Controversive movie: Buruan Cium Gue !

Baru2 ini merebak keresahan masyarakat sehubungan dengan munculnya kontroversif filem yg berjudul "Buruan Cium Gue!". Filem ini dinilai sebagai filem yg bertentangan dengan norma2 agama dan adat ketimuran. *kabarnya, sih.. aye juga belom nonton*.

Yah, filem ini kebetulan kebagian apesnya, kali ya... Karena sebenarnya filem yg bertentangan dengan norma2 bukan cuman itu, bahkan yg disiarkan di layar lebar pun sebenarnya juga sudah banyak. *huhu... betapa memprihatinkan!*

Haha... salah sendiri nih filem pake judul yang sangat mengundang kontroversi. Filem2 yang lain mungkin selamat karena pake judul yg bisa 'menutupi' ketidaksopanannya, filem yang ini... eits.. nggak bisa berkelit lagi.

Kalo aja produsernya lihai dan berhati-hati dalam memilih judul, mungkin bisa agak2 selamat kali, ya.. hahaha... *lha kok ngasi ide!*
Sebenernya kan banyak judul2 yg tidak mengundang kontroversi, coba judulnya diganti jadi gini:
Buruan Cium Gu(l)e *kan gak pa pa tuh, kalo buru2 nyium gule di dapur*
Bu Ruan Cium Gu(l)e *apa lagi Ibu yang bernama Ruan lagi nyium aroma gule, kan sah2 saja*
Bulukan Cium Gu(l)e *nyium gule sampe bulukan ? ngapain aja cobaaa...!*
dan masih banyak lagi....

Mbok ya, produser2 filem itu yang kreatif dikit napa ? eits.. bukannya kreatif dalam menutupi keburukan lho! tapi kreatif dalam membuat filem yang bermutu. Masak yg diexpose yang begitu-begitu? masih banyak dari sisi-sisi kehidupan yang layak diangkat menjadi bahan cerita filem, yang mengetengahkan nilai2 kemanusiaan, sosial, budaya, pendidikan, dan laen - laen.
Mbok ya sadar bahwa publikasi itu sangat berperan dalam membentuk opini masyarakat, berperan dalam proses mendidik bangsa.

Ditariknya filem tadi semoga bisa membangkitkan kesadaran masyarakat untuk peka dalam menyikapi produk2 entertainment masa kini. Mari tunjukkan kepedulian kita kepada nasib anak bangsa !!

Special thanks to A'a Gym yang telah berjuang dalam menyadarkan dan membangkitkan kepedulian masyarakat dengan program Gema Nusa -nya

*first article in Indonesian*

Diary vs Blog

Yesterday, four of us (faj, shinta, noe2l, and me) were involved in a tense discussion to define the term 'DIARY'. It was rooted from the same agreement that: a blog is not supposed to be a diary!
For the sake of our 'too-high-dignity' for our blog not to be judged as a diary, there we went... diary vs blog.

According to Google's definition:
The word diary comes from the Latin word diarium ("daily allowance", from dies, "day" - more often in the plural form diaria). The word "journal" comes from the same root (diurnus = of the day) through "journey".

In dictionary, it is defined that:
diary : A daily record, especially a personal record of events, experiences, and observations;

'Diary', daily record, whereas 'Journal' came from the same root as 'diary'.
Blog was initially created as an online journal. Then, does it differ from diary ? Is 'diary' a subset or superset of 'journal'? or how?

*tweoweoweoweoweoweow...*

To decide whether a blog is diary or not, we should know what 'diary' is and what its characteristcs are.

There were some aspects that we were viewing in defining a 'diary':

1. Confidentiality.
   It contains personal and top-secret matter. In fact, we deserve some slaps if we read other's diary without permission.
   What about published diary, like Anne Frank's, Zlata's ? Are those diaries still be considered as 'diary'? Hmm... may be under the provision that those diaries are permitted to be 'read' by public. Or how ??
   
   *tweoweoweoweow.....*
   
   
2. Point of view.
   Diary is normally written as if the author was talking only to the diary.
   Here are some examples:
   "dear diary,
   I am feeling blue today... why the sky's so blue and the sun's so bright ?"
   or
   "dear diary,
   I had no money today. Can I borrow from you some ?" (faj,2004)
   
   Thus, the point is: there is no intention in involving audiences but the diary itself, in diary writting.
   Will this be sufficient condition ?
   
   Hence, it is only the matter of the way we are retelling the stories. Isn't it?
   So, do you think the one below is not a diary writting ?
   
   "hi everybody,
   I am feeling blue today... why did he never call me today ? I've been longing for it...oh, please, somebody, let him know that I am waiting for his call!"
   
   *argghhh... yaiks... so disgusting !!!*
   
   
   
3. Content.
   The content of a diary is more about the author's personal matter. *That's why it is confidential*
   Yet, in its growth, Diary tends to be associated with love matter and melancholic type of writtings *well, it must be because of the influence of many radiostations with their 'dear diary' program!*.
   Actually, personal matter could be anything! Could it be about financial, contemplations, etc etc.
   
   Yet, the concern now is: there's no standard in determining whether something is confidential/personal or not. For an introvert person, everything could be personal, even the fact that he/she has not eaten for the whole day... Yet, for a very expressive person, he/she would not mind if everybody knows his/her love history.
   
   How ?
   
   Or may be, as long as we don't write about love matter and melancholic things we are safe ?
   
   *tweoweoweoweoweow....*

The discussion ended up with indecisive conclusion.

A good point from Shinta: "Just consider blog as your own private publication with you yourself as the solely author. Just like a publication(e.g. newspaper), blog may have breaking-news corner, poetry corner, daily corner, etc.." *what about private whine (ind: curhat) corner?*

Hey, I agree with you, shin! just be yourself! express yourself as you wish! Just use your blog to express yourself. No matter what people may comment, it's my blog. My own publication, so what! hehehe...

As the final say, to save our 'dignity' from having a diary-style blog, we decided to put a disclaimer in our blog:
no matter what the contents of our blogs are, our blogs are not 'diary's!

Being friends...

If I were asked to define 'friend', this would be my answer:
To me, friends are:
persons whom God had introduced to me along my journey of life.
As everything happens for a reason, so does friend.
Friend's existance in our life is not just for no reason, yet it is for certain reasons that we don't (or seldom) realize. Sometimes, we could not choose to befriend or not to befriend somebody. Suddenly, they happened to be our friends. Friendship is part of God's plan in our destiny.

We had good, best or even bad friends. All of them, even the worst one, play important roles in our life.
Obviously, good friends are to help us through out our life journey, yet, what about the bad ones?
Yes, they did also taking part in it.

I recalled my experience not long time ago. I had a friend who was always be around me. I don't know why, we were always in the same group, class, *I didn't choose though..*, or... shortly, here, there and everywhere. Actually, the person was kind and helpful, yet a bit tactless in the way the person spoke and the attitude. I, being the one who was 'fated' to be around the person, often felt uncomfortable. *It's not only my personal comment, anyway... most of my friends also thought so* The person was disliked by the surroundings, because the person's words often put other people down, sometimes humiliating.*Yet, I always tried to be a good friend, by being numb or just don't care about it.

I started to think why God had given me such a friend. There must be reasons! Good reasons definitely...
I, then, come out with 2 possible reasons:
(1). Such friend was brought into my life in that particular time to be the trigger for me in doing my work.
Well, I am inherently last-minuter and procrastinator * hehehe...* Those particular time was really my critical time, having many work loads within limitted time constraint. Yeah, I did not realize that such kind of friend was actually somebody that I 'needed'. I felt so 'angry' everytime that friend gave 'humiliating' comments, yet... unconsiously, I told myself to prove that I was not that bad. I was invoked, and hence had put me back on track - to work seriously, to prove it!
(2). I can't stand separation, especially with friends. *Well, I am quite sensitive with separation thingy :p*
Having 'unpleasant' friend is just so good that lessen my suffering from being separated from him/her. *hehehe...*

Despite the 'advantages' of having bad *or unpleasant* friend, I always prefer to have good ones. And I hope, I can always be other persons' good friend.

Being a good friend means:
- being understanding and forgiving *quotted from someone ;)*
- being like a 'feedback controller' *a term in control field*, which could bring our friend back-on-track
whenever he/she were going out of focus.
- being the second opinion - to provide different point of view in seing problems.
- being an opponent, in a positive way. Does not always agree, but always try to be as objective as possible.

To all my dear friends, thank you for being the part of my life. I can't always be your good friend, but I will always try to play my role in your life as what God has intended me to do.

for somebody:
I had a sense that we are going to be 'so near yet so far'. Let's prove it wrong!

Dirgahayu Republik Indonesia !!! (Happy B'day Indonesia!!)

Today is 59th's Indonesian's National Day/Independence Day. Happy B'day my beloved country!

In general, 'Celebration' was supposedly meant to revive the values and meanings that have come together with the celebration itself. In this case, the Independence day celebration was meant to revive the historical values of the Independence day, i.e. patriotism, heroism, nationalism and also to appreciate the role of the Indonesian heroes in struggling for our Independence.

I just watched Indonesian channel showing the 17 August flag assembly in Istana Negara Jakarta -*my favorite program on every Independence day celebration*, 11 am o'clock (Singapore time). Oh, yeah, btw, I like to see the the flag-raiser contingent (Paskibraka) when they were on duty. *yeah, when I was a child I always wanted to be one of them, although I dislike doing those field stuffs and being exposed to sun rays - so, I just enjoy to be their audience, hahaha...*
What can I comment on the ID celebration is that: it could not really invoke the values that supposed to be conveyed. The assembly is way too formal - with its militarism style assembly - and did not try to get the involvement of the audiences. May be only the participants of the assembly could feel the heroism senses during the assembly, yet.. it does not work for the far-away audience - TV audience, like me. To me, the ID assembly on TV was just a 30-minute broadcasting of a formal militerism assembly that showed the perfectly-aligned contingents celebrating the ID.
May be I am quite sceptical, but... that's what I felt.

May be only the assembly participants like the Paskibraka members can appreciate the values of the ID celebration; as for them, to prepare for only that one-fine-day, they had to undergo a tough one-month training which could not be worse than what the heroes had sacrificed to gain the nation's independence.
Then, how about the audience? What could make them get involved in feeling the sense of the heroism?
Hmm.. that's a good challenge for the ID celebration's committee.

What could made me touched was when I heard an Indonesian national song accompanying the subsequent TV program showing a historical clip on the Indonesian heroes struggling in the battlefield.

"Tanah airku.. tidak kulupakan...
kan terkenang.. sepanjang hidupku...
biarpun saya... pergi jauh... tidak kan hilang dari kalbu...
Tanahku yang kucintai, engkau kuhargai...."

The song just suitted me well. It had invoked my nationality. It's just a song, yet... could affect me more than the ID assembly itself. Celebrating national day away from home country gave different sense. Sometimes it invokes the feeling of nationality more than when we are in home country. It does not depend on how happening the celebration is, rather, it is more on how we appreciate the meaning of the independence day itself.

Happy B'day!

Happy 39 Anniversary to Singapore !

Happy 3rd B'day to *Nina!

Some more B'day, anyone ? :p

*Nina is my niece

Think out of the box - be objective!

"She's such a stupid! Why on earth she still insists on marrying him, although right under her nose she had found him betraying her! Just break up from him and find someone better!"

Often, we made such comment while watching a TV-drama. We seem to know the best solution for the actors. As the observer, we could see that something was wrong; while the actors didn't.

Most of the time, we didn't realize that we had acted like the actor(tress) in the drama - we didn't realize that something was wrong. Although people around us (analogue to the drama watchers) had tried to give suggestions and comments on it, we still insisted that we were right!

To our defence, "Thanks, I don't need your suggestions. I am sure you will do the same thing, if you were me!". Hey, if you want me to be you, why don't you try to be me instead? Just try to see your own problem from different perspective - outsider's perspective.

In solving a problem, Objectivity is the key. As much as possible, try to put away our subjectivity, because subjectivity tends toward our desire (arabic: nafs). Desire would not help solving anything.

How to get that Objectivity?

That's where "Think out of the box" playing a role - by thinking from outsider's perspective.

How could we do that?
Thinking out of the box requires somebody to bring him/herself out of the system.

Detachment from all the desires is the key in doing this. This is how to start being objective.

Normally, we will find it difficult to detach our desire, especially when we were dealing with heart matter - love, etc. But, always remember that our aim is to solve the problem, not being trapped in it.

Afterward, just like the movie watcher, we can start judging the actor (which is the previous ourself) from different perspective.

The things that we thought the actor should do, are actually the things that we should do in dealing with our problem.

Let's think out of the (TV) box !... ;))

Just In Time Specialist

Finally submitted an assignment, about half an hour before its due date, 6 August, 23.59. Fiuh,....
Always and always, I become a last minuter, or in a more elegant way... JIT-Just in time Specialist...hehehe...

Most of the time, it's because of my bad time-management. If not, somehow there will always be external factors that make me be last minuter.

I want to get rid of this behavior now. I had "promised" to my self not to be slacking again (been doing this for so many times ;p). And, I think now is a good time to change since it's still early in the semester. "I want to be a good student, now!" *hahaha... laughing to myself*

The first week run smoothly. I was not late in any assignment submission. *of course! what kind of assignment can a lecturer expect to collect in the first session of the semester!*

Then, it comes the second week - now. I know that there's an assignment to be submitted soon. Just glanced at the announcement, "it is still next week", I thought," So, I still have the weekend to do the assgnmnt and will get it done by then!"

What happened next....
Only yesterday, I found out that the due date for the assignment is today midnite! I hadn't done anything yet! And, I think, will take long time doing that. arghh...
Panickly *a bit*, I started to work on it, this early afternoon.
keep working.. working..*watch tv*...working...*chatting*...working...*eating*...working...*getting more panick*... working... *asking ppl around*...working... and.... fiuh... it comes to an end! Then submitted it.

Oh, well... seems like...there's no way I could escape from this behavior.
See! I've tried to manage my time, but.. there's always external factor.
Yeah, seems like I've been fated to be JIT Specialist, hehehe...

Not bad, coz in my resume later, I can write,"able to work under pressure" *hahahhaa...*

Hospital - a place to remind us to the unfortunates

For some reasons, hospital is a place that most people are avoiding as much as they can, except for those who work there, such as doctors, nurses, etc, and somebody like me - doing research in hospital. Avoiding hospital could mean avoiding sickness: either being sick or getting sickness from.

I myself, only if I become a patient, would go to hospital. However, in the first place, I, as much as I can, would avoid to be a patient! Oh, who likes to be sick!
Other reason that could make me go to hospital was visiting a friend, and.. that's all!

That was what I adopted in the past. Yet, it had changed after I undertook a research in a hospital 5 months ago. No choice, I have to go to hospital almost everyday.

After sometimes working there, my view on hospital was changing. Being in hospital premises is not as bad as what I thought before. On the other hand, it had revealed me a spiritual view that I didn't see previously. *hey, the "spiritual view" doesn't mean that I can see spirit, huh! :p*.

Instead of viewing a hospital as the place of disease, I now see it as a place of unfortunateness. It's very touching everytime I saw the scenery there - the elderly sitting on their wheelchairs knowing nowhere to go, the cripple dragging themself along the passageway, the weak patients lying on their bed after undergoing operation with infusion tubes attached on them, etc. Oh, what if I were one of them!

This had reminded me, over and over again, to thank God for every single blessing that I had til this moment.