orientation week - the nightmare

It's orientation week (or rather registration week) in University of Malaya.

Initially I didn't realise it eventhough I saw a huge number of students (freshies) in their uniforms (some wearing black t-shirts, some in pink and some in yellow). I thought there was an expo or a PMR seminar going on in the campus. These freshies look very young (or in another word childish) and you won't deny that most of them are being treated like secondary school kids by their facilitators.

It reminds me of my orientation week many many years ago. It was a dream come true for me to go to the university of my choice (I went to UKM during one educational trip and immediately had a good image of the university). However, the orientation itself was a nightmare. The facilitators and seniors were so mean that I never seek help from them throughout my entire years there.

The overused word by the seniors which I will remember for the rest of my life was "cocky" (we, the innocent freshies were already scared to death to be away from our family for the first time and this was the word used to address us in their every sentence).

Nevertheless, one thing good about the orientation was I shed a lot of weights due to heavy exercises and torturing. Then of course I didn't get used to the food and I lost appetite to eat. I easily lost 15kg after the orientation week. Pretty amazing, huh?

Coming back to the orientation week here in UM, I realised that a huge percentage of these undergraduates are female. We are aware of the gap between female and male in universities even few years back but somehow I think the issue is getting out of hand now. So, where are the guys?

say "yes" to London for Olympic 2012

Tony Blair is very popular these days. Three days ago he gave his support to Live 8 to "make poverty history". Now the British Prime Minister is in Singapore to back the London team in the crucial vote to elect the Host City for the 2012 Olympic Games and Paralympic Games.

London never host the biggest sports event since 1948. However, one poll showed 52% of Londoners didn't want the games. On the other hand, Blair wanted so badly to succeed judging from the attention given to him in most of the headlines as he undertook a hectic series of meetings.

Should London fail to win this bid, blame it on Blair, Bush and Iraq. Since London failure would also means New York's failure, then the winning bid should go to Paris.

Let's see the results tomorrow.

angelina jolie's speech on live 8 was axed

Music makes the people come together ...

Really enjoy the effortless performance by Green Day, Madonna and Snoop Dogg. Too bad that we didn't get to watch the speech by Angelina Jolie which was axed at Astro Channel 88. Don't get me wrong. Jolie didn't swear in her speech (but a number of musicians did during their performance). Insider told me that they didn't managed to squeeze in her part, that's all.

No doubt Live 8 is the biggest concert ever. It was like all of a sudden we have forgotten about war and terrorism. Instead Sir Bob Geldof makes us realised that we still have an unfinished business, poverty.

I don't care if some extremists think that this is a propaganda of the West.

Hopefully when the G8 leaders meet this month, they won't disappoint all the people around the world.

when was the last time you read local sports section?

So what is going on with our local sports scene? It has been extremely quiet ever since Datuk Azalina Othman takes over the top post in the Ministry of Youth and Sports.

Everyday, foreign sports updates monopolize our sports section. We are fed with Youth World Cup and Confederation Cup results and pages of full reports on foreign teams and star footballers. Even the less popular Wimbledon Championship takes up a page or two although tennis is not Malaysians favourite sports.

We read about the retirement of the great former Chelsea star, Gianfranco Zola and yet we don't really bother when Wong Choon Hann lost to Ronald Susilo in the Singapore Open last night.

Can anyone tell me how far does our football scene changes because I don't have a clue. It is really a shame. Back in the 80s until the late 90s, I was a strong supporter of the Pahang Football Association. No doubt I was a big fan of the local sports scene. From Zainal Abidin Hassan, M. Kumaresan and Misbun Sidek to Jeffery Ong, you name them and I can tell you that I have great respect for them.

We had our gloriest moment in the previous decades. I hope we did not retire after the Commonwealth Games in 1998. Or did we?