stupid tv

have been spending time in a hospital for almost a week. no, it's not me sick; it's anna's father. all the time i have been watching tv. and i've come to agree with anna how stupid the programs are. you switch channels around and all you get is crappy news or dumb local series ("sinetron" -- for "electronic cinema"). the ramadhan just passed, but i still remember: every hour you can find a "sinetron" devoted for the holy month, except that it's nothing but ghost story. this is the typical plot: some guy commits sin - he is killed in a car accident - his body gets eaten by worms - he haunts his friends and families. this kills me.

and this week, the news rooms get a pet. it's the killing of "dr. azahari" -- the most hunted terrorist. suddenly all tv channels and even radios and newspapers keep talking on that issue. really boring. ok, that man is dead. big deal!

"sms"

it's reaching the eid day. expect your cellphones to get clogged by "sms" (short message service). love the technology.

the story of @ in email address

via google own blog, we learn that @ just turns 34. amazing, the founder didn't file for a patent. there are people like tomlinson who create yet overlooked. happy birthday, @.

this is ALIVE!

hello there. i know, you have declared that this blog is seriously ignored by its owner. he seems to like his other blogs more (linked on the right pane). but no, you are reading a new post now. i'm back -- this time with no excuse -- nope, nada. just look at how i wrote "alive" above. i usually don't bother hitting "shift" or "caps lock", except when i mean formality or ... some kind of promise...

why back, so? because, yes sometimes when i get so bored i have to vent out. a nonsensical blog makes a good ventout. besides, my wife believes i'm more convincing in talking nonsense than talking economics. what a compliment: i got d-minus trying to persuade my family members that market is wonderful and price tells everything.

other than that, life goes on:

• many local pundits now have a new bible. it's called "confession of an economic hit man", written by some shaman lover (google up!). i don't like it. but, i'm not allowed by the blog owner to discuss it here. (by the way, did i tell you that sachs failed his nobel prize? and bono, too?)
  
• my brother has chosen his way: populism. i applaud his motivation and humanism. i disagree with his solution. that guy from jogja really cloud my brother's eyes.
  
• still listen to music and still read fun stuff. as i'm writing this, billie holiday is singing "i'll never be the same". in my car i have ayn rand's "fountainhead" -- sort of reread the classics, i told people. (yes, "on the road" is still on the closet top). and oh, by the way, i watch "alias" every day on the way home. (i love laptops -- not when i'm crunching numbers of algorithm on them, but mostly when i use it watching movie).
  
• have added new thingy to my laptop (because i have to not replace it). a pcmcia card for internet phone connection. no, not for oral conversation -- it's my solution to extremely unreliable connection at office.

be back to you again. AGAIN.

shame on you, china!

for doing this, this, and now this.

my nephew said i'm the greatest driver

news from my sister in tokyo. from her chat with fadel:

nesia: who's the best driver?
fadel: uncle aco! uncle aco!
nesia: are you sure?
fadel: yes, yes. uncle aco!
nesia: why him? why not auntie nanna?
fadel: ugh... well... look... when it comes to street-turns, uncle aco doesn't need to slow down. auntie nanna does.....

i take that as a compliment :-)

should we always tolerate the wrong?

kompas reports (in bahasa) that a doctoral student quit her hunger strike, after her demand was granted by her department. according to the report, she started the strike two days before as she found that the university had decided to expell her from school. the system has it, you have to register every semester. she failed to do that because she was "in maternity leave". a university official says that the student has failed to re-register for four (!) consecutive terms.

the student happens to be a leading activist -- or so implied by the newspaper. she was accompanied by her fellow activists in doing her protest. demonstratively she also burned her textbooks.

what in the world is all this? you've got system with rules in it. you violated the rule. but you don't want to bear the consequences. you did admit your mistake, yet you refuse punishment; you even blame somebody else for your own failure.

if i were an authority in the department, i would not tolerate such irresponsibility. even if it comes from "important" persons in the society.

aussie's freak

news this morning: "90 percent of australians believe that corby is not gulity". of course! whoever did that stupid "research" should have also sampled indonesians. and, trust me, the news would say: "while 90 percent of indonesians believe otherwise". what good do this kind of silly polling do for peace? crap.

by the way, read the linked article above. "some (australians) declared they would never travel to bali again". so what, mate? big deal!

i think i'm gonna watch it, finally

it's the "starwars". just like the case of "lord of the rings", i have found no strong urge in me that could lead me to go watch either series. they are not my things. but, now that all the starwars series are completed, i might as well spend some whole day to see why so many people like this kind of thing.

indonesian starbucks is joining force with bank niaga

how many, do you think, bank customers are coffee lovers? how many coffee lovers like to do their banking activities in a coffee shop? myself being both a bank customer and coffee lover, am inclined to say, well, not too many. in fact, i am afraid that frequent coffee house visitors will get disturbed by a bunch of bank customers -- many of which might have no interest in enjoying the coffee.

so, i think this plan is stupid.

just married

the day was april 24. and that explains why i haven't been writing. but now i'm back. (by the way, here's a new blog of us/ours).

the blogosphere welcomes dio

and this is special why? because the blogger is my very own brother. i was in jogjakarta two nights ago when he called me up. he launched his blog. he's still same ol' bro: watch the name of his blog. my favorite post is his poem to his wife. it says, more or less:

she who i've been knowing is a beauty
and in her six month pregnancy
she remains so: you're beautiful

i'm just a hard damn coral reef
and you're my cute lil' anemone

will (s)he be born as a rock or a fish?
ah, may (s)he be pretty as you are
and hard as i'd like to be

god, why is july so distant?

phew, that was a long pause

indeed. was too busy, i guess. just got back from a field survey. i was in east borneo for couple of days for a research on the impact of oil and gas industry on the regional development. in particular, the environmental aspects. but hey, this is a fun blog, so forget about the nitty-gritty.

some real stuff for this blog include:

1. east kalimantan is just ok. it's statistically the richest province in indonesia. but it doesn't seem so. corruption is pervasive, for your information.
2. it felt good to be back on the seashore, breathing that familiar salty air and talking with fishermen. missed my childhood.
   
3. internet sucks in balikpapan, the capital. no, probably just in the hotel i was staying. it's damn expensive. i got a better deal across the street. it was ten times cheaper. yes, cheaper if you don't internalize the cost of sitting among smokers!
4. as exciting as it is, i failed to gather information on the impact of oil drilling on deep sea whales.
   

that's about my survey. now, as i am back to the real world again, i gather:

1. bloglines wins. i'm happy. but google loses to yahoo. how come?
2. wolfie is likely to be the next chief of the bank. what were they thinkin'?
3. nias was hit by another earthquake. my deepest condolence to the victims.
4. what else? ah, nieces and nephews are getting cuter. they kill me.

by the way, expect a migration to my own domain soon!

iyya wants protection, too

iyya, my other niece is 16 months old. i am told, kids start walking not long after their first birthdays. but iyya refuses to do so. not because she can't -- she knows, she is guaranteed protection. once we were amazed: she walked firmly about ten meters. then she saw her nanny. she stopped right away, sitting on the floor, waving her hands. for the rest of the day, she refused to walk by herself.

people do respond to incentives :-)

addendum: iyya started to talk earlier than normal kids, though!

pachi's tech is Leontief!

i couldn't help but blogging this. once i thought, this is a material for the other blog. but this is so fun, and not necessarily econic -- so you read it here. pachi, my cute niece is, as i just found out, leontief-ian. her mother told me this story over the dinner. she bought pachi a set of cute stationary set. it has six colorful pages to write letter on and three envelopes. it's time for pachi to write letter to her friends. when she's done she showed it to her mom. mom saw three letters, each with single page and three envelopes -- one for each letter. mom asked her, so you still have three pages leftover, honey? pachi stared at her mom. "mom," she said, "why should i still have them? you gave me only three envelopes. but you gave me too many papers. i threw three pages to the trash bin". isn't she cute?

walt hates blogosphere (roy suryo sort of thing)

all this thing about eason jordan's resignation from the cnn. he talked to the public, things went awry, he resigned, big deal! that happens everywhere! so why in the world is this walt rodgers guy so blaming it on the blogging world? i say, mind your own kitchen, walt!

happy valentine, roy

people love you, and i'm joining in.

don't read this

men of violence

on the way back from dubai i read this book. beware, don't do the same mistake. this is an extremely ill-written book. unless you are willing to read 200-ish pages of cheap big-mouthing, do not waste your money.

pity this man

"...about your hatred toward friendster and blog (sic!), i pity you..."

so i wrote to this person. frankly, i never took him seriously. but this morning i couldn't keep laughing when reading his letter to tempo magazine. and i'm not surprised to see so many "fans" of him in the internet. try google him and you know what i mean.

the proposal

tie the knot!

another step forward, yesterday.

rip: my flashdrive

my flashdrive has gone

me so sad. i have been with her for about 3 years. until i accidentally left her in a taxi. yes, it was foolish: i didn't notice the cab's id. friend, wherever you are now, me still love you. i'm sorry, i never mean to hurt you like that...

snobs for humanity

my concern has just been confirmed, based on a discussion with a journalist who just came back from aceh. the story goes like this. some pop icon celebrities rented a private airplane from jakarta to aceh. one member of the crowd was having a birthday. so yes, en route to the killing fields, in that plane in the sky, some people were having good time. singing and cheering happy birthday. then they arrived. took pictures here and there. in less than an hour, they were back in the airplane. some hours later, they were presenting their "first-hand" observation on tv, as if they had been struggling there for days helping people. clowns.

and they call that new paradigm!

so the newsletter says (translated freely):

choosing the deans: new paradigm -- it's selection, not election. selection is good. because it requires thorough assessment by a competent committee. Bla bla bla...

since when democracy means "selection" and not "election"? since these people think they are better assessors than you. you can't elect your dean (you can't cast your vote). They should select one for you.

well, i say crap.

money talks, bullshit walks

so that corruptor's son shot an innocent young man to death. everybody there saw it.
then you start to tremble:

oh god, what do we do, what do we do! this shooter is a vvip. he should never be wronged. this man is so darn rich he is outlaw. what do we do, what do we do! people, people! somebody please hide the gun! somebody please cover for him. what do we do, what do we do! for god's sakes get the damn press out of here! somebody please make up stories. write he was drunk. write he was high. write he didn't mean to shot. oh god, this man is a vvip. his father was a godfather. his brother is vvvvvvvip. oh god, what do we do, what do we do! somebody please stop the news. dear god, how can we change the case into an innocent shooting by a drunkard? oh god, this man is a noble. he's not to be downgraded like that. how about "guilty of driving without license"? what do we do, what do we do! oh, sh*t...

writing, i mean reading. no, both.

i was thinkin' about my discussion with ces-mad and hasif the other day. we were talking about writing. about how this country really lacks of good writers. hasif was telling us about how difficult it was once for him to manage a literary journal. the harderst part is always to find good writers. there are bunch of writers out there. but many of them are simply persons who write -- not "writer" in the sense of "author". this is not only the case in prose or literary critiques, but also in poetry. hasif mentioned to us his experience as an editor for poems in a leading newspaper's culture page. it was painstaking: the authors are just the same persons taking turns over and over again. no matter how hard you try to motivate your readers to start writing, you end up requesting the same authors to hand in their other pieces for the next issues. many times, hasif had to use his own pieces -- himself is a writer and a literary critic. he did received bundles of pieces requesting for publication. ninety percent are craps.

ces and i shared his concern. i think this problem is pervasive: not only in literary but in all media. i told them, even kompas and tempo, the two leading media are now in their lowest quality levels as far as editings are concerned. pick one. pick one news at random. read. you find a typo already? or grammatical errors? they even publish rubbish. on televisiontoo: everyday we consume junk news (many times, buying those pirated dvd's and enjoying them instead of watching the news on tv, will leave you more enriched). radios are the same.

but ces, hasif, and me agreed; this problem has it's twin sister. reading problem. i always believe, those who can write well cannot be the ones who seldom read. i remember one day when i was still in journalism mood, back in the college years. i was invited as a speaker to a session in a journalistic training in the department of letter. they asked me to give a talk on how to write well -- journalistic-wise. i had told them: you can't teach people how to write well (and i have no idea myself, how to write well). i asked them to slightly change the topic into "how to write effectively". they didn't want to change it ("the training kits has been distributed" -- ah well). so i told them: ok then, but no paper to be handed out. they insisted: i had to present a paper. so there i went. with a paper. there was only one word in the whole paper: R-E-A-D.

but i should admit. reading too much can be dangerous. (ces and hasif seconded me). the more you read the more confident you are about some issue you want to elaborate on. but, you'd better stop somewhere before you realize you know... nothing. now we can understand why some writers fade, just after they have been so good. (or, to make me feel better: there are persons who never even reach the "good-part-one" level and somehow want to think they have, and then think they are in the state of knowing-too-much-hence-know-nothing. we were afraid we are in this set). only very few writers can write well all the time. (well, maybe not. change "all" to "most of"). we were talking about mas goen. he's the first candidate we would list in that rarest-breed-of-writers-list. and hasif told us: even gm sometimes admits, writing is damn difficult.

and writing this is one way to learn, i guess?

arrgh.

the cute riot

fadhl-figo-pacchi

These are some of them I told you about elsewhere...

alterego strikes again

i admit it. i am always distracted by oh so many things. so there are times when i just hate what i am supposed to like: economics. no, i can't explain why. it's like married couple (or so they told me). you never like one another every second of time. distance is good sometimes. it gives you room to look at where you usually stand: and you might want to change a little.

now that explains why i have this blog -- in addition to this.

i'm not gonna describe what this blog will look like. it might even dissappear from the blogosphere the next time you click the footage in your web-history link. in case i don't like it that much.

enough today.

when i hate econ