Kapitan Signature

The other day we went to Kapitan Signature. There were five of us, and none of us had been there before, so we decided to order five items to share.

There were two different kinds of briyani, dum briyani and dalgona briyani. There were a few pictures in the menu, but no description of what they were.

We ordered both kinds, but only one dum, because there were somehow more kinds of dalgona (for example the lamb shank and prawn versions were not available in dum briyani).

The strangest dish is the dum briyani, which came with bread baked on top of the dish.

dum briyani chicken, RM18

after we broke open the bread

The chicken was a whole chicken thigh, at the bottom of the rice.

dalgona chicken briyani, RM18

dalgona lamb shank briyani, RM32

dalgona prawn briyani, RM25

After seeing the dishes, I think that “dalgona” might refer to the sauce that they put on top of the briyani (or that they cook the meat in). Another clue was in the name of the dishes…the “dum” comes right before the word “briyani”, whereas the word “dalgona” comes before the name of the meat.

For pizza, we chose kebabish pizza, and it seems to have pieces of kebab and tandoori chicken on it. (they also had tandoori pizza, which I guess may have those pieces of tandoori, but no kebab chicken?)

kebabish pizza, RM25

They gave us small individual plates, but I’m wondering whether it was only because we ordered the pizza. (the pizza was the first to arrive with the plates)

The wrath of guys who don’t get to meet girls

So the other day, it was a holiday and our Tetra badminton court didn’t have enough players. So I asked a few of my badminton teammates to come and practise together.

Two Tetrans (I’ll call them A and B) came to play, and so got to meet the girls. There were two younger girls their age, so naturally the talk later was about these two girls (I’ll call them P and Q).

After that session, we were in the office when somehow the topic came up. A said he had spoken to one of the girls, P (he had plucked up the courage to ask her name! :P ) Then I told him, B has Q’s number already…

Two other guys were around at the time (let’s call them C and D, and by the way both of them do come to the badminton sessions more or less often), and all three of them went “What?! Is it true?!?!”

Not wanting to label B as a playboy, I decided to tell them the truth, which was that Q stays at the same apartment as B - and C immediately exclaims, “Me too!” I managed to get them to calm down so I could continue - she was looking for badminton players who could go to their apartment’s badminton court (it’s open to outsiders too, but of course it’s convenient to stay nearby!) - to which it was D’s turn to immediately exclaim, “I can go anytime! Just let me know!” (and note that D stays far far away…)

I doubt they were being totally serious, but the whole scene was absolutely hilarious. Which is why I still remember it about a week later… So now this post is for keepsakes. :D

The child at the table

Last night we had a lantern festival event in our neighbourhood, with dinner followed by a lantern walkabout.

While I was eating my dinner, someone suddenly put a hand on my shoulder and exclaimed, “Wah, your lantern is so nice ah!” The lantern was on the table, a bit to my right, and two girls were sitting to the right of the lantern (it was theirs). I replied that it wasn’t my lantern, then the guy asked the girl on my right, “Is it mei-mei’s (little sister’s) one?”

Initially I had thought that he might have mistaken me for a parent, but later it occurred to me that he might have thought I was a child. I just got a haircut (really short :D ) and from the back, I might have really looked like a kid :P This new realization also came because the way he spoke to me had that tone of someone speaking to a child…similar to the tone that he used with the girl beside me.

On a side note, there were mooncakes on the table when we were having dinner. I spotted this cute “Don’t litter” logo on one of the packages and had to snap a photo. What’s more, this week’s Photo Friday theme is cute, so here you go!

(I bet even the children didn’t notice this rabbit :P )

A "makeover" indeed

I went and got my old TV repaired.

The repairman first said that the LED lights weren’t working any more, and that he could get the new parts in 3 days, then it should be quick to fix. Surprisingly, the following weekend it was still not ready. Today (another week later) he called me and said that it was done. When I went to pick up the TV, he told me that the LEDs weren’t broken after all; instead the board was broken. I asked whether it was the circuit board (at that time, the term “circuit board” evaded me and I just pointed to the board on another TV that he was repairing), but he said no, and kept saying “board” (“paan” in Hokkien). So I didn’t quite know what he meant.

At the shop, he had already plugged in an HDMI cable to show me that the screen was now working. Back home, I tried it out, but hit a snag: Why couldn’t I find the HDMI port?

Now this TV is one that I have been using for years (see the post linked above; I got it in 2014!) And I have been plugging and unplugging the HDMI cable very often, to switch between my NJOI box and my PC (there is only one HDMI port on the TV). The HDMI port is on the side of the TV, so I was very confused not to find it there. Then I noticed that there were two USB ports, and the other ports also looked different.

Next I checked the TV model (from the sticker on the back of the TV), and compared it with a photo that I had taken earlier of my old TV (I had taken a photo so that I wouldn’t have to keep going back to my TV to check the model :P ). They weren’t the same. But the repairman had put a sticker on the screen of my TV, with my name and phone number. Could he have swapped the back cover? Was it a mistake, or was the swap necessary for some reason?

While checking the TV model, I found the HDMI ports at the back of the TV. This TV model has two HDMI ports, so I next tested out the ports. I mean, I’m not gonna complain if I’ve now got two HDMI ports…having only one HDMI port was one of the minor drawbacks of my old TV.

Both HDMI ports worked. However, I noticed one more thing: The front of the TV was not mine either. My TV had the standby LED in the centre, and switching the TV on and off I realized I didn’t see the LED, so I paid a little more attention and suddenly noticed the LED on the corner of the TV. At this point I was wondering whether he had given me someone else’s repaired TV, and was going to give my repaired TV to another customer…

So I called the repairman and asked him about it. He said that he swapped the cover because the new board fitted this TV model better. (something about the “feet” of the board in Hokkien, which I take to mean the board connectors) He said he could switch back to mine if I wanted, just that the connectors may not fit so well. He said that basically everything was my TV (board, screen…? I can’t remember exactly what he said) He was surprised I noticed the swap…but then again, the HDMI port is what I use the most, and its location had totally changed! (if not for that, I might not have noticed immediately, but I would have noticed the standby LED anyway, sooner or later)

In a way, I guess it’s kinda a good deal that I got my TV an additional HDMI input through the repair. :P

Note for future reference: LED lights were supposed to cost RM280. For the board, he charged me RM270.

Textured wall

Since the photo theme this week is wall...

I decided this wall was a little less boring than just a plain stretch.

Unfortunately I didn't come across any interesting wall painting in the past week...

The latest episode of “geographically-challenged Penangites”

I said I was from Kuantan.

Penangite 1: Kuantan is in Terengganu or Kelantan?
I laughed and said, neither, please try again. And added a hint: You know where SH is from? (SH is from Pahang too, albeit not from Kuantan)
They think and guess: Selangor? (Turns out they didn’t know where SH was from)
Me: No.
Them: What other states are over there??
I ask them: Do you know where Tioman is?
Penangite 2: Johor? *facepalm*

(The one who said Johor, she said that to get to Tioman, you leave from Johor. I wouldn’t know; I’ve never been…)

After I told them that Kuantan was in Pahang, they were extremely shocked.

Penangite 2: Genting is also in Pahang? So different and they are in the same state *facepalm again*

I recalled a drawing that I had put on Facebook before…I couldn’t find it on my blog, so I dug it back out from Facebook. (I didn’t draw this!)

How did the drawing come about? It was when I was still in IQ Group (FB post was on 4 April 2013). Three Penangites (I still remember who two of them were, but not the third…) said that Pahang does not have a beach. They drew a map...with Pahang in the middle of the peninsula. 😢 (okay, technically, one drew and the others approved)

I told those two Penangites about this drawing (didn’t show it to them, I just dug it out for my blog post), and they were in total agreement, nodding “yes yes, we also thought Pahang didn’t have a beach!” *facepalm 3*

My previous blog post on this was here. I had forgotten that story!

And to be fair to Penangites, not long ago a Kedahan also said that he did not know where Perlis was. :P He was kinda worse; he didn’t seem to know that Kedah was north of KL (but I may have remembered this wrongly; the main thing I remember is that he did not know something about Kedah even though he was from Kedah!). Basically he said that he did not care about these things at all.

Edit (22 Sept): I asked three Penangites today whether Pahang has a beach. All three said yes. There is still hope for Penangites after all... :P

An empty court

An empty badminton court in the early morning...

I was not the first to arrive...but my friend went out to show someone the way in. This is the court in the One Imperial condominium, so for first-time visitors, it is kinda hard to find!

More than one arch

Last week's photo theme was arch.

You can look for your favourite arch in this photo :P

Effects of ruinous empathy

This post has been floating about inside my head for quite some time…months at least. But writing it down takes time…especially writing it down properly.

I’ve probably ranted about people’s English on this blog before (long story short, culture shock when starting work, to discover that the standard of English is that low among professionals). But I’m not going to spend my time digging those old rants out. This will be about new observations, and my thoughts on it.

What I’ve noticed is that those with bad English tend to say sentences that do not have any meaning, or do not actually mean what they want to say. But from the context, sometimes it is easy to see what they mean, so we brush the miscommunication off and just reply as if they had actually said what they wanted to say.

Example: You go to someone’s house and they tell you, “Come in. The door open already.”

Everyone understands that. What they want to say is “The door is already open.” So no one corrects them, and they continue thinking that the sentence is correct.

However, technically speaking, “The door open already” is not a proper sentence. “Open” here sounds like a verb conjugated wrongly, and “already” isn’t something that can be opened by the door. (Here, you might have lost me if you don’t know proper English grammar)

This is why the title of this post is about “ruinous empathy”. This is a part of the “radical candor” concept that started making waves a few years back. The concept is about “caring personally while challenging directly”, and if you draw two axes, one for caring and the other for challenging, this makes four quadrants:

drawing courtesy of Radical Candor

Radical candor is what we should aim for, where we care about the person while still challenging undesirable actions. The opposite of it while still caring, is ruinous empathy, where we keep silent to spare someone’s feelings.

So when no one tells them that their English is wrong, and everyone understands them perfectly, they conclude that their English is correct. How could they come to any other conclusion? However, this also means that their English will not improve. How would they know what to improve if they do not know what is wrong?

I have had my head bitten off before by a colleague when I corrected the structure of their sentence (luckily, it was not literally :P ). They were writing it for a requirements document. They were upset because they had always been using that sentence structure and no one had ever complained. But this was either because those reading (or listening to) the sentence did not know that it was wrong either, or because they were practicing ruinous empathy. Frankly, I don’t correct every grammatical mistake I see or hear either; that would ruin every communication (and my relationship with more than half the people I know).

I also use Manglish often (like that sentence above about the door), especially with people who speak Manglish. There is an uncomfortable feeling of being pompous when we use grammatically-correct English with people who are using Manglish. I guess this would also fall under the category of ruinous empathy. Guilty as charged.

Even though in this case it seems like a little ruinous empathy is necessary (again, we cannot correct every single mistake!), the question is, how do we offset the effect of that ruinous empathy?

I have been trying to figure out what those people who cannot make a proper sentence are missing. The answer, unfortunately, is “a lot”. But it is not possible to get them to go back and learn basic English. So, what can be done to have the biggest improvement with the smallest effort?

I settled on two things: Transitive/Intransitive verbs and active/passive voice.

Both of these have to do with sentence structure. Verb conjugations may cause some confusion if done wrongly, but these are more easily clarified or corrected. Vocabulary (using the wrong words) is less of a problem; most of my colleagues tend to have better vocabulary than grammar. Differentiating nouns and adjectives/adverbs is another issue, but that usually does not cause huge misunderstandings.

Back to what I mentioned earlier in the post, my colleagues would say sentences that actually make no sense. They would use a transitive verb without an object, thus leaving a sentence hanging. (And they do not know that their sentence is incomplete.) They would say a sentence with a noun-noun-verb structure, and we wouldn’t know which noun is the object and which is the subject. If they understood active and passive voices, they would be able to use a noun-verb-noun structure, even if the verb were not conjugated properly. (or am I being too optimistic here? :P )

There is a colleague of mine who is very hardworking, and it seemed to me that they were making efforts to improve their English. I would notice them using not-so-common English expressions when no one else would use such expressions in Manglish. So a few years back when this colleague started writing formal documentation, I told them (kaypoh much?) that they could try paying more attention to these two items, namely transitive/intransitive verbs and active/passive voice.

Recently, after seeing a number of written explanations that made no sense, I decided to tell a few more people about these two “improvements to try out”. This time, I looked up examples on the Internet, and shared the two links above with them. Whether they will actually make the effort to correct themselves or not, I do not know...

Water art

Last week's photo theme was drops.

I had a brown paper bag lying around, so I decided to make it my canvas...

...by flinging a few drops of water at it.

Artistic much? :P