A lot of us would like to see our own site coming up on the first page of any search result from any search engine.

However, I found out that my page appears as a result of a search for 1) drunk malay and 2) nurhaliza chinese teresa. Huh?! What's up with that?! That's almost as bad as mac's girls on ladder search result. I wanted to add the link to his blog but I couldn't find the posting he made about it...or even if he did post an entry about it. Hmmm....

And since I've been getting a lot of hits from people looking for siti nurhaliza and the Royal Albert Hall, I suppose I could write what I've heard about the whole thing.

One thing I heard is that the Royal Albert Hall is not in the habit of inviting people to perform there. They have better things to do. So most people clamour to get a spot to perform there. And if you have a stint there on April Fool's Day, not many people are likely to take it seriously.

Another thing I heard is that not many people consider Siti Nurhaliza's performance a success because the attendance was 2,500 Malaysian people, most of which are students studying there and the rest are from the Sultan of Pahang's entourage! Some people in the entertainment industry would consider it a success if she had managed to get the Londoners to watch her show. Well, I do remember 2 British men making a statement about liking her music when they picked up her CD while they were in Malaysia and they had decided to attend the show when they found out she was going to be there.

Another thing I heard is that Siti got an interview on BBC about her show. Again, I didn't catch it myself. But my very reliable source said that Siti was asked what she thought about Britney Spears. To which she answered that she wants to establish her own image and not copy anyone else's...or something to that effect. And my only reaction is...huh?

Which brings me back again to the quality of English in our country. It scares me that our people actually go overseas with these English skills that we currently generally have. I'm not counting Sabah and Sarawak because we're generally still stuck in colonial times where language is concerned.

It's only in Sarawak where the conversation would go something like:
Person A: Tempat ya kat Limbungan Brooke kah? (That place is at Limbungan Brooke - basically means Brooke Dockyard anyway)
Person B: Kan!! Nya di Brooke Dockyard!! (No! It's at Brooke Dockyard)
Well, here, I know of people who are so used to hearing the names in English that they think you're bluffing when you tell them there's a Malay name for it too.

And another incident went:
A friend was in England for the first time. He was standing in line with a friend at a grocery store. Then, the friend who was in front of him told the lady behind the counter that he wanted Coke. Unfortunately, he said it as 'cock' not 'Coke'. Let's just say that the lady had to ask him to repeat it twice before my friend took pity on them both and quickly said 'Coke' in the correct pronounciation.

All these incidents are funny when you look at them in hindsight. But if you're ever caught in that situation, it is embarrassing.

And how did I get from search results to Coke?

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