As Suanie Sees It

Do you think I would let such an opportunity slide me by? Of course not!

My Little Bird James invited me to a TVC shoot he was involved in, starring Maya Karin. It is for a service to be launched soon, and the storyboard seemed rather cool. Seemed to be a lot of work involved, especially the post-production part. James said something along the lines of, “Well, a lot of things we do for money. This we do for love.” Awwww touching betul

Behind the scenes

Maya Karin rehearsing her role

Me with Maya Karin

Syiok.

I wish to highlight a blog entry by GuiloStories. In a nutshell (and according to her and the family) one of her relatives passed away. His eldest son turned up from nowhere declaring that his father who had passed on was in fact a Muslim, having converted to Islam sometime back. This eldest son converted to Islam a few years ago. The Syariah court declared that the deceased was a Muslim, and the body should be buried according to Muslim traditions. Read on…

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Justice and Fair play for the family of Gan Eng Gor (deceased)

1. Our father was seventy-four (74) years old. He suffered a severe stroke in 2006. He was immobilized, bedridden, mentally unsound, cannot speak, partially deaf and has very poor vision.

2. We transferred him to stay with one of our brothers in Klang. Our aged mother looked after, bathed and fed him. She also helped to look after our nephews and nieces.

3. Our father died on 20th Jan 2008. As Gan Hock Seng (the eldest son) is a member of the family, we informed him of our father’s death. He was then told us that our father is a muslim, we were shocked and did not believed him. So we continue to perform the wake service as our father have never led a muslim life. The Majlis Agama officers came and attempted to snatch the dead body, all our family members more shocked and angry, we resisted and strongly protested against the removal of our father’s body.

4. We obtained his alleged conversion papers from Majlis Agama the second day.

5. We were advised by our solicitors that there are serious irregularities in the said conversion papers especially the Declaration of Conversion into Islam.

a). The declaration was before a Pegawai Ukhuwah. His rubber stamp was on the paper but that officer did not sign.

b). Further there was no signatory at the certification column.

c). There was an illegal alteration on the date to 3rd July 2007.

d). The thumb?print was questionable as we are certain that our deceased father was in Klang and not at the address No. 451, Taman Megaway, 70400 Sikamat, Seremban as stated in the application form.

e). His address stated in the Borang Perakuan Memeluk Islam is No: 1272, Jalan TBK 6/2, Taman Bkt Kepayang, 70200 Seremban, the residence of the eldest son. We wish to state that our father has never resided at this address.

f). The Majlis Agama Authorities claimed that our deceased father made an oral declaration in Arabic accepting the Muslim faith. Our family has medical confirmations from three doctors that our father was unable to speak.

g). We were asked to appear before the Syariah Court Seremban, we believe the Syariah Court is for Muslims only.

h). We refused to attend at the Syariah Court on a matter of principle as non?Muslims. We refused to submit to the jurisdiction of the Syariah Court.

i). The Syariah Court made a unilateral declaration that our father is a Muslim and is to be buried in accordance to Muslim rites.

j). We filed an application at the High Court Seremban to adjudicate on the validity, authenticity,veracity and legality of the conversion paper especially the declaration of acceptance into Islam.

k). The High Court Seremban dismissed our application on the ground that he has no jurisdiction to hear this matter as the subject matter falls within the purview of the Syariah Court. We beg to differ.

l). We were indeed shocked and aggrieved at the simplistic way the High Court disposed off this matter. We only seek justice, fair play and to find out the truth on his alleged conversion.

10. The eldest son Gan Hock Seng converted to Islam years ago. Our father and mother had strenuously opposed his conversion.

11. This eldest son had allegedly converted our father without the knowledge of our mother and all other seven siblings.

12. Further, the eldest son had NEVER taken care of him physically and financially. He hardly visited him too.

13. Even if the eldest son had converted our father, we like to ask :
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i). Why is it that he did not take care of him and brought him to stay in his house to lead a Muslim life?

ii). Why did he allow our father to continue living in a non-muslim home in Klang? Our father had never prayed and continued eating pork and other non?halal food. He never revealed to anyone that he has converted to Islam.

iii). Why he as a Muslim, did not ensure that our father (if he had been indeed converted) led a Muslim life ?

iv). Why is it that the Agama Islam authorities did not visit and follow up with our father – the alleged new convert, after his conversion?

14. We believe we have been unfairly treated by our eldest brother and the Agama Islam authorities in this alleged conversion of our father. If there had been a conversion, we firmly believe that the Agama Islam authorities should have informed all members of the family. There should not be a fight over the body of dead person. There should be dignity and respect on the dead person.

15. We hope the PM and the higher ups in the Islamic Authorities review this case and to ensure that the truth is unraveled. We hope that all conversions to Islam is fair and transparent and made known to all the next of kin of the convert.

We Seek Justice, Fair play and Truth in this matter.

From,
Gan Hok Ming for and on behalf of the family members of Gan Eng Gor (deceased)
Date: 25th January 2008

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My colleague who is a Muslim told me that even if both the father and son are Muslims, the distribution of the deceased properties and monies will be conducted according to his will. He’s not sure about the part if the deceased did not leave a will, but he is of the opinion that all properties and monies will be distributed evenly to the deceased’s family, regardless of religion.

But I guess that the main issue is the family wants a Buddhist/ Taoist funeral for the deceased. Reverse the situation: hypothetically if the whole family are Muslims, and the eldest son converts to Buddhism (or any other religion), and decided to claim his father as having converted to Buddhism before he passed on, and wants him to be buried as a Buddhist, I think that the eldest son is full of shit.

All orthodox religions expounds on the important of filial piety. My colleague just related a tale to me, that he cannot remember in full, but he managed to google it, and here it is:

Read more »

Taken using my N95.

Too many things to get to. None of particular significance… but hey, that’s this entire blog for you.

Over the weekend I discovered 2 great songs that I am now playing over and over again. I suppose I’ll get tired of them within 2 weeks, and I suppose those who already know of these 2 songs will scorn at my late discovery. And I suppose a lot of young’uns will not appreciate them… do you know how old I felt when someone younger than me by a couple of years didn’t know Bon Jovi’s songs? Except for ‘Always’ of course, because that one is overplayed, over-hyped and over-emo.

I guess it’s the exposure part; e.g. I wouldn’t recognise any songs by Sex Pistols. But I can sing Patti Page’s ‘Changing Partners’ word for word, thanks to my mom’s love for oldies (a.k.a. pop music to her, heheh). And Limbo Rock. The first English song (besides Twinkle Twinkle Little Stars) I heard was Bill Haley’s Mambo Rock. I remember only the chorus though.

Anyway I heard Men At Work’s ‘Down Under’ and David Bowie’s ‘Rebel Rebel’, and I’m loving them. Now scorn.

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Sometime back Chewyx asked me if I would appear in a cameo role in his first movie, an indie short flick that he wrote, directed and produced called WEB OF LIES. Of course I said yes. So one day he picked me up, took me to his house where he was shooting, got Eunice to apply make-up on my face, gave me a script containing my lines and told me to memorise them… fast. Basically I was a blogger named Suanie (sounds familiar?) with certain information regarding a mysterious person.

Also met Alfred (main naked actor), Sarah (main curvaceous actress) and Grace for the first time. Also found out that I should never opt for an acting career, ever.

So Chewyx had a mini screening of his movie last week. I was invited along with Edmund (who was credited as co-producer), and had dinner prepared by Chewyx. Then he screened the final product… and I had some cringe-worthy moments…

There were some parts that I felt were not so good, but actually it was not bad considering that it was Chewyx’s directorial debut. I think he knows the negative bits that we discussed after the screening. Well, good job, keep it up And thanks for asking me, it was quite an experience

Edmund had with him a copy of his latest work, KURUS (co-written and directed by Woo Ming Jin) and so we got to watch that. It’s a tele-movie for NTV7, due to be broadcasted sometime end of March. If you’ve read his blog raving on and on about Carmen Soo and how gorgeous/ jaw-dropping bootiful/ patient/ extraordinary/ superwoman-like qualities bla bla she is, well this was the movie she was in. And honestly, I liked most of it, except two parts and I’ll tell you why:

1) Independent/ not-enough-money/ artistic/ mind-boggling/ what’s-the-point shots. You know what I am talking about. In some movies, it could be 10 seconds of coconut trees swaying in the breeze, or a boy walking down a narrow road for 20 seconds, or green paddy fields or dilapidated houses… Reason they exist is because these shots are deemed to be ‘artistic’ or highlighted to be the mark of ‘independent’ movies but to me they are no more than self-wanking moments. To give them the benefit of the doubt, they do not have enough money to rewrite the script to include more meaningful dialogue, or to pay actors for extra screen time. Luckily I could only detect one such self-wanking shot in KURUS, and that was acknowledged by a grinning Edmund.

2) The ending. So many things I want to say about it, but I’d rather you watch it when NTV7 broadcasts it.

But there were many good things about KURUS, and the one I liked the most was the chemistry between the actors. Some of the actors were first-timers, but they seemed as if they had years of training. Mislina Mustapha (who was Mukhsin’s auntie in Yasmin Ahmad’s MUKHSIN) was simply delightful. The script was funny, and… well, you’ll just have to wait to watch it. I’m sure come March, Edmund will pimp KURUS all over the blogosphere

For more info about Edmund, please read a previous post of mine here.

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Random MSN conversation with Reuben:

Reuben: Hey I upgraded to the Nokia N95 8gb because you loved your N95!
me: You are kidding me?
Reuben: No, serious.
(bla bla bla)
me: Sing my praises!
Reuben: Suanie is better than a block of Stilton cheese, a bottle of port and a sunny afternoon.
me: So me + a block of Stilton cheese + a bottle of port + a sunny afternoon = you + boner?
Reuben: Yes.

Or something like that. I was sleepy and didn’t save the conversation. Reuben, speak up!

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I loved you, Heath

So my boss wanted pizza for late lunch. Since we are regular devourers of Dominos Pizza, we referred to a discount coupon thing that they have been distributing. The choice was between Offer 1 ( 50% off on your 2nd pizza purchase ) and Offer 2 ( RM 45 for 3 regular pizzas ).

He wanted 2 large pizzas, i.e. Offer 1. I asked, why not Offer 2 since you get 3 regulars instead of 2 large? And so he began:

“So we want to find out if 2 large pizzas are equal to 3 regular pizzas. The surface of a circle; i.e. our pizza is calculated by:

Area= TTr2
= TT x r x r

We know that a regular pizza is 9-inches, and a large pizza is 12-inches. For a regular pizza, its radius is 4.5 inches. 22/7 x 4.5 x 4.5 = 63.6 sq inches per regular pizza. Multiply it by 3 pizzas = 190.8 sq inches.

For a large pizza, its radius being 6 inches means 22/7 x 6 x 6 = 113.1 sq inches. Multiply it by 2 = 226.2 sq inches.

Now, anyone would know that 226.2 is bigger than 190.8! 2 large pizzas are bigger than 3 regular pizzas by 35.4 square inches!

So Domino’s is selling a thin-crust large pizza at RM 29.80. Offer 1 = RM 44.70 for 226.2 sq inches of pizza. Offer 2 is RM 45 for 190.8 sq inches of pizza. It’s less pizza and more expensive by RM 0.30! The choice is so obvious!!”

He ordered a ‘Classified Chicken’ and a ‘Beef Suspense’. They were nice. He also gave this blog post its final title.