Amazing Four Hands Guitar

For some reason, i just can't stop smilling watching this... :)

Four Hands Guitar

Peace lover

Here’s an article from The Star today:

It was a Jais intrusion, says church

PETALING JAYA: The Damansara Utama Methodist Church (DUMC) maintained that the Selangor Islamic Affairs Department (Jais) had trespassed on its premises last week.

DUMC senior pastor Dr Daniel Ho reiterated that Jais and police officers had entered its Dream Centre without a search warrant.

“They intruded into the thanksgiving dinner, interrupted the programme (and) took photographs and videos when they came in.

“The Jais and police officers did exit the hall but remained in the corridor, still taking videos.

“Jais officers (also) issued several warnings to the organisers for refusing to cooperate,” Dr Ho said yesterday, rebutting a statement from Jais director Marzuki Hussin on Thursday.

Marzuki had said they had not raided the church but had entered after obtaining permission from the organisers.

He said Jais was merely conducting a “check” to look for Muslims at the Aug 3 event at 9.45pm, which is provided for under the Syariah Criminal Enactment (Selangor) 1995.

Marzuki maintained that the enforcement officers did not act aggressively or trespassed that night.

Damansara Utama Methodist Church

My question is, are they allowed to conduct this kind of RAID or “check” (as stated by JAIS) in other religious event? How much power do they have to simply walk in on worship premises and conduct the unwarranted raid? If so, can our priests conduct similar raid in any mosque around Malaysia? This is humiliating and it gives great concern to all non Muslim in Malaysia.

The strongest condemnation came from the Malaysian Consultative Council of Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Sikhism and Taoism,, an interfaith group that said in a prepared release that it “unreservedly condemns the unwarranted raid... which clearly breached the constitutionally guaranteed, and internationally recognized, sanctity of a holy place of worship – an event which has been confirmed by the Malaysian AIDS Council to have been organized to raise funds.” The religious police’s action, the council said, “sets a dangerous precedent which must be stopped and condemned by all peace-loving Malaysians. The constitutionally guaranteed and internationally recognized sanctity of all places of worship cannot be compromised, and this unprecedented violation must be investigated and those responsible, appropriately punished.”

The statement also questioned whether any people had been asked to convert, as the newspapers reported, and demanded that: “If the newspapers in question are found to have published false statements likely, or meant, to incite religious or racial hatred between Malaysians, the authorities must initiate the necessary action to punish them to the full extent provided for in our laws.”

What’s new in my life?

Well, nothing much except the latest addition I had 3 weeks ago...an acoustic guitar and an amplifiers.

What's the one thing that almost all small venue musicians strive for when it comes to amplifiers? Some might say "pure immersive tone", which would undoubtedly be followed by "portability". The Ibanez T-Series Acoustic Guitar Amplifiers deliver exactly that, along with the striking appearance of a hand-crafted boutique amplifier. Whether you’re strumming away at the local coffee shop or playing weekly gigs at a religious venue, the sounds of the T-Series will fill the room. Plus, you won't have to break your back getting your amp in and out. The Ibanez T-Series was designed with portability in mind.

Troubadour amps allow you to confidently chart new musical paths and acoustic journeys through any terrain. The highly-portable T10 10-watt acoustic-electric amplifier features hi-fidelity components and an extended-range 6.5" Power Jam speaker that can convey your acoustic sound at any volume. A switchable chorus with speed and depth control is a great feature to have, especially on an amp of this size, and the tilt bar is pretty handy, too.

                                                  SPECS

10 Watt Dedicated Acoustic Guitar Amplifier

6.5” Custom-Made Coaxial Speaker

Switchable Chorus With Speed Control

CD In

Tilt Bar

10.3”w x 8.2”h x 7.6”d

Weight: 7.5lbs

Finger dancing good

Here’s what I found…For the launch of the Galaxy SII in France, Samsung brought JayFunk, the internet Finger Tutting phenomenon, from Los Angeles to Paris to deliver an incredible and surprising choreography. Watch it till your jaw drop readers!

Fancy a Hoverbike?

It’s our childhood dream that one day we’ll be riding a flying bike or flying car. Could we be close to riding around on hoverbikes?  If Chris Malloy has anything to do with it, yes.  Chris has developed a working prototype of a hoverbike and is looking for investors to help him push it into production.

The hoverbike has two counter-rotating blades and resembles a performance motorcycle.  It is 231 pounds which makes it less than a motorcycle. Adventurous motorcyclists might be familiar with the thrill of getting airborne at the top of a rise, but the Hoverbike is set to take catching some air to a whole new level. With a 1170 cc 4-stroke engine delivering 80 kW driving two ducted propellers, the inventor of the Hoverbike, Chris Malloy, says with its high thrust to weight ratio, the Hoverbike should be able to reach an estimated height of more than 10,000 feet and reach an indicated airspeed of 150 knots (278 km/h or 173 mph).

At the moment these are only theoretical figures as the Hoverbike hasn't been put through its paces yet, but Malloy has constructed a prototype Hoverbike and plans to conduct real world flight tests in a couple of months. Behold dreamers(*yeay)!!

Chris Malloy with his beast machine!

Rainforest World Music Festival 2011

Hmm, where should I begin? Alright, the first time I heard of Rainforest World Music Festival I had no clue of what were they offering. I watched it on tv years ago and I knew it was exciting, lot of fun, and it’s a heaven for music lovers (rainforest music precisely…). I started attending RWMF in 2008 and it was a blast! Without second thought, I promise myself I’d attend 2009 RWMF and ever since that, I made  3 consecutive pilgrimage to Cultural Village, Kuching. Hahaha…

RWMF 2011…with Bearmany, world cup fever remember??

This year around, please don’t be surprised if you see me in the midst of the crowd jumping and waving my hand in the air to the music…(exactly what I had done for the past three years albeit the muddy ground). Strangely, I forgot where I save my pictures from 08 and 09 visits (geeze..).  I didn’t realize I still had 2009 ticket inside my wallet as well!

RWMF 2009…RM 90

RWMF 2011…RM 110!!!

RWMF 2011 will be held on the 8^th – 10^th of July at Sarawak Cultural Village, Santubong. I’m coming to watch the second day performances (since I have to drive all the way from Sibu on the first day, and get back to Sibu on the third day every year hence, explains my one-day-only visit to RWMF). You can get your ticket from online here or you can go to their nearest counter at Tourism Board (waterfront, Kuching). Have I bought I my ticket? YEEESSSSS! Please, don’t miss this event as it exposes world class musicians and if you are really into music, you might want to try their workshop or just enjoy other activities around cultural village. Till then, see you on the second day of RWMF readers!!

You won’t realize your body moving to the beat and next thing you know, you’re sweating with mud all over your feet…

The coolest stuff ever!

What stuff? What is this? (wait and see…)

Hello there…it’s been awhile now. This time around, I had one of the most memorable Gawai celebrations with my family. Why, cause all my family members were here during Gawai this year. It’s probably two years ago since our last gathering and last week, we met again, older, wiser, and getting bigger…hahaha. So what is Gawai Dayak? Well, according to Wikipedia( yeah, I don’t know how to explain it and need help):

Gawai Day or Gawai Dayak is a festival celebrated in Sarawak on 1 June every year. It is both a religious and social occasion. The word Gawai means a ritual or festival whereas Dayak is a collective name for the native ethnic groups of Sarawak (and neighboring Indonesian Kalimantan): the Iban, also known as Sea Dayak and the Bidayuh people, also known as Land Dayak. Thus, Gawai Dayak literally means "Dayak Festival". Dayak would visit their friends and relatives on this day. Such visit is more commonly known as "ngabang" in the Iban language. Those too far away to visit would receive greeting cards.

There you go…so first of all, we had planned a family photo just to imprint the precious moment of all time in a frame and hang it on the wall.

It wasn’t allowed in the studio, but I don’t care…

We went as a big band and it took 4 cars to fit us all (such a huge family,gheehehe). This was our first family photo and the scary part was the tiny studio couldn’t fit whole of us in camera. Finally the photographer manages to arrange our position (after 10 minutes of waiting) and everybody gave their best pose...*click!  

Head count anyone?

So how was our Gawai this year? Lots of booze and karaoke session went on and 3 days on non-stop crazy celebration did take its toll. I almost lost my voice for a good few days and not to mention, doing wonder girls ‘Nobody’ dance at 4 a.m., waking up next day and remember nothing ‘bout it…(no! I would not expose my embarrassing photo here!)

I think it was a masterpiece song..hahaha

I must say we didn’t visit much but we stayed in the house, having fun with each other. Other relatives also stayed and celebrated Gawai with us to some extent there were 30 of us sharing one bathroom and a toilet! As for our outdoor activity, we went to Kubu Brooke in Julau swimming(although the river was knee-deep only) and strolling along the river bank.

Peace!!!

As my brother and sister going back to their respective workplace, I continue my journey to Kuching for a few days.

Taken using Samsung wave…

Beautiful sunset….

While staying there, I spent RM400+ on clothing and that was a huge amount of money! Nevertheless, I deserve a new shirt and short since Sibu didn’t sell up-to-date clothing (seriously…). Alright, back to the coolest stuff. It is a clip-on tuning device for guitar (my brother got it for me). The clip-on tuner provides an accurate reading with a bright back light, best suited when tuning is required in dark and noisy environment such as during a gig (whooaaa!). After tuning my guitar, I admit my guitar sounds pretty damn nice!!

Tuning in progress…

For more info, visit here.

Thanks for reading guys! Till then, enjoy this song(I’m so crazy about this song after gawai *karaoke mode)

Tanak Kampung by Jimmy Palikat