Early April this year San Francisco became the first and only U.S. city to ban the use of plastic bags. Now, the rest of the country seems to be following in its footsteps.
Kudos!!! Plastic bags after all endanger wildlife and can take up to a whopping thousand years to decompose.
Surveys done across the U.S. show that up to 54% of Americans believe that plastic, non-compostable shopping bags should be banned. In addition, a survey done on a population of 1,080 Americans showed that at least one-third of Americans take reusable shopping bags to food stores.
Globally, many countries are following this move to promote sustainability and to make our planet a greener place for future generations. Those countries include Bangladesh and China. How about Malaysia?
The Malaysian government finally made a decision to decrease petrol subsidies, thus affecting us directly since petrol prices will effectively increase by about 40% from the old RM1.92 per liter to RM2.70 per liter. The announcement literally caused a petrol pumping frenzy throughout the town. Petrol stations were packed with people trying to fill up their petrol tanks.
Most of us are probably hating the decision and complaining. Cannot deny the fact that we are all going to have tie our tummies and spend less. But lets face it, the decision to cut back on fuel subsidies is way overdue and should have been decided years ago. Call me crazy but, the money saved from cutting fuel subsidies can be used for the development of the country.
Basic economics theory, government spending contributes substantially to GDP growth. Subsidies are good in the short term to get the economy going but otherwise the money should and must be used for other development.
For instance, with the growing rice prices, the money can be used to push agricultural projects. Economic growth does not only mean focusing on industrialization. Besides the agriculture sector, there are many bright and talented Malaysian individuals who cannot venture into businesses despite having wonderful viable business models due to lack of funds. The money saved from cutting subsidies can be used to finance these people for say, a lower interest rate in repayments.
Many of us complain, it is the government's duty to subsidies our fuel for the betterment of the people. Quite frankly, I think that way of thinking is very naive and short sighted. If cutting back on fuel subsidies can bring back the times when Malaysia was getting a good 8 to 9% GDP growth, that will definitely be for the betterment of everyone.
Besides, comparatively across other countries in the Asia Pacific we are still paying for cheaper fuel. In addition, with the planned discriminative fuel charges for foreigners, we stand to gain more. Across the asia pacific, Malaysia is slowly losing out in terms of economic growth and attracting foreign direct investments. If cutting back in fuel subsidies means growth and more development, I am in for it! Its a long shot, but its worth a try!
Morning breakfast looks like this from the table. A quiet spot just outside the restaurant, cooling and comfortable. :) Mornings are a good time to have quiet time to just reflect on things and just let the mind relax before starting it off.
Like any other Malaysian, food is of imperative importance!
After all, can't let the mind work on an empty stomach now can we? Thosai Masala is definitely the way to go to start one's day off! Healthy food and plenty carbohydrate from the potato mix inside it. Hmmmmmm.......... mix your mouth all wait eh?
See all those sweets on my lecture notes?? That is what I consume every time I start feeling the pinch from studying and nearing to the date of my exams. Actually, that's like only half of what I consumed like an hour ago..... hehehehehehehe
Hmmmm, makes me wonder if diabetes, obesity and revision go hand-in-hand? After all, it is a known fact that sugar consumption does help reduce stress levels. :)
Approximately one hour after I snapped a shot of all those sweets, I finished them! Feeling a bit sick of chocolate and sweets now to be honest but can't deny I enjoyed every bit of it.
Hopefully the sweets help me absorb the information I reading (can't recall sweets being classified as brain food though). :P
Months of saving and surveying for the right workstation, I finally landed myself a new laptop and an LCD screen for an extended desktop.
Its a Dell Vostro 1200. But I increased the RAM to 2.5Gb to get more from it. This sure goes well with my new side project for ~Path of Time~. This side project involves me and my camera cellphone, documenting pictures of what I see interesting on my walk on the Path of Time. :)
I was free for the night, a friend mine was free for the night; why not have tea? Most of the time I am used to going to places like Starbucks, Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf. He introduced me to this place at The Curve but I kind of forgot the name of the place after we had a good chat over tea. Apparently, it was a variety of tea that helps sleep. :)
We reached about 10 pm the place was still buzzing with people..... figured I tried to capture the atmosphere with my camera phone.
I couldn't really zoom all the way since my camera phone is pretty limited, but I am definitely trying to learn to take better photos with my limited 1.3 mega pixel camera phone. :D
Its a Sunday, exam's coming and I had plenty to read up. After lunch, full and comfortable why not spend the time reading up my lecture notes. The best way is studying in a relatively quiet atmosphere over some good ole' hot chocolate! Hmmmmm.... hmmmmmm....
Thank God I ordered hot chocolate because it got cold after while when the rain started. The gloomy clouds and chill........
Guess my cellphone camera couldn't get the rain drops since I couldn't adjust for slow shuttle speed. But, if you look closely, realllllyyy closely; you might just see the rain falls! Hehehe
Early April this year San Francisco became the first and only U.S. city to ban the use of plastic bags. Now, the rest of the country seems to be following in its footsteps. 
