Project 365

I had such a long day today! I went for angklung practice in the morning, followed by an ‘election day’ organized by the Indonesian Student Association in Eindhoven (PPI/e) to choose a new president.

The election ran a little bit messy in the beginning. Nobody was interested to nominate him/herself to be the President. As a result, there were no candidates at all. So, it ended up with a direct nomination. But each candidate refused to take the tough job. Everyone was frustrated and there was even a talk that the PPI/e would be freeze as no new leader was chosen.

A good friend of mine, Arya, who was the President of PPI/e at that time, was even more frustrated and worried. He had worked so hard to bring the name of PPI/e to the surface and to make the organization a platform for Indonesian students in Eindhoven to gather. If the PPI/e would be inactive, his effort would be so useless. So he delivered an unexpected and spontaneous ‘speech’ that really stabbed the hearts of everyone in the room. I was so touched. It was a really great one! If I had the guts and time to be the President, I would have nominated myself. But sadly, I didn’t. After he delivered the speech, two candidates stepped in and we finally chose the leader :). Congrats Al!

It was such a long event. But it ended with a great dinner and entertaining video! I enjoyed it.

After meeting with my professor to report about my progress, I went to the centrum to have some fresh air with my friend Elva. We went for window shopping and by the end of the day, we sat at my favorite café, Usine. We talked for hours! I really enjoyed it. A great way to end my day! Alhamdulillah.

How will you know the difficulties of being human if you’re always flying off to blue perfection?

Where will you plant your grief-seeds? We need ground to scrape and hoe, not the sky of unspecified desire

— Jalal ad-Din Rumi

Yay! I got three postcards today! Two postcards were from a friend of mine, Ikmal, who recently traveled to Bangkok, Thailand. To answer your question on one of the postcards: no, I’m not scared of the picture hahaha.

Another one was from Qonita who went to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, USA for a conference. She couldn’t find a post office over there, so she gave it to me in person instead.

Thanks Ikmal & Qonita for the postcards! 🙂 I’m so happy! My postcard collections are growing! Yay!

We help people when big things happen to them, when you see them getting hit by a car, when a brother or a sister or a father or a mother dies, we’re there for them because we can see that death kills more than the person it takes. And yet, the people around us who die a little all the time, moment by moment, who require the least help, the smallest sacrifice, are the ones we ignore completely.

— Iain Thomas @ I Wrote This For You

Just a reminder for myself. And for anyone who reads this.

I was browsing the list of best blogs of 2010 from Time magazine and I ended up myself in this blog. It’s a very interesting blog, I have to say, even from the moment I read the first post! Then I found myself reading this: Why I don’t care about success and I couldn’t agree more to what was written! It’s been in my mind for so long and I didn’t know how to actually say it. But everything was explained perfectly in this post!

If all you’re striving for is money, you’ll do horrible things to get it. If all you want is a successful business, you’ll screw people over to get it. If all you want is fame, you’ll give up your dignity to achieve it.

Success isn’t about achieving something in the future, but about doing something right now that you love.

So forget about “success”, and just find joy, passion, love, awesome-ness right now, in this moment. *That* is a success you can achieve, without any self-help course, without any method. Just go out and do it.

I have been walking this journey of life for quite awhile without carrying the burden of success with me. Many people around me do not agree with it, however. They think that I’ve spent most of my life studying and earning degrees, so the only thing I should be doing next is to find a decent job with a decent pay. But I’m not looking for that anymore, I’m sorry. I may want to have a lot of money just because I want to travel or set up a school or community project, but the term success is far from my mind right now. Is having a top job the only result or advantage that I can take after my years of efforts in academic fields? I just want to enjoy everything and do something I’m passionate about… It’s a simple wish and it’s a flexible one. It’s more flexible than having a good high positioned job in a well-known company, right?

The view from my room was foggy!

Update: It’s actually foggy for the whole day and evening!!!

I got it!!! It was on SALE for 140 Euro (600 ringgit) including luggage, LCCT bus ticket, and taxes!

To-Do checklists:

• Return ticket to KL. I hope I can get a free one from AirAsia. Planning to stay in KL for few days before or after my trip to OZ, but I need to know my sister’s schedule first 🙂
• Australian tourist visa. I hope I won’t be rejected!!! (It happened to my sister last time)
• GRADUATE before August! The most important thing ever!

It hurts to see the person you love happy, while the life she has been living in is full of lies.

It even hurts to see the person you love not knowing that her other half has been unfaithful to her.

It hurts even more to see the person you love and you’re not able to tell her that she has been so blind.

It hurts the most to see yourself watching the whole movie, sitting there unable to do anything.

It hurts to see yourself hurting slowly. Every time the heart bleeds, you stitch the wound. You don’t know how many more it can bear before it eventually breaks.

Then you ask a simple question, who are you protecting from? Him? Her? Or yourself?

The urge to travel is back again!!! 🙁 Help! 911!