Friday, June 6, 2008

Oh that SPM farewell Dinner


Ages ago guv.. ages

Way back in '96 we had our farewell dinner a few weeks before SPM. The dinner was held at our Dewan Makan. The only real difference between this farewell dinner and our usual “ikan singgang” dinner are

1. We actually dress up and try to look half decent
2. Forth former serve us food instead of us lugging the heavy metal trays
3. The table is less oily than usual (hardly any fly!)
4. No stray cats with gnarly skin disease under our tables. there was this cat who is blinded on one eye. the left eye pops out due to infection.For a week or so he "terrorised" us at the Dewan Makan. Cool shit!

So that was our “cool” farewell dinner. When I look back at the photos, I can’t help but smile and I told myself “damn that was a really awesome night”. You want to know what is so awesome about that night? Read on!

After the dinner which ended at about half past ten (yeah gosh! 10.30 pm dowl! that is longer than prep malam) me and a friend of mine decided to go to the academic block to fetch some notes.As SPM neared no one dared wasting a night without revising on something. We were walking down the long covered corridor between the Dewan Makan and academic block when I spotted something bizarre about 50 feet in front of us. At the end of the corridor I saw a white figure hiding behind a column. The friggin thing didn’t even touch the ground and was hovering ominously behind said column. I looked at my friend as asked him;

“Bro.. lu nak lagi ke note Cikgu Hasmah?”
“Penting sial.. gua kena hafalkan mekanisma mitosis malam ni jugak”
“Ok ok.. gua rasa kita amik kanan kat sini kita pusing ikut blakang lab bio“
“Alright.. aku rasa ok idea ni

Off we went through the biology lab so that we won’t have to meet the floating blob bastard. Essentially we are taking the long way around the school ground to get to our class. On retrospect what we did was kinda stupid since the most haunted place in school is the biology labs. There were stories about pregnant lady apparition and headless creatures lurking in toilet. But at that time we totally forgot about these stories since the actual “threat” was at the end of the covered corridor. We made “turtle track” all the way to the academic block to retrieve the notes. On the way back we chose a different route to teh hostel. The logic behind this was maybe the floating ghost is a brainy one and decides to surprise us at the biology lab if we walk through there. Pah! We are just trying to outwit this creature! Buat malu budak MRSM je kalau kena sergah secara predictable oleh hantu. That was one memorable farewell dinner. Good times… Good times

So why am I writing about a farewell dinner I had over a dozen years ago? Well my sister will be having her's this year and she dragged me to One Utama to get the supplies. Apparently the dinner will have a masquerade theme and she wanted to get a cool mask for her dinner attire. So I end up telling her the story above

“So what is the point of your story Abang? Your dinner is so lame and ordinary?”

Well adik, the moral is when I was your age a dinner is just a night where the menu is a bit grander (we had KFC instead of smelly singgang! LUXURY SIAL!) and we dress a bit nicer (instead of baju semayang maghrib/ prep malam).We have no time for fun and ended the “dinner” before 11 . We all then went back to the dorm to study and no floating apparition can stop us from revising about Mitosis that night! Now that was a bloody awesome farewell dinner!

p/s: yeah.. it's actually a shitty dinner. but the ghost bit makes it supa dupa

Monday, June 2, 2008

Dumb it Down


Lets just combine karaoke and guessing! that's a WINRAR formula!

I don’t really have much time to watch the telly these days but from time to time I would surgically excise myself from this keyboard for some telly time. I usually kept my channel surfing within the range of 551-555. If I’m really bored out of my mind I would venture out to 712 or 703. Yesterday was an exceptionally boring day and I found myself stuck on 104 (Astro Ria) and I was gob smacked by the shear idiocy on show. They are showing “Jangan Lupa Lirik!” (JLL) which is the localised version of “Don’t Forget the Lyrics!”. The premise of the show goes something like this. Contestants are required to complete a line from a song. If your lyrical IQ is up to scratch you can win RM 1,000,000.

Before JLL there was Who Wants to be a Millionaire (Millionaire). And before that we have other good general knowledge shows like Teka Ria and Angka-Angka. In all these shows no one ever won the top prize. If I am not mistaken the most someone ever won on Millionaire was RM 250,000. I won’t go out and say Malaysians are dumb. This is just isn’t true. My main gripe with Millionaire is the inconsistency of their questions. If you watched the US or UK version of Millionaire you can see that the questions in the show are localised. This means that they won’t ask a question about the history of Zimbabwe on either show. In the Malaysian show, the RM 500,000 question goes something like this;

Manakah diantara kapal berikut tidak ada didalam flotilla Christopher Columbus?

A)Nina
B)Pinta
C)Santa Maria
D)Santa Anna

Now how many of you guys learn about Chrissy Columbus's discovery of America in school? I don’t see how they can justify plugging North American history in a Malaysian show. Simply put they just don’t want anyone winning the million dollar price! This is akin to Regis Philbin asking the American contestants this question;

Who killed Altantuya Shariibu?

A) Najib C4
B) Rosmah Tua Vogue
C) Raja Petra Kamaruddin
D) Depends on who you ask!

In case you are wondering, the answer to both questions is D. HA HA

JLL is another example of the dumbing down of TV shows over the last ten years. In the US they have Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader. This show further enhances the stereotype of stupid American. Just Youtube the word “Stupid American” and you will laugh your ass off. Here we just bypass "Darjah 5" and went for the lowest common denominator which is crappy karaoke lyrics recalling game! Hey Malaysia why bother flexing your brain and learn about facts in Millionaire when you can learn about stupid rock kapak lyrics! Do you know that in the XPDC's “C.I.N.TA” ,after “ C.I.N.T.A K.I.T.A” the next line of the song is “Satu rasa” ? . Now you know! Please add 5 into your collective IQ now. It’s simpler and less taxing! We even put your favourite host Aznil Nawawi to entertain you!

‘Nuff said. Now please enjoy this song from Lupe Fiasco. It sums up the problem with entertainment industry these days wherever you may be.

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