Books for sale

I’m selling off three of my books.

A Place Called Here by Cecilia Ahern (RM25)
The Harmony Silk Factory by Tash Aw (RM20)
Intimacy (a novel) and Midnight All Day (stories) by Hanif Kureishi (RM20)

All prices quoted include postage.
All books are in good condition.
Buy all 3 2 for only RM55 RM40.
Email me at simpli.siti[at]yahoo[dot]com or leave your email in the comment section.

Why am I selling these books? To fund my next book splurge :)

Tersentap juga

Jika KNV semalam tersentap dengan beberapa blog post, hari ini saya tersentap apabila membaca kisah ibu mendera anak sendiri dalam akhbar tempatan.

Tayar besar tayar kecil

A few mornings ago, on the way to the babysitter’s house, Along asked “Tayar kereta Ummi kecik kan?”
I saw that he was looking at the lorry in front and saw where he’s coming from. “Ha’ah”.
Picking up his cue, I asked him “Kalau tayar motor, besar ke kecik?”
“Kecik.” he answered.
“Lori?”
“Besar.”
“Bas?”
“Besar.”
“Kapal?” Now, this is a trick question.
“Takde.” He answered, much to my delight.
And then he asked, “Keretapi ada tayar tak, Ummi?”
Oh no, Ummi is not sure! “Takde, sebab keretapi jalan atas trek dia.” There is some sort of mechanics of the train moving on the railtrack, and there is this circular-shaped things that moves the shaft (at least the old type), but I’m pretty confident they are not called tyres.

Moral of story: I know I’m not expected to know everything, but I guess it would be nice to know most of the basic things. Arrk pressure..

What about you? Are you comfortable saying to your kids “Ummi tak tau, sayang” or “I’m not sure, my child”?

Expensive cars

Sometime back, I used to ‘whine’ about the expensive cars in Malaysia. But after awhile, I have ‘accepted’ it as a fact of life. But reading Raslan Shariff’s column in the Star last week brought back the ‘emotions’. I reproduce the article here, and click here to go to the origin:

Literally paying to own a car (Raslan Sharif)

A car that of late became a hot topic in the news pages only costs a buyer in the US half what a Malaysian has to fork out.

I’m a big fan of Top Gear. Besides the cool cars, you just have to love the wit of Jeremy Clarkson and Co. They are hilarious. Top Gear is probably the best TV show on cars, and one of the best TV shows on whatever as far as I’m concerned. I have also been buying the magazine since they launched the Malaysian edition some time back. At RM10, it’s cheap, far cheaper than the UK edition. And at that price, it is an unbelievable bargain. You not only get very informative car reviews and interesting features in the magazine, but there are also columns by Clarkson, Richard Hammond and James May (Clarkson’s partners in crime) as well as other writers on the editorial staff to look forward to. From the reviews, columns and features, you learn a lot about the workings of the global auto industry.

When you start to know how cars are made, marketed and sold in other parts of the world, you begin to understand that there are several things that badly need fixing in the local auto sector, primarily because car buyers here are made to literally pay for it. First of all, while Top Gear Malaysia is much cheaper than Top Gear UK, you can’t say the same about car prices here and over there. Take, for example, the new BMW X5. Over here, prices start from slightly less than RM490,000. Over there, it starts from slightly more than £40,000. How much is £40,000 at current exchange rates? About RM220,000.

Let’s take a more down to earth car as an example, say, the Toyota Camry, which can be frequently seen on our streets. It’s a popular car, especially among those who can afford to pay about RM140,000 for a car. In the US, car buyers can get a Camry from about US$19,200. That’s around RM67,700 at today’s rates. The most expensive model in the US, the Camry Hybrid, starts at US$26,150, or about RM92,200.

Why the huge difference between the prices? Why do we need to pay twice the price of what the British and the Americans do for the cars mentioned above? Several factors contribute to Malaysia having some of the highest car prices in the world, and among them are the duties and taxes that the Government levies on cars – whether locally manufactured or assembled or imported. It is a lucrative source of revenue for the Government, as about 500,000 vehicles are sold every year in Malaysia.

More importantly for us, the bulk, if not all, of the cost is generally passed on to Malaysian car buyers.

Now, I understand the need for the Government to generate revenue. After all, there are various public needs that have to be fulfilled. There is also the argument that local car manufacturers need protection before they are ready to compete openly, although I think they have been protected long enough.

But try seeing it from the consumer’s point of view.

Most car buyers pay a small down payment and get a loan to finance the remaining cost of their purchase.The interest-bearing loan pays for not just the actual cost of the car, but for the taxes and duties as well. I know I’ve said this before, but it’s worth mentioning again, especially as there is now talk of doing away with that other bane of car buyers – approved permits (APs) for imported cars.

International Trade and Industry Deputy Minister Datuk Mukhriz Mahathir said that ending the scheme (oh, what a scheme it is) was among the many options being considered to ensure that “any levy or tax should benefit the Government”.
He added that “cost savings, if any, should go to the rakyat”. Although Mukhriz’s mention of taxes benefiting the Government probably puts paid to any hopes that I might harbour of deep cuts in the duties and taxes levied on cars, I’m all for major changes to the AP scheme (better still, end it) if it means the cost savings from doing so “go to the rakyat”.

If this had happened earlier, I probably would have had to pay much, much less for the car I own today. The holder of the AP used to import my car, bought about two years ago, had very little to do with the making, transporting, marketing and selling of the car. And it kind of gets to me pretty badly that part of the loan I took to pay for the car went to the AP holder as payment for what is supposed to pass for “effort”.

At least the Government uses my money to build roads, schools and hospitals. I’m looking forward to Mukhriz’s announcement on the APs, and I have a feeling that it would be one that would put a bit of a smile on the faces of those who sell and buy cars. Maybe, someday, we’ll see a serious reduction in duties and taxes on imported cars, and be able to do more than just drool at the prices people overseas pay for their cars.

In this article, Raslan compared the absolute value of the cars. For example, a Camry in Malaysia costs RM140k, while is US it’s USD19.2 multiplied by exchange rate, say 3.6 becomes about RM69k (car price are referring to article above, I didn’t doublecheck), which is already half. What he didn’t compare, but I think is still relevant to the picture, is income per capita. A fresh grad engineer earns about RM2k per month, while a fresh grad in US also earns about the same, but in USD! So while a Camry costs the Malaysian engineer her 70 months salary, it only costed her US counterpart about 10 months salary. It’s absolutely feasible to buy a brand new Camry in cash (while over here 10-year car loans are norms). This of course, does not take into account the different tax systems, for example, and other things like health and education benefits, maybe. Still. We’re taxed heavily on our cars. Is it fair? Well, gain some, lose some, I suppose. At least, the new DPM recognizes that our income per capita is low and has some suggestions to increase it, at least for certain groups of people. I don’t know much economics, but things like this won’t take two or three years. It’ll take decades. But it’s a start, anyway.

Bank income vs return

The main source of income for banks are from loans, isn’t it? I wonder, when they charge 6-8% (say) per annum for consumer loans, how can Bank Rakyat give 15-20% returns per annum to their members? Or do they charge higher interest/profit rate for commercial loans? Well, credit card uses are charged 15-18% per annum. Do banks have other sources of income? Usually banks use the cash deposited by account holders to give out loans (and the banks would come out with all sorts of promotions to attract people to keep their money with them), and in return depositors gets 1% (or is it less?), or in the case of FD 3%ish. But of course the members of Bank Rakyat are a different case altogether, they are like shareholders, maybe. But still. Well, this is perhaps too simplistic a way of looking at the bank industry, which I don’t know much about, but I can still ‘wonder’, can’t I?

My Mum is Amazing

Happy Mother's Day to Mok, Mak, and all mothers out there!

My Mum is Amazing
By: Zain Bhikha
By: Naadira Alli, Zain Bhikha & Linda Gcwensa

She wakes up early in the morning with a smile
And she holds my head up high
Don't you ever let anybody put you down
Cos you are my little angel

Then she makes something warm for me to drink
Cos it's cold out there, she thinks
Then she walks me to school, Yes I aint no fool
I just think my Mom is amazing

BRIDGE/CHORUS:
She makes me feel
Like I can do anything
and when she's with me
there's no where else, I'd rather be

After School, she's waiting by the gate
I'm so happy that I just can't wait
To get home to tell her how my day went
And eat the yummy food, only my Mom makes

Then I wind her up cos I don't wanna bath
And we run around the house with a laugh
No matter what I say, she gets her way
I think my Mom is amazing

BRIDGE/CHORUS

In the evening, she tucks me into bed
And I wrap my arms around her head
Then she tells me a tale of a girl far away
Who one day became a princess

I'm so happy, I don't want her to leave
So she lies in bed with me
As I close my eyes, how lucky am I
To have a Mom that's so amazing

BRIDGE/CHORUS

Then I wake up in the morning, she's not there
And I realize she never was
And I'm still here in this lonely orphanage
With so many just like me

And as my dreams begin to fade
I try hard to look forward to my day
But there's a pain in my heart that's a craving
How I wish I had a Mom that's amazing
Would be amazing

P/s: I heard this song on the way to work this morning. Sedih. Thank you Allah for my mother..

Who is which?

In an imaginary country called Amphibilians, there two types of people. One is called Fellahs, who invariably tells the truth, and the other is Phibba, who invariably lies. The inhabitants of Amphibilians have problem telling the two apart, but visitors would usually find themselves confused. One day, a visitor met with a group of five Amphibilians. He asked them, “Are you Fellahs or Phibbas?” The first person answered, “There are more Fellahs than there is Phibbas among us.” The second person shook his head, “No, there are more Phibbas than there is Fellahs among us.” The third person said “Two of us are Fellahs.” The fourth person said, “Three of us are Phibbas.” The visitor asked the fifth guy, “What about you?” The fifth person answered, “I am a Fellah.”

Can you tell which are Fellahs and which are Phibbas among these five Amphibilians?

Answer:















3 and 4 are in agreement, so they belong to the same group.
1 and 2 are not in agreement, so they belong in a different group.
Let's say 3 & 4 are Fellahs, and plus either 1 OR 2, that would be at least 3 Fellah, so it's contradicting 3's statement, which can't happen if 3 is a Fellah. So 3 & 4 are Phibbas.
So, 2 is Fellah, because he said there's more Phibba than Fellah.
So, 1 is Phibba, because he's the opposite of 2.
What about no 5? If he is Fellah, than 3 is right (there is 2 Fellah) which can't happen because 3 is a Phibba (he lies).
So, 5 is a Phibba.
In conclusion, all are Phibba except no 2.

A visit to Zoo Negara

MHH took us to Zoo Negara last Saturday. We’ve enjoyed ourselves, Alhamdulillah. We went early (upon advise from my sister), and were among the first few admitted when the zoo opened at 9. And the treat for us the early ‘birds’ were – well, birds, flocks of storks were roaming free on the street, unhindered by non-existing crowd. They were so many and so close, we could chase and touch them if we wanted to. And we watched the zoo staff on a truck threw fish to them, and the birds quickly flew towards the moving truck, right above us, we could feel the wind caused by all the flapping of their wings. That was a novel experience.


Anyway, I’m somehow interested to look a bit (just from a visitor’s view, I have no information whatsoever) in terms of their funding. I think (guesswork only) their main sources of income, in order to operate and maintain the zoo, comes from:
- Government/state funding
- Ticketing (RM15 for adults, RM6 for children/senior citizen
- Corporate sponsorship

And their secondary sources of income:
- Merchandising (all the T-shirt/cap/etc souvenirs)
- Tram tickets (RM3 for adults, RM2 for children)
- Renting out commercial outlets (drinks/snacks/meals/souvenirs booths etc there’s even a Celcom booth)
- Photos with animals (deterrently expensive, IMO)
- Renting out space for private function (a group were having some sort of telematch, probably a family day for a company, when we went there)
- Public donation
- There’s even a large inflatable slides (which reminds MHH of Thundercats) that charges kids to go on them
- And my favourite - a stint during the animal show, where a parrot would fly and take money from your hand. More effective than a donation box; afterall people are willing to pay for experiences.

Some suggestions for more incomes:
- A bit more advertising (but careful, don't be too disruptive and annoying)
- Visitors can buy prepared food to feed certain animals (only tame animals like goats, turtles, fish etc, janganlah pula nak feed lions and tigers hehe)
- Bicycles for hire (or would this be a nuisance to other visitors?)
- More vending machines (visitors are thirsty!)
- Pony rides or other experiences relating to animals (but not to be overdone lah)

Unrelated: A lady in black abaya and niqab (purdah), likely to be from Middle East, gave salaam to me. I smiled and answered. It's pleasant to receive salaams from strangers :)