NFS Underground

At the moment I'm just staying at home and spend the time mostly with my brother. Too bad our PS2 has became faulty after some of the electric cables in my house was struck by lightning. That means all the huge piles of PS2 games have to sit on the shelves and gather dust, a total waste!

So, the other day I went to my brother's room and found this old Need For Speed Underground CDs for PC. I was so bored and I thought why not give it a try, who knows it can still work and helps my brother and me do something rather than just stare at our faulty PS2.

Thank God, the CDs can still be read by my laptop and we successfully installed the game. Now, though the PS2 is no more working, I can still enjoy playing NFS Underground on my laptop. Yes, that is one old game, but at least it's better than none. Hmmm..I might check other PC games in the shop while I collect enough $$$ to fund a PS3 or PS2 Slim (PS3 games are too pricey, so maybe only PS2 is suitable for me).

My Photo of the Day

Just thought I could share this photo with you guys. I was outside the house, wanted to throw the rubbish and I heard something moving around the leaves in my mom's flower pots. I slowly turned my head to see where the sound came from and there it was - "mengkarung" not sure what exactly it is called in English but to me, it looks very similar to a skink.

So, I quickly (and quietly of course) went in and grabbed my camera, attached my 70-300mm telephoto and started snapping away. I managed to get some decent shots, and personally I like the one below the best. So, here it is, just for sharing. :)

I'm back!!

It's been sometime, well, a long time since I last updated this blog. I was kinda surprised to notice that my last post was dated 3rd May 2009 - that's almost 1.5 years ago! Man, I really need to be more consistent if I am to maintain this blog.

Well, here you go. I'm planning to write a bit on what I've been up to lately ( or for the last 1.5 years for that matter) and try to share some interesting links like I did in some of my previous posts. It's an established fact that I'm no great, interesting blogger, but hope my posts will be something of use to you guys. That's all for now, will update more later. Cheers!

Now we've Boyle, Jafargholi..Lets see who comin' up next ..

Over the weekend, while Boyle was setting up chats with "Oprah," CNN and every other news outlet that could get her "gobsmacked" reaction to being viewed more than 50 million times on YouTube, another Britain's Got Talent singer was already waiting in the wings.

Shaheen Jafargholi, a 12 year-old from Swansea, appeared on the show on Saturday and initially bombed with judge Simon Cowell, who made him stop singing his Amy Winehouse version of the "Valerie" after just one verse. Here's the video of Shaheen singing during BGT 2009 episode 2.


When the preternaturally poised Jafargholi rebooted with the second song, Who's Lovin' by Michael jackson, the audience went nuts. At the end of the song, all judges gave the boy standind ovations - even Cowell too. Reaaly a great moment!

"This is how one song can change your life. And this may be the start of something special for you young man." Cowell said before winking at the boy. And Holden said he passed her goosebumps test just as Paul Potts and George Sampson did. Lets just hope she's right..

p/s: I've been watching the video over and over again. The boy has really good voice and with both Cowell n him, OMG they are really cute! :P

~A Gift for Myself ~

After dreaming of doing things in different ways, after having high hopes, and after a long long wait, I finally gave myself a birthday gift that has always been in my wishlist. Now, there's a new member in my little world - my Canon EOS 400D with Canon EF-S 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 lens.

I've took some photos during my recent trip to Leicester, and I'd say I'm quite impressed with the results. At times, the weather wasn't that good, hence some pictures look rather underexposed. And for some, it's just my lack of talent and knowledge of operating an SLR that made them look nothing more than a normal point & shoot produced pictures. Here are some of the photos I took with my new EOS:

My Canon EOS 400D - I'm loving it... =)

Gaza War Crimes Investigation

Cut to pieces: the Palestinian family drinking tea in their courtyard.
Israeli unmanned aerial vehicles – the dreaded drones – caused at least 48 deaths in Gaza during the 23-day offensive



Palestinian brothers: Israel used us as human shields in Gaza war.
Three teenage boys say they were made to kneel in front of tanks to deter Hamas attacks



Under attack: how medics died trying to help Gaza's casualties.
Israeli military says medical staff 'take the risk upon themselves'

Children of Heaven (Bacheha-Ye aseman)

Children of Heaven (Persian: بچه‌های آسمان) is a 1997 Iranian film by Majid Majidi. It was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film in 1998. It deals with a brother and sister and their adventures over a lost pair of shoes.

In 1998, the film was the first Iranian film to be nominated for an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. It was successfully shown on numerous film festivals and won awards at the Fajr Film Festival, the World Film Festival, the Newport International Film Festival, the Warsaw International Film Festival, and the Singapore International Film Festival. It was nominated for the Jury's Grand Prize at the American Film Institute's festival.

(I watched this film few years ago, when I was still studying at school..Personally, I think it's a great movie, one that's worth-watching..Here's the download links for those who wish to give it a try, and for those who feels like watching it again, just like I did.. :)

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8

Mark Steel: What have Palestinians got to complain about anyway?

When you read the statements from Israeli and US politicians, and try to match them with the pictures of devastation, there seems to be only one explanation. They must have one of those conditions, called something like "Visual-Carnage-Responsibility-Back-To-Front-Upside-Down-Massacre-Disorder".

For example, Condoleezza Rice, having observed that more than 300 Gazans were dead, said: "We are deeply concerned about the escalating violence. We strongly condemn the attacks on Israel and hold Hamas responsible."

Someone should ask her to comment on teenage knife-crime, to see if she'd say: "I strongly condemn the people who've been stabbed, and until they abandon their practice of wandering around clutching their sides and bleeding, there is no hope for peace."

The Israeli government suffers terribly from this confusion. They probably have adverts on Israeli television in which a man falls off a ladder and screams, "Eeeeugh", then a voice says, "Have you caused an accident at work in the last 12 months?" and the bloke who pushed him gets £3,000.

The gap between the might of Israel's F-16 bombers and Apache helicopters, and the Palestinians' catapulty thing is so ridiculous that to try and portray the situation as between two equal sides requires the imagination of a children's story writer.The reporter on News at Ten said the rockets "may be ineffective, but they ARE symbolic." So they might not have weapons but they have got symbolism, the canny brutes.

It's no wonder the Israeli Air Force had to demolish a few housing estates, otherwise Hamas might have tried to mock Israel through a performance of expressive dance.

The rockets may be unable to to kill on the scale of the Israeli Air Force, said one spokesman, but they are "intended to kill".

Maybe he went on: "And we have evidence that Hamas supporters have dreams, and that in these dreams bad things happen to Israeli citizens, they burst, or turn into cactus, or run through Woolworths naked, so it's not important whether it can happen, what matters is that they WANT it to happen, so we blew up their university."

But mostly the Israelis justify themselves with a disappointing lack of imagination, such as the line that they had to destroy an ambulance because Hamas cynically put their weapons inside ambulances.

They should be more creative, and say Hamas were planning to aim the flashing blue light at Israeli epileptics in an attempt to make them go into a fit, get dizzy and wander off into Syria where they would be captured.

But they prefer a direct approach, such as the statement from Ofer Schmerling, an Israeli Civil Defence official who said on al-Jazeera, "I shall play music and celebrate what the Israeli Air Force is doing."

Maybe they could turn it into a huge national festival, with decorations and mince pies and shops playing "I Wish We Could Bomb Gaza Every Day".

In a similar tone Dov Weisglas, Ariel Sharon's chief of staff, referred to the siege of Gaza that preceded this bombing, a siege in which the Israelis prevented the population from receiving essential supplies of food, medicine, electricity and water, by saying, "We put them on a diet."

It's the arrogance of the East End gangster, so it wouldn't be out of character if the Israeli Prime Minister's press conference began: "Oh dear or dear. It looks like those Palestinians have had a little, er, accident. All their buildings have been knocked down – they want to be more careful, hee hee."
And almost certainly one of the reasons this is happening now is because the government wants to appear hard as it wants to win an election. Maybe with typical Israeli frankness they'll show a party political broadcast in which Ehud Olmert says, "This is why I think you should vote for me", then shows film of Gaza and yells: "Wa-hey, that bloke in the corner is on FIRE."

And Condoleezza Rice and her colleagues, and the specially appointed Middle East Peace Envoy, could then all shake their heads and say: "Disgraceful. The way he's flapping around like that could cause someone to have a nasty accident."

[Retrieved from belfasttelegraph.co.uk]

Time...

It's my second post..Was browsing thru lotsa blogging widgets just now and came across a few interesting ones..Somehow I miss the IT & Multimedia class back in UNiM, it was really fun!! We had the chance to mess around with those HTML and JS codes :D

Well, this post isn't actually about those fun times we had, I was actually wondering about the way I spent my time today..After a tiring, full-day class, I had a meeting and only reached back home at almost 8pm..Enjoyed dinner and chatting with my housemate before I decided it's time to prepare things for tomorrow's classes..Unfortunately, I was too "busy" browsing thru the widgets that I haven't prepared anything for tomorrow up til ...it's past midnight now!! hmm..It feels like time passes a bit too fast these days..Gotta go now!! :)

Passion + Authority = BLOGGING

So, blogging requires passion..I mean, continues passion..

hmm..I wonder if blogging really suits me..~lack of passion~