Quite a lot of comments I feel like making about what has happened in the world this week.
I don't know what you make out of it, but I reckon it's pretty tragic that the wrong body was sent back to Australia. You see, we had our first soldier who died in Iraq about a week ago, a Private Jack Kovco. The official story is that he was killed with a bullet while he was "cleaning his pistol", but the family believes otherwise because he is a sniper and of course they are in disbelief that this could have happened. To make things even worse, the wrong body was sent back to Melbourne. This, they only found out when the plane arrived in Australia. Apparently, they say it's a body of a Bosnian soldier, or the government says it is a body of an "Eastern European" soldier. Anyway, the Defence Minister, Brendan Nelson, broke this news to the family and according to newspapers, "all hell broke loose after that". Does not take one to imagine the mess the government is in at the moment, having to explain what went horribly wrong.
Then of course, today's the 10th anniversary (and btw, people are reluctant to use that word because of its +ve connotations) of the Port Arthur massacre (in Tasmania), where a lone gunman (Martin Bryant), killed 35 people with his machine gun. Today's the last public remembrance of that event.
Also, 2 mine workers are still trapped in Beaconsfield, that's also in Tasmania. This happened on Monday... apparently they were drilling for gold and there was a minor earthquake caused by their activities... and they were caved in 1km underground. 3 workers were trapped, one body has been retrieved. And now it's 2 people left.... the company claims there is still oxygen beneath.. but I'm not too sure.
Nominations Day yesterday in Singapore! For the first time in 18 years, PAP did not have a walkover on Nominations Day, only 37 out of 84 seats I think. Jeremy said it's a good time to be back in Singapore. I remarked, "Well yeah. Revolution! And you're the Lenin in exile in urm... Perth". Anyway, if you don't know the context here, as the Provisional Government continued to crumble in the months leading up to October 1917 (Bolshevik Revolution), Lenin was in exile in Finland. He then got back to Petrograd in a secret German train, and started to agitate for revolution, despite the reservations that it was not time for a proletarian revoltion yet, coming so soon after the "bourgeois revolution" of February 1917.
Was reading this article on SMH (Sydney Morning Herald) last week I think. It was a paper inviting readers to submit their thoughts about which is the best and worst airports they have been to. And I'd say that by far, the most accolades went to Changi Airport. People are really amazed at what we got there. KLIA and Chek Lap Kok (HK) has impressive thumbs-up also. Now what really took me by surprise is that people complained and bemoaned Kingsford Smith (Sydney) Airport big-time! And it's kinda weird because I've dreamt a lot about Sydney being a really nice and exciting place to be. People complain that it's all solely run for profit's sake, as Macquarie Bank is operating it. One reader wrote that "I doubt the toilets have ever been cleaned since the Sydney 2000 Olympics"... A cold ham sandwich would probably set you back AUD$7, lukewarm coffee or tea for like AUD$5, parking for half an hour might cost you nearly AUD10 and so on and so on.
Anyway, the thing I'd like to share this week is...
My Pol Science lecturer (from China) was saying during lecture that in China, piracy is so rampant and cheap that people sell DVDs in the markets by kilos. :)
_____________________________________
MY CONVENTION 2006 UPDATE
I kind of typed this entry half-way before going to Combined Public Meeting. So, here's part 2.
I'm so happy that my Convention promotion talk went well :) As usual, I felt a bit nervous talking to like 70+ people... but yeah I was really happy to share about convention.
Basically, I showed the video which we all watched the day before the end of the convention (2005). It definitely brought back a lot of happy memories for those of us who were at last year's convention. And the newbies whom I talked to later were interested in convention, and how that it's in Melbourne this year and all. Definitely quite a fair bit of OCFers here in WA are interested. Thank God for this good start and encouragement from others.
Yeah the thing about convention is. Once you've went, you'll want to go to it again, and again. :)
Really. I hope you believe me on that point. And of course, nothing's better than never giving up meeting with your brothers and sisters, to encourage one another on to good deeds and in love.