The circus is in town. Shout it out from the streets – or just type out the messages in the impersonal cyberspace. It’s time for the (political) parties. The ringmasters, the pretty artistes and the acrobats are out in all their glory. Oh, and the clowns are here, too.

SO the show begins. The dates for the long, long-awaited general elections are finally known. And already, the excitement is at fever-pitch.

But it’s that time of the year - when fake news starts to fly like, well… flies.

The statistics are terrifying. There are more bits of plastic in our seas than there are stars in our galaxy. Very soon, even the fish will be outnumbered. The result? Catastrophe. All because of our plastics.

Two Chinese New Years saw two sad events, with the passing of sports legends. But the greater sadness was the forgetfulness of Malaysians.

Life’s a bitch. These are heartbreaking times, with so many sad stories around us. However, as the Year of the Dog prances in, we can focus on the positive and see what we can do to help make things better.

WHAT a Wednesday! Okay, what a rotten Wednesday.

At the base of the National Monument is an inscription: ‘To Our Glorious Dead and the Emergency’. It honours the people – of many races and many nationalities – who died fighting for this nation.

I HAD a really enlightening moment a few days ago. I was at a restaurant waiting for my fried rice “bungkus” when this vaguely familiar man waved to me. I waved back and smiled.

Those As are important. But they are not everything. What we need is wholesome education for all.

The Ruler of Johor is advocating the return of English-medium schools. It’s a call that should be heeded.

It could have been a freak of nature, a climate change factor or just plain human greed and bad planning. Whatever the reason, hard questions need to be asked.