3½ Months To Renew M'sian Passport In NZ!

Last week, after waiting for THREE AND HALF MONTHS we FINALLY got our "renew" Malaysian passports!

My Kiwi colleague was amused and asked if Malaysia belongs to a THIRD WORLD country!

I remember FIVE years ago, we went through the same angst!

Five years ago I complained to Jeff Ooi and he blogged my pain in his Screen Shot's "Wisma Putra Blues" entry.

"Citizen CY Leow, who has been residing in Kiwiland as a Permanent Resident in order to school his two daughters, never realised renewing his Malaysian passport at the Wellington Malaysian High Commission in the New Zealand capital can be so 'third world'.

He shares his bitter experience.

About time someone brought this up!"  said Jeff and that was five years ago!

Objects of angst!

Tribute - Pioneers of The Star, Malaysia

September 9, The Star (largest in terms of circulation) an English-language, tabloid-format newspaper in Malaysia turned 40.

On that day the paper reprint the first copy of The Star (09-09-1971) and gave to those who attended the anniversary celebration.

You are able to download this historical first issue in PDF format, here.

Within that first issue, The Star also reprint in full; the January 3, 1976; National Launch Supplement which show case the pioneers on that historical event!

My Memories Of WTC

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — Ten years on from the day the 9/11 terrorist attacks changed so much for so many people, the world's leaders and millions of citizens are pausing to reflect...

On this day I pause and go through my photos and memories of our visit to The World Trade Center.

It was SEVENTEEN YEARS ago when we visited the WTC, as can be seen from this shot taken by our eldest daughter May-N with a 35 mm Nikon AF compact.

It was shot from Ellis Island, which was a good place to capture the New York skyline with the two imposing twin towers.

1994 was a good year for us, I was working in Singapore and we were having a time of our life; a two weeks holiday in The Big Apple!

Photographs are like a time capsule, looking at them brought back the happy time when we were posing with the Twin Towers :)

Perfect Video Frame Grab With JVC GC-PX10

Last February I wrote about the Power Of Video Frame Grab, I showed you how it was done and you have seen some delightful video stills of beautiful Zhang Lei performing a Guzheng recital.

Stolen Camera Finder Redux

In April this year I wrote about this interesting site.

This programmer by the name of Matt Burns has written a search engine that lets people find their stolen camera by submitting an unedited photo taken by the lost camera!  It's magic ;)

After giving it a go, I was impressed by what Matt is trying to do! But I did have a few concerns.

Well, I received a response from Matt himself yesterday!

eCosway Come To Wellington!

Saturday, September 3 - Wellington

The direct selling phenomena eCosway spread it's tentacles to our Coolest Little Capital today!

According to their "About" link:
"You're in business for yourself, but not by yourself, because you're backed by a giant proven company with an incredible track record.
eCosway (launched in 2002) is a rapidly growing international company with headquarters in the prestigious golden triangle of Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. It has thousands of sales centres located throughout the world.
It is a subsidiary of Cosway Malaysia Sdn. Bhd. which is wholly owned by Cosway Corporation Limited, a company listed in Hong Kong (stock code 0288), a member of the Berjaya Group - a top conglomerate in Asia.
eCosway has been awarded the coveted "MSC Status" by the Malaysian government for its outstanding contribution to the growth and development of information technology."

First Wellington shop...

The first eCosway shop at the Johnsonville Mall, Johnsonville.

JPEGmini - photos on diet?

As long as I can remember, we have been trying to make digital photos smaller for faster on line uploading or when emailing them to friends.

For a long long time, JPEG is the default format that everyone use.

According to Wikipedia:

In computing, JPEG ( /ˈdʒeɪpɛɡ/ jay-peg) is a commonly used method of lossy compression for digital photography (image). The degree of compression can be adjusted, allowing a selectable tradeoff between storage size and image quality. JPEG typically achieves 10:1 compression with little perceptible loss in image quality.

I remember fondly, in the early days of internet; the fastest way to break a friendship was to email them a 2 to 3 MB picture ;) A sure way to stuff up their email "in box" too!

Now a day you can easily re-size your photos by compressing them on line, the last time I Google "resize photos"; I got SIX MILLION hits!

There are literally hundreds of FREE sites that you can upload your pictures and get back a resized copy within seconds!