Wandering eyes

The Internet is a big place. Every computer linked to the Internet has an IP, but what we see most of the time on our computers are not IPs, but are websites. Some websites are easier to design than others, especially, if there is already a generic template for them. This is especially true for forums and blogs. However, most of the information on the Internet is rubbish, and it takes a while for us to sift through the rubbish and find the real gems. Not if you do know where they are...

The Prefect Board of USJ 12 for the term 2005/2006 was well known for one thing - digitilisation. So much so that most of the Cabinet members (now called exco) had started their own blogs after they left school. They had their own blogs until recently, when they combined all their blogs and contacts, forming one big blog with many contributors entitled "Ourcoffeestops". (URL: http://ourcoffeestops.com/)

You may go there yourself, but it used to be (and still is) one of my more informative stops when I surf the Net. It helped me keep abreast with what I was missing out by doing Form 6, as well as figure out what the more prominent members of my Form 5 batch are doing. Reading posts is one thing, but until recently, I had yet to read the writers' profiles. I have to say, some of the information I read was totally unexpected.

For starters, there was Ying Wei and Chirstopher's comment on his comment. For the record, they are "Despite his good photography skills, nice voice, handsome countenance (I nearly died typing this), he’s still wondering why life has been so unfair to him: He’s still single.". Well, not to say that Mr. Siah is not handsome (I don't know, I normally don't look at guys and judge whether they are handsome or not), but I would think it prudent to let the ladies decide for a change. I know, Chris had a lot of fans in school, and as such he could be in a good position to determine whether a guy is good looking or not, but I really feel that they should have let the ladies decide, or let one of the female contributers of Ourcoffeestops write that comment instead.

Then of course, is Chris' comment on his comment. that "I nearly died typing this". As if I did not spray enough spit on the screen when I read Chris' comment on Ying Wei, I sprayed even more spit when I read that. Not that I wouldn't nearly die doing the same thing, I just think I would die writing that any other guy is handsome. I am heterosexual, thank you very much, and very conservative while we are at it, so for me to say that another guy is handsome just feels completely alien to me.

Speaking of female contributors to Ourcoffeestops, it was not so much one of them who caught my eye, but more of where she studied. Irna is, if I am not mistaken, ethnically Malay, so when I read that she was studying at Methodist College Kuala Lumpur (MCKL)...let's just say that my eyeballs nearly rolled onto the floor. I myself am a Methodist, and I don't go to MCKL. One of the other contributors of Ourcoffeestops is a Methodist as well, and he doesn't go to MCKL either. And we both would have gotten discounts if we had decided to enroll there.

What really had me surprised was the fact that MCKL is run by the Methodist Church, a Christian denomination, and there, a Muslim was studying, while a great number of Methodists, who enjoy discounts if they decide to enroll there, decide instead to got to private colleges, or in my case, Form 6. As we all know, evangelising to Muslims in Malaysia is banned, so when you see a Muslim in a Christian college, it really gets one thinking. Maybe we aren't that backward after all. Maybe there is still hope for everyone to get a good education regardless of who is teaching.

But then again, there are a few factors which may allow Irna to pursue her education there without JAWI coming down on her. Firstly, she is a Singaporean, so I guess she is not as racially polarised as Malaysians are. Then, maybe because she is Singaporean, JAWI may not have any say over her education, so maybe she could get away with it. And then she is probably more religiously tolerant the most Malaysians...so much for us Malaysians being the most racially or/and religiously harmonious people on Earth.

Unlike Malaysians, Singaporeans are Singaporeans first, then Chinese/Malay/Indian second. Although there are many things we can learn from Singapore in terms of racial integration, there are certain aspects of Singaporean life we can do without, such as labeling of people, from "super-spreaders", used during the SARS outbreak, to "normal stream students", referring to students who do their secondary education in five years instead of four.

The Internet is wide, with a vast amount of information. Sometimes our wandering eyes find something we laugh at, other times, we find something we didn't already know, or something which really catches us off guard. It is up to us to find the gems, and savor the sight while we are there, before going back to the daily grind of life.