Color advisor for your house!

/* November 14th, 2009 by poobalan | View blog reactions No comments »
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I still remember the trouble we went through to get an idea of matching colors for the house. I used some of the freely available tools in the Net, like EzyPaint which was very useful in choosing (and also avoiding) colors.

Good to read that Jotun has provided a tool as well, the Color Advisor. All you gotta do is taken a picture of your room and upload it into the net.  Oh ya, you have to register first with a valid email address. I didn’t try it, but looks like fun. Its available in English, “Malaysia” and Chinese, but no Tamil.  Tak-1Malaysia 🙂

Happy Coloring!

8 tamil schools in danger

/* November 13th, 2009 by poobalan | View blog reactions No comments »
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While its good to hear that Selangor government is allocating RM4 million for Tamil schools next year, the news that 8 schools are having low enrolment is a cause for concern. Why aren’t the schools relocated like those Chinese schools? Even today’s paper mentioned about relocation of a chinese primary school from Bagan Hylam to Bukit Tinggi 3, Klang with expected enrolment of 1500! The school got free land and RM1 million from developer while government giving RM3 million.

But Tamil schools? Not many developer want to give land. And government not  giving enough funds to build buildings that cater for large number of students. The money given is barely enough for population of  few hundred students only. After few years, overcrowded.

THE Selangor government has allocated RM4mil in next year’s budget for the development of Tamil schools, reported Malaysia Nanban in its editorial.

It, however, added that eight Tamil schools in Selangor may be closed due to low enrolment.

Education, Welfare and Research Foundation president S. Pasupathy said during a press conference that six schools in the Batang Berjuntai area have fewer than 30 students.

“If Selangor faced this situation, there is a possibility that other Tamil schools could be facing the same problem,” he added.

Pasupathy asked Indian organisations to get parents to send their children to Tamil schools, otherwise the continued existence of Tamil schools could be affected.

Brother shot dead, sister drinks poison

/* November 13th, 2009 by poobalan | View blog reactions No comments »
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Brother shot dead by police, so sister drinks poison AND poisons her four kids! I couldn’t believe it at first when receive email from HRP. Who in their right mind would take suicide as an option. Yeah, you loved your brother. But to the extend want to murder own kids as well, so that they “can be with him”? Who’s going to answer the kids’ father?  Is the lady being selfish? – she want her brother and also her kids, so kill them too?

If she survives, there would be an attempted murder case against her. Who is going to take care of the children? What happens to the marriage? All gone down the drain? These 4 kids end up as product of broken family? If not handled well, may produce 4 more criminals?

What made her contemplate suicide? Didn’t she know its a sin? Where is the counseling for family members of the dead? High time such a unit is set up to provide support for family members.

I don’t think her case should be used by HRP to make a point, it gives a wrong picture.

Unable to stand the grief of losing her youngest brother in a police shootout recently, a housewife and her four children consumed poison so that they could “all go and meet him.”

R. Seetha, 33, is said to have given her children drinks doused with weed-killer, before downing a glass of the deadly poison herself.

Seetha’s brother Surenthiran, 24, was one of the five suspected robbers and alleged member of the PCO Boy gang killed during a police shootout early Sunday morning.

According to Seetha’s sister Parvathy, one of their siblings Sumathi, three, had seen Seetha and her children drinking the deadly potion at about 8.30am at their parents home in Kg Berempat, in Kapar near here on Thursday.

“Sumathi grabbed the drinks from them and called for help to rush my sister to a clinic in Kapar before bringing them to the hospital,” said Parvathy, 28, at the Tengku Ampuan Rahimah Hospital here where the family has been warded.

Seetha was still fighting for her life at the hospital’s emergency unit whilst two of her children — Darshini, nine, and Yugendran, five — were unconscious at the intensive care unit at press time.

According to hospital sources, Seetha’s condition was fast deteriorating as the weed-killer had severely damaged her internal organs.

Two other children Usha Rani, seven, and Navina, three, were warded at the children’s ward.

Seetha’s lorry driver husband M. Manimaran, 35, said his wife had told him Wednesday night that she wanted to see her brother and be with him.

“I didn’t take it seriously and am still unable to understand why she has done something like this,” said Manimaran, adding that Seetha was exceptionally close to Surenthiran.

Seetha is the third child whilst Surenthiran was the eighth sibling in a family of nine children.

Both Seetha and Manimaran and their children, who lived in Gemenceh, Negri Sembilan, had come to her parents home to attend Surenthiran’s funeral.

Seetha’s father R. Ramapathy, 61, said Seetha was not able to accept the manner in which her favourite brother had died.

There was a lot of talk at the funeral about how he was killed, and this visibly upset her, he added.

He said his wife R. Saraswathy, 54, was inconsolable and shattered over what had happened.

“We lost our eldest son in an accident not long ago, followed by Surenthiran’s shocking death and now we may lose Seetha and our grandchildren,” said Ramapathy who stood vigil outside the emergency unit.

Klang district police chief Asst Comm Mohamad Mat Yusop said police were investigating the case under attempted suicide.

Meanwhile, Human Rights Party chief P. Uthayakumar who was at the hospital said that in the event Seetha died, her remains would be brought to Parliament as a mark of protest against police shootings.

“The police should arrest suspects, charge them and send them to prison if found guilty instead of shooting them down,” he said.

Manoharan unhappy

/* November 13th, 2009 by poobalan | View blog reactions No comments »
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Interesting to read the article below. While some may choose to brand Manoharan as being racist or narrow-minded, I have to say one thing – when issues involving Indians arise, there seems to be very little noise from the PR side (only Manikavasagam always create some ruckus). So, can the public be blamed if they think the PR coalition doesn’t care that much?

DAP assemblyperson M Manoharan today described Pakatan Rakyat-led Selangor as no different than the previous government run by Barisan Nasional.

In his 20-minute Selangor 2010 debate debut, the former ISA detainee and Kota Alam Shah assemblyperson said the Pakatan government should have rewarded the Indians the most. His reasoning was that ‘they are the ones who contributed to the coalition’s huge win in the last general elections’.

Manoharan also chided Menteri Besar Abdul Khalid Ibrahim for only having one Indian exco in the government leadership lineup.

“The government is supposed to appoint two Indian excos. Instead, they only gave one (to Dr Xavier Jayakumar). [so, who made the agreement to have two EXCOs and why only got one now?]

He asked why Bukit Melawati assemblyperson M Muthiah wasn’t appointed as well. Manoharan said that as Muthiah is an engineer, he would be qualified to be an exco. [Good question. How many others are equally or more qualified than Muthiah in terms of academic/professional qualification?]

Manoharan also attacked the menteri besar for giving a ‘less-important’ porfolio to Jayakumar, a dentist. The latter was tasked with the health, estate workers, poverty and caring government portfolio. [it also depends on the person on the seat to make use of his portfolio and help people. What are the things being done for estate people? What are the funds available for poor people? All these come under Xavier.]

“If a dentist from Umno (Dr Mohd Khir Toyo) could be made a menteri besar, why isn’t a dentist in Pakatan given a more important portfolio?” said Manoharan.

Manoharan said the menteri besar should not have commented on a case sub judice (under judgement) when Khalid rebutted the accusation that Umno was involved in the infamous ‘cow-head’ protest last August.

Last Tuesday, Khalid defended Umno over the recent protests against the relocation of a Hindu temple in Section 23. Though he admitted that the protestors were from Umno, he stopped short of accusing the party of orchestrating the protest.

Continuing his tirade, Manoharan said the budget presented by the state government should have addressed more plights among the Indian community.

“Selangor still does not make Indians as its priority. I hope they will come up with their own think-tank so that they would not lose the Indian support in the next election,” he said. He cited Hindraf’s think-tank as a deciding factor in Pakatan’s win in the last election.

At this juncture, PKR rep Azmin Ali (Bukit Antarabangsa) interjected, saying that any Pakatan assemblyperson should champion every race, rather than focusing only on one race.

“I am a Malay, but I don’t champion my own race. I am concerned about the Indians and the Chinese too,” said Azmin (left). [But I can’t remember him commenting on any issues related to Indians so far. Anyone can help out here?]

He also said that the menteri besar, although he did not come out with specific programmes for the Indian community in the budget, still allocated RM4 million to Indian vernacular schools. [Yeah, this is one good thing, but the other schools (chinese, missionary, and agama) also got RM4 million each. But more importantly, how many schools have received their own lands?]

Azmin also said that Khalid had allocated RM2 million to estate workers’ children who were mostly from Indian families. [this is a good thing too, hope its an annual thing, and similar help should be given to the pribumis as well]

“I can assure you that throughout the time we have governed the state, the state government is always concerned about the Indian community and other races as well,” added Azmin.

However, Manoharan remained unconvinced, saying that such arguments were also made by BN previously.

Application for IPTA for SPM leavers open for Sesi 2010

/* November 11th, 2009 by poobalan | View blog reactions 8 comments »
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Application for SPM leavers to apply for local IPTA is OPEN already. Deadline for FASA 1 is 31st December 2009. No need to buy PIN number from BSN until next year, so just apply first!

Main url: http://upu.mohe.gov.my/

Application page: https://upu.mohe.gov.my/online1011/spm/mohon.php

New calculation of merit marks: PDF file

General guideline for SPM/STPM leavers:
http://www.portal.mohe.gov.my/portal/page/portal/ExtPortal/STUDENT/GENERAL_STUDENT/Student_Admission_Public/eguide/am

Schedule of whole process:
http://upu.mohe.gov.my/portal/epanduan/TARIKH%20PERMOHONAN%20KEMASUKAN%20KE%20IPTA%201011.pdf

Any questions, just leave a comment, and i’ll try to help.