Back to those green green school days

Ok this is going to be short.. for a few reasons:

1. This post is a warming-up post for me to eventually, hopefully, pick-up the habit of blogging back again;

2. I'm really lacking of ideas to write a new post..This post is simply a promise granted to my two little new readers Farah and Dani as I've promised them to show some 'good' pictures during our recent geological field trip in East Malaysia.;

3. Student's life: study comes first---- yup LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, I'm now officially a master student of Petroleum Geoscience of Universiti Teknologi PETRONAS.. Being one of the first batch students, the responsibility of benchmarking the standard is SO critical..(c'mon for God's sake, kill me please...)..so, in other words, less blogging and mumbling..;

4. 'Short' is a promise to myself for not to start mumbling with my mouthful of sentimental stuff... although I know the definition of 'short' is kinda uncertain so far..

5. My new laptop cannot enter the photobucket website.. and this is frustrating since all my blog's pictures are uploaded from photobucket.. no photobucket, I feel like loosing a tool; no tool, no fine work. ..;

...and the last reason, 6.. this post is going to be short cuz I only have SIX reasons to get excused.

I'll be back with more serious and not-so-playful post.


ps... the pictures loaded here were taken during we had our lunch break at Tanjung Layang-Layang, Labuan on the 4th day of our geological field trip. .. and they are not uploaded via PHOTOBUCKET (damn!).

pss.. to Farah and Dani, imagine what will this post turn into if I loaded all the outcrops and fossils and rocks into this post.. hehe, so better don't, right?

Jiwang philosophy

I deleted 'Welcome to CP13', a new blog's post that I recently composed in rememberance of my first eco-game marshaling job in Nomad Adventure's Eco-XCapade at Hulu Langat.

Why? cuz' suddenly I really agreed to what Eja told me.. my blog entries-- jiwang karat la~~

When I looked back what I've written in 'Welcome to CP13', I knew that was simply too-too, too much sentimental; likewise, I wasn't very proud of my previous post 'Let the colors tell the story..' when I realized that there was just overfilled with rust of jiwang..

..and I decided not to put any pictures in this blog just because of the same reason/same worry.. Pictures, for me, sometimes helplessly triggered the sense of being sentimental in me..

Hence this is my first time to delete a blog's post of mine; it's my first time to not have any pictures in my blog's entry..; and it's my first time to confront my severe jiwang karat syndrome.

...ah BTW, a footnote about jiwang philosophy before I end babbling:

Cambridge Dictionary defines sentimental as "...strongly influenced by emotional feelings, rather than careful thought and judgment based on facts.."

So....one question... have you ever seen man with testosterone getting so emotional-connected and really go out of norm and go crazy for something?

Think WORLD CUP FEVER.

That's a solid and undeniable proof, that shows man or mamat, going SO SO SO---SO sentimental about something that we are passionate about.

...and it's globally. :>

Let the colors tell the story...

Apparently, Malacca's historical value has blanketed its color.

Malacca is not famed with its color or colorfulness. .. erm, put this in another word, Malacca is not colorful enough, but, a trip to Malacca made me believed that, it IS a traveller's excitement that extracts colors of this historic city, outshines under the sunny and glorious sky.

Fiza took a piture of three of us posing in front of the red wall of Studthuys. Well, here's the issue: if she did not intentionally snap the picture in the way she just did, then trust me for God's sake, Fiza must be bearing a hidden gem-like artistic vision.

She captured the picture right straight, perpendicular to us and the wall. Meaning? The red color of Stadthuys' wall was purely absorbed, no toned-up nor toned-down due to different angles and and sun light.

I had no idea why I was so hyped-up by her work with just a simple click on the button (according to her..), but all my inspirations about the color of Malacca were just triggered after seeing the picture.

And you know what? Right this moment a name just crossed my mind: Vincent Van Gogh. I do not know much about this most controversial artist and his masterpieces, but I do know one true thing about him, that his works demonstrated his personality and his mentality.

Like wise, the simple straight forward picture demonstrated the way Fiza treats her simple life: SIMPLICITY. She did not think about the angles she did not think about the posing she did not think about the brightness, she just simply click the camera to shoot the picture; just like what she is, she doesn't think about... hmmm... too much.. (smile..),

she just loves.

Sue finally turned her 'not-so-on-for-vacation' mood into the vibes that made she swung happily and cheery when four of us arrived Malacca from Port Dickson. She was like a bird, a pink bird to be exact, dancing and singing and swinging freely and blissfully, in the middle of Malacca's reddish road.

OF COURSE she was in pink. Well, we should have a song for her that sounds 'Pinky Sue wears a pinky suit, dancing in the rain in her pinky boots...' ...yeah, at least something like that... but one thing for sure, this girl, she got flare.

She likes to pose she likes to be in photos she enjoys admiration she turns people's head while walking on the street..... normally, this KIND of girl is so much predictable for a guy, but what comes to my surprise is, Sue's not.

Sue works HELL hard as if she is so ugly and useless that only 'working-hard' is her only quality to get her survive; Sue laughed her modelling opportunity off and continued to get herself inspired by Donald Trump and Dan Brown instead of Amber Chia or Tyra Banks; Sue sometimes late just because of works or meetings, not putting on her make-up nor picking which shirt to wear; ...

Sue sang 'Happy Together' in such a not-so-happy tone that confused me to think of whether there is really a not-so-happy thing inside her or just simply a not-so-precise pitching stuck on her voice (smile..)...

.... but that's Sue, the pinky Sue. Not eye-piercing red not pale white but is a mixture of both exciting red and ingenuous white.

Do not expect any story of my first visit to Malacca (I know that sounds unbelievable, after 25 years staying in Malaysia..) in this entry... I'm not good in describing wonderfulness. Malacca is certainly a nice place to visit, and I prefer to let the brown walls of A'famosa tell you their story, let the red bricks of Stadthuys tell you their story, let the white statue of of St Paul tells you his story, let the clear blue sky of Malacca tells you their story...

ps... to Yahya my buddy, I'm NOT running out of idea to talk about you.. this lengthy story full of sentimental touch is dedicated to ladies only.. I can give put some testosterone into my next entry if you want, just to hope that it won't turn into the rugged and brutal look that you posed in most of our pictures in Malacca.

Saving Balinese Family

Wayan, Made, Komang and Ketut.. these names were so commonly heard right after the question "What is your name?" or "Siape name?" when we tried to make friends with the local in Bali. It was confusing at first cuz we, somehow, thought that, these names are the only options for Balinese to name their people.

In fact, similar to what we have in our Malay family, Wayan, Made, Komang and Ketut equal to our Along, Angah, Alang and Achik. And sometimes, Wayan is also called Gade; Komang is also called Nyoman; and Ketut, also has an alias.

Simple said: Wayan, Made, Komang and Ketut, these four names stand for one word in Bali:

FAMILY.

... and these four names were entirely applied to four Bali loafers that claimed themselves have 'adventurous' as their middle name.

Hence, these four names appeared most of the times in my every blog's entries when I talked about Bali life: the eldest Azwa the Wayan or Azwa Adventurous Wayan, Yahya the Made or Yahys Adventurous Made, Wongey the Komang or Aiman Adventurous Komang, and the youngest Fiza the Ketut or Fiza Adventurous Ketut.

I really do not know how to express my gratitude to these three comrades of mine. They made the journey of loafing in Bali so memorable and .. cool, hmmm..

Yahya the Made and I planned to go Thailand for our next trip. I kinda love this guy cuz strictly saying, he is the only one among my friends who really 'just go!' right after each traveling idea we made.

We both strongly agree, that too much planning and budgeting and hesitating, will only turn all dreams and ideas into rubbish.

"What would you do, if you just ignore all your fear?"

I somehow learnt to appreciate this quote when I realized that I've got too many dreams that eventualy turned into garbages.

Fiza and Azwa are kinda surprise for me. Fiza the Ketut always looks serene but you gotta believe what that there are similarities and differences between serene and clueless. She is humorous, mild-mannered but extreme reactor towards doggies.

Azwa the Wayan, relatively, is an aggresive young lady that actualy is the main drive to get lots of plans moving. Matured but playful, considerate but stubborn, wise but emotional -- Contradiction is Wayan's second name.

I wish to put more words on these three wonderful people, on this wonderful journey, and on this weird Balinese family. However, people will not have patience to read this entry if it is any longer. So allow me to save this post, save this memory, save this journey, save these friends, and save, this Balinese family.

Cold mountain

I was awake before the fog clouded over Danau Batur.

It was 5 in the morning. Yahya the Made, Azwa the Wayan and Fiza the Ketut were still sleeping, hugging tight the sweet dream they were having and slidding their tired body deeper into the warm blanket..

5:00 a.m. was freezing -- the temperature of Danau Batur area IS already chilling. I din put on any sweater, for some unknown reasons. Staying frozen in the highland of Bali could be some kind of cool experience, maybe.

I was waiting for a spectacular sunrise, which I was not so sure about. Gunung Batur and Gunung Abang were in front of me, guarding the crater lake, Danau Batur, which was formed after eruption of volcano. It is hard to imagine how a volcano eruption could happen in such a beatiful, peaceful, quiet place.

I believe Danau Batur, or Lake Batur, must be a kind of compensation given by Gods, as an apology after all the catastrophic eruptions happened on this land.

Don't tease me for being sentimental, you must come here and see it, or maybe, feel the gentle but sorry touch of Gods. (..but, 5:00 a.m. ..,ok?)

The fog started to cloud over when it was about 6:30 a.m. Danau Batur was fully covered by a blanket of soft white cloud. Mt Batur laid back into the darkness of the sky, but not Mt Abang. The outline of Mt Abang could be clearly seen, even the silhouette of the trees on the mountain was clear against the sunrise.

But it was freezing still. Sun lights did not penetrate the mountain, neither the warmth.. and out of a sudden, I thought of Cold Mountain, and the opening line of the movie, voice of Nicole Kidman just touched my heart..:

"Dear Mr. Inman, I began by counting the days, then the months. I don't count on anything anymore except the hope that you will return, and the silent fear that in the years since we saw each other, this war, this awful war, will have changed us both beyond all reckoning. "

As touching as the story, some warm-hearted feeling and some appreciation seeped into my heart. I know I've been sentimental in this post, that happened when some precious memory slipped in, about the journey in Bali, about the journey in life.

When the Henna fades, the journey ends..

To get ourselves really looked like a bunch of cool, wild, those kinda kick-over-the-traces naughty guys when we were loafing in Bali, on the very 1st morning of our days in Bali, we got ourselves tattoed...

...but since deep inside four of us are still those kinda kindhearted, well-behaved, gentle 'angel-like' species, we only got that ready-to-fade Henna 'tattoed' on our easy-to-cover body part.

I know, some of y'all will say I'm kinda nerd...

..eh-hem.. ...whatever.. (btw, I'm not..) ..there we go...

...we got our 'tattoo' in Kuta Beach with 50,000RP each.. (we then realised that we could even get one with much much cheaper RP..). Azwa The Wayan got a complicated fine-worked little butterfly on the back of her hand; Yahya The Made and Fiza The Ketut got theirs same pattern on same right arm as a...erm.. kinda declaration of love..; and me The Komang, had a real cool striking flare tattoed on none other than a lefty's left arm.

And guess what, after that we couldn't even fathom out how much infatuated we were with our Henna..

I mean at least for me, getting a real tattoo is always something I realy dream for.. Not only cuz' of the art, but also the spirit and the significance..

My Ibanese family once told me, Ibanese got their body tattooed when they started on a spiritual quest by traveling to the other land. I was so thrilled by this romantic story.. and right now right on the land of Bali island, suddenly I felt the mysterious 'spiritual quest' was right ahead of me..

But then, another significance of having a tattoo is the experience of getting disobidient.

I don't really know how did this feeling come to my head, but when you realise that life is conquered by tons of rules, disobidience sometimes make you feel lots better.

...while 'HE HAS TATTOO' always equals to 'HE IS A BAD GUY' in my conservative backyard, shouting 'SO-WHAT??!!!' back to all those blimpish old-fashioned rule-setter is always one of the coolest thing to do, bukan ke gitu?

...but.., still, pathetic enough, what I got was a Henna, the fake tattoo that will fade in 2 weeks time.. wasn't that a sign indicating the truth of '...AND STILL, YOU HAVE TO COME TO MY WORLD OF RULES...'???

'When Henna fades, the journey ends... ' I wrote this in my travelogue when I saw the fading flare on my left arm, in Jakarta, after my unforgettable trip in Bali.

Rebirth... to reality..

I thought I'm quite well disciplined but the hiatus happened in my very own blog indicates failure of my consistency, or my self-discipline.

Sorry for the hiatus.. I need to apologize after realising there are actually some readers out there waiting patiently for my posts.. and that really came to my real big surprise..

.... I put 'Rebirth... to reality' as this post's title for some reasons..

First, when u just entered the age of 25 --ok that was an optimistic way of saying that-- i should say, when u just finished your 2nd round of 12-year-circle and realizing u did nothing in your life, the hope for getting REBIRTH is a real desperate one...

..but that is not my main issue anyway~~~

My concern here is my second reason: REALITY...

After having a real unforgettable days in Bali, and after coming back to my routine to my work to my life, the word 'Reality' is such a pathetic reality to me...

Bali, is such a paradise..

...and as i failed to share the story of my trip to Phuket early this year due to various reasons (..or excuses, whatever u want..) .. Bali will be certainly my next post's story.

This I promise u.