Of Pokemon and Red Alert

Salam.

Bismillah.

Reminiscent. Lately, it happened quiet frequent. Maybe because I'm in holiday mood in a holiday. No programs, or any long-term-outside-of-my-house affair. Seems like I got a lot of time to do things that I want to do.

So, when I have the time to do things I want to do, another event happened. On my way, I stumbled upon with the worlds of my past. One by one. Ceh. Like Toy Story - of how relentless Woody and his friends try to do things to get back the attention of their owner. A grown up boy. Hee.So, I just thought, oh, it's ok, maybe the 'ghost's of my childhood worlds has come to me(?).

So, what are they? Who are they? Well, they have been here with me along my walk in this life. I guess it's normal. Some of them are still with me until today.

Pokemon and E-mail
I got decks of Pokemon trading cards. When my holiday started, I didn't even know where I had placed that cards. Hundreds of them. Until one day, Ayaz and Saif discovered the treasure. Not surprised, when we memorize something during our childhood, it stays firm. Just like me, my friends and Pokemon. Hundreds of them with different type and character, power and their forms of evolution, levels of evolving and many more specific details. I still remember them until now - with their songs. It's a happy world though. "Prepare for trouble. Make it double......" Team Rocket's.
I learned a lot of English vocabulary just by memorizing Pokemon's names.
Rapidash - rapid
Charmender - salamender
Charmeleon - cameleon
Articuno - arctic
and many more to be listed..

I still remember during Ramadhan few years back, NTV7 had a Pokemon series at 8.30 p.m. At that time, we were very happy when our dad worked in the night shift. My siblings and I will have our Isya' and tarawih prayer at home with maximum speed so that we won't miss our cartoon. So childish. I was still in the primary school that time.

I have watched all of their movies hitherto. And now, as a replacement for Tv, I let my brothers watch Pokemon in the computer. It's better I think, because Tv has too much aurat exposure.
Picture below is a Pokemon named Rayquaza. Sky Dragon.
 

Rayquaza. Its name was so cool, so I took the name for my e-mail. Still using the mail.

Red Alert and Nikola Tesla

This is a game. Which I guess still bring a 'nostalgic' value to most Malay gamer from my age. Perhaps, for today, it will be a bit boring game. As it isn't as challenging and 'cool' as today's game, but still it was a legendary game. This game had introduced my generations a new picture about wars and its vicinity. Or to me at least. I still remember, after I came back from Subuh prayer at mosque during Ramadhan, I sat for hours playing the campaign mode of this game. 

Last week, when I surfed the net - I found a surprising information. You know, in Red Alert, we got two sides. Allied and Soviet. On the soviet's side, we can find their main theme was Tesla. They got Tesla trooper, Tesla coil, and Tesla tank. Even Tesla walker.

[Source] Tesla Coil. Feared guard tower.

[Source] Tesla tank.

These two are the Soviet's identities - in the game. As I surfed, I found something about Tesla. At first, I thought, oh this must be another attempt to bring things in game into real life - but, as I schemed, it's real. And it's all about Tesla.

So, who's Tesla?

[Source] Nikola Tesla (1856 - 1943)

Click Here to read more. He's Nikola Tesla. "The genius who lit the world" - title of a book about him. If Einstein smashed this world with his theory of relativity, Tony Stark with his Iron Man suits, Stephen Hawking with his black hole breakthrough, and Rosmah with her Islamic Fashion Festival and First Lady Summit, Nikola Tesla stepped-up the voltage of technology with his alternating current electric power system.

"Tesla pointed out the inefficiency of Edison’s direct current electrical powerhouses  that have been build up and down the Atlantic seaboard. The secret, he felt, lay in the use of alternating current, because to him all energies were cyclic. Why not build generators that would send  electrical energy along distribution lines  first one way, than another, in multiple waves using the polyphase principle?" - Tesla Memorial Society of New York

"I know two great men and you are one of them; the other is this young man." said his former employer to Thomas Edison in Tesla's recommendation letter. Tesla worked his way from working with simple electrical engineering to improving Edison's machine. According to Wikipedia, he claimed he was supposed to receive a huge amount of money when he finished redesign the inefficient Edison's work. Yet, he didn't receive anything at all. He then resigned from Edison's company.

The International System of Units  unit measuring magnetic field B (also referred to as the magnetic flux density and magnetic induction), the tesla, was named in his honor (at the Conférence Générale des Poids et Mesures, Paris, 1960). - Wikipedia

Besides his contribution in electrical engineering, he was also claimed to be the original developer of radio, not Marconi which we heard of him as the father of radio. Years later Marconi's patents were deemed invalid, and the real hero appeared. Tesla introduced the concept of wireless energy transfer with his radio controlled robot-boat.

He contributed to the world. And there's a lot more to be known and discovered by the public. Although most of his contributions were not too known, he had a famous invention called Tesla coil. What is Tesla coil? Let the picture describes its coolness.

[Source] The original Tesla coil.

A perfect counter-attack for amaterasu.

Sediakan payung sebelum kilat. :)

Lastly, as most cool scientists would do, he had few 'last shot's for this world. In his late years, he had completed a ''dynamic theory of gravity'',  but it never came out. So did his famous 'death ray'.

Dynamic theory of gravity. (What is that? Uh.. I don't know. It never made it way to the publisher.. You guess?)
A nice quote from a brilliant man for another brilliant man. He said about Einstein's relativity theory.
"...[a] magnificent mathematical garb which fascinates, dazzles and makes people blind to the underlying errors. The theory is like a beggar clothed in purple whom ignorant people take for a king ... its exponents are brilliant men but they are metaphysicists rather than scientists .. "

He also stated
"I hold that space cannot be curved, for the simple reason that it can have no properties. It might as well be said that God has properties. He has not, but only attributes and these are of our own making. Of properties we can only speak when dealing with matter filling the space. To say that in the presence of large bodies space becomes curved is equivalent to stating that something can act upon nothing. I, for one, refuse to subscribe to such a view" - Wikipedia


'Death ray' or 'Peace ray'
For a worldly context, the terms aren't a bit contradicting, aren't they? Ok. So, what is this ray? Perhaps this polite title of pieces he wrote would explain better - "The Art of Projecting Concentrated Non-dispersive Energy through the Natural Media"

More details - a particle beam. Cool..

"[The nozzle would] send concentrated beams of particles through the free air, of such tremendous energy that they will bring down a fleet of 10,000 enemy airplanes at a distance of 200 miles from a defending nation's border and will cause armies to drop dead in their tracks.^{[88] -Wikipedia} 

The weapon also never made its way to this world. Until now people never know what had happened. Or, the public never know.

Ok. That's all for this time being. Just want to be thankful to Allah because I have parents that know the 'limit' of these kinds of things. I'm enjoying this kind of thing. Maybe I'm restricted to some thing, but that's how it works. We have limited freedom. Alhamdulillah - I'm growing up without having anything to regret with my childhood, or anyone to blame in this case :)

p/s 1 : Hunting for Starcraft.
p/s 2 : Got an email in FCR alumni YG - got a book to recommend. "A World without Islam". Interview

Ok. Salam.