Valued Attachments

 Just the other my youngest daughter asked me: “Is RM1 for a piece of sausage expensive?”

Being typical me, I didn’t give her a straight answer, opting instead on a cryptic (for a kid of seven who just started school, I assume so): “It’s not the number that is put on the item that matters, but the value it actually carries that makes it either expensive or not.”

Feel free to judge if this example clears it up for the poor child: “RM1 for a piece of sweets is expensive, but the RM1 for a car would be dirt cheap.”

I knew she didn’t understand as she then reiterated: “So, can I continue to buy from the seller or not?”

In the end, my wife – who overheard the conversation – decided to put an end to the subject by packing her and the elder sister sausages to bring to their holiday camp every alternate days or so.

Her question did get me thinking though: pricing is moot as opposed to the value of items, and yet value on its own is highly subjective.

Take for instance my RM388k home in the, ahem, Greater Kuala Lumpur area (heh).  The price tag caused me to slightly break sweat all over my brow, but speak of the same TODAY, it’s cheap. 

Not DIRT CHEAP, but Klang Valley suburb cheap.

Looking at the prices of even mere terrace home (intermediate lot, mind you!), I am thankful to my better half for convincing me to take the plunge (and the developer for coming out with a pretty good, spacious home at the said price which was quite competitive about 3 ½ years ago).

Depending on our, urm, financial community (for want of a better word) standings, value is even more subjective than ever.

So, to the, urm, semi well-heeled, the Lamborghini Avantador at RM2.8m (plus minus) is a VALUE proposition to the RM5.2m Buggati Veyron, especially since you can get your hands on the Lambo far easier than the Veyron.

For the likes of even the semi well-heeled then, the RM240K Lotus Elise is literally a weekend go-cart model which can be thrashed if they are so inclined.

The top-of-the-range RM73K Proton Preve? Bah!!

Of course, they are the (what’s before semi? quarter?) well-heeled who do not carry the same philosophy on values as mentioned above and thinks that a RM23K well maintained second / third hand Mini Austin is as good a car as any others.

I’ve meet one, in fact: hangs around in his favourite kopitiam in shorts, singlet and slippers in between minding his million Ringgit restaurant business.

He is an old timer, though. From simpler days when money wasn’t everything and flaunting your wealth is as welcomed as farting out loud in public.

Do I think RM1 for a piece of sausage expensive, then?

Selling to kids at a State Mosque function: but of course!

Critically Just

The banning of books (or any other form of art & literature) is a very spontaneous kind of thing in this country with the latest being the book "Allah Liberty & Love -Courage To Reconcile Faith & Freedom" by Irshad Manji.

I would assume that the banning of the Canadian-Ugandan-born author’s book was done after much deliberation and a full review of the book’s content.

According to the Sun, but for some last minute cancellations, Ms Manji wassupposed to hold talks at two universities and a bookstore in Kuala Lumpur so she went ahead to meet a small group of people at the Kuala Lumpur and Selangor Chinese Assembly Hall.

How small? God knows.

Could her book (translated into a Bahasa Malaysia version by ZI Publication entitle “Allah, Kebebasan Dan Cinta") have slipped under the radar had she not been a professed LGBT proponent?

This, we’ll never know.

(BTW, ZI Publication is also the publisher for Reza Aslan’s Tiada Tuhan Melainkan Allah which provided with a pretty good read albeit only the first half of the book.

Being an Iranian, albeit one residing in the US, Aslan wrote the book with a very pro-syiah outlook, but oklah: it does open up your mind a little on how the West looked at Islam in general.

What hooked me to actually read Tiada Tuhan Melainkan Allah was the brilliant first chapter. Whoever did the translation job did a great job in roping you into jumping into what is an extremely studious, researched based academic work on Islam.

Tiada Tuhan Melainkan Allah was not an easy book to digest and it took me long nights to finally get through all the pages.)

Anyway, back to the banning of Ms Manji’s book.

It does seem that the SOP for such a banning to take place is if there is a complaint, or a raising of concerns, preferably from something with clouts to make things move.

That would explain why some others equally deem-able of offensive book / literature can make it quietly into the bookstore and on to the readers without much fanfare.

Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso’s noir-ish 100 Bullets, for example. Very mature audience targeted.

Or Osamu Tezuka’s MW, which feature a serial killer, a priest and a conspiracy.

My question is this: what is the defining line that gets a book, a literature the ban?

Very likely, it is theological misfeasance where Islam is concerned.

However you won’t know of this until you actually read the book. Was it read in its entirety? Who read it? Was he / she swayed from the right path after reading the book? Did the translated work follow the original to the point? Where were the offending bits? How were they offensive? Why was it translated in the first place? Why was the author cleared for so-called initial engagements?

Was it, in fact, even a good read in the first place?

FOOTNOTE:
The Home Ministry has came out with the reasons for banning the book. Kudos to them for the explanation which answers some questions the reading public might have in the mind following the action by the religious authorities.

Fanciful Sniggers

"Using the photographic blocking system, it has been determined that 22,270 people were at the Bersih 3.0 rally on April 28. This is close to the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) estimated figure of 25,000 people but way off from what Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim had announced to the rest of the world."

Quoting Rais Yatim;figures apparently from Bernama.

What is this penchant for dwelling on the trees and missing out on the forest?

So what? What if merely 2,353 people turned up?

What about their message of the need for electoral reforms? For the Authoritative Institutions to not be tainted with hints (much less full stench) of partisanship?

What is so bloody wrong with freer and fairer elections anyway?

All these statements would be quite comic if not for the almost tragic connotations of their utterance.

Why is there a need to whittle the numbers down? Just because Anwar says its 250,000 doesn’t mean it is.

Everyone knows so.

BUT, if the turnout had really been 22, 270, then probably the Parliament would have been dissolved by now.

Especially since the Umno recently held 66^th birthday (really? Umno Baru?) garnered like, what, 150,000 attendees?

Being in a Stadium, probably Bernama super duper masses calculation method via the “photographic blocking system” would not be needed to cite the figure, correct?

So, what’s the hold up?

Doesn’t BN want the three states back into their fold?

Doesn’t BN want to kick LGE / KI / AAR out of office and save the down-trodden and sidelined Malays from the clutches of the LGBT-loving and promoting PR?

After all, 22,270 is barely 0.18 percent of the total number of voters in Malaysia (12,595,268, isn’t it?)

You can say, Bah!!, snigger away and say: Okay, let’s get a good margin mandate now.

And remember too, the 22,270 people are most probably from the Klang Valley, which means that their votes would be in places like Jinjang, Kepong and Bukit Bintang anyway. Or Klang and Gombak.

Again: Bah!!! Snigger and holds the General Election.

22,270 is like the number of people at a Pasar Malam.