romansa metromini

Those deafening sounds of car engines and honks and human’ shouts piercing through your ears.

That smoke-infested air filling your lungs and making your eyes water.

Those rubbish scattered all across the roads.

Those dirty buses with funny graffiti and naughty paintings.

Those crazy drivers and pedestrians who don’t seem to care about basic rules of driving and traffic.

Today I went to Kampung Melayu to hop on a bus for the first time after 5 months of separation. Seems like I’m the only one who’s moving on. Seems like I’m the only one changing. I felt like as if it was my first time.

Maybe this is called homecoming-craziness syndrome, but really, while 5 months ago I detested Kampung Melayu, now I came to fall in love with the scene.

“Oh come on, it’s not like I’ve gone for 5 years or so,” I kept saying to myself.

When I settled myself on one of the bus seat, I started observing around and, well, feeling the moment and letting it to sink in.

It never occurred to me that I would miss those Bataks shouting and cursing across buses, those lunatic grannies and kiddos hopping into and out of the moving bus like bunnies, and even those irresponsible smokers smoking their cheap tobaccos and spreading that carcinogenic smoke all over the bus and inducing asthmatic attack.

And don’t even start with street musicians cum beggars. I heart street musicians - I never give them any money though, no pain no gain, man! They may sound as messy as can be, but sometimes they’re damn good and always entertaining. It’s like, Bang Toyib is perfect soundtrack for public transportation! Or maybe I just like some music on the road.

I still hate those begging kiddos though.

It also never occurred to me that taking a bus home could be so inspiring. I looked around, admiring those blipping 5-watt light bulbs making the tired faces of the people appeared and disappeared. I felt the wind coming from the sides, and while it wrecked my hair, the effect on certain people’s hair was dramatic.

But the thing I love the most about metrominis is the feeling of life’s hardships. I saw people coming home from work, trapped in their routine essential for their survival. I saw street musicians, reciting their usual have-a-nice-trip-but-give-us-money talk before playing their not-so-perfect-but-they-got-to-do-it-anyway tunes. I saw beggars trying to cash in easy money. I saw drivers and keneks, stopping their buses anywhere they want just so they can earn more. I saw journeying people, willingly inhaling that unhealthy air and sitting on iron plates called seats just so they can have a cheap trip.

Just the kind of Jakarta-ish hardships you won’t find in countries like Singapore, where everything just seems numb and robotic, at least for me who is used to living in Jakarta. I know now that I still need to see that raw desire of survival coping in big cities infested with capitalism.

Oh well, I’m no expert in economics or sociology or anything anyway, so I don’t have rights to crap about survival and infrastructure in Jakarta anymore than this.

kewlness

i found these indisputably best quotes on tees ever on threadless.com

A quote from Wikipedia (lazy ass):

"Designers upload their t-shirt designs to the website, where visitors and members of the community score them on a scale of 0 to 5. On average, around 1,500 designs compete in any given week. Each week, the staff selects about ten designs.^[3] Each designer selected receives $2,000 in cash, a $500 gift certificate (which they may trade in for $200 in cash), as well as an additional $500 for every reprint"

Threadless has included several famous artists such as tokidoki and native Indonesian brand, balletcats. Often boosting their names in the industry. Maybe I'll send a design someday, hahahahah.

Check more awesome graphic and typography tees on the site!

Sok tahu

Sepatah dua patah kata sebelum Anda membaca entri berikut:

Saya sedang dalam delusi berlebihan yang membuat saya besar kepala dan sok tahu. Maaf kalau menyinggung.

Satu hal yang paling membuat saya kesal adalah orang-orang yang ketika ditanya tujuan hidupnya apa, menjawab "jadi orang kaya". Atau teman-teman saya sendiri yang kalau ditanya kenapa masuk suatu jurusan jawabnya "gampang dapet kerja" atau "gajinya gede".

Saya tau kok, dengan uang, hidup bisa menjadi lebih mudah dan memang hidup yang layak bergantung pada uang. Tidak salah juga kalo ada orang yang bilang dengan uang, banyak hal menjadi mungkin. Uang = aspek praktikalitas dari hidup.

Kalau contoh ekstrimnya, saya mengutip 5Cs-nya Singapura. Entri dari Tante Wiki adalah sebagai berikut:

"The 5 Cs of Singapore, namely: Cash, Car, Credit card, Condominium, and membership(s) of Country club are a term relating to materialism found and used widely in the Singapore Singlish lexicon. It arose as a popular joke based on certain truths attesting to the unstated Singaporean cultural ethos of materialistic obsession and aspiration to achieve these things in order to impress others, both socially, economically and sociologically."

Kalau saya membayangkan kehidupan yang berorientasi uang seperti ini: kerja keras --> harta berlimpah --> foya-foya dan hidup senang --> kerja keras lagi supaya tambah kaya --> foya-foya lebih heboh lagi, dst, dst, dst, dan mati.

Sebuah siklus yang mengutamakan kekinian dan berakhir dengan hampa. Oke mungkin saya ekstrim.

Uang dan gaji dan finansial memang harus selalu menjadi faktor yang diperhitungkan, tapi, ya ampun, hidup di dunia ini nggak sekedar tentang uang dan bagaimana kita harus hidup bahagia damai sentosa.

Saya percaya kalau dunia tidak akan menjadi berubah kecuali kita, saya dan Anda, berubah. Dan saya berani bilang kalau dunia hanya berputar di sekitar saya dan Anda. Karena ada alasan mengapa kita masih hidup di abad ke-21, di dunia yang masih ada permasalahan seperti kemiskinan, kelaparan, wabah penyakit, demoralisasi manusia, pemanasan global, dan lain-lain-lain-lainnya.

Karena kalau kita tidak meminta kita tidak mendapat apa-apa. Karena kita diciptakan untuk mendobrak ekspektasi. Karena yang menghambat kita adalah diri kita sendiri. Karena kalau bukan saya dan Anda yang bertindak, tidak ada yang bertindak.

Jadi, tolong, jangan jawab pertanyaan "apa tujuan hidup Anda" dengan "uang" atau "harta" atau "kaya" atau "hidup senang" atau "gampang dapet kerja" atau "gajinya gede". Bahkan menjawab "tidak tahu" pun masih lebih baik, paling tidak masih membuka diri pada kesempatan-kesempatan untuk berkontribusi pada komunitas. Saya percaya selalu ada jalan berkontribusi pada masyarakat tidak peduli pekerjaan atau bidang yang digeluti.

Lakukan sesuatu pada hidup Anda. Adalah sia-sia menjadikan diri sendiri objek uang.

Dunia adalah objek kita.

white as milk

i changed the icons in my mac, now they all look nicer!! :)

credit goes to panic & iconfactory!

reverse

Indulging myself in dreams,

I have to go back to what I should do,

And I stripped it off once again.

I change my skin to hide from the sun.

Go backwards, do not.

I left something behind but I have to move forward.

REVERSE

i have to move forward but i left something behind.

Move backward

Do not change my skin to hide from the sun,

I stripped it off once again.

And I have to go back to what i should do,

indulging myself in dreams.

Inspired by: