My youngest, Sarah, has just started her form four. She came home today with a confession: she likes Chemistry.
Something's wrong with her. But let's leave her for another day because we now have something more urgent: MH370. When I was at Petronas, I'd to do things which were urgent and important first, which admittedly were not that many. We'd paid BCG good money for this highly complex idea, shown in a proprietary perfect square. I know it's hard for you to believe that things can be urgent but not important. But let's not argue. Let's agree that MH370 is urgent and important.
I was glued to Astro Awani for the first two days, keeping abreast every half-minute. Then my tendon tore and my spine sored as little progress was made. But what really broke my back was the sight of a general, or maybe a field marshal, trooping in, his chest decked out with military medals and ribbons. A curious onlooker would easily mistake Malaysia for Managua.
You could feel the all-round confusion and discomposure. I know jet planes don't disappear everyday, but it's scant excuse for turning a crisis management into management crisis (quoting a clever reporter). The flight turn-back was confirmed after six days. Pilot's last words were modified after three weeks. A goal-line technology used by the English Premier League can decide whether the ball crosses the line in less than half a second. Little wonder Singapore air force parks all its non-hostile foo fighters over our airspace.
As with any crisis or disaster, there's a lesson or two. The management school calls this trick "failing forward". Meaning, we succeed by learning from mistakes. Of course it's a lot nicer if we just succeed, without first making a mistake. This tragic episode has truly challenged my intellectual and cognitive competency, or whatever left of it five years into retirement. The outlandish theories and hypotheses springing out of this unfortunate event are truly disturbing. But I'm also struck by some of the elegant and extravagant terms and expressions bandied about by the experts and the media. Here's nine. I've listed them in a glossary format for easy reading:
1. Assets. The Minister said "all our assets are now being deployed.......". I came across this word "Assets" in my first accounting class. It means, quite simply, what I own. What I don't own is a Ferrari. Seriously, I'm not sure why this dull, catch-all word had to be flogged and glorified to include just about anything used to find the missing aircraft. All sense of urgency and gravity is lost. Assets now includes equipment, ships, men, women, shaman, technically anything that moves, except our two eBay-class submarines.
2. SAR, ACARS, ELT, PC, PSR, PK. Abbreviations are inevitable in any disaster. When Titanic sank, the only abbreviation was SOS. SAR is not singular of SARS, the deadly flu strain. PK are local university professors coming out of the woodwork to talk tosh. PC is now press conference, personal computers are now called personal computers.
3. China. Not an abbreviation. How we wish it were. China is Chinese, only worse. They harried, they hounded, they bullied Malaysia Airlines and Malaysian artistes. They kicked up and complained at every turn, alleging cover-up and conspiracy. Lucky thing our government is well prepared, thanks to years dealing with similar tactics used by PKR. I'm not trying to defend Malaysia Airlines, but no airline that carries nuts can promise a zero-accident flight. And the flight was a code-share with a Chinese airline, which quickly disappeared after the plane disappeared. To be fair, all those Chinese relatives wanted was information. You've to understand, these people were so used to getting all accurate information from their transparent government.
4. Corridor. I lived in a hostel hell for eight years. The narrow space outside our dorm is a corridor. Now a corridor means just any space, anywhere, onshore, offshore, airborne. In this case one corridor covers Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and 15 other countries with "tan", except Canada. Another corridor consists of only Australia. The search team quite rightly plumped for Australia after British spies secretly calculated the plane's location to anywhere within 100,000 km of Perth. They also secretly calculated that it's easier to spell Australia than Kyrgyzstan. The icing is, of course, Australia's maritime skills and know-how, after 100 years of chasing Afghan boat people.
5. Ping. I know what you're thinking: a Chinese Dynasty. That's Ch'ing and Sing. Ping is a signal sent out by a satellite. A dozen signals equals twelve pings, not thirteen as in bread and pastry. You might also detect a faint ping when the army chief opens his mouth to speak.
6. Pinger, Pinger Locator, Chinese Pinger Locator, Towed Chinese Pinger Locator, Chinese Towing Towed Chinese Pinger Locator. A clever wordplay of the words ping and Chinese.
7. Turn Back. It means turn back.
8. Dari masa ke masa. This is an eloquent and poetic expression mercilessly mangled time and again. One newsreader concluded with "kami akan menyampaikan maklumat terkini dari masa ke masa". Another one used "dari semasa ke semasa", and he switched to "dari masa ke semasa" before I switched off the TV. I'm angry because this is not French. I used to hate Baru vs Baharu bollocks, now this. Please, Perkasa or somebody similar, fight for Malay supremacy and settle this issue now.
9. H. As in MH. Malaysian Malays are a polyglot lot. A Durex survey found that an average Malay speaks three languages and watches at least three episodes of Tanah Kubur. But most Malays and most Malay professors seem to stumble over the letter "H". A pretty Malay TV3 newsreader easily got away with "M Hatch" because she's a pretty TV3 newsreader. Another one repeated "M Hetch 370" 370 times, where "e" rhymes with the famous Imalah in verse 41 of Surah Hud. There's H in Hud. There's no H in H. I think only the Minister got it right, which proves that this country has at least one literate Malay minister.
Pray for MH 370.
You could feel the all-round confusion and discomposure. I know jet planes don't disappear everyday, but it's scant excuse for turning a crisis management into management crisis (quoting a clever reporter). The flight turn-back was confirmed after six days. Pilot's last words were modified after three weeks. A goal-line technology used by the English Premier League can decide whether the ball crosses the line in less than half a second. Little wonder Singapore air force parks all its non-hostile foo fighters over our airspace.
As with any crisis or disaster, there's a lesson or two. The management school calls this trick "failing forward". Meaning, we succeed by learning from mistakes. Of course it's a lot nicer if we just succeed, without first making a mistake. This tragic episode has truly challenged my intellectual and cognitive competency, or whatever left of it five years into retirement. The outlandish theories and hypotheses springing out of this unfortunate event are truly disturbing. But I'm also struck by some of the elegant and extravagant terms and expressions bandied about by the experts and the media. Here's nine. I've listed them in a glossary format for easy reading:
1. Assets. The Minister said "all our assets are now being deployed.......". I came across this word "Assets" in my first accounting class. It means, quite simply, what I own. What I don't own is a Ferrari. Seriously, I'm not sure why this dull, catch-all word had to be flogged and glorified to include just about anything used to find the missing aircraft. All sense of urgency and gravity is lost. Assets now includes equipment, ships, men, women, shaman, technically anything that moves, except our two eBay-class submarines.
2. SAR, ACARS, ELT, PC, PSR, PK. Abbreviations are inevitable in any disaster. When Titanic sank, the only abbreviation was SOS. SAR is not singular of SARS, the deadly flu strain. PK are local university professors coming out of the woodwork to talk tosh. PC is now press conference, personal computers are now called personal computers.
3. China. Not an abbreviation. How we wish it were. China is Chinese, only worse. They harried, they hounded, they bullied Malaysia Airlines and Malaysian artistes. They kicked up and complained at every turn, alleging cover-up and conspiracy. Lucky thing our government is well prepared, thanks to years dealing with similar tactics used by PKR. I'm not trying to defend Malaysia Airlines, but no airline that carries nuts can promise a zero-accident flight. And the flight was a code-share with a Chinese airline, which quickly disappeared after the plane disappeared. To be fair, all those Chinese relatives wanted was information. You've to understand, these people were so used to getting all accurate information from their transparent government.
4. Corridor. I lived in a hostel hell for eight years. The narrow space outside our dorm is a corridor. Now a corridor means just any space, anywhere, onshore, offshore, airborne. In this case one corridor covers Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and 15 other countries with "tan", except Canada. Another corridor consists of only Australia. The search team quite rightly plumped for Australia after British spies secretly calculated the plane's location to anywhere within 100,000 km of Perth. They also secretly calculated that it's easier to spell Australia than Kyrgyzstan. The icing is, of course, Australia's maritime skills and know-how, after 100 years of chasing Afghan boat people.
5. Ping. I know what you're thinking: a Chinese Dynasty. That's Ch'ing and Sing. Ping is a signal sent out by a satellite. A dozen signals equals twelve pings, not thirteen as in bread and pastry. You might also detect a faint ping when the army chief opens his mouth to speak.
6. Pinger, Pinger Locator, Chinese Pinger Locator, Towed Chinese Pinger Locator, Chinese Towing Towed Chinese Pinger Locator. A clever wordplay of the words ping and Chinese.
7. Turn Back. It means turn back.
8. Dari masa ke masa. This is an eloquent and poetic expression mercilessly mangled time and again. One newsreader concluded with "kami akan menyampaikan maklumat terkini dari masa ke masa". Another one used "dari semasa ke semasa", and he switched to "dari masa ke semasa" before I switched off the TV. I'm angry because this is not French. I used to hate Baru vs Baharu bollocks, now this. Please, Perkasa or somebody similar, fight for Malay supremacy and settle this issue now.
9. H. As in MH. Malaysian Malays are a polyglot lot. A Durex survey found that an average Malay speaks three languages and watches at least three episodes of Tanah Kubur. But most Malays and most Malay professors seem to stumble over the letter "H". A pretty Malay TV3 newsreader easily got away with "M Hatch" because she's a pretty TV3 newsreader. Another one repeated "M Hetch 370" 370 times, where "e" rhymes with the famous Imalah in verse 41 of Surah Hud. There's H in Hud. There's no H in H. I think only the Minister got it right, which proves that this country has at least one literate Malay minister.
Pray for MH 370.
