You woke up at 4 in the morning. You had a rough night, hardly slept, deep sleep interspersed with violent rage, dreams a recollection of failure and regrets, memories resurfacing from a deep crevice of the brain, graves of sadness. Not even nightmares, no ghouls or unearthly beasts chasing after your life. At least nightmares are better, you know they’re not real, born from imagination, as soon as you wake up (which you usually will) they disappear, shoved down by the waking brigade to that deep crevice in your brain where all things unpleasant reside.

The world is dark at 4 am. You read somewhere or heard from someone that the world is darkest right before the sun comes out. You’re exhausted from lack of sleep. You want to lie down a bit longer, unable to find a good enough reason to let go of the soft embrace of your pillows, the only comfort you have at the moment. Suddenly, you hear a faint melody surfacing from the vacant air, startled at first, you look around the room for the source of this music invading the silence of early morning. At a corner of your room, on a wooden cabinet you bought just last month, beside the relic of a tv, now broken, huge and black with a blank for a face, a peculiar machine gives out a soft glow of white, red and blue, illuminating you room, light in the deepest dark.  On top of this machine, tentacles, soft but solid, glowing with a soft green light, at first a glimmer but sensing that you’re awake, the glow grows brighter. It’s the magical mucic machine, you set it to start at 4 am but forgot all about it.

The tentacles start swaying despite the apparent lack of air in the room. You now realize how stuffy your room is but instead of opening your window, you chose to suffocate, perhaps hoping this lack of air will induce a sense of euphoria, a sense common during asphyxiation (in other words, strangulation) or for a simpler reason that you’re too tired to get up and open the windows. The sway of the tentacles (with the soft green glow) has a very hypnotic effect, you feel calm and lazy,  still sad, not happy but more accepting of your current emotion. You understand that you’re sad and wishes to stay sad a bit longer. The machine understands you and you’re grateful for that.

You recognize that melody now, the incoherent wailing, hypnotic notes repeated over and over, monotony of emotion played out in a single track pushing you deeper into your shell of sadness, melodies some may mistake as a cacophony of madness but in truth a work of genius, electronics and percussions (bereft of the loud guitar) creates a sense of detachment, of travels in deep space, an alien world that exist on this terrestrial plane.  That melody is radiohead, the machine chose to play kid a and amnesiac acknowledging the deep sadness that resonates from these recordings. The effect you get is hypnosis. You close your eyes and drift into deep sleep.

You woke up, the world is still dark, you cursed the machine, what’s the point of hypnotizing if you can only get 10 or 15 minutes worth of sleep. You look at the alarm clock, green numbers glaring at you, you’re mistaken, it’s 1o o’clock in the morning, you’ve been asleep for the last 6 hours. You’re body aching, muscles tired of sleeping, joints eager to move, you woke up, got down your bed and made your way to the window. You drew up the curtains, the world is dark outside, you wonder, is it the end of the world? It’s raining. You open the window, a gush of cold wind brushed against your skin making you shiver, drops of water stained the front of your pyjamas, thunder roared, lightning flashed. You closed the window out of fear, out of care, careful not the let flood comes through the window or let the wind blows you away into a world of  gales, ice and stormy wheather.

You’re in the kitchen. You are boiling water to make a pot of steaming hot tea. You hope it might cheer you up, it always worked in movies. When you’re sad, make some tea, when you’re sick, have chicken soup, when you’re horny, have sex and when you’re tired of living your mundane life, take the blue pill and follow morpheus into the matrix. You took a stool and sat beside a closed window, staring with vacant eyes, thinking of nothing in particular. You can hear music drifting along the cold wind permeating the silence of the kitchen. The kitchen is suddenly alive, the pots and pans, forks, spoons,spatulas and ladles humming, rattling creating soft vibrations, sound waves so soft you can hardly hear them. You can hardly see anything outside, the world is covered by a veil of grey water.You imagine yourself seeing a field of green grass bending over the weight of cold water, unable to protect themselves against the heavy rain and in the background, tall tress swaying with the violent wind. This is the scene you imagined, a scene evoked by the music you hear, a scene depressing and cold but so natural, calm and beautiful. This is the music of sigur ros.

This tale continues in the next chapter………

Music featured in this chapter are as follows:

]]> http://jeyhan2.wordpress.com/2009/08/23/a-study-on-sadness-part-2-5/feed/ 0 jeyhan Radiohead.kida.albumart Radiohead.amnesiac.albumart hvarf-cover http://jeyhan2.wordpress.com/2009/08/22/obsessed/ http://jeyhan2.wordpress.com/2009/08/22/obsessed/#comments Sat, 22 Aug 2009 05:15:31 +0000 jeyhan http://jeyhan2.wordpress.com/?p=108 ]]> Have you heard the recent gossip about Daphne Iking’s (in case some of you are clueless who daphne iking is, she’s malaysia’s famous model, tv personality and actress hosting shows like explorace and ringgit sense on tv3 and was 2006′s #14 in FHM Malaysia’s Sexiest) husband suing another guy for “enticing or taking away or detaining with a criminal intent a married woman”, whatever that means. The trial had to be adjourned after the judge who was said to have recently recovered from a heart condition became upset after lawyers representing both sides started lashing out at each other in the middle of the trial.

Well, that was certainly uncalled for, so instead of turning this into a huge fiasco which only serves to embarrass both parties and tarnishes daphne’s goody- two- shoes image, i suggest both parties take it outside court and settle this dispute in a more gentlemanly way. Daphne could take the cue from mariah carey and her husband, instead of suing eminem for obsessing on her boobs, recorded a single called “obsessed” and tells the world how eminem is a fuckin loser. Since in malaysia you have to cut a malay single for it to sell, i have taken the liberty of translating the song obsessed for daphne and hope she considers this song for her first single (get that badass lawyer of yours to settle the copyright issue with mariah carey’s recording company). This song is called ” Terhegeh-hegeh”.

Terhegeh-hegeh

Kenapa kau terhegeh-hegeh kat aku?

So oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh oh

So ohX9, So ohX9, So ohX9

Dalam blog kau tulis kita jumpa dekat bar,

Aku langsung tak kenal engkau,

Cakap aku pergi rumah kau, naik kereta kau.

Kau dekat LA, aku kat rumah Jermaine,

Aku ada dekat A (A???????), kau memang tak malu,

Takde sape kat sini sebut nama kau,

Mesti kau hisap ganja, mesti sebab E (E???????),

Cause you be poppin hood, you get it poppin (i have no idea what that line means, so as the rest of the world)

Korus:

Kenapa kau terhegeh-hegeh kat aku, budak aku nak tau,

Kau tipu kau romen ngan aku tapi semua orang tau,

Sah-sah kau marah kat aku,

Akhirnya kau jumpa pompuan yang tak hingin kat kau,

Laki terakhir kat dunia pun tak mampu.

Kau dah jadi gila, kau memang gila,

Kau dah hilang akal,

Kau dah keliru, kau memang keliru,

Kenapa kau buang masa,

Kau makin panas dengan kompleks napoleon (is she sayin that eminem is short? or is his dick as small as napoleon’s?),

Boleh tembus kau macam mandi dengan windex (is that a brand of window cleaner?) .

Budak, kenapa kau terhegeh-hegeh kat aku?

So ohX9 , So ohX 9

Terhegeh- hegeh, terhegeh-hegeh, terhegeh-hegeh.

Kau buat keje kau, kau benci bangat

Tak nak bagi kau makan, biar kau kebulur

Kau sesak nafas, aku tolong kipas

Kau tak cukup nafas, jangan tunggu aku.

Bagi tau satu dunia, kau rindu kat aku,

Kite tak penah bercinte, nape kau sentap,

Kau mak dan bapak, aku syarikat besar,

Aku sidang akhbar, kau sembang kosong.

Ulang korus X 1

Kau sayang kat aku ke? Kau sayang kat aku ke?

Whenever i feel sad, a part of me started becoming aware that i am at this point feeling sad. Some people feels sad but sadly unaware of their own sadness that other people notices their sadness but chooses to ignore them because in the case of sadness, an emotion which is not logical, the brain chooses to ignore it to prevent oneself from getting emotionally involved thus creating a conflict. This is the function of the brain called IQ. But through extensive studies in the fields of psychology, neurology, sociology and perhaps emotionology, scientist has been successful in creating a new terminology (perhaps driven by their own selfish needs to stop people from calling them zombies or frigid bastards and bitches) called EQ. This is a brain function that allows you to feel your own emotions and chooses to sympathize, empathize or simply ignore another person’s emotions.

When i’m sad, i sometime feel an obligation to continue feeling sad. To have this right to wallow is my sadness, feeling that aching feel of loneliness, the emptiness in the chest that sometimes choke you to the point of death. I allow this feeling to grow, turning every single minute of my waking life into a picture of melancholy, seeing everything through lenses of negativity and pessimism. I find music a great help in these circumstances. Music creates the right mood to enhance such feelings of melancholy, fueling it and sustaining it to a point where wallowing in sadness becomes a natural process.

I am sadly not an expert in music. Terminologies and descriptions of works by masters of yonder eludes me for i am not learned in musical history nor technology but what i do know is how to appreciate music and recognize which music tells me best how to be sad. It is also a very sad fact that the radio today doesn’t allow you to be sad. Radio fills the airwaves with one pop song after another and true to its name, pop being pop is all about popping the hood be it mariah carey or lady gaga or lady gaga and mariah carey. When you’re sad they scrutinize you with their bohemian ideas of psychedelic fun and sex day in, day out, numbing your senses, short circuiting y0ur brain. You are a product of the MTV brainwashing program, a generation of mindless, senseless, dumbass,*&@#^!()?><” generation who lives to party (pronounced as “paartay”) and paartay to be alive.

In this section, I present to you my own list compiled from the small number of cds i have in my possession. List of albums that have helped me through my bouts of depression. These songs did not serve to cheer me up and lift me above the grey clouds of melancholy but instead, allows me to feel this sadness, understand it, appreciate it and tell me it’s just part of being alive. I will describe this music to you but i choose to do it in a different way, not the pop way of creating a 10 top ten list of albums which is subject to endless debate, a marketing ploy to increase the album sales. This list is very personal and close to my heart. I sighed and cried listening to these albums. I have taken the creative liberty of using a fictional account of a melancholic man to tell of all these wonderful music. This fiction is called the magical music machine.

The Magical Music Machine

You have in your possession a wonderful instrument called the magical music machine. You can’t be certain how or when or even why you manage to procure such a peculiar thing but you know it’s in your possession and you have a certain attachment to it, in fact, upon careful rumination, you remembered that you love this machine more than anything you have ever possessed in your entire life. That is all that matters anyway. So, you wonder, what makes the magical music machine so magical?

No one knew who designed this magical machine. This machine is attached with sensors like the many tentacles of an octopus and like the octopus’s tentacles are able to sense its surrounding but unlike the tentacles of an actopus does not help this machine to move as it prefers to remain stationary. What does these tentacles do? The uniqueness of this machine is its ability to sense the owner’s emotions through its many tentacles, analyzes in its mini super computer and decides the best music to play in accordance to the owner’s emotion. This machine has a special blue tooth function which enables the machine’s computer to link with the owner’s brain and decides which music to play either to aggravate the emotion, pacify it or in the case of an owner who is unable to decide how to deal with his own emotion, chooses to play any music from a random selection of mood enhancers or mood dampeners.

So it happens one day, you became very sad. You tell yourself this is natural, you’re depressive cycle is setting in, part of you loathed it but another part welcomes it and the EQ part of your brain decides how to deal with this emotion. You decided to remain sad for a few more days and that is exactly what you did. You came back late from work, went to the magical music machine and set it to start at 4 am the next morning as this is usually the time when you wake up every time you’ get depressed. You showered and being too sad for dinner, decided to head straight to bed and true enough, you woke up at 4 am the next morning.

To be continued…………………

I have been suffering from a chronic case of depression since the day i became conscious of my own feeling. Looking back in time, i now realize that it took me nearly a quarter of my life to reach emotional maturity. It is not as though i was emotionally incapacitated for the first 20 years but the emotions i felt are somewhat fake, preordained, determined by my teachers in primary school, by my parents at home, emotions based on simple logic and calculations, happy when i’m called for, sad when my needs are not met, needs as simple as hunger, wants for things as material as a toy or a show on tv i wanted to see. I grew up in a boarding school, i underwent my first experience of brainwashing. My emotions are governed by a simple rule of rights and wrongs, i spent most of my teenage life feeling guilty and sinful, not really aware of this part of me that wanted to break free and be someone else with different ideas of rights and wrongs, with liberty to determine when i should be proud of myself, being wise enough to justify my actions even when my conscience tell me i should feel guilty. I graduated from high school with knowledge of algebra and biology, physics and mechanics, to speak in malay, english and arabic, to recite the holy quran, memorized verses after verses. I came out a model student, physiologically mature (even when i couldn’t understand any of the changes, nobody was there to tell me about it, no one was open for discussion) but emotionally stunted, the part of my brain responsible for feelings was functioning well, i know because i can still feel sad, happy, worried and angry but the other part of my brain that is supposed to think of why i need to feel remains dormant, still very young, immature and unable to form a sound judgement. This part of my brain i fondly refer as innocence.

One day i lost innocence. I’m not sure when but i only realized it now as i’m sitting in front of my laptop writing this piece of self-indulgent crap. I know now that i really missed innocence. I’m tired, exhausted beyond words. Having to think on every single feeling i feel, to justify my mood swings, to give an adult meaning to a childish tantrum, to procrastinate feeling happy and keep it for many sad days to come. Guilt, the most basic but most complex human emotion keeps haunting me no matter how old or mature my emotion age. Guilt is a feeling of sadness, sad at being pitifully weak. Guilt is a feeling of anger, angry of your own weakness but unwilling to blame yourself, put the blame on others. Guilt is a feeling so human yet brings you closer to God, at least that’s what my teacher use to say, i chose to believe it for i am too weary to have my own belief. The innocence i loathed is now the innocence i seek, the innocence i wish i never destroyed in my futile attempt to achieve emotional maturity. In search of emotional maturity, i now suffer from emotional immaturity.

I first became inflicted with depression when i first discovered love. Love is an emotion even more complex than guilt. Love is 20% happy and 80% sad but in a complex way of reasoning, the 80% of sadness happens to be a prerequisite to attain that 20% of happy and through of complex formula of calculation love is 100% happy because in love even when you’re sad you’re supposed to be happy because you’re in love. That may sound incoherent and it may not make any sense but that is what love is all about, senseless, incoherent, immature, juvenile and incalculable. Through love i found a new type of innocence, a higher degree of naivety, a stupendous level of stupidity and a new definition of crazy. In the words of ryan adams, love is hell. Love is an emotional asylum.

There is another part of the brain that does all the thinking in my life. This part is governed by rules and regulations. Formulas formulated based on experiences, the part that coined the phrase learn from your own mistakes. This part to me is very important. Most of the time, my sadness stems from hopelessness, my anger caused by the same predicament. This part of my brain although is governed by rules and regulations tells me that when it comes to rules, you can choose to go around it, bend it, break it, ignore it or if all else fails, accept it. This is part of the brain that produces hope, a function that may seem trivial to others but more than vital to me. A life-saving function that pulls me out from the heaviness of grief and bleakness of desperation. Some may argue that emotion is not logical but to me, the best emotion is a logical emotion, an emotion born from contemplation of cause and effect,  a rational emotion that seems so brilliant that people call you genius. I call this part emotional logic.

After all the senseless ramblings and feverish thoughts, am i getting any closer to find my cause of sadness? Have i found the answer to end all my grief and start feeling happy again? Have i finally found the reason to feel joy? What does it mean to be sad? What does it mean to be happy? Was I ever happy? Am I happy now? Will I be happy tomorrow? Will I ever have a happy life? Will I have a happy death? All i know for sure is that at this exact moment in time, on august, 20, 2009, i started my day being sad, still unhappy until now but i really hope that this sadness won’t last long.

That sadly concludes the first part of a study on sadness.

This is the time of the year when most Malaysian will proudly (or not) celebrate the Merdeka month. It used to be a single day,  but the people with power (PWP) later decided that we should have a whole month of reminiscing and glorifying our country’s glorious independence with a whole fanfare of flag waving, endless sales involving every single departmental stores and hypermarkets, a host of cultural shows in every possible venues, musicals on our late prime ministers (this year it’s tun abdul razak’s turn), petronas sponsored ads (which used to be one of the main highlights until yasmin ahmad passed away), merdeka-themed concerts (which involves the standard issue i.e. “safe” artists belting out the same patriotic songs every year) and last but never the least more of Pak Ngah’s colorful choreography. The celebration ends with guys and gals too high on booze and poppers gathering together and shouting merdeka over and over once the clock strikes twelve on the eve of 31st August (and the sex party that comes after which explains the countless used condoms found all over dataran merdeka) and the compulsory formal parade which involves the same people every single year (Pak Ngah is never left behind), each showing their undying love and loyalty to the country with the customary salute (tabik hormat) to the rows of PWPs seated in the VIP podium.

I’m sure with that paragraph alone (which contains approximately 200 words), I can be taken into custody under the ISA act. In order to redeem myself in the eyes of the PWP, i have decided to present a list of things which are dear to my heart which i think have redefined the image of a modern and independent malaysia for the past 50 years. Things which includes movies, music and food among others, things we can be proud of, things we can do without, things over-hyped and whatever thingamajig that needs to be mentioned. With that, I proudly present the merdeka series in celebration of our country’s 50 years of independence.

Merdeka series #1: Malaysia in Movies

I was inspired to write this article after reading a review by an author in the august edition of the august magazine (a magazine by men for men that celebrates men’s vanity and promotes metro sexuality as a lifestyle). In this review, he listed ten movies (perhaps because he was only given a two-page feature with as least words as possible) which according to him has helped redefine malaysian pop culture and giving it a new light which will propel our country’s movie industry into a new level of sophistication and bravado (pardon the theatrics, we’re talking about movies here anyway). Being the absolutely annoying self-proclaimed movie critic that i am, i have to disagree with some of his statements but i am very, very grateful to him for opening this opportunity for me to discuss malaysian cinema (from a shallow point of of view, don’t take me seriously), something i’ve been dying to do after the passing of yasmin ahmad, one of the greatest malaysian director to ever live (next to P Ramlee). So please bear with me as I go down this ego trip of mine, I present to you my very own list of malaysian movies that made an everlasting impression on me for the last 31 years of my life living in this country (this list is compiled in no particular order).

Puteri Gunung Ledang paving a new direction in malaysian epic movies (or NOT)

I chose to start this article with a review on malaysian epic/fantasy for a very good reason. I strongly feel that in order to understand a nation’s culture you need to have a strong background of the country’s history which is usually presented in the form of epic and war dramas. Folklore and fairy tales passed down from one generation to the other carries a very strong message steeped in moral and ethical values, tradition and religion, all of which help define the cultural image of a nation. Fantasy movies are more often than not based on local folklore and fairytale, rarely steering away from cultural norms in order to stay relevant with the audience. Therefore, in my personal opinion, epic/ war drama/ fantasy is still the best genre to represent a nation’s culture despite the rather small number of production due to the usually lukewarm response they receive upon their release. I’m starting to sound like a fake expert so let me stop here before i make a fool of myself. Moving on.

No one can talk about malaysian epics without mentioning Puteri Gunung Ledang. This movie was produced in 2004, directed by Saw Teong Hin and starred Tiara jaquelina (TJ) as the princess with a very long list of distinguished actors in supporting roles. This movie made malaysian history by being the most expensive movie ever made in this country with a budget of USD 4 million (i used USD to make it sound more expensive). This movie was malaysia’s official entry for best foreign film for 2005′s academy awards but never got shortlisted. Both critics  and crowd loved it but i always felt something missing in the movie.

Here are some of the flaws i detected from this movie:

1. Both the director and writer for this movie decided to use a different take on the legend of puteri gunung ledang. Instead of keeping true to its original story of a tyrannical king and  his overly loyal henchman, Hang Tuah and his relentless pursuit for an imaginary princess who lives on top of the highest peak of peninsular malaysia, they used the “imaginary” love story between the princess and Hang Tuah as the background of the whole movie.  Using love as the selling point of an epic movie is not uncommon. Titanic (James Cameron, 1997) used an “imaginary” love story between two “imaginary” figures with the doomed cruiser as a backdrop and later became the highest grossing movie of the decade. This idea, however, does not always work. Pearl Harbor (Micheal Bay, 2001) used a tragic love triangle to tell the story of the bombing of Pearl Harbor during WWII but was heavily criticized for its lackluster narrative and weak performances by its lead actors. More importantly shifting too much focus on love instead of the tragic aftermath of war has caused the movie to loose its momentum as a strong epic movie. The same goes for PGL, too much focus was given on love without realizing the true potential of this legend in telling a powerful story of the flaws of monarchy ran by a tyrant. This legend was told in a classical malay manner whereby criticism is not penned out bluntly especially with regards to monarchy but told in a subtle manner without loosing its core message. This message however, despite being three hours long was lost in PGL the movie.
2. One of the main attraction of this movie happens to be the epic battle between Hang Tuah and the King of Majapahit. Being the only action packed scene in this three hour soppy love story, everyone was obviously psyched up on how the action scenes are going to play out. As it turns out, this scene proved to be disappointing. If I may recall, this movie takes place in the sultanate of malacca at the height of its reign and correct me if i’m wrong, SILAT and not KUNGFU is the main form of martial arts for both malaya and indonesia. Therefore, i was wondering why Hang Tuah and the King of Majapahit were fighting a duel to death, flying and summersaulting in the air with nary a movement that resembles SILAT. Despite weilding Taming Sari (touted as the greatest keris in malay history), Hang Tuah was waving it around like a wand rather than use it in close combat like in real SILAT. The whole choreography reminds me of scenes from Zhang Yimou’s Hero (the floating on the lake sword fight) and Ang lee’s Crouching Tiger Hidden Dragon (the floating on bamboo forest sword fight).
3. The courting scene between Hang Tuah and Gusti Putri (PGL even has an imaginary name) was represented by a dance. This move was definitely aimed at increasing the aesthetic value of the whole movie. I’ve recently viewed this clip from youtube and one of the fans commented and i quote, ” dance so beautiful,fresh and inspiring-portrays how humble asians are..and how love can be seen clearly without having to cuddle or kiss…congratulations tiara jacquelina..”. To me this scene would have worked perfectly if the choreographers have put in the extra effort to make it more creative, imaginative and more importantly, true to its original form. I am not an expert in dance, but I have seen Marion de Cruz (who is an indian by the way) performed a malay dance with even more grace, humility, sensuality and a greater gusto. Dance which comes from the heart and translated through the movement of the whole body and not just some simple twisting of the wrist   and making an indian/ balinese/ possibly malay gesture with the hands. This may be a dance but not a dance at its finest form, why everyone seems to be making such  great deal about it, i have no idea.
4. I actually have a very personal remark I would like to make regarding this movie but on second thought i’m not going to stoop to that level to avoid sounding unprofessional and giving people the chance to discredit this review as a mere act of petty jealousy. One thing that still eludes me is the fact that the original idea and concept of the whole movie came from mamat khalid (one of malaysia’s acclaimed director, famous for movies like zombie kampung pisang and man laksa among others) but when it came to directing the movie, the task was given to a relatively unknown director. One may argue that tiara (everyone knows that tiara is the PWP in this  production) is opening up chances for new directors to shine but are you willing to trust a USD 4 million production to an uncredit director. Why wasn’t mamat hismself (who will definitely have a better idea of the movie’s concept as it was his own idea in the first place) given the task of directing this movie?

Well enough said, do I think this is a bad movie? No. This movie can be credited for many technical achievements among others cinematography, fashion design and whatever what not, but to acknowledge this movie for its achievement in direction, artistic direction, performances by its two leads i.e. tiara and m. nasir or even screenplay writing to the point of getting the best picture award instead of Sepet (Yasmin Ahmad, 2004) in 2005? I don’t think so. Would I given the power of PWP for one day choose this movie to represent our country for the oscars? No. Would I have chosen Sepet or even Mukhsin instead? Yes, anytime. Am I ready to be scorned and hated by the PGL fan club? Yes, bring it on. Is this the best movie to represent our culture? Maybe not. FYI, this movie has so far won the following international accolades:  “Best Actress” category at the 50th Asia Pacific Film Festival, and  the “Best Producer” award at the inaugural Asian Festival of First Films in Singapore (2005).

To be continued in part 2 of malaysia in movies, coming soon in the cinema near you……………………..

1. Sienna miller’s boobs. After the make over (courtesy of her own pervert brother), the baroness now sports two newly upgraded boobs which almost spilled out from her super-tight black leather suit. Sorry to disappoint you but despite the PG13 rating, she didn’t get naked in any scenes and she didn’t get the chance to make out with Duke or any of the other 4 guys who had the hots for her. What a waste.
2. Channing Tatum’s (CT) hard chiseled body. They manage to gets the shirt off but that is as far as it goes. He didn’t get naked or even half-naked for what it’s worth. I’m sure that would have helped the movie from sinking deep in ice cold water.
3. Fans of the mostly annoying but occasionally interesting Marlon wayans (MW) will be glad to see him in a new light. He is still as irritating as ever but this time he gets to fly a super fast jet and kick ass too. What fun.
4. Famous actors like Dennis quaid and Brenden fraser manage to make a fool of themselves in this movie. How often can you see that? Wait, i have to correct myself, brendan faser is constantly making a fool of himself in all his movies, at least this time he’s not fighting a mummy.
5. If you don’t get enough mayhem and explosions from Transformers, this might just be the movie for you. Heck, both these movies are based on characters designed by the same company i.e. Hasbro. There are enough explosions to blow your minds, even the scene where CT and MW jumped around Paris is a slow-mo action sequence looked like a total rip-off from the two transformers movie.
6. This movie has way too much flash back scenes which was supposed to add some layers of depth to a rather silly, superficial movie. Perhaps the team behind this movie is going along with this new Hollywood’s obsesssion with origin movies e.g. wolverine: the origin, star trek: the origin of spock and kirk, terminator: the origin of john connor. Making the title with the word origin is definitely out of the question, hence the title GI JOE: rise of the cobra which also means, GI Joe: the origin.

Well, i guess that should be enough reasons for you to catch the movie. Do you really need to see it? not really, you can catch it on DVD which will probably come with an extended version or deleted nude scenes of duke, the baroness or maybe even the cobra commander. Will i watch again? yes, if somebody is paying for the tickets. Would i watch this movie just for the fun of laughing at the silliness and absurdities only a true movie critic can enjoy? Yes, definitely.

Ratings: 1.5 out of 5

Part 1: Destro: The Origin

Destro is a scottish arms dealer (funny how destro didn’t even sound a bit scottish in the animation) and a traitor who sells weapons to both the good guys and the bad guys. Apparently, this is a family tradition which runs very deep within the ancestry of the McCullan clan (the movie opens with a history lesson on Destro’s ancestor being tortured by a French guy who sounds very Bristish in a French dungeon). He runs a multi-billion dollar company called MARS with headquarters located beneath a thick layer of ice somewhere in either the North Pole or South Pole (who cares). This company will later funds most of COBRA’s criminal activities and most importantly supplies this organization with high-tech weaponry no single country on Earth possesses. At the end of the movie, he got a total make over courtesy of the soon- to- be Cobra commander (a serious case of bleaching gone wrong using nanobots which turns his skin metallic).

Part 2: Duke the Origin

Duke started out as the leader of  a NATO troop which was commisioned to transport a briefcase containing four warheads armed with nanobots (produced by destro’s company, MARS) to a location which was never revealed (TOP SECRET) before they were ambushed by a group of mysterious mercenaries in the middle of an unknown jungle led by a hot, leather-clad, kick-ass bitch in high heels. He got his (cute, tight) ass kicked by the kick-ass bitch who turns out to be his ex because he could’t hit her because he still loves her and he’s still alive (even when all the other members of his troop got blown to pieces) because as it turns out, she still loves him after all these years and they were hoping that maybe later thay can hook up somewhere and have the break up sex they never had which made her miserable in the first place and decided to join the bad guys and dyes her hair black and become the baroness. Duke later became the leader of the JOEs despite being the youngest and the newest recruit, after succesfully blackmailing the commander, Jeneral Hawk with information regarding her ex (an information they can easily get using their super computer), acing every single test they need to take before becoming official members of the elite team, impressing his instructor (a rather dumb-looking Brendan Fraser) by being the only guy on the base to kick Snake-Eye’s ass (Snake Eye is the only Japanese/ American ninja representative on this team) and best of all, beating the baroness without having to get his ass kicked.

Part 3: The Baroness: the origin

The Baroness is actually Duke’s ex. Her transition from an average blond american with an average fashion sense to a black-haired, kiss-ass, ruthless mercenary with a fetish for leather, high heels, shades and everything black remains a mystery. The only clue we have comes from Duke’s many flash backs (his flash backs alone occupies half of the whole movie), she got engaged to Duke but after her brother’s death she was left alone, was so miserable that she had to sleep in a huge bed in a sexy silk pyjamas leaving her vulnerable to being shot with a syringe filled with nanobots which in her case, gave her a great make over which turns her hair extra black, gives her huge boobs, killer instincts and a fetish for black leather and high heels. The climax of her story is the part where she finally remembered how HOT her ex-fiance is and manages to overcome the nanobots controlling her brains and decided to stop being a kick ass BITCH and get married to Duke, dyes her hair blond again and live happily ever after. This process was supposed to be excruciatingly painful but the only response we get is her fainting and later regains her consciousness with a touch on the touch-screen remote control which Duke managed to wrestle from the hands of the evil dudes. To top all that, she is the one and only woman in the whole movie who has five different guys going heads over heels for her but in the end, she chooses Duke because she loved her even when her boobs weren’t as big as when she got her makeover.

Part 4: Snake Eye/ Storm Shadows: the origin

Snake Eye started as a homeless American boy who broke into a monastery in Japan headed by a Chinese monk only to meet a Japanese boy who fights him to the death for a reason as simple as stealing garbage from the huge, well-stocked kitchen. This boy will later grows up as a Korean ninja named Storm Shadows who works for COBRA while the goody- two- shoes american boy later becomes Snake Eye, a mute ninja who works for GI JOE. SE hates SS for killing his sifu aka godftaher and SS hates SE for taking over his spot as the teacher’s pet thus spawning hatred and rivalry so long that ended with SE killing SS in a very cliched final showdown between two great ninjas that comes from the same chinese monastery in Japan.

Part 5: Cobra Commander: the origin

I want to save this last part as the only shards of mystery left of this whole movie but i’ll leave these clues behind for you to figure it out. Joseph-Gordon-Levitt. Military science officer. Missile attack. Darth Vader. Dr. Mindbender. King Cobra. Nano-Viper. Weird plastic mask. Cobra Commander. Go figure.

To be continued……………..

The question is, how is it in this time and age, where medical technology has advanced beyond dreams, we the so-called children of the millennium has failed to curb the spread of a seemingly harmless FLU virus and worst of all, unable to effectively treat this disease that more people are dropping dead from a simple case of FLU. A more interesting fact to note is that despite knowing that this virus is continuously evolving in the intestines of a PIG, our government (an ISLAMIC government which is supposedly a model for all other islamic countries around the world) continues to support PIG FARMING and takes great care NOT to offend PIG FARMERS and PIG eaters continue to devour this rather disgusting, foul-smelling and seriously ugly animal.

Well, putting that fact aside, I have a few theories regarding the SWINE FLU outbreak and I would like to share it with everyone reading this blog, not as a fact supported by statistics and scientific proofs but rather as a food for thought, something to question, argue, discuss, ignore, deny, laugh at or whatever you wish to do with these theories that i am about to put forth. Read and decide.

Theory #1

The prophet Muhammad s.a.w. once said in a hadith regarding Armageddon:

Count six signs before the Hour: my death, then the opening of Bayt-al-maqdis; then death in huge numbers, like the plaque of sheep; then there will be such an excess of money, such that a man would give one hundred dinars to a (needy) person and he looks at that with disgust; then a confusion that will enter every house of the Arabs; then a truce between you and the non-Muslims (because) they will be exceedingly powerful against you, coming to you with eighty different groups (of soldiers or eighty different compelling excuses); under each group twelve thousand (soldiers or twelve thousand explanations).

Take extra attention to the third sign of the Armageddon (in bold) which says that near Armageddon, a lot of people will die from a disease which resembles the plaque of the sheep. Many scholars (experts in hadith) have agreed that the phrase ku’as al ghanam which is translated as plaque of the sheep is a disease which is airborne and the people infected will display symptoms which resembles flu i.e. producing copious amounts of saliva, nasal discharge and subsequently results in death due to respiratory failure. The description above fits the profile of an influenza outbreak.

This is not the first time such an outbreak has occured (these days they prefer not to call it a plaque, calling it an outbreak makes it less menacing, more controlable and most importantly, without the usual religious connotation), the Spanish flu which occured between 1918 and 1919 took the lives of nearly 20 million people. SARS occured in 2003 resulting in 773 deaths worldwide. The current pandemic of swine flu has so far claimed 1ooo over deaths and until now is not showing any signs of slowing down. Today’s situation which involves extensive travelling around the globe makes the possiblity of worsening pandemic even greater, what started in the american continent is fast spreading to vast reaches of this planet to places as remote as Africa. It is also a remarkable coincidence that the Spanish flu did not even start in Spain as its name suggest but the first few reported cases were traced back to the american continent, exactly like what is happening now. To make it even clearer, the worst influenza pandemic that ever occurred in history i.e. spanish flu in the year 1918 and the worst pandemic to hit this millennium i.e. swine flu that started in April 2009 are indeed caused by the same culprit, a virus called H1N1.

So why is this happening now, after 90 years from its first outbreak? Is the first outbreak  the first warning of Armageddon and will this be the last? Will the world end tomorrow? Will it be that after the final death count and everyone lets out a sigh of relief that this nightmare is finally over, the end of the world begins in all its glory of destruction? Will we live to see that day?

To be continued…………………………..

So you wonder, why am i so ticked off with this person, why am i even calling her a bitch? Let me tell you why, a story which starts six years ago when i first reported duty in the pengarah office, a junior so naive and insignificant, unknowing of this political world that existed only behind closed doors, conference rooms and meeting sessions, private vendetta against one another but in the end the only victim that suffered is a measly medical officer who only wishes for a better life after five years of living hell. Please hear me with an open heart, i don’t have this habit of telling bad things about others but as i slowly loses sleep and my appetite, i have no where else to go, this is my only venue to tell this sad story and hope for a sympathetic ear and a word of advice that hopefully will lift up this grey cloud that hangs heavily around this miserable heart. I’m suffering mentally and emotionally and constantly fighting this urge to simply end my miserable life. HELP ME, HELP ME PLEASE.

I joined this hospital five years ago. After finishing my houseman ship, i was offered a position as a medical officer in the cardiology department, a decision i made since i was given no other choice, it was either cardio or another year of housemanship which was absurd since i’ve already did 2 years of houseman ship in Alor Setar. After joining i’ve made many attempts to leave as i felt that i don’t belong in a field that deals with emergency situations day in, day out. I applied to leave many times but after the first two years, i’ve started gaining confidence, i got better in what i do and decided to stay back a little while longer. I would never have imagined that, that little while longer would last for five years.

Over these five  miserable years, i’ve endured the worst sort of mental breakdown, lost sleep during heavy calls, sometimes not sleeping at all until the break of dawn, the usual office politics and dramatics. I’ve been the best SLAVE for my department and indirectly for the hospital. I’ve been called many names, amongst them cruella de ville, something i find funny but at the same time showing me what i’ve become as a result of all these mental tortures. I’ve lived through all these, still alive, still walking, whole on the outside but inside empty, tired, worn out, bored and most of all uninspired by what i do. Five years is not short and through all these years, many left, my colleagues, my bosses, my juniors became my specialist, junior specialist became consultant and i’m still here, a mere MO (even the word sounds boring). Many mocked me, telling me in the face or behind my butt, directly and indirectly, saying that i’m a slacker, a nobody, lacking in ambition and the drive to improve myself. I’ve been through all these, FIVE long years of agony.

This year marked a change in my life. I have finally got my calling, i felt this urge to end this worthless idling, five years of misery is just too much for someone to handle. I wanted to leave the department and try my hand at a new field, nuclear medicine, a field that is gaining popularity and promises a bright future. From there i will persue a postgraduate degree in the same field and one day come back to serve this hospital as a nuclear physician. This is my drive, my ambition and my hope for the future. I apllied for a transfer, a long and grueling process with lasted nearly six months, endured countless meetings with my own head of department, the head of nuclear department and even the timbalan pengarah, all of whom have been helpful enough to ensure the success of this transfer. The only problem was my transfer letter that was supposed to come last week never came.

To be continued…………………

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

Enjoy.