It reminded me on one of my dreams when I joined LFM ITB (Liga Film Mahasiswa ITB), when I just bought my first lomo, Diana; that I want to learn & develop alternative photography.

It’s been a year, or more, and I’m doing it. I fell in love. Then that dream seems starting to come true. Insya Allah, I will participate in Festival April 2010 Photo Exhibition, with my Diana black and white shots. The concept is about ‘Desiring Body’. It’ll be held in Goethe Haus, Jl. Sam Ratulangi, Jakarta from 13th to 17th of April 2010 :)

I’m really really excited. Please come there as the festival would be really artsy and out of the box I think :D

—

The thing is actually not about how big the award or the exhibition. I read a lot of quotes about dreams. I listen a lot of songs and I saw some movies about them. You dream, it may just come true. I dream it, it may just come true. You dream to be famous, it may come true, but will it make you happy, you should start to think about it as well. You dream to be rich, it may come true, but is that it?

So dream wisely, people.

—

“Be careful what you set your heart upon – for it will surely be yours.”
- James A. Baldwin

I think all people should be responsible of their own words. Beautiful or bad, happy or sad. And I think, “I love you” is a really bold statement. It takes a lot of responsibilities. It takes time. In some cases, it takes a lifetime. For me, it is not only about letting a person know. This is one of my favorite piece of Jonathan Safran Foer’s novel, Extremely Loud Incredibly Close,

“She wants to know if I love her, that’s all anyone wants from anyone else, not love itself but the knowledge that love is there, like new batteries in the flashlight in the emergency kit in the hall closet.”

 

Brilliantly said.

I think many people say “I love you” a bit too easily. They say it loud, they make songs, they tweet it, they carve it on trees. It is not the point for me. There are too few of them, who keep the responsibilities. So, I decide to be careful. To say it less, so it wouldn’t be less special. To mean it, and keep it.

Instead, I say: “I’m happy. Let’s go to the zoo, or to the park, so we can play, and take pictures of our laugh.” Or, “I’m hungry, let’s have some sushi and green tea.”

:)

Studying geology has brought me closer to the Earth, and simply turned me into an Earth fan. I prefer call myself a ‘fan’, rather than a ‘lover’. I’m not officially an environmentalist, and I don’t do Save-The-Environment campaign on the street, being naive and tell people not to cut the trees. Soon I’ll be paid for digging holes on it.

What I do, is admiring. How it works. How complex it is. How old, the same as  how young. How detail it is, that even a piece of rock can tell us about many things; about the journey he has wandered, about the river or about life. How patient, and how it keeps the secret underneath; the secret about its past, and its future.

I admire volcanoes too.

For its height. For it mystery.

“What a mount of heartache it is. A volcano resembles human life. In youth it gives reign to the passions, and burns with fire. It spurts out lava. But when it grows old, it assumes the burden of past evil deeds, and it turns as quiet as a grave.”

-from Volcano by Shusaku Endo

—

(The picture above is Hekla, a volcano in Iceland. It is not like the explosive volcanoes we know in Indonesia. It is calmer, but hotter. It is basaltic. It is taken from here.)

Well, I think you do (wondering), and I think I do (paying too much attention to things that are none of my business).

Now I’m telling you.

—

Since I was a kid, I’ve always been thinking, that I’m the luckiest person in the world. I have great family, great grade, great amount of things I can laugh about, great words to say and write. My family is not a rich one, I would say, (it’s a bit hard to decide because we use money as variable, and money is something infinity, and infinity is just, abstract) we’re just in the middle. I went to school by public transportation. We have our own car, but we don’t have chauffeur.

We could afford another car, honestly. Maybe cash, maybe we could pay in installment. We just could, but my parents decided not to, and I’ve never been a spoiled type. I didn’t ask for a car (until recently), and I never suggest that we should have a chauffeur. Instead, I take the bus. I take the train. I take angkutan kota. I (seldom) take the taxi. Sometimes I’m tired of standing on the bus, of traffic jam, of the sun burning off everything but the dust.

But I live the life. I see the reality. How people struggle through the morning. How the fresh-graduates seek for jobs. How the vegetables are brought to the market. How uncountable plastic glass and bottle and wrapper becomes the rubbish at the end of the day. How the kids, with excitement, chase their dreams, and later they forget it, choosing cigarettes and whatever to be written on the walls. How zero option the city leaves for the pedicab drivers. How old and sad some people that I think they’d better be at home soon.

I see them, maybe just like you do.

So when I see the magazines, or enter the mall, just because I can afford them, or just because I have to do them, and have my own life, I just can’t leave the other part of my life. It haunts me, but unfortunately it is not thriller. It saddens me, but unfortunately it is not drama. It is irony. How some people pull the cart all day just for the price of a cup of tea. A cup of coffee. A gulp of wine. A bite of roast duck. How some people spend the same amount of some other people’s income of a whole month, just for a pair of original rubber shoes with alligator logo, and they complain about life. It is irony for me, for both are real, and both are my life.

I know life is unfair. There is yin, there is yang. There is day, there is night. I’m in the middle of them and I’m going nowhere. I can see both sides like they are transparent but actually separated. Then life leaves me here. Thinking. Be sad when it is sad. Complain when they ask for way too much more, and the other else only get less than none.

Complain when some people go busy busy busy wanting exact pieces of fashion items for the sake of the trends, while some others only have washed out clothes from flea market with the same amount of days in a week. And it’s not one sided judgment.

—

Oh, well.  I already told the conclusion on the previous post. This is only a late prologue of a self-introspection.

I only wonder of you really wonder.

—

It’s similar with one of my past post. Maybe I just like this kind of life stuff.

I’ve always been cynical and judgmental. Those who have read this journal long enough would know that I dislike people who try too hard to be popular. I dislike people who overrate fashion just because they think it’s cool. People who buy DSLR just because they think it’s cool when a photographer rotates the lens, adjusting the focus. People who tweet about lunch with sushi because sushi is so in vogue and they can afford it. People who buy iPhone just because it’s Apple and expensive. Girls those turn Blackberry users just because everyone does, and they want to update their status via UberTwitter. Kiddos who spend too much of their parents’ money, and keep complaining about how inconvenient this life is.

Sometimes I just dislike rich people just the way they are. People who seem to close their eyes about those helpless people on the street.

Yeah. I know. I’ve lost much of my wisdom and spilled much innuendos lately.
I’m sorry, guys. I will try to care the less, and love the more.

This is my self-introspection for today, and Happy Valentine for those who celebrate. (I don’t). Oh, also, Happy Chinese New Year for those who celebrate! (I don’t, but I really wish the tiger in me would wake up and roar! :D)

Sepertinya sudah lama sekali saya nggak main mainan semacam ini. Kangen rasanya. Maklum, saya bertumbuhkembang dengan mainan-mainan ini. Mainan yang rapuh oleh angin kencang, dan mengharuskan kita berinteraksi langsung dengan lawan, dimana lawan adalah anak tetangga. “Janittt, Janitttt….” begitu dulu saya selalu memanggil teman masa kecil favorit saya dari depan pagar (namanya Janitra). Saya bertumbuhkembang di kompleks BTN, dimana tetangga adalah keluarga, dan silaturahmi adalah pasti.

Anak-anak zaman sekarang sepertinya nggak mengalami masa menyenangkan itu ya? Sepertinya mereka lebih asyik dengan mainan seperti play station, atau bahkan sekarang nintendo wii. Memang canggih sih, tapi kok sepertinya sepi ya? Terlalu sepi ah untuk masa anak-anak. Hehehe. Eh, tapi kalau anak-anak gaul jaman sekarang masih main kartu atau uno sih. Mainnya di kafe tapi, dressed up dan pakai make-up, sambil ngerokok. Sangat nggak nostalgik ah :P

Kemarin saya dan Ais (Ais ini nama pacar saya, haha, ahey :>) mendadak mau main monopoli atau halma. Kita lalu putar-putar keluar masuk toko-toko mainan untuk mencari board games tersebut. Tapi ternyata sudah jarang yang jual. Akhirnya saya berhasil mendapat mereka di Pasar Simpang Dago, setelah mencari di beberapa toko.

Ibu Penjual: Iya, sok neng, mau cari apa?
Saya: Ada game kayak halma atau monopoli gitu bu?
Ibu Penjual: Wahh, kalau game mah nggak ada neng.. Adanya mainan.
Saya: Oh, iya. Mainan aja deh kalau gitu. *langsung berencana update blog pakai Bahasa Indonesia :P*

—

Yeyy.. Akhirnya dapat.
Teman-teman, ayo kita main :)

I always dream to be a writer. A professional one. Yes, I often dream to be someone whose books are found and sold out everywhere; whose signature is valued even more than the copy itself. It is not that I want to be famous, or rich, or both. It is actually the vision of living a life with coffee and cheesecake and notebook and writing all day. Ah, I’m starting to think naive, but late at night, it just sounds more tempting.

But well, it’s maybe more than that.

—

Because writing is something magical.

You can make people fall in love with you, with life, with something even when they have no idea about anything. You can make them laugh, you can make them cry. Smile, frown, or even sleep. You can make them wonder, and if you’re powerful enough, then you can make them think (oh yes, you should be flattered when you can make other people use their brain). You can inspire them. You can be alive in your death. You can stay young and wise for hundred years. Isn’t it magical?

—

What if it is not magical at all?

Unsuccessful professional writer is the other name of the lame and unemployed you, with unpaid debt, beers and cigarettes on the floor, and a stack of dusty unsold-plastic-wrapped-books-you-author in your shelf those you bought yourself just because you couldn’t stand seeing your words left untouched, unseen, unintended, in the bookstores. Sleeping with dream, and dreaming about something else other than sleeping. Broke. Well, it’s my worst case scenario of a writer, but I know, it’s pretty realistic for an idealistic life-plan.

—

I always dream to be a writer. But I’m never a risk taker. I choose to be a coward turns an earth exploiter. I love words, but they are too fragile. They are my dream, but they are not the only ones. I can’t put my dreams based on another dream. I can’t stand taking risks. I can’t stand dreaming to be a dreamer.

Then I left it here. Where my words are mine, and people won’t kill me just because I write or I don’t write. Some people may be inspired, and I don’t have to worry, whether people would feed me by buying my words or not. Whether people would care or not. Whether Earth would grow old and dying. It just would.

Thanks for letting me know that
it doesn’t have to be extraordinary
to be special

Thanks for letting me know that:
There will be sun, sun, sun

I maybe sound so skeptical, but it doesn’t mean that I never regret my words. It doesn’t mean that I’m happy being a cynical person. I try to tell my version of truth, but sometimes it turns me unwise.

I wish I were wiser.

And the best way, I can think, to be wise is trying to put myself in someone else’s shoes as much as possible.

—

Putting yourself in someone else’s shoes is an idiomatic expression.

It’s meaning is that you should consider other people’s circumstances before passing judgement or making conclusions about them. Figuratively, putting yourself in someone else’s shoes means stepping directly into their life and viewing a situation as if you were that person. Hence, you would understand their thoughts and actions.

The lesson is that one should always consider other people’s perspectives before making conclusions. The expression most commonly applies to situations of conflict and judgement.

(very definitive definition from here)

—–

To be wiser, maybe I have to try owning my own shoe shop.

So I can put myself in a lot of kinds of shoes.

Ugly brown boots, pink ballet flats, rubber flip-flops, cheapo fake Crocs ™, red stilettos, plain sneakers, old moccasin, fluffy slipper…

Ultra-expensive shoes of millionaires, or ultra-glamorous shoes of celebrities, are never affordable though. Too rich, and too popular, kind of shoes. Head over heels.

There, I can’t be any wiser.

—

“The idea of putting yourself in someone else’s shoes — that’s pretty basic. But staying conscious of that stuff helped me.”
- Don Freeman

—

(image from gettyimages.com)

I was interviewed in E-Lifestyle program in Metro TV this afternoon. Me, and Mas Koen. We talked about blogging, macro-blogging (oh yes, ‘macro’ is just for dramatizing the difference between blogging and plurking or twittering or even worse, facebooking :P), whether it’s already been defeated by the charm of 140 characters limited posts or not. Whether it’s still worth it to strike back or not. Well, you can see the full interview in MetroTVNews.com, I won’t retell about it in here.

Being on TV was somewhat exciting :D But not that much. Well, as I’ve always said, I’m more like behind-the-lens type. The second reason is: I don’t watch TV. I sometimes do, but I’m pretty cynical about everything on TV, well, in general, everything popular.

However, this afternoon, I, errr, felt like biting my tongue. I used television popularity to say something I always want to say about blogging.

About how I love blogging, and how it has nothing to do with money. My blog doesn’t pay me, instead, I pay for it. My blog has been teaching me a lot of lessons, and I’ve grown up with it. It gives me more than one dollar or two per click:

It gives me opportunities, and it gives me friends. A lot of them.

—

Hello world! This is me on my blog,
I love you, and now, let’s start to forget about being on TV :)

—

“Television is not real life. In real life people actually have to leave the coffee shop and go to jobs.”
- Bill Gates

If you come to my room here in Bandung, you’d see a lot of words. Surrounding, and motivational. Burning, but soothing. Well, there are some reasons why I put them all on my walls so I can see them on day and they can see me at night:  1) Because I have a lot of things to do; a lot of things to accomplish. Yes, a lot of goals and a lot of plans. 2) Because I love words, and I love being surrounded by them. 3) Because I’m forgetful. :D

So, here I am, 2010.

Ready with my words :)