Life Of A Typical Malay - March 2000

Thursday 2/3

I've been a bit weary that my journal may be getting a little too depressing. It mirrors my life, but not quite. Life isn't all bad at the moment. It certainly is not a bed of roses either.

My mood the last couple of days, yesterday particularly, had reached rock bottom and nearing the end of work I felt like I was going out of my mind. My head was crowded out with all these thoughts and emotions and I was trying to put them altogether to make sense of them. I couldn’t face going home so I decided I would go for a drive to KL to clear my head. Took me less than 10 mins to reach Bukit Bintang, I did 160 km/hr 90 km/hr all the way. After a glass of Teh Tarik Tongkat Ali (Eurycoma Longifolia Jack Tea) – ["The Malaysian Ginseng" for men, the herb that helps to increase male libido, enhance health and vitality. It is believe that "Tongkat Ali" possess properties that not only contribute towards increasing male libido and sexuality but also reducing fatigue; increase strength; energy and stamina, and improve blood circulation] at Estana, I drove home.

Have you ever thought about abandoning everything you hold dear... just to fly away... and see if anyone ever realizes that you're gone and never coming back?

I realised that sometimes, maybe a lot of the time I over analyse what's going on in my head, go around in circles and near drive myself crazy. Maybe I'm this type of guy: When I play cards, I play without a full deck. I'll do a jigsaw puzzle, but the blocks don't fit.

I felt much better as soon as I got into my car and this weight I had put on my own shoulders eased off a bit. I still have the same problems, but I'm not punishing myself so much over them (at least at the moment). I cant make everything right with the click of my fingers and I should always try to either. Life is strange and isn’t meant to be understood by people.

So Zainal, what was/were the problem(s) actually?

Sam and Raja Halim ran away with my RM 30,000-00 without registering the Brokerage House in Seremban, and on top of that I have to come up with RM 40,000-00 within 2 weeks, Ariffin's closing his account.

There you have it. Just in one sentence. I don't remember whether I ever mentioned these 2 names (Sam and Raja Halim) in my previous entries, I think I referred them as X and Y once, way back in Oct/Nov 1999. They certainly are tops on my hate list now.

Well, it's good to have a big problem once in a while, it keeps my mind occupied, keeps me on my toes, it certainly makes me closer to God.

Much closer.

Friday 3/3

1017 GMT: MARKET TALK : CSCE Coffee Seen Building On Thu Gains

1020 GMT: MARKET TALK : LIFFE Coffee Resistance Seen At $1,041/MT

1023 GMT: MARKET TALK : CSCE May Coffee Targets 107.53C/LB

1136 GMT: MARKET TALK : Liffe May Coffee Up; Follow-Through Buys

1142 GMT: MARKET TALK : CSCE May Coffee Due To Open Dn On Liffe

1246 GMT: DJ Liffe May Coffee Slightly Up On Continued Roaster Buying

1300 GMT: DJ CSCE Coffee Called To Open 1.00C/LB Lower

1320 GMT: DJ CSCE Coffee Now Called To Open Unchanged

1400 GMT: DJ CSCE Coffee Now Called To Open 1.00C/LB Lower

1612 GMT: DJ CSCE Coffee Futures Lower Early On Spec Profit Taking

1700 GMT: DJ Charting Coffee: CSCE Bouncing Into Resistance

1751 GMT: DJ Liffe May Coffee Ends Dn On Origin, Local Selling

1753 GMT: DJ Liffe Mar Coffee Settles At $984/Ton; May At $1,002

1930 GMT: DJ CSCE Coffee Futures End Lower On Local Liquidation


Those are headlines on Dow Jones iCoffee website tonight, pretty useful in keeping tracks of price movement. As I said before, LIFFE (London) and CSCE (New York) seem to trade on a similar direction these few months. Quite surprising considering the fact London Exchange deals with Robusta Coffee while New York Exchange only trade Arabica.

Looks like one of these days I will have to subscribe to this site, been on 2-week free-trial for months now. I'm not cheating them, just taking them for a ride I guess..hehe.. Every 2 weeks I will register for that free-trial using different email address, last month I was a Chinese ( I used a Chinese name), a few weeks before that I was someone from Brazil. Kewl 'innit?

Quite a few fellow traders depending on fundamental news now, so much so I have to be at the office at least half an hour before trading starts. And that means my laptop will be connected to the internet for 6 hours, non-stop.

How's London performing?
What was London's opening price?
Any fundamental news from Brazil, New York, London, Colombia, Mexico, etc?
How's weather in Brazil, Colombia, Mexico, Vietnam?
What does the stochastic say?
Did London close high? Low? Unchanged?

Kak Siti and Abang Wan have been asking me these questions almost every night now. And they make their entries/exits base on those info I got from the internet. Works well so far, 5 out of 6.

Only a few who don't really believe the connection between London and New York exists, they are the one who will give sarcastic remarks everytime I read aloud any news that flashes on my computer.

Are you sure the writer is not from India, Zainal?
Computer is only a machine, we can never trust machines.
blah blah blah...

 But why didn't you tell us?

Dang, remember I told you last week the price would go down to below 100, but you guys laughed at me.

Such a pain in the ass.

Saturday 4/3

10-30 am:

I'm at home now thinking about what I will do with my weekend, trying to latch onto something to look forward to. There is nothing. How unimaginative to see that there is nothing to look forward to. Tomorrow is a day yet to be written, yet I sit here knowing or at least anticipating it to be nothing. I could make it to be many things, but what? What can I do tonight? What can I do tomorrow? What changes can I make?

I don't want to let days pass me by with nothing to show but a blurry memory of each day being like the last. I want moments to live, to look back and have bookmarks to times I did something fresh or times which touched me inside. Possibilities are numerous yet I see them not.

1-35 pm:

I was about to go for lunch when Teh called,

We are on our way to Shah Alam after visiting Kak Teh's cousin.

Yeah, ok, I'll be at home, I'm not going anywhere today.

It was fun monkeying around with the little ones, Adrianna and Balqis.

10-45 pm:

I just got home, went to PJ after Isyak, wanted to go to KL but changed my mind. Decided to spend the whole day in KL tomorrow, go for a movie or something, or perhaps go for another theatre play. Harith Iskandar will be performing at Actors Studio tomorrow night, Jit Murad will be his guest for the show. Must be fun eh?

Sunday 5/3

I couldn't bring myself to sleep last night so I decided to log on to the internet. I farted around "commodity forum" and we exchanged coffee posts until early morning.

Left for KL right after Zohor, there was massive traffic jam right from PJ, all the way to MidValley City. I don't get it, what's so great about that newly-opened MidValley Mega Mall? The next crawl was at Jalan Pudu leading to Jalan Bukit Bintang.

So I missed the 3 o'clock movie show, The Talented Mr Ripley. Thanks Miss Vanderbilt for suggesting that movie...(stop reading my journal, will ya?...*LOL*..) It sounds like my kind of film. And speaking about film, I hope Wonder Boys will be shown here very soon. My all-time favourite hero, Richard Thomas (hehe...I know it's sad, isn't it?) has a small part in it.

Called Kumar and within minutes I was already at his working place. Ordered a plate of fried rice and after gulping 2 glasses of iced-tea, I lost my appetite to eat. Man, it was so hot outside, these few days have been sweltering hot. After chatting for about 30 mins or so I walked to Bukit Bintang Plaza, wanted to buy a pair of Polo shoes - no new designs.

Then to Sungai Wang Plaza and bought latest issue of 'net. I saw a nice pair of Bonia shoes on display at Isetan, Lot 10 but the queue was a wee bit too long.

I then drove to Jalan Raja and parked my car by the roadside at the back of Selangor Club Building. It's damn expensive to park at Plaza Putra basement carpark, even on Sundays.

Can I have a ticket for tonight show, please.

 Sold out. Weeks ago.

The counter girl didn't even look at me. She looked very tired.

I then walked to Central Market, said my Asar and window shopped for another half an hour.

There was another massive traffic crawl right infront of Angkasapuri. I should have taken the train instead.

Reached Shah Alam just about Maghrib, said my prayer at the State Mosque. Saw Subki Latiff (he took on Mahathir in the last general election, and lost) on my way to the car park. He was with a few supporters.

All in all it was a great weekend, well, compared to last week. It's 11-00 pm now and I'm dead tired I better call it a day.

Good night, John-Boy!
Tuesday 7/3
I've been struggling with my thoughts the last few days. I started working on yesterday's entry the moment I reached home (about 3-45 am) , and it got longer, and longer, and didn't say enough, so I added and changed and tweaked and... well, it got out of hand. So I decided not to publish it. Hehe..

I was seriously debating if I should even write anymore. The answer, though, was an emphatic "Yes, you should keep writing, just don't force yourself to write. Just write whenever you feel like it, and don't be too hard on yourself". Because the truth is, I do it for myself, and I shouldn't let my emotions about other people play a part in the things I do for myself.

And I still don't know what's wrong with my own domain I registered a few months ago, www.akudia.com.[aku means I/me/myself and dia means she/her/herself or he/him/himself]. It's the coolest name ever invented!..*LOL*... I know it's still mine but I can't figure it out how to have my files ftped to the main server. Tried a few times yesterday, managed to ftp a few but the page was still blank.

It's so frustrating...anyone out there, help me please!...I want to move to my own domain name! www.akudia.com But I don't know how to! And don't you bloody try to register www.akudia.net, www.akudia.org and www.akudia.com .my, I want these names too! Just wait until I figure out how to this shitty ftp things work. I want to have my own community on the 'net. No, don't laugh at me now, you can laugh later. Or in a few years perhaps.

This web thingy fascinates me, it undergoes many trends within a short time I don't want to be left behind. In the beginning, internet was just a vast library, full of so much information. I could only hope to learn it all. A library in my very own living room. Then came the personal homepages. And the not-so-personal pages. They didn't have a purpose, mine for example, just a waste of bandwidth, but everyone had one.

Everybody and everything had a webpage all it's own, cluttered with broken javascript, large graphics, bright colors, fancy layouts etc.

Then a new trend had begun. The openness of a few struck me deeply. First I thought it was just plain weird. Online Journals were being displayed all over the web. Personal and private journals were left open for me to read. And I read. I would stay up to read about strangers lives.(I don't do that anymore now, honest!)

I didn't know it then, but I was soon to be one of them: someone who shared himself with everyone, someone so self-absorbed, someone so detailed ,he could only write about himself.

I don't know how it happened; one day I just found myself coding journal entries in notepad. To me, Online journalling is very sadistic. By putting my life online I open myself to many risks. For that I keep reminding myself to always keep my big mouth shut.

My friends could find me on the internet. Even though most of them are pretty much internet illiterate and the web is drenched in pointless website after pointless website, it could always happen. They'd find it, read, punish me for my life truth's and ask questions later.

I had to take my journal off the web once. That was early last year.

There's always strangers finding this journal. Some check for new entries daily. That glg.jaring.my (Unknown O/S, Unknown Browser ) for example, he/she was here for the second time (today) just now. He/she checks my site almost every morning, at about 8-00 am. Am I giving free email service here? NO!

The obsession is almost flattering. But it's not. It's frightening.

Truth is...

I never felt I had an identity worth shit. Often times I took stories that I had heard and turned them into my own sweet stories to the next person I met. Nothing, absolutely nothing in my life was interesting enough. I just found out people are the most interested when you say nothing at all. If there's anything attractive to someone about me, it's figuring me out. I should say novel, because once they realize I'm not going to open up quite that easy, they get bored and go away. I took great efforts to hide how I felt from everyone who know me.

Yet I do it anyway. I keep doing it, putting my life into html codes, even if it makes me cringe, even if I want to quit. I keep doing it. It isn't simply what I do. It isn't my release, the way I can honestly express myself, or my way to reflect on a long stressful day. At some point it is all of those things but really it's so much more. Online journalling is what I know. After an upsetting day, I can sit in front of my computer and type. I don't feel better afterwards, I just feel different. More at ease, perhaps. More able to survive another cruel day.

I am always blinkered to all the possibilities of everyday. I'm looking with the same lazy vision and things always seem the same. Somehow I need to wake myself up to a different view of life. See new possibilities and find positive where before there was only negative. A fresh way to see the world, a key to the door I'm standing at.

Y'know what? That's all a lie.
Wednesday 8/3
3-13 a.m :

Just a quick one, I just got home and in 10 mins or so live telecast of European Soccer (Real Madrid vs Bayern Munich) will be on telly. Lothar Mattheus will be playing his final game, and I don't want to miss this one out.

I'm a bit tired actually, was in Tanjung Malim this afternoon. Kak Siti TM wanted to invest some money in commodity, I went there to kind of explain the whole thing, the procedure, the risk etc.

Actually Kak, I cannot do much with this RM 10,000, you know, I deal with US dollar...blah blah blah...

But I don't have that much of money, RM 30000-00 is such a huge sum.

I suggest you keep this money in the bank. Don't simply trust strangers, well, I'm not a stranger but I think you better keep your money in the bank.

Hope she will not call me anymore, I have the feeling she's up for something...(she was extremely nice blah blah blah) which I don't want to go into details.

Went to Azhari's office and chatted with a few Proton City former staff.

Teh called tonight asking me to be a "co-pilot" for his school treasure hunt this weekend.

No, you don't have to do the driving, you only have to , you know, solve the puzzles, riddles etc, read maps and take care of the students.

How old are the students?

13 to 16 years old international students.

Oh dear, what am I to do with those kids? They are half my age! What are we going to talk about? Gossiping about Spice Girls? N' Sync? Backstreet Boys? Christina Aquilera? Brittney Spears?
Thursday 9/3
Once upon a time
there was a boy
who thought that he was
a coffee baron

and he lived
in his very own tower
in the clouds.

He kept building
his daydreams blindly
and living
his sweet little lies.

His tower
just got higher and higher
and he was happy
just overlooking reality.

And then
he realized that
he had trapped himself
in his own tower within.
Too high to ever get out....

Oh, I don't think I can sleep tomorrow, I'm having open positions in coffee. I went long at the dip after mid-session because the price tested upper level a few times and failed to break the resistance.

Towards the end, it reversed on a spectecular late profit taking and closed near the low. Now, what if it opens gap down tomorrow? I'll be in deep deep shit again looks ike.

This coffee business makes me want to scream sometimes, the moment I enter position, it goes against me.

But I still have the feeling it will go up tomorrow, even if it slips I won't be kicking myself because I got quite a good price. And hopefully that retention scheme (of holding up to 7 million bags of coffee) initiated by Brazil will be implemented soon. C'mon Colombia, c'mon Vietnam...


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