Archive for November, 2008

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SPM student taps rubber at 3am then goes to school

November 24th, 2008
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This is among the most heartbreaking news I read this year.  I really don’t know what to say!

But I know what to do:

Those who want to contribute can send cheques to the Maragatha Ambiga Fund, c/o Negeri Sembilan MIC, Jalan Tuanku Antah, 70000 Seremban or contact Rajagopalu at 019-6612337 or 06-7622609 or Tampin MIC division chairman R. Rajendran 013-3532526.

Imagine getting up at 3am and until night no rest. How would the poor girl cope with the studies? Lack of sleep, lack of rest, lack of nutrition, lack of money, peer pressure. God, if she gets good results, have to salute her! Also, I respect her for not abandoning her studies or her family. Bravo!

This should serve as a wake up call for parents and adults. Take care of your health. Don’t be a burden to your family and make them suffer.

Why her plight went unnoticed for more than a year? She kept quiet? None of her friends knew? No teachers knew? How about the people in the estate? Or the local politicians in the estate? Since the family received RM200 (not mentioned from who) for schooling assistance, there could have been some way to extend it to welfare and medical assistance as well.

SPM candidate Maragatha Ambiga wakes up at 3am to tap rubber for three hours before rushing to school.

This is what the Fifth Former, 16, has been doing since her parents fell ill in August last year.

She would ride a motorcycle to the 4.6ha rubber estate in Bukit Jalor, about 10km away, and help a neighbour tap rubber for three hours before returning home at 6am.

She would then clean up and head to SM Bukit Jalor which is 3km away.

She gets RM20 a day tapping the rubber. If it rains, she would not get any money.

Student breadwinner: Rajagopalu (left) taking a look at Ambiga’s SPM’s revision books. With them are her father Ramasamy (right), mother Tamil Shelvy and brother Suriya. Looking on is Tampin MIC division chairman R. Rajendran (second from left).

He mother V. Tamil Shelvy, 42, became asthmatic in August last year and was unable to work. Her father P. Ramasamy, 48, was a lorry driver before joining his wife to tap rubber. He also had to stop working because he is a diabetic and has high blood pressure and heart problem.

She has a brother, Suriya, 10, who is studying in a Tamil primary school.

Ambiga’s plight was brought to the attention of Negri Sembilan MIC chairman Datuk T. Rajagopalu who visited the family in Taman Air Kuning Selatan, near Gemen-cheh about 75km from here.

Tamil Shelvy said her daughter’s rubber tapping provides the only source of income for the family in addition to the RM200 welfare assistance for the children’s schooling.

She said that her family members had refused to help her out and instead, had asked her to get her daughter married off.

“I want my daughter to study hard and be somebody in life.

“I have confidence in her,” she said.

Ambiga, who is currently sitting for her Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) examinations, said she had to work for the sake of her family.

“I am confident of passing and hope to secure a place to attend teacher training course as I want to become a teacher,” she said.

Rajagopalu said he would assist the children with their education.

He had also made arrangement for Ambiga’s parents to receive treatment at Seremban Hospital and for a contractor to do some repairs to their house.

Those who want to contribute can send cheques to the Maragatha Ambiga Fund, c/o Negeri Sembilan MIC, Jalan Tuanku Antah, 70000 Seremban or contact Rajagopalu at 019-6612337 or 06-7622609 or Tampin MIC division chairman R. Rajendran 013-3532526.

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Friend

November 24th, 2008
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Sometimes is not easy to see things clearly. For example, imagine being informed that your good friend (who is like a sibling) just gave birth (as in a baby!). Well, for one, that means we have not met face to face for such a long period of time! That’s life in the fast lane. Even though we live within traveling distance, but very hard to meet. Can’t believe its been months.

But wait a minute, we do chat and email every other day. Not to mention plenty of SMSes and phone calls. It kind of substituted the need for physical meeting.

A friend would share the good things and the bad things with you.  People have reasons for not sharing things. To protect others, for example. Or lack of trust. Or its just their nature. Perhaps its quite personal.

So, what is a friend actually?

One thing for sure, no one is like me. There’s only one Poobalan. :-) I learnt to appreciate myself recently.

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Posted in Personal

pensioners can work as bloggers

November 24th, 2008
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Yup, you read that right. Pahang is the place to be for pensioners. The state government is offering jobs as bloggers to retirees. So, all datuk and nenek, please apply now! Benefits include Internet access at your homes.

Their jobs is to “thwart slanderous comments and allegations posted on the Internet.”

So, the number of professional bloggers (who blog for a living) will increase tremendously.

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Posted in BornInMalaysia, TechStuff

Silibin remains, so no referendum?

November 23rd, 2008
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The family of late Patto rejected the proposal to rename Jalan Silibin to Jalan Patto. They were quite distressed and unhappy that the contributions and sacrifices of Patto were belittled or even unknown to the residents. Some excerpts from Star below:

Patto’s widow Mary, 59, said the decision was out of respect for the Silibin residents, who had protested against the proposed name change, and not out of fear.

“I am very sad and hurt to say that as a family, I will reject the offer to rename Silibin Road because of the controversy and uproar,” she told a packed press conference at Wisma DAP here on Saturday.

Speaking softly and passionately, Mary said she and her daughters were greatly distressed by newspaper articles suggesting that Patto had not done anything for the people.

The widow described her husband as a simple and humble man who wanted unity for all races, who often gave up his time with his daughters and wife to travel around the country.

“It was for the people that he lived for. When he lost his parents in Bagan Serai at a young age, he went through a lot of hardship and found many people living that way too.

“Those feelings stayed with him until he decided that he should work for the voiceless and that he would sacrifice his life for the less fortunate,” said Mary.

Lashing out at critics saying her husband had done little for his constituents as the Bagan MP, Mary said Patto was a national leader who struggled for everyone.

“He spent 18 months under ISA detention because of that struggle. What has Patto done to you?

“I am asking the public: Please do not attack us anymore. We have suffered enough. He is not here to defend himself,” she said with emotion.

To a question, Mary said the family was open to any other suggestion by the Pakatan Rakyat government to honour her husband.

Patto’s daughters Shaalini Anne, 27, and Kasthuriraani, 29, were of the view that it was not right that the people should remember their father because of a tussle over a road.

“My father’s struggle was not superficial. The newspapers have been quoting the minority who protested. What about the thousands of people who agreed to renaming Jalan Silibin?” said Shaalini.

Possible that the current generation does not know about Patto, what more of his contributions. People move out, businesses take over premises, things happen. Unless its properly documented somewhere. We can trust the history text books (and really, how many students love to study history subject?). Some won’t even know the name of all 5 prime ministers, what more of a opposition MP.

I guess the Silibin people have moved on. They really don’t see the need to rename the road. Purely viewed from economic and practical points.

However, does this rejection mean there won’t be any referendum to reveal the wishes of the people?  Since the road won’t be renamed, obviously no need to ask for opinions. I was looking forward for the referendum as it provided people a chance to directly have their say. Looks like have to wait for next controversy to come along.

It seems now that a new DAP research centre will be set up and name after Patto. The ‘P. Patto Research Centre’ will be its name.

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Bloggers Buff 2008

November 23rd, 2008
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I was running late (isn’t that becoming a recurring theme of late?) for the Blogger Buff event today. Was in two minds on taking public transport. Since it was already 8.25am when I left home, decided to drive. Took me 40 mins via KL-Putrajaya highway to reach PWTC. Guess what – the place was full of people! They have Stamford’s convocation, GoMobile 2008 expo, Batik Fashion show, and a career guidance programme.

I was a bit lost in PWTC and asked the guards where’s the venue that Tun Mahathir will be attending. Guess what? those guards were blur! I got suspicious. Don’t tell me security is that lax until guards don’t know ex-Prime Minister is coming? Something’s not right here…..

Managed to find the venue and got myself registered. Said hi to Amutha, Novinthen and Mahendran. Met Puvanan and Kavilan as well. Then came the bad news. Mahathir not coming. He flew to Syria (???) yesterday. Hmm…how can this happen?

And guess who was the replacement? Syed Hamid Albar!!! I couldn’t stop smiling at this point :-)

The crowd grew steadily till about 80% full. Syed Hamid came in at 10.20 or so I think. It was quite a late notice and he had to come all the way from Kota Tinggi this morning. With the formalities done by the emcee (Sarah), we got to hear Home Minister Syed Hamid Albar deliver his keynote address.

He spoke about many things – importance of bloggers, the need to be responsible, creating an ethics code, and so on. I had a feeling that he didn’t really understand or meant what he spoke. It sounded a bit unnatural for me. He read parts of his text and added some of his own points, but still didn’t really gel. You can read parts of it at The Star.

The Q & A session started off with a Putera MIC fella asking about ISA detention and the status of Hindraf 5. The minister gave an elaborate answer on how ISA works, and the possible ways for a detainee to be released. According to him, those detained under Section 8 will be facing a panel of 3 people after 3 months, and subsequently every 6 months. This panel will evaluate if a detainee is fit to be reintroduced into the community. He stressed that ISA is mainly for prevention. Then, there were questions on the MSC Bill of Guarantees and the arrest of the Sin Chew journalist. The Q & A time was limited thus not many questions were asked. For me, there were few points mentioned by the minister which is contentious or inaccurate. It was then time for tea break. Syed Hamid left after that, and so did about 15 % of the crowd. I met a participant from last year’s Blogger Buff -Dayah. She has completed her studies and is planning to further study. Wish she will succeed.

The next session was a dialogue kind of thing with Datuk Ahmad Talib (Pahit Manis) as moderator. Ahirudin Attan (Rocky Bru) and organising chairman P Kamalanathan were the panelists. Here the focus was on bloggers ethics, responsible blogging, role of bloggers, comparison between print media and Internet, citizen media, selective presecution etc. Again there were some inaccurate points mentioned.

I think the participants were not so interested in the sociopolitical angle so far. Some of the Indian participants perhaps were more interested, but I’m not sure about the rest.

So, it was a welcome relief for some when the third session started. Josh Lim of Advertlets provided some tips on blogging and the need to have the passion for blogging. Tim from Empower Lives also spruced up the environment a bit with his simple but meaningful game.

Lunch break was at 1.45pm (self-funded) and continued with another dialogue session at 2.30pm. It was moderated by Felicia Wong. The participants were Dr Sunny (Big Boys Oven), Jason (Jason Mumbles), Ka Ling (Ling) and Gina (Mini-Bites). Each were involved in different types of interest, nothing remotely sociopolitical. All four were asked questions on why they blogged, what they blogged about, how long they’ve been blogging and so on. Their shared their opinions on blogging about work/office (definite no no) and about politic (all of the seem to be averse to politics!). They tend to stick to “safe” things. Hmmm…takde oomph la. Where got fun :-) I guess for them, sociopolitics means saying something that may offend the authorities. Why want to go asking for trouble. Better keep the mouth shut. All four spoke about the need to have passion and interest. The money part is secondary.

The session ended at about 5.30pm, after which there were some photo session.

I was surprised that the crowd was less than last year. Probably the topics did not interest bloggers. Things like law, ethics, unity, accountability etc. doesn’t affect the non-sociopolitical bloggers much. The crowd was quite mixed – newbies, blogger hopefuls, experienced bloggers- all were there. Not sure how much each of them benefited. As for me, I think about 50 percent beneficial.

Some photos I took:

By the way, where’s the lucky draw prizes? :-)

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Posted in I Was Here, TechStuff

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