I've Landed

Am I a Good Mom?

2011-12-10T23:39:00.001+07:00

I have been asking myself this question lately. Sometimes I'm pretty comfortable and confident in saying yes, I am a good mom. At least a lot better than some other moms. But other times, I'm not so sure. Plenty of reasons why I've been doubting my "mommyhood performance". One of them is because I've been working harder and harder lately, with more late nights than ever. Can I help it? Perhaps not. Better time management is not the answer either. For the past few months, I have been spending a lot less time doing non work-related stuff both online or offline, like reading a book or blog hopping. I have never been so preoccupied with work. Even when I am not at the office or in front of my laptop, I am constantly thinking about work, my mind can not seem to stop. It's probably a phase I have to go through, we are at a sort of turning point in our company where every decision seems to be a major one which can affect the the future of our business. So it's perhaps unavoidable to be spending so much time at work and consequently, I have very little time for other things. My life is all about work and Aluf.

Do I feel guilty though? Yes, of course. I usually don't give in to the thought too often when I'm at the office, but when I finally park my car in front of the house, step into the dark and quiet living room for the 3rd or 4th time that week and I know Aluf is already sleeping soundly in our room, I'm always hit with a pang of incredible guilt. I hate having to miss our night time ritual. I love reading to her before bed and love how immediately after, she'd ask me to tell her a story from my childhood. I love how she snuggles up to me afterwards, her little face looking so content and I love watching her finally dozing off and her lips are still smiling. It pains me having to miss that but I know deep in my heart that if I want to reach the goals that I've set up for myself and my family, I have to do this. I just hope she'll understand it when she's old enough.

Aluf just celebrated her 4th birthday last week. This is the first year when she is actually aware of her big day approaching. So she started the countdown since about a week before 2nd of December. She woke up from her sleep, her eyes widened and shouted "5 days to my birthday!" and so on. Every single day. On D-day, she woke up before 6 am (never happens on regular days), shook me while whispering "Morning's here! Wake up!"

We had a simple celebration. I thought of throwing her a big (well, big-ish) party where I'd meticulously plan every detail: the theme, decoration, food, party favors, etc. But Aluf never asked for any of that. All she asked for since a few months ago was for us to do a little celebration in her school and a birthday cake with Ariel the Little Mermaid decoration on top. That's it. So that's what I gave her. because anymore than that would be about me, and not her.

I also made sure she was surrounded with people she loves and people who love her, since the moment she opened her eyes, till the minute she closed them again. So after school, I invited both of her grandmas, my dad, her cousins Yoko, Sabine and Jasmine to play at my house. My sister in law, my brother and his wife also visited after work to give her a big kiss and a present. I planned no party. We just helped her open her presents and played with her all day. Hubby and I gave her a new, pink bicycle. And, just as I promised myself a long time ago when she had just been born, we gave Aluf her first ever bike lesson that afternoon. She was smiling and laughing the whole day. At night, after putting her in her brand new pajamas, a birthday present from Tante Manda and Igo, she was chattily recounting her special day when she suddenly stopped, and said "It's strange, I don't feel 4."

"How old do you feel?" I asked her, trying so hard not to laugh.
"Just as I was, 3." she said.
"Well, it doesn't happen overnight. But gradually, you'll start to feel like you're 4."

And then, without me asking, she gave me a long, big hug and said "Thank you for bringing me the cake."

Maybe, I'm not doing so bad after all.

Alive & Kicking

2011-10-26T01:39:00.006+07:00

My poor blog has been abandoned for more than 2 months. I meant to write more via my BlackBerry but it is such a hassle to type on that little thing. I'm starting to regret buying it even though I realized I did it because it was the cheapest model and I was only going to use it for the messenger service. Silly reason but everyone I know, friends, family, co-workers, clients- are on BlackBerry so if I could make my life, and theirs, easier by being easily reachable, it's worth it.

Rambling.

Just got back from London last week. It was one of the most memorable trips I've ever taken and I have a feeling that I haven't even seen the real impact of it yet to my life and my business. So many stories, but I don't have the energy to write about them now. I haven't been sleeping right this past week. I must try to get some rest tonight as tomorrow will be another long day for me. So what's the point of this post you ask? Only to make myself feel better that I've written something here.

Oh, and photos.

The last 2 photos were taken by my infinitely talented friend, Joe Nattapol Suphawong.

Supermarket

2011-08-14T05:16:00.000+07:00

I think Aluf has reached a stage where she can say the most embarassing thing at the most 'unfortunate' time.

Yesterday we were at the cheese section in Hero Kemang. There was a lady standing nearby, looking intently at the cheese. Aluf suddenly said "Liat ma! Kejunya banyak banget ya. Kayak tikus aja makan keju, hahaha!"

When I tried to drag her away, she let go of my hand, picked up a cheese, sniffed it and said loudly:

"Yuck, bau KING KONG!!"
Sent from my BlackBerry® smartphone from Sinyal Bagus XL, Nyambung Teruuusss...!

Aluf Goes to School

2011-07-25T23:57:00.008+07:00

I have imagined what it was going to be like at Aluf's first day at school for the longest time. I could still remember vividly my own first day at school. In Kindergarten in 198...ok nevermind, that was a long time ago :D The point is I remember clearly holding my mother's hand at the school yard, watching other kids running around making noises. I also remember feeling rather nervous but excited.

I certainly hope Aluf's first day was just as memorable. I've been putting off getting her into a school because I don't see the benefit of starting too early. I feel like now is the right time. She's getting more and more curious and has been showing interests in a lot of things like language (English specifically), drawing, writing and math. It's clear that now is the right time for me to offer other activities, more structured ones, than what she has been doing at home. As it happens, we found a school that we really like. It's called Bumi Bambini and it's located nearby, about 10 minutes drive from my house. I love the lush, green surrounding of the school, how friendly the teachers are and how independent the children there seem to me. I've written a review on it in Mommies Daily, feel free to check it out if you're keen.

Anyway, Aluf went to school for the first time last Monday, on July 18. I woke up at 6 am to prepare her stuff and made some bread pudding for her snack, with extra raisins that she loves so much. She woke up and had breakfast and seemed so excited to get ready for school. She donned the bright orange t-shirt that the school gave, wore matching hat, a pair of jeans and a new pair of shoes that her Uti bought specially for this day. We asked her to pose for the camera on our front porch and she did so happily while asking repeatedly "Aku keren nggak ma?" :D

Then off we went to Bambini. I was quite amazed that she didn't seem nervous at all. I guess taking her a few times to the school (once for survey, once for trial and once for "orientation") really helped to make her feel familiar with the place. When we got there, we saw a few children crying while running back to their mothers but Aluf just marched straight ahead to the arms of the teachers without even looking back to see me. So there were no tears, at all. And because she was so relaxed, I also didn't find it necessary to get all emotional, even though my chest felt like it was about to explode because I was so proud of her :) I stayed near the entrance of her class and watched her stand in line for a tour of the school. She was standing in the back, with another girl beside her. Again, she looked so comfortable, as if she has been going to school for years. I called her name, and she waved at me with a big smile on her face. Precious moment.

I then went to the waiting area and did a little bit of work while waiting for the clock to turn to 11. When it did, I went to pick her up from her class and just as I arrived, she was walking out with one hand holding her teacher's hand. She looked at me, gave me a thumb up with the other hand and said "Aluf pinter!"

Yes you are, baby. And I'm so proud of you.

This cheeky little girl is now a proud Playgroup B student

Too bad the next day, she caught some naughty virus so she had to miss school for the rest of the week. But that's okay. Nobody remembers their second or third day at school. It's the first day that stays with you, right? :)

Winning IYCE 2011!

2011-07-11T19:33:00.014+07:00

I think everyone enters a competition with wining as the ultimate goal. Even if you tell yourself otherwise, even just a little, you want to come out at the end of it as the champion. I was no exception. I entered IYCE 2011 to win. I took my time preparing my application form and my presentation carefully to wow the judges. I wanted to make sure I did my best to ensure my chance of winning, regardless of the outcome.

But as I entered the final judging last week, the 4 days "karantina", I felt that my goal had somehow shifted. Not because I didn't want to win the competition anymore, but more because being a finalist and getting the chance to go through the activities somehow already felt like the prize. Like I said in earlier post, I met so many new people whose creativity and passion amazed me. Being surrounded by them was already an inspiring and humbling experience and I began to think, it didn't matter anymore whether I won or not. I also learned so much from those 4 days, whether from the visits, workshops, talks or just from the interactions I had with other finalists and speakers, I knew that when I came out of the series of activities, I already gained so much more for myself and the company and my newfound drive, even stronger than the one I had before, made me feel impatient to go back to work and started implementing everything I had learned.

Anyways, those 4 days went by very quickly. Everyday, we started our activities at around 7.30 in the morning and it didn't end until 9 or 10 in the evening, with very short breaks in between. And every night, when I returned to my hotel room, I immediately began to work on my presentation, usually lasted till about 2 in the morning.

Day 4, where we had to face the team of jury for our presentation and final judging, was even more grueling, even more so because I had to do it twice, for Fashion sector first, and Interactive the second. Even though I had prepared for it as much as I could, I was still taken aback of how tough the jury were especially for Fashion :D I had the 'honor' to go first and of course the jury were still feeling fresh and more than ready to test how far we know about our business and our vision of it. I really had to squeeze my brain to try to answer all of their questions, while at the same time maintaining my good English grammar and composure :D I didn't blabber nonsensical stuff, I guess you could say I did okay. But I walked out of the judging room feeling almost sure I wouldn't win the Fashion sector :D I also remember thinking "So this is how the MasterChef contestants feel after getting butchered at the judging table." Okay, maybe I was exaggerating a little but honestly, it was that tough.

When I did my presentation for Interactive sector, around 1.30 PM that day, I was calmer and more prepared. I guess the first presentation helped me to anticipate what was coming. And to make things easier, I knew 2 people of the 3 jury and they were all being quite nice to me. They asked some tough questions too of course, but they were questions I expected would be asked, so I was more ready with the answers. I also managed to gain so much valuable input for all 3 of them, which I felt truly thankful of.

I stepped out of the last judging room feeling very relieved and light. Whatever the outcome, I felt good knowing that I gave it my best shot.

But all the stuff I had to go through for the past 4 days started to take its toll on me as we approached awarding night. It was held in JCC, also as the opening night of Pekan Produk Kreatif Indonesia (PPKI). My energy was drained and I almost couldn't wait for everything to end. Lack of sleep made me feel like I was floating from one spot to another, talking with one person to another.

The first winner announced by Edward Hutabarat, was for Fashion sector and sure enough I didn't win :D I'm happy for Aria Rajasa from gantibaju.com though, he really deserved it. Then, Arvin Maricelova was announced as the winner for Screen sector. After that, Muhammad Lukman, last year's winner of IYCE Interactive, went on the stage to read the winner for the same sector. I was standing near my fellow finalists, a group of guys whom I had the best time with during the past 4 days. Funny thing is, before each winner was announced, the jury had to read a brief description of the winner and why that person was chosen as the winner. The description was in English and when Mas Lukman began reading it and said "HER business has...." my friends immediately cheered and congratulated me because I was the only girl in Interactive sector so it couldn't have been anyone else! I of course refused to believe it until my name was called :D

Finally, Mas Lukman called my name and I walked to the stage feeling dazed. I got there, stood and saw familiar faces all clapping and smiling at me and suddenly I felt this overwhelming joy. I won! I won! The hard work I've put in the last few weeks has paid off! And when Keith Davies, British Council Country Director came to give me my trophy, I grinned like a lunatic, as you could see in the picture below :)

The last winner who was announced was Joshua Simandjuntak for Design sector. The finalist with the most daring personal photo which you could take a peek here :D

Arvin, Me, Aria, Soegi (who won Nokia Fellowship award), Bang Josh with Ibu Mari Elka Pangestu who said to me "You should do our website." :D

After that, it was like a dream. Everyone there congratulated me, some journalists came to ask me some questions and took my photos. I was so happy that my husband and Hanzky and Vanya were there to share this incredible moment with me. They made it that much sweeter. We went to Portico later that night to celebrate and even then it hasn't truly sunk in what had happened.

The next day, I was all alone in my house. My husband had gone to work and Aluf took a day trip to Cibodas with my mom and dad. I opened my laptop and saw this streams of messages on Twitter, Facebook and also BBM from friends and family, congratulating me, even from people I haven't spoken to in years. Then it began to sink in and I started to get quite emotional. Not because I had won, though I'm quite proud of it, especially the fact that I'm the first female who has ever won IYCE, but because I realized that I have so much support from people around me. It was a humbling moment, really. Knowing that there are people out there, a lot of people, who cheered for me through every step of my journey and it makes me want to go even further.

So friends and family. Thank you.

And to my partner and best friend, Hanzky, whom none of this would ever happen without, thank you and let's continue to make history.

To all finalists of IYCE 2011, if you are reading this, I am honored and proud to have known you all. Whether you realize it or not, every single one of you inspired me with your passion, intelligence and determination, and that motivated me to work harder and do better. I sincerely hope we could remain friends for a long time.

And to my husband and my little girl, I hope I make you proud :)

Photos courtesy of Feri Latief

IYCE Day 2

2011-07-05T00:24:00.001+07:00

So here I am, day 2 of IYCE 2011 final judging. In just two days, there have been so many experiences, so many people I have met that I don’t quite know what to say yet. It’s overwhelming but also inspiring to be in a setting where you are surrounded by some truly creative minds. I now understand completely what British Council meant when they wrote “Let your mind be like a dry sponge, ready to absorb everything” in the briefing. It’s true. I want to talk to each one of these people and pick their brains, if only I have the chance to do it.

Anyways, will write more about the experience when it’s over. At the moment, I’m trying to unload what’s on my mind because I need a clearer head to finalize my presentation and practice what I’m going to say on Wednesday morning. I keep on tweaking the presentation because everyday I learn or remember something different which lead me to adjust minor (even major) stuff in the slides.

I miss home terribly of course. I miss Aluf even more. It’s so weird to wake up and not see her little angelic sleeping face beside me. I was feeling rather sentimental on Saturday before I went to the hotel, thinking how I would manage being apart from her for this long. But then I reminded myself that taking a leap forward isn’t always comfortable or easy. In fact, it usually involves breaking away from your comfort zone. But you gotta do it. Because I truly believe it’s important for the growth of the business and also my own.

And now, after 2 days of going through with it, I believe it even more.

IYCE and The Lazy Song

2011-06-24T17:54:00.010+07:00

This is one of those posts where I don't know what to begin it with. I don't even know what title I should put, though I most likely will find something later. There are so much going on and it's starting to overwhelm me. I guess the point of me writing this is to get all these stuff out of my mind. Then maybe I'll have some space for other things.

A cool thing happened to me last week. I was shortlisted as a finalist for International Young Creative Entrepreneur 2011 in both Interactive and Fashion sectors. I was excited but also scared. They give me less than 2 weeks to come up with a presentation, which will be used by the jury to decide whether or not I'm the right person to represent Indonesia to the competition in London. And because I'm a finalist in 2 sectors, I have to submit 2 presentations.

10 days may seem like a lot of time, if you're not doing about a gazillion other things. Which I am. And it's not just regular stuff at work, several projects are going on at the same time. And sometimes in life, you can plan all you want, there are still a lot of things that are out of your control and they can fall apart right before your eyes. And you don't really have any choice but to pick up the pieces and try putting them back together again. Because, who else would?

That, and then there are some personal issues I have to sort out which have been occupying my time and my mind too. It was all beginning to feel too much that yesterday, I woke up and asked myself "How am I going to get up and face everything?"

Coincidentally, on my way to the office, a song played on the radio. I've heard this song probably more than 100th times before but I never really paid attention to it. But yesterday Idid and it was uncanny how perfectly that song described my mood:

Today I Don't Feel Like Doing Anything
I Just Wanna Lay In My Bed
Don't Feel Like Pickin' Up My Phone
So Leave A Message At The Tone
'Cause Today I swear I'm Not Doin' Anythin'

(I later found out the song is sung by Bruno Mars. I don't even like his music!)

So yeah. That's how I felt. I was so tired emotionally and physically that I just felt like unplugging everything (my laptop, phones, BlackBerry, etc) and just lay in my bed all day long. I remember about two years ago, when I just started focusing on this business, I said to my friend that now I know why not everyone is a business(wo)man. Because it's. so. freakin. hard. I've read books and heard stories about entrepreneurs and they all say how grueling and demanding it is to run your own business, but still I had no idea it was this hard. And two years after I said that, I find that overtime, it becomes even harder...though the reward is so much better too.

I met Ibu Martha Tilaar a few days ago at a media gathering she held in her house. I had the pleasure of sitting next to her and had a chat. I wanted so much to ask her "How did you do it? How did you manage to find the time to do all this?" but I was too shy to do it and the timing didn't seem to be appropriate, for some reason. But I really want to know. Partly out of my curiosity and also frustration. I wonder if she ever had a day where everything became too much to bear and she hid in her bedroom all day long. I thought about that a lot yesterday.

But then I tried to think about how my life would be like if I hadn't made this decision. If I hadn't quit my previous job. Well, I most likely would still be working at MAC Cosmetics, doing all those "glamorous" work, perhaps going abroad on business trip once a year, receiving nice paycheck every month. But you know what? Now that I tried to imagine this "alternate" life, it didn't sound like the kind of life I'd prefer over this one. In fact, even being in this exhausted state, having been through the craziest 3 years of my life trying to build the business from almost nothing, and sometimes feel frustrated, angry, tired, flat broke, sad and confused: I am more convinced that this is exactly the life I want to live. I can't explain it now but I just know I'll be doing just fine.

So anyway, there are only 2 days left until my IYCE presentations is due. But I know I'm gonna get it done.

I always do.

...after a Decade of Waiting

2011-06-12T23:24:00.021+07:00

...I walked into the Nusa Indah hall of Balai Kartini that night and gasped. I saw for the first time where I was going to sit. Not only that it was located in front (which was expected because I had paid for front row tickets), but the piano was literally located right in front of it! Or more specifically, the piano stool that Ben Folds was going to sit on for 2 hours that night, was located right in front of my seat! It was really the BEST seat in the house!

That's where I was sitting!

I squealed and told Detta, a friend who went to the show with me, how perfect everything had been, that this is all "meant to be". Detta just rolled her eyes because she's been hearing me going on and on about how perfect that day was for me. But it really was. Everything worked out very well for me and it was as if every single thing I did leading up to that day was orchestrated in such a way, by some higher power, that caused me to experience all this awesomeness. Yes, I just used the word higher power and awesomeness in one sentence. That's how giddy I am still about it.

Me and Detta

With the t-shirt I just bought and straight away changed into in my car :D

Anyway, Ben Fold's long time fans know how great his live shows are. His stage antics are perhaps as famous as his songs. The man really knows how to draw the crowd in and he's superbly creative about keeping them excited. He is known for involving his audience as part of his performance and he has done it in many different and amazing ways. He used them as his backup vocal (maybe almost always), doing a capella montage for one his songs (though we haven't seen the finished work yet), get them to be a part of a music video for Sarah Bareilles, getting them into a chat roulette improv ala Merton, asked them to do paper plane requests and many many more. He has gone way beyond saying a few words in local language to communicate with his audience (though he did that too in Jakarta but that's only a teeny tiny part of his stage banter) He has performed with guitar orchestra, a full orchestra, acapella group; he was the first musician that ever had a live show broadcasted via MySpace. His live shows are a huge part of his career and there is always something new and interesting in them, that fans just want to keep coming. I have a DVD of his concert with West Australian Symphony Orchestra (WASO) in Perth and that was the first time I seriously got my calculator out to count how many $$$ I need to go to Australia to see him perform live. Thank God I didn't have to do that!

Anyway, even as his biggest fan, I still had my doubts about him performing solo. Just him and his piano? Can he really make it as awesome as when he played with his full band or an orchestra? Well, he answered those doubts that night and now I know that the answer is: yes he can!

So Detta and I settled in our seats. My sister actually came to the show as well, but because she was using her media pass, she could not sit with us.

At 9 PM sharp, Ben came to the stage to the clapping and cheering from the crowd. He smiled, waved, sat down on his stool and immediately played the first song. It was "Effington" from his "Way to Normal" album. Effington! I almost screamed the words. I can no longer count how often I played this song on my way home from work, singing loudly while driving on the toll road. It felt surreal to hear it live. After that he launched straight to "Annie Waits", an opening number from his "Rockin the Suburbs" album. Watching him play piano was mad. He managed to make that one instrument to sound so alive and rich. It was like he had a love and hate relationship with it. Sometimes he would play it delicately while singing his lyrics softly. Sometimes he would bang the keys or use his whole arm. It was amazing.

I also had to give it to Ismaya Live for choosing the most perfect venue for such set up. The size of this hall was just small enough for the show to feel intimate but big enough to not make it stuffy. And the accoustic was better than I expected! There was one moment when Ben was singing the high note in "Sentimental Guy", where his voice sounded absolutely crystal clear, I almost forgot to breathe.

I also like that Ismaya didn't try to compensate the lack of instruments with unneccessary stage set up. It was simple and elegant. Just black curtain, Ismaya Live logo illuminating on top and a grand piano in the middle.

Though they did put a smoke machine that got Ben to play my favorite song from "Whatever and Ever Amen" album, "Smoke".

About the setlist, It was clear that Ben dedicated this show for his longtime fans. Out of 24 songs he performed that night, he only played one song from his latest album "Lonely Avenue", and it was "Picture Window". One song! Usually musicians or bands perform songs from whichever album they're promoting at the moment but with Ben, it was like he didn't even care whether people have even heard of it. He even said "I'm just gonna keep playing, I've been doing this for 15 years and never once had a gig here, so I'm just gonna play some stuff from my entire career."

Oh and he took requests too. Isn't that cool? He would stop in between songs and said 'Hmmm let's see, what else.." And we would start yelling out song titles. He would just play whichever caught his ears. Funny thing is, he even started a song, and then stopped and said "Wait wait let me try to figure out the key, it's been a while." And then said "Ok I think I got it." then started playing again. That also happened during "Bitch Went Nuts", a song he said he never played live. It was clear that he's forgotten some parts of the lyric but he just kept going. He was so relaxed that it felt like he was singing to a group of friends from his living room. It was indeed an intimate show.

About stage banter I mentioned earlier, below some examples:

--------
Ben: you guys are so sweet clapping at me drinking water

Crowd: clapping and cheering even louder

Ben: *drinking water dramatically*

The crowd went wild.
----------
Ben: the only indonesian words I learned is terima kasih. I didn't get to learn much, just from people I met. I also noticed from Twitter than you guys use a lot of "dongs"? I don't know what that means. Google translate doesn't know what that means either. You guys have created a language that defies Google Translate.

-----------

Ben: (before he sang "All You Can Eat") A lot of people ask me where I got my inspiration to write songs from. Actually I got it from the conversations people have around me. Like my dad for example. I got so many inspiration from him. He says the craziest shit.

------------

Ben: (telling us story behind "Steven's Last nigh in Town" - I noticed he does this a lot on his shows)..so the women started getting turned off by Steven because he told them he couldn't love a woman with cellullite and...this is true story, I didn't put this in the song though...fat ankles!

Me: OUCH!

...And many more.

Ben has some crazy traditions on his live shows as well. One of them is called Rock This Bitch. Basically, when one of the audience yell out "Rock this bitch!" during his show, he would instantly play an impromptu song about anything, usually about that specific city or country he's playing at, and the song always sounds different all the time. And Jakarta got our own version of rock this bitch that night! I know it's a weird thing to be proud of but heck, now we have one more thing in common with Tokyo, Sydney or Chicago! :p

It was clear that the audience was big fans of his. They..or we..sang along to almost every song, especially people on the first few rows. But nothing was more epic than when we sang "You Don't Know Me". The song is a duet with Regina Spektor who, of course wasn't there. So Ben asked us if could do her part. Uh, SURE? And I've got goosebumps everytime I hear/watch it again on Youtube because it was too awesome for words. You could even see how pleased Ben looked when he realized his Indonesian fans can carry the tunes as well as those in other countries and he reacted this way in other songs as well. Should've come here sooner, huh Ben?

My other favorite moment was when he sang "Rockin the Suburbs". I didn't think he was going to play it because it's a rock song and I couldn't imagine it being performed only with a piano. But he did it and he rocked it too. Now if you've listened to his songs, you'd know that not only Ben's songs are full of catchy melody and great lyrics that are fun to sing along to, but they are full of profanities as well. If you blush everytime someone says the F word, you'd have fainted during this song. But as his fans, it was an honor for us to scream out this word to/with him :D

Were we swearing throughout the entire show? Of course not. Ben wrote fantastic slow pieces as well. The fact that he plays piano brilliantly adds to the poignancy of the songs he performed. He also managed to sound genuine and honest in singing them so it never felt cheesy. The crowd's favorite was "Still Fighting It" and "The Luckiest". The latter is not my fave song of his. I don't know, I guess I'm just not in a romantic touchy feely mood whenever I hear the song and I do think it's bordering on sappy. Though I can understand why people love it. But Still Fighting It is a song I couldn't help getting emotional about. The first time I realized what the song was about, I bawled like a baby while watching the music video. Its so heartbreaking. If you're a parent, especially a dad, it's a song you absolutely have to listen to. Absolutely.

Then there was "Picture Window", another heartbreakingly beautiful song, where the lyrics were written by Nick Hornby. I heard Nick's son is autistic which made this song almost unbearable to hear for me.

And of course, my favorite song, at least from his "Songs for Silverman" album, was also performed: "Landed". I closed my eyes for a while when he sang it. It felt like a dream.

During his performance with WASO, he taught the audience to do a 3-part harmony so they can sing the backup for "Not The Same". It was so funny and I never ever thought he would do the routine here! But he did and it was a great way to close the show.

Though of course he came back after we all gave him a standing ovation and told him we wanted more.

He came back, performed "One Angry Dwarf and 200 Solemn Faces" and "Army", so powerful and full of energy. The crowd was wild, singing and clapping with him. Those 2 songs are classic Ben Folds Five and classic Ben Folds as well. The piano playing really shined in these 2 final numbers and he left us in awe of his amazing skill.

After that he waved and said "Thank you kind citizens of Jakarta and the surrounding area." And disappeared behind the stage.

We gave standing ovation again and the light was turned on. But a lot of people still lingered in the hall. The show was too spectacular and we just wanted to relish every single moment just a little bit longer. We took photos in front of the stage and left the venue, almost like in slow motion.

posing in front of the piano where Ben was just playing minutes before

Many people were wondering why he didn't play "Brick", one of his most popular songs from Ben Folds Five era. Some seemed truly upset that he had put it on his original setlist, but decided to leave it out at the last minute. Honestly, I didn't miss it at all. Sure, I like the song, it's great and some perhaps consider it one of their 90's anthems, but I was too happy that he decided to play his more obscure songs, like "Smoke", "Time" or "Don't Change Your Plans". To me these songs have deeper meanings than "Brick". So no, I didn't have any complain at all. Not one single bit.

Now a lot of my friends thought I was gonna be emotional and weepy during the entire concert but I swear I didn't! I didn't shed a single tear, I was just bubbling with happiness. I was happy. And I felt lucky and privileged to be able to see such fantastic and memorable performance from my favorite musician. And I was, still am, blown away by how such an incredible show was delivered only by a man and his piano.

I genuinely felt I had to thank him for making me, and other fans so happy that night and made a decade of waiting worth it. A quick search on Twitter told me most of the audience felt the same way. And like me, they also admtted that some moments from the show stayed with them long after that.

What's left of the night were the memories and these

When I got home, my timeline showed this update:

It was definitely nice to know we weren't the only ones enjoying ourselves :)

And call me crazy, but I'm already looking forward to his next performance here :D

Click the link, if you wanna see the show's recap by Ismaya Live and Junk Online, where they've quoted my tweets, photos and videos on numerous ocassions, tee hee.

YouTube video courtesy of curipandangdotcom and entulista

"My hearing is Ass, sorry Affi."

2011-06-03T01:33:00.010+07:00

To keep you up to speed, one of my favorite singer/songwriter, Ben Folds, came to Jakarta and I got a chance to meet him, chatted with him and took photos. But I forgot to bring my CD for him to sign on.

Or, for a more elaborate version of that story, read my previous post.

And now let's move on the really interesting part of the story! (Oh shut up, to me, it's interesting!)

So there I was, eating my lunch...or more like, trying to shove some food down my throat, while Ben Folds himself was being interviewed by the media, two tables away from me. I told my sister and Ipong how I have stupidly left the CDs in my car and wondering if I should run to the parking lot to get it. We had some back and forth exchange of words, but to keep it short, both of them said to me "Don't you just sit there wondering if you still have time! Run! Now!"

I grabbed my car key, ran to the elevator and rode it a few levels down to the parking lot. I grabbed the "Lonely Avenue" CD, locked my car and rode the elevator back up again. When I went back to Pizza e Birra, I noticed that there were only a few people left in the press conference area. Ben was talking to someone and there was a girl inching forward, clutching something, either a CD or DVD cover, I can't recall. I walked really quickly the corner where they were all standing. I saw Ben's tour manager (I later learned that he's called 9 Year?), talking the the girl and said "Did you get your autograph? No? Oh it's okay, I think we still have time for one more." and I thought "Oh no, they might not allow me to do this!"

There were two people from Ismaya Live standing next to me and I asked them politely if I could get Ben's autograph, really really quickly. They were hesitant, saying how they really had to go to the concert venue. I quickly decided I wasn't going to get a yes out of them, and understandably so of course as they had to watch the schedule and all, so I just went straight to the tour manager and asked him. Luckily, I didn't have to beg, as he was really nice. He said yes, sure and ushered me to where Ben was standing. He saw me and I think remembered me from the interview, because there was a flicker of recognition in his eyes and he said "Hey there!"

"I forgot to bring this with me earlier, so could you please sign it for me?"
"Yes, of course! What's your name?" he asked while taking out his marker.
I started spelling my name "A...F....F.." then I froze because I saw that he had written A.S.S on the cover!

"It's "F" actually." I said politely trying not to laugh
"F? Oh..these look more like "S" than "F"!" he said incredulously. "I'm sorry." he said, and he looked genuinely sorry.
"That's okay. You can just strike it." I said. It really was okay to me.
"No, no, let me try to fix it!" Ben said still holding his marker mid air. He thought for a moment, looked up to me then looked at his tour manager and said
"Uh...I guess there's really not much I can do about this, is there?" and started laughing really really loudly.

His manager and a few people who were watching what happened started laughing too. And I, of course, also started laughing because....I've got an "ASS" written with black marker on the cover of my CD..by Ben Folds. I can not think of anything more bizarre than that!

"Okay how about this.." he said and started scribbling something. "So could you please spell your name again?" and I did and then I read what he had written:

My hearing is ass, sorry Affi.

this is now locked in a vault and stored deep inside my secret dungeon

and he put a little arrow through the heart icon next to it, before adding his autograph.

The sweet thing is (even sweeter than what he wrote), he kept apologizing to me about the ASS.
"I'm sorry about that."
"It's really okay! It's... your...ass?" I said laughing
"Yeah, it's my dumbass." he said remorsefully.

I didn't want him to feel uncomfortable, so I tried to change the subject. And I did this by asking to take a photo with him again! :D He said "Yes, absolutely!" when I asked and I looked around trying to see if there was anyone who could take the picture. My sister and Ipong were too far away and the only one there was the manager so I asked him. He took my phone (my Nokia N97, oh how I will treasure you forever), and asked me which button to press. I stood next to Ben. He was preparing a pose and suddenly said "Oh, we better not hunch. It's not good. Stand tall." and I laughed. It's just the kind of thing my mom used to say to me everytime she saw me hunching (I tend to do this because I was always the tallest kid in my class). I just thought how adorable it was for him to say that, though perhaps he was kinda saying it to himself.

So the manager took one picture and showed it to me. "It's good." he said. Ben took my phone and said "Let me see." He studied it for a moment and said "Yeah, I look kinda crazy here." I couldn't help but laugh again. The whole thing was just so out of this world. There I was, excited to be able to finally meet him, yet at the same time nervous and scared out of my wits that I had come off like an obsessed, lunatic fan and he was the one who thought he looked crazy!

Don't hunch..and don't look crazy

Before leaving, I told him that I was going to sit in the front row of his show later that night. He lit up.

"Really? Oh I guess I'll be seeing you tonight!"
"Yep, really looking forward to it, Ben."
And he said, thank you, gave me a huge smile and reached out to shake my hands again.

Honestly. How can it be more awesome than that?

It couldn't, you said? Oh but it will :D

I walked back to our lunch table, almost unable to contain my excitement. I told my sister and Ipong what happened and they both laughed their....asses of :D

I drove back to my office feeling like I was driving through white, fluffy clouds and when I got there, I saw that Ben had sent out this picture on Twitter.

Can you see my face peeking from the back? Right at the center? Yes, that's me! So when I saw him lift up his BlackBerry during the press conference, he really did take picture of us.

I RT'ed his tweet with the remark "Hah, my face is peeking from the back!" and went back to recounting the incredible thing I just experienced to the girls at work. Then, I went to the bathroom and when I came back, I saw that I had a lot of mentions on my Twitter. My friends were all excited about something and I couldn't understand it at first until I saw:

See? I told you it was going to get more awesome :D

So yes. As you can probably imagine, I was happy. No, happy is an understatement, there is no word for how I felt that day. Everything went as planned...even BEYOND what I had ever imagined in my wildest dream.

It was just such a cool experience to meet someone behind the music which has been a source of inspiration to me. Someone who wrote all those songs which have helped me go through a lot of things over the years. And it's even more wonderful to find that that person is genuinely nice, friendly and funny. And the interaction I had with him, though short, was so ridiculously weird that I would remember it for a long time.

With a smile. Always.

Just like I will remember the unbelievable experience I had watching him perform live.

But that's another story for another post.

Meeting "The Man"

2011-05-29T19:46:00.015+07:00

After months of psyching myself out for the D-day, I was strangely calm and collected on Thursday morning. I woke up, had coffee and some toast, took a shower and got ready. I even caught a little bit of the American Idol finale while getting dressed.

It wasn't until I drove closer and closer to Plaza Indonesia that I started to feel nervous.

A little background story. Months ago, when I found out that Ben Folds was really coming to Jakarta, I told the girls in the office I was going to meet him. I told them I had several plans, but one of them was I was gonna ask my sister, who works for Cleo magazine, if there was any chance they were getting an interview with him and I would offer myself to do it. Now bear in mind that I hadn't even talked to my sister about this plan :D But I had no qualms about offering myself because I have written for some magazines as contributor and I have done several interviews with international artists during my radio days. It was just a matter whether the magazine was interested in covering the show/artist or whether the promoter agreed to grant them the interview. Like I said on my previous post, I had no control about the outcome, but I had faith in it anyway. And like so many times before, I luck out. Majorly.

Several weeks ago, my sister told me that Cleo was going to be one of the media partners for this concert, though she still wasn't sure they were getting an interview. On Monday, 3 days before the show, my sister told me that it was confirmed; they were scheduled for an interview with Ben Folds on Thursday, 26th of May at 1 PM. Right after the press conference.

So there I was driving to Plaza Indonesia for the press conference, with my sister in the passenger seat. Between feeling nervous and cold (it was a rather cold morning), I desperately needed to go to the bathroom so we were in a hurry when we got out of my car in the parking lot. Which caused me to forget something quite important. Which would later lead to an unbelievable story.

We got to Pizza e Birra, the venue of the press conference, at 12.05 PM while the invitation was at 12 sharp. However when we stepped inside, there were only about 4 people there and the backdrop was still being assembled. Half of the restaurant was occupied by patrons, eating their lunch, totally oblivious to the fact that I was about to have the most incredible experience.

They're just setting up the backdrop

So we were early, and it was fine by me because that gave me more time to compose myself. At that time I was already very nervous and it didn't help that I didn't get enough sleep and could only eat very little in the morning. At one point, I told my sister I felt like throwing up and falling asleep at the same time.

Then somebody from Ismaya Live came to us to say that the interview was going to be a group format, with 2 other journalists from different media. More and more people started arriving filling up all corners of the space allocated for the press conference. Still though, I expected more people to show up. Not that I was complaining, less people meant there was a bigger chance for me to maybe sneak an extra minute or two during the interview.

I spent some time going through my questions with my sister and checked my Twitter timeline. Speaking of which, there was like a sideline story involving Twitter. Apparently, my friends, (oh how I love them) who have been hearing me talking and tweeting endlessly about this day, couldn't help to feel excited for me. So they started giving me pep talks and well wishes since the night before and they really tuned in to my timeline to find out what was going on with my "Meeting Ben Folds" plan. Vanya and Tjetjep, even started a "hug campaign" the night before, where they tweeted Ben lots of times telling him that I was his biggest fan and that I should get a hug when I meet him. Those tweets got retweeted a few times by other people that I started to panic. Luckily they stopped before it got out of hand :D Anyway, on Thursday, a lot of them tweeted me asking for updates and wishing me luck. It even came from people whom I didn't even think would pay any attention to my crazy tweets at all! The whole thing was just so sweet. I felt somewhat less nervous knowing that my friends, especially the girls in the office, were cheering for me from in front of their computers/phones. Thank you guys!

I'm okay, I just wanna puke.

Anyway, after waiting for about an hour, suddenly, Ben showed up. He walked so nonchalantly that I almost didn't notice it was him. But I've seen his face so many times (on YouTube mostly haha) that I froze right away when I saw the top of his head from where I was sitting. I grabbed my sister's hand. "What??" she said, annoyed. "He's here!" I said, almost passed out from excitement.

And there he was. He looked exactly like I imagined him to look like, except whiter. I know that's a weird thing to say but that was my first impression. He was really fair and his hair was lighter in color than I thought. He came in with only 2 people. No entourage. No bodyguards. Nothing. He looked well rested and relaxed. He said hi to a few people in the room and the press conference started right away.

I tried taking lots of pictures but for some reason, the room suddenly got dark, even though there were huge glass windows on the side. So the camera wouldn't focus and I was too excited to change the setting. At one point, I noticed that he lifted up his BlackBerry towards us, (there were perhaps 10-15 of us standing right in front of him), took a snap and smiled. He answered some questions from the journalists politely, cracking a joke or two.

I couldn't remember much about this part of the day, it was sort of a blur because my head was screaming "Affi, Ben Folds is sitting less than a meter away from you! Would you believe this?" And I was trying to shut it up. Next thing I know, he was asked to stand in front of us so we could take better pictures. I took this chance to snap some more photos, which as you can see below, came out better.

I love the goofy look on his face in this picture

Then, the interview session began.

We were divided into several groups, each consisting of 3 journalists. My group got the second turn so I was waiting near the long table where the interview was conducted, trying to figure out which questions I was going to ask. You see, I prepared about 10 questions, but I realized that I wouldn't have enough time to ask them all so I knew I had to cut them half. I had to figure out which questions that were most likely will be asked by other people (so I wouldn't have to ask them again) and which would be most interesting for Cleo readers (had to stay professional even in the eye of madness). Before I was through figuring it out, they called our name.

Ben doing interview with the first group. I was up next.

And there I was, standing right in front of Ben Folds, the man whose music have become a part of my everyday life for the past few years, they might as well be the original soundtrack of it. We shook hands and we were told that we only had 10 minutes. My heart sank a little. 10 minutes meant that each of us could only ask 2 questions max. And Ben was such a great interviewee, he never answered questions in just 2-3 sentences. So by the time I finished my first question, and before it was my turn again, the MC reminded us that our time was up. I told her "I only got a chance to ask 1 question. Could I please ask one more?" but she said "Sorry, time's up." Ben then said "It's okay if they all ask another question each." :)

Unfortunately I can't reveal too much detail about the interview. You just have to wait until it shows up in Cleo magazine, which I think will be out end of June.

After the interview was done, I asked him if I could take a picture with him and he said "Sure!". So I stood next to him while my sister took the pictures with her fancy camera. I wanted to ask for another one using my own camera but the line of people waiting for their turn to talk to him was so long that we had to hurry up.

My sister and I went to a table nearby where we met one of my best friends, Ipong, for lunch. I couldn't focus on anything anymore. I was relieved that the interview was over but how could I think of anything else when Ben Folds was sitting two tables away? Then from the table I saw that he was signing some CD covers and then I thought "Oh no! I forgot to bring mine!"

And that story will be on my next post :) Thanks for reading, guys.

One More Day to Ben Folds Up Close & Personal!

2011-05-25T08:46:00.006+07:00

I still can't believe I'm going to see Ben Folds live in Jakarta. Just one more day to the D-day and I still can't wrap my head around the idea that I will be sitting in the front row, just a few meters away from someone whose music I've been listening to for the past 13 years, watching him play live.

Oh yes, I've got my front row ticket, baby. Waited since 8 am the first day the tickets were sold, even though the ticket booth didn't open till 10-ish that day :D

Actually there's another thing that makes me bubbling with excitement at the moment. I can't reveal too much detail because...I don't want to jinx it (silly, I know). But let's say that there's a big chance I will meet him in person too tomorrow :D To be honest, it's something I sort of knew would happen. I'm not being cocky or anything. But ever since I knew he was coming here, I sort of laid out some plans on making it come true. Now, I'm not the one who calls the shots in any of these plans, but I didn't push it hard either. I sort of adapted a zen-like approach to the whole thing. I did my part and I let the universe take over. If it was meant to be, it was going to happen. And it did. :)

So I've got a very exciting days ahead. Let's just hope everything goes well.

Lemon Cupcakes with Lemon Glaze

2011-05-17T20:54:00.007+07:00

I made these when I was still in my lemon-obsessed phase. I couldn't believe how good this turned out. The cake is moist and bursting with lemon flavor and the glaze, while very very sweet, has just the right amount of tang to cut through the sweetness. Even smelling them will bring you joy.

It is happiness in a cupcake.

Lemon Cupcakes with Lemon Glaze, adapted from this recipe.

Ingredients

Cupcakes

1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup buttermilk (or 1/2 cup plain low-fat yogurt)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 lemon, zest and juice
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs

Glaze

1 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar (also known as powdered sugar or icing sugar)
2 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice
zest of 1/2 a lemon

Direction:

Preheat oven to 170 degrees. Butter and flour cupcake tin (or use silicone baking cups like I did and skip the buttering part :D)
In a medium bowl, whisk the flour with the baking powder and salt.
In a small bowl, whisk together the buttermilk (or yogurt) vanilla, lemon zest, and lemon juice. Set aside.
With an electric mixer, cream the butter and granulated sugar until light. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.
With the mixer on low speed, add the four mixture in three batches, alternating with two additions of the yogurt mixture.
Divide batter evenly into cupcake mould
Bake until the toothpick inserted in the center of a cake comes clean, 15 - 20 minutes . Cool for 10 minutes in tin, then cool completely on a wire rack.
In a small bowl, stir confectioners' sugar with the remaining 2 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice until smooth (add more lemon juice if needed).
Pour glaze over the cakes, or just dunk them!
Let stand for 30 minutes before serving to allow the glaze to set

Peeling Without the "Lobster Face" Effect

2011-05-12T19:25:00.000+07:00

Years ago, when I entered my late twenties, my sister suddenly pushed her face very close to mine while saying "Let me take a look at your skin!". Then after inspecting it for a few minutes, she turned around and said "You definitely need some chemical peel."

Yeah I know, what a loving sister huh? :D

Anyways, I'm one of those lucky people who never really had any problem with my skin growing up, even though my skincare ritual was nothing extraordinary. BUT...that didn't last very long. As I mature, my skin starts to cooperate less and less. The most annoying problems for me is dryness, which at first came as a big shock because I've always had oily skin! Another one is blemishes that won't go away and sometimes, my face will feel a bit rough and look dull.

So I admitted to myself that I do need some kind of help from exfoliation products. I used to use AHA cream from this skin clinic, and that worked quite well, even though I wasn't fond of the after effects. My skin would turn red (not bright Lobster red, I may add, but visibly redder than usual) and my skins were flaky and peeling significantly before I saw some result. So I'm a bit hesitant to return to that product.

I was looking for a new exfoliator when Amal introduced to me Artistry Intensive Skincare Renewing Peel. The claim that got me interested to try it is that it's able to lift up dead skin cells without irritating skin.

The main ingredient, which is the enzyme of Mucor Miehei Mushroom, will work to lift up your dead skin cells until it reaches the cells where the PH is balanced. That’s where the Mucor Miehei Mushroom will stop lifting anymore of your skin cells and therefore it will not cause any irritation. So you won't get the lobster face or the annoying flaky skin!

Luckily, I managed to get my hands on a bottle of Artistry Intensive Skincare Renewing Peel. I used it as directed, which is after washing my face clean. I used 8 full pumps worth of product all over my face and waited for 8 minutes. Afterwards, I dampened my fingers with water and started massaging my face lightly. I cleansed the product off my face with water and proceeded with my regular skin care. We made a video on how to use this product, you can check it out here.

I was glad to say that I didn't feel any tingling, tightening or any other unpleasant sensation when using this product or afterwards. My skin looks visibly brighter after a few times use though it didn't completely make my blemishes fade away. I also noticed that my skin felt more supple.

Most importantly though, I didn't see any redness or flaky skin when using this product for a few weeks. Big whoop! I could safely apply my foundation and powder without worrying it will "break" on my face.

This product costs Rp 999,500 for non Amway member price and it’s in 20ml packaging which is enough for 8 weeks or 16 times of use. But if you’re joining Amway’s Privileged Customer program you can get a distributor discount too without having to run the business. Follow @sehatplus on Twitter or check their website www.sehatplus.com for more info.

Three Ps and FD Transformation

2011-05-10T15:39:00.003+07:00

In business and in life, it's important to have a clear and defined set of goals. What is important to you? What do you want to achieve in the next year? 5 years? 10 years? What do you NOT want to be? What can you do today that will set you off in the right path to achieve those goals?

I knew these questions had to be asked, but I didn't realize just as important until I read Delivering Happiness by Tony Hsieh. I'm not going to write a lot about the book, let's save that for another post, but l just have to say that it is a real eye-opener.

Tony Hsieh, the author who is CEO of Zappos Inc, elaborated about the 3 important things about his life and his way of doing business. Profit, passion and purpose. I read the whole thing in 3 days and got me into thinking about our company's profit, passion and purpose.

Coincidentally, Hanzky and I are at a point where we knew we had to make some big and important changes to our business. So, about 1,5 months ago, we sat down and talked for hours and continued doing so the next day. We asked ourselves the "hard" questions and thought very very deeply about the answers. As it turned out, when you take away all the "distractions" and be very honest to yourself, answering those questions are not that difficult. We knew all along what we wanted and what we wanted to achieve, we just got sidetracked a little bit along the way :)

Anyway, after the long and stimulating discussion, it was time to make some decisions. Like I said in the beginning, we knew we had to make some changes, some were quite drastic and we knew it will probably raise a few eyebrows. But we didn't have any doubts and we felt in our hearts that this is the right thing to do.

So on to the transformations! Everything happened so quickly. Renaming the company, from The Daily Media to Female Daily Network. Changing the logos of all our websites. Launching the new layout for Fashionese Daily and Female Daily (the rest of the websites will follow), implementing single sign on system and also, changing the name (and the concept) of Fame n Frame to Pops Daily.

Quite a lot for less than 2 months, right?

Well they really were some of the most exhausting and exciting weeks of my life. Everyday, we had to make decisions and tried to do everything quickly because we couldn't afford not to! But things went according to plan. Thank God.

On Saturday, 7th of May, we held FD Garden Party. It was the biggest event we had to organize (though it probably wasn't big at all for some people) but we really pushed ourselves to make it happen, as well as racing against time to finish redoing the layout because we planned to announce it during the event. There was a moment where I almost called off the whole thing out of sheer exhaustion and frustration but I have the most wonderful team who can discuss every problem and we could find solutions together. So in the end, we stuck to it and everything worked out well. The event was a success, everyone who came had a blast and, to us, it was like a celebration marking the beginning of our transformation :)

The whole FD crew at Garden Party minus Syita. My face was half-covered by Hanzky's...thanks loh Han! :D

Yes, we have a long way to go. And comes to think of it, we are still heading to the same place as we were a few years ago when we started. But we have changed how we're going there and which ways we're going to take. And with this new direction, I am 1000% positive we're going to enjoy every mile of our journey.

Aluf on a Rocket

2011-04-25T23:52:00.005+07:00

When she was about 1,5 year old until she turned 2, every time Aluf opened her little eyes in the morning, I always asked her this question:

"Selamat pagi, Aluf. Mimpi apa tadi malam?"

and she would always answer with this:

"Mimpi naik loket*....ke angkasa!"

*loket=roket

When Life Gives You Lemons, Make English Pancake!

2011-04-03T10:19:00.018+07:00

In my opinion, there are few things that emanates cheerfulness and freshness other than lemons. From the scent to the tart and refreshing taste, and the color! Everything about the citrus fruit is sunny and happy. Just look at that gorgeous yellow! How can you not be happy looking at it?

I'm currently finding myself browsing more and more baking recipes that use lemons as a star. I just love how a small amount of zest or juice can give whatever I'm making a whole new dimension both in taste and smell.

Anyway, usually on the weekends, I would make pancakes for Aluf and Agus. Their favorite is delicious, fluffy buttermilk pancakes, which I'm gonna share the recipe in another post. But one day, I was kinda bored with the thick, fluffy pancakes (or "flapjacks") and was thinking of making crepes. But while browsing for recipes, I came across one for English pancakes with lemon and sugar. Lemon! Sugar! For breakfast! I can't think of anything that'll bring me more joy :D It was also great to find out that this type of pancakes are very easy to make, perhaps even easier than regular pancakes.

By the way, Pan-O has on their menu, which they also serve with lemon and sugar and also blueberries but I can't remember what they call it.

My husband and Aluf loves it though I couldn't convince neither of them to eat it "the proper way". My husband chose to spread some strawberry jam on it while Aluf, the queen of "meises warna-warni" insisted that's what you eat pancakes with.

English Pancakes
recipe from this website

Ingredient

1 egg,
1 egg yolk
1 cup flour
1 1/4 cups of milk
1/8th teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon melted butter
White sugar
Lemons

Sift the flour in a bowl with the salt

Make a well in the middle and add the eggs and half the milk, whisking.

Then add the rest of the milk and melted butter, whisk well.

Heat an 8-inch frying pan until hot and then reduce to medium.

Add a very small knob of butter to the pan, spread it around and let it sizzle.

Pour approx 2 tablespoons of batter into the frying pan, tilting the pan swirling the batter to cover the round area of the pan.

Cook the pancake for approx 30 seconds per side.

On a plate sprinkle plenty of white sugar and freshly squeezed lemon juice on each pancake and roll it up.

Squeeze extra lemon over the pancakes eating.

It's Sunday now and I'm getting ready to bake something this afternoon and I'm going to be using...you guessed it!

lemons!

My Sweet Life

2011-03-21T23:33:00.012+07:00

I wrote an article on Mommies Daily last week about my little hobby: baking. While the article was mostly about baking with kids, I felt like there were actually so much more I could write about it. But I'll bore MD readers to tears if I did it so let me just vent it out on my personal blog :D

I've always been interested in baking. I remember, when I was in high school, I tried baking a loaf of brownies using my mom's small oven and thinking "Wow, this is easy!" (sok bener ye). But being a high school kid with so many other things that kept my mind busy, I never went back to the kitchen and tried whipping up anything else again.

But even though I never came near any flour during those years, I still spent many hours of watching Nigella Lawson and Anna Olson, with drools hanging out from my mouth, I decided to give it a shot again. I also came across Penny Lane's blog. Not only she captivated me with her mouth-watering photos and the beautiful way she writes (I think she's one of the few people who can describe a brownie in the most poetic way :D), I also felt my curiosity growing bigger and bigger.

Then I found Tastespotting and it was like finding a 24 hour cooking show with no dialogue, only rows and rows of food photos you can feast your eyes on, so beautiful you want to lick the computer screen and make whatever you happen to eat the moment seem unworthy. I used to open the website every night before bed and imagine having the time and skill to produce all those lovely food at home. One day, I couldn't take it anymore, I decided to make a dessert that requires no baking, as I didn't have an oven then. Panna cotta.

It wasn't the best panna cotta I've ever tasted but I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to whip up something that sounds so posh :D The next few days, I went to buy an electric oven and there was no stopping me after that. I was hooked on baking.

I think the first thing I baked with my oven was some macaroni and cheese, as it's one of my favorite food. (Actually, anything starchy and creamy is my favorite food). After that, I've baked banana bread using various recipes, brownie, muffins, cupcakes, cookies, carrot cake and plenty more.

I'm also quite fascinated with taking a good picture of my baking goods, though I sadly lack the equipment, skill and props to really come up with gorgeous photos like those I've seen in Tastespotting. But since this is a hobby, I'm not overly ambitious with it. I learn slowly, very slowly, and savor every moment of the process, both in baking and photography. When I finish baking something, take decent photos of it and can watch Aluf helping herself to seconds, I consider it to be a good day.

Actually, a great day :)

Peanut Butter And Jelly Sandwich

2011-03-19T09:29:00.002+07:00

This morning I offered Aluf to make peanut butter and jelly sandwich. She's seen her favorite cartoon characters eat them on TV, I think it was Oso or something, and excitedly said yes. She usually eats her bread with butter and chocolate sprinkles like any other Indonesian kid :D

As I was making it, she stood beside me and watched.

"Ayo kita bikin peanut butter and jelly sandwich! Ini yang namanya peanut butter luf" I said while spreading it on a piece of white bread. She knew peanut butter as "selai kacang" before.

"Dan ini jelly-nya" I added while scooping some strawberry preserves from the glass jar.

"And-nya yang mana?" Aluf asked innocently.

Kids are so cute.

The Big Move!

2011-03-18T17:32:00.010+07:00

I know at least 2 people who're going to laugh their ass off because I said "big move" *melirik judes ke Hanzky dan Vanya*

Okayyy, maybe it can't be called big when the blog only has 15 posts. But considering I did the moving from Posterous to Blogger all by myself, with a teeny tiny help from Thomas, I still considered it a big move. If you know how gaptek I am, you'll probably want to congratulate me too :D

Anyway, I thought Posterous was okay but way too plain and there wasn't much I could do with it. I'm only starting to tweak my blog using this new platform and I'm already fascinated by how easy it is to personalize everything! All it needs is a cute header and I think I'm all set in this new home :D

Hopefully, this move will also motivate me to blog more often. Because I intend to.

Yes seriously!

image from apartmenttherapy.com

A Day to RRRRemember

2011-03-03T12:24:00.001+07:00

Just like other toddles, Aluf had a hard time pronouncing the letter R properly so she simply replaced them with L. To me, it was the cutest thing ever :D Her speech has been pretty clear so to hear her saying 'Mama, aku lapel nih' was just really adorable. I remember my brother also had trouble with his Rs and it wasn't until he was in Elementary School that he began to say it correctly. So I thought I still got to enjoy Aluf's 'cadel' for a few more years.

But this girl is so determined to move fast ever since she was a baby *sigh*

A few weeks ago, I noticed she started to pronounce R differently. It wasn't the usual L, but more like the English pronounciation of R (kayak bule gitu deh ngomong R-nya :D). My mom noticed it also and said 'She's gonna nail it soon'

Well earlier tonight, I was reading to her Little Mermaid before bed and she started chatting about Ariel and her friends. I caught a very clear and pronounced "R". I told her "Hey, you can say R!" But that made her self conscious so she couldn't do it again. I pretended not to pay attention to her speech (though I was dying to hear more of those Rs) so she'd relax and it worked! A few minutes later she started saying "Nanti bonekanya aku suruh berrrrrsih-berrrrsih dan aku suruh tidurrrrr" and I was flabbergasted.

My baby girl is pronouncing "R" correctly!

I called my husband, got my cellphone and started recording it. She was so proud of herself when she realized she really could pronounce R correctly (I think it just hit her) and she said every word I asked her to say that contains R. After a while she started to show off by adding Rs to words that don't even contain the letter R :D

And now I'm filled with pride and... a slight sense of loss. You may think I'm nuts but I'm sure other parents can understand it. When your child moves on to the next stage, you're happy and proud but it also means she no longer does the things she used to do in the old stage. Things you love so much about her. It's gone, forever. And it's making me teary-eyed just thinking I'll never get to hear 'olang besal' from her little mouth ever again.

And if I'm this emotional about the letter R, can you imagine how it's going to be like on her first day at school? Don't want to even think about it!

Tantangan 7 Hari

2011-02-22T11:31:00.002+07:00

It started with a joke where the girls at the office were teasing each other about #misi21. My friend Venita Daben had sent us greentea cheesecake because she is baking a cheesecake every single day for 21 days, as part of her #misi21, a challenge program initiated by career coach, Rene Suhardono. I love baking but I can't even imagine having to do it every single day for almost a month!

Anyway, we thought, it's actually not bad idea to give us challenge like that, but 21 days is too long for us :D so we decided to just do it for 7 days straight.

The idea is to do something that you've been meaning to do but can't find the time/will to go through with it, or something that can be considered going out of your comfort zone. After toying with several ideas, including reading one Mira W novel every single day for 7 days (I know, insane right?), I decided to choose something I've talked about doing for the longest time (including in this blog): exercising!

Yep, I will exercise for 30 minutes every day for 7 consecutive days. I just finished my first session this morning and it was a piece of cake :D I decided to do yoga, which is something I used to do on my own and am familiar with, and even got Aluf to move with me :D so the first day of my tantangan #7hari went smoothly. But I guess it's easy because my schedule is quite relaxed today. The real challenge would be tomorrow, where I have to take Aluf to preschool trial in the morning, followed by work and a launch event in the evening. How am I going to slip a 30 min workout during that crazy day is something I need to figure out. Soon.

Anyways, it would also be fun to see how my friends will do on their challenges. Hanzky will write 1 post a day on her blog, Amal will not be drinking coffee for 7 days straight (she's nuts about coffee!), Vanya will come to the office at 9 am sharp, Syita will stay out of fried food while Farah will not be eating meat. Lita, who usually wears only black hijab, will start wearing colored ones for 7 days and Ita, the intern, will wear flats everyday, something she says she can never do. Rizka, who is very new to makeup, promised to wear full makeup everyday for the next 7 days! The fun thing is, once our friends heard about this challenge, lots of them want to go on board too!

So will we all succeed in our tantangan #7hari? Who will be the first one who gives up? Stay tuned! :D

Ps: If u also want to join and keep track of everyone's progress or wants to report your own, visit this thread on our forum :)

Big No No: Using Your Phone while Driving

2011-01-30T20:33:00.000+07:00

I wrote this post right after I watched an episode of Oprah about distracted driving. It was such an eye-opener for me. When I was younger, I used to do all kinds of things inside my car while driving; eating, drinking, putting on makeup, talking on the phone, - foolishly thinking I was a good enough driver to keep myself from having an accident.

Nowadays, even though I no longer do any of those stuff above, I still ocassionally answered phone calls while driving (usually when I'm not driving on the highway) or checked my sms's / Blackberry messages. I thought it was still okay since I was going not too fast anyway. Wrong. The stories about victims of accidents that happened because of distracted driving really made me ill with fear and guilt. It shocked me to realize that it’s not that I’m such an excellent driver that I could handle talking on the phone while driving, I have just been lucky. As simple as that.

I decided to write something about it on Fashionese Daily. Since the beginning, we have been trying to raise awareness on important issues on Fashionese Daily , even those that are not directly related to fashion or beauty. We are fortunate enought to gain a steady popularity all these years, it would be a shame if we don't use the opportunity to do something good for other people or society with it. My hope is by reading about the danger of distracted driving, I could at least remind someone that accidents can happen even though it seems that we are still in control and it's irresponsible to put other people in danger just because we can't wait to reply to a message on our BlackBerry. Hopefully that someone will also tell their friends and family about this and their friends can tell their friends and so on.

Anyway, please read the post if you haven't already because it's important. Let's hope this will never ever happen to you or anyone else ever again.

PS: while researching for this article, I found out that even changing radio stations or CD is considered distracted driving. I am so glad Mazda2 has audio control on the steering wheel so I can easily change CD tracks, radio stations, adjust volume etc without once taking my eyes off the road.

B B B Benny is Coming to Jakarta!

2011-01-28T20:35:00.002+07:00

Bear with me people. For the next couple of months, I'm going to talk a lot about this topic. Yes, from now on, I'm going to write incessantly about one of my most favorite musicians, Ben Folds, probably until he makes it here. Or... even long after that.

I've been a fan of his since he was still Ben Folds Five and I heard "Fair" playing on the radio. After that I listened to a few songs from "Whatever and Ever Amen" album but it wasn't until about 5-6 years ago that I truly became a devoted fan. I tracked down all of his records, played them nonstop and got hooked. Big big time.

Now I'm not going to explain why or how I got hooked or which album is my favorite, I'm just going to fast forward to the last couple of weeks.

One morning, I was spending my morning blissfully baking a loaf of banana bread and checking my Twitter timeline. And then there it was. Ben Folds himself tweeting "Indonesia, I would love to play there, maybe after Australia? But what venue?" (or something like that, don't remember the tweet exactly :p). A tweet that sparked a hundred or so tweets from his fans in Indonesia (I had no idea there were quite a few of them here) who promised to hook him up with some promotors here. Including me, of course! I was ecstatic!

But, not for long, because it was obvious to me that he was just musing about it. I figured, it would take long before it finally happened because, let's face it, even though his tweet about wanting to play a gig here (and some silly stuff he tweets in Indonesian using Google Translate, he is so adorable) received some positive feedback, he is really not what you would call a mainstream artist. I'm sure there are a lot of people here who'd see him play live, but I can't imagine the concert will be something that'll sell. (Sorry, Ben, I'm just stating the truth here, I'm sure you know it too right? You said yourself that you don't even make profits from your European concerts)

So anyway, I had sort of forgotten about it a couple of weeks later. Then something happened. Something that was beyond my wildest dream and something that I thought would never happen to people like me (who is usually way too shy to strike up a conversation with people she admires, online or not). I was at the doctor's waiting room, sitting and waiting for them to call my name when I looked at the tweet that Ben was sending out. He said that his agent told him, he could come to Indonesia but only if it's a solo gig (without a band, just him and his piano). I tweeted him, without thinking really, because I was really curious, "Is that even possible? Are you considering it?" Then a few minutes later, I almost had a heart attack when I read this.

Oh yes. Ben Folds himself. Replied my tweet. HE REPLIED MY TWEET!!

Feel free to leave this blog and never come back because I'm only going to get more insane from this point on.

BEN FOLDS REPLIED MY TWEET!!!!!!!

I was literally clutching my chest because my heart was really racing! Not only that HE REPLIED MY TWEET, but he also said that he is working on it! He is working on playing a gig in Jakarta! For me to see! Live! In the same room as him!!

I almost cried. Too bad I was alone and had noone to share my excitement with but I was seriously and utterly overwhelmed with joy. Incredible huh, how a 33 year old, perfectly sane woman can act like a star-struck teenager just because her favorite singer dropped two lines.

Oh heck, I don't care. BEN FOLDS REPLIED MY TWEET!

Anyway, of course I feel like a whole new person after that. How can my life be the same ever again? I think this is one of my biggest achievements in life, it would be hard to top this. I can even put it in my CV and people would be like "Wow, really? You must be, like, super cool" Right? Right?

Yep. So I'm patiently hanging on to hear more news about this gig from him while listening to his new album "Lonely Avenue" which is a collaboration with British novelist, Nick Hornby. Who happens to be one of my favorite writers. You see how I get crazier and crazier?

And today I heard from someone that it might happen sooner than I think. Like how soon you ask? Like, May soon.

Oh yes. oh yes.

But I can't write anymore than that because it may or may not happen and I really really don't want to jinx it. Even though if the other thing, that I can't tell you about, is really gonna happen, I'm gonna be so happy I don't think I'll be able to eat anything until it happens.

Still can't tell you.

Until then.

Here's one more before I go to sleep.

BEN FOLDS REPLIED MY TWEET!!!!

Three Years, Big Changes

2010-12-02T12:37:00.000+07:00

Three years ago, a doctor cut me open and brought to life a small baby who cried loudly. My life is never the same after that.

How do you say happy birthday to the person who makes you appreciate every breath, enjoy every flicker of smile and relish every sigh?

Mama loves you and very proud of you, Aluf baby. Happy fabulous 3rd birthday.

Here's to many more years of fun we're going to have :)

Wave

2010-11-07T20:40:00.001+07:00

It's scary when you realize how little control you have in this life. Things can just happen. Good or bad. Sometimes you're not prepared for it and you will it to go differently but it never does. The best thing you can do is just ride the wave. Up and down. Don't fight it because it'll be futile.

On the last current, something in my life changed and I can't undo it. But I've accepted it and I've let go of my own natural instinct of always questioning, always looking for answers. There aren't any. Not for this anyway. Goodbye J. I miss you every day. I hope you know that.