Category Archives: Rollin` With My Hommies

2nd anniversary of Kuala Lumpur GTUG

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For the past 2 years, being in GTUG has been an amazing journey for me. More importantly, it has been amazing to meet the people that I’ve met, helped (hopefully), inspired (hopefully), and have come across along the way.

My main highlight was my first trip to Google I/O this year. I wish I could write a longer post about this experience, but I’m leading a triple agent life = product manager by day, freelancer/startuper/advisor/mentor/lover by night, evangelist by the weekends with GTUG & Codeandroid; I’m just too tired to write a comprehensive one.

But I do like to share some things I learned from being the 1st GTUG in Southeast Asia to one of the most active in Southeast Asia. The only concern I have: is how long can I last? Anyhow, here’s what I’ve learned so far…

  1. Never depend on Google on everything you want to do for your GTUG. Be it for sponsorship, speakers or what not. They can and will help you the best as they can. But they can’t do everything or be everywhere. The best thing I’ve learned was to be independent. Help comes. Just not in the way & how you wanted it to be. This is when you need to innovate ;)
  2. Always and always make the people/developers in your GTUG community (or other kinds of developer groups) feel special. They are your most important asset in growing the gospel that you are carrying as a GTUG organizer. They are the coolest people you would have ever known! They are to me!
  3. Be relentless and persistent in what you’re trying to achieve & grow. My goal was (and still is!) to create a healthy & striving developer ecosystem in my country. I think I’ve done enough with trainings, free workshops, free meetups, free advise, free ideas and healthy criticism to stir up the community. Be a firestarter.
  4. Last thing I learned: don’t depend on Google for everything. Depend on the people in your community, depend on yourself. Things will get better.

To finish things up, thank you to Christine Songco, Stephanie Liu, Vinoaj Vijeyakumar, Jason Costa (Xoogler), Hanson Toh, Wesley Chun, Timothy Jordan, Daniels Lee, Bob Aman, Pamela Fox (Xoogler), David McLaughlin, Ikai Lan, Sajith, Derek Callow and other Googlers for the support. I really appreciate it. Very much. Please drop by KL!

Thank you to Krish (Singapore GTUG), Ohm (Bangkok GTUG), Azaman (Brunei GTUG), Agus (Indonesia GTUG) and other GTUG organizers in Southeast Asia for making a big effort to stir things up in this region. Thank you to other GTUG organizers for all of the funny things you say in mailing list. Nonetheless, the effort you guys have made to making GTUG the most awesome community organization in the world is indispensable.

As for celebrations, I kind of celebrated our 2nd year anniversary with an impromptu Google App Engine 24 hours hackathon in June with Ikai Lan from Developer Relations team. It was real fun! But that belongs to another post.

Read about the hackathon from Ikai’s blog!

Last but not least, thank you developers for changing my life :)

Cheers!

SYGMY

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This is my Malaysia. I would do anything to protect this freedom.

But I’m frustrated by the indecent acts of my own kind towards other people. That’s one way to make sense & a realization from one of many mom’s best advices: don’t watch too much of television.

Maybe someday, everything will make sense to them. Just maybe, there’s hope for them.

Salam Malaysia.

My personal report card for 2010

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Finally, Google DevFest is coming to Kuala Lumpur! Happening on the 16th of July 2010, DevFest is set to rock your socks with technical sessions conducted by engineers from Mountain View, California. The objective here is to engage Malaysian developers with the latest best practices & techniques from the visiting Googlers. Come and join in the fun! You can register yourself here.

OK, what’s all this report card shit? Trying to be cool?

Not intentionally. It’s more like a personal note of what has been achieved so far. Disasters and small wins, those are my achievements. I’m kinda weird, in a sense where I measure myself by everything I do. I’m not entirely an angel.

So here goes…

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Roll about just right

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First of all, big props to Choong Hooi producing this video & congratulations to him for getting engaged. Secondly, allow me to show you how much progress Malaysian rollerblading community has made.

Wow. Seriously wow. I thought, “Betul ke ni?”. Let me show you how skating was like 4 – 8 years ago:

It’s a big difference. The amount of tricks, the creativity. Man, no words to describe the excitement I’m feeling. The best part, I can actually see a 3rd generation of Malaysian rollerbladers. It’s not been long, but it’s been that a while now.

Coming from the 1st generation, so I think, the 1st crew I rolled with was the Shah Alam crew – Abang Hardy’s crew. That crew was one of the early pioneers of rollerblading in Malaysia. Setiawangsa was one of the toughest crew to beat. Big tricks, solid, superb creativity (back then), handrails jumpers, the police. It all started in 1994 and it’s been 15 years since then. I might be off with the years, but it’s been that long since I remember grinding that big fat practice rail in Section 9 Shah Alam. The MESA. The small street battles on handrails: not a Hoax, but enough to make you wet. The early days of being the firestarter of a new industry. The noisy minority.

Then came the KJROLLERS years. Created & formed this crew when I moved back to Kelana Jaya. That pretty much boomed in early 2000. The early involvement with ESPN Asian X Games organisers pretty much made the mark for most of us. Then came the street comps. The local merchandising. The skate videos.

And now, the 3rd generation appears. The skateparks. The new blood. And I’m out of the game. Literally.

Man, the amount of skating done in a short time of our lives is so damn bloody much. And it hurts 15 years later. In the knees all. But it was worth the pain. Worth every bruise.

Keep on rolling boys. I’ll have my kid rolling soon.

One buck short, but rocking away to the right direction.

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Pride flows in my veins when I watched this.

That’s Rahul, band leader of One Buck Short. The band has put together resources & worked on an idea that I’ve heard so, so, so many times repeatedly when I was managing them. You might think I could have listened to one person from the band about the idea, but actually, all 4 of them, and including Sen, was talking all about it from day one I took over from Adrian. 2 years down the road, it finally came true. And it’s all because of themselves. That’s how you make it big in the music business, from my point of view. With your own pure effort. More excitingly, it’s with your friends. In music, you need all the friends you can make. Good, real friends.

I’ve posted some details about their event recently, you need to check it out & make yourself there for it. It will be a rocking show!

Reasons I quit KJROLLERS

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Many asked me why I quit the KJROLLERS group. Some came up to me with a direct approach, some just, well, let say loves to assume the reasons why I quit. If you’d like to talk to me about it, please come and talk to me. Don’t just hide behind the tree like a Hindustani actor/actress.

Here’s a reason why I quit: it’s time to move on to my next adventure. I can’t be stuck and be happy & miserable doing the same things & go thru the same shit all over again. When there’s no compromisation, you can either keep on fighting or leave. And I choose to leave.

I’ve been skating for 14 years(if you want to find out how long I’ve been rollerblading, take my age & divide it into 2) & co-founded the KJROLLERS with my 2 other friends for more than 12 years ago. It is without doubt there are clashes of thoughts & arguments with each other, but it was for the sake of Malaysian rollerblading, which I hope would also be the reasons for the other 2 co-founders.

I’m like Jawed Karim, the 3rd silent co-founder of YouTube, where he takes the back seat. He was the one who conceptualized  and inspire the development of YouTube (the general public don’t really know this fact, so sad) & let the other 2 co-founders take all the fame & glory. It was full of happy times & happy thoughts. And I choose to go first.

Gua jalan dulu beb.

Find my next adventure or it will find me. I prefer to be an independent & a nobody. But that doesn’t mean I quit skating. That is one thing I can’t quit. Full stop.

The feel of failure

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And nobody actually know how exactly failure feels like. But anyone can know how to avoid one.

That’s the thing. Why is everyone so afraid of failing? Why is failure not an option? Subhannallah, God didn’t make us humans perfect. But that doesn’t make Him a failure. Maybe, just maybe all that He intended to do was for us to learn how to fall, so that we can learn to pick ourselves up.

I am in no position to think the way He thinks, but it is a thought.

I did something incredible today(more precisely, yesterday). It’s a decision that has been made several years back but it took several years after to figure what, how & when to make it into a reality.

I officially resigned from any active role from my 14 year old rollerblading crew, KJROLLERS. Yes, they are my own version of the “Band of Brothers“. The battle scars that I’ve accumulated over the years are like tatoos that will always reminds me of the great years I had in life as a skater & also as a friend. Was I a good skater, was I a good friend? That answer remains to be unanswered. And I prefer it to be mysteriously that way. Oddly enough.

I don’t regret letting it all go & moving on to be a simple boring geek in this underestimated world. When I think back, without those years, I wouldn’t had made it alive & well today. To be honest to the world, I have never felt better. It’s like nagging thought that has been hidden and keeps scratching for an itch that was never there yet. And now it’s gone. I saw freedom.

It’s ok not to be cool. But it’s not ok to be unable to free yourself when you know you can. That, is not cool.

To the KJROLLERS, I wish them the best of luck & may the group reach success where no one has ever reached before. This I know will happen. In fact, it’s been happening all the while.

Thank you for everything. Thank you for being my friends.

Ilman wins Stunts 4 Swag 5: Penang!

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His disaster farside makio over the kink made my balls shrink & run for cover! It was a nail biting moment waiting for him to lace the trick.

Thank you to all for coming & if you’d like to share your moments in this year’s S4S5, just register yourself with Stunts4Swag.com & post your stories & experience during the competition. Remember to link your photos from other image hosting websites like Flickr or ImageShack because the site runs on a tight budget web hosting. But you can upload your own photos if you want. Soon, you’ll be able to upload your photos to the site itself. I promise!

Congratulations to Ilman aka Lui for winning this year’s Stunts 4 Swag! Bling bling! It was a good return of investment, so to say =D

Thanks to the Ed & Kajang crew for the awesome England Clothing t-shirt. I’ll be wearing it tomorrow at work!

Photo courtesy of Wheel_Love. Read their post. Read the Stunts4Swag.com post.