Do you think the Jet man's contraption might be available for rental in amusement parks soon? Or maybe they might commercialise it and make it available at Toy'R'Us? It will be so exciting to fly one to work... or visit my mom at Kulai with this. No more worries about traffic-jams and long, boring journeys. I suggest a light-weight but indestructible exoskeleton as a peripheral for this product. And a bumper-like device in place of the helmet. Just in case ;-) 

Original story below:

Swiss man flies over Channel on jet wing
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2008/09/25/international/i082419D20.DTL

^{Photography by Dian Agung Nugroho}

What's the use of going to school when we do not learn to honor the humanity of another? What's the use of knowledge when we have no self-knowledge? What's the use of material wealth when we are consumed by our demons inside?

Why are we sending our children to dance classes, piano lessons, dramalabs and all other extra-curricular activities  to enrich the lives of our children but we won't spend 15 minutes a day speaking to them about the need to love and respect for another? 

Dear mothers of the children of the world,

Please teach your children the meaning of love, honor and respect because one day you might find out too late the disdain you've modelled to them so carelessly in your selfishness will stare you in the eyes, cold and demeaning, just like you.

SKY BURIAL n. a traditional Tibetan funeral ritual in which the corpse is exposed to the open air to be eaten by sacred vultures

I had sworn myself off fiction after my post-grad on Malaysian fiction. I had enough of stories. I think it was a little like when you had been in the kitchen too long, you discovered you have lost your appetite for food.

Over the past 15 years, I can count the number of novels that I have read with just one hand. Therefore I surprised myself by finishing the novel below, Sky Burial by Xinran, in 3 hours. I had originally bought it for my 12 years old. I saw her sitting on the couch, transfixed. Then it was my turn.   

The blurb says,

'In the early 1960s a rumour circulated through China that one of its soldiers in Tibet had been brutally fed to vultures. Xinran was a little girl: the tale frightened and fascinated her. Thirty years later, she met a Chinese woman who could tell her the astonishing story that lay behind the legend. Her name was Shuwen and she had spent most of her adult life lost on the Tibetan plateau. . .'

The story begins as below;

'In 1994, an old woman dressed in Tibetan clothes smelling strongly of animal skins, rancid milk and dung sat down opposite me in the town of Suzhou in China, and began to describe the 30 years she had spent searching for her husband on the Tibetan plateau. I was working as a journalist at the time and had made the four-hour journey by bus from Nanjing to interview her. Her name was Shu Wen.'

A haunting story told simply. 

Here's an interview of Xinran, who also authored the acclaimed, 'The Good Women of China'. 
http://www.randomhouse.co.uk/xinran/qa.htm

If you get to visit China, which part of this big country will you go?

I got to ask myself this question this time. I've not been to China so I am taking my guys over for a 5 days trip to the Middle Kingdom. Beijing was a good candidate for the trip. So was Shanghai. But you know, I have this thing for nature and the cultural part of this country. All things considered, (cost too, of course) I am taking all my guys for an experience of that part of China we have always seen and heard of, but only as paintings on the walls and stories from our grandmothers across Malaysia.

Guilin, this will be the first time I will set foot on the land of my ancestors.  

I am reading Nassim Nicholas Taleb's, 'The Black Swan : The Impact of the Highly Improbable'.

For a person who likes to identify everyday patterns and enjoy 'making predictions' about what will happen based on what had happened in the past, this book is a rude slap on the face. A big slap.

But well, since I pride myself as someone who has the appetite for the truth, no matter how indigestible, I read on, slaps after slaps.

And I have been enjoying the stinging blows of Taleb's contrarian insights very much.

There's a sado-masochist in me, I guess. ;-)

When I was at school, (...twas long time ago...in the 70s and 80s...) I remember having 3 choices of school shoes. Bata, Fung Keong and WARRIOR SHOES. And the coolest was the Warrior High-cut basketball shoes that I can buy from main-street, Kulai. I wore it from Form 1 up to Form 5.

If you wear a pair of Warrior, you jump higher and you dribble better on the court. If you wear Bata to play basketball, you are a geek. That sounds familiar, no? It was the Nike Air of my time! Well guys, we've been there, done that. And it cost a lot less, our performance shoes!!!

Back to the story, I wore it almost everyday for Five long years, then I forgot about them...until today, that is.

Apparently, the brand didn't just die. I grew out of it.

Warrior shoes was THE SHOE of China from the 70s to the 90s. It was the shoe of the farmers, factory workers, construction laborers and the leaders of the country. Everyone will have a pair at home. However, with the economic reforms and subsequent wealth of the country, the younger generation look to brands like Adidas, Nike, Convderse, Reebok, etc.

From what I heard, the brand is making a comeback. It was featured in the Beijing 2008 opening ceremony. Remember the thousands of martial art exponents leaping in synchrony. They were assisted by Warrior Shoes! And Orlando Bloom was caught wearing a pair in his new film. (sorry, I don't know the name...) 

Jump higher with Warrior Shoes! 

Eat your heart out, Converse! Warrior's Superhip Cross-trainer...

Wohoo! A whole collection of Warrior shoes, retro and hip! They RAWK! :-)

Alright! I am gonna pick up a pair on our upcoming trip to Guilin, China.

Read more about this brand here:
http://www.bookofwarriors.fi

It's good to note that our work (XIMNET MALAYSIA) for Ngee Ann econdary School and Microsoft Singapore got featured in The Star over the weekend. Here's a caption of the article:

How far can you go with the use of ICT in classroom learning? In Singapore, there seems to be no limit.

NEWTON’S students think he is smart and patient. There are 40 of them in class, but he always gives them individual attention and is generous with his compliments whenever they get an answer right.

The Physics teaching assistant is also known for his sense of humour.

“Tell us about Newton’s Law 1,” says Secondary Three student Teo Wan Jing.

“Take a book resting on the table,” says Newton. “What do you think are the forces acting on it? Weight and normal reaction (Type 1) or friction and air resistance (Type 2)?”

“Type 1.”

“That’s correct! The weight of the book pushes on the table and the table exerts a contact force that pushes back on the book.”

To test if Newton is indeed as funny as people say, Wan Jing pops the next question: “Am I pretty?”

Immediately, he replies – “Why don’t you ask me about things that I’m here for?” – and ends his sentence with a smiley emoticon.

Wan Jing and classmate Ong Sin Yee burst into laughter as they read Newton’s reply on Windows Live Messenger, an Instant Messaging (IM) tool that enables a user to send and receive messages, photographs and videos.

Newton is not your usual Physics teaching assistant. He is a Windows Live Agent (WLA), an “always-on” character who can chat with students about Physics, ranging from the background of the famed scientist he is named after, to the theories behind topics such as gravity and forces.

“WLA is a chat interface based on the interaction between a sentient human ‘speaking’ to a computer with artificial intelligence capabilities to achieve a goal,” says Alvin Tan, subject head of Information and Communication Technology/Media Resource Library at Singapore’s Ngee Ann Secondary School.

The goal, in this case, is to teach students about Newton’s Law in a pilot project involving 80 students, in collaboration with Microsoft Singapore.

Read the full article here:
http://thestar.com.my/education/story.asp?file=/2008/8/24/education/1860517&sec=education

I attended Sime Darby's inaugural Developing Sustainable Futures Lecture Series last night.

While  I was listening to Prof Emir Salim, I was reminded of the similarities of the theme of his talk to this book I am currently now reading, THE NECCESSARY REVOLUTION, by Peter Senge, author of 'The Fifth Dicipline'. Senge is the proponent of The Learning Organization, a  systems thinker that overhauled  the business world with his deep insights into the way organization thrive and fail, depending on its ability to learn and reflect. Peter Senge was named one of the twenty-four people who had the 'greatest influence pver the last 100 years' by the Journal of Business Strategy.

Senge asked himself this question, 'What is the ultimate learning goal of an organization?' To be more profitable? To be more efficient? To be more effective?

To what end?

He thinks the real goal of learning organizations is to create a SUSTAINABLE WORLD, without which, we are all headed towards the harsh reality of a civilization trapped in its own illusion, spinning towards destruction in the next decades or so.

Just as we have watched many many cycles of economic bubbles, we are headed for a bust as the people of the Industrial Age Bubble. This giant bubble that was fired by the non-renewable fossil fuel economy  is coming to an end.

Either the Industrial Bubble ends with a new, sustainable model of development, or we might go the way of the Mayan civilization.

What role would you like to play in this?

Deborah pointed me to this video. Classic Carl Sagan.