Yes, ColinJong.com is 3 years old now.  The traffic has increased 200% since 12 months ago.

Thanks to our loyal readers who always support this blog and thanks to the search engines that have been bringing new visitors to us.

Actually, SiewPeng and I have written less posts this years but luckily the growth of the traffic can still be maintained.  It reminds me a chat with my ex-colleague sometime ago said that having a real baby is not easy, but it would be easier after 3 years.  Yes, this blog is the “virtual baby” of SiewPeng and me on the Internet.  We hope it grows healthily, fast and most importantly it can give meaningful contribution to every corner of the world as its title says - “Peace and Harmony are Our Ultimate Dreams“.

Recently, I have added a new category - “Astronomy”.  Besides sharing the interesting part of the astronomy, we also hope that our earth is peaceful from the outer space attack such as collision of HUGE meteor.  When a meteor is small, it create a line of firework on the night sky and many people make wishes to it, but when a meteor is huge it would be a disaster.  At that time, everyone will pray so that our earth is safe.

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Planning for the Coming Year

1.  Update the almost abandoned section of this blog - “Gallery” more frequently (every month).
2.  Design new theme for important festivals, such as Chinese New Year, Gawai, Christmas, Hari Raya and Deepavali etc.

We hope that you continue to support us and enjoy reading this blog.  :)

Happy Mid Autumn Festival.  :D  How much moon cake have you eaten this year?

This year, the Mid Autumn Festival celebrated by Chinese (15th of 8th Month in Chinese Calendar) is special because of the following:

1.  It was really on “mid-autumn” astronomically because it falls on the equinox (22 Sept).
2.  Jupiter is having “jupiter opposition”, and very close to Earth (happens every 11 years but not necessary on equinox or mid autumn festival).
3.  There was a moon halo on 21 Sept night.

Thanks to my cousin and Wilson who told me about the moon halo.

14th Moon on 21 Sept 2010.

15th Moon on 22 Sept 2010.

Moon and Jupiter.

Astronomy chart shows that actually Uranus is very near to Jupiter, but we can hardly see it because of the light pollution in the city.

The magnitude of objects in the sky:
Moon -12.13
Jupiter -2.9
Uranus 5.8
Neptune 5.08

Neptune is also not far away on the East, but is also hardly seen here with naked eyes.

We spent the entire Hari Raya Aidilfitri holidays in Sibu for a 2-day DiZiGui Course.

This is the first time SiewPeng visited Sibu town and my second visit.  My last visit was in February 2009 using express boat across the South China Sea, and stayed there for less than 3 hours for a day trip, where the journey takes 5 hours each way.  This time, we used bus, and it took us about 8 hours for each way.  It was really a tiring experience, but what we have gained from the DiZiGui course worth the journey we have traveled.

Our bus departed on 10am from Kuching on last Friday (10 Sept), and we arrived Sibu at about 5:45pm in Sibu.  In between, the bus stopped for 3 times.   In Sibu, we have only visited the night market and a shopping mall.  We have 2 full day of the course (1.5 hours X 8 classes) from 8am to 5:30pm on Saturday and Sunday.  We then departed from Sibu at 10am on Monday, and arrive Kuching at 5:45pm.  The 400km of road distance took 7 hours and 45 minutes.

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DiZiGui or Standards for being a Good Student and Child is an ancient book based on the teaching of the Chinese philosopher Confucius.  Although it is for young kids and students to study, but adult should learn it as well, because it can bring peace and harmony from an individual, to a family, country and the whole world.  All good deeds start from filial piety to our parents at home.

In 2 of the sessions, we have music classes.  The speaker show us some video clips that touched everyone’s heart.  The songs, videos etc. are about our parents, and tell us why we should love them.  As this course is specially for school teachers, some of the teachers even cried after listen to the story.  Here, the teachers had became students because they (including SiewPeng and me) were learning from the speaker.

To be a good teacher, you have to be a good student first,
to be a good parents, you have to be a good child first.

We have also gone through the success example where a school that apply DiZiGui have no discipline problem at all, and automagically their academic performance has increased.  It is very common nowadays where a school can produce high academic performance students, but the students have done something illegal.  DiZiGui is the basic education on top of acedemic success, but nowadays nobody implements it.

I have a chance to talk to a headmaster of a primary school and asked him if nowadays they still cancel moral classes, physical education, art and music classes for primary 5 and 6 students and replace the time slots to prepare for local UPSR exam, he said it is still happening now.  It happened to me about 20 years ago where my timetable is clearly written that it is time for PE music / art classes, but we were doing the exam questions.

And the moral exam in local secondary school is based on writing but not based on how a student behave.  With this type of education system, the good moral values have been ignored.  DiZiGui cab be a good moral syllabus.  It is a traditional Chinese teaching that have been proven success since 5000 years ago, and it is not related to any religions, but it is a good teaching to create a peaceful and happy life.  Since 100 years ago, it has been gradually removed from the China education system.

English version of DiZiGui (pdf format). ….. [Download].

From the title, I think you can guess what this short film is about.  There are also stories that you have heard which share the same value like this one.  Being arrogant never pays.

There was a race in the wood between the rabbit and the tortoise.  Everyone, including the rabbit of course, knows that the tortoise was slow.  However, the tortoise did not give up.  So the race began.  The rabbit led and the tortoise was far behind.  Then, the arrogance of the rabbit arisen and he decided to take a nap under a tree because he believed that he was going to win anyway as the tortoise was known to be very slow.  But, he overslept and the determined tortoise won the race.

All these short films are not shown on local TV stations anymore.  I used to wait for them to appear when I was young.  They tend to show these films before the beginning of a programme or after a programme.  Well, Internet was not that convenient that time.  Haha!

Once again…here are the short films that we would like to share with you.

1.  Childhood Cartoon 1: Sang Kancil and Monkey.
2.  Childhood Cartoon 2: Sang Kancil and Crocodiles.
3.  Childhood Cartoon 3: The Clever Crow.
4.  Childhood Cartoon 4: The Arrogant Rabbit (this post).

This short film is about how a clever crow used stone to fill up a bottle of water in order to quench his thirst on a hot day.  Another meaningful cartoon produced by the National Film of Malaysia.  Enjoy.