Detail of Earth Hour 2009 in Malaysia...

Earth Hour 2009 is just around the corner..it will be on this Saturday, 28th of March 2009…from 8.30pm to 9.30pm when cities from around the world will switch off their lights in an hour…

the global event first started in year 2007  in one city, Sydney, Australia. In year 2008, there are 400 cities in 35 countries participating the event, turning it into a global and international event…

In year 2009, it will be far more greater than the previous ones…there will be over 2400 cities from 82 countries from all around the world participating and giving their full support to the event…exceeding the target of 1000 cities (exceeded of over double, great result)

For Malaysia, there will be few cities that will switch off their lights, mainly Kuala Lumpur (capital city), Penang Island, Putrajaya (administrative city), Malacca and others…

Famous landmarks in Malaysia will be in the dark on that night in an hour such as Petronas Twin Towers (one of seven wonders of Asia, world tallest twin buildings), Kuala Lumpur Tower (world fifth tallest telecommunication tower), Independence Square, National Monument, Prime Minister Office, Penang Bridge, Sunway region, and many others..

Other famous landmarks from all around the world to be in dark will be Empire State Building, Great Pyramids of Giza, Golden Gate Bridge, Acropolis and many others…

Major cities participating are New York, London, Beijing, Hong Kong, Seoul, Kuala Lumpur, Manila, Sydney, Bangkok, Jakarta, Mumbai, Delhi, Paris, Cape Town, Tokyo, Toronto, Chicago, Rio de Janeiro, Mexico, Las Vegas, Athens, Shanghai, Singapore, Los Angeles, Dubai, and many others…

Support the event if u wished too by switching off the unnecessary lights at your home on 28th of March 2009, from 8.30pm to 9.30pm, local time.

Then, check out how Kuala Lumpur turns into darkness on that night..honestly, Kuala Lumpur does not have many lights turned on at night everyday, anyway, there is something unusual to see also as the lighted up Petronas Twin Towers and KL Tower will switch off their extreme lights too…

What I am desperate is to see how Hong Kong turned off all its beautiful lights in its city skyline at night…it is the best skyline city in the world..the lights there are amazing, colourful and changing neon lightings and lasers really amazed everyone…on that night, we won’t be seeing this as the city goes to darkness and the Symphony of Light show in the city everyday will be cancelled specially for the Earth Hour.

Am I supporting? Duno yet…let’s see…haha……………………………

U2 - City of Blinding Lights

Iglu & Hartly band member arrested after assaulting security www.privateofficer.com

Austin TX Mar 21 2009

A member of the band Iglu & Hartly, which is playing at the South by Southwest Music Festival, attacked a Downtown Austin hotel security guard Thursday morning while his band mate ran around taking his clothes off, according to Austin police.

Hilton Hotel security officers say they went to the sixth floor and found Samuel Martin running around taking his clothes off. While they were talking to him, they say Michael Anderson Jarvis started playing around on the piano.

Hotel security officers say while they were talking to Martin, Jarvis punched one of them in the face.

According the arrest affidavit, Jarvis said while he was playing piano, it looked like security was trying to fight his friend so he got up and rushed them. Jarvis also said he and Martin thought the whole thing would be funny.

Jarvis also said he figured it was okay to punch a security guard because he knew he wasn’t a police officer, according to the affidavit.

Jarvis is charged with assault on a public servant, a third degree felony.

Iglu & Hartly is scheduled to play two more weekend shows in Austin. The band’s website says it plays something described as a mix of synth-pop and rap. They got their start at the University of Colorado then moved to California

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CONVERTING CASH TO FINANCE

Kevin asks, “Can you discuss why cash buyers should consider financing, especially given the current credit ‘crisis’.”

If you don’t want to leave it up to your Business Manager to try to convert the customer, here are two simple techniques you can use on the sales floor to convert a cash customer to finance.

#1. Finance Charge Comparison: If you were to compare the simple compound interest investments versus the finance charges on a conventional auto loan, you would find that you would actually make money by keeping the investments in interest bearing account and making payment on the auto loan. A 6% auto loan, when compared to a 3.5% investment, will actually net approximately $800 in the customer’s favor. In addition, if they choose to finance they will have a free and clear vehicle and $29774 in the bank in 5 years!

#2. The home mortgage pull ahead: If your customer had a $165,000 mortgage for 30 years at 6% and made a one-time payment of $25,000, they would cut 9.5 years off their 30-year note saving them $112,775 in interest.

You can remind the customer that given the current economic climate, it makes sense to hold on to your cash in case of an emergency, you can always pay off your loan early. Even financial expert Suze Orman recommends holding on to your cash right now.

I recommend that you give every customer a lease and a finance payment when you give them your cash price. (It is a good idea to check with your Business Manager to see if they offer a one pay lease alternative as a third option.)

If the customer still wants to pay cash just let the Business Manager know that you discussed finance options with the customer, they may want to re-visit the issue.

If you have not tried to convert the customer, use these word tracks to give the Business Manager the opportunity to convert them. “When you speak with our Business Manger, make sure to ask him how he has saved some of our customers $500 to $2000 of the total cost of ownership on their new vehicles. See if he can do the same for you.” Make sure to tell the Business Manager that you have said this to the customer this information.

Note: Go to www.bankrate.com, click on the calculators at the top of the page; once the new page opens, go half way down and select your calculator.

Online Advertising: A money maker for businesses or a telemarketers dream?

My business number used to be swamped with telemarketing calls that when I answered was an automated attendant in a taped loud voice, saying things like “Hi, this is Sharon from customer service” or a guy nearly shouting “Would you like an office in Newport Beach?”.  Fortunately those type of calls have slowly disappeared.

The newest wave of business telemarketing is the  ”Hello…crackle…hiss….my name is….fiss…how are you doin…pop….day?”  variety.   Instantly I know it’s another one of those overseas telemarketing companies that’s using a cheap VoIP phone system.   I usually ask “What are you selling?”.  The response is almost always “Sir…we are …hiss, pop…crackle…not sel….crack, pop….we are offer…hiss, crackle, crackle, crackle, pop….you a very special offer of…hiss, pop, pop, pop…”  No sale, no big surprise there.  And with the thick heavy non-English accents of the telemarketers, and the snap-hiss-crackle-pop, the items they are “not selling” begin to sound the same.

But in the past few months I have seen a significant increase of telemarketing calls to my business.  I had assumed it was due to the faltering economy and that many companies were stepping up the telemarketing efforts.   And even though the majority of telemarketers have been the snap-hiss-crackle-pop VoIP variety, I also have seen an increase in local calls as well.   But it wasn’t until I received two separate calls on Friday that I realized the faltering economy was only part of the picture. 

First I received a local call from a company called PipeOne Communications with two very pushy tag-team salesman.  I admit the pushy salesman type can be great to play with sometimes, string them along, have them salivating thinking they are going to get a sale.  But I eventually I said no and asked where did they get my number.  They got it from my Craigslist Orange County Computer Services ad.

Wham.  It hit me like a ton of the proverbial bricks.  I had stepped up my on-line advertising campaigns, which included my telephone number.  Telemarketers stepped up there telemarketing campaigns by searching the internet for phone numbers to call.   I was dumbfounded because I didn’t make the connection of the recent increased telemarketing calls to the same reason I cancelled my Google AdWords and Superpages Online campaigns several years ago.

For every click and call I received from someone actually looking for my services, I received and paid for four clicks for companies to telemarket me.

The second call later that day confirmed it for me.  I received a call from a local company called Top Ranklisting and their pitch was that for $100/month, they would guarantee my business would be at the top of the Yahoo Sponsored listings in my local area.   I said that unless I was offered a money-back-guarantee that at least 50% of the calls from the sponsored ad were from consumers looking for my service and not just other companies trying to market themselves to me such as his own company, I would not be interested.  Even though he assured me that the calls would be from legitimate customers, he could not give me the money-back guarantee.  I eventually said to no to him and also asked where did he get my number.  As you may have guessed, it was from the same Craigslist ad.

My experience with online advertising is terrible in one aspect, great in another.  Its great that my online campaigns are visible and being seen, but terrible in that I seem to get mostly calls from the telemarketers which wastes my money and my time.   Some call it “click fraud”.

What has been your experience?  I would like to know.

Reverse Phone Detective Review

Gloria and Ike

Here is a story so tragic, so sad and so hopeless that it nearly can’t be true…but it is…

Perhaps 18 months ago we found a family in need, nothing amazing at the time, just another malnourished child (2 actually) in a struggling family with too many children and too small an income to feed and keep them all…nothing new, same old story in every slum all over the world.

But as time goes on and we get to know the family, the mothers name is Gloria, her husband is Ike and there are 7 kids. We save the children from malnourishment, medicate others in the family as needed, fix up their house so that the rain doesn’t poor in anymore…we help them, we love them just like Jesus.

Gloria is always grateful, but Ike is always aloof, morose and quiet, hardly ever speaks. God shows me a deep sadness, like a deep seated despair in him, something so traumatic that it has really messed him up on the inside. A grown man that no one except his wife loves and cares for, a man so desperately lonely, lost and hopeless on the inside, some one who has been absolutely shattered as a human being. I have no hope of describing accurately what God showed me about Ike, but I can honestly say I have never ever seen such deep sadness like this before. But as the team continued to visit, as we continued to help the family and then we gave Ike a Pedi Cab…hope came into their world (which sounds like such a pathetic cliché line).

I remember the first time I saw Ike smile, it just made me so happy. He rode that Pedi Cab everyday and sold a local food product in the nights. He worked so hard in all sorts of weather. He came to our house one day with cracks in his feet from riding and walking trying to make an income…we gave him boots, and he was just so incredibly grateful. We would see him in the day riding his Pedi Cab and he would smile and wave. Gradually he began to worship Jesus, listen in bible studies…his life was changing, his children and wife were all doing well. It was a long slow process, but there was real change in his life.

And then the unthinkable happened. He was out selling in the night and was confronted by another man looking for some one else. He asked Ike where this person was, Ike replied that he did not know and was then shot in the head and died on the spot. No reason, totally innocent, dead…just like that.

Now that is shocking enough…but now there are 7 young children who have no father, a wife with no husband and a family with no provider…what do they do…? Is any of this their fault, what could they of done differently, how can they fix this…who is responsible for them now…? WE ARE…

We began helping them with food, we helped them with the funeral. Then a church, Hope City, put up their hand to begin family sponsorship of this family. AUD $30 per week, more than a full wage amongst the poor. Today was the first day that an official food package was taken to Gloria. As I explained to her what was happening, and that she would now get a food package twice a week for a long time to come…she sort of sat there looking at us, and then she just burst into tears…hope had come again. As she cried, I cried and told her this was because Jesus loved her “Mahal ka na Hesus”.

The bible says that pure and undefiled relegion is to fly around the world in your private jet, preach in large crusades, collect large offerings and preach on prosperity, buy two more cars, another house and upgrade the sound system in your church…NO, NO, NO, NEVER…James 1:27 “Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and keep yourself unspotted from the world”

The bible says “has not God chosen the poor of this world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom, which he promised to those who love”.

Gloria, in all her heartache and pain has been chosen by God to be rich in faith (I am not saying God chose her to suffer). We can learn a lesson if we look at her life. If I was to put $30 into the offering of any large ministry, it would not be recognized as anything of importance, nothing of significance…but when it is put into the hands of a mother, with 7 children and no food, someone who has nothing at all, it reduces her to tears of thankfulness and gratitude, and she will see it as the hand of God, because she knows that she is no one, she is nothing, no one knows she even exists and then when a church in Australia (worlds away) feels a burden from God to help this insignificant, unknown mother of 7…she knows that God somehow did that for her, because how else could it of happened..?

This particular church now sponsors 7 families, most of them are only short term, but this one will be long term. The church is Hope City in Melbourne, the pastor is Andrew Magrath, there is a link to their site to the right of this article. Check out his blog, go to their site, visit their church, pray for them, finance them - they are doing a great work in their own neighborhood amongst the poor and needy.

None of us really needs to be supporting stuff overseas, there is so much need in our own backyards. I will say that again “NONE OF US REALLY NEEDS TO BE SUPPORTING STUFF OVERSEAS”…unless you are already helping people in your own backyard first.

All churches, all christians should have a four fold plan and vision for evangelism…

Jerusalem represents your own world, your own place and location, reach the lost there first and foremost…

Judea represents your surrounding area, suburbs, towns or cities…

Samaria, places a little further away, unloved, unliked people groups…

And finally the world…DON’T DO THIS FIRST, DO THIS LAST, IF AT ALL…

“CHANGE YOUR OWN WORLD, HAVE AN IMPACT THERE FIRST”