The Most Powerful Man on Earth

Please be very very careful

We must never let these horrific acts frighten us into paralysis.

Thomas Jefferson said 200 years ago:

"The price of freedom is eternal vigilance".

Vigilance....Vigilance.....Vigilance......

Google Street Maps- now in Cambridge!

Google Street View is a feature of Google Maps and Google Earth that provides 360° horizontal and 290° vertical panoramic street level views and allows users to view parts of some regions of the world at ground level. When it was launched on May 25, 2007, only five American cities were included. It has since expanded to thousands of locations in the United States, UK, the Netherlands, France, Italy, Spain, Australia, New Zealand and Japan, and includes a variety of urban and rural areas.
You can now go to a particular place 'virtually'.
Great help to travelers.
Picture shows Zara, located in St Andrew Street, Cambridge, UK.

Too bad I can't show you where I stay, which is in Perne Road. Hopefully, they will map it later..

Airport issues- MacBook Intel 10.4

Have been having several issues with my Macbook.

My MacBook is almost 3 years old now and seems to be having some 'health' issues.

1. Airport- Would occasionally fail to detect wifi signals for few seconds before 'turning back on'. This happens almost on a daily basis. It's not really disruptive. Only irritates if downloading something- the download would get disrupted and you need to redownload.

2. 169.X.X.X signal (self assigned IP by the MacOS if it fails to detect IP address which is generally not usable) on IP address instead of the usual 192.X.X.X (It means that the Airport doesn't detect the IP address supposed to be sent by the router).
This happened yesterday.
I have gone through the Apple support section- seems to be a problem with the router (That is what they say. Pushing the blame on the router??)

But could it be a problem with the Airport causing this problem?

My Macbook seems to be playing up......

Anyone got any ideas as to what's happening?

Guide to tea brewing

Brewing tea is really quite easy. Here are some instructions for brewing a perfect cup of tea.

First start with cold, great tasting, water. If your tap water does not taste good, then use filtered or bottled water. (I say to use cold water because a typical hot water heater will often add contaminants and reduce the amount of oxygen in the water, which is needed for flavor extraction).

Then bring the desired amount of water to a rolling boil. (Do not boil the water for a long period of time because this too will deplete the water of oxygen).

Put approximately 2 grams or 1 tsp. of tea leaves per 6-8 oz. of water into a pre-heated pot or cup (pre-heating will allow the tea to steep at the proper temperature).

Then add hot water according the chart below for the type of tea you are brewing. Please note that these are general guidelines. If your tea container has brewing instructions I would follow those as they are probably ideal for that specific tea.
About Water Temperature

The water temperature does not have to be exact. The main thing to remember is to not use boiling water for Green or White teas. They will burn and create bitter flavors.

A good way to guess at the water temperature without a thermometer is to bring the water to a boil, and wait about 30 seconds (for white tea) or 60 seconds (for green tea) before pouring over the leaves.
About Steep Times

The amount of time that the tea steeps will determine it's strength. I enjoy different teas at varying strengths. I would suggest that when you buy a new tea, as it is steeping, check the taste every minute with a spoon. This way you can blow on it so you won't burn your tongue!

Let the first cup steep until it's either too strong or you notice bitter elements that are unpleasant. Then take note of when the tea tastes best to you and write it on the package. Besides, who can tell you how you like your tea better than you!

General guide to brewing time:-


Article from http://www.2basnob.com/brewing-tea.html

Green and Black Tea Consumption and Risk of Stroke. A Meta-Analysis

Stroke. 2009
Published online before print February 19, 2009, doi: 10.1161/STROKEAHA.108.538470

Background and Purpose—Experimental models of stroke provide consistent evidence of smaller stroke volumes in animals ingesting tea components or tea extracts. To assess whether a similar association of black or green tea consumption with reduced risk is evident in human populations, we sought to identify and summarize all human clinical and observational data on tea and stroke.

Methods—We searched PubMed and Web of Science for all studies on stroke and tea consumption in humans with original data, including estimation or measurement of tea consumption and outcomes of fatal or nonfatal stroke. Data from 9 studies involving 4378 strokes among 194 965 individuals were pooled. The main outcome was the occurrence of fatal or nonfatal stroke. We tested for heterogeneity and calculated the summary effect estimate associated with consumption of ≥3 cups of tea (green or black) per day using random-effects and fixed-effects models for the homogeneous studies. Publication bias was also evaluated.

Results—Regardless of their country of origin, individuals consuming ≥3 cups of tea per day had a 21% lower risk of stroke than those consuming <1 cup per day (absolute risk reduction, 0.79; CI, 0.73 to 0.85). The proportion of heterogeneity not explained by chance alone was 23.8%.

Conclusions—Although a randomized clinical trial would be necessary to confirm the effect, this meta-analysis suggests that daily consumption of either green or black tea equaling 3 cups per day could prevent the onset of ischemic stroke.

Fish intake of Swedish male adolescents is a predictor of cognitive performance

REGULAR ARTICLE
Acta Pædiatrica
Volume 98 Issue 3, Pages 555 - 560



ABSTRACT

Aim: Fish intake is reported to positively influence cognitive performance in infants and the elderly. In a longitudinal cohort study, we evaluated how fish consumption related to later cognitive performance in healthy young male adolescents.

Methods: In 2000, all 15-year-olds (n = 18 158; 9260 males) in the western region of Sweden were requested to complete an extensive questionnaire with items on diseases, fish consumption and socioeconomic status. Questionnaire data from the male responders (n = 4792, response rate 52%) were linked with records on subsequent intelligence test performance at age 18 from the Swedish Military Conscription Register (n = 3972). Multivariate linear models were used to estimate associations between fish intake and cognitive performance, adjusting for potential confounders.

Results: There was a positive association between the number of times having fish meals per week at age 15 and cognitive performance measured 3 years later. Fish consumption of more than once per week compared to less than once per week was associated with higher stanine scores in combined intelligence (0.58 units; 95% confidence interval 0.39, 0.76), in verbal performance (0.45; 0.27, 0.63) and in visuospatial performance (0.50; 0.31, 0.69). The association between fish consumption and the 3 intelligence scores was the same in lowly and highly educated groups. This indicates that education did not influence the association between the frequency of fish meals consumed and cognitive performance.

Conclusion: Frequent fish intake at age 15 was associated with significantly higher cognitive performance 3 years later.

Coffee cupping at 15 Perne Road CB1 3RX

Coffee cupping is a mandatory event for all coffee lovers.
Coffee cupping is like wine tasting but for coffee connoisseurs.
Enjoyed the following coffee:-

Jamaican Blue Mountain
Costa Rican
Hasbean Espresso blend


Now I know what makes a cup of good coffee.

Pics courtesy of Eric who just bought his new canon DSLR 450D. Shot with his kit lense 18-55mm IS USM 3.5-5.6 ISO800

My best mushroom soup recipe

Made this mushroom soup as a pre-coffee cupping event yesterday.
4 mushrooms were used for this.

Procini (1oz dried). Shitakae can be used as alternative to porcini.
Portabello (3oz fresh)
Chestnut (3oz fresh)
Morel (1 small portion)

Recipe has been modified from the traditional french recipe to reduce calorie/fat.
Makes 4 bowls.

Step 1- Vegetable stock
Carrots, Leeks, Mushrooms stems, celery, onions, potatoes.
Add 600mls water and reduce it to 300mls of vegetable broth.
Remove the potatoes. Mash 1 medium size potato (to be used as soup thickener later)
Drain the stock.

Step 2- Making the rouix
In French cooking, the roiux (pronouced as 'roo') serves as a sauce thickener.
It is a combination of flour and fats (butter, oil, etc)
Purpose of cooking this 2 ingredients together is to eliminate the raw taste of
flour and also to prepare it to absorb liquid.

1 tablespoon butter and 2 table spoon olive oil.
Heat oil up in a pan (low heat).
Add 2 tablespoon of flour slowly over the oil and stir continuously till it forms
a dough.
Stir and cook for 3-4 minutes.

Step 3- Making the soup base
When rouix is ready, add the vegetable stock while stirring it continuously.
Add the mash potatoes.
Add salt and black pepper to taste
Blend the soup if you want a smooth consistency (even with part of the mushrooms)


Step 4- Mushroom preparation.
Soak the porcini (1oz) for 20 minutes in warm water (150mls).
Don't throw away the resultant water which will be used in the soup.

Soak the morel in warm water for 20 minutes.
I discard the water as it usu contains sand and soil.

Cut the porcini, portabello, chestnut into the desired consistency.

Cut the morel mushroom finely.
2-3 shallots finely chopped.

The heat up a pan.
2 tablespoon olive oil.
Saute the shallots.
Then add the mushrooms.
Add herbs if you like- Rosemary, Thyme, Parsley
Add white wine if you like.
After about 10 minute, add it into the soup.


Cook for about 10mins.
Add 150mls of full cream milk for texture.

Serve with croutes (hard toasted french bread)

Decent place for a cup of Espresso

Stumbled upon this place (virtually!).
Pretty decent place for a good cup of Espresso/ Espresso based drinks (from my gut feeling).
Located in SS14 PJ.
They also brew their coffee in a Vacpot (Syphon brewed coffee)!

Price wise- depends on the taste.

Those staying nearby SS14, please try it out and let me know.
(By the way, I have no shares/ affiliation to this cafe.)

Will definitely visit this place when in PJ.

Their menu/pricing are all listed in their website:

http://www.gv.com.my/

Delay no more

I have been reading closely the current issue of english in the teaching of science and maths.

But instead I have learned new cantonese/hokkien words.

1. Delay no more- this was started in Hong Kong, where curses in Cantonese are often very colourful. If you pronounce the English words in a quick Cantonese accent, you will find that it refers to someone’s old mother.

2. Curry Lembu- Hokkien equivalent of 'Delay no more'

A trip to Audley End

Audley End House and Gardens

King Henry VIII gave Walden Abbey to Sir Thomas Audley, who transformed it into his mansion, Audley End.
Audley End remains one of England’s grandest country homes with over 30 lavishly decorated rooms to enjoy and explore.
The sumptuous interior is largely due to the third Baron Braybrooke who inherited Audley End in 1825, filling it with treasures including paintings by Masters such as Holbein and Canaletto.
Imagine yourself back in Victorian times when visiting this place.

Only 14 miles from Cambridge, UK


All pictures taken with Canon 350D 24-70mm L f/2.8 USM
ISO 800 used for indoor shots.

Free lunch on offer

The Star
LONDON LOG
By CHOI TUCK WO

Fancy being paid £1 to eat as much as you can?

AS the credit crunch bites deeper into Londoners’ pockets, many restaurants are at their wits’ end trying to boost their fledgling business.

First, there was Cha Cha Moon near Oxford Street. It caused a stir with its price-busting £3.50 (RM18.50) deals for popular hawker fare such as Singapore fried noodles and Penang prawn mee until recently.
James Huynh proudly displaying his £1 offer for customers. The promotion has attracted long queues outside his restaurant.

Then came Little Bay in Farringdon, which literally tore up the bills and asked customers to name their price instead.

“No food bills – pay us what you think the food is worth,” declared a blackboard outside the eatery in east London. Some see it as a psychological ploy to test one’s self-respect.

In the end, many would have paid up more than what was on the table – an ego-boosting trip for some, while saving the blushes for others.

Of course, there were also those who saw the chance for a too-good-to-be-true meal. Some had the audacity to leave as little as two pence (about 10 sen) for the food before slipping off.

But no one had bargained for what a Vietnamese Chinese restaurateur came up with next – he’s paying customers £1 (RM5.30) to eat as much as they can!

Now, that’s what you call a real Chinese takeaway. It’s about paying people to stuff themselves with aromatic duck, honey roast spare ribs and chicken noodle soup while fighting recession at the same time.

“It’s my way of giving a little back to my loyal customers who had supported me during the good times,” said James Huynh of Oriental Aroma in Wootton Bassett, Wiltshire.

He admitted that he had been incurring losses every day. Yet the day would come when his goodwill would earn back more business from his return customers.

“My mother used to tell me from childhood that if you’re prepared to give a little without expectation, in time you can only prosper,” said Huynh who arrived in Britain as a refugee about 30 years ago.

So it looks like the advice has been working well for him so far. Hence, the extraordinary offer believed to be the first of its kind in the country.

And since the promotion began recently, it has become the talk of the town, attracting a growing number of customers with queues forming even outside the restaurant.

Critics may sneer that there’s no such thing as a free lunch. Well, the catch is you have to spend at least £5 (RM26.50) on drinks to qualify for the offer.

Huynh, however, insisted the drinks price was not a catch but merely to prevent undesirable people from “gate-crashing” the restaurant.

Say what you like. The ineluctable truth is that the economic crisis has left restaurateurs scraping the barrel for more innovative ideas to attract customers.

Bank begins 'printing money' to fight slump- another 'boleh-land' in the making

There are a few 'boleh-lands' around the globe.
Here's just another place.
75 billion pounds of quantitative easing (up to 150 billion pounds)- it virtually means printing more money.
This strategy has been tried in Japan before without much success.
Also interest rate has been cut to 0.5%.
SO everyone here is saying- just spend the money and then ask the government for more.

So what is the moral of the story- in the land of boleh-land, there are more boleh-lands around.



Bank begins 'printing money' to fight slump

* Larry Elliott and Heather Stewart
* The Guardian, Friday 6 March 2009


The Bank of England yesterday announced unprecedented steps to prevent the deepest slump since the 1930s when it unveiled plans to inject up to £75bn into the economy over the next three months.

Alarmed by signs Britain's malfunctioning banking system is starving consumers and businesses of credit, chancellor Alistair Darling yesterday gave Threadneedle Street clearance to begin creating money - the last-gasp measure used by Japan to end a decade of recession and deflation.

The Bank said it would embark on quantitative easing next week, after its monetary policy committee cut the bank rate for the sixth time since the global financial system came close to collapse last October. The rate is now 0.5% - a level not seen before in the Bank's 315-year history.

Thousands caught unawares as 2m-high flash floods hit KL

Flood waters rose up to 2m at the junction of the Dynasty Hotel on Jalan Ipoh and in the Kampung Baru area.

Can someone tell me about the function of the SMART tunnel?

Updates in medicine

Achives of Surgery
2008;143(12):1222-1226
Requirement of perioperative stress doses of corticosteroids: a systemic review
• Patients receiving therapeutic doses of corticosteroids undergoing surgical procedure do not routinely require stress doses of corticosteroids as long as they continue their usual daily dose of corticosteroids.
• Adrenal function testing is not required in these patients because the test is overly sensitive and can’t predict which pt will develop an adrenal crisis.
• However, patients receiving physiological doses owing to hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis d/o require supplemental doses of corticosteroids in the perioperative period.

Invest In Our People!

by M. Bakri Musa

Millions of Chinese had a rude awakening when they returned last month from celebrating their Lunar New Year in their villages. They discovered that the jobs they had in the cities before they left only a few weeks earlier had now disappeared. Tragic though that may be to them individually, the aggregate loss pales in comparison to that suffered by their government through its massive investments in the stocks of American companies and other paper assets like bonds and Treasury Notes.

If only the Chinese government had invested in its people, imagine the good that would do to them, and to China. If their government had spent the funds to build better schools, Chinese schoolchildren would not have dangerous physical facilities that collapse with the slightest tremor. Had those funds been used to build affordable apartments, the Chinese people would have been better housed. That would at least help alleviate their miserable existence.

The Chinese people suffered twice. First, they worked incredibly hard under intolerable conditions and insufferably meager wages so the West could enjoy inexpensive consumer goods. Then the foreign currencies earned by their government from the exports created through their hard work vanished with the downward spiral of Western economies.

When Western consumers could no longer afford to spend, the Chinese were forced to work under even harsher conditions so the products they make could be sold cheaper still. This is just a modern twist to the old “coolie” concept. In the early part of the last century, millions of indentured Chinese were brought to America to work on the gold mines and railways. Today the coolies remain in China; America brings in only the products of their hard labor.

China is not alone in engaging in this folly of investing abroad instead of in their people, so is the rest of Asia. Singapore lost a hundred billion dollars on its American investments. On a per capita basis, Singapore’s loss is massive and readily dwarfs that suffered by China.

Granted, Singaporeans live in a different universe from those folks in China, at least with respect to the creature comforts of life, though not in personal freedom. That notwithstanding, imagine how much better off Singaporeans would be if only their government had invested in them instead of being enamored by the fancy financial papers hustled by those Ivy League-educated white boys on Wall Street.

A Singaporean friend who owns a subsidiary in Silicon Valley lamented that the secretary to the head of his American company enjoys a lifestyle far better than his: larger home, a decent car, more social amenities, and better opportunities for her children. Meanwhile back in Singapore my friend has to make do with one of the pigeon holes of a home in those monotonous urban high-rises, and his children have to spend what little spare time they have in “cram schools.”

On another level, had Singapore invested those billions in nearby giant Indonesia instead of faraway America, imagine how much good it would do to the poor Indonesians. More pragmatically, a developed Indonesia would be a more high-value market for Singapore’s products and services. Besides, imagine the gratitude and goodwill created through such investments. You cannot put a monetary value to that. Indonesia desperately needs those investments; America could easily do without Singapore’s dollars.

Malaysia Fortuitously Spared

Fortunately in this current global crisis Malaysia is spared this tragic fate of losing its investments abroad. This is not the result of any brilliant foresight on the part of the nation’s leaders, rather the consequences of our own harrowing experience with the Asian economic crisis of 1997. For one, Malaysia has not yet fully recovered from that trauma and thus does not have the extra cash to be investing in any new and exotic financial instruments concocted in the West, those acronym-filled papers that are the “assets” of what former Finance Minister Tun Dain Zainudin derisively termed the “cowboy economics.”

For another, the capital controls implemented by Mahathir, though now largely dismantled, have left a deep impression on Malaysian economic managers, immunizing them against future meddling in such poorly understood foreign “investments.”

That has not always been the case. Prior to 1997, agencies of the Malaysian government were active players on the London Stock Market, as well as the London Metal Exchange and the Foreign Exchange Market.

It was at the London Stock Market that Malaysia executed its famous (or infamous, at least to the Brits) “Dawn Raid” on September 1981 that effectively nationalized the huge British plantation company, Guthrie. That was hailed as a brilliant move that also satisfied our national pride. It proved that we natives were fast learners and could be just as agile as those pros in the City, a much-needed confidence booster for those who require it periodically.

Malaysia’s brash attempt to corner the world’s tin market at the London Metal Exchange also involved mega sums. This time however, there was no rush to accept responsibility for this squandering of citizens’ precious funds. There were other colossal losses, including Bank Negara’s forex debacle, as well as the now defunct Bank Bumiputra’s many expensive foreign misadventures.

Again, I could only imagine the immense good had our government invested those precious funds in our people instead. Although average Malaysians have it considerably much better than the average Chinese, nonetheless our quality of life could always be improved.

Contrary to the soothing but misplaced assurances from our leaders, Malaysia cannot insulate itself from the current global economic storm. There is no “comfort zone.” Yes, Malaysia was fortunate enough not to have been entangled in those highly deceptive newfangled financial instruments with such fanciful acronyms. However, when our biggest trading partner and consumer of many of our commodities is in economic difficulties, rest assured that Malaysia will also inevitably be roped in.

Invest In What You Know

Like other countries, the Malaysian government has also introduced its own economic stimulus in an attempt to deal with the crisis. Our economists too have read Maynard Keynes and understood the rationale for counter cyclical public spending in a downturn.

Understanding the concept is one thing, translating it into reality in our local context is entirely another matter. The challenge is to make sure that our economic stimulus does indeed work, meaning it does spur the economy, and that our investments are indeed investments, meaning they would produce returns in excess of the capital expended.

At the height of the dotcom boom, the legendary American investor Warren Buffet was asked why he was not investing in that sector. He answered, “I invest only in things I know!”

I live in California and know that the real estate dynamics in San Francisco is radically different from that of San Bernardino, so I invest only in my community. I can at least follow the trend. Yet we have bankers in Singapore and Beijing pretending to be knowledgeable about real estate in the entire United States. That is the only explanation for their readily investing billions in securitized American mortgages!

Follow Warren Buffet’s maxim: Invest only in what you know. What do Malaysian leaders know? For one, more than any Western banker or Nobel prize-winning economist, our leaders know our people, their daily needs and living conditions. So invest in them, our people. For another, the economic “multiplier” of such spending is considerable; there is no such local multiplier when we invest in foreign stocks and other paper assets.

Our leaders are aware of the deplorable conditions of our schools especially in rural areas. They also know that these children risk their lives daily in crossing rickety bridges to get to schools. When they return home, their houses are flimsily built and in an unhealthy environment. They also have poor access to healthcare. So why not invest in building new schools, bridges, clinics, and affordable public housing?

Similarly we all know that those rural children could not get good teachers. So why not invest in teacher training and provide greater incentives for teachers to serve in rural areas?

The beauty of such investments is that they generate values way over and above the capital and other efforts we put in. The benefits are also enduring, and indeed “recession-proof.” Should there be an economic downturn, the superb education those children had received would still be with them; likewise their good health. Indeed a populace that is healthy and better educated, and thus productive, is the best weapon against a downturn.

In the last budget, and also in the proposed additional stimulus, considerable sums were devoted to investing in the local stock market and in furthering the government’s already considerable involvement in the private sector. Come another recession or a market misjudgment, such “investments” could easily evaporate. We have already squandered hundreds of billions on Bank Bumiputra, State Development Corporations, and the myriad GLCs. All we have to show for such investments are some old, tattered letterheads. We have not even learned any useful lessons from those debacles.

Let the investment bankers, brokers and other middle men and paper shufflers invest in exotic financial assets; governments should invest in their people, and in infrastructures that would enhance their lives. Those are the only investments that are properly the purview of governments, not company stocks, foreign bonds, or fancy derivatives.

Investing in our people is also the only effective way to prepare them for the increasingly competitive world. More significantly for leaders, that would also ensure that come election time when citizens would make decisions about their future, our leaders would not be rudely awakened to find themselves without jobs.