recycling has its perks - eventually

many months ago naza bought three big laundry baskets and labeled
(laminated) them:
plastic
paper
metal

from time to time, the household fill the baskets with wastes from our
everyday consumption.
papers - mostly newspapers and supermarket promotional booklets.
plastics - empty bottles and packaging/wrappers.

my job: to empty those baskets periodically.
destination: recycle bins at jusco permas jaya.

i know that what we are doing are relatively small scale towards greener
earth.
in any way, we know that we are saving quite a lot of energy than it would
take to produce our everyday things.
we are not that enterprising when it comes to dealing with recyclable
materials.
we did a few times at giant plentong - they issue coupons redeemable at
their supermarket. not that much, though.
well, i'd like to think of recycling as a charity. plus, doing it without
much hassle: unload, dump, and go off.

i went to jusco permas jaya friday afternoon before friday prayers, a day
before hari raya eidil fitri.
that's the only place i know where big recycle bins are provided. plus it
is on my way to run other errands.

the 'papers' bin is quite full, but not yet to its brim.
to my surprise, there are valuable papers in the bin.
no, not those banknotes (although it would be a nice treat especially on
the eve of eidil fitri).
they are in the form of books. and magazines.
lots of them. self-help books, national geographic magazines, and men's
health magazines.
without hesitation, i took those books. many of them. i ran through the
NGs, and many of them are already in my collection.
i took only 2 of them - one of them with a special report where Steve
McCurry found his subject after many years of searching - the Afghan Girl.
the books, among others:
kiyosaki: retire young, retire rich
don't sweat the small stuff for men
rowling: harry potter and the prisoner of azkaban
carnegie: how to stop worrying and start living
fish! tales
there's another by carnegie, one by dickens, and a few others.
i'd say total retail value worth easily more than RM250.
much, much better than measly coupons at giant (no, not saying that
recycling at giant is not good).
and the value of knowledge: who can put the price on it?

i didn't have the luxury of time (plus don't want to be a dumpster diver)
that afternoon.
so, i just grabbed only a few. there's a lot more in there.
sitting here typing this away, my mind went back to that bin thinking of
the other mags and books left in there.
i hope somebody else who appreciates good reading materials got his hands
on them.
and to the person who left (dump) the valuable papers in the bin: i don't
know what to say.
i have mixed feelings. happy, for i've found books that i wanted/wished to
buy.
regret, for those books and mags can be donated to institutions who needs
them.
they can always be left in a big box in front of a library entrance, or a
school.
slap on the box a label that says 'please take good care of them'.
much like harry potter was left in front of the door in a basket by his
parents.
perhaps he was in a hurry, or didn't know where to dump them, or tired from
packing things for moving away to some other place.
from the genre of those reading materials, and the fact that those are in a
recycled bin (not in just any dumpster bin), i know he's a learned person.
and must have a good reason why those books and mags end up there.
anyway, whoever it was, i would like to say 'thank you very much'.

petrosains @ klcc

If you love science in general, and especially petroleum-related science -
have a visit to Petrosains.
The entrance is on the 4th floor of Petronas Twin Tower in KLCC.
For the exhibits (many state of the art), the entrance fee is reasonable
(as the usual case - if it's free, you won't appreciate it that much).
I paid RM24 for 2 adults and 2 kids package (not sure what's the normal fee
- but with the package, kids get in free, sort of)

Largely it is about science related to petroleum. many are hands-on, which
brings appeal to the young ones.
from the formation of hydrocarbon, to drilling, to processing, to
transporting, to refining, to the end product.
there's a drilling platform, right after you step right out of the
helicopter simulator (Marsya thought it was real). among many others, the
platform bears life-sized replica of the xmas tree, lifeboat, cabin, galley
(kitchen), surau, drilling activities, separator vessel (smaller scale),
pipings with valves and fittings, pig launcher/receiver (not that obvious),
riser (with the 5D bends for pig to negotiate).
there's also a hands-on LED sim of petroleum refinery station.

well, you have to have a visit yourself. understand better about the role
of petroleum in modern life.
highly recommended.

oh, and be prepared with strong legs and full tummy. we took more than 3
hours to finish all the exhibits. plus a mini exhibit 'space' - in
conjunction with the recent and ongoing angkasawan program.

building blocks

Adam's birthday is on the 21st September.
for this year, i gave him a 'lego' present, in the shape of a bulldozer -
like 'bob the builder', he said.
it was not the actual expensive original blocks from Lego of Denmark.
rather, it was inexpensive copycat blocks from Ligao of China (where
else?).
i bought it from a stall in tesco ampang for rm8 - real cheap.
the quality of the pieces? on the good side. snaps quite tight as you'd
expect from the original lego.
the plastic parts are without burrs on the edges - really, really important
for blocks.
of course, the models are limited, but perfect for a novice.
one setback is that the roof of the bulldozer comes out quite easily.
i suppose it is the poor 'construction' design of the model. not related to
the block pieces.

legos are my favourite when I was growing up.
my brother and I had a few models in our collection.
It was very expensive, back then (even now, still).
one of my distant cousins went to london furthering his studies when i was
in the primary school.
when asked what kind of souvenirs we would like from london, we asked him
to buy us legos.
my father went to korea for one of his training stints with ktm. he brought
back 'kawada' - much like legos.
when i did my degree in manchester, i bought a lego technic set (big one)
at a flea market - for 5 quids - very cheap! (retailed at rm200++ in
m'sia).
was overjoyed with it, but my mates couldn't understand why.
too bad, i didn't have the opportunity (rather, the drive) to go to
legoland in windsor.

the special thing about lego is that it shaped my thinking and creativity.
i could also very well agree that it also influenced my character.
legos are only pieces of plastics. it is the thinking, creativity, and
vision that makes up the models.
in the lego instruction booklet, you can learn to make a few different
models out of the supplied pieces in the box.
it is flexible in nature - the message is that things are not limited, and
you may explore to make different things.
i learnt to make out things out of only the pieces that i have in hand.
if you've seen the movie Apollo 13, there's a situation where the engineers
in houston have to figure out to make something out of available limited
resources to help bring back stranded astronauts in space.
that's problem solving with use of creativity - helped me in countless
occasion.
perhaps because of lego, i go for things that have multiple usage, although
not necessarily 'all-in-one'.
i'm sort of 'kill two birds with one stone' kind of guy.

Adam and I enjoyed the 2 hours following the instructions in the booklet
and the bulldozer came out just nice.
He's very happy with it, and i'm happy to know that he can do it very well.
just that he hasn't got the grip yet on snapping the pieces together.
within those 2 hours, i learnt quite a few traits of my 5 year old boy.
he's attentive to details (even i missed out on them).
he does things neatly.
he can judge quite well.
i love his determination and perseverence. he didn't give up when it is
difficult.
sometimes i felt like doing it for him, to make it finish faster, but i
learnt that being patient has its rewards.
he needs time, and my confidence in him.
i think i'll get a few more for him and his sister Marsya.
and i hope they'll enjoy the adventures with those blocks.