Jeff''s Made captain Party

The Fine Art Making BBQ Spare Ribs - Eric.

Dubai up to date...at the Bahari's Residence

The truck is still the same only the wheels has gotten larger and the noise louder. The cost of the four wheels alone could pay for my small kancil back home.

But you are young only but once and why not if it is what you like in life and can afford it, why not? So take it to the garage and get those front grills or rod or whatever installed!

Nope, he is not married yet but this is Tiara Steve and Lucia's beautiful daughter. She turned a year old two days ago; Tiara rules!!

At home in the living room two new guitars added to the collection in the living room so I get a chance to reminace some old tunes while doing my painting.

The piano is another new piece of sculpture added to the decor, call it scultpture cause no one in the house plays it anyway, but it make the room looks pretty good and that's what counts!

My ongoing project continuing from last year's visit, the Bodhisatva Manjushri. The infinite Wisdom Bodhisatva that was done in Acrylic before, now being worked on with oil. It is a good warmimg up project to get my momentum going for a marathon painting trip that is long overdue.

My five, pieces of 'connected' landscape which I did on my last visit is still hanging in the bedroom. I like how they turned out if I may say so myself!

Somewhere underneath those rocks there is a Shark about a foot long and waiting for his shrimp dinner.

Steve and Lucia with their lifelong project, Tiara. Whenever I visit Dubai a dinner Steve's is a must, he is a gourmet chef who can whip up anything for you without too much references to recipes, he makes a mean BBQ chicken with his personal mixes of spices bought from every trip to foreign countries and visiting their markets to pick and choose from. He is a pilot so he gets around to do this naturally. 

It's written all over the Mom's face the joy of being a mother! She used to fly too as a cabin crew member. I was there when they first started off together on my first to Dubai and now I am witnessing another adition to their family tree; what a blessing! 

These are actually her first few steps happening right before our eyes! An auspicious moment and that smile on Dad's face tells it all. The hand will always be there for her throughout her life to guide and protect her and those that are there to receive her if she misses her steps to hug her and kiss her in times of need.

So Naz! What in the name of the Makhtum and the Sheikh are you waiting for? Everyone else has become a grandpa,  so get   moving there boy! Make your Mom proud!

Oh my Malaysia 2

I am blowing the Clarion call for the awakening of the old and the young alike to stop for a moment to reflect upon our nation's fate lest we get too carried away with out conditioned minds in letting our self centered emotions cloud our judgement. I am shouting on top of the mountain and over the hills to let our people be set free from the bondage of ignorance and self propagated fears. I am kneeling before my Lord in begging for His infinite Compassion in shedding His Light of Truth upon all of my fellow citizens. I, as a Malaysian am sick to the heart in seeing the path leading to destruction that is being laid before me by those who seek to rule for the sake of self serving self gratifying and power mongering.
I, as a Malaysian would like to see the dreams of my forefathers be a reality and not be traded for wealth and corruption. I and my fellow Malaysians deserve better than to be taken for a ride by those whose thirst for wealth and power at the expense of those whose blood, sweat and tears have helped create this country. I refuse to be led with a noose run through my nose like a buffalo to the slaughter house without a fight for my right to freedom and justice: enough is enough and i and many like me have had enough. Please do not insult my intelligence with political rhetoric and religious dogmas but show me your ability to be leaders and lead with right understanding in meeting the needs of the nation; not that of your family ,relatives and close friends. Keep your empty promises and political bribery, save your preachings for those who lacks the faith in themselves, show me your wisdom and intelligence in managing this nation with fair and uncorrupted justice. Lead us into the future with enlightened understanding and compassion that we all may enjoy the peace we deserve;  do not lead by police brutality or millitary might simply because they are your instruments of last resort.
I would like to be a proud Malaysian in knowing that my leaders are well deserved of the respect of the people due to their genuine interest to serve rather than in their ability to connive and con their way to the seat of power. Let meritocracy and unblemished track record be the gauge by which we choose our future leaders; for those who do not prove of their ability to hold a position in running the government should be barred from doing so even if they are fiery in making speeches; let common sense be the rule of thumb. It is the empty drums that makes the loudest noise, let each man who stands to run for election reveal his qualifications worthy of the post he is fighting for; simply being wealthy or influential is an obsolete criteria; show us your credentials not your money, connections or bloodline.
I realize I am asking for the moon and am only dreaming for these tall orders which in our present  dreamstate is next to impossible to achieve, however, this is what I feel deep inside me  as an intuition that is born from having watched helplessly how the fate my country is being gambled by the few who have made it their right to dictate what is right and what is wrong and those who are blinded by Greed, hate and ignorance manipulating their way into the corridors of power. In utter despair i scream out to my fellow Malaysians let us not fall into slumber and stupor too long and awaken from this nightmare of complacency and denial. Let us not be fooled time and again by those who seek to divide and control through fear and ignorance, let us be fully cognizant and grab the opportunity to make a difference by making the right choices when it comes the time to do so.
  
 

Oh My Malaysia...what will become of Thee.

As I read the blogs written with regard to politics and religion in Malaysia it makes me look within myself of who I am and where i stand with regards to these issues. The situation in the country although not life threatening is becoming more and more serious and runs a whole lot deeper than what seems like just a passing phase. Politicians and religious leaders  are stirring up a whole mess of issues that has long been broiling beneath the surface of what seems like a model liberal Muslim country as some wish to claim of this nation. What is worse those who are with any amount of wisdom and knowledge with regard to these issues are either too afraid to voice out their opinion or simply taking advantage of the conundrum to amplify their self serving agendas. Religion was supposed to fade away as globalization and freedom spread. Instead, it's booming around the world, often deciding who gets elected. And the divine intervention is just beginning. Democracy is giving people a voice, and more and more, they want to talk about God. With the General Election
looming in the horizon the ruling party seems to be doing its best to pacify every sides but getting more bogged down with differing views than arriving at any definitive conclusion.
The lay man, the masses on the street and in the villages are getting restless and agitated by the lack of will and the uncertainty of what lay ahead and in store for their future. Too many unanswered questions and not enough truth and transparency; too much politicking and finger pointing and not enough proper governance. Everyone i know of are either living in denial of the political time bomb we are sitting on or too busy intellectualizing and pontificating on who is right and what is wrong. It is a precarious state we are in, one that can make or break us up as a nation; somewhere, sometime, something has to give and make way for an equitable change; an everlasting change of the whole by the whole, for the whole. A revamp of the society as a collective whole in every respect of its existence; we have to embark upon a brave new world.
We need not be the richest or most powerful nation on earth but we can surely be the most peaceful despite our differences in race culture and religion. We need not be all out to prove who is right or wrong but simply accept our strength and weaknesses and learn to live with our right understanding of who we are; we have to live with a great deal of tolerance, honesty, pride and dignity of who we are. Living for the benefit of others will have to replace our prone towards self serving mentality, We live for the sake of the nation and not for our individual, racial or religious domination over others; let our Gods be and allow for a nation building and healing precept to become our daily practice.
Let us not just preach what the Quran, the Vedas, the Bible, the Sutras or the Tao Di Ching has to offer but practice the wisdom of their content; for all religions preach the same message of Love, Peace and Compassion towards our fellow man. Let us discard our sense of Greed, Hatred and Ignorance and cherish our sense of servitude towards our fellow creatures; it does not makes us any poorer if we exist for the benefit of our fellow man for wealth is in the ability to give.
Right livelihood is the cure for corruption as Right understanding is the cure for all religious bigotry.
Right mindfulness will open our hearts towards the welfare of others,
Right words, thoughts and deeds will enable us to accept others as equals,
We have to be done with the politics of hatred and divisive nature and we have to smile more at one another regardless of our ethnic origin; we are a band of brothers in this multi-racial country. Our survival depends upon our fully accepting this fact of life or perish we will. We have to educate the nation from the PM to the fisherman and farmers to accept this move towards a peaceful change no matter on which side of the political divide we presently stand. We have no other cause but the course that will lead us away from harm towards achieving being a peaceful nation. Let anyone who stands in our way of this course be branded as the enemy of the state for our attainment of peace as a whole is non -negotiable. Ignorance is not an excuse and greed is a desease that has to be nip in the bud without fear or favor; all Malaysians are accountable to what happens in the near future when the ballot is cast, let us vote in the name of peace and justice for all. If we have to leave a legacy behind us as a nation let it be that of a Nation of Peace and Harmony.

Falcon City - Re Visited

He needs a wife!
My son, his grandmother Beatrice Goerst, God rest her soul, used to call him,'the mixed up kid'. When he was born I was not close by to welcome him to the world, he was born at Asunta Hospital in Petaling Jaya, Kuala Lumpur and I was working in Georgetown Penang at the time. When his Mom and I went our separate ways, I was not much there for him especially when they moved to Germany where he grew up a teenager. Now he is trying to find a home for himself in this Middle Eastern Country  I can only visit him every now and then; but mixed up as he still is I love him and I know he would go the extra mile for me.

The eel jumped out of the tank and killed itself, perhaps out of a sense of being left for another by its owner, and now the shark has taken over as the lord of the tank. I miss the eel as I had watched him grow from the size of no wider than a pencil and no longer than three inches to a foot long black and white spotted graceful lace in the water. I enjoyed coaxing him with shrimps and slices of squids from the refrigerator; he was finicky when it came to feeding.
Sadly enough we are all living in a fish tank, most of us just don't know it, we are under the illusion that we are free; simply because our tank is too vast to notice; perhaps after death we just might or if ever we get a chance to step out into space and look back.As it is our tank is fast getting smaller and smaller with time.With technology and the Internet, with the advancement of transportation and the breaking down of borders our fish tank is shrinking and not much for the better. There is so much discord in our tank today that soon we will be needing a major cleanup, perhaps a change of the water or the adding more chemicals to make sure the environment is safe or getting rid of those we see as threatening to our existence like the shark kicking out the eel.   

When I was growing up a teenager on the East Coast state of Terengganu in Malaysia I used to pilfered from my father's pants pocket hung on the wall everyday and i would find at least twenty cents there sometimes a little more and sometimes less; but there was at least twenty cents. As I grew into adulthood I had the audacity to say that the most my father ever gave me in my entire life was fifty ringgit and this was when I had visited him upon returning to Malaysia for a visit from the US. Now on looking back I regretfully realize how blind I was not to see that my father had been giving me my pocket money all along by pretending not to notice that he was missing 20 to 30 cents from his pocket every day. Had he given me when I asked him then it would mean he also had to give to my twin brother to be fair. My Father favored me over him without a doubt as my mother favored him over me. Sometimes we fail to see the small things the little plants for the forest.

No man that I know of has designed and redesigned his space more than my son and i admire him for this. He is an artist by his own right an interior designer with great taste for colors and arrangements. He is no Mozart but he got the piano just to see how it would look in the living room! However unlike his father he is more meticulous and exact when it comes to getting things accomplished, he has his mother to thank for this;  I had made the right choice in looking for a mould to cast my son,. He has her will.

My long conversation with Diego the Emirates Air Bus bar tender was about the perception of what is wealth, what is it to be rich in this life. We talked about the successes of the likes of Richard Branson ans I had Branson's book at the bar and it was what prompted the conversation. I had also told him that in essence I was a bum with not much to my name financially; I am the ultimate 'starving artist' but there I was having a drink served by him and spinning tall tails spanning from Alaska to South America visiting my children in Dubai,and perhaps later in Switzerland after leaving the beautiful city of Georgetown, Penang. Wealth is another grand illusion, it is relative, it is not a matter of having or not but what you do when you have and when you don't; to be able to accept both being rich or poor without discrimination, that's the secret. 

My twin brother today is perhaps already a millionaire and his family is well taken care of God bless him and I am still without a home of my own and drive a Kancil, (the size of a mini), my children, oh well you know this already if you have been reading my blog. It used to bother me yes, I cannot deny that, perhaps I even envied my brothers their wealth and comfort but now that I look back at what I have in my life: I don't think I was meant to be rich, financially. To reflect lamely from a Zen perspective, because I own nothing, everything is mine.

The Flight - Em[rate Air Bus

This is it, the life of the rich and famous or is it the life of a starving artist with not dollar to his name. But life is an illusion and who would know unless you share it them let it be known? Not  week ago I had to borrow from a friend fifty ringgit and another gave me ten, all he could afford...Such Is! This trip I make with my thoughts of them, it is their trip too.

You got all the comfort of a Business Class Traveller on board one of the most highly rated Airlines in the world. It was like riding a 'Kompressor' on the highway only it had its own minibar and Tv set among other things.

Accompanied by none other than the man who owns an Airline, Richard Branson, how can you go wrong. The seat will recline into a bed if you decide to travel in your sleep; but how can you afford to snore with your mouth drooling while riding the clouds iwht such class, that would be inhumanly a waste even for the most jaded of travellers.

Ah, the crew; that smile tells it all.

My son had texted me to tell me that he had booked on this particular flight as a surprise and insisted that I make my way to the back of the plane. Sure enough there was a bar loaded with my favorite nuts among other things and the bar tender who originated from Argentina by the name of Diego.

Members of the crew were all smiles and very obliging to whatever your needs may be.

If you are the type that can pretend to be unaffected by the luxurious facility and services of a high class act then there is over a thousand channels of entertainment to escape with just touch the screen. I watched the latest remake of Total Recall with Colin Ferrell.

The only other passengers closest to me was a family whose little boy screamed  his hearts out before the flight by settled down to enjoy the flight after take off. I am sharing this whole trip not because I would like to show off but simply because it is an experience that I can say happens in my life when I approach the point of giving up and accept that nothing more could happen to me that is worth happening.

The flight to Dubai , my third from Kuala Limpur was memorable because I saw in myself many lessons being played out especially that of not giving up and having the patience to endure the felling of being at the end of the road.; "and this too will pass..."