Saturday, October 31, 2009

Kinokuniya: The story of a great bookshop











There is a great book store in Kuala Lumpur City Center (KLCC). This bookshop is located on level four. When I had an opportunity to get there, I always spend an hour or two to riffle book collection displayed within the bookshop. This bookshop was Kinokuniya.

Among matters of interest in this book store is there is an extensive book exhibition space. This store has two levels. There are a variety of books displayed according to various topics and subjects desired by customers.

In one corner of the shop upstair, they have provided a food store to facilitate the customers eat and drink. Although the price of food and beverages offered relatively high, however it is quite match with the store environment that is very special.

As a reader who is interested in history books , I found out that the exhibition space for history books are very large as big as a classroom.

Kinokuniya Book Store. It is vast bookstore with a massive collection of novels, magazine and other books. They even have magazines and comics in japanese language. You can find all sorts of reading material of different interest here.

When I was exploring inside, the idea of ‘time is not enough’ came floating into my head, there’s too much to read inside.

If I am alone, i want to spent hours in this bookstore. Unfortunately my presence there was accompanied by my wife and my children, so I cannot be there long. In my heart, I said ..."if only this bookshop be in alor setar or in Kangar, how good it is"

Reading....

“It consoles me in my retreat; it relieves me of the weight of distressing idleness and, at any time, can rid me of boring company. It blunts the stabs of pain whenever pain is not too overpowering and extreme. To distract me from morose thoughts, I simply need to have recourse to books.” The Complete Essays III.3.932, Michel de Montaigne

Other blogger opinions about Kinokuniya book store in KLCC

Eyeris' 2006 Book Lists: The Eyeris Bookstore Awards

After some thought, I decided that instead of having awards for specific BOOKS (which, since I've not read that many, will only consist of the same books over and over again, much like my movie and music lists...), I shall have lists for book-RELATED topics instead.So, I shall now kick off with...

The Rather-Biased Eyeris Bookstore Awards 2006

Best Major Bookstore:Kinokuniya, KLCC - For being so convenient for me to get to, the atmosphere, the good selection of graphic novels, and the good fantasy section. Oh, and all those 20% discounts!

Best Secondhand Bookstore:Payless Books, Ampang Point - It's a BIG store, and I love wandering around here. You never know what you're gonna get!

Best Customer Loyalty Scheme:Times Bookstore: For just ten bucks a year, you can get 10% discounts of books, and 5% of magazines! (MPH card is pointless lar. Collect points for what? I don't buy THAT many books!)

Most Annoying Display:MPH 1 Utama - The PERMANENT display of Dang Brown paperbacks and illustrated books just behind the 'New Arrivals' shelf near the entrance. For god's sake, get rid of it already. It's been there since last year!

Best Reading Atmosphere:MPH 1 Utama: It's relatively quiet, and I love the benches around the pillar at the fantasy section.

Most Up-To-Date Books:Kinokuniya, KLCC - For consistently being the first bookstore in KL to stock the books I want. I've bought more new books there on whims than from anywhere else.

Most Clueless Staff:MPH: For asking this question - "Who Is Terry Pratchett?"Sneeziest Environment:The Secondhand Bookstore on level 3 of Amcorp Mall: Everytime I go in there I start sneezing. For gods sake, DUST the shelves a bit lar!

Most Annoying Feature:
Kinokuniya, KLCC: For wrapping up their books. Though if that's what it takes to stop people tearing out pages and defiling the books, then I don't really mind, to tell the truth...

Most Improved Bookstore:Borders, Berjaya Times Square - I still don't like going to that termite warren of a shopping complex, but at least Borders had the sense to get rid of the stupid World of Feng Shui section and replace it with a pretty decent graphic novel section instead.

Most Disappointing Development:Kinokuniya, KLCC: They started charging RM1 for wrapping books. WAAA!

Best for Local Books:MPH: They very the support local authors one. Good good!

Best Graphic Novel Section:Kinokuniya, KLCC: No fight, thanks to that entire WALL of graphic novels, and the up-to-date shelves of new arrivals. MPH's graphic novel displays tend to be damn messy and filled with nothing but Star Wars titles; Borders Times Square's selection is so-so only (The Curve's is downright pathetic).

Best Magazine Section:The Two budget Magazine stores in Amcorp Mall: For selling imported magazines like Empire and Q for only RM9.90-12.90 (back issues lar, of course)

Labels: , , Posted by eyeris at 1:12 PM
Poke My Eye! => (9) pokes in the Eye. GAA!
postCountTB('4281306553035134348');
(0) trackbacks as usual. Sigh...


nuffnang_bid = "2e0dd9c5722c95581c509557db0554b9";
Monday, December 18, 2006

http://eyeris.blogspot.com/2006_12_01_archive.html


I was at my favourite bookstore, Kinokuniya yesterday and found many good books that interest me.

So I bought a total of 24 books, 3 for my client.

Why I like Kinokuniya so much:

1. The range of books available is the best among all the major bookstores in KL ( compare to MPH in MidValley, Borders at Times Square, Time Bookstore in Pavillion KL, even Borders in Singapore )
2. 20% on many newly released book titles or bestsellers! That's the main reason I can afford to buy so many books at one time! Another money saving tip for you.

3. Sometimes, they have joint promotion with credit cards company. I remember they had a promo a few years ago where Citibank credit card members get discounts on the books they bought at Kinokuniya.The fact is that I was never a fan of Kinokuniya when the store was in Lot 10, Kuala Lumpur, because they were selling mainly Japanese books and the price of English was also high. I got a pleasant surprise when I waled into the present Suria KLCC Shopping Mall a few years ago. From then onward, it has been my favourite..
Don't take my word for it.

Check it out at Suria KLCC when you are in KL.

IT is very easy to find, just take the lift to Level 4 and it is opposite Petrosains's Gallery. You can't miss the big blue Kinokuniya signboard.I enjoyed my book shopping... I am going to take my " sabbatical leave " to catch up on my reading soon :>

Do come back to my Blog soon as I will post more on the books that I read and recommend.. ( only on non-fiction / knowledge books as i don't read novels )


K I N O K U N I Y A KUALA LUMPUR CITY CENTER

















Friday, October 30, 2009

Q&A What would u ask? at facebook...




You, Azarudin Murad, Khoiron Noor and Zaidi Azraf Zainal Azmi like this.

Fadhli Atari
sudah ada blog yee. senyap gitu je putera jejawi ni. :D kenapa pilih 'jejawi'? Pokok Jejawi?
Yesterday at 04:05 · Delete

Jaman Asri
can you be trusted?
Yesterday at 07:24 · Delete

Rosli Mohammed
ia that your only speed limit...
Yesterday at 07:26 · Delete

Efendri Sikumbang
What does Friend mean 2 u?
Yesterday at 08:22 · Delete

Rosli Bin Hamid
Pali...saya nak bekerja dalam senyap...saya pilih nama tu sebab moyang saya dulu orang Jejawi perlis..sekarang ni saya pula menetap Jejawi, Perlis.juga ...jadi putera jejawi tu bermakna anak kelahiran (asal) jejawi..


Jaman...sure...u can count on me....


Rosli...ermm sometimes i drive 110 km per hour in highway...but i can think a lot in short time...

lol..


Efendri ..everything ...for life and death...loyalty is very important..but i real live i am a humble person ....
Yesterday at 14:48 · Delete

Mahid Myhead
ini bakal ADUN Jejawi.. :)
Yesterday at 14:49 · Delete

Rosli Bin Hamid
hahaha...saya tak campur sangat pasal politik dalam negeri...malu pula kat en. mahid sebab bahasa inggeris saya teruk...1000 apologize...
Yesterday at 14:52 · Delete

Zaidi Azraf Zainal Azmi
soalan saya berbunyi begini....Kenapa buah Pelam Harum Manis banyak melata kat Perlis???...kenapa tak kat Perak ke????..Tereingganu ke..Penang ke???....ehehhehe..sekian, terima kasih chegu...ehehehehhe
Yesterday at 14:57 · Delete

Rosli Bin Hamid
ok...soalan yang baik tu..sebabnya bumi perlis mempunyai tanah yang subur..jenis lanar dan hitam untuk pertumbuhan pokok mempelam itu..faktor kedua ialah pancaran matahari yang agak terik sepanjang tahun dan faktor ketiga ialah kehadiran faktor angin yang kencang yang ketara pada bulan-bulan tertentu yang menyebabkan harum manis lebih banyak di tanam di Perlis berbanding dengan negeri-negeri lain..sayangnya buah mempelam ini ada satu musim saja dalam setahun ..kalau 2 - 3 kali lagilah baik...
Yesterday at 15:00 · Delete

Zaidi Azraf Zainal Azmi
OOOoooooo....sebab tu rupanya...sungguh saya tak tau...ehehhehe....insyaAllah nanti mari musim lagi mungkin saya akan kesana....ehehhehe....:)))
Yesterday at 15:07 · Delete

Rosli Bin Hamid
hehehe..mai la ke perlis...
Yesterday at 15:08 · Delete

Zaidi Azraf Zainal Azmi
InsyaAllah chegu...:))))
Yesterday at 15:08 · Delete

Mahid Myhead
soalan saya berbunyi: kenapa kena tanya SATU soalan jer? tanya byk2 soalan tak boleh? hehe
Yesterday at 15:08 · Delete

Rosli Bin Hamid
tanyalah banyak pun ..saya sedia menjawabnya...hehehe..rasa macam selebriti pulak...sedangkan saya hanyalah seorang guru kecil di sebuah sekolah yang besar...kalau en mahid nak tanya lagi ..boleh juga tanya dlm inbox...nanti saya balas....
Yesterday at 15:13 · Delete

Khoiron Noor
knape nama rosli tk nama lain aje?
Yesterday at 20:09 · Delete

Rosli Bin Hamid
hehehe...nama tu popular di perlis tahun 1960an...itu pilhan ibu bapa saya..tapi ok pa...saya suka nama tu..dah 43 tahun saya hidup dengannya dan tak banyak kerenah...hehehe
Yesterday at 23:17 · Delete

Muzem Yunus
What is the biggest fear in your life, Cikgu? :)
Yesterday at 23:26 · Delete

Rosli Bin Hamid
when i realise that i have made a mistake with people...

Saturday, October 24, 2009

di sebalik wajah anak-anakku...




























































































































Buat anak-anakku....

Muhd Hafiz


Adel Wafi
Ahmad Izzat Azraie

Afif Wajdi





..anak-anak ku yang tersayang..

jika abah ditanya apakah antara perkara yang paling membahagiakan abah di dunia ini..


jawapannya ialah melihat kamu membesar dalam keadaan bahagia dan ceria sepanjang masa.....kerana kamu semua adalah anugerah yang tidak ternilai yang abah dan umi ada dalam kehidupan di dunia ini dan kamulah satu-satunya harapan abah dan umi untuk kebahagiaan di dunia dan di akhirat..

Jika abah ditanya lagi....apa yang menariknya tentang kamu?

Jawapannya ialah ....

kamu mempunyai akhlak yang mulia dan beriman kepada Allah SWT...


kamu mampu berkomunikasi dengan jelas kepada dunia dan dunia memahami kamu sebagaimana kamu kehendaki....


kamu menjadi seorang insan yang sentiasa mencari dan dahagakan ilmu pengetahuan yang bermanfaat untuk dunia dan akhirat...


kamu mempunyai wawasan dan cita-cita yang jelas dalam hidupmu...


kamu mempunyai raut wajah yang comel dan manis sebagaimana wajah abah dan umimu...


Jika abah ditanya lagi..apa harapan abah terhadap kamu?


Jawapannya ialah kamu menjadi seperti dia.....
dia peka pada masyarakat


dia penyayang:


dia spontan:


dia jujur:


dia genius


dia menyampaikan ilmu dan


menyebarkan kasih sayang sesama insan:


dia indah secara dalaman:


akhlaknya mulia:


hidupnya ibarat matahari menyinari kehidupan orang lain:


dan dia senang sekali dengan kehadirannya dalam masyarakat sekeliling


dia tahu apa nak dibuat pada setiap masa:


matlamatnya jelas:


agendanya banyak:


untuk Tuhannya


untuk manusia dan kemanusiaan


Bagaimanakah kamu harus melihat setiap yang berlaku terhadap kamu ?


Lihatlah dengan mata hati....kerana mata hati tidak menipu...mata kasar yang menipu...


dan bila kamu bersedih dan resah kerana pada pandanganmu bahawa dunia ini tidak berlaku adil terhadapmu...


sedarilah bahawa..itu hanya pandangan kamu sendiri sahaja....bukan pandangan semua orang....


lihatlah ....bila kamu bersedih...


dunia ini masih juga berjalan seperti biasa...


..sungai Pahang masih mengalir ke kuala..


..pantai Teluk Cempedak masih juga dikunjungi orang untuk mandi manda dan berkelah...


air terjun jeriau masih juga tak henti-henti mengalir dan terjun ke bawah....


.matahari pagi masih juga terbit di ufuk timur seperti biasa...


.burung-burung tetap keluar pagi mencari rezeki..


..ombak di laut tetap pasang dan surut menurut ketentuanNya...


Kita melihat dan menterjemah apa yang ada dalam persekitaran kita menurut cara kita dibesarkan...


.sedangkan dunia ini boleh dilihat sebagai jambatan bahagia ke akhirat bagi seorang individu


manakala


bagi individu yang lain ia melihat sebagai suatu tempat yang penuh dengan kesengsaraan yang tiada hentinya


Jadi lihatlah dunia ini dari sudut yang positif ....jadikan dirimu bahagia di sini dan berusahalah dan berdoalah untuk mendapat perlindungan Allah di sini dan di alam satu lagi....


Andaikata ...kamu masih lagi bersedih..hayatilah lirik lagu ini....dunia tidak berakhir apabila kita bersedih .....


Artist: Davis Skeeter


Song: The End Of The World

Album: Pop Hits Collection


Why does the sun go on shining?
Why does the sea rush to shore?
Don't they know it's the end of the world,
Cause you don't love me any more?


Why do the birds go on singing?
Why do the stars glow above?
Don't they know it's the end of the world.
It ended when I lost your love.


I wake up in the morning and I wonder,
Why everything's the same as it was.
I can't understand.
No, I can't understand,
How life goes on the way it does.


Why does my heart go on beating?
Why do these eyes of mine cry?
Don't they know it's the end of the world.
It ended when you said goodbye.


Why does my heart go on beating?
Why do these eyes of mine cry?
Don't they know it's the end of the world.
It ended when you said goodbye.


Hayatilah pesanan ini:


25 Pesanan Luqmanul Hakim kepada anak-anaknya: Renung-renungkanlah....

25 Pesanan Luqmanul Hakim kepada anak-anaknya


1. Hai anakku: ketahuilah, sesungguhnya dunia ini bagaikan lautan yang dalam, banyak manusia yang karam di dalamnya. Bila engkau ingin selamat, agar jangan karam, layarilah lautan itu dengan SAMPAN yg bernama TAKWA, ISInya ialah IMAN dan LAYARnya adalah TAWAKKAL kepada ALLAH.


2. Orang-orang yang sentiasa menyediakan dirinya untuk menerima nasihat, maka dirinya akan mendapat penjagaan dari ALLAH. Orang yang insaf dan sedar setelah menerima nasihat orang lain, dia akan sentiasa menerima kemulian dari ALLAH juga.


3. Hai anakku, orang yg merasa dirinya hina dan rendah diri dalam beribadat dan taat kpd ALLAH, maka dia tawadduk kepada ALLAH, dia akan lebih dekat kepada ALLAH dan selalu berusaha menghindarkan maksiat kepada ALLAH.


4. Hai anakku, seandainya ibubapamu marah kepadamu kerana kesilapan yang dilakukanmu, maka marahnya ibubapamu adalah bagaikan baja bagi tanam tanaman.


5. Jauhkan dirimu dari berhutang, kerana sesungguhnya berhutang itu boleh menjadikan dirimu hina di waktu siang dan gelisah di waktu malam.


6. Dan selalulah berharap kepada ALLAH tentang sesuatu yg menyebabkan untuk tidak menderhakai ALLAH. Takutlah kepada ALLAH dengan sebenar-benar takut ( taqwa ), tentulah engkau akan terlepas dari sifat berputus asa dari rahmat ALLAH.


7. Hai anakku, seorang pendusta akan lekas hilang air mukanya kerana tidak dipercayai orang dan seseorang yang telah rosak akhlaknya akan sentiasa banyak melamunkan hal- hal yang tidak benar. Ketahuilah, memindahkan batu besar dari tempatnya semula itu lebih mudah daripada memberi pengertian kepada orang yang tidak mahu mengerti.


8. Hai anakku, engkau telah merasakan betapa beratnya mengangkat batu besar dan besi yang amat berat, tetapi akan lebih berat lagi daripada semua itu, adalah bilamana engkau mempunyai tetangga (jiran) yang jahat.


9. Hai anakku, janganlah engkau mengirimkan orang yang ***** sebagai utusan. Maka bila tidak ada orang yang cerdik, sebaiknya dirimulah saja yang layak menjadi utusan.


10. Jauhilah bersifat dusta, sebab dusta itu mudah dilakukan, bagaikan memakan daging burung, padahal sedikit sahaja berdusta itu telah memberikan akibat yang berbahaya.


11. Hai anakku, bila engkau mempunyai dua pilihan, takziah orang mati atau hadir majlis perkahwinan, pilihlah utk menziarahi orang mati, sebab ianya akan mengingatkanmu kepada kampung akhirat sedangkan menghadiri pesta perkahwinan hanya mengingatkan dirimu kepada kesenangan duniawi sahaja.


12. Janganlah engkau makan sampai kenyang yang berlebihan, kerana sesungguhnya makan yang terlalu kenyang itu adalah lebih baiknya bila makanan itu diberikan kepada anjing sahaja.


13. Hai anakku, janganlah engkau langsung menelan sahaja kerana manisnya barang dan janganlah langsung memuntahkan saja kerana pahitnya sesuatu barang itu, kerana manis belum tentu menimbulkan kesegaran dan pahit itu belum tentu menimbulkan kesengsaraan.


14. Makanlah makananmu bersama-sama dengan orang-orang yang taqwa dan bermusyawarahlah urusanmu dengan para alim ulamak dengan cara meminta nasihat dari mereka.


15. Hai anakku, bukanlah satu kebaikan namanya bilamana engkau selalu mencari ilmu tetapi engkau tidak pernah mengamalkannya. Hal itu tidak ubah bagaikan orang yang mencari kayu api, maka setelah banyak ia tidak mampu memikulnya, padahal ia masih mahu menambahkannya.


16. Hai anakku, bilamana engkau mahu mencari kawan sejati, maka ujilah terlebih dahulu dengan berpura-pura membuat dia marah. Bilamana dalam kemarahan itu dia masih berusaha menginsafkan kamu, maka bolehlah engkau mengambil dia sebagai kawan. Bila tidak demikian, maka berhati-hatilah.


17. Selalulah baik tutur kata dan halus budi bahasamu serta manis wajahmu, dengan demikian engkau akan disukai orang melebihi sukanya seseorang terhadap orang lain yang pernah memberikan barang yang berharga.


18. Hai anakku, bila engkau berteman, tempatkanlah dirimu padanya sebagai orang yang tidak mengharapkan sesuatu daripadanya. Namun biarkanlah dia yang mengharapkan sesuatu darimu.


19. Jadikanlah dirimu dalam segala tingkahlaku sebagai orang yang tidak ingin menerima pujian atau mengharapkan sanjungan orang lain kerana itu adalah sifat riya' yang akan mendatangkan cela pada dirimu.


20. Hai anakku, janganlah engkau condong kepada urusan dunia dan hatimu selalu disusahkan oleh dunia saja kerana engkau diciptakan ALLAH bukanlah untuk dunia sahaja. Sesungguhnya tiada makhluk yang lebih hina daripada orang yang terpedaya dengan dunianya.


21. Hai anakku, usahakanlah agar mulutmu jangan mengeluarkan kata-kata yang busuk dan kotor serta kasar, kerana engkau akan lebih selamat bila berdiam diri. Kalau berbicara, usahakanlah agar bicaramu mendatangkan manfaat bagi orang lain.


22. Hai anakku, janganlah engkau mudah ketawa kalau bukan kerana sesuatu yang menggelikan, janganlah engkau berjalan tanpa tujuan yang pasti, janganlah engkau bertanya sesuatu yang tidak ada guna bagimu, janganlah mensia-siakan hartamu.


23. Barang siapa yang penyayang tentu akan disayangi, sesiapa yang pendiam akan selamat daripada berkata yang mengandungi racun, dan sesiapa yang tidak dapat menahan lidahnya dari berkata kotor tentu akan menyesal.


24. Hai anakku, bergaul rapatlah dengan orang yang alim lagi berilmu. Perhatikanlah kata nasihatnya kerana sesungguhnya sejuklah hati ini mendengarkan nasihatnya, hiduplah hati ini dengan cahaya hikmah dari mutiara kata-katanya bagaikan tanah yang subur lalu disirami air hujan.


25. Hai anakku, ambillah harta dunia sekadar keperluanmu sahaja, dan nafkahkanlah yang selebihnya untuk bekalan akhiratmu. Jangan engkau tendang dunia ini ke keranjang atau bakul sampah kerana nanti engkau akan menjadi pengemis yang membuat beban orang lain. Sebaliknya janganlah engkau peluk dunia ini serta meneguk habis airnya kerana sesungguhnya yang engkau makan dan pakai itu adalah tanah belaka. Janganlah engkau bertemankan dengan orang yang bersifat talam dua muka, kelak akan membinasakan dirimu.


Dipetik dari blog surau : http://surauat-/ tarbiyyah. blogspot. com/2008/ 11/25-pesanan- luqman-el- hakim-kepada- anak.html






Friday, October 23, 2009

Dr. Pornthip Rojanasunand



"
Hari ini mari kita lihat dan teliti sumbangan seorang tokoh yang hebat dalam bidang forensik dari Thailand. Beliau ialah Dr. Pornthip Rojanasunand, seorang wanita yang dilahirkan pada 21 Disember 1955. Seorang ahli pathologis forensik yang kerjanya membedah mayat orang dan mengenalpasti punca-punca kematian seseorang. Di negaranya sendiri beliau dikenali sebagai seorang wanita yang berani, seorang pakar dan seorang aktivis hak asasi manusia yang menyifatkan dirinya sebagai seorang yang berkhidmat untuk membela mayat yang tidak lagi boleh bercerita kepada kita tentang apa yang berlaku sehingga kepada detik kematiannya. Seorang isteri dan ibu ..selalu dilihat dengan fesyen rambut pelbagai warna..(bukan suruh tiru...wanita Islam kena tutup aurat )..jarang-jarang senyum...wanita hebat yang sesekali mencabar kerja-kerja polis dan pemimpin politik negaranya sendiri...dia mahsyur di negaranya sendiri dan kini mula dikenali di negara kita kerana penampilannya di mahkamah Malaysia baru-baru ini (saya tak campur hal politik dalam negeri ..saya lurus..saya objektif dan saya cuba berlaku adil ) kerana dia bekerja atas prinsip yang jelas untuk manusia dan kemanusaan.
Seringkali saya menulis dalam bahasa Melayu dan sekerap itu juga saya ingin memuatkan sebanyak mungkin artikel yang berguna yang berkaitan dengan tajuk yang saya pilih. Anda mungkin bertanya mengapa ya? jawapannya ialah kerana saya ingin sesuatu subjek yang saya pilih dilihat dan diamati secara menyeluruh..dunia ini bulat...akan tetapi dahulu kala orang mengatakan dunia ini mendatar (leper) hanya kerana masa orang itu mengeluarkan pendapat dan kenyataan ..dia hanya mengetahui setakat itu sahaja...jadi wahai teman....anda yang saya hormati...lihatlah dengan mata hati....kerana jarang sekali ia menipu...tapi sebelum itu bersihkanlah hati...kerana kalau hati tak bersih dan kotor....sama saja kita melihat dengan mata kasar....takkan nampak yang benar ....berfalsafah pulak saya..huhuhu....
Mungkin ada antara anda...akan bertanya " awat yang dia tak mau tulis sepenuhnya dalam bahasa Melayu atau terjemahkan saja dalam bahasa Melayu saja? kan senang nak baca..."mai sini cek nak habaq....byk artikel asal ditulis dalam bahasa Inggeris...kita kenalah hormat penulis asal....lagipun kalau saya nak tolong terjemah ..ia akan mengambil masa yang lama dan satu lagi ...maksud yang benar-benar nak disampaikan oleh penulis asal akan terpesong"....mai la kita belajaq baca dalam bahasa inggeris...bukan pasai bahasa ni hebat..tapi pasai sampai la ni...dalam internet banyak bahan ilmiah kita boleh dapat dengan senang di internet..lain la kalau satu hari nanti semua seluruh dunia berfokus ke Malaysia kerana Lembah Siberjaya kita jadi tempat utama orang mendapatkan ilmu dan menghasilkan ilmu....jadi masa itu insyaallah akan sampai juga....masa yang mana bahasa Melayu menjadi bahasa utama alam siber .....Insyallah...
Jom kita baca kisah hebat kerjaya seorang ahli pathologis forensik

THE SATURDAY PROFILE; On Death's Trail, a Detective Larger Than Life
By SETH MYDANS
Published: Saturday, April 13, 2002

THE SATURDAY PROFILE;
On Death's Trail, a Detective Larger Than Life","description":
"THE mild-mannered bank manager poked his head into the doorway, then quickly pulled it back. His wife was at work, and he did not want to look. He has never looked. He is afraid of corpses. If the body on the stainless steel table inside had somehow awakened for a moment, it might have jumped, too, with shock.
THE mild-mannered bank manager poked his head into the doorway, then quickly pulled it back. His wife was at work, and he did not want to look. He has never looked. He is afraid of corpses.
If the body on the stainless steel table inside had somehow awakened for a moment, it might have jumped, too, with shock.
Bending over it, with hungry fascination, was a woman whose head was covered with dark red spikes, whose lips were the color of dried blood, whose gloved fingernails, as she prepared to slice the body open, were encrusted with spangles.

Or perhaps the body would have said, as a dying accident victim once did, ''Oh, hello, Dr. Death.''
Once someone has seen Dr. Pornthip Rojanasunand, 47, the country's most famous pathologist, on television or on the cover of one of her best-selling books, it is impossible to forget her. She may be the strangest looking woman in Thailand.

Outlandish outfits. Platform shoes. Hair that seems to say, ''Surprise!'' in orange, rust, scarlet, mauve, chestnut. And, most unnerving, an absolutely straight face.
But Dr. Pornthip has earned her nickname not only through her flamboyance -- and this is not a nation of flamboyant people -- but also through her professional innovations and her straight talk about crime and social issues.

Almost single-handedly she has expanded the nearly nonexistent field of forensic pathology, has belatedly introduced DNA testing to Thailand and has brought some order to the procedures of her calling, detective work on the dead.

IN a country where power and status are something like a business-class ticket that offers special perks and comforts, Dr. Pornthip's candor about high-profile crimes has made her a real nuisance to the police and to those they protect.

It may seem surprising to find a pathologist on the front lines of social change, but Dr. Pornthip, in calling a bullet wound a bullet wound, is a leading voice in the struggle to replace the rule of privilege with the rule of law.

''The chief of police hates me,'' she said, ''because the police use a double standard and for me, everyone is equal. An unidentified body is the same as a powerful man to me.''
When the police quickly announced two years ago that the death of a member of Parliament had been a suicide, Dr. Pornthip received death threats when she told the press that photographs of the body made that seem unlikely.

The police revised their report.
When the police claimed in a sensational case last year that they had immediately identified the dismembered remains of the victim through DNA analysis, she pointed out that such tests take much more time. Again the police backed down.

Until her public criticisms brought a change in procedure two years ago, the police alone conducted autopsies on victims of police shootings or people who died in custody.
''How can such a system be allowed to exist?'' she said. ''How can the public be certain that autopsies conducted by the police forensic institute in cases of extrajudicial killings are not modified to help the police?''

Dr. Pornthip is a self-made specialist as well as a self-made celebrity. Much of what she knows about her field she taught herself from books; at the time she began, there were only a half-dozen forensic pathologists in Thailand.

She found, in the tales told by the dead, a way to discomfit the privileged. ''I didn't like powerful people to take advantage of others,'' she said. ''I thought I could do something about that.''
The relatives of one murdered man asked for her help when the police said, unconvincingly, that he had been killed by gangsters. Her autopsy found a bullet that provided evidence implicating the police themselves in the killing.

It is dramas like these that make her four books compulsive reading.
Her tales of her medical detective work, interspersed with how-to hints on dissection and bone-cutting, are told in chapters with irresistible titles like ''My First Corpse,'' ''Death by Tapeworm'' and ''I'm Not Scared of Ghosts, I'm Just Scared of the Smell.''


THE SATURDAY PROFILE; On Death's Trail, a Detective Larger Than Life
By SETH MYDANS
Published: Saturday, April 13, 2002
var articleToolsShareData = {"url":"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2002\/04\/13\/world\/the-saturday-profile-on-death-s-trail-a-detective-larger-than-life.html?sec=health&pagewanted=2","headline":"THE SATURDAY PROFILE; On Death's Trail, a Detective Larger Than Life","description":"THE mild-mannered bank manager poked his head into the doorway, then quickly pulled it back. His wife was at work, and he did not want to look. He has never looked. He is afraid of corpses. If the body on the stainless steel table inside had somehow awakened for a moment, it might have jumped, too, with shock. ",

On the cover of one book she is dressed in vestal white, cradling a skull. On the cover of her latest, titled ''Teaching With Corpses'' and published this year, she appears with her husband and daughter, all three of them in bright red outfits.
Dr. Pornthip is not, although she looks it, a person of the night.
Rather, she is a person of the predawn, when it is always darkest. She arrives most days at Ramathibodi Hospital by 5 a.m., and as the living world still sleeps, she is alone with her cold corpses, slicing, sawing and cracking bones.
From these swollen and discolored bodies she extracts the jewels of her craft, the liver, the heart, the kidney, the last dinner. Sliced and studied under an electron microscope, they reveal their secrets.

HER own secrets, hidden under her gaudy exterior, are harder to dislodge. Her parents, both scientists and teachers, tried, in vain, to steer her toward conformity, insisting that she study medicine rather than architecture.
Pathology attracted her, she said, because of the freedom and detective work involved and the chance to confront official hypocrisy.

Her artistic side found other outlets: drawing, cooking, homemaking, collecting popular music and the creation of her public image: long black dresses, leopard-skin tops, rainbow tunics, just about anything that no one else, not even rebellious kids, is wearing.

But she becomes suddenly colorless when asked the meaning of her visual statement. ''It cheers me up,'' she says, as if she had never given it a thought. Or, ''I think it makes me look younger.''
Special occasions hardly affect her look; perhaps a handful of glitter in her hair. ''I don't like going to parties,'' she said unexpectedly. ''I don't like a lot of people looking at me.''
If this is irony, it is seamless.

Her husband, Wichai, the bank manager, is her straight man, dry and low-key. For the first years of their marriage, he claims, he had no idea his wife worked with cadavers. ''I just thought she looked into a microscope and analyzed things.'' When at last he visited her workplace, he said, ''I ran.''

Their 9-year-old daughter, Nong Ten, seems to have a better idea of what her mother does than Dr. Pornthip's husband did at first. At school she has started drawing pictures of imaginary autopsy rooms and machines for extracting bones from bodies.
It is honorable work, her mother explains.
''I tell her that I have a duty to work with dead bodies to find out the truth about their death,'' Dr. Pornthip said. ''And if we do good, good will come back to us.''

For all her experience with cadavers, Dr. Pornthip does not seem to have given a great deal of thought to the manner of her own death.
She has worked on a man who choked to death on a banana and a snake-handler who was strangled by one of his pets. She has dealt with epidemics of suicide by jumping, hanging or swallowing rat poison.

None of that seems to have inspired her fertile imagination.
Like just about everybody else, she said she would prefer to die in her sleep.

Pornthip Rojanasunand
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
Khunying Pornthip Rojanasunand M.D. (Thai: พรทิพย์ โรจนสุนันท์, sometimes transliterated as Porntip Rojanasunan, RTGS: Phonthip Rotchanasunan; born: 21 December 1955) is a Thai forensic pathologist, author and human rights activist. She has repeatedly publicly stated that she has come across evidence of police abuses during her work.[citation needed]
Pornthip presently is Director of the Central Institute of Forensic Science, Ministry of Justice, in Bangkok and introduced DNA evidence to Thailand.[citation needed]
Before her public criticism, autopsies of victims of alleged police abuse were carried out in the police's own forensic institute; this has since changed.[citation needed]
During the anti-drug campaign by the government of Thaksin Shinawatra in early 2003, more than 1,000 people vanished or were killed; Pornthip has shown that several of these deaths were caused by police.[citation needed]
She has written several books about her work. The most prominent pathologist in Thailand, she gets regular media coverage with her allegations of abuse, and by her own admission, her unorthodox appearance: punk-rock hair dyed purplish red,[1] eccentric clothing and glittery eye makeup, and platform shoes.[2] The Thai English-language newspaper The Nation chose Pornthip, along with Chuwit Kamolvisit and Chote Wattanachet, as persons of the year for 2003.[citation needed] She was honored by King Bhumibol Adulyadej with the title "Khunying".[citation needed]
In the aftermath of the 2004 Indian Ocean earthquake, Pornthip took charge of the effort to identify victims of the tsunami in the Phang Nga region.[3] She and her team were widely praised for their hard work and dedication, but on January 13, 2005 Police General Nopadol Somboonsab complained that the police's identification centre in Phuket should have charge of all identification operations. Many commentators and Pornthip herself attributed the late intervention to Nopadol's personal vendetta against her.[4] Nopadol was ultimately successful, and the Phang Nga operation was closed down on February 3, 2005.[5]
The 2005 National Geographic documentary Crime Scene Bangkok (2004) tells her life story and covers her work in Phang Nga after the tsunami and her battle with the police.[6]
In June 2009, she was one of the pathologists investigating the death of actor David Carradine.[7]
In October 2009, she concluded that Malaysian Democratic Action Party employee Teoh Beng Hock, who had been detained by the Malaysian federal Government's Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission had an 80% probability of being murdered. [8]

Devoted doctor takes on her toughest challenge
She's trying to ID thousands of victims
Lynne O'Donnell, Chronicle Foreign Service
Wednesday, January 5, 2005


(01-05) 04:00 PDT Phang-Nga, Thailand -- Porntip Rojanasunan, Thailand's punky Doctor Death, strides around the courtyard of the Yan Yao Temple, a forensic superstar with spiked purple hair and glittering gold eye shadow now facing her sternest challenge.

Her fury and frustration pierce the throat-searing atmosphere of death that has encased this Buddhist temple since the Dec. 26 tsunami turned it into a morgue for 1,800 rotting corpses, many still unidentified.

"We have nothing here. What do we need? Everything," she says as clouds of eerie white vapor swirl up from blocks of dry ice thrown between black plastic body bags to slow the tropical rot. "We are not prepared for such a big disaster as this."

Dr. Porntip, as she is known in Thailand, has taken charge of the grim task of identifying, tagging and bagging the thousands of victims of the tsunami that engulfed the tourist mecca of southern Thailand. So far, around 5, 000 bodies have been found, and most of those yet to be buried or cremated are stored at three temples in Phang-Nga province, north of Phuket island, where the vast majority of victims died.

Yan Yao Temple has been transformed by necessity into Thailand's biggest morgue. Every minute, more bodies are brought through the arched temple gates, some in hastily knocked-together coffins stacked in trucks or on the back of tricycle rickshaws, some in plastic bags dragged in by volunteers wearing face masks against the stench.

The remains of the dead are laboriously unloaded onto the concrete courtyard, patrolled by young Thai volunteers wearing yellow rubber overalls and carrying backpacks of disinfectant that they constantly spray on the ground and on the unending flow of people who come to help or inquire about lost loved ones.

Refrigerated containers line the driveway, and former market stalls now distribute rubber gloves, rubber boots, face masks, bottles of mineral water and cups of instant noodles. The open-air prayer hall also offers free telephone and Internet services for the bereaved.
Dr. Porntip, 48, marches to and fro, calmly giving advice and support to the phalanx of foreign doctors and forensic experts -- Britons, Australians, New Zealanders, Belgians, Dutch, French, Israelis -- who have descended on Thailand to help identify the dead.

The multilingual Babel in the courtyard is evidence, Dr. Porntip says, that the recent tragedy has vindicated her criticism of the Thai government for not taking her profession seriously.
"We have only 50 forensic scientists in Thailand, no pathologists, no forensic anthropologists. We have no government official based here, and no manager to manage things. I am doing it all myself. And because we have never developed the quality of forensics, we cannot deal with the bodies in a thorough way," she said.

"The color of the skin and hair tells us if bodies are Thai or foreigners. We have tried to identify them completely, but because we lack staff, equipment and knowledge, we are just doing rough identification, by the face and clothes, and finally by DNA, which we have to send to China for analysis. '' As if to add emphasis to her complaints, 300 bodies, all Asian, had to be exhumed early last week after being wrongly identified before burial.

Over the past decade, the diminutive doctor, a devout Buddhist, has acquired superstar status in Thailand as a warrior for justice who stands up to police corruption and gangster intimidation. Unafraid of confronting a notoriously corrupt judicial system, she has risked personal danger by openly accusing police of torture and murder. She relentlessly badgered the government to set up an independent forensic laboratory until it established a Central Institute for Forensic Science a few years ago and appointed her deputy director.

"I think that goodness should protect me from danger from other people," she said. "So I believe that the spirits of the dead will protect me. It's the Buddhist way."

To stretch her meager state salary, she has become a best-selling author of books about the cases she has worked on, popularizing the image of modern detective work. Honored by the king with the title Khunying, equivalent to the British honorific Dame, Dr. Porntip says she hopes the tsunami will bring with it the lessons she has been trying to teach the Thai establishment.

"For seven years, I've been telling the government that Thailand needs a missing persons bureau because we have a thousand people every year who go unidentified. The police just throw the bodies in the river or burn them," she said. "I've been telling the ministers that when the police find an unidentified skull or other body parts, they must not destroy them, they must call me to come and get the body and do a DNA analysis. Now that we have this disaster on an international scale, and we cannot cope with it ourselves, I think finally the message will get through.''

While she is recognized wherever she goes and often mobbed by autograph hunters, Dr. Porntip has also earned enemies. Recently, she was sued by a regional police department after announcing that a young man accused of rape had been beaten to death during interrogation rather than by fellow prisoners, as police claimed.

Many of her detractors deride her wild hairstyle and casual dress, which contrast sharply with the accepted norms in conservative Thailand, and accuse her of being an attention-seeker. She brushes off criticism, saying her individual style aims "to make me happy, to compensate for the work, not to be an actress."

After Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra's wife, Potjaman, visited the temple early last week to offer her help in identifying the dead, and was politely turned down, Dr. Porntip said: "Our prime minister is aware of economics but he does not understand justice. No one understands that I want to do this type of work to help people. I am very tired, but I feel happy and satisfied when I can identify someone for their families." Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2005/01/05/MNGPEALB211.DTL#ixzz0UlHOgeOZ

Wednesday, October 21, 2009

Titanic: Crushing The Past






















Titanic - My Heart Will Go On Lyrics Album:
Every night in my dreams
I see you, I feel you

That is how I know you go on.

Far across the distance

and spaces between us
You have come to show you go on.

Near,

Far,

wherever you are,

I believe that the heart does go on.

Once more, you opened the door

And you're here in my heart,

and my heart will go on and on.

Love can touch us one time

and last for a lifetime

And never let go till we're gone.

Love was when I loved you,

one true time to hold on to

In my life we'll always go on.

Near, far, wherever you are,

I believe that the heart does go on.

Once more, you opened the door

And you're here in my heart,

and my heart will go on and on.

You're here, there's nothing I fear

And I know that my heart will go on.

We'll stay, forever this way

You are safe in my heart

and

my heart will go on and on.


First News of the Greatest Marine Disaster in History
THE TITANIC IN COLLISION, BUT EVERYBODY SAFE"-- ANOTHER TRIUMPH SET DOWN TO WIRELESS TELEGRAPHY-- THE WORLD GOES TO SLEEP PEACEFULLY--THE SAD AWAKENING.

LIKE a bolt out of a clear sky came the wireless message on Monday, April 15, 1912, that on Sunday night the great Titanic, on her maiden voyage across the Atlantic, had struck a gigantic iceberg, but that all the passengers were saved. The ship had signaled her distress and another victory was set down to wireless. Twenty-one hundred lives saved!
Additional news was soon received that the ship had collided with a mountain of ice in the North Atlantic, off Cape Race, Newfoundland, at 10.25 Sunday evening, April 14th. At 4.15 Monday morning the Canadian Government Marine Agency received a wireless message that the Titanic was sinking and that the steamers towing her were trying to get her into shoal water near Cape Race, for the purpose of beaching her.

Assalamuaalaikum dan selamat sejahtera semua ...

Saya teringat satu peristiwa bersejarah dalam hidup saya .(1997)..antara hari-hari gemilang zaman bujang saya di Universiti Sains Malaysia, Pulau Pinang. Satu hari saya ke Pusat Komputer di kampus induk USM. Masa tu internet baru saja bermula di Malaysia...kekaguman saya terhadap teknologi ini telah membawa saya berjalan sorang-sorang sambil membawa satu beg galas ke pusat komputer tersebut semata-mata untuk membuka satu email untuk dihantar kepada kawan-kawan saya di Universiti Utara Malaysia.

Masa saya di pusat komputer tu ...kebanyakkan skrin komputer (wallpaper) dihiasi dengan poster filem Titanic...siap dengan gambar hero dan heroinnya dengan pakaian yang sesuai dengan latar masa kapal itu tenggelam. Apa yang menarik sangat tentang filem "Titanic" ini..getus saya yang bukan kaki wayang ?...khabarnya filem ini berjaya mencetuskan satu fenomena seluruh dunia yang mana semua orang mula bercakap tentang satu peristiwa sejarah yang sebenarnya sudah berlaku pada 14 April 1912. Di Malaysia...hampir semua akhbar memuatkan forum perbincangan para pembaca tentang pengajaran dari filem ini...hebatkan? jarang berlaku ....jom kita lihat apa yang mencetuskan fenomena ini....

Diarah oleh
James Ca meron
Penerbit
Jon LandauJames Cameron
Pengarang
James Cameron
Lakonan
Leonardo DiCaprioKate WinsletBilly ZaneFrances FisherKathy BatesGloria StuartBill Paxton
Muzik
James Horner
Sinematografi
Russell Carpenter
Suntingan
Conrad Buff IVJames CameronRichard A. Harris
Pengedar
-Antarabangsa-20th Century Fox-As/Kanada-Paramount Pictures
Mula tayangan
31 Oktober 1997 19 Disember 1997 23 Januari 1998
Tempoh tayangan
194 min.
Negara
Amerika Syarikat
Bahasa
Bahasa Inggeris
Perbelanjaan
AS$200,000,000[1]
Pulangan kasar
AS$1,845,034,188(seluruh dunia)


Titanic, kapal penumpang yang menjadi harapan ramai, pernah dianggap sebagai kapal paling selamat di dunia. Badan kapal itu sepanjang 850 kaki dengan 14 buah kompartmen kedap air. Beratnya 46,000 tan. Tiada siapa menyangka ia boleh karam. Kapal Titanic dianggap sangat kukuh dan mampu menghadapi apa jua keadaan di lautan.
Namun, kapal itu telah tenggelam, karam di dasar laut bersama-sama kapten dan 1,513 penumpang yang malang.

Peristiwa kapal Titanic memberi pengajaran tentang perlunya perubahan dalam organisasi, pendekatan perjuangan, hatta kepada pegangan orang perseorangan.

Bagi Victor S.L. Tan, peristiwa Titanic berpunca dari 3 kesilapan besar:
Kesilapan 1: Percaya akan kekebalan - Setelah Titanic melanggar tepi bongkah ais (iceberg) yang tajam bercerancang, Kapten Ernest Smith sedikit pun tidak bimbang, meskipun dia sedar bahagian badan kapal itu telah merekah. Malahan, para pegawainya bersorak dengan gembira kerana kapal itu dapat melepasi iceberg. Apa yang mereka tidak sedar ialah air sedang mengalir masuk melalui rekahan sepanjang 300 kaki. Kesudahannya, kapal itu tenggelam di Lautan Atlantik.

Kesilapan ke 2: Mengambil ringan ancaman persekitaran – Seramai 2,300 orang penumpang berada di dalam kapal, tetapi terdapat hanya 16 buah bot penyelamat untuk 1,250 orang sahaja, walhal kapal itu boleh dilengkapi dengan 48 buah bot penyelamat. Meskipun laporan tentang wujudnya iceberg di sekitar perairan yang akan dilalui diterima, kapten tidak mengarahkan supaya kelajuan kapal dikurangkan atau bertukar haluan. Isyarat wireless yang menunjukkan kapal itu sedang bergerak dengan kelajuan 22 knot sejam menuju ke arah iceberg, sedikitpun tidak dihiraukan.

Kesilapan ke 3: Sudah terhantuk baru tengadah – Menurut laporan, perlanggaran berlaku tepat pada pukul 11.40 malam. Selama 25 minit berikutnya, tiada apa yang dilakukan. Hanya sejurus 5 minit selepas waktu tengah malam, barulah arahan untuk mengeluarkan bot-bot penyelamat diberi. Tetapi ia telah terlambat…

Demikianlah secebis kisah tentang perlunya PERUBAHAN. Kita sebagai individu juga perlu berubah. Apatah lagi Islam mengajar supaya `hari ini lebih baik berbanding semalam dan esok lebih baik berbanding dengan hari ini’. Kerajaan juga boleh berubah. Maka marilah kita bersam-sama melakukan perubahan ke arah sesuatu yang diredhai Allah swt.

Time for Reflection and Reforms

SPEED AND LUXURY OVEREMPHASIZED--SPACE NEEDED FOR LIFE-BOATS DEVOTED TO SWIMMING POOLS AND SQUASH- COURTS--MANIA FOR SPEED RECORDS COMPELS USE OF DANGEROUS ROUTES AND PREVENTS PROPER CAUTION IN FOGGY WEATHER--LIFE MORE VALUABLE THAN LUXURY--SAFETY MORE IMPORTANT THAN SPEED--AN AROUSED PUBLIC OPINION NECESSARY--INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE RECOMMENDED-- ADEQUATE LIFE-SAVING EQUIPMENT SHOULD BE COMPULSORY--SPEED REGULATIONS IN BAD WEATHER-- COOPERATION IN ARRANGING SCHEDULES TO KEEP VESSELS WITHIN REACH OF EACH OTHER--LEGAL REGULATIONS

IT is a long time since any modern vessel of importance has gone down under Nature's attack, and in general the floating city of steel laughs at the wind and waves. She is not, however, proof against disaster. The danger lies in her own power--in the tens of thousands of horse power with which she may be driven into another ship or into an iceberg standing cold and unyielding as a wall of granite. In view of this fact it is of the utmost importance that present-day vessels should be thoroughly provided with the most efficient life-saving devices. These would seem more important than fireplaces, squash-courts and many other luxuries with which the Titanic was provided. The comparatively few survivors of the ill-fated Titanic were saved by the life-boats. The hundreds of others who went down with the vessel perished because there were no life-boats to carry them until rescue came.

SURVIVORS URGE REFORM

The survivors urge the need of reform. In a resolution drawn up after the disaster they said:
"We feel it our duty to call the attention of the public to what we consider the inadequate supply of life-saving appliances provided for the modern passenger steamships and recommend that immediate steps be taken to compel passenger steamers to carry sufficient boats to accommodate the maximum number of people carried on board. The following facts were observed and should be considered in this connection: The insufficiency of life-boats, rafts, etc.; lack of trained seamen to man same (stokers, stewards, etc., are not efficient boat handlers); not enough officers to carry out emergency orders on the bridge and superintend the launching and control of life-boats; the absence of search lights.

"The Board of Trade allows for entirely too many people in each boat to permit the same to be properly handled. On the Titanic the boat deck was about seventy-five feet from the water and consequently the passengers were required to embark before lowering the boats, thus endangering the operation and preventing the taking on of the maximum number the boats would hold. Boats at all times should be properly equipped with provisions, water, lamps, compasses, lights, etc. Life-saving boat drills should be more frequent and thoroughly carried out and officers should be armed at both drills. There should be greater reduction of speed in fog and ice, as damage if collision actually occurs is liable to be less.

INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE RECOMMENDED


"In conclusion we suggest that an international conference be called to recommend the passage of identical laws providing for the safety of all at sea, and we urge the United States Government to take the initiative as soon as possible."
That ocean liners take chances with their passengers, though known to the well informed, is newly revealed and comes with a shock of surprise and dismay to most people. If boats are unsinkable as well as fireproof there is no need of any life-boats at all. But no such steamship has ever been constructed.

That it is realized that life-boats may be necessary on the best and newest steamships is proved by the fact that they carry them even beyond the law's requirements. But if life-boats for one-third of those on the ship are necessary, life-boats for all on board are equally necessary. The law of the United States requires this, but the law and trade regulations of England do not, and these controlled the Titanic and caused the death of over sixteen hundred people.

True, a steamship is rarely crowded to her capacity, and ordinarily accommodations in life-boats for a full list would not be needed. But that is no argument against maximum safety facilities, for when disaster comes it comes unexpectedly, and it might come when every berth was occupied. So there must be life-boats for use in every possible emergency. Places must be found for them and methods for handling them promptly.

Suppose a vessel to be thus equipped, would safety be insured? In calm weather such as the Titanic had, yes, for all that would be needed would be to keep the small boats afloat until help came. The Titanic could have saved everyone aboard. In heavy weather, no. As at present arranged, if a vessel has a list, or, in non-nautical language, has tipped over on one side, only the boats upon the lower side can be dropped, for they must be swung clear of the vessel to be lowered from the davits.

So there is a problem which it is the duty of marine designers to solve. They have heretofore turned their attention to the invention of some new contrivance for comfort and luxury. Now let them grasp the far more important question of taking every soul from a sinking ship. They can do it, and while they are about it, it would be well to supplement life-boats with other methods.
We like to think and to say that nothing is impossible in these days of ceaseless and energetic progress. Certainly it is possible for the brains of marine designers to find a better way for rescue work. Lewis Nixon, ship-builder and designer for years, is sure that we can revolutionize safety appliances. He has had a plan for a long time for the construction of a considerable section of deck that could be detached and floated off like an immense raft. He figures that such a deck- raft could be made to carry the bulk of the passengers.

That may seem a bit chimerical to laymen, but Nixon is no layman. His ideas are worthy of every consideration. Certain it is that something radical must be done, and that the maritime nations must get together, not only in the way of providing more life-saving facilities, but in agreeing upon navigation routes and methods.

Captain William S. Sims, of the United States Navy, who is in a position to know what he is talking about, has made some very pointed comments on the subject. He says:
"The truth of the matter is that in case any large passenger steamship sinks, by reason of collision or other fatal damage to her flotability, more than half of her passengers are doomed to death, even in fair weather, and in case there is a bit of a sea running none of the loaded boats can long remain afloat, even if they succeed in getting safely away from the side, and one more will be added to the long list of `the ships that never return.'

"Most people accept this condition as one of the inevitable perils of the sea, but I believe it can be shown that the terrible loss of life occasioned by such disasters as overtook the Bourgogne and the Titanic and many other ships can be avoided or at least greatly minimized. Moreover, it can be shown that the steamship owners are fully aware of the danger to their passengers; that the laws on the subject of life-saving appliances are wholly inadequate; that the steamship companies comply with the law, though they oppose any changes therein, and that they decline to adopt improved appliances; because there is no public demand for them, the demand being for high schedule speed and luxurious conditions of travel.

"In addition to installing efficient life-saving appliances, if the great steamship lines should come to an agreement to fix a maximum speed for their vessels of various classes and fix their dates and hours of steaming so that they would cross the ocean in pairs within supporting distances of each other, on routes clear of ice, all danger of ocean travel would practically be eliminated.
"The shortest course between New York and the English Channel lies across Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. Consequently the shortest water route is over seas where navigation is dangerous by reason of fog and ice. It is a notorious fact that the transatlantic steamships are not navigated with due regard to safety; that they steam at practically full speed in the densest fogs. But the companies cannot properly be blamed for this practice, because if the `blue liners' slow down in a fog or take a safe route, clear of ice, the public will take passage on the `green liners,' which take the shortest route, and keep up their schedule time; regardless of the risks indicated."

PROMPT REFORMS

The terrible sacrifice of the Titanic, however, is to have its fruit in safety for the future. The official announcement is
{illust. caption = A diagrammatic map showing how...}
made by the International Mercantile Marine that all its ships will be equipped with sufficient life-boats and rafts for every passenger and every member of the crew, without regard to the regulations in this country and England or Belgium. One of the German liners already had this complement of life-boats, though the German marine as a whole is sufficiently deficient at this point to induce the Reichstag to order an investigation.

Prompt, immediate and gratifying reform marks this action of the International Mercantile Marine. It is doubtless true that this precaution ought to have been taken without waiting for a loss of life such as makes all previous marine disasters seem trivial. But the public itself has been inert. For thirty years, since Plimsoll's day, every intelligent passenger knew that every British vessel was deficient in life- boats, but neither public opinion nor the public press took this matter up. There were no questions in Parliament and no measures introduced in Congress. Even the legislation by which the United States permitted English vessels reaching American ports to avoid the legal requirements of American statute law (which requires a seat in the life-boats for every passenger and every member of the crew) attracted no public attention, and occasional references to the subject by those better informed did nothing to awake action.

But this is past. Those who died bravely without complaint and with sacrificing regard for others did not lose their lives in vain. The safety of all travelers for all times to come under every civilized flag is to be greater through their sac- rifice. Under modern conditions life can be made as safe at sea as on the land. It is heartrending to stop and think that thirty-two more life-boats, costing only about $16,000, which could have been stowed away without being noticed on the broad decks of the Titanic, would have saved every man, woman and child on the steamer. There has never been so great a disaster in the history of civilization due to the neglect of so small an expenditure.

It would be idle to think that this was due simply to parsimony. It was really due to the false and vicious notion that life at sea must be made showy, sumptuous and magnificent. The absence of life-boats was not due to their cost, but to the demand for a great promenade deck, with ample space to look out on the sea with which a continuous row of life-boats would have interfered, and to the general tendency to lavish money on the luxuries of a voyage instead of first insuring its safety.
Did You Know?

The band played "Nearer My God To Thee" as the ship was sinking. The Titanic cost 7.5 million dollars (1912 dollars) to build.
The Titanic was a monstrous 882.5 feet in length and weighed a whopping 52,310 long tons!
The Titanic's final resting place is 12,500 feet below the ocean surface, 350 miles southeast of Newfoundland, Canada.
The Titanic was just one of three ships conceived by the White Star Line that would be at the height of comfort and speed. The White Star Line called the other two ships The Olympic and The Britannic.
Because of the immenseness of the ship, the Titanic's maiden voyage was delayed from March 20 to April 10, 1912.
There were three real smokestacks, the fourth being a "dummy" stack to add to its size. The fourth stack also was used to vent smoke from the ships many galleys.
The ship was able to sustain 3,500 passengers. On its maiden voyage it had 2,228 passengers, yet only had lifeboat capacity for 1,178 people.
The third class, or steerage, cabins boasted indoor toilet facilities that some of the steerage passengers had not enjoyed in their own homes!
The ship had not one, but two full musical ensembles, a squash court, swimming pool and gymnasium.
The ship cruised at 22 knots (around 25 miles per hour).
The day the Titanic sunk, it received its sixth ice warning by wireless telegraph.
Out of the 2,228 people on the Titanic, only 710 people survived.
After the ship sank, 337 bodies were found in the wreckage, 128 bodies were buried at sea, and many others were buried in Halifax, Canada.
Sir Arthur Rostron, Captain of the RMS Carpathia, was given a medal of honor for sailing through 58 miles of packed ice to pick up survivors of the Titanic.
As many as 549 out of 1,518 people who died on the Titanic were from Southampton, UK.
The iceberg struck the Titanic on its starboard side (front and right side).
The hull was divided into 16 watertight compartments, making the builders sure that she was "unsinkable."
The Titanic was rediscovered in two pieces on September 1, 1985.
On the night that the Titanic sank the seawater was a frigid -2 degrees celsius.