良薬口に苦し Ryouyaku kuchi ni nigashi

ひどい風邪をひいている。。。I've catch cold...and it is the worst one among several series of influenza I've had before in my life...Seems like my body is still in the stage of adapting to the winter condition..cold and dry...I still managed to attend my everyday routine to the kenkyuushitsu but with less experimental activity and more to surfing and reading journals..

My bad influenza starts with only a few cough but it get worst day by day..By recommendation from a lab friend, I bought Benzablock, self-remedy lozenges (24　in a box) for cough and flu with natural herbs costing 900Yen at the Coop's pharmacy. They even bought me some kairo カイロ, sticky patches like koyok in Malaysia but you stick it outside your inner (not directly on skin) and it will transmit heat to your body so that you will feel pleasant in the cold winter. A few attempts seems promising but nevertheless, I still have running nose and dry cough (It was real bad when I'm accidentally awaken in the middle of the night just due to coughing and don't really aware when did it ends and continue sleeping). Despite of the never ending cold, I thanked my lab mates a lot for their approaches in trying to make me better. Japanese, although advance in technology and standard of living, still possess the uniqueness of Asian culture in morality and good conduct. This treatment makes me really feel that I'm not that far from home.

Another unique character about Japanese is that they will try their best to prevent themselves from being a vector in spreading the virus to other person. This could be done (in case of influenza) by wearing a mask. During winter and rainy season in Japan, you could find almost everyone with influenza or running nose will cover themselves with masks. In spring however, the mask is used to prevent from inhaling pollens, a common phenomenon where thousands were warded due to allergic reaction and this has become a common reason to escape school and work. There is even a USB-attached mask on sale (please refer this catchy advertisement).

Thanks to God that I rarely fell sick but when I got hit once, it will be a heavy one.I personally feel that this fight with influenza and dry cough will never ends without an antibiotic as it keeps on haunting me for two weeks. So one day, I and Asmadi (another Malaysian friend in Energy Science doing phd trying to cure his frequently nose bleeding) seek consultation at the Kyoto University Student's Clinic (same with Klinik Mahasiswa in UM but with better service). After filling the all-Nihongo form (luckily I practised writing my faculty address and home address a lot earlier) and helping Madi explaining to the cute nurse about his condition, I got my consultation from a young physician and a friendly nurse asking friendly questions after realizing that I could understand Japanese.

As a result, I end up with several medication prescribed by the physician and being charged 390Yen. So affordable for students like me!! (please refer pics). I went back to the kenkyuushitsu and straight consuming the prescribed drug. One of them which comes in a form of white powder in a small packet is sooooooooooooooooooooo bitter!!!!Never had anything like this before!!! As I complained about it, a friend next to my desk Matsuda-san said that there is an old Japanese proverb 良薬口に苦し　Ryouyaku kuchi ni nigashi which means Good medicine tastes bitter. I automatically remembered about a perumpamaan Melayu 'pahit seperti hempedu' and later spend some time explaining it to them. May I have a speedy recovery so that everyone in the kenkyuushitsu will be safe from the virus. Hehehe..till then, I need to sleep...seems like the flu pills I consumed earlier has started to react...

Just merely a ranting...

The year has yet come to an end again. But this year, I'll probably celebrate it differently as I'm far from home. Normal new year celebration (Gregorian) for me for the past 4 years is by spending time with Shikin at any countdown party to watch fireworks together. KlCC is a favourite site of ours because it normally held the biggest fireworks show every year. Then, the long night out will be continued with a BBQ party cum poker nite at Alan's place with other budak koleq (Alan's place is a permanent venue every year although Alan have been moving from condo to condo for three times up to this year coz his place always come with a perfect site for pool-side BBQ plus a aplendid nice view too) New year morning for me will start with a breakfast with my mom at any stall as it is not good to ask your mom to cook breakfast on New Year's Day (my principle. ..hehehe). How will I celebrate it this year? Still have no clues about it and I think it will be not much than a visit to Kaiten sushi, bowling, or just stay home in front of the laptop, writing new year resolutions and online.

JLPT-2 was very tough. I don't think I could pass it the way I passed JLPT-3 last year. Last year, I took the exam while starving at the test site in Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM) as all the cafeterias were closed due to semester break. So last Sunday, I have brought 3 chocolate bun and a bottle of mineral water to satisfy my hunger during the short break between papers. I have also happens to meet two Panasonic scholars possesing contradict personalities at the test site, Bo Eng (who worries a lot but usually excel in the exam later on-Malaysia ) and Mervyn (who will always say everything is great but later bochi bochi-Phillipines). As special as their character are, I believe that they must also an excellent student in academic or else they might not be here representing their country. After the exam, I took a chance cycling along the river to Sanjo. There, I grabbed a hot small-sized Creme Brulee at Starbucks and spend some time at Teramachi's Random Walk, a bookshop to ease my mind before heading home.

Back in Malaysia, I get to know from streaming online news that the nation is currently suffering due to big flood. Johor in the south, northern areas covering Perlis, Kedah and Pulau Pinang and Pahang in the east are several states affected with thousands of people fleeing home for safety in temporary refugee center set up in schools and community center. Lucky for us Malaysians that flood-related diseases has been successfully wiped off decades ago and therefore, casualties are rare. So far, no relatives or family member involved directly as a flood victim but some of them volunteers in collecting food and supplies from their co-workers and neighbors before sending it directly to the families affected. It is something we should be proud of as they did this without any political affiliations, just plain volunteer without excessively large mock cheque of taxpayer's money and big smile on newspaper front page. Thanks to them and only God could repay their kind deeds .

Flood situation in Kampung Laut, Skudai, Johor. (pics fr sirloinskipper)

To all flood victims in Malaysia, please take care and I will always pray for your best recovery in the aftermath.

Love and Peace...

Autumn is nice. It is even nicer when you get a chance to stroll along the river to view the reddish leaves of the trees. Despite of my busy days at the lab doing experiments and preparing for the upcoming JLPT (maybe it's too late..huhuhu), I still be able to afford one evening to visit Kiyomizudera (one among hundreds of UNESCO's sites here) during its 'Light-up'.

Being there with two guys who also happened to come and study in Kyoto last March, I'm quite sabishii (lonely) to see loving couples walk themselves up to the tera. I got to know from a Japanese friend that in a love relationship between a Japanese guy and a Japanese girl, a Japanese guy usually tend to act over-macho, over-protective but in the meantime also calculative and not gentleman. That is the main reason why Japanese girls have tendency to search for a foreigner boyfriend. I personally did not agree with this as I always do believe that Love itself is magical; when it strikes you at the heart, everything else like stupid behaviour or bad deeds just doesn't matter that much as you have to love somebody for who they are, were and will be. Love neither should be a burdon to oneself nor should restrict oneself from being himself/herself. Love should support us to be the best in everything we venture into. A labmate of mine spend hours of time and even sleep at the lab to finish his experiments on time so that he could spend one whole week of holiday with his girlfriend who currently resides up north in Niigata while another friend sticked to bringing bento (boxed lunch; usually home-cooked) or eating salad everyday just to buy pricey present for his girlfriend. So who said that a Nihon-jin guy is not a gentleman or romantic, maybe it does not apply to all but most of them..I don't know...

One night, when I accompany a friend to the Sakyo-ku post office (Japan Post, its mado-guchi offers 24 hour service..see picture). I have personally experienced a situation involving a couple and the old oba-chang (female senior citizen..In Japan, retirees still very much wanted for part-time jobs). It started when this couple of lovers requested to pay for the charge to send a pile of their letters with credit card. As the clock just ticked 2 a.m in the morning, the old lady refused to accept the payment as she said that it might not be accepted by the system. The guy suddenly shouted in rage that he never seen such a stupid post worker in his life like this old lady and preached to the old lady what is the meaning of 'customer is always right'. While the old lady keep apologizing, the girl slammed the counter, said a few angry words and pulled her bf out from the post office. Nobody acted to solve this 15 minutes drama (if in Malaysia, I promised that this guy must have been knocked out by other customer.... who were waiting in long lines behind him). I'm quite shocked but did not dare to react in this foreigness situation of me. After that, the old lady continued serving other customer with her shaky hands.

Whether my friend's opinion is true or not, I would like to call to everyone to love, respect and value everyone with honour regardless of their age, skin colour, ideology or whatever characteristics that makes us different from one another (especially involving senior citizens, children and female). Only with that, every single unit of living things in this world from Jerusalem to Congo and Sierra Leone could live in peace. Peace for all, let's spread the love...

What is the value of science without humanity...

I was exposed to theaters at my very young age when I still didn't know what it is all about. It was back in 1993, where Malaysian economy is still at the peak of prosperity before the 1998 economic crisis that my father ran a company offering creative works and consultation. Among his awarded jobs are design sets for theaters produced by National Art's Academy or Akademi Seni Kebangsaan (ASK) (Currently ASWARA..offering academic program until Diploma level) apart from numbers of TV programs sets, Shopping mall's festive decorations and tourism promotions. During that time, Istana Budaya haven't been build and theaters were performed at Panggung DBKL, MATIC and ASK itself. I couldn't remember all the titles but mostly it was directed by old skool like Uda & Dara by Ahmad Yatim and Kena Main by Khalid Salleh. Practically, we could watch all the theaters for free but at that age, I am still fond towards collecting Marvel cards more than this artistic performances.

In college, theaters were performed annually for Merdeka and sometimes on Teacher's Day, mostly organized by MC Production House (abbreviated as MC Prod..hehe..always fought with lebai-lebai among us when organizing concerts). It was really busy to be part of the production team (reasons to escape prep classes and stay up late over light's off time) but also full of joy. I have involved in few of them, if not all and have enjoyed every second of pre- and post works of it (although I do always get a role as a Japanese kenpetai or kenpei, maybe because my eyes...sepet).

Unfortunately, I have missed to watch both of our latest and greatest (by testimony from critics and theater fans) theater production which were the Puteri Gunung Ledang: The Musical and P.Ramlee The Musical. Craving to watch it from Japan, I only could read or view it partly from the informations available online (online newspaper, blogs and YouTube). However, I am very happy that during the Panasonic summer seminar, we have been given an opportunity to watch a musical theater performance by Shiki, an illustrious theatrical group in Japan. This 'Lion King' musical based on the original Disney Pixar animation Lion King were presented in a splendid 2 hour performance. Looking forward to watch more performances by Shiki!!


Last 23-25 November, Kyoto University held its November Festival (大学園祭　Daigakuensai). Luckily, I have been invited by a friend (who is also an actor in this theater) to come to a play entitled 'Red Demon' (Aka-Oni..please refer to the Kanji in red) specially performed for this festival. I was very 'lucky' because my new friend doesn't even know that I love theaters but instead just invited me to come. This play is a masterpiece by Hideki Noda, a famous playwright of modern Japan. The original version is entirely in Japanese language but this play have also been staged in English, Thai and Korean languages too. For this Kyodai version, it is performed in bilingual mode, English and Japanese to suit a bigger audience.

Red Demon is a story of humanity. It starts with a man who was washed up to an isolated island with no means to communicate and explain where he is from. The islanders then mistakenly thought him as a red demon, who possibly eat human flesh for food and related to some monster. However, he has been taken care well by That Woman (Ano Onna), a girl who lives with her brother and sister. That Woman is the only person who could communicate with the Red Demon. The villagers however misunderstood the good deed of this Red Demon in an incident where he saved a baby from being kidnapped. The Red Demon together with That Onna were then executed by the villagers but That Onna's siblings managed to save both of them and left together in a rowboat. Their tiring journey begins and the play ends when all of them came to a place with beautiful rainbow, far away over the seas.

In my opinion, the Red Demon play actually symbolizes the beginning of the modern period of Japan (late 19th century-present) where Japanese ended their seclusion from the world and rushed to catch up with the industrialized West (Meiji government policy). During that period, foreigners start to dwell into the society and as typical as everywhere in the world, differences in culture, language and characters start to form a slight spark of doubts between the locals and the outsiders. However, Hideki Noda through Red Demon wish to deliver to all of his audiences (especially his fellow Japanese) that the new world (represent by the analogy 'the land beyond the sea') needed all of us to tolerate between each other peacefully, learn to accept dissimilarities and changes.

Recent unhealthy issues represents by street demonstrations, peace walks and outraged by minorities back in Malaysia reminded me that we Malaysians should also learn something from this Red Demon play. Malaysia has been famously renowned for its delicate ethno-political balance, and this could only be maintained if we keep opening up our minds to accept differences and learn to live in it by tolerating among us. Malaysia has always been open to the world even since Malacca glorious years where languages, religions and cultures of the world had passed through here. So there is no reason why we can't survive another centennial of peace, respect and mutual prosperity.

(I purposely wrote this just an escapism out of my busy laboratory works and experiments..Afterall, what is the value of science without humanity....)

Reading is to the mind what exercise is to the body...

I have just finished reading Kam Raslan's Confession of An Old Boy which surprisingly took only seven days of delivery by ordinary air mail to Japan (bought it online from Selects Books, Singapore..). The author has successfully relinquished the untold story of a fictional character named Dato' Hamid (DH), an anglophile budak koleq and a humble MCS officer back in the old Malaya. I am sorry to say but rigid minded people may look this piece as a full 7 chapter of book telling how typical a Malay Collegian could possibly be by always in love with sports (for DH it's hockey... and not to mention long lists of old boys heading the national sport's association and mere example of my 9701 brothers, always crazy about football and nonetheless, play rugby for MCOBA), hot girls (in DH case, it's always foreign beauties..in our naive years, girls from Tkc and Stf..later Sri Aman, TTDI, Subang and Assunta) and wine (no comment).

I, however..being characteristically analytical in my points of view and always try to see things from a different angle found out that this book have successfully revealed some important distinctive qualities that a true Malaysian or Malayan (as per described by the author) possessed but now had lost over the time. Malayans at that time are people with full of adventure (as per potrayed in Tun M's poem 'Perjuangan Belum Selesai')...who is at young age travel far either for knowledge or complacency...a Malayan is always a charm little Asian gentleman who will never forget to tell about sunlight and palm trees, endless empty beaches and the dense jungle lair of tigers and elephant of his lovely country as part of an introduction to himself..DH in this story is nevertheless a student cum traveler, playing drums in nightclubs with his Kelantanese friend, Nik during summer holidays..but never forget to come back home to Malaya..maybe you said that you have been chosen among thousands of applicants to undergo apprenticeship in PWC London straight after graduation but please do remember that at one point after your long years of climb towards the uphill track to be a chartered accountant, you must later go back to serve your country, your people in whatever means you could...I have personally seen students graduated from Japan who seems forgetting their roots...never mind their hair colours and style.....never mind their weird Malay accents..just please come back to serve your people when you already get what you wish for...stop trying to be somebody else...especially when your source of scholarship is related to the pile of taxpayer's money in EPF or whichever other Fund it may be derived from...

DH also faced a tough time to reject 'duit kopi' when it is the only way to fulfill his Anglophilic desires beyond his pay as a government servant...Borrowing Kam's word....What do you do when your tastes have been conditioned to be expensively international, but your training is to be a government functionary? Cynical to the present situation, Malayan at that time were Anglophilic but Malaysians currently are becoming Anglicized, proved by the increasing rate of shopping visits to London.

Go grab this book if you love nostalgic memories and would like to learn from history. Maybe I should stop now and figure out what happen to my order via Dawama for two books on two prominent leaders of ours.. Dato Onn Jaafar and Tunku Abdul Rahman...it has been 2 weeks since my third mail of ordering..no wonder Malay Language progressed so slow..just look at the efficiency of the guarding entity and its marketing agent..Just wonder how long it will take for the books to find its way here...

Let us learn a lot...and make no more repetitive mistakes..

Proclaim (Read) ! In the name of thy Lord & Cherisher,Who Created..
Created man, out of a (mere) clot of congealed blood...
Read ! And thy Lord is Most Bountiful,-
He Who taught (the use of) the Pen, Taught man that which he knew not...

(Surah Iqra/Al A'laq)

*If any abbreviations in this article is not fully understood. Kindly post a question in the commentary section about it. I will attend to it shortly.

The price to pay for development...

Doing research in Japan is just not the same like doing it elsewhere. I am still wondering and learning on how did they incorporate their customs in life (over-rated respect towards seniors/superiors) into science and technology but yet progressed much in this field. We all knew that rigid minds hardly made new discovery due to lacks of creativity but as special as Japan itself is, this special people with their special way of thinking and extraordinary hard work just could make it happen. Equipped with this attitude, no wonder these Japanese who was at one time the losing team in WWII, now emerged as the second largest economy in Asia and the world leader in terms of technology and industrialization.

One chill evening, as my eyes and body grew tired out of 5 days research work every week, I took a chance to unwind along the river next to my apato, the Takano Gawa. As I stroll along this smooth flowing river towards the point where it meets with Kamo Gawa at Demachiyanagi, I noticed that despite of being the leader in technovation, Japan has never neglected the environmental factor in its modernization. The river still flow with the same crystal clear water no matter how rapid that the city grows. However, this should not be so interesting to us as we should already knew that a huge amount of money being allocated to maintain this condition and by being a developed country, a keen concern towards environmental issues is a must if the government wish to stay in power. Please don't compare it with our Sungai Klang and Sungai Gombak because the politician that forms the city council here in Japan are the one who serve the community well or else they won't get elected. In Malaysia, it's the other way round where the politician are the one who 'wet their beaks' in most of the so-called taxpayer's projects, so just don't compare and contrast before changes being done, or else it might be an unfair ground comparison. ;p true?

In this post, what I wish to highlight the most is the existence of the blue canvas villas at nearly most of the bridge's underpass in Kyoto City. This blue canvas villas is one among few other places in Kyoto where homeless people seek refuge. This is a permanent self-build structure and do belong strictly to the person who builds it. Some of them even had a TV set and even grew their own vegetables at the river banks (refer left pic 2). Homelessness is the condition and societal category of people who lack fixed housing, usually because they cannot afford a regular, safe, and adequate shelter and this scene here just represent a micro percentage among an estimated 100 million of homeless people worldwide. Homelessness have been a major problem to the world for long and don't be shocked if I tell u that among these homeless people in Kyoto, some of them are actually the people who builds the city but get sidelined due to several pathetic reasons. From the information I get from several Japanese friends, some of these homeless people were alcohol abusers but some had really good background. Some were even doctors, managers, engineers and psychologist previously. This shows how different is the homeless society in Japan to the one in America, which occurred due to high rates of alcoholism, drug abuse and mental illness. In Japan, large proportion of the homeless people had steady jobs and stable lives until their companies went bankrupt and they were put out of work, mostly due to the crush of the Japanese asset price bubble (バブル景気　baburu keiki) which represent the time of skyrocketing land and stock prices in the Japanese economy, lasting from 1986 to 1990. The homeless people now are mostly the product of 'bubble collapse' (崩壊　houkai) and this is what we called the price that we have to pay from rapid development.

As Malaysia now moves into its next chapter of the development full with corridors criss-crossing the map from north to south, I do always pray and hope that our leaders will carefully and intellectually plan the best strategy to drive our country. We want to leap, and we want to fly high..but we must always remember that the bigger we became after the leap, the harder we will fall...

Till then for now...Let me enjoy my jog..enough time for serious thinking..I want to let loose and enjoy the view!!

Me & You..Success and failure...

As students, we often search what’s wrong with us and why we can’t be excellent in studies especially when it comes to bad exam results or failure in certain subject. Being just a research student in the beginning of a research life in Japan, I never ask you to believe in everything that I wrote in this article. It is because what I’ve gone through in these 23 years 1 month of life is not enough to endorse me to teach all about success and failure in life. However, allow me a chance to trigger your mind for a deep thinking and to share a little information that I have in this article. By the end, I do hope that you will be able to acquire at least a small chapter of worthy knowledge out of your busy daily life.

Subjectivity is the main element used to describe a successful life. To some of us, living in a simple happy family with foods to feed on everyday and good neighbours is already a success. To others, material wealth is the measure of earthly success. Quoting an old army pensioner that I knew and happens to be my grandfather, “Success is when you feel joy in everything you have achieved with the blessings of God and parents, to win the respect of intelligent people and being love by children, to master your own greed and lust, and to know that even one life has breath easier because you live.” This is what I believe as a principle key for him to have been successfully brought up his 5 children with his limited army salary, all becoming alumni of renowned universities with wonderful career nowadays. Whatever ways you defined success, it surely not far from the reality of leaving the world a bit better than the way we found it

Each of us knew that to achieve success is not an easy task. One has to really work hard for his goals. Success is not a destination but a journey. It is never final. In fact, it’s just a continuity of repeating, reinforcing and refining past achievements and conquering new challenges. A successful person is the person who dreams and works at his dream. Without a positive reaction and just a dream, one may become just another daydreamer and desires remain mere desires.

I’ve seen many among my friends that do not achieve much as they failed to plan for their daily routine at all so I try my best to plan each of my next days. The main subject is not to wait and not to react towards exigencies. The idea is not to type your assignment one day before the pass-up date or it may probably be a ‘cut and paste’ assignment from your friend’s work or the Internet. We must act according to our plan and priorities. Motivational Specialist also suggested that we plan for our next day’s commitment the night before we sleep.

Shortage of time is always a problem but for a successful people, the less time they have to work with, the more things they get done by wise management of time. As we could see, there are some real good role models that venture in almost all college projects, sports and voluntarily charity works during university life but yet still maintains his distinctions in every subject for every semester. Why this is not possible for us? Neither should we allow ‘lack of facilities’ or lack of ideal circumstances to cripple our efforts. We must do whatever we can with whatever resources we have so that we will be prepared for more challenging life after campus.

Adversities can be turned into opportunities. Dares could be doors. Failures are rehearsals for the next successful efforts. Mistakes can become stepping stones for future triumphs. Everyday, some things are being done that many has said cannot be done. Proton, Malaysia’s national car manufacturer was widely criticized in 1984 when Malaysia’s 4^th Prime Minister, Tun Dr. Mahathir came out with this national car project. During that period of time, some of our own Malaysians doubting the ability of Malaysia to produce cars while still importing our own tooth picks from China. But now, the person who once criticized the idea is currently happily drove in the latest model of Proton Perdana to send his grandchildren to school and even advised his daughter to buy Proton Gen-2 that looks sporty and catchy. This is what we called life where twist and turns are all about.

Though life is tough and we all have limitations when some of us born with only average ability, we must also accomplish whatever anyone else can. There are thousands of world class eminent figures like the respectful founder of Matsushita Electric Industries Co. Ltd. (Panasonic) , Mr. Konosuke Matsushita (1894-1989) who start with nothing and born not to a wealthy family but succeeded greatly in life. We must do believe that an average ability with brilliant planning and strong determination can help ordinary people achieve extraordinary things in life. After all, God never gives us more responsibilities than what we are able to perform. For Muslims, clearly stated in Surath Al-Baqarah (2:286) of the Quran, “On no soul does Allah place a burden greater than it can bear”. So, do your best and leave the rest to God.

Failure is normal in life. Please do not see it as the end of the world because perfection is rarely attainable. Don’t waste our life in learning nothing and be a master of zero. Whatever you do, do well. There are no small roles, only small actors. The most admirable of people are those who did ordinary jobs in an extraordinary way. My last advise, do not be intoxicated by success, it is never final. Do not be defeated by failure, it is never fatal. My fellow friends, see you all in the Hall of Fame.