the challenge is up again!

it's been ages i didn't come to this habit of writing. since i'm super free today, i visited the one minute writer blog. and the title for today is wishing upon a star.

we (indonesians) do not have habit of wishing upon a star. chineses pray upon a moon, moslems look for constellation to date the eid mubarak, hinduists don't particularly fond of star ( i guess, as far as i know), and yes the stars led the christians to baby jesus. we don't really buy the concept of wishing upon a star. is a meteor considered a star? yes, a falling star, huh? ok, then we pray upon a star. it's a urban legend, i guess, more to the effect of watching korean's and taiwanese's movies.

anyway, i wish upon a star that someday i will run my own day care center. it won't be a formal school, just a small intimate day care center will be wonderful for me. when i ponder it now, it seems far away. hopefully, i can practice and have more faith in the power of dream.

Manner, where art thou?

we have been taught to behave well since we were young. as for I myself as a chinese, manner matters. it shows not only how good i am as a person but also how good my parents raise me. and in chinese culture, "saving the face" is crucial. so we better watch our manners, or our parents will do. and it's not gonna be nice.

i believe i behave well and i keep my manners good enough (yes, it's a self confession). and during my time working with children, teachers are forced to behave well every second, at least in front of children and parents. children can pick up any misbehaviour quickly. so, during my two and half year time, we (teachers) remind and support each other to behave well. we appreciate people who have good manner.

now, the point is that not all people practice good manner. "sorry, please, and thank you" are the basic words that you use to show manners. we remind every kids and ourselves basically every day to keep close with those words. and kids pick them up quite well. but how about adults? they seem to forget those words. the older you are doesn't mean you have better manner. nope! shockingly i found that even directors, with such high position and degree, do not necessarily pratice manner! it's upsetting for me. because when people with low socio-economic background do not practice manner, you can give yourself excuses. but when peope with high socio-economic background do not practice manner, what is your excuse?

moreover, when people are being nice to you, can you be nice too? i'm not a hypocrite, if people do nasty things to you, you can either slap that person or still being nice. but when people are being nice to you, please please please be nice! what privilege do you have to be nasty to other people? humans have same beginning (birth) and same ending (death)-Morris, in what sense you think you are higher than others so that you can be nasty to others? seriously it's ridiculous. stop acting childish and behave, adults!

have a wonderful day

there's a notice on upgrade thingy in my dashboard today. i'd normally ignore it, but my finger was kinda "itchy", so i clicked this blogger update (please be aware that i'm computer idiot), and i was amazed! my dashboard looked so cool now! and they have this stat, it's written that my blog has been viewed 1.516! seriously! there's always no comment in my posts so i thought nobody checked my blog. therefore, i wanna thank to everyone who checked my blog, accidentally or not :p

another shocking thing happened to me this week was when i read joel osteen's daily reading from your best life now. oh yes, it's been ages since i posted something spiritual. but i just wanna share a bit here:

the scipture says, "be confident of this. he that began a good work in you will continue to perform it until it's perfectly complete" (see philippians 1:6). god is never going to quit working on us. he's not going to get halfway through and say, "i am tired of dealing with you." "you keep making that same mistake." "you've got so many faults, i've had it with you." no, god is going to keep working on us until he shapes us into the people he wants us to be. 

pg. 67

i bought this book mid of last year. when i was reading it at first, i couldn't relate myself to any of the topics brought up. for me, it's too hypocrite. till recently i reopened the book, and this paragraph shocked me and opened my eyes. the verse is a popular verse, many have quoted it, but i only understand it yesterday. i guess i have to give myself a bit more respect and a lot of gratitude to god.

have a wonderful day.

photograph of the month: august 2011

i was so excited to see a bee buzzing around in my garden. and my excitement got bigger when i saw these birds and caught a decent photograph. happy!

photograph of the month: july 2011

when i opened my agenda, i went through my resolution for this year. barely a quarter have i checked the list. sigh...

trying to catch up with some small resolutions... hwaiting!

urban jazz crossover 2011

the most awaiting concert was finally here! we'd been wondering around when it'd be held. as soon as yenty heard the news that its' coming, she was so busy informing me and getting the ticket. she had waited this concert for so long. thanks to yenty, she got the tics both of us :)

as expected the concert started late. so we had time hanging around and bought the concert t-shirts! gotta wear it soon.

the atmosphere and the props outside the concert room was almost similar to last year. but this year, they gave us this black bracelet with brown 'urban jazz crossover' words on it. it's kinda cool.

the opening band of the nite. the guitarist is so cool!

finally i got the chance to see this diva sing live. and she is diva.

she is 100% talented and sweet. the next big star.

who said if you are not the winner of indonesian idol, you can't survive in music industry? he can, because he is damn good!he is so wild and sexy!he made the jazz rocky for the nite!

i like the visual effect happening behind him.the master of reggae "ras muhamad" made the crowd danced to his rhythm. the famous ari lasso.his voice vibrated the room.the master mind of the concert this year.artists in action!

the concert was closed pretty wild.

compared to last year, personally i think it's a lil' bit jazzier, a very lil' bit. but the atmosphere was definitely merrier last year. i didn't see the artists performed as solid as last year. but the concert's surely refreshing after a hectic week.

world trip! (day 2 & day 3)

day 2 and day 3 were mostly spent by shopping and eating time. as my bro's wed party approached, i was assigned to buy bling bling silver party shoes for me and my sis. and they were damned difficult to find. finally we got two pairs! when we almost gave up. thanks chan and pak for your patience accompanying me shopping. i got a unique wallet too from bonita. and that's all for shopping session :p

and here we go for eating session.

day 2: we met choon foong for sing-k! sing-k in m'sia is totally different, as in the atmosphere, food, and definitely song selections. i had no idea that kok is into sing-k too. we got our brunch here and sang our heart out.day 3: we landed at jojo's little kitchen, which specialized in pan mee. and they rock!

mine; the spicy onechan's; the soup onepak's; look at the egg yolk! yum...

then we met sook chin and yee yin (do i spell their names correctly?) for lunch/afternoon tea, catching up with each other's life. it's somehow deliberating to have someone to talk, to rethink our passion (and reality too), and to support each other. it's surely girls' day out @ delicious.

chan's quite disappointed with the mushroom soup. the mushroom was kinda rough, or in another word, it's too mushroomy... :ppak's strawberry short cake. it's very fresh! mine; classic chocolate vanillayee yin's chocolate brownies, so yummy and so choco sook chin's spaghettisoda rose

another highlight of this trip was i finally got the chance to see chan's collection. it's kinda freaky actually (sorry chan!) to see so many mice in one room if you don't get used it. but i think she's definitely passionate of mouse since she collects not only dolls but also books and movies about mouse. and i can say it's costly. salute!

it's just a few from a big collection of herchan's nephew and niece. her niece called me "pheng you". do i look that young? :p

after a very full homey and yummy dinner cooked by chan's family, we still went to have our supper at sweet hut.

mine; a healthy onechan's; the mango loverpak's; almond & chocolong life supper! will surely miss our supper moments...

world trip 2! (day1)

after crossing out so many exciting destinations, we fell to this option. it fit our time and budget perfectly. our second world trip destination is malaysia! ahha!

it's great that we could meet up again. and it's the real point of making 'world trip', to make a little time just for ourselves, catching up with each other and just have fun. that is not easy to do in today's world.

but, i made a big stupid mistake by not charging my cellphone on my arrival day, which made chan and pak had difficult time finding me. luckily it's only lcct :p chan's parents picked me up and drove us home safely. thanks and sorry aunty and uncle!

our first hit the next morning was bagan lalang. it's a family beach, i guess. we didn't really prepare ourselves coming to the beach. my tips for future reference for anyone who wanna go there are bring your family as many as you can (coz the more, the merrier!), bring food and mat, and don't forget to bring hats or sun block (very important!).

what day is today? it's malaysian's independence day! :)

sort of a 'must' pic on beach a declaration that we've been here :ptugs of war (fun game to play on beach) :)chan was forced to take every shell that pak saw :p

in indonesia, we have this mitos that if we gush our breath toward the shell, it eventually will come out. but when we tried, it didn't work. chan thought that i fooled her. perhaps only indonesia shells do that.

we saw this family (dad, mom and son) was busy looking for shells. but this mom definitely took my attentiontoward afternoon, we saw many stands selling windmills and kites. i didn't have chance to shoot the kites ;(

sepang gold coastwe waited for minutes to get visitor pass to enter the resort. it's worth waiting.

my dream pic, yatta! (should practice more though)

toward the lunch time, we headed to a very famous restaurant around the area. and the problem with a very famous restaurant is there are lots of tables and hungry mouths to be served. so it takes lots of time. after waiting for few minutes, we went to another place to eat. we could see several people whom we also met at previous restaurant. the result was the same, we waited so long...

finally the food came! bon appetite :)seafood and a glass of beer, what else could i ask for more?

recharged after taking lunch, we went to the famous love/ couple bridge. what can you see there? of course, couples, lots of them. making me jealous? hmm... a bit. actually i wanted to see some dead fish on the bridge, but couldn't find one :p i think the biggest question is "what's there at the end of the bridge? a pot of love? a magic love wand? love powder? cupid? lover claim station?"

NOPE! the answer was a fisherman! (enjoying his time fishing and ignoring every lovey dovey things going on around him. so proud of him!we reached the love/ coupld bridge! look at our hair! like these :)

throwing all of the lovey dovey behind, we went to this mushroom house. you can see many mushrooms and mushroom products you've never ever imagined. love their drink products.

i love this mushroom. they look like a dorayaki, don't they?