Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Loceng maut...

"Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee." -- John Donne

If you gotta listen to the news.....

Eagles! I love em...

"...Its interesting when people die-
Give us dirty laundry..."



"...We all know that crap is king
Give us dirty laundry!..." Haha! Brilliant!

Wednesday, May 14, 2008

Good beat, I like...



Its really reminiscent of the Thaipusam dance beat. What DarkKey has done is to infuse it with that almighty musical instrument - the electric guitar. Good stuff! I bet Richard Dorrall would give me a two hour tongue lashing if he hears this!

Some of the lyrics (truly Malaysian, I tell you):

"...dei maccha, nee sollu dari mana? vadda, vadda, vadda, vadda, vadda maccha, bijak..."
"...tarak pa, tarak pa, mugatulle rettum vadikitu, tarak pa...kerana, kerana, sandapottu, [can't make it out] merana..."

And of course the title of the song - Karatana. A "karat" person (karat = rust).

Rock On Guys!

Monday, May 5, 2008

Subtractions, a primer...

I was in Taman Medan Jaya, Klang, on Saturday for a preview of our program, especially Qmaths. Its always a good feeling, especially if the kids and their parents show up and take part.

I had finished the "all of nine, last of ten" formula when one of the parents asked: "What if the number to be subtracted from (edit: the minuend, if you must know) is not 100 or 1000 or whatever, but a complex number, like 4,321?"

OK, I said. Lets figure that out.

Lets say we are trying to find the difference between 1,234 and 4,321:

Step 1:
Subtract 2,000 from 4,321. Why? Because 2,000 is the nearest thousandth number and larger then 1,234. If the subtrahend (thats the name we give to 1,234 in our example here) is say is only 234, then it is not 2,000 but 300. Get it? Anyway, we get 2,321 as our answer.







Step 2:
Using "All of nine, last of ten" we subtract 234 out of 1000. Easy aint it?








Step 3:
Add 2,321 and 766! Thats all there is to it!

QED!