Never get involved in a land war in Asia.

Last night, I don't know why, but I got the itch to play Civilization IV again. I dug out the disc and reinstalled it. Ah... listening to the opening and title themes is probably one of the best gaming moments... ever.

It had been quite some time since I last played cIV (2 years!), so I was a little rusty with the game mechanics. I decided getting chummy with the tutorial session was in order. After the tutorial session is over, the game lets you continue playing in the map, which is pretty easy, since the only other civilisation apart from yours is India, led by peace-loving Gandhi.

In this session, I, playing as the Romans with Julius Caesar, decided to spread my religion (Buddhism) and culture to Gandhi's cities. Gandhi swiftly embraced Judaism and I was not pleased. As my civilisation was advanced further up the tech tree than Gandhi's, I decided to do some arm-twisting. Embrace Buddhism. Or else.

Gandhi, being the peace-loving hippy that he is, agreed. India gave up Judaism and embraced Buddhism.

When another civilisation's religion is the same religion as your state religion, it's easier to influence their cities to defect to yours. Which was exactly my plan. Before long, Rome's cultural influence and happiness of its citizens persuaded the Indian cities of Lahore and Bangalore to fall under the glory of the Roman Empire.

I didn't really concentrate on my military, and neither did Gandhi, so we agreed to have an open borders treaty, and together we declared "there shall be peace in our time". Hehehe... little did Gandhi know, while I built magnificent libraries and temples to increase my influence of culture, I was also secretly increasing my technological abilities, and my secret scientific labs came up with new advancements as the ages passed. I shared some of these technological advancements with my pal, Gandhi, of course. But by the time I gave them to Gandhi, they were already inferior to what I was already building.

Before long, the Roman Empire had expanded across the tiny continent we were on. It became painfully obvious that the continent was no longer big enough for the both of us. One of us had to go.

I'm sorry, Gandhi. It was great while it lasted. All the niceties we shared was just pillow talk, baby. You can never hope to defend your cities with your pikemen. My army of tanks will crush you.

He surrendered after I took Bombay. And Delhi. Now the planet was mine.

Meanwhile, in the real world, it was 2.30am, and I had to sleep.

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Lesson: Commemorative Covers are Lame.

Well, I got the first day cover that commemorates the 35th anniversary of the establishment diplomatic relations between China and Malaysia that I mentioned a couple of posts ago. Except that it's not a first day cover, it's a commemorative cover, which is a slightly different beast. I guess I should read the news article properly next time! The difference between the two is that first day covers are specially-designed envelopes stuck on with specially-designed stamps, and marked with a specially-designed postmark. A commemorative cover is a specially-designed envelope... and that's it. All in all, it's an unremarkable affair, especially if you're used to well-designed first day covers (not that Malaysian first day covers are well-designed... but I digress). Oh sure, a commemorative cover has a stamp printed right on to it but that's just like an overglorified aerogramme. Lame. On the whole, what a disappointment. I haven't been collecting first day cover

HOWTO: Get Rid of Silverfish

The bane of every book collecting person: the Silverfish. DUN DUN DUNNNNN!!! How to get rid of them? If one book has been infected, place it inside an air-tight plastic bag along with some silica gel desiccant. The silica gel is important to get rid of moisture, because you will now place the sealed plastic bag with the book in it inside the freezer. Leave it in there for a couple of days so that those bugs catch their death of cold. If you're feeling particularly paranoid, (like I usually am) feel free to leave the plastic bag in there for a week. If they're not dead, then you might likely have an infestation of zombie silverfish , which is out of the scope of this blogpost. But what if a whole colony of silverfish decided to invade your whole bookcase? Then you have to make sure you're ready for war. Place a generous amount of silica gel (or if you can find it, diatomaceous earth) behind your books at the back of the shelves so that moisture levels remain low.

An Ipoh Ghost Story.

When I was growing up in Ipoh in the 90s, the only good bookshops around were Mubaruk's, which specialised in textbooks (and still does), and Novelhut, the second-hand bookstore that used to be in Yik Foong (and maybe still is there, but I haven't checked in years since I prefer going to their Ipoh Parade outlet when I'm in town). There was also a pretty good bookstore in the Parkson Grand in Ipoh Parade which could have been a Berita outlet, but I don't remember. This was in the days before they expanded Ipoh Parade into what it is today. (And temporarily causing the Convent school next door to consider moving.) I recall this because I was thinking of when exactly I started reading "serious" fiction, trying to pinpoint the years when I moved from young adult/fantasy/sci-fi books into non-genre fiction. I still can't remember, but it brought back memories of a book I bought from a short-lived bookshop in Old Town. Mum had brought me there, because she must

Ted Mahsun

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