Harry Potter Mania

I remember the first time I heard about Harry Potter was when I read a review on a website of the latest book (then), Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone.

This was before Harry Potter mania hit Malaysia. I was wondering what the fuss was all about. I mean, it was just another Children's fantasy book, a story about kids. I was surprised at the number of grown ups who were crazy about the whole Harry Potter phenomena.

Once I was chatting on the net with my soon-to-be sister-in-law Ezu, who was then studying in LSE. She told me that she had just bought the latest Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban and could not put it down. Her final exams were a few days away. I was like, "you mean you are engrossed in a kiddy story book when your exams are knocking at your door".

Soon afterwards I got my hands on the electronic version of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban and as they say, the rest is history. I was hooked. Yes, an adult earning a living in a subsidiary of a huge company. My wife-to-be soon caught the bug and now, she among the early birds, buying the hard cover version every time a new book comes out- on the first day.

I am sure by now that all Harry Potter fans are aware that Rowling killed off one major character in the latest book.

Well! My wife was quite upset after reading the book and told me that she was moody the whole day. She was like, "How can Rowling do this?"

After I read the book, I refused to believe that the character dies. I told her that Rowling is going to reveal that the person didn't die after all - like Gandalf in Lord of the rings.

According to my wife, I was in denial.

Yesterday, while going through the PPS, I read a blog, which in turn lead me to a site. The author of the site gives very convincing reasons why the character in question did not actually die. Well I quickly notified my wife who was quite happy. I will not put the link here, as I want to avoid spoiling the reading pleasure of people who have not read it yet. However, this is mere speculation, as only Rowling knows what she has in her mind.

I guess we will all know when the next (and reportedly the last) book in the series comes out.

Monsters in Your Bed

Last weekend my wife reminded me that I hadn't cleaned the air conditioning unit for quite sometime. I usually clean the filters at least twice a month but had neglected to do so.

I lifted up the cover and was shocked at the state of the filter. It was so filthy. No wonder the aircon was noisy and didn't seem as cold as before. On closer inspection there was something like black fungus growth inside the unit. Uugh!

My wife washed the filters with water and soap and the basin was all covered with a black layer of grime. That's how dirty it was. I took some tissue, cotton and brush and did my best to clean the inside of the unit. The amount of stuff that had accumulated inside was amazing.

When I was done, the whole floor was littered with black stuff and I was gatal, gatal (itchy, not naughty)all over. My wife was sneezing a lot too. We had the maid come up, vacuum and mop the entire room.

Not good! With Rahil growing up fast, I can't afford to be complacent. What with organisms crawling all around.



I had read about house dust mites (Dermatophagoides sp.). These are microscopic organisms that feed on dead human skin. Their prime habitats are indoor beds. According to this site, 'a typical used mattress may have anywhere from 100,000 to 10 million mites inside'.

They are strongly allergenic and are considered to be one of the causes of asthma in infants.

And you thought the picture was scary.

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USEFUL LINKS

Click here for more information about babies and allergies

Click here for more information about babies and risk of asthma.

Not Again

Writing this post, still groggy. I reached my house at 3:15 am morning (from KL) and could only catch a few hours of sleep. Had breakfast with my friend, Shahmir at our favourite mamak stall. And then I read this: ‘10 sen more for petrol and 20 sen more for diesel’.

It was a real nice way to spoil your mood for the whole day. We all knew it was coming but somehow whenever it happens, any rise in fuel prices really pisses you off. Except maybe for some people who are the ones ripping off consumers.

I dread it because despite the Government’s call not to increase prices last time, almost all the businesses ignored it and I am sure that it will be the same, this time around. The first people to raise the prices would be the transport companies. Last time, bus ticket prices went up by almost RM5 – which meant an extra expenditure of nearly RM40 every month (I go back and forth almost every week). I wonder how much they would increase this time around.

Anyway, it was nice to read about Nicol David’s win in the CIMB Malaysian Women’s Open Squash Championship. Have been following this lady’s career and she is showing no signs of slacking after her various awards (unlike other Malaysian sportsman). Instead, she is getting better and better. This is her forth title of the year on the professional Squash circuit. On her way to the title, the third seed beat World No1. Rachel Grinham (Australia) and World Champion Vanessa Atkinson (Netherlands). Too bad, that this sport is not included in the Olympics.

Malaysia Blogger Map

In case you have not heard, Penang blogger Cheeun has launched the Malaysia Blogger Map web site.

To get your blog plotted on the map of Malaysia, provide him the required details.

However, I was wondering what would happen if there are two or more bloggers from the same area. Wouldn’t the dots overlap?

BTW, Cheeun is the designer of the Firefox theme (which I am currently using) called Phoenity.

And to those who asked, yes! I am contacting the bank today and what their respose is to my problem before writing to the newspapers. I realise that complaining to the authorities should be the last resort after you fail to solve the problem through amicable means.

One of the ladies did mention that we may have a chance to get the late charges waived if we can prove that the bank did send the cheques or money in time.

BTW, Ah OK Lah Blog recently crossed the 30,000 page view mark (one third of which is probably mine). I would like to thank all visitors to my blog.

A Mistake?

Just talked to my wife. She had called up the developer (read my previous post here) to fix an appointment date to obtain our apartment keys.

As I had expected, the developer (from here onwards, anybody working in the company and dealing with us will be referred to as the developer) said that all the dates are fully booked till the 10th of august and we could only obtain our keys after that date. Stalling move? Of course, paying service charges for the two months even though nobody has moved in yet.

I also realized that we would be sharing the approach road with low cost apartments (construction still going on). Also realized that there won’t be enough parking spots for all the tenants. Fortunately, we already bought a covered parking space. (Yes! They are selling parking space).

I am seriously beginning to wonder whether we made a mistake in buying the apartment. Well, at that time it looked like a good investment – great location and reputable developer. I am not going to recommend this developer to any of our friends or family anymore.

The fact that my wife’s cousin had bought a condo at Puchong for almost the same price (RM180K++) didn’t help much. We had seriously considered buying a condo unit at the same place too but the location (Puchong) was not that attractive. However, as a condo, the plae is quite exclusive (more privacy) with free parking space. I was really amazed when I learnt that the condo comes broadband ready with internet connections in every room and other high tech features – example, remotely switching on/off house lights from your office.

Thinking of sending an e-mail to the newspapers tomorrow.

Ripping off customers

In 2002, we (my wife and I) finally decided to make our heaviest investment together. We decided to buy a high cost apartment, which was then being developed in Damansara by a well-known developer.

The location was great and had a lot of future potential due to its proximity to the Ikanao power center, the Curve, Tesco and One Utama. My wife was enthusiastic because the company has a good reputation and is probably the biggest and only Bumiputra developer of major projects in Malaysia. We obtained Islamic (so called) financing from one of Malaysia’s biggest banks, which was not so easy but that is another story all together.

Whenever we passed the place, we could see the structure slowly growing and imagine the days when we could finally move in. The apartments were due for completion in November last year. The dealine passed but construction was still in progress. My more experienced friends told me not to worry as it was considered normal for developers to miss the deadline. They comforted me by saying that the developer usually will pay compensation if they passed the deadline.

Two weeks back, we received a letter from the developer saying that the apartment was ready and to collect our keys as soon as possible.

We were so happy that we were finally going to own a place of our own. So off we went to their office. Really disaapointed to find out that we are not eligible for compensation as we they had delivered vacant possession of the property within thirty six months (3 years) from the date of our agreement. Damn!

Moreover, we found out that we had to settle various dues. We noted that one of them were late payment fees. We were like, “what late payment fees?” It turned out that the bank delayed payment to the developer a few times and even though it was not our fault, we have to pay the fees. What I found amazing is that this is considered normal in Malaysia. Yeah! Real Islamic banking.

One of our friends informed us that her developer had waived their fees and so we wrote an appeal letter to the developer. The lady attending to us said that we may appeal and so we did. Accordign to her, we would receive the reply a week later.

We then drove down to the apartment and had a shock.

Our building was not even ready yet. Workers were still working on the upper floors. The lifts were not working and they told us that even the utilities (water) had not been connected yet. One of the workers took us up to our unit, which we found unlocked. However we were happy when we found that we had a great view of the hills and the lake. The squatter huts (workers) were an eyesore but I am sure they will go as soon as the buildings are complete.

Fast forward to last week, Saturday. We drove down to their office and straightaway went to their credit control department. Was really disappointed when we found that our appeal for the waiver had not been approved.

I mean its not fair.
1. When we delay our payment to the bank by even one day, we pay late payment charges.
2. When the bank delays on their payment to the developer, we still have to pay late payment charges (this time to the developer).

Now, we have to talk to the bank. One guy gave us some hope when he told us that Citibank helped their customer to get their interest fees waived. Going to contact our financing bank and see what they have to say. Will publish their reply here.

Disappointment turned to anger when I found that we also had to pay maintenance charges for the month of July.

How can they charge us maintenance fees when we have not moved in yet – when the building is not even ready yet?

The lady at the office tried to push some legal stuff in our face – “according to the agreement *blah, blah, bullshit, bullshit*”

Yes, on paper the building is complete. However, the fact is that the fire safety stuff (pipes, etc) have not been installed, construction still going on the top floors, water not connected, and most important of all - the lifts are not even working yet. I am not sure whether the buildings have even received the Certificate of Fitness for Occupation (CFO).

In other words we can have the keys to the house but WE CAN'T MOVE IN YET.

This is how some developers try to rip of their customers in Malaysia. I am wondering how many of you have faced these problems or is our's an isolated incident.

Will inform you about the ongoing saga in full detail later. We still want to give them a chance.

Back Up

Just learnt that the blog of famous Singaporean blogger Xiaxue has been defaced/hacked. Somebody deleted all her entries (2 years worth of posts). The story doesn't end there, someone got into her e-mail account, most probably the same people and deleted about 3000 e-mails.

I keep telling other people the mantra of safe computing "Back up, backup and back up again". However, as they say, we are usually good at preaching and not practising. To tell the truth, I never back up my entries, only my template codes. If someone hacks into my account and deletes my blog, I would have to start all over again but without my old entries.

Now that's really scary. More than 2 years of thoughts, dreams, rants and effort down the drain.

My office internet connection has been really bad the past few day and my pointed out found out that half the "A Day at Putrajaya" post had disappeared. Had to retype the post again yesterday. Is that a sign?

Unlike other people I usually don't use the cut-and-paste method. Maybe I have to start doing that - writing in Word, copy and then paste on blogger. At least I'll have a record of my old posts.