The Red, White, Blue...and Yellow!

I remember my years as a primary school boy crying in unison with my friends the word “MERDEKA” and writing it in huge letterings across our classroom chalkboard. It was always the right word to use in that situation to express our overwhelming joy.

That is, the joy of having finally completed the week of our final exams. We did this year after year not realizing the real significance of the word and how our lives would’ve been different without it.

It wasn’t until recently when I started working on a project for a Merdeka Edition T-shirt that I started doing research into the little details of that extraordinary day. The day that ultimately gave us all the equal chance to behave like buffoons, nonchalantly throwing around this powerful word without knowing its true substance.

Many of us do not truly grasp the significance of the word Merdeka. It is important as Malaysians to understand that this word doesn’t just signify another public holiday on our calendar or another season of tear-jerking vintage styled ads but is really the memory of the day our nation got past its teenage years of being mothered and made its transition into adulthood.

The word itself means nothing without the memory. It is the waving and swaying of the red, white, blue and yellow, our dear Jalur Gemilang, that will always be the greatest reminder of the day our fathers and our grandfathers, regardless of race, regardless of religion, regardless of social status, stood together chanting this one word seven times with our forefather.

It is with this that I have come to finally understand the cohesion of the word Merdeka, along with these four colors and the vows we made to our country every morning during our school assembly.

“Independence is indeed a milestone, but it is only the threshold to high endeavor”

- Tunku Abdul Rahman

Uniformity

Alan dropped by the office the other day to hang out. In the same damn T. So I had to change before we went out for a few beers. Not coool

KLue Urbanscapes 2011

Here's a little video I did for promotional purposes for our upcoming reappearance at KLue Urbanscapes!

A Private Party

I spent my Saturday at a party organized by a friend who was making his debut as a party DJ spinning some of the sickess tracks on deck.

He even got the whole entire crew wearing Pestle & Mortar for the night! So naturally I had to be there not just to document the whole thing but to also enjoy myself after weeks of work straight out.

Representin!

Saw this on the wall. I thought it was a pretty cool piece to have, and then figured out it was actually spray painted on the wall using a stencil. Uber cool.

Then I spotted this hottie sporting this at the bar. It was a really nice jacket but this country's not even cold enough to be wearing a flannel shirt. Cool jacket, but no not here in M'sia!

More pictures on Pestle & Mortar Clothing's facebook page! Go HERE!

Btw this is my first blogpost with my new Macbook Pro. Pure delight!

Temple Travel

Photography & Self-Reflection

Photography use to be a skill. An art form that relies heavily on the skills and ability of the person wielding the instrument. It was based on the person capturing the picture to be able to foresee events and understand lighting conditions before being able to properly set his/her camera to take the photo in a desired effect.

These days photography is all about a persons ability to understand certain words in English. In other words, you really only need to know how to read to work a camera. Technology has made it such that people don't have to learn so much anymore to know how to work a professional camera. Instead, they buy one, test it out a bit, read the manual, figure it out somemore, and then run along calling themselves a professional photographer.

I admit I fall into this new generation of pseudo photographers.

All it takes these days to become a name in photography are the right tools (A big professional DSLR, big professional lenses and Adobe photoshop)and a bit of luck shooting a few big names.

A story was related to me once about how this professional photographer took up a part-time teaching job at a local college, and in his own words "Not for the pay but to give back to the community". Such is the level of modesty that in order to properly give back to the community we need them to know it beforehand?

This photographer was becoming quite the prominent figure in Malaysian photography and shot to photography stardom when he got the chance to shoot Siti Nurhaliza's wedding.

Photography has sold out. It is no more an art form of subjectiveness based on individual creativity but has become something that people can look at and say "You're doing it all wrong!" Since when has art ever had a right or wrong? Who's to say what piece of art is good and what is bad.

Photography is nothing but another business. Why? I think because Chinese people became so involved (Just kidding).

No more is the skill of wielding a camera enough. These days what it really takes to become a REAL photographer is based on how much money you make doing shoots and who hires and where your pictures have gone and at the end of the day, who you know.

There are very few photographers left out there who do it for the passion. I'm talking about real passion. Like Mr. BrainWash (MBW) with his video camera passion.

I'm glad I know at least one even if I'm a sell out.

Hang Zhou, China

Hang Zhou, China. Famous for its ginormous (Unless you're a marathon runner you might find it rather difficult to see everything in a day) West Lake situated a close 4 to 5 blocks from the city, with plenty of tourist attractions and heritage sites speckled all around it.

A modern and booming city of China naught but an hour's train ride from Shanghai on the bullet train, fully equipped with plenty of malls, nice hotels and plenty of night markets and street bazaars to keep you occupied when not sightseeing.

This busker had the brilliant ingenuity to strap a huge speaker to the back of his moped acting as an amplifier for his guitar. Thats not all he had, if you look closely he also had a mixer for it! All powered by a small car battery.

Oh yes, he sang really good too.

I spotted this on the way back to my hotel. If you pronounce it wrong it actually says Cibai (Ji Bai) Group! For all of my non-Malaysian readers out there, that actually means pussy in a Chinese dialect (Hokkien). HAHA

Grade A Green Tea leaves of Hangzhou. Famous for its green tea, Hang Zhou has a local legend about a Dragon that lives in well and this well contains not water but green tea.

The Shanghai Clock tower of the building where they use to have horse races. Refurbished now to be Shanghai's Museum of Art. A must see that showcases local Chinese talent of the highest respect.

Old before New.

There's a park (The People's Park) in Shanghai filled with these little ads. As much as China has developed and become a major economic power in the last couple of years, many traditions are still apparent throughout. These are actually ads for arranged marriages. There are even agents who sit around all day to attend to interested "customers".

Shanghai Grand Theater. It was so big it took almost forever to walk around it.

Everybody see's the tall, shiny, glass buildings in China's fast-growing economic hubs but what a lot of people don't know is that those buildings were only build as a facade. A clever and quick solution to quickly develop, hiding behind them in little alleys houses and residences of what use to be China all over.

The Chinese Museum of Traditional Medicine.

A little isle in the West Lake.

A favorite Chinese past time. Mahjong in the park.

An elderly group of Chinese people were actually spending their time just chilling out and singing old songs in the park, like kids do these days with guitars.

This has got to be one of the best, most cost-efficient brooms I've ever seen. It's made out of leaves and twigs and basically dried up stuff from plants and covers a whole lot more area than do conventional brooms. Talk about innovation AND going green at the same time!