Project 365

The beautiful King’s Lake (Königssee) in Bavaria, Germany. Such a beautiful place.

I’m super excited now! My friends and I have just planned another road trip around Europe, and this time to Paris, King’s Lake (Königssee) in Bavaria, Germany, and Salzburg, Austria. Three countries in 3 days with 2 super strong female drivers! Awesome!

We’re planning to start our trip on Thursday (1 April) evening to Paris. We’re gonna stay there til Friday afternoon before heading for Munich (or any other cities nearby in Bavaria) to spend a night at. On Saturday morning we’ll drive to the amazingly beautiful King’s Lake (and other places in Bavaria, but I haven’t explored which places to visit yet). Then our trip will be concluded in Salzburg, where Mozart was born and where the famous movie The Sound of Music was filmed (which has a beautiful setting!).

Oh, I can’t wait for this trip! Here’s the rough route.

I’m a big fan of TED and I try to watch at least one video per week from the site. It has such informative talks! Anyhoo…

This is a short 3 minutes talk by Richard St. John about 8 secrets of success; after conducting 500 interviews for 7 years! His talk is very useful, entertaining, and funny at the same time. One of the secrets of success is persistance. He said that we need to be persist to failure and CRAP — which is: Criticism, Rejection, Assholes, and Pressure. ROFL!!

After watching this short talk, I found his other TED talk on YouTube and felt reminded once again. It’s indeed true that “success is a continuous journey.” It’s not a one way street. You gotta keep doing the 8 elements of success in order to avoid failure. This is really happening to me right now. I don’t think I’m already successful. But going to and studying in Europe has been my dream since I was in High School. I’ve catched that dream and I feel like I’m on top of my world. But sadly to say that I sit back and relax during the time when I shouldn’t be doing any of that. I have stopped working hard. I have lost my passion. My ideas have been blocked. And I’m on the edge of failure.

I don’t think I feel 100% motivated by this video, but being reminded and “slapped in the face” is all I really need right now. And thank you, my stranger friend, who surely gave me the push to take a one step forward (and even kind enough to be the barking dog 😛 ). I hope I can continue my journey, which has been ceased for as long as I can remember, from this day on.

If your feelings are still what they were last April, tell me so at once. My affections and wishes have not changed, but one word from you will silence me forever.

If, however, your feelings have changed, I will have to tell you: you have bewitched me, body and soul, and I love… I love… I love you. I never wish to be parted from you from this day on. — Mr. Darcy

This is my most favorite scenes and most romantic ones in 2005’s version of Pride & Prejudice. I love the way he says it. Sure, I prefer Colin Firth to be in this role, but in this scene, Mcfadyen’s role as Mr. Darcy makes my heart melt. I’d most probably faint if somebody ever says to me that way. Such a beautiful and romantic scene!

[I promise, this will be the last post talking about Pride & Prejudice!]

The happiness which this reply produced, was such as he had probably never felt before; and he expressed himself on the occasion as sensibly and as warmly as a man violently in love can be supposed to do. Had Elizabeth been able to encounter his eye, she might have seen how well the expression of heartfelt delight, diffused over his face, became him; but, though she could not look, she could listen, and he told her of feelings which, in proving of what importance she was to him, made his affection every moment more valuable.

— Jane Austen’s Pride & Prejudice

* This was written so beautifully! Such a joy to read this part of the chapter. This paragraph occured after Mr. Darcy proposed to Elizabeth Bennet (Lizzie).

If you will thank me, let it be for yourself alone. That the wish of giving happiness to you might add force to the other inducements which led me on I shall not attempt to deny. But your family owe me nothing. Much as I respect them, I believe I thought only of you.

— Mr. Darcy to Elizabeth Bennet after she thanked him for his “unexampled kindness to her poor sister” in Pride & Prejudice

* I’ll make this project at least 1 post per day.

The minute I heard my first love story
I started looking for you, not knowing
how blind that was.

Lovers don’t finally meet somewhere.
They’re in each other all along. — Rumi

The Rumi book that I ordered 3 weeks ago has finally arrived! I’m so happy.

In total, I have 9 other books waiting to be read. I’ve already started reading few pages of Rumi, quarter pages of Bill Clinton’s Giving, some pages of Karen Amstrong’s Muhammad, and John Roosa’s Dalih Pembunuhan Massal. I’ve been trying to keep myself contented and busy — and reading these books have been quite enjoyable.

Even so, I thought of buying the famous Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, after watching its BBC TV series on YouTube, featuring one of my favorite actors, Colin Firth who really fit into the character of Mr. Darcy I must say! Few years ago, I watched Pride & Prejudice’s movie adaptation, and I remember how I really loved it!! That’s why I came to think of buying the book. I know that I hate classic English literature, but that’s because its constructions of words are hard to understand. But I really want to learn. I want to get used to it. I want to be able to feel and understand the beauty of those words.

But anyhow, I was happy to find the full version of Pride & Prejudice on Google Books! So I decided to read it online in the meantime — perhaps I’ll buy it once I read all of those 9 books.

After having to abandon Couchsurfing for more than half a year due to my busy schedule, I decided to take part in this super awesome community again — helping travelers and meeting new like-minded people. Today, I met with Ivan, a Russian guy who was in Eindhoven for a business trip. I was contacted by him few days before and I was honored to be his first Couchsurfing friend, as he just joined the website not so long time ago. I took him to the Boekencafe, which was my favorite cafe in Eindhoven, for a cup of delicious hot chocolate. We were there for about an hour; talking about Russia and our life in general. One thing that surprised me was that, he didn’t drink alcohol!! (knowing that Russians really looooved their vodka and beer!) We only talked about an hour and it was a pity that we couldn’t talk longer. I think he was a good and charming boy. In the picture, this was me and him in the cafe.

After meeting Ivan, I went straight to teh Rita’s house. As usual, we had a weekly pengajian (Qur’an recitation and study) with our religious leader whom we refer as Pak Haji. Every week I learnt so many things; and for today, I was struck by this verse of the Qur’an (Al Ankabut 64):

And the life of this world is nothing but diversion and play. And indeed, the home of the Hereafter – that is the [eternal] life, if only they knew.

Dan tiadalah kehidupan dunia ini melainkan senda gurau dan main-main. Dan sesungguhnya akhirat itulah yang sebenarnya kehidupan, kalau mereka mengetahui.

This verse is such a good reminder for me. It made me shivered when I read it. Ya Allah, please keep me reminded and guide me to the right path… Amin Ya Rabbal Alamin.

Another verse that we discussed was from surah Ar-Rum: 2-3:

The Romans have been defeated in the nearest land. But they, after their defeat, will overcome.

Telah dikalahkan bangsa Romawi, di negeri yang terdekat dan mereka sesudah dikalahkan itu akan menang.

The Romans (Byzantine Empire) were defeated by the Persians at the time when this verse was sent down. And the Qur’an had predicted that they would win the war from the Persians in few years time (which happened during the years of Abu Bakar As-Siddiq). Subhanallah, this is one of the miracles of the Qur’an.

From this verse, Pak Haji also pointed out that recently Harun Yahya discovered that the words “fi adnaa” in Arabic which is translated by many as “in the nearest land” actually had a literal meaning of “in the lowest land”. What’s the lowest land, you may wonder… Well, the lowest land in the world is the Dead Sea (395 meters below sea level) which was the place where the Romans were defeated by the Persians. During that time, NOBODY knew that the Dead Sea was the lowest region on earth! Yet, the Qur’an had been able to reveal this at that time! Oh, my heart is beating right now. Even as I’m writing this post.

Wallahu A’lam (Allah knows best).

Phew. There are too many things to be grateful about today. It was quite a busy and tiring day, yet at the same time it was such a fun and exciting day.

After about a month of procrastinating, finally my friend and I resumed our project that had been looooongggg abandoned. I went to the ICTheek in the morning and tried to understand the whole thing. It wasn’t so effective, but at least we saw some light. We saw progress. It was slow. Yet, we were a bit sure. At least, this could be my new motivation! 🙂

I went to the High Tech Campus to meet with some people to finalize my website project. I was sooo panic that time because I was 15 minutes late! I could have been on time had my Dutch class finished on time and I weren’t LOST! It was raining so heavily that for the second time I was lost. I took the wrong street. I cycled and cycled and cycled until I had no energy. I felt so bad 🙁

Long story short… I met them and discussed about some improvements and adjustments that I needed to make. We discussed about the salary too. Well, in the beginning I wasn’t expecting that much since this was a new NGO. So I was quite satisfied with it, alhamdulillah. I also told my boss that once I graduate (if!), I’d be able to work for him temporarily; so that at least I can do something while I seek for a permanent job. Well, let’s see what will happen later.

After the meeting, my boss and I also had a long conversation about his work and life, politics, etc. It was quite interesting. Meeting this kind of people who is the initiator and whose purpose is to improve other people’s life always inspires me. Hope I’d be able to do it one day. Insya Allah. Amin.

My day finished with a great dinner at Agni’s place with his sister and Arya. It was such a fun and warm night. We haven’t done any dinner gatherings for sometime now… Hmm, maybe we should plan one soon! (trying to gather my motivation here!)

I’m really looking forward for tomorrow. I’ll be going to meet a couchsurfer from Russia for a coffee. This would be the first meet up after I took a long half a year break from Couchsurfing. It’s going to be exciting! And he seems very excited! I’ll share the stories tomorrow, of course. Good night. Dream sweetly.

Antwone Fisher: “Why do I have to forgive?”
Jerome Davenport: “To free yourself, so you can get on with your life.”

– Antwone Fisher movie

When someone makes a mistake that leaves scars in your heart, it is hard to see him beyond his mistakes. It is easy for you to forget what this person did to you before this happens. It’s easy to deny the fact that he is a normal human being that is capable of making faults. It’s easy to forget that he was the one who were there for you when you needed someone at 1 am. No matter how cold it was at night, he came for you and listened to your problems. He made sure that you were okay.

I wonder… how could I be so blind? How could I not realize it til now?

So… I’ve decided. I’m going to leave these pages empty and close this book. I’m going to get another one. I’m going to start everything from the beginning again. I’m going to forgive him. So that I can get on with my life.