"
Breathe, keep breathing. Don't lose your nerve" -
Radiohead



Page 163: As Simple As That

/ Thursday, August 30, 2012 /
Couple of days ago when I just got back from my parents’ home and entered the apartment; I called my roommate, “Neng?” And when she replied, I went straight to her room, and hugged her. I don’t know why. Yes, I haven’t seen her for a week because she went to Medan, but before that, I didn’t miss her that bad until decided to gave her a hug. And before that, I had experience being far from her more than a week, but still I didn’t hug her.

Anyway, after that, we did our “routines”: sharing about most of the things that recently happened in our life, gossiping, discussing this and that, and laughing our ass off about silly things/ people. I like several thoughts that came up from our conversation that day. I think that’s the joy of talking with smart, funny, and open minded person like her. You can always get some fresh insight for your mind and some of them make you want to share it through your blog. Although I don’t know if anyone ever really read this blog *hahaha*, I mean except my friend or people that dropped comments. But yeah, visitor counter said that actually some people came to this virtual asylum. :p

I think the most interesting part when we finally acknowledge that the way we saw our beliefs is changing *tsaaah...seddaaaap :p.* Me with the way I saw Islam, its rituals and rules, and how I connected with God. While she had already came to the point when she thinks she is no longer an agnostic, but an atheist. I can’t tell about her turning point. Mine is happen last Ramadan. I am still learning, though, on dividing which that I must hold dearly in my heart, which that actually was part of Middle East culture that people misinterpreted it as part of Islam, and which that was actually came up because the way people exaggerated things in the past. It is important because your belief should lead you to inner peace, make you a better person and treat people with respects and tolerance. It doesn’t have to be religion; you can still find inner peace although you’re an agnostic or an atheist. It is important because that is the least that you can do to find the real value, something that you really can do while you are still breathing, while you are alive.

Up until now, I still don’t understand people who persuade their friends to choose leader/politician that has the same religion, simply because they felt threatened that if they didn’t do it, it will oppress their freedom to do rituals. Believe it or not, my neighbor was practicing this method to my father. And all that my father could do was smirking. He didn’t give a damn, for sure. Hahaha. Once I wrote about this kind of blind faith, time passed by and I still don’t understand how they could be so suspicious. Why it seemed very hard for them to understand and learn more about the concept of tolerance? It’s a simple thing actually. As simple as if my roommate asks me why I haven’t took prayer while I was busy doing something. See? She doesn’t believe in god or deity yet she still reminds me about my rituals, because we know that as adults who can use their brains to think and their hearts to feel, no one can and have the right to force belief/faith to others. Yep, as simple as that.

Aweee, we’re so adorable or what? Hahaha.

And here's Losing My Religion by R.E.M. Just because i miss Mr. Stipe and the gank today ;)

Page 162: Today’s playlist

/ Wednesday, August 29, 2012 /

Because yesterday a friend sang this song and i did not recognize it right away. Weird, because there were this particular period of time when i listened to this song repeatedly.

Sorry, yorke. ;)

So let’s sing together!
“Little babies eyes, eyes, eyes, eyes,”


Aaaandddd............back to work!
:|

Page 161: Victim Blaming, Preaching, and Eid Mubarak.

/ Wednesday, August 22, 2012 /
Once, this sentence written on Jezebel, “more than 50 years after the women’s movement began, we’re still trying to silence women with dicks.” True. Although “weapons” used by misogynist could be different on each country/ area, the core strategy is still the same: use sex to beat women down. Besides rape, (and sexual assault, oppression, stupid law and regulation, etc), victim blaming is also one of the weapons to shut women’s minds and mouths.

Couple of days ago, after I had Eid Prayer at a mosque near my home and get ready to leave, an old lady in my neighborhood asked me why she rarely saw me during tarawih time this Ramadan, even on weekend. I simply answered I had tarawih at other places, because I want to get new experience. I wasn’t lying, I’d had tarawih at other places, I just didn’t tell her the details, that the mosque where we used to have tarawih at, disappointed me last year for invited preachers that spread this vague hatred towards other beliefs and women. I remember a preacher told this story about women that wearing short skirt or tight shirt can’t blame men entirely if they assault them sexually, because that kind of outfit is another way to seduce men without saying a word. Great! What a fallacy! That impolite cave man encouraged people to do victim blaming.

That was WTF moment. And that preacher is an a-hole.

I know how it feels to be blame when actually I was the victim. Years ago, a stranger groped my breast on a bus, and when I told my cousin about it, the first thing that came out from her mouth was, “what were you wearing that night? Maybe it was too tight so that man took the wrong signal.”

Another WTF moment.

I was angry that time. And I told her that there’s nothing wrong with what I wore (oversized shirt and jeans, and I was much skinnier back then, how seductive that could be?) but there’s definitely something wrong with that man’s brain and her head.

My points:
1. If a woman wearing tight dress or even bikini, doesn’t mean you can lay your hands on her just like that. My body is my temple, there’s list of rules and you have to respect it.
2. Quoting this person: Rape is caused by rapist, misogyny, structural violence, institutional tolerance. Not by women's clothes, the way she walks, the way she crosses her legs, the makeup she wears, being in the "wrong" place, drinking, or not being "careful enough".

Anyway, happy Eid Mubarak for all Moslem in the world. Happy holidays (if you had any) for the rest. This year Eid wasn’t that different from previous years, at least for me. Still busy help my mom preparing food for more than fifty people. Still help my dad rearrange furniture (but this year, including held the refrigerator for 15 seconds or more so it wouldn’t tumble down while my dad was fixing a wheel on its supporting board. After that, I can’t feel my arms and spine for a while :p ) so all family members could fit into our home. Still can’t eat anything with santan in it for a week (never really like santan, tho). Still munching kastengel continuously like there’s no tomorrow. Still make a cup of black coffee at night as a reward for myself on facing a super hectic day.

a cup of black coffee and a new book, a little piece of heaven :) 
I know this post has such a messy structure, but I’m stick with JK Rowling that, “For my own mental health, I need to write.”

Page 160: I Miss My Days as a (Full time) Journalist

/ /

Some say every picture has its own story. For those who don’t know the story behind picture above would say that it’s just a picture of three women had fun with an application, which gave them silly virtual hats. For me, well, it’s not that different actually, hehe. The additional story is that the picture was taken 2 years ago, when we were still journalists, unmarried, and lived in the same big chaotic city: Jakarta.

Yep, back then, three of us were journalists. Young journalists. The left one was an economic journalist, the one in the middle was a lifestyle/woman media journalist, and the right one (me) was an IT journalist. We weren’t that satisfied with our companies, three of the biggest media companies in Indonesia. So we decided to make some changes in our life, for a better future. Since then, here’s a quick recap of what happened with us:

- The left one got married and move to Surabaya, leave her career as journalist, now a mother of one daughter. Still blogging, loves cooking, and recently got interviewed by one of the biggest newspapers in Surabaya for an article about mothers that breastfeeding their kids but still fasting.

- The one in the middle now working as media relation staff, still unmarried, had pretty amazing love stories *this is not sarcasm, li. I really think that your love story was pretty amazing, please don’t hurt me if you read this*, dated few guys, fell in love and broken hearted. Still lives in Jakarta.

- Me? Now I’m working as digital media/ marketing and communication staff on a company based in Jakarta, still unmarried, fell in love but then failed on building a healthy relationship *twice*, but I’m sure I’ve moved on.

I’m not trying to analyze whether our life gotten worse or bad in this post, what I know is that we’re not in the same city, and we’re not journalists anymore. And o boy, I don’t know what bumped me in the head, but I miss those days when I was still a full time journalist (I’m still a freelance one, btw), when most of my friends also were, not just the two of them.

I miss gathering news, hunting pictures, traveling, and interviewing smart-interesting people. I miss those days when readers send me emails to give compliments or ask me anything related with my writings. Even as a writer in Seringai fanzine, High Octane, when their fans asked me about their schedule or simply told me that they like what they read on last issue. I miss people ask me almost about anything because they think I always had the answer, simply because I’m a journalist. I even miss my long tousled hair in that picture! I miss the day after deadline when we drank coffee in the morning and gossiping or shared everything that recently happened in our life, and then off to the office at 2PM. Yes! 2PM!

I miss talking about latest news and discussing with my boss about my questions for interview session I’ll have in the next day. I miss sharing facts and gossips about informants, about funny and silly things that happened during photo session or press conference. I miss free delicious meal and cute stuffs inside goodie bag. I miss free trip to other part of this country or Singapore, although I don’t love that country. I miss reviewing restaurants and interviewing chef about food when I was working in lifestyle magazine. I miss my boss raised his voice tone to remind me that I must gave him four more pages for upcoming issue immediately. I miss how my weight stuck in 43 kilos (no diet or exercise) because as a journalist I always moving and doing things and kept busy.

Hell no, I don’t miss the deadline. I don’t miss leaving office at 5AM and then have to be at the airport at 7 to take flight to other city/country and can't get some rest before I finish writing the freshest news I can get on that day.

To be honest, I’m not sure why I miss those things suddenly. Is it the job or the fact that I was younger when I had that job? Because maybe, just maybe, I simply miss my youth when I don’t have to face the fact that three years from now, I will be 30. Damn.

Page 159: Dudeeee....

/ /

Why you have to make that picture as your avatar? (Something that looks like) white plain shirt? Dense stubble?

Good God, come on! I don’t want to fancy this guy. 


Page 158: Art Nowadays. From a Commoner Like Me.

/ /
Not so long time ago, I had a conversation with my friend about how creative industries in Jakarta been growing fast these couple of years as well as urban art scene. Along with its growth, some names also appear in the Emerging Artist list. We were also discussing about those people on the list. We agreed that some of them are making marvelous artworks, but some of them also overrated; they are not that good, or you can find other artist who can create better artworks with better technique and deeper meanings.

No, both of us are not curator, experts, or even working in art field. Yes, we went to art exhibitions sometimes. And sometimes, during our visits we found ourselves “lost” in some artworks from artists whom took part in those exhibitions. “Lost”, meaning we didn’t understand or think or feel that it’s good/superb/magnificent/great/wonderful/make-us-want-to-shed-happy-tears when we saw it.

Good in my perception is if I can see that the artwork can delivered the artist’s purpose, get the message beneath, or make me feel some kind of strong emotion all of a sudden when I see it. At least make me think, “Gosh, this is great. I will never have the ability to make this kind of painting, not even if I know the technique needed to produce it” when I see it because it’s so…awesome in details.

Not good in my perception is when I went to some exhibitions and I wasn’t impressed nor get the message, even after I read the description which curator made for like 10 times or more. Once again, I’m going to emphasize that I’m not an expert in art, but I have watched/read pretty lot documentations of what society claimed as good arts. Thus I think, even as a commoner, my level of understanding aesthetic matters. *insert smug emoticon here* :p

Besides, when you hold an exhibition, it means that you want public – including commoners – to acknowledge your art, right? Not to be an arrogant and judge them as a person who “don’t-have-good-sense-of-art-hence-I-will-definitely-think-you-are-lame-and-don’t-understand-that-my-works-are-actually-representing-avant-garde” right?

I remember what other friend told me about urban art scenes in Jakarta: that sometimes what makes a person can run or participate in an exhibition is connection. I have a friend, a talented graphic designer who has participated in international exhibition but he rarely showing his works to Jakarta crowd because once he told me that the issue of connection and mingle-ing bugged him a little. He has been avoiding that kind of stereotype, that if people find his artwork in some “hip” exhibitions, they can easily judge him as designer who used the connection. It’s not forbidden actually, but when it becomes more important than the artist’s talent, then we have a problem.

Other sub-topic in our conversation that night including a person that thinks that to be artsy are much much cooler than commoner, so he/she only wants to be friend with artsy people. Artsy in this kind of people perspective: artist, designer, people who often go to gallery to attend exhibition, talk about art, know who Warhol or Basquiat or Dali (but who doesn’t?), and dressed edgy. I’ve met a person like this. She’s a friend of a friend, who obviously dislike me (I am such an insensitive person, but I can tell you that this woman dislike me.) You have to see it with your own eyes how she kept showing people that she couldn’t remember my name and always ditch me every time she got the chance on every conversation. Haha. I am not sure what caused this or have I done something bad to her but I didn’t realize it, but my friend said that the reason why she acted like that was because probably in her perspective, I’m no one in art scene. I am not important enough to be her friend. Wow! That’s interesting :D.

It is interesting, also hilarious; this whole artsy thing and how it has influenced some people to behave, how the system of connection and mingle-ing (is this even a word? :p) matters more than talent, how they exaggerate things to prove that they are great enough as artists and sometimes makes they forgot the pleasure of following their passions instead of just looking for popularity. Nevertheless, what do I know? I’m not an artist :p

Cheeerssss!!!
:)

now that's a superb artwork! it has marvelous details! you should see it by yourself. 

Page 157: If I Had Kids

/ Sunday, August 12, 2012 /
...i would definitely tell them this...

image courtesy: here

Page 156: Do you like to read books?

/ Friday, August 10, 2012 /
Do you like to read books? If you nod, what kind of books do you read: fiction, fairytale, satirical, non-fiction, social studies, biography, science fiction? Would you mind to tell me about your favorite authors? Why do you like their works? What books that changed your life?

Tell me. Tell me the truth. Even if you don’t like reading, just blurt it out. Please do not lie to me, I repeat, DO NOT lie to me because I easily get irritated by people who pretend they know and like something just because they want to impress others. I won’t hate or despise you and think that you are shallow minded person just because you don’t read. Well, maybe a bit. If you don’t know who the hell are Tolkien, Tolstoy, Sartre, or Chekhov or Gaiman but you adore Meyer who wrote crappy stuff called Twilight, I might laugh at you. And I definitely will laugh harder if I know that you actually just pretend that you really like reading. It’s condescending.

I didn't post this because I want to act like a snob bitch, but because I know that not everyone would enjoy reading. It takes time, patience, and not kind of hobbies that will grow instantly. People who read have this fondness with words, stories, imagination, ideas, even the smell of the papers.

So yeah, I could tell that you are lying if I could not find a book in your room, or never caught you while you are paying full attention reading that bundle of joy. Or when you said that Neverwhere by Gaiman seems like a nice book and you want to borrow it from me although you never heard who he is or even read the summary that written on its back cover, just to impress some guy who think people who read books is cool *it is a good book, though. Of course. It’s Gaiman’s*

The conclusion: do not fake it, honey.

image courtesy:  here





Page 155: R for Random

/ Sunday, August 5, 2012 /
Random pile of shit that stuck in my head lately:

/1/
This country and bule.
Several things have changed in my office for these past few weeks. Let’s call it “reformation” (it sounds like political thingy, but I hope you know what I mean). My team and I have new space and new people to work with. Some of them are bule – word used by Indonesian to call foreigner, mostly Caucasian. Once, I had to accompany my bule colleague to check on an apartment at Kalibata City. It was night and the landlord who also my friend was late so we had to wait for two hours. This guy and I talked about books, music, movies, etc. Nothing was weird until I sensed a bunch of middle-aged men who were sitting nearby giggling, whispering, and sometimes glanced over at us. I heard one of them said unpleasant and nasty speculation about me and my friend, that we were some kind of “kawin kontrak” couple. “Kawin kontrak” is a term used to describe a marriage between a foreigner man and Indonesian woman under an agreement and period of time. It’s more like a hidden prostitution actually, since the ceremony doesn’t registered in KUA (Ministry of Religious Affairs) and the main reason is that the man need sexual partner. The man will pay the woman’s family and pimp. Back to my story, I guess my friend did not realize that and I had no intention to tell him either. I tried to ignore that bunch of shallow minded men because it was harmless for us at that time. (Although I wanted to yell at them, “you said that because you don’t understand English right? If you understand it, you would have known that we were talking about movies and books, you pervert!” )

That stereotype of “bule is sexually active, thus anyone who hang out with them also potentially has role as their sexual partner”, is so common until most Indonesian could easily judge them. I take it as weird and racist thing, because you don’t have to be bule to do premarital sex. I have Indonesian friends who have sex regularly with their girlfriend or boyfriend. Another weird thing is because actually, most Indonesian also has this admiration for bule, this some sort of tendency to see bule is much smarter, prettier, and even greater than Indonesian. I agree with my roommate that, “maybe it's because we were colonized by the Dutch for more than 350 years. Or maybe it's because we've seen too many Hollywood movies, bombarded by too many "western" media, and consumed too many of "western" culture.”

I mean, you can find ugly bule just like you can find ugly Indonesian. On the other hand, you can also find handsome Indonesian guy the same way you can easily find handsome bule.

That's Michael Fassbender. He's a handsome bule. And with those stubbles, maan, he's hot.
*yea i have a thing for guy with stubble :p

They are just people, flesh and blood, they eat, they poop, they fart, they laugh, do stupid things. In short, they are human, just like you and me. So chillax. Grab a glass of cold chocolate milk and go watch Big Bang Theory.

/2/
The question of how do animals poop while they hibernate.
Do they just stop poop-ing? Or they poop a lot before they fell asleep? I have found a link that explains about it but I still search for the right answer.

/3/
I don’t understand people that share (or tweet) their sexual life so often.
I really don’t. For me, you have to keep your sexual life private, because for Yorke’s sake, you do that with your private parts; therefore, you have to keep it private. Once or twice is okay, more than that, it makes me uncomfortable. I’m 27, I know what people do when they “get busy”. I don’t have the need to know what or whose “tool” that stick up on your ass, what is your favorite style on bed, or what songs that have been played during that section. You are not a porn star, don’t bother to share it with me, unless I ask. Please.

/4/
The question of why I don’t want to watch any Roman Polanski’s movie.
Especially after I answered, “He’s a rapist and pedophile.” Yet you still need better explanation than that? Oh, and that’s why I was disappointed to know that Johnny Depp defended Polanski for that matter. :|

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