Here's a pleasant surprise that dropped in our Picture Inbox.

Pinky shares with us a picture of her wedding at Kampung Kuala Perlis. She writes: "In the photo, Nadia, my second photographer was helping me to tidy up my hair before the Chinese traditional wedding ceremony started. I love this photo a lot as it is so beautiful! This photo was taken by Nadia's husband, Fendi."

Yes Pinky, it's a pretty picture in more ways than one. Do send us more. Get Nadia and Fendi too. And congrats on your wedding!

THE British were stumped. How do you fight an enemy that moved like the shadows, with skin and nail that blended with the belukar, and a spirit that mocked death? The communists were proving to be a stubborn lot. It called for a bold plan - quite possibly Malaya's grandest of mega projects - and it had to be executed with little margin for error.

Today we remember it as the Briggs Plan after its founder, Sir Harold Briggs, a General with the British armed forces.

It was launched 60 years ago on June 1, 1950 as a multifaceted operation to cut off the support and supply network of the Malayan National Liberation Army (MNLA) during the Malayan Emergency. It set out to win the "the hearts and minds" of the rural Chinese and the sprawling pockets of squatters just outside the main urban centres throughout the country. It was also during this period that the Police Special Branch acquired its reputation as being one of the best undercover intelligence agencies in the world.

Altogether about 500,000 Malayans, mainly ethnic Chinese, were relocated into communities called New Villages (or Kampung Baru). These were freshly carved from the jungle fringes, laid out on a tight grid of alleys, surrounded by barbed wire, and police posts. No more the sounds of cicadas and the moaning toads; their nights would be lit by floodlights.