency services, because we are the ones they trust the most in case of any serious injury. Is it scouts? or Boys Brigade? or KRS? Or Girls Guide? No. Its US. BULAN SABIT MERAH MALAYSIA. And all our services are F.R.E.E. 0 Ringgit, 0 Dollars, 0 Yen, 0 Rupees, 0 Pound Sterlings. Your trust in us to do our duties is all we need. Beyond that, there are so many aspects of first aid service we learn that other uniform bodies dont. This knowledge can be the difference between life and death. And best of all, this knowledge can be applied anywhere, anytime, by anybody, as long as they know how to do it. Sadly though, members now dont join BSMM because of this great cause, they just join because they want the easy life.

I stepped in with the ambition to recover this society. My AJKs and I have made so much effort to reshape BSMM for the better; fixed the financial accounts, reorganised our stock records, reshuffling our meeting timetable to meet the whines demands of members and most importantly put in much tighter rules and having the last in a dying breed of strict AJKs to put back some discipline into BSMM. Through stories from my seniors (who also knew my brother), I got to know of how ACS PBSM used to be so full of quality, having inspirational and dutiful AJKs and aspirational members that actually HAD the dream of becoming an AJK to don the dashing all-white uniforms and be a leader to the members. Now members just complain that their legs ache and they've been marching under the sun "for so long". Back then, there was barely such a thing as members complaining and making a fuss. What has happened to the glory days of PBSM?