I guess the title says it all.

Today, my Intoduction to Human Resource Management (IHRM) lecturer suddenly brought out this topic, causing much discussion in our lecture hall.. and even after class, some people were discussing about this.

Sadly to say, in our Malaysian culture where it has become a social obligation for the youth to update their friendster account 3468746 times a day, msn til their finger bleed, sms people all the time (even though the said person is just at the other end of the room) cause fu-yoo.... sms damn cheap ma reading as a hobby has become a radically diminishing habit.

So when I told my classmates that half the space in my room at home is occupied by storybooks, they just stared at me with comical expressions of pure surprise.

When I asked why, they response was around the lines "But you dont look like the reading type"

!!!! ISH.I dont know whether to be flattered or to be pissed off.

Great! Since when did you have to LOOK like the type who loves reading to love reading? Besides, is there some rule defining that people who loves reading are like a species of mammals that can be classified, categorized thus making them easy to spot and define?

I blame it on pop culture. Watching too much american teen movies does things to your head. You start thinking that pretty people who loves dressing up are brainless gits incapable of stringing whole sentences together. Then ah, people who wear spectacles so thick that they couldnt possibly get thicker, sloughes, wear braces, have pimples strategically placed aound the T-zone and have a weird sense of dressing are those who are capable of scoring straight A, loves reading BUT ah, have no people skills?

Thanks to pop culture classifying those who love reading as nerds, reading deemed as embarrassing reading textbooks dont count. cause you are FORCED to do it. Being caught reading would of cause gain you raised eyebrows and curious stares from your peers. It's like you are being caught dancing in your underwear!

Thus, it doesnt surprise me that one of my housemate doesnt know who saddam hussien is, despite him putting up a piece of Iraq's currency on his notice board. When I asked him how he got a currency with saddam's face in it, he went " saddam who?"

Oh.My.God.

For goodness sake people, READ. When I say read, I dont mean textbooks. It can improve your language, widen your perspective, make you more knowledgable and the best thing is, you wouldnt appear like a katak dibawah tempurung in front of people.