Technology in our day to day lives - Microsoft Online Dialogues series

The Microsoft Online Dialogues series is an innovative Learning Networks partnership, bringing together the experience and perspective of a technology industry leader, and the power of AIESEC's Learning Networks Platform. The new topic in this series, Technology in our day to day lives, is one in which all AIESEC'ers can benefit from participating. So what exactly is this topic all about?

"Organisations like Microsoft and Google are under tremendous pressure to abide by government ruling in various countries. Yahoo is being questioned over revealing identities of its users. E-bay is being accused of selling more fakes on the internet than any other site. Instant messaging is being used to introduce handy computerised robots to help learn the way you work and adapt to your lifestyle. Where do you fit into this picture? How do these facts have an impact on you? "

The importance and relevance of technology in our day to day lives is ever increasing and can be ignored by a rare few. Living in a world driven by technology at every step, we need to keep pace with it, look at, discuss and evaluate the different faces of technology. A dialogue on the theme of Technology in our Day to Day Lives is going to explore various aspects of technology, which evolve at a rapid pace and are often responsible to create benchmarks in tech history. Given below is a sneak peek at the topics we are going to focus upon during this phase of the dialogues:

" Social Networking
" Blogging
" Instant Messaging

And much more!! So get ready to experience some of the most intriguing discussions you have come across on AIESEC.net, only on the Microsoft Online Dialogues Forum! If you or your LC members want to get involved in this topic, then:

1. Download and read the "Technology in our day to day lives" dialogue starter package
2.heck out the blog at: http://spaces.msn.com/msonlinedialogues
3. Post your thoughts on the Microsoft Online Dialogues forum, on the Corporate Responsibility IG community.

Would you like to know more about the Microsoft Online Dialogues Series? Contact the Project Manager, Harjeet Kumar - harjeet@gmail.com

Malam BUDAYA - a photo entry

Here's some photos from Malam BUDAYA... it was a great night! Thanks to Melvin, Christine, Alan, Geraline, Jamie and Chao who came...meant a lot to me!

The emcees, Christopher and Aishah

Getting ready...

Look who came!!! *grin*
Kaheng and Chao

Cindy, Belinda and Edwin at the control room

One half of the backdrop

The other half

Nyonya ladies from the Penang Peranakan Society

YB Teng Chang Yeow giving the officiation speech

Souvenir presentation - Thanks for coming! :D

Members of AIESEC USM doing the Haka

Sokka Gakkai performing a Mongolian dance

AIESECers are multi-talented!

Japanese exchange students perfoming the Soran Bushi

What's an AIESEC event without square dances? :D

Dinner for two. (Or things that I wished)

It was a cold Wednesday evening when I was staring at my table. It looked like a hurrican had just went pass the area, and there was barely enough place to put the three books I had borrowed from the library for my assignment.

Not to mention that under all that debris was part of the assignment itself.

Well, staring wouldn't accomplish much, but stared at the thing I did, hoping that there was some miracle that my mind would suddenly move all the papers and files and plastic bags into neat, ordinary piles.

So it was a long shot.

After about 3 minutes of staring, my phone started to ring. Thankful that something had interrupted me from my staring, I picked it up and looked at the message.

Are you hungry? Want to go out for dinner?

-Rachael

My heart skipped. Dinner? With Rachael?

This was too good to be true. Images as (only) the two of us sitting at a table, joking as we had dinner over a candlelight with the beautiful moon overhead...

My mind mentally slapped me again, waking me up from my daydream.

Shaking my head to clear my thoughts, I replied here sms, saying that it would be my pleasure. Putting on a pair of jeans and a simple shirt, headed to the front of the college and waited for the Princess in Shining Armor to arrive. Except that the shining armor would be the Perodua Kancil that Rachael drives, and that she isn't really royalty.

It was drizzling lightly when she arrived, and after picking me up we went over to K 14 to pick up Por. Instantly my dreams for a romantic candlelight dinner were dashed, and even more so when Rachael said we would be picking up Boon Jiann and Anne, his trainee from Holland for the HIV LN that LC UPM was running.

Picking all the other people up, it was decided that Anne would be introduced to Malay food. We drove up to a malay restaurant near UPM which specialised in huge glasses of fruit juices. There, we meet Nicole and Iqbal, two other AIESECers who were already finishing their dinner but decided to continue and hang out with us.

There was laughter and excited discussion all around, with us talking about everything from the weather to preparation of alcoholic drinks and putting lime in your eyes and snorting salt. Anne also got to taste Nasi Goreng and Nasi Lemak, Malaysian style. Apart from that, I also learned that drinking apple+starfruit+orange juice does not kill you, but tastes quite good instead.

It was fun all around, and although not a candlelight dinner, was still an awesome way to procrastinate and not do work.

Of course, going back to my room and still having my disaster-area table untidy was painful, but that's a different story.