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Here's something interesting about how we're impacting our world.

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ICU

I regret to announce that this blog is currently under sedation in the intensive care unit for treatment of inactivititis. Recovery is expected to take a while. In the meantime, a Loyal Commission of Inquiry will be established to determine how this blog deteriorated to its current moribund state. A full and impartial investigation will be launched, leaving no stone unturned. I hope the same will happen with the investigation into the late Teoh Beng Hock's death. It's sad to see that one critical thing that the government needs now is what it lacks: credibility.

On another note, I was in Tioman three weeks ago, and I saw more impressive sea creatures while snorkelling than while diving*. I was pleasantly surprised that the house reef just off the beach at the southern end of Salang bay hosted bumphead parrotfish, a moray eel and some razorfish, which are creatures we normally see only when diving at less accessible sites. There was a turtle too, but I was most pleased to see the small school of five bumphead parrotfish, each about one metre long. They hung around the reef in usually in the late afternoon and allowed us close encounters. We went snorkelling on Monday afternoon, Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday morning, and all three times we saw the bumphead parrotfish. The only other times I've ever seen bumphead parrotfish were while diving at Perhentian and Sipadan. I guess I'll have to change my impression of Tioman. I previously assumed that since Tioman was getting very developed and well-visited, the nearshore marine environment would have deteriorated and become rather lifeless. So I was proven wrong, apparently.

*[ We dived at Chebeh and Malang Rock. Chebeh had nice swim-through passages under the boulders, plus colourful sea fans and nudibranchs. I caught a glimpse of a blacktip shark at Malang Rock but the visibility was too poor for us to spot any whale sharks. :P ]

But, I must still say, the conditions on land are not very appealing. The little river flowing to the sea at Salang is filled with untreated or minimally treated wastewater from restaurant kitchens and chalet bathrooms. The river bed is mucky with an awful black colour, and there's a foul odour at certain times. It's only because of the incoming and outgoing tides flushing the river mouth that the river doesn't become more dirty. At high tide the river stops flowing and the icky water acculumates. Then at low tide, the river drains out to the sea, taking with it all the dirty water. The next high tide brings in (relatively) clear sea water. But that just means that the yucky river water is being diluted into the sea. Well, the river condition is not THAT bad (not like the Klang River), but it's certainly not befitting of a tropical marine park island. It gets worse during weekends and peak tourist seasons when more visitors result in more dinner plates washed and toilets flushed.

In the bigger picture, there's some sort of trade-off. If visitors want cheap accommodation and food, then I suppose the operators won't be able to afford the investment in proper wastewater treatment systems. But I'm not sure if the chalet operators are earning lucrative incomes or scraping by with the minimum. Some visitors would say that they are already paying so much for their spartan chalet and restaurant food on the island. Well, price is relative, but is value relative too? Would you be willing to pay more for your visit if you knew that the money is used to take care of the wastes that you generate? There's no free lunch, and no free toilet flush either.

Indah Water is planning to build a proper extended aeration activated sludge centralized sewage treatment plant at Salang and Tekek. The EIA was approved in July 2008, but I'm not sure when the project will start and be completed. Let's hope that the project will do good and not cause more damage, or become a white elephant (new species on the island). Indah Water will probably be charging the chalet and restaurant operators for sewerage fees... and I wonder if the operators will pay the fees or even connect their sewerage pipes to the treatment plant in the first place. Do you pay your Indah Water bills?

Kegersangan kata

The blogospheric pressure has been dropping lately. It has been getting harder and harder to crank up the creative cranial juices to churn out a decent blog post. The juices are drying up. This is partly due to the fact that one of my favourite topics, i.e. politix, has been getting too predictable. It's the same old story -- BN big boys using their financial and political big sticks to whack the Opposition, the judiciary, Parliament, royalty and the media into docile submission. And we the people quietly watch, because we're afraid to rock the boat. Hello, the boat is leaking. It's time to make some noise. If you are not making any noise, at least pray lah. Yea, I need to do more of both. There are really exciting events waiting to unfold.

Hmmm, what can I say about the ekonomi? I'm just glad they didn't privatize Bank Negara. It just boggles my mind that the folks who should know what they are doing are now telling us that they didn't foresee this global economic mess. My heart goes out to President Obama and his team as they try to fix the terminal illness of corporate America. Perhaps it's not corporate America that started the problem. It's plain old human nature.

What if I talked about another favourite topic -- diving. But I'm afraid I don't have enough time to start and finish a proper story. I haven't even started writing about my Sipadan dive trip in May last year, and it's already the end of March this year. Oh well, since I'm on it, I would just like to say that Sipadan is still easily one of the best dive sites in the world. It's one of those places where I would (gladly) wake up at 5AM to go diving, and do six dives a day. Oh yea, last year I finally saw the legendary school of barracudas at Barracuda Point. On my first trip to Sipadan in 2005 I dived at Barracuda Point four times but didn't see a single barracuda. So, seeing the barracudas swim by in the hundreds was truly a sight to behold. Too bad they didn't swim around us in their signature vortex formation. Perhaps next time? Haha. And I'm still waiting to see the nudibranch vortex that our one-screw-loose divemaster was raving about. ;P

OK, another diving story. I was at the Pulau Sembilan group of islands two weeks ago. I got a nice sunburn despite staying (or, trying to stay) in the shade. The diving was OK lah. Visibility was terrible, but we saw seahorses and one frogfish. Some of us thought we felt a whale shark swim by, but the viz was too poor for us to see clearly. Haha. But the food on board the Kaleebso was superb. The only thing I don't like about the live aboard dive boat is the waste management. It cuts my heart to even think about how they disposed of our sewage and garbage, so I shall not talk about it. Oh man, and to think that I was one of the sources of the problem.

I think that's enough for now. Till the next post, I bid thee farewell. Drink lots of water and eat fruits.

Ecownomics 201

SOCIALISM : You have 2 cows, so you give one to your neighbour.

COMMUNISM : You have 2 cows. The State takes both and gives you
some milk.

FASCISM : You have 2 cows. The State takes both and sells you
some milk.

NAZISM : You have 2 cows. The State takes both and shoots you.

TRADITIONAL CAPITALISM : You have two cows. You sell one and buy a bull. Your herd multiplies, and the economy grows. You sell them and retire on the income.

AN AMERICAN CORPORATION : You have two cows. You sell one, and force the other to produce the milk of four cows. Later, you hire a consultant to analyse why the cow has dropped dead.

ENRON VENTURE CAPITALISM : You have two cows. You sell three of them to your publicly listed company, using letters of credit opened by your brother-in-law at the bank, then execute a debt/equity swap with an associated general offer so that you get all four cows back, with a tax exemption for five cows. The milk rights of the six cows are transferred via an intermediary to a Cayman Island Company secretly owned by the majority shareholder who sells the rights to all seven cows back to your listed company. The annual report says the company owns eight cows, with an option on one more. Sell one cow to buy a new president of the United States, leaving you with nine cows. No balance sheet provided with the release. The public buys your bull.

A FRENCH CORPORATION : You have two cows. You go on strike, organise a riot, and block the roads, because you want three cows.

A JAPANESE CORPORATION : You have two cows. You redesign them so they are one-tenth the size of an ordinary cow and produce twenty times the milk. You then create a clever cow cartoon image called 'Cowkimon' and market it worldwide.

A GERMAN CORPORATION : You have two cows. You re-engineer them so they live for 100 years, eat once a month, and milk themselves.

AN ITALIAN CORPORATION : You have two cows, but you don't know where they are. You decide to have lunch.

A RUSSIAN CORPORATION : You have two cows. You count them and learn you have five cows. You count them again and learn you have 42 cows. You count them again and learn you have 2 cows. You stop counting cows because you're sobering up and open another bottle of vodka.

A SWISS CORPORATION : You have 5,000 cows. None of them belong to you. You charge the owners for storing them.

A CHINA CORPORATION : You have two cows. You have 300 people milking them. You claim that you have full employment, and high bovine productivity, and arrest the newsman who reported the real situation.

A BRITISH CORPORATION : You have two cows. Both are mad.

I received this forwarded in my email sometime ago. Consume at your own risk.

FunnyMoney

In the wake of the recent crisis rocking the US financial system, the government has decided to redesign the dollar bill as a gentle reminder to all...

My dream exchange rate:

RM1.00 = USD4.00

How rich are you?

I got this forwarded in my email. I don't know how accurate it is, but it's an interesting exercise. Try it. You might actually be richer than you think. So count your blessings.

Up up and away

I was amazed at the long queues of cars radiating from every petrol station that I passed by this evening. Obviously the drivers were rushing to fill up their tanks while the petrol price still remained at RM1.92 per litre. In true Malaysian fashion, the news/rumours of the price increase of petrol was spread via email and sms since early afternoon. It later transpired that the PM had made an announcement in the evening that the petrol price would increase to RM2.70 at midnight. That's a 40% jump.

What I don't understand is why people would go through all the hassle just to save a few bucks. I mean, it looked like some of those drivers would have to wait at least half an hour before they could even enter the petrol station. My tank was 90% full so I didn't bother to top up the last 10% just to save a few Ringgit.

I figured that even if I filled up a tankful of petrol, I would save about RM30, and just for this one time only. From tomorrow onwards every full tank of petrol would cost me at least RM100. It would be a slightly different story if I were a truck driver with a 200 litre tank. But still, I would save only this one time.

I really don't mind paying market prices for petrol. Let it be RM4.00 per litre. If it's market price, it could go up, and it could go down. What I have a problem with is paying an artificially inflated price for my car, just because the entire auto industry in Malaysia is subsidizing Proton. I don't have any personal vendetta against Proton but I do have objections to our gomen's policies.

In Thailand the petrol is more expensive, but the cars are relatively cheaper. That means that consumers have a real choice of vehicle ownership and usage. It's good, because people can afford to buy a car and not feel bad if they don't use it everyday. Lower cost of ownership, higher cost of operation. That's OK, because then it encourages the use of public transport during weekday commuter rush hours, but still leaves the car owner the choice to drive during off-peak hours.

In Malaysia cars are ridiculously expensive, and public transport is inadequate, so the car owner feels compelled to maximize the utility of their car. In the past, the subsidized petrol offset the high price of car ownership. High cost of ownership, low cost of operation. But now with the fuel subsidies being gradually lifted, we are hit on both sides. High cost of ownership, and high cost of operation. It sucks. Here I am paying RM80,000 for a Toyota Vios when it should only cost RM60,000. And now the petrol price is going up to match market rates. On top of that, the public transport is still unsatisfactory.

My bottomline is: If the government wants to remove the petrol subsidies, it should also remove the Proton and local auto industry subsidies. If the government wants to help the lower income group, it should tax the expensive cars and subsidize the public transport, motorbikes and small cars regardless of the make or model, i.e. not only Proton.

I blame Dr Mahathir for much of this mess. Firstly, his grandiose vision of industrialization has led us up this dead end road called Proton. Secondly, his handpicked successor seems to be unable or unwilling to tackle the root problems of the economy. And don't forget that it was under Dr M and Dr Ling Liong Sik that KL's Light Rail Transit system was established -- a system consisting of three different companies operating totally different and mutually incompatible hardware, separate ticketing and train stations that do not integrate. So you can see now why we're stuck, since these disparate LRT systems are literally cast in concrete.

The Malaysian economy is riddled with systemic inefficiencies. Many of these stem from abuses and misuses of the NEP. Which means that overcoming our handicaps will be doubly or triply difficult. Not impossible, just more difficult. Don't we all love challenges? We also take heart in the fact that there is no perfect economic system on Earth, since we humans are inherently imperfect. Since I am part of the problem, I should then be part of the solution. Forget about saving a few Ringgit worth of petrol tonight. Look at the bigger picture.