Kopi Luwak - probably the best coffee in the world

Since tasting my first cup of kopi luwak (musang) in the highlands of Kintamani Bali, I am hooked. I have become a coffee man since giving up smoking 5 years ago. I have tasted all the different type of coffee there is, but only one coffee has tasted so good above the rest. Move aside Starbuck or Gloria Jeans, Kopi Luwak is the best coffee in the world.

Kopi Luwak is one of those unusual blends. One of the strangest and most expensive coffee brands, Kopi Luwak, or civet coffee is made from ripe coffee berries that have been eaten by, and passed through the digestive tract of the Asian palm civet and other wild cats.

The civets eat the best coffee berries but the beans inside pass through their system undigested.
The beans are then collected and cleaned. In Australia Kopi Lawak sells for A 50 dollars a cup, but in Kintamani Bali it about Rm 10 a cup. The beans are sold for Rp 600,000 (Rm200) per 100 gram (make 10 cups) and cost Rp 450,000 (Rm150) at the airport for a mere 20 grams (make 3 cups) !!

If Kopi Luwak is not your cup of tea (pun intended!) try Kopi Toraja, although the coffee plant is planted the traditional way in Toraja land, near the southern tip of Borneo.

How do you describe the taste of Kopi Luwak? It has a heavenly taste after a hard day's work. It is mellow not bitter, doesn't leave an after taste and there is a touch of caramel. In Vietnam they call it Weasel coffee.

You can argue it's halal-ness until the cows come home, but meanwhile I'll be enjoying it to the last drop until a fatwa is issued against it.

The splitting of the moon

The real reason why the stadium roof collapse !

Have a nice school holiday...........

An Ignorant Judge

Rasul Allah (saw) said: "Judges are of three types, two of them will go to hellfire and one type will go to paradise. The one who knows the truth and judges with it, he is in paradise. One who knows the truth but doesn't judge by it, will go to hellfire. The one who doesn't know the truth and judges between people with ignorance, will go to the hellfire" - narrated by Abu Daud and Termidhi.

We have seen from the series of judgments handed down recently; they were widely criticized as politically partisan resulting in various dubiosities and blatant disregard of constitutional provisions, judgment without proper or written grounds or judgment in indecent haste.

Judges must remember that they will one day stand before The Almighty and be counted of whatever judgements they make during this short worldly life. Hopefully they will ponder the above hadith.

May Allah save us all from the calamity of the hereafter.

Panas !! Court rules Nizar as the rightful MB

'The Kuala Lumpur High Court today paved the way for a fresh round of battle in Perak by declaring that BN's Zambry Abd Kadir is not the legitimate menteri besar of Perak.

The decision by justice Abdul Aziz Abd Rahim today rubberstamped ousted Pakatan Rakyat MB Mohammad Nizar Jamaluddin's argument that he is still the legitimate menteri besar'-Malaysiakini

Padan muka hang, zambry................

Kabinet mengikut undang undang jahiliah: Anak ikut agama asal ibu bapa

Semalam Kabinet Malaysia telah memutuskan bahawa kanak kanak mesti kekal menganut agama asal ketika ibu bapanya berkahwin. Ini bermakna kanak kanak tidak boleh bertukar agama walaupun selepas salah seorang pasangan itu menukar agama. Menteri di JPM, Nazri berkata "Anak perlu dibesarkan mengikut agama asal ibu bapa mereka........"

Keputusan Kabinet ini dilihat sebagai akan mencampuri urusan perundangan Mahkamah Shariah dan akan melibatkan banyak implikasi kepada kes kes yang melibatkan pertukaran ke agama Islam, anak anak yang dibawah umur.

Sanggup kah menteri menteri Islam didalam Kabinet menanggung dosa besar, apabila permohonan mereka mereka yang ingin memeluk agama Islam (bawah 18 tahun) diatas pilihan sendiri ditolak oleh Mahkamah kerana arahan Kabinet dan undang undang yang akan digubal nanti?

Semuga Allah melindung kita dari bala Allah yang akan datang kerana mengamalkan undang undang jahiliah ini.

Another By-Election in Penanti: Damned, don't you all get tired?

Here we go again. Another tussle between UMNO and PKR with MCA, MIC, DAP, PAS, and some independent monkeys entering the fray. This time it is not because a YB passed away, but PKR need to find a person good enough to be the DCM of Penang. Don't you all get tired of all the many by-elections in this country?

Our country is facing the worst recession ever. People are losing jobs and crime rates are increasing, yet politicians will be throwing millions of Ringgit to win the by-election. We will again see dirty linen wash in public and brickbats thrown against each other.

When will our politicians be united and face the global economic crisis? They should be putting their heads together to improve our livelihood rather than clashing against each other to win a by-election.

Some see this as a political move by PKR. They believed that Umno could use the graft charges to force Fairus jumping ship, as what they have done in Perak. To ward off this possibility, PKR leaders had to move fast to force Fairus to quit and pave the way for a by-election.

By asking Fairus to resign, it still shows a blatant disregard by PKR for Malaysian's wishes of having a stable government to avert the looming economic crisis.

Father Lawrence Andrew (editor of Catholic Herald) dinner grace

Dear Allah, thank Allah for this food.
Bless the hands that prepared it.
Bless it to our use and us to Allah's service.
And make us ever mindful of the needs of others.
Through Allah we pray. Amen.

Oh Allah
Allah blessed us with five loaves and two fish
Bless this food we share
Place Allah's peace in our hearts
and Allah's love in our lives Amen

For food in a world where many walk in hunger;
For faith in a world where many walk in fear;
For friends in a world where many walk alone;
We give you thanks, O Allah. Amen.
Allah is great, Allah is good
Let us thank Allah for our food. Amen

When UMNO forgot to 'kidnap' the Speaker -Mohamed Hanipa Maidin

One tends to make a mistake when doing something in a hurry. That was what happened to Umno. The unholy haste to topple the PR government in Perak has now landed the party in uncharted waters. The side effect is a constitutional impasse.

It all started when Umno forgot about the speaker. Greedy with power, Umno overlooked the importance of the speaker. Their focus was mainly directed to the three former Pakatan state assemblymen. What they failed to realise is that without the speaker on their side they would be facing the greatest obstacle to convene the assembly.

In a non-military coup, the role of speaker is extremely significant. Failure to take into account the role of the speaker is seriously fatal. Now Umno has felt the pinch due to its own ignorance on the role of the speaker.

Umno might have thought that the speaker had nothing to do with the process of ousting Datuk Seri Mohammad Nizar Jamaluddin, thus toppling the legitimate PR government. Thus they concentrated their effort elsewhere. They mainly focused on how to convince the Sultan of Perak to force Nizar’s resignation.

What Umno failed to realise is that the speaker is not akin to Umno’s permanent chairman (pengerusi tetap). If Umno holds that view the party definitely has committed a very serious and grave error. Any government which follows a Westminster model should know very well how important the role of a speaker is particularly when there is an attempt to overthrow a government via a vote of no confidence. In a political coup like what happened in Perak the speaker is a kingpin.

When the speaker started to exert his power and flex his muscles i.e by suspending Barisan Nasional’s Datuk Zambry Abdul Kadir and his six exco members, Umno began to concede its foolhardiness. Zambry had to turn to Prime Minister Datuk Seri Abdullah Ahmad Badawi for assistance. The latter however prescribed a wrong medicine by advising Zambry to lodge a police report. One wonders what business the police have when the matter involves the speaker’s prerogative and constitutional interpretation. Never in history has the police been brought in to investigate the speaker’s power. The constitutional turmoil is beyond the purview of the police domain.

Zambry, I believe, knew very well it was a sheer stupidity to bring the police in. However he and other Umno members have grown up with an embedded culture of blind loyalty to their leaders. It was immaterial, as far as Zambry is concerned, whether Pak Lah gave correct or wrong advice with regard to lodging a police report. Umno’s motto: whenever the higher up says we have to follow blindly. Thus the emergence of 19 reports against V. Sivakumar, the speaker.

If Abdullah had taken pains to get proper legal advice, he surely would have known about the existence of the following laws dealing with the immunity of the speaker, namely the Legislative Assembly (Privileges) Enactment 1959 and Article 72 of the Federal Constitution respectively. These two laws protect the speaker from any civil suit and criminal prosecution whenever he discharges his official duty.

It is submitted that the issue whether the decision of the speaker was legally correct or not does not arise in this matter. The laws,enacted by the BN government, conferred him immunity. The speaker’s decision, unless set aside or quashed by a court of law, was legally valid and binding on Zambry and his six exco members. Non-compliance with the decision of the legitimate speaker is at Zambry’s own peril.

It is axiomatic that almost all countries in the world including Third World countries confer immunity to the speakers of Parliament or the state assembly. There are a plethora of decided cases which show that the speaker’s powers cannot be challenged in any court of law. As far as the court is concerned, the power of the speaker is non-justiciable. It is better to share the following authority with Umno.

In James Eki Mopio vs Speaker of Parliament [1977] PNGLR 420, the case concerned the appointment of Michael Somare as the Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea following the general election. James Eki Mopio, the plaintiff, who was a member of the National Parliament, contended that the requirements of s142(4) of the Constitution were not complied with, and on that ground sought a declaration that the appointment of the prime minister was null and void and that a new election of prime minister should have been ordered..

Section 142(4) of the Constitution provides as follows: “(4) If the Parliament is not in session when a Prime Minister is to be appointed, the Speaker shall immediately call a meeting of the Parliament, and the question of the appointment shall be the first matter for consideration, after any formal business and any nomination of a Governor-General or appointment of a Speaker, on the next sitting day.”

Mopio contended that that section went further than to prescribe the order of business for the next sitting day after the meeting of Parliament had been called, and required that the election of the prime minister was to be conducted on the day following the appointment of the speaker. Mopio also submitted that the section was mandatory and not merely directory so that non-compliance would have the effect in law of invalidating the appointment.

After Mopio outlined his case , a preliminary objection was taken by Pokwari Kale on behalf of the speaker that what Mopio was seeking to do was to litigate before the court the question whether a procedure prescribed for the Parliament had been complied with, and that such a question, there being no special provision in a constitutional law to the contrary, was non-justiciable — Constitution, s. 134. So far as Mopio’s reliance on a breach of the Standing Orders was concerned, Kale submitted that as such orders concerned the order and conduct of Parliament’s business and proceedings that matter also was non-justiciable. (Constitution, ss. 133, 134)

The Supreme Court, in dismissing the suit filed by Mopio, held that the matters concerned with the conduct of the business of Parliament and its procedure. Accordingly as the issues before the court involved the question whether that procedure had been complied with, and also the exercise of the freedom of proceedings of Parliament and the functions and duties of the speaker, the court had no jurisdiction to entertain the case .

Zambry now realises that lodging a police report was not a wise move. Such a move made him a laughing stock. He has to switch to another viable option. Thus came the idea of consulting the QC. Money is not a problem to him. For Pakatan leaders engaging a QC is a reflection of a colonial mentality plus a waste of money. However since when Umno really cares about spending a huge sum of money for its political survival?

What is interesting about this Perak fiasco is that despite the collapse of the PR government the office of Pakatan’s speaker remains intact. And the most fascinating fact is that even the Sultan has no power to remove the speaker. He was appointed by the state assembly, thus the removal must also come from the latter unless he resigns or no longer holds office as an assemblyman.

Since the speaker has not lost his office it follows that he still possesses very vast powers in so far as the business of state assembly is concerned. He has inter alia very wide powers to suspend any state assemblymen as he did to Zambry and the six BN exco members. As far as the “three stooges” (don’t tell me you don’t know who they are) are concerned they are no longer assemblymen. The speaker has already made a ruling that their resignations were valid and constitutional under Article 35 of Perak’s Constitution. Even if they consider themselves assemblymen they only represent the Elections Commission and not the rakyat of their respective constituency.

Umno may be proud that the Sultan has backed it in ousting the Pakatan government of Perak. But what transpires now seems to suggest that the life of the BN government is hinging now on the speaker of the PR government which it unjustifiably ousted via undemocratic means.

Mohamed Hanipa Maidin is the Pas legal adviser. He is also a lawyer.

How to get rid of your ugly potbelly?

Everybody want to have a flat tummy. Remember when we were teenagers, we can eat as much as we want, and still maintain a size 28 0r 30 jeans. With our flat tummy, swaying our hips to the tune of Tina Charles was fun. But now, expect a dose of Ponstan and Voltaren if we swing our belly too vigorously! Our metabolic rate was in turbo mode and running overtime during our teenage years and whatever we eat turns into energy and burned off. As we get older, our metabolic rate is running on old diesel powered engine, very sluggish and inefficient. That is the order of nature but you can still make the most of it's sluggishness.

Having a potbelly is not something natural that you must suffer when you turn 40 or 50! Personally to me, it is karma punishment because we did not take care of our body all these years. But still you can get rid of it. What you need is some simple exercise, proper dieting and WILL POWER.

I won't go into detail the sciences of how to calculate your resting metabolic rate. Suffice to say, if you are living a sedentary lifestyle, in which 90% of us are; your basal metabolic rate (metabolic rate when you are not doing anything and the number of calories per day your body burns) is around 2000 calories

To get rid of those ugly potbelly, you must lose weight by burning off excess body fat, so aim to eat 500 fewer calories per day than your daily caloric needs, and maintain or increase your exercise activity.

Do not go below 1200 calories per day unless you are on a medically supervised weight loss program or after consultation with your doctor.

To lose weight healthily, try to eat 500 fewer calories per day. You might ask how much is 500 calories? Well, to put this into perspective, a glass of teh tarik is about 150 calories and a can of coke is about 140 calories. A piece of bread is about 80 calories and one hard boiled egg is about 110 calories. To lose weight you need to have a deficit account, so to speak. Calorie in must be less than calorie out i.e less food and more activities, so that the body burn fat for fuel.

Check out Kevin Zahri's website: http://cekodok.com on our local food calories, etc, etc.

So start reducing your 500 calories a day. A simple rule of thumb is to cut half of whatever quantity of food that you eat everyday. If you are taking a full plate of rice, then take half a plate. If you are taking two roti canai, then take a single piece. In the long run, the weight will surely drop and the size of your potbelly reduced. You need to turn on your will power and ISTIQAMA (presevere).

You cannot spot reduce the fat around your belly. Even if you do 1000 sit-ups a day, the fat will not melt away and probably you will end up with a bad back. So don't waste your money buying those sit-up machines that promise to burn the fat in your tummy. The only thing that will burn is your hard earned money.

Next, I will write on how to fast track your weight loss. Tune in soon.