1) 2011 Touhoku Earthquake and Tsunami, a 9.0 Richter scale earthquake occurred offshore Japan on 11 March 2011 has triggered a massive tsunami sweeping across northeastern coast of Japan causing widespread destruction and lost of human life. With death toll continue to rises by the hour (Rolling news coverage has really kick up the urgency of event, with horrifying images of the aftermath splashed across the medium.), it has been acknowledged that this natural disaster is the worst crisis that Japan is facing right now since the end of World War II. While there are many inspiring stories of bravery and survival in the aftermath which reflects Japanese's sense of unity and resilience in times of adversities (you have admit with the whole country situated right beside one of the geologically active place in the world, Japanese's preparedness for earthquake is deeply embedded in their psyche which indeed significantly lowers the death toll and maintaining social order.), it seems that the worse has yet to come: engineers over Fukushima I Nuclear Power Plant are scrambling every second to prevent a nuclear meltdown when tsunami hit the power plant subsequently knocking out the cooling system for the nuclear reactors, dealing with explosion and fire on containment building as well as rapidly rising radiation leak which prompted mass evacuation from the nuclear power plant. The Japanese authority has rated this event on the INES scale as four but other foreign nuclear agencies and government has expressed their concerns that it might reached six or even seven already with the subsequent explosions over Fukushima I. Whatever that happens, let's just hope that the crisis can be averted avoiding Chernobyl style accident which is the only level seven disaster to this date on INES scale.
While the rest of the world offered their genuine concerns, sympathy and aids, a small but annoyingly visible people (The world are made of all sorts of people...including idiots.) failed to read the air and numerous gaffe which attracted ire from the rest of the normal, sane, caring people. Facebook being the world largest social network in the world unavoidably hosted idiots too and some idiots just can't resist to express their bigoted opinions in the form of 140 letters status update hence bringing this gem of mass brain cell decay. Then there's this mass spreading of status update warning about the threat of "acid rain" almost immediately after a few explosions occured at Fukushima I which causes some sort of hysteria including my own mom (MOM!) who asked to stay indoor and avoid for the next few days during her call to me a couple of days ago...before it was duly debunked by actual nuclear experts. (The lack of general knowledge of youth these days despite being the most connected generation ever caused my brain and heart to died a little). Mass spreading of brain death doesn't stop here. No. It moves on the those pretentiously "pious" god-fearing creations that claims that THE END IS NEAR or GOD HAS SPOKEN!!!11 START EMBRACING THE ULTIMATE TRUTH HURR DURR DERP that makes me wanna cuss TABARNAC and spits on their face and their holy book the fear so much. (Abrahamic Religions/Agama Samawi: The greatest scourge of human mind. U MAD? *trollface*). Not to be outdone by various individuals, comic artist over Berita Harian too decided to the join the fray of mass stupidity by drawing a comic that poked fun of the Tsunami which in turn prompted mass outrage from other more sensible public irritated by the comic which in the end being posted on CNN's I-Report, their "citizen media" (note: user-generated or YOU ARE TEH JOURNALIST HURRDURR.) platform. Another stupid comment that attracted outrage, shame and snark lashes from the public comes from none other than the PM's wife or BIK MAMA ROS which her massive beehive hair is used to hide her lack of intelligence while commenting about "responsible development." which then of course end up on I-Report and as a laughing stock as well.
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| The stupidity. It's too much to handle. |
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| Help Japan. Design by Signalnoise. |
For anyone who want to contribute any form of aid, Google has come up with a neat, rapidly updating page that contain all resources needed from up-to-date news and relief effort. Go and there and play your part.
2) More Holy Bible/Alkitab Injil fiasco.
The detention of shipments of Alkitab Injil or Holy Bible in Bahasa Indonesia at Port Klang and Kuching has caused furore among Christians especially Sarawakian. While the cabinet has ordered conditional release of the said Alkitab, cynics and pundits view it as mere ploy in the forthcoming Sarawak State Election, Christian Clergies feels skeptical or insulted with the conditional release because the bible have always been for the indigenous Christians' usage only and it has been use for the longest time in the hinterland of Malaysian Borneo. As usual for the ulamas and other pretentious serbanistas/tudungnistas, they bemoaned about the usage of Allah in the AlKitab Injil and warned about "Islam under attack" and merosakkan akidah and all those religious HURRDURRDERP. (exactly the same line as Murrika's Christianity under attack stance. It seems to me the majority is always under attack!)
As a Pastafarian, the continuing conflict between Abrahamic Religions for centuries like all those furore that I mentioned earlier definitely strengthened my personal belief that religion (especially Abrahamic Religions) is the biggest scourge of human mind. Or maybe I shouldn't be this cynical or cruel and just point out that stupidity and sin is part of our already depressing human nature and no holy books will be able to save us from hell (if there's one, that is.) or eventual demise.
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| You know it's true, fellow followers of Abrahamic religion. Human mind are bound to clash hence resulting in splintering sect. Inerrancy my foot. |
Looking from a viewpoint as a translator however, the translation of any religious scriptures are bound to be challenging (fellow BATIan, remember Nida and his Formal and Dymanic Equivalence!) with influences from prevailing opinions, socio-cultural norms and religous belief but it's definitely not insurmountable. Since Munshi Abdullah has attempted in translating Holy Bible into Malay, why can't anyone continue whatever that's left from his work and produce a distinctively Bahasa Malaysia Kitab Injil? Or it's just economically nonviable to embark on this admitting daunting endeavour that it's eventually cheaper to import Bahasa Indonesia's Alkitab Injil instead? Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka as the official Bahasa Malaysia regulator in Malaysia should've realised the potential of enriching the Bahasa with more concepts and vocabularies related to literature, philosophy and religion (the long neglected fields in terms bank in pursuit of modern technological advances.). What's left of course before this endeavour can be attempted is on how to prevent religious bodies (The Abrahamic Religions) from meddling with translators work too much...because everyone has opinions on how things should be done.
So what's your take, my fellow translators?
Epilogue: That's all for now and Phew! it has been a while since I actually come up with an opinion piece/things that depicts piece of my mind about events around me. My brain power is drained. As for my research progress, SIPUT BABI. *don't ask anything about it please. I will come up with...something. By hook or by crook.*
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