A Sneak Peek in US Embassy

Today I am going to talk about a place most of you had never stepped into - the US Embassy to Malaysia!

Well actually, there is nothing much to talk about. But let me talk about some random interesting facts that I had noticed when I was inside.


1.) They uses airport security technologies.

The scanner from Smith Detections used at the security outpost.

You have to pass through three scanners before going into the main building.   For obvious reasons, America being one of the most loved and hated country in the world (I find it interesting that people usually love or hate America, I've never met someone who are sort of neutral. Hmm...), this is to prevent people from trying to sabotage the embassy.

Although, if you would ask me I still think it's not good enough. I mean I get to walk in the courtyard unescorted even though the pass I get says "Escorted Visitor".


2.) They give random queue numbers on different days.

Well what does that mean? That means, you don't get to cut queue. For example, they give out numbers 010, 011, 012, 013 today, they won't give out those numbers on tomorrow. Instead they will be giving 014, 015, 016. This prevents people from taking the queue number and leaving and coming back on another day and uses the previous number.


3.) There is no set dress code.

No formal suit required.

Forget what your parents said about dressing properly, Americans does not care what you look like, what important is substance. So, don't dress as if you are going for your best friend's wedding, you will look awkward. But of course, that doesn't mean you can just walk in in ragged clothes and torn pants; what I mean is, dress as you would normally, that would do just fine.


4.) You have to queue for 4 different times.

Yes, there are many stations that you have to queue for. The first is of course outside the embassy, where you will queue up for security inspection. While inside, after you get your number, you will have to wait for your turn for the first or second counter, where you will need to submit all your documents for them to check.

After that, you will have to wait again. The next counter was the biometric scan counter, where they will need to take down your fingerprints.

Lastly, it is the interview counter. The interview is not what you would expect. No, you do not go into a room, with an interviewer or two. Instead, it is in the same room where you submit your documents and have your fingers scanned.

The interview proceeds as if you are on a fast food restaurant ordering some food, that is how it is done. And everyone else who are there for visa interview will be in the same room, listening to the questions the consulate asks and your response.


5.) The interviewers knows Chinese (fact contributed by my friend Le Lee)

A couple of interviewers there are Chinese, which seems very surprising. Turns out they are American born Chinese (ABC). The interview was conducted in English though, that is for sure. However, if the purpose of your trip is just to visit some relatives over there at the States, they are a little more lenient and allows the interview to be conducted in Chinese (if you are a Chinese lah). Study trip = English, non-negotiable.

I wonder if they speak Malay too. Someone find out for me?



Alright. That is all for today. Hope you learned something, and if you are going for an interview soon and never been there before, feel free to drop questions at me. Although generally you would find my advice not very helpful due to my lack of knowledge.


Till next time, cheers~

People: Laci Green

Post delivered as promised. Kicking off the "People" series, we have Laci Green!

Name: Laci Green
Location: San Francisco, California, US
D.O.B.: October 18, 1989
School: UC-Berkeley, Class of 2011 (Just graduated this Spring)
Known as: YouTuber, sexuality educator and social counselor, secular humanist.



Some of you may be surprised at the choice of person for my first post of the series. After all, the first is always something important right? People remember their first kiss, first date, first day of college, first (insert something here), all sorts of first-time experiences. Why do I, on such an important occasion, would want to talk about someone that is barely known (to most of us anyway)?

Well, the quick answer is, I got this idea of "People" series because of her. No, not because she told me to, or that she did anything remotely similar. But because of the positivity she radiates, and it is so infectious that every time she says something that struck a chord with me, I feel like everyone should be listening to what she has to say. And hence, the first post of "People" belongs to her.



Laci is a frequent YouTuber, she runs her official YouTube channel here. On YouTube, she is most well known for her videos on sexuality and relationships, mainly the weekly series called Sex+ (read as "sex positive"). She tackles many topics involving boy-girl relationships, and other sex-related topics that are usually considered a taboo to talk about in most societies (or so we think otherwise). What I like about her is her approach to making these topics interesting, and most of all, the way she talks about these topics openly; it makes people feel that we shouldn't be ashame to be talking about sexuality (not talking about sex, there is a difference, although she does in a way encourages that, to which I see no harm).

She believes that human relationship should be our core value in our community, and let me quote her personal philosophy from her website.

I believe compassionate human connection should be our #1 value as a species. I provide guidance to others online and in my real life to help foster this value in day to day situations. I believe we all live at the intersection of complex systems that dismiss compassionate regard, replacing it instead with greed, competition, bigotry, and selfishness. Woven into all of my work is the underlying argument that we should push for compassionate regard for one another in our social, political, and economic endeavors.

Her videos on sexuality definitely show her passion for reaching out to as many people as possible to spread her compassion and energy of positivity.



Anyway, to detract from her story a little. Some of you may wonder, how did I stumble upon Laci, right? Well, rest assured I'm not that perverted, and I did not stumble upon Laci's channel because I entered "sex" or "boobies" in YouTube search box.

Long story short, we are both secular humanists, and I came across one of her videos on the oppression of religion (she was brought up in a family of Mormons, but decided she will be better off without it). Then, you know, the natural thing happened. But this is not the point today. :)

Laci with the geek look

Point is, I really admire her work in trying to enlighten people on these diverse yet important issues (important, so that we do not have bigoted opinions).

Personally, I would like to emulate what she does, although in a different field - Sciences. Of course, one of the first steps to do that is to blog (that is what Brain Stew is for). Also, meeting her for a conversation wouldn't be too bad ;)  (if I can catch her around while I am in the States, that is).



Meanwhile, I have compiled a list of the online media she uses, so you can check her out... like right now.

YouTube Channel
Website
Facebook Page
Twitter



Hope you like it. More inspiring people on "People" next week!



Till next time, cheers~

"This is your body, don't let anyone tell you what to do with it"

Good News!

Good news! Well. It's not exactly news. But anyway, here goes. I have been admitted to University of Wisconsin-Madison!

Macam terpilih masuk Hogwarts saja.

So yes, I am now officially a Badger (School mascot). Quote Wikipedia "Badgers are short-legged, heavy-set omnivores in the weasel family."

Bucky the Badger

I have been busy over the past few weeks trying to sort out my admissions documents. Trust me, there were LOTS of them. The paperwork is just endless. Luckily, I was having my semester break, so I spent my break settling the problem. It's not a huge problem now that it's out of the way.

Anyway. I have been getting a lot of these questions from my friends and relatives - "Where is Wisconsin?", "Wah, University of Wisconsin ah? Good school or not?". I think, I will try to answer those two most common questions in my blog today.

Okay first of all, Wisconsin is a state in the US. There, indicated in the map below.

It is situated near north and a little bit mid-east of US (Oddly though, they call Wisconsin as part of the Midwest states). At the west of Wisconsin, is the more well-known state of Minnesota, and to the east, Michigan. It is flanked by two of the five "Great Lakes", Lake Superior and Lake Michigan. And down south Wisconsin are the neighboring states of Iowa and Illinois.

Done. Now question number two - "Is University of Wisconsin-Madison a good school?"

Well. Since I haven't started to study there yet. I can't exactly tell you how good it is. But as far as the world ranking is concerned, it is one of the top schools in the world. Below are some rankings of UW-Madison, just to name a few surveys.

QS World University Rankings (2010) - 48th

Times Higher Education World University Rankings (2010) - 43rd

Times Higher Education World University Reputation Rankings (2010) - 25th

Shanghai Jiao Tong University's Academic Rankings of World Universities (2010) - 17th

So, although it is not as good as Harvard, I'd still take any school that is in the top 50 of the world rankings, simply because it takes a lot to stay at the top of the rankings chart. Remember, Malaysian Universities can't even make it to the top 200 in the world.

Oh, another note. University of Wisconsin-Madison is informally known as one of the "Public Ivy" schools. Because it is a public university (unlike the other universities in the Ivy League, which are all private universities), and the quality of instruction it gives is on par with the Ivies. Then again, we'll see when I get there, since I am not a student there yet.

Okay. I think that is all.



Oh by the way, another good news. If you were wondering why have I been blogging so much lately, it is because I have decided to spend my time better (which is to blog) instead of doing something useless (which is to stare at my computer screen). So, starting today, I am going to start a series of weekly blog posts, called "People", featuring peoples (duh) that I follow, watch, read, (insert verb here), etc. Essentially, people that I feature will be the ones that have significant effects in my own personal development (intellectual or otherwise), ones that have taught me great lessons, or ones that I just think that everyone should know.

That, followed by another post on any random topic, will give you at least 2 blog posts per week. 2 brain stew per week! What more can you ask for? (Hint: 3 blog posts per week, that is what.)

Alright. Off I go.



Till next time, cheers~



p.s. If you have anything that you want me to write about, you can leave a comment below. I will see if that is possible. :)

Horses: The American Empire?

I read an article about the domestication of animals by our ancestor today. It was written by a Jared Diamond, a scientist, and that article was part of the book The Third Chimpanzee. In that particular chapter, he mentioned that horses played a big role in shaping human history, especially in terms of warfare.

Also being mentioned is the fact that horses existed in the American continent about until 10,000 years ago, when it went extinct. That is about 2,000 years after humans migrated into the American continent from modern day Russia, hence it is very likely the early Americans turned them into horseburgers, wiping them off the surface of the continent.

Let's pause for a moment and think - what if horses didn't went extinct in the American continent? What do you think would have happened?

Many scenarios may play out, but if history is anything to go by, I would say the Americans (north and south) would have become a global powerhouse very much earlier.

Horse artifact

Go back into history and have a look, let us see how horses have helped the development and expansion of civilizations.

Horses are popular choice of ride for the Greek god Zeus

And of Odin of Norse Mythology too, but his ride Sleipnir has 8 legs. Earliest recorded case of "Pimp My Ride".

Horses had a variety of roles in the ancient civilizations, in helping out in agriculture, hunting, but especially increasing our mobility thousand times over. And it is this increase in mobility that quickly spurred (no pun intended) the expansion of empires.

It is no mistake that almost all huge empires in ancient times forged under military might made extensive use of horses, particularly in cavalry warfare.

Egyptian chariots are widely use in the military

The Assyrians are one of the early adopters of horses in warfare, before Persians made it a staple part of its army, breeding powerful warhorses and arming the mounted soldiers with armors. The Persian Empire, of course, was a vast and powerful empire at its time, if not the most powerful.

Then came Alexander the Great, who led an expansion campaign into Egypt and Persia. King Phillip of Macedon developed tactics for cavalry units which were passed down to Alexander. Alexander had a group of cavalrymen called the Companion Cavalry, the most prestigious group of elite soldiers of his army. The Companion troops spearheaded the campaign in Persia, acting as shock troops that uses the speed and power of the horses to pummel through enemy ranks.

Alexander the Great.

And then of course the Chinese, though isolated from the messier part of Europe and Middle-East at that time, independently developed horse warfare. Chinese states at that time which have limited access to horses are quickly dominated by the other states that has superior horse units. The Qin Dynasty (The first unified Chinese dynasty, you know under the guy who started the Great Wall project, Emperor Qin Shi-Huang) owed much of its success in conquering its neighboring states to cavalry.

A terracotta figure, dating before Qin Dynasty 

The Roman Empire used horses too, but didn't made so much use of it in the military. Romans are more fond of infantry. Then came the Hunnic Empire. Led by Attila the Hun, they made use of horse units and slapped the Roman Empire in the face; they had two very successful campaigns against the powerhouse of Europe.

The peak of Hunnic Empire under Attila

Let us not forget that the biggest empire in history was built by the finest horsemen at that time - the Mongols. They were the master of horses, grew up with them, learned to ride on horses before they can even walk. Their conquest of China and the Middle-East and the eastern part of Europe were mostly based on cavalry warfare (each soldier owns an average of 3 horses).

The Mongol horde

What followed were the Islamic Empires and Medieval Europe, both had their fair uses of horses in warfare. But I think I made enough points I do not need to elaborate on that part of history.

Your stereotypical Medieval knight

So, in summary, horses = military supremacy in ancient times.

Which begs the question, would there have been a widespread American Empire if horses didn't go extinct in the American continent, instead of the localized states? The Mayans, Incas, Aztecs, all built their civilization using human power alone, wonder what would happen if horses were there to lighten their work, not llamas.

Maybe they would have established a powerful empire by the time the Europeans discovered them. They may have already developed technologies that are of similar level, and not at such a disadvantage when the first Spanish Conquistadors tried to invade them. The Europeans may have failed to colonize them, and their civilization could have survived to this date. We wouldn't have to call South America the Latin America, because they speak variation of Latin (which came from Europe).

If they were widespread enough the British would have had a more difficult time trying to establish new settlements in North America. If they had developed their civilization faster, the American Empire might have been sailing long before Zheng-He from China start his expedition or Christopher Columbus touch down on America.

Maybe they might even invade Europe instead of the other way round. What a fascinating alternative history that would be. Hmm...



Till next time, cheers~

Rapture!

I would hate to be this guy on May 22.

Nope. Not the Bioshock "Rapture".

If you have been following the international news or, particularly, the news in the US. You would have heard of this news. If you had not, I would suggest that you stop reading and google something along the line of "May 21 Rapture", read any articles by any news media. That would help you understand what's going on.

So a church in the US has been telling everybody that the world is coming to an end on the 22nd of May, this year. The church, led by an old man named Harold Camping (I should add that he is also a multi-millionaire and the host of the most subscribed Christian radiostation in the US), spent enormous amount of money setting up billboards all over (I do not know how far wide are the billboards, but I presume quite a large area across the US). Here are a few examples of the billboards. I have taken the liberty of sharing them with you. ; )

That is right guys. Cry, cry... Be very afraid. Because Bible GUARANTEES it!

Yup, don't want to miss a barbecue session with Jesus.

And all you unbelievers will be tortured until the 21st of October, then the world will end, and you then will get more torture in Hell. 

Here we go "again". Just like many other false prophecies.

Yes, it is really that insane. But what's more insane is that these people genuinely believe in it! They wear sandwich boards in cities, giving fliers, grabbing anyone off the street and yelling at them. If you didn't know, you would have thought that it was a massive publicity campaign for some cheesy product.

That doesn't surprise me though. What surprises me is the level of hypocrisy of these "believers". They preach that the believers will ascend to Heaven comes 21st of May, but they do not live as if they are really going to leave this world.

If you are going to leave this life, why bother saving your money? Why bother keeping all your possessions? Walk what you preach, give it to the poor, you do not need those in heaven anyway (and the poor deserves better).

Still keeping? I don't know what do you call it if not being a hypocrite. Seriously.



As for Harold Camping who made the prediction. Well, he made a prediction a decade earlier, saying that the world is going to end in 1994. Nothing happened.

Personally, I would hate to be this guy on the 22nd of May, when everything is still fine, and Jesus didn't come, and none of these "believers" left for Heaven. But that's just me. Some people love attention so much they believe that bad publicity is still publicity. Don't be surprised if he end up trying to bid for US presidency after this. (Another Christian evangelist, Pat Robertson, made a prediction that the world is going to end in 1982, nothing happened of course. But Pat Robertson went on to run for presidency in 1988.)

Oh well. I am just glad that Christianity in Malaysia hasn't stooped that low yet. But given enough time and with the growing fundamentalism movement, I am sure one of these days something like this may spread to and surface in Malaysia - Land of Anything Also Can. That is when I will totally - and finally - give up hope for this country.

Anyway. Happy Rapture everyone. Hope I will see you around when tomorrow comes.



Till next time, cheers~


p.s. Would someone ask Kanye West to interrupt the Rapture, please?

Size Does Matters

Have you ever wondered, why are there so little insects in the colder regions? Or why you have a 8.5 meter long intestine? Or why hasn't a giant cockroach invade your city already just so that you do not have to take that school exam of yours?

"I'm in yo city, eating yo lunchboxes."

Turns out they all have one unifying factor, that is, SIZES! Forget what the experts said, size does matters.

Except for your favorite Happy Feet.

Cold regions that have eternal winter such as the arctics and antarctica are devoid of animals that are smaller than a fox. In fact, if I may generalize (of course, there are always rare exceptions in biology), reptiles and amphibians are no where to be found in areas of freezing temperature, so are birds and insects (Birds and insects usually migrate to warmer places during winter). This is because bigger animals are better at keeping warmth within their body than smaller animals. How exactly?

Uh... Don't try this at home?

You have an intestine that is about 5 times longer than your height. But why do you need an intestine that long. Well, the high school biology answer to that is just to increase, surface area for food absorption. You already know that. But then again, why do you need increased area for food absorption? Worms have a straight gut that is as long as its body, it didn't need an intestine that is as long as a spaghetti.

And why don't we have giant cockroaches, if not at least as big as our arm or something? Or let us expand the question and ask, why don't we have giant insects the size of a cat or a dog? Why not giant human beings 50-foot tall? Is Godzilla possible?

Alright, I hope I raised enough questions to keep your attention. I will explain away the answers to these questions, with biological principles and some maths (not much, you do not have to be an Asian to understand them :D ).


The animal kingdom, I must say, has to be one of the weirdest thing to happen to the universe. To have matters (atoms and molecules) coming together to form reproducing lifeforms is one thing, to evolve into a being that are mobile is another miracle altogether! Okay, that has nothing to do with the topic today, but putting that aside, I want to point out another thing to you. If you noticed, of ALL the animals that exists today, none of them come in the wrong sizes, they are all just the right size, right shape, right proportion, just like the story of Goldilocks. Now what do I meant by that?

Suppose you have a gazelle (a deer-like animal native to Savannah), you increase the size of the gazelle by ten times but keeping the proportion of the body the same, what would happen? Immediately, the gazelle's bone will crack under the enormous weight of its body, but it doesn't happen when it is just as it is, that is - just the right size. On the contrary, if you shrink the gazelle down by the factor of ten, it won't be crushed by its weight (in fact the gazelle will feel itself so much more lighter), but again it will not survive for long, because its body is inefficient at functioning on an animal that can fit on your palm, it will need so much more food (I'm talking about in relation to the body, not the absolute amount. Of course, a mouse-sized gazelle eat less than a real gazelle), and its body will be incapable of producing enough energy.

This biological principle pertaining body sizes is really based on simply mathematics. Now let me show you, with a more relatable example. Humans are on average about 5-foot tall (we shall take the average at 5-foot for the sake of simplifying calculations). Let's say we try to increase our size by ten times in all dimensions, that is - height, width, and breadth; we will have a human being that is 50-foot tall, has the same body shape and proportion as a human who is at normal height. According to mathematics, although the human had only increased his height by ten times, he have about a thousand times increase in volume!

10 fold increase in height, width, and breadth = 10 * 10 * 10 = 1000 fold increase in volume!

Now let's make the assumption that the density of the human does not change when he "grows", we can deduce that a thousand times increase in the volume means a thousand times increase on his weight! The person now has to bear a weight 100 times more than he have to compared to when he is normal.

1000x increase in weight / 10x increase in size = 100x more weight to carry!

Let's not forget about our bones. Our bones of course, will have a thousand times increase in volume too, but only a hundred times increase in the cross-section area. Put that into equation and we have:

1000x increase in weight / 100x increase in bone cross-section area = 10x more pressure on bones!

Incidentally, our strongest bones (femur) breaks at this amount of pressure. So, can you imagine how much exoskeleton strength does a cockroach has to have if it were the size of a building? It is simply not economical.

Now, I will not present an argument for reduced efficiency when our size is reduced proportionally. Simply because 1) There are no maths for it as a far as I know, and 2) It is not known whether we can survive is we downsize all our dimensions by 10 times. However that does not mean biologists do not have a case for it. We can see all around us, most tiny animals have very simple systems that keep them alive, which leads to a hypothesis that simple systems are more efficient and easier to manage at small scale. The realm of mammals and complex organ systems ends as soon as it reaches the size of your thumb, anything smaller beyond that are simpler lifeforms. Therefore, I suspect that complex systems are being selective against in favor of simpler systems that function more efficiently in small-scale organisms.



Speaking of small animals, let's take a look at another organism. This time, the humble earthworm. Simple, straight-forward, the earthworm is basically just a mobile tube (or hollow cylinder, whichever you prefer). It has no brain, just some basic neuron that acts according to stimuli received; a straight gut, surrounded by a layer of muscle, no bones, no flashy displays, just essentials that keep it alive and moving.

The beauty about earthworms and other similar-sized organisms is - they do not require a specialized respiration and digestive system. Small creatures have large surface area compared to their volume, we say in biology they have large surface-area-to-volume ratio, therefore they can have enough oxygen just by simple diffusion through their skin, the oxygen intake will be sufficient and can be delivered to all body cells. Ditto to the digestive system, they have a low body volume, which means less cells to feed, that is why they only have a straight gut, not the winded and elaborated ones we and other larger animals have.

Nom nom nom

But if you increase the size of the earthworm to, let's say, the size of an anaconda. Not only it will require to eat faster than this guy eats his hot dogs just to get enough fuel, it will suffocate because the oxygen just can't diffuse fast enough to reach all body cells to keep it alive. (Not to mention it will poo as much as it eats)

That is when your 8.5 meters intestine comes in. With more surface area to absorb nutrient, you do not have to eat that much just to extract enough energy to power your body. By the time the food reaches the exit of your gut system, it probably have very little nutrients left to be absorbed. (I have heard somewhere that your feces still have enough nutrients to nourish you for a few days, but let's just leave that thought right there.)

That being said though, it doesn't mean that being small is good because we need only to maintain systems with low upkeep, or being big is worse because of the complications that are more likely to occur on our body systems. But there is one thing that definitely gives an advantage to bigger animals and that is body temperature control.



Let us go back to the question on why aren't there any small animals in cold climates. The explanation given above is that bigger animals are better at keeping warmth in their body than smaller animals. True. But let's put it in mathematical terms and see why.

Returning to the principle of surface-area-to-volume ratio, I had mentioned that smaller animals have larger surface-area-to-volume ratio (let's call it SA/V ratio here onwards). It means, smaller animals have more surface area per volume of body, or to every unit of volume of the body, there are more surface area. That is not the case for bigger animals, though, they have a smaller SA/V ratio. In other words, the surface area of the bigger animals are smaller in relative to smaller animals.

This brings a great advantage to the bigger animals in colder conditions. Because let me tell you this, almost all of the energy extracted from our food goes into producing body heat to keep our essential organs working, which means almost all the energy lost from our body is in the form of heat through the skin. Therefore, when each unit volume of the body is producing equal amount of heat, the animals with smaller SA/V ratio (big animals) are going to lose heat through the skin slower compared to animals with larger SA/V ratio (which in this case is the small animals).

That is why, small animals tend to die rather easily in freezing weather, because their body loses heat faster than they can generate heat. To compensate for this disadvantage, smaller animals have to eat a lot. How much? Imagine this, a mouse has to eat about a quarter of its own weight daily. Convert this into the human scale, it's like us eating about 15-17kg of food per day! And all of that food goes into producing enough body heat to survive. So, economically speaking, it is better for smaller animals to migrate to warmer areas than to live searching for extra food each day in cold areas, a herculean task given the scarcity of food in colder regions. (Some smaller animals hibernate in winter, which uses less energy and therefore conserving the energy.)



So, is it better to be a smaller or a larger animal? There is no correct answer to that. We should all appreciate the fact that evolution is a very beautiful thing itself. And that all animal lineages that survived long enough passing the test of time, to this date, should be considered a success story in their own right.

With that I shall end my sloppily organized and rather incoherent attempt at writing a science article. I shall hope that you will leave this post with a little more understanding about the biological principles behind the body sizes. And your homework for today is, answer one of the unanswered questions above. Is Godzilla possible? If so, what kind of body systems must it develop to survive as an organism?


Till next time, cheers.

Don't Understand People Lah...

Probably one of the biggest news in a while, that Osama bin Laden is dead.

I was keeping tab on twitter even before Obama decided to announce the news the other day. Then one of the tweets from CNN news announced that Obama is going on air for a special address to the nation. I remember one tweet saying that Obama decided to go on air at that time to draw peoples' attention from Donald Trump's "Celebrity Apprentice", which was going to be aired at the same time.

For those who didn't know, Obama and Trump got into a little 'feud' about the president's country of birth. Thus the joke tweet.

Anyway, the rest is exactly what you heard from the news. The international news channels rating soared, saturated with all sorts of news and interviews - how it happened, who was involved, did Pakistan know, effects on Middle-East politics, effects on al-Qaeda, etc., even though some people had no business to be there (instant fame on CNN wor, who wouldn't accept?).

There are groups of people who remained skeptical of the news, though. And they believe the US fabricated the whole spectacle, and - to a certain extent - staged the conspiracy from the start of 9/11. What did the US do to deserve such a claim?

  I cry foul as I like. ok?

Um, I don't know what I should make of this. I have in mind to blog about this a long time ago, but was unable due to time constraints. But one issue bothers me - why did they think so?

I think crying foul and saying that the US is conspiring against us is just plain absurd. People have been asking for the US to present the evidence that bin Laden is dead, or else it's a conspiracy. One thing I would ask these people though, where is the proof of conspiracy?

Do not use creative imaginations to link unrelated facts together that do not even pass Ockham's razor, and present it as a fact, claiming that the US is politically motivated to do so. The complex conspiracy theory fails, because in order to explain the whole situation, more baseless theories have to be made to support it. That doesn't work due to the nature of its complexity, and when both explanations are equally viable, the simpler prevails. Simple. Case closed. (I am not a big fan of US, I'm not some unpatriotic "char-siew" who will - on the first chance he/she gets - grab a green card and show Malaysia his/her ass. I'm defending because I think it's unfair and unjustified.)

I would want to return on a later time to lay out all the 9/11-related conspiracies and debunk them one at a time. I really don't understand people who thinks that the US has all the time in the world to stage this bloody show just to spend trillions of dollars into the military to wage a war against no-one (and get the oil which is then used to earn money which is then spent into the military which is used to get the oil in the first place). Come on, the whole plan is just too smart and complicated for Bush to execute (except the military spending - oil money cycle, and the after-effects on the American economy, now that's dumb and typical of him).

Meanwhile, I would like to end with this photo. Bin Laden's photos were not released yet. Look lah. Ok? Good night.

Osama's Las Vegas photo, he got drunk that's all.

Till next time, Cheers.