life is beautifully funny

There was one time, that I was chatting with one of my recurring chatmates, and he asked me what kind a job that I was looking for. I told him two very opposite things. Against all odds, my chatmate seemed to be very supportive of it.

Another chatmate, also asked me one time what I will do now that I'm in Jakarta. I answered a similar answer, but not necessarily the same ones. He was unbelievably supportive as well, by saying, "Well, both are very interesting subjects for me." Or he's just trying to kiss my ass.

Surprisingly, (I was surprised to the deepest depth of my bones) both chances come in a quite the same time. It's still in the form of chances right now. But I believe that it can grow into something serious. I kinda hope one of them will, but I actually want both of them. DAMN! Why these thing kept happening? Two things at the same time that you were hoping it should have been one thing came up before or after the other? Sigh ....

In a more positive note, I went through the ups and downs (there aren't really any downs actually) of Jiffest. 5 movies. Over 500 hours. Stupidly bragging I-don't-know-them viewers who always did the oh-I-understand-what-they-are-talking-about. Silly "movie addict"-ive occurences. Pet-peeves. 5 hours of sleeping for 4 nights in a row.

The movies that I saw:

1. Breaking and Entering. Anthony Minghella went Woody Allen.
2. Volver. Wisteria Lane went Madrid suburbs.
3. All the King's Men. Jude Law went unbelievable. (not a good thing, that is)
4. The Queen. Thirteen Days went british. PS: As I told someone, I like everything British. Let me rephrase, coincidentally, things that I like are british. So go figure.
5. Little Miss Sunshine. JonBenet Ramsey went plump.

Things to do before the calendar reads 2007, portfolio, updated CV, and follow-ups. And ow, busting my ass trying to snatch that grand prize of a whopping 100 M.

I have a feeling that 2007 will be an unlikely year.

the due graphic (you know, it's 12:30 a.m. and I am not sleeping yet, so mind the ugly and probably wrong title)

I'm three days late!!

... for .. you know ...

It never hurts to stay on the safe side. Expect some graphics perhaps in some days.

bla bla bla bla

Bla bla bla bla. Bla bla bla bla bla. Bla bla bla bla! Hahahhaaa... Bla bla bla bla bla? Hmm.. Bla bla bla bla bla bla bla, bla bla bla bla bla. Bla bla bla, bla bla bla bla bla. :)

Bla bla bla bla bla bla. Bla bla bla. Hihihi.. Bla bla bla bla bla. Ach, bla bla bla bla. Bla bla bla. Whoa! Bla bla bla! Bla bla bla bla bla, bla bla bla bla bla. Oops. :)

I just found out like some days ago that my "crisis" was supposed to be named Quarter-Life Crisis, not Mid-Life one. :)

Argh .. Crisis, schmisis.

Let's just have fun at Jiffest! Or in another good news, whodoyouthinkheare is back!

10 things I HATE/LIKE about Jakarta

It's been a week. One week. Seven full days. Some hundred hours (I wouldn't count them all, are you kidding me?). And all I can do is sigh. Well, you know what, I should have seen them coming. What's them? Here:

1. The fact that all my friends are here, and I can laugh like out loud in a dining table because of the joke that I actually understand rather than just a courtesy laugh. HATE/LIKE


2. The fact that I don't have a broadband internet connection and therefore miss youtube and all the podcasts that I subscribed so much. So fuckin' much. HATE/LIKE


3. The fact that things are so cheap, but since the money that I'm using is not mine (yet!), the things still look like so fricken expensive. HATE/LIKE


4. The fact that my sister has like a big box full of DVDs which she'd never seen, some of them are serious series that I seriously intend to watch seriously, but then my sister don't know where she put the other discs. HATE/LIKE


5. The fact that it's always thirty-fucking-something degree out there. Borrowing Project Runway 3's third runner up Mychael Knight's quip: I'm sweating like a ho in a church. Well, in this case perhaps a mosque. HATE/LIKE (well, explanation for this one is kinda long and some kinda boring. So let's settle for n/a here.)


6. The fact that food is good. Tasty. Tasty tasty. Unlike the things that they tell you it's tasty, and then for me it's european tasty. HATE/LIKE


7. The fact that high mobility on the street is a privilege. HATE/LIKE


8. The fact that body-awareness-related business is still in its growing phase (e.g. sports center, gym studios, fitness centers, etc.), to put it in other words, they are still God-help-us-all expensive. HATE (second fact only)/LIKE (first fact only)


9. The fact that my niece is so so so so so so so (and I can type that word much longer) cute and adorable, eventhough she wouldn't talk, play and sit with me on the whole first day we met (that's Monday) and after every nap (can you believe it?), and now she's kinda always saying, "I wanna play upstairs!" (where my room is), but as I said before, except after every nap where she has this shyness again all over again. HATE/LIKE (and a big fat enormous LIKE, that is)


10. The fact that I AM NO LONGER THE BROWNIE ANYMORE BECAUSE EVERYONE IS LIKE THE BROWNIE HERE AND I'M EVEN PALER THAN SOME OF THEM. And the fact that I am so upset about it so that I'm writing it in capitals. HATE/LIKE


11. The fact that I already miss Hamburg eventhough it's only been under 200 hours, and friends were saying that the weather was so shitty, not a 30-something degree, it rained cats, dogs, elephant, and the whole Noah's arc, it even flooded Fischmarkt. HATE/LIKE

But it's looking up in some days, methinks. I'll be travelling to an ex-shooting-location in Bandung (will I?) on Sunday, and singing again on Monday (thank you for the music, the songs I'm singing, YEAH, ABBA!!).

I think I'm losing my fucking mind. And no, I'm not counting the result of the self-conducted survey. :)

Hmm.. It doesn't add up to the title.

err .. I think I didn't order a bowl-of-melancholy-to-go last night ...

This is it. I still need all this to sink in. Sink. In. OK, I'm ready.

This, I think can be the last time that I'm writing an entry for this blog from this chair, at this house, in this town, on this temperature, in this country. Long story short, I'm flying back to Jakarta tomorrow morning.

Suitcases are packed. I'm scared to death that it will be overpacked (of course it is - on a non-related issue, Firefox 2.0 introduces a spelling check??) and I have to leave out some stuff here which of course I don't know what. The pants, T-shirt, Jackets, that I can't live without, well, I can't live without. I have to again apply my sister's method, I think. I have to choose between two favorites and stop being a crybaby about it.

I felt really sad for leaving. I don't know whether it is because of the fact that I hate goodbyes, or simply because everything in Hamburg had started to grow on me. I am torn, really torn. I mean, of course it will always be pleasing to know that in November you don't have to hustle everytime you're walking to keep yourself warm, or wearing a three-layered clothes, or treading in your wet shoes. In the mean time, I felt like I haven't told stories about Hamburg enough, I haven't experienced Hamburg enough. And such crap like that.

I felt really happy for leaving. I've had enough of this student-life. ENOUGH. I want to be part of the crowd of employment market as soon as possible, build a career and start my own life. Why not doing it here, you ask? Well, there are hundreds of reasons to start with. But one of the most basic ones, is that the opportunity is not there yet.

I felt really scared for leaving. You know, scared of starting something new. Starting something on my own, relying solely on what I've been told and taught (which I can tell you that it's not much), and wondering, "Is it really like what I've been thinking about?"

I felt extremely dilemmatic about leaving. I kept too many promises. I don't know if I can keep them all. And, eventhough I'm sure it's only the best for us all, but I don't see these parties that I gave my promises to (and promise me something in return of course), are ready to give 100% to keep it as well. I have to let myself wait and see.

So, just yesterday, I can't count how many times I streaked a smile on my face everytime I'm thinking about the things that I will be doing in the next few days. At the same time, I had to hold myself together like tens of times so that I wouldn't cry, and I failed three times. Already.

If we can vote what's the worst invention of humankind, my vote goes to goodbye. (I'm not sure whether goodbye is a human invention, though. Heh.)

today's one liner + its post post post scriptum

Well, err .. ummm ... Lani would definitely get a haircut shortly after.

PS: I hope I didn't blab too much. :D

PPS: The title for this clip on youtube is "Jomblo Vol. 13 of 13", I hope you know what's this about.

PPPS: I know it's much better to post a full entry like right now before the afterglow fades, but I have a patient to attend. :( So, hopefully the euphoria is still there tomorrow morning.

baking adventure

What .... do you think will happen when a man was not allowed to eat, or drink, or smoke for a whole day, but he really wanted to do stuff rather than slumping on his chair the whole time?

Why, he bakes a cake, of course.

The problem is, the man never baked a cake in his whole life. So a bit of loggin-in and searching in some sites with recipes brought him to an After-Eight Cheese Cake. And the man tried stopping writing in third person from this sentence on.

I was kinda tempted with the After-Eight thing rather than the cheese cake, though .. Hehehe..

Some ingenious facts that I found while baking:

1. I know that there are two types of that rotating thing (beater?) for mixer. I think in Indonesian, I called it, the spiral ones, and the non-spiral ones. The funny thing is that I don't recall that I have used the spiral ones prior yesterday, but I based the name on the spiral ones anyway. Spiral is much easier to identify. In German they are called ... ummm Rührbesen (non-spiral) and Knethaken (spiral).

2. I didn't know that you eventually will use your hand in making dough. I thought you'd only have to beat it, crash-boom-bang, it's done. Apparently, one must use their hands to make the dough ... you know, stick together (Gosh, how awful is my English?). It's like playing claydough, dough. I mean though. Thank God I washed my hands beforehand.

3. Beating white eggs into egg-snow (this is a literal translation from the German word, Eischnee. I don't know if there is an English word.) is so much fun! I can do it the whole day. Separating the whities from the yellowies is not as much fun though.. :(

4. Placing the dough onto the Springform (I don't know the English word!) was obnoxious. You know, one must know how much you need for the base, and for the sides. I miscalculated of course. And that made the base butt-ugly.


5. All and all my triumph came when all I need to do is put the pre-cake to the oven, and pray to God that the oven won't screw it up. And the oven screwed it up. :( Too bad I don't have a picture of the sorta screwed cake. I think it was too hot.


6. That dude, named Barney (B is for Barney, not Bie), claimed it as soon as it was done, ate half of it (half of it is still in the fridge). I, was still fasting when the cake was done. Eating it is a no-no to me. Hehehe.. >:)


The After-Eight-y taste was the real reward for me.

nostalgicismity

Must. Build. Time machine.


PS: Please visit Foxtrot website to check previous editions and so on. Or subscribe to Foxtrot through gocomics.com.

PPS: Yes. Alright. My card is read. I didn't exactly fly fighter kites during its season so often like other "boys". But reading this strips brought so many memories about playing flying fighter kites with other "boys" anyway. And chasing losing fighter kites. Now that, I did that.

What brings the memories is the fact that my house, which has the tallest water tower in my dwelling ... umm ... residence, was often being used as a basecamp to fly fighter kites by the "boys". What did I do when they were flying them? I have no idea anymore, now. Perhaps cheerleading. Defensifely I say, in a boyish kinda way.

OH, MY. GOD!!

today's one liner

Ew!

today's one liner

I, wholeheartedly, am jealous of this bloke's photoshopping skills.

today's one liner

I'm gonna read as much as possible definition, explanation or whatever on passive-agressive behaviour, because I recently worriedly suspect that I were a guy with one.

first look

I am gonna gotta keep it short.

Project Runway Collections.

I was shocked to find that most people are agreeing with me. I think the best collection is Laura's. But one problem, it's not springy. I found Jeffrey's positively surprising. I was kinda glad, because I was really pulling for Jeffrey to be the top 4 (not three, though) just to see his collection. It's far beyond not-disappointing. I still hope he didn't win, though (eventhough it's very possible that he does).

Uli's is good. I was kinda relieved to see that not all of the stuff is a flowy patterny dress. But somehow nothing very wow-y about it. Her final look is totally fierce, though. Michael's is unfortunately surprising. In a negative way. Disappointing. I just couldn't figure it out. I think there's a bit of this and that in every piece of his collection, but it's not solid. Sorry, Michael.

The winner? Of course I want Laura. But it's OK if it's Jeffrey. *knockonwood*

Survivor: Cook Islands

Yay! The Asian-American kicked ass! But .... why is it the two teams that finished first in the immunity challenge consisted of three men and two women? I know it is purely coincidental, but still.

I like Becky. But I think she's going to be the Cindy (Guatemala) of this season (go far, to be cut in the final 5 or 4). I like JP, but I think he's going to be Nick (Exile Island) of this season (eye-candy who's voted off "first" after the merge because of physical threat). I like Ozzy, he reminds me of a portuguese friend of mine.

It turns out that the premiere episode was disappointing. I mean despite all the drama and rumor leading to it, it was merely a first episode of Survivor, that you realize that every season Survivor, eventhough have different twists, turn, dramas, is always only about that. Ah, well.

The Amazing Race.

Huahahahhahahahaha. I bet, that the producers of The Amazing Race were spending their summer watching and laughing at their show's rip-off: Treasure Hunters. And then they had a meeting, and made a pact like, "Let's show these guys why we are winning emmys four times in a row."

The 10th installment of The Amazing Race came back with a vengeance of a dreadful season 8. It was fully revamped, superbly edited (pun intended). It was shitty though when one of the teams was eliminated before it reached the pit stop, and they did it in front of all of the other teams which is kind of heartbreaking. Oh, Drama!

Favorite team: Duke and Lauren. Not because of Lauren is the first openly lesbian racer, but I always fond of Parent-Kid team. David and Mary is a comic relief. Tyler and James? Hmm .. I kinda suspect that their names are actually Tyler James and James Tyler. How cool was that. But honestly, this is the first race that I find that none of the team was annoying. But perhaps one of them has a Flo hidden deep inside their soul.

Too bad Arti was eliminated second. She's the prettiest among them all. Vipul is a lucky bloke.

today's one liner

I kinda worry for not being worried about Andy Roddick might triumph Roger Federer tonight.

today's one liner

Shit, shit, shit, SHIT, I wish I would have watched this match!! I saw it!!! It was heartbreaking for sure ...

today's one liner

Ohmigod whatta great graphic!

PS: and solely because of that, I'm definitely gonna see the movie.

how fucking difficult german is

Even a writer as caliber as Mark Twain once wrote that german is awful. More than that, complicated. The rules were there to make your life more miserable. Twain didn't emphasis it with the f-word though.

So last night, at home, I took Der Grosse Deutsch-Test which was shown on RTL. The reason is, because I always love watching things on TV that I could play along with. Perhaps that's why I love TV-quizzes so much.

Other reason was that, after three years living here and almost four years studying the language (not intensively, of course) I just wanted to see how am I really doing with this broken german. Is it mendable broken? Or straight-to-the-garbage-can broken?

First test

OK. It was dictation. :D

I made 38 mistakes! :D (the snapshot was made after the show, though, so it doesn't reflect my real dictation test).

10 of them is due to the missing comma in my sentences. Dort ich Stunden lang bis ich endlich gefunden wurde, und zwar von einer phänomemal großen Spinne. I didn't use a comma for that sentence.

9 of them is because I can't differentiate between words that should have been written together or not. Like nichtsdestoweniger instead of nichts desto weniger. spazieren zu gehen instead of spazierenzugehen.

4 of them was spelling mistakes. Like I was writing misverständ instead of missverständ. I am so proud of this.

And 15 of them is because I made a hearing mistakes or never heard of the word. Like merkeln instead of Mäkeln, Schämel instead of Schemel, herrlichten instead of helllichten (come to think of it, that's not the correct way to spell herrlichsten as well.. :)) But I got hanebüchen correctly, eventhough many people in the studio neither have heard it or knew its meaning as well. YAY!

Second Test

Second series of test was twenty multiple choices problems divided into four categories: spelling (I kinda forgot the actual word), big or small letters (you see, German uses big letters in the middle of a sentence. sigh), Dudenspiel (guessing the meaning of a new German word that's been officially put to the Duden dictionary), punctuation marks (here I was hoping the most mistakes).

Annoyingly, I still made tons of mistakes in this test. Nine, that is. I made, respectively, one, four, three and one mistakes in each category. Very surprised in the last one.

Some of the mistakes were made because I didn't know any rules for the problem .. :) Some were unfamiliarity with words on the problems (especially on the Dudenspiel). And some because, well, people made mistakes. :D

So anyway, in total, I accumulated 47 mistakes, which earned me the most bottom group of people who took the test last night. Hurrah! I was kinda disappointed, though. I thought I would do better than the bottom. The upper limit for the group was 45, so I was three mistakes too much.

But it was unbelievably shocking to see how they decided the limits for the notes.

So, Mr. Twain. Where can we find a time to sit together over a coffee to talk about that awful language also known as German?

PS: Wanna play along?

today's one liner

AA lost to BB.

today's one liner

Eventhough I kinda loathe his stage performances passionately, I have to admit that I am a bit (a bit!) jealous with Anthony Callea.

somewhat nature boy

Current books read: About a Boy. Finished!

I'd really like to start the story with a solemn hymn with words like, "There was a boy. A very strange and enchanted boy." But it's been taken, right? And the boy I'm talking about, wasn't really enchanted. He's more like ... cursed. :)

He had an ongoing shaky relationship with his hair. One day he loved it to death, another day, it felt like he should let it all go.

He was once contemplating if which cities he should be living in, based on the fact which city had the best water to nurture his oh-so-very sensitive hair.

He successfully made peace with himself that he had to say goodbye to all of them anyway one day. On that day, there would only be two choices: be happy about it, or be very happy about it.

But until that day comes, he wished that he could cherish moments like this a little bit longer. :)

I hope that answered this question sort of. :)

[Honestly, I am more than less uncomfortable to publish myself posing while someone took my picture. This entry was made just because.]

i shouldn't have titled the entry Project Runaway

I wrote a six-paragraph entry about how I wasn't sad that Robert Best was leaving Project Runway. My Firefox hung, I haven't saved it, it is now lost somewhere between my fingertips, through the LAN cable and the router, and Blogger server who knows where.

Shit. Crap. And insert other cursing words that of course I am not familiar with.. [Now insert Y!M-styled angelic emoticon.]

today's one liner

It's like falling completely in love all over again with YouTube after seeing this clip which I almost didn't believe that it coulda been there.

[for those of you who have trouble accessing youtube pages, it was one of the result when I did the search with keywords: good morning singin rain. If you know what I mean.]

today's one liner

Should I cellotape my eyelashes up to keep my eyes open and watch Emmy awards?

on dates or something like it

Current books read: About a Boy by Nick Hornby. I told you so. - watched dvd: STOMP out loud. Amazing!!

Know what, having a date is like picking the right grooming product. It can smell good, look good, feel good, and appropriate for you .. But leave you in the morning with an iffy feeling and sure that it's best to call it off. At least that what happened to my last date shampoo picking.

I need one promptly. Because apparently, I have left one in my hotel room in Heidelberg. Mine was a Haut und Haar (Skin and Hair) product from Adidas. I always kinda worry everytime that I picked a 'this and that' grooming products. Shampoo and conditioner? Never bought one. But this Adidas thingie is so provocating. First it is said that it was developed with athletes. (WOW). Second, it smells good .. I mean sportily good. It can be a great weapon to combat my after-gym-hour sweat.

So I bought one. And also another one from Nivea with a gimmick saying it contains Aloe Vera.

I brought the Adidas bloke to Switzerland. But as I said, I left it in the bathroom in the hotel in Heidelberg. Unintentionally. Because yesterday I needed to hit the gym, I brought the Nivea bloke to my gym. I used both to wash my hair and skin.

The Adidas bloke is nice. Smells good. As I said previously, it is sporty and active without being over-the-top manly. It feels good. Soft, soothing and non-sticky. Produces enough bubble for the hair, and skin. The problem is, like other Adidas shower gel, it's too fluid. I think the engineers in Adidas did this on purpose .. you know, to let us finish it quickly. :( My hair, which is super spoiled and has dandruff, had no problems with it. It survived until the next hair-washing without without me scratching my hair and letting some pseudo-snow fall on my shoulders. Ew!

Enter the Nivea bloke. The one with Aloe Vera. Unlike the blue Adidas, it comes in a green color. I think it's for the sake of Aloe Vera. It's less fluid than the Adidas. Smells softer (but still sportively soothing). Good amount of bubble. The packaging, though, is not as good as Adidas bloke.

Then came this morning. This morning, I woke up with a terrible itch on my head. ITCH! OUCH! The itch was felt like an I-am-allergic-to-your-cat itch than I-need-to-change-my-undie itch. So I knew right away. It must have been the Nivea bloke. I rewash my hair with another shampoo and thank God, the itch was gone.

It was hard and awkward though. I know that we can't be together again. Well perhaps we still can be together, but I won't take it with me to my gym, to the pool, to the squash arena, or to other places where I need to bring only one bottle of grooming products to the shower room. It will still stand still in my bathroom though, because of Aloe Vera? Last time I heard it's still good for the skin as well. But not the skin up there on my head.

You will be missed, sweets!

you know it's time to cut your hair when ...

[backstory for those who's interested: We were in Luzern. Or Lucerne in italian. Luzern is in Switzerland. The city has the best landscape ever. So fucking awesome. Anyway ....

The picture was taken after (1) I had a morning shower where I washed my hair (biggest mistake ever!). (2) We'd just finished a two hour ferry ride around the lake. That means .. (a) I had to stand outside (on the deck) because I shot like immensely many amount of pics. (b) For two hours the wind was playing my hair around. (3) There were no mirrors around. (4) My companions would have been dead-shocked if I primped myself in front of an exposed mirror or mirror-like. (5) I just took a picture of my companions and they weren't smiling. I would feel like an idiot if I decided to pull my cheeks farther up. (6) I hate posing. Especially when the shutter must be operated for some seconds. So. Long story short, look at the picture.

But for your eyes only, I was contemplating to post it here. But if you can't make fun of yourself, you won't be able to handle people that do. Just look at today's "today's one liner" post. Ohmigod, I was just having an Oprah moment.]

... you started to look like that gay guy from American Dreamz (with a zee). There are just too many tackiness in that sentence alone.
Crap.

today's one liner

Oogling at Jake Shears in this clip, made me feel want to audition for Indonesian Idol and rock that stage badly (alright, I admit, pun intended).

we drove almost one thousand kilometers to two different cities in switzerland ....

... and all I can see is crappy and yucky Starbucks Coffee houses like these almost everywhere. [Exaggerated sentence is included as always.]


Bleh!


BTW, good to know that Rupert Everett is kinda on the same page with me. You go, mate!

yeah, i do have lips. but they're not servicing anybody right now.

Current books read: How to be Good by Nick Hornby. Hell yea, I'm gonna have a Nick Hornby decathlon!

I hate lip service. I hate them. Hate them. If they were alive and doing annoying stuff exactly like mosquitos flying around the house, they would have been gone the first time I heard the buzzing of their wings.

I hate the fact when people say something like, "It's been great! We should do this again some other time.." It doesn't mean that we will do this another time. I mean why can't people just say that stuff when they really mean it? And when they don't feel it, or they don't really mean it, they should have just kept quiet.

"Nice to meet you.. Have a save drive home." is enough. There is no harm done to the other party believing that there would be another time. Gosh ..

I think the reason that I hate lip service is (1) I'm not a good lip service people. Sweet talk and such fail me. When people ask me where I was coming from (a typical Indonesian lip service), I would have rambled on saying things that I did some hours before, rather than, "Home." or "School." And if the place I visited is embarrasing or is not interesting enough, I always came up with something like, "Well, you know .. around .. the thing is that I don't have so many task this week, so .. you know .. around .." Doh!

(2) I'm (still) too naive. I (still) believe in things that people say to me are the truth, even far away from a white lie. So it's been fun and I'll call you soon for me means that it was fun, and they will call me soon. And soon means soon. Not two months soon and so on.

(3) I think positively, in a way of taking things that are advantageous to me. That made me thinking that .. OK .. we're having a good time .. we can do this some other time and so on.

So when on a certain occasion people say, "I'll send you a message." or "We can chat during the week." or "I got your number, so don't fret." And none of those shoulda woulda coulda things happen .. It is time to say ...

.... lip service should go to hell.

Or is it only me being 26? ;)

today's one liner

I wanna grow up to be a decathlete.

strange little thing (no, I'm not a fan of Ms. Tori Amos)

I started as a harmless visit to IMdB to find an answer to a question that I asked in my friend's blog. So of course the snap-shot top box-office list kinda stole my view.

OK, honestly. How often this thing can happen? Eh? It's kinda once in a lifetime don't you think?

I just wished a bit though that the number 3 and number 4 films would have followed suit like Miami Vice: The Movie, or The Descent: Ooh, yeah!. That might have had put them higher in the rank. :)

today's one liner

Monday morning means the start of the madness of Foxtrot (the comic strips, that is), and this week, it looks like that we're gonna have a real bumpy hillarious ride in front of us.

today's one liner

Panic mode: my DVD-ROM can not read DVD that contains season 2 of Project Runway.

today's one liner

With a similar theme to the previous one liner, I've heard the first one minute and thirty-five seconds of this sampler for like 379 times yesterday only. (thanks Lisa M.)

today's one liner

I can easily pee in my pants hearing 'One Night Only (Deena's version)' from 'Dreamgirls', so I took them off really quick listening to Beyonce's which is superbly awesome.

today's one liner

It's official, I LOVE ROBERT BEST.

post-(non)drunk post

Current books read: A Long Way Down by Nick Hornby - music in ear: Scissor Sisters - watched dvd: Disney's Sport Spass Superstars

Some people are just not meant to be some things. My friend's brother for example. He got a really bad taste, so we decided that he wasn't born to be a designer, a decorator, or anywhere near a stylist. He has a damn good negogiating skills though. He's a diplomat. Not a very important one, but still, a good-to-look-up-to diplomat.

I, clearly wasn't born to become an athlete. I sucked in almost every sport I've tried out. Basketball? Suck at that one. Swimming? Too fucking hairy and don't have intention to ken-doll-ify myself. Tennis? Suck at this one too. Softball? Also insert suck-related phrase here.

Squash? I tried it once, but I lost 9-0 9-0 9-0 and 9-0 9-2 9-0 to a nice guy who supposed to be my so-called trainer, not butcher. Bowling? During some tens of games that I've played, I scored over 100 three times only, I think, and over 110 only once. Badminton? I can be a really good player in this one, had the rules stated that nets were not a fucking necessity.

What else have I tried .. hmm .. Volleyball? A good ball controller, but lack of strategy. I hallucinatively believe that I will rock in Beach Volleyball, though, eventhough I don't have all the bulging biceps, triceps, and pecs. Chess? Once check-mated by a friend in less than 10 steps, and it traumatized me.

I did got a tons of compliments from my PE teacher and classmates in my second year of junior high for jumping the highest at high jump, running the fastest in 100 m sprint, being the most flexible and foldable student in gymnastics, and scoring the highest in all first-mid, second-mid, and final tests. And he's not the pervert one of three of our three PE teachers. So I guess I will be OK doing tracks or gymnast.

But during last weekend only, I reckoned that I also was not born to be one of .... those people. Stick with me to hear the story.

Saturday. ca. 4pm.

I was just finished doing leg exercise at my gym and was ready to stretch my legs on my bed when...

Not me: Hey, you wanna go out tonight?
Me: Go out? (with a very audible worriedness)
NM: Yeah. A friend of mine from Madrid came and I kinda obliged to him showing the city around because he did it all the time when I visited Madrid. So?
M: Urgh... OK ...

I kinda wanted to go out, though. Because honestly, I rarely go out and once in like two fucking years won't hurt, right?

Saturday. ca. 7pm. 1st Bar.

NM: A bottle of [one of the beers that I have never heard of. It's Italian].
Madrid Guy: Beck's Gold.
M: Your best non-alcoholic cocktail drink.
Bartender or whatsnot: That'd be Ipanema.
M: Sounds great. [eventhough I don't really know what the hell is that]. I'll take it.

M [not out loud, bitterly]: I can't believe they will charge us 5 Euros for some cut lime, ice and ginger ale..

NM, M, and MG: yadda, yadda, yadda ... [having fun]

The bar was great though. I love their new decor kinda. They are having this sorta Beach Party theme for a month during summer. And it was nice. But since I wasn't planning to step on sands and have some sticking to my sweaty feet, it threw me off a bit stepping on those little sands.

Saturday. ca. 9pm. Hamburger Hafen.

We were walking around, reaching even Speicherstadt and Hafen City to show MG around. It's fun, interesting sight, awesome weather, but my legs hurt like hell.

Saturday. ca. 10pm. Hamburger Dom.

Hamburger Dom is always fun. But apparently, tonight was a quite special night. (1) It seems that there are more tourists then ever. (2) There are some a lot of Junggeseller Abschied (eng.: Bachelor Farewell) groups. (3) And also for the bride-to-be's. It was super funny to watch and see.

We were having another drink. MG ordered another Beck's, NM ordered Cola (he's driving), I ordered a baby-beer (Malzbier), or that's how the waiter called it.

And finally, visiting Dom means that another some kilometers walking..

Saturday. ca. 11:30pm. 2nd Bar.

I couldn't sit up straight (please, no pun here) on the bar bench. My legs totally hurts.

NM: Two Beck's Gold, please.
M: Spezi. (Yay! I love Spezi.) [But next time, I will wiggle the car keys in front of the bartender, so that he thought that I'm the one who's driving, without the sudden judgmental look what had this guy just done? Ordering a Spezi in my bar. Or perhaps it's only me thinking that he's judgmental. Hohhohoho..]

The bar was actually great though. The music was awesome. We didn't dance, but the dancing crowd is pleasing to watch. There was this point where we order the second drink, and of course M and NM ordered another alky. Me? I'm happy with bitter lemon. :) MG asked of course, why I don't drink. And I explained the fact of me being a moslem, and I don't like the smell anyway.

And then the funniest thing happened. The DJ played 'I Will Survive'. So I was like, teased them both, clapping hands, singing along, you know.. the usual stuff. Especially in the bridge part. The La-la.. La-la-la-laa la-la-la-la-la-la .. so on. The instrumental part. I mean, come on! It's the best part of the song, anyway. And MG said something like, "Wow.. I didn't know that they use Vodka for Bitter Lemon here in Germany."

The preceding paragraph proved that I don't need alcohol to act crazy.

Sunday. 3:00am. 3rd Bar.

I don't like this bar. Let's just don't talk about it.

[I didn't realize that this post will get this long .... ]

Sunday. 5:00am. Fischmarkt.

I can barely walk. First, I'm not wearing my walking shoes, walking sandals, or whatsoever. I was wearing my 'sexy-professor-vibe' sandals. Yeah, they are still there and have that 'sexy-professor-vibe' alright. :) The sandals that I was wearing, broke once in Jakarta, and I was so afraid that I will break it here, and can't find some man with a humongous talent to repair it eventhough he's only sitting on the sidewalk.

At least that was how my sister told me when she had the sandals repaired.

Second, I could barely stay awake. Because I don't usually spend a day without sleeping for more than 8 hours.

Third, my stomach was unbelivably very gassy, due to all the soda in my drinks. And you know what you want to do when you have a really gassy stomach right? You know, similar to that thing that someone probably do before they perform some kind of a supposedly traditional performance in some so-called competition in order to make them somewhat better from the gassy feeling.

Fourth, I haven't pooed on Saturday. So go figure..

Sunday. Some minutes before 8am. NM's place.

I successfully collapsed on his couch. The part of my stomach needing some attention? We cleared that up (pun intended) at Fischmarkt in a public loo.

Moral of the story: so you know that song by Alicia Bridges? How does it go?

Oh ... I love the nightlife. I got to boogie. On the disco' roooouuuuuund oh yeeeeeeah ...

Yeah, I'm not cool since I wasn't born to be one of those people.

High Fidelity vs High Fidelity

Current book read: A Long Way Down by Nick Hornby - watched dvd: High Fidelity, The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen

You know. If there were ever a T-Shirt with a sablon saying "I'm the newest biggest fan of Nick Hornby" on it, I will buy it right this second. I will buy it, and I will wear it like every day of the week until my afterglow is over. No, I won't wear it directly, of course. I will first cut off its sleeves first, like what I did to almost all my T-Shirts this summer, and then wear it.

Good Lord. Nick Hornby is awesome! He's an awesome writer! I mean, take High Fidelity, for example. The hero, Rob Fleming, (A) Does not resemble me. (B) Can not be someone I look up to, at least for now. (C) Does not remind me of any guy that I know. (D) Is really not the type of guy with whom I am usually friends with. But (E) Is so compelling, so that you will not feel sorry for yourself even after hearing him laments about his recent broke up with Laura.

The guy is so specifically characterized, until you'll say that, "I can't believe that there is a character so specific like Rob in a work of literature." The specific character make the guy real. And then sometimes you will see a bit of yourself in him. And then a bit of your friends. And finally, maybe Rob represents how men are. Or in this case, Hornby is so genius, so that he could draw what represents men in Rob. Breathtakingly genius.

Because of the five things that I thought Rob was, I lost so many times in the book. Sometimes I didn't know what I was reading. This is specifically, because I am not a Rob-musical kinda person. I'm not. And I won't be. I mean, my music? Blah. It's a mixture of a top 40 pop, musicals, and musical films, for God sakes. But I'm enjoying it. If I were friends with Rob, I would have eaten his rotten insults of my music. I'm not saying music taste, because clearly, I have no taste.

But seriously. Guys. GUYS! Read the book. Read. The. Book. You will not regret it. At least if you have countless commuting hours like I do, it will keep you company.

Now off to the movie.

The movie ... why did I need the movie? Hmm. Basically, I'm not the type of guy who after reading a book, I want to watch the movie to compare it, or vice versa. But sometimes I want to see how it translates. And this time, because I lost so many times during reading the book, I needed some directions.

There are some good news and bad news about the movie. The bad news is that, Rob is too clean, slick, cute, perfect looking. I know Hornby likes Cusack, but I'm not really. The redirection from London to Chicago sucks. And some of the Hollywoodification were too much.

The good news is, I LOVE Dick character. Love him. Now HE can be a good friend of mine. Gosh. And of course there is this thing.

You know, I loathe German productions. Especially their reality series. I hate all those all-time-favourite singles thrown into every moments literally. For example, take a house makeover series. And after some dreadful steps, the house is finally finished. The family who lived there will see it for the first time. In order to make them surprised, the producers put blindfolds on them and told them to open it after they were told to do so.

What happened then? The producer then abruptly throw a song like "One Moment in Time" when the family sees the new house for the first time, for believing that this was a one moment in the family's time. So fucking lame.

In High Fidelity, there are a LOT of chances for this lamity (if there is such a word) to happen. Throw a song here and there just because it fits literally. But no. Guess this is what makes them Hollywood, though. They saved it until the last time. The very fucking last time. We were just fed and fed and fed about the almighty song, and when it's there ...............

it's emotional.

So, yes. I was watching a boy movie. Based from a book that can make all the chick-lits writer wish that they could have had at least 5% of Hornby's talent. And it's not sad ending-y. But I cried.

HAH! No more tears and serious stuff and life-slash-future-related entertainment on Fridays. I'd better get me some Harry Potter.

Have a nice weekend!

today's one liner

Big Brother All-Stars: Awright people, nothing to see here, shoo, shoo, let's go home and have a cold bath, nothing interesting to see here..

today's one two liner

All jokes and dramas aside, the boys and the girls of ITB Choir (or is it ITB Students Choir, you guys?) snatched two golds and two silvers at the World Choir Games and made me real proud of 'em.

Congratz, guys...

project project runway. season one. episode eight. the explanation.

Current books read: A Long Way Down - another Nick Hornby's masterpiece - music in ear: Don't Feel Like Dancing by Scissor Sisters. Yay!

Achtung: Of course this post will contain spoilers of the first season. Who're you kidding?!

OK. I kinda have to admit it. Perhaps it's not the single best episode in reality TV ever made. Perhaps it owes everything to other episodes preceding it. But really, watching it the first time, I can really see every emotions of the competitions worn on the shoulders by every contestant on this episode.

Jay McCarroll.

Jay kept his character throughout this competition. Especially in this episode. He was so exhillirating, amusing, funny, cleverly witty. Typical Jay. Augusta Gloop? Oh. My. Gaw! ....

Nah, I lost it. I gotta see it again and refill myself with the euphoria. BRB! :)

PS: Miss Universe is so deadly boring! Even after I skipped a lot of stuff there, it was still. Hmph.

today's one liner

This Big Brother All-Stars episode that I just watched, episode 7, kicks some serious other Big Brother episodes' asses!!

today's one liner

Now, this is the proof that Ken Jennings deserved all that 2.5 millions that he cashed from Jeopardy!.

today's one liner

I'm really curious to know how did Kayne feel last night.

project runway. season one. episode eight.

A must-see episode for every reality TV fan. MUST! SEE! I got so euphoric just now, so follow-ups can be expected tomorrow or some days later.

Have a nice weekend.

transcript, schmranscript

Talking about transcript nowadays ...

Now take a look at this transcribing job. Gosh it made my heart beat faster, and made me miss Jed Bartlet.

No comments are allowed. I have excused politics out of my dinner table quite a while ago.

Miss Indonesia 2006 and Her Broken English

Current watched internet clip: Miss Indonesia 2006 early interview in Miss Universe 2006 errr.. Pageant

I don't mean to be rude, but I believe that this video, of Miss Indonesia being asked some daily life questions on sequins and ruffles (the questions not the miss), can turn straight guys gay. In order to turn them back straight, I attach her picture below.

I mean, come on! In 10 years ag(o)..?! My admire.. admirer is Mother Theresa?! Damp instead of them (Twice!)?! And the biggest shocker is .. Indonesia is a beautiful city?!

Quoting Joey, "That's it? Boy, you're lucky you're hot.."

Honestly, Miss, I would like to be on the same queue line with your fans. I would like to root you to snatch the title. Or if it is too much to ask, I would be more than willing to let you represent the face of my country. Beautiful, kind-hearted, sexy, good intentions, which I believe those things are you.

But the interview video is not the only thing you are offering me to root you as a representative for my country, right? Right?

So here's the deal. You have a team, right Miss? Ask your team to study who Verona Pooth nee Feldbusch is. On a second thought, you're half german, right? You must have known Mrs. Pooth, then.. If not, or it's too hazy, here's an article of her in german Wikipedia. Don't tell me you don't understand what's on it. Come on, now!

Tell your team that you have to turn this language malfunction to your benefit. At least now people are talking about your english rather than your I-can't-believe-she-struts-in-front-of-millions-in-a-swimsuit kinda thing. Be cute and irresistable and famous because you are making mistake exactly like other humans. Just like Verona. And I'm sure you will get more publicity than Janet Jackson. Prolly not, but a good shot anyway.

The reason I'm telling you this, is because I reside now temporarily in Germany and I know a lot (A LOT) of Indonesians who live in Germany surviving only with their broken german (I'm one of them, I must say), and my german friends think we are adorable. So there you go.

Remember: (1) There is no such thing as bad publicity. (2) a little flirt would have never hurt. (3) Even an english native speaker can have a language malfunction and survive the turmoil. Just watch the clip. So, cheer up!

So go out there, kick some ass and break a leg. But I hope you know what I mean by that last three words in the preceding sentence.

Now it's up to you, Miss, to think whether I'm being seriously sarcastic or being sarcastically serious. After all, you have the resource. You won a contest whose criteria is Brain, Beauty and Behaviour, for crying out loud. Or is it possible to win it by only having two out of three?

I'll be watching you to find out the answer by knocking on wood three times. Knock-knock-knock.

We're settled.

PS: This post is written mainly to support a gal that I know. I'm not sure if she still knows me, though. :) She's kinda having a rough time now because of a post like this.

morning post

Yesterday was hell. Well, at least I was having about an hour and a half superbly great time with drinking coffee .. umm .. caramel chocolate with a British guy. But apart from that, was hell. Horrible.

I learned my lesson, though. Sometimes, it is a good idea to spend the whole night wide awake. But perhaps it's not a good idea to spend it by digesting one full season of Sex and the City, because in the morning you will get Carrie-d away. What a sad pun.

It's also not a good idea to not spending the next day in a kinda hazy state because you're so sleepy, and then not eating for the whole day. During the day, I only had: a bite (bite!) of apple pie. Some glass of water. Of course, I can't live without water. A long-glass of hot Chocolate Caramel. A cracker. A bit of chocolate bread.

It left me with a spinning head at around 8 pm. So I arrived home two hours later by screaming, "You know that I didn't sleep last night, right? And guess what? I didn't eat at all during the day."

So there was I 20% awaken, 120% hungry, 90% tired, 22 pm in the night.

I think I wanted to get sick yesterday. It's subconsciously in my head when I need attention. I knoooww it's the most uncool thing to do. And I won't do it again. EVER! Now I know what's going on with the survivors.

Anyway, guys and girls, kick some ass in China!

sex and the city and i

Current books read: High Fidelity by Nick Hornby which had to wait for some days because of other activities - watched dvd: Sex and the City, season 6, disc 1-2-3-4-5

After I figured out that lots of people I mean LOTS of people in my circle are working overtime and some must stay until the wee hours this week, last night I suddenly had the mood to can not sleep. And it was successful. So successful so that I had to turn on the TV for company (and of course there's nothing there), and jam some DVDs into their players.

So I caught up with Carrie Bradshaw's Love Story a.k.a. Sex and the City. Season 6. The whole season. In one night. Guess how that made me feel now. Right..

But I kept thinking. In this era, where religion can be chosen from Hinduism to Hedonist, from Scientology to Oprah to Jedi-ism, when will Sex and the City will also be considered as one?

Oh God, no. I'm not having a Carrie Bradshaw moment here. Posing a question and then post it in their journal. :) No, no. Not me.

But don't you think it made sense? My sister already said to me one time, "I'm trying to pull a Carrie Bradshaw today. Do I succeed?" She's talking about the fashion. It must have been heard somewhere, "Well, Carrie said that ... " or "What would Carrie do?". Hmm..

But anyway. Sex and the City. Yes. I still can't project when what is being talked in that series can be applied in Indonesia. Or has it been?

For a start, dating game in Indonesia is being played on a completely different field. The procedure will be foreign, and what is seen in movies will seem .. bland, for me. Yes, bland, not blatant. And then it doesn't include sex. I know there's a lot of damn's because of that. And it includes a lot of Saturday nights. Which is tiring and boxing. And guess what, sometimes, it includes a lot of parents. WTF??!

So, Sex and the City, in Indonesia? Not in a million years. Just kidding. Maybe in a hundred. Well at least when I'm aware of Indonesian dating games. In the meantime, I have to catch up with Indonesia.

Gosh getting really drowzy now. Perhaps I should start the date with my pillow.

Cheers!

honestly, i don't know which i'm rooting for

Dirk is for France. Andreas is for Italy. Jürgen is for France. Geget is for Italy. Hammo is for France. Barney is for Italy. Harlie is for France. Philip is for Italy. (I guess) Rama is for France. Tanti is for Italy.

I was for Italy last Wednesday. I was for France later last Wednesday. I was for Italy Thursday. I was for France yesterday. Now I don't know which team I am for.

May the best team win, and let's take a sip of that drink to finish it.

Prost!

Update: Ew! What's up with Zidane?? I'm so for Italy.

Update (2): Err.. so congratz Andreas, Geget, Barney, Philip, and Tanti. :)

Update (3): Kottke has an interesting entry on this.

Update (4): Mazeratti denies, lip readers/translators can not be relied on.

i'd like to have a hair in my conversation, please

Current books read: High Fidelity by Nick Hornby. Gosh! It's amazing.. - expected TV program: Wimbledon Gentlemen's final

I have a feeling that people were born along with the hair that their hate. Hair is like your older sister, I think. You were born with it. You can change it if you don't like it. You like it shortly after you change it, but it won't stay long, and you know that you stuck with it for the rest of your life.

Last night on the ride, I caught a reflection of myself in Jürgen's car. And I blurbed out "Ich will Welle auf mein Haar..". Translations: I want curls on my hair. And he was like, "Then you can have mine, and I'll take yours." And I was like, "Seriously?!" Because I kinda like his hair. "Yeah! Because I really wanna have a straight black hair like yours. My hair is so shitty." And so on.

Mind you, this is the second time that I exchanged conversation like this with a friend. Some 6 or 7 or so years ago, I had a secret admiration to my housemate's hair. But I never tell. And then he once went to a barbershop and had a cut similar to mine. And I told myself, "See, that's the hair I'd like to have. Not this ugly one."

We were having dinner and the conversation went more or less like this.

Me: Hey, great new hair.
Not me: Yeah. Cut it this afternoon. Not quite the model I wanted though.
Me: Who're you kidding? It's great, regardless.
Not me: I don't like it. I actually trying to cut it like yours though. But I think our hair type is different, and I so want to have a hair like you.
Me: *speechless*

It's the way it is.

On that note, I won't miss this for the world. Let me repeat. FOR THE WORLD.

Have a nice sluggish weekend.

obsession, n. see Dreamgirls

Current books read: High Fidelity by Nick Hornby. Eventhough I'm not a music kinda person, love it, love it, LOVE IT!! - dvd watched: The Awful Truth, Hable con Ella

It's gotta be obsession, right. I am obsessed, right? I mean how else can you explain this behaviour.

My firefox opens three sites everytime I load it. Bloglines, gmail, and Wikipedia, english edition. And while waiting them open I keep pressing control+T, that's keyboard shortcut to open a new tab, and then type youtube.com and hit enter. After a while I type dream, hit down arrow, hit tab, and then hit spacebar, making sure that I wouldn't miss any Dreamgirls' latest trailer. If any.

What's that? Yeah I can hear you clearly. Obsessed, right? Problem is, it's still around 6 and a half months to go. Mensch.

Anyway, on the other side of the world, Wimbledon almost has its Traumfinale for the ladies' singles. I still hope that top 2 seeded players in Gentlemen's singles will reach the final. It will be very interesting to see the match.

On another side of the world, I still don't know if I'm gonna watch both last two World Cup matches. OK, if there is nothing to do, I'll watch. :)

Anyway, do you know what is better than gathering with some tens of thousands football fan and watching the game? It is scouring the city trying not to watch the game. We (almost) did it! And it's (almost) possible. And it's also (almost) so much fun. And of course I (almost) want to do it again.

Oh, by the way, the book that I am currently reading is awesome. AWESOME. I think it is more or less like Almost Famous the movie, but much better.

Sigh.. Have a nice weekend. I will. Tomorrow there's a birthday celebration, Saturday and Sunday there will be finals here and there.

melancholy on steroids

Current books read: High Fidelity by Nick Hornby

Judged by three (once) best friends of mine basing their judgment on Personality Plus by Florence Littauer, I came out as a sanguine-melancholic lad. I'd like to leave the sanguine side at home for today, and tag along the melancholic for the rest of the day.

I think people should know when to stop. They sometimes should just stop dreaming, reaching, doing stuff that is making them less preferable, or simply the stuff that they don't like or even like. I should stop. I should stop doing some things. Things which are kinda stupid and will eat me out for instance.

For a start. I should stop mumbling when talking to other people. I should say things clearly everytime I think of something and talking like I was in an interview. Or the days I had my presentations. Or the day I would win the Oscar. Gosh. It's impossible to win an Oscar if I kept mumbling. Imagine how the captions on websites will look like. "I think it's a great honor to [inaudible for 45 seconds]". Duh?

The reason for mumbling is that I care too much to what other people think about the things that I said. I should stop that. I should stop negotiating my own brain to think the best policy when it comes to communicating with people. Last night during a bus ride, there was a loaded guy who asked a cute girl he doesn't know, whether she watches football. The girl answered with a simple, "Absolutely not. I don't care about football even just a pint of it." And they ended up with having a good time on the bus with each other. And by time, I mean conversation and keep your dirty thoughts in the bottom drawer of the bathroom closet, please.

If she were me, or if I were her, I would have negotiated myself to answer the question that would make me look interested in the conversation. It may be kinda fake. But I just want the person to like me. Typical sanguine. I should stop doing that as well. Correction. I have stopped doing that. Now one of the concrete things to do is telling what I thought inside.

I should stop trying and give up talking in British accent. It's making me tired. Not tired of talking in such a way, but tired of repeating what I said. It's because (a) people are not so familiar with British accent, or (b) my accent sucks. I mean my pseudo-accent. I'm leaning towards b, though. But it's kinda difficult to drop. I like talking in British accent. I like the challenge to not speaking in American accent eventhough it is deadly difficult. I can talk all night saying "Monica daalin.." and so on. But I would NEVER EVER talk English in Indonesian accent. EVER.

I should also stop thinking that I am special. Come to think of it, I know for a fact that everyone is special. Each person is special in their own way. If the whole world is made up of special people, doesn't that mean that we are all ordinary?

And finally, I think I should stop writing post-emotional-breakdown, or private and subjective, or non-sensible entries like this. That means

finale .. o-o .. finale .. o-o-o-o ..

Current books read: Shopaholic and Sister by Sophie Kinsella. Not so good - expected TV program: Wimbledon matches - watched dvd: The Awful Truth season 2

Honestly, I kinda saw it coming. I mean, come on .. there were no fighting spirits in their (English and Brazil) last matches. English got lucky twice, and Brazil played all matches far below expectation.

Do I want France and Portugal to advance? Hell no. I hate France and cocky C. Ronaldo. Gosh. But come to think of it, this will turn out to be a great final after all. So one of two of this season's villains will advance, and (hopefully) will face Germany in the final.

And let's just support what's left wholeheartedly so that the good guys win the battle.

Eventhough a source close to mine (not to the guys) said that Germany 11 is not the most humble team there is either. Heheheh..

what a great weekend!

This weekend just couldn't get any better than this!


Huahahhahahahahaaaa...!!

I can still remember how I and some people around me tried to hold things up when the commentator said, "This is the first time in this competition that the boys are behind their opponent.."

I couldn't hear what the commentator said after Klose even things up.

When Lehmann saved the fourth 11 meter shot, I will always remember that emotion.

Lehmann is Le Man.. oh what a bad pun to write since I don't know how to write or read French.

Have a nice weekend, boys and girls..

give a W! give me an I! give me an M! give me a ... it's just too long to spell "wimbledon" by cheerleading, right?

Current books read: Shopaholic and Sister by Sophie Kinsella - music in ear: Scissor Sisters and Dreamgirls

I'm glad that this week world cup reaches his end of non-stop-match days. Today, the last two matches from the game of 16 round will be played. After that, I can concentrate for about two days in following another battle on grass court. The Wimbledon.

This year, I guess I'm rooting for Roger Federer to take the gentlemen's singles, and surprise, surprise.. Anastasia Myskina for the Ladies' singles. YAY!

Roger Federer, from Switzerland, will play a difficult draw. He's facing Richard Gasquet in the first round for example. The energetic Gasquet is one of the few players that has beaten Federer in two past years. Gosh..

But I'm sure he'll pull through. And then I'll have a newly founded respect for him. Plus the fact that he speaks fluent German, French, and English. I mean fluent fluent. I feel ashamed and abashed at the same time.

Anastasia Myskina reached the final in ... Eastbourne? (hehehe not sure) Lost to JHH in three sets, though. Honestly, I think she's the nicest Russian of the pack. Yes, she's a bit hefty in the smiling department, but I still think that deep inside, Myskina is kind-hearted. Plus, her fashion is just .. appropriate. Good to look at. :)

So anyway, Federer and Myskina. And I can't wait to see what Nadal can do this year on grass.

Dreamgirls will never leave you

OK, it's official. I'm gonna watch this super-short-early Dreamgirls teaser like one thousand times a day.

I linked the one which is not edited because the poster, JenCan on YouTube, has posted tons and tons to make you Dreamgirlsified. If there's such a word.

From the preview, I like the fact that Beyonce sings Beyonce, with little or no influence from Diana Ross or Sheryl Lee Ralph. Because that's how I wanted her to sound like. Just sound like her.

Jennifer looks really happy for just being able to revive the immortal role. I'm just so happy for her. Her vocal until now is still being kept from everyone.

But I will keep an eye on Anika. I think she'd blow everyone away..

And no, I'm not mastering the choreography.

Yet.

*beep*

Scheiße!!

Forgive my French. But still, Scheiße!!!

This thing always happens. Always happens. ALWAYS!!

So, recently I'm kinda rooting for these two teams in World Cup, alright? The germans and the swedish. Yeah, I reckon they will meet in the top 16, but who can blame the rules. Yesterday I so wanted Sweden to win so that they don't have to pack their bags earlier.

So the swedes drew, when Germany wins. They will meet in top 16 (what is 1/8 final called in English?). And I was so excited watching it happens. I checked out my gameplan calendar to check it out. When and where.

In the background, we were sitting in the kitchen of General Consulate of Indonesia in Hamburg. Talking how we will be excited to see the opening of "Der Traum von Bali" (The Dream of Bali) exhibition. I got two tickets to the opening!! Because I know the so-called project manager. Hehehe.. Frankly, he should be a role model for every Indonesian.

Back to topic.. After I secured two tickets, I checked the time, Oh, great, Saturday 1500 hours. I can rush to the Germany-Sweden game.

And then it struck me. At 1800 hours on the same day, I have a performance in University of Hamburg (the university that you ITB-Choir sang in two years ago). I will be having a performance at 18 o'clock. In the middle of Germany-Sweden game. The last chance to mis-pronounce while cheering on Ljungberg of Sverige, or huthing Huth.

But on the other hand, who will watch us perform? More importantly .. what will happen during that time? I mean, fuck with all 63 other games. I want to see this one!

OK, now I know how my dad feels everytime I nagged, "Daaadd.. I wanna watch Doraemon. You can read the result from the boxing tomorrow on paper anyway..".

Emotional breakdown starts now.

And, uh, by the way, because I got far too tired, I missed Anderson Cooper's interviewing Angelina Jolie on 360, of course.

morning news

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!! Oh my God!

The scream might be a high-pitched-borderline-girly one. But who won't have one after they read this article.

The article naming the latest contestants of Project Runway 3 introduces 15 designers, who one of them is named Michael Knight. That Michael Knight bit caught my eye, of course.

And there is an Ulrike Herzner.. Maybe she'll talk to Heidi far beyond the Auf Wiedersehen!

Hrrrh.. there goes my summer plans..

world cup and ramadhan

Football (since a little boy I have refused to call it soccer) World Cup is like Ramadhan. The month, not the man. You know that we are taught that we shouldn't miss each week of Ramadhan because there are different good things happening on each week. And those good things are reeeaaallly good so that you won't think of missing a week of Ramadhan.

So people who has one of their eyebrows lifted when one of the CNN anchors says, "The World Cup 2006 in Germany .." may ask question like, "Why should and who could stand a month of football?" Not just a month, but 64 games in like 32 days..

Well, you could, if you take the flow of the world cup into consideration.

You see in the first days, we (as the viewers) start to measure up the teams. Some start to rethink their predictions, seeing the first few games. Some of the games are not interesting, of course, especially when two on the bottom from each group meet.

Some days after, for about ten days is my favorite part. This is when some knowledge of conditional syntax may come in handy. If A wins, then if C draws, then B is out of the competition, else we still have to count the goals. And so on.. For the whole time.

I mean we (me and my music teacher) spent for like 40 minutes processing what will happen in Group B if Sweden would have been lost or draw yesterday. And it is only Group B. We can talk hours possibilities for other groups and other consequences of course.

For example, today, 7 days in, only three teams are ensured to advance to the top 16, only 4 teams were certain to kiss their dream to continue the competition goodbye. We can still talk about other possibilities for other 25 teams, which may result in a permutation that I refuse to do by head.

We connivingly thought that Paraguay will give Tri and To advantages so that Sweden would be out. Huahhahahaa..

Week 2. Honestly, who wants to miss the games in the top 16 and after? Maybe he does, but I won't.

I know, I may be the last man in your friends' circle to talk about football anyway. But no harm done in trying, right?

OK, gotta go getting some rehearsals.

something to read between commuting hours..

Ten Questions for the man..

The book written by the man..

The man's show blog..

Any review or YouTubed caps reporting Rufus Wainwright's last night concert.

But in the meantime..

Current books read: Can You Keep a Secret by Sophie Kinsella - huahahahhaa..

it comes, i see, and me likey!

It's here, mate! And currently, it is my favorite toy. So far so good, still installing navigation shift from mouse-based to pen-based in my brain.

comparing How Deep is Your Love?

Current books read: Bulletproof Web Design von Dan Cederholm. I hink I start to get the hang of it - music in ear: George Michael's Greatest Hits

Yesterday, I confessed to a random chatter (hehehe) that I thought Bee Gees' 'How Deep is Your Love?' is an unbelievably beautiful song. The reason is: Because it was so detailed.

My opinion was that the song was full of emotion (hey, that's another title!), all sung correctly. And then the Bee Gees' sounds are fairly distributed throughout the song. I mean it isn't festively decorated by the falsettos.

And then the dynamic and the tempo was on the money. It makes the song soothing, favorable to rock to, and still have the feeling of that 70's disco song.

And after a while of blabbing, the chatter told me: "I thought you were talking about the one from Take That..!" :-o. In all fairness, Take That's version did steal my attention back then. And I listened to it like 300 times during its glorious time. And because of that my knowledge of the song was totally ruined.

You see this morning I found a chance to drop by (again) to one of my favorite places on earth: YouTube. And the first video that I googled YouTubed was Bee Gees singing How Deep is Your Love?. And it turns out, that the lyrics are slightly different.

I just found out today (TODAY!) that the lyrics were supposed to be .. "How deep is your love? I really mean to learn". While Take That sang it "I really need to learn". and how about those "I feel you touch my hand in the pouring rain" as opposed to "I feel you touch me in the pouring rain?" Scandalous! Heheh..

But anyway, Take That's version introduces a slower tempo, which makes the song less dynamic and Gary Barlow sound so medok. Just watch and listen to it. And of course Take That sings everything much whinier.

But until today, I kept singing with when the "When I fall .." part (1:33 and 2:31 on Take That clip) comes along. Hahahah..

When I faaaaall...

He's (not) a manny?! (Said with a pint of Chandler Bing. Wonder what are Chandler's creators up to these days. Not working on Joey, right?)

Let yourself be confused.

Roland Garros, the semifinals

Current books read: Bulletproof Web Design von Dan Cederholm. It takes much longer because it's in German. :(( - music in ear: Dreamgirls ps: can't wait for the movie

Oooh.. I really can't wait to see the semis! Can't wait, can't wait, can't wait.

Just look at the names on the women's singles. And if everything went right and by the book, we will have the top four seeded players in the Men's Singles semi. I wish I could see Hamburg Masters Organizers' faces if Ljubicic were through today.

So in the meantime, GO NADAL! GO LJUBICIC! But after that, GO FED!!

As for the ladies, Vaidisova is totally surprising. But I'm for Kuznetsova to win their SF, and then Clijster on the other match. To take home the title, I haven't settled on anyone. More towards to Clijster, though.

In the meantime, remember the last time I blogged "What Would I Do?"? If not, here I remind you. One of the lines was written as follows: Once I was told, that all man get what they deserve. And damn, Phoebe Buffay! Because of her I kept singing it this way: Once I was told, that old man gets what they deserve.

OK, I have to go. I have a risotto to make. Or Bake.

hey big spendor

Hmm, this week is definitely going to be the week in which I will spend most money in a week. It's because of these things.

First, Frank and Tanja got back from the USA. If they found the time to buy me The Mole 1st season (a reality show which is hosted by the one and only Mr. Anderson Cooper) DVD, that means I'm out twenty bucks. I don't know if I should count the currency or not.

Second, cheap brand Augencreme, or in English eye cream (hmmm.. is this even correct?) costs around 9-11 Euro. And cheap brand Nachtcreme, or in English night cream costs around 8-10 Euro. I have no idea how those things are gonna work, I just told that I should try some. :-o BTW, If those thing are bought in Douglas, I don't know how much it'll cost.


3rd, I am the highest bidder in eBay for a thing that I had wanted since I knew that that kinda thing existed. It's a second-hand Wacom Graphire 3 Classic Graphic Tablet, that if it's bought in Wacom official store, it will cost me 56 Euro, without the mouse. With the mouse, it'll be 93 Euro. :-O. I got very lucky on eBay that day: my biggest competitor didn't know how to bid accordingly on eBay. I won by 22 cents only. Hahahaa.. And I got to pay some 60 Euro including the mouse. Yes! But that means I have to pay for it.


Fourth, I kinda fixed a date to cut my hair. And this time, it would be done by a friend of mine, which is also a professional hairdresser. I don't know how much he's gonna charge me for that.

Last, and definitely the least, I still wanna watch X-III, The Omen, and M-i-III in no particular order. And I should pay two tickets for The Omen.

Maybe this weekend is the right time to file bankruptcy .. to my mother. :)

Luckily I don't have any World-Cup-related expenses. Yet (?).

Shh! Don't talk to me now. Nadal is on court.

what will happen when you let public decide

1. Chris Daughtry got eliminated.
2. Lordi wins European Song Contest 2006. (Just search some keywords at Google. I totally lost interest..)
3. Wooden-face Wayne Carpendale wins Let's Dance and I never understand why the jury kept pumping him and his wooden-face and him. Totally overrated. (Let's Dance = German's Dancing with the Stars)

Sidenote: Bosnia is number three! YAY!

there should be a reason why after one thousand times hearing it i still can't memorize the refrain of 'no no never'*

Simply because, line 2 and line 7 of the chorus. Negative negation! Argh!

For those who watching, have fun tonight .. and do the line dance if it's possible. :-D

*'No No Never' is the official entry song for Germany in ESC. It is confirmed, I'm a bit obsessed and euphoric.

eurovision song contest after semifinal tidbits

Cirie and Kellie's pics are up. :) Quite a tardiness there.

Anyway .. From what I saw in the semifinals, I am so totally behind Turkey, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sweden, or Germany for ESC! Turkey, because I always mesmerized everytime I saw rubber Ken dolls on stage :-O. Plus the singer has an awesome voice and the song can't be sung by just any people. Eventhough the title is a bit weird and kitschy.

Hari Mata Hari (pictured on the right) from Bosnia and Herzegovina is simply by far the best male vocalist takes part this year. The BEST! I love hearing his singing voice. And his stage name is Hari Mata Hari for gosh sakes!


Sweden because I like the stage performance a lot. I think they made their point that ESC entry can be good eventhough it doesn't have young, bouncy, colorful, gimmicky, loud, singers and dancers and props on stage.

Germany because I am addicted to Dittsche. I think that is why they are voted through in Germany anyway. Eventhough all songs from the three German candidates suck, they suck the least, and they have Dittsche and Ingo as members.

But seriously, overall, I think Turkey (pictured on the left) deserves it. Or Germany. :D

I think, Lithuania can be the winner. But the song is just too similar to Genghis Khan. I mean using the concept of stadium songs with memorable words because it's too easy anyway. And it uses the lines dreadfully similar to the great great grandfather of stadium songs, i.e. We are the winners. What the ..??

I just found out that Spain is represented by Las Ketchup. The force behind Asereje, ja, de je, dejebe tu dejebe de sebiunova majabian de bugui an de buididipi. Please forgive any misspelling. And yes, I have checked it with my Spanish friends that it doesn't have any meaning.

By the way, Zakky's .. I mean Sakis' voice is quite pleasant.

Bet you don't know what I'm talking about.

ick! argh! ugh! boo! mpht!

Current books read: Timeline by Michael Crichton; Bulletproof Web Design von Dan Cederholm (auf Deutsch!!! :(() - expected TV program: European Song Contest 2006 Semifinal. Do. ZDF. 21 Uhr

Ick! Still no pics from Kellie (by now she's already "Kellie who?") and Cirie (by now, she's already "Cirie? Oh, I LOVE Cirie.."). A proof that sometimes or most times I'm just a lazy bastard.

Argh! Only yesterday morning that I realized that I COULDN'T GO TO EUROVISION SONG CONTEST 2006 FINALE PARTY AT MY FRIEND'S PLACE, because I have to perform in Bremen!! (Look under Samstag, 23:30 Uhr)* Huwwaaa.. And due to the fact that my performance is clashed with this Idol thingy of whole Europe, who will watch us then?

The conversation this lunchtime at my kitchen went like this.

Me (with disappointed face): Hey, I just remembered yesterday that on the twentienth, I have to go to Bremen.
Not Me: Twentieth?
Me: Ja. Das wäre Samstag.
Not Me: Samstag?
Me: Ja. Der Tag von Eurovision Song Contest Finale.
Me and Not Me: !! !! !!

There goes my Eurovision Song Contest drinking game.

Ugh! I just tasted my first beer. Before you throw a big fat eff-ing "what" to my face, it's Malzbier, by the way. A close friend of root beer. And you know what? It tasted so good so that I think I got addicted to it.

I just hope that it won't give me any Bierbauch. :)

Boo! That is all I said when I sadly saw Roger Federer apologizing for withdrawing his participation in Hamburg Masters on TV. Thank God, I haven't bought any Dauerkarte .. umm tiket terusan (I don't know what it is in English) so that I don't have to be disappointed emotionally and financially.

I mean, let's face it. For me, everyday is a very emotional moment when I have to pass another advertisement poster showing Federer and Nadal with a boastful claim that it will be the peak of the tournament as the clash of the two biggest current rivals. True, though.

So I was extremely torn of buying or not buying the ticket because of it. I mean, I think Nadal will prove me wrong: saying that he is a one-hit wonder as he won Roland Garros last year, just like other spaniards. It was almost proven when he lost early in Wimbledon and US Open. However, he is definitely not a one-hit wonder on clay. Hmm..

And last week in Rome, witnessing Federer's disappointment is just .. disappointing. Here it is a guy with three back to back grand slam title but lost everytime he faces Nadal. And both are great guys. Nadal is pleasant to watch with his energetic expressions, while Federer is ... Federer.

Ah well. But I bet the chairman of the tournament was like, "WTF WTH WTMF??!!" when he heard that both guys are pulling themselves out.

Mpht! After some disappointment, how about singing a song?

I'm never ever gonna leave you to cry on your own
Never ever gonna not go and pick up the phone
I'm never ever gonna let you be chilled to the bone
No, no, never
No, no, never
I'm never ever gonna leave when you're lost in the storm
Never ever gonna not keep you safe where it's warm
I never ever will desert you when your heart is torn
No, no, never
No, no, never

Seriously, I can't kick it out of my head.

I wonder if Dittsche will still air on Sunday.

*I really hate websites with frames.

counting platonic friends

Current books read: The Sky is Falling by Sidney Sheldon - boring

Four.

Zentralbibliothek Bücherhalle Security.

I go there like twice a week in a rare occasion. Most of the times, three times or more. I think his shift is early monday wednesday friday and late tuesday thursday saturday. I'm not sure, though. I suck at remembering days. However, I encountered him again when it turns out that he is also a security guard at Völkerkunde Museum.

The start of the platonic friendship is when I was like, "Hey." And he's like, "Hey." We know each other's presence.

The Gym Boy.

He is awfully young. Around 21 or 22 I think. Every Sunday afternoon, when the gym opens, almost certain that he will be there. That is when I kept bumping into him. Sunday afternoon.

One day, there was this guy, who's a bit full of himself, confident and all, kept doing stupid stuff that even I got so embarassed for him. Let's call this guy Ulf. During that day, I was all smiles everytime Ulf did his stupid stuff. The Gym Boy as well. All smiles I mean, not did stupid stuff.

And then Ulf made us laugh together. You see, at that time, our gym's hair dryer is not working, so people must go to the reception area to borrow it and normally, people will go back to the changing room to dry his hair in there.

What did Ulf do? He asked for a hair dryer, and then plugged the hair dryer, right there. In the reception area. You know, wiggling his head, blowing his hair (and only God knows what is also in there) everywhere in the reception area, seen by all people working out.

I witnessed this from a mirror at the back of the room. And so did The Gym Boy. My reaction was a clearly audible "O. My. God.". Shortly after, The Gym Boy looked at my looking direction, and we both laughed.

So the platonic friendship is like, everytime I caught him in the eye, I smiled, and so did he. We never talk, but we always share the memory of Ulf.

The Döner Restaurant Owner.

I respected him a lot. He supports his family by keeping a Döner Restaurant in Dithmarscher Strasse. The Döner, is not the best in Hamburg for sure. But one of the best. He's so friendly and non-annoyingly talkative.

There was a time when I visited him like twice a week. And because of that, of course we started to notice each other's presence. Or he started to notice me.

Around two weeks after, he started to start conversations. You know, the normal conversation between a customer and a seller. How's your day?, Having Feierabend?, Going to sport?, and all.

We talk, but we don't know our names.

The Usher or Studio Guard in BSM 21.

Eventhough it was deadly far from the place that I lived in Bandung, BSM 21 is my favorite place to watch a movie in Bandung. It's somewhat cheaper than it's fellas in Jakarta, it has THX in studio 1, it's in a mall, and because it is so far away, not so many people (or half uniformed after-school students) went there, and it's new (CiWalk wasn't even planned yet).

I went there normally during the day, so there are only two mbak-mbak twenty one working as cashier, two mbak-mbak twenty one working as usherette and two bapak-bapak berbaju safari as ushers. One of the bapak-bapak is the youngest bapak-bapak berbaju safari I have ever seen.

The platonic thing started when he started to look at me in the face with the expression of asking himself this question: Where did I know this guy from? And it was growing when his expression was saying: My God, he's already watching another movie? Doesn't this guy have a life or something?

And of course the platonic thing was more as a cat & mouse relationship because I always hid snacks and drinks in my bloated bag (who am I kidding not stopping by Hero and buying some chocolate bars and smuggle them in) and he always suspected that I did that but never dared to ask me to open my bag.

I think he was always torn between, Hmm.. he's a faithful customer and hmm.. why is that bag unnaturally bloated everytime.

We never talked. Well, I kept saying, "Makasi Mas." everytime after he tore my tickets. But that's all. Currently, I can't figure out how his face looks like, or how's he doing now.