Malaysia

LIFE IS WHAT HAPPENS WHEN YOU’RE BUSY MAKING OTHER PLANS

It isn’t a nice time for Planet Earth,

don’t you think?

Between climate change that’s getting scary and the possibility of a global pandemic courtesy of the novel coronavirus, the world seems to be quickly going to hell in a handbasket.

We are told that Jakarta is sinking and will vanish off the earth’s face in 30 years. Likewise, the ringgit – and a whole host of currencies besides –is getting that sinking feeling. So are our disposable incomes. 

It’s got a lot of people scared. I spend a lot of time in Singapore these days and people here went near berserk when the government first amped up its warnings on the infection a month ago. Stores rapidly emptied of sanitisers, face masks, rice, eggs and, especially, toilet paper. Even now, face masks are at a premium. 

Bear in mind that Singapore is one of the richest places on the planet. Now think Somalia – which is facing the same challenges – and you get a glimpse of the horrors of income inequality. 

Maybe it’s a product of my generation, people born in the 1950s and who came of age in Malaysia and Singapore in the 1970s. We did not go through the hardships of war or occupation, for example. My father did and he remembered them to the extent that he carried it around with him like a badly healed wound. When I once offered to drive him around Seremban in my wife’s new Ford Laser, for example, he declined on the grounds that it was Japanese.

So yes, while we might remember the embarrassing discomforts of bucket toilets in the 1960s, it’s a fleeting memory, not unlike a fading nightmare. I remember the genteel poverty of my family and wonder how on earth we managed to make it – all of us – to where we are now.  

Indeed, it would be true to say that my classmates and myself have largely availed ourselves of the opportunities afforded us, each in our own way. In my case, I have had an over achiever’s share of luck along the way and I’m grateful. 

In short, while there’s been a bad day here and there, it’s not been a bad life. 

That’s why we should pray that the economic, climatic and political speedbumps that are emerging to confront the world do not last. Let’s hope that man’s ingenuity carries the day. 

In Malaysia’s case, it is especially important. While the RM20 billion stimulus package will go a long way to alleviating the challenges of the pandemic, our political climate is far more ugly. 

Dr Mahathir Mohamad only returned to power through co-operation from stronger parties that was cemented through a promise. That is easily broken, it seems. Now he urges a unity government but one that will only work if he is to head it. It does not seem to occur to him, going on 95, that others might do it just as well, if not better.  

It is ironic that Muhyiddin Yassin, sacked by the former premier for daring to reveal a great wrong, now thinks it appropriate to partner people facing trial on charges of corruption. Taking the premise to its conclusion, it implies that his victory would grant them absolution. 

What would it mean for the AG’s Chambers? The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission? All that fledgling reform of which he was a part? 

It was George Santayana who predicted: “Those who forget the lessons of history are condemned to repeat it.” 

Brace up folks. It could be a rough ride. 

IN PRAISE OF CNY

I once asked a Catholic friend of mine which festivity her family took more seriously, Christmas or Chinese New Year, and her reply was unhesitating: “Chinese New Year!” 

It’s the time, apparently, that it’s almost guaranteed the whole family will get together. 

When I was growing up, however, I knew very little about the festival. All I knew was that it was almost always very hot, and we didn’t have to go to school. And on its eve, the sound of firecrackers exploding late into the night. 

It always thrilled me and my brothers although, I think it annoyed my parents no end. 

In the 1960s and early 70s, Seremban pretty much came to a stop for at least a week during Chinese New Year. My mother used to hoard provisions before the fact; a practice generally followed by most of our neighbours. 

And if you depended on your bicycle – as did all my friends – your goose was cooked if it suddenly developed a puncture during the period because the only bike-repair shop within walking distance of my house would inevitably be shut and remain so for a week.  

I grew to admire such people after a while. I mean, the bike repair guy could not have been making much, but he was always cheerful and worked like crazy throughout the year so that he could enjoy a week with his family without worry.

You’ve got to admire such stoicism. 

As I grew older, my high school classmates would occasionally invite us over. We used to go in bicycle packs: there’s courage in numbers. 

Apart from the traditional cakes, there was always cold Orange Crush which even today I cannot drink without triggering some youthful memory. 

And there were the salted melon nuts or the ubiquitous kwa chi. That stuff was positively addictive. 

I’ve been married for a long time now and my wife’s family is a truly Malaysian mishmash, so we get invited to quite a few family reunion dinners.

The only difference is that the Orange Crush has been replaced by beer or something a lot stronger.  

Which reminds me there is a lot to be said for Chinese New Year because it’s the only time you can buy beer at almost 30% discounts. I find this custom laudable and urge beer companies to extend this throughout the year because it will make for great corporate social responsibility. 

When we were living in Section 6 in Petaling Jaya in the 1990s, we struck up enduring friendships, with some single neighbours and couples, that have lasted despite many of us moving to different neighbourhoods. A curious, if quirky, tradition also evolved out of it. 

We don’t remember who started it, but we decided to adopt the festival because, among other reasons, my wife has some Chinese blood from her paternal grandmother. 

So, we decided to have reunion pot-luck dinners, too, but on the day itself, and not its eve because one of us is a Chinese guy and he always spends the eve with his mother. 

It’s been going on now for over 25 years and it’s been a lot of fun. 

Happy Chinese New Year everyone. 

We’ll drink a cup of kindness….yet

Obesity, apparently, is a growing problem in Malaysia. 

In fact, it is so problematic that a lot of people in Malaysia are overweight. Indeed, the number of overweight people in the country could very well constitute the majority, which means the overweight person now constitutes the average. 

There you go. That’s nailing your main New Year resolution right there.

A new year is dawning, and we stand poised to leave the last teen year of our lives. And what we approach – 2020 – is a bellwether because it used to represent an ideal first articulated by Dr Mahathir in 1991 when all Malaysians might “walk free and equal under the Malaysian sun.” 

Fat chance. 

We are becoming more polarised along racial and religious lines. And, alarmingly, it is almost always seen as a Malay-Non-Malay schism, a phenomenon that’s been boosted by the alliance between the primary Malay opposition parties.

Minor matters are being blown out of proportion. The return, and disposal, of Chin Peng’s ashes has stirred up such a fuss and such anger against the government, you’d think communism was alive and well in Malaysia!

Unfortunately, that’s what some people think. A Muslim preacher said that recently; while another student warned that the country could face race riots if the Chinese educationist group, Dong Zong, was not banned. 

Meanwhile, the ringgit stubbornly remains below RM4 to the greenback while the stock-market is trending near four-year lows. And this despite very reasonable economic growth for last year and this. Let’s face it, a 4-5% expansion in real gross domestic product in these economic times is very good. 

And notwithstanding the defence put up by Mr Kadir Jasin, some of that blame must rest squarely with the Prime Minister. Markets hate uncertainty and, faced with it, almost always vote with their feet. 

By adamantly refusing to set a definite date for a transfer of power, Dr Mahathir has cast a pall of uncertainty over the PH government. That is not only irresponsible – he is 94 – but downright distasteful.

It seems to suggest that he can no longer bear to be out of power after having achieved it again, and against all the odds. For a man who willingly surrendered power in 2003 when he was unchallengeable, that is not only sad but pathetic. 

To say it’s because he does not trust Mr Anwar Ibrahim is almost disingenuous. Could not that be said for all his potential and real-life successors?

Which reminds me. In early 1994, I was invited to a three-day seminar in Langkawi. Dubbed a camp to build a “Premier Nation,” its participants were all non-Malay Malaysians comprising politicians, prominent businessmen and others including journalists.

On the last day, Dr Mahathir held court and he did so candidly. At question time, I thought I would also be frank and asked him about Vision 2020, something along these lines. On hindsight, I never thought it would be ironic. 

“2020 expects equality and a blurring of race. But that will arouse opposition and it’s likely that you won’t be around. What guarantees do we, the Non-Malays, have that your successor, whoever he is, will share your allegiance to the policy.”

Dr M then ran through his potential successors – Musa Hitam and Ghafar Baba, respectively – whom he then proceeded to disparage. 

He then assured us that “if anyone can, my successor Anwar Ibrahim” will deliver 2020, adding surprisingly, “he reminds me of myself when I was that age.”

OK, that was 26 years ago. But who knows, maybe 2020 will be a good year, perhaps even better than its predecessor. Let us hope so. 

Happy New Year folks.

Not quite dead enough

If it’s not one thing, it’s another.

The latest, and needless, controversy over the return of the ashes of Chin Peng to his home state of Perak is much ado over nothing. 

It was reported on Tuesday that the ashes of Asia’s last revolutionary and the former leader of the Communist Party of Malaya had been quietly returned in September and scattered, partly in the sea and partly in the jungles of Perak, his home state.

Ever since the peace agreement with the Malaysian government in 1989, various CPM leaders have returned home under the terms of the accord. All except Chin Peng who was refused entry despite his oft-stated wish to be, at least, buried there. 

It was not for want of trying. The unrepentant communist took his desire to return to court and finally lost in the Federal Court only because his lawyers could not prove that he’d been born in Malaya. 

Even when he died in 2013 – in Thailand, of cancer – he continued to remain in exile as the then-government barred the return of his ashes. 

Be that as it may, his ashes have not only returned but have been scattered in Malaysia. But the tumult over the matter is astonishing. OK, so some octogenarian ex-colleagues of the former insurgent may have brought back his remains without permission. 

That’s a crime?

It’s a waste of time and money to devote resources to investigate the matter. More astounding was the hypothesis put forward by at least one UMNO leader: that the return of said remains might somehow re-ignite a communist revival in Malaysia. 

That is about as absurd an idea as the notion of chocolate-covered ants.

First off, the communists were not at all popular by the time the 1970s rolled around. Although its movement persisted until the late 1980s, the fact that it agreed to almost all the Malaysian police’s demands showed that its back was broken and it was more or less a surrender, albeit an honourable one. 

The fuss over the late communist’s remains also underscores no little hypocrisy on the opposition’s part. The reason why the CPM lasted so long was because it was, for the longest time, supported by the Communist Party of China.

It is also something that all Malaysian governments – past and present – prefer to conveniently forget. When it comes to China, it appears, it’s better to err on the side of caution.

A resurgence of communism?

Nuts! 

The collapse of the USSR has almost completely strengthened the hand of capitalism in one variety or another. Lenin is dead and the old Communist order represented by Chin Peng and his ilk have vanished along with the Berlin Wall and the Warsaw Pact.  

If you disregard a paranoid North Korea, the only remaining communist countries in Asia are the three that essentially practice state capitalism – China, Vietnam and Laos. 

It is clear that it isn’t an issue of communism, it’s just the politics of nuisance and race. 

“What do you expect us to do?” asked Dr Mahathir quite reasonably. “Pick up all his ashes?”

Quite. 

The man is dead after all. There is nothing left there but the ghosts of Communism Past. As the police chief character in To Kill a Mockingbird says towards the book’s end: “Let the dead bury the dead Mr Finch.”

“Let the dead bury the dead.”

Listen to what the man said

You’d think the Minister would leave himself some wriggle room. 

But no, there was Entrepreneur Development Minister Redzuan Yusof in Parliament, stubbornly sticking to his story that the country could see its “flying car” take off by the end of the year. That’s a month and a half away. 

In Malaysia, there is only one vehicle with wheels and flies. It’s called a garbage truck. 

To Malaysians tired of Dr Mahathir’s near-delusional obsession with a “national car of our own,” this flying car idea seems like more garbage of the sort first trumpeted in 1984. Mr Redzuan should get real. 

If after more than 30 years in the business, we are still incapable of nurturing a genuine auto industry that can innovate, we should give up the ghost, stop throwing good money after bad and call it quits. 

Proton, Dr Mahathir’s brainchild and the country’s first national car, has been a monumental failure. Even with continued protection, it began bleeding because its models were of inferior quality and the company had to be delisted to prevent a national embarrassment. Only after China’s Geely bought into it in September, 2017, and took over its management, did its fortunes improve. 

A smart leader would have declared a Malaysian victory at this point and moved on.

But no, this administration is a glutton for punishment and has since announced plans for a third national car. It has promised, however, that no government funds will be involved in the venture. Unfortunately, no one believes it for a minute.

All this is, of course, separate and distinct from Mr Redzuan’s flying car. No one will be surprised to hear plans for a “car without wheels” next. I bet they’d work on it tirelessly too.  

Mr Redzuan was speaking in Parliament because Khairy Jamaluddin had asked him a question about the “ecosystem” for flying cars. Methinks he shouldn’t take the Rembau MP too seriously. Let’s face it, he really didn’t do anything remarkable when he was the Minister of Youth and Sport in the previous administration apart from bemoaning the fact that Malaysian youth rarely exercised. 

You could not say the same about YB Khairy and exercise: he was generally surrounded by dumbbells.

Indeed, the one thing that sticks in the memory about the MP was a videotaped conversation between him and the former Prime Minister which was widely distributed over social media just before the general election on May 9 last year.

Mr Khairy can be seen talking soberly to Mr Najib about the challenges posed by the election. He ticked off three points that he said the opposition coalition was using against the government. In order, it was “slander, incitement and false hopes”. 

I’m not sure about the “incitement” bit and there might be something to be said about the “false hopes”. If I remember right, however, most of the so-called “slander” revolved around 1MDB and its alleged pillages of government institutions. 

Earlier this week, Mr Najib was asked to file his defence against seven charges of abuse of power, breach of trust and money laundering all involving 1MDB, brought against him by Malaysia’s Attorney General. 

In response, Mr Khairy tweeted something to the effect that the ex-PM, and his former coffee shop mate, was still innocent until proven guilty. 

That is an obvious and quite unnecessary statement and one wonders why the Rembau MP felt compelled to issue it. 

Almost like saying that any car can be damaged. Like Mr Redzuan driving his car into a tree to show how a Mercedes bends. 

THE BALLAD OF BO(SS) AND JHO

Despite allegations at him hurled,

The fat fraud’s been circuiting the world,

With a ‘ticket, and a ‘tasket,

A whopping currency basket, 

A heist so big, Dr M’s hair did curl.

It wouldn’t do; a million or three,

It had to be billions going to me. 

Look after Boss was the remit, 

Beyond that, the sky’s the limit.

All one had to do was remain free.

For six glorious years all was fine:

A yacht, a plane, women, fine wine.

Until the cracks began, 

Which the Edge duly fanned

Into the blaze that became May 9. 

With one voice the people had spoken,

Finally, the Bee-N got broken;

Umno-cat was belled;

The mighty were felled;

From slumber, the voters had woken.

Shocked, the Boss could run but could’t flee.

“It’s all someone’s fault, not me” wailed he.

As for Jho,

He laid Low

And deeply dreaded the IGP.

The plump pirate planned to run forever,

So far so good, but never say never.

St Kitts was a bust,

Macau bit the dust,

A haven was what he needed, if ever.

The Boss himself had little or no shame, 

To Sharol, even Jho, he assigned blame.

While playing his fiddle, 

The country got diddled.

In court, he now has his fair share of fame.

Jho thought he’d everyone paid for and bought.

But all his best laid plans had come to naught. 

The moral of this story

Is positively hoary:

A crime isn’t wrong until one gets caught.

The global noose for Jho is tightening,

And in nowhere is it ever  brightening.

Like this plain rhyme,

It will take time.

Alas, poor Jho, it must be frightening!

For Fatso, all roads are leading to jail, 

That’s enough to make even Rosmah quail.

He will only know his fate after he loses some weight,

During the time he’s imprisoned without bail.

When justice is no longer a decision in your favour

Most people thought they knew all about Low Teck Jho.  On matters of style, for example, they knew he had the best taste money could buy.  

It now turns out that the corpulent conman known as Jho Low to pal and prosecutor alike also kept his cards close to his chest. In those days before the wannabe wrongdoer morphed into the fat fugitive he is now, his regular three-nation tours abroad were assumed to be visits to his money. Now it seems it was not just the US, Switzerland and Singapore that held his assets, it was the United Kingdom as well. 

And, if you thought he only owned realty, art and jewellery think again: he owned a lingerie firm in London as well.  

We know all this because of the US authorities. The London office used by the Malaysian miscreant for his luxury lingerie company is to be sold under a forfeiture claim by the United States because, according to US authorities, the property is one of many acquired with money embezzled from IMDB.

And, as per his wont, nothing was too good for him. 

The office as well as a nearby penthouse and apartment was acquired by the tubby thief in 2010 on Stratton Street in the upscale Mayfair neighbourhood. The bad news for the plump pilferer is that he is likely to surrender those monies to the US and Malaysia. 

But he was an optimist. It could be worse, reflected Fatso philosophically, “I could still have been living there.”

You didn’t have to be a philosopher to figure the reasons why he dived into underwear. 

The ample alumnus of Stanford liked to be brief. His speech was clipped and short. His emails were short and generally coded and even his meetings were kept short to discourage questions. 

It explained his foray into lingerie which his associates knew rhymed with “gingerly”. But the bulky brigand put it differently. “Brevity is the soul of lingerie,” he explained and they knew they were in the presence of The Master. 

The dapper delinquent thought he’d masterfully handled his Stratton offices which were used by Myla, the said lingerie company that Low thought could be leveraged into film and profit seeing how he’d bankrolled Red Granite, a film production firm that had, incredibly, produced at least one award-winning film. The firm was headed by a stepson of Fearless Leader who, unlike his chubby consigliore, was facing the music and not safely ensconced in a country that denied it was China. 

In a 2014 email the plump Penangite sent from his Myla account, he introduced a Red Granite Pictures representative to Myla executives to follow up on “any opportunities for Myla in the movie space.

But Hollywood turned up its nose at “Lost Encounters of a Brief Kind” and, instead, happily agreed to “Dumb and Dumber.”

There was no accounting for some people’s tastes, thought the thick thief tranquilly. 

But life was no longer tranquil and the voluminous villain was belatedly realising that the odds of retaining his overseas assets were sinking faster than his associates could mispronounce “Titanic”. The US had brought thirty forfeiture suits against him and, cumulatively, was seeking real estate, investments, art and jewellery valued at US$1.7billion (RM7.14 billion) that Fatty and his accomplices had bought with their ill-gotten gains. 

He could not go to the US to defend those suits because he would be arrested if he did.  But as long as he wasn’t there, he would lose.  

It was ironic, he thought, but it was better than Fearless’ position. 

Crime meant never having to say you were sorry. 

Yes, All People Are Equal But Some Are More Equal Than Others

I only found this out a few days ago and its blatant unfairness is positively chilling. 

If you are a Malaysian male and you marry a woman of a different nationality, your child is a Malaysian no matter where he or she is born. No questions asked. It is, apparently, a right. 

Unfortunately, the converse does not hold which is to say the children of Malaysian women born overseas do not qualify automatically as Malaysian citizens. They can apply but they should not hold their breath because, this is a privilege and not, apparently, a right. 

While the Federal Constitution guarantees citizenship to children bornoverseas to Malaysian fathers, it is silent on children born overseas to Malaysianmothers. Consequently, there are a significant number of Malaysian women married to foreigners who are unable to secure Malaysian citizenship for their overseas-born children. 

OK, I should disclose my interest here. Our only child, Raisa is married to an Austrian and lives in Vienna. I’d humbly plead that any child of hers be granted Malaysian citizenship as well.

I’d argue that it’s the child’s right and they can make up their minds when they’re 18. 

That would be the ideal situation. 

But – and there is always a “but” -there is a famous paradox that goes something like this: all things being equal, all things are never equal. And it was Lee Kuan Yew who once commented sourly about life “never being fair.” 

Even so, our Constitution does say something about “all people” being equal under the law. And while people in the West had to fight for the right of women to vote, Malaysians didn’t have to, getting that power from the word go: independence itself.  

So let’s not regress where this is concerned. It’s been fifty-six years since Malaysia was formed without bloodshed, in peace and relative harmony. And God knows we in Peninsular Malaysia, especially, have regressed in ways that Tunku Abdul Rahman could not have foreseen.

In many ways, we are a mess of contradictions guilty of no little hypocrisy. We refuse to grant citizenship to the overseas-born children of Malaysian women yet we do not see the absurdity of granting permanent residence to an Indian citizen accused of hate speech and money laundering in his own country. 

And we appear a to be a land of promise only before a general election. 

Remember the rule of law? 

How, in all good conscience, can we expect China to agree to extradite the fat felon back here to face justice when we refuse to honour India’s request that we do the same to that permanently-residing beardo? 

I once interviewed Dr Mahathir in 1987 just after his Ops Lallang crackdown and he justified it by saying that Malaysians could not handle too much democracy or something to that effect. “When I first began, I tried to be liberal and look what happened?” he asked. The implication: he’d had to clamp down or there would have been trouble. 

Fast forward 32 years later and we seem to have learnt nothing. 

Except there is a new weapon out there which is capable of great good and, just as equally, great mischief in the hands of opportunists bent on causing trouble. 

After May 9 last year, Malaysians were granted a precious gift – that of freedom of speech. May God give us the prudence never to exercise that in a hateful manner. 

And lest we forget, there are these Malaysian women who ache for their children to possess the citizenship they do. It is a small step for the Home Ministry but a gigantic leap homewards for the children. 

Behind Every Great Fortune Is A Crime

The majority of people in Thailand are Buddhist which explains their philosophical approach to life. It’s like “treat every day as your last and one day you’ll be right.”

That sort of explains the Death Awareness Café.

The establishment is a cafe in Thailand that’s using a macabre gimmick to draw in customers – closing them in coffins after finishing coffee.

The Death Awareness Cafe in Bangkok features mortuary-inspired décor and coffins placed for customers to spend time closed inside after their purchased beverages.

A sample poster on the wall reads “Twelve remain dead in morgue shooting.” Another reads; “You should never grieve at funerals. In fact, if anyone cries at my funeral, I’ll never speak to him again.” 

Veeranut Rojanaprapa, the owner of the extraordinary café said the purpose of the cafe is to inspire customers to reflect on their lives. He said the idea was inspired by Buddhist philosophy and is aimed at encouraging people not to be driven by greed.

And he didn’t see any irony in opening the cafe for profit? Actually, the businessman was an eternal optimist. When he was a child, he persuaded his parents to buy him two goldfish. He called them One and Two so even if one died, he’d have two left.  

Be that as it may, there are as many business models as they are varied. The death motif was original and, to hear Mr Rojanaprapa explain it, it was also quintessentially Buddhist. 

“Our main goal is for the visitor to experience the death awareness,” he said. “When the lid of the coffin closes, their basic instincts will come up and they will realise that eventually they cannot take anything with them.”

The felonious fatso now not hiding out in China would have said that what they’d feel is panic. 

The Royal Malaysian Police felt panicky and wished the ostensibly Buddhist Felonious aka Jho Low would have had such self-realisation before he came up with his grand plan to defraud Malaysia that the Wall Street Journal described as the “world’s greatest heist.” 

But the smiling swindler must have known he would rise to a level of thievery that made even Bernie Madoff look like Winnie the Pooh. He knew that an MBA with a brief case and a fountain pen could steal more than a hundred men with guns. 

“Behind every great fortune is a crime,” wrote the French playwright Honore de Balzac way back in the early 19th century. But the plump pilferer who continued to haunt the dreams of the Inspector General of Police knew something that Balzac didn’t. 

Very early on, perhaps as early as his college years in Wharton, he’d realised that, in Malaysia, crime did not pay as well as politics.

So he combined the two and, if things had stayed the same, he may have gone on to become a latter day Warren Buffett.  

For isn’t it said that history is written by the victors?

He might even have commissioned Tom Wright and Bradley Hope to write his memoirs called – why not? – Billion Dollar Whale.

Alas, poor Felonious! His advice will no longer be sought by governments, he will always be looking over his shoulder  and the next book about him might conceivably be about his arrest and trial, the best-selling Billion Dollar Bail.

It doesn’t get any more Zen than that.

Where Jinns Fear To Tread

It is said that women can occasionally make fools out of men but we seem to have a Malaysian professor who’s more of a do-it-yourself type. 

One Professor Dr Mohd Zohdi Mohd Amin from Fakulti Pengajian Quran Dan Sunnah at the Universiti Sains Islam Malaysia has stated that dinosaurs weren’t animals but were jinns or what the Western world calls genies.

The comment drew hilarious responses on social media. Example: “If a university professor thinks that dinosaurs are genies, how can you blame an artiste for mistaking a sun bear for a dog?”

This was in reference to a singer arrested for harbouring a sun bear in her condominium. She was quoted as saying that she’d thought it had been a small dog.

But I digress. The dinosaur-researching prof says he based his conclusions on the hadith which says the Jinn species is made of 3 groups, namely dogs and snakes, the groups that fly in the air, and those that settle, move and are destructive.

The hadith refers to the words, actions or anything that received the silent approval of Prophet Muhammad. 

Why come up with such a statement in the first place? It’s neither here nor there for it can never be proved.  It’s like the saying “I think sex is better than logic but I can’t prove it.”

Not only is the statement unnecessary, the good Professor may be trying to rediscover the wheel. As far back as 1812, the science of palaeontology had discovered the first fossils of dinosaurs and it is now estimated that there were at least 500 distinct genera of the reptile.

There is reasonably objective proof of the existence of these reptiles. Mankind knows that dinosaurs existed well before homo sapiens made his entrance because we have their perfectly preserved bones, even remains of their faeces. Whole skeletons of the creatures exist in numerous museums around the world.

Indeed, the notion that all the dinosaurs perished after the earth collided with an asteroid millions of years ago may itself be only partially true. Birds, apparently, evolved from dinosaurs which means the breed still have some present-day relatives.

University faculty should realise that nothing is taught if nothing is learned. It’s a waste of taxpayer funds to put it bluntly.

Who knows? He could be the same guy who thought that a water bed could be made more bouncy if one used spring water.

Clearly, the academic was a sceptic. You can take a horse to water, but you can’t make him think. Similarly, you could take the Prof to the National Dinosaur Museum in Canberra and ask him what he thinks of the exhibits. “Remains to be seen,” he would inevitably reply. 

Or you might tell him that you think you might have discovered a dinosaur skeleton and he would inevitably say it’s a fossil arm.  

Next, he’d be saying that you can’t hear a pterodactyl in the bathroom. Actually, he’s right: the “p” is silent.

Finally, here is a fun factoid about dinosaurs: 

The thesaurus not only has the most extensive vocabulary of the breed, it was also the first to perish, become extinct, be superseded, die out, vanish, become exterminated, become defunct…..