Project 365

Welcome! This is my own 365 project of creating at least one post per day about the stuff that I learnt, achieved, and found, the stuff that made me happy, or the new thing I did every single day.

The project was started on 21 February 2010. It has stopped for few times but I am determined to continue!

This project is dedicated to myself. I want to feel grateful for every single thing I have. I want to be thankful for my own life. I just want to feel that I have enough.

Tag: friends

Surprise Food Delivery

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Recently, my friends said that I’m much skinnier than usual. I admit that I haven’t taken care of myself well these past weeks. I eat bread, chocolate, or noodles the whole time. I don’t feel like cooking anything. I just make sure that my stomach is not empty, but I don’t make it full either. But their comments about my skinny body struck me. I’m not fond of "skinny" body because I’m already skinny. How much skinny I can be before I turn into a scary bone creature? LOL.

So I "bragged" about it on Twitter. The next thing I knew was that: I got a food delivery from my "sister" Mulia who was in UK! It was a total surprise! I didn’t expect it at all!!! (obviously… d’oh) She’s so far away and at the same time so considerate!!! I have known her for about 6 years through online/blogging but we never had a chance to meet! We’ve discussed about a lot of stuff, from politics, religion, to personal issues and I consider her as my older sister. But I never expected that she’d be doing this to me!  I wanted to cry huhuhu. Some people are just so freakin nice, you know. Anyway, I didn’t know that there’s a website where you can order foods online from different restaurants and be delivered wherever you want! Cool stuff!

The food was delivered right before I was about to have my meal after Maghrib prayer. It was just on time haha. It was good and filling β€” a typical Turkish food. I still had some left for tomorrow πŸ˜‰ and I also had some foods packed for me from Jessie’s mom (oh, she always does this for me all the time *cry*). I don’t need to cook for the next few days, alhamdulillah.

The wonder of Ramadhan? πŸ™‚

The Least Safe Place

Eindhoven was found to have the highest crime rate in the Netherlands for 2006, 2007, 2009, and 2010

Wikipedia

I was quite shocked to read it! I mean, I knew that Eindhoven was the most dangerous place to live in terms of crime rate, but I never knew that it had the highest crime rate four times in 5 years! Wew.

Actually, I live in the least safe neighborhood in Eindhoven (or maybe one of the least safe neighborhoods). Most of the people who live in my neighborhood are immigrants β€” the Africans/Caribbeans, Moroccans, and the Arabs. And I do get scared of going back home late at night, but thankfully I can take another route that is longer but safer.

Last week, I had the most scariest experience ever! Somebody rang my house door at 1 AM for multiple times and there were no one in the house except me. Yes, ME. Alone in the house. A-L-O-N-E! Can you imagine that?! 😐 I couldn’t do anything but be extremely scared. Yes, I know what you’re thinking. A potential burglar wouldn’t ring the bell before hand, BUT he could do that to see if there’s somebody in the house. RIGHT?! Right?! Am I right or am I right?

Anyway, I was actually soooo scared that I caused the twitterland to panic :P. I did that so if something ever happened to me, my friends knew and could do something about it. I locked my door and turned off the lamps in my room. My friend actually told me to go downstairs to ask who’s ringing the bell so that any potential burglar would have the second thought of going into my house, because the house wasn’t empty! BUT COME ON! I was not brave enough to even go downstairs! What if they decided to break the door, knowing that there’s only a woman in this house?! A lot of things seriously ran into my mind.

The best idea I could come up with when I was in “danger”? Pretending to sleep! Not a very smart move, eh?! Actually, it was the stupidest thing I had ever done! I didn’t even know the emergency phone number, until I wrote this post hahaha. Can you imagine that?

But anyway… thankfully, nothing happened. Alhamdulillah. One of my housemates came home 15 minutes later. It might had been him or his friends. You know me: paranoid in everything haha. Well, weekends are the scariest time to live in the house, to be honest. All of my housemates are usually not home. Grr.

Well, this stranger-rang-the-bell scenario didn’t only happen to me. It happened to my friends as well, who lived not too far from my place but located on a much busier street than mine. Another friend of mine even told me that her apartment was rang for so many times by drunk people.

Oh! Another friend got her house almost robbed two weeks ago! The outermost door was already damaged and the burglar was already inside the house, trying to open the second door which lead to all parts of the house. Thankfully, her brother screamed and threaten him with knife or something. So, the burglar ran away. Her house isn’t that far from mine too πŸ™‚

Eindhoven isn’t THAT bad, I can tell you. I feel so safe here. It’s definitely much safer than in Jakarta. The only thing I’m worried about is robbery and drunk people πŸ˜›

Visiting Baby Kenji

I went to Enschede today with some friends to visit Baby Kenji. Enschede is a city 3 hours away from Eindhoven by train; quite far by Dutch standard. Before we visited the newly born, we went around the centrum first and had lunch at La Place. My friend had some discount coupons so we used them to buy 2 tuna sandwiches, 2 fruit cakes, 2 banana yoghurt drink, and 2 coffee. It was only 5 euro per person! Hehehe. I loveeeeeeee bargains! πŸ™‚

Bargain lunch at Enschede's La Place

And… baby Kenji?!

Cute baby Kenji

He was just an adorable and cute little baby! Oooohh I always wanted to squeeze him soooo tight! Soo sooo soooooooo CUTE!!!!

Swan Lake

 

Our recent performance at a charity event in a small city of Best, which is only few minutes by train from Eindhoven.

I think we did a great job playing this song! πŸ™‚ Many of the notes need to be played longer though. But I hope we can play it perfectly next month! 2 more songs to practice, then we’re ready for the Festival Muziek op de Dommel! Can’t wait!

The Best of The Easter Road Trip

I haven’t had time to write about the trip. So, for now… I can only post some pictures with the captions. These are some of the best parts of the road trip, sorted by my most favorite ones πŸ™‚

Switzerland: The Alps & The Lake

The roads to the Alps were still closed as it was still snowing heavily over there, so we had no choice other than to take the Gotthard tunnel, the third longest tunnel in the world. The Alps and the lake were so beautiful. Too bad most of the places in Switzerland are touristy and too crowded, compared to New Zealand… But the good thing about traveling with car was that, we got to avoid the tourists and got to "chase" the view of Alps and the lake… so breathtaking!

The Swiss Alps Switzerland Alpnachersee in Switzerland (near Luzern)

 

CouchSurfing

Couchsurfing at locals’ houses is by far my favorite part of any previous travels that I did! I got to learn and discover new things. It was memorable! My couchsurfing experience in Arzo, Switzerland was THE BEST one out of all! We got to stay at a super cozy 16th century apartment and got a chance to have a delicious vegetarian dinner and a breakfast prepared by our wonderful host! We couldn’t ask for a better host πŸ™‚ She’s just the best!

We brought our own inflatable mattresses and sleeping bags :) With our French host in his beautiful house on the hill of Nice, FranceDelicious dinner prepared by our host in the village of Arzo, Switzerland Our Swiss host preparing for our breakfast. A very special one I have to say!

"The Great Wall of Switzerland"

We planned to go to Lugano in the Italian part of Switzerland, but our host recommended these castles in Bellinzona (there are three castles by the way), not too far from Lugano. So we decided to change our plan and went to Bellinzona instead! It was worth it πŸ™‚

The Castles of Bellinzona

Italian Pizza

Our main aim of going to Italy was to EAT! We didn’t regret it at all! I ordered a seafood pizza (Frutti di Mare) and it was DELICIOUS, even more delicious than the Italian pizza at my favorite Pizza Café at UQ (Uni of Queensland).

Frutti di Mare

Côte d’Azur

The beach was beautiful, but the weather wasn’t that nice and the city was just too posh, full of wealthy tourists. It’s not my most favorite parts of the trip but it’s just refreshing to see the beach again!

Nice, France Monaco

A Guest

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My friend, Elaine, came all the way from the States today. She’s going to stay at my place for two nights before traveling somewhere else. I’m SO glad to meet her again! I can’t believe it’s been 2 years since the last time we met and she promised me that she’ll be back one day to Europe again. She did πŸ™‚

Previously she gave me a San Francisco cable car miniature and today she gave me a new cool pair of shoes! Hehehe. This isn’t my type of shoes, but it seems comfortable and it’s good for traveling! πŸ˜› I’m so happy πŸ™‚

A Present from Belitung

Belitung

A friend of mine sent me this picture of Belitung. She is enjoying her vacation over there at the moment. She sent this picture to cheer me up while doing my thesis in the winterland of the Netherlands. Hehehehe. Thank you, dear πŸ™‚

It’s strange to say this, but I can’t wait to go back to Indonesia. To settle, that is. Now I know EXACTLY what I’m going to do!!! This excitement and the feeling of "know-what-to-do" override every other feeling, including my hesitation to settle there πŸ™‚

Thank you all my dear friends… who have never failed to inspire me πŸ™‚ YOU ROCK!

CARTUSSSS!

CARTUSSSS!!!

Yep, that is a greeting that only me and my Japanese friend understand. We lived in the same dorm during our first year in Brisbane. We had a weird friendship, I have to say. We barely talked (in depth) and I have little memories of us except this unique greeting.

One conversation we had that I fondly remember was about my headscarf. He asked me why I wore it and I answered it as short as I could as I wasn’t so sure if he’d be interested in the longer version of the story. And then he asked me: "When will I be able to see YOUR hair then?!" I jokingly answered, "when you marry me!" And that became his frequent question directed towards me πŸ˜›

One day, he asked me the word ‘paper’ in Indonesian. And I told him, it’s ‘kertas’. Since that very day, every time we bumped into each other, he’d mention that word. It became our greeting and we highly took pride of it. Everyone around us would probably be wondering, what in the world are these two strange people are talking about?!

Years passed by and we barely bumped into each other anymore. Now that we’re so further apart, we’re only connected through Facebook. When the earthquake and tsunami occurred in Japan, I wrote to all of my friends residing in Japan and my Japanese friends living outside of Japan, asking them if they or their families and friends are affected in any way. I wrote to all of them, including him.

I was so glad to hear that he and his family are fine. But one thing that touched me was when he wrote CARTUSSSS (he didn’t know how to spell the word, hence cartusss). I felt nothing but touched when I read his message. Wow! He still remembers that!!! πŸ™‚ I believe it was at least 4 years ago since I last saw him!

One thing I feel so grateful about when it comes to these events: Queensland floods, Egyptian revolution, and Japan earthquake/tsunami is that: my friends and I are reconnected again. It doesn’t matter if we were only a hi-bye friend, bumped into each other for only few times, had little memories to remember, or never wrote to each other before. The thing that matters to me the most is that we are able to connect again and knowing that they are fine. Even if it’s only in the form of very short messages. Sometimes it helps just to show that this insignificant friend of them still remembers them. I hope they would realize that the world still cares for them and they’re all in our thoughts and prayers πŸ™‚

Sunset at Kinderdijk

Sunset at Kinderdijk with Wiza

This was me and Wiza in Kinderdijk. Look at our facial expressions! Hahaha! Hillarious! We were supposed to be jumping, but as usual, we failed LOL!

The photo was taken last week.

Blessed to Have Them

Amalia darling, I haven’t read your email yet, but I wanted to first let you know that I’m fine. I’m at home now watching the heartbreaking news on tv. The earthquake we felt here was about 5 on the Richter scale. At the time of the earthquake, I was on the 9th floor; therefore, the shaking was amplified. Fortunately, we evacuated the bldg & no one was hurt. I hope those who are closer to the center of the earthquake find food & shelter soon. Thanks for checking up on me, hon!

— Jenny

I’m so glad she is safe! I was thinking about her last night out of the sudden (see my previous post). I felt a bit worried for unclear reasons. I’m not sure if it’s a coincidence, but I take it as a sign that something bad was going to happen. Which it did. I watched the live pictures of the tsunami in horror! But I’m so grateful that she is safe and sound.

I also got in touch with another ex-housemate Mayu, who is in Brisbane. Thankfully, her family is also fine :). I still remember how kind her mom was to me and Jenny. She’s so understanding, very considerate, and tolerant towards me, a Muslim. I can’t wait to see her again at the wedding! And I call her Mama too πŸ™‚

I also call Jenny’s mom Mama. I have three moms spreading around the world, huh? Hehehehe! She was the one who taught me how to cook at the time when I didn’t even know how to cut veggies properly hahahha! (THAT’s how bad I was at cooking. But hey, I’m much better now! I’m sure she’ll be proud of me hehehehe). If she still lives in Penang, I’m going to pay her a visit this October πŸ™‚

I won’t be able to see my "real" mom this year, but at least… I’ll be able to see at least one of my mums πŸ™‚