This is my favorite decorated car in the Wesak Day procession 2010 in Kuching, Malaysia.  It was decorated with a lot of lotus flowers with beautiful lighting.  Most importantly, there was a Chinese style litter or JiaoZi (in Chinese) for GuanYin.

The front part of this trunk was actually a big contrast to the rear part.  There was a big picture of multi races in Malaysia.  Salam Satu Malaysia to other races in Malaysia, you are welcome to watch this Wesak Day procession.

This was a roofless decorated vehicle with at least 3 Buddha statues on it.  Can you see the driver was driving the custom made truck?  There was no side mirrors or rear-view mirror for this vehicle.  It must be interesting to drive this type of vehicle, I hope I have a chance to drive in the future.

Let’s see who was coming?  I have taken this photo directly in front of the vehicle from quite far away before it was coming near to me.  The head light shone directly into my camera.

Yes, a Buddha with a big stomach and smiling face was coming.  He is called Maitreya (or MiLe in Chinese).  His smiling face and big stomach give the meaning of high tolerance because he can store everything in his stomach.

He is also called a “BuDaiHeShang” which means a monk with a bag, because he always carries a bag with him.  But in the picture above, he was carrying a hat.

Another GuanYin statue on the decorated vehicle.  The number 2554 on the truck was implying that this year is the 2554th year in the Buddhist calendar.

Another decorated truck was having a Buddha statue as the background, and a team of local musicians were playing traditional Chinese music using YangQin.

Another decorated vehicle was having the 1Malaysia theme.  The girl on the left in red cheongsam represented Chinese, and the boy on the right with a shield and a feather hat represented Dayak in Sarawak.  Yes, this year the Wesak day and the Gawai day for Dayak are very close to each other.

Wesak Day - 28 May 2010.

Gawai Day - 1 and 2 June 2010.

This 1 Malaysia theme design suits our Malaysia cultures in multi races very well, but it looked a bit messy to me.  Look!!!  There was a speaker on top of the truck, can you see that?

Well, if you ask if there was any lion dance in this procession?  No, there was not even a single lion dance.  I think it is good to differentiate between Chinese tradition believes and Buddhism.  It is not too noisy compared to the Chinese temple parade with lion dances where I can watch in under a normal heart beat.

You may also ask if there were any people walking in the procession?  Yes, there were quite a lot, and I will show you in the coming post after the Gawai holiday.

To be continued…   and stay tuned….

We had a different experience on this year’s Wesak Day.  We were also on the road and among crowds of people.  We were excited and thrilled about the parade.  We were waiting patiently.  And for the first time, we were not the participants of the parade this year but the spectators!

Suddenly, the policemen arrived in their big motorbikes.  They were dressed neatly in their uniforms and they parked their motorbikes aside, walked down, took their positions on the road and controlled the traffic.  The crowd suddenly appeared from every direction.

After that, we saw the participants of the parade in their teams and the decorated vehicles moving towards us.  The Sarawak Buddhist Society’s team led the parade followed by the team from different secondary schools in Kuching.  Next, the decorated vehicles appeared with its team following closely behind.  They are usually Buddhist temples and organisations in Kuching.  The decorated vehicle shown in the picture above shows the statue of Prince Siddhartha (Gautama Buddha) when he was born.  This one was colourful and attractive.  The butterflies were controlled by a mechanism and they were flapping their wings as the vehicle moved along the road.

The participants really put in a lot of effort in decorating the vehicles.  The colour yellow is often used because it represent light.  We need lights to see things in the dark.

Buddha has shown us the light in our life.  Enlightenment and awakening help us to see things clearer and to understand and control our emotions in a more effective way.

The side of this vehicle was decorated with golden cloth designed in a beautiful pattern.  There were also man made lotuses and lotus flowers.  Someone was controlling the music “behind the scene”.  Everyone put their hands together to give the highest respect to Buddha.

There was a stupa on this decorated vehicle.  Surrounding the stupa were the statues of Buddha.

Another view of this decorated vehicle.

There were reverends sitting on this decorated vehicle next to the stupa.  This reverend was sprinkling blessed water to the crowds with hope that everyone will have a blessed and peaceful life.

They were also reading mantra. Play this video to listen to it.

This vehicle used a towing car to move forward.  Unlike the others, they had drivers on board to make it move.

To be continued…

Since the Dewan Undangan Negeri Sarawak (DUN) or Sarawak State Legislative Assembly Building is just less than one minute drive  from the orchid garden, we visited the DUN after we spent hours in the orchid garden.   This is our first visit to the DUN.

This building was launched last year, and I have taken its photos across the Sarawak River from Kuching Waterfront with the decorated boats for some events and celebration in Kuching last July.  This time, we have a closer view of this huge building.

It was not a working day, I got a pass from a security guard at the guard house at the entrance.  The security guard exchanged the pass with my identity card (IC).

We planned to take photo outside the building first.  We were not the only visitors there, we saw a professional photographer holding DSLR with long and big lenses taking the wedding photos of a Malay couple near the entrance.  They use the DUN building as their background.

Take 1: It was a hot afternoon, I asked SiewPeng to hold the umbrella higher so that the building was not blocked.

Take 2: I wanted to include the complete wording of this building.  Can you see the word in red - “Dewan Undangan Negeri Sarawak”?

Take 3: I wanted to show how huge the building is.

We walked down the staircase to an area where it faces the Waterfront Kuching.  I took quite a lot of photos there.

We found that this wall is similar to a curved wall in Kings Park, Perth, Western Australia.  This curved wall has the name of the building written on it.  We tried to do the same thing as we have done in Kings Park.  SiewPeng stood at the other end of the curve and we tested if we could hear each other if we speak very softly.  Yes, it works.

At this area, we can view the scenery across the river - Kuching Waterfront.

There is a park outside the boundary of DUN area.  We cannot reach it from the DUN area without turning a big round.  It is not far from the Pangkalan Sapi (Sapi Jetty) and the Astana.  Years ago, it seems abandoned when we visited there, I am not sure how it is now.

This is the artistic design on the  curved wall with the flag poles.

While we were taking photographs there was a security guard riding motorcycle stopping by and looking at us from far away (above the staircase).  He did not come to us and we did not know when he left because we were busy taking photos of ourselves.

At the same time, the wedding photographer has changed their location as well.  They were not far from us because they were using the huge golden main door of the DUN building as their background.

Next, I moved towards that security guard and asked if we could further our visit into the DUN building.  He said we can only go into the building during office hour.  He then asked me if we were the people wandering around the building, I said yes and asked him if there is any problem.  I had my visitor pass with me at that time.  He said that visitors are supposed to wander around this area not more than 10 minutes only!!!

It is hard for me to believe, because I was not informed when I got the visitor pass at the guard house.  There is also no written rules about that.  I have checked it from the Internet and could not find any rules where visitors can only stay there for 10 minutes.  And another group of people were having a wedding photography session there.  Why did they have double standard?

Most importantly, if this is the rule (for any reasons especially if related to security issue), they did not inform the visitors or they  also did not take any actions to send the visitors out of the open area surrounding the building.  I also doubt that how would they calculate the time if there are too many visitors coming.  I agree that security is important but this place is made using tax payers’ money, I believe I have the right to be there for a longer period of time so that I can take more photos.

I did not want to get into any trouble, saying thank you, and good bye to the security guard and we get ourselves out of the DUN area.  When I returned the pass, the security guard at the guard house near the entrance has say nothing about being there for more than 10 minutes is not allowed.

I have a lot of question marks in my head.  Next time, if I have the opportunity to meet an MP (Member of Parliament), I will ask if this rule exist.

There is a piece of green and smooth grass.  I have never seen this type of grass before.

We went nearer and we found that it is actually artificial grass which look like the running track in a stadium.  It is similar to tar but it looks softer.

We were at the entrance.  Look carefully, another group of people were taking wedding photos.  They were in traditional Malay costume in golden colour.

We will visit here again when we visit the orchid garden next time, and I will check if anyone tell me that I cannot stay inside its boundary for more than 10 minutes, or if I need to get a permit to have a longer photo session there.  10 minutes is really not enough for anyone to take photos there.

I used my brother’s mobile phone last evening (Tuesday).  The voice that came out from the other side of the mobile phone almost broke my ear drum.

The stories started from here…  My cousins were having Internet connection problem and borrowed a modem from me.  After they went home and tried to connect the modem, they faced different types of problems.  I guided them step by step through my brother’s mobile phone.

First, one of their computers have LAN failure as seen from the “LAN” light on the modem was not on.

Second, they tried to move another computer to their monitor, keyboard and mouse, but they could not find the port to connect the monitor.  They might have confused with the serial port.

Third, I guided one of my cousins step by step on how to setup the ADSL connection on the modem, including troubleshooting using ping and ipconfig in the command prompt.

While the modem was rebooting for saving the configuration setting, it seems nothing happen, and I asked her to try to browse, suddenly I hear the shout of excitement, “YEAH…  can go online…“.  It was really loud.

Finally they get connected.  It has been weeks since they have no access to the Internet.  Most importantly, they have done it by themselves with only my verbal guide.  They gave me an exclamation of their success.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

An Interesting TV commercial on broad band service

It reminds me about the recent commercial on a local TV channel, where all the Internet applications such as email, Facebook, Twitter, Google, Yahoo etc. are represented by a group of people who are locked in a prison.  This group of people are funny because they wear prison costume and accessories that represent some popular Internet application.  One of them has mailbox on his head and another one has a book on his neck.

A young man is looking at a mobile phone and shakes it left and right, the prisoner are having an earthquake because they are locked in the mobile phone.  It means that having an intelligent mobile phone without Internet connection will lock the access to those popular Internet applications which have been built into the mobile phone.

A sales person appeared and asked the young man if he wants to sign up to a broad band service, and the young man says “okay”.  Suddenly all the prisoners cheer happily because they are now released.  One of them releases a bird with both hands opened and I guess it represents twitter.  They are no longer being locked inside a mobile phone.

That is the moment of having the exclamation of success.  It all happens in a sudden.

This fence is really messy.  The climber plants have climbed all over it, and part of the fence is covered with a black plastic sheet (on the left) as a shade to block the sunlight to some Bonsai.  Look carefully, the three big “X”s are actually another piece of iron (abandoned from a door or window) leaning against the fence.  After a complicated mixture of many components, finally, the fence itself cannot clearly being identified in the photo above.

Most of the time, our hearts are similar to the fence above.  Our hearts are surrounded by many thoughts and feelings.

Well, the main point is - if our hearts were wrapped by messy things which are unnecessary, we cannot see our real hearts, and our hearts cannot attract other thoughts and feelings which are more positive.  Even if one heart is wrapped by a mixture of positive and negative thoughts at the same time, the positive thoughts are not 100% pure.

For example, if I plant a beautiful morning glory on this fence and it blooms beautifully, but the weeds or unwanted climbers also exist, it will spoil the beauty of the morning glory on the fence.

A gardener always weed a garden to prevent the unwanted grass taking over the plant that he/she has planted.  We, as the gardener of our own hearts, should weed away the rubbish in our hearts as well.  The two main rubbish are greediness and hate which actually attract more other rubbish to our heart and make us unhappy.

Do you think those who keep a lot of rubbish in their house happy?  The answer is “NO”.  Besides, they may also make their neighbours unhappy.