Lets Guess the Race Date of 2011 SCKLM

If SCKLM has to be in June, then there are 4 possibilities.
Could it be
a).  1 week after Sundown-M, i.e. 3 weeks before Sundown-UM?
b).  2 weeks after Sundown-M, i.e. 2 weeks before Sundown-UM?
c).  3 weeks after Sundown-M, i.e. 1 week before Sundown-UM?
d).  Co-incide with Sundown-UM?

Either choice, SCKLM will lose, at worst, 600 potential marathon-takers.
Since they are going to lose some marathon-takers to Sundown-UM anyway, my bet the date will be on (d).  That will give Sundown-M takers time to recover and to 'revenge'.

However, many say that June may be our next general election month.  If so, it will be unwise to have such a big event just before/after general election.  Which VIP should they invite to 'flag-off' and to 'show index finger' this time?  Pening... pening...!

So, there is a chance that SCKLM 2011 will NOT be held in June.

Glad that am not SCKLM's organizer!

Unusual Participant-Grabbing Race has just Begun?

There is an interesting phenomenon happening now in the race event organizations.

First of all, in order to grab the impatient race participants (those who worried that places will be grabbed in no time), one race-organizer opened their event for registration while important details are yet to be finalized...

... hoping to grab the first batch of race-participant.  Question: does "early bird get the worm" or the "early worm eaten by the bird"?  I don't know... but some participants have already got frustrated for slow release of information and race details.

Then, there is another event-organizer starts informing participant to hold back a little as they are organizing something interesting too...

Then, another popular local event-organizer started to get panick, and put this up...

Am 'impressed' with their 'efficiency' this year.  I remember they were quite slow in opening registration last year.  Am wondering how they counter the 'aggressive marketing attack' by the 'early bird/worm'?

Why won't K-event organizer replicated what has S-event organizer done... by opening registration while finalizing race detail?  It is just like what the auto-maker like to do... open for booking first before the actual product is out!  Why would they make potential-customer wait for another 31 days?  They just have to fix the race date and finalize details later.

Am expecting Putrajaya Night starts to count down soon.  What a competitive world!

Event organizer better be fast, don't open registration too close to the race date as that will definitely deter the 'virgins' or 'barely virgins' from joining... that was what happened to me last year.  I have to give up Energizer and Putrajaya last year due to too short notice.

Please understand that there are a lot of potential new runners out there... a new 'craze' to run marathon is burning in this country now!

I Love You and Thank You

Next time if you see the following sign language, you'd know that the person is trying to tell you that he/she has hearing impairment...

Then you can tell him/her the powerful 3 words...

He/she may show you this...

That is what I learnt from the 2011 calenda...

Kid's philosophical talk on 'deaf reading'

On an ordinary Sunday morning after-breakfast shopping in Amcorp Mall, we saw a little stall ran by a group of people with hearing impairment selling 'deaf art' and calenda for 2011.

Decided to make a little contribution, I browsed the stall with my 6 and 7-year-old boys.  Being the first time close-encounter with people with hearing impairment, the kids were very curious of the way the deafs communicate using sign-language.

Now, the most interesting and amazing part was...

Boy: papa, can they read?
Papa: yes, they can read because they can see.
Boy: can they read in their mind?
Papa: yes, of course they can read in mind because they can see.
Boy: but they cannot hear (un-convinced).
Papa: yes, but they can see.
Boy: (started to become impatient) but they can't hear, how do they learn to read?
Papa/mama: they can't hear... but they can see, right? So, they can read lor...
Boy: (frustrated for not being understood) but if they couldn't hear, how do they read in their mind?
Papa + Mama: ......(silence for a few seconds)...

At this juncture, I was very confused why the boys were so un-convinced with our simple answer despite repeating ourselves for so many times.  Isn't it simple that the deaf can see --> so they can read --> so they can read in their mind.  That's what I thought, initially.

After taking a step-back and a moment of pause, I suddenly realized that the boy had seen the issue of "deaf reading-in-mind" from an angle that has never crossed my mind before!

Kids, for having a very pure and innocent mind, could be unbelieveable in looking at things from many different angles!

To all the adults, do we understand why the boys are frustrated?  That is because he didn't understand how do the deaf 'pronounce' words and sentences 'silently' in their mind.  While we are reading this sentence in our mind (silently), we are actually 'pronouncing' the words in our mind silently.  We can understand the sentences and the meaning by pronouncing words in our mind, in the way that we learnt through hearing.  We certainly pronounce words in our mind the way we are taught through hearing, and in turn, we comprehend what we see by 'making' up the sound of the word 'silently' in our mind.

Now, the boy was curious if the 'deaf' read in their mind the same way that we do!  How do the 'deafs' understand words by 'silently' making out the sound of the words in their mind?

I felt ashame for not able to see thing from different angles.

While working in an 'artificial speech production' project sometime ago, I remembered that human's hearing + speech production is such an interesting invention of the nature.  We learn speech by our hearing, NOT vision.  That's why baby can pick up speech without knowing the position of mama's tongue and lips.  That's why the borned blind can speak just like us.

Now, what about the deaf?  Do they read-in-mind the way we do?  Certainly not.  But then, how?  Do they 'pronounce silently in mind' at all?  That's what the boy was asking.

I was not able to answer his question, that might sound simple, this time.