Chains of Words

I Discovered Life is a Series of Misteries

2014-05-07T20:01:00.001+07:00

I guess it is quite true that life begins after college and works in a mysterious way afterwards. As it is for me, a lot more interesting things have been happening ever since. You know, like you got your first job, earning your own money, paying for your expenses, taking care of yourself. It is like having the power, the authority, and the full control over your own life. For some other, it is perhaps way more than that. And surely life can give you surprises.

As life after college continued, I had never got a legally binding job until the one in the hotel, The Trans Luxury Hotel. I mean, seriously, I could hardly say that teaching only four times a week was a real job. Although I have to say that teaching is an interesting job, if not the most profit-making. But that is not really why I’m writing this post today. I’d like to just share that with adulthood, come fun, scary things.

Getting back to my first job in the hotel (which I wasn’t sure what position I applied for), but I was placed as a telephone operator that they call STAR back then though. I mean, my most favorite newspaper I applied to, turned down my application as a journalist at the most heartbreaking way (or not). I have to be honest I was a bit of an opportunist who would trade idealism for the regular buck wired monthly into my account at that time. And I should say I wasn’t so proud of it. An English Literature graduate whose dream was to become an editor or a lecturer got stranded in hospitality industry that he knew nothing about. And there was this slight thought in the back of my head that screamed like a dumb telling I had shut the door to my ideal career path and headed toward the very wrong direction (to my very least understanding). So much for the power and authority over my own life!

But then again, life works in a very mysterious way. I probably have not been heading towards the direction I previously navigated to. But something whose value is way more than just a job and money and power happened in the very place I said I was stranded in. It started out with a joke. Then it continued with the intense texting, talking, we finally had a date. Never crossed my mind that I would ask her to be my only life companion who I‘m profoundly in love with. Taking that job was the best decision I had ever made.

It has been around two years now. Being with her is the happiest moment. It’s the feeling of being entrusted with a confidence to overcome whatever life throws, an assurance that you’ll get through, you know. I love it when she’s talking funny, when she’s laughing, when she’s being serious, when she’s walking down the lobby of the hotel with her uniform, when she’s mad (although sometimes she can be pretty scary). I love it that we go to places together that she’s a great company. Time flies when she’s around.

So after all, as I said, life offers you so many unexpected, interesting (even amazing) things to live through that come far out of the plan. Had I got the job I thought to be the most ideal, I would have never met and known her the way I met and knew her now. Sometimes the egotistical feeling of being powerful over your very own life can be a misleading thought. Sometimes, your grand design for life is not really the only way that can take you to happiness. Life works in a mysterious way, and if you are brave enough to be in it, you will uncover the best out of it.

Sony Would Be My First

2013-08-24T13:50:00.001+07:00

Ok, I love traveling, let’s stop bragging about it. It’s all over it. So I thought that in order to capture the moments I need a proper camera, by proper I mean an interchangeable lens camera with huge pixels and more ISO (common people paradigm). The last time I used the kind was when I went to Karimunjawa and it was my friend’s. It was a shame though, I could not maximize the function. To my least understanding of photography, I thought I took some great pictures. Here the photos I took with Canon EOS 550D with 18-55mm kit lens.


Pantai Pulau Cemara Kecil


At the small boat, heading to Karimunjawa island, the mainland

I love taking picture and traveling. I’ve been wanting to buy a camera since a long time ago to preserve the moments. I said the hell, this is it, and I have to buy it now. And so they say, the first camera you buy is very crucial because in the future you will be needing more lens, more accessories that are to be compatible with one you already have. So it is more likely that you will have to stick with the first. Given the thought, to avoid future regret, I asked some of my friends for reference who then told me to just buy a Canon.

I’ve done my homework. I came to a dozen camera shops just to ask reference pretending that I would directly buy from their shops. I researched and read almost all the reviews that popped up on google. Their answers vary from favoring the mainstream brands like Canon and Nikon to the underdog, new comer Sony. This did not lead me to any further confusion though. If anything, it convinced me to stick with the underdog that I was in love since the first time I laid my eyes on her at one of the shops I came across.


Sony A37 SLT

After some debates (mostly with my own persisting fear of regret), research and friend-asking process, I decided to buy a Sony camera type Alpha A37 SLT (Single Lens Translucent) with 18-135mm kit lens with aperture range f/3.5 – f/5.6. The debate involved the popularity amongst the brands that I considered (Sony, Canon and Nikon), the wide availability of various lenses, the features and performance, the image quality that they produce, the complexities of the camera, the endurance and maintenance and of course my instinct.

Well, since I was still very green in the area and not really in the capacity neither to break down the detail of review here, nor to thoroughly compare this camera to another. I’m just going to highlight some reasons of why I am happy with this little Sony A37 so far.

Let’s see here what all those things might be. It is obvious that the size is quite small. It comfortably fits my grip and it is quite light as well. The camera has wide viewfinder that makes you comfortable to peek out through it and shoot. The speed of the focus when taking picture is also amazing. This has something to do with the technology that is talked a lot from a Sony camera alpha series, which is its translucent mirror technology that allows the mirror inside the camera not to move so enables you to take pictures with shooting-speed up to 7 fps. The technology enables the camera to shoot and focus simultaneously. And the picture is great, the color is vivid. The Sony A37 is also talked to be able to record great full HD video. And I was shown this one and it was great. The camera is very responsive.

Here are some of the pictures I took with my Sony A37.


Spider at Gelanggang Kolamrenang UPI


Sunset around Gelanggang Kolamrenang UPI


JICA, UPI

I didn't do much editing to those two images. I just change the sizes to that it would not be too hard to upload.

So what do you think of the images? The underdog is not that bad after all, is it?

Fajar.

Traveling? Yet Again.

2013-08-16T21:56:00.001+07:00

It has been quite a long time since the last time I wrote something. I mean with all the works, romance and personal struggle through everything, I had spent so little time for this particular activity (thank God I finally have a life). It’s not that I am a regular or professional writer or anything. It’s just that I used to like writing once in a while. So here I am, trying to rebuild the habit hoping to be able to make something out of what has been left off, what has been unused for a quite some time.

So what I like to talk about this time is traveling. This particular topic has been on my mind since a very long time (to make sure of it, I have written couple about it). I have to admit that I am some kind of a late bloomer for this kind of thing, looking up to those traveling gods I read on the magazine or some places worthy of visit that they have been. Here I reasoned why, it was not only because I had no money to do that but also I had no gut. It was gut mostly though, to be more honest. But not anymore, I have money now, it was not a lot but if you save up a little, it could take you to places. So I now travel.


Pantai Cemara Kecil, Karimunjawa.

Speaking of traveling, I like to talk about a fellow traveler I ran into the other day. The story was just to help me make a point out of this writing. It was a young foreigner on my way home the other day. We took the same minivan to Pangandaran, my hometown, her traveling destination. It was like a private shuttle services so it provided door to door pick-up service. We were the first two passengers in the minivan. The waiting was killing us. I knew it’s killing me. And it’s killing me too, not to initiate conversation when, aside of the driver, there were only us. I might have got quite a story from this foreigner and some time to kill.

So it began with “wow we are waiting for the passenger to come” on my part, she responded with “yeah, is this some kind of housing for rich people?” and the conversation continued to traveling, how she had been sitting for more than 20 hours on a bus hopping from Padang to Medan, all by herself (yeah, I was amazed too). And the conversation moved on towards the most fundamental thing in our existence in the world of how we perceived religion. It’s not that she was in some kind of in a mission of religion neither was I, with all the religious talking. Bottom line, we’re not religious freaks. We were just couple strangers who, for the long hours, got stuck together and made conversation of whatever came to mind and surprisingly we shared the same questions and confusion about what religion really was. And the funny thing was that I never got her name, neither did she.


Oma Alchy Bar, Karimunjawa.

But anyway, my point was that traveling not only could get you to places but it also could get you to meet a lot of people you would not expect when packing your bag and sitting on a bus, train, plane or ship and discussed the most private, essential and unlikely subject you probably would not discuss with the people you already knew at home. You got the chance to have insights from complete strangers who you probably meet only once in your life but you will remember them and their stories for the rest of your life, not to mention their companies to enjoy beers and cigarettes. All we have to do is to be open and that is exactly what I have been trying.

The Vacation that had me going!

2011-11-21T10:02:00.002+07:00

I thought back then in Indonesia that spending seven days in Thailand would be too long. But in fact after you actually are there, one whole week was just not enough! There are still a lot of parts of Thailand waiting to explore, offering its spectacular views and uniqueness. Anyway, given the time, I think I have made the most of my one week vacation, though. Here I’d share places that I have been to and that are worthy of a visit.

Arrival at Phuket International Airport

Though we planned on visiting Bangkok, our flight was to Phuket, land of beautiful beaches. First day of the vacation we joined a one-day tour trip to Phi Phi Island. This was the part of the real excitement where you witness the beauty of islands around Phuket. In the tour we got on some sort of ferry boat, we went around islands and Phi Phi was our last stop. My favorite was Khai Island and Maya Bay.

Khai Island, Heaven on Earth

At Maya Bay, gorgeous, isn't it?!

Khai is a small island surrounded with white sand beach and some areas of reef and coral in certain parts of the island. Here you can snorkel and feed the fish. The snorkeling part is spectacular; swimming with beautiful colorful fish is something you do not want to miss when having vacation to the beach. And Maya Bay offers something different. It is a small bay, isolated from the ocean by high cliffs at its sides, it is more like a lagoon with soft white sand beach at the dune. You can swim, sun bathe or just walk around the beach. Surely you HAVE to take thousands of pictures here.


The Grand Palace

As initially planned we visited Bangkok after the fantastic one-day tour at Phuket. It takes fourteen hours from Phuket bus station at Phuket Town to Bangkok. Obviously, Bangkok offers the life of modern urban lifestyle, not so much different from Jakarta though. We spent two days here. We had lunch at the fifth food avenue at MBK centre, one of the popular shopping centers in Bangkok. In the same day we also visited Madam Tussauds wax museum and the Grand Palace. To me, The Grand Palace is the most interesting attraction of all though in Bangkok. The architecture is beautiful, the Buddhism atmosphere is very strong. That is the pride of Thai. Anyway, I am very sorry for the flood that has been hitting Bangkok recently. I saw lots of sacks in front of buildings used to prevent the flood from going in even though the places I visited were no longer in flood. Hope the disaster is over soon.


MBK Center, about to have lunch at the fifth food avenue


waiting for the bus at Rama Bus Station, Rama Road, Bangkok.

Anyway, we went back to Phuket the next following day). At our hotel, some locals said that you didn’t really visit Phuket if you didn’t see Phuket FantaSea show. We certainly were interested. We watched the show for sure. It was like a musical drama and a little bit of circus performance by the elephants and all. It was really entertaining. You got a chance to know Thailand and its people through the show because they tell things about it. They are not far different from us. Well, at least that’s what I got. After all what it’s said is true, we have visited Phuket and we have watched Phuket Fantasea.

with a giant elephant, the star of the show at Phuket FantaSea!

Another uniqueness of Phuket is that its acceptance to the different. Ladyboy is another attraction that is a little unfortunate to miss. They are beautiful (though still, they’re fake). But the fun is irresistible. I watched their show in Simon Cabaret where they dance and sing in lip-sync. With all the hype, the glimmering dresses, the dance, and the fun, they certainly make a show. The key to enjoy it is “don’t judge!” just sit back, relax and enjoy the show, and laugh on!

Simon's Ladyboys, at Phuket Simon Cabaret.

We wrapped up our days by hanging out at Patong beach the day and night before, seeing the lampion ritual and the annually Khai khratong ritual in which you send some offering in a form of a traditional bouquet to the sea. Patong is really crowded but fun though. Then we spent our very last day at Kamala Beach having original Thai tom yam at a restaurant near our hotel. Kamala is a lot quieter than Patong, I recommend the place for staying more than Patong. Anyway, I recommend all those places I just described. Thailand is spectacular!

So, traveling IS awesome. Besides the hype of the fun, the vacation, you certainly can take something out of the experiences. Traveling allows you to get to know who you are. It is when you are far from home and in a foreign surrounding. You are also exposed to problem because man, traveling does not mean having a vacation without complication and problem. There will always be some unexpected things to happen. They vary from having to sleep at a bus station because you get wrong information, having different opinions from your friend in the group, cultural and language differences with the locals or money problem. The thing is, traveling trains you how to deal with those problems and later allows you to see what kind a person you are and what to fix to make the better out of yourself. Hell, this is my first traveling abroad experience and sure it does not make me an expert but you know, one is all it takes if you care enough to pay a little more attention. I think I made something out of it. I hope I make something out of it.

Road not taken! urbanpackrat.com

My journey of self discovery through going to places has just been started though. I make up my mind. I have tons of plans of having this traveling kind of thing. I’m gonna work and save my ass up and travel. Traveling with a companion will be great, alone won’t be a problem either to me. Next route of my traveling will be Yogyakarta, Mount Bromo, Malang, Bali, and Lombok. I’m open to any one of you who wants to join me. It’s not gonna be very soon but maybe one year from now. A man needs to make a living, right!?

Getting through the Days SANELY

2011-07-15T10:37:00.004+07:00

Supposedly I felt this particular feeling my friend told me about, that you know, you feel a very massive relief, like a giant stone has been removed from your chest and you are overly in bliss. Yet I feel nothing, I have no idea where this numbness comes from. The euphoria of the fact that I finished my college study did not strike me that hard. Well, that doesn’t mean that I am not happy though, I am. It’s just that THE feeling is sort of overrated. Or maybe it’s going to be a totally different case when I actually graduated one year ago. Anyway I’m so grateful for what I get right now that I could finish what I had started and to my parents, my mother mostly, who had paid for the tuition, I could say that I had done THE responsibility right. And the result is not that bad either. That is what matters. Am I right?

Anyway, my graduation ceremony is one month ahead and the classes that I have been teaching in are in break so I have so much time for myself, doing nothing mostly though. You know how boring it is not to have lots of things to do right, as if your whole life seems so pointless. When you see there’s not much going on with your life yet the world around you revolving very fast, seemingly leaving you at the other side, that’s just as depressing as you drunkenly lose your house over a casino gambling. Duh, exaggeration alert! I don’t like being that depressed, no it IS not me. Now I’d just like to think that being happy is a matter of choice, you know. It’s that you would either let yourself rot, loath yourself, and just wait for something to happen or you try to make THAT thing happen. And damn, I choose the last one. So I’d like to share what I have chosen, what I have been doing during this where-the-hell–would-I-take-my-life-to moment.

Not that surprising, I swim. As you probably can see on my profile that explains “you will occasionally see me swimming”, so yeah I swim, A LOT.

I know, right? but damn, it's not me!

There are a lot of good things you can get out of swimming you know. Let me begin with my personal opinion about it. Well, I always feel refreshed when my skin touches the water and good about myself afterwards. I feel like I’m in control, in check of my breath, my body movement, my speed while exercising, because honestly I am not really good at other sports. And I feel healthy and good about my shape. Alright, alright I don’t have that much of a swimmer ~~killer~~ body shape, but yeah you’ve got to see my chest and shoulder. Hahaha. One more thing though, based on the article that I read the other day, I forgot the title and the writer, swimming is found very useful in muscle recovery due to injury. It helps relax your muscle. Swimming is also one of the sports that can maintain body endurance a bit longer with a very least injury risk. It also has minimum risk of conflict, you know, because unlike soccer, you go solo when you swim. So, bottom line in my personal opinion, swimming is damn good. It works for me.

By the way I swim here, at Gelanggang Kolam Renang Universitas Pendidikan Indonesia, my campus, just in case you care to join.

Besides swimming I also allow myself with some fun, ~~honking~~ playing my guitar. Yep, I just bought myself a guitar.

And yeah, I like singing alright. I go karaoke now and then with my friends. It’s not that I’m confident with my voice. It’s just one of my ways of releasing stress, channeling the energy, blowing off some steam. It hit me the other day that why not play a guitar and sing along, or more like make noise with it lol. I’m still working on with some of my favorite songs though. Phew… it’s not as easy as it seems, really.

Well, anyway, let me tell you one little secret, I was actually in a band back then in high school. Not really a band though, it’s just us singing with the 'equipments'. I actually was a vocalist so I held nothing but a microphone. So blame it to that thing if I’m still learning how to play this only one music instrument now. Either way, I enjoy it, seriously. Now I can play two or three songs and soon another, and another, and another. Yeah it’s fun, man. Really.

Well, well, that has been my life being currently away from college yet still vaguely close to a serious job. I swim, play a guitar, and I read also by the way, and WATCH. Have you read my previous post??? It tells the whole thing about it! Ooh once again though, don’t wait up something to happen to you, you ought to go out there, do everything you have been meaning to do, and choose to be happy!

Life of the Lifeless

2011-07-09T09:20:00.005+07:00

This whole mini thesis thing has got me to the forced hiatus of keeping this blog posted. I mean that is the obvious reason why my life has become a little bit out of the order. To keep my sanity I let myself stumble into these good shows. I mean TV is the most therapeutic cure for the stress, I gotta admit though sometimes it provides nothing but bunch of craps. But FYI I don’t get stuck with craps, so I bought myself bags of potato chips, cans of soda, sit my ass down on my black floppy couch and watched. And you’re told that I’m a generous man so here I am sharing what it is that gets me through the lifelessness, lol.

Well, let me get you to this hilarious show. Anyone who watches Modern Family has to agree with me that the show can make you laugh like crazies. And I did, I didn’t know what other tenant at my lodge thought when they heard me all alone laughing like crazy. Duh, who cares!

So the show goes around the families of Pritchett and Dunphy. So Jay Pritchett, who is re-married to a Columbian widow with one son, Manny Delgado, Gloria Delgado, has two children Claire and Mitchell. Claire is married to Phil Dunphy and has three children, Haley, Alex, and Luke. And Mitchell lives with his boyfriend Cameron Tucker and adopts a daughter from Vietnam, Lily. Each episode of the series goes around the comical events, family problem and trivialities of the daily basis. They do not seem to try to act funny yet the effort shows otherwise. Each of the characters shows their own strength and ridiculousness.

Here is the reason why you’d like the shows: simply hilarious.

Here’s the reason you might not like it: NONE.

While I watched Modern Family I was also enjoying this action series, Hawaii Five-O. It’s the remake of the 60s Hawaii Five-O except that there is one hot female cast join the tough and go-strike task force named Five-O and maybe the story line. I honestly have limited research on how the 60s version went but I’m quite confident that I could give some good reasons why you’d like to watch this present version of the series. So, it’s about a long shot investigation of Commander Steven McGarrett over his parents’ deaths.

In the pilot episode it’s told that Steve‘s father is amid the home invasion and threatened to be killed by some violent gang in exchange with the freedom of some perpetrator Steve holds into custody. He cannot make it, his father dies and the perpetrator finds his way out. Later he learns that the affair has something to do with his father’s investigation about his mother’s car accident that goes way beyond a mere accident. The all lead he has is a tool box full of postcards and photographs and the documents of investigation his father leaves in his garage of their house in Hawaii. With the help, as in the resources and full immunity, of the Governor he starts the investigation to hunt down the man who kills his parents as well as to fight for the justice in his childhood homeland, Hawaii. Later join the force, Detective Danny Williams, ex-cop Chin Ho Kelly and his cousin, the hot female character I talked earlier, Kono.

Here is the reason why you’d like the series: it’s all about action and explosion. Car chase, martial arts, gun fire and all are the must-requirements in every episode (the fights and murders would be an understatement). Besides, it’s set in Hawaii, man! Exotic beaches with girls in bikinis running around, DUH!? And Kono is a surfer. Occasionally she poses the role as a surfer, riding those big waves of Hawaii on a surfing board. Man, she’s hot. And for girls, I think (since I’m secured enough to spill it out that I can appreciate other men’s attraction) Steve and Danny are another attraction to the show, they look nice. Oh yeah BRAH, I’m that shallow!

The next series is White Collar. Just like any other US action drama series, it’s a crime-themed series. It follows the story of the white collar crime detective of the FBI, agent Peter Burke and a flamboyant ex-con artist-soon-be-FBI consultant, Neal Caffrey.

The pilot episode sets the scenes in which Neal is a prisoner with four months to go for his freedom after being booked in by Peter who’s been chasing him for years. But something goes out of the schedule when Neal gets a visit from his girlfriend Kate. The rendezvous gets Neal broken hearted and yet he senses something wrong with the breakup. Afterwards, with his skills as a con artist he escapes from the prison and tries to find Kate to get the answers to her disappearance, which he can’t, and the entire attempt only leads him to another question.

For the second time, Peter manages to catch Neal, only this time they arrange a deal. The deal is to let Neal free under Peter’s custody with the tracking bracelet put on Neal’s ankle to keep him in guard and track down his every whereabouts. In returns Neal becomes a consultant for the FBI to hunt down the white collar criminals and at the same time he continues to find Kate and seeks the answers to what is really happening behind his girlfriend’s disappearance that seems far beyond a breakup. Join the team inside the FBI agent Diana Berrigan and Clinton Jones, as for Peter himself he is helped big time by his amazingly supportive wife Elizabeth. Neal on the other hand is propped by his eccentric fellow con artist Mozzie. In one or two episodes the teams from these two corners work together to fight crimes! The show is classically fabulous. Yeah that’s strange that sentence just struck me! Anyway, it’s worth awhile.

Alright, in the process of writing this posting by the way, I run into the fifth season of 30Rock. Oh I just realized how I’ve missed the ‘lemons’. The show sure, still has it. And really want to talk about the show. But wait, yeah I think I already do that. Then let’s just talk about Castle. Yep crime is still the most popular theme for US TV series. This show is one of a bunch that is considered good. It tells the story of a beautiful NYPD detective, Kate Beckette and a popular mystery writer, Richard Castle.

I would start with the pilot when I talk about a series because I think it’s the point through which you’d know where the show is going, is it going to be somewhere or just another “pfft, it’s not gonna make it!” kind, you know? So yeah let’s talk about the pilot episode of Castle. Well, I think you may a bit wonder why a popular narcissus mystery writer would wind up catching bad guys with a rigorous and devoted detective of NYPD. Yep, the novel the writer writes is the connection. Well, it seems that one of Castle’s readers really wants to make something real out of the novels. He, the fan, imitates the killing procedure or ritual I might say as what Castle has written in the novel. Kate realizes soon enough that she needs the expertise of the mastermind of such killing procedure, or wait, the one who inspires the mastermind. And just like that they end up working together to catch the perpetrator.

Having the idea that the two of them have the sparks glimmering around them, Castle assures the irritated Kate to let him join in the team in her several cases to observe how she works, telling Kate that she’s his new muse. Of course with the help of his popularity Castle can make his way in. Together they catch killers and start having up-and-down feeling for each other. With his witty, imaginative and fun attitude, Castle brings life and usefulness to Kate’s team in every case they work on, making them so fun to solve. Join with the team Detective Javier Esposito, Detective Kevin Ryan and their boss Captain Montgomery and a lab tech Lanie Parish. At home Castle is supported by his lovely teenage daughter Alexis and his mother Martha Rogers. Each episode tells about lots of different murders and motives and means and yet the story has also a long shot plot in which Kate is actually investigating her mother’s murder back then when she is a teenager. And it’s the reason why she becomes a cop in the first place. And I gotta say the show is also the one you don’t want to miss out whenever you have time to get cozy on your couch.

Well, as fun as it is for me, I think I really need to stop writing. phew.. I can see it on your face. But ooh, before I go, gonna be quick. Here are some other shows that I also want you to watch but I can't review.

Weeds

United States of Tara

and Cougar Town

well, my final remark: watch them all!!!

New Days Begin!

2011-01-30T07:27:00.000+07:00

Let’s say that the beginning of this year was a way far from what I imagined. I definitely had plan, good plans. Resolution, as what is commonly known. But how can I say, you definitely can’t predict what tomorrow will bring to you. At exactly the beginning of those days after I had my shitty holiday, New Year holiday, I learned that I just lost my job over some stupid new regulation my office issued (let’s just drop it, too crappy). It’s out of the blue. We just never saw it coming. Slap! On your miserable face, man! I did take it quite hard, because clearly it got me back to the old days where I need to ask for my regular allowances from the old folk. Well, anyway since I grew up in the culture where it doesn’t matter how much you hurt you just happen to be grateful that nothing else hurt you even worse, I just need to look at the bright side. That it’s the time for me to get back to my research paper. Unbelievable!

I meant, that’s it, I needed to get away from all of this, right fucking now. I was not a spontaneous person before. Not a chance in hell. I needed plans, assurance. I needed to calculate everything. But this was just too overwhelming and I was sure as hell allowed to take a leave. So I decided (spontaneously) to go here;

I need a place where screams do not cause a commotion and are not interpreted as a warning of danger, or a sign of troubles. There I got it, trying all those games that got me scream till my throat sore and shook my tummy up till I wanted to throw up. You saw the world turned upside down (literally), yet you got through it and you got through it all just fine. All you have to do is let it out, that made me a little bit better. Same thing works for the (temporary) real screwed-up state of mind. You don’t need to pay someone with Freudian bullshit, patronizing, sitting and talking to you in a room on a floppy couch, telling that you have to simply work on your anger management or mild depression, which in fact you just need to loosen up a little bit, to have fun to recover. Scream helps!

I spent two days in Jakarta, long enough to make me fall in love with the city. Pretty lame, huh?! When everyone begins to hate the mess, I just begin to know it and even love it. Here is the thing, I mean, almost every big city in this world is a two-faced bitch. In one hand, she shows the beautiful alluring face where you can see future, hope and, wealth she might offer. On the other, she shows the ugly one where you can’t see anything but the fucked-ups! Living there can be a proof if you’re strong enough to work your ass up there. This was like a booster for me, a reminder that I have purpose, I still have dreams, and I still have a lot of options and I’m young and free.

By that I get to realize, firstly, I need to finish my research paper to get my butt out of the university. And it tells me that bitching on it won’t help me get any of that at all. It won’t finish itself. Then I started to write again. I guess what they say is true after all, that you’ve got to look at the bright side. Thinking, well, at least my other hand didn’t get cut, (trying to be metaphorical).

Defining Who You Are

2010-11-04T06:37:00.000+07:00

Who are we? Really? I mean, we can pretend to be the one with the mask that no one will never imagine that we’re wearing one. In one moment you are the ugly duck trying to fit herself to the rest of the beautiful community in the pond. At the other, you might feel, no! That you’re the center of everything, the earth is rotating with you being at the center of it.

You can be a wolf disguising himself amongst the sheep. However, you never realize that you’re playing somebody else. Here you say A, there you say B as long as you go along the population you’re in. Hypocrite never comes self-admitted. They just go on, blend in, and follow the group. No complaint ever spoken, no act ever done that gets himself the most distinguished one. Since they are afraid, afraid that when the sheep take off their fur clothes, and the disguising wolves have to do so, they will reveal themselves. When that happens the wolves will always be the wolves, either they will attack the community that has put trust on him, embraced him as one of them even though they had got suspicion from the very beginning you joined the club (being a hypocrite themselves), or they will simply walk away, realizing that they are best left alone.

Wolves are the lone creatures, walking the night seeking for company that they’ll never find. They just howl towards the full moon at the edge of the cliff. The moon is his only company. Telling her how agonizing it is being a loner and being himself in disguise is the cure for his agony, the bliss that they can get the most. They never expect more than howling towards the moon, when she’s full, when she’s at her best to embrace him the way he really is. No pretense, no complaint, no hypocrisy, just honesty and big heart to accept the truth to embrace him when he’s not being someone else, nothing but himself. So, who are we, really? If we have to change our color every time we come to the different trees.

Ariel Peter-porn V.S. Parents’ Anxiety

2010-07-05T13:24:00.001+07:00

This whole thing about peter-porn and all really gets everybody. It’s all over the news for Christ’s sake! Here’s what I think. Lots and lots of people do the protest demanding that this Ariel goes to the jail, which has been done anyway, and the ladies in the video to join him there (but not to make another video of course!). They think that this guy and his video destruct the young generation’s morality. They’re afraid that their sons or daughters will imitate what he’d done. They burnt the picture of these ~~one-hit-fame porn~~ stars, wrote at the paper that they have to go to the hell. I mean, man! It’s what makes your young generation wants to take a look at the video at the first place. You make it all over the news, make it bigger that what it really is. You do the sudden inspection over your young students’ cell-phones to check if they keep the video. And it involves the police. Jeez! You just treat your beloved young generation as a criminal. And you think that that’s what helps! Please?! You don’t trust them and you don’t even try to help them earn your trust. Instead, you frisk them, at schools!

And one thing about the extreme protestors; it’s like they never made one single mistake in their lives. Just because somebody made a mistake (a horrible one actually), it doesn’t mean that you are the most saint person in the earth that gets every right to judge and send them to hell. I, instead, begin to think that maybe they just look for someone to blame for their worries and even failure of educating, teaching, or guiding their children to differentiate what’s right from wrong. If they think that they’re successful to guide their children those moralities they hold on to, they actually don’t get to be extremely worried that they will imitate that stupid defiant sex preference. You don’t get to worry since you and your children have been gaining high conscience, they know exactly what to do, what to follow or not. You just believe in your kids. However the world shakes, you guys just stand still.

This thing doesn’t mean that I agree or justify what Mr. Peter-porn did, or that I’m a big fan of his, u-uh no, just so you know. It’s still stupid in so many levels, what he’d done. But, it’s just I believe everyone makes mistakes but they still get to have a second chance, you know. It’s all.

Teaching? Why not!?

2010-07-05T13:07:00.000+07:00

“Hey what’s up?”, “What are you up to, now?”, “What have you been doing recently?”, “How’s your thesis?” Ah… those questions again. Seriously, give me a break! It’s not that I don’t want to catch up. I mean, it’s just there was nothing a lot had been going on in my life recently, you know? I would just sit around watching DVDs, listening to the music from my computer, playing that stupid card game. The questions and the fact that I actually got nothing to do were really bugging me. If what you do is just get up from the bed and know exactly that for the next 18 hours you’ll get nothing exciting to do and eventually will end up on the same bed with the same feeling; useless, you’d really want say the same thing as I do. And the most awful thing is that I haven’t got any new direction where I’d bring my thesis. And there was no willingness to carry it on. And Jesus! Make them stop talking ‘bout this peter-porn thing all the time. Man, he’s a f*cker! Yeah, yeah, here I go again, a whining b*tch mode ON! Pardon the language, Sir, Ma’am!?

But, anyway, thanks to my friendship with my senior in debating club I got a job to apply to. Just like an unlikely angel she suddenly texted me letting me know that the place she’s been working in as a teacher happened to need new teachers. And boom! I got to come in. I got to get thru’ the application letter things, interview and set of tests of course, (you know the basics) but somehow I passed them. Now I got the break! Ha ha ha

It wasn’t my first interview of course; I’ve been in several interviews for my scholarship, albeit all of them just brought me failure, alas! But not this one, I was worried that I was going to be nervous and suddenly do some sort of stupid things like breaking something in the room, crying, or peeing on my pants. But thank God it didn’t happen. In fact it went well, not really the way I’d imagined before but it went well. I like the place, it’s clean, not as big as my campus though but it’s a good place to begin with. I know that my desire to be a teacher will never die. Though thru’ times I’ve been doubtful, unfocused about that. I want to be a journalist, then a news anchor, then go back again to be a teacher, then change again, but somehow it eventually will end up to being a teacher. I am not really certain about why I end up at that profession. Maybe it’s simply because I just get no any other talent?! Laugh at that!

My first day in a classroom with a bunch of adult students wasn’t really bad. In fact it was fun. I honestly had prepared for the worst. I’d imagined several possibilities. You know, since I’m a way younger than they are, I imagined it’s going to be hard to earn some respect, that they probably will despise me, underestimate me! Not that I hold on to a bad prejudgment, no. It’s more like I want to be well prepared for the unpleasant things. And I know it’s seriously hard to just accept that a supposed-your-son-or-brother kid teaches you, not to mention that some of you are the secretary, or the staff of this company and that company and all. But then again it’s nothing like I’d imagined before. Like I said we had so much fun. We learned, me and my older students. And despite their ages, they were just like kids, you know. I could see their eyes widened as I said the lectures in English; I could see they try to grasp them, to understand them. I could tell that they put effort to be able to do the assignment I gave. And one of them asked me whether I’m married. It really amused me.

And they wanted to go home before the end of the class. See!?

And I like my outfit when going teaching by the way. A shirt with a pair of pants and a pair lack shiny shoes. I feel like respecting myself and earning it from other people. Does it work? Well, I don’t know that, but at least I appreciate and respect myself.

So, now when I wake up in the morning, I know that for the next 18 hours I’ll be doing things in prioritized order as I just did at that moment. And I’d love to catch up with my friends about what’s going on with our lives.

Five TV Shows You Wanna Watch

2010-05-03T10:15:00.001+07:00

Been a long time since my last posting, for I’ve been crazy about my internship, to be quite honest; not really in a good ways though. Ok, not so much for the talk, I’m going to review five most recommended series I ever watched. Yep it’s American-TV-Series we’re talking about, not some sort of local soap operas in some local TV. So here come the undeniably entertaining shows. Let’s begin with

Chuck.

Major idea is that a civilian that out of sudden is to be involved in national security matters in undercover. The show focuses to the life of Chuck Bartowski (Zachary Levi) (a.k.a. special agent Charles Carmichael) who in all of sudden becomes a spy for that he receives an e-mail from his former “best” friend back in Stanford five years ago, Bryce Larkin who not only gets him kicked out of the university but also takes away his girlfriend. Apparently the e-mail that Chuck gets and reads is not a hey-so-long-buddy-you-come-to-the-reunion e-mail, but it’s got the ‘intersect’ with it that contains a big deal of secret information that the government’s to keep, which downloaded into his brain during the process, that later allows him to access information through flashes he gets.

As of the all e-mail and the intersect things, Chuck becomes the asset of the NSA and CIA, so valuable that he has to be protected by a hot, blond, breathtakingly beautiful CIA agent Sarah Walker (Yvonne Strahovski) and a muscly, edgy, cold-hearted NSA agent John Casey (Adam Baldwin). With them, Chuck plays all the spy and secret agent things, jumping from one dangerous, but funny mission to another with his naiveté and ridiculousness yet the thing that keeps him human, living a never ending romance with agent Walker, not to mention his protective big sister Ellie Bartowski (Sarah Lancaster) and her boyfriend, Captain Awesome, his lifetime best friend Morgan Grimes and co-workers in the Buy More (an electronic store in which Chuck works as a computer technician as well as a TV set installer in Nerd Herd unit) who are annoyingly funny. The series is just like a mini action, romance and comedy movie in one package served not in just two-hour long. I guess four and a half is not overrated.

Dexter.

This series is rather dark, and so is the joke. It’s adapted from Jeff Lindsay’s novels Darkly Dreaming Dexter and Dearly Devoted Dexter. This crime thriller series focuses on the life of Dexter Morgan (Michael C. Hall), a blood spatter analyst in Miami Metro Police Department, with his sister, Debra Morgan and his deceased foster father (who somehow still lives in his mind) as a police officer and a former police officer, respectively, in homicide unit.

Dexter is depicted to have a seemingly normal life at the day time. He is supportive to his sister, has a steady girlfriend with two children who love him. However, at the night he has another kind of “productive” life. He is a hunter, he has another life that no one close to him has ever known; that he is a night hunter. He hunts down criminals who escape law for crimes that they’ve done. Following the code his foster father, Harry Morgan, instilled him, which is some sort of basic rules; he tracks down his prey, and terminates them in a traceless and particularly constant method. Well okay, a crime-detective-themed series narrated through the cold-hearted, two-faced murder’s viewpoint, think it kinda gets into me. I guess three and a half for Dexter.

30Rock.

It’s a comedy series created and acted by Tina Fey as Liz Lemons. Liz is the head of creative team for TGS (The Girlie Show) described airing in NBC starring Tracy Jordan (Tracy Morgan) and Jenna Maroney (Jane Krakowski) with their executive producer Jack Donaghy (Alec Baldwin). The series shows the entire stupid and funny thing that happens amongst the characters and the creative team from TGS, mostly from the insecurity of Tracy and the stupid attention-seeker artist Jenna Maroney. And at the end of the day Liz Lemons comes up to clean up the mess in also ridiculous and sometimes hard ways. The series is funny for its sharp comments, stupid action, which sometimes lead it to be found slapstick, which is also very “Tina Fey” to me. The show has won a great deal of awards one of which is from Emmy for the best drama comedy category. Four certainly is not overrated for this show.

Grey’s Anatomy

With focus on scared and insecure yet a great surgeon Meredith Grey (Ellen Pompeo) (well, at least until fifth season it is), the series tells the story of several surgeons in Seattle Grace Hospital. There are a hot blond emotional Izzy Stevens (Katherine Heigl), an ambitious hard-core Christina Yang (Sandra Oh), an edgy closed-personality Alex Karev (Justin Chambers), a kind-hearted quite George O’Malley (T. R. Knight), a brain surgeon also known as Mr. McSomething and Meredith’s love interest Derek Shepherd (Patrick Dempsey), a hard-working, kick-ass surgeon Miranda Bailey (Chandra Wilson) and other characters that keep coming in through the seasons, some of them are an attractive neonatal surgeon Addison Montgomery (Kate Walsh) who later becomes a main character in another series Private Practice as the same person, and an orthopedist Calliope Torres (Sara Ramirez). The series is all about drama, love life amongst the characters, life lesson derived from their patients’ stories that have been told to them during the medical process, surgery and all. The series has won lots of awards from Emmy Awards and Golden Globe and now been in its sixth season. Well, I give three and a half for Grey’s Anatomy.

Lost. The story starts as Oceanic Flight 815 from Sidney to Los Angeles crashes somewhere on mysterious tropical island in South Pacific. The story developed in both primary stories in the island about the survivors to find their way out of there, the island that’s not located in the map, and secondary stories about their lives outside the island. Those survivors are a man of logic, spinal surgeon Jack Shepherd (Matthew Fox), a brave tough fugitive Kate Austen (Evangeline Lily), a “bad boy” conman James Ford also known as Sawyer (Josh Holloway), a paralyzed destiny-believer John Locke (Terry O’Quinn), a pregnant girl Claire Shepherd (Emily de Ravin), a former Iraqi torturer Sayid Jarrah (Naveen Andrews), a likeable lottery winner Hugo Rayes a.k.a. Hurley (Jorge Garcia), and Korean spouses Jin (Daniel Dae Kim) and Sun (Yu Jin Kim). Together they are thrown to the adventure on the island to find their way out facing the deadly mysterious black smoke, finding a hatch that leads them to the fact that the island has inhabitants called Other and former researcher community of Dharma Initiative, not to mention the mysteriousness of the island itself.

Through the seasons, the story of the series developed ramifying, that tells not only about love, devotion, redemption, life choice, but also mystery and science and at the same time about conflict between all of them and more specifically between science and belief. And each episode gives unpredictable twists. Just like Grey’s Anatomy, it is in its sixth season now, which turns out to be its season finale. The series also won lot of awards from Emmy and Golden Globe for several categories. Four is given to Lost.

That’s five shows amongst many that you might want to watch. But hey, here I give you another five worth watching TV series yet without a review. There are musical drama Glee, science-fiction Fringe, comedy-science-fiction Warehouse 13, medical-themed drama House, and detective-themed drama The Mentalist. And oh yeah, the rate that I give for each show above is in the scale of five. Well, then, that’s it. See you guys at another review…

x.o.x.o.

Date Night: A Date that Jeopardizes Souls

2010-03-21T10:33:00.001+07:00

What’s going to happen as the queen of comedy meets her king from the different realm? There you can witness the ridiculous affair they will serve in Date Night. Tina Fey (30Rock TV Series) will play the wife of Steve Carell (The Office TV Series) in this action comedy movie.

It’s told that this couple, Phil Foster (Carell) and Claire Foster (Fey) have a moment in her marriage in which they start to feel saturated by all the routine they have. Work, house, each other, work again, then house, and each other. There, to regenerate their love and to spare the saturation, they decide to visit places where their love used to grow as they began the relationship.

However, the trouble begins as they change their identities to be the other couple Mr. Tripplehorn and Mrs. Tripplehorn, who appear to be criminals. The dangerous and breath-taking yet ridiculous adventure then begins. They, Foster couple, have to deal with the fact that police will be after them for they are now the bad guys. Not to mention that they also have to deal with the big boss of criminals and being chased in the taxi with its nuts driver. Their date time obviously will be the most unforgettable date ever. But, will it spare them the saturation (only if they can get through all the dangerous parts of their date night safely)?

If we see the casts of the movie, there’s no doubt that they will make such entertaining comedy. Tina Fey herself is known as a prominent comedian for her career as a writer for Saturday Night Live (SNL) and the creator and main protagonist in Emmy-winner TV series 30Rock for her role as Liz Lemon (the head of creative team for The Girlie Show (TGS) who is a funny, overbearing and opportunist woman). While Carell is known for his role as Michael Scott, the overbearing, strict, yet clueless and ridiculous boss in The Office TV series. Besides those two protagonists, the movie is also supported by the young promising actress Mila Kunis (That 70’s Show TV Series, The Book of Eli), as Mrs. Tripplehorn. Her experience as a comedian is also unquestionable for her role in That 70’s Show TV series for her role as Jackie Burkhart, a wealth-and-social-status-centered and narcissist cheerleader girl. Not to mention the others prominent actors in Hollywood Mark Wahlberg (The Lovely Bones), James Franco, and the beautiful young actress Leighton Meester (Gossip Girl TV series).

Based on the premise of the story and the actors and the actresses in it, the movie is interesting. It’s lightly entertaining and might be able to be accepted easily by the wide watchers for its simple plot of the story. You can prove it at April 9th for its release in both US and wide. Can wait to see it!

My Traveling Tale: the Exotic Ujung Genteng

2010-03-21T10:18:00.001+07:00

Adventurous, an adjective; I find the meaning in the dictionary as

/fond of adventures/ or

/full of excitement/

And for me it means that you have enough gut to just go outside your house and go out of your comfort zone, wander and find new comfort in new place. You’re familiar with surprises that might happen outside, you’re ready to enjoy anything the world might offer, not to mention its beauty, kindness, and sometimes ugliness.

Well, to be quite honest, I was not really fond of adventure as I was a little. I tended to spend my time reading or just playing my favorite music home (not that I was a nerd). I went out once in a while, for sure, but that didn’t include exploring the neighborhood, or going to the preservation forest. But, quietly, I have passion of an adventurer of doing that. It started as I read books by Gola Gong (an Indonesian author with his iconic character named Roy). Somehow it inspired me to also do traveling, okay maybe dream about traveling. I begin to feel the need to see the world, by my own, you know. I need to figure out what’s out there. I need to know, the world outside mine, so that it will open my new perspective. I need to get out of my shell. Meet a lot of people, learn something new, see new places, know what God has given us, and praise it, okay, this one sounds cliché, but that’s probably true.

My first (I’d say a real) adventure of traveling was as I went to Lampung with my friend about a year ago, I’m sure I have written it in this blog, you can find out in the blog’s archives. See the excitement about going off the island for the first time. But now I want to talk about my trip, couple months ago, to Sukabumi. There were three places that we visited, Pelabuhan Ratu, Ujung Genteng, and Cisolok hot spring.

Let’s see the details.

Ujung Genteng

Practically it takes six hours to get Ujung Genteng from my friend’s house in Sukabumi, we went by motorcycle. The road is so sinuous and narrow that you have to be very careful if you drive your own vehicle. It’s about 16 KMs from Surade, the closest sub-district, since Ujung Genteng is quite rural. We may find the tea plantation, at the mountainous part of the road, and coastal forest near the spot.

Ujung Genteng is really gorgeous. The shore is complete white sand beach. There’s place like a lagoon before the high seas. It’s quiet out there, both the entire place and the lagoon, so you can swim safely. Cottage that we checked in was exactly in front of it, not to mention the gazebo nearby (we baked fish there at night and got fresh coconuts at mid sunny day, over the blue sky and green sea, good Lord!).

You know the concept of virgin, right? Well then, you might categorize the place into that. Oh yeah, there’s also tortoise preservation in Ujung Genteng. You can come and visit then you can release a baby tortoise to the ocean and feeling that you’ve saved them, saved the earth. Isn’t that a great feeling?! I should say that the exhaustion of the trip will be worth it, seriously. I’ll tell you how to get there.

If you go there by public vehicle, here is the direction. Supposed you go from Bandung, there you take the bus to Sukabumi taking about four hours trip, then in the bus station in Sukabumi you take another bus to Surade, another around four hours long. You’re almost there as you arrive in Surade. You might want to reload your supplies here, since you might find no big stores in Ujung Genteng, neither restaurant. From Surade you take public minivan (angkot), the red one which will lead you to the exotic heaven on earth.

Pelabuhan Ratu

There’s not much to tell from Pelabuhan (maybe because my hometown is, at some part, the same, though mine is cleaner and more beautiful hehehe). I do not really reckon the place, for maybe I came in the wrong time, sometimes it happens as you visit beach you know. It is dirty there, trash at the coast line, inconvenient waves, and so on. I did not even bother to swim there. So, I did not really enjoy the place.

Cisolok

It’s a hot spring. Here is the thing, hot water spurting from the rocky small river (there the hot spring, I guess), but oddly, the water around the river is not hot, really. There is nothing more I can tell from the place though; meaning that I don’t reckon this place either. You probably will want to spend your holiday in Sari Ater, Subang instead.

So that’s my traveling tale to Sukabumi. So eager to tell you another traveling trip that I ‘m going to do.

“Traveling—It leaves you speechless, then turns you into a storyteller.”

-Ibn Battuta-

Ten Things Singlehood Has Done to Deserve Hatred

2010-03-14T12:34:00.003+07:00

Being single certainly does not always bring such happiness, if you know what I mean. Some people may sing a song about being happy as a single, but SERIOUSLY? Here, I give you some actual and vivid descriptions why singlehood does suck. And these might make you aware of disaster you are dealing with. So, let’s begin:

1. Enduring an unbearably disgusted feeling as you end up with your DVDs or Play Station at Saturday night as your best friend is hanging out with their dates

2. Suffering from self-quality degrading, since no body seemingly wants to be with you

3. Being accused as a gay for you’ve never been with any boy or girl since like forever

4. Suffering from heavy stress due to the crappy feeling of loneliness or yearning for your ex. God, this one does suck!

5. No one checking on you as you get fever or fall from the stairs and broke your leg or maybe you fall from your stupid little bike

6. No one to spend time with while skipping the tedious lectures

7. No one to hold hands with when you walk to the movie as you see some lunatic little high school students embracing their hands to each other

8. No one to call or to text to for a just trivially sweet talk till very late though you’ll be broke since then

9. No one to support you when your GPA keeps declining and be the reason you survive college

10. The last may be nasty, but no one to kiss as you feel like cherishing love, LOL…

Well, after all, d’ you still think that being single is very happy? You tell me!

Okay-okay! For the sake of balancing I’ll give ten awesome things of singlehood in the next posting, so keep on reading!

X.O.X.O.

Percy Jackson and the Lighting Thief

2010-03-11T16:34:00.000+07:00

it's the movie i watched couple weeks ago. i kind of think the movie was really childish but thanks to Alexandra Daddario who keeps the movie more interesting.

Being Critical: What’s That Supposed to Mean?

2010-03-09T09:12:00.000+07:00

Being critical. That’s the thing that I’m confused about up to the second I write this. There’s actually thing in which I do not really understand about being critical. In what side I should be on, what dose of being it I have to swallow, so that I’m becoming neither overwhelmed nor lacked of it. When I joined a debating club, I 102% agreed that being critical was what the most required to be a debater, considering the things that I knew about it were merely about finding the loophole(s) of my opponents’ argument, about you question everything, about how could you make theirs so hideous that yours will remain the most convincing and making sense of all, for debating is not the place where you find the truth or the right things. But now, I somehow doubt it.

There’s sometimes moment as I begin to ask a lot of questions that I have no answers for, I begin to be like okay, as you stop asking questions then you stop facing confusion then live happily ever after (or silently ever after). But then, oh c’mon you, no questions asked then no, nothing! You will probably live in denial, stupidity at the worst.

Well, I’m not really sure that I share such dilemma with my fellows in debate or any of my friends. They seem fine, all of them; the ones that, I consider, are highly critical and the other that are less critical or even do not care of anything at all “Hell, take it easy, just live a life” they probably will say.

Here are the things about being critical I’m basically confused of. You begin to despise people, disrespectful. Somehow you always see or try to see (by the habit) something lacked of one’s performance, their talks, you think, do not make any sense, (through your shoes) they are not supposed to be like what they are. You know, there’s a certain point in which you put high expectation then you just get nothing or far below what you have anticipated before (as the result of you being critical, you think you know exactly something that’s supposed to be, you think you know the standard), and then at that moment you become unappreciative and disappointed all at once for the things in front of you, even sometimes for yourself. You also become skeptical of anything, you are not naïve (it’s a good thing), but you’re exceedingly realistic.

Becoming cynical is another result of being critical, it’s a sign of cleverness I was once told. But then again, if that means that you fail to see any single good thing in anything or anyone, I don’t think so. Life is too short to be used to judge, criticize, and despise people or yourself. It’s also too short to be seen cynically or skeptically just because you are smart enough to do so.

I don’t want to end up that way. But I don’t want to be so naïve that becomes an absolute believer, either; one who swallows any given thing without asking. The thing is I want to spare all the overwhelming side effect of being a superfluous inquisitor. Just want to be critical without despising people or ungrateful, to be realistic yet not to be skeptical, and to get wits instead of excessive cynicism. I know that sounds impossible, too perfect to be true, “nobody’s perfect” an old saying screams, but everybody can try to be perfect, don’t they? Well then, I guessed the point’s been made here.

“There couldn’t be a good guy if there wasn’t a bad guy who set the standard”
Jodi Picoult The Tenth Circle

Time Flies By: Really? Really!

2009-12-11T16:57:00.000+07:00

There’s nothing you can do to manipulate time, to compromise with it, to extend it, to reduce it, to even stop it, so that you can remain the same staying in the state that you want to be in like forever! God, that’s a joke. It still has 12 months, 52 weeks, 365 days, and 24 hours in each day, and it still moves forwards with the perfectly designed and constantly moving velocity. And like I said, it’s beyond our control; you can do nothing about it. For some people their given time might not be felt enough, but for other theirs might be more than enough. Either way, as you don’t get to know how to deal with it you’ll kinda be lost in it, you know. Yeah, it’s scary! But clearly, one should get to realize how they’ve been using theirs.

It’s incredibly terrifying to know that you run out of time in the very last minute. It’s simply like you’re woken up from a very long sleep (assuming from a coma) but in a wink of an eye of your consciousness you have to go back to it till only God knows when. Jeez, that’s terrible. It’s like you have been there waiting for your train yet as it appears you miss it and you just remain sitting, watching it going away, doing nothing. You obviously know what to do, but you can do nothing, it just goes. That is when you don’t get to know how to deal with your time.

It’s just like what I felt as I woke up this morning. Normally, I would go to the bath room urinating, washing my face (if I wake up earlier, I’ll get a pray, but to be quite honest, if I don’t then I won’t), then having a cup of coffee, a very hot energizing one. Yet, different thing happened this morning; I woke up just by all of sudden. I didn’t have a nightmare, or dirty (wet) dream for sure. Though apparently, I dreamed. Yet I wasn’t sure what it was about. Just opened my eyes, got to think,

“Man, what day is today? Date? Clearly realizing it’s getting to the end of the year after seeing the digital calendar in my cell-phone”.
“WHAT? REALLY?”

The first commonly normal reaction to it was that freaking out, collecting sanity (if you still have any) and shaking head then just starting the day. Yet I just remained lying down, eyes wide opened, fully aware and completely freaking out.

Let me tell you how it felt. Physically, I’m pretty much sure that I was awake, mentally I was sort of out there somewhere, either in my dream or my reality. The only thing I was pretty much sure about was that all this time I’ve been living my time doing nothing. Like I said it’s like being woken up then put back into the same long sleep again almost simultaneously. Clearly, it’s depressing to get into the fact that you don’t get to have anything spectacular in your life, well, my life all this time. Day by day just goes by.

It just makes me think of some facts that I have to wholly and bitterly swallow which are first, I am still single and still haunted by the time-and-energy-consuming fantasy of my ex (it’s really unhealthy, and sucks but uh…); second, nothing special had happened this year, not to mention the fact that I failed two attempts of scholarship abroad; third, my GPA freely fell from the sky and I had no gut to tell my parents about that; and fourth, many other things that I find will be icky as I mention, so I’ll shut the heck up for good. For sure, those aren’t the things that you want to remember as it comes to evaluating your achievement in your time.

Well, anyhow, I kinda look over the bright side though, which is that I get to realize it quite early. I don’t get to realize it as I am forty, for example, and just see the fact that I am still single and pathetic and lonely, God! Spare me that. At least I know it now as I am what? Twenty-one? I have enough time to get prepared. So, I get up, having my coffee first, of course, then I made plans (although mostly it doesn’t work, it’s just oddly reassuring to have plans) for this remaining last month before the end of the year including the plan of making plan for the next year… So I’ll be readier now. Every second of my life won’t be futilely evaporated. I may not be able to manipulate time obviously, but I may be able to effectively use it, not to waste it instead.

"...why are you sitting around thinking ‘bout what you can't change and worrying ‘bout all the wrong things, time flying by moving so fast, you batter make a count ‘coz you can't get it back..."
So Small, Carrie Underwood.

Book-Reader’s Magical Relationship???

2009-09-28T16:38:00.000+07:00

I should tell that I’m not really a believer. I don’t believe much in sort of things, which some people might really believe in. But, I believe in my gut which telling me something isn’t going right, for example, and in fact there’s something isn’t right, but it’s hard for me to believe that someone forecast and know what is going to happen tomorrow or the curse which might come to reality or all sorts of things. Okay, in other words I am not superstitious.

But the fact is I kinda realize something that might be rather impossible for such unbeliever (or un-superstitious). I might think that I believe in the notion that book chooses its reader, quite literally. Ha! How absurd is that?

I kinda start having that thought while I am reading Arturo Perez Reverte’s The Nautical Chart in which the main character, Coy, the sailor, stated that book might choose its reader, which, I assume, is well confirmed by my experience of wandering book shelves in the bookshops while having plan to buy some. Well, I read, but I would not buy books, I just bought few of them. I borrowed or rented. But now I buy books, which is nice, because I can really have my own.

Well. Okay, here is the thing!

Couple days ago I went to a coffee-corner bookshop. I bought Sue Miller’s While I Was Gone and Gregory Maguire’s Confession of an Ugly Stepsister, which, obviously, were bought by all of sudden. There’s something in the book while I was wandering the shelf on which the books stand, wait, actually. I just know that I wanted to buy those books. I start to read the synopsis in the back cover, I considered it for a sec, and then I just put it back to the shelf, at first. But you know what the next thing is? The next thing is I turned back to the shelf, and then I re-picked the book up (although I basically never heard before about the author; Gregory Maguire). While with Sue Miller’s I just dropped to the shelf, studying the cover, then just pick that up. Click! Just like that.

I’d wandered almost the entire shelves of the bookshop, of course. Then I just bought the two, because I didn’t feel like other books shouted louder (or maybe they didn’t even shout), which means they didn’t choose me. So the thing is they picked me as their reader, and I kinda feel like fitting the books. I usually feel like I am going to like the book that chooses me and yes I am, except the book that is deceptive, which is really rare.

I somehow think that it’s magical but not haunted or possessed by the spirits or stuff like that, God no! It’s not like that. Well, though I still feel how dumb that sounds to you (even to me). But sure, I’m not crazy, I just… You gotta feel it. I feel it. I mean, it’s like the book tells you, you know, they shout at you more precisely (considering that I had left the shelf on which Maguire’s stood, but then I came back to pick it up. The book must have shouted to make me turn back).

Well, you might think that this is completely ridiculous, but I might say it’s magical, again, and maybe yes, little bit absurd, but I know it (if believing is a strong word, knowing will be appropriately suited). And that doesn’t make me crazy, does it? I’m just following the gut, you know, I am not a quite believer but I believe in my gut, which is usually true, and so are yours.

So, what do you say?

The Mentalist

2009-08-04T17:47:00.000+07:00

/someone who uses mental acuity, hypnosis and/or suggestion/
/a master manipulator of thoughts and behavior/

I just finished watching the entire first season of The Mentalist in a place that I never imagine, Subang, the place where I run (read am stuck in) my university program KKN, which, to be honest, seemingly un-enables me neither to read nor to watch while curling at wherever available. You know, considering a lot of people whom basically I never met before, the noise (all of us are 12 which actually never fully there), program that should be done (which is unclear from the first week ‘till the very exact moment), thought I will never have moment enjoying what I really like, but in fact I have more than expected, by which I keep pushing myself to survive.

And I could finish reading King’s Rose Madder which I myself never thought could be finished that fast and now I am in Lauren Weisberger’s Everyone Worth Knowing. Well, spare you my KKN program and my killing-time activities in this place of nowhere (which actually will be posted the time I finished here) let’s just see how this show can be regarded worth watching.

Story of this TV series, The Mentalist, basically roots from the quest of Patrick Jane (Simon Baker) for Red John, a psychotic serial murderer with a bloody smiling face picture drawn in his every murder place as his murder trade mark, over the revenge to killing his family in turn of public humiliation he had done that Red John had to endure through his psychic ability (though he never admits he has such things as psychic) for revealing murder Red John had done, in a live TV show long time ago.

Sorry, regret, sadness, anger, and revenge have always been his since then, which is the reason of his firm oath of finding Red John. The entire quest for revenge, supported by his amazing sharpness and bizarre ability of tracking the serious crime including the murder’s motive, killing process, and the murderer, leads him to joining California Bureau of Investigation (CBI), despite his sarcasm, straight-forward-with-no-boundary act and his eccentricity in doing his job. With senior agent Teresa Lisbon, and her subordinate agents Kimbal Cho (Tim Kang), Wayne Rigsby (Owain Yoeman), and Grace Van Pelt (Amanda Righetti), as the consultant of investigation, Jane starts his quest for his enemy through one by one murder investigation in the state of California.

Frankly speaking, this detective-stuff series gives me some freshness in the sea of total drama series I have been watching, which overly exploits the emotional side, sex life, and so on which turns out to be less enjoyable. This serves new area of enjoyable entertainment.

And well, I love the last episodes in which Jane gets really close to his eternal enemy, Red John, in which Red John has played him. The trick is about the story of teenage twin girls kidnapping and murdering by a police state that apparently has relation to Red John.

Red John plays trick by attracting Jane to the scene of the crime, he deliberately lets Jane know that the man (the killer) has access to him. He makes Jane suffer in the anger and revenge and the ambition of finding him even worse. Things get worse when Lisbon tries to warn even prevent him to do something stupid over his anger; she kept Jane out of the case. Lisbon assumed that they can gain information once they have caught the killer, the one who was being used by Red John.

And in the of the story when the killer get caught which apparently to be a very priceless access to Red John, Jane inevitably have to chose either revenge or friend whom appears to be none other than Teresa Lisbon (whom I bet will be his love interest), because right at that moment she was under a gunpoint of the killer, whom then shot by Jane to death, which means he had to lose his access to his eternal enemy, which makes obviously potential extension of the story for the next season.

Basically I like almost every episode in which I realize that never crossed my mind that jealousy, anger, sadness, caring about self, people you love, and the most defensive defense could be the act that makes someone end up hurting or even killing other people.

But after all, technically, you’re the one who can control all emotion you have and keep yourself from hurting other people, only if you just can do thinking before acting.

Mrs. Tolliver: “What do you know?”
Jane: “All sorts of things
You really only pretend to like skiing, right?”
Mrs. Tolliver: “yes, b…”
Jane: “You’re pleased that your best friends recently gained some weight…about ten pounds. You wished to be more adventurous when you’re younger. You love India, but you’ve never been there. You have trouble sleeping. You favorite color…is blue”
Mrs. Tolliver: “I don’t understand
You’re… you’re psychic?”
Jane: “No…
Just paying attention…”

Amateurishly Taken Photographs

2009-07-18T19:38:00.000+07:00

Here come some photographs i and my friend Grace took few days ago in my beloved hometown

enjoy...

From FEMINA to THE JAKARTA POST and end up in Jakarta Fair

2009-07-18T18:29:00.000+07:00

Technically, I am supposed to still be able to stay in my home enjoying afternoon biking around the beach or doing some talking with my parents in this SHORT holiday (it’s just if I can say it’s a holiday) before I spend my next 40 days of it in Subang for my KKN program (last program as one of the subjects in this VERY LONG semester).

Instead, I have to make another at-least-a-thousand-word essay for my trip to Jakarta two days ago, which obviously was not a holiday. But that’s fine, I mean, the trip was fine (even it’s magnificent), and the essay? That’s the thing that’s not fine hahahahaha…

But here, with you, I’d like to share my trip with pleasure.
It was a program from English Department in my university to have a visit to The Jakarta Post and Femina in order to introduce their students to the workplace where they might belong in the future or in the recent time; where they might belong for their apprenticeship program for the next two following semester.

And they chose about 30 out of roughly 80 students of my attending year. Well, I see this as an opportunity to explore my next world might be after leaving university NEXT year (hahaha I wish I could and I would and whatever). Spare you the details!

So, in Femina it’s just fine, we were having a presentation from all those fabulous ladies, and one of them is the chief editor. They talked a lot about their magazines, about a bit of the world of journalism, about how a media like that can survive in all competition, including the obstacle of the higher penetration of TV and Internet to people that might threaten their existence.

Well, that’s undeniably true, but one thing that might become debatable is that they talked about the lack of our people’s reading interest. See what people from The Jakarta Post will talk about it.

To be honest, I was impressed by them. They are smart, independent and beautiful, and funny I should tell. And for you to know there is only ONE single man working in that magazine. See!?

While in The Jakarta Post, we talked also about the newspaper, about its development and the more interesting talking is about the apprenticeship that they will provide (what an opportunity) and about some stuffs of writing. And one thing I know from both of them is that they share the same concern about the existence of TV and Internet that may become their competitor nowadays.

While considering the notion about people’s reading interest; chief editor of the Jakarta Post apparently had a different view. They can’t blame people (technically reader) for problem of having their newspaper or magazines to be read, that is a problem about either you make it interesting or not to them (target readers), since he saw that people’s reading interest is not that terrible based on his observation in certain book fair which is always visited by the crowd as an indicator to that.

Well, for me, it is US who can answer that best. I mean ask ourselves, do you prefer spending an hour reading a 500-page novel and gradually finishing it to staring hours in front of sophisticated home theatre your parents have? I’m not telling that one is worse comparing to another; but we are grown up enough to be able to well manage our time to be more fruitful.

And! one thing I’d like to talk about is that since I am really concerned about this (my) blog and you, my readers, I asked the chief about how a writing can be told interesting and my blog can be read by a lot more people (indirectly), but seriously, it doesn’t mean that I don’t appreciate you who already read it, obviously for you, my faithful reader I really appreciate that, and for you who reluctantly read, I appreciate if you read constantly also hehehehe (kidding). I thank you all for reading it. Well, to tell you the truth, from my questions I got quite answers that might deserve giving a try, just see how well I can reflect the lesson I got back there.

Time to shop (practically they spoke that, not me)! We went to Jakarta Fair, which I didn’t think really a worthy visit. Seriously, I supposed it will be sold things like traditional handicraft from all over regions from our country, or at least I could see a single ondel-ondel as the mascot of Jakarta around! But instead, I saw a lot of stands selling foods, drinks, helmets, cloths, and stuffs. Yet, thanks for, in the middle of the chaotic crowded bazaar, there’s kerak telor (particular food from Betawi made of rice and egg) which I desperately want to taste, and it tasted not bad, just skip Jakarta Fair!

Okay, alright! I’m about to end the talking, I know you’re bored to death reading my blah, blah, blah … so I promise this is the last; I’d like to say thank you for the chief of English Study Program to conduct (read include me in) such this program. My 8-hour trip from Pangandaran to Bandung apparently is not a dud; in fact it’s an inspiringly enlightening activity you’d ever done and I’d ever had…

Looking forward to another one!!!

About Movies--About Feeling the Excitement

2009-07-03T16:36:00.000+07:00

There are two things how I enjoy from movies; those are its great story and its sophisticated technology. If good, those will be very fascinating, but usually each of them served in each different movie. I mean, some serve stunning visual effects and some serve great story, but seriously, just a few serve both.

Well, about great-story movie, for me it would happen to be movies such as American Beauty, Revolutionary Road, Rachel Getting Married or the latest I watched; My Blueberry Nights and Georgia Rule to be worth watching. Okay, what I mean to say is those total drama movies, or drama comedy, or maybe thriller. Those kinds of movies serve a quite acting, a good story which is great life experience (sometimes tragic), and emotional thrill, amusing scene, suspense, or even sarcastic dialogue, which appears to be their strength. While Transformers, The Dark Knights, Monsters VS. Alien, (action or animation), on the other hand, will get you such stunning technology, despites their stories that speak out about the same thing that the good will always eventually prevails.

And here are some movies I recently watched and enjoyed, which specified into those two things:

My Blueberry Nights (starring Norah Jones, Jude Law, Rachel Weisz, and Natalie Portman); it’s a movie about how you learn to deal with life’s bitterness, how you heal from a great loss, pain, or suffering which seemingly lead to such a despair and eventually how you look at the bright side and just recover, which is perceived by Elizabeth (Jones).

Not a way different, a family drama movie Georgia Rule directed by Garry Marshal, acted by Jane Fonda, Felicity Huffman, and Lindsay Lohan also speaks about life’s complexity about how clear you would define what is right from what’s wrong, the truth and lies and about how deep and wise you could be to forgive everyone (you love) who un-intended-ly hurts you so badly. It is telling you how forgiving could be so hard and complicated, as well as easy and simple at the same time. These movies are as enjoyable as the movie showing robots with the hard metal look but dynamically (gracefully) fighting to serve peace for the universe which I watched few days ago.

It’s Michael Bay’s second installment movie of Transformers, Transformers: The Revenge of the Fallen, despite a less great story, (for me) it belongs to those enjoyable sophisticated-technology movies. Seriously it’s really cool, the visual effects. See all the robots fight against each other to save the universe from a massive invasion of those bad ones, see also the military jet plane of USA of course. And take a look at their movements in the war scenes; see the detail of the massive destruction resulted in the city, the Pyramid. That is technology we are talking about. And okay, it all is intimidating and fascinating though.

But…
If such situation is really happening, I get a little question crossing my mind about why is it supposed to be only USA to stand solely saving the world? Ah...well, just forget it…

So! that’s got to be the way how I enjoy movies as my entertainment which sometimes makes me get to have a muse by those touching or even amusing stories and or makes me stunned or fascinated by those twenty-first-century accomplishment of human civilization; sophisticated technology. And honestly speaking, I like them both. They’re cool…

-Plain Truth-

2009-07-03T16:30:00.000+07:00

Plain Truth is the book I just finished reading, it’s by Jodie Picoult. It tells about a teenage Amish girl, Katie Fisher, who is being charged for a new born baby murder who supposedly belongs to her. Katie, however, keeps insisting that she has never murdered the new born, even she admitted not to ever get pregnant in the first place. She eventually is pushed to the corner as all medical evidence lead all the state to the fact that she has recently delivered a baby and the fact that she might have something to do with the death of that infant. In the court, Katie is being helped by a brilliant attractive attorney, Ellie Hathaway to whom Katie can talk to, to reveal the truer truth.

Through the story we are brought to see how Amish-men live their simplicity of life. Amish is an obedient German Christian tribe in USA who live in small village with all the simplicity of religious life. If you are an Amish, you do not call your friend with cell-phone, do not go to the movie, you do not watch gossips on TV, you live with no electricity, and you do not travel by a car, neither go to college. You work at the farm and serve the church after all and Amish, they don’t lie, which make all absurd for Katie Fisher to have a baby out of wedlock, even committing a murder.

I like the plot of Plain Truth. It portrays the details of Katie’s life as an Amish and her little experience in ‘English’ world. Through which I feel like to see how what’s right can be perceived in different ways. I mean sometimes as you try to do and say the right thing but in the wrong place, it might appear not to be what it’s supposed to be or it could be not the right thing to say. Like sometimes you just have to keep the truth for yourself, because after all, you might not need anyone to define for you about you either tell the truth or lies. Those are coming from the fact (particularly in the novel) that in human justice (in the novel it is the ‘English’ court), the truth can be just a result of a winning-battle argument and the trial as the battlefield. Practically saying, it can be such shifting idea about law and court as a place to find justice and defend the truth, but instead, it can be merely the war of the prosecutor against the attorney to serve a more convincing story of such crime for the judge to decide the punishment. So the truth itself can be very bias, and after all we are not in the capacity of giving a judgment, moreover, a punishment.

It tells also about how forgiving could be so easy, which is I know in real life it could be the hardest thing to do. Sometimes your ego won’t let yourself to let it go, by which you will never be able to move forward from all your pain, anger, and suffering. And in the end of the day, it’s just you, your ego, who will hurt yourself, not people who begged you for forgiveness in the first place.
About un-judging point of view towards people; about who they are and the acts that they do, for we gotta to know that they should have reason why they do so, which maybe beyond our thoughts. And it’s about how far you would defend your faith which might define who you are and stick to it.

Three and a half for Plain Truth, and I look forward to another Picoult’s, Tenth Circle.

Not to be a slave, Not to be tortured

2009-06-20T13:21:00.000+07:00

News about Indonesian manpower working overseas took my concern few days ago. It’s sad to see all that keeps happening again and again. We (our country, our people) do not seem to learn from the past about what’s happening, and they (our working people), what do they actually look for in foreign country? What do they expect?

Maybe their aim is simple that they want to earn a living for themselves, for their family. But the fact that happened to them is so miserable. The aim of nobility meets the act of cruelty. Going abroad, working as a housemaid with (they think) a sky-high salary may become a temptation, a promising temptation but the fact is it’s just a danger in disguise. Okay, fine! Maybe I never know how hard the lives they had been dealing with in this country; maybe I never know how it feels not to get a financial safety very often in lives whatsoever. Yet all I know is that risking yourself to be tortured abroad is not a justifiable justification to earn a better living after all. That, on the other hand, is just going to hurt you yourself, might as well family you are fighting for.

There are a lot of stories about those Indonesian housemaids going abroad making relatively a lot of money, being spoiled by their boss, coming home with the chance of making new life, a better one. But there are not a few of terrible ones to tell either; about being unpaid, being tortured, being treated like nothing of human, being raped, or even tortured to death. If you think that it is crazy, yes it is. It doesn’t make any sense, no it doesn’t. Certainly it’s still fresh in our memory story about an Indonesian woman climbed down a fourteenth storey room to escape from her boss’s apartment in Malaysia, a woman had to go to the jail in Emirate Arab Union for the thing she never did. Not to mention the recent story of Siti Hajar coming home from Malaysia with all bruises all over her body, burnt and bitten scars around her ear, and dozens of other sad stories I believe it’s not only hurting her (them) physically but also mentally. Our women are not supposed to (must not) be treated that way; no women in this world are. However, our women (most of them, as you know, coming from the side of which enduring financial issue) are blinded by the sky-high salary then risk all the things, their lives actually. So, see the fact! Think twice ladies!

Never said that we blame government for this entire things happened, but they had better provided a better security for their own people (women) working abroad, even can be said their assets. Even before those women decide to go wherever abroad to be a working labor specifically a housemaid, job field should be already provided in their own country. Even if they are determined to go, they should be supplied by those sufficient skills, knowledge, or even self defense skills if necessary (this one is silly I know, but seeing the fact, what would you do?). Eventually, our governments (we obviously) have to defend their (our) self-esteem, telling and proving the world that our country is prosperous enough not to let their own people to be treated as, I’m sorry, slaves in other countries, nor in their own.

Talking about Mood

2009-06-12T19:40:00.000+07:00

Unstable mood, overwhelmed bunch of emotion, dissatisfaction, or feeling of losing gut! That sucks huh?! Yeah that really does! And that may highly and commonly happen to anybody. But what is that then if erupting so rapidly and morbidly? Well, let’s psychologically figure that out then. Yeah! We’re going to talk something scientific rather than emotional like I always do hehehe, but it’s still me talking.

I come to the thing that called bipolar disorder; they call it so, the psychologists actually. It has something to do with the presence of your abnormally (if I may say; disorderly) erupted mood state changing, and can be regarded as mood disorder and clinically called mania while for the one which comes to be milder as hypomania. In a severe case, it happens to be psychotic. Wow! then I begin to worry about what I had been experiencing lately. I almost think I could go crazy (yet sure I am not, nuts never call themselves crazy for God’s sake).

Well! In this case the sufferers are most likely to show the symptoms of period of depressive state defined by the persistent presence of anxiety, feeling of sadness, hopelessness, shyness, fatigue, loneliness, problem concentrating, anger, guilt, disturbance of sleeping, social withdrawal, isolation, losing interest, losing apatite and so on and so forth. Severely cause delusion and hallucination and can be regarded to be psychotic. Those symptoms can be also appeared different in each sufferer. And unluckily this heck of disorder can’t be diagnosed evidently through those tests like blood test whatsoever, and it’s hard for even a mental health pro. But scientists believe it’s caused by the imbalance state of the chemical substance in your brain. Environmental influence and genetic factor have things to do with this disorder.

So, according to what I read too, the disorder is divided into four types which are bipolar I with manic state, bipolar II with hypo-manic one, and cyclothymia, and bipolar NOS (not otherwise specified). Those four basically show almost the same symptoms but in different level in each occurrence. For example, in bipolar I, the sufferer may experience manic state with or without major depressive state. Unlike it, in bipolar II, the sufferer may experience at least one major depressive state and hypo-manic span which sometimes, unlike manic state, simply presents the period of having highly work productivity or success, which makes it harder to diagnose. While in cyclothymia appears to be the state of unstable mood changing which interferes the functioning of the sufferer. And the last, bipolar NOS happen not to show those mentioned symptoms but one suffers from what so called bipolar disorder.

Wow, what the heck is that? I mean it’s undeniably horrible, the disease. It drives human being crazy. To tell you the truth, writing it is depressing. And maybe you find it boring to read such thing, but I guess you better not to because it’s knowledge people. At least it’s better to write (and read) this rather than my lousy feeling expression. Correct me if I’m wrong!
So, talking about your emotional state (if you’re having one), do you find yourself having those symptoms???