newest recruit to asrame budi.......

Newest - Baby Shawn, and Not So New - Baby Tua YihYi

Baby Shawn - recruitment date July 25, 2011

a long while...........

Nothing beats the excitement of getting an email from a dear old friend first thing in the morning, and surely nothing beats the excitement of getting an email from a dear old kindred whom I've lost touched with for a bit ;o)

I'm so happy I have to post this up!

FROM:
Sherena Nair

TO:
arteo@yahoo.com

Monday, July 25, 2011 3:41 AM

a long while.....

Dearest Roddy

First of all, congratulations on your MPH!!! What are your plans at the moment and where will you be based? I hope that you are well.

I know it has been an immensely long while since I last corresponded with you - but something happened today and the first person that came to mind was you. I have been reading your blogs on and off and I too do think about the Fuzzy Project, about all the things that could have been and I should have done....and for some reason, these last few weeks, my mind has been feeling so very unsettled about the future.

Life has obviously changed for me, married, and doing the everyday-things that married people do, but there is constantly a void - that void that can only be filled with the doings of a JR, or the christmas list for kids, etc.....

So what happened today - I am not sure if you are still a church-goer or not - but I have been a relatively luke-warm catholic these last few months. Partly because of events that have taken place in my life, but today I went to mass. And as I sat down during the homily, something came over me and I felt this pit in my stomach - and I thought I was going to be sick for a moment, and then it passed. But throughout the entire service, I had this resounding nagging in my soul - of needing to do something different with my life. I still have no idea what I'm going to do.

Hence, I was wondering what your Red Nose plans are - what are your intentions? What do you want to achieve? How can I help - financially perhaps, or brainstorming? I don't know. I want to rekindle that spirit of vigour and passion that we had when we sat around the table for a much-needed debriefing session...... to feel that exhaustion after a good day's work, but most importantly, I think I need to start fighting the good fight again.

I am terrified of what this change might bring about. The path that I have to walk, feels very uncertain, yet much needed, with a million unanswered questions. All I know is that I have to make a start, and perhaps with everyday that comes, the universe will unfold itself.

I really hope that you are happy Roddy, and I wish you all the best. Do drop me a line to let me know how you are doing. Take care.

love and God bless
Sherena xx

Dear Sherena, Congratulations on your Wedding, I'm truly happy for you and Paul ;o) I wish the best for both of you! I'm just doing these entry to tell you I've received your email and was euphoric to get it on a Monday morning ;o) I'll be replying your email properly soon ;o) I'm posting your email here because I think it may re-sparkle some old amber in some of us old kindreds ;o)
Hope to catch you when you come back to Malaysia, buzz me your dates again please ;o)
Love, arteo

this i like.........

Interpretation #01
Fit man trapped in the body of a Fat man (original)

Interpretation #02
I just swallowed a man and I'm trying to flush him down with some sort of beverage

Interpretation #03
A man playing a Japanese Gameshow "The Wall"

not so cute statistics............

I've done some calculation in this time of self-hating motivation to lose weight, and it seems that I need to give birth to 14.3 babies in order to achieve my (ideal) weight at BMI 23.

14.3 DROOLIN', KICKIN', CRYIN', BARFIN', POOPIN', SUCKLIN' BABIES!!

That's a friggin' lot of epidurals. Feck!

no eye candy.........

If I see an obese person outside I look at them in disgust. I hate it when I see them eating at buffets, pigging out, and at fast food restaurants. I especially hate it when I’m at Wal-Mart and I see some fat lady riding around in one of those automatic wheeler cart thingies. JUST GET UP AND WALK! I know, I know. This seems insensitive. I’m fat so I know what it feels like to be in public and be stared at. Or not even being stared at but feeling like everyone is looking at you because deep inside you hate the fact that you are fat and can’t or haven’t been able to control yourself.

But while I have been fat, I have been disciplined as well. I know I can attain my goals if I stick to the plan. So I use that as a way to separate myself from other fat people, in my mind at least. In my head, I am not the same as them. I am different. Better. But that’s where it gets kind of crazy because I AM fat. I have used the same excuses they have. Done a lot of the same things they have. Eaten a lot like they have. Worn over sized clothes like they have. You get the point.

I’m fat, have been for most of my life....

Quoting Israel Lagares in his blog.

Suddenly the little pebble of dysmorphia that has been snowballing throughout this week came crashing like a boulder.

I am just wondering... I usually get in the mood to shape up only when I have enough self-hatred to fuel the weigh loss motivation, and even after hating the mirror image for almost all my post-puberty life, I've not been able to keep it off. How much more do I have to hate myself to make it work? I do wonder.

A friend just reminded me about the 'buying a new pants you want to get in' trick to keep up the weight loss motivation. Maybe I should go shopping for smaller pants tomorrow.

lesson on happiness #001..........

What does it take to keep a little girl happy? Nothing much but a felt tip marker, a piece of paper and some colour pencils...

But I guess more than anything else, is someone to sketch some bears and lions and fish and hearts on demand, and someone to look over her shoulder when she does the good work of colouring within the lines ;o)


We do not seem to have enough of happiness from material possessions because of s phenomenon called the Hedonistic Treadmill that we subconsciously run on. As we gain more or have more possessions in life, we will take our current standard for granted while our aspirations get ratchet up. It becomes a continuous cycle of aspiration for the next level, which will again fail to satisfy.

Stop for a while, and enjoy the wonder of a 4 year old's wealth of imagination in colouring a fish red, green and purple.

dad's 60th birthday bash.........

convocation 2011 for mph..........

I suppose it is an auspicious date after all...

got fuzz?...............

1. November comes early again this year. Currently having this nudging feeling that I've not been doing enough (or rather not doing anything at all) to leave any significant footprints behind.
2. Whatever I've had few months back on the Red Nose Project seemed to have been buried deep with priorities given to passing the master degree and do well in the exam. Well, passing it I did, but doing well is subject to interpretation I guess...
3. In the moments of anxiety I might have bargained with God that if I manage (or rather, if He miraculously) pass me on that exam, I'd dedicate efforts towards charities that I've abandoned. I guess a promise is a promise, and I am a person of principle. Red Nose Project must be revived!
4. For the past few days I've been (fondly) taking a walk down some distant memories back at the times when the gang was together and we were doing things to evoke this happy-fuzzy kinda feeling among the people we come in touch with (and ourselves mostly it turned out to be). Projects were called Fuzzy Projects. Those were the best times when everyone believes in making a difference and there are no such thing as stupid ideas.
5. So now, my idea is this, I'll gather a group of kindred spirits (God help me in finding more of them!) and dress ourselves in red noses. We'll plan out activities for charities, and sit down to discuss philosophy. I'll be telling them about my version of the philosophy on Fuzzy Project, and we'll always have an empty chair in the gathering to honour a fellow kindred who believes in this so much. Keets, this chair is reserved for you, come back and join us please!
6. Yeah, it's about time we get busy to work on spreading the fuzzy feeling in the world again ;o)
7. So you with us? Where's your Red Nose?

bersih: gangsta in da haus.......

Once when I was little, I remembered an occasion when a monitor lizard sneaked into our house one weekend evening. We were terrified with the visit of such monster into our house. A neighbour who is an auto mechanic (I think he is) came to the rescue to capture that not so little uninvited reptile. There was a short struggle between them and finally he subdued it by pressing it on its neck and catching it by the tail.

This picture evokes the same terrible feeling from that childhood memory. I don't know was it the cop's face or the poor guy being pinned down, but surely this isn't a nice picture to look at.

Here's another unsightly picture to look at.

Sheer EVIL. Goosebumps!

e.p.i.c.f.a.i.l...........

There should be a law to regulate the extend of stupidity allowed in the media in this country. An example of how a backward civilization trying to imitate the technology that is so freely available and still failing to do so, the notion they are even called a 'civilization' should be taken back.

This is an online version of one of the 'mainstream' news media in Malaysia, trying to tweak the truth by pasting up a picture of a terrorist onto the Rally scene in Kula Lumpur yesterday.

Click here for that unfortunate page

Maybe a few pointers would help them do a better job next time:

1. Check for the shadowing, make sure it's similar angle with the rest of the background
2. Make sure the sharpness or the contrast isn't too different between subject and the background
3. Always check for anatomical accuracy, don't make people stand on the medial aspects of the feet, that's too unnatural
4. Go with the general theme of the occasion, perhaps getting a terrorist wearing yellow shirt would make it more identifiable

P/s: Mr Effendy Rashid, putting such a lousy photoxed picture online only shows you're in need of more education, perhaps we can sponsor your classes in LimKokWing or something... This time it's forgiven at the expense of our laughter on a Sunday afternoon, next time it's a crime!

EPIC FAIL!!!

clean up at work.........

Malaysia witnessing the movement of people power in action, something that is essential in a democratic nation but rarely acknowledged here as the ruling party has had their own definition of democracy for the past 54 years. Typical of the men in the cave looking at their shadows analogy, those who are not used to this will be screaming and kicking at the idea of real democracy.

Pictures taken randomly from websites showing the scene of Malaysia finally getting its true freedom, congratulations to those who braved the obstacles during the rally. The journey has just begun, my friends. This is indeed a moment in the history of a reformed nation in the making ;o)

t.r.a.f.f.i.c.j.a.m..........

1. Stupid road blocks everywhere causing massive traffic jams all around Klang Valley. The stupid blocks were for nothing significant in particular, just having those gongbin policemen and policewomen (now that's a call for equality -- sama sama bodoh) flashing a torchlight into the cars to spot what ?? supposedly people wearing yellow shirts. Bodohnyerrrr....
2. The route that I take from Kinrara back to Bukit Jalil after work took 4 times longer than usual. And it definitely didn't help at all when some bodoh babi Malaysians decide to cut queue and use the emergency lane to create a third lane to suffocate an already bloody suffocating bottle necks at the road blocks.
3. Now if this is not infuriating, I don't know what else is... But apparently I am not angry at the Bersih protest. It's the other zhu-tiew-piang at the other side. Bodoh babi!

c.l.e.a.n..........

1. Police road blocks all over main roads bottle-necking 3-lanes roads to single lanes causing crazy jams all over the place. Funny the gov was talking so much about threat and inconveniences caused by the protesters, but up to now the only inconveniences I see are caused by the gov anyway..
2. First patient came in at 2111h, probably due to the police commotion on the road causing terrible jams, and the gov centered media propaganda that instilled fear among the people of the possible 'evil' that the Yellow Rally is up to. Guess they will never realize that their air headed message and deeds are the ones causing so much troubles to the people.

d.e.l.i.b.e.r.a.t.i.o.n....

1. The only recipe for getting things done for procrastinators like me is -- deliberation! There's no other way but to force myself to do it.. Like writing this blog entry. I'm doing this throughout the day, let's see how long can I last ;o)
2. No matter how much practice we get, it's never going to be easy to break bad news to the patients, especially for primigravids who just experienced bleeding with clots well into the end of their first trimester. I've had mothers who seems strong and accepting when I tell them of the probability of miscarriage, and they really do make the job done easier. The one I had this morning cried on the ultrasound couch when I couldn't find the foetus via scan. Yeah, losing a baby even as young as 12 weeks old can be very depressing. And doctors had better equip themselves with soothing words to say should they get trapped in such situations.
3. Early weekday clinics are kinda shittey to run. I guess 7 out of 10 ends up with MC, and ore often than not, they will spin up some symptoms that don't really tie up with their conditions, and I end up pressing my mind unnecessarily trying to figure out the logic of their symptom reporting.
4. Learning how to write my name in Thai ARTEO (อาเตียว)... cool... but somehow it is back-translated to Ming Zhang by Google translate, god knows what that means... RODDY is (ร๊อดดี้).
5. Got to know that one is allowed to become short term monk in Thailand, where he will spend the mornings and evenings in prayers and the day time attending Dharma classes. So one can choose to become a monk for 7 days, 15 days or 30 days. Thought that's kinda fun. The head shaving isn't optional though...
6. Have not been able to be disciplined with taking Aviance Slym pills... Got to find other motivation to do it, since paying a huge bomb for it doesn't seem to pinch anymore.
7. Ah... can't wait for Transformers III later. Tickets are sold out for all the nearby cinemas and there are no seats further than the 3rd row from the screen, that's absurd! Lastly I had to make do with watching it at Tropicana, on a Monday night. It had better be worth it!
8. Blogging stopped at 1740pm approximately...