My Journey in Life

Light

2009-11-22T19:16:00.001-08:00

Today the sun doesn't shine so bright
The cloud and the rain is blocking the light
That's how it feels when I see you cried

As the moon is drifting the coldest night
Nothing much really makes a good sight
Without you by my side

It's hard even if you tried
To tell the wrong from the right
That's how I made that tears dropped from your eye

If I said it doesn't feel bad, then I lied
It breaks every inch of my heart and my pride
Everytime I see you cried

Just like the sun will never die
You always give me another try
To dry the tears in your eye

-- created by w2
-- dedicated to me :D

Blossom of flower

2009-11-19T22:38:00.000-08:00

Life is much better now than ever
Just like the blossom of flower
That moment will be treasured

Like meteor shower
Brief but joyful before it's over
That happiness will be devoured

It feels like standing on top of the tower
You'll do everything in your power
Treasuring every minute of the hour

Life could be sweet and sour
Wheel of fortune can put you higher or lower
But now you're on top of the world for sure

Hope the beautiful moment will last forever
That life will always be full of fine hours
Just like the time he tells you "the moment is ours"

-- created by w2
-- dedicated to me and hs

Lindawati is .....

2009-11-19T22:29:00.000-08:00

I felt so sleepy today, so me and my friend made several acronym for our names and our friends names. Here is mine ( my friend made it up for me =P) :

Lindawati is Love Is In D' Air With All The Intimacy

My Short Trip to Hong-Kong and Macau

2009-10-26T06:20:00.000-07:00

My little journey started 2 weeks back (I mean 2 weeks from the time I wrote this). Destination, Hong Kong then Macau. It was 5 days trips and believe me when I said it’s a real short holiday. Hong Kong and Macau have got lots of interesting place to visit, unfortunately due to time constrains, I missed many of those interesting place.

I went for the trips with mom and sis. We ruled out tour package in the early stage as we wanted some adventure. We tried all means of transportation, from bus, train to cab. Because we didn’t join tour package, we need to ask around for direction to get around. Now I’m proud to say that I survived Hong Kong and Macau.

My holiday started from Singapore – Changi Airport Terminal 1. We booked the flight one and a half months before hand so got a pretty reasonable fare. It took the plane 3½ hours before it finally touched down HK airport at 2000hrs. Our first destination there is… Surprise, surprise ---- our hotel which my sis booked way back from Jakarta. The hotel, L’Hotel Nina Convention Center in New Territory District. We walked from the arrival hall to the bus interchange to catch a ride to our hotel. As was said previously I did (I mean it when I said I did, NOT we did) asked a lot to get to the right direction. From the arrival hall to bus interchange which is only about 15minutes walking distance, I asked 3-4 people and stopped 3 or 4 times to check on the map to see if we are on the right track. Lost is the last thing on Earth I wanted to happen then.

Alas bus stop is on sight. Our next operation is finding buses that go through our hotel. After sometimes we found our bus then we hopped in. We sat in the bus for one full hour inside the bus before we stopped at Wan Tung Street (If I’m not mistaken), the closest to the hotel. Talking about the street, it was crowded with people around with stalls that sell everything from food to dress.

As it was already late and we still haven’t had anything filling our stomach, we went to the nearest guess what, McD. Why McD? Well, mom and sis have their own preference about food. They are not a big fan of any food other than Indonesian food. That’s not very exciting fact for me because it means I don’t get to try the local food there.

In McD I came to realize that not many in HK speak fluent English compared to people in Singapore. In HK people usually speaks dialect – Cantonese. How do I know? I’ve got to repeat my order many times before they got my orders right. I’ll skip how we ate the food and stuff.

With stuffed stomach, we rode the cab to hotel. Actually the hotel is very close to the McD we went for our dinner earlier, but ignorance really costs money. We didn’t know it was that close, so we took cab and paid for our ignorance which cost us HKD18 for the fare from McD to hotel and another HKD10 for failure of putting on safety belt (that’s my mom and sis, I did put that thing on in case you are wondering). As for the HKD10, I believe it’s more of a way the driver wanted to con us for additional HKD 10, not because of our ignorance.

Done with the cab, we now reached the hotel. Usual procedure - checking in, then accompanied by a bell boy to our room. It was a large and nice room with two single bed. The bed is kind of big for single bed, it can fit 2 persons. We got a very nice view from our room with a large window. We got a bathtub in our room too. However, it was pretty cheap for the room we got. It costs only HKD 314 a night. And because it was already late, we decided to call it a day and start our exploration the next day.

View from our hotel room

Before leaving the airport I managed to get copies of brochures about HK. Well, anyway there comes second day; both my sis and I woke up at 0700hrs. It’s definitely early, perhaps too early for my normal wake up time. Soon after we woke up we started reading on the brochures and the book I got from library in Singapore about exploring HK before making our itinerary for the second day.

Short discussion took place then we decided our next stop, Lantau Island and Victoria Park and perhaps Avenue of star to experience the Symphony of Light and Ladies Market at MangKok, if and only if we still have time.

We knocked off around 0900hrs leaving the hotel and heading to the MTR (which is the train, can’t remember what it stands for). We rode the MTR from the closest station to our hotel all the way to Tung Chung station as was recommended by the book and brochures. Lantau Island was connected with Tung Chung station by cable car, so that’s what we were taking – cable car. The ride from the station to Lantau Island was about 20 minutes, but we got panoramic view throughout the ride between the station and the Island.

Inside the train -- very similar to train in Singapore

Cable car to Lantau Island

Now that we have reached Lantau Island safe and sound, our first stop for the day would be Ngong Ping Village, a village full of cultural theme. Among the attractions in this village are: walking with Buddha, Monkey’s tale theater and Ngong Ping Tea House. Unfortunately time is the main constraint here. We didn’t get to visit some of the attractions here such as Walking with Buddha and monkey’s tale. Nonetheless, we did explore the village, shop around and of course took some shots (which is a must).

Next stop in Lantau Island was Tian Tan Buddha (or Giant Buddha). A 34meters statue of Buddha made of Bronze. The statue was completed in 1993 with cost estimated to be around $68millions. The statue was located near Po Lin monastery and symbolizes the harmonious relationship between men and nature, people and religion. Here we’ve got to climb the stair to get close to the giant statue and it was REALLY draining my energy, but it’s worth the climb.

Giant Buddha

Our final stop in this island was Po Lin monastery which is of course close to the giant statue. Nothing very much that we did here, as usual taking pictures and did some exploration around. Then we had our vegetarian lunch here before ending our visit in the monastery and headed back to Tung Chung station by cable car.

Now back at Tung Chung station, we visited Citygate which is somewhat close. We are so glad with what they’ve got there. Yes, you’re right. We found many outlets selling branded goods. Devil inside of me whisper to me to shop and I was so helpless that I followed that voice and shop around.

Done with shopping we continued our journey to Victoria Peak where we took MTR to reach central then continue on foot for another 20 minutes to reach Peak Tram Station. From Peak Tram Station we took Peak Tram ride all the way up to reach the Peak. We visitted Peak Tower and Sky Terrace which located at the Peak where we could have a spectacular view of central Hong Kong, Victoria Harbor and the surrounding island from the top.

Victoria Peak is also known as Mount Austin, which is located at center west of Hong Kong Island. With altitude of 552m, it is the highest mountain on the island proper. The actual summit of Victoria Peak is occupied by a radio telecommunications facility and is closed to the public. However, the surrounding area of public parks and high-value residential land is the area that is normally meant by the name The Peak.

View from The Peak

We then visited Madame Tussauds house of Wax (which is located at Peak Tower) where we took some pictures with celebrity and sportsmen, which is made of wax of course as the name suggest. Madame Tussauds Hong Kong is part of the renowned chain of wax museums founded by Marie Tussaud of France It is the first and one of the only two permanent Madame Tussauds museums in Asia. The Hong Kong branch houses nearly 100 wax figures of internationally-known personalities, with Asian figures taking up more than a third of the total, of which sixteen were Hongkies. The wax figures are featured in a range of themed settings such as Hong Kong Glamour, Music Icons, Historical and National Heroes, The Champions and World Premiere.

Me with the Beatles

We explored the Peak until 1900 hrs and experience a spectacular view of sunset from the Peak. After the experiencing the sunset from the Peak, we’re all set for our dinner. As I said earlier, mom and sis are not the biggest fan of local food, so for the second time in Hong Kong we had our McD dinner. Well, this is not so fun part of the trip.

After our McD dinner at the Peak we rode a cab to the Avenue of Stars to watch Symphony of Light which is performed daily at 2000hrs. We didn’t know that it was quire a distance from the Peak to Avenue of Stars, consequently the cab fare is expensive too. We did manage to reach and still have some buffer time before the symphony of lights began. So we walked alonng the Avenue of Stars to check out some celebrities hand print till 2000hrs where the Symphony of Lights began.

The Avenue of Stars modelled on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, is located along the Victoria Harbour waterfront in Tsim Sha Tsui, Hong Kong. It honours celebrities of the Hong Kong film industry. The promenade commands a stunning panoramic view across Victoria Harbour. At night it is a popular viewing place for the Symphony of Lights display. It is a good place to go to see the glamourous stars of HK.

A Symphony of Lights is a synchronised building exterior decorative light and laser multimedia display, featuring 44 buildings on both sides of the Victoria Harbour of Hong Kong accompanied by symphonic music. The technology was developed by Australian firm Laservision and cost approximately HKD44 million. It has attracted over 4 million visitors and locals so far.Guinness World Records has named A Symphony of Lights the world's largest permanent light and sound show.

Special pyrotechnic fireworks will be added to the show on the rooftop of participating buildings on both sides of the habour or stages off at the Tsim Sha Tsui waterfront on special events or holidays, example like Chinese New Year and Christmas.

The Show comprises five major themes, taking spectators on a unique journey celebrating the energy, spirit and diversity of Hong Kong:

The first scene "Awakening" begins with flashes of laser lights that give life to a nucleus of light-energy which gradually illuminates participating buildings using an array of dancing lights and rainbow colour. This scene symbolises the genesis and powerful growth of Hong Kong.

The second scene "Energy" is represented by the display of rising colour patterns and the sweeping of the lasers and searchlights energetically across the night sky, signifying the vibrant energy of Hong Kong.

In the third scene "Heritage", traditional lucky red and gold colours are displayed across buildings on both sides of the Harbour, complemented by the introduction of music using Chinese musical instruments, symbolising Hong Kong's colourful heritage and rich cultural traditions.

The fourth scene "Partnership" features a display of laser beams and sweeping searchlights scanning across the Harbour, representing an illuminated connection with the opposite side. Beams reach out to symbolically connect the two sides of the Harbour into one greater and unified partnership.

The finale "Celebration" brings out a powerful rhythmic display of swirling, kaleidoscopic patterns of lights and beams dancing lively across the Harbour. The exciting final scene signifies the celebration of the close partnership between the two sides of the Harbour and represents an even brighter future for Asia's world city - Hong Kong.

Symphony of Lights - cannot get a better picture :(

The performance lasted for approx. 30 minutes . We then continue our trips to Ladies market at Mongkok. We almost got lost when we walked from the MTR to the market, fortunately we brought HK map along so we could navigate ourselves there. We check on almost each stall at the market, from tee shirt to bag, real to imitation. After some shopping at the market, we decided to call it a day and headed back to our hotel.

Day 3 started with our visit toDisneyland. Hong Kong Disneyland is the first theme park inside the Hong Kong Disneyland Resort and is owned and managed by the Hong Kong International Theme Parks, an incorporated company jointly owned by The Walt Disney Company and the Government of Hong Kong. We visited almost all everything they could offer in Disneyland except for the festival of Lion King where we were late for the show.

Us in front of Disney Land

Us posing with Minnie

The park consists of four themed lands similar to other Disneyland parks: Main Street, U.S.A., Fantasyland, Adventureland and Tomorrowland, however, there is as yet no Frontierland. The theme park's cast members use English and Chinese, including Cantonese and Mandarin dialects, to communicate verbally. Guide Maps are printed in both Traditional and Simplified characters, Japanese, and in English to helps the visitor to go around.

Nothing very much we did today other than exploring the entire Disneyland Hong Kong. We started and ended our day at Disneyland (realizing childhood dreams I’d say). Then we went back to our hotel.

Our last day at Hong Kong was spent in visitting Wetland Hong Kong. We chose Wetland as our next destination because sis insisted that she wanted to visit this place as she loves conservation of nature very much. Hong Kong Wetland Park is a conservation, education and tourism facility, located at the northern part of Tin Shui Wai, in Yuen Long. The park is best known for its slogan seen on MTR stations, "Unroll the Hong Kong diverse green temptations".

The Hong Kong Wetland Park comprises a 10,000 square meter large visitor centre, Wetland Interactive World, and a 60-hectare Wetland Reserve. The Wetland Interactive World has themed exhibition galleries, a theatre, a souvenir shop, an indoor play area (swamp adventure) and a resource centre. The themed exhibition galleries with gross floor area ranging from 250 meter square to 1,200 meter square showcase the importance of wetland on biodiversity, civilization and conservation. Visitors can learn more about the native flora and fauna of Hong Kong through the animals and models displayed in the Living Wetland Gallery, such as False gharial, mouse deer and green turtle.

Wetland

The Wetland Reserve consists of re-created habitats designed for water fowls and other wildlife. The Wetland Discovery Centre, located in the Wetland Reserve, provides visitors more hands-on experience on local wetlands. Other facilities include Stream Walk, Succession Walk, Mangrove Boardwalk and three Bird Hides situated next to the fish pond, mudflat and riverside, leading visitors to venture habitats of wildlife such as Fiddler Crab, Mudskipper and the rare Black-faced Spoonbill.

We explored this place from indoor to outdoor conservation until 1500hrs. We then went back to hotel to pick up our luggage. We already checked-out earlier but we left the luggage in the hotel so that we could move around much easier than carrying luggage around the wetland…. Not funny. After picking up our luggage, we are ready to head for our next destination – Macau. We were taking MTR from the hotel to the ferry terminal, but while walking to MTR station we were caught by the rain, pouring rain. Another not so fun part about this trip .

We finally reached MTR station and we’re heading towards ferry terminal. Are you still with me? Great. At ferry terminal we approached the nearest ticketing counter to get 3 tickets to Macau. There are 2 ferry terminals at Macau, and one of it is at Taipa. So when the lady in the counter asked which terminal we would like to go to, my initial reaction was “Taipa, please”. Turned out, Taipa ferry terminal was just a temporary terminal.

Taipa is the smaller of the two islands in Macau Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China (formerly the Portuguese colony of Macau). It is 2.5 kilometres from Macau Peninsula and east of the Lesser Hengqin Island of Zhuhai, Guangdong Province. Macau International Airport, University of Macau, Macau Jockey Club and Macau Stadium are situated in Taipa, and three bridges connect the island to Macau Peninsula.

We waited 20minutes before we could finally find a cab. It was quite out there, different from buzy Macau to hotel in Macau. I felt sea sick inside the ferry on the way to Taipa. It was my first sea sick (don’t wish to experience the second though). I think the cause was the turbulance caused by the strong current that day.

We’re at Macau now and it’s already late afternoon. Without any delay we went to our hotel, Taipa Best Western Hotel. After checking in, we went directly to our room and we were shocked with what we found. The room is ultra small and there’re only 2 beds but we paid for 3 people price. So I called the receptionist to ask for an extra bed. Extra bed was delivered to us after 30 minutes.

We were not so fortunate this time. In Hong Kong we got a great view outside the hotel window and the room was somehow luxurious. This time round the wheel of luck has turned. We got a small room and not so nice view. I prefer room in Hong Kong, if you asked me.

After some rest in the room we continue our visit to City of Dream hotel and casino. City of dreams is a building with 4 towers – Hard rock hotel, Crown Towers, Grand Hyatt Macau and 47 storeys luxurious apartment. It also offers mega-casino, shopping complex, bars and higher end retail lots (The Boulevard) and theater (The Buble).

We explored the hotel and the Boulevard. We then went to watch Dragon Treasure, a multimedia and light performance at the Buble (admission is free). As usual, we get couple of great photos here and City of Dreams. Since it’s already late, we went back to our hotel.

Hard Rock Casino in City of Dream

New day is here. After some brainstorming session with sis, we decided to visit St Pul ruins and places around it. We took cab all of the time here in Macau to get around. So, that’s what we did to reach St. Paul ruins.

The Ruins of St. Paul's refer to the façade of what was originally the Cathedral of St. Paul, a 17th century Portuguese cathedral in Macau dedicated to Saint Paul the Apostle. In 2005, the Ruins of St. Paul were officially enlisted as part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site Historic Centre of Macau.

St Paul Ruins

Built from 1582 to 1602 by the Jesuits, the cathedral was the largest Catholic church in Asia at the time, and the royalty of Europe vied with each other to bestow upon the cathedral the best gifts. With the decline in importance of Macau, which was overtaken as the main port for the Pearl River Delta by Hong Kong, the cathedral's fortunes similarly ebbed, and it was destroyed by a fire during a typhoon in 1835. The Fortaleza do Monte overlooks the ruin.

The ruins now consist of the southern stone façade — intricately carved between 1620 and 1627 by Japanese Christians in exile from their homeland and local craftsmen under the direction of Italian Jesuit Carlo Spinola — and the crypts of the Jesuits who established and maintained the Cathedral. The façade sits on a small hill, with 66 stone steps leading up to it. The carvings include Jesuit images with Oriental themes, such as a woman stepping on a seven-headed hydra, described by Chinese characters as ' Holy Mother tramples the heads of the dragon'. A few of the other carvings are the founders of the Jesuit Order, the conquest of Death by Jesus, and at the very top, a dove with wings outstretched.

After we’re done with the ruins of St Paul, we visited Macau Museum and Monte Fort. From there we bought some famous pastry along the walkway. Then we continue walking till we reached our next destination, Lisboa Hotel and Casino.

Lisboa Hotel and Casino is a very luxurious hotel with gold as its theme. We went in to the hotel to have a look around before proceeding to the casino. We took some photos outside the casino (because we are not allowed to take it inside the casino). After extensive exploration of Lisboa, we took a cab back to Venetian Macau Hotel which located just opposite of City of Dreams Hotel and Casino.

It’s amazing what you can find in this hotel. The hotel has a Venice like interior design. Visitor can even experience Gondola ride inside. It really feels like as though I was in Venice. We of course took the Gondola ride, it’s one of a kind experience. During the ride the man sang us some songs in Spannish. Although I couldn’t understand a word of the song, the feeling is great. Nothing less.

Gondola Ride

With Venetian Macau Hotel we ended our short trip in Hong Kong and Macau. Our last stop in Macau is actually our own hotel. We took a cab back to our hotel to pack up and checked out before catching another cab to go to ferry terminal. From the terminal we got ourselves 3 ferry tickets directly to Hong Kong International Airport (HKIA).

The time we reached HKIA and our flight time is very close, so we didn’t really waited too long for our flight. In HKIA we got refund of Value Added Tax (VAT) of HKD 120 each person. Inside HKIA we did our final shopping in Hong Kong before waiting to board the plane.

Announcement that passengers of our flight can board the plane was made. All of us boarded the plane which was around 2000hrs. The flight will took 4 hours before it landed in Singapore Changi Airport.

Holiday was fun. Hong Kong was fun. I love the place. Perhaps someday I’ll visit it again.

--- Thanks to HD and his Sister that gave me tips and tricks for going around HK, WW that help me edited this post. Several information was taken from the Internet.

Congratulation My Dear Cousin

2009-10-02T00:31:00.000-07:00

Congratulation for finding the love that is true,
Congratulation for the marriage of you two,
And congratulation for the moment she’s saying: “I do”.

As a cousin and a friend I do feel glad,
That you found someone who can share your good and bad,
Someone who can be there when you’re happy or upset.

For life is a journey, we need someone to be there,
We need someone, for whom we can share,
We need someone to show us how much they care.

And I’m glad you have already found,
Someone who can make you world goes round,
Someone who can share your ups and down.

I’m honored to witness this very blessed morning,
And the moment you two exchange vows and ring,
So congratulation again for the wedding.

-- created by ww
-- dedicated to Lindsay's Cousin

Happy Birthday

2009-09-28T22:32:00.000-07:00

There are times when things are not coming your way,
There are times when everything seems to be in disarray,
But that's yesterday.

There are times when all you can do is to pray,
Hoping that all problems can be kept at the bay,
But that's not today.

'Cuz today is a very special day,
Not just another day that slipped away,
For today is your birthday.

So let's hope that all good things will stay,
That joy and laughter will come what may,
Especially for today.

So, Happy birthday there I'd say,
Wishing you all the best in every way,
Not only for yesterday or today, but everyday.

--- created by ww
--- dedicated to ld

My Personal Website

2009-07-30T20:29:00.000-07:00

Just finished to publish my personal website (http://www.mysmu.edu/phdis2008/lindawati.2008/default.htm). Finally, managed to finish it. Thank you to all my friends that help me making this website. Thanks to Herman who helped me in making the design and transform my picture to a lovely header. Thanks to Eddy who helped me to check the grammar, wording and language. Thanks to Helda who became my final checker for my website (she check everything, especially the content). And thanks to the others that give me a very big support when I'm developing my website.

Feel free to visit my website and give me comments ...

Short Trip to Hanoi – Halong Bay

2009-07-23T07:48:00.000-07:00

It was almost three month since my short trip to Hanoi and Halong Bay, Vietnam. During this one month, I didn’t have time to write a post about that trip. Correction, it is not because I didn’t have the time, but because I’m too lazy to write it :D. The trip was short but memorable; it is one of trip that I wouldn’t forget.

To make it short, I went to Hanoi and Halong Bay with 7 other crazy friends, 4 girls and 3 boys. Our trip was arranged by a tour travel agency and thanks to Nellie, whose already dedicated her time to negotiate with the tour travel, we had a fair price for 4 day and 3 night trip. We planned this trip for around 2 to 3 months.

The trip started on Tuesday, 30 April at 1.30 pm. We gathered at Changi Airport and after all of us arrived, we checked in. We used Vietnam Airlines from Changi to Hanoi. The plane took off at 4pm (Singapore time) and arrived at Hanoi at 7pm (Vietnam time, which is one hour late then Singapore). We were greeted by our tour guide, Kuang, and our driver, Toing (if I’m not mistaken), both are Vietnamese men. They escorted us to Restaurant Green Papaya to have dinner. We ate Vietnamese Cuisine there. The food was good; at least we all liked the food.

After dinner, we went to Jasper Hotel, the hotel that we were going to stay during our stay in Hanoi. Kuang helped us to check in and arranged our rooms. Although there had been a little misunderstanding about the room arrangement, we finally resolved it. After room arrangement solved, we wanted to explore night activities around Hanoi, so we took taxi to go to Hoan Kiem Lake. The lake was near our hotel, it only took about 5 minutes with taxi. Hoan Kiem Lake is historical lake in centre of Hanoi and serves as one of places for public activities. Although it was already quite late, 9pm, the lake was still very crowded. Perhaps because it was weekend, so a lot of Vietnamese stayed out late and spent their time in the lake. There was also a kind of performance by local singer there and a lot of people watched it. We walked and took pictures along the lake. We spent about 30 minutes there and then we rushed back to our hotel because it was started to rain. Here we experienced the traffic of Hanoi. The traffic was terrible. When we want to cross the street, not only we had to pay attention to the left and right side of the road, we also had to pay attention to the front and back side of the road. Terrible right? Luckily we managed to cross the street in one piece.

I almost forgot, on our way to the hotel, we dropped by on one of the seller on the side walk and tasted the Mix Fruit Ice (various fruits mix with ice, sugar, milk) and sit on small chair (looks like chair that is used by children).

On the second day of our trip, our driver picked us from the hotel at 8am, just after we finished our breakfast. And our five hour bus journey to Halong Bay begun .... usually it only took about 3 to 4 hour drive from Hanoi to Halong Bay, but unfortunately, it was the national day of Vietnams, so a lot of people went for holiday and made the traffic very crowded. After arrived at Halong City, we waited almost 30 minutes for our boat, Hai Long Suite (I hope it is right). Our boat cannot go to the pier (I don’t want to call it a harbour, because it only a small port) so we had to take another small boat to embark to the boat. At the boat, we had our welcome drink and listened to Cruise briefing. In the cruise briefing, one of the boat staffs explains about the cruise activities, places that we were going to visit and onboard activities. After that, we savoured a delicious Vietnamese lunch as Hai Long Suite heads to Bai Tu Long Bay passing the towns of Hon Gai and Cam Pha, Oan lagoon, Mat Quy (Monster Head) and Am Tich (Teapot) Islets and Vung Vieng fishing village (according to the itinerary).

We rested for a while in our cabins (the boat cabins is more comfortable and nicer than Jasper hotel rooms). We went to the sundeck and enjoyed the air and view there. And then, as stated in the itinerary, we docked for a while and visited Surprise Cave (Sung Sot), the largest and most impressive cave. Well, the boat was not actually docked, only anchored, but we used small boat to transfer us from the boat to the land. The cave is made by nature. There are three large grottoes, each festooned with stalactites and stalagmites that take on different shapes, such as a dragon, tiger, and event Buddha Hand. In the end of the journey in the cave, we saw a spectacular view over the bay below. We spent a few minutes there to smell the fresh air and of course took a lot of pictures. Then, we climbed down and went back to the boat.

Back in the boat, there was an onboard activity, cooking demonstration. Because, all of us were not interested in cooking, so we skipped that activity and took rest in our cabin. We went to the sundeck again, enjoyed the air, and took pictures. According to the boat schedule, we should go to the fishing village after that, but unfortunately, we missed the small boat, so we cannot went to the fishing village. So we made another plan. Four of us, me included, went for kayaking.... while 4 others enjoyed a Happy Hour drink in the boat. After one hour kayaking, we got back in the boat, ordered drinks and went to bath. Then..... dinner ..... seafood seat dinner onboard. After dinner, we sat on the sundeck and enjoying sky view at night ...

The next morning, we were still on the boat. We should have started our day with Tai Chi on the Sundeck, but we skipped that activity. :D it’s too early to wake up. We had a light breakfast and then went to Virgin Island. At Virgin Island, we climbed almost 200 steps to go to the top and viewed the bay below. It is an amazing view. After that, brunch was waiting for us. We ate our brunch as the boat leisurely back to the pier. We disembark at Halong Pier, Halong City and proceed back to Hanoi.

Similar from Hanoi to Halong, our bus journey from Halong to Hanoi also took about 5 hour. But again, we didn’t feel bored. We only stopped once on the souvenir shop. In Hanoi, we picked up Kuang, our tour guide, and enjoyed late lunch at A Taste of Hanoi Restaurant. After that, we rushed to see Water Puppet Show in Thang Long Puppet Theatre. The show divided into 17 water puppet performances with different themes and music. The show took about one hour. It was a nice show that captures several legends and habits in Hanoi. After the show, we rushed to the nearest shopping mall. Should enjoyed shopping everywhere we go :D and that’s the end of the third day in Vietnam.

The last day in Vietnam, just before we went to Hanoi airport, we visited the biggest pagoda in Hanoi (already forgot the name.... :D). We didn’t spend much time there.. we only spent enough time to walked around the pagoda and took pictures. Then... went directly to airport...
That’s it. That was the end of our short journey to Vietnam. It was a pleasant journey ... and a journey that worth to remember :D.. thanks friends for having this journey together...

My crazy friends that went to Vietnam with me: Helda, Nellie, Lilis, Maryana, Harta, Handy and Bong (in no order in particular)....

Our photographer: Helda, Nellie, Harta and Bong ....

A Few Pictures together....

Stairway to heaven???

Me in The Boat (Love this Pic... thanks friends :D)

Together - minus photographer (Bong)

Together - minus photographer (Nellie)

Together - minus Bong & Helda

Me and my background :D

Together and Halong Bay View

Lets Jump....

With Boat Crews..

Girls only

Who's more scary??

In my sleepless night

2009-07-23T07:46:00.000-07:00

In my sleepless night
I’m often wondering
Where is my soul mate?
Who is my soul mate?
When I will meet him?
Is soul mate truly exists?
Or have I met my soul mate but because of my mistakes I drove him away?

In my sleepless night
I miss saying good night to someone before I sleep
I miss smiling to someone every time I meet him
I miss laughing with someone
I event miss arguing with someone
I event miss fighting with someone
I miss seeing around someone that can understand me

In my sleepless night
I would like to have someone that can
Cherish me
Support me
Encourage me
Love me
Make decision for me
Not because I’m not able to make decision for my self
But sometime it feels good to be able to let someone else make decision
I miss love ....

So this is what its feels like ..

2009-06-09T03:20:00.000-07:00

I know that eventually I will hear about the “news”. But when I actually heard it, it felt like something hurt inside of me and make me want to cry. I can’t describe that feeling; it’s not a good feeling. I just know that I felt hurt inside. So this is what its feels like..

I’m finally able to feel it. Even thought that’s not a good feeling and I want to get rid of it as soon as possible but at least I realize one thing, I still can feel that. So is this meant that I’m still a woman that can be hurt? Not a woman that don’t have feeling at all. :P

Anyway, enough with this feeling. Just want to do my work as soon as possible and plan for my next explorer … :D

Pass All My Course Works

2009-05-04T02:02:00.000-07:00

I finally know all my grades for this term course works. I manage to pass all the course works with 2 A- and 1 B+. It is not too bad I think, considering I only spent a minimum time for my entire assignments (except for DSS term paper class, I spent almost 1 month for that because my Prof asked me to submit it to a conference, even thought in the end, he and another Professor that we collaborate should re-writing it for conference submission :D ).

By passing entire course in this term, I completed my course work requirements. I already pass all 6 courses for my study. But after finishing the course works, doesn’t mean that my study become easier.. new challenges and researches will definitely come. It will be tougher than the course works. Should prepare my self for that …. Its not the time to be lazy … come on Linda … gambate ….. :D

My Two-day Trip to Melaka (Malacca), Malaysia

2009-04-28T09:18:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday and Sunday, I went to Melaka (In English: Malacca), Malaysia. I went there with two-other friends. Melaka is a historical city centre that has been listed as a prominent World Heritage Site of UNESCO since 7 July 2008. Beside for its historical attraction, Malacca is also well-known for its food. Most notable of all is the Nyonya Asam laksa (Nyonya-Baba Cuisine) and Chicken Rice Ball. Nyonya Asam laksa is not made with curry powder, instead, it rich with various spices and taste a bit sour. I like the taste... it’s really good. Another food is Chicken Rice Ball. These rice-balls, about the size of golf balls are taken with boiled chicken flavoured with sauce and sesame oil. The rice itself is best taken with pounded chilli-sauce. We ate Nyonya Asam laksa and Chicken Rice Ball in Jonker Street. I already forgot the name of the shop that sells Nyonya Asam Laksa and Chicken Rice Ball, but in Jonker Street, we can find those two very easily. Another food (it’s a desert actually) that I like in Melaka is Cendol covered with brown Melaka Sugar. The cendol is tasted very sweet.

(from: www.jonkerchickenriceball.com)

Nyonya Asam Laksa

Cendol

Other than enjoying the food in Melaka, we also went to other places, most of it historical places. We went to Christ Church, which the structure reflects original Dutch architecture and has hand-crafted benches, jointless ceiling skylights, copper replica of the bible, headstone written in Armenian language and replica of “The Last Supper”. Other place that we went to is St Paul Hill, where we saw St. Paul Church which is part of the Malaccan Museums Complex. The St. Paul Church is easy to recognise because it has Statue of St Francis Xavier. St Francis Xavier was Roman Catholic missionary who spent several years in Melaka, serving the poor and sick and translate all simple prayers and instructions to Malay. The body of St. Francis Xavier was interred here temporarily before it was taken to Goa, India. We also passed through the Proclamation of Independence Memorial, didn’t have time to enter the museum.

St. Paul Church

Beside the historical places, we also went to Jonker Street and two modern shopping complexes, Mahkota Parade and Dataran Pahlawan Melaka Megamall. Jonker Street (or Jalan Hang Jebat) is famous for its antique goods, foods and carnival-like atmosphere during weekend nights. We went there to taste the food and went shopping.... there is a lot of unique stuff there, and the price is still reasonable. I bought a t-shirt there; the shop keeper said that they only made 1 t-shirt for 1 design and 1 colour. So, there would be no one that has the same t-shirt (in same design and colour) like I do. At Dataran Pahlawan Melaka Megamall, we went shopping again. We bought several items in Padini Concept Store that sell all clothes, shoes, and goods from Padini Holdings brands, which are Padini, Seed, Vincci, PDI, Padini Authentics, P & Co, Miki Kids & Miki Maternity. Padini is a well-known Malaysia-origin brand. Another shopping mall that we went to was Mahkota Parade. We went there just to eat Nandos. One of my friends is really like to eat Nandos, she fall in love with its famous peri-peri chicken. So we went there to eat it. I order ¼ of chicken with very-hot peri-peri flavour. In my opinion, Nandos’s peri-peri chicken is too spicy and that’s all that I can taste. I cannot taste other flavour because it was too spicy. I think for the next time, I will choose mild-spicy flavour, so I can still taste other flavour.

I almost forgot, at night, we took river tour. It is almost the same with River Taxi in Singapore. The River Tour took about 45 minutes to travel 9 KM river. The scenery around the river is very nice, especially at night; all the lights make the scenery more special. During the river tour, we could see the Eye of Malaysia, Maritime Museum, water-wheel and other scenery. I really like the scenery and it made 45 minutes flies.

That is the story of my two-day trip to Melaka, Malaysia. I can wait for another trip ....

NB: All picture (except the rice ball) provided by Helda....

Pass with B+

2009-04-19T22:27:00.000-07:00

Finally, the lecturer published the result for the DB class. I managed to pass with B+. Luckily…..yey…… Usually (about several years ago when I was doing my undergraduate and master program), I would be furious if I got grade lower than A. But now, I’m happy just to pass the course. Hmmm… does this mean that I’m lowering my own expectation? Or am I not as ambitious as I was before? Does it even matter?

As for my other courses, the results haven’t been published yet. I still have to wait for several more days. Hopefully, I can pass all my courses in this term with good score.

My last week in Term 2

2009-04-15T03:38:00.000-07:00

Just finished my last exam for this term. I still have 1 more term paper and 1 more critic essay. The deadline is this Friday. I think I can finish it tomorrow. After that I’m free… yey……

But now, I am worry about my score, especially for DB course. I’m not sure whether I can pass that course. The DB lecturer already posted the score for other assignments beside the exam and the result was not too good. Hopefully I will get enough score at the exam so that I can still pass the course. I just hope for enough score to pass the minimum requirement. Hopefully… hopefully….. But if worse thing happen, hopefully I can accept that too…. Just hopping for the best things to come ..

My First Songkran Day in Singapore

2009-04-15T02:50:00.000-07:00

Last Sunday, I joined Songkran Day celebration in UBT (Uttamayanmuni Buddhist Temple). Songkran is a Thai New Year which is celebrated every year from April 13 to April 15. Songkran was traditionally a time to visit and pay respects to elders, including family members, friends and neighbors. But in UBT, the main activities in Songkran are pray, give food to the monks and (the most exiting thing) throwing water. Throwing water has a meaning of its own not just a fun activity. Throwing water to each other believed as a way to give blessing. The water is considered as “blessed” water because it had been poured over the Buddhas for cleansing. In Thailand, throwing water is used to relieve the heat because April is the hottest month.

For me, without even know the meaning of Songkran at the first time, Songkran festival was really fun. First, we did several chant and gave food (or in my case money, because I didn’t bring any food. It was my last Singapore dollar :(( didn’t have money.. hiks.. ) to the monk. Then, after lunch, we followed the parade around the temple. Before the parade, one lady put a cold white powder in my face, so my face had two streaks in each cheek. The parade was lead by Thai music players and dancers, followed by person that brought money tree and the rest of parade participants. We walked and made a little movement like dance around the temple.

Musical Parade

Traditional Music

After the parade, we poured water to Buddha statues and the monks. The monks were sitting near the Buddha statues, so we can pour water on them. Then they can pour the water back to us. It was considered as blessing. There were a lot of people that waited in line to pour the water, and because at first I didn’t know what to do, I queued at almost in the end of the line. After that, we threw water at each other. Everyone is wet. No one is allowed to stay dry. If anyone still looked dry, people would throw water on him/her. Bhikku Keminda, an Indonesian monk in UBT, didn’t want to lose the chance to throw water on us. After the line was over, he got a bunch of water and threw it on us. Such a fun event.

Pouring Water

Me, Helda and Vivi

Even though I was wet and I felt dizzy (and a bit sick again :(( ) after that, I was really happy. It was really fun. Celebrating Songkran day in the UBT was really fun and I cant wait to celebrate Songkran again…..

Another Karaoke Journey ................

2009-04-11T01:16:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, I went through another a bit crazy journey and full of challenge but we all felt happy :D. Even thought I was still sick, yes, I haven’t healed yet. Still have cough :(. Yesterday, I went to JB again .. for karaoke. :D But the journey was a bit crazy and adventurous. The journey started in Bugis at 9am. We supposed to meet at Bugis at 9am but because I had to find ATM to withdraw money, I arrived at 9.20. But, I was not the last person that arrived. My other friend (RK) arrived at 10 because he thought that we met at 10. (HD already called him the day before and told him to meet us at 9 but he simply forgot........... arghhhhhhhhhhhhhhh).

After we all gathered at 10am, we went to buy something to eat first. So, we (me, RK and HD) went to Bugis Junction. I forgot to mention, there was only the three of us that went to JB for karaoke because the Karaoke room in JB only have 3 mic and all of us didn’t want to share the mic, so we decided not to ask other people to join us. So, the journey was only for three of us, two guys one girl. Back to Bugis Junction. We first decided to buy McChicken @ McD, but because it was still 10am McChicken had not been served yet. So, we bought BreadTalk instead.

Then, we went to the bus station to take bus to JB. But, not like what we expected, the queue in the bus station was very long. There are 3 kind of bus from Bugis bus station to JB, first SBS 170, Singapore JB Express (SJE) and CW 2. We thought we should just queue at the shortest one. So, we queued for SJE. But SJE busses were very few, arggggggggggghhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh, so we had to wait a very long time to finally get a bus (about 1 hour). The time was showed around 11.30 when we finally got on the bus. So, for the next time, don’t take SJE.... just queue for CW 2. I think its better. This was the first challenge in this crazy adventure. The journey in bus took about 30 minutes.

We arrived at Woodland checkpoint around 12. The checkpoint was not crowded, so it only took a few minutes to pass the checkpoint. Then, we went downstairs to continue our journey to JB immigration using SJE. The queue was so long and disordered. Arghhhhhhh, Yes, this was the second challenge. People queued in any direction. It was not like a queue but it was more like a bunch of people push each other around. Because the queue was already in mess, we decided to follow the mess and just cut the lines :D .... we were not a very discipline people. After 15 to 25 minutes, we managed to get bus..... yey........

The third challenge was on the bus. The bus took almost 45 minutes to reach JB immigration. :( It was a very long journey because the traffic was very crowded and jammed everywhere. The bus was very hot too; I thought the AC was not working properly. So, it was like “sauna” in the bus. All sweating, we arrived at JB immigration checkpoint where another challenge took place. The condition there was not that good also. The queue was very long and also disordered. We took the shortest line as always, but it turned out that the line was merged with another line, so it was also a very long line... and it took us almost an hour to pass the checkpoint. :(.... all my cloth was wet and sticky because of sweat. :( When we finally got through the checkpoint it was already 2pm and we all starved.

We went to have lunch at City Square, only a few minutes walked from JB checkpoint. We ate Sudanese food and after that went around shopping a little bit. I bought a new pair of shoes and several t-shirts.

After we finished shopping, we want to go to another shopping mall, Pelangi Plaza, to karaoke. I didn’t realize it was raining heavily outside. We tried to find a taxi to go to Pelangi Plaza. In the taxi stand, there was no queuing; everyone was tried to in to the taxi first. It was a bit chaotic there. I realized that HD and RK would never get a taxi because they not used to do that. Especially if they have to grab a taxi from other women. So, I had to find taxi for us. I tried not to go too far and too front from the taxi stand shelter because it was still raining. But if I not went to the front, I would not got a taxi. It was such a heavy job. Before all my cloth got wet, I finally managed to grab a taxi for us and up we went to Pelangi.

We arrived at Pelangi at 5.30. We went directly to Red Box, karaoke place. After asked the receptionist, we had to wait about one hour to get karaoke room. I went to the toilet to change my t-shirt. Did you know that to go to the toilet we had to pay 20 cent per person? In JB most of the place is like that. We had to pay to go to the toilet.

To spend one hour, we went around the Pelangi Plaza. But there were not a lot of things to see in there. At 6.30 we came back to Red Box and after a bit negotiation on the price and member card, we were ready to karaoke. We managed to get 1 student price and member card. We can use the member card next time to get a 1 free entree. We also had a dinner buffet. It was already included in the karaoke price. The food in the dinner buffet was delicious. I ate tepanyaki, the soup, the ice cream (even thought I was still cough :P), the fruit etc..... we spent more than 3 hour there. Even thought I still cough, I can sang ..... yey....

After karaoke, we came to the last challenge. The last challenge was how to get back to Singapore. It was already late... around 10.30 when we arrived at JB immigration checkpoint. Luckily, the queue in JB immigration was very short. But, that was not the problem here. The problem was how to get back to Singapore. We didn’t know which bus was still operated. The queue for the bus was also very long. So, we queued in two different lines. I queued in smrt 950 bus and RK queued in CW 2 bus, while HD tried to find some information about the buses. HD talked to several bus officers there to find out which buses still operated. They said that CW drivers and officers were no longer there so it was very likely that there were no more CW operated. Then, HD tried to look around and tried to find the shortest and the fastest bus that can take us back to Singapore while I and RK stayed at the queue. HD finally found SJE (Singapore JB Express) bus that already ready to go to Singapore and the queue was short. He called us to go to the queue and we all finally managed to get in to the bus, even thought there was no more seat, so we had to stand ..... but we were on our own way to go home to Singapore ... yey ..................

The bus stopped in Singapore checkpoint at almost 11.30pm. We started another queue in the Singapore Checkpoint. Because I cannot scan my passport like HD and RK, so I had to go in separated queue. As usual, I chose the shortest queue, but again, it was not a best one. My queue was moving very slow. The immigration officer was working very slowly. She only finished checking one person while the other officer in the other line finished checking five people. So, it was a very long queue.

At the time I passed the immigration it was already 12am. After immigration, we needed to find SJE bus again to continue our journey to Bugis. Luckily, there was one SJE bus waiting to go to Bugis. So we run the stair and followed the queue for that bus. We got in the bus and started 30 minutes journey to Bugis. I tried to sleep for a while. We arrived at Bugis at around 12.40. Because we wanted to go to the toilet, we walked to Raffles Hospital. From the hospital, I took a taxi to go home while the others walked to their home. I arrived about 10 minutes later and felt very tired.

That was my journey that day. A crazy and challenging Journey................

My one week sick....

2009-04-05T06:28:00.000-07:00

It started one week ago. In rainy Sunday afternoon. I went home from temple and lunch with a friend and get caught up in the rain. I went home with a bit wet cloth and wet hair. When I opened my room door, I saw something that I didn’t expected. I can’t go in to the room. So, I stayed in front the room and after that went to the toilet. It was really an unexpected thing. Because of it, I can’t directly took bath and hit the bed as I planned before. So, I managed to go inside my room and took my laptop and went to the study room. The AC in the study room was really cold and directly hit my head.

A day after that, I started to get a cold and fever..... after the ISM class, I went to see the Doctor. He gave me 3 kind of medicine, one is Decolgen for my cold, I think, one is some menthol for my sore throat and another one is cough syrup. I drank all of that obediently until the medicine is run out. But, after drank all the medicine, I had not recover from my illnesses. I still got cold and fever... hm... Maybe the medicine was not strong enough for me. So, yes.. I’m still sick, until now, when I wrote this.

Even thought I felt sick, I still had to finish one my term paper last Friday because the due date was on Friday midnight and on that Friday, I also had to give presentation for another term paper. At Thursday I also had to meet my supervisor to discuss my further research. So, it was a busy week. I don’t know was it because of the illness or because I was just too lazy, from Tuesday to Thursday, I could not write anything to finish my term paper. On Thursday, I only managed to finish my presentation for the day after. So, I thought I was in a real problem. On Friday, I presented. Even thought not went as well as I want it, but at very least I managed to present my term paper. Then, after the class, I had to rush to do my other term paper, which was due that night. So, I used about 7 hours (from 4pm to 11pm) to finish the term paper. It was not as good as I wanted, but I at least I finished it. Hopefully my prof would satisfy with the idea and the result in that term paper and give me a good score. Man, I really need a good score, because I a little bit mess up when I gave the presentation for this term paper. Why my life is become bits mess up lately? What happen to me??

Back to my sick week, at Friday also, Bhante Kheminda called me to ask me how my condition was. He already knew that I was sick. I said that I’m still sick and cannot go to the Friday meditation class. Well, despite of my illness, I was also had to finish my term paper. That is why I cannot attend the meditation class. Sorry Bhante, I was not in my best shape lately and thank you for all your advices. He told me to buy vitamin C, which I followed the day before.

Still on Friday, after finished my term paper, the time was already a few minutes passed 11 pm. Couple of friends already waited for me in the park to go somewhere and chat. Sorry friends, I cannot go anywhere that night. After I finished my term paper, I started to get fever again and my head started to spin. All I wanted to do is go home. So I excused myself and went home. In the way home, my other friend called me; he wanted to give me back my laptop which he borrowed from me. I met him that night; he bought me a something to eat. I really didn’t want to eat. All I want was sleep. I ate only a little and took the rest home. So that how my Friday ended. But before I went to sleep, I was worry very badly about my term paper. I was very worry that I could not get good score ..... I got so many things to worry about.

On Saturday, I slept almost the whole morning. I woke up at 12, had lunch, felt bored just stayed at home. Unfortunately, the internet was having a problem, so I cannot online. :( I really hate that.So, I spent the day by watching Japan dorama. I went out to buy things that I wanted to give to the temple for the next day. Because this Sunday was an offering day. And continue to watch movie until almost midnight. And then, I went to sleep.

Today, I woke up at 7 am and felt a bit fever and my coughing still continues. I decided not to go to the temple; because I was afraid I would make myself worse and made other people uncomfortable because of my coughing. I continued to sleep and woke up at 12. I bored again ... so, I decided to watch dorama again. At the same time, the internet was fixed. So I can online again. So I chatted with some of my friends and tried to stream a movie. At 4pm I felt dizzy and fever again. So, I went to take a nap. At 5pm, I woke up and felt it was a good time to take a bath, which I had not done for almost 2 days.... Yes, I’m very lazy to take a bath, especially when I’m sick. So I took bath and went to find dinner. I ate porridge for diner and decided to buy some medicine for my cold. Because my cold is not getting better. So I bought Panadol for Cold and Flu and took two pill at once and tried to sleep. I think the medicine was working. I was sweating. But, I cannot sleep. Maybe because I already have so much sleep that I cannot sleep again. So, I decided to write my sick story in my blog.

Hopefully, tomorrow I will feel better. I will go to Doctor again tomorrow. Hopefully, my sick day will be over tomorrow.

By the way, I didn’t tell my parents or my sisters that I am sick. My sister called me on Saturday, but I didn’t say anything about my sickness. I just don’t want to make them worry. Hopefully I did the good things......

Is it important to get married?

2009-03-26T03:41:00.000-07:00

I keep thinking how to answer this question. In my opinion, married or not married is decision a person should make. It is not a right or wrong decision, just how you want to live you life. Married is not always the right answer for every problem. If you get a good partner and can endure life together then its is a good decision, if not.. You make your life a living hell.

Is it true that if you’re not married then your life is not perfect, especially for a woman? Some people believe that, even most of my families believe that. That’s why they persuade me to get married soon. But is it true? I think my life now is great. I have a good life, a good family, good friends, good education, a good scholarship, a good future, a good personality and so on. But is it not enough? Will married bring me a better life? Or worse? I feel my life is perfect right now. True, that I sometime need affection and feel kind of lonely. But is it means that I should get married? Do married people don’t feel lonely sometime?? And if I haven’t found someone that I really want to spend my life with, should I just choose any man that comes around? Will I be happy if I do that? Should I wait until the right man come or should I just settle with the man that I meet now?

Nice quote ..... got this from an email ..

2009-03-24T21:00:00.000-07:00

Life is short
Break the rules
forgive quickly
kiss passionately, love truly
laugh constantly
And never stop smiling
no matter how strange life is
Life is not always the party we expected to be
but as long as we are here, we should smile and be grateful

A little time so much to do .....

2009-03-23T02:39:00.000-07:00

Today, I was just finished my ISM term paper presentation. Not too good but not too bad also. I think its enough to pass the subject. Why now I can settle in “enough”?? before I always search for the best … hmm… its not a good thing. Why? Is it because I already lack of spirit? Lack of courage? Lack of determination? Is it?? Or is it I just tired to achieve something that doesn’t really matter?? Is it a bad thing to just pass the subject with “enough” grade?? Or should I aim for the best??

Should I study all the time and forget go have fun??

Another mistake for today :(

2009-03-03T22:26:00.000-08:00

Actually it is not today mistake. But I just realize the mistake today. I just did 7 experiment with wrong data :(. I have to repeat it again. Each experiment takes 2 to 3 hour. So, I have to spend another 21 hour to do the experiment… hiks… hiks….
So stupid that I didn’t realize that the data is wrong :(

My Poor Presentation ….. Oh …..

2009-03-03T21:49:00.000-08:00

Today is again a disaster happen. Because yesterday and a few days ago I was too lazy to do anything, I delay making my presentation. I had to do the presentation today, at 9am. So, because of the deadline (yet I still don’t pay much attention off or making a great effort on it), I woke up at 4am and start to construct my presentation (I hadn’t even finished reading the paper). I finished it at 7.20 and rushed to take a bath and went to school.

Luckily, I arrived before 9am. So, I still can do several preparations. And then, at 9am, I did the presentation. The presentation went well, I can not consider it good, I know that I can do much better if I’m not to lazy to make the presentation and rehearsal. I mentioned one fact wrongly. I’m still consider whether I will come clean about the mistake that I made or just pretend not to know that… damn…. Another doom day  because of my laziness. How can I remove my laziness?? How?? How??

Fight with MATLAB

2009-02-23T22:37:00.000-08:00

This few days, I have been fighting with MATLAB for my research project. It turn out, that MATLAB not as horrible that I imagine, but worst…. =D ….
Luckily I only have to modify the existing MATLAB code to implement my ideas, so I don’t have to make it from stretch. I am already able to modify it and able to run it. I’m waiting for it to end running and then analyze the data.
I have to make a good progress and submit a paper this march. Time is running out….

2009-02-21T05:59:00.000-08:00

In Searching of Soul mate

This post is kind of sentimental thing for me…. I’m in sentimental moment.. I want to cry … I feel sad… I miss something.. But I cant exactly describe that thing….

I had just watched Korean drama movie which title is Soul mate. It is a nice story about love and soul mate. The movie showed that sometime we come across our soul mate every time but we just didn’t realize it. We coincidently at the same place at the same time but just not realize it. Is it really true? Is soul mate and true love really true?

I always believe in true love and soul mate. But sometime I wonder when I will found it. I already 26 now, but I still haven’t found my true love and soul mate. Or have I found it and just give it up? I already gone through several relationships that is not turn out well. The last one is kind of painful, and most of it was my mistakes. I had been loved several times before, kind of deep love, but I blow it away. Do I will find that deep love again or I already lost my chance? Do I really want to find someone to love or do I just miss to be loved or do I just miss the love.. The feeling of being loved?

Right now, I keep wondering, when will I find love again? I never felt that my heart beat move fast… every time I meet a man my heart still beat the same way, not faster of slower. Is it meaning that I have not found my true love or soul mate? Or maybe I just not allowed my self to fall in love? I want to fall in love again.. I want to feel the love again.
I’m looking for someone… someone who is my true love and soul mate. I don’t want to be with some just because I fit his qualifications. It would be devastated. If I have a relationship with someone again, I want it because we loved each other, kind of true and deep love. I don’t want that he love me because I have good qualifications. I want he love me because who I am, not my qualifications. When will I found that man?

In the searching of soul mate, I remember yesterday class. The professor was talking about equilibrium. He said that in every market or game or condition, there is equilibrium. You just have to find it. And finding it will need a long time and also hard. Is it the same with true love and soul mate? There is exists one true love and one soul mate for everyone… we just have to find it. And find it is hard and need a long time. So is it true?? Will someday I finally found my true love and soul mate?

2009-02-12T08:21:00.000-08:00

---- Old Memory ...... in February .................

February again. Then, it is almost 5 years ago, when I made my decision. My decision about him. It was kind of ridiculous decision, I made it because of anger and childish and my ego. I try not to regret my decision. But I had regretted it. About 3 years ago, I regret my decision and asked him to be with me again. But sadly he rejected it, because he already found someone else. Now, I don’t think that I regret it. Anything that happen in the past is stay in the past.

When I think about it again, maybe he was never meant to be with me. He was really a controlling man, for me just like a control freak, while I like my freedom. He said I didn’t love him as he loved me. But just because I act different from what he expected, it didn’t mean that I didn’t love him right? Maybe I did love him. as big as he loved me. But I just never let him know or my self know because of my ego. Yeah… I was really egocentric at that time. Maybe I still am. I still don’t know. Still not sure. If I can turn back the time, the result would be the same. But may be less painful. And just because I was the one who break the relationship, it didn’t mean that I was not hurt too.

Well, just forget about it. It just some memory… memory in February. I will keep that in my heart and remember it in a short time in February. Just like a reflection of what I did ….. after that ... well.. just think and reflect for a while and then be me again … the cheerful me .. :D

2009-01-07T00:16:00.000-08:00

My new blog entry in 2009.

As usual, in the beginning of a year, I always make a New Year resolution. My last year resolutions is not completely fulfill .
Still have several resolutions that need to work with.

In the beginning of the year, I want to write down 2 things. First are my New Year resolutions…. Yipeee… and the second is my Lasik surgery experience.

My new year resolutions are listed below:

More diligent and serious to study my PhD. Want to finish my PhD as soon as possible.
Find a new love. The last time I had a relationship with someone was about 5 years ago. So its time for me to fall in love again ;)
More caring to my parents and family. They all my greatest support. I will always feel grateful to them.
Enjoying life. Even thought I will work hard to finish my PhD, I also want to enjoy the journey .. my journey of life.
More generous. I admit sometime I still stingy. Hopefully I can be more generous in this coming year
GO AROUND THE WORLD…….. my greatest dream of all………………..

That’s my resolutions. And another thing, I will join fitness (for pilates, yoga, and cardio dance). I really think I need to exercise more.

Now, lets go on to thing number 2.

I just had a Lasik surgery. At first, I would like to do the surgery in JB (Johor Bahru), Malaysia because it’s cheaper. I went to JB to do the pre-Lasik evaluation on 24 Dec 2008. After series of examinations (I had to be examined by 5 different devices and manual check of eyes power, the examination also made my eyes blurry), they said that my cornea thickness is not enough to do intralase Lasik, so they offer me to other procedure named LASEK. LASEK is similar to Lasik but instead of making flap, it use alcohol to cut your cornea a little bit. The LASEK recovery is much much longer then Lasik.

After lot of consideration, I decided to do another pre-Lasik examination in Singapore. Luckily both pre-Lasik examination (in Johor Bahru and Singapore) were free. I do the pre-Lasik examination in 30 Dec 2008. In Singapore, the doctor said he can do intralase Lasik and it is possible to do the surgery at that day too. So, after talking to the marketing staff in order to get a discount, I decided to have the surgery at that day (at 7.30 pm). I also called my friend to come and pick me up after the surgery because after the surgery I would feel blurry and teary.

So, I did the surgery on 30 Dec 2008. The surgery it self only took about 10-15 minutes for every eye. But before that, there were several preparations that need to be done. I changed cloth to hospital cloth, wore head cap and foot cap. Then, I went to operation room. In that room, the Doctor made a flap in my eyes and did the Lasik procedure. I didn’t lost conscious during the surgery. I knew what the doctor do to my eyes, even thought I didn’t feel pain. But when they fire the laser, I smelled that like something burning. Yes, my eyes burning because of the laser. :P

After the surgery, they asked me to take a little rest and cover my eyes with eyes lid and drop antibiotic eye drop every hours during the first day of the surgery. I rested a while, my eyes started to hurt a little. I felt very blurry and teary. I felt like all I want to do is crying. They told me to take the sleeping pill to help me sleep that night and the next morning the teary feeling would go. And I did what they told me to do and turn out its works. The next morning when I woke up, I didn’t feel teary again. But my eyes feel a little bit dry. So I had to drop several freshness eye drops.

I went to the doctor the next morning to do the first examination after the surgery. The doctor said the surgery was going well and my astigmatic is gone and my power is -0.25 (both left and right eyes). But that result would still be fluctuated in the next 2 weeks to 2 months. My next examination will be held on 16 Jan 2009. Until that time, I would have to use the antibiotic eye drops 4 times a day for 10 days and freshness eye drops when ever my eyes dry. And my eyes are a little bit red too. But the doctor said, the red will recover in the next 2 weeks.

So right now, I still use antibiotic and freshness eye drop from time to time. My eyes still red so I need to wear sun glasses. But hopefully in the next 2 weeks, I wont be needing those things ………………………..

………………………………..

2008-12-22T21:18:00.000-08:00

Choices in Life

We are forced to make choices everyday.
From the very early morning until the late night.
We have to make choices.
In the morning, we make choices whether to continue sleep or wake up and go to work/study
(I also choose to continue sleep :P… not a good habit)

After we woke up, we have to make choices in what to eat, what do wore, when to take a bath, when to eat, etc…
Life is about making choices.
And some choices will change our life forever.
And because life is reality without eraser, our choices in the past are what make us who we are today. And our choices in present moments will make who we are in the future.

Have you ever regret the choices that you make in the past??
Well sometime I do.
If things are not going well, sometime I regret the choices that I make.
But when I think it over, that choices are what bring me here today.
And I should be grateful to be able to make those choices.

So, let make choices that we won’t regret…
If it is a big decision that will change your life, let’s analyze the choices
And make the decision before the choices is run out…

2008-12-15T11:22:00.000-08:00

Could I have the chance to meet you again

What happen with me?
Cry in the middle of the night?
Is it because I am lonely?
Is it because I regret things that I have done?

I have give up several loves that come to me
And now, when I need someone on my side, I just can not find one

Where did the love go?
Is four years not enough to finally fall in love again?
Or will I keep remembering those old days?

Is it okay to let my self fall in love again?
Or will it just end the same way like before?
Will I find someone that as well as I want it?
Or will it just bring the hurt back again?

I can even believe that I write this.
In spite of my smiling face, I still need that love
Love that can make me woke up every morning
Love that can make me rest easily
Love that can make my heart beat twice faster

Where is the love?
Could I ever find it again?
Where are you hiding?
Are you near?
Or are you far?
Are you seeing me right now?
Are you reading my blogs?

Where are you?
Could I have the chance to meet you again?

2008-12-11T23:49:00.000-08:00

My ideas of my perfect man

Several days ago, I was asked what kind of man is my perfect man. Well, of course I have a lot of criteria of my perfect man; this is the summary of it.

1. My perfect man should be sincere, honest and love me. That is the first and the most important criteria. I don’t really care about that man education, job, wealth, appearance etc. the most important thing to me is he can show that he loves me with sincere and honest words. :D

2. My perfect man should able to accept my flaws and be there for me when I need him. I know that I’m not perfect.. far than perfect. And my perfect man should able to cope with my flaws and accept it as it is. Don’t try to change me please, because I love my self and I’m not ready to change.

3. I’m able to accept his flaws. My perfect man is not perfect too. He will have flaws and I should be able to accept it. I think I can tolerate people flaws as long as it is not against my idealism. I also think that it is hard to hope other people change. That’s why I should be able to accept his flaws.

That three simple things is the basic criteria of my perfect man. It may not be perfect to others but it is perfect to me, and I know that perfect man is somewhere out there ... :D (just like Fox Mulder always says: the truth is out there ...)

2008-12-04T22:07:00.001-08:00

Relief….

It is a relief to know that finally I finished my term 1 and pass the minimum requirement for every subject. I got A- in my decision support and optimization class (which is my depth course and it is required to get A-), and get A- and B for the other subjects. I know that I can do better if I gave more time to study but right now I often distracted and lazy to study. What happening to me?? Is it true that if we grow older we become more lazy and hard to study?

Wow, hopefully not. I will do my best in my second term. I will minimize the distraction and my laziness. Hopefully in the second term I can get a better score.

2008-12-04T08:31:00.000-08:00

Worry Feeling

I feel worry today, thanks to my friend. He said that it will be embarrassing if I don’t pass my subject with minimum requirement and get kick out from school. I know that I will feel embarrassed and disappointed if I failed but … what else I can do?? I already try hard for this subject and I don’t know what else to do.

I think the result will be announced tomorrow. Still hope that I could get the minimum requirement. I don’t feel confident because I know that I didn’t do very well. But the result has not come up yet .. so should I be worry? Or should I be worry tomorrow?

2008-11-27T23:50:00.000-08:00

End of first Term

Finally, just submitted my last assignment for this term.
Its time to relax and enjoy a little bit of vacation.
But, I don't know what to do next?
Getting ready for the second term?
Or just browsing, chatting, watching and do useless things?
For today, just enjoying browsing, chatting, and watching
and gossiping.

Finally... the end of first term.
What torture will I endure in my next term??

2008-11-26T22:15:00.000-08:00

No more exams for this year.

Just finished my last exam.. (for this term) ….. yipieee… no more exam for this term. Finally, I came to the end of term. Just have to refine one more term paper and that’s all. I don’t know what the result are .. but hopefully it is enough for the minimum requirements. I don’t expect to get A, I will settle with the minimum requirements. Why? Because I don’t think I give my best to all the subjects. I still can do better then that but my laziness is keeping me. I should be more diligent for the next term. I should be better ….

2008-11-26T22:09:00.000-08:00

Is he sincere or not?

Lately a friend is offering to help me in something but I just keep get the feeling that he is not really sincere to help me. I think he want to help me because he can get something out of it. I don’t know why, I keep feeling it. And he is really started to annoy me. I’m keep thinking what’s in it for him. Why is he willing to help me? I don’t believe he help me because he want it to, just keep getting the feeling that he only used me. I can figure out what the purpose is but am I to suspicious?

I have many friends and often get help from them. A lot. My best friend even loan me money to pay my bond to my previous company and I don’t feel suspicious about it. But with him, I don’t know why I got suspicious. Am I too exaggerating? Or this is my conscious that telling me to be careful?

He often said that he did it to help me and it will help my future. I just want to say, let me worry about my future my self, I don’t need you to worry about it. I don’t think that he understand about me and my future. I can not say no to him because I think it will be impolite to reject such a lovely help. But I just can get rid of the feeling. Why? Am I to suspicious?

2008-11-25T00:06:00.000-08:00

Overslept

Lately, I always overslept. Yesterday I slept all day. Just wake up to eat dinner and then slept again. I also overslept on Sunday. I only woke up to go to the cinema to watch “Body of Lies”. Even thought, I had exam the next day, I didn’t have the willingness to wake up. What happening to me??

I need a reason to wake up every day. I need a reason to stop dreaming and start living.. what happen to me??

2008-11-20T22:39:00.000-08:00

Are their problems my problems?

I sometime wonder, whether my parents or my brother and sisters problems are my problems too. Sometime their problems are nagging me. I know that we have to fight our own wars. And my wars are definitely different from their wars, but sometime I get carried away with their problems too. Is it wrong? Or am I fuss about other people businesses?

As a family member, I will try the best that I can to help their problems. But what if the problems are too much for me? And I still have to solve my own problems. Should I just not interfere and let them solve their own problems? Just watch and see they solve their own problems, is it the best things to do?

For now, I will consider their problems are their problems. I don’t have to interfere. I will help as much as I can, but that’s it. They have to try to solve it on their own. Problems are what make us learn about life. Right? We have to have problems in our life in order to improve and see the beauty of life. Is it wrong?

2008-11-19T03:22:00.000-08:00

In my search of Happiness

What make your life valuable? Is it the dress that you wore, the food that you eat, the house that you life, the parent that you have, the spouse that you can hold, the education that you take, the money in your pocket, the book that you read, or what?

What make your life valuable? I feel prettier when I am wearing a good dress. I feel delight eating delicious food. I feel comfortable living in a cozy house. I feel grateful having good parents that never questions me and order me what to do. I feel thankful having brother and sisters that support me when I’m down. I feel happy having friends that can accompany me. Even thought I don’t have any spouse right now, I know that I will feel cheerful to have person that I can share all my laughs and cries. I feel proud having a good education. I feel secure having money in my pocket. I feel excited reading my books and watching my movies.

So, what make my life valuable?? Is it all those things above? I don’t think so. I think what make my life valuable is when I can do small good things every day. It is so clichéd. I know that. But right now, that is what I feel :D. So, lets make small good things everyday.

2008-11-18T22:21:00.001-08:00

The story of my career

I started my career very early. Because I was one of students which got scholarship from Bina Nusantara University (BINUS) under career scholarship program, I had an obligation to work at BINUS from the first day of my undergraduate study until 2n+1 years after I graduated. Value of n here is the number of years that I need to complete my undergraduate study.

I started my career as an administration staff at EDP department, BINUS in September 2000. Now, EDP department is not exists anymore, it was merge with other IT departments. My duties more or less just arranged mails and documents, especially ISO documents, since BINUS already hold ISO 9001 certification. Sometime I helped my colleges to input data to computer and do simple query to extract the data. That’s it, just that simple. It was a boring job, but it gave me plenty of time to focus on my study and learn other things.

Realizing my potential, my boss, at the time, told me to learn Visual Basic 6, MS SQL server 1997 and Crystal Report. He even asked one of his programmers to give me training about it. So, I started to learn programming language and applied it in several simple forms. And not so long after, I forgot the exact date; I was promoted to be a programmer. It was a bit of improvement.

I worked my days as a programmer until Dec 2002. During those times, I involved in several projects using Visual Basic 6, MS SQL server 1997 and Crystal Report. My main responsibilities were to encode, test, debug, and install program systems or application that was being used in BINUS. I hardly remember the applications, but I think one of it is the early stage of admission application and library system.

At January 2003, I got promoted again. I was promoted to be a system analyst. The duties were pretty much the same from previous position, but in this position, there were additional tasks that I must do. As a system analyst, I had to analyze and design applications to fulfill user’s requirements. It was kind of challenging tasks, because in BINUS, users requirements changed rapidly. I can not really blame the users for changing the requirements because the requirements had to change to adapt to the real world situations and conditions. I learnt a lot of things during my time as system analyst not only in analyze and design application technique but also in business processes. I worked as system analyst for almost 4 years before I got another promotion. I finished both my undergraduate and graduate study during that time. I also managed to pass CISA exam with a very tight passing score.

At December 2007, I started my career as a Project Leader. I found that job was interesting and quite tricky to do. My main duties were to planning, monitoring, and controlling projects, while still helping to do analyze and design applications. I often had to negotiate the projects schedule with my users and control the quality of my projects. For me, the most interesting thing in working as Project Leader was how to communicate with users and the rest of the team. I think my patience and communication skill was improved during these times. Sadly, I become project leader just for a very short time. At July 2008, I resigned from BINUS and went to Singapore to continue my study.

Right now, I am just a PhD student. But I’m sure in the future, I will find other jobs that can be more challenging and exciting then I was have before. Still looking for the next best things to come.

2008-10-12T23:17:00.001-07:00

Volunteering Experience

From Friday to Sunday, I was volunteering for Ajahn Bram talks and seminars organized by Buddhist Fellowship. I never did volunteering before, and these 3 days really a good time for me. I gained experiences that I never had before. Even thought I helped as an usher to direct people to the talks and seminars place and had to stand the whole time, I didn’t find those as boring or tiring jobs. I enjoy every second of it.

I enjoy greeting and smiling to people and show them the way.
I enjoy working with my IC and others usher.
I enjoy being a part of the events.
I event enjoy eating the vegetarian food.

And the most enjoyable and exciting thing is I was able to meet Ajahn Bram. I never met or heard his talks and seminars before. I only know him from books that he wrote. Listening his talks and seminars directly is more enjoyable than reading his book and not everyday that I have the opportunity to listening his talks. I also had the opportunity to take a picture with him.

So, the conclusion is, I have a good time these past 3 days. Even thought the volunteering is tiring, the enjoyment is much greater than that.

2008-10-08T01:34:00.001-07:00

Exam Sucks...

I hate exam.
Especially if I didn't do good in that Exam.
My two exam so far didn't make me satisfied. I think I didn't do good in those exam. I only manage to did half of it right (50%, give and take 20 %). Cant wait to see the result. Hopefully I still can smile after receive the result.

But, I still have one other exam. So, must fight ... don't give up. Study .. and fight for this last mid term ....

2008-10-06T00:44:00.000-07:00

My Series of Events in Singapore

Bukit Timah - 08-Aug-2008

Fireworks - Sing's National Day - 08-Aug-2008

After Youth Symposium - 24-Aug-2008

IPA Inauguration - 30-Aug-2008

Helda's B'Day -3-Sept-2008

Chinese Garden - Lantern Festival - 5-Sept-2008

Night View - 13-Sept-2008

Vivo - 29-Sept-2008

Ko Meng San Temple - 30-Sept-2008

Ladies Day Out - 30-Sept-2008

Sungei Buloh - 11-Oct-2008

Botanical Garden - 14-Oct-2008

2008-10-05T20:28:00.000-07:00

Thank you note

There are a lot of people that I want to say thanks to. I would not be like this without them. But today, I want to say special thanks to my dear friend HS. Because of our small talk yesterday afternoon I remember again my goal in life (the goal that I almost forgot because of all the tension lately).

Several days or weeks ago, I was really depressed because of my studies. I thought I chose a wrong path and a wrong research field because AI was definitely not my thing. Even thought I tried to smile and look like everything ok, but deep inside I felt depress and started to question my decision to take this PhD. Bad result in my previous two assignments added my depressed feeling.

But yesterday, somehow, after our small talk (which not even discuss my depression), I re-found my goal in life which I have forgotten for a very long time. I re-found that my goal in life is to learn new things everyday and enjoying every process of it. I re-found that I should not just stuck to the result (such as result assignment), but enjoying every processes of it. So what if I got a bad mark? The most important things are I learn something new and I learn not to make the same mistake again. I re-found my passion to enter the PhD. I re-found that I want to take PhD because I want to learn new things and yes, by taking PhD I learn new things (a lot of new things).

So, from yesterday and so on, I will enjoy my process of learning. Not just learning from books but also learning from others. I will enjoy it and do as best as I can to learn and implement it and will not worry too much about the results. Bad or good results is always the opportunity to learn again right?

So, thank you dear friend. And if somehow I forget about my goal, please remind me again.

2008-09-30T04:27:00.001-07:00

Me ... at SMU ...

It will be my place to study for about 3 to 4 years...

SMU ... School of Information System

SMU ... School of Information System 2

The Direction Sign

The Bodhi Tree

2008-09-08T01:09:00.000-07:00

Close..

Close has a relative meaning. One people can say something is close and the other says it is far. In term of relationship and friendships, how can we describe close relationships? How can we differentiate close as a friend or close as a couple? When a friend tries to be more close then just a friend, what are the signals??

While I try to find the answer, this is a lyric of song which title is “Close to You”

----------
Why do birds
Suddenly appear?
Everytime you are near
Just like me
They long to be
Close to you

Why do stars
Fall down from the sky?
Everytime you walk by
Just like me
They long to be
Close to you

(*) On the day that you were born
The angels got together and decided
To create a dream come true
So they sprinkled moondust in your hair
Of gold and starlight in your eyes of blue

(**) That is why all the girls in town
Follow you all around
Just like me
They long to be
Close to you

Just like me
They long to be
Close to you

Woo... Close to you...

2008-08-22T02:24:00.000-07:00

Can easily fall in love? Is it a bad thing or a good thing??

I’m still trying to answer that. From my past experience, “can easily fall in love” give you a couple of advantages, namely: you are able to find good things in every one, you make your life cheerful and you can forget bad experience fast. But the disadvantages are also quite a lot. One of disadvantages is you can experience a lot of pain from broken heart. One said: If you are daring to love then you should dare to loose or to be rejected. And by easily fall in love, this feeling will always hunt you. It is not a good feeling. It is a terrible one. Other disadvantage is people will think that you too ease to catch because with just a little affection you will fall in love.

Still don’t know weather “can easily fall in love” is a bad thing or good thing. 

2008-08-21T00:10:00.001-07:00

Love is all around

I really like that quote (from a song). Every day we witness love. It can be friends love, parents love, couple love and any other type of love. Love is all around.

When ever I’m in the lowest time in my life, I always think of that. I always think that I have love all over me and it’s not the time to feel sad.

I have parents who love me very much and never force me to do anything against my will.

I have brother and sisters who also love me and spoiled and care about me.

I have siblings that also love me.

I have many friends that love me and willing to help me.

I have love and I’m capable to love anyone without boundaries.

I have universal love.

So, love is all around…. Just look around you and you will find love.

2008-08-20T23:46:00.000-07:00

My First Time ..

First time at new school, first time at new place, first time at library, first time at class, first time …..

There is always be a first time for anything. For me first time is good. It is mean that you try new things. These are list of my first time in Singapore:
1. First time went to Singapore alone: 03-Aug-2008
2. First time moving to student hostel: 03-Aug-2008
3. First time went to SMU: 03-Aug-2008
4. First time actually report my self to SMU: 04-Aug-2008
5. First time meeting my Professor: 04-Aug-2008
6. First time get lost in Singapore: 04-Aug-2008
7. First time Academic Briefing: 05-Aug-2008
8. First time went to movie in Singapore (Vivo City): 05-Aug-2008
9. First time English Proficiency Lesson: 06-Aug-2008
10. First time hiking in Bukit Timah: 09-Aug-2008
11. First time watch fire works in Singapore: 09-Aug-2008
12. First time went home at 2 am :P : 09-Aug-2008
13. First time Matriculation: 12-Aug-2008
14. First time losing SMU Visitor Card: 13-Aug-2008 (fortunately the security guard found it)
15. First time attend SMU Workshop: 14-Aug-2008
16. First time eat dim sum in Yum Cha: 15-Aug-2008
17. First time watch Chinese Orchestra: 16-Aug-2008
18. First time went to Buddhist Fellowship: 17-Aug-2008
19. First time borrowing book from SMU library: 15-Aug-2008
20. First class: 19-Aug-2008
21. Etc ……………….

2008-08-20T22:54:00.000-07:00

My PhD Application Process

This is all started when my friend tell me that there is a vacant position in SMU (Singapore Management University) as a Research Assistant. And if I’m interested I could try to send my CV to his friend in SMU. I was interested with that vacancy and at 9 June 2008 I sent my CV to him. I also tell him that I’m interested to get a PhD.

At 12 June 2008 to be exact, my friend tell me that although the PhD in-take was already closed, the PhD Program Director willing to give me a chance to apply for the PhD Program. They ask me to fulfill the entire application requirement including two referees, personal statement and research statement and sent it to SMU before 20 June 2008.

I started to fulfill the application, ask for referees and writing my personal and research statement. My friend also helps me to refine my application form, personal and research statement. For the referees, I ask Mr. Sablin Yusuf (Dean of Computer Studies Faculty, Universitas Bina Nusantara, Jakarta Indonesia, www.binus.ac.id), Mr. Harjanto Prabowo (CIO of Bina Nusantara, Jakarta Indonesia, http://ict.binus.edu/) and Mr. Benny Ranti (Senior Lecturer and also my Supervisor in University of Indonesia, www.ui.edu).

After fulfill the entire documents, at 18 June 2008, I sent it to SMU by using DHL. I thought it will be able to reach SMU at 19 June 2008. But until 20 June 2008 3pm, the status is still On Delivery Courier. I start to panic, I start to call DHL officer and their tell me to call the Singapore DHL to ask it. I call the Singapore DHL to make sure that my application will be sent at 20 June 2008. I also call the SMU Assistant Manager to ask weather my application already there or not. And finally my application can successfully deliver to SMU.

At the same day, after read my application, the PhD Director (Prof. Pang) email me about my research area. He said that they don’t have any faculty that specialize in that area and he ask me weather I interested in other area which are data management, information security, or decision support systems. I reply the email and said that I’m interested in Data Management and Decision Support System. And he told me to check the SMU Professors web pages and let him know which professor’s research I’m interested in.

When reading the professor’s web pages, I’m become interested with Prof. Lau research in Decentralized Decision Making in Network Enterprise. And I email Mr. Pang about it. Not long after (24 or 25 June, I forgot the date), Mr. Lau call me and gave me a phone interview. He ask several questions about algorithm and artificial intelligent (which I almost forgot about) and he also ask about my motivation, commitment and willingness to study. At the end of the interview he said that they will give decision and inform me about my application as soon as possible. The phone interview lasted for about 45 minutes.

At 27 June 2008, finally they inform me that after a series of evaluation from our PhD review committee, I was offered admission into our PhD in Information Systems program with a full scholarship. I was exited about it. And finally what I have worked for a couple years to get a PhD scholarship payoff.

I’m also very grateful to all my friends that help me to get this scholarship. Because I know that they all gave a very good recommendation for me.

That’s how I got my PhD Scholarship and hopefully I could finished on time and with excellent result.

2008-08-14T04:41:00.000-07:00

Tarsius Spectrum

This is the story about little pretty animals (when I say little it’s seriously mean little) which can be found in North Sulawesi, Indonesia. I first met these little creatures in 18 May 2008 when I went to Bitung, North Sulawesi, Indonesia. Scientific name for these little animals is Tarsius Spectrum (from Tarsier Family), the smallest primate known.

Tarsius Spectrum Morphology

Known as the smallest primate known, Tarsius Spectrum only weight 125 gram (for male) and 110 gram (for female). They measures between 11 and 15cm in length. They can not move their eyes but can turn their head 180 degrees.

Life as a Tarsius Spectrum

They usually found in Indonesia, on the island of Sulawesi and the nearby islands of Sangihe, Peleng, and Salayer. This species lives in a variety of habitats, including primary and secondary forests, coastal forests, and mangrove forests. This species is found at altitudes from sea level to 4000 feet.

Tarsius Spectrum is a rear animal but still relatively abundant in protected areas in Sulawesi such as Tangkoko Dua Saudara Nature Reserve. However, Tarsius Spectrum has a limited geographic range, and little is known about their current distribution throughout Sulawesi. Habitat disturbance is occurring throughout much of their known range. And their reproduction is also very slow. Every year they are only 1 baby Tarsius Spectrum born.

But to see these little animals in actions is not easy. We have to wait until night to see Tarsius Spectrum. Tarsius Spectrum usually appears when it is dark to find foods that are usually small insects.

Tarsius Spectrum is mate for life. They are monogamist. If their spouse is dead, they will get sad and die not long after.
Reference:
- http://www.theprimata.com/tarsius_spectrum.html
- http://www.freewebs.com/wallacea/tarsiers.htm
- http://www.deplujunior.org/koran_berani.html?id=278

2008-08-13T01:18:00.000-07:00

Night at Sing ..

at 9 August 2008

Rita, Helda, Me and Lidya at esplanade

Me, Helda, Rita and Lydia at Clarke Quay (I think .....)

2008-08-13T01:03:00.001-07:00

When I went Rafting
A very nice experiences and this is a very long time ago ... on May 2004, almost 4 and half years ago ...

Before the Rafting

In my Boat (the boat only fit for 5 person + 1 instructor)

Eat some snacks on the boat

In the middle of the Journey, take a rest and eat "Kelapa Muda" (young coconut??)

After eating Coconut, get ready for the rest of the journey

Swimming after Rafting ?? hm...

Eat ........... After Rafting ..... Need a lot of food to gain strenght again

See how hungry we are... :p

2008-08-05T20:18:00.000-07:00

Menado Trip

Last May I join Sahabat Museum to go to Menado-Tomohok-Tondano.

Its quite intresting trips with people that I never know before.

Here is several pictures from that journey

Bunaken

Under The Sea - Taken by One of Tour Participant

"Dasar laut"

Bunaken - on Bridge to Santika Hotel

Cute Little animal - Tarsius something

Teluk Lambe -- If I'm not mistaken

Tuo Mao Mao Restaurant

Bukit Kasih

Bukit Kasih - Huge Cross

Morning Glory

2008-06-10T07:02:00.000-07:00

Trip to Beijing and Shanghai

Last April, Me, My Mom, My Sis, and My Sis Sister in Law went to Beijing and Shanghai. Here are several pictures of us there....

Big Statue

Yellow River

Heavenly Temple

Sholin Kung Fu Show

Great Wall of China

Great Wall of China 2

Olympic Count Down

2008-06-07T07:25:00.000-07:00

...Trip to Medan....

Last Dec .... me, my sis, my mom and my sis mother in law, went to Medan for 4 days 3 night. These are several pictures in there ....

Me and Becak

Drink Coffee and Tea in the "Puncak Brastagi"

Sipiso-piso waterfall

Lake Toba

2008-03-25T05:11:00.000-07:00

DHL Mengecewakan

Ceritanya begini, jam 10 pagi tadi, saya menelpon DHL untuk pengiriman paket. Saya sudah pesan sama customer service DHLnya saya mau di ambil kalau bisa siang atau sebelum jam 5. Oleh petugas customer servicenya di iyah kan dan diberikanlah saya sebuah nomor booking 37500. Dia berpesan apabila jam 4 belum datang juga silahkan menghubungi DHL kembali dan memberitahukan nomor booking tersebut.

Jam 4 lewat 20, kurirnya belum datang juga, akhirnya saya telp DHL kembali. di terima oleh seorang petugas Customer Service yang bilang akan menghubungi kurirnya dan meminta dia segera datang sebelum jam 5.

Tapi ternyata sampai jam sekarang (jam 7 15 menit) belum datang-datang juga orangnya. Jam setengah 7 tadi saya sudah berusaha menghubungi customer service DHLnya. saya bertanya, dengan masih baik-baik, kapan kurirnya akan datang mengambil paket saya .. dia suruh saya menunggu .. entah apa yang di lakukannya .. ditunggu ditunggu gak kerasa sampai 7 menit ... .... kemudian tlp nya putus pula. jadi saya menunggu 7 menit dan tidak mendapatkan jawaban apapun. kemudian saya telp lagi, kali ini pun saya di suruh menungguu... selama lebih dari 5 menit dan setelah itu putus lagi .. parah banget kan ... pelayanan macam apa seperti itu.. akhirnya saya sengaja tunggu sekitar 20 menitan baru tlp lagi .. dengan harapan dari pihak DHL nya sendiri yang menelpon saya mengabari jam berapa paketnya akan diambil... tapi ternyata tidak ada tlp apapun....

Akhirnya jam 7.10 tadi saya tlp lagi. petugasnya kali ini mengatakan maaf kurir kami mengalami keterlambatan, akan datang sebelum jam 8 "biasanya". ada kata biasanya... jadi bisa aja kurirnya datang jam 9 atau 10 atau mungkin lebih malam lagi .... memang seperti itu yah pelayanan jasa pengiriman international ?? tidak menghargai waktu.... bayangkan saya sudah menunggu dari jam 5 sampai saat ini. sudah 2 jam lebih. akan lebih menyenangkan kalau bisa tau kapan kurirnya datang untuk mengambil paket saya. sedangkan ini .. tidak diberikan waktu yang jelas... Saya juga kan punya kesibukan lagi selain menuggu kurir untuk mengambil paket.
Benar-benar service yang mengecewakan ... kalau memang tidak bisa mengambil paketnya, kenapa tidak bilang dari tadi sewaktu saya tlp pertama kali jam 10.. dengan begitukan saya bisa memikirkan alternatif yang lainnya.
Jam 8.30 belum datang juga kurirnya.. gila banget kan.. parah. udah tlp lagi ke customer servicenya cuman di kasih tau bahwa sedang dalam perjalanan. perjalanan ke mana?? gak mikir yah DHL nya. kalau cuman telat 1 jam an masih gpp,... ini udah lebih dari 3 jam. emang seperti itu yah layanan ekspedisi international ??

2008-01-25T04:08:00.002-08:00

Fuih .. lelah nya. Abis yoga ..
udah lama gak yoga/senam lagi. karena lagi males hehhehe

setelah di pikir-pikir, yoga tuh bagus bagi kesehatan. agar ga insomia lagi .. menderita dech insomia :(
jam 5 pagi bisa masih bangun :((
sedihnya..................

2008-01-19T22:46:00.000-08:00

Tgl=20 Jan 2008
Jam=13:47
Tempat=My desk - My office

Ngantuk banget .. hari minggu harus datang untuk stand by karena ada USM Online. Sebenernya males banget sih ... cuman karena kewajiban jadi terpaksa dech.
USM nya dibagi menjadi 2 shift, ada yang jam 09:00 dan ada yang 14:00. Berhubung yang Online ada di kedua shift itu, jadilah akhirnya aku terdampar di kantor sampai jam 16:00 untuk stand by.

Sebenernya kenapa perlu stand by? Mungkin karena USM Online ini masih baru. sehingga perlu penanganan ekstra. So far.. udah di pakai 3x termasuk ini. waktu pakai pertama kali, ada sedikit masalah karena menggunakan browser Safari. tapi udah di perbaiki sih. sehingga ketika di pakai kedua kali berjalan mulus. Nah .. yang ketiga ini, kebetulan orang-orang yang menggunakannya (staf/penjaganya) berbeda. yang pertama dan kedua untuk program International Class sedangkan yang ketiga ini untuk Reguler.

Jadi yang ketiga ini ada beberapa yang patut di perhatikan sih. terutama dari familiarity staf/penjaganya dengan USM Online itu sendiri...

Karena hal-hal di ataslah .. makanya ... udah jam segini masih terdampar di Kantor.. ngantuk :(
terpaksa menunggu :((

2008-01-11T19:35:00.000-08:00

Waktu: 1038
Tgl: 12-Jan-2008
Tempat: my desk in my office

Baru jam setengah 11. sedang menunggu jam pulang. Masuk jam 9 pulang jam 12... males kerja yah. Jadi menunggu jam pulang aja. soalnya 3 jam itu nanggung sekali untuk kerja... bikin tidak mood.

Pulang hari ini aku akan menempuh jalur yang berbeda. Mau naik bis. udah lama gak naik bis. sebenernya naik bis karena mau ke Hypermart serpong. Mo komplain. Masa beli lampu enerziger yang harusnya dapet kartu garansi ini gak dapet. Beli nya sih tanggal 30-des-2007. waktu beli, petugasnya bilang petugas yang bawa kartu garansi nya sudah pulang dan kuncinya di bawa. jadi kartu garansinya gak ada. Dalam hatiku, gak peduli petugasnya udah pulang atau belum, yang jelas aku beli dan hak ku untuk dapat kartu garansi. Akhirnya si petugas mencatat namaku dan dia berjanji besok dari pihat hypermart akan telpon untuk mencatat data-dataku dan memberikan kartu garansi. Tapi udah di tunggu sampai 2 minggu ini, gak ada yang menghubungi. Niat gak sih itu hypermart?? parah banget. untuk mendapatkan kartu garansi resmi merupakan hak dari setiap konsumen .. iyah gak?? makanya mau ngomel-ngomel nih ke hypermart. mo menuntut hak akan kartu garansi. oo iyah sama sekalian mo ambil pisau.. kan di hypermart ada promosi, mengumpulkan berapa stamp dapet pisau. dua minggu yang lalu udah mau tuker juga. tapi pisaunya gak ada.. jadi hari ini mo menyelesaikan banyak urusan di hypermart. ..................................

2008-01-06T17:56:00.000-08:00

Waktu: 0857
Tanggal: 07-Jan-2008
Place: My small desk in my office

Sedikit cerita dari pernikahan adik sepupuku kemarin. Rame .. banyak saudara yang hadir.. hampir semua keluarga besar dari pihak mama hadir .. di kenalin ke beberapa saudara. Hal biasa lah yang dilakukan di hampir setiap pernikahan.

Tapi seperti biasa yang paling mengesalkan adalah di tanya Kapan Menyusul .... classic question yang ternyata masih sering di tanyakan juga. Mengikuti iklan di TV kalau di tanya seperti itu, di jawab dengan senyum dan Kapan-kapan ..... :P.

Mungkin bila di lihat dari pesta itu, aku merupakan gambaran wanita karir yang kerja di kota besar dan mandiri serta enjoy sama dirinya sendiri. Pergi ke pesta perkawinan tanpa pasangan pun masih enjoy aja ... walaupun banyak teman-teman/saudara-saudara yang membawa pasangan masing-masing. Kan emang kenyataannya belum punya pasangan, masa sih di paksain cari "Plus One" hanya karena gak mau ke mana-mana sendirian? kalau "plus one" nya sesuai dan cocok sih gak masalah, tapi kalau tidak cocok dan di paksa in cocok wah bisa berabe.. iya ga ?? so, pesanku kepada semua single di dunia, dont be affraid of walking or going to party alone, just feel enjoy with your self. dont commited your self in relationships just because your affraid of being alone..... I, my self, always try to be happy with my self ....

2008-01-02T19:29:00.001-08:00

Waktu: 2035
Tanggal: 2 Januari 2008
Tempat: Kamarku

I’m staring my face in the mirror. Ada jerawat besar dech. Diameternya hampir 8 centimeter. Setelah beberapa hari menggunakan perawatan dari dokter, kok semakin banyak jerawat yang muncul yah, termasuk jerawat segede ini. Bikin serem. Semoga aja ini memang salah satu tahap penyembuhan. Jadi semuanya di keluarkan dulu baru akhirnya muka berangsung-angsung akan sembuh.....

Semoga ... semoga .... semoga ...

2008-01-02T18:44:00.000-08:00

Waktu: 2050
Tanggal: 31 December 2007
Tempat: Kamarku

Hari ini merupakan hari yang baik, sangat baik. Aku telah mengetahui sebuah rahasia, ”big secret” yang diketahui oleh semua orang-orang hebat di dunia ini. Ya, hari ini akhirnya aku menonton ”The Secret”. Sebuah buku yang sudah aku ketahui beberapa lama tapi belum sempat untuk membacanya (belum sempat atau memang belum tertarik). Aku juga sudah membeli dvd ”The Secret” ini bulan yang lalu dan baru hari ini tertarik untuk menontonnya. Dan aku sangat mensyukuri keputusan aku hari ini. Menonton ”The Secret” memberi sebuah ”insight” baru bagiku. Membuka pengetahuan akan hal-hal yang harusnya sudah kulakukan dari dulu. Tapi tidak ada kata terlambat. Aku akan memulainya sekarang. Hari ini juga. Detik ini juga. Anggaplah ini sebagai resolusi tahun baru. Hari yang tepatkan untuk memulai sesuatu yang baru. Tepat pada malam pergantian tahun.

The biggest thing that hit me from The Secret is we are what we think about. If we think we can do things and have things, I’m sure we can indeed do those things and have those things. Karena di dunia ini, semua tarik menarik. Bila kita percaya kita akan mencapai hal-hal yang yang kita inginkan, pasti kita bisa mencapainya, walaupun mungkin saat ini kita belum tahu bagaimana mencapainya. We created our own universe. Our universe will be created as we wish for. Your wishes are my command. And if we want something so bad and we belief we can achieve it, it will come true. Kita akan menjadi seperti apa yang kita pikirkan. We are what we think we are, said The Buddha.

There are a lot of things that I want. A lot of things that I belief I can have. A lot of things that I’m sure I will have. In order to achieve that, rule number 1, I should list it. So, this is my list of wish, that I belief and I will try so hard to get:

1. Finding my True Love. I want to find my true love, I want to journey a true love.

2. Write an outstanding paper and dissertation. I will do it. For starter, I will write my paper, based on my thesis that I have postponed it for long time. And I will start to email professors to find scholarship for my PhD and finished my dissertation.

3. Travel around the world. I want to go to Venice “my dream place”, Rome, French, Thailand, Nepal, Tibet, Japan, and other countries in the world. I want to skiing, bungee jumping, jet skiing, and others I want to do it all.

4. I want to have sport mobile. A red convertible sport car. I’m sure will look great in that car.

5. I want to do social works. I still don’t know what I will do, but I will do it. I will do social works to bring happiness in my self and in others.

I think that all my major wish for now on. I still have lots of wishes, but those 5 things that I want the most. I will repeat those wishes everyday and I will visualize that wishes come true.

And those wishes will sure come true.

2007-12-28T17:48:00.001-08:00

Pengalaman ke dokter kulit ...

Kemarin aku ke Dokter Spesialis Kulit dan Kelamin .. tapi bukan untuk pemeriksaan penyakit kelamin yah, tapi untuk memeriksa kulit muka. Muka ku itu berminyak sekali dan jerawat di mana-mana :( walaupun sekarang jerawat sudah mulai sedikit, tapi tetap saja muka berminyak dan jerawat-jerawat kecil membuat muka menjadi lebih kusam.

Sebelumnya aku sudah sering ke klinik kecantikan, dari yang mahal sampai yang murah (mulai dari beberapa puluh ribu sampai lebih dari 1 jt). dari yang memberikan foundation tebeellllll banget sampai yang tidak memperbolehkan memakai foundation. tetapi konsepnya klinik-klinik kecantikan yang sudah aku datangi konsepnya semua sama mesti facial. padahal facial itu menyakitkan. Kalau sudah saatnya facial, aku menganggap itu merupakan 2 jam penyiksaan.

Nah dokter spesialis kulit yang satu ini, katanya bagus (info dari temannya cici) dan tidak perlu pakai facial-facialan. Jadi kemarin setelah pulang kerja (tenggo nih) cepat-cepat lah aku ke sana. Kebetulan dia berpraktek di Apotik Benteng (di Tangerang di Pasar Lama Tangerang). Nama dokternya Dr. Sutardi (semoga bener ejaannya). Kesan pertama ke sana .. (karena sudah lama gak ke Apotik Benteng), kok tempat ini semakin tidak terawat dan obat-obatan di apotik benteng semakin sedikit.

Kemudian aku berjalan ke pojok dan menemukan meja pendaftaran Dr. Sutardi. Asistennya mulai mencatat namaku di list pengunjung dan menanyakan sudah pernah datang atau belum dan karena aku belum pernah datang, dia memberikan kartu pasien yang harus selalu di bawa setiap kali menemui Dokter. Kalau tidak salah, di list pengunjung tersebut aku urutan ke 11 atau 12. Wah aku udah mulai berpikir, lama nih nunggu nya. ...

Tapi ternyata tidak, hanya tinggal 1 orang lagi yang di kamar periksa.. Aku mulai berpikir .. cepet juga nih dokter.. Saat itu masih jam 18.30-an dan Dokter datang jam 17.30-an. Jadi selama 1jam-an dokter itu sudah melayani 10-an pasien. Karena kebelet pipis, jadinya aku ke toilet dulu .. pada saat di toilet ternyata namaku di panggil, tapi karena aku gak ada, jadinya orang yang belakangan dech di suruh masuk ke ruang periksa terlebih dahulu. yah gpp dech. daripada kebelet pipis. So, aku keluarkan koran dan mulai menunggu. Sekitar 10 menit kemudian, pasien tersebut keluar dan aku di persilahkan masuk menemui dokternya.

Dokter itu sudah setengah tua, mungkin sekitar 40an, keturunan china, putih dan sepertinya sudah berpengalaman dengan masalah jerawat. Dokter menanyakan masalah aku apa, walaupun kayaknya dia udah tau dech, kalau masalah ku tuh tentang kulit wajah yang berjerawat. dan dia mulai memberitahu bahwa yang akan dia coba lakukan adalah mencoba mengembalikan wajah ku seperti ketika 10 tahunan, yang secara otomatis free-dari jerawat. Tetapi untuk mengembalikan wajah seperti itu, perlu waktu 5 bulan dan perlu kerjasama yang baik dari aku dengan mematuhi dan mengikuti petunjuk-petunjuk yang di berikan.

Dokter-nya tampak baik dan berpengalaman. dan intinya sih dia memberitahukan bahwa mengobati kulit muka tidak bisa instan. mesti ada proses, sama seperti proses mengandung anak. bila proses mengandung anak 9 bulan, maka proses untuk penyembuhan kulit muka memerlukan waktu 5 bulan. dan jangan hanya 1 bulan sudah agak baikan, kemudian berhenti dan kemudian mengalami masalah yang sama kemudian ke dokter lagi .... Karena dia bilang, dia berusahan untuk mengatasi akar masalah, bukan hanya masalah yang tampak dari luar saja.

Konsultasi dengan dokter berjalan sekitar 10-15 menit dengan biaya konsultasi Rp 90.000, 00. Dokter itu juga memberitahu bahwa selain praktek di Apotik Benteng, dia juga praktek di Rumah Dakit Omni di Alam Sutra setiap hari selasa dan kamis. I still wonder, .. di Rumah Sakit Omni biaya konsultasinya lebih mahal gak yah? karena kan rumah sakit Omni tempatnya lebih bagus dari Apotek Benteng. :-> ... kapan-kapan mo tanya sama Dokternya dech.

Setelah itu aku di beri resep yang harus di tebus di apotik benteng. Obatnya berupa 1 botol facial soap, 1 botol facial toner, 1 krim pagi, 1 krim malam dan 30 butir pil vitamin yang katanya akan mengeringkan kulit sehingga tidak terlalu berminyak. Ternyata resep itu lebih mahal 5x lipat dari biaya konsultasi dokter. Biayanya Rp 495.000,00. yang paling mahal sih pil vitamin itu. 250rb lebih dech kayaknya. mungkin juga karena itu 30 butir. jadi mahal dech. Jadi total ke dokter hari itu menghabiskan Rp 585.000, 00 untuk pengobatan selama kurang lebih 1 bulan. Jadi setelah habis ke dokter lagi ... Setelah di pikir-pikir, kalau memang bisa mengembalikan kulit wajah seperti umur 10 thn lagi .. kayaknya harga segitu masih worth it lah .. jadi aku berpendapat mari di coba dalam 1 bulan ini. Bila ada perubahan yang berarti .. maka bulan depan/bila sudah habis, baru aku ke sana lagi.

Setelah selesai urusan di dokter dan apotik, waktu sudah menunjukan jam 8 kurang 15. Pulang lah aku. Perjalanan dari Tangerang - Serpong, yang harusnya bisa naik angkot 1 kali menjadi naik angkot 4x. Kenapa begitu?? hal ini karena aku 4x di oper oleh angkot-angkot tersebut...
:(( nasib banget .... tapi .. toh akhirnya sampai rumah dengan selamat .. dan itu sesuatu yang patut di syukuri.

Pas turun di gang depan rumah (yang masih sekitar bbrp meter lagi dari rumah), hujan mulai turun. Hujannya sih biasa-biasa saja .. tapi anginnya parah sekali. 1 dahan pohon besar sampai jatuh dan menghalangi jalan. Terus penderitaan bertambah dengan mati lampu. Jadi aku mesti menerobos kegelapan di tengah hujan dan anggin yang kencang .... ckckck .... benar-benar cuaca yang menakutkan. And again .. akhirnya sampai juga ke rumah dengan selamat ......... bisa mandi dengan tenang. minum obat dokter dan mencoba sabun, toner serta krimnya. :D.. tunggu postingan selanjutnya untuk mengabarkan perkembangan kulit wajah ku :P

2007-12-28T17:38:00.000-08:00

Pagi Hari Tgl 29 Des 2007.

Mendekati penghujung tahun 2007. Masih tetep masuk kerja .. walau di kantor dan di jalan-jalan sepi sekali.

Semakin mendekati akhir tahun membuat ku flash back lagi. apa yah yang sudah berhasil di kerjakan di tahun 2007, apakah tahun 2007 ini membawa arti yang penting bagi ku, apakah di 2007 aku sudah berhasil dengan baik.

hal-hal ini masih banyak bergelayut di pikiran. Blom menemukan jawaban sih. Mungkin mesti menyepi dulu di akhir tahun untuk bisa tau jawaban-jawabannya.

Pagi-pagi, sepi, mendengarkan musik berdayu-dayu, jadi gak niat ngantor. Pengennya kembali aja lagi tidur. Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz ..................

2007-09-12T01:57:00.000-07:00

Ngantuk ...

udah jam 4 lewat mendekati waktu pulang. tapi nguantuk banget ... :( masih dua jam lagi pulang. kok masih lama yah ...

hari ini mo main dulu ah... pengen ke wtc untuk cuci mata bentar .. udah lama gak ke gramedia, jadi mo ke wtc sambil lihat-lihat ada buku apaan aja. Tadi setelah presentasi yang sisfo marketing, di bilang informasi yang di tampilkan masih berupa data mentah yang gak bisa memberikan informasi apa2 ..

hmm... mungkin emang bener kali yah.. karena selama ini sih sisfo marketingnya hanya mengikuti keinginan user .. user mau begini di buat begini .. jadi tergantung user nya .. harus lebih banyak membaca-baca buku marketing nih. biar lebih ngerti. tapi mana sempet yah?? mana banyak banget yang mo di lakukan lagi.. so little time so much to do .. tapi kok masih sempet-sempetnya merencanakan pergi ke mall ... hahah .. parah nih linda ....

2007-07-31T23:10:00.001-07:00

Jalan-jalan .. mari jalan-jalan....

KL -- Me and My Sis

Butterfly World

Penang

Buddhist Temple in Genting

Buddhist Temple in Genting

Genting

Sentosa Island

Chinese Garden

Singapore Zoo (Me and My Sis)

2007-07-26T22:07:00.000-07:00

Udah akhir bulan juli lagi ... :(
sudah setengah tahun 2007 berlalu .. sedih juga ..

target-target, baik pekerjaan, pribadi dll, banyak banget yang terbengkalai yang belum selesai.
Sedihnya. Kayaknya bener-bener mesti membenahi target-target dan jadwal-jadwal kerja dech... baik itu untuk kerjaan kantor, maupun di waktu-waktu pribadi.

Tapi biasanya, setelah bercape-cape di kantor, sampe rumah tuh udah malesssssss ngapa2in lagi. dan ini membuat banyak banget kerjaan (diluar kerjaan kantor) yang terbengkalai. Buat Artikel dari hasil Tesis belum, Memikirkan topik untuk buat proposal disertasi belum :((, les Mandari udah berhenti, mo Les Perancis gak jadi karena belum ada waktu, mo Les Nyetir Mobil juga belum karena blm ada waktu juga :(( ... jadinya sebel d .. bingung .. so little time so much to do..

Biasanya, aku pulang dari kantor dan sampe rumah sekitar jam setengah 8 sampe jam 8 (naik kereta jam 18.42 .. kalau gak telat keretanya). Nah kalau udah jam segitu di rumah paling istirahat bentar, mandi, nonton ... males deh ngapa-ngapain lagi.

Mesti cari cara nih untuk bisa buat hidup lebih bermanfaat ....

2007-06-29T03:19:00.000-07:00

Busy Month

Akhirnya.. bisa posting lagi di blog. udah sekitar 2 bulan ini gak posting di blog. gak posting di blog bukan karena gak mau .. tapi gak bisa.
habis 2 bulan ini di dera rentetan pekerjaan yang gak ada habisnya.
Mulai dari deadline hris yang mesti selesai secepatnya.
trus lagi sibuk-sibuknya kerja, harddisk crash .. parah kan??
padahal gak ada data yang di backup .. mati d ....
mesti ngulang lagi pekerjaan dari awal..
harddisk 80 gb .. semua isinya hilang begitu saja.
mulai dari file-file untuk kerjaan .. :((
konsep-konsep, rancangan program .. hilang dech semua ..
mesti bikin ulang

file-file pembuatan cd/dvd wisuda juga hilang
padahal wisuda tinggal 1 minggu lagi .. tapi blm buat apa2 nih :(
parah banget ..
mana programnya untuk create mahasiswanya hilang ...
hiks :(( mesti buat lagi ...semoga bisa cepet buatnya ...

knp yah ?? rentetan ini terjadi :(
pusing d ...

sekarang sih lagi berusaha bikin ulang semua kerjaan :( deadlinenya udah mesti di penuhi nih ...

pusing dech pusing dech :((

2007-05-04T20:36:00.000-07:00

Foto-foto dari Outing Mini ...
Anyer (03-04 Maret 2007)

Peserta yang ikut

Welcome to Anyer

Di satu tempat peristirahatan berteduh di Karang Bolong

Di Pohon .. Karang Bolong Juga

Another Place in Karang Bolong

Ci Luk Ba

Makan malam ...

Mercu Suar

Di dalam Mercu Suar

View From The Top

2007-05-04T02:24:00.000-07:00

Setelah beberapa hari mengeluh dan memprotes tentang keadaan tempat kerja yang silau... akhirnya hari in mulai bisa merasakan kenyamanan.
Hari ini monitornya sudah diganti jadi LCD. untung dech. bisa melihat dengan baik dan benar dan gak silau lagi.
Ternyata protes demi protes didengar juga. walaupun agak lama sih. tapi setidaknya di dengar juga sih. mungkin udah bt karena tiap hari di protes dan dikejar-kejar mulu =))...

tapi jadi seneng ding sekarang .. dpt monitor lcd .. penglihatan jd lebih baik ...

2007-05-01T19:11:00.000-07:00

Apa yang harus dilakukan bila suasana dan tempat kerja sudah tidak lagi nyaman? Apa harus terima saja atau melakukan sesuatu?

Di tempat kerja ku sekarang, suasana tidak lagi senyaman dahulu. Setiap pagi, siang, sore mata sudah pasti sakit karena silau. Silau dari dua jenis sinar, dari sinar matahari dan sinar lampu.
Sudah berkali-kali protes tapi selalu membuah kan hasil... apa yang harus dilakukan kalau seperti itu?

Untuk cahaya sinar matahari, sudah sedikit teratasi dengan memasang spanduk bekas (maklum anggaran untuk beli vertical blind belum ada .. ), tapi cahaya dari lampu di belakang belum. Setiap hari pasti silau dan menyakiti mata. Sekarang mata selalu tampak lelah dan tidak kuat untuk berlama-lama di depan komputer. Padahal bos meminta pekerjaan selesai secepatnya. Bagaimana pekerjaan bisa selesai dengan cepat bila kenyamanan di tempat kerja saja tidak ada ?? Mataku sudah tidak bisa lagi setiap saat melihat komputer karena sudah sakit :(

Berbagai usaha untuk menggumamkan protes sudah dilakukan. Mulai dari cara halus meminta pindah tempat duduk sampai memasang poster sendiri (walaupun sekarang sudah dicabut krn diganti dengan spanduk). Kalau sudah begini bagaimana ?? Bila suara-suara protes belum juga membuahkan hasil, apa harus memikirkan alternatif lain ?? Bertahan dengan sakit mata yang terus menerus sambil terus menyuarakan protes (siapa tau suatu saat nanti akan didengar) tapi sampai kapan??

2007-04-06T17:50:00.000-07:00

Dua hari yang lalu, seorang teman bertanya, apa istimewanya UI dibandingkan dengan Binus sehingga aku memilih s2 di UI instead of Binus? Melalu perenungan yang dalam, akhirnya dapat juga alasan-alasan kenapa aku memilih s2 di UI. Kebanyakan dari alasan-alasan tersebut bersifat pribadi, artinya tidak melulu karena kelebihan-kelebihan UI versus Binus. Well, beberapa alasan itu adalah:

1. Keinginan untuk membuktikan diri dan membuka wawasan lebih luas lagi serta mencari tantangan baru
Aku s1 di binus, kerja di binus, bila s2 di binus lagi, aku berpikir wawasanku akan lebih banyak di binus aja. hanya seputar-seputar binus. perlu juga untuk melihat-lihat dunia luar, jangan cuman "jago kandang". Ini juga perlu untuk pembuktian diri, bila aku kuliah di binus juga dan mendapat nilai bagus, orang bisa saja bilang bahwa aku kan emang kerja di binus jadi wajar dapat nilai bagus. Nah karena itu, perlu membuktikan diri di tempat lain agar pandangan seperti itu hilang. dan nyatanya, di UI juga aku bisa lulus dengan cum laude .. suatu predikat yang tidak mudah untuk didapat.
Selain pembuktian diri, memang banyak sekali wawasan yang aku peroleh di UI. mulai dari sistem kuliah yang berbeda dengan di binus, teman-teman yang backgroundnya berbeda (banyak yang dari instansi pemerintahan, jd lebih bisa memahami kerjaan pemerintah spt apa), sampai ke belajar naik bis dari kemanggisan ke salemba. Benar-benar pengalaman dan tantangan yang menyenangkan....
Ada beberapa hal yang didapatkan dari UI yang berbeda dengan yang ada di binus dan bisa dijadikan benchmark agar binus juga bisa lebih berkembang lagi.

2. Program studi,
Di binus, hanya ada MM. mendengar kata MM, yang terbayang dibenak ku itu langsung management dan hal-hal yang berbau ekonomi lainnya, termasuk akuntansi. Dari kata-kata MM saja sudah kehilangan minat masuk ke Binus (walaupun akhinya aku tau juga bahwa program MM binus ada peminatan ke information technology nya juga). But, aku sudah memutuskan untuk gak ambil MM, jadi aku memilih MTI. nah MTI terdekat dan well-known yang di UI. jarak dari UI ke kemanggisan (tempat binus berada) juga tidak terlalu jauh dan masih bisa ditempuh dengan bis (maklum belum punya kendaraan pribadi :P). pergi ke UI salemba hanya sekitar 45 menit bila tidak macet, plus 30 menit bila macet.
Selain jarak terjangkau, MTI UI juga mempunyai reputasi yang baik. dari Universitasnya saja, UI sudah memberikan reputasi yang baik. Siapa juga yang tidak kenal UI (university of Indonesia), UI tuh sudah seperti universitas nasionalnya Indonesia. jadi sebagian besar orang mengetahui UI. Khusus untuk MTI-nya sendiri, mendengar dari teman-teman yang sudah di MTI dan browsing-broswing brosurnya di internet, MTI memberikan program pendidikan yang menarik dan pratikal yang bisa diterapkan langsung di dunia kerja dengan dosen-dosen yang berpengalaman di bidangnya (tidak hanya teori tapi juga prakteknya) . MTI lebih banyak mengajarkan softskill dibandingkan dengan hardskill. Jadi di MTI sudah tidak lagi mengajarkan aku membuat program yang baik dan benar, tapi lebih ke bagaimana kita membuat strategi IT, menjalankannya, mengontrol dan mengevaluasinya.. baik dalam hal jaringan, software, infrastruktur, database dll.

3. Biaya
yah, faktor biaya juga salah satu dari pertimbangan. Biaya di MTI UI relatif murah, 10 juta per semester, dan usahakan mengambil 3 semester saja, sehingga uang kuliah yang dikeluarkan hanya 30 juta + uang lain-lain yang bahkan aku sudah lupa untuk apa, jadi total pengeluaran nya 35 juta-an (more or less).

4. dosen-dosennya
di MTI UI, menurut cerita-cerita orang yang sudah terlebih dahulu kuliah di MTI UI, mempunyai dosen-dosen yang bagus dan berkwalitas. dan memang setelah dibuktikan sendiri, dosen-dosen di MTI UI bagus dan berkwalitas tinggi. walaupun tidak semuanya. ada 1 atau 2 orang dosen yang mengajarku, yang menurut aku sendiri tidak mengajar dengan baik. Tapi untungnya sekarang dosen itu sudah tidak mengajar di MTI UI lagi (kabar yang aku dengar seperti itu).

well.. itu alasan-alasan kenapa aku secara pribadi memilih MTI UI. aku gak bilang bahwa di MM Binus tidak bagus, hanya saja kalau aku secara pribadi tidak ingin memperdalam ilmu di MM. Setelah kuliah di UI, ada beberapa keunggulan dan kelemahan MTI UI yang bisa dijadikan pertimbangan-pertimbangan bagi siapa pun yang ingin melanjutkan kuliah ke MTI UI.

Keunggulan2 yang aku rasakan:
1. Mutu Dosen yang bagus
lagi-lagi, kalau kita kuliah pasti kita akan melihat pada dosennya. apakah dosen-dosen yang mengajar di tempat tersebut baik atau tidak. dan di MTI UI, dosen-dosen yang kebetulan mengajar aku, sebagian besar bagus dan mampu memotivasi aku untuk belajar dan menggali lebih dalam wawasan yang ada di sana (sampai-sampai baca buku2 yang di sarankan sampai habis :P padahal jarang loh aku seperti itu). Mulai dari jaringan, database, strategi is it, manajemen korporat, system requirement, investasi, manajemen proyek dll .. yang jelas itu semua berguna dan bsia diimplementasikan di dunia kerja
(NB: system requirement sekarang aku gunakan untuk mencari kebutuhan-kebutuhan user, dengan RUP lebih mudah jadinya, mungkin karena sudah ada template-template nya. Terima kasih pak dosen (Mr Eko Budianto dan Mr Arisapta), yang sudah membuka mata tentang RUP :D. Selain system requirement, yang lain-lain, selain jaringan dan infrastruktur, juga digunakan untuk membantu pekerjaan ku. Jaringan dan infrastruktur belum membantu pekerjaan ku karena kebetulan kerjaan ku belum berhubungan dengan itu, tapi selalu menyenangkan untuk mempunyai pengetahuan umum tentang hal-hal itu)

2. matakuliah-matakuliah yang ditawarkan
matakuliah-matakuliah yang ditawarkan konsisten dan saling mendukung. mulai dari sem 1 - 2, paket matakuliahnya merangkum pengetahuan tentang IT yang berguna di lapangan kerja. sedangkan di sem 3, kita bisa menyalurkan minat kita ke salah satu matakuliah tertentu. kebetulan di sem 3, aku belajar tentang investasi TI dan manajemen proyek (btw, katanya sekarang manajemen proyek sudah termasuk matakuliah wajib untuk sem 2, bagus banget tuh. manajemen proyek memang sangat diperlukan untuk praktisi IT). Dari investasi dan manajemen proyek ini, aku mendapat pengetahuan yang kalau kita mau melakukan melakukan investasi IT, perlu didasarkan pada banyak hal, terutama cost dan benefit, jadwal, dan kwalitas yang dihasilkan.

3. Rekaman kuliah
setiap kuliah, direkam ke dalam format file mp3 yang bisa di download secara bebas oleh mahasiswa MTI. hal ini sangat menguntungkan terutama bagi mahasiswa yang kebetulan terpaksa bolos. jadinya kejadian atau diskusi-diskusi di kelas tidak akan tertinggal.

4. staf-staf yang ramah dan selalu siap membantu
mulai dari wakil dekan, ketua jurusan, staf pengajar, staf perpustakaan dan staf admin, selalu sangat membantu. bahkan ketika aku sibuk2 cari topik tesis, selalu ada orang yang bisa diajak diskusi.

5. Jaringan internet (baik dari hotspot ataupun kabel)
jaringan internet di ui, mempunyai bandwith yang tinggi (terutama bila malam hari), sehingga memungkinkan untuk mendownload ebook-ebook dengan cepat. dan jaringan internet tersebut free. hanya perlu daftarkan wifi saja bila kita pakai hotspot.

6. sistem pendataan kehadiran dengan finger print
belum banyak univ yang pakai sistem pendataan kehadiran dengan finger print. di mti ui sudah menerapkan sistem ini. asal jangan lupa datakan kehadiran pas masuk dan keluar saja.

Kelemahan-kelemahan di MTI UI:
1. informasi yang ditampilkan di web belum terintegrasi dengan baik
informasi-informasi kecil seperti jadwal kuliah, nilai, keuangan dll belum bisa dilihat di internet(walau pun bisa informasinya sangat-sangat lama baru keluar di internet). bagi aku yang kalau di binus, melihat jadwal atau nilai atau info keuangan hanya cukup dengan login ke www.binus.ac.id, hal ini menyulitkan dan membuat tidak terbiasa dan juga merepotkan. setiap informasi harus ditanyakan lewat telpon atau datang langsung ke salemba UI. dan ini bukan pekerjaan yang menyenangkan bila hanya untuk nilai, pada saat libur kita mesti ke UI.

2. perpustakaan
perpustakaan di mti ui tidak begitu lengkap koleksi buku-bukunya, untuk buku-buku yang tidak digunakan dosen sebagai referensi kuliah, sangat suli tuntuk didapatkan. sehingga kalau mau buat tesis, susah mencari buku referensinya. tapi dengan adanya jurnal-jurnal online, jadi sedikit terbantu. selain koleksi, di perpus MTI UI, hanya buka sampai jam 7 malam, padahal aku kuliah sampai jam 9. dan kadang aku atau teman-teman datang terlambat dan tidak sempat lagi untuk ke perpus karena perpusnya sudah tutup. hari sabtu juga waktu buka perpus sangat singkat. akan lebih baik lagi bila waktunya di perpanjang. dan data peminjaman perpustakaan tidak terintegrasi ke dalam sebuah sistem informasi perpustakaan terpusat. bayangkan aja, masa untuk mengurus surat bebas pinjaman perpus (yang harus ada u mengambil ijazah), harus mengurusnya langsung ke perpustakaan pusat di depok... padahal letak perpustakaannya saja tidak tau, gimana pernah pinjem buku coba.

Mungkin ini keungulan dan kelemahan MTI UI selama aku menjadi mahasiswa s2 di sana. Tidak bermaksud untuk menjelek-jelekan tapi semoga dari pendapat ini, baik MTI UI maupun Binus bisa berkembang menjadi lebih baik lagi .....

2007-03-25T17:46:00.000-07:00

Mogok Beramai-ramai Angkutan Umum?

Di serpong - tangerang, saat ini kendaraan umum (angkutan umum) sedang melakukan demo. saya sendiri tidak jelas demonya tentang apa. yang pasti mereka semua kompak tidak beroperasi hari ini. Tidak tau jelas hanya di daerah serpong - tangerang atau ke daerah jakarta juga.

Yang jelas terjadi, sejak jam 5 tadi pagi, jalan-jalan di serpong-tangerang menjadi sepi. Jarang sekali kendaraan umum yang berlalu lalang, bahkan hampir tidak ada. Dari rumah saya, yang biasanya tiap pagi terdengar bunyi-bunyi kendaraan berlalu lalang, hari ini sunyi senyap. Tidak ada lagi hiruk pikuk kendaraan-kendaraan umum tersebut. Bahkan tadi pagi, yang biasanya dari rumah ke stasiun, saya naik angkot, hari ini terpaksa jalan (hanya 5 menit sih. tapi kadang malas jalan dan naik angkot. :P)

Bila hal ini yang terjadi, bagaimana dengan nasib-nasib penumpang angkot tersebut? Atau lebih tepatnya bagaimana nasib saya?? apakah hari ini bisa pulang dengan selamat ke rumah? atau terpaksa pulang malam lagi?

Pertanyaan lanjutan yang muncul di benak saya, apakah demo ini merupakan cara yang efektif untuk menyampaikan aspirasi supir-supir angkutan umum tersebut? atau kah hanya akan membuat penumpang terbengkalai??

Nasib saya mungkin sedikit lebih beruntung, walaupun mengandalkan angkutan umum juga, tapi setidaknya masih ada alternatif kendaraan umum bisa digunakan. Hari ini saya naik kereta (kebetulan naik yang AC karena bangunnya kesiangan, dan tepat waktu .. tumben deh akhir-akhir ini kereta api mulai tepat waktu, mungkin karena terlalu sering di demo). Kereta api serpong-palmerah, menghabiskan waktu kurang dari 30 menit, setelah itu, karena khawatir angkutan umum di palmerah mogok juga, akhirnya naik ojek lah saya dari depan stasiun. setelah tawar menawar ojek (akhirnya dapat 7000) dan setelah 15an menit di ojek, sampailah saya di kampus binus ini. akhirnya, bisa juga kerja hari ini. padahal sudah memikirkan worst casenya. Dalam perjalanan di ojek tersebut, saya menyadari ternyata angkutan umum di palmerah ini tidak ikutan demo dan mogok. M11, M09, M24 tetap ada berseliweran. Mungkin demo nya hanya di daerah serpong - tangerang saja.

Setelah sampai di kantor, hal yang membuat bingung selanjutnya adalah bagaimana pulangnya? pulang kantor pasti sore, nah bagaimana angkutannya?? apakah sudah tersedia, memang sih rencananya pulang mau naik kereta api lagi. dari binus ke stasiun kereta naik M11 kemudian tinggal naik kereta sampai rumah. Tapi setelah itukan mau kursus ke melati mas (deket wtc). gimana yah kalau tidak ada angkutan?? bolos kursus?? sayang dong. udah bayar uang kursus kok. lumayan lagi. Makanya .. gak boleh males2an. Nanti sore mesti melihat situasi kendaran umum terlebih dahulu. baru bisa memutuskan akan pergi kursus atau tidak.

2007-03-22T20:45:00.000-07:00

Ngantuk .. banget ... gak tidur nih semalaman alias begadang ... sebenernya salah sendiri sih. menunda2 pekerjaan jadinya pas udah deket waktunya mesti ngebut. susah nih menghilangkan sifat menunda2 pekerjaan. walaupun udah tau sih, sebaiknya kita lakukan apa yang kita bisa hari ini. tidak perlu menunggu hari esok. tapi kebanyakan gak mood aja ngerjainnya. parah yah. memang bukan contoh yang baik.
Kalau dalam management waktu, linda tuh parah sekali. selalu dech terburu2 pada detik terakhir. kejadian ini gak cuman satu kali dua kali. tapi seringggggg banget.
contohnya pada saat pembuatan tesis. banyak waktu yang terbuang percuma karena lagi blm mood aja ngerjainnya, akibatnya pada saat2 terakhir ngebut. sampai begadang2 dan meninggalkan pekerjaan kantor. maaf yah bos ... kl saya sering ngabur2 .. maaf juga yah pak benny (pembimbingku) .. jadi saya kejar2 pas terakhir2. tapi untungnya tesis bisa selesai dengan baik dan benar .. jadi lulus dech ;))
sempet sih bertobat (atau mencoba bertobat lebih tepatnya) tapi kebiasaan sulit untuk di hilangkan. hiks .. gimana yah.
mesti mencoba menyusun prioritas nih. mesti bisa menghalau mood buruk. kalo gak bisa gawat. masa tiap di kejar deadline mesti begadang. lama2 bisa mati muda nih ... begadang mulu.. timbul penyakit2 .. hiks. mari mencoba .. coba coba .. susun prioritas.
semoga ....

mari kita lihat perkembangannya 3 minggu yang akan datang.

2007-03-16T22:33:00.000-07:00

Inovasi Nilai

Blue Ocean Strategy
W. Chan Kim dan Renee Mauborgne

Ditafsirkan oleh Linda

Sebuah pasar, terdiri dari dua samudra yaitu samudra biru dan samudra merah. Samudra merah adalah pasar yang dikenal saat ini lengkap dengan semua aturan-aturan dan standar-standar yang ada. sedangkan samudra biru adalah pasar yang belum di kenal atau belum di eksplorasi.

Persaingan di samudra merah sangat berat dan berdarah-darah. setiap perusahaan berjuang untuk bersaing sesuai dengan standar-standar yang ada dalam pasar tersebut. setiap perusahaan berusaha mengalahkan kompetitornya.

lain halnya dengan di samudra biru. pada samudra biru belum ada aturan-aturan dan standar-standar. Perusahaan yang terjun ke dalam samudra biru tersebut akan membuat aturan-aturan dan standar-standar sendiri yang nantinya akan dipatuhi di pasar tersebut.

Strategi di samudra biru adalah dengan melakukan inovasi nilai. inovasi nilai terjadi ketika perusahaan memadukan inovasi dengan utilitas (manfaat), harga dan posisi biaya. tidak cukup hanya nilai saja dan hanya inovasi saja. tetapi harus merupakan keduanya.

to be continue ....

2007-03-16T17:26:00.000-07:00

Competing For The Future

By Gary Hamel and C.K. Prahalad

Ditafsirkan oleh Lindawati

Kelangsungan perusahaan jelas tergantung bagaimana perusahaan tersebut menentukan strategi bisnisnya. Strategi bisnis yang hebat bisa menempatkan perusahaan dari tidak terkenal menjadi pemimpin industri sedangkan strategi bisnis yang tidak baik menyebabkan keuntungan perusahaan tersebut semakin lama semakin kecil dan pada akhirnya akan membuat perusahaan ini mengalami kebangkrutan. Contoh perusahaan yang dengan strategi bisnis yang baik dapat mengalahkan saingan-saingan yang telah lebih dahulu merajai pasar adalah Honda dari Jepang. Honda dapat mengalahkan banyak pesaing dari amerika dan eropa yang selama beberapa abad terakhir merajai industri mobil dan motor. Dengan strategi bisnis yang bagus, Honda dapat terus berkembang dan mengalahkan pendapatan dari perusahaan-perusahaan mobil dan motor yang lainnya.

Bagaimana menciptakan strategi bisnis yang bisa membawa keuntungan bagi perusahaan? Hal ini tergantung dari banyak faktor, salah satunya adalah sifat alami dari industri itu sendiri. Bila industri yang digeluti masih merupakan industri yang dimonopoli dan hanya melibatkan 2 pihak (perusahaan kita dan konsumen, disebut sebagai 2C, company and consumen) tentu perusahaan tidak diharuskan untuk mempunyai strategi bisnis yang baik. Karena mau tidak mau, konsumen pasti membeli/menggunakan jasa dari perusahaan tersebut. Biasanya perusahaan bersifat arogan dan tidak mementingkan pelayanan terhadap konsumennya. Perusahaan akan berpendapat, “bila mau silahkan gunakan jasa kami, bila tidak mau yah sudah.” Di Indonesia, hal ini bisa dilihat pada salah satu perusahaan yang dimonopoli oleh pemerintah, yaitu Perum Kereta Api. Sudah menjadi rahasia umum bahwa pelayanan kereta api terhadap konsumennya kurang baik, bahkan beberapa kelompok konsumen ada yang sampai berdemo untuk memprotes pelayanan dari Perum Kereta Api ini.

Sifat industri yang lain adalah industri yang melibatkan 3 pihak (3C, company, consumen and competitor). Di sini perusahaan sudah mempunyai pesaing dan memerlukan strategi untuk dapat unggul dari saingannya tersebut. Beberapa teori yang bisa digunakan untuk membentuk strategi bisnis ini, mulai dari teori 5 forces, value chain, SWAT, TOWS, CSF dan masih banyak lagi. Inti dari strategi bisnis ini adalah bagaimana kita bersaing dengan kompetitor dan menjadi pemimpin dari industri yang kita geluti. Teori-teori untuk membentuk strategi bisnis ini menjadi sangat terkenal di era 90an dan awal 2000. Banyak perusahaan yang membuat strategi bisnisnya berdasarkan teori-teori ini dan dengan berjalannya waktu, terbukti bahwa strategi bisnis dari teori-teori tersebut hanya bisa berjalan beberapa lama dan selebihnya bisa membuat perusahaan menjadi oleng. Salah satu contoh dari kondisi ini adalah Kodak. Kodak dikenal dengan kemampuannya menciptakan kamera film yang berkualitas tinggi dan mempunyai strategi bisnis untuk tetap meningkatkan kwalitas kamera film tersebut sambil meningkatkan pelayanan terhadap konsumen. Tetapi satu hal yang tidak dipertimbangkan oleh Kodak, yaitu kemajuan teknologi digital. Kodak tetap pada strategi bisnisnya untuk meningkatkan kamera film sedangkan perusahaan lain, seperti Conan, menciptakan kamera digital. Dan pada akhirnya Kodak kehilangan pasar yang potensial karena sebagian konsumen berpindah pada kamera digital. Dan pada saat Kodak sadar akan perkembangan kamera digital dan mencoba terjun di kamera digital, teknologi Kodak sudah tertinggal jauh dari Conan.

Apa yang menyebabkan hal ini terjadi? Mengapa strategi bisnis tidak berjalan sesuai dengan yang diharapkan? Padahal dalam penyusunan strategi bisnis, sudah memperhatikan konsumen dan kompetitor, sudah mengantisipasi usaha-usaha kompetitor dan ancaman-ancaman yang mungkin terjadi. Jawaban dari pertanyaan ini sebenarnya mudah, yaitu strategi bisnis tidak memperhatikan perubahan yang terjadi, baik itu perubahan teknologi, kondisi lingkungan, kondisi politik negara dan lain-lain. Bagaimana menciptakan strategi bisnis yang bisa mengantisipasi perubahan yang terjadi? Bagaimana kita berkompetensi dan menciptakan strategi bisnis pada dunia 4C (company, comsumen, competitor and change)?

Untuk menjadi pemimpin di industri yang seperti ini, perusahaan harus bisa berkompetisi tidak hanya untuk masa sekarang, tapi juga untuk ke masa depan. Tidak cukup hanya menjadi mengungguli kompetitor tetapi juga harus bisa merebut kesempatan bisnis di masa depan. Bagaimana cara melakukannya? Jelas berbeda dengan pembentukan strategi bisnis di dunia 2C dan 3C. Pembentukan strategi bisnis di dunia 4C ditekankan pada pandangan kedepan perusahan dan pembinaan core competency dari perusahaan tersebut.

Untuk dapat bisa berkompetisi di masa depan, perusahaan harus mempunyai pandangan ke depan dan tidak terpatok pada kondisi pasar di masa sekarang. Perusahaan harus bisa memprediksi apa yang akan terjadi pada masa depan dan mencari cara untuk bisa mencapai masa depan itu lebih cepat dan lebih baik dari kompetitornya. Perusahaan tidak lagi berkaca pada kompetitornya dan melakukan perbaikan-perbaikan atau inovasi-inovasi untuk mengalahkan kompetitornya, tetapi perusahaan dituntut untuk mengantisipasi hal-hal yang akan terjadi di masa depan, peluang pasar di masa depan dan tidak lagi berpikir tentang peluang pasar di masa sekarang karena semua itu akan berubah.

Pertanyaan selanjutnya adalah bagaimana mendapatkan pandangan-pandangan ke depan ini? Bagaimana kita memprediksi apa yang akan terjadi di masa depan? Peluang apa yang akan tercipta di masa depan? Cara yang bisa dilakukan untuk mendapatkan pandangan ke depan adalah dengan meningkatkan keingintahuan akan perubahan yang terjadi dan mengadopsi nilai-nilai di industri yang berbeda untuk menciptakan nilai-nilai baru. Sehingga industri tidak lagi meningkatkan kwalitas terhadap nilai yang ada tetapi menciptakan nilai-nilai baru yang akan berlaku. Hal ini membuat kompetisi dengan kompetitor menjadi tidak relevan lagi karena nilai-nilai yang diacu sudah berbeda. Cara ini sama dengan strategi yang diterapkan pada Blue Ocean Strategy.

Setelah mendapatkan pandangan-pandangan ke masa depan, apalagi yang harus dilakukan? Yang harus dilakukan setelahnya adalah membina core competency yang ada pada perusahaan. Tidak hanya meningkatkan core competency yang sudah ada, tetapi juga menciptakan core competency yang belum ada guna mencapai pandangan ke masa depan tersebut. Sebelum lebih jauh tentang core competency, perlu didapatkan pengertian umum terlebih dahulu tentang core competency agar tidak terjadi perbedaan pendapat. Core competency adalah pengetahuan atau keahlian yang dimiliki oleh perusahaan sebagai satu kesatuan yang bisa memberikan kontribusi dalam menciptakan layanan bagi konsumen, membedakan dengan pesaing dan bisa dikembangkan lebih jauh. Oleh karena itu, core competency harus dimiliki dan disimpan didalam perusahaan dan tidak boleh di outsource kan ke perusahaan lain. Dalam perkembangan core competency, perusahaan bersaing dengan kompetitornya untuk mendapatkan core competency tersebut. Tahapan dari persaingan tersebut adalah:

1. persaingan untuk mengembangkan dan mendapatkan keahlian dan teknologi, dalam hal ini menyangkut mempekerjakan profesional yang mempunyai pengetahuan yang dibutukan, bekerja sama dengan pihak lain dan hak intelektual kapital.

2. persaingan untuk menjadikan keahlian sebagai kompetensi, dalam hal ini bagaimana menjadikan keahlian yang dipunyai oleh beberapa orang menjadi pengetahuan bersama yang akan menciptakan kompetensi bagi perusahaan.

3. persaingan untuk menciptakan dan memasarkan core product, dalam hal ini bagaimana membuat dan memasarkan produk yang bisa dijadikan platform bagi pembuatan produk akhir. Contohnya bagaimana Canon menciptakan dan memasarkan mesin laser printer (hanya mesinnya bukan printernya). Mesin laser printer ini akhirnya dijual ke beberapa perusahaan pembuat printer laser termasuk ke saingan bisnis Canon sendiri, seperti Hewlett-Packard.

4. persaingan untuk menciptakan dan memasarkan produk jadi, dalam hal ini bagaimana membuat dan memasarkan produk akhir perusahaan. Hal ini terkait dengan brand-image perusahaan tersebut.

Pengaturan dan pengorganisasian core competency, memerlukan 5 hal berikut: (1) mengidentifikasi core competency yang sudah ada, (2) memperoleh core competency yang belum dipunyai, (3) membangun core competency, (4) mengimplementasikan core competency, dan (5) mengamankan dan mempertahankan core competency. Kelima hal tersebut mutlak diperlukan agar pandangan kedepan perusahaan dapat dicapai.

Pada akhirnya, perusahaan yang berhasil mengantisipasi masa depan lebih dahulu akan memenangkan persaingan di masa depan dan perusahaan yang hanya berkutat di dunia bisnis yang ada sekarang hanya akan jatuh dan terkalahkan dari perusahaan yang berpikir lebih revolusioner. Karena pasar yang sekarang ada belum tentu masih tetap ada pada pasar yang akan datang sehingga dibutuhkan kemampuan dan keberanian untuk memprediksi masa depan dan meraih peluang di masa depan. Pencapaian masa depan, bisa dilakukan dalam kurun waktu yang tidak tentu, oleh karena itu diperlukan komitmen dari seluruh bagian perusahaan sebagai sebuah korporat untuk menciptakan masa depan tersebut.

2007-03-15T17:38:00.000-07:00

Kereta Api oh Kereta Api ...

Industri yang monopoli kerap kali membuat pelayanan konsumennya terbengkalai. Ini merupakan hal yang tidak aneh di industri yang masih 2C (company dan customer). Dengan tidak adanya pesaing (karena sistem monopoli), perusahaan dengan seenaknya bisa menetapkan tarif dan tidak memperdulikan pelayanan terhadap konsumennya. Mereka bertindak sangat arogan dan berpikir "kami kasih pelayanan seperti itu, kalau tidak mau yah sudah, tidak usah pakai". Karena mereka satu-satunya yang memberi pelayanan di bidang itu, mau tidak mau kita sebagai konsumen harus bertahan dengan sikap arogansi perusahaan dan buruknya pelayanan yang diberikan.

Hal ini juga terjadi pada kereta api di indonesia (lebih tepatnya serpong-jakarta). Sebagai salah satu pengguna jasa kereta api, saya merasakan sekali buruk nya pelayanan jasa kereta api tersebut. tetapi sampai saat ini saya masih berusahan bersabar dan menerima pelayanan yang buruk itu, karena belum ada transportasi sejenis yang bisa menjadi pengganti dari kereta api ini (bisa disangkutpautkan tidak adanya pesaing di industri kereta api ini, pesaing disini pesaing yang head-to-head atau apple-to-apple).

Beberapa contoh buruknya pelayanan kereta api ini (yang baru saja saya alami karena pagi tadi saya naik kereta api):
1. Tidak adanya tangga untuk naik ke peron (tempat naik kereta api, mungkin namanya salah). Padahal peron itu tingginya sekitar setengah meter (0,5 meter). Jadi sebagai pengguna kereta api, kita diharuskan untukbisa memanjat peron tersebut. Kita diharuskan mempunyai tubuh yang lentur sehingga bisa naik ke peron tersebut.
2. Selalu ada ketidak jelasan kereta mana yang akan berangkat terlebih dahulu. Sebagai orang yang sudah membeli karcis (untuk kereta ac 8000) menurut saya sangat wajar bisa saya diberikan informasi kereta mana yang akan berangkat terlebih dahulu. Pernah pada suatu waktu saya diberitahukan bahwa kereta yang akan berangkat ada di jalur 1, tapi ternyata yang berangkat terlebih dahulu adalah kereta yang dijalur 3. Apakah begitu buruknya komunikasi antara penjaga loket dengan masinis kereta api?? sehingga untuk mengetahui kereta yang jalan terlebih dahulu saja tidak bisa.
3. Masalah Pintu yang dibuka. Untuk kereta api ac, pintu tidak dibuka setiap saat (pada saat sampai ke stasiun untuk turun dan naik penumpan baru pintu dibuka, pada saat perjalanan pintu tertutup), tapi bukan ini yang menjadi masalah. Yang menjadi masalah adalah pada saat di stasiun (stasiun Serpong), pintu kereta AC (yang saya naiki jam 06.30) tidak dibuka juga padahal itu sudah jam 06.25, tinggal 5 menit lagi menuju keberangkatan. Yang dibuka hanya pintu kecil dekat gerbong masinis (didekat lokomotif) yang berada diujung muka (sangat jauh) dan tidak ada peron (tangga) -nya, padahal bila kereta ac itu mundur sedikit lagi, penumpang dapat dengan mudah naik ke sana (karena peron-nya tidak sampai ke ujung muka kereta tersebut, hanya sampai ke tengah-tengah). Setelah sedikit marah2 dan meminta pintu di buka pada petugas yang mengontrol perjalanan kereta api, pintu akhirnya dibuka, tetapi pintu yang dibuka adalah pintu yang tidak menghadap ke peron (kereta mempunyai 2 sisi, kanan dan kiri, kebetulan yang menghadap ke peron adalah sisi kanan dan yang dibuka adalah sisi kiri). Bagaimana mau naik?? mesti loncat2?? apakah kereta api ini mengajarkan kita untuk jadi pesenam?? Tapi banyak juga orang yang turun peron dan naik loncat ke kereta. Karena saya tidak mau melakukan itu, saya masih tetap marah2 dan meminta pintu di buka. Setelah bercape-cape marah2, akhirnya pintu dibuka juga (30 detik mendekati keberangkatan). pintu yang dibuka adalah pintu kecil di bagian lokomitif. Munculkan tampang masinisnya yang angkuh. bahkan tidak meminta maaf karena telah memberikan pelayanan yang buruk ... karena sudah terburu2, semua penumpang langsung menyerbu dengan sedikit marah2.

Beginilah kehidupan naik kereta api di sini. Jadi untuk orang-orang yang mau naik kereta api. diharapkan untuk bersiap2. Kereta api sudah tidak telat saja sudah bagus. Kita tidak bisa (atau belum bisa) mengharapkan pelayanan yang bagus.... sampai kapan semuanya akan seperti ini?? mari kita menunggu ..

2007-03-14T17:18:00.000-07:00

Pagi-pagi .. masih ngantuk. Udah sampe ke atl. Ini karena nginep di tempat santy dan terpaksa masuk kerja jam 7 pagi.. karena santy masuk kerja jam 7 pagi. hiks.
Kemaren kita pergi ke ta. selain untuk cari kado juga untuk maen2. first stop hok ben .. makan2 .. kenyang... ketemu jasin. ketawa2 dan ngobrol bentar sama dia. trus mulai ..hunting cari perlengkapan bayi. ternyata perlengkapan bayi itu mahal yah ?? ckckkck benar2 harus mempunyai cukup uang agar bisa membiayai bayi yang diinginkan. Tempat ganti popok aja 200rb lebih. steam (penghangat susu) bisa sampai 1jtan .. parah sekali. mahal2 sekali biaya untuk membesarkan bayi. Jadi untuk yang mau punya bayi, mesti baik2 memikirkan bagaimana membiayainya. mesti memikirkan dananya.
Setelah pusing2 cari2 gak ketemu, akhirnya menyerah membeli apa saja yang terlihat bagus. akhirnya di belilah tas. tas untuk bawa perlengkapan2 bayi. itupun mahal loh. 300an rb. ada discont sih. jadi tinggal 250an. tapi tetep aja. mahal kali yah... ckckkckc.... kenapa perlengkapan bayi itu mahal?

setelah berpusing2 dengan perlengkapan bayi. akhirnya tinggal satu kado lagi yang perlu di beli. perhiasan ;;) nah membeli ini lebih menyenangkan. sebenarnya blm beli sih ... lebih tepatnya survey. melihat barang2 emang putih, emas, berlian ;)) pengennnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn

Mulai dari ke benteng, franc and co dll... banyak yang di kunjungi.. sampe lupa.. dari tempat2 itu bisa diambil kesimpulan bahwa harga emas2 spt itu tuh mahal ... =))
di benteng ketemu gelang yang bagus .. tapi harganya 7jt-an
di sebelah benteng (lupa namanya) ada gelang yang bagus juga . harganya 1,6an (btw ini emas biasa 22 karat dengan batu di tengahnya, batunya cukup berkilau. modelnya bagus)
di franc and co ada cincin (bagus bermotif sederhana, harga 8jtan) dan gelang (lebih bagus lagi. elegan sekali dengan ukiran berbentuk bunga, 18 jt)....

dari yang itu2... jadinya beli yang mana dong?? ternyata mahal semua. Biarkan teman2 yang lain yang memutuskan. yang jelas linda udah survey in ;))

2007-03-13T17:52:00.000-07:00

Ghost

Just a lost soul or an evil soul

Menurut orang, di tempat-tempat yang jarang didatangi oleh orang, pasti ada penunggunya. Penunggu di sini bisa disebut sebagai hantu. Di tempat-tempat yang gelap, redup atau tempat kejadian kecelakaan juga ada hantunya. Tetapi tidak menutup kemungkinan juga kalau di kantor yang ramai ada hantunya juga .. hmmm

Ini terjadi di kantor ku, beberapa hari yang lalu terjadi kehebohan. Ternyata ada hantu yang menampakan diri. Sebenarnya apa yang dicari oleh hantu tersebut? apakah dia menampakan diri karena marah sebab tempat tinggalnya selama ini sedang direnovasi (NB: IT sedang renovasi ruangan) atau ada sebab lain.. yang menyebabkan hantu-hantu tersebut tiba2 saja menampakkan diri. Dan apa tujuannya hantu2 itu menampakan diri? agar sekedar di ketahui keberadaannya oleh orang lain atau untuk menakut-nakuti?

Sebenarnya apa itu hantu??? Secara umum definisi hantu merujuk pada kehidupan setelah kematian. Hantu juga dikaitkan dengan roh atau arwah yang meninggalkan badan karena kematian. Definisi dari hantu pada umumnya berbeda untuk setiap agama, peradaban, maupun adat istiadat. Meskipun secara umum hantu merujuk pada suatu zat yang mengganggu kehidupan duniawi, dalam banyak kebudayaan, hantu tidak didefinisikan sebagai zat yang baik maupun jahat. Sebutan setan, iblis, gondorowo, dan sebagainya, lebih umum digunakan untuk merujuk kepada hantu yang jahat. Sedangkan hantu yang baik yang dianggap mempunyai kemampuan untuk menolong manusia, disebut dengan bermacam nama yang berbeda, seperti sebutan untuk Datuk, Te Cu Kong (penguasa tanah, dalam agama Kong Hu Cu), dan lainnya. Tetapi di dalam kebanyakan agama, meminta hantu untuk membantu manusia adalah dilarang.Hantu dipercaya keberadaannya oleh hampir semua umat manusia yang mempercayai adanya Tuhan, meskipun hanya sebagian kecil yang mengakui pernah melihat hantu secara langsung. Keberadaan hantu menjadi pro dan kontra di banyak negara maju. Sebagian ilmuwan beranggapan hantu hanyalah ilusi ataupun khayalan mereka yang mempercayainya, sementara sebagian ilmuwan lain berusaha membuktikannya secara ilmiah adanya zat yang terkandung dalam hantu.(menurut wikipedia)

Jadi sama seperti manusia, hantu itu ada yang baik dan jahat ... tapi kenapa sering kali kita takut akan hantu-hantu tersebut? walaupun kita tidak tau hantu tersebut baik atau jahat. apakah hal-hal yang kita tidak ketahui membuat kita takut? bagi orang-orang yang tidak pernah melihat hantu, mendengar kata hantu pasti menimbulkan sensasi tersendiri. ada rasa takut, seram, benci dll. Benarkan kita takut krn kita belum pernah melihat hantu? atau karena pengaruh televisi dan film2 yang begitu besar sehingga bila kita mendengar kata hantu selalu terbayang makluk yang menyeramkan??

Aku sendiri belum pernah melihat hantu .. dan yah .. bila aku mendengar kata hantu, aku jadi takut sendiri. sepertinya terlalu banyakmenonton film hantu berakibat yang tidak baik bagiku. beberapa film hantu yang sudah pernah ku tonton antara lain exorsits, ju on, the ring (yang jepang maupun yang barat), kuntil anak dan bbrp film2 lain yang tentang hantu. Menonton film2 itu di bioskop tidak membuat aku takut, tetapi setelah pulang atau bbrp hari setelahnya, kenangan akan tempat-tempat penampakan dan wajah2 hantu di film2 tersebut masih tetap membayangiku .... jadi menyeramkan.

Tetapi apakah bentuk dari hantu sebenarnya? atau mereka tidak mempunyai bentuk? Menurut film Ghost whisper, hantu mengambil bentuk sama seperti saat mereka meninggal. Bila mereka meninggal dengan kesedihan, maka hantunya pun akan beraut muka sedih, apabila mereka meninggal dengan kebencian, maka hantunya akan dipenuhi dengan kebencian dan biasanya hantu-hantu ini lah yang sering mengganggu orang .. ingin melampiaskan kebenciannya.

Belum pernah melihat hantu, menyebabkan aku jadi sering bertanya2 .. apakah reaksi ku pada saat melihat hantu? pingsan, lari, atau apa? sampai saat ini, selama aku sadar aku belum pernah melihat hantu (kalo tidak sadar bahwa itu hantu tidak tau juga dech)... mendengar hantu menyebutkan nama ku sudah pernah .. tapi kalau melihat langsung belum pernah. dan semoga tidak akan pernah .. bukan takut atau gimana (padahal emang takut) tapi kalau di berikan kebebasan untuk memilih, lebih baik tidak.

2007-03-12T17:44:00.000-07:00

Two greatest Love

Dari film sex and the city (film yang beberapa hari ini selalu aku tonton setiap malam), salah satu episodenya mengatakan kita hanya mempunyai 2 greatest love in our live. how many greatest love that you already find?

Aku tidak tau apakah love yang aku temukan adalah greatest love. I have had six relationship, 2 of it is serious, but I still can't tell is it my greatest love? have I found my greatest love? What will happen if the two greatest love is just gone?

2007-03-12T00:13:00.000-07:00

The Right Man

Back to kampus syahdan.
Still thinking about the movie that I had watched, Sex and The City. Salah satu episodenya membahas tentang Bagaimana kita tau bahwa ini pria yang cocok untuk kita (the right man). setiap orang pasti ingin mencari yang paling tepat untuk nya, tapi apakah kita akan benar-benar tau bahwa ini the right man?? with no regrets. atau selamanya kita akan bertanya-tanya apakah pria ini merupakan the right man.

bagaimana kita tau pria yang ada di samping kita, adalah the right man?? sebelum membuat keputusan untuk bersama happily ever after, bagaimana cara untuk mengetahui bahwa itu the right man? Pertanyaan ini selalu memusingkan. dari diskusi dengan teman kemaren, dia bilang we would never know. The best thing that we can do is just follows your heart. if your heart say that he is the right man at that time, then, make commitment to him. and try to keep that commitment.

Tapi .. apabila sudah bersama seseorang, dan ternyata ada orang lain yang berasa lebih cocok dan merasa itulah the right man .. what should we do??
just break-up or keep the older relationship??
or ... can we just wait until the really.. really right man to come? sampai kapan kita harus menunggu??

2007-03-11T23:37:00.000-07:00

Web database

Masih di akademis anggrek. tempat mengajar hari ini. Matakuliah yang aku ajar adalah Web database. Apa sih sebenarnya perbedaan web database dan database yang lainnya? apa karena database itu dipasang di web maka harus ada perbedaan-perbedaaan ?

Di matakuliah ini akan coba di bahas hal itu. Alasan utama kenapa web database berbeda dengan database biasa adalah karena selain teknologi database, web database juga melibatkan teknologi yang tidak kalah pesat perkembangannya yaitu web. web sudah berkembang dari web 1.0 ke web 2.0 sebenarnya apa perbedaan di antara keduanya? dan apa hubungan web database dengan itu.

2007-03-09T20:33:00.000-08:00

Sulitkah menjadi teman kembali setelah putus ??

Pada saat putus hubungan, orang sering bilang bahwa kita jadi teman lagi saja. Tapi apakah benar setelah putus cinta menjadi teman merupakan pilihan yang benar dan mudah?? apakah kenangan-kenangan akan masa lalu tidak menghantui perjalanan pertemanan yang akan dimulai kembali?

As for me, menjadi teman dengan mantan pacar merupakan hal yang sulit. Bukan karena aku tidak membuka pertemanan dengan mantanku, tapi lebih ke sulitnya mencari topik komunikasi yang baik dan benar atau sulitnya mantan pacar menganggapku teman kembali. Hal ini terjadi beberapa kali. Setelah melalui putus yang menyakitkan, salah satu mantan pacarku seakan tidak bisa menerima aku sebagai teman kembali. Padahal sebelumnya kami berteman sangat baik sekali. I can tell everything to him. Setelah berlalu beberapa tahun (sudah 3 tahun lebih) kami sudah mulai bisa berkomunikasi kembali. Tapi komunikasi itupun terasa sangat hambar .. mungkin karena kami sudah tidak bisa lagi berbicara dari hati-ke-hati. I miss the time when I can tell him everything ...

Menjadi teman lagi setelah putus hubungan memerlukan keberanian. Some people say: Its hard enough to brake up, don't make it harder by being friend with the ex. Keberanian untuk mengubur masa lalu dan memaafkan kesalahan-kesalahan yang sudah terjadi. Kadang keberanian ini sangat sulit untuk didapatkan. Menjadi teman kembali tidak bisa dipaksakan. Bila dipaksakan hanya akan tambah membuat hubungan menjadi buruk....

So, the best thing to do is, just wait ... kalau memang bisa bersahabat kembali.. pasti hari itu akan tiba di mana kita bisa bercerita kembali ttg masa lalu, sekarang dan masa depan dengan tidak memendam duka ...

2007-03-09T17:42:00.000-08:00

Lagi suka dengerin lagi ini .... gak tau knp sih. Mungkin syairnya aja yang bikin suka :P

CRANBERRIES LYRICS

"Just My Imagination"

There was a game we used to play
We would hit the town on Friday night
And stay in bed until Sunday
We used to be so free
We were living for the love we had and
Living not for reality

It was just my imagination [x3]

There was a time I used to pray
I have always kept my faith in love
It's the greatest thing from the man above
The game I used to play
I've always put my cards upon the table
Let it never be said that I'd be unstable

It was just my imagination [x3]

There is a game I like to play
I like to hit the town on Friday night
And stay in bed until Sunday
We'll always be this free
We will be living for the love we have
Living not for reality

It's not my imagination [x3]
Not my [x18]

2007-03-07T21:55:00.000-08:00

Memories

Saat lagi bongkar-bongkar folder ketemu ini dech:

cai wo xin li
mei tien er se ke
xiau se, ai ni, teng ni, xiang ni
wo pu nen mei ni

Puisi yang di sms-in ke linda dahulu kala .. udah lama sekali. Apa kabarnya kamu sekarang? sudah lama tak jumpa.

Udah lama berselang yah sejak terakhir kita ketemu. Kita ketemu terakhir waktu aku b'day. sudah hampir 6 bulan yang lalu. Apa kabar sekarang? gimana kabar kamu dan si dia? masih baik-baik saja kan?

Sekarang kita sudah seperti orang asing yah .. jarang sekali kita saling menyapa .. walaupun aku lihat kamu online dan kamu lihat aku online kita sudah tidak saling menyapa lagi .. Kenapa ya?? padahal waktu dulu kita sahabat baik .. teman untuk curhat .. apa yang terjadi hingga semuanya spt ini?

Aku tau sih beberapa bagian adalah salahku. Mungkin aku yang kurang memperlakukan kamu dengan baik .. terutama saat kamu mengungkapkan isi hati mu. Maaf yah. Aku punya alasan kenapa seperti itu. Kamu salah satu teman baikku. dan aku gak ingin kehilangan kamu ... aku takut bila aku secara terus terang menolakmu, kamu akan pergi dan aku akan kehilangan salah seorang teman baik. Nyatanya ... bagaimanapun aku bersikap, aku tetap kehilangan teman baik. setelah itu, kita hidup dalam dunia kita masing2. dan kamu pun akhirnya mempunyai seorang pendamping yang manis dan baik.

Terakhir kali kita ketemu, kerasa banget perbedaan2 yang ada. kamu sudah dengan dunia mu, yang berkembang dengan pesat, dan aku yang masih di sini-sini saja. Mungkin sekarang kita sudah gak nyambung yah ngomongnya .. mungkin kamu juga bt kali yah ngomong sama aku dan aku gak bisa keep up dengan apa yang kamu omongin .. ternyata dunia kita sekarang sudah jauh berbeda ... dan sudah semakin sedikit yang kita bisa curhatkan bersama.

Bagaimana pun juga .... dalam kondisi apapun ... aku akan tetap mengingatmu sebagai salah satu teman yang baik ..

2007-03-06T17:14:00.000-08:00

Core Competencies vs NonCore Competencies
Competing for The Future (Part II)

Agar dapat berkompetisi di masa depan, sebuah perusahaan harus bisa menentukan dan memupuk core competencies yang ada pada perusahaannya. Bukan hanya sekedar hardware, software, hr dan capital, tetapi semua yang berupa kekayaan dari perusahaan tersebut (termasuk intellectual capital).

Bagaimana menentukan core competencies? dan apa perbedaannya dengan noncore competencies? Ada 3 syarat yang bisa menentukan core competencies, yaitu:
1. Customer Value:
apa yang diingat konsumen merupaka benefit yang harus dikejar dan dipenuhi. Ini
merupakan salah satu core competence dari perusahaan tersebut.
2. Competitor Differentiation
apa yang membedakan perusahaan dengan perusahaan lain? ini merupakan sebuah core
competence. bukan berarti kompetensi ini harus benar-benar unik dan tidak ada
diperusahaan lain, tetapi lebih diutamakan adalah kompetensi yang dimiliki perusahaan
dengan standar yang tinggi melampaui perusahaan-perusahaan lain.
3. Extendability
bisa dikembangkan dalam artian kompetensi ini bisa membantu menciptakan produk2 atau
service baru yang berguna bagi kepentingan perusahaan.

To be continue ...

From Competeting for The Future
(Gary Hamel and C.K. Prahalad)

2007-03-06T01:21:00.000-08:00

Cape ...

Hari yang melelahkan. Karena kereta rel nya patah, terpaksa dech hari ini naik bis. Bermacet2 ria. berdiri .. penderitaan dech pokoknya. apalagi pegel2 gara2 ke anyer hari sabtu minggu kemaren masih terasa. Berangkat dari rumah jam 6 lewat 15, sampe kantor jam 9 kurang 15. lama banget yah ...
langsung terasa lapar dech, makan ketupat padang dech pagi2 .. untung gak sakit perut.
trus melakukan pekerjaan-pekerjaan rutin yang luar biasa banyaknya .. hiks .. gak selesai2

Berpusing2 ria dech mengetes page yang pake ajax. di firefox bisa tampil dengan bagus. tapi kenapa di ie 6 gak bisa ya?? apa gak bisa compatible dengan ie 6? pusing dech nih ajax. ngebetein. Mana rule di TM gak jelas lagi .. kl rule gak jelas, gimana bisa buat sisfo-nya?? :((
nasib-nasib.
jadi analyst sisfo internal begini nih ..
tidak ada yang pasti. Semua selalu berubah2

hiks.....

2007-02-17T01:58:00.000-08:00

BT ....

Hari ini kan malam tahun baru tapi jam seginimasih di kantor ..
Krn proses honor .. hiks .. knp begitu??
Bt banget dech..
udah pusing2 kepala..
mending kalo ada kompensasinya. jadi hari ini lembur besok boleh masuk siangan .. ini sih gak ada ...
sebel2

mana perut udah mulai lapar :((

masalahnya .. ini mesti stand by ... menunggu orang selesai mengecek ... cape dech .... males banget. kalo masalahnya ada di sisfo kan bisa langsung di perbaiki. tapi ini menuggu orang dulu. kl ada masalah baru di perbaiki ..
aduh cepetan dong. mau ke vihara nh.. jam 6 mesti udah sampe rumah. tapi mana bisa. ini aja udah setengah 6.
sebel banget ............. :((
pengen ngomel2

gak mau spt ini lagi ... hiks...

bt .. bt... bt ..

2007-02-13T23:35:00.000-08:00

Happy Valentine Day ...

Hari valentine ini ngapain yah? mau pulang ke rumah dan benerin tugas2 yang ada =)) udah kebanyakan numpuk pekerjaan. jadinya mesti diselesaikan secepatnya dech.

Kemaren udah maen2 ke TA. jadi hari ini waktunya kerja .. mari kita bekerja ...

2007-02-07T17:00:00.000-08:00

Pagi-pagi, jam 5 kurang 15 menit, dibangunkan oleh suara halilintar dan hujan. yup.. benar sekali. serpong, tangerang, jakarta kembali hujan. Hujan yang tampaknya tidak mau berkompromi dengan warga-warga yang sudah kebanjiran tetap mengguyur jakarta. Sampai saat ini pun masih hujan rintik-rintik.

Sampai kapan hujan ini akan berlanjut? apakah banjir akan terjadi lagi? Itulah hal-hal yang pasti menjadi kekhawatiran sebagian besar warga Jakarta dan penglaju yang bekerja di Jakarta. Sebagai salah satu penglaju yang bekerja di Jakarta, saya merasa sangat was-was akan terjadi banjir lagi. Tentunya saya tidak ingin kejadian hari Jumat (pulang jam 12 malam karena banjir) terjadi lagi. Tapi apa yang bisa kita lakukan? Hujan tidak bisa diberhentikan begitu saja, karena itu adalah fenomena alam. Jadi? apa yang bisa kita lakukan? hanya diam dan berdoa? hm.. tampaknya keajaiban tidak akan terjadi begitu mudah. Kita harus berusaha mewujudkan keajaiban kita sendiri.

Fenomena banjir ini merupakan fenomena yang terjadi setiap tahunnya. tapi mengapa tidak ada penanganan yang serius tentang masalah ini? apakah kita sebagai warga masyarakat sudah mulai bermusuhan dengan alam? memang sih, kita terbiasa untuk membuang sampah di sungai-sungai dan saluran-saluran air dan mengganti pohon-pohon dengan pohon beton dan ketika banjir terjadi, kita serta merta menyalahkan fenomena alam. ckckck .. apa memang mental kita yang sudah terpatri ke dalam sanubari selalu menyalahkan keadaan pada orang lain atau pada keadaan?

Sudah cukup saling menyalahkan, baik itu menyalahkan pemerintah, warga dan keadaan .. banjir merupakan konsekwensi karena kita tidak memperhatikan lingkungan. Baik karena pemerintah yang tidak membuat tata kota yang baik maupun karena perbuatan kita sendiri.
Oleh karena itu mulai sekarang kita harus bisa mulai mencintai alam. cintailah pohon-pohon, sungai-sungai. Dan bila hujan tetap turun (sesuai dengan yang diprediksikan oleh BMG) maka kita harus bisa membuat rencana penanggulangan yang baik. Tindakan ini memerlukan kerja sama dari segenap pihak, warga masyarakat dan pemerintah. Marilah kita membuat Jakarta menjadi tempat yang lebih baik untuk tinggal dan bekerja.

2007-02-06T19:05:00.000-08:00

Wisuda ..

Foto..foto... (jumat dan sabtu)

2007-02-06T17:57:00.000-08:00

Kemarin gak masuk lagi .... karena banjir sih. Pagi2 hujan jadinya kereta gak jalan dan kalau naik bis pasti banjir lagi spt hari jum'at. jadi diputuskan untuk tidak pergi kerja. Ternyata banyak juga tuh yang gak kerja.

Hari ini gak hujan. dan langit tampaknya cerah-cerah saja. Jadinya diputuskan untuk masuk kerja. dan memang .. perjalanan lancar sekali. Naik kereta jam 6 sampai jam 7. walaupun di kereta penuh tapi biarin dech. yang penting dapet duduk ... hehehe .....

Di kantor ada bbrp orang yang gak masuk. masih banjir kali yah ... banjir ini membuat banyak kegiatan terhambat nih. kalau mau ke mana2 mesti waspada banjir. dag dig dug terus ..

Kapan sih kita bisa bebas dari banjir?? mau nunggu tahun 2100 ??

Walaupun Hujan terus mengguyur, kalau kita mempunyai sistem perairan yang bagus pasti tidak akan banjir. Atau apakah alam sudah mulai tidak bersahabat dengan kita ?? atau kita terlebih dahulu yang memutuskan persahabatan dengan alam??

2007-02-04T17:35:00.000-08:00

Senin ... di kantor lagi dech...

Perjuangan pagi ini aman2 aja. Naik kereta api krl .. kereta jalan walaupun cuman dari serpong - palmerah. jam 6 pergi jam 7 sampe kantor .. lumayan .. walaupun berdiri .. gpp dech.
tapi pulang gimana yah?? bingung nih.. berencana cari yang bisa di tebengin sih.. kalo gak ada yah udah terpaksa naik kereta lagi...

Jam 10 mau rapat nih .. tapi ke JWC. Ko Fendy baru aja tlp katanya gak bisa dateng .. mesti rapat sendiri .. mesti hubungin Handoko TM .. tapi lewat operator gak bisa hubungin HP .. hmm... gimana dong .. Tunggu kabar aja dech. Kalo jadi rapat baru berangkat ke Jwc...

mari menunggu2 ...

2007-02-04T17:20:00.000-08:00

Hari wisuda .. wisuda ...

tgl 3 akhirnya datang .. akhirnya hari wisuda datang ...
dimulai dengan pagi2 jam setengah 5. sudah di bangunin ..padahal semalem tidurnya mualem banget krn pulang jam 12 malem ..

jam setengah 5 mandi .. trus pegi dandan ke tukang rias .. rumah nya jauh lagi .. di anterin mama .. tapi mama juga gak gitu ngerti rumahnya yang mana .. setelah nyasar2 sampe dech. di rias dulu ... 1 jam-an jam 6 baru selesai. setelah selesai di rias balik ke rumah kok mobil blm sampe2 .. tlp2 dulu dech. tuh mobil kayaknya nyasar .. emang bener sih.. dia bingung jalannya gimana .. setelah tlp2 beberapa kali akhirnya tuh mobil (dengan dianterin sama Ko Dwi) sampe dech tuh mobil. Ko Dwi itu kakak ipar ku .. dia dan cici ku lagi nginep di rumah karena banjir .. pagi itu ko dwi dan cici ku mau pulang ke rumahnya naik motor mungkin ketemu sama tuh mobil.. jadinya di anterin dulu ke rumah.

Jam 6.15 akhirnya bisa jalan ke depok. karena dari serpong jadi langsung lewat tol bsd.. sempet ada tempat yang banjir tapi bisa di lalui dengan baik.

sampe di Depon ujan .. masih jam 7.15an .. akhirnya foto2 dulu di foto studio yang udah sempet daftar kemaren ..

ambil snack trus nganterin mama dan papa trus ke tempat wisudawan ngumpul dech sebelum masuk ke ruang balairungnya. sempet bbrp kali foto2 bareng temen2 .. banyak yang bilang tumben liat linda dandan .. hehe ... yah iyah lah .. kl gak wisuda atau pesta2 males dech dandan2 .. cape ....

trus selama wisuda cuman duduk diam .. ngantuk2 .. tidur2an .. ngobrol .. makan snack .. ngobrol sama andra ... (andra nih 1 sem di atasku .. tapi kita sama2 bimbingan pak Benny, jadinya kenal dech). di tengah2 acara sempet ujan gede .. dag dig dug dech .. takut gak bisa pulang :( setelah lamaaaaaaaaaaa sekali .. akhirnya selesai juga acara di balairung. abis ini ke fasilkom .. untuk makan .. heheh.... seneng dech kl udah acara makan :P. sebelum sampe ke balairung krn terpisah dari mama dan papa juga cici (Lina, ciciku akhirnya dateng juga ke depok .. tapi dia langsung dari bogor) mencari papa, mama dan cici dulu. sampe cape.. muter2 cari2 tempat mereka nunggu. cape dech ..... pas udah ketemu .. di kasih bungan sama felic (ponakanku) tapi bunganya udah layu2 pasti di maenin sama felic dan adiknya beto .. payah nih... abis itu foto2 bentar ..... trus ke fasilkom dech

di fasilkom makan siang .. trus ada acara di aula .. gak lama sih .. hanya jalan trus duduk di panggung.. dengerin pak dekan ngomong trus wakil wisudawan ngomong trus selesai dech .. tinggal ucapan2 selamat. .. salam2an ... setelah itu selesai .. cabut yuks .. pulang dech ...

pas pulang dag dig dug krn takut banjir :(( gak bisa pulang kalo banjir ...
tapi untungnya tol lewat .. udah gak banjir .. untung lah :d

sampe dech dengan selamat ... sampe rumah langsung tepar .... ngantuk .. jadinya kebanyakan duduk diam kemudian setelah sore (abis lina dll pulang).. langsung tidur .. gak bangun lagi sampe pagi =))

2007-02-04T16:49:00.000-08:00

Perjuangan Gladi Resik ...

Hari jumat memang dimulai dengan tidak begitu baik. Setelah pagi mengarungi banjir dan akhirnya tidak di kantor (dari jam 6- 9). jam 11 mulailah perjalanan lanjutan ke Depok UI (Balairung) untuk mengikuti gladi resik. Gladi resiknya sih di mulai jam 2 siang. tapi dari pada terlambat dan takutnya di mana-mana banjir .. jadi lah jam 11 linda berangkat ke Depok. Sebelum berangkat sudah konsolidasi dengan teman-teman sih. Sebagian besar teman-teman yang wisuda akan datang ke gladi resik .. makanya .. gpp dech di coba mengarungi ketidak pastian akan banjir untuk pergi ke depok.

Ternyata. .... perjalanan kemanggisan - depok (dengan naik M24 dan bis ke depok .. lupa nomornya berapa) .. lancar... bisa sampai dengan selamat walaupun sempet ada insiden salah turun dan akhirnya naik taksi untuk melanjutkan perjalanan ke balairung UI.. (heheh .. biasalah linda kan sering begitu :P).. sampai di depok gak sampai jam 1 (12.45) sudah sampai.. datang kepagian dech karena bingung mau ngapain akhirnya muter-muter dulu dech. Sempet daftar foto untuk besokannya. sempet lihat-lihat boneka makara ui .. sempet foto-foto juga sedikit ...

Kemudian di mulailah acara gladi resik .. rame .. tapi karena hanya menjadi wisuda wan biasa .. jadi hanya duduk diam dengan manis menyaksikan acara di mulai .. fyi, wisuda di UI hanya perwakilan fakultas saja yang maju ke depan . jadi yang lain-lain sih hanya duduk manis :P.

eh tapi sempet di kasih tau untuk berdiri pada saat namanya di panggil pas pengumuman cum laude .. kebetulan linda masuk cum laude .. (ip nya 3.86 ... lumayan tapi masih kalah dari s1 :(( ).

Abis itu gladi resik udahan dech .. kemudian ada foto2 .. sama rektor dan dekan .. (rektor dan dekan yang belum pernah aku liat sebelumnya). Abis foto2 satu2 .. (salaman dengan rektor dan dekan) kemudian ada foto bareng2 semua fakultas ilmu komputer yang pasca sarjana .. banyak banget yang titip foto-in ke petugasnya (salah satu nya linda) sampe rektornya ngomel2 dan seterusnya gak bisa titip foto lagi .. hehehhe....

Abis itu selesailah acara gladi .. tinggal ambil buku wisuda .. setelah ambil pulang dech ...

pulang nebeng anggun dari balairung ui ke Jl. simatupang. dari situlah bencana dimulai .... naik bis dari sana ke slipi memakan waktu 2 jam (yang harusnya 1 jam) .. macet sekali di jalanan ... tapi karena linda duduk jadi gak gitu perhatiin...
kemudian setelah 2 jam di bis .. kenek dan supir nya teriak2 .. yang Slipi turun di sini .. mau lewat tol .. dengan panik2 dan buru2 akhirnya turun deh dari bis .. jalan ke slipi palmerah ....
nah sampai di sana muacettttttttttt bgt. bis ke tangerang satu pun tidak terlihat .. katanya banjir di mana-mana. sempet mobil2 itu di putar balik ...

mati dech .. gak bisa pulang .. tlp ke rumah gak sampe2 ... parah nih .... apa yang harus di lakukan ? mau ke kebun jeruk .. takut kebun jeruk banjir ... lebih parah lagi. mau naek kereta gak bisa juga .. krn tadi pagi kereta di batalkan semua untuk hari ini ... parah dech .. akhir nya ke wartel (untung ada yang buka) menghubungi rumah di wartel dech. bilang ke orang rumah udah jam 6 tapi masih di slipi .. dan macet banget ... gak dapet mobil pulang...
gimana nih ?

setelah di tengah2 kebimbangan dan kekalutan. muncullah bis ke tangerang (satu-satunya bis yang ke tangerang) dengan setengah berlali2 mengejar bis... bis penuh buanget .. gpp juga dech .. tahan2in aja ... biarin dech .... dari pada gak pulang .....

akhirnya naeik lah bis itu.. dari palmerah ke slipi jaya yang biasanya hanya 15 menit di tempuh dengan 1,5 jam .. parah banget gak tuh ?? udah berdiri di bis .. cape .. ngantuk .. ac nya gak gitu dingin...
ternyata setelah itu lebih lama lagi .. dari slipi jaya sampe ke kebun nanas bener2 tidak menyenangkan .. slipi jaya - tomang --> macet.. tomang - kebun jeruk --> lebih2 macetnya ... ternyata di kebun jeruk ada bbrp tempat yang banjir .. jadinya mobil2 berjalan hanya di satu sisi jalan dan berjalan sangat lambat ...

bis sempet bbrp kali mematikan mesin .. rugi kali yah .. dari jam 6 sore ... sampe jam 9an gak sampe2. .. masih di sekitar tomang .. panas pengap ... haus lagi .. air habis .. di tengah2 waktu itu untungnya ada yang ngasih duduk .. mungkin orang itu udah bt juga kali yah
duduk di dalam bis..
selama duduk itu udah bermacam2 gaya dech di coba untuk lebih nyaman ...
tukang asongan lewat silih berganti di tengah2 jalan itu ....

dengan jalan merayap dan sering kali diam tidak bergerak akhirnya sampai juga ke kebun nanas (tapi sampainya jam 11 berjuang selama 5 jam ) ckckck... orang rumah udah panik .. dan udah bbrp kali tlp... abis gimana dong .. kejebak .. gak bisa jalan ke mana2 .. mau jalan kaki cape . jauh man .. akhirnya tidur2an aja di bis .. sempet juga ketiduran beneran ... hehhehe ..

sampe kebun nanas .. naik roda niaga dech .. seneng dech kalo udah sampe kebun nanas .. udah jelas kemungkinan pulangnya .. hehehe.....

pulang ke rumah udah ampir jam 12 .. gila parah banget sih hari jumat ini .... keluar rumah jam 6 pulang jam 12 malem ... ckckc.... gak lagi2 dech ..

banjir membuat semua acara terhambat d ... :((

2007-02-01T18:23:00.000-08:00

Banjir di mana .. mana ...

Pagi ini perjalanan panjang di mulai. Semua dimulai pada jam 05.15 bangun pagi. dengan sedikit malas-malasan karena hujan. Akhirnya bangun lah aku pagi itu dan mandi. jam 05.45 selesai mandi, minum teh manis dll. Berangkat lah dengan pasti (sambil membawa toga untuk gladi resik nanti siang) sambil mengenakan payung.... Ke stasiun kereta. banyak orang yang berkerumung di depan .. dapet firasat buruk nih .. dan firasat itu ternyata benar... kereta hari ini di batalkan karena di sekitar sudimara - tanah abang terjadi banjir di beberapa tempat. Banjir nya sampai sepinggang. ckckckckk. ..... alam sudah tidak ramah lagi. banjir di mana2 .. mungkin karena kita duluan yang tidak ramah sama alam kali yah ....

Back to perjalanan panjang pagi ini. Karena kereta tidak jalan .. akhirnya (setelah melalui pemikiran yang panjang), diputuskanlah untuk naik angkot dan bis. Jam 06.00 naiklah ke angkot (Roda Niaga) untuk sampai ke Kebun Nanas. Perjalanan masih bisa dibilang lancar walau ada beberapa kali macet di jalan .. tapi tidak parah. Jam 06.45 sampai ke Kebon Nanas. Mulai lah penantian Bis ke Slipi di mulai. Hanya dengan 15 menit menunggu, munculkan akhirnya bis itu. Tapi sayang nya penuh :(( .. karena udah jam 07.00 terpaksa dech .. naik bis yang penuh itu. berdesak-desakan lah. 30 menit berlalu ... macet ... belum sampai kebun jeruk ..... 60 menit berlalu .... masih macet ... dan masih belum sampai kebun jeruk .... 70 menit ... 80 menit ... 90 menit ..... akhirnyaaaaaaaaa setelah berdesak-desakan, bergelayut-gelayut dan bermacet-macet ria, sampai lah di kebun jeruk. Tapi ... ups ... TA aja belum terlihat .. jadi masih mesti bermacet-macet ria untuk sampe ke Slipi.. dari kebun jeruk - tomong - slipi... menghabiskan waktu 20 menit .. sambil macet2 segala sih ......

setelah berdesak2an .. akhirnya turun juga dari bis ... naik jembatan penyebrangan ... naik M24. tapi ternyata tuh M24 ngetem pula .. lama ... udah bt.... udah laper ... hiks.... setelah akhirnya jalan dan sampai ke Binus Tercinta .. ternyata sudah jam 09.00 ..

Parah .... perjalanan dari rumah ke binus sampe 3 jam ... ckckckck ..... parah banget sih ...

dan sampai sekarang hujan masih berlanjut .. gimana bisa ke Depok nih ??? hari ini kan ada gladi resik wisuda di depok .. walah ... di batalin gak yah ..... gimana dong ?? :((
kalo masih hujan terus bisa2 gak jadi ke depoknya.

Besok juga menghawatirkan nih .. hari ini tol BSD - Jakarta di tutup. padahal kalomau ke Depok dari rumah jalan yang paling cepat yah tol BSD - Jakarta itu. Kalau itu di tutup.. gimana bisa pergi besok .. hiks hiks....

Untuk hari ini setelah perjuangan di pagi hari, masih mesti berharap-harap cemas. semoga bisa ke depok dan pulang dengan selamat ke rumah .. dan semoga besok pagi bisa ke depok dengan selamat pula ....

Semoga ........

2007-01-31T23:11:00.000-08:00

Asuransi menyebalkan ... hanya di perusahaan ini saja atau di semua perusahaan ??

Hari ini dapat kabar yang menyebalkan. Pergantian biaya rumah sakit (yang sakit tifus dan campak) ditolak. Ada beberapa berkas yang perlu dilengkapi dan mengharuskan saya kembali ke rumah sakit. Katanya, kurang materai (kwaitansi untuk > 250 rb memerlukan materai) dan referensi pemeriksaan darah (karena ada biaya lab untuk periksa darah mesti ada rujukan dari dokter .. begitu katanya).

Emang seribet itu yah untuk meminta pergantian biaya rumah sakit? bukannya pergantian biaya rumah sakit itu hak dari setiap pegawai? Sebenernya peraturan itu dibuat untuk mencegah terjadi kecurangan kan?? bukan untuk membuat ribet pegawai. Ini aturan dari mana sih ?? Apa setiap pegawai (dalam keadaan sakit) harus mengingatkan rumah sakit / dokter untuk memberikan semua berkas2 yang diperlukan ?? Sudah gitu, setelah bersusah-susah gak di ganti 100 %pula .. apa iyah semua pergantian itu sesuai dengan kerepotan yang sudah dibuatnya ...

Sekarang mau gak mau mesti kembali ke rumah sakit dech. Kalo setelah kembali ke rumah sakit masih kurang-kurang juga bodo dech .. biarin aja. Gak diganti juga bodo dech .. abis menyebalkan sekali ...

sebel .. sebel .. sebel ... bt dech ....

2007-01-31T16:23:00.000-08:00

Membaca buku Competing for The Future (disarankan untuk dibaca oleh Pak Riri Satria di salah satu kelasnya) membawa perspektif baru.

Selama ini sebagian besar orang, termasuk saya, beranggapan untuk memperoleh keuntungan yang lebih tinggi sebuah perusahaan bisa melakukan restructuring dan reenginering. Dengan lebih sedikitnya biaya yang dikeluarkan, keuntungan yang didapat bisa lebih tinggi.

Tapi ternyata bukan hanya itu yang diperlukan oleh sebuah perusahaan untuk bisa tetap exists dan diperhitungkan di dunia industrinya. Sebuah perusahaan, untuk tetap bisa bersaing, diharapkan bisa melakukan restructuring, reenginering dan regenerating (reinventing) konsep industrinya. Untuk tetap exist di dunia industri, sebuah perusahaan harus bisa menjadi contoh atau penentu aturan di industri tersebut dan tidak hanya sekedar mengejar ketinggalan dari kompetitor-kompetitornya yang lain.

Bagaimana melakukannya salah satunya adalah dengan mempunyai pandangan ke depan (Intellectual Leadership), melakukan perubahan sesuai dengan pandangan ke depan (management of migration paths) tersebut dan berkompetisi untuk market share (Competition for market share).

-- to be continue ...........

2007-01-30T16:40:00.000-08:00

Pagi2 udah di kantor nih.
Menikmati pagi di kantor. hehehe..
Waktu tanggal 24-27 sakit.. menyebalkan dech. di suruh makan bubur mulu. sakit campak + tifus. kenapa penyakit bisa bergabung jadi satu yah .. hmm... aneh.
Tapi untungnya sekarang sudah sembuh. sudah baik2 saja. walaupun waktu senin pas masuk kerja masih agak melayang2 sih.. hahah untung aja melayangnya gak kejauhan :P

Bulan ini melihat gaji baru .. yang kalau di pikir2 lumayan sih .. cuman lindanya aja yang boros. jadi gaji segitu tidak mencukupi =)) mesti lebih sering ngirit nih ... kl enggak pasti gak punya simpenan mulu. sekarang aja simpanan berkurang.. padahal setelah gak kuliah harusnya uang yang ditabung lebih banyak .. ini malah kebalikannya .. pas udah gak kuliah malah lebih sering main2 dan belanja2 dan menghabiskan uang. parah nih .. kok jadi boros banget. ckckck. kl ketauan cici wah bisa di omelin...

ooo iyah .. bulan ini juga linda gak kos lagi. pulang balik rumah. dari kemanggisan ke serpong. jauh juga sih. dan yang pasti cape. tapi gpp dech. abis di rumah gak ada orang. cuman ada papa sama mama. kasian mama (kata cici sih kesepian) udah gak ada cici linda yang tinggal di sana lagi. jadinya kesepian dech ..... jadi linda pulang ke rumah nemenin mama dan papa.

Tgl 3 linda wisuda loh ;)) ... tapi belum buat persiapan apa2. pergi sama siapa dan naik apa pun belum di pikirkan. trus gak ada kamera lagi hiks hiks ... kameranya di pakai semua .. gimana dong .. masa gak foto2 :(. mesti mencari pinjeman kamera =)) ada yang mau minjemin ??

Udah ampir jam 8 tapi kantor masih sepi nih.. pada males dateng pagi kali yah. kan agak gerimis. mendingan sih tidur aja di rumah .. aduh jadi ngantuk ..

2007-01-19T00:16:00.000-08:00

Pengen ke sini lagi ..... kapan yah bisa liburan .....

2007-01-18T23:30:00.000-08:00

Akhirnya tesis lulus, semua matakuliah lulus, tinggal tunggu waktu wisuda. Tgl 3 February. cepet yah.. akhirnya bisa selesai dech kuliah s2nya.
Selama kuliah s2 ini linda banyak banget dibantu oleh keluarga, dosen-dosen MTI UI, staf-staf MTI UI, dan teman-teman di MTI UI maupun di Binus. Terima kasih semua nya .. selalu membantu dan memberikan dorongan baik secara langsung maupun tidak langsung.

Untuk keluarga linda yang selalu memberikan dorongan dan bantuan .. makasih mama dan papa yang selalu mendukung pilihan-pilihan yang linda ambil .. walaupun kadang pilihan-pilihannya suka gak masuk akal. makasih cici-cici linda tercinta ... muah muah ... dorongannya bener-bener berarti ... makasih. Johan dan Andri makasih atas printer dan kertas nya yang untuk sementara waktu linda culik demi menyelesaikan tesis .. hehehe .. sekarang printernya udah bisa dikembalikan dengan baik dan benar kok :P

Untuk dosen-dosen MTI UI, terima kasih atas ilmu-ilmu yang diberikan. banyak perspektif-perspektif baru yang didapatkan selama kuliah di MTI UI. Terima kasih yang spesial untuk Pak Benny Ranti yang sudah membimbing linda di tesis dan matakuliah Investasi. maaf yah pak bila linda sering merepotkan bapak dengan koreksian-koreksian tesis .... Terima kasih yang gak kalah spesialnya untuk Pak Yudho Giri Sucahyo (semoga ejaannya bener) yang sudah membimbing linda juga dalam tesis dan matakuliah database juga nasehat-nasehatnya yang diberikan. linda bisa ngelamar jadi dosen mti gak pak ?? hehehehehe ... Terima kasih pada pak Riri, pak Budy, pak Muki, pak Rifki, pak Uchok, pak eko, ibu aniati, ibu betty, pak johny, pak wahyu, pak dana, pak ari, pak adhi, .. kayaknya sudah semua dosen yang ngajar linda dech .... (kl ada terlupakan maaf yah ....)

Untuk staf-staf MTI UI, terima kasih sudah membantu mengurus surat-surat administratif selama linda kuliah di MTI UI. Terima kasih sudah mau menelpon/mengemail linda apabila ada kabar-kabar terbaru. Makasih juga pada Ibu Sri + Ibu yang satu lagi (gak tau namanya :P) yang sudah nungguin linda mengumpulkan tesis + numpang ngeprint lagi. hhehhehe .. oo iyah .. sama pak rizwan (semoga ejaannya benar juga) juga .. udah banyak di tanya2 .. hehehhe

Untuk temen-temen kuliah di MTI UI, selamat yah .. akhirnya kita bisa melalui semester 3 .. walaupun ada juga yang BT dengan nilai-nilai yang di dapat .. hehehe... Untuk yang wisuda tgl 3 ini .. nanti kita foto bareng yah .. jangan kabur2an ... sampe ketemu tgl 3. Untuk yang blm selesai tesis/pa nya ... ayo semangat - semangat ..... cepetan selesaiin ... oo iyah .. makasih yah semuanya .. sudah memberikan dukungan selama linda kuliah .. jadi inget saat-saaat mengerjakan tugas sampe jam 1an malem.. wah gak bakalan terulang lagi tuh ... kapan nih ... bisa ngulang lagi ?? =))

Untuk teman-teman di binus maupun di tempat lain ... makasih yah ... udah kasih dukungan sama linda dan udah bantuin terjemahin abstrak ke bahasa inggris (makasih ceemot, santy, ci hen, engkong) .. lain kali .. bantuin terjemahin lagi yah. abisnya tulisan inggris linda kan aneh :P
untuk bos-bos linda di binus.. makasih udah ngertiin linda kalo linda sering ijin untuk ngerjain tugas atau tesis atau sidang. terutama akhir-akhir ini. thanks yah. btw, jangan nagih traktiran mulu dong ... hehe lagi bokek nih ... traktirannya tergantung kenaikan gaji yah :P kalo gaji naek gede baru di traktir =))

Untuk yang belum di sebut namanya..... thanks all. 3 Semester di MTI UI merupakan kenangan yang tidak ternilai .....