AMAZING!
Tanah airku tidak kulupakan
Kan terkenang selama hidupku
Biarpun saya pergi jauh
Tidak kan hilang dari kalbu
Tanah ku yang kucintai
Engkau kuhargaiWalaupun banyak negri kujalani
Yang masyhur permai dikata orang
Tetapi kampung dan rumahku
Di sanalah kurasa senang
Tanahku tak kulupakan
Engkau kubanggakan
An amazing song sang by Ada Band and Gita Gutawa. This used to be my favorite song ever.
But listening to this song again drowns me into the ocean of sadness. I wish I can just skip September. Or I wish I can just be in a comma, so that when I wake up, October welcomes me with a smile. I don’t know what to expect. What I know is that… reality is cruel and I’m not ready to face it. I’ll never be ready.
I just finished watching a very interesting TED presentation by William Li about a new way to treat cancer and other diseases. He introduced a new term which I hadn’t heard about: angiogenesis, which is the process involved in the development of new blood vessels. As we all know, blood vessels are one of the most essential parts of circulatory system that transport blood throughout the body. There’re about 19 billion of these blood vessels exist in our body. The amount of blood vessels that are present at any given time are controlled and regulated by our body. These vessels can either grow to form new blood vessels or can be pruned back to remove excess blood vessels to baseline using simulators and/or inhibitors of angiogenesis.
However, everything does not always run smoothly. Defects in the system do exist; i.e. when the body can’t prune back extra blood vessels or can’t prune grow enough new ones in the right place at the right time. In these situations, angiogenesis is out of balance, which results in a myriad of diseases. For example, insufficient angiogenesis (not enough blood vessels) can lead to wounds that don’t heal, heart attacks, and nerve damage; while excessive angiogenesis (too many blood vessels) can lead to cancer, blindness, obesity, and Alzheimer’s disease. The interesting thing is that: there are more than 70 major diseases that actually share abnormal angiogenesis as their common denominator. And the new way to tackle these diseases is by controlling angiogenesis!
Let’s take a closer look at cancer. Well, everyone of us has microscopic cancers in our body. These cancers are small, microscopic nests of cells that can only grow to one half a cubic millimeter in size (which is as small as the tip of a ballpoint pen). They can’t get any larger due to lack of blood supply (no oxygen & nutrients). So they’re not dangerous at all, until they get a blood supply. As Li said, “the body’s ability to balance angiogenesis, when it’s working properly, prevents blood vessels from feeding cancers.” That means, we can prevent cancers (and other diseases) by blocking angiogenesis and preventing blood vessels from reaching cancer cells, right?!
In fact, there’s a so-called antiangiogenic therapy/drug which aims at cutting off the blood supply to cancers. It seems quite promising! I seriously have never heard of it before. It seemed to me that chemotherapy was the only way to fight treat cancers. But of course, anti-angiogenesis drugs do have side-effects, some of them are quite serious. In fact, the risks of using these drugs might actually outweigh the benefits. I haven’t done quite an extensive research on this but I found that these drugs may result in tumor recurrence at many sites in the body. Scary, but I think more research needs to be done about this.
Now, the question continues: what could we add to our diet that’s naturally antiangiogenic, that could boost the body’s defense system and beat back those blood vessels that are feeding cancers? So here are the list of some foods that we can eat:
🙂
On this day, you read something that moved you and made you realise there were no more fears to fear. No tears to cry. No head to hang in shame. That every time you thought you’d offended someone, it was all just in your head and really, they love you with all their heart and nothing will ever change that. That everyone and everything lives on inside you. That that doesn’t make any of it any less real.
That soft touches will change you and stay with you longer than hard ones.
That being alone means you’re free. That old lovers miss you and new lovers want you and the one you’re with is the one you’re meant to be with. That the tingles running down your arms are angel feathers and they whisper in your ear, constantly, if you choose to hear them. That everything you want to happen, will happen, if you decide you want it enough. That every time you think a sad thought, you can think a happy one instead.
That you control that completely.
That the people who make you laugh are more beautiful than beautiful people. That you laugh more than you cry. That crying is good for you. That the people you hate wish you would stop and you do too.
That your friends are reflections of the best parts of you. That you are more than the sum total of the things you know and how you react to them. That dancing is sometimes more important than listening to the music.
That the most embarrassing, awkward moments of your life are only remembered by you and no one else. That no one judges you when you walk into a room and all they really want to know, is if you’re judging them. That what you make and what you do with your time is more important than you’ll ever fathom and should be treated as such. That the difference between a job and art is passion. That neither defines who you are. That talking to strangers is how you make friends.
That bad days end but a smile can go around the world. That life contradicts itself, constantly. That that’s why it’s worth living.
That the difference between pain and love is time. That love is only as real as you want it to be. That if you feel good, you look good but it doesn’t always work the other way around.
That the sun will rise each day and it’s up to you each day if you match it. That nothing matters up until this point. That what you decide now, in this moment, will change the future. Forever. That rain is beautiful.
And so are you.
* A beautiful piece by Iain Thomas @ I Wrote This For You.
A very funny and entertaining video discussing about issues concerning Ramadhan (e.g. moon sighting wars, super speed taraweeh, 8 vs 20 rakaats, etc). This video serves as a reminder for all of us, the Muslims around the world 🙂
I remember I borrowed the book Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman’s Search for Everything Across Italy, India, and Indonesia when I was in Australia 3 or 4 years ago. I couldn’t follow it for some reasons. After few pages, I dropped to sleep. I borrowed the book because it was the best-selling one and it had Indonesia in it! Perhaps, I should just watch the movie! 😀
One thing that disturbed me when I watched the trailer of the movie was when Julia Roberts said:
I’m going to Italy, India, and I’m going to end the year in Bali
Why Bali, I wonder, instead of INDONESIA?!? Arghhh. People always think Bali is a country by itself. I’ve met some people in Australia who didn’t know where Indonesia was (Oh yeah, talk about ignorance!), but knew where Bali actually was! How ironic! Let’s learn geography, shall we?
There was a very interesting presentation today at the mosque about card fraud, known as “skimming”. Skimming is the type of card fraud which copies magnetic stripe cards to produce duplicates. Honestly, I’ve never known anything regarding this type of scam! I was quite shocked that this could happen. I was even surprised to know that the Netherlands is one of the European countries most targeted by skimmers, mainly from Eastern Europe. There have been over 900 reports of skimming in this country according to this website. It’s indeed scary!
I’ve never paid attention to this honestly. I mean, every time I take money from ATM or buy my train tickets from the ticket machine, I never be suspicious of anything. Now that I know, I should have been more careful!
So, how can we avoid to be the victim of skimming?
Hope it’s useful 🙂
This is a video titled “Jakarta in Jeopardy”. It was uploaded about 2 years ago but I’ve never watched this til now. It’s very interesting. I always heard about how Jakarta could be sinking in few years time and I didn’t know if this argument came from experts / scientists or from people speculating on those issues 😛
But in this video, my doubts were cleared. Jakarta is indeed sinking. The city is expected to be about 1 meter lower than the current position — thanks to the ground water extraction done by most households and business as well as industrial giants in Jakarta. When a city develops, it gets heavier. As much water from the ground gets extracted, the whole city gets pushed downwards. So this can also be the reason why Jakarta is flooded during the time when no rains fall. Because of the sinking Jakarta — it sinks below sea level, unfortunately.
The flood that frequently occurs in Jakarta is also caused by two main reasons: urban development and rubbish. Development can’t seem to stop, every 2 years I go back to Jakarta, I always see new huge buildings or malls built. It fascinates me how fast Jakarta grows. But unfortunately, the rate of Jakarta’s maintenance runs slower than its development. And our government doesn’t seem to care about this. Can we safe our Jakarta?
According to Wikipedia, The Netherlands is a geographically low-lying country, with about 20% of its area and 21% of its population located below sea level, with 50% of its land lying less than one metre above sea level. But somehow, the canals and rivers are clean, free of garbage, and most importantly have never caused any floods for the past 40-50 years! Amazing, isn’t it?
I myself think that Jakarta is not “livable” anymore. It’s waaaaay too crowded! Let’s just move to another city then 😛
Mother’s Day is celebrated today in the Netherlands. And although Indonesians celebrate it on 22 Dec, I just want to post this great song titled Bunda (Mother) by an Indonesian singer Melly Goeslaw; dedicated to all the great mothers in the world, including my beloved Mama. I miss you, Ma!
I have successfully influenced my friend Ari to Arabic music! Haha! And she seemed to like it! 🙂
Anyway, I was supposed to have dinner with my friend today, but unfortunately she cancelled it. I was a bit disappointed about it as we hadn’t seen each other for so long, but I understood that she had some stuff to sort out.
I went for an afternoon walk today and I thoroughly loved it. Walking for half an hour, thinking about my life and other issues. It’s enjoyable. Spending your time alone is really important 🙂
And what was the result of this afternoon walk? I got an idea to write for my blog. Stay tuned!! 🙂