journalism with context

From monday this week up until very very late last night i worked as an interpreter on this Training of Trainers for the CoPeJoN - Conflict and Peace Journalists Network. This is the 3rd of their series of Peace and Conflict Journalists training, intended to shape some trainers out of some journalists in Indonesia so that the people from Phillipines didnt have to come down to Indonesia everytime they wanna hava a training.

As a person whos life long dream is to be a journalist specializing in conflict zones, this is a step towards my dream, and i get paid to ^^;


A lot of the materials is highly interesting. I learnt that journalism is as exciting as i thought it would be, yet i find that its un-nerving and complicates beyond my expectations. The participants of this trianing are pretty much hotshot journalists of Indonesia; editor of Jakarta Post, a senior aceh journalist who was once take hostage by GAM in Aceh, a journalist who is a multiple award-winner including nominated a few times for the Pulitzer, and a few other TV journalists. I mean, wow! One day I'd like to be the guy sitting in that trainee's seat, putting on the table my experience and my fat tele-lens SLR camera and discuss about the profounding complications of conflict journalism.. Phew! :)


I learnt that there was a deep ordeal in the face of journalism in conflict. There was this trand they call "traditional journalism" which led to journalistic pieces being non-partial and non neutral, only covering one single aspect of an incident, and problem is most of the angles taken are only exploiting the gore, blood, and violence happening. This is problematic as apparently conflict has many sides to its coin; background, stakeholders, context, etc. Unless all these aspects are explored what you have is a media propaganda.

I sat down had a chat with Carlone, a senior Phillipino journalist who once covered the Mindanao conflict, he said that "journalism is not about showing people blood, its not to judge a conflict, its also never meant to advocate peace. what journalism should be is to cover as many angles as possible from an incident, report it fairly, and provide people the choices so that they can judge a certain problem, and thats how we propagate pressure to the government. we can never cut the people in this process, thats the problem with traditional journalism"..


This is wonderful! I never thought of this before. Its so true, yet so profounding that I never really sat down and thought about it. Have a look at for instance a cover on the news about government evicting people, what you see is the riots, the violence. You never really see in-depth analisys of what happened, why did it have to lead to a physical clash, etc. This is what Conflict Sensitive Journalism is about..

I learnt that conflict is complex, violence is complex. In journalism there's also a triangle, which on the top it has democracy, and on the sides human rights and peace.. these aspects incorporated in a piece of journalism produces quality reporting and voicing the voiceless.. what this creates is a choice for people, the choice to do whatnot.. and to pressure world governments to either change or stick with status quo..


I also learnt throughout the training that there's such a thing called the "2 part geometry" where the tendency of labelling within an article could escalate conflict. There's an analysed piece of journalism from a reporter in Ambon that not only reflects partiality and picking sides, but it squeezes in like 3 different news in one article! Fiasco, eh? The framing of the news is designed so that readers identifies there's a conflict among religions although thats not necessarily the case.. very problematic, aiy?

So i guess there's much to learn for conflict journalism in me side.. How about you guys? You think that the profounding ordeals of conflict journalism is problematic? Or is blood and violence your thang?

FB = FaceBook, or FB = ForBidden?

I'm pretty sure that if you can read my blog, that means you're accessible to the virtual world. Most of you also have facebook accounts, i'm most certain. For those roaming on the internet and have yet to find out what in the world facebook is, you probably live in grenland, the artics, or China :D click here to find out..

Now for those of you in the majority, especially as i'm reaching out to those living in Indonesia, how do you take the news that some entities in this country are trying to ban facebook and its usage? To those living outside Indonesia, you now know how compromisable the idea of internet freedom is here.. But let me get one thing straight first, I wont be scrutinizing the government just yet, as this is only so far in the form of "statements" made by some institutions.

Today is my resting day after 2 straight days of sleep deprivation. So after cooking lunch with me house mates, i sat in front of our little and cuddly TV to see the noon news, and lo! I saw headlines saying that there were outcries to make FaceBook "forbidden/anthema" (the Indonesian word would be "diharamkan") I was eager to find out why, sure you are to, read on..

Apparently some institutions i Indonesia have been monitoring this lovable social networking site of ours, and they saw that the basic functions of FaceBook was fine, for social interaction, but they also identified that it has its misuses; trade cons, cheatings, soul-mate searching, date searching, and tainting people's reputation. These institutions even claim that FaceBook allows people to cross the religious steps in leading to marriage; as they do it over the net instead of having all these ritual formalities.

Okay, in this light i'm quite indifferent. I guess i'm a guy that both respects values of religion, cultural practices and such. But I'm also a believer that other people's bussiness is, well, other's bussiness.. When i heard about the guy in Japan who made an online petition to marry an anime character because he didnt feel like human interaction was for him, i didnt really support his intentions, but i never condemned him for trying either.

I'm not saying and telling you guys which is right and wrong, I think there's always, at minimum, two sides of a coin, so you may feel differently from me. Thats fine. Questions of practicality however will arise in the future when it comes to FaceBook banning, which i won't bore you with as i'm sure you get the idea. Law has had quite a hard time enforcing legalities of law precedures thru the net, because its well, virtual. The whole dimension of subject, object, nature of crime becomes so vague and jumbled, while most of our municipal law was designed to regulate tangible occassions. This happens almost everywhere. Remember how China had trouble with Wikileaks.org? Proves that there's so much a state can do.

But that's practicalities. What about the foundamental analysis? Look I may be indifferent, but my opinion is of a fragile alliance, I won't be indifferent no more if they decided later on to ban universal use of FaceBook, i mean all i'm doing with my account is to connect with friends, how wrong can that be, in like ANY religion?

Have you Indonesians heard of this news as of late? What about you living outside the country, what are your opinions on this? Is it ethical? It's a free blog to discuss, I wont impart any indoctrinations, dont worry =)

three cheers for sweet love

For this whole day I've been juggling a many things, i was writing up 3 papers and 1 translation job, and that's enough multi-tasking to make you puke, i would think..

So now that i look at the time, it's 1 in the morning, surely time to stop, for health's sake.. Earlier today just to ensure myself that i wasn't intoxicating myself by working too much, i took a rest, after all my rule of thumb in working is that hard work never killed anyone, but why take a chance? :D

"i'd probably be the first one killed by my own friends if i were to ever ask them to kill people for me for a girl"

While resting, i sat myself in front of the TV. But let me tell you about this TV we have in the house; it's situated in the center hall of me and me mates' frat house, but it's like friggin' 14 inches of screen, so it's a berryberry small TV, and its funny when we all gather to watch a movie together, as we would be like kids in a rural 1960s Indonesia where only one guy had a TV per village and everyone would cramp a rooms to see black and white on small inch TVs and feel really technologically advanced after that. Plus our TV had shitty broadcast receiving as we have shitty antennas (and yes we have two antennas lodged to one TV --"), which now we rely a lot on the internal antenna because the outdoor one wasn't working as properly, and this is sad because me mate Sani climbed the roof like he was MvGyver, installed the antenna but couldnt climb back down like those cats on TV who finally had to be rescued by the firemen ^^

"hard work never killed anyone, but why take a chance?"

Now the movie feature of tonight were "Helen of Troy" (the one with Pitt and Bloom in it, I'm unsure if i got the titles right), an old movie but has good market longetivity (my way of justifying that we're not stuck watching a yesteryear movie :D). But this got me thinking of the thing we all call but never quite understand; "Love". The legend of Troy was that Greece waged a war on Troy simply because Paris of Troy "stole" the wife of Greece's crown prince (I think it goes something like that), which enraged Greece to wage a 10 year Trojan War, involving hundreds and thousands of men, tens of thousands of fleet armada, all because of one single woman, and the fight for love (cuit cuit i feel sick haha). I'm a guy currently very much in love, and i understand that sometimes we do what we gotta do, right? But wow, what happened on that war was sheer lunacy..

"this got me thinking of the thing we all call but never quite understand; "Love""

I then remembered watching an episode of FRIENDS where Ross wanted to make his marriage with Emily work, and that meant ahving to move appartments and no talk to Rachel (okay first of all i think its stupid that the guy mentioned the wrong name at the marriage ceremony). But when his pals thought he was giving up too much, he said; "Sometimes in marriage we have to do stuff, it may be something thats irrational, and sometimes we may not even like doing what we do, but that's sometimes the price we pay"... I agree completely. I'm not boasting, but I've done a lot of things for the woman i love right now (Yotsuba, you know who you are :D) that many friends thought was either stupid, illogical, irrational, acting the goat, and sheer dumb lunacy. But hey, at least i didnt wage a 10 year war right? (besides I'm neither a king nor a prince, so i'd probably be the first one killed by my own friends if i were to ever ask them to kill people for me for a girl ^^;)

"I'm a guy currently very much in love, and i understand that sometimes we do what we gotta do, right?"

I guess everyday we learn new things, eh? Especially about this curious thing called love. I think its continuous learning, this is. Sorry that i write this like a diary, i promise this is the only one, but i still think its worth writing because i believe you readers can all to a certain degree relate to what i say.. Am i right? Cheers for love, eh? :)

berryberry crazy laah

Why do people like blackberries? Is it because the name reminds them of strawberries, or blueberries, or even raspberries? It's an amazing fact that a new product entry like this can grab so many market in so little time, i mean its only marketed in Indonesia for a couple of moons now..

I've been paying attention ya, to the blackberry craze, and the thing costs like IDR 8.500.000 for the average type, that's like USD 750.. Of course you can get the black market ones for 70% of the price, but i wont go condoning that in here :p I've always been amazed at the market absorption rate of Indonesians, people always complain that they live in hardship over here but once we're talking about consumer electronic goods, i think we're quite comparable to other consumers in other countries (Indonesia is Asia's leading market in electronics, it is also Toyota's biggest market in Asia)

So why oh why do people acquire these goodies? I've been asking around, as i know in countries with 3G, 3.5G, 4G, or even G-String communications technology ^^ they have a specialized network for handheld like these.. In the US i think Palm is a bit more famous in terms of jargons (are palms = blackberry?).. Indonesia is pretty slow i think in adopting these specialized connections, so even if you have a blackberry with tremendous technology like EDGE, 3.5G, and ooooo it has like a screen, a keyboard, and a camera! :D you can't even optimize it, right? Some say that "well its to anticipate someday when we do have the proper connections" well i think only God knows when, and what if by the time Indonesia adopts the technology there's already a newer line of blackberries, ones who can walk and speak by itself? ^^

Is it because of fashionable utility? Is it simply because it looks cool? Maybe so. Is it true that when 2 people are standing side by side both are typing text messages but one holds a blackberry and the other like one of those liberacci style phones you see in scarface where you have to use both hands and your bulging biceps to even holh, would the one with the blackberry look cooler? I suppose so. Not necessarily true in my eyes, but i know some who would say "L'Accord"

And its not as if they have these massive campaigns on the mass media, you still see more bullcrap competition among phone connection companies waging war against one another in seeing who has less 0 digits in their phone rates..

So what is it, eh?
- Technology? Sure but not applicable optimally anyhoo
- Price? You can feed 10 mid economy families for a month with the price of a unit
- Fashion? Sure it looks cool, it's the wave of 2009. But is that it?

Maybe it'd be good if someone wrote a paper on it, it could really be a good basis of a thesis. I dont think i would suit to make one, it has nothing to do with law @.@

But what do you think? Do you own a blackberry? How would you see it from a utilitarian point of view?

Indonesia's paranoia..

I have to admit that i don't read news much, when i pick up the daily paper on the front porch of the house (i wonder if they throw these papers from the street just like they do in the movies?^^) i usually read the title of the headlines just so that i don't blank stare trying to wake up while sipping my coffee (i love sugarless sumatran black coffee).. That's the thing about me and information, i often only read the information that attracts me, unfortunately most of my attraction is to the graphic advertisements in the edges of the paper (bakaa!)

So the other day when i was dilligently^^ doing my paper assignment for my Humanitarian Law class, i stumbled a very interesting history of Indonesia, its law system, and its paranoia. This is a side of Indonesia I've never heard of. I think it's fine for me to expose this here as the sources where i got this from is over the public internet (External party reports on humanity in Indonesia) so this is not hush hush confidential double-owh-seven stuff n_n

1. I found out this ridiculous fact that although Indonesia has signed the Geneva Conventions, especially the Additional Protocol 3 (Humanitrian protectionism in non-international armed conflicts) it has yet to develop and incorporate a proper set of humanitarian law as intstruments to prosecute humanitarian breaches. Also, in like 1989 Indonesia also signed the UN Convention against torture, yet the only law close to torture that exists is laws against "mistreatment".Unreal!

2. One of the pivoting cases i studied was the happenings of the Aceh incidents, where separatists GAM (Freedom Aceh Movement) wishes to disintegrate from the Republic. These people are what is called insurgents (a group of non state armed forces who has proper line of commando and exercise territorial authority over a certain territory). This usually falls under the Geneva Convention i said above, so both armed individuals and civillians are subjects of the protectionism doctrines that exist. From 1970s to 2005 (signing of the Helsinski Peace Agreement) some 20,000 individuals became casualty to the "atrocities" that happened, where cases of abuse, ill-treatment, rape, casually happened on an every day basis. Happenings exactly like what the US government does also happens here; the apprehension of those suspected to be linked with the rebel groups are taken hostage and thus interogated, sometimes even forced to make false testimonials. Most of the PoW (Prisoners of War) in Aceh were not subjected to fair trial, and there was even a time of paranoia where the National Armed Forces justified their actions to people there by claiming that whoever they impose aggression to is affiliated to the rebel groups. There was this attack on an elementary school that took 59 casualties, which was then tried on the basis of military negligence instead of human right violation; there was even an incident where a witness fleed after allegedly received threats from unknown parties. Insane!

3. From one of the journals i read, there was a tendency in Indonesia's law that occassionaly does not prosecute government official related cases, as there's a paradigm that in the end the state would be disadvantaged, as these cases apparently quite often happens thus it would ruin the credibility of governmenance in Indonesia. I wonder how this is different from the old dictatorship regime led by former President Soeharto that oppressed society and filtered information? And this was a time when there was massacre in Jakarta's northern port and no one else across Indonesia ever knew this happened at the time. And i thought we were in a transitional phase? Agression in Aceh still happens even post peace treaty in 2005, 7 years after the democratic process is claimed to have start!

Women armed division of the GAM forces; Inong Balee

All these years i've judged superpower countries as having silly paranoias, and produce puppet policies. It shocked me to find out my own country was doing this, and i bet some of you knew about this already. What about the others? I still know in some remote areas they even still glorified the old regime. I wonder if they knew at the time people across their province was slaughtered simply because they wanted everyone elese in the country know about the Givernment's rotten closet?

I think we've lots of homework. The scary thing is that this act is systematic, thats why systematic and structural prevention is an absolute necessity. Let's not let history repeat itself..

footnote:
last time i wrote a law article, someone said i didnt have legal sources to back me up, so here it is;
- US State Department, Country Report on Human Rights Practices : Indonesia (2002-2005)
- Official Documents of the Geneva Convention Additional Protocol III 1977
- Amnesty International, Annual Report on Indonesia (2005)
- Journal by Suzannah Linton, Accounting Atrocities in Indonesia (2006)

the truth really is out there

after the International Law class today, which was the only class for today, i had nothing better to do.. I actually have quite a funny article coming up, yet it's still in the cooks, so i'll throw you some fascinating info that you might or might not have known..

I was browsing the internet just for some references of my next article, but instead stumbled upon what i think is quite interesting. Apparently the smart people of astronomy found in this galaxy called Alpha Centauri (uuuuuu my mind remembers directly to a Command and Conquer game xixixi) there are two planets orbiting a star they named Gliese 581 that might just be the "twin siblings" of our beloved earth.. Read on a quote from Wikipedia i found;

"Gliese 581 d (pronounced /ˈɡliːzə/) or Gl 581 d is an extrasolar planet approximately 20 light-years away in the constellation of Libra. Because of its mass, nearly 8 times that of Earth, the planet is classified as a super-Earth. In late April 2009 new observations by the original discovery team concluded that the planet is within the habitable zone where liquid water, and therefore, life, could exist.

The planet was discovered by the team of Stéphane Udry of the Geneva Observatory in Switzerland using the HARPS instrument on the European Southern Observatory 3.6 meter telescope in La Silla, Chile on 24 April 2007. Udry's team employed the radial velocity technique, in which the size and mass of a planet are determined based on the small perturbations it induces in its parent star’s orbit via gravity.^[2]

The team is confident that the planet exists but recognizes that unlikely events could mimic its existence. They believe the issue will be settled by upcoming studies.

Dynamical simulations of the Gliese 581 system assuming that the orbits of the three planets are coplanar show that the system becomes unstable if its component masses are so high as to correspond to an overall inclination angle of 10° or less.^[3] For Gliese 581 d, the upper bound of its mass must be half that of 581 b; that is, 581 d's maximum is 44 Earth masses.^[4] At this mass it must be held together with a central heavy-element core like Saturn and maybe even HD 149026 b."

Now, after reading that, its apparent that there might just be the possibility of inhabitance in this planet. As a movie geek, my mind is jumping from one space movie to another (star wars, star trek, wall-e ^^).. Now I really think that maybe not now, not in my lifetime at least, it's still impossible, but imagine like 100 years, or 1000 years haha from now, people of earth might just immigrate between solar systems and planets, either for tourism, or in the case of wall-e because earth becomes so inhabitable that humans have to move to another planet and ruin the goddamn thing over again ")

But what if that's only the best case scenario? What i think is that if that planet sustains the possibility of living entities to survive, wouldn't there be possibly already existing creatures there? Its only good stuff if we're talking about insects and stuff, what if its like really advanced civilization, creatures with human-like brain but with heads like a cat but teeth like a shark and body like a hamster and can fly as fast as the speed of sound? (hahahahaha) i wonder if they would accept us gladly? I wonder if WE ourselves would be willing to share? If no, wow it'd really be War of the Worlds.. I'm already imagining a galactic republic like the one in Star Wars for soft diplomacy ^^

Maybe for now this is only a fragment of my imagination, but what if someday its true? This takes the notion "survival of the fittest" to a whole different ball game doesnt it? What do you think?

"want a hair cut, sir?".. "no.. i want them all cut!"

So after waking up pretty late today (me and a few of me mates saw the Chelsea - Barcelona Champions league semis) i had a major headache due to sleep deprivation, went to sleep at 5 after writing the Uno! article, which you can see is a total mess, 50% of what i wrote is completely unintentional and in an unconscious state hahaha

My paper's handed in to my Humanitarian Law lecturer, so that assignment's in the bag, all i gotta do is enjoy the rest of the week off kawaaiiii!!

This euphoria foolishly only lasted a couple of hours when my internet acted the goat again and there was ANOTHER electrical surge!! Seriously it annoys me that i'm actualy starting to get used to it --" it was a nice cool breezy day actually, light rain drops colour the skies today so its fairly nice weather, but again we were bored..

Then i realized something very very impotant yet stupid.. I have no clean undies left! Pretty sure it was only 4 days ago that i went to pick up some clean laundry.. I am pretty sure i have quite an amount of undies yet they are missing! Suspect number one is Adi, i have ocassionaly and randomly found my undies in his room, it freaks me out imagining what its doing there (bakaaaa!!) But after a thorough inspection in his room, it was to no avail, so i suspected the laundry (Sani and Nanda lost a few shirts there, i'm lucky actually to run off only with undies missing)

I'm not a guy who prefers "going commando" (iuwh,,) so i had to get my hands on some fresh undies, so i decided to get some. Finally Adi and Nanda came for the ride. Then that's when it happened, Adi came up with the idea of getting a haircut.. At this point i went to the mirror and lo! i sure am starting to look like a gorilla with all scruffy dense hair, so i l'accord-ed Adi's idea. Nanda also had an unimportant agenda; to cut off his sideburns (nice idea, hot shot --")

I've always been a little spooked out of going or doing things that is a little "metrosexual", i've always found myself feeling that tingle of ickiness relating with those stuff. Going to this hari salon was one of it, i usually go to the simple barbershops down the road, but i've gone once here before, so a second time shouldnt hurt. So we went off to this salon named "Jhonny Andrean"

I forced Adi to go in first, as he looked more suited than either me and Nanda in getting to places like these. I got the second turn after Adi. Okay i should tell you the last time i was here i got a straight hair cut, this time Adi booked me on to have shampooing stuff o.O so there i went looking like the lost idiot that i am, until i find people are waiting to service us in this funny looking chairs that has like those sinks for washing dirty dishes in the part where you put your hair. I suddenly feel like i'm in the "Zohan" movie --"

I changed my mind when i started cursing about the shampooey sessions, it was pretty nice actually, washed my hair with soft shampoo, then relaxed with an extensive massaging session and it's very very reliefing (Adi and Nanda later on curses me for getting longer sessions than they did,, for the same price!!^^). Later on i sat on the chair which the guy started to "do" my hair (rrawwwwr hoekk hoekk haha)

The cut is pretty nice, the whole time i sat i was eavesdropping on this lady sitting beside me who was arguing with her stylist whether it was possible for curly-haired ladies to have a pony bang made,, i wanted to reach out and say "it doesn't matter, you're a little too old for ponies anyways, you're better off with the natural grey hair" but i felt it would be impolite and create unnecessary trouble in the salon, i'm already embarassed as it is actually going here without me picking a fight, so i went back to solitude and silently making comments and giggled on this small old man across me who had his grey hair coloured to shiny black and spiffy brown o.O

The whole process takes about 30ish minutes i suppose, iwas very keen on getting out off my chair as the stylist took off that robe looking thing they put on you. They say its to keep hair sheds out of your clothes but i think it makes me look like a baked potatoe haha..

I gotta say, it costed me IDR 38.000 which is roughly USD 3.20, pretty costly for a hair cut in Indonesia, but i think overall the experienc is well done.. I still feel icky but happy with the hair cut altogether..

What do you think of men going to hair salons?

Uno!

You remember those days way back when board games were still alive and kickin? I suppose they still are right now, but pretty much things have moved on to more digital pastures. More kids get more and more interested in High Definition gaming these days. When i was in Australia we would play a LOT of board games, from Monopoly, Guess Who, Cluedo, Operation!, etc. It was heaps of fun, opens a lotta room for personal bond and interaction with your friends and family. A lot of these board games have gone digital too, which makes people less likely to enjoy board games as much as they did in the past.

I'm not very good at card games; in fact i only play "Hearts" and "Solitaire" simply because that's one the basic games you get with your XP hahaha.. I've always restrained myself from attempting to understand card gameslike Poker, Blackjack, and the sort. I just don't follow the train of though on card games --"

A few months ago i was introduced by Adi to this game; it's called Uno! (Yes, there'll be a point where you actually shout).. This is interesting game because it has all the nice colours and political exercise in it, i swear t God it does! :)

It's basically a who-can-finish-his-cards-first type of card game, where instead of the usual pictures of royal families in thelaying cards, you get numbers and symbols. Your aim is to take out any of the both; same number, same colour, or both. There's many "obstacles" of playing Uno! such as ; here are symbolic cards that absolutely can be used and misused to violate your peer players hahah..Such symbols like the one with all the plusses means the next perrson next to you gotta take a few cards according to the number you reslease, but then there's other obstacles; stop sign, wildcard, etc.

This game is so much one there was one night in my house there were like 4 buds of mine who played this game from 11 at night till 6 in the morning. Its highly addivtive. Precautions!

I think i might to get one of those decks just to add in on the fun. I suppose any number of people is free to follow the game, but things hit off really interesting in that part.

I'm a bit tired and sleepy, as i haven't got this article all edited and done, sleep deprivation is truly a mad mad crazy man.

What board or card games did you play in the past or currently, cards - decks?

Addicted to electricity..

If you ever see my facebook page, you'll see a on the left column a couple of lines below my main feature picture a little description of myself and i wrote down that i'm addicted mainly to 2 things; internet and electricity.

This time I'm going to tell you about the last few days where my house went back prehistoric and experienced frequent electrical surges --"

These last couple of days have been quite busy for me, beside college, i'm doing some sort of movie-a-thon and i've been seeing a LOT of motion pictures i now feel a little dizzy (very productive i know hahaha).. I was also busy writing this paper for my Humanitarian Law class about War Crimes in Indonesia, which is apprently very exciting stuff, I'll tell you all about it soon on my next posting, its quite complicated laah ^^

But my headaches as of late was these darn surges, the last 3 days there was always a time when the electricity would die down a couple of hours (bakaaa!!) which disturbs both my paper assignment and my movie-a-thon haha and it would've been fine if it only lasted like 10 minutes but noooooooo these are like 2-3 hour surges T.T

I sometimes wonder, I live in pretty much one of the major cities in Indonesia, and for the 4 years I've been here, this year's electrical surges is quite a lot. I wonder what happened ya? Reduced capacity of plants? Rising production costs? Earth Hour? haha and its not like we have an interactive service with the State ELectrical Company here, it takes ages to get info from them, that just sucks..

Today when things died down we were stuck with playing scrabble and nibbling on Nanda's roast chicken (without him knowing hahaha), i really am addicted to electiricity, everything i do everyday relies on it. What about you? Are you addicted too?

It's amazing isn't it how people in the past have lived with minimum electircity, i guess they didnt have as much electronic gadgets as we do now, but life seems amazingly calm without all sorts of cables running around your room, e? But i cant imagine myself living so, maybe i need to get out more and enjoy the nature rather than being a computer geek all the time ^^

Is electricity in your area troublesome too?

this summer's most awaited movie..

I'm a long time fan of the Transformers series, eversince its release and n00b looking original cartoon, top the beast wars series. When the movie went out, i was amazed at this movie, the depiction of the bots was amazing, the philophy content was inspiring.. If you're interested to read my review on this movie, go to this link.. Or hasve a look at the official site for more updates on this mega-movie..

When they announced there would be a sequel, i knew this was gonna be about Starscream, who managed to fell himself leaving Megatron to his death in the final battle in the first movie.. This movie's due to be released worldwide this coming summer, 24 June 2009.. I'm sure there's many heavy movies coming out this summer, but this is the one for me, as long as they don't change the lineups of the actors, voice-ins, and director, i'm sure this thing's gonna blast it's way to become a blockbuster box office hit!

So excited, kawaiiii! What's your summer movie ecitement this year?

a trip to the supermarket..

Today me and my bud, Sani (a fixed cast of the pathetic traveller series) decided to go out to do some grocery shopping. Most of the times i would see this as a little weird, it discomforts both of us that two guys are doing shopping for household needs arguing which detergent to buy, what materials to cook what for dinner, and whether our toothpaste was depleted or not --" But hey, it's a Sunday, the world is good from my point of few, so why not, eh?

Aside from the tender moments (yuck) we spent deciding on our purchase, then hated the fact that we only bought motorcycles instead of a car (i mean who likes to be seen like a fool bringing boxes of gorceries on a bike? o.O), Sani did mention something profounding; "You know when i go to these stores, i always feel guilty that i spend my money to these giant capitalists instead of the impoverished sellers in a traditional market?".. i didnt really have a good answer, so i agreed and say; "Well,, yeah,, uh-huh"

But now that i think of it, it's interesting to write about this.. Read on..

Sometimes when we read books that write about the condescending nature of globalization and how capitalist pigs are ruining micro economy, we don't really relate to our very lives. I can't speak on behalf of you guys, but for me when i read this i just usually nod and that's it, in 5 minutes i'll forget all about this tragedy..

Today i did relate. Which is why i cared enough to write about it, tommorow hopefully i'll do something about it. I bet a lot of you are never striked with that thought. Its a common consumer behaviour for us to be lured by sized, luxury, and moderned things. We don't need to be ashamed, i think it's a human nature. Ask people in marketing and they'll tell you i'm correct in some ways. Big supermarkets, like the one we went to today, superindo, is quite booming. The whole idea of a one-stop shop where you can get anything and everything yet you do it in a more "consumer-friendly" manner is booming. I did a little observation and i found that in this city the rate of a sepermarket or a mini market is quite rapid; Indo Maret, i think still affiliated with Super Indo, is sprouting in every corner of the city. Circle K, a 24-hour minimart franchise, opens 4-5 retails in one single city block (true story, the block near Galeria Mall, Yogyakarta, Indonesia). Amazing? Maybe. Economical growth? Most likely.

Don't get me wrong, i am being a bit hypocritical on this, but at least i admit it. I go to these shops. I like going to these shops. Why? They're clean, they have what i look for in all sizes and brands, and they offer competitive pricing. Its so practical. But now i'd like to think; how many people think alike? A lot, my guess is. I'm no brains in economy, actually quite stupid in it. But i think in the whole idea of supply-demand doctrine, if many shops alike are sprouting, it means that they calculated their chance of survival and sustainability, that means there are buyers. Under the same doctrine, i conclude that the amount of shops is proportional to the growth of consumers or at least potential consumers. Scary!

Why scary? Indonesia is not a modern country yet. We're going under this phase i'd like to call transition. Economists would call it growth. Government people would call it development. Whatever. Thing is, when consumers have started to move on, some merchants have not. This is why there is a disparity in the micro economy; that sellers are loosing their buyers. And they lost their buyers to those who have bigger money, bigger capital to start their bussiness, to make a huge market enterprise that attracts the consumers. These people are called capitalists.

I have the slightest idea whether there have been traditional markets being victimised, but i'd like to think maybe so in the coming years.

Can we do something about it? I don't know. Maybe not. But hey, i think awarenesss is a start.

Have a good one people, cheers :)

mellow schmellow..

You know what, i've always opposed the idea of watching a Korean made movie.. Why? It basically fits into my fundamental theory of entertainment : a good entertainment is one that is NOT more complicated your everyday life. I think entertainment is supposed to cheer you up, not stress you out (some people may buy the complications just so that it makes them happy how uncomlicated their life is.. not for me it's not)

I've always fertilized this prejudice towards Korean made motion pictures, as from what i learn it always is about tragic romance, the worst kind of all entertainment according to moi. I managed to squash out the habbit of watching Korean thru my childhood.. Lately I've been tempted, some friends managed to convince me that i should give it a go. A few days ago that weirdo Nanda screened for me a movie he just rented; "My sassy Girl" and i was quite impressed, i loved that foolish looking guy who played main actor, and it has an acceptable ending. The other day me and Adi went to the internet cafe to exploit the multimedia database they have and copy it into our harddisk. One of the movies we copied upon Adi's wishes is a Korean one named "Love Phobia".. Later today i was bored and had nothing to do and the stupid internet acted the goat again so i took a risk, i pressed play on this movie.. A choice i now regret --" read on..

Let me give you a run down of what the storyline is like; like a typical Korean romance, the story starts from the childhood years of the main guy and gal (forgive my bad spelling on names, the guy was Ju-Kong, the gal was Ari Dong Song.. peculiar names).. they met when they were in elementary, and this weird girl was a new student who had the weirdest story, that she was an alien from the planet "Elipson" o.O and had a curse that one who touches her would have a bad accident. Later we find that she is an actual alien --" who had AIDS because some stupid doctor injected the wrong blood in her transfusion when she was a baby (talk about heavy plot).. Okay apart from the gooky overarcing plot, i think the stream of the story presented is quite eloquent. In the first half of the movie it was actually funny.

I think things went overboard for me in the last one third part of the movie, where the audience learns about how she's dying and all. So this desperate guy who's not prepared to "let her go with a smile" makes circle crops to call upon the alien mothership to pick Ari up.. Okay i know people do stupid stuff when they're in love but i gotta admit this is probably the thickest act of late i have seen.. Kinda sweet, but artificial.. Like those sugars you consume if you have diabetes; you know its supposed to be sweet, but somehow it just doesnt seem sweet..

The ending scene was too much for me to bear. Just a disclaimer; I DID NOT CRY. I'll admit that there were watery effects in the corner of my right eye, but i will deny till i die upon the claim of cry ^^ In a nutshell, it's a romeo-juliet archetype where they end up not together, there were lots of tears, and the girl gets lifted by her spaceship and return to whereever while the guy ends up selling sushi --"

The tragicness of this movie is only topped by an 8 minute feature named "Kiss Me" where a guy donates his eyes to this girl so she can heal and they still dont end up together. I now have a quite dissatisfied opinion on Korean romance films..

then i end up the night listening to a song Adi played; "Love will lead you back" and "Ayat-ayat Conta" (the verses of love).. nice!

Royal rumble...

Here's the devastating karaoke pics for the article "Panic at the karaoke"..

"We are family,,, i got all my sisters with me!!!"

These three broke out of the Mental Health Institution

"Do a little dance,, make a li'l loovve,, get down tonight!!!"

Adi was a little drunk and decided to take things jusstt one notch higher ^^

Pictures are gratitudes of Irma and are copyright protected (meaning you have the right to copy it; either the pic or our style.. hahaha uh-rah!)

You may now puke :D

Idiot's Guide to TOEFL tests

i've done a few TOEFL tests in my day, both the -like and the ITP version, so i'd like to share some useful insights on doing the tests. As usual, i gather this from experience, observation, and my opinion.

- Most important; before doing your TOEFL test, check and make sure you understand correctly the time and date of your test. This sounds stupid but i learned the hard way, and both separately; there was 1 time when i got the time wrong (came 3 hours early o.O) and one time i got the day wrong (a day after the actual tests --"). Do not do this, coming to TOEFL tests is the first key to ACTUALLY getting a score, da..

- Book your tests at latest 24 hours before. There was i time when i became foolish and decided to do a "go show" registering for the test 30 minutes before and i was rejected T.T inefficiency of time, petroleum, and intelligence..

- Choice of seats is like what Donald Trump always says in his Apprentice show ("Location, Location, Location!").. this has multiple uses actually, especially if you go in with a jockey to help you.. make sure you do not sit in one view line from the supervisor's desk, do a diagonal position, but don't choose the very back, about row 6 out of a 10 row map should be perfect :) i do this so that i can still use my phone to chat with people once i get bored waiting for the rest of the time after i actually do my tests hahaha..

- Section 1 is listening. My advise is have a read thru the answers, so you get an imagination of what the question should be like, so its all the easier when you listen to the conversation. Of course you have to understand that the answers is in the book that you receive, a frined of mine (initial "H") once did a test without realizing that the answers you meant to tick is in the book they gave you, he spent 10 minutes wondering how people could choose among A, B, C, or D.. bakkaaaaaaa!!!! ^^

- In section 2, just do what you can and you're sure of, usually this section allocates the least time, and better than wasting your time trying to think it out, leave it, we can finish them later. Do you ever face questions where you gotta pick which underlined word should be fixed and you find that the problematic word is none of the underlined, but the one NEXT to an underlined words?? there's at least one of these everytime i do the test.. touche!

- Section 3 i usually read thoroughly the text, then answer. It's so much easier to look for the answer if you have an idea what the text says. I usually finish all 50 question fast, giving me 30 minutes to spare. This is where i can go back to section 2 and finish off the ones i'm not sure of. Other than that try drawing on the book, or chat with your friends, it helps kill time. I never want to submit ahead of the others as i fear that they will see me as a schmuck.. In these tests you dont really wanna be looking like a smart ass :)

- Concentrate. There was a time when there was this very cute girl sitting in the seat in front of me and i lost 15 minutes of section 2. And no i didnt even get her number so believe its a lost cause, not a worthwhile investment.

- Make sure you have good looking ID cards. I always give out my driver's license (which half of the top part is broken, so i got the same gooky look from the supervisor that i get from policemen in their road searches.. not nice ==;)

Do all that, and you should be fine. Don't sleep to late the night before, you really wanna be fresh. Practice a lot, the patterns of the tests are very similar, so familiarizing is not too bad of an idea. I've managed to keep a stable average of above 630, so my guide above should not be too devastating for ye :)

Good Luck! :D

my most favorite gal in the world..

30th of April is a very very special day in my family.. On this day we celebrate the birth day of my little sister, Sasha --Safira Diah Pranidhana-- She was born into this world as a healthy baby 15 years ago, in 1994. I'd like to just say that she's always been special from day 1..

As the usual brother-sister relationship, we have many squabbles, even though we're years apart, approximately a 6.5 year difference. In my young years i've had time when i'd be furious at her for rampaging my toys, there were times when i felt she just bugged the hell out of my life, and even when she broke the screen of the PSP i gave her for her birthday, and i've always said a lot of times we're never really close. That's a lie, I'm not that type of brother where i obviously show my love for my little sister, but let's make it clear here that i do, i do very much..

My dad once told me a story that on the days near my birth, a little girl with wavy hairs came to him and calling him in his dreams, that is why at the time he was very sure his first born would be a girl, which is why when i showed up, he was, like, lo! It's a boy.. (my dad used to tell me that i was born with 10 twins and he had to choose 1 to keep and he probably chose the wrong one T.T) so you can imagine how happy he was that 6.5 years later, the girl who came to his dreams finally was in his hands, held tightly. You can say this is probably divine intervention.

Sasha in her early years didnt have much hair, so she would be adorable running round as a baby with a rounded head when other babies her age already had thick hair (you know when babies walk its as if they're on invisible springs *boink boink* cuuuute ^^). She's been quite a cheery girl from the start, she had always had her moments of narcissism (i was least famous compared to her when it comes to running in front of the camera dad was holding), which stays until now. 

Sasha is sometimes moody, especially now she's in her teen years, but most of the times a happy person. Now she loves to read, and much like me is addicted to the internet. In her highschool she joins the drumband crew which is quite interesting.

She and I are probably equal halves of our parents, whereas i posses the more quite side of life, and she's just a girl who loves to go wild and have fun. We have very different personalities, and yet huge similarity at the same time. We would spend hours in front of the computer playing "Sims 2" decorating the house, arguing which tv to get our sim, who our sim should date. It's a past time that i assure i get with her everytime i go back home.

This is a momentoe that I made for her on her 15th birthday, and i do pray and wish she'll lead a successful life in the future (so she can help pay my rent and stuff hahahaha). I always said to mum, i just can't imagine being an only child, i think life would be unbearable for me if i know life without the company of this small, sweet girl..

Love you, sis.. Happy birthday :)