Mario no Hibi

My article. Read the comments too ^^.

Last Sunday I went out for hiking in Cimahi. Well, somehow regretted it. I was happy to go there. Even when I was just departing from Bandung, I just found a poster of a young Chinese female MP candidate! From Christian PDS, of course. To make life easier this April, I’ll just vote for her for the heck of it.

I thought “hiking” would be “walk on around 30 degrees elevation for 2 hours while listening to mp3, chatting, and refueling along the way.” Something like Night Time Picnic.

The reality, of course, was a steep, muddy, and narrow 2 hour climb . Okay, that’s real hiking, not picnic hiking. That’s why the film is titled “Night Time Picnic”, not “Night Time Hiking”.

After that, I went to IP where I thought “hmm, at least I could make two new friends…”
And they left me standing for 30 minutes - wet, cold, dirty, hungry, wondering where are they going.

Which leaves me listening to REM’s Bad Day, regretting that I didn’t spend the day at home, alone, playing PlayStation while having Pizza Hut delivered. Sometimes going out isn’t always better than staying home.

On Tuesday morning, Santa Ursula called me. Work interview in fortnight. Gaaah…I’m happy to be on employment again, but at the same time, of course, feel bleh with the prospect of spending my days in lousy Jakarta (granted, it has Kinokuniya and more electronic stores. But why does the people and the streets have to be that scary?)

And finally, this morning I have started to become a registration officer. Ah the joy ^^.

I’ve invaded Britain:

My first short story (after 11 years trying!):

Well, some interesting things did happen.

SATURDAY: CAFE AND KARAOKE
After some aversion, finally, like many other people, I got cold. While on recovery, I went to another Choice meeting. Afterward I caught up with Greg and his friends, and we went to Ngopi Doeloe.

I observed that we were the only Chinese table there (yes, I know Greg isn’t Chinese, and I’m only half), and my observation was quite true. As I often said, I love to represent (but not at UI). All around us were stereotypical ITB kids with their laptops and their MySpace, Facebook, Friendster, Wordpress and Blogspot (but why didn’t I catch anyone browsing detik? :p)

Then we hung out at someone’s flat, which was cozy enough with a beanbag chair and cable. Then off to karaoke. I wasn’t very adventerous to browse for a Japanese song (on second thought, maybe they do have an Utada or L’arc), and therefore chose a prudent Western set.

What I mean by set is a classic, a gay song (gay as in “Dude, that’s gay”), and an emo. The choices were Don’t Worry be Happy (which is easy if you know it…some lines are spoken instead of sung), Toxic (because I remembered Adrian from Lunasy complained he had that song stuck on his head…and I think it’s still much safer than any ABBA title or “It’s Raining Man”). And for the emo, I duetted Fake Plastic Trees with Greg.

To bring back some silly memories from Lunasy’s 2004 karaoke - the classic was duet of You Can’t Touch This with Daz, and I took two emo - Luna Sea’s gravity and L’arc’s Winter Fall. The problem was there was no romaji lines, so luckily there was a Japanese girl from Melbourne Uni to help me out. Because of hanzi romanization was available here, Greg was able to sing Jay Chou’s An Jing (and believe me, some people just heard that song at that time)

TUESDAY: STIFF NECK
Now with my cold over, I’m experiencing a pretty terrible pain in the neck. I don’t know if that’s got to do with a dream where my mom and sister disappearing from a tour group, me and Dad were dropped off at Grandma’s house instead at the airport, and the van was leaving with our luggages inside. Yesterday was pretty horrible. Today I went to the hospital for the third time this year.

I got a nice doctor and some cute nurses. And a livewire physiotherapist who knew me from childhood. She conviniently told other patients, other patients’ parents and other patients’ therapists about my personal history up to the fact that I was in Australia and was foolish enough to return here. Now feeling bit better, but I think I need more massages and microwave heat therapy.

O yeah, Jakarta Post rejected my article again :(. So now it’s 4 in and 3 miss.

I downloaded some 2002ish games and played them…Rome Total War and Rise of Nations.

I’ve joined Choice and came to its weekend. Well it was fun. For a while perhaps I couldn’t write much about it. But really I love some people there. For the first time in Bandung I don’t feel lonely and bored.

Went to another education fairs - Singapore and Australia. Disappointing (the Australian was okay - if I have the money for Postgrad. Still, most programs are less than two years so there’s little point if I’m looking for PR)

It’s been one year since I left Temasek. I remembered the Kit Kat I gave to 10 A…for Halloween. Then the afternoon when we went to Ciwalk, the morning where I couldn’t go along to swimming, and the Saturday when I gave farewell. Cil, I think I’ll discard those bubbles you gave me.

Since then I felt many boredom and many joy. I went to Singapore, then to Pontianak, got hospitalized, had a nephew, met Bella, had my kinda disappointing birthday dinner, had a personal hell, met Lina (who’s a real great friend),  applied for UI and got accepted (but I dumped it because it wasn’t fun enough and it didn’t have enough beautiful people and admirable professors), got hospitalized again, and learnt modern world history and Indonesian history like a madman. And got 4 articles published in The Jakarta Post, with the last two rejected. I’ve decided to submit an article each month - I’ve got two topics up.

In the past one year I’ve met new people, lost some old friends, made up with some lost old friends.

And still, I don’t have a permanent job. I think the number of people that don’t have permanent jobs are quite increasing recently.

But well, it’s quite painful not to have a constant life, although I’m really glad to spend each precious day with my loving family. To be honest, until recently I haven’t tried hard enough. Partly because I’m afraid to leave home again. Partly because I don’t want to grow up. Partly because I hate it here, more than I WAS dissatisfied with Melbourne.

Partly because I had plenty of questions about Indonesia, about being half Chinese and half pribumi, about being an Asian, and about racism and poverty. I’ve got all the answers from my self-study, and all I have to do is to take the conclusion. Yet the pain of seeing the Anti-Pornography Bill passed and the discomforts of Jakarta and Bandung are still overwhelming.

Okay, I think hiatus is over. Must pick myself up again before I’m going to be 27. (and I think I’ve written along those lines several times)

Who knows, perhaps I’ve started to love myself. That’s quite a progress.

Grrrkkk…I think all my friends are in relationship now…bleh. Sometimes it reminds me why keeping in touch can be sucks.

Okay, to something more positive.

Some weeks ago my sister wanted to buy crib for the baby. I always bring some stuff outdoor - including the camera that day. Then I discarded it, thought that afterall, we were just going to Ciwalk and to baby store. I thought it was something like Yen’s or Lavie (three letters: CQB - Close Quarters Battle).

Turned out the baby store was empty, since it specialized only in selling cribs and some toys. In some way it’s like an art store.

I heard the Japanese often bring cameras, or at least are keen to keep taking pics. Well in the Hero movie a novelty photo served as the sought after proof. So to my biiiiggggg regret of not bringing a camera, I couldn’t take the picture of a cute 1 year old toddler who is the daughter of the lady boss (I learn this term from Asian Food Channel).

Like many other female, she was quickly attracted to my nephew and kept chasing him. Even she brought a merchandise for him as a gift.  See, if I have a camera you’d see some cute pics. She was already walking and kept holding her bottle on her mouth.  As she was standing and my nephew was on my sister’s shoulder, she kept poking at his feet, and according to my sister, tried to poke my nephew’s eyes, probably curious why his were round.

Her grandma was quite curious about us. Boy I love when people ask about our family heritage. Really. It’s nothing special if you think about it but I’m proud of it.

To add the “insult” (or as perfect ending), after we’ve got the crib and checked out, both babies were lined up and made to say goodbye to each other.
Since then I bring my pocket camera outside :p.

Some things happened after my return from Jakarta. First, I became more reclusive. Then I spent days reading and watching anime and movies like mad. And then after several health issues, in late July I was admitted into hospital with severe typhoid case.

After I was cured, it was the time for Olympics, and I completely enjoyed it. My whole household was addicted to Olympics. I supported China, Japan, South Korea, and Indonesia. Then I continued my meditation, while getting another article published by the Jakarta Post. The meditation was over last evening. I spent today writing another article to the Jakarta Post about political crisis in Malaysia.

The past two months about my quest in university. I had two questions: Why did May 98 happen? And could Indonesia be like Singapore or Malaysia?  I think my university education was about questioning those two points. This year I think the answers come down into four books.

The first is Sven Lindquist’s “Exterminate all the Brutes“. It is about a Swedish historian’s journey to the Sahara, to understand racism in 19th century Europe.

The second is Amy Chua’s World on Fire. It is about the rising of ethnic tensions due to economic reasons since 1990s, and it deeply examines May 98.

The third is Jeffrey Sachs’ The End of Poverty, which I gave to Dimas on his graduation and which I read in hospital. Its introduction says that the world we know now just started in 1820, when industrialization increased world population and industrial output sharply.

The fourth is my dad’s copy of Bernard Vlekke’s Indonesia. It is a re-released history of Indonesia until 1941, written by a Dutch historian in early 1950s.

From those four books, I’ve got the complete picture. Before the Industrial Revolution in England, the world history is stagnant. The Industrial Revolution brought steamships, stocks and guns for the English, who set out to conquer India, Malay, Australia, and Africa. The European, Americans, and Japanese followed, and progress in science and economics teaches them that imperialism and colonialization are necessary.

Thus current problems in Indonesia are modern. First Islamism just started in 1870s, when steamships enabled Indonesians to go to Mecca in great numbers. Modern anti-Chinese sentiments appeared just in 1911, the same year with the Chinese Revolution. Social situation in Bandung or Jakarta in 1918 is identical to 2008’s.

During the Cold War, conflicts in the Third World were mainly driven by ethnic and economic relations. The problem intensified after 1991, and May 98 and 9/11 were also products of this ethnic and economic tensions. It was not the case of one down and one up - everybody goes up, but the majority is slower than the leaders. By 1914 Western Europe, America and Japan have left the rest of the world. In 1994, only South Korea and Chinese-speaking islands in the Pacific have followed the first world.

So in the past weeks I went into a crash course of 200 years of world history on Wikipedia. It was a dizzying journey, and it confirmed the picture that I’ve drawn.

So I think I’ve answered the questions from university, so it’s time to return from the mountain and to move forward.

I went to Jakarta last weekend for UI exam. A nice trip.

Friday
Leaving Bandung at dawn, arriving at Depok at 7.30 AM. Had bad impression with the area. At 8 I went in, and got in the queue. Feel alright with the jostling game with postgrad candidates who haven’t learnt that there’s such thing as a queue. Even more surprising, there was no some kind of queue line for this kind of thing.

And so wonderful…the administration doesn’t have a computer on its counter, and the exam cards are unorganized. And they lost my photo. As usual…they just said it’s fine, I could go in to exam without photo. So I sent in 3 photos for nothing. But other people had more complicated problems.

The thing with UI is it has too much wide space without reason, so you really can’t walk from one point to the next. And I don’t see their yellow bus running very often.

Friday’s job has been fulfilled, so I went to Pondok Indah Mall. Arrived there before 10. The lights still off, two Korean ladies were reading at the reception. I had very nice breakfast at J.Co. My, it felt like Melbourne at 10 am after I dropped in a late essay. OH THOSE DAYS!

Stayed there until lunch time. Impression: PIM is Bandung Super Mall on steroid. And yeah, Disc Tarra & Gramedia at Jakarta & Surabaya aren’t better than Bandung. I was dismayed that Avex Trax put in early 2000s songs in their compilations instead of 2007-8 singles. And put the price at 200 thousand. Dame!

Citos was…confounding. IS THAT THAT SMALL????? And what does make people flocking there…..there’s really nothing there. O no, it’s such a joke if you’ve known Bandung Ciwalk…had very nice Malaysian lunch at Malay Village (nasi lemak, mango sago & teh tarik), then shopping at the Yogya Foodmart. Which is available at Bandung’s Riau Junction.

Then when to Dad’s childhood home at Puncak. Dined at Kalimantan (speciality: meatball noodle & nasi tim). Spent the night watching animes - Cowboy Bebop (#3, Honky Tonk Women, when Faye is introduced, is legendary) & Nodame Cantabile.

Saturday
Test day and I did not study :p I arrived at 8, dismayed that the toilets were so small (miss La Trobe & Monash toilets…Mel U toilets were substandard anyway :p). Test began at 9 with what is called Test Prestasi Akademik. Consisted of Bahasa Indonesia, mathematics and logics.

I was too old for the math shit (with great respect for my friends who do Math) so I just took guesses. The room doesn’t have any clock so they relied on supervisor’s handphone’s watch. Which was too late.

Okay, I’m just being blunt and I believe some would appreciate my observation: It’s a bloody PNS place. Pegawai Negeri Sipil. The attitude, the mindset, the language, the behaviour. After lunch it was English test. Nice & simple, although too many readings were on biology. What’s with that?

At 2.30 went home. The traffic was awful. And after negotiating out of Depok, I was stuck at Ciawi. The traffic was dead at dusk. Luckily the Nissan Serena in front of me had a TV so I could watch Toy Story 2 & Tom & Jerry via the rear window.

After all the odyssey, I reached Puncak at 10 PM. Ayam Goreng Cianjur was still open at least. Immediately went to bed.

Sunday
Over breakfast I read my American Politics textbook, paying attention on what’s Electoral College, change in Democratic base in the 1960s, and the Amandements. Arrived at Salemba at 8. I went in to the wrong building, which was going to be used for seminar on syaria economies. At 9 the test started. A Time article on the first Asian American cosmetics. So we were free to write about Asians in America, multiculturalism, capitalism or American values based on that article.

I went in with my Azn pride. After that, I expected interview, but there was no interview. I would be called sometime later for interview. There’s my chicken rice lunch box, goodbye.

How nice is that. UI is such an unbelievable place. Dad said while waiting he managed to piss off a beardy (Islamist) by listening to RRI’s Sunday Mass. We celebrated by going to Mall Kelapa Gading.

It was a nice looking suburb. Again, if you want to have a beautiful city, let the Chinese handle it. Except in communist China :p. When I was in Sogo there was a funny accident - a lady accused an otaku of trying to taking photos of the ladies toilet. She called security, and of course the otaku’s parents loudly defended their son.

An otaku! In Jakarta! Doing hentai thing! Two Chinese families fighting in the public! How new is that! Sogo staff couldn’t stop laughing about it.

Walking, I am still amused about Kelapa Gading and Salemba and Depok. It’s like Setiabudhi Supermarket, Riau Junction and PVJ and my neighborhood. Yes, I like my Indonesia like Kelapa Gading & Setiabudhi Supermarket.

Of course, the guys are annoying, the men are slimy. The women are mean, the girls are superficial. The education doesn’t care about Humanities. They are loud, fickle, but also sneaky and manipulative.

But here’s the good deal - they don’t hate foreigners, they don’t hate free market, and they don’t hate freedom. And they make good infrastructures SBY only could dream about.

So I don’t like their lifestyle, but I’ll defend it to death. Theirs is the best deal for Indonesia.

After lunch went home. Reached Bandung before 5 pm. I am able to appreciate Bandung more, and I’m glad I’ve made myself more familiar with Jakarta.

And no, I don’t think I like to go to UI. It’s not a worthy master.

University of Indonesia put me in for entry exam.

Well, I thought they didn’t because I haven’t got a letter from the Education Ministry saying that my degree is legit. But UI has my exam candidate number and the room for my exam.

It’s 3 days in Depok and then in Salemba. My first contact with Jakarta for a while, whoa. At last I have the opportunity to visit malls in South Jakarta.

Every morning I wake up and still wondering would I get along with Jakarta. I don’t mind wake up and spending nights in Singapore & Melbourne (alright, sorry, many people have bad memories of me complaining about lonely Melbourne nights), but I still hesitate about Jakarta.

Still, Bandung is not much better. Some cities have expressed interest in building comprehensive public transport system, and Bandung isn’t one of them. Bandung never wants to go forward and to get real. I spent my teenage years in school, home, and between, but apparently never been in Bandung.

And what’s place left in Indo for Humanities studies? Aceh & Nias are just for hardcores ^^;. There must be some ways overseas that don’t have to get through Jakarta, but I haven’t had access to there yet.

I also still don’t know what would happen if I get accepted. That’s still about 3 weeks in the future. I still prefer editing for National Geography or The Jakarta Post, but they haven’t contacted me yet (and yet…fortune could change in just one day, as this UI case has proven).

As long you’re healthy, well fed, have a home & people you consider family, I think it’s fair to take your duty as a game to have fun with. And it’s fair to keep a dream and to work for it. My British friend said that the Americans are great people because they pursue their happiness - which reminds them that there is always hope. In the end, they always find that life is worth trying.

So, as I always struggling with my loneliness and fear, I always strive to believe. Honestly, I still don’t know if I’m going to UI. But I want to enjoy this weekend’s exam, which is certainly more fun than my Japanese exam.

Tonight I watched Rainbow Song  on Celestial. First I thought the leading girl was Ryoko Hirosue and the story had similar motives - a girl interested in camera moving to US and died (that’s mean. So do Japanese films equate moving to US with suicide?)

Instead, her name is Juri Ueno, and waa…turned out she was the lead at Swing Girls, which I should put as one of my favorite movies. Plus she’s also at the dorama version of Nodame Cantabile.

Now I have a new idol ^^.

PS: I was wondering if she would share screen with Masami Nagasawa and read this. Ack, domestic violence story. Unable to watch T_T.

The story is only based only on my memory and some little notes. So last week I went to Surabaya & Bali for 8 days for my cousin’s wedding. Relatives read my FS blog so I hope I won’t reveal personal incidents too much haha. Pictures coming…hopefully soon…on Flickr, Facebook and FS. Yeah, stuff still prevents me from going publish everything in one day :p.

O yeah, thank you very much to people who accompanied me via text messages during the trip! You rule! Ping ping!

Saturday, 31 May
We left Bandung before dawn, since the fuel price demo happened everyday. Reached Bogor by 8, and met my step-uncle for the first time. We left Bogor to Jakarta about 1 pm, for Mandala flight at about 4.30 pm.

Mandala was owned by the Army, but had been taken over by Indon and American investors and is run by foreign execs. Since then the quality has improved. That’s foreign privatization for you :p (actually…it was privately run. By the Army). But the food and drink are for sale - overpriced (Pop Mie for 12 thousand).

We reached Surabaya and was impressed by the airport - Dad said it’s like Changi in the early 80s. Well, the seats and stuff were ex-Changi. The bride family greeted us and took us to a 4 star hotel. I was damn impressed by the highway and the street - sif it was in Malaysia. Cleaner, wider, better. Surabaya is hot and humid, but so does Singapore & Pontianak, so I’m used to it as long there’s AC indoor :p

Had dinner in Boncafe, a steakhouse. So beautiful…beautiful interior, beautiful patrons, beautiful steak (Aussie ribs eye for 50 thousand!). And a very beautiful ice cream pancake, I would publish the pic.

Sunday, 1 June
Spent the early morning talking with my parents about life, family, our futures…being philosophical. Had buffet breakfast. Then I began messaging some friends away, and began getting replies. Ah, Dimas was in Surabaya too (eeer Bri…he said he was going to Surabaya for business right? I’m not spoiling anything am I?).

Dressed up to meet up with bride’s family. We brought in gifts in accordance to Chinese custom, introduced each other, and went together for lunch.

In the evening went to a Catholic church in Ciputra Land, an area built to be a mini Singapore. The street signs and markings were Singaporean. The church was damn lavish, with giant archangel statues and a mad priest (mad as in bit insane).

Afterward we went to Pakuwon Indah, and saw history of Surabaya exhibition arranged by Petra University. Another Singaporean style. I believe in Bandung no way it’d be given to Maranatha or Unpar. We had rujak cingur for dinner. Don’t ask me what’s rujak cingur. Okay, it’s beef mouth salad. Beef mouth salad. There cingur, some kind of veggie. There’s beef mouth. And pineapple, some kind of pear, noodle, and peanut sauce. I just finished my dish.

Monday, 2 June
Checked out and the bride took us to Tunjungan Plaza. I think we went to the 2nd or 3rd section out of the 4 sections. Had lunch, where I met Dimas ^^. He said he knew we would meet somehow. Of course, we talked about the whereabout of Tito. Where are you To?

I browsed the anime shop and bought Suzuka DVD and L necklace. Don’t like necklace but I don’t know. It’s L. Too many DEATH NOTE merchandise, but I don’t like DEATH NOTE as an anime…why it can’t be a cute school comedy like School Rumble? Said goodbye to Dimas at Starbucks, and then experienced total blackout. Total, sudden blackout at the whole mall.

So there you go, another experience in energy shortage. We picked our luggages from the hotel and went to Ciputra Land again for dinner. Then went to the airport, and took very short flight (about 30 minutes) to Denpasar. Stayed at Kuta.