Looking for…

There’s this blog that I like to read regularly. One time she said that her friends commented how the tone of her writings now have changed compared to before. They said that before, her writings were filled with anger and frustrations, but now, her writings are mostly self reflective and the tone is laid-back. The “before” was the period from when she was still a grad student who struggled with tons of researches and paper, continuing to her job-seeking phase, up to the point she got a job. She pondered that maybe the changes are due to the fact that she’s settled now. She’s got a great job at a great company and is married to her longtime boyfriend. I wonder if I will turn out that way too. Right now most of my posts are tirades and rants. Will I calm down when I’m settled? Or maybe the more important question is, will I ever be able to reach my dream and settle down? Wallahu’alam. Insya Allah

 

Suffering from disillusionment…

It’s hard but hey, life’s a bitch. Like it or not you’ve gotta move on..

 

hahh shame on (stupid) you..

Hahaa memalukan sekali masalah tari Pendet kemarin. I found it really strange that everyone and especially the media instantly (dan dengan penuh semangat) mencaci-maki Malaysia. How could they be so confident of their side of the story? Did it never occur to them to verify the so-called theft? Didn’t they think of the possibility that the blame might lie on Discovery? But nooo!! Nobody I talked to even think of the possibility. They vehemently declared that “Malaysia is once again out to steal our culture!!!” and they called on everyone to come join the hate wagon. So now Discovery has admitted that it was their mistake, what do you have to say? Nothing. And if anything, this incident only serves as a testament to your stupidity. Hehh. And what’s worse, pemerintah kita yang tercinta itu (hoekk) made an official protest to Malaysia about this matter. Can you imagine? They made a big fuss over nothing!! And this is the government for God sake!!! How can they made a mistake over something like that?? So what are you going to do now? Issue apology to Malaysia? Hahh..

Everyone should stop this hating game already. It’s been going on for too long and too far and nothing good will come of it..

 

Notes on Jakarta

This is an old one, written when I just moved to Jakarta.

The first thing that I notice of Jakartans is that they don’t have the concept of personal space. They love sticking to people even if it’s not crowded. There have been several instances where I was on an angkot and there was only one other passenger. Of all the places in the empty angkot the passenger chose to sit right next to me, so close that we’re rubbing on each other. And when she fumbled in her bag, looking for the angkot fare, her elbow would invade my personal space. That’s just plain weird (and very uncomfortable). Trying to be husnuz dzhan-ing, maybe they’re so used to being squashed in a crowd that they feel insecure in an empty place.

The second one is people here love to spit. They spit everywhere. At the side of the road, in the market, in the bus and even in an angkot (yes, angkot). Very disgusting. I lived in Bandung for almost 5 years and I rarely (if ever) saw spittle at the side of the road. One time, there was even an old man who spit so zealously that along with the spit he also threw out some phlegm. And this happened on a bus, can you believe it?? Gross.. What if he had some contagious disease? Others on the bus could have been infected.

 

Random investigation (1)

Hm hmm judul di atas adalah untuk kalo aku lagi ingin melaporkan fenomena alam ataupun sosial hasil pengamatanku. huwehehee najong banget bahasanya.

Yah pertama-tama, membahas hasil postinganku sebelumnya, yang mengenai orang pacaran dunia milik berdua. berdasarkan “feedback” dari kawan-kawanku, bisa diambil kesimpulan (kok jadi kayak lagi nulis Bab 5 TA ya.. ) kalo opini terbagi dua, yaitu:
1. Bahwa aku terlalu sensi dan tidak mau mengerti keadaan orang yang punya pacar.
2. Setujuu!! memang bagi orang yang punya pacar tu pacar segalanya dan kawan bukanlah apa-apa.

Naah sekarang berdasarkan demografis (aka status) partisipan survei didapat bahwa, the ones who hold the former opinion are mostly those who have or used to have bf/gf. And those who think the latter (that people in love are a pain in the as*) are mostly those who have always been single ato dengan kata lain emang belum pernah pacaran (ini perkiraan sih, karena ada beberapa yang aku tak tau statusnya). Naah dari sini bisa ditarik kesimpulan.. kah? Bingung yang ada aku.

Does this mean that everyone will turn into selfish jerks when they get themselves a bf/gf?? Na’udzubillah deeehh (knock on wood). Aku tak mau jadi teman di kala senang doang kayak gitu..

 

Alhamdulillah

Just watched this video, and the first thing that came into my mind when I watched it was, the Inuit people must be having a hard life. Es dimana-mana, dingin selalu (yah gak sepanjang tahun sih, tapi almost all year-round).  Brr. Dulu waktu kecil kalo liat buku-buku cerita bergambar tentang orang eskimo, cuman mikir, “wah dingin”. Gitu doang. I had no idea how cold it could get in the Arctic. Sekarang, setelah merasakan winter yang dinginnya senajong-najong, barulah aku bisa sedikit relate gimana dinginnya di Arctic. Tapi tetap aja, di arctic pasti jauhhhhhh lebih dingin daripada winter di korea.

Dan lagi-lagi  (mengulang postinganku dulu), aku merasa orang Indonesia harus bersyukur, bersyukur dan bersyukur atas alam dan cuaca di Indonesia yang sangat nyaman dan bersahabat..

 

how much land does a man need?

The sentence “how much land does a man need” comes to me every now and then. It was a title of a short story by Tolstoy that I read when I was in high school. It’s been a long time but the story left a lasting impression on me. If you’ve never read this story I recommend you to read it

The story is about one greedy man in his attempt to get land from some tribe. The tribe is willing to sell the land at a really low price for any area of land. Here’s the catch, the area of the land is determined by how much he can walk around in one day. If he can get back to the spot where he started by the end of the day, the whole area enclosed by his walk is his.

Due to his greediness, he walks as far as he could. But he forgets to take into account that on the latter half his strength will have depleted and so he scrambles to reach the starting point before the sun sets.  He finally reaches the starting point and everyone watching cheers on him for his newly acquired vast expanse of land. But it turns out that the exhaustion has killed him so they buried him. In the end, he only needs a 2×1 meter square land.

 

mari bersyukur

How many of you Indonesians make it a habit to check out the weather forecast everyday? I don’t. Because I don’t think it really affects me whether it’s raining or not. If it’s the rainy season then I’ll always bring my umbrella with me. If it’s the dry season then I won’t. It’s always been that simple. Back in Indonesia, it seems to me that the weather has always been out of the picture when planning something, or anything for that matter (even when you’re holding a wedding party, cause most Indonesians will just hire a pawang. lol).

However,  during one of my conversation class (the one I described lovingly in the previous post ) we were having “weather” as the topic and I was asked one question, “How does the weather affect your lifestyle?”. I was like, “Affect my lifestyle? How CAN a weather affect my lifestyle??”. And Michael (for those of you who forgot, Michael’s the teacher’s name) was like, “Are you telling me you have never been affected by the weather all your life? Didn’t you consider of what the weather would be while making plans??”. I answered with a simple “No” and then he had this incredulous look on his face. He said, “For example, where I come from, the whole town could shut down because of a snowstorm. And when you open the door you see that snow has blocked your doorway up to the roof.” So I answered, “Well, Indonesia has only two season and they are not very different. The only difference is the amount and frequency of the rain. Which means you have to bring umbrella during the rainy season. That’s all. We don’t have four seasons, where the weather goes to the extremes.” And he had this you-guys-have-it-easy-there-huh look on his face that all the Indonesians (merasa dianggap remeh ) quickly replied,

“But during the dry season it gets really hot.”

“How hot? What’s the highest temperature it gets in Indonesia?”

“Umm 34? 35 degree Celcius?”. And then I added, “It was so hot that I’d get headache”

“In Canada, during the summer the temperature might reach 45 degree Celcius.”

And we were all like, “WHATT??!!” and were so embarrassed for saying 34 degree celcius is really hot…  

So, moral of the story, bersyukurlah kita, orang Indonesia, berada di khatulistiwa with its moderate climate. Musim kita gak aneh-aneh. Gak ada musim dingin yang dingin menusuk tulang ataupun musim panas yang kayaknya betul-betul bisa bikin mati kepanasan. Dah gitu gak ada angin topan, tornado, hujan badai. Tapi kalo gitu berarti Filipina kasian kali ya. Udah cuman dua musim, sering kena topan pula. Huehehee

 

Would you? or would you not?

Have you ever thought of what you would do if someone near to  you was being a victim of some kind of a violence (being robbed or attacked..)?  I never thought of it but recently I found out the answer for me.  And I must say that I’m ashamed of the answer.

Several nights ago, a man forced entry to the room next to mine. It was around 2 a.m and I was woken up by loud voices outside my room. When I listened, it turned out that some kind of struggle was going on. A woman (or is it a girl?) was trying to get away from a man. From the way he spoke I guessed that he was drunk. The girl screamed for help. At first only softly but gradually her scream became louder and louder.

I froze. I couldn’t do a thing. My heart was beating very fast. I didn’t even dare to move an inch since my bed creaks. I thought of grabbing the cooking knife, going outside and tried to scare him with the knife.  But then I thought against it. I was afraid that the act might drive him to be even more violent. But maybe that’s just me making up excuses to defend myself..

Well now I’m haunted by guilty feeling for having done nothing. Also, whenever I’m in my room the tiniest sound would make me jerk and be on alert. Even though the sound was only caused by someone passing my door and her bag happens to touch my door. And especially when a girl speaks with a higher tone. Because it reminds me of the scream. It was even worse several days before. Hearing a Korean man, whose voice resembles the attacker, speaks would unsettle me. I can only imagine how traumatized the poor girl is.. >_<

 

I love this class :)

In Korea, other than the Korean course I also have to attend the English conversation class. And I have to say, I reaaally love this class. I always look forward to it. One of the reasons is because the teacher is my favorite type of teacher. I have to admit that I’m a fervent admirer of the American way of teaching, where the teachers encourage the students to be critical of anything they are told. Where “the only dumb question is the one unasked”. They never say or do anything that discourage the student. And he is exactly that kind of teacher (he’s Canadian, by the way, not an American).

I mean, there is this guy in class who is very very quiet (Hellooo this is a conversation class. What are you here for??). He never volunteers to speak unless you ask him directly. And when he does talk, his voice is very very, and did I say very? soft we can barely hear what he’s saying. And Michael (he’s the teacher) never ever told him to speak faster. He always let him take his time to think and speak. He always has this interested expression on his face. Like he really wants to know your opinion. Michael waits patiently for him to speak even though the rest of us (or is it just me? ) have lost interest when we realize he needs like, five minutes, to say just one sentence (okay, maybe I’m exaggerating, a bit).

Another reason why I love this class is due to the diversity of the nationals in the class. Well actually not THAT diverse. There are only three nationals (four if you count Michael). But it’s good enough for me . Through the class I gain insights (caila bahasakuu ) on what’s it like in other countries. And they are all very interesting. And I will tell them on another posting.