Fun, Food, Friendship and Fiesta.

The week ends are thank fully replete with activities this month as the activities seem to double come the fasting month ! My friend, Moidu and I attended a Taklimat recently (Briefing) where the Melaka Government  included the names of the two of us as Lead Auditors for the Landscaping and Cleanliness Referendum for Melaka Maju 2010. Melaka Maju is an ongoing collaboration between the various departments within our administration to peg the standard of living of the citizens of Melaka to the level of the OECD ( Organization of Economic Co-Operation & Development). 

To help make the various governmental and non governmental (NGO)outfits achieve this collaborative effort by the State Economic Planning Unit of the Chief Minister's Department, these last 10 years, an annual chart of deliverables based on Management by Objectives format has been observed and followed. 

Amongst the various deliverables that each department in the state government's charge has to achieve are items like the number of doctors per 1000 people as compared to other OECD developed cities like Vienna,Strasbourg; Algeria; and also items like the number of  women in government as dept heads, etc.

 The countries within the OECD  grouping are used as checking boards to determine Melaka's living standards as compared to theirs. This MBO system of the State Government has managed to elevate the basic standard of living of the community and citizens as it allows the administrators to peg their resolve in raising standards according to fact based and recognized goals.

Any ways, like I was saying, the NGO's are normally invited to collaborate with this sincere effort by the state departments during an annual seminar where every year the stated achievements and goals are summarized and  action taken on. Under the auspice of the Malacca Tourism Association; yours truly has been actively participating in these various programmes.One of this year job scope will be a 60 day immersive programme whereby selected public areas and buildings and businesses will be audited for their efforts in maintaining our city's vision as a green and clean city.

After the briefing at the Media House in MITC, we dropped by the Auto City locality where the Transportation  Museum by Perzim is located. It is almost out of the way for normal melakkans but the promotion by CMI Holdings Berhad to have a Car Boot Sale every sunday  in that locality is hopefully going to change all that. The Museum charges RM 10.00 per adult entry, but the set up is encouraging. The tickets will also allow the entrants to visit the other museums in Melaka.

Many items on show were actually loaners that the car owners are using as a sale display to hawk their cars. But, there were items there that were quite interesting esp. the olden wagons and horse carriage ! I suppose , given a couple of years more even my old trusty car can be considered worthy of display at the museum?

Later that afternoon, after getting stuck in traffic for almost 45 minutes between Tranquerah Road and the Mahkota Parade area ( all school zones); I managed to doze off  for a few hours in preparation of the evening's schedule of  dinner & meetings. 

The high light of the evening was the monthly St . Francis Association (SFA) meeting  that was this time around hosted by Simon the GM of Straits Meridian Hotel, Melaka. Michelle tagged along on this occasion as I felt that Phillip ;our secretary for the association would be a little over burden with the heavy list of items on discussion and to follow up. So, I offered my wife's help to the association for assisting with the taking of  meeting minutes , which they gladly accepted.

3 hours of talking and planning later, the meeting was disbursed with everyone contributing well inputs for the day, especially since the tummy was well taken cared off earlier!

The food on offer for the Ramadhan Buffet was as always diverse in offer and taste with items off the Grill; meats and savouries of many kinds; & Nyonya food items were also on offer in the buffet which was keenly appreciated by our group of eaters.



On Saturday, another  few friends and I participated in more offers of hosted lunches and dinners as there were seminars and talks to attend with regards to our involvement in the sales of Financial Products.(with Phillip of Money Concepts, Melaka)



Walton International also extended their invitation to me this weekend to participate in their Land Bank Sales Scheme; whereby the strata purchase of development land in USA was discussed and previewed. It was a very interesting sales talk and I was very keen tp participate and the best part was, so was Phillip,who came along for the show .

 The idea of retaining a small percentage of our various investments with this company was highly interesting and intriguing. And to top it off each purchase of a titled plot is small enough to be almost not much worry about. Only USD 10,000.00 per purchase. (about RM 31,000.00 at today's prices)

Their hosted luncheon was also quite a classy affair as it was held at the Holiday Inn Melaka which is always good for taste and show.

Vincent and Phillip enjoying the myriad food on offer. I was busy taking photo's but managed to gorge myself also, slightly later ;>