Every one of us will endeavor to live the life we desire, but inevitably the fear of what others might presume about us will stamp out our dreams. Eventually, many of us end up being a slave to societal perceptions. It’s an agonizing pressure escalating within us to follow the flock which is against our will. I have heard the common phrase uttered frequently, “I’m sick of being a doormat”! I will just give them a cynical grin and feel sorry for them for not taking a control of their own life. The day God created us; we were manufactured with in-built operating manual to function according to our design. Then why do you allow external factor to drive your operating system (literally meaning your own life)? Those who fall into societal perceptions, tend to give in into the pressure of tyranny absolute dictatorship! And I totally loathe the idea of someone controlling our life. Hey com’on folks! This is not something you should give up on.
There are too many people that allow this thing to happen to them. You can avert yourself from being a slave by taking back control of your life. There are some essential steps that you need to take in order to completely take control of your life.
Here are the steps that will allow you to start feeling empowered and in control of your life again.
1. Voice up your displeasures - Don't just sit quietly and do what others ask you to do all the time. Being compliant all the time, will snatch away your freedom of life. If you don't want to or can't do something, then speak up and let them know. Tell them that you are willing to take their ideas once in a while, but not every time. You’re not obliged to commit their advice or ideas. It’s up to you to decide.
When people know that you can't be stepped on, they will respect your thoughts and daren’t infringe your private space too often. If they don't respect your convictions and still thinks they can dominate your life, then you may not want to be around that person anyway.
2. Be firm with your defined convictions – Be firm with your convictions, but in a very polite manner. Eventually, when you stand up for your principles, others will also adhere to it with respect. In other words, if you are always putting yourself down or vague about your own faith, then others will take you for a ride. Get rid master of slavery out of your life and start treating yourself with the respect that you deserve and others will follow suit.
3. Don't let others dictate your life - Being submissive, means that you are letting others tell you what to do and when to do it all the time. Fill up the gap where, others attempt to dictate your life by taking charge of your life. When others know you are in charge of your own life they won't be able to dictate you anymore.
I was fixated to write up this fascinating subject, out of excitement to share my true encounter with such extremely obsessed human characters. Domination is their ultimate motive to achieve their sadistic pleasure. I have come across several characters resembling the authoritarian behavior to master the life of others besides theirs. It’s pure obsession that makes them to take authority into their own hands and gives instruction to others. What’s even worse is, this type of character dominates other people’s life NOT for their wellbeing’s (literally meaning NOT for optimistic progress of the other party), instead to shun them from being successful or being a match up to them. But the real publicity stunt is, their overwhelming compassion deceives us into something I call a ‘lion’s den’. *ROLF*. Their pushy nature, eventually chuck us into a ditch kind of circumstances. The masquerade fades away when reality hits us, the hard way.
You might be wondering how I handled such culprits. Simple and downright direct on the face! Hahahaha…Nothing will teach them to keep their hands off other people’s affairs. Only tell them to buzz off from your life, will they ever shut their mouth. Even then, such culprits find it hard to accept their discontentment to further dictate. One thing for sure, they will not attempt to face you directly coz they never anticipated for someone to rebel against them. Then can go yakking about you at the back, but deep down, you will realize you made the right choice to stand up and put a stop to this.
Reflect on how you can prevent yourself from being taken advantage by them and help you start feeling better about yourself and you can feel more empowered. It is of no harm to be harsh with such characters to defend your rights. No one can question you.
Let us steer our life with all the values added to make it a distinct space of our own.
Monday, November 29, 2010
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Traffic Woes in KL City
A ray of hope is something that we, city dwellers look forward on the horizon who crawl our way through the notorious Federal Highway jam daily (snail-drive, I name it). Sometimes I can see pedestrians are faster than motorists. Each time I hit the Federal Highway (highway is not an appropriate name for it anymore), I imagine a city centre without traffic jams. Not just during off- peak hours or public holidays but every day, where I don’t need to sit idle staring at the sea of cars, hearing impatient honking and looking at disgruntled drivers with frown all over their forehead. It’s a mere sight each day when we are battling to reach our destination, HOME after a hard day’s work. What sort of life do we have here in city? Now I began to realize why my parents love their small town, Ipoh and look forward to settle down post retirement.
Traffic inch is all over routes in KL and Selangor. Both directions of road are filled with engine fumes and impatient drivers. Let it be, you’re exiting the city or reaching towards city, it makes no DIFFERENCE. And worse still, the traffic congestion is unpredictable! Regardless of public holidays or school holidays makes it even ghastly. Obviously, this is a daily anguish for all of us which there are no end to it, unless the authority does something about it ASAP!
Let us have a quick look into what is the root cause for the never-ending traffic brawl in the city. The focal reason for traffic congestion in the city was due to the substantial increase in the number of single occupancy vehicles coming into the city. It will still be zilch efficiency anywhere in the world even if the PWD authority escalates the number of new routes or roads, or expand roads to keep pace with the rapid increase in passenger cars. Why is this happening? Isn’t the public transportation sufficient to cater the public to commute from work to home and vice versa? One reason the public still chose to use their own vehicles was because the public transportation system was still inadequate and did not fulfill the demands of users especially in accessibility, continuity and being on time. There is no way the current road system can take in more cars; the only solution is for an alternative mode of transport – improvisation of public transportation.
I believe, a comprehensive and integrated plan should be put into place by the Government to solve the erratic traffic woes in the city. Integrated public transportation system should be established and not become a near reality, a distant future or just a pipe-dream. This is a serious matter and should not be looked at being unrealistic. The on-hand public transportation exclusively the LRT/commuter should be innovated to greater heights and channeled to various destination especially offices, factories, hospitals, and shopping malls via underground or amid the skyline. The rail transit will be the most effective mode of transportation for a quick and safer travelling. This included expanding LRT services, improving the quality of commuter trains and increasing the number of buses and their stops.
It comes of no surprise that almost most big cities in the world experience this sort of predicament. But the authority comes up with innovative ways of dealing with this problem. I.e. car pool, limit the cars on the road, improve the services of public transportation with better comfortable trains and reliable LRTs and also a combination of cycle-park and taking the train. In most developed countries, 60% of the people use public transport but in our country, it is about 20%, so we are way below the world average. So this is why we are still struggling with traffic anguish.
There must be nationwide campaign to get all the people including the company’s directors, bosses and political leaders to take the public transport at least once/twice a week. After all this is about leadership by example and walking their talk.
This is not something out of the ordinary, since even in USA, their Vice President Joe Biden commutes by metro.
My greatest doubt is how PWD and government streamlined the physical criteria’s of roads in KL and survey the traffic conditions prior to developing the infrastructure for traffic systems? The elevated roads are constructed for routes that only a handful motorist uses it. Why? The peak-hour traffic congestion on the highway which is one of the city's main arteries should be scrutinized and given a paramount importance for improvisation of roads.
Another immediate suggestion is to come up with a proper management scheme to control the flow of traffic on the highway. The traffic controller can play a major role by making their presence felt and worthy especially during peak hrs all throughout the day (from dawn till dusk) irrespective of the weather conditions. A holistic solution was definitely considered necessary to solve traffic problems in the city for the next two to three decades.
It is time to give it a big boost as we make Kuala Lumpur city to be even better and greater.
Traffic inch is all over routes in KL and Selangor. Both directions of road are filled with engine fumes and impatient drivers. Let it be, you’re exiting the city or reaching towards city, it makes no DIFFERENCE. And worse still, the traffic congestion is unpredictable! Regardless of public holidays or school holidays makes it even ghastly. Obviously, this is a daily anguish for all of us which there are no end to it, unless the authority does something about it ASAP!
Let us have a quick look into what is the root cause for the never-ending traffic brawl in the city. The focal reason for traffic congestion in the city was due to the substantial increase in the number of single occupancy vehicles coming into the city. It will still be zilch efficiency anywhere in the world even if the PWD authority escalates the number of new routes or roads, or expand roads to keep pace with the rapid increase in passenger cars. Why is this happening? Isn’t the public transportation sufficient to cater the public to commute from work to home and vice versa? One reason the public still chose to use their own vehicles was because the public transportation system was still inadequate and did not fulfill the demands of users especially in accessibility, continuity and being on time. There is no way the current road system can take in more cars; the only solution is for an alternative mode of transport – improvisation of public transportation.
I believe, a comprehensive and integrated plan should be put into place by the Government to solve the erratic traffic woes in the city. Integrated public transportation system should be established and not become a near reality, a distant future or just a pipe-dream. This is a serious matter and should not be looked at being unrealistic. The on-hand public transportation exclusively the LRT/commuter should be innovated to greater heights and channeled to various destination especially offices, factories, hospitals, and shopping malls via underground or amid the skyline. The rail transit will be the most effective mode of transportation for a quick and safer travelling. This included expanding LRT services, improving the quality of commuter trains and increasing the number of buses and their stops.
It comes of no surprise that almost most big cities in the world experience this sort of predicament. But the authority comes up with innovative ways of dealing with this problem. I.e. car pool, limit the cars on the road, improve the services of public transportation with better comfortable trains and reliable LRTs and also a combination of cycle-park and taking the train. In most developed countries, 60% of the people use public transport but in our country, it is about 20%, so we are way below the world average. So this is why we are still struggling with traffic anguish.
There must be nationwide campaign to get all the people including the company’s directors, bosses and political leaders to take the public transport at least once/twice a week. After all this is about leadership by example and walking their talk.
This is not something out of the ordinary, since even in USA, their Vice President Joe Biden commutes by metro.
My greatest doubt is how PWD and government streamlined the physical criteria’s of roads in KL and survey the traffic conditions prior to developing the infrastructure for traffic systems? The elevated roads are constructed for routes that only a handful motorist uses it. Why? The peak-hour traffic congestion on the highway which is one of the city's main arteries should be scrutinized and given a paramount importance for improvisation of roads.
Another immediate suggestion is to come up with a proper management scheme to control the flow of traffic on the highway. The traffic controller can play a major role by making their presence felt and worthy especially during peak hrs all throughout the day (from dawn till dusk) irrespective of the weather conditions. A holistic solution was definitely considered necessary to solve traffic problems in the city for the next two to three decades.
It is time to give it a big boost as we make Kuala Lumpur city to be even better and greater.
Myriad Faces of Old Railway Station
Standing in pride at night
KL Railway station is a heritage that ought to be proud off and cherished for the future generation.
Glory of KL Railway Station
The Kuala Lumpur railway station building may be a shadow of its former glory but it is as majestic as ever from the outside. But when you step into the heritage walkway, things have been toned down a great deal. Ever since, KL Sentral took over its role as the main railway hub, the frenzy around the old pride has been stripped away.
Each time I happen to be there to send off my mother to Ipoh via railway transit, a surge of nostalgic memories comes gushing into my mind. The KL Train Station opened with much pomp and circumstance in 1911 to receive trains from Butterworth and Singapore. This wonderful confection of turrets and towers looks particularly impressive amid the blue sky. The soaring domes and arches were skillfully restored in the 1980s, to preserve heritage and serve as historical mileage. But the replacement of new hub by the new KL Sentral station in 2001, brought the glory of old station to a fading one. Today the platforms are only used for KTM Komuter trains to the suburbs. Although it's looking a bit disheveled these days, it's still worth coming here to imagine the glory days. There is something about this place that makes us feel heavenly sitting in the one of the oldest building in Malaysia.
My parents recall many fond memories of the station. “Every day, the platforms would be filled with working people, especially government servants, because they got vouchers to travel by train. According to them, the train fares then were affordable and everybody enjoyed that train ride.
Fortnight ago, I went to pick my aunt from KL station; I decided to venture around while waiting for her arrival. Inside the main building is a mini-museum featuring train models and other railway paraphernalia. There were one or two stalls selling snacks, newspapers, magazines, etc. It’s worthwhile exploring the whole place as it brings nostalgic memories looking at the black and white photographs depicting the heydays of railway station. All I wished for was to see the train station revived to restore its glory as it was built by the ancestors during British Empire.
The once upon a time glorifying station packed with people sharing the same platform to bid farewell or wish safe journey to their families, relatives and friends or meeting them on their arrivals. The station was filled with myriad emotions; tears, laughter, joy, and frenzied atmosphere packaged with whistles of the station master and blaring honk of the diesel-fired steam engines. The sight of the station master in his smart uniform was a formidable moment as he checks the final procedures before the departure of the train. Who can we forget the shiny copper bell being tolled followed by the loud whistle indicating the departure of train. The flagging off train by wave of a green flag completes the olden day procedures.
With the metamorphed railway hub in KL Sentral, the loss of charm of the old station is saddening. Gone were the days of people entering the railway platform to bid farewell. At KL Sentral, well-wishers are not allowed on the platform. The precious memories of yesteryears faded away. I wish the government will do something about bringing back the glory of old station. The station be livened up by conducting official tours, exhibitions and passing on its history and all the culture and heritage it contained to the future generations. I believe it has a huge meaning in every Malaysian life. Never forget that Malaysia’s railways are the connection between our past and our future.
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