'Tis Memorial Day weekend and I got nowhere to go. Most of the guys have their parents over so they're - like - all over the country now. Otherwise, we would've had a barbecue or something. But, I'm not complaining. Actually, I'm so glad I got time to relax and recharge. It felt like this is my first true vacation although it's only a 3-day weekend, but it's been really relaxing.

Went to dinner with Raeleen on Friday night (we were suppose to go with Devmann to this vegetarian restaurant but he had to work overtime... man, i think i will never manage to work in the private sector) to Ruan Thai. Good dinner: Panang Chicken (yes dev, it's chicken's better, beef sucks) and Raeleen finally managed to order the good Catfish dish.

Saturday... went swimming! The first time since the surgery and before that I don't think I had swam since I started working so it has been well over a year. So glad I could still swim OK, although after forcing myself to do two sets of 10 laps, my back kinda ached. So I got out of the pool and went to the sauna while I wait for Raeleen to finish her swim. Then we, lounged for a bit in the sun, ha ha ha two Southeast Asians trying to get even more tan.
15 minutes later, Devmann called to ask if we were still on for dinner at Great Sage, the vegetarian resto. And so we went. It was really good! Honestly, it surpassed my expectation. and the Tempe with this creamy pink sauce made from veggies was excellente. Yum, my mouth waters just thinking about it. The dessert was really good as well, I could taste the freshness.

And today, I meant yesterday on Sunday, I finally got around to wash my car and vacuum the filthy floor mats. Then Dev & I went to see the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. It was just as i expected it to be: funny, witty, fantastic, nutty, very brit-y. I loved it, I wish Hollywood would make more of these blockbuster with depth and wit more.
When I got home I somehow got the urge to do some cleaning. I guess looking and my shiny car with clean interior really opened my eyes that my house is filthy! LOL So I did my laundry, cleaned the kitchen, and scrubbed the bathroom. I think I did my exercise for today by scrubbing the bathtub 'cause my arms are all sore now. So both my house and car are clean now ^_^

Alright, crashing into my bed now, I can hardly open my eyes anymore, let alone typing in English! So before I start inventing my own language, お休み!

Today marks the first anniversary of my working at the Bureau of Transportation Statistics. Do job anniversaries exist? Or does that just mean I'm too lazy to find another job? But it's not the one year itself that matters most, it's the fact that I got to change my photo ID!!! Hahaha, 'been waiting a long time to finally get rid of that ugly picture. This time I was more ready, but it didn't turn out that well either, I guess I'm just not ID-genic T_T

I really felt that life truly is nothing but a set of cycles and this job anniversary marks the end of a long and very eventful cycle. Actually, the past weekend was when I really felt that a year has finally passed. Driving to the highway from Muvico with Devmann, we somehow took the exact same route where I got the news about my brothers' accident and where I finally found out that Umang has left us. I'm pretty sure that that was not the first time I drove through that street after my brother's passing, but I guess with all the graduations I was going to attend the following day; My mind was on déjà vu mode.

Seeing my friends' family, taking pictures in front of the hall: The commencement atmosphere really took me back to last May when I was flying in and out of Minnesota, California, and Maryland attending graduations in 4 different cities: Ii's in Mankato, Umang's in Mpls, Luki's in LA, and Yuli's in SF. It was about two months after the accident at Mt. Shasta, California and during that time, I had the strangest feelings inside. Yes it was celebratory with all the graduations but in the same time I can't help thinking we're missing one person. I was shifting back and forth between being happy and sad, but most of the time I was feeling melancholic, smiling while almost shedding a tear, laughing with an emptiness inside followed with a pang of guilt for being able to laugh so soon. In a way, this period set in more clearly in my memory than the wake and all the crying that entails it. I guess I was more conscious when I attended those graduations than when we took care of wake and funeral. I think we all operated on a limited consciousness during that time, didn't really have the energy to remember anything but being sad.

So with all the things going on with the graduation weekend, all these came back to me. I guess that was why I felt what I felt when we drove through that street. I was sad but then I realized that I was not feeling but I was instead remembering. I was feeling a past emotion and that was when it hit me "it has finally been a year since life returned to normal." Well, it's true what they say, when you're at the bottom, you can only go up. Last year I got no job, lost my brother, got stitches at the emergency room, and herniated my disk. But now, I got a decent job, got a new niece, went through a successful surgery, and got closer to friends that might very well be family. I suppose I still have a lot of things to cherish. I should look up more.

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edit: hahaha sorry Von, i forgot the happening metropolis that is Ithaca! it should've been FOUR different cities

While waiting at the dentist's office this morning, I read on Popular Science that they ranked Minneapolis (yes, Minnesota) as the most high-tech city in the United States. I was –like– perplexed for a full sixty-second. Minneapolis? That so-called metropolis in the north where people with a Canadian accent and soda is called pop? The city that I call home even though I've only stayed there for a little bit more than a year?

MIN-NE-A-PO-LIS. Tell me if I'm right, these gotta be the words that come to your mind after reading that: cold, snow, fargo, cold again, blizzards, jesse ventura, more snow, ... Never would I have thought that the city could actually be in a ranking called technopolis found. And there it is, at numéro uno.

I needed a few minutes to let it sink in before it dawned on me that the news isn't really that surprising. I guess I've really taken it for granted all the privileges I enjoyed while living in the Cities. After reading the article, I pretty much agree with all the points he mentioned except for one thing: public transportation.

Well, one point in the article that I can soooo relate: in Minneapolis, you can swipe your plastics anywhere, taxis, chinatown restaurants, posh boutiques, you name it, they'll swipe your card (yes, even Discover). This, of course, really can't be said about other metropolises such as New York or even DC where they seem to miss the cashless society train.

As uplifting as the article was, it seemed to have failed to talk about [the lack of] public transportation in Minneapolis. Yes, yes, they've just opened the sleek yellow light rail that will wisk riders from the airport to downtown in minutes, but that really is not enough. The minimum cost of riding a bus is $2.00 the last time I checked and they run very infrequently (for a city with that size). Plus, if you live in the suburbs, then just forget all about helping the environment and congestion by taking the bus because it doesn't exist! Or most often, you drive 15-40 minutes to the commuter terminal and take the bus that could run as infrequent as twice a day!

I still think that the Twin Cities is a great place to live (especially the uptown area) but I guess I just can't tolerate people glossing over certain facts.

Do any of you bloggers ever felt like writing an entry and then ended up postponing it because you're tired, the pictures aren't downloaded yet, etc.? And when you're finally going to post it, you realize that it's already so passé. Well, that's exactly what I'm feeling at the moment. I guess blog is better served fresh, huh?

The song by the way is « Taste of Harmony » by an Indonesian group called Homogenic. If it sounds familiar to you Björk fans out there, that's where they got the name from. These three young (very young, they're born in 1983!! younger than me and they got a record deal already T_T) people from Bandung might not get the same recognition as their record label mate, Mocca, with their sleeper hit album « My Diary ». Nevertheless, I think they really do have enormous potential: slick programming, great arrangements, and smart songwriting (although a bit of intensive english lessons really wouldn't hurt). Oh, and if you manage to get a hold of the actual album, the design (both photography and graphic) is just plain stunning. Yes, they sing in both Indonesian and English. So contact your Indonesian stockists and inquire about it.

« Taste of Harmony »
if i could show to you someday / i'll have all my dreams in my hands
don't ever close your eyes again / it's all in front of you
make it real, you will see / 'cause you will always be around me
you will see the sunshine in my eyes / your face will hear the melody from my song

Now let me sum up the past week. Went to the Emergency Room 'cause Benny's right face was swelling and hurting. We got there at 7:30 and finally at 15:00 Dyah and I left the hospital. It's perfectly fine if in the 7-and-a-half hour they were doing all sorts of tests and analysis on Benny's condition, but it was just plain inefficency. In that 7.5-hour period, Benny probably was seen by a half dozen physicians and nurse in 60-minute intervals and 5-minute sessions each. So you can imagine us, sleep-deprived, caffeine-intoxicated, loitering about the emergency room. And even when they finally made the decision to admit him because they wanted to get the antibiotics intravenously in order to prevent the infection to spread to the brain, it took them more than an hour before somebody finally put an IV on him! My past experiences at the emergency room here in the US are pretty much identical, so I think the best advice to anyone who's going to the emergency room is to moan and scream in agony incessantly while if possible drop some blood. Perhaps that would make them work faster like they should be. I mean, it's called emergency for God's sake!

Another thing is Leo's going away. Yeah, after two months here in DC, he finally departed for Columbus this morning (supposedly). I guess no more eating out during weekdays now since he was the culprit of that heinous and fattening activity for the past two months straight! ^_^ Now it'll probably be a long while before we would go to Bob's Noodle, China Chef, Ruan Thai, and Oriental East again. Oh... I almost forget the most important one: Bubblemix !!

met ultah ya myr.... the best housemate ever! moga-moga semua rencana-rencana elo (yang buanyak dan rumit itu) pada jadi kenyataan ya~

Yesterday was Myra's birthday, unlike what we have done in the past years, we decided to quit doing the big complicated deceitful surprises. After doing it again and again on everyone's birthday for more than a year, it became so predictable. So this year we just did a simple party,

with a special guest appearance by....
the Hazelnut Meringue from Pasta Plus. One of our latest findings in the District's patisserie industry. Thanks to Raeleen for raving about it to me!!

Well, I know I said we didn't want to do the whole "surprise!"-and-now-let's-start-throwing-food-at-myra thing, but it was still supposed to be a surprise with a cake nonetheless. Alas, Myra & John actually came home sooner than Devmann got to our place. Well I guess it was still a surprise in the "what are these people doing here? kind of way. Then Devmann came with the torte, and we did the light-the-cake-blow-the-candles-sing-happy-birthday-cut-the-cake ritual. And we pretty much just chill and savor the torte complemented with Shanghai Rose tea while Postal Service was playing in the background.



Don't get me wrong, John & Myra are my dear friends, but seriously... I think I should just get Myra a photography class voucher for her birthday, ^_^. Let's analyze these two pictures, for some reason everytime I deliberately tried to take a picture of them, they're never smiling, although when they don't see the lens, well, let's just say that being subtle is not exactly their best quality.


ps. mouseover the images for comments

iya li... iya, nih gua update lagi, diganti pula lagunya. aduh, mustinya lo tuh ninggalin komentar bukan bikin-bikin permintaan! untung gua baek, jadi diturutin deh.
I've been meaning to post about my outings last weekend to the film festivals and the cafés, but technological issues hindered me from doing so. I got some pictures from this café that we went to (Café Bonaparte) on my cellphone but I haven't managed to transfer them to my PC. I guess Nokia make good cellphones by sacrificing their tech support funds. So let me just give you the summary.

I've got an idea if the District's tourism promotion board ever on the lookout for a new campaign. I admit it won't be that original but it is representative of what DC is. The problem is, when most people think about DC, what comes to their mind is the White House, the Capitol, and the Monuments and Memorials all over the city. It's not that they're wortheless or anything, they're beautiful in fact (Lincoln Memorial at night glowing with the reflecting pool underneath it is definitely one of DC's best views). But, it's such a shame that because of they're forgetting that the District is also a city full of contradictions, a liberal capital of a conservative country, a gay district right by the city's affluent old-moneyed area, yuppies shopping at the same spot as senators, film festivals vying for audience with the demonstrators at World Bank headquarters, the list is endless but you got the main point: if you order a sampler platter of the world's population, then DC's populace is what you will get.

I could almost hear you say, "What about New York or Paris or London?" True, those cities have really diverse population but it doesn't stop there. A New Yorker is a New Yorker first and foremost, same with a Parisian or a Londoner. One thing that's interesting about DC is that it is yet to grow it's own personality, so there is no such thing as the DC dialect or DC style or DC food. What we have here are choices of the plethora of authentic arts and food from whatever part of the world. Those two things are the top two reasons why I love DC. First, the choice of restaurants from fine dining to diner food to ethnic cuisine to fusion of everything. Second is the international festivals that seem to run year-long here in DC, there's DC FilmFest, DC Independent Film Festival, the Festivals at the Smithsonian, the Screenings at the AFI, the Art Museums, the Screen on the Green, and most recently the US-ASEAN Film Festival. The choices are endless.

I've put on a new song by the way, it's called « Une île », a duet performed by Serge Lama and Anggun. Cukup pelan gak buat elo li? It's quite old actually, but I've just finally managed to get my hands on the mp3. I don't think it's available anywhere but in France and some stores in Montreal perhaps.

« Une île / An Island »

une île, entre le ciel et l'eau
an island, between the sky and the water
une île sans hommes ni bateaux
an island without man nor boat
inculte, un peu comme une insulte
uneducated, a bit like an insult
sauvage, sans espoir de voyage
savage, without hope of voyage
une île, une île
an island, an island
entre le ciel et l'eau
between the sky and the water

ce serait là, face à la mer immense
it would be there, facing the immense sea
là, sans espoir d'espèrance
there, without hope of hoping
tout seul, face à ma destinée
all by myself, facing what's destined for me
plus seul qu'au coeur d'une forêt
more alone than the heart of a forest
ce serait là, dans ma propre défaite
it would be there, in my own defeat
tout seul, sans espoir de conquête
alone, without hope of conquering
que je saurais enfin pourquoi
that i would finally realize why
je t'ai quitée, moi qui n'aime que toi
i left you, me who loves no one but you

une île, comme une cible d'or
an island, like a golden target
tranquille, comme un enfant qui dort
tranquil, like a sleeping child
fidèle, à en mourir pour elle,
faithful, to those who die for her
cruelle, à force d'être belle
cruel, to the force of being beautiful
une île, une île
an island, an island
comme un enfant qui dort
like a sleeping child

ce serait là, face à la mer immense
it would be there, facing the immense sea
là, pour venger mes vengeances
there, to avenge my vengeances
tout seul avec mes souvenirs
all alone with my memories
plus seul qu'au moment de mourir
more alone than at the moment of death
ce serait-là, au coeur de Sainte-Hélène
it would be there, at the heart of St. Helen
sans joie, sans amour, sans haine
without joy, without love, without hate
que je saurais enfin pourquoi
oh how i would finally know why
je t'ai quittée, moi qui n'aime que toi
i left you, me who loves no one but you

une île, cette île, mon île
an island, that island, my island
c'est toi
it's you