Bleach Anime

cute but deadly

The scenic birdge

This is the causeway bridge linking Johor to Singapore. It is not a bridge, it is a landfill, which cuts through the sea to join the two countries.

Many years back it had been decided that we build the new bridge

for some reason, shit happens and malaysia decided to build our own new half. there fore it looks like this

it was name THE CROOKED BRIDGE....we now prefer to call it the scenic bridge...

As a engineering student i can't help but calculate some "impacts"..mainly on fuel consumption. as we can see the original bridge is 1km...judging from the artist's impression the new scenic bridge gives a total length of 1.5km.

assuming that we have a car that does 40miles per gallon 17 km per litres. so to cross to the opposite costs 0.06 litres. current petrol price of RM1.90 per litre means it costs u RM0.11 per crossing.

let's see how much more it would cost for the new bridge...0.09 litres to cross....means RM0.17 per crossing.

The average traffic per day is 60,000 vehicles a day (sourced from wikipedia) this counts to...21.9 million vehicles a year.

fuel costs of old bridge: RM2,409,000 per year ; new bridge RM3,723,000

it COST RM1,314,000 MORE everyyear...plus the building of the bridge costs RM1 billion (1,000,000,000)

Malaysia government subsidises fuel (read more here and here and here), which surpressed the price, and spends USD$1.4billion a year to do so. it is estimate that if the subsidy is to be lifted fuel prices may at least RM2.45 per litre...so let's assume the government takes RM0.55 per litre, we can calculate the cost to subsidies addition crossing-fuel to be RM3,613,500.

Therefore the extra fuel cost to cross the scenic bridge is RM4,927,500 per year. yes....nearly five million ringgit is wasted per year...this is the lower limit as most cars are less efficient than 40mpg, and the actual traffic is more than 60000 a day and it is increasing.

although 5 million ringgit is really as small portion of our government's budget every year, (USD$29.33 billion..RM105 billion, accroding to CIA world factbook). we will never know the implications if the 5million is used elsewhere...

SO, ARE WE LUCKY THAT MALAYSIA HAD FINALLY SCRAPPED THE PLAN TO BUILD THE SCENIC BRIDGE??? read on...

_____________________________________________________________

the dispute of the bridge in short:

" Malaysia says the new bridge will allow water to flow again in the Straits of Johor, thereby improving the marine ecology and reducing the stagnation and the stench. Malaysia also hopes the new bridge will reduce traffic congestion in Johor Bahru, which is across the causeway from Singapore. Singapore’s objection is over the cost of building a new bridge as opposed to adding lanes to the existing causeway. At least that’s all the info that I could find. "

there is a conspiracy theory going around, which can be found HERE. the text that comes after this paragraph are from the same website:

to summarise the conspiracy...

1. Malaysia wants to replace the 80 year old causeway with a new bridge. Reasons given are –
To improve the marine ecology by allowing the water in the Straits of Johor to flow
To reduce traffic congestion in Johor Bahru2.

2. Singapore is reluctant to replace the causeway with a bridge. Reasons given are –
Cost is higher than simply upgrading the causeway ... Unspecified environmental concerns

3. Negotiations between the two countries are underway, but it is not moving anywhere

4. Malaysia has decide to proceed with it’s half of the bridge unilaterally

So what is all the fuss? Why is Singapore reluctant to cooperate with Malaysia in building a new bridge? Why are they stalling?

The causeway has basically dammed up the Straits for a little over 80 years now. As a result, shipping traffic has to go around Singapore to get from the Indian Ocean to the Pacific Ocean. Singapore gets a lot of revenue from shipping traffic.

Removing this dam/causeway will cause traffic to divert through the Straits of Johor, reducing traffic to Singapore and possibly increasing traffic to her rival port across the Strait. Both situations are not favourable to Singapore.

What will the end result be then? that is why Singapore will not willingly cooperate

UK malaysian students doesn't go home to serve the country

"Money is not everything – Malaysian medical students in Britain have been told.
Higher Education Minister Datuk Mustapa Mohamed said the students must have a strong sense of nationalism and patriotism, and should return home to serve the people and the Government after completing their studies. " - the star (click here for full coverage)

THis is a response to the UK Executive Council for Malaysian Students (UKEC), which found that low pay and long working hours in government service were among the reasons Malaysian medical students were reluctant to return home after completing their studies in Britain. (the survey includes also science and engineering student)

REgarding this issue i have a very strong opinion, as i am an also an engineering student in UK.

The response given by Dato Mustapha is an ill-given one, he had failed to consider these few arguments:
1. The realiaty waiting for graduate students:
2. the mentally of the students.
3. application of what is being studied.

regarding 1.
the reality is that majority of students finance their studies thru loans (either government or private sector or family). this loans are huge as an average science degree will set u back aat arond RM200,000 over the course of 3 years. How long would u need to pay that back (not calculating the interests) if u comeback to malaysia? a quick count will tell u that it'll take more than 10 years to pay it all, age-wise u're either at your mid-30's now, or you are now over 40. add into the payment of your future homea nd cars and expenses, u'll be living most of your life IN DEBT.

The best way out of such a situation is working overseas, where the pay is higher, E.G. in UK u earn £24,000 per annum as a fresh graduate, that is at least 5 times as much as u can earn back home, which means u can settle your debts and loans faster (meaning u can reduce the interest being paid).

THat's the reality, my dear Datuk Mustapha.

2. the mentality
why do we not have much patriotism within us? first consider this

i.
what is the percentage of non-government sponsored students in UK? it is a significant portion, in my uni it is 80% of the M'sian students.

ii. of these portion of non-sponsored students, there are more than half that have got VERY GOOD RESULTS in pre-uni qualifications, they are either nto given scholarships they need(and deserve), or they are denied the place they want in local uni (such as medical students), when a lot more are given to bumiputeras with much lower qualifications. This is the reason why many top students are studying overseas, in order to fulfill their potential and dreams which they have proven in past examinations that they can.

these reasons prompt a very negative reaction, students feel they are either abandoned, treated unfairly or just not being important enough to the country. so it is only fair that the fire of patriotism is being dampened by the process.

to put it simply, "overseas student will not have a strong enough patriotism to take huge personal sacrifices because they don't feel they are appreciated enough in the first place"

3. the application
i can only speak this from my own experience. in my uni the emphasis is on design and computer modelling, while in msia it is not so, it is more geared towards manufacturing. personally i would like to try applying what i've learned rather than having to do something else.

tattoos

if u remember my post a few weeks back on tattoos u might be wondering if there are a lot more real life mistakes that i can show.

well i've found it!! click here!

so once again...be careful when u choose to scar your own body with tattoos that you don't understand (especially when the tattoo-ist gave you a huge discount with nice smile)

Bushisms

" we believe humans beings and fish can co-exists peacfully"
-george bush on human-fish relations

like that? we all like bush, as much as we hate him. how long had we waited for a stupid world leader, now we're blessed with one.

and the man himself acknowledge that, with his own parody at the white house.

for more on bushims, please click here. (courtest of about.com)