Public Servants Wearing Tuxedoes Now?

Imagine next time you visit some government offices, and the public servants are all wearing tuxedoes, with shiny shoes, shiny hair, stuff you only get from Shanghai’s mafias in the 30s. When they talk to you, you get the same freaky English ascent from MAS flights. What do you think of our public servants’ quality then? Better? More high class? And of course, do you think agree that your tax money, or your parents’ should be spent in such way?

According to New Straits Times online, apparently that’s what some of the smart-a** officers in KL City Hall did. According to them, they gave 31 of their workers training on "Corporate Grooming and Social Etiquette", which involved lunch and dinner in fine restaurants, karaoke sessions, and the participants were required to wear formally, and their tuxedoes were provided, each cost RM1200.

The first session was at the Equatorial Hotel Bangi from May 5 to 7 which cost RM78730. The second phase was held at Sheraton Imperial Hotel on June 19 and cost RM23863.

So, these public servants Generation-X will be dressed like James Bond, able to bulb with class, to fart with class, sing like Nat King Cole, and know tango and cha-cha as well. Pretty cool, but just in what way is this going to benefit the people?

Maybe after another session, the o-bah-san who cleans the toilets will be wearing prom dress or cheongsam. Walau!

I say hor~ just teach them three things: (1) teach them to eat and drink faster so that they can finish their lunch break earlier and get back to work, (2) teach them some basic English vocabularies like ‘Sorry’, ‘Thank you’, ‘Excuse me’, and ‘Please’ so that we can realize that we are dealing with normal human beings, and not apes or our local orang utans (actually apes and orang utans are more gentle) (3) make them realize that they don’t have to work like dead people, and some extra walking to fetch some files or documents won’t possible take up to a few hours.

Bloody HR

My friend forwarded me this joke recently:

After 2 years of selfless service, a man realized that he has not been promoted, no transfer, no salary increase no commendation and that the Company is not doing any thing about it. So he decided to walk up to his HR Manager one morning and after exchanging greetings, he told his HR Manager his observation.The boss looked at him, laughed and asked him to sit down saying, "My friend, you have not worked here for even one day!" The man was surprised to hear this, but the manager went on to explain.

Manager:- How many days are there in a year?
Man:- 365 days and some times 366

Manager:- how many hours make up a day?
Man:- 24 hours

Manager:- How long do you work in a day?
Man:- 8am to 4pm. i.e. 8 hours a day.

Manager:- So , what fraction of the day do you work in hours?
Man:- (He did some arithmetic and said 8/24 hours i.e. 1/3(one third)

Manager:- That is nice of you! What is one-third of 366 days?
Man:- 122 (1/3x366 = 122 in days)

Manager:- Do you come to work on weekends?
Man:- No sir

Manager:- How many days are there in a year that are weekends?
Man:- 52 Saturdays and 52 Sundays equals to 104 days

Manager:- Thanks for that. If you remove 104 days from 122 days, how many days do you now have?
Man:- 18 days.

Manager:- OK! I do give you 2 weeks sick leave every year. Now remove that 14 days from the 18 days left. How many days do you have remaining?
Man:- 4 days

Manager:- Do you work on New Year day?
Man:- No sir!

Manager: - Do you come to work on workers day?
Man:- No sir!

Manager:- So how many days are left?
Man:- 2 days sir!

Manager:- Do you come to work on the (National holiday )?
Man:- No sir!

Manager:- So how many days are left?
Man:- 1 day sir!

Manager:- Do you work on Christmas day?
Man:- No sir!

Manager:- So how many days are left?
Man:- None sir!

Manager:- So, what are you claiming?
Man:- I have understood, Sir. I did not realise that I was stealing Company money all these days.

Luckily this is just a joke. But really~ Maths can be one stupid way to get yourself into trouble!

Upcoming Gundam Merchandises Images

The Gundam Base.Side 1 website always comes up with some pretty cool and up-close images on upcoming Gundam stuff. This time the website gives us some sharp images on HCM Pro Sazabi, HGUC GP02A and HCM Pro White base punitive set.

HCM Pro Sazabi seems absolutely fabulous to me. The posibility is excellent; you can pose him in a butt kicking action; see the images from the link for yourself. But I wonder why the website always attaches the URL at his xxx part in all the images? :-D

HGUC GP02A is another big time release. Fans of Anavel Gato have waited six years since the release of HGUC GP01 for this kit to arrive. The face design doesn't seem good to me though; the big guy looks a bit sleepy :-P Anyway, since it's in HGUC format, the model should have no problem in lifting and holding its shield, whereas in its Master Grade format, the heavy shield which prevents the model from holding it right was the biggest disappointment back then. It is unknown at the moment, whether the display-stand shown here is included, or you have to get it from other HGUC kits.

The last one on the list is HCM pro White Base punitive set, featuring a previously released Zaku II Type J, the Magella Attack Tank and Cui Land Carrier. The extra would be the clear sticker to enhance the three kits, including a sexy model’s picture, for the Zaku II’s shoulder shield and a Zeon motto which turned out to be grammatically wrong :-D

ITA 1:0 AUS Man of the match: Luis Medina Cantalejo

Italy sent the Australians packing with a controversial one nil victory in the World Cup second stage match 2 days ago. The match was not of my particular interest, since I support neither team. After watching the match, I felt that the conspiracy theory is at play again, and there seems to be a tie with Italy’s World Cup experience in 2002.

Italy's games for me were always boring. Their defense was the strongest among in the world, most of the times, their opponents’ ball only circles around the midfield. Having said that, it would seem impossible for the Sorceroos to even reach Gianluigi Buffon.

The Australian did a great job in their offense, utilizing many chances to score. The goal possession at one point was Italy 41% and Australia 59%, quite impressive. I kind of feel sorry for them at one point, as their attempts kept bouncing off the Italian wall, especially Fabio Cannavaro, who kept his yard clean of any Socceroos.

Walau, like this also red card, sure or not?

Materazzi’s dismissal in the second half gave some light for the Australian side as Italy was down to ten men. Lippi immediately substituted his striker with a defender, which made the game even harder for Australians and much more boring for the viewers.

It's a huge man on the ground lah, brother. You still miss him and tumble? No wonder you can't score in 90 minutes.

Perhaps it was time for the Azzuri to avenge their humiliation of World Cup 2002, as we saw the referee played a huge part in the final score line of the match. At the very last minute of stoppage time, Grosso earned Italy a penalty from a seemingly Australian tackle, although he looked like diving to me. Francesco Totti scored the penalty, and Australia is out. A controversial penalty scored by an Italian played who was sent off controversially in World Cup 2002. The referee, Luis Medina Cantalejo of Spain became the avenger for Italy.

Schwarzer saw the penalty well, just can't reach it. Well, maybe yellow and green is not the lucky color this time?

I don’t know, maybe he was in rush of going to the loo?

Images are from FIFA World Cup Germany 2006.

Upcoming Gundam Stuff

Hobby Net Web Shopping and ESToys review several Gundam merchandises to be released soon. The date of release, as well as the price, unfortunately, were not mentioned. Anyway, let's have a peek at what Bandai is up to recently:

Cosmic Region Akatsuki – should be interesting to see how Bandai remold the golden knight of Orb to match the quality of Cosmic Region Strike Freedom, Destiny and Infinite Justice

EMSiA Atmospheric Re-entry set – a re-colored EMSiA Gundam Mk-II plus a Flying Armor. Bandai shows their “frying cold rice” tactic again.

MSiA Providence Gundam – Finally, a match for MSiA Freedom and Justice. But, isn’t it quite late to revive the SEED mecha now?

MSiA Baund Doc – a strange looking transformable MA from Zeta Gundam. This fella got the biggest butt of all the mecha in the Gundam era

GFF Crossbone Gundam X-3 – very beautiful kit for me, especially the skull on the chest. But I’m not quite sure about the character’s background though

UC Arms Gallery Vol. 3 – most series aimed at the MS, this series is about the weapons. Pretty cool, all the items are redesigned, so a lot of extra details are available.

Crazy Japanese TV Show

I'm having my exam at the moment, which is why I'm quite slow in updating my blog these days. Apart from the exam, it's the World Cup season, and as with any typical football fan, a huge percentage of a day's time goes to the TV, usually at night.

Anyway, this posting is not about football, but a very funny Japanese TV show clip from YouTube. I found it on Mr. Brown blog, and almost laughed my head off after watching it. It's definitely a treat to all of my Swinburne friends who are in the heat of exam at the moment. Hope you enjoy this one as much as I did. Just like what Mr. Brown said, "Good shit must share."

New Transformers Movie

Fans of Transformers will be delighted to know that there will be a new movie coming out in July 2007. This time it's targeting the big screen, with big names behind the production. Produced by Dreamwork and Paramount, the director is Michael Bay ("The Island", "Armageddon") , and Steven Spielberg is the executive producer! Wow, can't wait till next year to watch it. The plot of the story, Dueling alien races, the Autobots and the Decepticons, bring their battle to Earth, leaving the future of humankind hanging in the balance (from Internet Movie Database). In the mean time, you can check out the movie's website, featuring a huge, seemingly Megatron's eye over planet Earth. Cool... ...

Also, I found out from Internet Movie Database that a Voltron movie is coming out in 2008, featuring the five lions I watched long long time ago. No details yet, but you can see some of the tentative production note on IMDB.

Master Grade F91

I'm not sure how well you know Gundam F91. I read quite a bit about it on MAHQ.net once, but had never watched it on anime. According to the website, Gundam F91 features many revolutionary types of weaponry; including the first ever beam shield, and the Variable Speed Beam Rifles, which allows it to control the power outflow of its beam weapons. Along with the arnaments, the mecha design of this Gundam is much more compact, making the size of the MS to be smaller, yet more powerful than any previous Gundams. The overall height of the MS is 16 meters, whereas most other Gundams are 18 meters.

Well, all those marvelous specs work well for the anime, but when it comes to producing the model, 2 cm shorter means it is 2 cm less fun, since most of us like our models to be real tall and mean. On the other hand, it will be interesting to see how Bandai is going to re-mold this mecha, since it is going to be very delicate at such size (other examples are Gundam Wing Ver.Ka and Gundam Wing Zero Custom which are also smaller compared to the other Gundams). Here are some images from Danny Choo’s blog, showing you the prototype Gundam F91 to be expected this July. The price is 3200 Yen, around RM200 when released.

HCM-Pro Sazabi

Among the Gundam merchandises coming out next July is this impressive HCM-Pro Sazabi. MSN-04 Sazabi is the last mobile suit for Char Aznable, and the red giant truly represents the Red Comet himself. Not only the color scheme, the design of the helmet is based on the helmet worn by Char is UC0079. Sazabi is one of my favorite mecha, and the Master Grade version has been on my top priority list for a very long time (Just can’t get it here in Kuching!). The HCM-Pro version is equally good, with the details of the legs, and all the action it can pose. With Sazabi coming out in July, I bet Nu Gundam will be out as well before the end of this year.

Images are from Hobby Link Japan.

Gundam Astray Gold Frame Amatu Mina Custom

What a long name this fella got!

I'm not sure how well you know this mecha. I just did a bit of research on him since Bandai is scheduled to released the 1-100 scale model for this mecha, coming out in July at the price of 4000 Yen (same price as Master Grade ZZ Gundam!) according to Hobby Shop Midori.

Here a bit of information on Astray Gold Frame Amatu (A.G.F.A.): The storyline is in Gundam SEED Astray, the side-story of SEED. You would probably know Gundam Astray Red Frame, the one with a Samurai Sword (please refer to the review on the 1-144 Scale model I posted quite a while ago). Along with P02 Red Frame, two other Astrays were produced, namely P03 Blue Frame and P01 Gold Frame. All the three mecha were produced on Heliopolis, the same place Strike and t other four GAT-X series Gundam were born. Same with the five Gundams, the Astrays were meant for the Earth Alliance to battle the MS forces of ZAFT. However, the pioneer behind the Astray project, Orb Union decided to keep the project as a secret and send people to destroy the three prototypes. All three of them survived however, and Gold Frame landed in the hand of a Coordinator named Rondo Ghina Sahaku. After several battles, Astray Gold Frame was damaged and was overhauled to become A.G.F.A., which features many unique types of equipment such as an additional mono-eye sensor on its head, and the arm unit salvaged from Blitz Gundam. The salvaged arm gave A.G.F.A. a deadly combat ability, the 'Mirage Colloid'. When activated, it renders the MS invisible to enemy radar, making it a perfect stealth assassin. The main armament of A.G.F.A. is 'Maga-no-Ikutachi' (Living Sword of Evil), which is some sort of equipment to drain the energy of enemy MS in close range. Rondo used this MS to deepen the confusion and hatred between ZAFT and the Earth Alliance, hoping to use that situation to his own benefit. Anyway, A.G.F.A. was defeated, and its pilot was killed by Astray Blue Frame Second L.

The story of A.G.F.A. doesn't end there. The twin sister of Rondo Ghina Sahaku, Rondo Mina repaired the damaged MS and equipped it with two more armaments, hip sabers and a claw on its left arm. Rondo Mina continues to use this MS to fight on behalf of his dead brother.

The model to be released this July is the one used by Rondo Mina, as you can see from the photo below that the hip saber and the trademark claw on its left arm is also available. But I guess you can just take off the hip saber and the claw, and you will get the MS piloted by Rondo Ghina. I think many people would like to have this model, since the golden coated parts make the model quite exquisite. For folks in Kuching, you need to hold your wallets for two months to lay your hands on this babe.

Images are from MAHQ.net and Hobby Shop Midori.

Ex-S Gundam

Another favorite Gundam mecha commented from the poll is Ex-S Gundam. The reason why this guy is not in the poll is because he wasn’t featured in any anime, and his popularity grew because of the models released based on this mecha. These products include models in old HG, old SD, HGUC, MG, GFF and many resin kits from various smaller manufacturers.

Designed by Hajime Katoki, Ex-S Gundam for me is the ultimate manifestation of transformable Gundam. It can transform perfectly into a battle cruiser called G-Cruiser, which looks much better than ZZ Gundam. A special note is that Gundam Sentinel, the storyline where S and Ex-S appears, was created after the the ZZ anime, yet the timeline of the story is between Z and ZZ Gundam. Therefore, the challenge for Katoki was to create something that can blend-in with the existing timeline, yet special in its own way. I have seen the anime of ZZ, and got the MG version of both Z and ZZ, and I really feel that Ex-S Gundam is much better than any of those MS, in terms of transformation and the mechanical design.

I got both MG S Gundam and Ex-S Gundam in my collection, and these two models were the hardest to assemble, yes, even harder than Perfect Grade models. The number of screws and parts are beyond any MG models and most of them in sturdy ABS plastic, so that the transformation process will not exhaust the joints and damage the parts. For Ex-S Gundam, it is so heavy that a display stand is included along with the model. Please view my photo album on Ex-S Gundam if you would like to know more on that model.

Images below are from Gears Online. Click to enlarge.

Master Grade Wing Zero Custom

I received a few requests to put Wing Zero Custom into the 'Favorite Gundam Poll'. Unfortunately I can't do so unless resetting the entire poll :-( Therefore, a treat for all of you is a few Wing Zero Custom images I got from some Japanese modelers’ website, acknowledged below. Ryuji’s Wing Zero Custom is exquisitely assembled and modified to get the feeling of the feather wings, which is easy to imagine, but very hard turning plastics into finished work of art. It uses Wing Ver. Ka’s body, but looks equally impressive too. I bet it can swap the wing unit between Wing Zero Custom and Ver. Ka.

Donald’s Wing Zero Custom is pretty much what you will get from the basic MG kit, but I like the coloring and the use of both Wing Ver. Ka and the original kit’s clear sticker on this model. Normally people don’t expect to see stickers on Gundams such as Wing Zero Custom, since the emphasis is on how elegant it is, especially the wings, and not the mechanism part. However, since it’s still labeled as ‘Gundam’, stickers help to give the sense of machinery to it.

Here are the two photos, the first one from Ryuji’s gallery and the second one from Donald’s. Click to view in new windows.

BB Senshi Sekijishi Gundam

I noticed that Bandai is quite slow is releasing BB and SD Gundam models now. Not quite sure about the reason, but the few BB Gundams recently are quite amazing. For example, BB Senshi Sekijishi Gundam out this month. The model itself has the ability to transform into a lion. When combined with some other previously released BB Gundams, it's able to form a greater beast. Quite a creative idea, since the SD product line doesn't have to follow strict rules or standard on scale and logical structure, or even inner mechanism as we see in all the Master Grade models. Lets hope there will more of such stuff from Bandai's cookie jar.

Pictures are from The Gundam Base Side 1.