The Great Assembly part 2

Captain’s log supplemental.

My engineers nearly started a riot when Admiral Abu conveyed the message that we are not going to continue the build the star ship. I was pretty pissed off too after so much hard work to a space ship together…

Admiral Abu brought us the "good" news that at half of our intended budget, the Chinese are going to sell us the PLAAF Xinjiang, one of their ‘geriatric’ Dongfan class starships. At least it comes with the the latest halal-food synthesizer. Chef will be pleased. The word at HQ is that a free space tour for Admiral Abu, our dear Prime Minister and their families on board the PLAAF's latest warp 5 starship clinched the deal.

Well they could have fooled the others by using the word ‘geriatric’, but my English is not that bad. It just means ‘old’. The Dongfan class ships were the first attempt by Cherry Aeronautics when they tried to copy the NX class starships. As with all Cherry knock-offs the vessel looks authentic, but only on the outside. When it goes to warp 2, the captain’s seat fells like its attached to a blender.

What could we do? We all signed the Aku Janji agreement when we were asked to join this project. So our creaking excuse of a starship now sits in Jiuquan spacedock waiting to be brought back to Kuah Space Port in Langkawi for commissioning by the Prime Minister's wife. Fingers crossed, her bottle of grape juice won't make a dent in the hull.

My latest order from Admiral Abu is to assemble a crew to fly the geriatric Xinjiang, now renamed KDA Mahathir. He specifically asked me to make sure that the team will reflect “the harmony of our society” and the priority should be given to those who are on the Unemployed Graduate Database.

I have asked the registration department to prepare a list of possible candidates and as usual, they are not as efficient as I would expect.

Ali out.

The Great Assembly part 1

Captain’s log stardate 203 er… 32.3 er… Oh. Its 20332.3.5. Hell, it is November 21, 2162.

I am still not familiar with the stardate system, a new system imposed by the Boleh Aeronautical & Space Agency a few days ago because they want to be different from other space agencies on earth.

I was asked by Admiral Abu to assemble a team and work with BASA to come with an exploration space ship that can travel faster than light. BASA was not happy when I ordered the warp 2 capable engine from Mitsubishi due to some historical event over 70 years ago. I did not give a damn because BASA gave me so little budget and that’s fastest that I could get. The BASA budget was so low until I have instruct the engineers to get some scrap alloy from the Waja junk yard to make the hull plating of the ship. For kevlar and graphite composite, we recycled the tennis racket rejects from Adidas.

For electronics and computer components, we had a great deal with Engtel. Engtel is the only Chinese company that can supply us with 100% Intel compatible processors, sub-processors and parts. For photonics, Cisico of China gave us a super saver for the the optical networks. For operating systems, we still have not decided whether we should use FreeBSD version 362, Windows XVI-P Space Edition or Mac OS XVI. So I have asked my engineer to get a few trial copies from Low Yat plaza. Let’s see what we can do tomorrow.

Ali out.