Rosmah Mansor, the controversial wife of prime minister Najib Razak, looks set to be thrust into public limelight again, following the appearance of a new YouTube video.
The blurry two-minute video clip (click here), uploaded very recently alongside many duplicate clips, shows the 61-year old taking centre stage among other performers dancing to the tune of the Hindi hit song ‘Jai Ho’.
Are you a woman in your 40s struck by strange restlessness, angst, and a feeling of something missing? Wonderful! You have hit the mid-life crisis, which today is nothing short of an opportunity to reinvent your life and live the way you wish to.
n Samuel Beckett’s brilliant absurdist drama, Vladimir and Estragon are two down and out tramps who keep waiting for a person, whom they know only by reputation, to turn up to change everything in their lives for the better. To keep busy while they wait, the two argue, sing, sleep, philosophize, and even contemplate suicide.
Every now and then they cry, “We’re saved”, whenever they feel Godot might be near. By the time ‘Waiting for Godot’ ends, the savior doesn’t turn up even as other characters, one of whom the tramps initially mistake for Godot, float in and out of their desolate lives. Like most great works of literature, the play is open to myriad interpretations – religious, ethical, existential and so on – but let’s look at it from a political angle that might capture the collective sentiment of many Malays today.this is the question put forth by the Federal Territories Umno headed by Minister Datuk Seri Tengku Adnan Mansor in defending Rosmah Mansor who has been criticised for using the government executive jet for her travels.Najib’s ‘love’ can fly in private jet for his own peace of kind. But he must pay for the costs himself, not get taxpayers to foot the bill. There is no parliamentary provision for the PM’s wife to enjoy private jet privileges by herself, whether on official business or not. The only exception is when she accompanies the PM while he is away on official duties.f this is the crap they can turn up with then it is a crying shame. If the love is in danger flying commercial airlines like our national carrier, then heads must roll in MAS, not that only the FLOM can and must travel by private airliner. If Sri Perdana is over spending on electricity bills then they should cut down and use maybe solar or LED lights. Dont just say they must live in darkness. Just like Jibs should not have suggested that he dines in candlelight, no one is suggesting that the first fat family live in darkness. Dont be a smart alec. Minister Datuk Seri Tengku Adnan Mansor
This is the question put forth by the Federal Territories Umno headed by Minister Datuk Seri Tengku Adnan Mansor in defending Rosmah Mansor who has been criticised for using the government executive jet for her travels.Now the plot is getting more interesting, this Federal Territories delegate Affandi Zahari is saying Shahidan was really stupid because Shahidan did say flying by private jet could be cheaper than commercial flights! A delegate and just mere UMNO member was outrightly saying a Minister in the Prime Minister Department Shahidan is a stupid or was he attempting to do damage control for Najib again?
We must be thankful that our Govt uses only a simple jet to travel. Like U.S., they use a 747 Jumbo or very soon maybe the Airbus 380. Maybe got kitchen inside to cook their favourite recipes with 5 star chefs, physio for heart problems, toilets with perfumed water for flushing, full bath whenever feel like bathing, iPad to play games and pets to pamper. Malaysia is so humble, compared to all this.Can you imagine the emotional strain Prime Minister Najib Abdul Razak will endure should something unfortunate happen to his wife when flying in a commercial airline?Don’t ever let anything happen to (Dr) Rosmah Mansor or else Najib will be wailing and moaning and groaning non-stop for 1000 days—and if he still breathes at the end of that period, he will strangle himself, rise from the dead, strangle himself again, rise from the dead, strangle himself again, on and on. Now, we wouldn’t want that to happen to Najib, would we? He is such a lovable, living, walking saint if ever there was one. Do let the honorary doctorate holder use the private jet whenever she travels out of and returns to into his armNajib’s ‘love’ must fly in private jets, bring along her posse of minsters’ wives at taxpayers’ expense, spend millions of ringgit on overseas shopping junkets, buy US$24 million diamond ring from Jacob & co, and manage billions of ringgit worth of federal funds on behalf of Permata. Yes, Najib really sayang his wife.
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Datuk Seri Azalina Othman yesterday gave the prime minister a hint of what to expect during this Parliament meeting – a rougher ride from the Barisan Nasional backbench.You don’t need to undertake that arduous journey, why hold your heart in your hands as you negotiate that slippery slope on the perilous path to UMNO president.READMOREhttp://suarakeadilanmalaysia.wordpress.com/2013/07/02/azalina-to-najib-stop-being-an-armchair-pm-why-women-has-beg-to-get-what-is-rightfully-theirs/
An interesting week this with two people I enjoy following on Twitter being at war with each other on a popular social networking site and beyond. It all started when Modi’s following on Twitter crossed the all-important million-mark and he thanked his followers for the love and appreciation. Tharoor like a provoked panther whose nose had been gently rubbed with a generous dose of pepper sarcastically sneezed in his ever so articulate fashion, “ Alas, most followers aren’t fans!” Now, maybe Mr. Tharoor has a point, but there is no guarantee that all of Tharoor’s 1.5 million followers are fans too. Was this Mr. Tharoor turning green, for now there is another politician in the ‘million’ club? A worthy competition in cyber world perhaps that irks Tharoor no end? Frankly, besides Modi and Tharoor, I see no other politician who can amass popular support on social networking forums. The rest are far too boring or far too corrupt for most to be wasting time over, with love or hate alike.
Fine, I understand Modi’s irritation, I understand Tharoor’s fury, I understand their choice of words too, albeit both being in extremely bad taste. But, what I fail to understand, is when somebody like Khurshid beats his chest like King Kong and shouts from the mountain top in a voice that can split the trembling oceans below that he can die for Sonia Gandhi, I am extremely bewildered. What kind of a role is Khurshid playing here? Is he playing the Salman of “ Maine pyar kiya” and sending his love messages tied to tender pigeon’s claws? Or is he playing a bogus Benhur and would not mind being pulled apart by horses veering off in opposite directions? Whatever act he is indulging in, the pigeon has surely carried the message to 10, Janpath. If the Law Minister of our country can stake his life for the Chairperson of his party in such a theatrical fashion, then there is no surprise why such Law Ministers get promoted to Foreign Affairs after ‘alleged’ robbery of wheelchairs and hearing devices.
Holistically speaking, neither should Modi have ridiculed Tharoor’s love nor should Tharoor have taken a dig at Modi’s singularity nor should have Salman been stealing from the specially abled. But, we are far removed from such holistic environments. Politicians by and large (with extremely few and rare exceptions) are the most thick-skinned of all breeds, a shameless lot. They would put a crocodile to shame with their tears, they can make a rose wilt with their fake sensitivity and make legendry thespians like Dilip Kumar appear quite mediocre. Loyalty, love, faithfulness have no permanent place in their lives. Everybody swims with the current, nobody dares to oppose, it would be perilous for them to do so. Love affairs, treachery, deception and drama in Indian politics are not new. Our Politicians being public figures cannot expect their personal lives not to be dragged into an open arena. If they do, then they better learn to live with disappointments, just like the way we have, when promises in plenty made by our Politicians have not been kept. Its time for us to change.
They need to be slapped for their lethargy, corrupt practices and treachery to the public, just like the way
Friday 12th October, onlookers in the Wisma Bapa Malaysia in Kuching were treated to an astonishing scene.
The elderly Chief Minister, Taib Mahmud and his very young wife Ragad indulged in a public row in the foyer of his office building.
Ragad had apparently turned up at the building and demanded to see her husband, for whom she waited until he came downstairs. As one person reported:
“after words were exchanged, the poor old man was subjected to a violent assault as his retiring bride kicked him in the shins in public!”
The couple then departed, in separate cars.
This is not the first sign that Sarawak’s ‘First Couple’ are enjoying a far from perfect union. On another recent occasion where Ragad again resorted to violence, she threw Taib’s briefcase at him in front of his assembled household.
Of course, Taib is no stranger to violence himself. Shortly after the marriage back in December 2010 he terrified people around him by picking up his golden gun and shooting it into the air in frustration after Ragad had apparently disappeared without saying where.
If that is how they act in public…..
Needed: A playmaker, not centre-forwards
We have political clowns dominating the national stage but unlike in Shakespeare’s plays, they provide no entertainment or anything of merit or significance to our conflict-ridden society. Instead, they simply push up our stress levels.
The most recent examples of political clowns the parliamentarian, Bung Moktar Radin.
The last in this group, Bung Moktar, the MP for Kitabatangan had previously made the headlines with various political antics and a polygamous marriage which did not meet the procedures and conditions required by Islamic law.
How can one person or a single emotion have so much hold on you as to wipe away the rest of your life? When a lover walks out on you…
One of the most painful experiences of romantic love is when one partner loses interest, while the other retains his or her romantic illusions. Ensconced in the illusory world that lovers create, it takes time for one partner to realise that the other has burst the bubble and escaped.
And with that realisation come immense pain, disbelief and denial. You feel wronged, and like a fish out of water, try desperately to flip back into the earlier equation. People try pleading, cajoling, emotional blackmail, manipulation even threat — anything to get back the magic. Some like Jiah Khan, even give up their lives. But that is no way to love or be loved. You cannot, and should not, force anyone to stay in a relationship, because an unwilling relationship causes unhappiness and is unnatural, often bordering on the dangerous.
venated…
Rosmah Mansor, the controversial wife of prime minister Najib Razak, looks set to be thrust into public limelight again, following the appearance of a new YouTube video.
The blurry two-minute video clip (click here), uploaded very recently alongside many duplicate clips, shows the 61-year old taking centre stage among other performers dancing to the tune of the Hindi hit song ‘Jai Ho’.
Kids flew the nest? Marital problems? Bored with your job? Lonely? Or, just irritated with the sameness of everything? You could be facing questions in your personal or professional life, or accosted by existential queries — do not just go with the flow. Get a grip on life and lead it where you want it.
I recently attended a Life Alignment group healing session with healer Jeff Levin in Delhi. Whether or not I managed to align my life through his revolutionary healing system is a moot point, but the day did turn into an interesting session that included therapy, some confessions, non-religious chanting and vibrational healing.
This group had almost all women in their middle years. The themes that emerged were: being taken for granted, forced to conform to social conditioning, arrested dreams, and unfulfilled aspirations. As Jeff encouraged each woman to speak, what reveal;ed itself was a group of women, who have purportedly lived a wonderful existence, undisturbed by major upheavals. They all considered themselves a happy, blessed lot with caring families — and yet there was a feeling of something vital missing.
Most of them had led protected lives, conforming to societal expectations. As one woman put it revealingly, “I went to college, got married, had children….and my husband has never restricted me. Yet, I always wanted to be an architect, and now I think it is too late.”
This panicky feeling of having done one’s duty to others, but not enough for oneself is a repeated motif in the lives of women of a certain age in India. As the years move on inexorably, women start feeling deprived. They have lived as daughters, wives, mothers and friends, but not really as themselves. What is it that you really want for yourself? What is the true purpose of Your life?
A tough question for women, especially Indian women, who grew up before the media explosion that brought in Hannah Montana and Lady Gaga into our living rooms. Few of us were lucky to have enlightened parents, who taught us to think for ourselves. For the rest, submission was the norm; rebellion, very rare.
Thankfully, today when mid-life crisis strikes, there are still a good many quality years left. Good education and independent incomes have ensured that women at this stage can still bring in powerful changes that give a new wonderful twist to their lives.
As natural creators and lifelong multi-taskers, women are far better equipped than men at reinventing their lives. But deep emotional attachments make it tougher for them to move on. Reaching for what you want involves a trade-off and so we tend to stick to our comfort zones.
However, so long as you are clear what you want, it is never too late to salvage a dream — so what if we can live out just certain aspects of it? And so, if not an architect, what stops you from creating beautiful spaces around yourself ? If you wished to be a doctor and couldn’t, what stops you from healing now?
After all, what’s in a name?
Sometime ago, a reader wrote to me in utter distress about a girl he met through social media. They (let us call them Rajan and Priya) struck up a relationship, and Priya waited three years for a commitment. Rajan told her to move on as he was not ready to commit. After a year, he realised he was unable to forget Priya and decided to get back with her. But by now, Priya had actually moved on and was in love with someone else. When he wrote to me, Rajan confessed he was so obsessed and regretful that he could neither eat, sleep nor work. He had taken to stalking Priya and the more he saw her, the more he regretted his mistake. This self-destroying obsession cannot be termed as ‘love’!
I was reminded of Rajan when I read actor Jiah’s suicide note where she says, “the pain that you (Suraj Pancholi) caused me everyday has destroyed every bit of me, destroyed my soul. I can’t eat or sleep or think or function. I am running away from everything. The career is not even worth it anymore…”
How can one person or a single emotion have so much hold on you as to wipe away the rest of your life? There is certainly something abnormal in this. People like Rajan and Jiah are so firmly locked within their own emotions that they fail to notice that their love is not reciprocated anymore. For, how can you love someone who doesn’t love you back? How can you suffer abuse and keep going back for more? And if you really love someone, how about giving them the space to choose who they want to love and live with? Where is your pride, your dignity, your love for others in your life, or even for yourself? Obsessive personalities love disproportionately, lavishing all attention on one individual, to the exclusion of all others.
Let’s take a look at what Jiah accuses Suraj of in her letter — she says life is not worth living when the person you love “threatens to hit you… cheats on you, telling other girls they are beautiful… throws you out of their house… lies to your face… makes you chase them in their car or disrespects their family… You didn’t even meet my sister, you didn’t bother buying me something, you chose to be away from me on Valentines Day.”
If anything, what emerges clearly is the picture of a young man raring to get on with his own life and end this relationship. And, unfortunately, Jiah comes through as highly emotionally-disturbed and not able to deal with reality, insisting on clinging to a relationship that is clearly dead.
Of course, this in no way exonerates Suraj, whose responsibility it was to try and help Jiah deal with her emotional distress. Instead, he not just closed his doors on her and openly flaunted other girls, but in an unforgivably cruel gesture even sent her a ‘break-up’ bouquet that reportedly proved to be the last straw for the distraught actor. When one lover walks out of a relationship, it is his duty to help the other get over the hurt.
Why would a woman want to stay in an abusive relationship? Jiah says, “I didn’t see any love or commitment from you. I just became increasingly scared that you would hurt me mentally or physically. Your life was about partying and women”, and accuses Suraj of “cheating and lies”. If that was so, she should have given up on him in any case and worked on freeing herself of any emotional distress. But she chose to remember all that she had done for him, and then gave up her life as well.
In her letter, Jiah talks of all that she gave to the relationship and almost seems to be demanding a price for her love, loyalty, time, obsession, and the gifts she gave Suraj. If a relationship leaves you with a gaping void within, why give so much to it? “I have no confidence or self esteem left, whatever talent whatever ambition you took it all away. You destroyed my life… you made me feel alone and vulnerable. I am so much more than this.”
One should give only as much as one can comfortably give to a relationship — be it emotions or gifts. The moment you give much more than you receive, or more than the relationship deserves, you raise your own expectations unrealistically and are bound to be disillusioned.
And nobody, I repeat, nobody can destroy you or make you feel powerless in a relationship unless you allow them to!
Did Kinabatangan MP Datuk Bung Mokhtar Radin marry the wrong person?
Most couples past the initial flush, start to wonder if they married wrong. Truthfully, there is no right person; there is only a right attitude
Watching a couple in their mid-30s with two young children talk intimately and smile at each other in the Shatabdi train, brought a smile to my face. It is heartening to see a married couple of some years with eyes only for each other. God knows there are so few around.
Interestingly, I had seen another on my way to the station in Chandigarh; a Sikh couple, well past middle-age eating chaat at a roadside vendor’s and talking animatedly with each other. “It’s praying and eating together at the gurdwara that keeps them so close to each other,” explained my mother, as she saw me admiring them.
Goodness, are we on our way to becoming cynical with regard to matrimonial bliss minus special divine blessing? I hope not. But the number of unhappy, disgruntled couples one comes across does make one wonder. A few years into matrimony, once the initial charm wears off, most start believing they have married the wrong partner. As the march of years weighs one down and the panic of approaching mortality strikes, it is common to list marriage to the ‘wrong’ person as one of life’s biggest regrets. This is the easiest way of externalising all blame for what one perceives as failures of life. It is easy to imagine that you could have achieved more and been a happier person, had you married someone else.
This regret is not unlike the hypothetical thought — “Had I been born richer, wealthier, better looking, I would have done far better in life!” The only difference is that you cannot hold yourself responsible for the facts of your birth, but you have only yourself to congratulate orblame for your choice of a partner.The more choice one has, thegreater the stress and scope for regret and what-ifs. You do not blameparents, siblings or children as being ‘wrong’ for you; since you never got to choose them, you just accept and work around them. But that doesn’t hold true of your spouse. You choose him or her out of many, and so keep wondering all through life, if you did actually end up with the ‘right’ one. And the fact that you wonder, is what causes the problem.
Also, romantic literature and art have infused unhappiness in love with a certain romanticism that seems attractive. So, it is not uncommon to see lovers of literature indulging their romanticism by imagining themselves trapped in marriage with the wrong partner. One such ‘sufferer’ dramatically told me in a conversation, “I am leading a suffocating life, with no ventilator for self-expression.”
However, truthfully, the only cases where we can say one is stuck with a wrong spouse are those of domestic abuse, unhealthy practices such as substance abuse or chronic infidelity. The rest, I believe, can all be overcome.Maudlin self-pity, the resort of the weak and cowardly, keeps us from taking a hard look at ourselves and examining if we really made the effort to do better in life and marriage, or were just content with our lot? Did we even make an effort to make the marriage work, rather than take refuge in declaring we got married to the wrong person? Do we even know who is, or was, the right person to marry? The truth is that there is no such one right person to marry. It is all very romantic to believe in soulmates and the one person God made for you, but the practical truth is that the success of a marriage lies not so much as in marrying the right person, as in adopting the right attitude towards your marriage and partner.
What then is the right attitude that ensures your marriage isn’t wrong? The most important is the sincere intention to make your marriage work. Mutual respect comes a close second, followed by patience and the ability to strike an emotional interdependence and so, form an enduring attachment. It is important to surmount your ego and never stop making efforts to keep up a channel of constant interaction and some shared interest. The important thing to remember is it is never too late, if you make the right effort. You would be surprised; scratch the surface and you may find your partner just as eager to meet you half-way.
It is easy to figure out the health status of a marriage by just watching a couple when they are together or out amongst other people. Indeed, my respect for a man goes up several notches after studying the body language of his wife. Is she confident and fearless as she talks? Does she have an opinion to share? If yes, then she has surely been given due regard and space in her marital home. And if a man is well-groomed and steady, surely he is well-looked after and respected at home.
So either all of us are married ‘wrong’ or all of us are married ‘right’. I tend to believe the latter.
