O'Katz Parang Lading

Parang Lading is a weapon used by exponents of Silat Cekak and is also an agricultural tool.

This is a sort of generic design from a picture that I obtained from the net. The specific blade that I wanted to talk about is the O'Katz Parang Lading. From what I know, he only made 8 of these, and I am the proud owner of number 8.

I believe there are two differences between his design and the conventional parang lading.
1. His design is full tang compared to conventional rat-tail design commonly found in Malaysian parang
2. His long handle that caters for two handed holding.

My Handmade Knives

Since I went away, I got involved in some knife group and I was introduced to some knife makers in Malaysia. I have acquired a few handmade knives along the way, and here are some of them.

The first one is made by Kumar. You can search for him in Facebook under the name Vicious Tools, This knife is made using O1 steel. I believe now he has 1095, Elmax and D2 steel too, The sheath comes with the knife. You can check out some of his latest design in his Facebook page. Anyhow this is my first handmade knife. A word of advice, O1 is not stainless steel, so you have to oil it regularly or it will rust.

My pride and joy. This knife is made based on the One-Armed Swordsman movie. The steel is 5160 and the handle is made from kemuning emas wood. It has hammer patterns on the blade. Strangly I named this knife "Happy".

Another of my handmade knife, this one is made with IDK steel, and the handle is super special, it's Indian Rosewood.

If you look closely, you will see the same signature on both knives, the maker of these knives are Katz Tan out of Teluk Intan. He does not simply make and sell the knives to anyone, so you might want to get to know him first. He can be found on Facebook under the same name.

Those two knives does no come with sheaths. For sheaths, you might go for kydex sheath, Nadir from Outdoor Dynamics, based in Penang does kydex sheath. You can even send your blades to him if you are not in Penang.

 

He also sells an array of parangs under the brand MyParang. You can check out his website for more products.

I'm coming back - 18-August-2014

I have resigned from my Job and will be back actively from 18-August-2014.

Those are Rick Hinderer knives that I'm holding there.

Chinese New Year is coming at Queensbay

Merry Christmas

Rurouni Kenshin 2 - The Great Kyoto Arc Official Trailer

Wah, the Kyoto arc, I don't know how they are going to fit all the characters in one movie.

TIMSS and PISA results

Some of you might have heard of these 2, if you are in the education field. While some ministers boasts that we have the best education system in the world, the results say otherwise.

The Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) provides reliable and timely data on the mathematics and science achievement of U.S. 4th- and 8th-grade students compared to that of students in other countries. TIMSS data have been collected in 1995, 1999, 2003, 2007, and 2011. The next data collection is in 2015.

This is not a two cent NGO, the results are acknowledged worldwide, unless you are in denial. Their website if you want to refer http://nces.ed.gov/timss/

Here is the result for 2011, well, part of it anyhow

Here is the full reference in the website http://nces.ed.gov/timss/table11_3.asp

The average score is 500, with Malaysia scoring 440.

What about this PISA? No, it's not the leaning tower that we are talking about

The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) is a triennial international survey which aims to evaluate education systems worldwide by testing the skills and knowledge of 15-year-old students. To date, students representing more than 70 economies have participated in the assessment.

Their website http://www.oecd.org/pisa/

And the result for 2012

For the full result http://www.oecd.org/pisa/keyfindings/PISA-2012-results-snapshot-Volume-I-ENG.pdf

If you look carefully, you will see that Thailand has a higher score than Malaysia.

Time to wake up..