It's a quiet morning on the dawn of the new Islamic year of 1429. Wishing all Muslims Happy New Year. I must admit, I had to refer to my diary and check what year it was, and also the Internet to remind myself the significance of Maal Hijrah - Here's a starting point http://www.regit.com/malaysia/festival/muharam.htm
Being a Malaysian we are blessed with so many New Years celebrations, from the usual Gregorian calendar New Year celebrations on Jan 1st, the Islamic New Year, Chinese New Year and the Hindu and Sikh New Years which fall in April. As I found out through my recent experience in trying to let out my apartment, the period between New Years and Chinese New Year tend to be the time most people move house, especially if you;re Chinese..to signify a new beginning or change your Feng Shui & luck for the new year.

For us in my-KART, it so happens that we will start our K1 series 2 days into the Islamic New Year, with Round 2 just before Chinese New Year, but I think the first two rounds will be "learning events" before things start to stabilise in earnest for Round 3, which will fall in the Chinese Year of the Rat. Yes...K1, and K2 & K3, will be "Rat Races" hahahah...literally!

But seriously, given the fact that only 8 rounds out of 10 are counted towards the championship, we will stabilise our format and participants and lock it down from Round 3 onwards.

What are the outstanding issues to resolve before Round 3? These are the main ones...
- Waiting list for K1 is growing by the day. Need to decide if we stick to 20 ppl for the whole season, or raise it up.
- Format will be tested for the first time in Round 1, and there will definitely be suggestions for improvement
- Privateer karters have already expressed interest to us for participation. We need to decide if we allow these to be run with the CRGs in K1 -> this may free up space on the CRGs for the waiting list ppl.

As of today, we have a healthy waiting list, and K2 & K3 participants lists are also healthy, which means the oveerall interest in my-KART has picked up with our old friends or "ex buayas" starting to come back to the group!

The year 2008, Islamic Year 1429 or Year of the Rat, may indeed be my-KART's Golden Year!

Wasalam and Happy Holidays to all. See you on track on Saturday!