Asri Wijayanti's Notes

Balancing Life

2011-09-29T05:53:00.004-04:00

There is something about blue sky, clear water, and the dripping sound of fountains that feels peaceful. I guess that is why people try to reproduce those natural beauties in places where people want to relax. Like the view that you see in the picture above: the pool view of a hotel near my office where I had lunch today.

One day in autumn 2006, as I hiked along the track of Healing Forest in Nagano, Japan, our guide explained that human DNA retains the memories of its primal lives millions of years ago. Those are the memories of living so close to nature, where the abundant of fresh air, the scent of the woods, and everything that awakened human senses came from the forest environment where our ancestors lived. The sensations from the forest are invigorating. How it happens is maybe similar our memories about dinner with our family that we retain so well, that when we sense the scent of warm meals in the air around the early evening time, our hearts would swell from a beautiful feeling. The only difference is, with dinner, our senses have direct experiences while with forest, our DNAs recorded it and replay it, giving us a somehow good feeling without direct-experience-based explanation.

That good feeling works like a magic remedy to the bad feeling. Sometimes you just have a bad day at work, when everything seems to just go wrong and there are too many reasons to fight with your colleagues or supervisors. When you are an office worker with limited break or off privileges, you often end up staying where you are, swallowing all the mess of the day and feel beaten up at the end of the day.

Escaping to a place that gives you the sense of goodness, even just during lunch break, often helps. Like today, when I started my day thinking that I had to get into an argument over the proposal that I submitted to the finance unit. Dealing with the system that does not fit the nature of our field works takes so much mental energy and it drained me quite too early this morning. Then came a telephone call that swept my zen-ish morning even more. By lunch hour I felt that I had lost my productivity. Luckily, my good friend invited me for lunch at Hermes Palace, a hotel just 5-minute drive from my office.

Just spending my first fifteen minutes sitting by the pool, my zen returns. Then for the rest 45 minutes I balanced my uncomfortable morning pace with the relaxing view of the clear water and fountains in the pool. Sitting by the window, I enjoyed my lunch by enjoying every bites, chewing slowly, appreciating the flavors of every ingredients. Whenever the agitating thoughts came back, I took a deep breath. I looked up to the blue sky, down to the tips of the palm trees around the pool, and just felt the air flowing into my chest as I inhaled, absorbing the beauty and my will to feel the peace.

Some people say that happiness is man-made. I say, feelings and moods are manageable. Happiness is about listening to our hearts, knowing our limits - when we feel uncomfortable, agitated, sad and when to retreat, as well as knowing what makes us feeling good, peaceful, relaxed, and happy. From there, we know when should we withdraw ourselves from negativity, then take ourselves to the matters that makes us feel better. With all the limitations that we have - the time, space, opportunities - we can always identify the simplest thing to do to retreat and to balance our lives; as simple as spending one hour lunch by the pool,or sitting by the window, looking up to the blue sky. :)

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An Escape To Discover

2011-09-25T07:20:00.004-04:00

5.46 p.m.
Cloudy sky hangs over the Indian Ocean. The usually-turquoise water absorbs the gray hues of the sky. Sounds of the waves, busy kitchen, people chat, gospels sang in German at the stereo, a space for myself at a corner of a café made of bamboo and coconut woods, an open view to the ocean, a book corner with shelves filled with books from many corners of the world, individuality that stands out but never disturb each other. Wide open air outside, and I know so well that soon dots of stars will cover every corner of its horizon.

This is the place I turn to when I need some moments to think. A place for a short escape, place to find inspiration. This is an escape to rediscover. I made big decisions here. Withdraw myself for a while to recollect myself, create great plans, wrote some of the most important documents I have ever written. It's amazing to realize how peaceful feelings can bring so much strength.

A netbook now is opening before me. Lines of plans and proposals are waiting. Deadlines are set to tomorrow. I will have some more glances to the ocean, take a deep breath and start.

Time to time, in life, you need a place like this. An escape where you can let your mind feeling at ease, where your mind feels pampered by the sense of freedom to discover what it needs to discover, pampered by the effortless beauty, just the sea, sun, sand, and the sky, then your creativity will flow naturally. Nice and easy, like the wind that sweeps the tips of the leaves down at the cliffs around here.

Thank God, for leading me to discover this place four years ago.

*Written during another peaceful escape at Sumurtiga beach resort, Weh island, Indonesia. This place is also known as Freddie's, referring to the name of its owner, a very nice and hospitable Freddie Rousseau. I think someday I will stay here to write some of my best novels. *crossing my fingers* :)

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My Interview in The Story from Disaster Land

2011-09-24T18:41:00.005-04:00

Today TV One, a national news television channel in Indonesia starts a new 30-minute documentary program called "Cerita dari Tanah Bencana" - literally means "The Story from Disaster Land". (TSDL). This program is developed in cooperation with the National Disaster Management Agency of Indonesia to cover disaster issues in the areas where major disasters hit.

The issues include the stories of community's survival, the efforts done in post-disaster reconstruction and rehabilitation, the lessons learned from the disaster recovery processes, and the efforts to reduce future risks. I was requested to be one of the resource persons in TSDL series on Aceh. The request from one of the producers, Hendra, was very specific, "I want you to be the resource person because you were here, actively involved, since the beginning of disaster risk reduction in Aceh."
So I was just like, "alright, let's see how I can assist you."

When I was a journalist, I always said that one day I want to shift role from someone who interviews into the person to be interviewed. As I moved to Aceh to start my disaster risk reduction works, I enjoy my roles as the person producing or directing my organization's TV programs on disaster risk reduction public awareness. My works have been my second university. I learned a lot from the people I work with, and from the documents that I have to review. As time goes by, I have collected precious knowledge on the field that I work on. I think I am very lucky.

This program with TV One is my first appearance in a national television as the resource person for disaster management issue. Apparently, I enjoy this new role. Here I answered some questions on how post-tsunami blueprint worked, what made it fail, and what would be the best approaches to involve the community in reducing disaster risks.

So this is the collection of my interview in TSDL, recorded from my TV:

Thank you for everyone who gave me the opportunity to make my voice heard. :)

My Smile Is My Best Make Up

2011-09-10T10:10:00.003-04:00

A neon sign I saw at Roppongi Hill, Tokyo :)

My daily routine starts with turning off my alarm, checking my mails, and doing a little writing or document review. Then as my driver arrived, I usually rush to get ready for work. Forget the make up, or proper hairdo. I would just hop in the car without make up, except when I have to go directly to a morning meeting or workshop. In the mornings when I arrive at work, I must first walk pass a metal detector gate, and then the security guards would run their metal detector bar over my bag. I cannot just walk into my office unnoticedly, while often, I arrive at work with bare face. Without any make up, at all.

This kind of life is so different from when I worked in broadcasting industry. I was always be neat and camera-ready, because people recognized myself, and they would expect me to look as good as how they saw myself on TV. I could not go shopping in flipflops with messy hair, because I felt like I have the responsibility not to let them down, added with a little ego of not wanting them to say that I looked messy in reality. :D

The TV make up was done for at least one good hour, with neat shadings, eyeshadows, fake eyelash, blush-on, and lipstick, and really good hairdo that involves the heat of the blowdryer and good salon products. I also sometimes wear designer or boutique-sponsored outfits, that sure looked good. It felt good, but it also feels good to live without the obligation to always look flawless.

I love my life and my works today. I can wear things that fit my personality. I often say that one thing that I love about working with the my organization, in the field office, is that I can wear my jeans to work.:) Physical look is not our capital, nor our commodity here. But still, looking good makes me feel good. I love to see people dressing up and groomed well, and thus I want myself to be as presentable. I can go with my jeans, but time to time I can also go with my nice suits. How good is that? :)

Here I have figured out that the important beauty factor from my look is my smile. People know knows me know that I am very generous about smiling. I even put a lot of smileys on my informal writing, naturally, because that is the way I converse. How do I start my smiling habit? I don't know exactly, but I think just like any other custom, or cultural properties, I took it for granted from the culture where I grew up.

Some books, including traveling guidebooks about Indonesia describe Indonesians, especially the Javanese, my native tribe, are the people who are generous about smiling. Smiling is part of our acts of greeting. Smiling is our ways to say that we agree and disagree, sad and happy, accepting and refusing. Confusing? Yes. Many foreigners may get really confused about it. They thought that we agree when we actually strongly disagree. Often a Javanese just stays quiet, shakes his/her head, and smiling, and it could mean that he or she was strongly disagree. Smiling is our ways to maintain harmony. To get the harsh messages of disagreement across without being harsh (to our standard of culture). This potentially-confusing uniqueness got some people from different tribes simplifying their conclusion by saying that we are the most hypocrite people for not willing to strongly express our stance. That, is the case of cultural misunderstanding,
that is enforced by the fact that Suharto, our second president who ruled with an authoritarian power for 30 years and enforced some human severe human rights violations was known to the world as the Smiling General.

I reduced my smile as I live in Aceh. People here do not smile as often as the people in Java. The first gesture that people here shows when I smile at them is mostly crinkling their forehead and looking at me with awkward look. In Java, it is so easy to exchange smiles. I haven't got any literatures that explains why the Acehnese don't smile as much as the Javanese but I think that with the prolonged conflict, it must have been difficult to trust even the simplest friendship gestures. Added with the implementation of Sharia law, a woman like myself should not initiate such friendly contact. However, it is still easy to exchange smiles with people in rural villages, and the kids I meet on the streets or in the schools that I visited on my duty travels.

Anyway, I have built some kind of closeness with my colleagues. They say I always look bright and happy, and many have said that my smile brightens up their days. Some weeks ago the marketing manager of an event organizer that I usually hire told me that one of her co-worker was my big fan. In our events, he often said, "I want Asri's picture!", and pushed their photographer to take some of my smiling pictures, paparazzi style. Creepy? Not really. That guy is very polite and professional that I didn't even know he did that. :)

Curious about how much smile matters to my look, I made a little experiment. I came to work without make up, and without a smile to our security guards or anyone I passed at the corridor of my office. Surprisingly, almost all of them asked me, "You look different.", "are you ill?", or "are you okay?" Then I put on some mascara and blush-on. Still without smile, I passed the corridor during lunch hour. People still thought I was not feeling well. A male colleague told me, "your eyes look smaller than usual". He didn't want to buy my explanation, that I was make-up-less. He insisted that I must have been ill.

Then the next day I came without make up, but I smiled to everybody as usual. I greeted them, also as usual, and I walked into my room. I chatted with my Coordinator, a very nice guy who is like my own brother now. He was the one silently passing me a box of tissue paper when he found me sobbing discreetly in my cubicle from my break up last year, he listens to me, and it was the moment when I knew that he was more than a boss to me. I asked him if he noticed if I didn't put on any make up.
"Really? You look the same like how you are everyday."
It was his answer.
My female colleagues didn't notice that either.
Then I put on my make up during the break. I asked my Coordinator again, if he saw the difference.
"Mmmmm... not so much. Yeah, your eyelashes look longer."
And that was it.

I think in daily life's human relations, (not in TV) people's eyes are naturally drawn first into smiles and bright expressions or gestures more than to the rest of the face.

When I feel down, I think of good things, watch nice things, or listening to good music, to invoke the simple sense of bliss. I feel much better when I sense the movements of the muscles on my face that draws my smile. Then when I start to smile again, the burdens feel lighter. When I see myself smiling, I see the strength within.

When I meet new people in some awkward situation I smile. It helps erases the awkwardness. When I made mistakes in my presentation I smile a little, take a deep breath, apologize, and continue. Smiling is relaxing. Smiling is like the sunshine to the iceberg. It melts the hard surface... when it comes with the right dose, off course.
*smile again* :)

Morning Flights

2011-09-02T18:57:00.005-04:00

I've been flying a lot recently. I have became very familiar to some airports that somehow I feel like there is an auto pilot in my head. I don't have to stop and read the airport directions carefully because I just know where to walk straight and where to turn. I even often feel that just suddenly I arrive on my seat. It feels like taking your usual shuttle bus to school. After a while you know that you just need to be at the very same bus stop, board in, and you would arrive to where you are heading to.

However, I haven't gotten used to early morning flights. It still feels quite torturing to wake up so early or even not sleeping at all to anticipate the early hour trip. Just like this morning, I had to leave at 4.30 a.m. from home to catch my 6.20 a.m. flight.

I haven't found the most comfortable way to do it. I usually end up staying awake all night or sleeping restlessly for some few hours. Then I'd sleep all through the flight. I wonder if others also have the same difficulties and I wonder how they cope with it.

One thing I can do is making sure that I don't bring too many things to the cabin. With sleepiness I tend to forget things easily. That is the best I could do to minimize the risk of losing things during my morning flights.

I am now waiting for my flight to Jakarta. One thing I love about morning flight is to see the sun rises at the airport. I can't get bored of it. The wide, open landscape allows me to see the crimson ball raising up gradually into a bright yellow sun. Wherever I fly from, it is always worthed to see the sunrise. Like the one below, this is what I am talking about. :)

After all, there is always beauty in every event. I should be glad I can cherish it. :) Now the sunrise moment has passed. I just want to board into the plane. I need to sleep. Soon.

Ahmad Yani Airport
Semarang, September 3, 2011

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I Am Not Ready for Any Funeral...

2011-08-27T02:54:00.003-04:00

5 a.m. this morning, my bags are packed and my driver was ready downstairs. I am traveling back to my hometown for the Eid holiday. My phone rang. It was my mom. I thought she would ask me to text her the estimated departure time of my plane. But no. She delivered a straight news,
"Your uncle passed away. 10 minutes ago."
I was frozen. In the recent two years my uncle has been suffering from accute diabetes and kidney failure. But his hard will to survive always defied my thoughts that his health condition was severe. He always laughed, made jokes, gave me advices. He even ran to the E.R. and took care of my mom's admission when she was hospitalized last May.

As much as I thought that I would be ready, I was not prepared to know that he passed away. I was never been prepared to accept that eventually his body could not fight the illness any longer.

I remembered the days when I lived with my uncle's family after my father passed away. I was only 12 year-old. Fragile and confused I was, he tried his best to take care of me. He prepared a glass of warm milk and sunny-side egg with the sprinkles of white pepper for my breakfast, then drove me to my new school. He cracked jokes along the way that I often could not follow as my mind was wandering to the memories of my father and my distant family.

Now that I grew up, I knew that what he did was meaningful to my development. After losing my wonderful father, I did not lose the role model of how a good man should be. My father was like him, successful in his career, yet caring, warm, and funny. I respect and admire him.

In May I went back to Semarang, my hometown. I spent my last evening visiting him. We laughed a lot, as he could always find the funny sides of almost every stories. And he showed me how he did the insulin injection. So light he demostrated it, as if it was a fun game to do. He would never allow us to feel sad or sorry about him.

We chatted until he felt tired and sleepy, and after all the talks about my single status,he left me with an advice,
"The most important thing to seek from a man is his responsibility. If he is a responsible person, he would fulfill his responsibility - as a husband, as a father. He would protect you, fulfill you, respect you, because he understands those responsibilities so well. And don't worry about age. You are 32 but you look very young. You are kind and beautiful. It won't even be a problem if you met someone who is 5 years younger than you and you guys want to tie the knowt. As long as he loves you - and responsibleful about his feelings, his life, and your life, I'd say go for him. You got my blessing."
It always feels great to get a good advice from an old man that I respect.

I always feel that people like my uncle would never die. He is too alive to be suddenly quiet, silent, cold, and burried. He is too exist to be inexist. In fact, I think I am not going to be ready for anyone's funeral. It is always heartbreaking to realize that people I once know is separated to different lives.

Here I am now, on my stopover to my next flight, cannot hold my tears to realize that when I'm back to my hometown, there would be less people I can sit down to talk with. That people, no matter how much we love them, are subject to the end of an end. That we are all going to say goodbye in any way.

Rest in peace my beloved Oom Bambang... You are greatly missed.

Soekarno-Hatta International Airport, Jakarta, August 27, 2011.

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Communication IS Aid

2011-08-21T04:10:00.001-04:00

I recently joined the Humanitarian Information Group in LinkedIn. There are many inspiring posts on how communications become the important part of a humanitarian mission. One post that caught my immediate attention was a link to Infoasaid*'s video titled Communication is Aid.

While many people still associate communication in humanitarian mission with press release, news coverage, lessons-learned documentary, collection of photograph, website management and reports, there is a deeper surface of communication that makes communication itself the significant aid to any humanitarian crises. Communication is not just a complimentary part of the operations. It is the core of the humanitarian operations. Humanitarian communication players need to advocate the important roles of communications to all stakeholders in any humanitarian organizations. Below is "Communication is Aid", a video that comprehensively explains how communication plays its parts in humanitarian actions.

Below is the transcript of the video:
It's talking to a neighbour, is emailing friends, is catching up with the news. We all depend on giving and receiving information to share our experiences and feelings, share our lives and join us to our communities, in the eyes of a crisis, whether it's natural or man-made.

Communication networks that support every communities can shatter along with resources and lives. And when all we've relied on is turning upside down, we need information more than ever. It's as crucial as food, water, shelter, and medicine
Where can we go for help?
What danger should be we be aware of?
How can we find our missing families and friends, and who will listen to our concerns and give us the advice we need?

Insufficient or even conflicting information can cause confusion and worsen the feelings of isolation. And if we don't know and trust the resources, even the most vital messages can miss their marks.

Lives can be saved with accurate, timely and well-targeted information. When our voices are heard and we know what to expect, we can start to make our decisions and get back in control of our lives. And once we can build a familiar communication networks and reconnect with the wider world,the process of recovery can really accelerate.

The right information at the right time through the right channels can save families, livelihood, and lives. It can give back their futures
Communication is Aid.

Note:
Infoasaid is a consortium of Internews and the BBC World Service Trust. The objective is to improve how aid agencies communicate with disaster-affected communities - the focus is on providing humanitarian information. The emphasis is on the need to deliver information, as aid itself, through the most appropriate channels.

A Fuk and Sharia

2011-08-06T13:40:00.013-04:00

It was a hot afternoon in Banda Aceh. After 12 hours of fasting I was craving nothing but sweet, cold, creamy - es campur – literally means “mixed ice”, a delightful combination of mung beans, red beans, rice flour and pandan custard, and chewy pieces of sagoo threads in creamy coconut milk and caramelish palm sugar syrup. It is cold, sweet, and creamy – a perfect thirst quencher that soon boosts the sugar level.

From Aforasri Pictures

In Banda Aceh, my favorite es campur is made by A Fuk, an Acehnese-Chinese who has a small shop across Methodist church. That church is, by the way, one among only two church establishments in the city. The other church building is a Cathedral located in a military compound by Krueng Aceh – the biggest river crossing the city center. Other churches in Banda Aceh operate in rented houses or shop spaces. Some Christian friends I know told me that it is not easy to get the permit to build churches here. Moreover, there are only a few Christians living in this town. “Had we built a real church, it would look empty”, another friend said.

A Fuk, just like many other Chinese in Banda Aceh, speaks Chinese. I don’t know whether the Chinese that he speaks is Mandarin Chinese, Hokkien, or Cantonese, but it seems like all Chinese I know in Banda Aceh speak the same language – unlike what I saw in New York City’s Chinatown where my Chinese friends sometimes couldn’t get what the others say as the Chinese there spoke different languages.

A Fuk’s shop is always packed as he makes the best es campur in town, but during Ramadan, just like many other food sellers in Aceh, A Fuk has to close his shop's green wooden door for almost a whole day. Only some hours before the breakfasting time approaches, he would be allowed to sell his ice. On the first day of Ramadan that fell on August 1, 2011, the lines in front of A Fuk’s shop went like a line of ant troop: crowded and restless. I was one of the “ants”.

So this afternoon my driver took me to A Fuk's.
“By the way, do you know that the Sharia cops raided A Fuk’s shop yesterday?”

My driver asked me as we drove down to A Fuk’s shop this afternoon.
“No. How come?”
“A Fuk opened his shop at 2 p.m. That was too early. All food (and beverage) sellers should only open their place after 4 p.m.”
“Oh.”

I’ve spent three Ramadans in Banda Aceh. The Sharia* rules enforced in this town remain the same: none are allowed to sell food and beverages before 4 p.m. and during evening prayer time that goes from 7 – 9 p.m. If they break the rule, the city government would suspend their business permits. Last year’s Ramadan news highlight was the news of two ladies selling foods in Aceh Besar during Ramadan’s who got caught by the Sharia cops. Selling meals during Ramadan is considered to be the violation of Qanun (law) No. 11/2002 on the implementation of Sharia Islam, Aqeedah** and Ibadah***. Here is the link to the news in Bahasa Indonesia.

In October 2010 the executors whipped the cane onto their backs before the eyes of hundreds of crowds. The news made a huge blow in many mailing lists and discussions. Most gender and human rights activists voiced their objections, but nothing happened. The Acehnese version of Sharia law still rules.

Ramadan is a hard time for culinary business here. To make up the void morning-afternoon time, many restaurants open after 9 p.m. until 5 a.m. The Subuh (early morning) time is when the Muslims start fasting.

“I just hope that A Fuk still opens today…” My eyes looked straight to the street, hoping to see the lines of A Fuk’s customers ahead.
“I hope so”, my driver said. He knows how much I love A Fuk’s es campur.
There were no lines. It was 5 p.m. and A Fuk had just opened his shop. He walked to and fro with jars and jars of palm sugar syrup and coconut milk, storing them at the shelves below the service counter. He looked serious, as always. I have only seen him laughing once. It was when a Chinese speaking guy patted his back and said some words – in Chinese, off course - with a funny expression.

“Why don’t you ask them what happened with the Sharia cops yesterday?”, my driver told me as I opened the car’s door. I know he is curious too. He, so far is one of the most reliable news in town that I know. Being a driver allows him to meet many people and thus hear many stories from every corner of the town – from his passengers, and from other drivers he hangs out with.
“I will.”

I ordered 5 es campurs. A Fuk’s assistants, a short-haired girl and a shoulder-length-haired girl worked on the es campur mixes as fast as usual.
“Is it true that you guys got raided yesterday?”
The short-haired girl paused. I could see the anger sparked in her eyes.
“Yes.”
“And why?”
“They said we opened too early. It doesn’t make sense to me because we sell this ice to go. We serve the fasting people. We don’t allow them to eat in.”
“I know…” I looked at her with my whole-hearted sympathy. She continued working in incredible speed.

“So what did they say?”
“Usual thing: that we shouldn’t open that early or…. Well, you know.”
“Ah. I’m sorry for that.”
“Did you guys got the ‘special message’ for not covering your heads?”
She shook her head. From her look I guessed she is a Batak. Batak is the major ethnicity in North Sumatra. Most of them are Christians. In Aceh, non-Muslim girls are not onliged to cover up their bodies in Sharia-compliant outfits.

The shoulder-length girl said nothing. She pretended to be busy counting the es campur that were ready and pack them in plastic bags. I knew she was listening.

“But… but it’s not fair…” The short-haired girl continued. “… Just down that block,” she pointed with her right hand, “there is a warung (food stall) that sells rice. They open at 10 a.m.”
I turned my head but I couldn’t see the warung that she pointed.
“I believe that the Sharia cops knew about it, but they didn’t raid that place.”
So, it was not about the raid that really mattered. It was the feeling to be treated unfairly that enraged her.

“If tomorrow they came again to raid us I would raise this issue. I would ask why they only raided us, who open at 2 p.m., but skipped that place, which opens EVERYDAY at 10 A.M.!” The pitch of her voice increased. The anger flamed in her eyes.

I was left speechless. Her anger was not about why A Fuk, her boss, is not allowed to sell es campur in the day time (while A Fuk’s shop is located at Chinese-majority, surrounded by Christian facilities - the church and a Christian school - quarter of the town). It was more about why they got raided while the other was not.

The shoulder-length-haired girl smiled. She handed me my es campur.
I walked to my car, thinking. I guess learned something today: in the matter of 'law' enforcement, the provisions of the law itself might be f*cked up (pardon my words - I just haven't found more decent enough expression that bear the whole meaning of it), but it is the unjust enforcement of those mussed up provisions that create objections. The sense of rightness is blurred. I often wonder: with all this confusion, would gradually the people here lose their common sense of right and wrong?

Note:
*Sharia:Islamic law based on the teachings of the Koran and the traditions of the Prophet (Hadith and Sunna), prescribing both religious and secular duties and sometimes penalties for lawbreaking.
**Aqeedah:basic tenets of faith
***Ibadah: rituals of devotion

The Colors of My Rainbow

2011-07-27T22:01:00.012-04:00

Kemang, South Jakarta
It was 3 a.m. at the end of January 2011. Dhora - my friend, and I laid in our comfortable mattresses, half sleepy. It was another good friends/girl talks sleep-over night. Dewindra played her guitar.
"tell me why, you make everything seems right, you hold my heart so tight, I don't wanna hurt inside..."
I read the lyrics from Dewindra's hand-written notes, trying to sing along. Somehow I could relate to that song. It crunched my heart.

"You're not the only one crying.", Dewindra said. She mentioned the names of our good friends to whom she introduced her song before and who sobbed like I did. Tell Me Why, the song that I she played was soulful. Working in broadcasting industry for quite a long period of time, I knew instantly that it has all the potential to become a hit.

Dewindra was on the way to pursuing her dream to produce her own album independently. This album is really indie; funded by Dewindra's own saving, supported by a great musician, Harry Toledo, who saw Dewindra's talent then poured his own talents to arrange the music and supervise the production of the album. All the love and dedication poured during the making of this project made the album brings the soulful vibes. Her songs are inspired by love and friendship that she lived.

Dewindra is no ordinary singer. She is a medical doctor who is currently working as the Health Manager for the American Red Cross representative in Indonesia. Most of her days is spent to manage the health services programs of the Red Cross, ranging from the issues of water and sanitation to the issues of public health services in disaster risk reduction, writing up the plans, logical frameworks, and reports. She is a busy girl, but she always has time to take care of others.

I met her in Aceh, as we were both working for the post-tsunami reconstruction and rehabilitation projects there. Dewindra arrived in Aceh a few weeks after the tsunami with the Indonesian Red Cross Society's team, working as the medical doctor who provided health services to the survivors. We met in 2007 and clicked instantly.

Inside this young doctor lies a great musical talent and passion. Loving music so much, she used to skip some classes during her medical shool days as she was busy performing with her band. It got her mom came up with the advice, "Dear, after you become a doctor, you can be everything else as you want."

Now, how many people you know who is a medical doctor, a humanitarian worker, who is also a composer and great singer, plus a very kind person? Dewindra is indeed a special personality. Plus, she has a very comforting big hugs, great sense of humor, and great smile. :)

The Color of My Rainbow - that's the title of the album - is about Dewindra's love for the people around her. Everyone who have good friends, families, beloved ones, and who had ever fallen in love would know the feelings described in the lyrics.

Finally, in April, Dewindra launched her album. It consists of six songs, three in English, and three other songs are in Bahasa Indonesia. All are soulful and smooth. Dewindra sent her CD to me two weeks ago. Here's what she wrote:

From Aforasri Pictures

Selling the album is not that easy. Despite the goodness in it, some stores simply turned it down without even listening to it. The marketing of the album goes friend-to-friend. Some songs entered the radio chart, but still it is not a big impact yet. I felt that it was not right. Dewindra really has a good stuff. The songs are worth to listen to and to remember. There should be a breakthrough somewhere. I want more and more people to listen to it and agreed that Dewindra's songs are great.

Kemang, South Jakarta, July 2011
On my flight to Jakarta I couldn't stop thinking of doing more serious promotion for Dewindra's album. I was about stay in her place again, enjoying the girl talks, and the comfort of sleep-over with my good friends.

Her big hugs welcomed me as always. Between the guitar, blanket, make up, cellphone and laptops that scattered all over the room, I popped my proposal to make simple videos for her songs. She was excited. So here we were, browsing for pictures until I fell asleep with my laptop on next to my head. :)

Banda Aceh, Northernmost tip of Sumatra
July 27, 2011, 2.10 a.m. (yes, a.m.) and I was busy working on my project: promoting Dewindra's indie jazz album through social medias.I finished editing a very simple video for Tell Me Why, with subtitles to help the viewers singing along. Good, touching lyrics is an important part to reach the listeners/viewers' hearts. Thoughtful visualization is important too. It carries the soul of the songs out.

I tried to fulfill my half-a year-promise: introducing Dewindra's album to my contacts in radio networks. I chose to launch Tell Me Why first, because I feel that the song would touch many hearts. With the tools in social media, sharing would be an easy thing. The power of social media lies in its multiplying effect. When it is a good stuff, people would happily and voluntarily spread it out through tags and link-sharing.

10 minutes after I uploaded the video on YouTube and Facebook, I got positive feedbacks from my friends on my wall. Until 3 a.m. I still talked to my old friends from the a national radio network about Dewindra's songs. She was happy to discover new, great musical talent and agreed to play the song in her station. Great!

In the first one hour after the upload I received 35 messages, a commitment from a national radio network that they are interested to play her song, a preliminary order of CD samples from a friend in Lisbon, Portugal, and as much as 25 hits on the song that I uploaded in YouTube.

Some friends asked me if I thought of becoming Dewindra's manager. No. I never thought of that idea. I just did what I believe. I believe that Dewindra deserves all the opportunities to be known for her talents and music, and I believe that Dewindra can be a great inspiration for many. Moreover, she is my good friend and I love her. Those were the drives that made me jump into this Color of My Rainbow project.

24 hours later, the YouTube recorded 319 views. I hope the number grows exponentially. I hope it is viral. I hope Dewindra can become a new inspiration for many people, for her talent, hard-will, kindness, and for her dedication in pursuing what is good for her and for others. She can be a doctor, a humanitarian worker, a singer, and a good friend at the same time.

Here is Tell Me Why, from Dewindra's first album. If you like it, please do spread the words. :)

Angels with Dirty Faces

2011-07-27T07:57:00.012-04:00

Someone has just commented on my note on Facebook. It reminded me that back in December I wrote this...

Innocent Eyes by Nazzareno Masiero | Children Photography
www.fotoblur.com - Collected in Aforasri Pictures

I believe, innocence, kindness, good times, and good people are the best healing ingredients. However, I never knew that "angels with dirty face" really do exist until I met them.

Last night I was in Pante Pirak, the biggest department store in Banda Aceh. Two street children of maybe 5 and 3 year-old hung around, chasing the passer bys, asking for charity. They were brother and sister. I don't like giving money to beggars, especially when they are little children. I'm afraid that it would make them think that begging is the best way to make a living. I don't want that to happen.

However, their bright eyes caught me. I am weak when it comes to those round, innocent children eyes. I talked to them, asking where their mom and dad were.
"Our mom is there." The older replied. Her little fingers pointed to the block down across the store.
"Our mom is also a beggar. Like us."
So, she registered that occupation in her mind. She knew all too well what her mom was doing, and what she was doing herself. I was choked. Indeed, within their innocence, children know no shame, nor hesitance.

I looked closer, and I realized that she was wearing a yellow dress that was stained and soiled with dirts. I don't mind seeing kids wearing soiled dresses when the soils come from playing. But I knew that she spent all day working around the store. It made me feel uneasy. Moreover, yellow was my favorite color when I was her age. I remember that my favorite dress was a yellow tiered tutu. Whenever I wore that, I felt like a princess. I even called it "my Cinderella dress". Remembering that made me sense too much contrasts between us.

I asked them if they went to school. The little girl said, "I wanted to but mom said that it's more important to help her making money".
I was speechless. Her answer was too blunt. Too frank. Rough and raw.
I asked another basic question – how old she was.
Guess what her answer was?
“I don’t know.”

I told myself, "Sure Asri, who would care about age if they have more important thing to think of?"
Somehow, even a basic question could turn out like a stupid one.

She is not me, my sisters, nor my nephews and my niece: the lucky people who have our mommies greet a happy birthday at a certain day of a year since we were little, to mark the numbers. That ritual made us think that those numbers are the important, integral part of human’s life.

What is important for us is not important to them. The differences of importance shows that there are really, different kinds of life we are living.

Those siblings I met were too innocent that their smiles didn’t fade even after I refused to fill their little plastic box. They didn't care even if they didn't earn from me. Instead, a minute later they played hide and seek around my legs. I was standing tall like a giraffe between two rabbits. I looked like a giant. They were just as tall as my hip when I was 5 inches taller - thanks to my high heels. They looked so tiny.

They were giggling. You know those innocent giggles of little child? There’s something about it that I can’t ever get enough of. They were barefeet, their faces and clothes were dirty. They were poor, their future might not be so bright but they didn't know it. It reminded me of A.G.'s 'classic' expression when we spent long nights working hard on our academic papers: "childhood was the moments when you were happy but you didn’t know it."

I watched them playing and I couldn’t help but thinking how being a grown-up gives us realization about the inner pain, wound, hurt, disappointment, anger, jealousy, envy - all those painful stuff. I saw the contrasts between myself and those kids. Sometimes I asked myself, should we regret growing up for losing the joy of innocence?

In my thought I see life betrays them, also their mom - who denied their 'rights' to be the the 'normal' children. But what is THE 'rights' anyway? What is being 'normal'? When you are innocent you don't know. It is when you develop your knowledge, when you've grown up - you've learned about a set of ideas, making you believe that you 'should be' entitled to some privileges for the way you are.

The point is, to cherish the innocent joy of my life as it is today, sometimes I shall learn to set aside my set of rights, that “I thought” or "I feel" were betrayed by life - and the ones in it.

I know I can’t ever be innocent again, but I can try to burn down the feeling of being entitled to a person along with the whole obligations attached to it. And let go, just let go. Let those people live the life that they chose to encounter.

I have to step out of my sets of expectations when I know I can’t expect someone to fulfil them. I just need go on with some fun stuff in life. Drop it, like the kids who light-heartedly dropped their plastic box after I refused to fill it – then just played hide and seek around my legs. Then maybe I will laugh again like them really soon.

They were still playing when I stepped in then out of the ATM booth. I remembered that I had 2 boxes of apple juice in my shopping bag (that day missed New York and good apples that flood the aisles of Price Chopper at the end of autumn). I handed all my apple juice out to those children.

You couldn’t imagine how beautiful their eyes were when they received those juice.
“Terimakasih kakak...” (“thank you big sister...”)
I smiled, caressed the sister's head a bit, then I said goodbye to them.
Holding the apple juice like holding a precious box close to her chest, the little girl looked at me, stepped closer, smiling, and said,
“Kakak, hati-hati ya...” (“big sister, take care...”).

I 'm not sure if she really knew the meaning of it, but I know she knows that there is a sense of tenderness there. Sure baby, I will take care of myself.

It was maybe, my most beautiful moment of a day. How beautiful innocence is. How tender it feels when kindness meets kindness. Compassion meets compassion. It was heart-warming. Then I know that I would be okay really soon, because along the streets of Banda Aceh, there are many hearts to reach. Much kindness to share. And those will help me a lot to feel better. God is good, and each day is a gift. I need not to worry.

Thanks to two barefeet angels with dirty faces, who came down to earth to help healing my wounded heart... May God look after you always.

Love and peace,
Banda Aceh, 01 December 2010, 8 a.m.

Faithful Like Hachikō

2011-07-25T14:27:00.012-04:00

From Aforasri Pictures

Last Wednesday I finally made it to pay a tribute to Hachikō. Just three hours after my arrival in Tokyo, I headed to the busy Shibuya station, straight to Hachikō Square.

It was humbling to realize how a dog inspires millions of human being to think of the ideas of loyalty. The stories, the movies, both in Japanese and American versions have made many people moved and cried from seeing the images of Hachiko's loyalty and persistence, to wait for his master until nine years after his master passed away.

“You don’t have to wait anymore. He’s not coming back...” was the line that caught me in the American version of Hachikō movie. The puppy's eyes looked down, empty, and so sad. I watched that scene, sobbing.

It got me to question:
Is loyalty a result of teaching?
Is it genetics?
Is it an instinct?
Is it some kind of primal urges?
Is it the result of believing in bonds?
Is it some kind of needs?

Hachikō was born in the town of Odate in Akita Prefecture, Japan in 1923. In 1924 he was adopted by Professor Hidesaburo Ueno, a professor in the University of Tokyo. During Professor's Ueno's life, Hachikō greeted him at the end of each day at Shibuya Station until May 1925, when Professor Ueno did not return. He suffered from a cerebral hemorrhage and died, never returning to the train station where Hachikō was waiting. Every day for the next nine years the Hachikō waited at Shibuya station, until he died himself.

Hachikō was given away after Professor Ueno's death, but he kept on escaping, returning again to his old home. Later Hachikō realized that Professor Ueno no longer lived at the house so he went to look for his master at the train station where he had accompanied him so many times before. Each day, Hachikō waited for the return of his owner, exactly at the same time when his train was about to arrive.

None really knows exactly what was in Hachikō's mind. Most people like myself only learned that Akita-breed dogs like Hachikō are known for their incredible loyalty.
Were they trained to be faithful? By whom? How? What can end a loyalty?

I also wonder if human being's loyalty can actually be compared to a dog's loyalty.
Does the logical capacity of human being turn down their capacity to be faithful?
How many people do we really know who can stand so long to wait, and just wait, to keep on hoping for another rendesvouz with their beloved ones?

I think most people including myself idealize Hachikō for deep inside we long for some kind of innocent, unconditional love. It feels beautiful to think of the ideas of having unbreakable feelings and bonds, and to have faith as strong as Hachikō's: that if we stand where we are and faithfully fulfilling our promises, one day we will be reunited again with the person that we love.

Shibuya today is different from Shibuya in Hachikō's time. The busy subways, private railways and JR East lines had already recorded over 2.4 millions passengers each day back in 2004. However the legacy of Hachikō remains and monumented into a bronze statue at a corner of the station entrance area. It is called Hachikō Square, where friends, tourists, couples, or first-daters meet. Puppy paws are painted along the busy corridors and hallways, and visitors from all over the world proudly take pictures around Hachikō's bronze statue.

Hachikō has passed away, but his story got me to thinking that persistence and loyalty worth greatly. The rain that was brought by a typhoon to Tokyo last Wednesday showered Hachikō Square for the rest of the afternoon. I took another glance to the statue as I walked into the Station's entrance. I felt that at that moment, Hachi has inspired me again, to be more faithful to what I believe.

Dōmo arigatō gozaimasu, Hachi!

Beyond The Plates and Palates

2011-07-25T12:08:00.016-04:00

From Aforasri Pictures

I flipped through the channels on my TV. I stopped by channel 240, the AFC. Asian Food Channel is one of my favorite channels, just like I favorited Food Network when I lived in the U.S. That night, AFC broadcasted Mexico: One Plate at A Time with Chef Rick Bayless. Chef Bayless went on with his explanation on how a Gelateria in Mexico adapted to Mexican palate. The flavors of the Gelato served in that Gelateria ranged from classic Italian-ish vanilla, mocca, and chocolate to exotic tastes of guanábana, maracuyá, and dulce de leche.

I was struck by the reality, that I have lost my Spanish cullinary vocabularies significantly. It took me sometimes to recall what guanábana, maracuyá, and dulce de leche were. At first I just could recall the dinners and lunches I had at Mr. Pio-Pio, a small joint that serves Latin American and Carribean dishes on Albany's Quail Street. I saw myself facing the menu card with A.G. smiling and explaining name-by-name of the foods and beverages that I pointed. He always said that my Spanish - or my efforts to say Spanish words - sounded cute.

Over that menu card, I remember my efforts to spell "gu-a-ná-ba-na" and "ma-ra-cu-yá", and some other more not-so-easy-to spell words such as Pechuga de Pollo Asado, or that delicious fish soup with the words of pescado and cebolla. Those are my primary memories about guanábana and maracuyá that turned out to be soursop or sirsak and passion fruit or markisa in Indonesian. Coming from a tropical country myself, and missing the tropical fruits all the time when I lived in Upper State of New York made me choose guanábana or maracuyá juices everytime I dined there.

My memory about dulce de leche came with the image of a winter afternoon at A.G.'s apartment. He opened his kitchen cabinet with a happy face. As he turned to me, he got that caramelish-colored bar in his hand. "Do you want some dulce de leche?"
I am a foodie, I love tasting food. Off course, I nodded.
He snapped the bar into two, happily nibbled his part, as I slowly nibbled mine.
Super sweet and dairy-creamy sensation hit the tip of my tongue. I'm a foodie but I'm not a fan of dairy product. The creaminess was to much for me.
A.G. was surprised to see my reaction.
"You don't like it?"
"Mmmm.. it's too sweet and too milky to my taste."
He laughed. He knew too well that I don't like milk.
Anyway, I guess he was happy that none would reduce his dulce de leche's stock. His his mom packed them for him far away from Caracas. Dulce de leche is not a common food stuff in Albany so I somehow feel that he treated them like golden bars. :) (*kidding, hun!*)
And oh, by the way, Dulce de Leche is milk candy.

The AFC's Mexican culinary program made me realize how lucky I was to have abundant of opportunities to experience the Latin American influences during my stay in Albany. I joined many Latin American parties where I had so much chances to taste home-made foods, sip great sangria, dip my chips into very delicious guacamole and salsa... A.G. also took me to Arepas bar in Manhattan and Venezuelan restaurant in Philadelphia and I fell in love instantly with all the dishes - from entree, main course, until the desserts. In some occassions we hit Dominican restaurant in NYC's Washington Heights, that inspired me to learn on how to make good mofongo (smashed plantain).

Knowing that fell in love with Latin American foods, A.G. got me a nice Mexican recipe book for my birthday. For months, I put that book by my bed and read it over in between my readings for communication studies. I love flipping over its pages and learn various names and colors of the ingredients.

I also borrowed a book on Mexican food culture written by Joy Adopon, the Culinary Arts and Anthropology where I learned the history of the "three sisters", the staple foods of the Indians, that consist of corn, bean, and squash. I learned about the ideas of Sazon - the taste of the food that comprises not only physical spices and ingredients, but most importantly, LOVE. It is love that makes the food's tastes infiltrate to the heart. The idea of fulfillment does not only imply the full belly but also the fulfilled feelings.

I found that the philosophy of Sazon influenced my cooking attitude. I always knew that I was happy whenever I cooked, but only after I learned about Sazon I realized that I pour all my love to the meals that I prepared for my beloved other-half. It feels beautiful, almost spiritual. Preparing food takes the nurturing instinct out, the feeling to give, and to care. Somehow I thought I can relate to the feelings of the ladies preparing foods for offerings to the deities in the temples or in a religious ceremony that I saw in Bali or in the cities of Thailand. Love and dedication are expressed through foods. When the signal of love and dedication is right, the love vibes in food goes straight into others' heart, the dedication soften the hearts. I can sense that in grateful smiles drawn on the faces of my beloved ones.

These days I realized that food-related activities reminds me of good memories.
Those make me recall the warm feeling, the smiles, and the joy from preparing and sharing foods with my other-half. Remembering foods, or the names of the foods help us clearing up the clouds of newer memories that make the old ones feel vague.

Food hold the values of a society. It also easily reflect the culture and bonds within a family, or a relationship. It embraces the hints of the events that we share with our friends, parents, siblings, or lovers. Just like the events I recalled when I tried to remember the meanings of guanábana, maracuyá, and dulce de leche, and many other memories of food, meal times, and dining in every places I have been.

I can go over and over with many stories of cooking and dining - to my memories of learning to cook Thai food from the grandmother in my host family's home at a corner of Bangkok, helping my bestfriend cooking in her tiny apartment by the Seine river of Paris, when I cooked for my sister's wedding day in Okinawa... Those memories spread all over the corners of the earth. They are all heart-warming.

Maybe, one day somewhere in this world we will have a relaxation or healing center using food-related approaches. Just my thought, I think it would be good... or yummy. :)

Somewhere Along the Roads of Phuket...

2011-07-16T01:24:00.008-04:00

Sunset almost falls. Silence. Hesitation. Life stories flash like a playback of a movie. The actor is me.

Strangers passing by. I am a stranger myself. Electric wires cross wildly across the sky, the newly built giant Buddha on the hill that I pass everyday is staring at the horizon. Alone.

This is an exhausted, over-exploited land. Exhausted, like many people that I know. Exhausted and overwhelmed, like myself, somehow.

Often we just don't know when the burden or the goodness is overwhelming. We don't know when to pull the brake until we crash. Crash into 'too much' state of being: too sad person or too happy person. Too ignorant, or too care.

If I may bet, the early settlers of this island didn't expect these crowds. As much as many people I know who never expect their life to turn out to a stranger's life. What do the people here think about their lives? Having all the beautiful beaches blocked by luxurious resorts and what they can do is standing as the security guards, tour operators, people who serves - instead of being the landlords of their own lands? Where do they go to enjoy the lush white sandy beach? Would they travel in beautiful boats like us? Would they be served with chilled beverages and beautifully-sliced watermelons and pineapples?

Yet people looks peaceful here. I think I can see the serenity of acceptance in their eyes. "They are okay. Everybody have their own roles in life" - my partner said. Maybe he was right. Some people who think too much (like myself) often live disputes of internal disagreement. This kind of people often wonders: why some people are unhappy about others' lives? Why won't someone change? Why do we have to change anyway? Who would become the selfish ones among those who is willing to change and who is not? What is an adaptation anyway? What will be the right percentage of acceptance, resilience, understanding, survival skills, evolution that would make a person belong to a place, to an environment, to a society?

If only this island can walk out when it feels that it can no longer fit someone else's shoes, would it shake its shoulder, drop the burden and walk away? Or has it adapted itself and just live with it?

My partner said I should just sit back. Relax. For that I should disconnect all my knowledge on tourism and business exchange in third world's realities. Just be the guest. Being served. Absorb the beauty only, forget the ugly. Ignore those shacks of street foods. Dirty wooden houses. Things that are hidden behind the small path along the suburb. Forget them. Just think of the comfort of our five-star resort, the beauty of the beaches and islands that we travel to. Can I?

Knowledge is a blessing. Knowledge is a curse. It's my knowledge, conspiring with my beliefs on good and bad - justice and injustice that agitated my point of views. I cannot see things "as it is" anymore.

"People have their own roles in life." I think it's his Buddhist spiritualy speaking. Now I have to think of what I was born for, and what are my roles in this universe. The quest, apparently doesn't get any easier...

Not only roads - even the caves around Phuket can't rest in silence...
Everyday, hundreds of tourists paddle the canoes in Koh Phanga

Phuket, Thailand
An evening note on my cellphone, July 8, 2011

Kuala Unga River Crossing, West Aceh

2011-06-27T13:20:00.004-04:00

This is the route that I pass quite often in the last one year. As we have some projects at the Western Coast of Aceh, we have to travel through this Banda Aceh - Meulaboh route. Most parts of this road were swept away by 2004 tsunami.

The tsunami also changed the landscape of the coastal area. Bridges that used to stand across the river are now standing in the sea water some 10, or even 50 meters away from the newly-formed white sandy beaches and dunes. New roads are now being constructed away from the coastal lines to reduce the risks, just in case (but hopefully not) if similar disaster strikes in the future.

The unpredictability of road block hours and the hesitance to drive a longer way on off-road route-like route made many passer bys chose this unique service: river-crossing service on a raft. I really love this part for the adventurous feeling always rushes in my mind as I cross this river. Here is my video on how the river-crossing on the raft at Kuala Unga works.

What We Need for Disaster Reporting

2011-06-26T12:03:00.010-04:00

Last week, on June 13 - 15, our project facilitated a workshop and focused group discussion on disaster reporting for Aceh journalists. Apparently, seven years after the massive Indian Ocean tsunami, very little attention have been given to the knowledge-sharing on disaster issues to the journalists in Aceh.

In my opinion, this happened because 1) Most organizations working in Aceh focuses more on government/policy makers and what so-called grassroot communities, that the layer in between those two received less attention. Journalists and media are somewhere between policy makers and common people, and 2) Most of us here took it for granted, that the journalists are the know-all persons. As an ex journalist myself, I know that we interviewed many people, we heard behind-the-stage stories, and we read a lot. However, it takes a quite intensive training on a certain issue to get into the depth of a topic and to see and report that very issue from different angles.

In that previous workshop and FGD, almost all of the 15 journalists whom we invited admitted that they had not heard about disaster risk reduction, had never heard such detailed information on the hazards in Aceh, and had never had sufficient trainings on disaster issues. Even though some organizations such as UNDP and HIVOS have organzed some disaster journalism-related trainings, those were not yet intensive and systematic enough to build a solid consensus that lead to the actions on how a good disaster journalism should be.

Until now, there is no specific guidance on disaster reporting published or agreed by journalist community and networks here. In Indonesia, the breakthrough of thoughts on the skills and ethics in disaster reporting happened last year after Ahmad Arif, a journalist from Kompas, the biggest national newspaper, wrote a book titled "Jurnalisme Bencana, Bencana Jurnalisme" (literally translated as "Disaster Journalism, Journalism's Disaster"), where he reviewed how media corporation and journalists in Indonesia reacted to disasters, how they worked in disaster-affected areas, and how they reported those disasters. The book is loaded with auto-criticism, that have opened many journalists' eyes on how dangerous their reporting practices have been, and how much they should learn to be able to write contextual, in-depth disaster reports. The book, and the many discussions on it have inspired some journalists in Aceh develop a guidance that should cover the aspects of journalists' preparedness, journalistic skills, journalism ethics, media management.

After a one-day of workshop with our disaster experts from Indonesian Geologist Association and from the Indonesian Science Institute, and with a senior investigative journalism expert, an FGD was held to gather journalists inputs on how a disaster reporting should be. The following is the summary of the discussions, that I hope would be useful for other journalists/media management all over the world:

The journalists first discussed the challenges that they encounter in disaster reporting:
1. Journalists do not have sufficient information to cover disaster
2. There is no standard operating procedures to cover disaster
3. Lack of personal, editorial, and corporate planning. Lack of equipments and logistics.
4. Limited knowledge on disaster.
Based on those considerations, they discussed what journalists and media management team and editor should do before, during, and after disaster from operational, management, skill, and ethical sides.

BEFORE DISASTER
Before disaster, the participants agreed that media must/should:
1. Posses maps of disaster prone areas
2. Have the standard operating procedures (SOP) in disaster reporting assignment
3. Provide trainings to their journalists on techniques and ethics in disaster reporting. Participants also agreed that the media company should allow their journalists to participate in trainings conducted by the third party.
4. Provide the opportunity for a sustainable DRR education
5. Identify the disaster/hazards around them and in their work areas
6. Provide special fund for disaster incidents
7. Prepare special desk for disaster issues
8. Posses the contacts/roster of disaster-related resource persons
9. Insure their journalists

On the management side, journalist should:
1. Possess sufficient preparedness (reporting cost, accommodation, camera, tape recorder, satellite phone)
2. Prepare personal needs (charger, first aid kit, enough/sufficient clothing, personal sanitary and toiletries needs, sleeping bag, food and supplemental drinks. Those should be kept in emergency bags)
3. Put the safety of their families first, including deciding the evacuation check points for their families

On the skill side, every journalist should:
1. Possesses sufficient knowledge on disaster issues, including the geological and archaeological histories, laws and other regulations related to disaster. They should continuously enrich their knowledge on disaster information by reading, learning, and writing about disaster issues.
2. Know the reliable information sources on/related to disaster issues, including a roster of resource persons, and access to significant stakeholders.
3. Be able to identify the evacuation sites, including having a sound knowledge on evacuation signs and routes
4. Ensure their personal and family safety
5. Share the disaster knowledge and information with their family and closest environments
6. Continuously share disaster knowledge and information through educative reports/writings in media to raise public awareness on disaster issues.
7. Develop dynamic discussions/dialogues with other journalists and editors to gain news slot priority and to make them understand about the importance of disaster news.
8. Develop a list and prepare emergency logistical needs that include foods, medicines, safety equipments, communication tools and equipments, and other necessary items.

On the ethical side, journalist should:
1. Hold the principles of accuracy, factuality, balance, ethic, and value to human rights
2. Understand and master the journalism ethics
3. Understand law no. 40/1999 on press
4. Master the news coverage ethics
5. Master the interview ethics
6. Understand the local wisdom and norms in the community they are deployed to

DURING/ AT THE TIME OF DISASTER
At the time of disaster, the journalists should:
1. Save and evacuate themselves, their families and close relatives
2. Be prepared for the assignment (prepare all needs suited to the disaster locations)
3. Gather preliminary information on the aimed disaster location
4. Coordinate with their colleagues, other journalists, networks, and related institution/organization
5. Observe and gather the information on the respected disaster
6. Report the disaster information
7. Ensure their personal safety and the safety of their family

On the management side, the media/management/editor should:
1. Provide reporting tools, equipments, and logistical needs (including DV camera, laptop, satellite phone, rechargeable/extra battery, basic medical equipments/medicine, food supplies, water sanitizer/purifier tablets, GPS)
2. Provide disaster reporting terms of reference (TOR)
3. Provide clear working/coverage areas for journalists, especially when they deploy more than one journalists
4. Rotate journalists assigned in disaster-affected areas
5. Continuously ensure the safety of the journalist/s living in disaster-affected area
6. Examine the disaster map as soon as there is information on disaster occurrence
7. Brief the journalists who are assigned to the disaster-affected areas
8. Be prepared for the possibilities of evacuating the journalists from the area
9. Deploy a back-up team that is equipped with all logistical needs
10. Be able to receive the raw reports from the journalists by phone

On the skill side the journalists should:
1. Emphasize on human interest sides and put the importance on the living survivors in their news
2. Position themselves as the journalists not as volunteers
3. Always establish good coordination with related institution/organizations
4. Possess basic life-saving skill in emergencies
5. Understands the psychology of the victims
6. Be able to define news angle and resource persons suited to the disaster issues covered
7. Be able to “read” the situation and the disaster map
8. Establish the networking with the authorities, communities, and every person in the coverage area
9. Interact well with the resource persons
10. Establish favourable communication and coordination with other journalists on the field
11. Be careful in covering the news and put their personal safety first
12. Keep in mind that disaster is not about an exclusive report, but more to be a social report
13. Should keep abreast with new, popular communication technologies (journalist should have a Facebook and Twitter account, be able to work well with cell phone and laptop)
14. Should understand the evacuation process and route, and understand the survivor/internally displaced people (IDP) management
15. Focus their reports on the survivors (people who are saved from the disaster), children, women, and elderly (vulnerable groups), and focus on the damage over public and economics facilities.
16. Be creative

On the ethical side the journalists should:
1. Establish inter-media syndication instead of copying other journalists’ news/coverage
2. Not publish any graphic or writing that might worsen the situation and/or survivor’s post-disaster trauma
3. Obey the rules/regulations established by disaster management authorities
4. Be sensitive to the situation in the area
5. Respect the disaster survivors
6. Be able to select questions that are appropriate to the survivors’ condition
7. Understands the local wisdom and social norms in the communities
8. Not dramatize the disaster stories, not gender biased
9. Be emphatic to the survivors
10. Keep in mind that disaster-affected area is not a tourism object
11. Set aside their ego, narcissism, and should not be exclusive
12. Use decent language, not provocative in writing/reporting

AFTER DISASTER
On the management side media management/editor should:
1. Secure/maintain the slot for disaster news
2. Supervise rehabilitation and reconstruction process in disaster affected areas
3. Observe the aid disbursement process
4. Develop the plans for follow-up and in-depth disaster reports
5. Present proper rewards to journalists returning from the assignments in post-disaster area
6. Continuously upgrade journalists’ skills in conducting the disaster reports
7. Encourage a continuous reports on reconstruction and rehabilitation process in disaster-affected areas

On the skill side the journalists should:
1. Travel to disaster-affected areas and develop reports that are based on accurate data (on the number of the survivors, IDP locations, disaster locations, aid needed by the survivors)
2. Expand the coverage areas based on the affected communities
3. Encourage information-sharing with other journalists and humanitarian organizations and government/authorities
4. Develop a media centre
5. Develop continuous reports that cover all disaster aspects including the condition of the survivors, the extent of damage, the social condition of the affected communities (in non-exploitative, non-dramatizing manners)
6. Write more in-depth disaster issues
7. Develop educative disaster reports
8. Maintain the continuity of disaster news
9. Develop empowering post-disaster reports to boost survivor’s motivation/spirit to live better and to recover
10. Be able to present the lessons learned from the disaster
11. Be creative
12. Be sensitive to, and observe/oversee the disaster recovery process
13. Be aware of the after-disaster hazards/impacts

On the ethical side the journalists should:
1. Not report news that awakens survivors’ post-disaster trauma, instead focus more on the education and mitigation issues
2. Not move to NGO or post-disaster reconstruction agencies(my note: this point is interesting, regarding that most journalists in our discussion group agreed that it is not ethical to do such move. I think it is related to their belief, that a journalist should be the impartial agent of social control, and therefore when a journalist decided to join the NGO reconstruction agency then he/she has taken a side)

Right now we are developing those discussion points into a guidebook that we will further improve with the inputs from more journalists. But so far, those points on what we need in disaster reporting have set up a ground for thoughts that further we hope would lead to improvements in disaster reporting.

Many thanks to our journalist friends for the thoughts. :)

Une île...

2011-06-21T14:10:00.005-04:00

Love stories are somehow difficult to explain. How it ends, and how we feel about it is somehow too complex to express. French is a very beautiful and rich language that expresses complex feelings in beautiful details. I've just found a great French song that beautifully pictures the ironic side of loving someone so much but having to leave him for the inability to understand her loved one, and the hopelessness that this person feel in bearing the ignorance and wilderness in the one that she loves, amidst all beauty that she actually finds in him...

This version of Une Ile is performed by Anggun, an Indonesian singer who made her way to international career through France and Europe.

Here is the English translation:

An Island
An island, between the sky and water
An island with no men or ships
Uneducated, a bit like an insult
Wild, hopeless travel
An island, an island between the sky and water

This would be facing the immense sea
There, without hope of esperance
All alone with my destiny
Longer alone at the heart of a forest
This would, in my own defeat
All alone with no hope of winning
I finally know why
I left you, I who love only you

An island as a piece of gold
Quiet as a sleeping child
Faithful to die for her
Cruel, by dint of being beautiful
An island, an island, like a sleeping child

This would be facing the immense sea
There, to avenge my revenge
All alone with my memories
All alone at the time of death
This would, in the heart of St. Helena
Without joy, without love and without hatred
I finally know why
I left you, I who love only you

An island between the sky and water
An island with no men or ships
Uneducated, a bit like an insult
Wild, hopeless travel
An island, this island, my island, it's you...

French Lyrics

Une île, entre le ciel et l'eau
Une île sans hommes ni bateaux
Inculte, un peu comme une insulte
Sauvage, sans espoir de voyage
Une île, une île, entre le ciel et l'eau

Ce serait là, face à la mer immense
Là, sans espoir d'esperance
Tout seul face à ma destinée
Plus seul qu'au cœur d'une forêt
Ce serait là, dans ma propre défaite
Tout seul sans espoir de conquête
Que je saurai enfin pourquoi
Je t'ai quittée, moi qui n'aime que toi

Une île, comme une cible d'or
Tranquille, comme un enfant qui dort
Fidèle, à en mourir pour elle
Cruelle, à force d'être belle
Une île, une île, comme un enfant qui dort

Ce serait là, face à la mer immense
Là, pour venger mes vengeances
Tout seul avec mes souvenirs
Tout seul qu'au moment de mourir
Ce serait là, au cœur de Sainte-Hélène
Sans joie sans amour et sans haine
Que je saurai enfin pourquoi
Je t'ai quittée, moi qui n'aime que toi

Une île, entre le ciel et l'eau
Une île sans hommes ni bateaux
Inculte, un peu comme une insulte
Sauvage, sans espoir de voyage
Une île, cette île, mon île, c'est toi

The Sail from Banda Aceh to Weh Island

2011-06-18T14:22:00.005-04:00

Many times when I travel I realize that I want to share what I see to my friends, family, and to the world. So here is the first video blog I made. It captures my trip from Banda Aceh to Weh Island last Monday, June 13, 2011.

I travel a lot to this island, for working or just to spend some good weekends. We can reach this islad by ferry ship (or should we call it boat?). It takes only 1 hour by fast ferry and 2.5 hour by the slow ferry from Banda Aceh to get there. Weh island has beautiful beaches and great underwater parks. You can dive, snorkel, or simply lay down on your hammock from dawn til dusk. However, this trip that I recorded was a business trip. We organized a workshop and focused group discussion to develop the guidelines for disaster reporting. There were 17 journalists with us in this mission. I will share some interesting points that we discussed there in another writing in this blog. :)

India Arie on Loving/Learning

2011-06-07T22:10:00.003-04:00

This is when Serenity Prayer is made into a song.
Soothing and so peaceful. Thank you, India Arie.

Oh, God, grant me the serenity
To accept the things that I can not change
The courage to change the things that I can't
The wisdom to know the difference

Oh and God give me the courage
To love with an open heart
To love with an open heart
To love with an open heart
I wanna love with an open heart
with an open heart

The highest expression of love is to give without expecting
The highest expression of love is to accept without exception
I have so much to learn, I have so much to learn, I have so much to learn...

Thoughts on Trust

2011-06-07T13:01:00.010-04:00

One thing I believe about trust is, when people work reciprocally in reinforcing mutual trust between them, the trust will magnify, and the chains of trust between them hold stronger than ever.
On the other hand, when people are ignorant about the works of trust-building, the trust will crumble and the chain will break.

Have you ever played a team-building game called "the circle of trust", or "the leaning willow"?

It's the game when someone should stand in the middle of a circle of people, where this one person is instructed to cross his or her arms tight on the chest, close the eyes, then just let his or her body fall into everyone's hands. Meanwhile, everyone in the circle is instructed to stand steadily and ready to catch the falling partner. When you trust your circle enough, you would feel the bliss of letting go and feeling safe in others' hands. Here's the picture of how we play the game:

The bliss of trusting (Asri's Photo Bank)

We played that game in an office retreat last year, and I enjoyed the moments when steady hands caught my falling body and turned it around by giving it to other gentle, steady hands in the circle. The game's instructions sound easy, but it turned out that it's not that easy for everybody to really let go and put their safety in others' hands.

Some people I know couldn't enjoy the process. They kept on opening their eyes, worrying if they would fall off. Some other bodies were stiff and inflexible, indicating that they were holding the lack of trust - on the steadiness of the supporting hands, on their own safety, on their own ability to sway. Some other admitted that they were afraid if they were too heavy for others to hold. Some simply said that they didn't feel comfortable.

When we took turn we could tell which ones of our friends were taking the game easily, and which ones were holding back. We, the supporting hands, could feel when there was lack of trust within.

When you trust everyone around you, you don't have to worry if you'd fall (Asri's Photo Bank)

In real life, the business of trust goes in similar ways. We feel the trust when we are really sure that the people who, or the tools that (we expect to) support us don't mess up. The confidence might come from the realization that our supporting group have understood the rules and the ways to ensure our safety. When it comes to adventurous sports like rappeling or scuba diving (I mention only these two sports because those are the only quite adventurous sports I've done), trust would come with the realization that our gears and tools are in the perfect shape and functions. Believing that those gears and tools are okay takes some preliminary tests.

In scuba diving we did a thorough check on the tools. We try to breathe in and out from our regulator and octopii before we buckle our BCD (stands for Buoyancy Control Device - a set of diving vest) on. I would feel safe when I know that my diving buddy is an attentive, caring and skilled enough person. In rappeling we have to check the ropes, harness, and carabiners, making sure that they are not torn or loose. We double, or even triple check the knots and buckles.

I studied basic information on the ocean current and the underwater landscape before I dive, and I inquire some information, or check the rock and soil formation myself before rappeling. I need good instructions before I jump so I know what to do to secure my life in those games. I would feel very confident when (1) After thorough checks, I am sure that I work with the 'right' person and tools, (2) when I know the rules and instructions well and I know that others follow that very rules, and (3) when I know the ground where I stand well - of course after some preliminary information or on-the-spot check. Those 3 factors are enough to get me into the fun of any adventurous stuff.

Trust is a two-ways exercise. Aside from our individual efforts to make sure, then to feel sure about what we do with others, our support group tends to support us better if they feel that we confide in them. In the circle of trust game, it's more irritating to play in the supporting group when the person in the middle of the circle keeps on opening his/her eyes or keeping on worrying about their weight, the way the fall, or whether we would not notice his/her swaying direction attentively. The weight of that person also feels heavier when s/he is standing stiff.

Distrust might come from past discouraging experiences. My friends who were afraid if they were too heavy admitted that they had been exposed to too much negative comments on their weight. It can also come as the result of the lack of knowledge. Those who didn’t feel secure to just sway might not know that this kind of game is completely safe and that people in supporting circle tends to take their protective sides seriously for the amount of trust given to them.

You might have ever heard that trust takes both instinct and logical considerations. Somehow you might say that you just "know" that you can trust someone. It's not as simple "I just know", actually. I believe that we, human, have the capacity to store some important information for self-survival. Our brain records the signs and traits of the persons and circumstances that are related to the secure and insecure states fro our direct personal experiences.

Ignorance is a threat to trust-building. It's like in a situation when you get a diving buddy who ignored the rules and commitment to stick together all through the dive. Not only it hurts to the heart for it signifies a degree of ignorance, but also it can be fatal. What would happen if there is an accident and one of us need air supply from another? You may pass out - that's the minimum risk - and you'll have to spend a week in a decompression chamber to recover.

We, often hear our partners saying that we'd better just trust them. But when trust is to hold, would you hold on to something that is unsteady?

Trust is to hold (Asri's Photo Bank)

Walking with trust does not equal to walking blind. When we feel that there is something wrong, we should step back and reflect, and take both your instinct and your logical consideration into account. Why does it feel suspicious? Why does it feel uncomfortable? When the end result just goes, "nah, I'm PMS-ing" - then you're pretty good. After that week you'd be okay. But when – in ANY KINDS of human relationship - you clearly see the signs of;

Disrespect. it includes some verbal expressions of: "No, I don't have a time to talk with you", "You're stupid" (the disrespect is so obvious, isn't it?:/), "You're boring", "I'm fed up of you", "get out of my house, now!" (imagine the worst scenario: it is said at 3 a.m. in winter night after a blizzard), or non-verbal acts of flirting with almost every guy/girl s/he meet, being super late for a date, chat on Skype, or call, or keeps on telling you to just summarize your story because he's not into listening to you. If s/he can be punctual for everyone else but you, why can't s/he do the same to you?

Ignorance: "I don't care about what you're thinking", "I can do whatever I want and you can't control me" , "we can have an affair but I'm not responsible about your marriage"

Disability to negotiate: "I don't want to talk about this: I can hang out with anyone I want.", "I'm bored of this conversation.", "You ask too much", or "We have nothing else to discuss.", (while you DO have things to discuss).

It's really time to question whether it's worth to work on ANYTHING with the person who expresses all those reactions to you. None can really share or build the trust if they are treated in those negative ways. We all know that a good professional or personal relationship take respect, caring, and understanding. Without those, would we feel happy? Would we feel secure? Would we feel confident that the human relationship that we build is meaningful to us?

Distrust is like the sea water to the steel. Not only that it would conceal the steel's shine under the rust stains, it would even break and crumble the steel apart. You want to shine. You don't want to break.

Trust, on the other hand, is bright and beautiful. My most recent example will be Kay, a great woman in a local radio in Banda Aceh, whom I trust so much. She is very attentive, smart, creative, kind, and professional. I guess she wins my trust because first, she fits my ideal standards.

Secondly, we both have a common interest: philanthropy. With her capacity as the program director, she produces and broadcasts civic education programs in her station, even though those programs do not deliver any profit. I did the same when I was a radio program director in Java, back then in 2005. We both agree that radio is responsible for educating the communities, and thus it should not only boost non-educative yet profitable programs, but it also have to find ways to deliver educative messages in the most engaging ways. Common interest connects your minds. I learned that like-minded people tend to trust each other because I think it’s comfortable to have a hint on the thinking and decision-making processes. It feels really good to work with her. I feel that now I don’t have to talk too much and she would understand what I want and what I mean, and she would come out with the outputs that fit exactly my expectations or even much better.

Thirdly, we have exercised our trusts toward each other in many projects, and we, with our like-mindedness, worked our best in fulfilling each other’s responsibilities and expectations. We are keen about kind words, about confirming and reconfirming, about sharing productive suggestions, and about apologizing as soon as things didn’t go as well as we expected.

This month we produce 10,000 copies of educational CD containing the songs and stories on disaster risk reduction to be distributed to the communities. Today she delivered the mastered recording that was produced while I was away taking care of my mom who was hospitalized in my hometown. I just left her with edited scripts with notes here and there on musical background and sound effects needed, explanations on each story-teller’s characters and what to do about them. She did the job that I planned to do before that sudden trip back home.

Because I fully trusted her, I didn’t feel the urge to fly back to Aceh to directly supervise the recording and production processes. I could take time to take care of my mom until she recovered, and next, just needed to check the pre-mastered recordings, gave some inputs and asked her to go on with the finalization of the recording. I could have my leave from work peacefully because I know she wouldn’t let me down. That's how peaceful trust is.

I think in professional world, satisfactory performance affirms the trust, in which any satisfactory performance comes with the willingness to listen, paying attention to expected details, good communication, honesty, and fair agreements between both sides that can only be reached through good negotiation process based on sincere respect and the will to be kind to each other. If only we can translate those modalities of trust into any other kinds of relationship, our world will be a better place to live. (*waving hand like a beauty pageant*) :)

30 Minutes

2011-06-04T06:00:00.008-04:00

How long does it take to change your life's direction?
Often it's very short. One impulse, one mistake, and someone, or you - yourself ruin a precious thing that you've built for years.

Telling your children that they are useless and ruin their self-esteem forever takes less than one minute.
Following your impulse, kissing another person and betray your beloved one takes less than two minutes.
Saying something stupid in a bad joke and get your good friend to thinking that you disrespect him or her takes less than three minutes.
Making a phone call asking another person for a night out while your beloved one is waiting for your call, that takes less than five minutes.
Getting so angry,yelling and bang your office door and get your boss thinking that you are an immature staff takes less than fifteen minutes.
Flirting with another person you meet in the bar and moving to another level of involvement while your spouse is waiting at home takes less than twenty-five minutes.
Those are the examples on how long it takes to make the mistakes you might soon regret.

How long does it take to finally make a decision?
Often you have been thinking about it for so long, but it takes one blink of the eyes to finally say, "this is it. I've had enough and I must walk away." It often only takes those short-minute mistakes from others to make your final decision.

You might have been abused all through the course of your career in an office but it takes one single 'too much' action from the person who abuses you to make you finally write a resignation mail, or to file a report to the higher management.

You might have been disappointed all through the course of relationship, but it takes a single short-second mistake of your partner to finally have a say.

How long does it take to ruin a great image, a dream, a hope?
How long does it take to heal the wounds from the event that that happened in that very short period of time?
How long does it take to recover trust?
How long does it take to make up your mistake?
How long does it take to finally be able to look into the eyes of the people that you used to love and say, "I forgive you."?
How long would you bear the regret, shame, disappointment, anger, resentment, disgust, trauma from the seconds of the hurt?
How bad those seconds of distrust and hurt ruin you?
That's the thing that we never know.

Even just to be able to talk about it, it takes time until you feel strong enough to recall the pain. Some people just keep the pieces of their hearts, pretending they are okay even if they are not.

It doesn't take too long to alter a life. To demolish trust. To dump the innocence. To make big decisions among many options.

Beware of the things you do in every single seconds that we live. Think about it carefully. Because if not, we might regret those very second in a million other seconds ahead.
Because once the precious thing is ruined, it's hard to expect that it would come back as a whole again....

(All are the the thoughts that come accross my mind whenever I listen to 30 Minutes by T.A.T.U. Here is the lyrics)

Saying something stupid and get your bestfriend to think that you disrespect him or her takes less than two minutes.

Through the Changing Ocean Tides

2011-06-02T02:49:00.029-04:00

(A note for my girl friends and sisters on how to cope with a painful break-up)

I love escaping to places like this to retreat and contemplate(from Asri's Album)

“Well I’ve been afraid of changing ‘cause I’ve built my life around you
But time makes you bolder, children gets older, and I’m getting older too...”
(Landslide, Fleetwood Mac)

How many times have you built your life around a person?
You feel comfortable, you love that person with all your heart, and you do everything possible to be with him, yet something unexpected comes on your way at the most unpredicted time, tearing the bonds between you and him all in a sudden. Feeling lost, disoriented, hollow, shattered, (well you know, all those keywords in break up songs...) are the most possible impacts. After all, he was the center of your life. Being with him was the main direction you were heading to.

Suddenly you don’t have to do many things that you usually do. No more preparing for breakfast, lunch box, dinner, or special menu on weekends. Suddenly you have to watch all your DVDs alone on Friday nights. Suddenly you don’t have anyone at the other end of the line to chat with. Suddenly you have none to hug, to look at closely with that look-of-love, with a little smile drawn at your lips. No more special nicknames for each other. No more dreams about the kinds of future that you would spend together. You eventually realize that all the savings you have to build a future with him would be there in your bank account for an idle purpose. No more trips on holidays, and you start to pack all the pictures, valentine’s day and birthday cards away from your sight for those start to feel bitter to see.

Whether you are separated by death or by betrayal, still you would have this moment of post-break up disorientation. However, in the case of betrayal, the sense of disorientation might go even worse because you end up questioning if you did really knew the person you were together with for a quite long period of time. You would question whether he really loved you as much as you believed when he said that to you while at your back he was cheating on you. You lost orientation on how real love should look like, and it may affect you for longer run, often way longer than what you predicted.

Feeling disoriented is painful. For any kind of pain, you need a cure. But first, you have to know exactly where it hurts. Everyone knows that different from physical pain, the wounds that trigger the pain after an end of a relationship are invisible. If treated carelessly, the wounds might turn into very sensitive scars in the future. Many of us try to ignore the pain by simply moving on. Alright, it is true that time heals most wounds. But time does not guarantee that it would heal the torn layers beneath the scars completely.

What the wound is about is the thing that we need to figure out. Is it your trust wounded? Is it your self-esteem? Is it your dignity? Is it your pride? Is it your confidence? Is it your intellectuality? Does it invoke some kind of fear? Or is it about the insecurities? Are you angry? Are you afraid of the sudden changes? Are you in grief? Do you grieve for losing the person that was so important to your life, or for losing some kind of status that comforted you? And if he was that important, what made him so important to your life?

You can ask many questions to yourself to explore the meaning of that now-broken relationship to yourself, the meaning of that lost person, and at the end, the meaning of yourself in relation to those matters. Asking those questions would help you seeing what do you think is good, important, and meaningful. This would help you a lot in mapping out your new path. :)

Breaking up is a great moment to reflect. After all the storms of rage, sadness, sleepless nights, series of questioning and fact-finding efforts, at the end, here you are – all alone. The closest person that you have is YOURSELF. So love her with all your heart. Take care of her. Take care of yourself.

Whether he left you because he was lonely, simply unfaithful or plain stupid, whether it was because he was insecure about your relationship, or because there were some ill-mannered women breaking into your relationship to fulfill their lust and ego, or because your personalities couldn’t stop colliding and quarreling most of the times, at the end you moved out from that toxic relationship because you have decided that you didn’t want to take those pains anymore.
So hold on to that and read this loud and clear to your mind: you moved out, because you don’t want to take more pain. So be it. Let the post-break-up moment be the time to heal the pain.

Sometimes the break-ups are rough, depends on the intensity of the pain happening during its process. Betrayal cases are usually the worst. I would suggest you to not reaching out to your ex when you still feel enormous pain and anger in you, because the betrayed feeling can hit you multiple times when you see him again, knowing that you (used to) love him so much (and maybe still) but at the same time you hate him so much for hurting you beyond anything you could imagine. Before you reach your inner happiness and peace, moving closer to the agent of agony is close to self-torturing acts. You may say that you would learn to forgive him, but ordinarily, forgiving is much easier to do when you can control your mind from recalling all the hurt that he cause to you.

As much as it feels good and liberating, forgiving is a work to be done, not something that would come automatically. To me, forgiving doesn’t mean “accepting/tolerating the acts done by the perpetrator/s”. I believe that forgiving means “to let go”. Out of weaknesses or out of mean purpose, what is wrong in the perpertrators wrongdoing is still wrong and I don’t need to condone that fact. But I have to allow myself to let go. I don't have to invite those persons who have harmed myself back into my lives or be friendly with them. What we do have to do is allow ourselves to release all negative emotions associated with that person, because if we hold onto the pain, we would allow that person's past actions to continue hurting ourselves. Learning from the hurt, I promise to myself is that I wouldn't want to betray anyone I love in the future, and I never want to be the woman who intrude in other couple's relationship. I want to live peacefully, without regrets or guilts. I'm sure many of you want that to.

Putting our priority to reach out to kind people is better than wasting our energy trying to reach out to those who have hurt us. We can learn more about kind acts from those kind hearts and affirm our path right there. As far as I know, kindness - that we do for others, or that others do for us - never fails to soothe any wounded heart.

After the break up, many people rush to find a new relationship, thinking that it would heal them faster. The truth is, we, people, tend to fill that vacant place with a person that is familiar to us. And those people are most likely the person with similar qualities as the one with whom we have just broken up with. That could jeopardize the healing process. Be careful with your steps. You don't want to get hurt twice. If you feel attracted to someone, don't ignore any signs that tell you there is something that is not right with that. Listen to your heart and just walk away before you re-commit to another circle of pain.

At times you may feel very sad, missing your ex and many things you used to share, and feel lonely sometimes. That is okay. We are human, the social animals that have the needs to bond, as much as the ability to cherish such beautiful affection called “love”. Embrace your grief. Let yourself cry if you want to. After all, he was your other half and he was important to your life. When you cry, you may tell yourself that it was great that you could love someone that much and you have done many things to keep that love alive in your past. Now, it's the time to bring back the love to yourself. When you are ready, burry your memories in the most respectful ways you know. Pack your old pictures in a box, remember that you were part of it, but now you are determined to move on. Let the past relationship rest in peace. Literally.

Now it’s the time to build your life around yourself. Take care of yourself, find some lessons from your previous relationship. Try to ease yourself, pamper yourself, do things you always want to do which would never have happened if you were still in a relationship with him, take care of others around you, do things that make you happy, make a list of good things that happen after the break-up, and re-map your future. Ask yourself what you really want in life, what makes you feel happy, and what kind of relationship you want in your future. Take your time. Walk those baby steps if you need to. No rush. Cherish every blessings that comes to your life, and you would find that life is full of bliss, that happiness comes in many forms, and your positive energy fuels your trips to meet great people and experiences. Good luck with your new journey. You’ll be alright, sooner or later. :)

I Think, I Tweet

2011-05-19T07:14:00.012-04:00

Social Media Blues - Funny Song About Social Media :)

So I fall in love to this new kid on social media block. Its avatar is cute, a blue bird with pouty beak that millions of netizens agreed to call as Twitter.

I started tweeting in the beginning of 2010 when I got bored of too many dramas I saw on Facebook. Yet I only started to tweet regularly after a friend of mine, Hoongling, took me to a New Year's day twit-up (that stands for "twitter meet up")in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. More than 200 tweeps (people who tweet) attended that gathering and I was impressed by the great human relations happening there, like people knew each other and looked very comfortable hanging out together. That was a kind of closeness that I only saw on Blogger gatherings. Later I learned that it was because of the openness they share on Twitter.

In that very night I met a great companion for a day trip to Malacca. A very nice, fun, and smart girl named Jerine and I was impressed to see how Twitter was an inseparable part of her life. :) Sitting at an old cafe in Malacca, I saw a vintage painting on the wall displaying two monks facing each other, lifting a box above their head. I was sure it meant something, and I was wishing that the Chinese characters written there could explain. I asked her, and she popped the question on Twitter. Poof. In less than three minutes she told me,
"It says, 'letting go and be free'."
Five tweeps answered her question immediately.
So that was it. I was impressed.

I followed news agencies and disaster information portals, and I started to check my twitter regularly. Soon I found the cool thing about it. I'm so quickly updated with new information. By then I realized that the journalist personality in me still crave for news and so much information. Twitter fulfills my craving.

By January 2011 I still had problem with Twitter's 140 characters limitation. 140 characters are too short to express an idea. However, just like in real life, eventually I learned to express my ideas using the language of Twitter world. I started to recall Marshall McLuhan's theory, saying that "the medium is the message". It's the medium that defines the way we think, perceive, and convey the message or information. So I learned to cramp my idea into 140 characters, and if I need more, I made it a series of tweet. This, in a way pushes me to convey only the main idea.

I think Twitter is unique for it can be both very personal and very impersonal. Its simple features allow many Tweeps to share their personal thoughts and stories in the simplest way possible. In Twitter I have seen many celebrities open up and speak up in the way that I don't see on TV or newspapers. Many people seems to have a common agreement that they can be free to be what they are in Twitter. Some celebrities I know even swear, argue, and exhchange some arguments with their annoying followers or friends. My most impressive moment so far was a morning when @wimar (Wimar Witoelar, a PR expert and the spokesperson of Abdurrahman Wahid, our ex President)tweeted me asking, "So, how do you do disaster risk reduction?", followed with an offer to interview me for his independent TV program. This could not happen without the openness of Twitter, that erases walls between people (or strangers).

Twitter is amazing for its openness allow a Justin Bieber to speak with its fans directly, Helen Clark of UNDP (@HelenClarkUNDP)to discuss with other Tweeps, Anderson Cooper (@andersoncooper) of CNN to greet a happy birthday to make his fan's day. The trending topics are even more interesting to watch. From social movement for Mobarak's resignation up to a joke of Frying Nemo, Nuclear Radiation issue up to mean words addressed to Selena Gomez, it's just amazing to see the scattered clouds of thoughts from people worldwide gather and form a universal, massive voice.

Unlike in Facebook, Twitter makes it easy to follow or unfollow a person, and there is again, some kind of common agreement that people should not make a great deal about following or not following, being followed or being unfollowed. The openness allow that kind of shallow, impersonal relationship to happen and thus a tweep who would like to 'unfollow' someone does not have to think as much as a Facebook user who needs to 'unfriend' his Facebook friend. See, even the word "unfollow" sounds mild and "unfriend" sounds very cruel? Really, I am a believer of linguistic relativity theory: the language used affects the way people think, feel, and behave.

As a social media, Twitter have created an environment in which people who socialize in it develops mutual understanding. One day one of my favorite Twitter celebrity, @SoDamnTrue wrote something like "I tweet because changing status 100 times a day is socially unacceptable in Facebook". This simple statement pinpointed a phenomena: both Twitter and Facebook have established social group with certain cultures, in which its members - who comes from every corner of the earth - accept some rules on what is acceptable and what is not and take those rules for granted simply because they "live" in it. This is unique because Facebook's terms and conditions had never stipulated any rules saying or advising the minimum or maximum number of status updates in a certain period of time. Neither had Twitter.

Even though Twitter asks "What's happening?" and Facebook asks "What's in your mind?", their users answered those questions alternately in both media. Many tweets are about what are in Tweeps' mind, and many Facebook statuses are about what happen to the Facebookers. The thing is, the culture in Twitter that I mentioned above gives more freedom to Tweeps to tweet multiple times without expecting people raising their eyebrows seeing the frequent updates.

In the beginning of Twitter trends, many users I know - including myself - felt uncomfortable to see the floods (not only streams) of tweets from the accounts we follow in our timelines. Really, some tweets are not fun to read, because they could be between, "sleepy." "tired". or "@xxxx oh. LOL.", or even some unpleasant jokes that I don't feel like reading. The easiness of unfollowing and the less worry of offending a person allow users to control certain kinds of information they want to see. And off course, it is a good thing.

Lately I think that the Narcissism Epidemic as concerned by Twenge and Campbell can be reduced by Twitter. Unlike Facebook that encourages people to be narcissistic by providing all features to display the best of a person; pictures, connections, schools, networks, and such, or MySpace that also provides a showcase to display the individuality or 'awesomeness', Twitter is like a very simple neighborhood where the biggest judgment point would be attributed to our written attitudes, not from the pictures or lists of schools that we display.

Twitter also allows people to create a character and hide their identity. It can be both good and bad because I have seen some account without real identity created to offend and annoy others. Like in real life, war in Twitter can be very harsh too. However, some good and creative people create those kinds of account to focus on a certain issue of interest. It can be their alter-personality which thoughts and ideas resonate to many others'.

This week I developed a new account called @DisasterIndo. This is out of my concern that so far there is no special Twitter account dedicated to share information of disaster issues, including the tips to cope with disasters and information on disaster risks, policies, and trends for Indonesian community. I hope it will be useful for many.

With the complexity and dynamics of human thoughts, I think that Twitter arrives just at the right time. It is not easy to find a friend in real life who can match all my interests 100%, but I can find some fillers to make my thinking process and opinion expressing more complete. Now many times I think then I tweet. Silly, smart, or critical, Twitter takes it. No wonder that many Indonesian friends I know often said they go "menyampah" (trashing/throwing trash) on Twitter. Trashing can clear up crowded minds. Even if it is just expressed in 140 characters.

Justice?

2011-04-20T11:59:00.013-04:00

A common view in Aceh beaches: man with bare chest, woman covered up in veil.
I took this picture at Suak Ribe beach, Meulaboh, West Aceh district.

Yesterday afternoon I sat with a journalist friend. In between our talks about his works, suddenly he said, "I feel disturbed."
"Why?"
"Have you heard the story of that photographer?"
"Which one? The one caught for Sharia misconduct?"
"Yes. Do you know the details?"
Hesitating, I said no. I only read the news about disaster and local election.
"What happened to him?"
"It's not really about him that I think about. It's about the girl he photographed."
"Oh."

Living in Sharia-ruled Aceh since 2007 got me an understanding, that usually, when there is a woman involved in Sharia violation case, she would become the victim of further harassment. The perpetrators are usually the men involved in the raid. In most cases, those men were the community members, and in some other cases, they were the Sharia police known as Wilayatul Hisbah or the WH. Here I call those women 'the victims'. The sexual harassment can be very severe. In some reported cases, they ended up undressed the victims, touched them inappropriately, or even raped them.

So he summarized the story for me. That day, the photographer shot this 18 year-old girl in his amateur home studio. She was wearing a knee-length dress; a very appropriate dress in other culture, yet an indecent outfit in this Sharia-ruled culture. Suddenly the neighbours and WH rushed in. They accused the photographer and the model of doing inappropriate conducts. The accusation that was unacceptable in my friend's opinion, regarding that the photo session was also attended by the photographer's wife.

Anyway, in my observation, justice rarely speaks in Sharia-related cases here. Both photographer and the model were pleaded guilty. The executors have caned them last week. Even at this point of the story, I already feel the rage. What I heard later got me shocked, saddened, and disgusted.

Apparently, during the raid, a community leader - in front of the angry mob, harassed this girl. I have been thinking if I should tell the story exactly as it is, or make it milder using an abstract word of "harassment", "perverted sexual conducts", or "sexual abuse". But those are not enough to describe the horror of this community leader's conduct: he undressed her, grabbed her breasts, and inserted his fingers in her genital.

The victim's father was raged as he heard this confession. He decided to sue the community leader. The court proceeding started yesterday, ruled by a woman judge and a woman prosecutor. The victim was attended by a woman lawyer. In Indonesian law, the maximum sentence for rape is seven years in prison. Unfortunately, the definition of rape in our law is so outdated. It is limited to "involuntary genital-to-genital sexual intercourse perpetrated by a man towards a woman who is not his wife". It does not cover oral or anal sex, it does not cover inter-marital rape, it does not cover same sex rape. With this fundamental legal flaw, the prosecutor only charge a seven month in-prison punishment to the perpetrator!

My friend said he felt very disappointed.
"I'm a man, but I can put my feet in this girl's shoes. What would I feel? Hopeless. The woman NGO here seemed to just agree to that sentence. Seven month is nothing."
I threw my back against the sofa. I felt hurt to hear such injustice.

I know that the victim cannot really speak on behalf of herself. She is still depressed after the whole experience: raided, heavily molested, caned, and had none with strong legal stance to really back her up. Sadly, we have not seen any news about the harassment.

Understanding the common practices here, I can figure out why none seemed to have the will to speak up on behalf of this girl's pain. Speak up before the court, speak up before the media. Defending a Sharia law perpetrator is not a popular act here. When it comes to Sharia, it seems that we only have black-and-white choices. If we criticize the flaw, if we stand for the perpetrator, the majority of community would judge us as sinner. We would easily become the next person to harass. If you ever wonder why none seem to stand up and say no against such opression, this is enabled by the inactions of most Acehnese; permitted by the fear ordinary people have of being viewed as un-Islamic, should they speak out against, or take action, against any of the Sharia-based (or cultural-based, as often the society is involved) punishment. This subtle oppression is also encouraged by certain leaders who rally vigilantes and invent justifications.

This whole evening I cannot help but keeping on thinking of my thesis: an unfair positive law often creates a disadvantaging environment to the marginalized group. In terms of Sharia law in Aceh, many of its believers said that the law is to protect the dignity of human being. They said that women should cover themselves up to keep their, and men's dignity, to keep them away from inappropriate conducts. Instead of teaching people about the deeper surface of religion, about the peace and respect upon others, the laws have created a shallow understanding on human dignity. Dignity is indicated by the acts of praying x-times a day, wear some kinds of outfit, count the blessings like they are trading with God. Whether people understands the deeper meaning of the verses they read when they pray is still questionable.

Often, the enforcement of Sharia law results to the growing number or people who bluntly thinks that all uncovered women are women without dignity, thus they think that they have the RIGHTS to treat them whatever they like. For them, those women are considered as sinners, the worst kind of human being that they should crash. The law has open a great room for justifications, that (1) women are more prone to sinful conducts than men. They are potential sinner to punish.(2) Men and women do not have equal rights at all, and (3) As long as it is to fight "the sinful conducts", they are free to punish the perpetrators on the spot.

B, a friend with whom I often discuss about my uneasy feelings about Sharia wrote me his thoughts about this circumstances, "Acehnese society is enmeshed in a culture of spying and a subsequent removal of private space. This lingering, subtle oppression and its accoutrements are not something that is simply read about in the newspapers but not experienced in the ordinary days of women (and, to a lesser extent, men); visual representations, and overt demonstrations of piety, are imposed and noted..."But I cannot generalize Aceh that way either. I know many people who are against such oppression. I know many Acehnese who feel the same rage, disagreeing to that "culture of spying" and self-judging. My journalist friend is one good example. I know some wise ulemas who teach peaceful approaches too.

Anyway, the last few weeks, my personal and public list of oppression experiences goes longer. Four big guys stopped me around my office premise, prompting me why I didn't wear a veil, and they threatened me, "next time I see you uncovered again, I will punch you." Last weekend Sharia police raided some coffee shops, arresting some girls who did not wear Sharia-appropriate dresses.Meanwhile, they care less about the model versus molesting community leader case.

Speaking of ensuring human's dignity, speaking of justice in the most common sense, which one is worse - a woman without veil, or a man who undressed and molested a woman? What kind of justice is it?

A way to fight against oppression is speaking up and shows a courage that would resonate to those who disagree to the injustice that they are not alone. Speaking out loud that every men who think that they are free to molest, abuse, punish their community members think twice. Speak up and let people rethink about the meaning of dignity. That we cannot let such things happening again.

"You write the news, soon", I told my friend. "I'll help you spreading the words through social media. I believe we'll get some supports." I hope later the message will resonate to the silenced Acehnese and get them stand up for this case, and further, for other cases. I believe, such oppression in the society can only be conquered by its own society members.

Take Me As I Am

2011-04-20T09:49:00.017-04:00

I was craving for an inspiring song, and there were only two names coming across my mind: India Arie and Mary J. Blige. I decided to watch Take Me As I Am, and as expected, I feel the beautiful spirit of its lyrics.

The video of Take Me As I Am, just like Mary's other hit, 'No More Drama', captures different kinds of hardships someone might have been living. A wife with lazy, jobless spouse, a lady with a flirty, disrespectful partner, a beautiful model facing the hardship in her relationship and modelling career, and a woman sharing her day's stories with her friend.

One thing I love about Mary J. Blige's empowering song is its personal touch. Just like in No More Drama, here she take the ownership the whole experiences: "she is me", that's what she said. It feels that she is a friend who tells me that she was in my shoes. She shows examples on how she uprises and learns from her bitter past without regret, and instead of drowning into bitterness, she accepts "all the things that helped to make she".

People have different take-on from every experience. Some blame people who hurt them in the past for making them a more bitter person, some others would say that they are grateful for moving out from the experiences. Some let their past bad experiences overshadowing their present and affecting the people around them, some others evaluate their experiences and see their flaws, then learn to walk more carefully and help others to avoid such experiences from happening.

After all, life is like a buffet dinner: you have many options and you can end up tasting different flavors. If you are not carefully considering your choice of meal based on the label next to the pots, people's suggestion, or your past tasting experience, you might end up tasting some foods that don't please you. However, you still have many other choices, and before the time is up, you can always have second, third, fourth, or more chance. You still have chances to enjoy your buffet dinner later you choose more carefully.

Here, Mary talks about a woman who chose to respect herself through accepting the downsides of life and the efforts to stand up. I feel that this song resonates to me for its inward-looking, self-empowering perspectives ring to my beliefs. Mary doesn't talk about revenge. She talks about the positive sides of living the hardships. Then, when she made it, she shares her story to the world. At the end, as the lady she talks about in her story gets older, she also becomes wiser, standing on her solid ground.
I wish many of us would end up the same positive way.

Here is the link to the lyrics: Mary J Blige - Take Me As I Am.

Life and Its Obstacles Can Make A Beautiful Story

2011-04-17T14:44:00.013-04:00

From Asri's Dive

Oceans deep, mountains high, I’m excited about life.
For some people, things are easy to reach. Almost effortless, almost look like its written in their destiny, and they are just born to a thing so easily. I think I was born a fighter and I just love it. I was born as the lightest baby in comparison to my sisters. I only weighed 2.8 kilograms while my sisters arrived to the world with chubbier cheeks. They all weighed more than 3 kilograms. I grew up as a skinny girl who got ill easily. Out under the sunshine for more than one hour in the afternoon would get me headache and high fever. I was sent home after an exciting day at a scout girl camp. My teacher was worried when I caught a 40° fever in the evening, and decided to take me off the camp immediately.

Very few parents would let that kind of kid going out. My parents were among the majority. They didn’t allow me to go out that much. However, my dreams were always flying high whenever I read children adventure books. I imagined the feeling of crossing the creeks, hiking up the hills, sleeping under the stars at night, or swimming in the lakes. I ended up exploring my backyard, doing some biology experiments with the trees we have there.

To make the story short, I decided to fight my physical weaknesses. In senior high school I joined the Scout and Red Cross. I went to every camps, I started learning search-and-rescue techniques, including practices of evacuation in extreme environment. I started learning about survivals, about how to walk correctly on steep and slippery slopes, and I practiced rappelling. I wanted to help others instead of being the weak girl who was helped all the time.

Sometimes I was still weak physically. Doctor told me I got a bad blood circulation system and my blood pressure tends to drop suddenly under physical or emotional stresses. Someimes I still got ill in and after the camps. But I have learned ways to handle them: just move on and enjoy every milestones that I reached. Good news is, my doctor told me that cardio exercises can help improving my blood circulation. When I turned 24, I started hitting the gym frequently a week for aerobic work outs. Today I feel much, much better than I did when I was a teenage. Beautifully-toned muscles are the bonus of the exercise. How good is that? :)

When I began to fight my weaknesses, lack of physical exercises when I was a child contributed much to my clumsiness. It took me four times slipping, then hanging upside down at a 40-meters cliff with my friends screaming in fear looking at me from above, until my trainer rescued me during my first rappelling training. Once I went home on my trainer’s back as I couldn’t walk. I sprained my right ankle badly during the night search-and-rescue trainings. However, those never stopped me from fulfilling my childhood dreams. You would rarely find me in the tents. During every camping, I always slept in the open air, fulfilling my wish to gaze the stars before I close my eyes, to sleep underneath them. One day I woke up with swollen eyes. A big, hard nutmeg was flown by the wind and hit me right on the spot. :)It didn't stop me from sleeping outdoor though. I don't sleep under nutmeg tree all the time.

One thing I about fulfilling dream is, sometimes dream comes with a cost. I always wanted to learn swimming. Yet I could not make it because it was too expensive for my family. My father already passed away that time, leaving us with our mom, who earned only Rp. 300,000 per month (before 1997 it equaled to US $ 120). The monthly cost of the swimming lesson was Rp. 30,000 per month, and the single entrance fee to the swimming pool was Rp.5,000. Accumulatively, it was way too expensive for us. With her single salary my mom must feed the whole family and make sure tuition fees were paid on-time. Swimming was only one dream to sacrifice among many others. I gave up my dream to go to the school of fine arts, my dreams to go to music school, as well as to own my own keyboard.

The only person who had a privilege to go to swimming class was my little sister. It was because she needed swimming skills prior to joining the mandatory diving club in her Department, Marine Science. It was like a crash course, and she was an awesome fast-learner. I loved to listen to her underwater story. I love her so much and I started to dream of diving with my beloved sister one day. :)

When I started building my career, my first destination after working hour was a graphic design school. I didn't earn much back then, but I wanted to redeem my old art school dream. I made it. Later I fulfilled my artistic talents with photography works. I also went to some other courses for the sake of learning. I made it to travel to my dream places through some exchange programs. I am blessed, that after that rough beginning in my childhood, I finally see the many faces of this world and lives in it.

I cherish every opportunities I find in every steps of my life. Now that I live again in Aceh, I enliven my old dreams: seeing the underwater world. I want to celebrate my 32nd birthday underwater. I thought it would be cool. :) To be confident in the water, first I had to I redeem my used-to be-too expensive dream: learning how to swim. With some friends, I spent Saturdays and Sundays learning how to swim with many younger swimming classmates in the pool. My youngest classmate is five year-old, and the oldest student after me is ten years younger than myself. :))

Some people asked me if I was embarassed to be seen learning the basics of swimming with kids in a public pool. I told them that instead of feeling the embarassment, I was happy to be able to fulfill my dream. Besides, I believe that we are never too old to learn.

Beyond my expectation, I was wondering where all my clumsiness gone. Our instructor told me that I was talented. I think just love being in the water. There is some kind of serenity in every waves, and bliss in every splash of it. In the 6th meeting of the swimming class, I already made it to swim across the pool. My instructor stood at the corner of the pool with big eyes and big smile. I thought I was ready for the dive.

So two weeks ago, I subscribed for the diving class. Was it difficult? Not really. It was just full of details and it takes so much composure to be able to stay in the water, breathing calmly with all the equipments.

In my first dive, I plunged into the open sea water around Pulo Tuan, a tiny, rocky islet off Ujong Pancu shore of Aceh Besar. I wanted to cry. I felt like the richest girl on earth. The earth is so beautiful inside out. The sky that I love, the lands, and now deep down in the water, everything looks so beautiful.

Thinking that in the beginning of this year I couldn't swim, but then I already dived, swimming ten-meters deep with gorgeous fish, blew my mind. Not to mention the sensation of splashing sea water as we crossed the currents with our speedboat to be back to the shore, while the sun was racing to the opposite side of the horizon, the hills stood still, and the big, black eagle flew graciously above us, crossing the patches of newly-grown mangrove trees. There is something powerful about the nature that we can only absorb when we let ourselves immerse in it.

Life reminds me again its greatest lesson: if we put an effort to something, we would be awarded our deserved rewards. And, the more skills and knowledge we have, the more good things we can do for others and for this earth. And it's true: my diving instructor already told me that next June we are going to work on coral reef conservation project: we will do a coral transplantation project to give a new life to our underwater world. :)
Above all, I still dream of diving with my sister.

It is our efforts in life that shape our abilities, and it is the achievement that shape our confidence to win our next fights. I learn, once and again, that life and its obstacles can make a very beautiful story. :)

Work on the Ground

2011-02-20T11:38:00.013-05:00

I work in disaster risk reduction field. This is an exciting work to do, as I understand how much it can help others to live safer despite the hazards they are living with. I work in Aceh, a province in Indonesia that was severely hit by one of the worst disaster in world's history. In December 2004, Indian Ocean tsunami claimed almost 200,000 of lives here.

With my other 2 colleagues, I am in charge of disaster risk reduction public awareness and education duties. Some friends asked me, what disaster risk reduction is. I have some links to more formal definitions of it, including from the United Nations International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (UN-ISDR) but to sum up - and this is my version - disaster risk reduction is the efforts to minimize the risks of the hazards in a community, through the systematic measures - from government policies that regulates the land use, environment management, building codes, and so on, the education to the community on recognizing the hazards around them and how to secure themselves, the establishment of mitigation facilities, and an active involvement of the communities in developing a safer environment for themselves.

Prior to 2004, very few Acehnese knew what tsunami was. The knowledge, that after a massive earthquake hit there would be possibilities of tsunami was not registered in their minds. The evacuation routes were not in place, there was no early warning system, neither was evacuation buildings. Had those measures were in place, the tragedies that follow the tail of the waves might not be exist.

In disaster, knowledge and awareness are among the most important safety measures. If people are aware that they live with disaster risks and they do not want to be the victims, they would do some efforts to secure themselves. They need to possess the knowledge on how to mitigate the risks, how to save themselves. They need to believe that they can really do something about their lives. To feel empowered, and to be prepared.

Our public awareness approaches go through various avenues. We hit the road, delivering public performances of the traditional artists to the villages: the dance, the songs, the comedy shows, and we introduced them to the empowering messages that they can reduce the risks. We deliver talk shows on televisions and radios. We write in the newspapers. And, most importantly, we go to schools. We introduce disaster risk reduction to children, because we believe that the internalization of life concepts, including the concepts of safety, is best started at the early ages.

We would like to promote what we call "the culture of safety": the ways of thinking, the attitudes, and behaviors that consider the safety measures as part of normal life.

We work with government counterparts in charge of the education and public information. This is to make sure that they would later continue our efforts with their ow fundings, after the international donors close down the aid program for Aceh.

I really have fun with my works. Lately we travel a lot to conduct the assessments on the communities' knowledge,a ttitude, and perspective on DRR. The results of the assessments help us to understand the level of knowledge of the community members, that later is considered as the basis for the development of more suitable approaches to them. We also went to elementary schools to map what children know about disaster in their environment, whether they know the safe spots at their schools so that they can rescue themselves if disaster strikes during the school hours. We went to meet the NGOs working with the community and learned about the local wisdoms apply in the villages where they work.

The more I work with the communities, the more I realize that our works really begin with the process of "listening" and "understanding" the people. We cannot just jump into the community and throw the messages of DRR without understanding what they need and what they know (or don't know). Communities are not at all inferior in terms of knowledge. They might not know exactly the varians of disasters, or the sophisticated terms like "risk reduction" or "sustainable development", but they have other knowledge such as how to make things work for them, and that is important. However, often they need to have the basis for the making well-informed decisions. And this, is where we make our entrance.

The process of listening itself is amazing. We learned a lot from our communities (I don't like to call them "beneficiaries" - as commonly practised in my "development world"). Their knowledge about their environments is amazing: how they recognize the nature's sign, how they survived disasters, how they have ideas about what might be good to be done by them. The process of "teaching" the communities comes along with the process of "learning" about,and from them. This is why I respect the ideas of participatory approaches. I love to ask "what do you know about X?", and start my works from there instead of coming directly with "This is X - and you have to do this."

In the Name of Love

2011-02-13T11:29:00.017-05:00

- A Valentine's Day Note -

Mobarak stayed for a couple more weeks despite the waves of protests inquiring the Day of Departure.
The Egyptians in Tahrir square insisted on the change of the new regime.

Different Egyptians interviewed in BBC and Al Jazeera News Hours debated on whether the sudden change of regime would be good. I remember, one of them said, "...those in Tahrir Square don't really love Egypt."
In the name of love, they argued.

Mobs attacking the Ahmadis in West Java did that in the name of love. They said the Ahmadis do not really follow the teachings of Islam. They claimed that they loved Islam - and that was why they fought for the "correctness" of its teachings.

The Ahmadis stayed where they are. Keeping their faith although the threat of bloodsheds was, and is apparent. They believe what they believe. It's about their religion.

In the name of love, corruptors greedily suck every resources that don't really belong to them. It's their love of wealth, money, or their love to their family that drive them crazy.

Those are the love dramas I see recently.

In the name of love, people kills.

People steals: goods, or other's lovers.

In the name of love, people goes crazy.

In the name of love, people fights, or defends.

In the name of love, people hates each other.

Whether love is good or bad, I think it is relative. It turns out that love can make one stand tall, break, smile, or cry.

Or else, it is like what Freddie Mercury said, "too much love will kill you."

The relativism of love is overwhelming. How much people believe in it is no less overwhelming.

Speaking of belief, love is not only embedded in a religion. Some people claims that their religion is "the religion of love". However, I think, Love itself, is a religion. That, is when we are speaking of religion that's described as "a strong belief in a supernatural power or powers that control human destiny" (Princeton). Love is about belief. A belief that tells ourself what we believe is good for us. That we are compassionate about things. That we must protect of beliefs. It is love that brings us to the spiritual exeperience of loving. How our heart swells when we look into the eyes of the ones we love. How powerful we could become when we are in love. How biased, funny, ridiculous, passionate, vulnerable, emotional, courageous, we are when we are in love.

In the name of love, comes efforts, fights, and sacrifice.

Then comes along memories. Good or bad, it will tell us if we have to keep on loving or just give up. Thougts about if we will still love the same thing, the same person, the same moments, or if we want to quit.

Love is a journey. An exploration of selves: ourselves and others. An experiment of strength that is both exciting and (somehow) worrying. A trial for beliefs. When love towards different preferences is being contested, things could become more complicated. It is not easy to change hearts to others: a regime, a person, a thing. It takes a major trigger to shift the heart's direction. It can be a betrayal that leads to a painful disappointment. Then at that point we will contest the options: staying or leaving. Fighting or giving up. My highest spiritual court order, when things get too complicated for myself, says that there is one love that may save the day: love to ourselves.

Banda Aceh, 13 February 2011

Lady Gaga's Philosophy

2009-11-29T23:14:00.007-05:00

This picture is taken from here

"...I don't judge other artist. And I don't care about what anybody else is doing. I care about work in the world and I appreciate other people's music. And I love music, and I love culture. But when it comes to judgment and criticism, that's something that's sacred in my house of creative people. If we criticize, it's very specific and it's brief, and it's only a note to improve our own work. I DON'T focus on another people, I'm like, 100% focus on being innovative, and as original and soulful..." *

You might not expect those words from a 24 year-old girl who sings Poker Face, Paparazzi, Love Game, or Beautiful, Dirty, Rich. Moreover, this girl, Lady Gaga, always wears things that are commonly perceived as "weird things" and was somehow portrayed as a hermaprodhite. However, I was not surprised at all when I found her saying all those wise words in the series of interview that I watched tonight.

I am a believer of the notion that "music tells a lot about the artist who creates it". Thus when I started to listen to, and watch Lady Gaga, I knew that she is really a special person. As a person who seriously appreciating art, an amateur artist myself, who used to work in entertainment and broadcast industry, I have a sense that she is a great person with a great talent, extraordinary visions, professionalism and personality. I am serious about getting to know a person that I believe to be great. So tonight, I made my way to know her better through the interviews with Lady Gaga in YouTube.

The thing about an interview is, it so much depends on the angle chosen by the interviewer. Many in YouTube are the interviews I considered as "bad", because the interviewers were shallow, unknowledgeable, and insensitive about the art, creativity, personality. Not only that, since the beginning of the talk, many of them seemed to underestimate Lady Gaga, asking ridiculous question, and unprepared to receive deep, smart and philosophical answers from this girl in blonde wig and fake eyelashes. CNN interview was among the disappointing one. The interviewer, who wasa pretty-faced presenter, totally lost in Gaga's answers. She couldn't follow, and she lost her words and concentration. Disappointing. Especially because she belongs to CNN, the news channel that claims to be "quoted everywhere"! I think I was also disappointed because I overestimated CNN - and that, by the way, was a good example of how stereotyping operated in my mind and deceived me from the reality. I take that as the weakness of my part.

Anyway, if one would like to be a good journalist, he or she should learn as much as possible about a person or a case, and have open-minded point of views about any cases - including when interviewing a girl who likes to show her skin off, wearing wigs, heavy make up and sings Poker Face! I guess that CNN Cutie forgot the basic philosophy of "don't judge the book from its cover" - or don't judge people from what other gossip media said. It is always useful to appreciate everyone who is being interviewed.

It's clear, from her works, that Lady Gaga is an artist, as well as an original personality (and it must be difficult to be original when you were born after some, if not many, great pop cult figures made their way to fame). Someone must be very creative to preserve originality. I really like it when she said, "yes, I'm bossy, but I'm also smart", and when she explained how she started: "I began with a keyboard in a 400 square feet apartment, an old turn table, and a BIG DREAM". The kind of people like Lady Gaga is gifted to see and to portray her world and the world at large beyond what normal people can see, portray and express.

I know that some people frown upon me or laugh at me for what I see, and for what I believe from "seems-to-be-ridiculous" part of pop culture. I remember how in a press conference, when I was a finalist for a national TV newscaster talent search, the emcee introduced me as the finalist who idolized Madonna, and almost all the journalists in that room laughed at me. None asked me why I idolized Madonna but they took it for granted, that a candidate of news presenter for a prestigious TV channel should not choose this contoversial blondie as her idol. A girl I know laughed, and made face at me when I expressed how much I like American Next Top Model in Oxygen channel. She thought that every girl involving in modelling are stupid, and that the show is also stupid. She didn't ask me why I liked it, but she made face - as if I was a dumb if I know many details of the show (and she seemed to forget that we are both in the US because we were qualified for the very same scholarship).

But hey, how many people in the world can have such talents like Madonna? How many people can win some Grammys, producing good music, write children books, becoming the producer for herself, in charge of her own brand, arranging great concepts for the live performance, and recently, helps the people in Malawi? (I still partially disagree to her adoption moves though, but I do appreciate her works there). And as for Tyra Banks, how many women, and top models in in the world can have a capacity to become a mentor for so many young, inexperienced girls to be models with good attitudes, a producer of a successful TV program, a fashion photographer, a talkshow anchor, and being a beautiful girl at the same time?

See. Stereotyping assasinated people's ability to see the world as a home with so many windows that offer different views from inside and out. It limits people's capacity to see the whole pictures before saying - "hey, it's the truth!" - while after all, most of the time, in daily life, your notion of truth is relative merely to what your (very limited) senses can perceive.

The world, as we know, has different faces. The faces can be true, yet they can also be deceiving. They can be playful, they can be embarassing. Yet most of the news that I heard about the famous people, especially those in the pop culture said nothing about those sides. They just care about how weird they dress up, how they're suspected to be a bisex or hermaphrodite, or how they break up and make up. I think those who are just able to see the world from that narrow window are unlucky. Unlucky to be so narrow-minded, that they are not even willing to see the other sides of the story before judging others - and appreciate the originality - even many said that it was only the product of the commercialized pop industry. If the way to fame is that easy, why only few people can make huge hits? It is true, they are supported by great marketing team. But without the respective artists' creativity, million dollars worth of marketing approaches would be wasted. I appreciate creativity, originality, and dedication in various fields.

Tonight, from 5 clips of interview with Lady Gaga, I was reminded again about the important wisdom of success. Those are:

To focus on our direction, we shouldn't listen to everyone but only to the people that we respect,
We're not supposed to judge others for what they do (and what they don't),
When we criticize someone's works, it's better to be brief and directed to the improvement of our OWN works,
We should always appreciate others' creativity and opinion,
If we would like to produce a masterpiece, we should not f*ck up with even any single tiny detail.
We're not supposed to leave those who have lifted us up - merely in order to be accepted by the rest of the market, and,
We'd better 100% focus on being innovative, original and SOULFUL...

Now I ask you: before you say that someone is bad, have you really learned who he/she really is? As long as I recall, a real great person would never underestimate others. And that's how they usually grow up to become one. The following is some part of the interview, from which I quoted the words that I wrote at the beginning of this article:

Earthquake Doesn't Kill People...

2009-11-29T22:56:00.006-05:00

The picture of the Ring of Fire is copied from here

I wrote this article in early October 2009, intended to be published by an Indonesian newspaper, two days after Padang was hit (again) by a major earthquake. This article was actually to respond to another opinion that was published earlier in that newspaper, that talked about disaster as part of destiny, and that merely criticized the slow response from the government. Here I would like to offer an alternative point of view, that we can actually minimize the risks, and at the end, what really matters would not be the emergency response after so many lives were taken, but how to secure the lives and the properties from the hazards...
The newspaper did not publish this article in their opinion section. Instead, day to day, when I checked their news on the disaster, they still focused on the conservative disaster management measures of rehabilitation and recovery. Maybe my writing was not compelling enough, maybe the people in the editor desk was not aware of the paradigm shift. Whatever it is, it's still a good idea to share this idea to public...

After a series of earthquake along the southern coast of Java in the last two months, last week Indonesia was again stricken by a major earthquake, affecting the people of Padang, claiming hundreds of lives and damages that worth billion rupiah. In this gloomy moment of post-disaster phase, one question that always comes up is, “Why are there so many disasters in this country?”

Most of the people in Indonesia would say that the disaster is solely a matter of destiny. However, despite of this belief, that disaster is unavoidable, there is actually an alternative paradigm about disaster that is worth to look at, which is called “Disaster Risk Reduction”. Disaster Risk Reduction paradigm emphasizes on reducing the disaster risks through systematic efforts to analyze and manage the causal factors of disasters that aims to lessen the vulnerability of people and property and improve the preparedness for adverse events.

Some might say that “managing the causal factors of disaster” sound like a mission impossible. How come we manage something that is so unpredictable such as an earthquake? To answer that, it is worth to first revisit the notion of “unpredictability” in the case of earthquake.

It is true that in comparison other natural hazards such as cyclone or volcanic eruption, the earthquake is more unpredictable. However, the people who live in some parts of Sumatra, such as in Aceh, Bengkulu, Lampung, West Sumatra, and those who live in the islands off the shore of Sumatra, such as Simeuleue, Nias, and Mentawai are familiar with the fact that several times in a year they would feel the earthquakes.

Along the western coast of Sumatra there have been major earthquakes that claimed the hundreds of thousands of lives and caused enormous destructions. Aceh is recorded in the world’s history for the massive earthquake and tsunami in 2004. Added with Liwa earthquake in 1994, Nias 2005, Bengkulu 2007, Simeuleue in 2005 then 2007, and Mentawai in 2005, 2007 and 2009, it is clear that the occurrence of the hazard might not be able to be predicted accurately, yet it is prominent.

In disaster risk reduction, the disaster is seen as the “serious disruption of the functioning of a community or a society involving widespread human, material, economic or environmental losses and impacts, which exceeds the ability of the affected community or society to cope using its own resources” (UN ISDR, 2009). The earthquake, tsunami, volcanic eruption, and other phenomenon that are commonly categorized as “disasters” are basically “hazards”.

A simple explanation for this concept is, if a major earthquake shook an inhabited island and there were no fatalities, no building collapsed, no public service disrupted, or in other words, the impact of the hazard is not disastrous, then the earthquake is not very likely to be considered as a disaster. It was a different story when the earthquake hit an area like Padang, where thousands of people live in the buildings, and using the public facilities that collapsed as they were not designed to withstand the shock. That is why, a popular quote in disaster risk reduction says that “the earthquake that killed people, but buildings do”.

For too long, the disaster paradigm in Indonesia focused only on emergency responses. The amount of loss due to the catastrophe, added with the funds needed for recovery and reconstruction of a post disaster sites double the costs that should be borne by the government and community. The efforts to mitigate and prevent the disaster and to reduce the risk seemed to be out of the attention even those can potentially save lives and reduce the loss significantly.

Ironically, this ignorance is “culturally acceptable” in Indonesia, as the popular narrative of the risk perceptions echoes a passive attitude towards disaster, that human are “powerless at the face of destiny” instead of believing that there are some parts of the destiny that a human can actually change. Sadly, the narrative of “disaster is destiny and there is nothing we can do about it” is so much reinforced during the post-disaster phase like now.

The fact that people can actually live with risk without having to be the victims have been shown by Japan. Nearly 6,500 dead in the 1995 Kobe earthquake, then Japan then strongly reinforced the building code regulations and disaster management planning. Those significantly reduce the number of fatalities in the later years’ earthquake.

Moreover, the passive attitude toward natural hazards was actually not shown in the nation’s cultural heritages. The traditional houses in Sumatra were built with constructions that could withstand the earthquake and floods. The old lullaby song in Simeuleue taught the children that when the big earthquake and the sea water withdrawn, they should run to the hills. Seeing those examples, the Indonesians should realize that disaster risk reduction is not at all an alien concept in their culture.

Past researches showed that emphasizes on preparedness and mitigation activities are at inherent disadvantage because those are protective measures that have a very long-term pay-off (Lindell and Perry, 2004). This is also case of Indonesia. In April 2007 the Indonesian government has enacted the Disaster Management Bill which sets up a legal and policy framework for the Indonesians to have an institutional arrangement, sufficient resource allocation for disaster risk, and coherent disaster risk intelligence system, which should change the life and the perspectives of the government and the people of Indonesia. However, the implementation of the law has been very slow(Pujiono, 2008).

Indonesia has seen enough disasters. At the other hands, Indonesia has the cultural root of risk reduction, and the legal framework to make it the real part of the Indonesians’ way of living. Those should be more than enough to build a new, safer, and more resilient community; a new culture that rises strongly from the rubbles of the past disasters....

Then Let It Be

2009-08-07T01:08:00.005-04:00

Somehow, life is about the repetition of feelings, repetition of thoughts, repetition of events. You might travel different places yet you might always be caught in similar feelings....

LET IT BE

My little angel embraces my soul
Whenever I ask her about love,
She always says it's all around me

My little angel caresses my face
When the rays of morning sun comes
She lets me know that here and there,
I am in the embrace of the Almighty

The love of the Absolute Love
The light of the Absolute Light
Then I should neither be in fear nor feeling lonely

My angel took my hands and leads me to fly
then I see:
all the ground that I walk on is my hometown
all the places where life brings me to settle down is my home

I was born as a wanderer,
then my happiness is hidden

at the secrecy of the places that I would see
If it means that I have to travel the world for eternity
Then let it be...

-AW*, April 28, 2009-

Obama's Mother and Indonesian Batiks

2009-06-20T19:16:00.003-04:00

this picture of Indonesian Batik is taken from here

"A Lady Found a Culture in Its Cloth: Barack Obama's Mother and Indonesian Batiks" is a series of exhibition featuring the Indonesian batik clothes collected by Obama's mother, Ann Dunham. This exhibition will pass through New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Houston, and Washington DC. As an Indonesian living in United States, of course I feel proud to see that our cultural heritage is being introduced and appreciated by the public in America. If you happen to live, to visit, or to be at those places when the exhibition is held, I think it will be a good idea to come by and see. :)

The following is the press release from the California College of Arts that I found here:

This exhibition features 20 large fabrics and two scarves from the batik collection of Ann Dunham, President Barack Obama's late mother. The collection has been in storage for many years and this is a valuable opportunity for the public to see it. The presentation is part of a national tour that is also passing through New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, Houston, and Washington DC this summer.

Indonesia is home to the ancient tradition of batik, in which fabric is decorated using a wax-resist dyeing process. Batiks are often intricately patterned and vividly colored, and they come in a wide variety of styles, from classic to contemporary.

The San Francisco presentation of the exhibition will also feature selected works by students in the Textiles and Fashion Design programs at California College of the Arts. These works will complement Dunham's collection and indicate some of the contemporary directions this centuries-old art has taken.

You can also read more about the exhibition at the Washington Textile Museum's website. :)

Only 13

2009-05-26T21:14:00.008-04:00

I found an old note about blood donation that I wrote in June last year, and I wonder if the statistics still shows 13 today...

It has been more than one and a half year that I haven’t donated my blood, as I have always been sick, tired and busy. Yet yesterday evening I felt fresh and healthy that I thought I would be eligible to donate. I was on the way to ride back home after my biking evening with Yoni, my best friend, and we agreed to drop by the Blood Transfusion Center of Banda Aceh Red Cross Society.

It was almost 9 p.m. when we arrived. The Center was a new building but it looked sleepy, dark, uninviting. There was a man sitting on white bench at the waiting room for blood request section, with his tired empty eyes while he inhaled his cigarette deeply – a typical look of Acehnese man in the waiting room.

None sat at the benches at blood donor section, and as we followed the sign and entered the Blood Donation Section, we still found none there except a girl in yellow veil, sitting at the receptionist desk named Melani.

Then I weighed myself. Thank God, I gained my 1,5 kilos back after losing it during my heartbreaking weeks. Melani then took my blood to check my hemoglobin level and my blood type. I was so disappointed to see the drops of my blood floated in the blue liquid - the solution to check the hemoglobin level. It meant that my hemoglobin level was lower than 12,5, indicating that I was not an eligible donor. In my disappointment I asked her to take my blood again and to recheck the drops. The result was still the same. My blood was not “heavy” enough. I need more hemoglobin to be eligible as a donor.

Still with my hopeful mind, I asked her to measure my blood pressure. The result was even more disappointing: 106/63, too low for a donor, because the normal pressure should be minimum 110/90. Anyway, it was good enough, regarding that in the last one month my blood pressure was pathetically ranging in 88/56, then 96/60, then 105/60...

Finally Ahyoni volunteered to donate his blood. It was his second time to donate his blood, and I did appreciate his guts. Even it started with his worries to see the needle, yet he coped with that well. Very gooddd, buddy!:)

As Yoni was lying down with the pipe that flew his blood to the bag, I chatted with Melani. I wondered if they have special room for children with Thalassemia like in the Transfusion Center in my hometown, Semarang. Apparently they don’t have such room for the children even they have regular patients taking the transfusion.

I felt nostalgic, I remembered the grateful feeling that washed my mind when I donated my blood in Semarang. I passed the Thalassemia room and saw the faces of the children from a tiny glass window on the white door there. I have never known those cute children by name, yet I felt blessed to know that soon my blood will be poured into their veins and support their life for another month or so…

Not so long after Yoni finished, there was a little girl with big beautiful eyes entering the room. A nurse took her blood, and my heart bumped so painfully when I saw her. I knew by heart that she was one of those…

I approached her. I had never been so close with Thalassemia bearer before even my blood might had been flowing in some of their body. Her eyes was brilliant, so alive. It was just hard to accept the fact that she couldn't live without other's red blood cells. I smiled at her, and she smiled back at me as a small syringe was plugged into her left upper arm by the nurse.

“Ouch..” both of us whispered.
It was our first word spoken in reflex.
“Is it painful?” I asked her.
“No.” She smiled.
Then silence. I was afraid to question her more.

“Are you a donor?” She asked me.
I was ashamed, hesitating.
“Mmh..yes... I was planning to donate, but my hemoglobin was too low.”
“Oh.”

“So, are you a donor too?” ;-) I winked at her.
She looked at me and laughed. She knew that I knew the answer.

“I’m gonna have transfusion.”
“Now?”
“Impossible for now. There is no blood tonight. I’m in waiting list, they will get me two bags tonight so maybe tomorrow afternoon I’ll have my transfusion.”
....

“What is your blood type?” I asked her.
“B.”
Oh. I wanted to cry at the same second. I felt that I owed her a life that I could actually share… if only I was healthier, if only I was more eligible…

“What’s yours?”, she asked me back.
Ashamed, I answered… “B.”

“Oh.”
She paused. “Too bad.”

I looked at her, “Wish I was healthier.”
“No problem. Maybe next time.”
She smiled again, her brilliant eyes sparkling.

I reached to her hands hand as she rose from the bed. “I’m Asri.”
“I’m Mia"
“How old are you, Mia?"
“Twelve.”

I wanted to disappear from her face. I couldn't stand my tears from bursting. She’s too young, too vibrant…
She walked to the door. A sort of stunned, I followed her like a dumb. She smiled again to me. Her eyes winking, teasing me.
“See you then, I might NEED your blood next time, because I’m a VAMPIRE!” then she laughed.

I felt uneasy, so uneasy. It felt like I was facing a hungry little girl who was about to die from famine with a box of food in my hand that I couldn't give, since if I gave it away then I’d be the one fainted...
Oh. I felt so sad.

I went out some minutes later when she was already leaving. Then I heard the staff of the Blood Center talked about their guilty feeling of not having enough blood that day. Before Mia, there was another child coming with pale white face, needing the O type blood. Yet there is no stock kept there. In average the Transfusion Unit of Banda Aceh Red Cross needs at least 50 bags of blood per day, yet there are only approximately 13 donors come to donate each day…

I am sure that there are more than 13 people in this city are healthy enough to donate.
The question is; where are they?

May 12, 1998 - May 12, 2009

2009-05-12T03:44:00.003-04:00

Back then, we were just students
Back then, I remember how much we loved our nation
Those uncertain days, we might look immature and clueless,
Yet we had the courage to rise and question;
When the will those tyrants,
whom we called the leaders of our nations,
step back and show a little compassion?
Will the nightmare of the hopelessness end?
Will we be free to speak up one day,
Will our nation recover,
Will we live in real peace,
with no more lies, manipulations, repressions?
Uprising. Movement. Demands for change.
Voices. Gunshots. The march under tropical sun.
Still remember the black ribbon that we knotted around our arms?
We grieved and we fought
May violent revolution would never need to happen again
in our beloved nation...

A Little Note from Losing Ground

2009-03-12T03:31:00.008-04:00

an individualist in a collectivistic society

this picture is taken from here

One day, in an assignment for my Culture and Communication class, we got a mind-provoking question of, "which of the following would have the most difficult time interacting with his/ her fellow society members? – An individualist living in a collectivist society or a collectivist living in an individualistic society*?"

(*click here to learn more about individualist vs. collectivist concepts)

It took me at least a week to juggle between two options, trying to reflect to my personal experiences and my friends', I was hesitating to choose one above the other. I do know that both options are not easy to go through. However finally I came up with an answer: In comparison to an individualist living in collectivist society, think a collectivist living in individualist society will have most difficult time interacting with his/ her fellow society members.

Aside from the hardship of being detached from a strong bonds with his or her society, the other difficult parts of the interaction that I foresee would be the adjustment to the new interaction style, the process to learn about the values, to get used to the new culture, also to integrate the values in his or her daily life practices. Individualistic individuals living in collectivist society also face similar challenges, however a collectivist would experience more difficulties as he or she gets so much used to the conformity, tradition, benevolence and collective interest, in which he or she lives comfortably with lack of self-assertion, while the individualistic society operates the values of hedonism, power, achievement and self-direction. In individualistic society a collectivist must be able to survive less directions and benevolence from others, and they need to adopt a new way of interacting, where their voice and self-presence is not the representation of a group anymore, yet the representation of themselves.

I, myself, am an example of a collectivist individual who moves to live in an individualistic society. The biggest difficulties that I encounter as I start living in the United States is first, to be outstanding and presence as I am, alone in the interaction process, since I totally do not get used to stand alone and show myself off, second, the lonely – and ignored feeling as I get difficulties to build friendship, to gain support and attention, and third - and this might be paradoxical; the feeling of losing ground, as I am now overwhelmingly free to express myself all the way I want to be. I re-questioned my state of self, I re-questioned, whether the personality, appearance, and actions that I used to perform were really my inner personality, and re-questioning the state of self as I turn 30 is difficult in a way that I found so much doubts about what kind of person should I become to fit, and how can I define my own personality?

The shift from one extreme edge of culture to another is not easy, especially when an individual has been so much get used to living and operating in a particular way for life. Interaction process in new society is not easy either since individual has developed their communication ability within the culture that they belong to, while belief, morals, custom, and habits, that finally develop a certain operation of “common sense” in which somehow he or she “takes for granted”, have become things that he or she practices daily (Hall, 1997, pp. 12 – 13). A member of culture learn about the culture codes in the socialization process, where the culture itself, as a system of sense essentially functions as “constraints of what is socially enacted and understood” (Hall, p. 16) also serves as guidance for what a person may expect from the society where he or she belongs to.

Gudykunst (1998) helps me to make sense on my uncomfortable feeling as he explains that in individualistic culture individual’ goals are emphasized more than ingroup’s goals, while at the opposite, in collectivist culture the ingroup’s goals become the priority (p. 109). The notion of ingroup as group of people where one concern about the welfare and willing to cooperate without expecting in returns itself indicate the bond that might be developed within, where of course a collectivist individual is so much get used to the values of harmony and solidarity, and perceive him or herself as inter-connected with others. The feeling of detachment from the original society itself is already difficult. Added with the fact that the person now have to live in a society which the major values is independence, he or she then have to develop a new way of survival through presenting the behavior that would be acceptable to the new society where he or she now belong. I believe that the most difficult part was during the adaptation process, where the individual who is still suffering from the detachment from his or her original culture have to recognize and live with new culture that does not provide similar support system as what he or she usually live in, at the time when he or she need the support, attention, leadership and guidance at most.

I foresee that an individualist living in collectivist society have better ability to cope with different culture as they have been “trained” to have strong self-direction, that equip them with the ability to survive any external pressure.

Interestingly enough, by nature, I feel closer connection with international students coming from Latin America. They are my closest friendship circle here in Albany. additionally most of my Indonesian friends studying at other parts of the United States or in the United Kingdom also reported the same experience; that they feel more connected, and just like what I do, build the circle of close friendship with the Latin Americans. Some literatures categorize those regions as places where the society collectivist culture practiced, thus I think at the end, by nature, the collectivists would always prefer to be in the similar comfort zone: being with other collectivists and build a new society that substitute their need of their original ingroup bonds. Hm. apparently those cultural theories can help me make sense of my social life! =)

Further interesting readings:

- Hall, E.T. and Hall, M.R. (2002). Key concepts: Underlying structures of culture. In J.N. Martin, T.K. Nakayama and L.A. Flores (eds). Readings un Intercultural Communication (pp. 165 - 172). Boston, MA: McGraw-Hill.

- Gudykunst, W.B. (1998). Individualistic and collectivistic perspectives on communication: An introduction. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 22 (2), 107 - 134.

The Unspoken - My Women's Day Notes

2009-03-09T05:48:00.003-04:00

Nothing special happened to my life yesterday, March 8, 2009. Nothing much happened around me either, so quiet, so silent like an ordinary day, even yesterday should have been a special day for the human of my kind - the women. It's the day that not many people knows, not because they are ignorant, but simply because they don't know, the day where we are stricken by skeptics questions of "what does it really mean?", "what more do you want?", or else. It's the widely unknown observance: it's the Women's Day.

The home of the official website of International Women's Day (IWD) wrote that IWD is a "global day celebrating the economic, political and social achievements of women past, present and future." Every year organizations, governments and women's groups around the world choose different themes each year that reflect global and local gender issues. In some years global IWD themes honored around the world, while in other years groups have preferred to 'localize' their own themes to make them more specific and relevant. The followings are the global United Nation themes used for International Women's Day in the last one decades to date:
- 2009: Women and men united to end violence against women and girls
- 2008: Investing in Women and Girls
- 2007: Ending Impunity for Violence against Women and Girls
- 2006: Women in decision-making
- 2005: Gender Equality Beyond 2005: Building a More Secure Future
- 2004: Women and HIV/AIDS
- 2003: Gender Equality and the Millennium Development Goals
- 2002: Afghan Women Today: Realities and Opportunities
- 2001: Women and Peace: Women Managing Conflicts
- 2000: Women Uniting for Peace
- 1999: World Free of Violence against Women

I cannot fully agree to the notion of "celebration" on this day. I feel that there is really nothing to celebrate that day, as the struggle is not yet over, the voices are still silenced, and the eyes out there are still blinded, not able to see that there are still unfinished - not only discourses - but also business about putting women as human. Human who possess the free will, whose rights are well-acknowledged, whose voices are heard, whom existence is respected.

You might call my above statement as cliché. But if you really open your eyes to see the answers of some questions and propositions that I would propose after, I hope you would find that my clichés are the cliché state of being of the world, even until only 2 years before the first centennial commemoration of the day.

There is a nice piece of Elizabeth Janeway's "Between Myth and Morning", where she shared her experience of being interviewed by Esquire magazine. She was questioned, "Why does the women's movement have no sense of humor?"

This question sounds similar to, "why are you girls too serious about it?", the kind of questions that I often encounter, when by a chance, I and my friends became so passionate - and somehow emotional when we talk about woman issues.

Janeway's answer to that is, "do you burst into peals of laughter reading Malcolm X or the Thoughts of Chairman Mao?"
Just like the story of Malcolm X (I won't refer to Mao's book as I haven't red it), the women's movement is a SERIOUS business. It's a business about the very basic human rights that's still UNFINISHED. And, look at the theme in 1999, 2007 and 2009. There are some similarities there, as 3 of the themes focus on violence against women.

Born in a considerably modern family in Indonesia, I still bear the burden of, for instance;
"being a woman, you shouldn't have too high education, otherwise, men will be scared to propose you", or
"you're a girl, you're not supposed to talk that loud",
"don't go home too late - you're a girl, it's not appropriate!", or,
"oh my God, you're almost 30 and you're still single?"

I guess have deal with most of those questions, not in the way that I accepted them as it is, but in the way that I have shown my stance toward those issues. The stance that I own is that not every woman possess, out of the null awareness - due to the inexistence of concept, that as human, they are not bonded to those limitations by nature, but more by culture, out of the inexistence of discourse of basic rights. I grow up seeing unhappy girls around me, bouncing back and forth between their personality and culture, crying out of "... but I'm just a woman...", scared of being above 25 and still single, depressed, frustrated, unwilling to confront people - because they would be seen as rebel, bad girl, or whatever negative connotation possible for off-mainstream attitudes...

And for those simple examples, that I am sure, at least you, my fellow Indonesians see so obviously present around you, would you still say that we, the women are free enough? Are our wills accommodated enough?

Now, let’s look up to an interesting case of sexist vocabulary:
“Payudara”. That’s the Indonesian word for women’s breast. Through etymology we can analyze that the word constructed from “payu” and “dara”. “Payu” literally means “sold out” – it’s a common term in merchant scope, for example, “bayeme wis payu” means, “the spinach is sold out”. While “dara” means “girl”. I can’t help but thinking (but please do correct me if I am wrong), that “payudara” means “a girl’s property that define the sold – out-ness of a girl?”

And for God’s sake, payudara is not a slang word! It’s formal word used when we refer to the organ, in medical term when we discuss the bra size up to the breast cancer awareness campaign!

The most prominent memory about my Indonesian language teacher when I was 11 year-old junior high school student was when he explained about some roots of our words, pertaining that our language is relatively new language that absorbs many foreign influences. He explained about “wanita”, Indonesian word for “woman”, and my class that was of course packed with early puberty teenage, burst into laughs as he explained that “wanita” is rooted from Arabic word of “wanit”, that means “lust”. And again, “wanita” is not at all slang, nor a dirty word!

I remember that I didn’t laugh at all. I felt humiliated, and since then I prefer to identify myself as a “perempuan”, also means “woman” but rooted from totally different meanings of word that is more respectful in a sense.

I was still so young when I realized that society treated me wrong, hostile and unpleasant just because I was a girl. I knew, empirically and by instinct, that “if I were a boy, it would never happen to me”. However didn’t really learn about woman empowerment issues until I started volunteering for a youth center that works on reproductive health issue when I was 18. Before that I didn’t know what harassment was, what dating violence, domestic violence, sexual abuse and harassment and so forth… even I had experienced all of those unpleasant situations, as a victim, of course.
I was victim for many harassments and abuse, including in relationship but I was silent because I didn’t know how to share my pain. I had a mental picture that people wouldn’t believe what I said. I was terrified of being blamed – and I don’t know why society tends to blame woman for everything, even when they are the ones tortured. I was afraid of humiliation. I was afraid of many things, that I decided to keep silent and it put me into more vulnerable stand.

But let’s think why I was silenced? Why it was so worrisome for me to share my pain?

After having loooong… journey of understanding myself, learning about gender, sexuality, human rights with wonderful people I met on the way of my further life, by the end I realized it’s my awareness about the structure around me that “told” me, that those issues of harassment and abuse are not the appropriate things to share. There is funny limit between public and private space in my culture where things that should be (in common sense) public become private, and the opposite. At the other hands, I found it surprising that last week in one of my readings I learned that EVEN in Western society, the victims “didn’t have the words” to describe their experiences in intimate aggression! (Lloyd and Emery, 2000).

The existing discourse of intimate relationships and the discourse of aggression do not accommodate the concept of “aggression in intimate relationship”, mainly because the “intimate relationship” is portrayed as fairy tales of romance, that brings with it the notions of loving, caring, forgiving, and so forth, and the understanding that men have higher level of sexual needs than women. At the other hand, the discourse of aggression, sadly, consists of four arenas: excusing the aggressor (my personal comment: non-guilty pre-assumption is so not in, in terms of intimate aggression!), blaming the victim, defining aggression (in which, for example dating rape is viewed as oxy-morons as dating is considered as a context that implies consent for sexual interaction), and the worst is, rendering the intimate nature of aggression invisible – where intimate aggression is rendered invisible by our culture and it’s considered to be more likely to occur in the hand of strangers…

Ah. Who constructed those discourse if not our own society? And who are the members of it? Who has the voice so loud to legitimate those discourses?

I was lucky that in my NGOs I learned about my rights. I built the discourses of gender, sexuality, and human rights that helped me to make sense of what goes wrong around my life. I developed myself from a victim into a survivor. I decided to strike back and speak up to show the people that the case is real, and it is not easy at all, even just to get people understand that violence is a serious issue…

I was laughed by some audiences when I spoke in a seminar on dating violence in front of around 200 students of a teaching institute in Semarang. Some students did think that being threatened by a blade - my experience when I was 18, was hilarious. And those who laugh are, by the way, men.

Also,sadly, the second arena of common discourse of aggression occurred. I, the victim, was blamed by some religious students – “…as dating and having intimate interaction with men is prohibited by our religion, you should be aware that it was your own fault that you were abused, because you are committed to the sin, because you, yourself, broke the God’s rules. So, I don’t think that it’s appropriate for you to complain…”

But you know what? I believe that there is actually spiral of silence under the surface of those voices. And just like me when I was younger, they were silenced, not completely by their own will, but by the realization that the society is pretty ignorant toward them.

Yet I still believe that there is a way to break the silence, modify the discourse, and de-marginalize women from the blindness. My word is simple. “Let’s talk about it” and those who are silenced know that they are not alone. Those who live without the problem would have a knowledge – an alternative concept in their mind, when they, at least have ever heard it, and as almost - skeptical Janeway believed, that “inside every Chauvinist Man Pig there is a human being struggling to get out” (sorry if it sounds rude but I swear that she wrote it exactly that way on page 148), I am a believer that men are not as bad as what is portrayed in general. I have abundant amount of male friends who are willing to listen and understand, and living the life as good friends, good husbands, or good boyfriends to their significant others, and I believe there are a lot more others out of my circle.

Men are our PARTNERS to develop our better world, because as much as we don’t want to live in men’s world, it won’t be fair either if we consciously or unconsciously trying to build our own women’s world...

Wishing you an inspiring Women's Day!

References:
Janeway, Elizabeth. Between Myth and Morning - Woman Awakening. 1974. New York: William Morrow anf Company, Inc.

Lloyd, Sally and Emery, Beth C. The context and dynamics of intimate aggression agains women. 2000. Thousands Oaks: SAGE Publications.

www.internationalwomensday.com

Seasons of Love =)

2009-03-06T02:33:00.002-05:00

I fall in love to Seasons of Love since I heard it for the first time in a SSEAYP documentary. Tonight I browsed through YouTube and I found this version. I think this is the most beautiful version of Seasons of Love clip. Even it's not the original version, I think the power of this clip comes from the sign language spoken by the friendly faces in this clip. It's touching, it's beautiful, it reminds me to cherish every single second that I have in live, and love, friendship, and life experiences that come with it....

Five hundrend twenty five thousand six hundred minutes
Five hundrend twenty five thousand moments so dear
Five hundrend twenty five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure, measure a year

In daylight, in sunsets, in midnights,
in cups of coffee, In inches, in miles
in laughter in strife,

In Five hundrend twenty five thousand six hundred minutes
How do you measure a year in the life

How about Love
how about love
how about love
measure in love
seasons of love
seasons of love

Five hundrend twenty five thousand six hundred minutes
Five hundrend twenty five thousand journeys to plan
Five hundrend twenty five thousand six hundred minutes
how do you measure the life of a woman
or a man

In truth that she learned
or in times that he cried
In the bridges he burned
or the way that she died

Its time now to sing out
though the story never ends
lets celebrate remember a year
in the life of friends...

Kokomo

2009-03-02T22:38:00.006-05:00

It was a super clody afternoon in Albany. The temperature outside was -11*C, I was sick, with coughs and running nose, sitting weakly in the university shuttle bus that drove me to the Patroon Creek, a corner of Albany where SUNY Albany's Healthcare Center is located. I had at least four layers of clothing under my coat, the trees outside are all bare, piles of snow have been all over the ground since December last year. In short, everything was so "winterly", but suddenly...

...Aruba, jamaica ooo I wanna take you
Bermuda, bahama come on pretty mama
Key Largo, Montego baby why dont we go
Jamaica...

I couldn't help but smiling. The radio tuned by our driver played Kokomo by the Beach Boys! I've just realized that Kokomo is the most possible ironic song to listen to during the winter. And as the boys moved on with the lyrics,

"...Bodies in the sand
Tropical drink melting in your hand
Well be falling in love
To the rhythm of a steel drum band
Down in Kokomo..."

I grinned cheek to cheek. Beach in my head, and snow in my eyes. How I live so far from those luxury of tropical beauty didn't get me blue anymore. Suddenly I saw the barren trees becoming coconut and palm trees, the snow became the grains of white sand, and I was there, running happily on the beach in my yellow bikini. My feet were covered by the sands, I had a big yellow ball in my hand, my skin was so tanned... and I looked so happy. Seriously. It was the effect of Kokomo! I looked out of the window, smiling, smiling, smiling, smiling all the way...

Now I won't care if the snow still fall even if it's already March. I know what can get me out of winter depression. I will just sing Kokomo! =)

Kokomo - The Beach Boys

Aruba, Jamaica ooo I wanna take you
Bermuda, Bahama come on pretty mama
Key Largo, Montego baby why dont we go
Jamaica....

Off the Florida keys
Theres a place called Kokomo
Thats where you wanna go to get away from it all

Bodies in the sand
Tropical drink melting in your hand
Well be falling in love
To the rhythm of a steel drum band
Down in Kokomo

Aruba, Jamaica ooo I wanna take you
To Bermuda, Bahama come on pretty mama
Key Largo, Montego baby why dont we go

Ooo I wanna take you down to kokomo
Well get there fast
And then well take it slow
Thats where we wanna go
Way down to Kokomo

Oh, Blumer...

2009-03-02T02:11:00.005-05:00

It's really not a good overview on the theories of crowd and public. It's just a note from an almost frustrated communication student trying to learn about the characters of the crowd and compare the style of the theorists. So first of all, I would like to provide a precautionous note, that this note is almost a nonsense. =)

Yesterday I had a hard time approving Gustav LeBon's theories of crowd. Just in the very first pages of "La Psychologie des Foules", his famous said-to-be classic works, I got severe scepticism attack, as I sensed that he under-estimated human's self-authority. I really dislike his argument, especially the one stating that "..sentiments and ideas go to the same direction, conscious personality VANISHES..." when people are drawn into the crowd...

It was a bad weekend night, really. So after condemning his point of views and had difficulty of sleeping because of the uneasy feelings after reading his arguments, today I jump to Helbert Blumer's theory of crowd.

I think I fall in love with Blumer for stupid reasons that I can't really share in my Public Opinion Class discussion. First, Blumer offers more make sense reasoning of crowds - okay, this one is acceptable to discuss in class... so let me jump to my second reason;

I love Blumer because of his explanations, that are composed like this:
".. the organic satisfaction unquestionably yields a pleasure and exhilaration that makes the experience momentous..."

or this:
"...when the expressive crowd reaches the height of such collective ectasy, the tendency is for the feeling to be projected upon objects which are sensed as having some intimate connection with it."

Gosh, I feel like reading a Cosmopolitan's article that discusses "the big O"!

Pardon me for my naughty mind, but Blumer gives me so much fun... it feels intimate, pleasurable, it gives me a momentous ectasy. Mmmhhhh..... =))

Belated Inauguration Note

2009-01-28T04:42:00.006-05:00

we watched the inauguration together...

(source: http://www.albanypubliclibrary.org/news/?p=144)

I couldn't make it to go to DC for the inauguration day. Post-holiday financial issue, added with the fact that I got sick, so that it was just almost impossible to travel 14 hours in total (7 hours each way), plus the fact that my class started on January 21 were the main reasons why I couldn't make it to be there.

I avoided TV and pre-inauguration news because I didn't want to feel bad about not being there. And it was just good enough to rest an dealt with our fever and cold in a cozy house, somewhere in Albany, where the entertainment tools were our laptops, books and a pile of DVDs. Yet I couldn't stand to just miss the hype. It was historical, I knew it, and I wanted to be somewhere that I could cheer and cry together with other Americans.

So that was it, I browsed, and I found that Albany Public Library invited the community to watch that historical moment together.

Yet before running to the bus stop that morning I rushed with Facebook-CNN's project. CNN provided live streaming of the inauguration through FB and I had a good laugh to see my friends' comments and status. At the same time I was amazed to see the power of internet-mediated social networking, where my friends, at that time watched the same thing, while virtually we were in different parts of the world. It felt like there was a huge TV across this planet, where that TV broadcasted CNN, and we were all sitting and watching nicely in a living room called Facebook, had some pop corns and soda (not beers, sorry, coz I simply just don't like beer.. hehehe..), and we chatted. Really chatted and threw some comments as if we were sitting next to each other!

Then, I went to the Public Library. As we got into that humble building on Washington Avenue, we could see a small TV and some chairs rowed in front of it. My Hun and I laughed at the first time coz we thought that we could have just watched it at my apartment - as I also have TV there. Then we found that actually there was a nice big screen in the auditorium, yet the quality of the internet streaming was very, very awful. Finally we all moved back to that little TV, when the invocation was about to start. I sat on the floor with some other ladies who were not tall enough to watch from the back part of the row.

Quiet. Solemn. I was touched to see those Americans. A big African-American guy, rasta haired, with a tattoo on his arm, laid down on his chair, so enchanted by the show, crying. An African-American couple hugged each other, same expression. Some white old ladies also cried, also the youngs, and I.

I can say that I'm not a fanatic fan of Obama, but I cried during the speech too. Not because of his words (even it was indeed, a compelling speech), but more because of the scene that I saw, live in front of my eyes: the hopes, the trust, the happiness, the overwhelmed emotions, all in those people's eyes... A tissue box was passed to all of us. When I looked around, seems that none didn't have tears flowing from their eyes. Everybody smiled and cried at the same time.

That view, made me say a wish: "I wish Obama's administration could fulfil those people's wishes..."

Hopefully, hopes will be fulfilled.

Food for Thought: Make Poverty History

2008-12-28T00:46:00.002-05:00

Bono speaks about why we should make poverty history. A nice message, nicely delivered. I'm impressed by his illustration of the death in every 30 seconds, by clicking his fingers... and it's so true!

Sundown in My Heart

2008-12-19T02:08:00.005-05:00

Snowy Albany from above, December 2008

Hey,
look at me today
I ain't got a magical love story
my days are just as grey as yours,
dull

If you open your eyes you'll see,
the same sundown in our hearts reminded us
by the end, we cannot be the same old person
nor a different person too far from who we are

Let's blame those who took away our innocence
and please hold my hand for I get a little lost
as by the end, all I know is I'm a little bit lonely
and I need your arms to hold me

As my past is tripping in the pages of history
my love is vanishing
my wishes fade away
and I lose my answer when my soul asks me who to trust

Those whom we love flies away in their own journey
and I guess, we just cannot count on to the past,
nor to the illusion
maybe it's time for us to open our eyes and admit
it's you next to me
and I, next to you

Let's wipe away our tears
and throw those regrets
as well as our misery
far, far away out of our windows

Maybe it's the moment for those sadness to face the sundown
and wish that nowadays is the moment to witness the twilight
learn to see in the darkness
without ever wishing too much again
or question, whether the sun will shine again another day

Surrender,
accept,
take the fact
that we are not the same us
and wishing for the pain to dissolve soon
is the moment when we torture our wounded soul

Let's cry
let's weep,
let's scream
let's face it,
brave, brave like those noble warriors
and hold my hand

Let's not believe in Pink Floyd,
that we're two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl
let's wish,
by the end, we're two contented soul swimming in the world's ocean,
or fly, far, far away, happy and free...

The Mind Map

2008-11-29T03:31:00.009-05:00

One of those successful persuader :)

The Presidents in democratic countries are among the most successful persuaders in the world history. On the way to election they go through the real works of persuasion to gain voters trust, then after they are elected they have to again, persuade the citizens, senate, congress, international community, in the name of policy introduction, peace talks, economical deals, and within many other frames.

Yet persuasion is not merely about politics. It is also a way that we went through since we were child, to make our parents buying us our favorite toys, or to make them letting us watching TV. :) It is all about making people doing what we intend them to do. For those, and for many more reasons that I cannot describe one by one here, I am so much into diving deeper to the art of persuasion. This gets me the joy in studying the message design and social influence.

This joy starts with the excitement to realize that we are all so much exposed by communication activities in daily basis, as information exchange is part of our life dynamics. We all serve as communicator and communicant, we convey as well as we receive messages, and through that process we can modify others’ behavior. Previously I was fascinated by the success of some ads, political campaigns or news in creating social influence, without overseeing the deeper surface of those messages. I just know that some of those were touching something in human mind that create a strong persuasion effect to the audience. It is only recently, through Message Design and Social Influence classes that I obtain the new point of view, knowledge and understanding on the underlying process, that in my own term, I like to call it as “mental map” – a direction that shows how the motivation, behavior, attitude and action derive and actualized.

After learning a little bit of the persuasion theories in the beginning of the semester I started to observe my own cognitive process in considering the pieces of the messages that I watch, read or hear. I tried to match the theories with the dynamics that I sense in my cognition. I realize that there is a certain wave of feeling within the cognitive process, where my mind receive then digest the information within the frame of my salient belief. Meanwhile my consciousness makes comparisons with my social values and norms, my head is filled with the pros and cons-telling me to do or not to do something, and I, end up with making, or not making a decision, or with doing or not doing a thing.

Here I'd like to share some facts about Persuasion that fascinate myself. In my understanding, the art of effective persuasion lies in the understanding of the psychological side within a persuadee as the target of persuasion activity. The persuader should understand the psychological background of their target prior to designing the message to formulate the most suitable strategy of communicating to the target audience, while the strategy should be actualized to bring the persuadee into the desired attitude, behavior, and action. My main textbook for Persuasion class is written by O’Keefe (2002), where he defines persuasion as “a successful intentional effort at influencing another’s mental state through communication in a circumstance in which the persuadee has the freedom.”

However, in my opinion O’Keefe set a very high ideal standard to persuasion – as he put the notion of “successful” toward "the effort" and the notion of “circumstance in which the persuade has the freedom.” I do prefer to regard persuasion as a process, regardless of its success in the outcome. I also see that it is not easy to ensure the state of freedom, as I believe that sometimes, a persuadee lives in a-not-many-option circumstances. When “freedom” is noted, I would imagine that term literally, is the absolute state of free-willing, yet in reality sometimes the “freedom” of the choices given to persuadee is the freedom within a frame of certain limiting conditions.

An instance to help revisiting this wishful thinking of the state of "freedom" is a situation the in medical setting. There in the practitioner's rooms, very often what it said to be the success of doctor’s persuasion to the patient is based on very limited alternatives of medical treatments, while at the same time the patients are trapped in the position of having to choose one between unpleasant options to survive. Thus I feel that it is a little odd when even in those fuzzy edges of the definition of persuasion, there is sharp lines drawn over the state of freedom. At the flipside, I may consider that the freedom O’Keefe refers to is the freedom that is identified as the existence of “more than one option” state, without any imposing power that insists someone to do something.

As persuasion is about “influencing mental state through communication”, psychological aspects become the highlight in further discussions on persuasion theory. When we discuss paradigm cases of persuasion, attitudes, behavior, belief-based models, cognitive dissonance theory, up to theories of behavioral intention, the influences toward mental state are the principal issues to consider.

The success of a persuasive effort is indicated by O’Keefe defined as “a person’s general evaluation of an object, where “object” is understood in a broad sense, as encompassing persons, events, products, policies, institutions and so on.” The general evaluation of an object is reflected through a certain attitude, where “attitude is an evaluative judgment of, or a reaction to an object.” (O’Keefe, 2002, p.6). Attitude can be positive or negative and both reactions can be driven by persuasion. As set in the common features of persuasion, we need an indicator of success. Some persuasion activities indicate their success to the change of behavior, where the change is bridged by the change of attitude at the first hand.

However some studies found that the degree of consistency between behavior and attitude varies depending on various factors and some critiques found that people actions are not always consistent with their attitudes. These inconsistency remind the message designer to consider the focus of the persuasive efforts, and try to relate them with corresponding measures, that can hold audience’s mental state.

There is a model that can help in understanding how persuasion works in the beginning. It is called "Believe-Based Models of Attitude. The main idea of it is that "one’s attitude toward an object is a function of belief strength and belief evaluation". Therefore it is very reasonable when the belief one has about an object influences one’s attitude toward an object. In this case then it is obvious that the efforts of changing the attitude MUST influence belief consideration.

This model is a function of one’s salient belief about the object, and indeed, it is so much related to the above-mentioned theory on perceived relevance of attitudes. The salient belief is claimed to determine the attitude, thus, in this theory, once persuaders grab the ideas of the salient belief and design their messages as close as possible to that, it should be much easier for them to persuade the respective audience. However, in designing the message, persuaders should carefully scrutinize the most salient factor of a case in persuadees’ mindset. This is the most challenging part, since relative salient belief of various groups is of course vary.

Thus, the road to becoming a leader of a nation is really an amazing path. How to bridge, how to bond, how to accommodate and how to serve those beliefs are incredible works. My country, Indonesia, is soon having a national election in 2009. I'm really excited to observe from far to see how the presidential candidates serve those beliefs - as my country is a diverse place in terms of religion, culture, languange and political syste. I will see, what will actually be the general tendency of my people's beliefs, then I would know, who will the candidates persuade the constituents... Exciting, isn't it?

UNCONDITIONALLY...

2008-11-24T07:58:00.005-05:00

With you I don’t have to be smart
With you I don’t have to be pretty all the time
With you I can wear my old shirt
And you always say that I look fine

With you I can be sick
With you I can be healthy
With you I can laugh
With you I can cry like a baby

With you I can be a woman
With you I can be a girl
With you I can be a child
And whatever I become, you smile at me

With you I don’t have to be fragrant
With you I don’t have to be that neat girl with manicured nails
With you I can put on any make up on my face
With you I can let my face bare

With you I can look pretty
With you I can look messy
And still, you look at me with admiration

With you I may act a foolish
With you I am welcome to be smarter
With you I can be weak
With you I feel strong

With you I can be the most realistic
With you I may become a dreamer
With you I can talk
With you I can meditate

With you I can wish
With you I can pray
With you I can dance
With you I can sing

With you I can find good books
With you I can cook
With you I can shop
With you I can be the laziest person possible in the planet
With you, I can do everything

With you I share the days by the oceans
With you I climb the mountains
With you I travel,
With you I fly
Holding your hands, watching the clouds from above

With you I watch the stars
With you I watch the full moon
With you I watch the sunrise
By your side, mostly, I watch the sunsets

With you I can be vulnerable
With you I am sheltered
With you I can be broken
With you, you mend my shattered pieces into one

With you I am a princess
With you I am a queen
With you I am precious
With you I am me

With you I can fail
With you I can shine
With you I can fall,
But always, you hold me to rise again

With you I believe,
With you I trust
With you I discover
With you I learn
With you I pray

With you I can live in perfection
With you I can be imperfect
With you I can be me
And you love me still, UNCONDITIONALLY…

(for a warrior who rescued my soul and taught me about love, let the love story rest in peace...)

A Little Note About Dreams

2008-11-18T03:26:00.005-05:00

path of flower, picture taken at Ratu Boko temple, Jogjakarta, Indonesia

"Where your treasure is, there also will be your heart," the alchemist had told him.

But his heart was speaking of other things. With pride, it told the story of a sheperd who had left his flock to follow a dream he had on two different occassions. It told of Personal Legend, and of the many men who had wandered in search of distant lands or beautiful women, confronting the people of their times with their preconceived notions. It spoke of journeys, discoveries, books, and change..." (The Alchemist, Paolo Coelho, 1993, p. 159)

Tonight I found some messages from some old friends in my Friendster account. Some asked me, how did fly away from my nothingness to wonderful journeys in my life. How I metamorphed, how I arrived in totallly different times and spaces than the ones I used to belong years ago.

I have nothing much to say but quoting Coelho's words about the sheperd, and I'm just that sheperd like the one in The Alchemist, with similar hopes, dreams, worries, thoughts, and a little guts to bet with my life. I realize that the hardest part of life transformation is the imagery of leaving our comfort zone; of being accepted by the culture truism, the preconceived notions, up to the level when we have to revisit our salient belief, and our self-image. That, is what I call "a breakthrough".

It is really about the problem of being older. We all have our Personal Legend alive so strongly in our soul when we were young and innocent. We made believe, that one day we will become a pilot, doctor, princess, witch or whatever impossible, until the grown ups told us that we should stop imagining "impossible" things. And, as hardships hit us on the way when we grow up, we start to develop our belief, that being a grown up means that we must forget our careless dreams.

Forgive me if it sounds like I oversimplify the story. My references are Saint-Exupéry's Little Prince, Gibran's The Prophet, Coelho's The Alchemist and Byrne's The Secret, those are all so badly full of symbolic discourse in comparison to Dale Carnegie's books, for example. So symbolic, abstract yet optimistics they are that some people have said that I am an accute dreamer.

Somehow I lost my innocence too, and at that point, life becomes so dull and heavy. At the other hand, living with the innocent mind pumps my adrenalin that gives me the excitement that soars into courage to beat the challenges and moving on with my dreams. It's a pleasure to dive into the depth of the thoughts and wander into the width of the mind, instead of swimming shallowly, or walking with too near finish line in front of me...

Anyway, blame none if you cannot dream again, because, like what Saint-Exupéry's says, "...all grown-ups were children first, but few remember it..."

Maybe then, what matters now to reach wonderful things in life is not only about your wake up call. It's maybe should really start with a comfortable bed and pillow to lay your body down, to sleep tight, and live your sweet dreams...

*Almost morning, now it's time for me to sleep...

When Butterfly Comes... (When I Miss Indonesia, Part 02)

2008-11-16T01:34:00.006-05:00

This is the new Visit Indonesia Campaign 2008. I smiled when I first watched it in Dina's Facebook, as it said, "in our tradition, when butterflies come, it is the sign of special one fellow around..", and it's true, when I was a child, I was always be grinning cheek to cheek when I found a butterfly coming through my window. I believed (and still believe until now), that a special guest will come. And usually, when it is signed by the butterfly, the guest is the person that makes me feel happy. Like my grandma,or my auntie. :)

Another thing about this Visit Indonesia Ad is that is uses contemporary music,that mix Indonesian tunes with modern instruments. And, look at the pictures:.... ahhhh... the sea, sunset, mountains, dances, temples... it's amazing to realize that that's the place where I came from. I've been to most of those, and somehow I think I took them for granted, as the beauty is so abundant. And always, I feel so grateful of living it in the most part of my life.

Okay, I promise, I'll compile more information about Indonesia, and develop a special section in my blog. I'll call it "Indonesiana".:)

When I Miss Indonesia... (Part 01)

2008-11-16T00:59:00.004-05:00

I miss Indonesia tonight, and this is what I watch over, and over again...

The title, "Rumahku Indonesiaku", means "My Home, My Indonesia".

For you, who are not familiar with the views of Indonesia, you are watching the scenes taken from different parts of Indonesia. With 17,508 islands stretching along the equatorial line, we do have a lot of breathtaking views to offer. The first part of the clip is the scene from Papua, the most eastern part of Indonesia. Next, with the savannah scene, I suppose it's taken around Timor islands, at the south-eastern part of the country. Then, the coral reefs and the beautiful sea, well, basically you can find it almost in all parts of Indonesia. From Sabang, where the zero kilometer of Indonesia begin up to Papua, we have amazing sea gardens and gorgeous tropical coral reefs with its diverse biotas. Then there is a scene of a red giant flower. That is Rafflesia Arnoldi, the world's biggest flower. Later you see Borobudur, the largest Buddhist temple in the world that was built in 8th century, located at the heart of Java island. There is also the beautiful crater lake that I suppose to be Kelimutu lake. We have more than 150 active volcanoes streched along the islands, and some of them have beautiful craters. Then, you see the Barong dance from Bali, that represents the good and the evil. Then lastly, the white sandy beach, blue sea and atol, are also everywhere in Indonesia... then the red and white brought by the children represents the color of our national flag. The red symbolyzes the courage, and the white symbolizes the purity of the soul. Really nice ad.

The ad was produced by Gudang Garam, a major cigarette company in Indonesia, for the Independence Day Comemmoration. Yeah, some of you might feel reluctant to this "cigarette" fact, but, yes, we have big cigarette factories here in Indonesia. Our soil grows tobacco and cloves perfectly, that makes smoking becoming things that you would see everywhere, at every corner of my country...

The following is the text of the naration in the ad:

Ketika aku melihat sesuatu yang tak pernah kulihat sebelumnya,
Mataku terbuka,
Betapa indahnya negeri ini

When I see something that I have never seen before,
My eyes are open,
How beautiful this country can be

Dan ketika ku merasakan hal yang tak pernah kurasakan sebelumnya
Hatiku terpukau,
betapa besarnya bangsa ini
And when I feel the things that I have never felt before
My heart is mesmerized,
How great this country is

Hanya di sini, di rumahku,
yang membentang luas ke empat penjuru
Kupersembahkan seluruh jiwa dan ragaku
Only here, in my home,
Which spreads to the four directions of wind,
I dedicate all my sould and my body

Dan kupastikan,
tak akan ada yang mampu merebutnya dariku
And I ensure,
None will ever take it away from me,

Hanya di sini, di Indonesia...
Only here, in Indonesia...

Lefty or Righty?

2008-11-14T01:20:00.009-05:00

look how fun right brain is!

(picture taken from here)

Faith

Faith is an island in the setting sun

But proof, yes

Proof is the bottom line for everyone

-Paul Simon, "Proof"-

This week I finished reading a book written by Michael X. Deli Carpini and Scott Keeter, "What American Knows About Politics and Why It Matters". However, the lines that caught my eyes were not anything related to the level of political knowledge as discussed in that book. Instead, the eye-catching lines are the ones that I quoted above.

I often joked about my brain capacity with Jj. We both realized that we possess different dominant part of brain. He, with his left brain is so good with numbers, data, analyctical skills, drawing conclusions from the facts, and I, with my right brain, has very strong intuition, artistic talents, and capability to read between the lines when things are blur. Yet, I am very weak with data reasoning. I'm hopeless with formulas and numbers. I have strong faith on many things, that is built through empirical reasoning, or merely intuition.

So, now, I'm at the flipside of my intellectual experience. Here I am NOW, a new student in a graduate study program. In this new world of mine, everything is justified with theory, data, evidence, numbers, statistics. Intuition is not something that is taught in the textbooks, nor in discussed in the class. While in this moment Jj is taking off to the world of right brain to balance his left one, I, am now crashing into the world of left brainers. Somehow I feel that it is like suicidal action to my identity.

After 29 years living within the formula of 75% strong basis of intuition and 25% of textbook theories for my survival potion, now I have to spread the "logical-rational" virus to my super-active right brain. Suppressing my right brain to influence less, while I feed my left brain with tons of supplements: of data reasoning, justifications. theories, cause-effect exercises, and the most horrible of all, restructuring my salient belief of many things. In positive way, I would say that I "improve" my salient belief, with "more reasonable" belief. The belief that derives from justifications of what the scholars said, no more merely from "what I feel is right".

If I have to explain the feeling, I just can say that I am overwhelmed. The two sides of my brain possess very strong "ego". I feel like now, for every decisions that I take, I will need "signed-and-stamped" consensus from both sides. In a way I also feel that gradually I lost my innocence. I lost my spontaneousity, and I feel that I build a huuuuugeeee wall around my right brain, limiting it from roaming, or day dreaming as much as before.

Today I'm writing this because I was shocked to find that I had no objection toward Paul Simon's "Proof". For years, my energizing anthem has been Jewel's "Intuition":

"Follow your heart, your intuition

It will lead you in the right direction

Let go of your mind,

Your intuition, is easy to find

Just follow your heart, baby"

Oh. It felt soo good to sing it in my sleepy early morning radio show....

By the way, some says that the right hemisphere of the brain is more emotionally-skilled, whereas the left is more cognitively-skilled. I, myself, used to follow the HEART (that, in my viewpoint, is the manifestation of the works of right brain), while left-brainers follow the (left) BRAIN.

However, I start to believe that a head is too weak to use without a heart anyway.

Wait... BELIEVE? In what basis?

Cognition or emotion?

Intuition of Information?

Proof or faith?

Oh no. Even now I can't tell whether it is my left, or right brain that's justifying it! :))

Survival

2008-11-09T02:40:00.011-05:00

What would you feel, and what would you do, if you love dining out but you lost your taste buds?
What would you feel, and what would you do, if you are a professional runner but you lost your legs?

What would you feel, and what would you do, if you love swimming but you lost your arms?

Now see this water lily painting,

....then see this one:

Did you feel like those two were painted by different person?

But no, it was painted by the same person. Those paintings are Claude Monet's works, under the request from French Prime Minister Clemenceau, who asked him to paint for L'Orangerie, a museum of impressionist and post-impressionist art located at Place de la Concorde, Paris. Clemenceau urged Monet to work on that project in 1914. Since that time, until his death in 1926, Monet painted a series of water lily paintings under the theme of Nympheas, which he decided to donate to the French State (Potts, 2000*).

I have just learned that during the completion of that project Monet's sight was worsen by cataract. He almost lost his sight. He, THE famous Monet could hardly see the view in his garden, nor the colors on his canvas. Monet, who has been playing with colors by intuition, had to read the names of the colors written on the paint tubes to find which colors he was using...

To be honest, I couldn't feel much joy when I saw his latest paintings as I identify Monet with something more joyful like his Poppy Field painting. Without the same visual capacity, Monet is not the same Monet. The spontaneous view, playful colors, lights, sunshine... they are all gone as he lost the most important tool belongs to a painter: the eyes. You know that someone still can paint even if they don't have hands: they can use feet or mouth to hold the brush. Yet without they eyes, how would you visualize?

If I was him, I know I would be so depressed. I was well-known, I was trusted, I was having a huge project for the state because I was considered as a great painter, but I couldn't even pick the right the colors with my own eyes. Then, later in the history of art people noted the change in my style, due to my disability....

How would you call that, if it is not IRONIC?

Then look at Beethoven. A great composer, passionate to the music, but deaf. A part of Wikipedia (my less trusted source of information, but, anyway...) even mentioned that to feel connected to his music, Beethoven used a special rod attached to the soundboard on a piano that he could bite. It made the vibrations transfer from the piano to his jaw to increase his perception of the sound. Ah. How sad...

Those two names, Monet, and Beethoven have been knocking at my heart in the last two days as I'm finishing my reading on "Monet", a book written by Vanessa Potts (2000).

When I used to work in radio and TV, I used to imagine, how if I lost my voice? What would happen to my life? This moment now, I can really understand why Beethoven had suicidal thoughts during his difficult moments.

Those two names, Monet and Beethoven, have showed the wildest possibility that can happen to life: losing the most important tools that you need to do the things that you are very passionate about.

If it happened to me, will I be strong enough?

Will I cry,

What will I do?

Will I survive?

Will I move on?

Will I be able to produce great works?

I really don't know the answer now, but I hope, if ever that unfortunate moment happened to my life, I wouldn't cry, I would find a way, I would survive, I would still produce great works...

*Potts, Vanessa. Monet. Parragon Publishing, London: 2000.

The Party Is Over. What's Next?

2008-11-07T01:20:00.007-05:00

my favorite line in Obama's speech in Chicago, November 4, 2008

The party is over. The celebration is still going on, at least until Obama is sworn next January, as the 44th president of the United States of America. Sworn, as the first "black" president.

I had so much to say that evening, after I followed the count, the speech and the euphoria. Too bad the internet was down, the very first time that I experienced bad internet connection since I arrived, I believe it was because of crazy traffic crashing through the veins of fiber optic, backbones, networks... to share a historical story. I couldn't access blogger so I couldn't write what was in my mind immediately, so all I did was finally calling Cynthia just to share my scream of "Aaaahhhh-Aaaahhh... I'm SOOO HAPPYYYY!!!" and, uncountable amount of "Yaayyyy... Yayyyyy.. Yayyyyy!!" that she couldn't help but laughing at me.

My heart jumped after ABC and CNN announced that Obama won, even at that time the counting was not even finished. Whatever they call, landslide, tsunami of voter turnout, I feel the wave in my heart, that,like what Oprah said, it was the first time after 9/11 that USA was united - not by the tragedy, but by hope.

Those scholars who introduced the notions of political apathy might now review their books, journal articles and papers, the center for civic education may soon write a report about slacker uprising, as Michael Moore had sent all people in his mailing list 2 mails since that historical election night. But then, what's next?

Yes, this election has grown new voters, bring the minority the pride, comfort to keep their chin up, that finally, their voices are heard, and realized, building within bitter memories of long, long fight that last for centuries. A friend of mine have declared that she would hang Obama's picture on the wall, next to Martin Luther King's picture. Reminder of the black heroes - and there, I see the deeply cultivated agony, the wounds of racial seggregation in this diverse "UNITED" States of America.

Then I, by purpose, popped a question about that sacred issue in my class the next day. That I don't see Obama as a "black" man, as I know he was born and raised by a white mother. The terms of "biracial", "colored", or "mix" were not even coming across my head - when I just said, "For me, and for amy other people 'out-there', Obama is 'America'. He is the reflection of the diversity, and for me, by default, by his race, by his genetics, by his education, he is not the mere representative of the black, but for the whole country."

I remember the awkward atmosphere in that seminar room. Where the only "black" classmate that I have in my class explained about the racism and discrimination, and my professor, who is a very smart white woman, as always, managed to perform objective stand, by admitting that.

So now, will this "black" president cure that deep down agony?

Will he, in the next 4 years of journey, be able to break the seggregating walls between these people with or without colors in this country, just like what was shown from Grant Park in Chicago, that November 4th evening, where blacks and whites cried for his victory?

Will he nurture the hope, or will he let those who hoped down?

This is not the best time to become a president, some said.

But as my attitude with the half full or half empty glass, I will say that it can be the best time to become a president in this country. Because if he succeed to lift this country from the mess of wars, financial crisis, poor social service and apathetic citizens, his name will be carved with golden ink in history. His success will be the motivation for the citizens to believe in the power of (representative) democracy. That there is really a sense behind a vote. That there is really a reason why we should trust our voice to a politician. That there is really a benefit of democratic system. That this knowledge, will be the best voter education ever, and that political apathy will be a history - with millions to blame, from TV channels, pundits to spin doctors.

I am so much looking forward to see America after this election. Will US will be more united? Will US wake up from these nightmares? Will the wars in Middle East be ceased?

Hope by the end of the day, in November 2012, Obama will answer it with, "Yes, We COULD".

My Article in Voices Without Votes

2008-11-04T14:28:00.007-05:00

Today is the election day in America and I have just found that my article on US Election was aggregated in Voices Without Votes, an afiliation of Global Voices Online. It was the report from my observation on the voter education and pre-election dynamics around me.

Voices without Votes is a project of Global Voices commissioned by Reuters. It "...highlights the conversations in non-American blogs and citizen media, with emphasis on the regions of Africa, Asia, Europe, South America, and the Middle East. The goals of this project is to monitor global citizen media responses to US foreign and presidential/politics in the run up to the elections, to illuminate the effect of US foreign policy abroad and provide a lively and interactive news experience, and to enable readers to experience American events through the eyes ofordinary citizens from outside the United States" (Voices Without Votes)

This is my third article aggregated by Global Voices, and I'm so happy about it. GOOD LUCK WITH THE ELECTION, AMERICA! :)

The Nice Ads

2008-10-29T22:37:00.010-04:00

One thing that I like to notice about the 2008 presidential campaign is the look of the ads. How they catch the attention, and how they touch my heart. Since I was in Indonesia I have been comparing the feeling that I feel when I watch both McCain and Obama's ads, and in a way, I just fall in love to Obama's.

Even I am still not in favor of sound-bites* that sounds negative, in general Obama's ads have more humanist pictures, where I can see hopes in the eyes of common people. Added with well-done music scores and Obama's charismatic voice conveying eloquent messages over the scenes, I don't have to be a black, an immigrant, a middle class American, a Colin Powell or a Democrat to fall in love with him. :)

Watching the 30 minutes "Obamercial"** tonight confirmed my opinion that there are great people behind the production of Obama's campaign ads. I think that the Obamercial is the peak of all ads production done by Obama's team. It covers Obama's plans comprehensively with very little negative tone toward his opponent. The Obamercial, just like other Obama's ads, talk right to the heart of ordinary people like me. People who is dare to dream, who wish for a change, who adores a smart-but-not arrogant person, who cares about the future of ecology, who wish to have a world leader that speaks with diplomacy - and not with bombs and bullets.

I don't have Obamercial clip by now, but I would like to share one of my favorite clip, taken from Barack TV. It's about the signs of change.

*sound-bite: the short clip of speech taken from a longer speech or an interview that is inserted in news report or ads to support the main idea of that report.

**Obamercial: this is the way some media call Obama's commercial that is broadcasted tonight, October 29 , 2008 at 8 p.m. ET in major TV channels (except CNN and ABC) in the United States. The duration of that Obamercial is 30 minutes, consists of Obama's campaign ads in semi-documentary format. According to the scotsman.com this Obamercial is rarely used in the US as it is very expensive. The previous presidential candidates who did that were JFK, Nixon and Ross Perrot. Assumed to cost $ 3 - 5 million (according to CNN), this Obamercial even caused the baseball World Series final to be delayed by 15 minutes so NBC, CBS, and Fox could air the spot simultaneously.

A Little Surprise :)

2008-10-27T21:58:00.011-04:00

A good news from a best friend is always nice. But it's really fun when the news comes with cute surprise.

So, yesterday night, in the middle of the daunting literature review assignment I found a new mail delivered in my inbox. It was from my very best friend - almost my brother, Ismu. :)

I copy you the original message:

...Pada suatu sore saat aku pulang dari kantor dan akan menuju Senayan City buat latihan Gym di Fitness First. Sambil menunggu lampu merah, ada beberapa SPG yg lagi sebar-sebar brosur, dgn ramah sang SPG membagikan kepada setiap mobil yang berhenti. Dan sampailah Mbak SPG yang ramah itu menyapa dan berharap aku membuka sedikit kaca mobil untuk menerima brosur yang ditawarkan.

That evening I went back from my office, heading to Senayan City to have my gym sesion at Fitness First. While waiting for the red traffic light, there were some SPG (Sales Promotion Girl) handing out some brocchures, nicely they gave those brochures to ever cars stopping there. So, there she came to my car, expecting that I would receive her offer.

Aku buka kaca mobil, dan brosur aku terima tanpa memperdulikan apa isi brosur itu, aku langsung menaruh disamping jok. Tapi berhubung lampu merahnya lama bangettttt, dengan terpaksa aku ambil brosur dan membaca " oh ternyata EUROPEAN HIGHER EDUCATION FAIR " yang akan dilaksanakan 1-2 November. Tuuuuuuuu kan gak penting banget, dan gak menarik buat aku, tapi begitu aku balik brosur itu........

I opened my car window, I received that brochure without really cared about the content, and I put it at the seat next to me. However, the traffic light was sooo long that I decided to grab that brochure and read it. "Oh, it's about EUROPEAN HIGHER EDUCATION FAIR that will be held on 1-2 November". Thaaatt is sooo not important and so not interesting for me, but when I turned to the other page.....

" Maksud'eeeeeeeee !!!!"
"Whaaaaatttt!!!"

Brosur itu berubah jadi menarik perhatiaanku...ternyata terpampang seonggok wajah (maaf ya....) hahaha yang sekian lama aku kenal dekat bangetttttttt . Itu Fotomu Nokkkkkkkkkkk.... hahaha....

That brochure becomes so interesting to me... there I saw a face... that I have known so close for sooo long. That was your picture Deaaaaarrrrr... hahahaha...

Dunia sempit banget ya....

The world is so small, ya...

Hehe dibayar berapa kamu nok mejeng dan tersebar diseluruh Jakarta Raya? wah selamat...selamat.... (*makasih banget mas!)

Hehe... how much did they pay you to be displayed there and circulated all over this Great Jakarta? wah congratulations... congratulations....

So, this is Ismu, my best friend, with the brochure. He sent it as the attachment to his mail. :D

I couldn't believe my eyes too.

It was a photo taken on a rainy afternoon in Paris, by a professional photographer named Unkay when I was a student of Alliance Francais (AF) Paris, back in 2006.

I was visiting my AF library when a librarian came to me and said that there was a Mexican photographer searching for Indonesian face to be the photo model for a European Commission project. I was so excited to imagine the experience of being the model of a professional photographer in Paris. Then I met that photographer, a gorgeous Mexican lady named Unkay, then I simply signed a contract that certify my agreement to have my photos to be used for the publications related to the European Comission project for four years. It was like a voluntary project and I was not paid by any single Euros. I was so impressed that even I wrote it in my old blog. If you are interested to see the story from that photo session, you can click here.

It's not the first time that signed a contract and I found my photo in publications later, yet it feels so dear to me as it was part of my days in beautiful Paris. And, as I am now pursuing my higher education abroad - but not in Europe, it feels a little funny. However, I still keep my dream to study in Sorbonne later when I go for my doctorate degree.

To make this article more meaningful for my blog visitors, the brochure is about European Education Fair Indonesia 2008, where it will be the biggest European Education Fair for anyone interested in studying in European Union Countries. The event will consist of Asia-Link Symposium in Hotel Shangri La Jakarta on 31 October 2008 and European Higher Education Fair on 1-2 November 2008 at Balai Kartini Convention Center Jakarta. You can find more information on that event in http://www.ehef-jakarta.org/web/ ... and... ehm, there you will find more of my photos at the front page*! :))

(*Jiji's comment on this news: "that must nourish very well the slightly narcistic side of you :)" well, I guess he's just right!)

Life is just so sweet with good friends and little surprises around in this little planet!

The front page of the EHEF website

The Alternative Windows

2008-10-16T04:57:00.015-04:00

By the way, the poster has wrong date imprinted!

On 15 October 2008 I watched the last Presidential Candidate Debate at the SUNY Albany Campus Center Ballroom. I went home after midnight as I was so much engaged into the post-debate discussion with my new friends, the Campus Republicans and Democrats, all the way from the Ballroom...downstairs...passing Indian at the Commons section of my campus... until I got into the bus!

Do You Believe in the Media?
It was verry interesting to watch the debate after I finished reading Bennet's News, the Politics of Illusion. I have so much thoughts to confirm to the real American voters. Despite of the negative tones in the campaigns and the preliminary concerns on the political apathy among young voters, I was first impressed by the eloquence of the young voters in describing the reasons why they would vote a candidate. They seemed so sure, so well informed, and so decided, while in Bennet's book, and later, Hallin, in his article on sound-bites in electoral coverage, and Watts and his team, in their article on elite cues and media bias in presidential campaigns; the media took a significant role in weakening the core issue delivered in the campaigns - that later brought public to bear the consequence of being distorted from the “real story” and becomes the misinformed public or the object of agenda-setting. Oh. Wow. Sounds serious, isn't it?

The discussion in my group moved from the opinion sharing on what the students thought about the debate, to the affirmation of their choice, and how far they considered the media role in informing them.

All of them agreed that the live debate on TV provided clearer information on what the candidates plans and policies are. From this point, a student raised my aimed issue: he mentioned that so far the electoral coverage - the hard or soft news did not really provide them with enough information about the candidates. Republicans pointed out that the media were biasing in favor of the Democrats, and the Democrats said that the media didn't provide enough clarifications to counter back the negative campaigning launched by the Republicans. NONE of the discussion participants in my group were satisfied by the mainstream media!

The Reinforced Choice

I then asked them if their peers felt the same. They said, maybe. But the most interesting thing is that, they all agreed that the media adversity toward the candidates had led to predominant negative tones in the election. They confirmed that the media, in a way, have confused the non-well-informed, and the non-politically aware public, in this case, the young voters. They, in their apathy, started to figure out the image of voting "the lesser of two evils", as mostly what they heard, and what were blown up by the media were negative critiques toward the candidates or the opposition to the candidates' plans.

They, my discussion buddies, said that they were among the little part of the students who have been politically aware, and they actually reinforced their belief toward a candidate through alternative media: the INTERNET and their peer groups - the fellow Republicans or Democrats.

Some of them admitted that the choice that they made was based on their "identification" toward candidate's backgrounds and policy. However, there was an interesting discussion between a Republican and a Democrat regarding on their social background, where both claimed to come from difficult background - with the struggle to gain better life. The Republican said that he did not agree to Obama's plans in the tax and social security-related policy, as he felt that it is sort of in favor of the "lazy" people - to live well, while the hard workers play hard to earn th better living. He called Obama a "socialist" (unsurprisingly, like many other Republicans), and he said that socialist values will destroy the Americans, and their American Dreams. In his opinion, American Dreams is where people who do their best effort will be rewarded unlimited opportunities. Of course, he added, "the "Socialist" system won't encourage this to happen". To support his argument he said that he had learned a lot about Socialist when he was travelling to some Scandinavian countries.

The Democrats countered back by mentioning that those who don't work are not necessarily lazy. They just didn't have any opportunity to live the basic standard and to have proper access to education, mostly due to economical reason. Without basic provision to secure their life, it's difficult for the citizen to make their first step toward their dreams!

Hm. I love that "American Dreams" term! It's like EEEVERRYYWHERE... in political speeches or motivational books. But let's have a look. In general the term of American Dreams refer to James Truslow Adams in his book The Epic of America, which was written in 1931, where he states: "The American Dream is "that dream of a land in which life should be better and richer and fuller for everyone, with opportunity for each according to ability or achievement" (cited from the Library of Congress page).

Comments, anyone?

For me, if we see with bias eyes that put the emphasize on "better and richer and fuller for everyone", we might perceive the dreams as the socialist-like concept. But if we see with another bias favoring the capitalism, we might see "opportunity for each according to ability or achievement" clearer that the "for everyone". So, I guess, trying to be neutral with my outsider eyes, I think American Dreams is none of Socialist, nor Capitalist. It's a mid-way, it's grey, it's a moderation that integrates a common welfare with individual hard works.

Anyway, enough for the American Dreams for now, and let's go back to the role of media.

Of course it's interesting that the best-selling jargon of American Dreams is perceived differently, in respect to individual beliefs. But the thing behind this discussion is that I want to introduce you to the fact, that actually each person holds their own bias, based on their existing salient belief. People has their own filtering system that defines their latitude of acceptance toward an issue. It is not impossible that one news is perceived to be biasing in favor of the the Liberals by the Conservatives, but at the other hands it is also perceived to be biasing in favor of the Conservatives by the Liberals. O-oh. :)

In the world where journalism and democracy has grown soooo loooonggg... before Indonesian independence (we, Indonesians proclaimed our nation's independence on August 17, 1945, yet we have never really had journalistic freedom until the end of 1990's), there have been so much development in media and in the citizen's mindset toward democracy. Added with the rapid growth of internet and its accessibility, Americans have bigger privilege to develop alternative media and to access it.

As admitted by my discussion buddies, they turned their back from mainstream media, that sells cliché pundit talks and commentaries, plus polls and horse-race journalism, to the alternative, more independent media that offers deeper analyses, reveals more facts, and provide different perspectives than the frames developed in the news stories. They, who care enough about politics reinforce their belief through those media, not as the supplementary source, but as the anchor within the massive waves of mainstream news.

However, back to the issue of bias again, I always keep in my mind that those who turn to alternative media are those who already have significant bias toward a certain political stand. There is a reason on a corresponding bias that refers to "wanting dispositions", which simply explains that "human tends to see the world as they wish to see it". In this case, it is very probable that the existence of the alternative media will pull people with different bias to different polars. The Democrats will be polarized to more liberal-toned media, and the Republicans to the conservative-toned ones. So, what do you think about this?

My biggest question now is, how will those politically aware-but-polarized society perceive their American Dreams? How about the others who are still clueless about what is actually happening in their Dreamland's politics? To whom are they going to refer to, who will help shaping their belief on an important democracy process? Or just let them be apathetic and shallow, and let the media keeps on going with their "entertaining" horse-race news, because after all, it looks just exciting?

Uh, gosh. My viewpoints on news and media effect have been deconstructed since I had more understanding on American politics and media. By the end, I just can say that as an alien in this country, it might take me a little longer to figure out what the real American Dreams are about...

Better life? Survival? Dreams? Awakening? Democracy? Achievement? Welfare? Opportunity? Being a champion? Do the Americans really know what they are into now?

I'll let you know when I have figured out the answer...

No Ordinary Day

2008-10-15T13:38:00.009-04:00

Just a short distraction in between my response paper....

I always wonder why my days are never ordinary. Uhm, I mean, as a student, my ordinary day should be between books-campus-classes-homeworks, rite? But if you followed my stories, seems that there have been too many dramas. Big or small, they made my life tastes so spicy. :)

Yesterday afternoon I dressed up for coming early to the campus for some readings in library. Then I heard bangs (yes, bangs, not "knocks") on my door. The peek hole of my apartment door is too tall for my eyes (yeah... you can laugh on it. I'm petite, what can I say?) so as always I just yelled at anyone at the other side of my door,

"Who's there?"

And I almost fainted to hear the answer:

...."POLICE!"

WHAAAATTT???
I was about to say, "you're kidding!" but the voice was so confincing. You know, that kinda deep voice in cop movies...

So anyway, I opened up my door and YES, there were two officers, their heights are double my height (ok, I'm exaggerating...but they're really tall!), with their nice uniform.

"How may I help you?"
I could see that they were in steady - ready position, have a look into my tiny room, and after seeing that I'm just such this tiny-little-cute-harmless girl in purple shirt and white cardigan, they started to ask me questions:

"Do you live alone here Ma'am?"
"Yes I do"
Then the female police officer showed me two photos captured from CCTV
"Do you recognize the man in these pictures?"
I looked at that. For me it looks nothing but an ordinary bald-headed skinny Caucasian, aged around 20. You can find a lot of guys looking so similar to that in my campus, but yeah, I don't recognize him as anyone familiar.
"No"
"Would you have a closer look to examine again?"
So I had a closer look.
"No, I don't recognize him. I'm pretty new here, just arrived in this building this year's September."
"I see, no problem."
"May I know what happened?"
"This man is suspected to break the windows of our patrol unit's car."
"Oh."
"When was it?"
"This weekend. We suspect that this man is living here or hiding around here."

O-oh. I was having a bad fever last weekend, and in the middle of the night I thought I heard people yelling and fighting, then ran in the corridor, at some point there was a man yelling, "Jimmy! Jimmy!", but I was not sure. I was between waking up and sleeping.

Anyway, I don't know that man, I didn't see the incident, and I didn't hear breaking objects that night.

Then the female officer took her note pad.
"May I have your name please?"
Then I spelled my extra-ordinary long alienish name that none of my professor have ever managed to spell correctly without looking at their paper... :))
I added my favorite remarks;
"I'm from Indonesia, if you're wondering where that strange-looking name is from."
"Oh, wow, Ok."

She leaned closer to me ask she asked for my date of birth and phone number, and I've just realized that she was sooooo GORGEOUS!

She got very defined eyes. I focused on her make up, she applied nicely toned dark greenish smokey-eyes eye shadow, nicely done eye-lashing and eye-lining, lipstick and -oh. My heart beat faster to realize that she looked so sexy in her outfit. I was even thinking of grabbing my camera, asking her to have a photo with me... But, of course, I didn't dare to do so! :D

After all, I realized that felt more nervous to face the police officer's beauty than facing the probability of having a criminal hiding in my apartment's building.
Gosh, what's wrooongggg with meee... ???

*I think I start to see the funny side of every drama....*

Gratitude :-)

2008-10-11T01:50:00.012-04:00

the cover page of my "book of good wishes"

Yesterday I wrote a very emotional article in my blog about my experiences with bad services in America. Added with negative feelings after the failure of my transaction with Western Union in the evening, my uncomfortable sinusitis and bleeding nose, I slept uneasily.

At 5.25 I was awakened by two nightmares in a row. I felt high fever, and I felt so bad. I was terrified. I needed someone to share, and there was only one person in my mind, whom I trust to share the craziness of my nightmare stories with. So, soon I jumped from my bed, grabbed my laptop and skyped him* (*name is disclosed as I haven't confirmed him if it is OK to undisclose his identity :D).

Thank God he was still online. So I told him about my nightmares, like the way I usually did in some other mornings when we were together. When he was around he would immediately sing Bob Marley's "Duppy Conqueror" and I would end up laughing to see his funny expressions. Too bad I can't have that special treat as I'm far away from him now... :(

Soon within our Skype talks he reminded me of one thing,

"....while reading your last article today in your blog, I felt so much negativity. And though i understand so much the frustration, the negativity is harmful to you in the first place because you will keep attracting more negative incidents. More bad taxis, more bad services, more frustrations..."

If you are Rhonda Byrne's The Secret's reader, I'm sure you feel familiar with that statement. Yeah, some months ago we learned about law of attraction from The Secret. Not only that we red the book, we also watched the DVD and discussed about that so many times. We do believe in the law of attraction, that "thoughts become things". It was in the end of May that we started to hit the book. Since then, we have "played" with our law of attraction and that brought us to some magical moment, of having our wishes fulfilled in amazing ways.

However, as I faced my frustrating days here alone, it had been very difficult to maintain my positive vibes. But he's right. Totally right. I should switch my negativity. If you ever wonder why when your day starts ugly, usually the unfortunate moments will follow you in the whole rest of the day, that is due to the negative energy that you keep, that pulls other bad energies in. And I don't wanna pull more negativity in my life, ever again.

I know I should switch my law of attraction, from the frustration mode to good wishes. After all, he reminded me, "You come to the States voluntarily. None kidnapped you to go there. It was your dream, and it was what you fight for!"

Ah, he's right. I remembered again how I wanted to get this scholarship, how I came to the Fulbright panel interview when I've just arrived from KL with severe bronchitis and fever, how I speed up on my becak motor (yihaa, it did felt so heroic to rush on that typical Banda Aceh public transport! :D) to be ontime for that super-important afternoon, how I prayed that the day should be sunny so the never-ontime Merpati flight could get me out of Nias after my mission, as in less than 24 hours after that mission I must be in Jakarta for my GRE test... How I studied so hard even at Binaka Airport, while having spicy Indomie soup with Robin, who taught me the simplest math... How could I forget those days?

Surely, it is not easy at all to switch our mind from negativity when the world treats us unpleasantly. Yet I MUST try to switch my mind to positive vibration. I find that counting the simple blessings and gifts that I got, and feel grateful about it are the easiest shortcuts to start with.

I actually have a book that I call "my book of good wishes" where I write about everything that I want to achieve, and all good things that I got. The cover page of the book is the picture that I put in the beginning of this article, where I drew all my favorite symbols and icons. The memories about the book itsef is nice. The book was an empty little notebook given by a good friend of mine in Aceh, Jessica, in my last working day there. Inside, I also have a dried four-petals frangipani flower, a lucky charm that reminds me of my beautiful childhood memories and beautiful moments of love...

So, this morning, after that reflection moments I decided to be back to be a happy person than a grumpy one. I should encourage the other side of my mind to discover positive lessons-learned of every events. I should feel the gratitude of every little things in life, and the sum of all those little things should be abundant because there have been so many good things gifted to me. So, fueled by the belief on good things, I re-launched my positive law of attraction, that life, after all, is just sooooo.... good. Yes, that's it: GRATITUDE! :)

*hope I will be strong enough to maintain this positivity*

Si, Se Puede, Baez!

2008-10-08T12:19:00.024-04:00

Joan Baez, in her 20s (the picture is taken from here)

There are many times that you are unhapppy with the system,
There are many times that you want to speak yet you feel you aren't heard
There are many times that you might feel powerless,
But in many ways, you are stronger than what you tought...
(my own words, after learning about a great woman, Joan Baez)

This story began its seed in my mind since 2005, started by a song that touched my heart. I felt that it touched me in the depth of questioning the state of life and freedom. It was Donna Donna, a song popularized by Joan Baez. I found a touching story of the Donna Donna origin*, yet in my opinion, what makes it spread worlwide was because of the soul that Baez put in the tones. Baez, in her life, has been a human rights activist who speaks loudly through her music. I used to wonder why Donna Donna has never been not so popular in any list of her songs, but however it is, Donna Donna was my eye-opener toward Baez' great works in life.

I heard that song for the first time way later from the year when it was composed. My first Donna Donna was the one sang by Sita Nursanti, an Indonesian singer. It was one of the soundtracks in Gie, an Indonesian movie about Soe Hok Gie, an Indonesian activist for democracy in 1960's. That song got me so deep that I always wondered in what context it was written. Then I found that there was Joan Baez' singing that song a long time ago.

I searched more about Baez after I watched Slacker Uprising couple of weeks ago. She appeared in one of the scenes, to encourage young people to vote for Barrack Obama. I was dying to hear her singing Donna Donna, but instead, she chose a Finnish national anthem for the audience, to remind them about the love to their motherland.... *sigh*

Baez' affiliation to Obama's candidacy is quite historical as she has been identical as a non-partisan figure in American political activities. Amazingly, on February 3, 2008 Baez wrote a letter to the editor at the San Francisco Chronicle endorsing Barack Obama in the 2008 U.S. presidential election. She noted that, "Through all those years, I chose not to engage in party politics ... At this time, however, changing that posture feels like the responsible thing to do. If anyone can navigate the contaminated waters of Washington, lift up the poor, and appeal to the rich to share their wealth, it is Senator Barack Obama..."

More support to Obama was shown when she played on the Acoustic Stage at the Glastonbury Festival in June. Baez said during the introduction of a song, that one reason she likes Obama is because he reminds her of another old friend of hers - Martin Luther King.* (Wikipedia)

I am drawn further into the stories of her life. Born in 1941 in Mexico and living her chilhood in many countries, including Iraq, as her father worked in education field and for the UNESCO, Baez started to develop her view on poverty and inhumane treatments to the people. Music, and civil rights movements seemed to be her path of destiny that walk side-by-side unseparatedly. In 1956 in the same year when she had her first guitar, she heard a young Martin Luther King, Jr. lecture on nonviolence and civil rights for the first time. It took not so long for her to express her humanist stand. Just in the next year, 1957, she started to take a stand within her idealism of no war. She committed her first act of civil disobedience by refusing to leave her high school, Palo Alto High School in California, during an air-raid drill, as she claimed it to be government's propaganda to create paranoia on atomic war. In that year she also met Gandhian scholar, Ira Sandperl, who becomes one of her strongest political influences.

Then she bloomed, not only in her musical career but also in civil right movements. My heart beat even faster to find that she was once an identical singer to "We Shall Overcome". This song is so dear in my heart as with my fellow students, during the 1998 Student Movement for Democratic Reform in Indonesia, we marched all the way with that song, we yelled on that message, after 4 students were shot by Indonesian Army in Jakarta as they rallied for the reform. Until then I really have never known that We Shall Overcome is considered as civil right anthem written by Pete Seeger, and had been sang even since the times of Marthin Luther King's movements....

I adore her courageous acts. I think it is very brave that a new singer who has just started her career dared to take unpopular stand by joining Civil Rights movement in the United States. Joan supported Martin Luther King to protect African American schoolchildren in Grenada, Mississippi and joined him on his march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama, singing for the marchers in the town of St. Jude as they camped the night before arriving in Montgomery. Her song, "Birmingham Sunday" that was written by her brother-in-law, Richard Farina, was the soundtrack of "Four Little Girls," Spike Lee's film about the four young victims killed in the bombing of an African American church by racists in 1963.

Realizing her rights as a citizen, she performed another extreme-but-(in my opinion), reasonable action by withholding 60% of her income taxes, as the amount was determined to be used for military purposes by the U.S. government at that time. It was the way she protested toward U.S. involvement in Vietnam. Unbelievably, I cannot recall any other person in the history who has done the same action as she did. It is inspiring to see how she fought the system in her own way, parallel to unfavorable policies performed by the administration of the country.

She continued to withhold portions of her taxes for the next ten years, despite of the legal consequences that she had to bear. And, after performing for President Johnson in Washington, she urged him to withdraw U.S. troops from Vietnam. That, I think, is the great thing that you can do when you are a public figure. Raising the awareness with the power that you have, and trying to speak up instead of trapping yourself in the spiral of silence.

One more thing that looks relevant about her past and today's America is "Si, Se Puede". I'm sure you often hear about it recently, spelled side by side to the famous Obama's "Yes, We Can".

Baez had been sounding that message since more than 30 years ago. It started with her involvement in United Farmworkers Union (UFW) movement that started in 1966 where she stood for California's migrant farm workers as they fought for fair wages and safe working conditions. Until in 1972, she was at Cesar Chavez's side during his 24-day fast to draw attention to the farmworkers' struggle and sang "We Shall Overcome" during the fast in the film about the UFW, "Si Se Puede".

Baez' journey expanded my point of view toward the other sides of American history. How in this said-to-be free country, the freedom was not at all something that one was taking for granted. Her dedication to folk songs, her works with Institute For The Study Of Nonviolence, Save the Children, Amnesty International, anti-war and anti-discrimination marches, the bans to her performance and albums, censorships, mistranslated political comments, her love stories, her visit to Vietnam, and many other works that she made makes me feel that she has been living a thousand lives.

I adore that kind of person, for the bravery of fighting for the values that she believes is true and at the same time creating remarkable works and inspiring people, since her youthful days of early 20s until today, when she already enters her 60s.

She, I think, shows us the realization of ..."Si, Se Puede!"

Joan Baez, in her 60s, still performing. I think she is more beautiful in this age! :)

(picture is taken from here)

Donna Donna

Donna Donna - Sita (RSD)

On a waggon bound for market

there's a calf with a mournful eye

High above him there's a swallow,

winging swiftly through the sky

How the winds are laughing,

they laugh with all their might

Laugh and laugh the whole day through,

and half the summer`s night

Donna, Donna, Donna, Donna;

Donna, Donna, Donna, Don.

Donna, Donna, Donna, Donna;

Donna, Donna, Donna, Don.

"Stop complaining!“ said the farmer,

Who told you a calf to be?

Why don`t you have wings to fly with,

like the swallow so proud and free?“

Calves are easily bound and slaughtered,

never knowing the reason why

But whoever treasures freedom,

like the swallow has learned to fly...

*I found the origin of Donna Donna in http://www.mudcat.org/thread.cfm?threadid=23577&messages=45

Words by Aaron Zeitlin (1889-1973); music by Sholom Secunda (1894-1974). Published in sheet music by Metro Music Co., New York, 1943.Originally entitled "Dana, Dana, Dana,": the song was written for Zeitlin's play Esterke, produced by Maurice Schwartz in 1940-41, and printed in the program. It became one of the most widely sung Yiddish songs and was performed in Yiddish and English translation by Theodore Bikel, Joan Baez, and others translations have also appeared in German and Korean. In some collections, beginning with Ben Yomen's (1946), the words are erroneously attributed to Yitskhok Katzenelson, a Hebrew-Yiddish poet active in the Warsaw Ghetto underground. In a recent record produced in Germany, not only is the song attributed to Katzenelson, it is interpreted as having been written in the Ghetto to express Jews' longing for freedom.

Sources:

Wikipedia, Joan Baez Official Website, Sing365

Eid in Albany

2008-10-06T01:50:00.010-04:00

Guess where it is.
Middle East?
No.
Pakistan?
No.
Okay. A muslim country?
No.

It was in front of the Islamic Center of the Capital District (ICCD), Albany, New York State, on Wednesday, October 1, 2008.

We celebrated the Eid Al Fitr, the big day after 30 days of Ramadan fasting month. It felt really warm in my heart, after almost two months living here in Albany, feeling as a minority, to find that there is a melting pot for common believers from different parts of the world to gather and to pray together....

The best part of the Eid prayer was the sermon. I found that the concept of Islam taught in the ICCD is a very peaceful teachings, with flexibility, yet encouragement to do good things in the track of Islam. Above all of them, the best part for me was the quote from Al Baqarah verse no. 277:

"Truly, those who believe and do roghteous deeds, and perform Salah (our
prayers), and give Zakah (the charity), they will have their reward with the
Lord. On them shall be no fear, nor shall they grieve..."

As a J1 visa holder, I've been living in worries and sadness. On Eid evening I started to feel that I was so weary, and I have just realized that I haven't really had a single good rest since I arrived in the States. I arrived late for the orientation as it was difficult to get the flight ticket due to the high season, I was not prepared with pre-academic, nor gateway program to comprehend American education system, while at the same time I was homeless, so I had to search for apartment, furnitures, moving, at the same time when I already started my class and the assignments started to flood my desk.

I had also to encounter pretty tough adaptation process, as on the way I had to deal with some problems; mostly about services issues, with my apartment landlord, with my bank, with my TB skin test, also dealing with the new education system, new major of studies, with the homework, with the broken heart, with loneliness (as I used to have a lot of friends back there in Indonesia), with the grieve and regret of hear that a very good friend of mine was murdered a month ago.... I can't count again, how many times I cried in silence, as I don't have good friends yet here.

I felt liberated on Eid. I did see that I was not alone when I saw hundreds of my muslim brothers and sisters there. The Khatib's sermon opened up my heart, that I should not be worry or live in grieve... when I pray and when I do good things, because I have the Almighty protecting me...

Isn't it nice? :)

Happy Eid, My Beloved Brothers and Sisters!

Hope your fast to be accepted: Sure, I hope so!

After 30 days of fasting, it should be the best thing to get!

meeting the Indonesian families...

Corner of the ICCD

ICCD from outside

Loooonggg.. line of the cars at the parking lot,

so we had to walk pretty far to get Mike's car

It was a cloudy day....

The Tales of A Fading Star (01) - Political Rhapsody

2008-09-29T12:51:00.011-04:00

A Public Awareness Poster on Voter Registration in Indonesian Election 2004 http://desaingrafisindonesia.files.wordpress.com/2008/02/2004_p4b.jpg

In the beginning 2004, when I was a broadcaster in a national radio network in Central Java. I was sent to Jakarta, our capital city, to have a training on electoral coverage held by Internews Indonesia. Internews Indonesia is a network of Internews, an international media development organization based in California. I, and some other selected radio journalists from other provinces in Indonesia had a very good training about the electoral procedures, the codes of conduct to ensure the impartiality of the programs, and message to empower the voters, including fostering the voter education.

Starting from that point I saw the fascination of international organizations toward a historical moment of the democrary in Indonesia. Those organizations sponsored media programs, voter education activities, including the development of voter education modules and public information materials, producing public service announcement in national and local media, conducting trainings for electoral staff, and so on. Some of them also deployed their Election Observation Missions (EOM) to observe overall electoral process, including the campaign, voting, up to vote counts. It was like a huge political extravaganza: the political parties ran circus-like, non-rational-critical debates rallies, and thousands of electoral observers observed the euphoria of what was said as the first democratic election, ever in Indonesia.

In my sharper vision after my training with the Internews, I started to see that this election has also been a center of attention of many international organizations, including US-based organizations. They were very keen on the electoral observation and public awareness programs to raise political awareness in this "newly-democratic country". From that picture, I built the image, that America, is really a democratic country, that is so keen about ensuring the political education to be absorbed by all levels of community.

Now, let's move to today, October 2008, I'm in Albany...

This picture is taken from here

Some months before my departure to the States, CNN was my almost-daily dinner menu. Not only that I was fascinated by the campaign trail but also the ups and downs of the vote predictions. I was thinking, that the Americans were so fascinated, as much as I was, about this election. I imagined the stacks of posters and banners all the way, as crowded as it is in Indonesia at the campaign phase, but I was wrong.

It was pretty surprising for me to see NOTHING related to the national election on the way. No photos of the candidates, no posters, no banners, nothing. I walked through the bus stops, campus corridors, downtown area, wondering. Why? Is it because everybody knows Obama and McCain so well? But are the people sure that they are going to vote?

I have heard a little about the political apathy in the USA before I arrived, but I hear about that so loud as I am here. I am, actually surprised by the numbers shown - that the voters turnout in 2004's Election was 60.7%* - slightly lower that the percentage of turnout in Indonesian Election 2004, 67.57%**. Can it be true? USA, a country that teaches the world, including my country, about democracy, and the importance of voting, actually has smaller percentage of voter?

That 61% in 2004 was said to be the highest hit since 1963. Highest? Wow. How about before, in between 1963 - 2004? Less than 61%? In this said-to-be most democratic country on the planet? How come?

I believe that the turnout in Indonesian Election before 2004 reached higher than that 67.57%, yet I cannot use that number for an apple-to-apple comparison, as Indonesia, prior to 2004 was a country operating on the basis of pseudo-democracy, the condition that looked like we fulfilling all requirements to count as that kind of "democratic" country, where political participation is represented through voting ballots, while the freedom of voting itself was not guaranteed. It just doesn't work.

So, it was my first schock, political-wise.

I then learned that voter education is something rare in national media. I watched news channels, and I hardly see neutral electoral ads, or the ads that merely encourage people to register and cast their vote. Instead, compared to the dynamics in Indonesian election, the voter education activities in United States, in my eyes looks like underground phenomenons, the off-mainstream media programs, as the channels are more interested in the political waves itself then the encouragement to the people to be aware of their political rights.

At the other hand, as I joined Political Communication Theory classes, I learned more that, yes, the media in general sets the voter education programs aside. Instead, some critiques said that the media even cultivate the apathy within the voter, as they provide great exposure on negative news related to the political actors and political parties. The term of voting between "the lesser of two evils" is something that I heard quite often in the last two weeks, and indeed, whoever invented that term, it empirically reflects the condition of lack of trust within the voter community.

I am not (yet) a political expert, but I remember so much on my election observation days, how strict the observers were in zooming to the media bias, black campaigning and impartiality issues. We were good friends to Panwaslu, the election watch dog in Indonesian electoral structure, in grabbing sets of data of negative tones in campaigns that can withdraw voter favors toward a certain party or candidate. Black campaign was a serious issue. an additional note, I was not only working with the EU Observer, but at a point in the second election term, I was also with a US-based election observer, and I knew how keen they were about that issue.

But here, in USA, I cannot count how much I have seen those indecent campaign ads broadcasted in national media. In a common sense, if you are an undecided voter, you are not well informed, you would be confused to see both competing parties putting negative to each other. In common public information values, you should not confuse your audience if you would like to build their knowledge. Carpini (1996), in "What Americans Know About Politics and Why It Matters" said, "...political knowledge helps citizens make sense of the political world by providing them with a basis for evaluating new information in light of their own values..."

Hm, so, allow me to offer you an "if" condition:

If, the only available political knowledge accessible to public is the contradictory information infused by opposite parties, would it be sufficient for common people to make sense of political world?

Michael Moore was said to do a voter education effort. I was all excited as Jiji told me that Moore was going to launch a documentary titled Slacker Uprising. I should have not been too naive to think that he was merely going to launch a neutral voter education project, regarding on his previous project track records. I downloaded the Slacker Uprising as soon as I came back from my class on September 23rd. Yet, I am a little disappointed. I do appreciate his spirit to open up the Slackers' eyes to the sins of the incumbent's leadership. The way he creates the bond between people - who already have the seeds of some common values is an interesting object for a message design and social influence study.

Yet, I think he doesn't work so well in bridging two existing political stands, to remind everyone that it is not about A or B, but it is about the future of America. This failure is indicated by extreme refusal from the opposite party, the GOP. A voter education, if it really aims to raise people awareness in general, should be more neutral, and non-condemning than that. This is just a tiny example.

After all we all know, that we cannot assume that ALL Americans really know what to do with their political rights.

I feel that it is ironic: US government should help its own people first before helping people in other country in understanding democracy. I don't know whether there is a regulation prohibiting the government to intervene the public information streams in the media here, but I suppose, in the battle between political parties, that might impact to unfavorable condition to voters' political knowledge, there should be a neutral party in between to shy the voters away from the apathy.

Seeing the slacker uprising in 2004 and reading the predictions on 2008 turnout "tsunami", I am optimistic that there will be more Americans using their right to vote. However, in my naive Indonesian point of view, these fights between the blue and the red has been too nasty, that it left a very narrow opportunity for the common people, to comprehend their choices out of the negative feelings toward others.

I am sad for the Americans. Politics, and the image of sweet democracy his is the first fading star in my eyes....

Notes:

* Washington Post

** The Jakarta Post

Interesting Links to Visit:

CIRCLE (Center for Information Research on Civic Learning and Engagement), Rock the Vote, Slacker Uprising, Politico, USAID-Indonesia, Democracy and Governance Project, The Carter Center Report on Indonesian Election 2004, United States Elections Project, US Cencus Bureau.

The Tales of A Fading Star

2008-09-28T03:55:00.009-04:00

Half-hoisted flag in front of Albany Federal Building, September 11, 2008

When Nathan, my group facilitator in Fulbright Pre-Departure Orientation said, "...first of all, don't trust anything that you watched in American movies. Most of them are not true!",

I was only assuming that the untrue stories were merely the to sounds-to-be-irrational stuff in teenage movies, you know, those kind of bullying, the battle for popularity, good looking football player dating with pretty cheerleaders, and such. But I was wrong. Those magical stories are not just in those teenage movies, but I can say, in almost all movies... and in the news.

Before I arrived in America, in my mind I regarded this country as the epitome of gigantic power, well-managed social welfare, democracy, high political awareness, warm personality, fun life. And this, is where I began my over-expectation towards this country.

I will organize my "Tales of A Fading Star" into different sections that will tell the stories of political rhapsody, greatest culture shock and how awful a service can be, based on my personal experiences, my observations, my readings and my conversations with my friends. The Tales of A Fading Star will not reflect the overall picture of the United States of America. It is just a compilation of a personal observation, towards what I expected before and what I found later in this country. It's simply a story about America from the eyes of an Indonesian woman living in the Capital District of Albany, New York.

What Makes You A "You"?

2008-09-18T21:52:00.001-04:00

I am a woman. I am an Indonesian. I am a Javanese. I am single. I am a legal alien in United States. I am a graduate student. I am a blogger. I am a moslem.

How many times in a this day you were requested to identify yourself?
Who you are, and what are all those attributes?
Why would we need that?
What for?
Why we believe in so much to those attributes and always, automatically identify those attributes when we introduce ourself, when we fill in a form, when we start a conversation?
Is it that important to wear all those attributes?

What makes me a "woman"?
Is it merely because I was born with uterus, vagina, and a pair of breasts, feel the chemistry to a man, my opposite sex, or is it because I BELIEVE that I am a woman?

What makes me an Indonesian?
Is it only because I was born in a country, back there at a corner of South-East Asian Region named Indonesia, from an Indonesian mother who was married to an Indonesian man - so that automatically, due to the ius sanguinis rule - the law of the blood, I automatically bear that identity?

What makes me BELIEVE that I am Indonesian?
The culture that is embedded in my mind, that shape my values, did I ask for that?
May I have a deviation?

What makes me a Javanese?
Is it only because of my "kuning langsat" skin tone, the shape of my nose and my face, or is it because of the language that I speak, the place where I was born, or merely, again because of the law of the blood?

The language that was taught as my first language, why it feels so comfortable to use it?
May I use it everywhere I go, because I am a Javanese?

What makes me a single?
Is it just because I haven't spell that sacred oath, or is it because I have none who attach him (or her - who knows?)-self to make me a complete human being? What is the criteria of non-single? It that about "two becomes one" rule, or should it include the existence of love? How about attachment? How about soul-mating?
May I say that I am not a single when I am not yet gifted that knot?

I checked my university registration account this morning. I am embedded with one more attribute there: legal permanent ALIEN.
Will I be alienated with that status? Excluded, defranchised, exiled?

And tonight, in my mail box I received my Social Security Card. I will pay the tax for this country. With that I will be eligible to work and earn money, and access public health facilities.

Who am I? A Non-Alienated Alien with exceptions?

I am a graduate student. My identity is tangible through my student card and my proof of enrolment. Yet when you meet me without those papers, you can't tell, who I am in the education realm.

Ah, GRADUATE student. I feels funny to wear that attribute. I have graduated from my kindergaten, from my elementary school, my junior high, senior high school, my graphic design course, my diploma. And it's only now that I am eligible to mention that I am in "graduate" level?

Who am I? What would I do? What does 'graduate' mean?

I am a blogger.
This is much easier to comprehend. Blog - newly invented vocabulary that was not even in human imagination a hundred years ago, has became both noun and verb. I am a blogger (noun)because I blog (verb) a blog (noun).

Can we live without those identities, attribute, identification, and just be, say, "whatever"?
I feel like a puppet in the box. I can't roam much. I'm clustered, marginalized in a way.

I should bear an attribute to act, to behave, to be accepted. I should have those organs and that look to be a woman. I have to prove that I am Indonesian with some pieces of document called birth cerificate, passport, visa. I should have wedding certificate and a ring to be non-single. I have to prove that I am a legal alien. I must keep my DS-2019 and my I-94 form. I am identified through my ID cards, my immigration document, my blog, all those man-made symbols. Seriously, it doesn't feel so human now to realize it. (but what is "a human" anyway?)

I am a moslem.
I am stunned when I have to identify myself with this attribute. What do I possess to identify myself that I'm that one of the kind?

I believe in Allah and Prophet Muhammad, yet I am not in the stage of praying five times a day. I don't wear a hijab, that made me very often being questioned when I lived in that Shariah town, but my faith is there, at the embrace of my beloved God, in my prayer where I praise His name each and everday.

When it's between myself and the Almighty, would I need an ID card?

When faith is within the invisible state of being, should I wear a man-made symbols to be that "me"?

I don't like living in a box. I don't like to be clustered. I want to mingle, mingle with my faith, with my beliefs, that are not imposed in any way. Not by culture, nor by my parents, nor by the institution called the State.

But then I won't have that place. You all know that what makes the world "a world" is the territory. There is no terra nullius in this planet. There is no, "null" land, without the rules, without borders, without clusters, without blocks.

I want to forget attributes for a while, and imagine, who am I to be an "I am"?

Beauty = Confidently Imperfect

2008-09-17T15:52:00.002-04:00

I bought a new Glamour Mag two days ago,

and I found 2 nice beauty quotes:

"The best beauty product is confidence.

When a woman shows it, you think she's hot, even she's not a beauty queen."

(Leslie Blodgett*, Glamour Oct. 2008)

"My beauty ideal is that modern woman who is slightly not put together.

I think imperfections are beautiful."

(Aerin Lauder**, Glamour Oct. 2008)

So I guess the beauty potion that we carry should consist of "confidence of being imperfect" ingredients. What do you think? :)

Notes:

*Blodgett is the entrepreneur who develops BareMinerals cosmetics, the pioneer of mineral-makeup revolution.

**Lauder is the granddaughter of Estee Lauder. She is now the senior vice president and creative brand director of Estee Lauder.

This Is Where I Began

2008-09-17T15:52:00.001-04:00

by cotn.co.uk

Newy Tri Istanti, Jonatan Luis Huliselan.

Those are two full names that I could recall very clearly tonight. Today is the anniversary of the Indonesian Red Cross Society, and those names were the anchor to my memories about my old life, back when I was a teenage girl.

After 13 years, my memories on the names have been drifted away, but there is a favorite story that I always want to share about that day, September 17, 1995. It was the milestone of a life turn, after it felt dull and sad for so long, and after I lost my faith that life could look beautiful again after my father passed away four years before that day.

I was 16 year-old. I was skinny, with 158 cm at my height and only 39 kgs at my weight. I was invisible in any social life, I didn't have a boyfriend, I was not the first rank student in my class, I wasn't at all good at sport, and sounds that those were not enough, my first crush, whom I got crushed with since I was 13, has just made his relationship with a cute girl named Mariana, public. Yes, they were gorgeous, they were popular. My first crush was a local catwalk and photo model, while I was an ugly girl with unmanagable curly hair - that some people called me "lion" to refer to its bushy texture.

Some other girls called me "flat", referring to my 32A bust size and the non-existence of my bum. I had nothing cool to wear. I had only two pairs of cheap shoes, 1 new school uniforms - and the rest were the "heritage" from my elder sister. I worn the same bag day by day and my socks were already loose as they lost the elasticicy that I had to tie them with rubber band. The idea was, as long as what I worn were not torn or stained, I would keep on wearing it til the end. I had no accessories to decorate my look, so basically I looked boring. I was not invited to birthday parties except the ones related to my only 8 good friends, and even my voice was okay, I didn't dare to dream of proposing myself to sing in a band.

OK, now you can imagine how my life as a teenager looked like.

One reason to explain my miserable look was that I belong to that category of economically-disadvantaged group. With my mom as the only bread seeker while she was nothing in her office's echelon, I had to think twice before I decided to spoil my appetite in school cafetaria. One main reason why I studied in that Senior High School was that I didn't need to take public transport, thus it would save significantly.

Until that time, even there had been three big shopping centers in my hometown, I have never dared to go there. First, because I didn't have enough pocket money to ride the public transport, and second, because I felt inferior. I felt excluded from the ring of "magnet" that pulled people to come and to have good times there. The boys and girls in my school who liked to spend their after school hours were those from rich families, so I believed that those places were just NOT FOR ME. Since I was 10-year-old until that time, I have never been to any movie theatre, I didn't read teenage magazine, and I had no idea about who Anjasmara or Dian Nitami was, until Aden, my classmate fainted after reading a magazine covering the story that Anjas and Dian were couple. :)

*By the way, Anjas and Dian were top celebrity couple in my teenagehood era. They have been married for couple of years now - and so has Aden, who was head-over-heel falling in love to Anjas.:D *

I was so not into the mainstream of teenagerhood. I was off the road, out of the conversation, clueless, nerd. Yet, I had a beautiful sanctuary: The Indonesian Red Cross Branch. YES, I mean it. When other teenagers would play the games at the game centers or watch movies, I spent my time at the Red Cross Office!

What did I do there?

Hm, let me recall my memories again.

I liked to talk to the nice ladies in logistical section. I always felt amazed to see huge kitchen utensils and boxes of clothes or instant foods that were ready to be sent off whenever emergencies called.I remembered how many ambulances at the parking lot when they were not on the road. I liked to read books on humanitarian services. I liked to watch the photos of the activities. I liked to sit on the roof of ambulance garage, and when I was lucky, I could pick some good mangos right from the tree and ate them fresh. Sometimes I helped the logistical section to stamp thousands of Red Cross Charity Coupons, and I always, until today, feel that the noodle soup in that office is the best Indomie (it's a very famous noodle brand in Indonesia) soup I could have. Above all, my favorite thing was, spending hours and hours with Lucky, my Junior Red Cross Coach... talking about LIFE.

He was the very first person who said that I was beautiful when I had the opposite concept of self. He was the very first person who said that he saw the diamond in me, that was waiting to sparkle after an artisan made his best cut to reveal the shine. "You are a diamond, yet people, and you still see yourself as an ordinary stone covered with mud. But I do see that sparks in you that is waiting to reveal... and when that time comes, you might be surprised to see how far you can become." He always encouraged me, he always managed to do little things that made me feel happy. He taught me many things about life, communication theory, public speaking, that very often I felt too hard to comprehend, but he kept on saying that I was a great learner. He was the first person who BELIEVED IN ME.

Those days at the humble Red Cross office were the days that shaped who I am today.

People who met me within the last eight years generally thought that I was raised in rich family, with all the chances to learn anything I want, with great confidence that I brought since I was born. But NO, my teenage friends absolutely had different picture of me.

From those "universe-sity" where I learned about life and my self-esteem, my minutes in the Red Cross office started to bring changes in me. I learned to talk in public. I overcame my lack of confidence. I learned that when my hair is tidy I could actually look better. I learned many modules as time to time I would look at Jean-Henry Dunant's painting on the wall (and I remember that I always smiled to him!), thinking that one day I would be in great humanitarian mission, jump to the war, disaster after math, doing cool humanitarian works.

Lucky sent me, and my friends to various competitions. He worked so hard to coach us to raise the funding to make sure that we had enough logistical needs (and very often he would use his own money). Lucky was only 26, he wasn't rich as well, in fact he worked three different jobs while he tried to finish his Public Relations studies. He didn't only give me words, but also showed me how hard work looked like. At the same time we had so much good times, from night rides in the ambulance, mountain camps, rock climbing... those cool experiences colored up my days. He built strong sisterhood within our Red Cross group, that until today, my friends remain good friends I have ever had.

"Be prepared to laugh for your victory, but don't forget to bring a big handkerchief, in case you would cry." That was his advice before every competitions, and shortly, after only one "big handkerchief" time, I finally made my competition results to the "laugh". Gradually I won competitions at the local level, then at provincial level, until then, in September 1995, I was sent to join a national competition, representing Central Java, as the candidate of the Best Junior Red Cross Member.

It was a huge program. The Chairperson of the Indonesian Red Cross Society was Mbak Tutut, our president's daughter. I couldn't believe myself when I arrived at Cibubur Youth Camp. In Indonesia, that spot is the most prestigious spot for youth achievement. When you are there, it means that you have leaped to a NATIONAL STATUS, and you met the best youth from other provinces. It was the first time in my life that I lived a mini-Indonesia. We had 27 provinces at that time, including East Timor, that now become a different country.

One thing I learned so much during that week in Cibubur was about the reality of Indonesian's Unity in Diversity. I fell in love to the fact that my country really consists of different tribes and cultures. I'm overwhelmed to see the facts that we did speak in different languages, looked different, yet we are one nation.

There, in between the competition, we shared good times, different culture, and for the very first time I realized that I was not a nerd. I was cool, I was not alone, and I was special in the middle of those awesome youth. We shared the same dream of doing social works, being in the places in need, we were all good in doing the first aid, and the best thing was, we were friends!

There, the first time after my first crush to a boy, my heart beat again as I saw a handsome dark skinned boy playing his guitar and sang. He was humble, he was cool and quiet, but from his eyes I knew he was smart. His voice and his guitar play were awesome. He was that John Louis Huliselan, the contingent from Mollucas Islands.

I was still the same shy girl when it dealt with feeling. I got panic attack everytime I needed to communicate with the boys. So, my story about John ended with me taking so much photograph of him playing on the stage, with very minimum conversation that consisted of only "good morning", "hi" and "good night". Pathetic, eh? :) Well, that was me... :))

Finally, after a week of comprehensive competitions, we all went to the Indonesian Red Cross Headquarter in Jakarta. It was a bright morning, September 17, 1995, when I stood up in line with more than a hundred other Junior Red Cross members from all over Indonesia.

I couldn't believe my ear when I heard my name was called as the first runner up. I thought that I was already so much blessed to experience that National Competition, after my zero state of self-esteem, and wait... really? I won? After Newy, that very smart and nice girl? WOW.

I cried, my first happy cry after long painful years, and I did the sujjud syukur, the bow to kiss the ground, to express my gratitude to Allah.

I remember how I looked that day, with my cheap black sneaker shoes, a little loose uniform that my mom invented from my dad's old shirt (as we didn't have money to buy the new one) that flared with the wind as my skinny figure was too small to shape the curves, I walked to the podium. I felt that the whole world cheered on me. I couldn't believe it. I felt that I was flying as I received the trophy right from the hands of Mbak Tutut - the elite figure that I saw only in TV and magazines... then some state ministers shook my little hands to congratulate me...

I couldn't stop crying, and, with the trophy in my hand, I watched John playing Mollucas Traditional Folk Songs with his guitar there at the corner of the stage in that courtessy reception, to celebrate the golden anniversary of the Indonesian Red Cross Society. I saw Ibu Hatta, the wife of the belated Indonesian Independence Hero - who was also the Father of Indonesian Red Cross... It was amazing.

I felt like a butterfly, ending up my days of ugly caterpillar, flying out of
the darkness of my coccoon...

And, that was the day, when I built my belief on the entity of my nation, when I promised myself to do the best thing that I can, and to start believing again, that I should dare to dream on the beautiful possibilities...

Thank You, Red Cross, Jean-Henry Dunant, Bung Hatta, Mas Lucky, and all my friends!

Siamo Tutti Frately Inter Arma Caritas. Always. Happy 63th Anniversary, PMI! :*

Notes:

I went to International Exchange Program for Junior Red Cross and Red Cross Youth Volunteers in Japan the next year with Newy. It was my very first trip abroad, and my very first call to international events. It took me to different stages of motivation, that now I have experienced 5 International Exchange Programs, and today, I live a new experience in USA as a graduate student funded by Fulbright Scholarship. Life is GREAT.
I improved myself from a "hi", "good morning" and "goodnight" girl into a warmer personality. Don't ask me about how many bf I have listed ever since... hahaha...
I don't know where my bushy curls go. You can see my look today, and what I can say is, maybe those curls were part of my growing pain exercise?
Lucky got married in 1997, and I lost contact with him since 2006 as we kept on changing our mobile phone no. From recent Googling I found that he is now running for 2009 legislative election in Jogja, Indonesia, while at the same time he runs a business-consulting firm. He is still the same charitable man, as most of the news covered how he provided the aid for small business and to build village roads.
I lost contact with John after the riots in Mollucas took place in 1999. Wondering where he is now...
I spent pretty long time exchanging mails with Isye Latuihamallo, John's friend in Mollucas' contingent, but also lostt the contact after the riot. Ah...
I was in grieve when I heard about more and more civil war took place in East Timor. I lost contact with my friends there, and I just could pray that they would be fine during the referendum, during the exodus period, and after the independence of East Timor...
This program that I joined in 1995 built my strong entity as an Indonesian, who is dreaming of my country as a better place for everyone, where we can stay together again as a whole undivided nation of brotherhood.

When A Newbie Reads Habermas...

2008-09-14T17:31:00.000-04:00

Even I've been working on communication "business" that dealt with quite an amount of political issues, I'm a total newbie in Academic Political Communication field. The previous two weeks was such a torture for me, as in the midst of my bump and bruising of adaptation, I had to understand a very special book written by Jurgen Habermas titled "The Structural Transformation of the Public Sphere". The hardest part was that we were requested to write a summary and brief analysis of the theories in that book.

Was it that hard? Hm, when you read more about it, you'll know...

That afternoon, at Barnes and Nobles bookstore in my campus, when I first held that book in my hand, I couldn't help but thinking, "Gee, this book cover is so ugly!" Seriously, it looks so far from attractive, with plain grey textured paper cover and title printed in white (I think) Book Antiqua font, it looks like a warranty for me to get bored of it or to fall asleep. Anyway, as my professor kept on mentioning that Habermas works are great, and it's a must for anyone learning political communication to read it, I built my expectation that it should be something really, really good.

This is how the book looks.

Now you know what I mean by "far from attactive"?

(photo taken from here)

So, I started to read it. This book, which originally titled Strukturwandel der Offenlichkeit (yes friends, originally it was written in German), is said to be one of Habermas' most influential and widely translated works. The introduction part mentioned that this book is a historical-sociological account of the emergence, transformation and disintegration of the bourgeois public sphere. With his ability to combine observations on sociology and economics, law and political science, and social and cultural history, Habermas grasps preconditions, structures, functions and inner tensions of the modern society's central domain. Hm, how does it sound? :D

Anyway, the strongest thing I felt about this book is that it really ruined my confidence, that I really master English as my third language. My high TOEFL score felt nonsense as I couldn't help but having my laptop on in front of me, with MS-Words opening up as time to time I would need to hit Shift+F7 function... to read the thesaurus. I did severely felt that I was undergoing another GRE exam, live, with the difficult vocabularies and sentence structures, that I needed to read them over and over, and over again until Icaught the meaning of it. Even if I may say, only slightly. *sigh*

The enlighting moment came three days before our deadline. A mail from my classmate in the class mailing list broke the silence of worries. She is a native American, who was born, grew up and has been living American Education, and she said that this is the most difficult book she had ever read!

Oh. I felt much better even it didn't reduce my worries of the paper that I had to submit. I decided to write about the role of publicity in public sphere, and this is what I got from my understanding in reading Habermas:

The subject of publicity is the public as the carrier of public opinion. As publicity contains the elements of public recognition, thus publicity is the efforts done deliberate public opinion into public recognition through the representation in a public sphere. Public sphere is seen as a specific domain in comparison to private sphere, while the sphere first emerged and took on its function at a certain period. As the consequence, the specific representation and manifestation of the publicity itself has been changing from time to time, following the dynamics of social structure including the power structure within the public sphere.

Originally, in its Greek origin public sphere was constituted in discussion which includes the forms of consultation and of sitting in the court of law, as well as in common action such as speeches. The history noted that the role ranges from status attribute, prince court, representative publicity, until in modern era it evolves into public authority, where publicity has political function to make public works asthe control of critical public.

In the era after the growth of liberalism, the original relationship of public and private sphere is dissolved and the form of bourgeois public sphere is modified. As there are more spheres in the society, gradually publicity lost this political function. As publicity contains the element of public recognition, it involves public representation. I see that publicity in public sphere always involves public opinion on certain issues, especially the ones related to social order.

As time to time public sphere is determined with different concepts of power-relation, the publicity grows in line with the acceptable social pattern at a certain period. The publicity is reflected by the needs of the society and by their way in envisioning the power.

Some examples mentioned by Habermas showed that there have been significant evolution of publicity concepts and activities as the social structure and power relation in the society took place. An example was when public was accepting the absolute power (i.e. in Feudal Period) publicity becomes the medium to justify the symbol of power of the ‘noble’ group such as the insignia and the rhetoric.

As the person involved in publicity also holds more than one function, as an person (that represent private sphere), and an additional function such as a property owner like in bourgeois public sphere, or as citizen like in Rosseau theory, we can see that in this stage publicity becomes the representation of private in public sphere. In this case public sphere is also recognized as an element in political realm and publicity helps to deliberate the information within public.

The interesting part of publicity is that the different realms perceive publicity with different meaning. An example is as in the realm of the mass media, where publicity has become the attribute of whatever can attract public opinion instead of a function of public opinion. To become more acceptable, publicity is represented through various media that are accessed and approved by different social classes and became part of their lifestyle. It involves culture, art, journalism, letters, and so forth, where at some points, subjectivity, which is known as the core of the private sphere would be reflected to public and might affect other individuals’ opinion. It might help public to be informed and become more aware of the issues in their society, including the political issues, yet it can invite opposition as well.

All of the above-mentioned tendencies showed that private realms, as well as more specified groups, hold strong identity. Regarding that in civil society those individuals and those small groups hold strong identity and represent their own ideas or opinion, public sphere likely holds the representative publicity.

I was happy that I could identify the ideas. In a way, after reading most of the chapters, I agreed that Habermas had set the ground for further discussions on Political Communications, as he had wrapped up the elements of it. However, as most of my friends feels, I also felt that he is pretty pesimistic about the power of the public sphere. Later also, non-related to the content, we agreed on the suspicion that it was the translator of the book that might made it sounds more complicated to read.

Whatever it is, reading books loaded with strong theories made me feel that I want to write books too someday. For that day on, I promised myself that I would write it in the easiest way to understand manner so I woudn't harm any English as the foreign language speaker, plus any newbies; like ME, today. :)

Habermas, how can I become as smart as you?

(photo taken from Wikipedia)

Corner of the Earth

2008-09-14T02:33:00.000-04:00

When you arrive to my blog, you will automatically hear my favorite song, Corner of the Earth, by Jamiroquai. Now, while you are listening, you might wonder why I like it. One big reason is that I always feel that this song is the reminder for me to always feel blessed for every little thing that I am gifted.

Here is a copy of the lyrics, and I highlight the part that I think is the most beautiful. See whether you'll like it too...

Little darlin' don't you see the sun is shining
Just for you, only today
If you hurry you can get a ray on you,
come with me, just to play

Like every humming bird and bumblebee
Every sunflower, cloud and every tree
I feel so much a part of this

Nature's got me high and it's beautiful
I'm with this deep eternal universe
From death until rebirth

This corner of the earth is like me in many ways
I can sit for hours here and watch the emerald feathers play

On the face of it I'm blessed
When the sunlight comes for free

I know this corner of the earth it smiles at me

So inspired of that there's nothing left to do or say
Think I'll dream, 'til the stars shine
The wind it whispers and the clouds don't seem to care
And I know inside, that it's all mine

It's the chorus of the breakin' dawn
The mist that comes before the sun is born
To a hazy afternoon in May

Nature's got me high and it's so beautiful
I'm with this deep eternal universe from death until rebirth

You know that this corner of the earth is like me in many ways
I can sit for hours here and watch the emerald feathers play
On the face of it I'm blessed
When the sunlight comes for free
I know this corner of the earth it smiles at me

I know this corner of the earth it smiles at me
Lalalala... lalalala... lalalala.... :)

This corner of the earth, is like me in many ways
I can sit for hours here and watch the emerald feathers play
On the face of it I'm blessed
When the sunlight comes for free
I know this corner of the earth it smiles at me

The Beginning...

2008-09-13T03:35:00.000-04:00

It has been a long time that I think of creating a new blog to replace my three year-old Daysofagirl blog. There is nothing wrong with Daysofagirl, only I feel that now I have reached a certain stage of maturity and self esteem, that I need a different space to speak up and share. With new features from Blogger, now I can also organize my articles better. So I hope, A for Asri will be more enjoyable to read. :)