Inception

You all know Inception. Basically it talks about architecting the mind under the control of your will. But how many of you did experience inception? I did.

This was what I experienced.

I don't know how I got myself in the dream. This always remains mysterious. You will never know when you are in the dream until you are dreaming. Haha. Got me? Nevermind, forget about it.

I was walking on a street. I walked walked walked....walked walked walked...This is also an interesting part of a dream. The transition of two scenes is always irrelevant. This moment you might be in the classroom, the next moment maybe you are singing in KTV room. Okay sorry..too much distraction. I shall continue.
I walked walked walked..walked walked walked..until I came to a room (I forgot what room that was)..

Then suddenly I felt the natural call - means I wanna pee. Haha. I don't know why in that dream, I was so into it. I knew that I was in my dream. I knew I need to wake up and so pee. Mentally, psychologically, biologically and whatever-cally I felt the urge. I needed to go to toilet. But I think my soul was trapped in the dream. I strived so hard to wake up before it's late. I used mind power. I screamed (Idiot me, I was trying to wake myself up). Then last resort - I tried to hit myself, hopefully I would feel the pain and wake up.

The urge was getting more and more intense. My bladder (refers to the real self and the one in the dream..hard to understand? yeah, i think so too) was going to explode. I knew my last defense will be down any time soon. Then...I slapped myself (in the dream). For your information this is a controlled act. 

One slap on the left cheek. Piak! No pain. 

Second slap on the right cheek. Piak! No pain too.

Oh no, I was trapped in the dream (or reality, I wasn't sure that time). I need to spin a gasing (top).

Argh~~~it's coming very very soon..Help!

Psshhh... oh oh something's coming out. Don't get mistaken. I managed to wake up at the end and rushed to toilet just right at the very timing. 

I architected my act in the dream. but somehow it didn't work. This proves one thing - you won't feel pain in your dream. Period.

Pride

17 months seeing an organization from a seed to today's landscape. I feel really proud of what we've been doing. When we were a nobody, we were running here and there to ask for support. We had nothing. Not a single eraser we own. Gradually from one university to another university. More and more people are joining us. Seeing the facebook fans from 10 to 100, to 1000 until 2000. Until today, people around us finally see us, recognize us. Not only local, but around the region too. The Singapore Health Promotion Director heard about our name too. That's exciting. Yes, I'm talking Green Lung -  a very own Malaysian social brand that I'm proud of. 

All started because we believe a dream. A dream that until today many people still don't believe in. Yes, it's attitude. We don't sleep and dream but we dream and wake up and start walking. That's the difference between their dreams and our dream. 

Many people questioned us on how we measure our success. Have we successfully turned USM into a smoke-free campus? How many smokers had we successfully helped them to quit? These are tangible indicators. Yes, to be honest, we haven't achieved any yet. The least we had done was that at least we could make them start to think why we need a smoke-free environment. In the past, they may feel nothing sitting around the smokers. Today, their perceptions might have changed. They start feeling uneasy and horrible dipped in the big smoky jar. The reason why we target youths is because they will grow up one day and their perceptions are the key determinant of our future. To change the world, change the youths or even children if we could today for better tomorrow. 

We won't stop until we are free from the nasty smokes. And ya, a preview - we are going to Malacca soon!

Ridiculous ideas always from friends

The most ridiculous idea always comes from friends.
Sometimes it's ridiculous, but it just works! Haha. Just finished an online meeting. Was discussing about the name of the event. and say what? Yeah, we got it! Thanks to Sawako! Your somehow spontaneous idea gave us a great name!
For this moment, I shall keep the name secret. ^^

Advisor's advice

Recently a friend of mine asked help from me to design them a logo. Okay. That would be certainly fine. Though I'm not that kinda so artistic person with so much artistic temper, I do have some too. Giving me some suggestions to improve the design is okay for me. After all you have the ownership of the design. But please do respect our creativity and imagination.

Okay, this is what happened. I received an email this morning.

Hi Rhu Yann,

Below is a suggestion from our advisor..Can you make some changes?? Just a little change....

This is from my friend. I know he's being difficult sandwiched between me and his so-called advisor.

His advisor's original piece of suggestion:

Nice ...would suggest leave out the stero type formal men and women..and replace it with the logo of the World Volunteers Web (just google)..perhaps the logo within a large heart

..love in the air ..big heart...

From Dato' I-am-advisor (To protect privacy)

So you know what he's trying to ask me to do huh? He's so good to make use of technology and kind enough to provide me the source where to plagiarize. Awesome. You see the word "Replace"? I know why we have Proton Inspira now. And what the heck? Stereotype?! I can't believe this word coming out from his mouth. Shit!

I just can't understand what's rolling inside your mind, Mr. Dato. If you think that WVW is doing a great job and you wish to be like them, that's not that way. They had branded themselves so well, please lah, don't be copycat. That's the stupidest thing to do. Do your own branding lah.

If you just need the logo from the website, you can just ask anyone to "copy" that instead of complimenting me "Nice..." and asking me to replace my design with something else which is already existing and being the flagship logo for that organization. If this is the case, we don't need designer. That's totally bullshit. When I saw this, I could foresee our future. If this doesn't change now, we will be in big time problem.

Our world now is a Right Brain-Oriented World. Knowledge workers like doctors, lawyers, accountants, managers etc. are the persons who could apply the theory into practice and put things into order. But Right Brains outside there who are able to create things out of nothing are doing the revolution and transformation. If you are attentive enough, you could notice the change.

Conclusion: Advisor's advice may be sound but may not be right (and sometimes ridiculous), even if he's a Dato.

And what did I do after this? ^^ I won't do a single amendment on my design.

Enough is enough

Do you know? While you are spending two hours watching "Rapunzel", one sexual crime is happening out there. And to your surprise, one out of two victims is just a child.

Child abuse or sexual crimes against children cases could be seen almost everyday on newspaper. This has come to a what-I-call-beast-like stage. According to YB Chong Eng's blog, sexual crimes including rape, sodomy and incest had increased from 2427 cases in 2005 to 4238 cases in 2009. The increase is about 100% and half of the victims were children under 16 years. And what heats me up is that only 4% of the rape suspects are found guilty by court.
Full article of YB Chong Eng, please go here.

Two months ago, a campaign called Kempen Rakyat Pulau Pinang had been launched in Penang to raise the awareness on sexual crimes against children. It aims to bring about a safe society for our children, free from sexual crimes.

What you can do?
1) Register yourself as a volunteer. Go here
2) Support and join their activities. Maybe gotta sacrifice your sleeping. If no one's moving, don't expect change.
3) Volunteer to help in their campaigns or activities if you have time.
4) Help distribute their awareness-building materials.
5) Report abuse case. To where, of course police lah.
6) Spread the words to your friends and family.

They deserve a wonderful childhood.
No more cases we wish to see and hear.
Enough is enough.
Your extra attention helps stop all these.

Contact: 04-2624059
Email: kempenrakyat@gmail.com
Address:
Kempen Rakyat Pulau Pinang
c/o 9th floor, Penang Chinese Town Hall Building,
22 Jalan Masjid Kapitan Keling,
10200 Georgetown, Penang.

What I had contributed? I helped design their logo and T-shirts *wink*

Kempen Rakyat
Pulau Pinang