London in Kuala Lumpur

I sit typing this in my office in United Kingdom. London maybe, yes.

From the window right in front of me I cannot see much of what is outside. The sky is grey and I can’t really tell where heaven/earth starts and where it ends. For all I know, there might be the Thames River right next to my building, or maybe my office is on the second floor of Buckingham palace. Maybe I am at the Principal’s office of Hogwarts, maybe I am a prisoner at Azkaban. It is very grey and hazy outside. Maybe i have died and this is hell (sitting in office is NOT my idea of heaven!).

It is very cold, as usual in this part of the world (I am the only occupant on this floor, and the air-cond is centralized and so I can’t regulate it. As usual, for some reasons unknown to me, the air-conds in Malaysia are always set at 16degC). It is cold and I am in my winter suit. Red gloves and turtleneck sweaters and jackets and warm wool hat too.

I have a pot of tea ready. I don’t have scones and clotted cream and homemade jams, but I do have cheese and crackers.

London has reached Malaysia!!

I heard the news yesterday that the plan to do cloud-seeding to make rain has been postponed. Reason: too hazy to fly a plane. So maybe they will do it after the haze is cleared. But wait a minute, why do we want to make rain to wash the air off the haze when there is no more haze? I am not very bright, I am very hazy in fact.

Indonesia warned us that the haze will worsen in the next couple of weeks because the Dayaks in Kalimantan will be busy burning burning forest for replantation activities. So they DO know the cause and the whens. Great. A problem anticipated is a problem half-solved. So what will be done to prevent the Dayaks from doing this? They are being pro-active about this of course. They give us warning ( 2-weeks notice) us and apologizing to us BEFORE the haze worsens. Right. Pro-active indeed. I feel so much better.

And why is it that we always look beyond the shores of the country to put blames on whenever the air is as choked as this? Don’t we think that we contribute as well? Our diesels are not exactly top grade, and our practice of bakar sampah belakang rumah, and the stack smokes from our factories, and our own agricultural practice, and our cigarettes and our smoky farts? If we all start looking at ourselves and each of us try to make our own little difference, maybe, just maybe, the haze problem will be reduced by some fractions?

So will the haze be an annual thing? Yes? Okay.

Can we do anything about it? No? Really? Uh.. okay.

Okay. In that case we will start stocking up the house with masks. Already the price has increased from 20cents per piece to RM1. Can fashion designers do something about it? I mean, make it more interesting, put some colours and designs perhaps? Put a big picture of red pouty lips maybe. And please make children sizes too. And make it less scary to them too.

Some of us may have some spare ribs in the fridge. Ribs are okay. But I don’t think anybody has spare lungs at home, do you? And Body Shoppe does not exactly sell body parts, no matter what its name may imply. I might as well smoke a cigar. It will not make any difference, to my lungs or to the lungs around me.

AP Index like the stock market, bullish! Going up and up and away!

In the meantime, dahlings, I may just pretend that I am in London, oi i may. Ye have any problems with tha'?

Tea anyone? Lovely.