I have finally beaten God of War: Chain on Olympus today. The game is actually not that tough. I played the Medium difficulty settnig and took me a week with an hour or two of play time a day to complete the entire game. Ofcourse, when I get to the respective bosses, I dies a few times and some incidents, I almost completely gave up. A day later, I pick the PSP up again and whola, proceeded to the next level. Sometimes one just need a little break to move on… philosophy learnt from gaming….

I have to thank gamespot for providing some of the essential walkthrough. Without the walkthrough, I would have been caught at a few scenes for ages. Now, how would I know that I must whack the statue head to peak through… glad that the guys at gamespot figured this out for me and allowed me to proceed with the game without spending too much time.

Finishing the game unlocks the God Mode, which is the hardest difficulty setting. I have started that and currently stuck at the first boss. Upon finishing the god mode, you will unlock all the treasures.

Aiyo yo… I tell you… today is one eventful day la. In the morning, I see in the news that the Perak fiasco not solved yet, but got light ahead. Then, by 10am, got rumors circulating in office that two of the PKR guy will jump ship. Like that, BN get power back in Perak. Its like two brothers saw a beautiful girl, they both fought to get the girl, they were so busy fighting, suddenly, their neighbor is the one who rides into the sunset with the girl. Rumor only.. Then, coming back from lunch, my wife called, she said her colleague mother just came back from Komtar, got many people there, looks like got fighting.. going to have riot, asking me to balik rumah. Her office all people scared and really balik rumah. The boss in Singapore gives approval. I checked for news, and nothing was on the web, only news on the Star and Straight Times asking people to stay away from Komtar. The bridge looks fine too on the bridge cam. So I told my wife not to worry, people are just making small things to become big, and ask her to balik first.

I continue with my work. An hour later, I went to the lab to check some stuff out. I told the lab lady, “eh, Komtar ada kekecohan!”, “Ya ka?” She said, in disbelieve. Another colleague called her friend. “Khairy gia 10k lang lai lor!” (Khairy bring 10k people), everyone silence a while. I said where got, that guy where got so brave, not easy to transport so many people around. Then she said the bridge tutup liau, I said where got, go see the penangbridge at blogspot, traffic lancar, sui sui. Then my friend asked, “Eh, you tak pergi ka?”, “tak ada la, I tak dapat invitation I said. UMNO tak ajak I pergi pun?, Jika tidak di undang, jangan nak pandai pandai pergi, orang tak suka.” I said, we all have a good laugh. Then when I get back to my office, my other colleagues start to receive info that something is going down in Komtar, and start to gather and search the web. Start la the ofice kecoh for a while. At that time, I already got a mail from another colleague, picking an article from Malaysiakini. 500 people only, and when police ask to disperse, they all disperse quietly, no arrest was done and it was a peaceful demonstration. Later I got back to the lab for another issue and told the colleagues there, “500 saje la, mana ada 10 ribu, your news agent cannot pakai la?”, we all laughed.

Then they said, eh, you seronok la, office tutup 2 hari. I said mesti la, Sabtu dan Ahad memang holiday ma. “Ya eh” she said, then she continue “kita ada food poisoning, sudah 30 lebih orang kena, semua cerit berit.”, I said you kena ka? She said “Tak la, saya tiap tiap hari makan kanteen kanak kanak riang dan sihat.” This one not a rumor, the cafetria got shutdown because of overwhelming visits to the clinic. Then when I got back to my desk, I have a dozen mails of latest development, photos of the demonstration in Komtar, then Banners in KL asking Pak Lah to step down, Mahatir son asking Pak Lah to step down, and many annoying colleagues chasing me for my work. I tell you some colleagues are testing my patience. I have not encounter such colleagues in the last company, but then again, in this company, a product development life cycle is just 3 months, so everything is super fast. Then just before I go off, I read that Perak have work itself out, 6-3-1 is the formula. I wonder if can buy 4d on this one, have to guest the 4th digit la…

The thing about suffering is that it changes all the time. And as a person, we often gets deluded about the sufferings. We often things that we change things, we change jobs, we change partners, we change home, our sufferings will go away. This is not true. What we change is just changing the type of sufferings. For example, in the current house, there are problem with neighbors being crazy, and we thought changing home, it would go away, well, partly true, they go away, but when we go to the new home, there are other new types of sufferings, and how would we deal with that then? It will never end. So, the key to eliminating the suffering is to deal with it directly. To accept that the world are full of funny things, and we can never escape from sufferings. To begin accepting the suffering is to first be thankful of the things you have now. Back to the house example just now, be thankful of the nice home you have. Be thankful that the home have sheltered you from heavy rain, and keep you warm and safe from thunder storms. When you start to cultivate these feelings, two things happen. First, the focus of the problems goes away, shifted to a positive focus. Second, because of the positive focus, you feel much happier. This is how we can eliminate our sufferings. Start with small things, and be thankful of them, and in time, we will be thankful of the life we have and the opportunity to do good and contribute positively to the society.

The Star paper recently reported that we can now renew license online and this have been enabled since last year’s April. This makes the system almost 1 year old. So, as a eager citizen, I went to try out the service. The experience brings out some interesting things that the paper does not report. This is what happen to me. A few days back, I renewed my driving license online. There was 3 options of payment and 3 options of license renewal proof. On the payment options, I selected Credit Card, since this is easy for me. There is a service charge of RM2 for every transaction (regardless of method of payment) for this online service. RM2 is ok for not having to leave the house. This brings us to the 3 interesting proof of renewal. First option is to truly without having to leave the house, and have the renewal slip delivered to you (within 5 days). For this option, you will have to pay a courier fee from RM5-10 depending on your location. The second option is to go to the nearest eService center and collect your payment slip. Third option is to go to the nearest eService center and upload the renewal to the MyKad.

Obviously, following the Prime Minister Abdullah Badawi call to change lifestyle over the increase cost of living, I decided to take the cheap option of going to the eService center and collect the payment slip. I glance at the address and it was in Sg. Dua, hastily, I imagined the JPJ at Sg Dua. Just before going over, I called the Penang JPJ office to find out the hours of operation. I told the lady that I renew my license online and would like to go over to JPJ to collect the renewal slip. The lady said that the Sg. Dua office is closed for renovation and moved to Bukit Jambul. I knew the new office and proceeded there during the lunch hour. Upon arriving there, the nice lady over the counter said to me with a smiling face, “Oh, you renew online, you will have to bring 2 photos and RM20 to make a copy of your license!”, I pause for a while. I wasn’t expecting this. I asked her to repeat as I thought I have heard her wrong. She was firm on her stand. I asked why?, She said that the Mykad usage of license is not fully implemented, so everyone are suppose to have a copy of their driving license.

Then I said, well, I have a copy now, I just need the renewed dates supplement. She said because my current license was with old IC number, I have to change a new one. Then I tried to explain to her that, none of this was said online, and the online system was giving the impression that we just need to renew online and we are done. She was firm on her stand, I was frustrated, but I understand her position, as she is just following instructions. Thats fine, so I requested to just upload the renewed license dates to the MyKad. She said she cannot do that also, she keep on insisting that she must produce a copy of my license. I could not give in even if I wanted to, mainly because I went to the JPJ unprepared, I didn’t know I had to bring 2 copies of photos with me, as I don’t usually these things with me all the time. I requested to talk to a superior officer because I felt this was not right. I failed to talk to the superior officer as it was already lunch time when I was done with the lady. What baffled me was a few issues. First, the fact that MyKad cannot be used solely for driving license, then why allow the option (during online renewal) of uploading renewed license into mykad? Second, if I have selected the option to mail the renewal slip (renewed license supplement), I wouldn’t have this problem. Then again, I might be committing a crime, that is assuming the lady over the JPJ counter was right. Which I felt she was not fully briefed as she could not answer my questions on this.

So feeling frustrated of wasted my time at JPJ, I return to my desk and went online again. I tried to renew my license again, and wow, I can continue to renew my license for another year to 2014. So in total, one can renew the driving license up to 6 years, and not just 5. Then I realize a grave mistake I have made earlier. By renewing online, I should collect the renewal slip at MyEG Office named ‘eService center’ and not JPJ. This office is in Sg. Dua oposite USM, close to the PG JPJ office and I did not see the full address. This office is open 6 days a week from 8am – 5pm. Since it opened 6 days a week, I went on a Sunday to collect it.

It was just at the shop lot right in front of the USM Sg. Dua entrance. The shop was located on the 2nd floor and after going up the stairs that smelled like urine, I came to center. It was jam pack, on a Sunday, there were so many youth renewing licenses. There was an old lady manning the desk and juggling between talking to me and taking photo for a young lady. I said I renew online, and she was like, yup, say no more… she flip through her files and whola, my renewed license, sign and off I go.

JPJ Online License Renewal, What’s wrong with it?… Me!

What have the ideology been so indifferent that both parties could not site down and work it out? I am really baffled and really needs to be educated on this. The Perak Sultan have chosen his MB and this is his choice. These are testing times for the political parties, if the parties could put the differences aside and work together this would be the time. Maybe this is a rough start, anyhow, the people’s fate are in your hands for the next 5 years. Guess what, BN will capitalize on this indifference, and I am not surprise racial issues will be injected into some things that may sound trivial at first. Stop bickering, accept the MB and move on.