My Written Thoughts

Hey, it's my wife's birthday! And she's over 10 weeks pregnant! So, what else is new? I left the Concierge profession and started working at Malaysian Association of Hotels (MAH) as an Admin Assistant - Finance. Well who would've thought I'd get a job like this one? I hate numbers, I hate to count, I hate memorizing things and I sure hate anything related to math. Yet, here I am working on finance and accounting. It was tough to start with, still is, but I take it as a challenge. If I don't test my limits and my capabilities, I may never know how good I am at anything at all. Through this job, I had an interesting experience joining the company organize an event called Culinaire Malaysia 2013. I get to stay at an executive suite at some fancy hotel in the heart of Kuala Lumpur for five nights. Throughout the event, we had to start working at 6.30am and wrap it up late at night around 10pm. Though as exhausting as it may be, it was definitely fun. As one of the F

So The Pool Art Project is back with a song titled "First Time". Written by our very own Mr Shaiful "Epul" Sidek, we recently had a new line-up again. This time we began collaborating with our former schoolmates Shahril "Banchik" Musa and Fadzlee "Mok" Razak. Mok plays the bass guitar, and Banchik is our drummer. Which means i had to switch to a new department. I'm officially the lead guitarist now. It has been a while since i played the guitar for a band. The last time that happened was when i was with a band called Area 51 in 1998. It was a great band to be with too, because the line-up then were my own schoolmates and buddies as well. Just as I had my own project band way back during Psychotouch (the former band name before The Pool Art Project), Epul had his own as well called Experimental Mice. So Banchik and Mok were the members of that band, which is a good thing because i have always wanted to try working together with them. So now,

So, many are concerned including myself whether Ecigs are safe health-wise. As most ecig users know, the e-juice contains 4 chemicals which are : Propylene Glycol(PG), Vegetable Glycerine(VG), Nicotine and Artificial Flavoring. All these ingredients except nicotine may be safe to ingest. But are they safe to INHALE? Here's what i googled and found out, mainly about PG though. Hope it relieves the uncertainty clouding today's society about Electronic Cigarettes. Question : So have any tests actually been done to determine if it's bad to be inhaling this all day? Who knows, maybe it's worse than tobacco? I doubt it, but has it actually been tested at all? I know they have tested it somewhat because they use it in fog machines and stuff all the time.. but that's just inhaling a bit that's in the air, it's not really the same. ____________________________________ by Admin This post is many years old and contains some speculation and out-of-date inform

Last week i bought a brand new Electronic Cigarette or 'e-cig' if you will. Some might also call it a PV (Personal Vaporizer). As the name suggests, it's an electronic device used for smoking and no, it doesn't produce smoke. It produces vapor. The device contains a coil that heats up and vaporizes a liquid solution into an aerosol mist, simulating the act of tobacco smoking. So some users came up with the term ' vaping ' instead. Yeah, as if it isn't enough for mails, greeting cards and books to become electronic, they just had to make electronic cigarettes as well. God knows what else would become electronic in the near future. Sex? I hope not! Hahaha! Well, whatever, as long as it is for a good cause, right? So these e-cigs are mainly used as a therapy to help people quit cigarettes/cigars/pipes or as a substitute for tobacco altogether. The e-cig produces vapor which is a much more friendly substance that doesn't carry with it the 4000 chemical comp

The Pool Art Project - Ketiadaanmu Ketiadaanmu is a song i made when i got married to my beloved wife in 2009. She was out of town for a few days and i really missed her, so i came up with this song and recorded myself playing it with my electric guitar, using my videocam. Once i also presented it to her using my classical guitar and we recorded it with her own cellphone. Now, after three years, I've decided to give it a proper studio recording specially for her as a birthday present. Well, belated birthday present that is. I didn't get her anything last year so yeah, here it is. This is my first malay song for the project. Some of the concepts of this song was actually adapted from a song by an American band, specifically its guitar plucking and the use of a harmonica. The combination of these two really caught my attention, which inspired me to create this song. The harmonica decorates the guitar plucking beautifully. They really go together well. However, this time i

So I'd like to share this funny tale that i just can't forget for the rest of my life. I never told anyone about it except my wife. It was a typical tiring night. I'd just got off from work during afternoon shift and it was about 11.30pm. So i was feeling hungry, stopped by at the row of restaurants near my house to order my favorite set of menu which was white rice, oxtail soup and fried squid, with my occasional iced tea. It was a typical malay roadside restaurant, one of my favorites. They serve good malay and thai food there. So i had my taste-buds indulged, my tummy filled and smoked a marlboro to wrap it up. After paying the bill, i stood up and walked towards my car. I reached for the keys in my left pocket and pressed the button on the key to unlock the car. It went "beep-beep!". So i opened the door, sat inside and shut the door tight. As i was trying to insert the key into the ignition, that's when it hit me. There was a thin red light around the k

To MOM & DAD, for no particular reason I'd like to thank you guys for all the sacrifices you've done for me (I never did thank u guys). All the love you provided unconditionally and all my crap you all had to put up with, i can never repay this. Just know that my love for you never fades, and never will. -Your Little Devil-

The Pool Art Project - Sunblock This was our second attempt at recording which we managed to complete. Well actually MY first attempt, since the drums were recorded first here at BOM Productions before we made our first song, Chasing You . The studio only provided drum track recording. So as complicated as it sounds, after i completed my drum session (took only 40 minutes of recording time), we later had to bring the recorded track to IZ Studio to further complete the song. It was here that our friend/band member Nuar completed his bass track session successfully. In the same month, Epul, and Nuar's twin brother Man were scheduled to record together on the same day. Unfortunately, there were numerous misunderstandings between the whole band at that time that neither Epul nor Man showed up that day. I still remember that disappointing moment, crystal clear. It was the eve of Hari Raya Qorban. If it's one thing I've learned, it is how difficult in reality for a band to sta

The Pool Art Project - Chasing You (acoustic) My very first experience recording an acoustic song was this one, done & completed in the month of October 2012. Epul spontaneously decided to record this with me while we were awaiting the completion of the song Sunblock which i had already finished recording the drum track for. Yeah, for those who don't know, to produce a proper song, each instrument has to be recorded separately, including the vocals. In late September 2012 as we were looking for a recording studio to start the project, i googled and came across these two studios ; IZ Studio in Wangsa Maju and BOM Productions in Desa Melawati. Ironically enough the first studio provides track-by-track recording for all instruments except drums. And the second studio, which specializes in vocal recording and dance classes, only allows drum track recording at the time due to lack of instruments/equipments. So i had my first recording experience doing the drum track there, whic