Happy Ramadhan 2008 AC / 1429 AH for all Muslims around the world who perform thirty-day long fasting. The starting day of Ramadhan this year most probably on Monday 1st of September or Tuesday 2nd of September 2008.

Update February 21, 2009: All export/import and embedded below-post-comment are now out of beta. So, you can directly login to blogger.com, instead of draft.blogger.com, and do export /import or setting below-post comment. ***

Google’s Blogger / blogspot doesn’t want to be lagged far behind its competitor. It seems willing and trying hard to improve its performance as per the end-users feedback. The embedded-below-post comment inbox is now on the trial–not officially released yet, though you’re encouraged to try it.

I wrote somewhere about English teaching in Indonesia thus:
Despite English language teaching starts from the junior high school (Class VII) in Indonesia educational system, and is supposed to be the second language after Bahasa Indonesia, instead of Dutch, the students are hardly conversant to this language unless they join a special Englsih course or having experience to study or stay abroad. The methodology of teaching and the quality of English teachers are probably two main reasons if we want to fingerpoint the major culprit.

 If Barack Obama loses in the coming election meaning white Americans are predominantly racists. That’s what Jacob Weisberg of Slate brilliantly concluded:
…the reason Obama isn’t ahead right now is that he trails badly among one group, older white voters. He does so for a simple reason: the color of his skin. … Much evidence points to racial prejudice as a factor that could be large enough to cost Obama the election. That warning is written all over last month’s CBS/New York Times poll, which is worth examining in detail if you want a quick grasp of white America’s curious sense of racial grievance.

The royals, kings and queen, in this 21st century may not enjoy the luxury of unreserved admiration, adulation and loyalty from their subjects like it used to be not so long ago. But certainly they still enjoy the luxury of “unlimited” wealth to enjoy the extravagant lives money can buy. In its 20th August edition, Forbes magazine published the list of richest existing royals, not the richest ordinary people, two of whom are coming from South East Asian countries, Thailand and Brunei. Surprisingly, King Bumiphol of Thailand got the “gold medal.” Please watch carefully the list below, who knows you are among those top list kings and queens.

A Spanish airliner bound for the Canary Islands at the height of the vacation season crashed, burned and broke into pieces Wednesday while trying to take off from Madrid, killing 153 people on board, officials said. There were only 19 survivors of the mid-afternoon crash, Development Minister Magdalena Alvarez said.

An Indonesian named NGUNI TOKA RONDONUWU (written RONDONUWU/NGUNI TOKA in the list below) was among those who were killed in Spain worst crash since 1983.

State officials

Below is the list of the names of Indonesia’s 12 richest state officials and how much money they have.

Name
Title
Wealth

Aburizal Bakrie
Indonesian Coordinating Minister for People’s Welfare
$1.05 billion

Hamengkubuwono X
Sultan of Yogyakarta
$140 million

Fadel Muhammad
Governor of Gorontalo
$16, 638, 186

Fahmi Idris
Indonesian Minister of Industry
$9, 423, 488

Zaulkifli Nurdin
Governor of Jambi
$6, 543, 216

Bun Bunan EJ Hutapea
Deputy Governor of Bank of Indonesia
$5, 927, 470

Fauzi Bowo
Governor of Jakarta
$4, 410, 803

Meutia F. Hatta
Indonesian State Minister for Women’s Empowerment
$4, 271, 758

Ginandjar Kartasasminata
Indonesian Chairman of Regional Parliament
$3, 246, 939

Budiarsa S.
Member of Indonesian House of Representatives
$2, 147, 909

Ratu Atut Chosiyah
Governor Banten
$1, 978, 968

Source: Wikipedia.com