After a long hibernation

.. Finally decided ending the long hibernation f(^^

For the last 2 years, I’d been sending nengyajo – postcard for friends in Japan and outside Japan. I prepared buying, hand writing like somewhere in November, but this year I haven’t even bought single postcard, I am afraid I spent time buying lil presents for friends, baking and attended some company and pre-christmas events.
As it seems like i’m not able to keep my two consecutive years tradition sending the postcard this year, I’d like to wish you my warmest advanced warm Merry Christmas and Happy New Year greeting. Wish you many many more for the upcoming 2011. I know it’ll be exciting for all of us.. 🙂

We had a Terry Fox running,  it’s a Running for Hope volunteer-led event which the raised fund goes to the cancer research. I personally view it’s a run family or friend time for good cause. Not only for health reason, but also for charity. 😉
The participation fee is the donation of at least 3,000 yen with the targeted participants as many as 1,000 people. This is an annual event held by the support of Canadian embassy and Four Season Hotel. And the running itself takes place in Imperial Palace, giving the option of 5km or 10km run. Not all the employees ran. almost half enjoyed good walk, the other half participated the 5km run, and a few completed the 10 km run. Unfortunately I only managed to run a 5km course, stamina’s dropped due to no endurance training since winter.

Terry Fox - Run for Hope

Start line for 10km run

At the end of the run, each participant was given a bag of banana, apple, ham bread sausage, energy drink. They also provided salmon snack and yaki onigiri – grilled rice ball for free.

Energy Drinks & Mineral Water

Yaki Onigiri - Grilled Rice Ball

The interesting parts are also that they gave out the participation certificate with the name of participant on it. And also there’s lucky draw, we’ve got piles of numbers.. And guess what I got? I got 3 coupons and I got 2 prizes out of those three. It’s a cute winter cap and also a Dr Ci LaBo BB Perfect Light Cream which costs like 4,200 yen. Lucky! The first prize is Four Season Hotel stay.

Certificate of Participation

Winter Cap & Dr.Ci:Labo BB Cream

The other company event is the annual year-end event, a Christmas dining which requires us to dress up to the theme decided. This is my first year experience, and the theme was dream job. I’m wondering what I should wear, the simple one which needs no money is to dress up as Balinese dancer as I already have the whole set costume, but it’s winter and I don’t think it’s a good idea to dress up having the full course dining with the summer-like costume. LOL. The other thing that I could think of is ballerina, but I don’t want it to become like an adorable wow beautiful ballerina that I could get compliments during the party. I wanted something different, so kept on browsing the online shops until
stuck on one interesting costume. I requested Arman for help if he could order and send it to Japan since the shops I stumbled that time provided no delivery to Japan. The unfortunate thing is also that it’s so closed to the Halloween when almost all the costumes were sold out. Finally I got one from Amazon UK, it costs me like 2K yen+ but the delivery cost is like 4k yen+, phew! f(^^
And are you ready to see how I looked like in the party? The most embarrasing costume among the ladies.

Graduation

Picture tells thousand words. Bumped to the old pictures and made me feel like writing.. ^^

I was a naive-teens struggled to pursue my higher study after completing senior high school. I was badly hopping to get into university in Australia. There were days when my friends mostly managed to decide their choices going to Germany, US, Singapore, Malaysia, etc, while I still went from one to the other education exhibitions in town, collecting the pamphlets and calculating the tuition as well as living costs.
It reminds me of the tough time since I got no support from parents of going to Australia. They wanted me to stay in hometown with couple of reasons, particularly in financial issue.
However, I finally managed to convince my strict daddy to go at least to Jakarta. ^^
My cousins were there, and they helped me in the sense of convincing my daddy for the tragic riot case as well as the overview of the expenses. Thanks to them! On the other side, my daddy always wants us to propose and manage our finance. So, even he’s convinced, he still need me to make kind of proposal, finding out the cost that he needs to cover for the bachelor degree. Yes, different families have different way of teaching the kids. As I went to a private school with pretty many well-off families background students, most of my friends had no burden to even think of the money. Some of them were even got decided from parents where to pursue their studies. Frankly I felt how easy and lucky their lives were, they didn’t even need not to think about the cost. But at the time passed by, I’m truly thankful for the process that I went through until what I am now. At the end of the day, my daddy approved my proposal. He sold the car and I got funded for half of the total cost of university in advance. It’s very nostalgic moment, I even kissed the car before it was given to the buyer since the car had given so many memories for my family.

As the only daughter and the first time to be away from parents, my daddy went to Jakarta accompanying me to make sure everything’s settled. We went on ship, operated by P.T. Pelayaran Nasional Indonesia (Pelni) which took us 3 days 2 nights to reach Jakarta. There’re lot of things I learned during the journey. I made new friends and knowing the fact that we would go to the same university. What an unforgettable experience.

Let’s work out..

I know.. I know that I still have the posting of my moving last March in the draft folder. It’s the 3rd time moving in Japan, and as always I hate packing and moving.
– 1st time moving from nomaden living to Mitaka Lodging
– 2nd time moving from Mitaka Lodging to super quality Odaiba dormitory
– 3rd one is my current room which changes my life style dramatically.

After moving out from Odaiba and living in new apato (apartment), but please dun think of the luxurious apartment which most likely located in the heart of city, like in Indonesia.. The apartment in Japan is the most ordinary people can afford. It’s usually only one small room. Well, depend on the type 1K, 2K, 1LDK, etc.

One of the dramatic change is nobody is really knowing each other. It’s completely different when I used to live in dormitory, I always felt having a lot of friends surround. Not to mention that I no longer can dispose trash any day. In the previous dorm, no matter how late I came back home, I could still go to gym which is only 2 minutes away from my building. The gym facility for residents open til midnight, so I always have chance to work out for quite some time.

In my new residential area, sure we don’t have the gym facility. I already thought of joining the gym club, but it’s a bit far. I gained weight, and at the same time feel my health and stamina dropped.
After almost 6 weeks, the brilliant idea of starting all over the exercise popped up. Yes, I want exercise which I can do on my own pace at my convenient time. And it’s running in the neighborhood. 🙂

So these are the running gear I’ve!
A pair of  Nike Running Plus shoes and sportband + sensor.

The sportband and the sensor

This is how the sensor is attached inside the Nike plus shoe.

It keeps track of every run detail ~ calories, pace, distance. It save the personal best in the training history keeping motivated and challenged from the world wide Nike runners.
I made progress set and track goals of burning 2000 kcal on the first month, and I made it, that’s why I reached orange level (like what I wrote in previous fashion chronicle project)

This month, my target is burning 4000 kcal, but seems like I’m gonna fail it, since we’re entering rainy season in Japan. huhuhu.. Yeah at least, I can still keep my body fit, and moreover still about 2 weeks to go to burn other 3000+ kcal. Go Willy!

Fashion Chronicle ~ Flower

~~ Konbanwa Tokyo Ohayou New York Konnichiwa London ~~
This gonna be the sixth posting of this year, lol.. I realized how unproductive I have been heh! I’ve got few drafts written in March though.. f(^^) I plan to finalize them, mottainai kara ne~ but for now I’ll post about fashion chronicle.

I was blogwalking to Inge‘s and she posted about fashion chronicle thingy with her first flower theme. I guess Elrica is the pioneer as I read in her posting before.
Inge’s asking if somebody would like to join the fashion chronicle.
Yeah, I know I’m not a fashionable type of gal. Not following the fashion magazine like Vivi, Can Cam. I’d say that I’m not that shopping-freak like what I used to be. Back then in my hometown, my mom and I loved window shopping which was obviously we did shopping at the end – clothes and accessories. As I have no sister, I did share clothes with mom.
I try to do mix and match my old wardrobes with my different collection, trying to having a new look.
Back to the project, I couldn’t even pop up wif any single idea of the flower stuffs that I’ve until yesterday. Yes! I found out that I do have quite number of flower stuffs from skirt, blouse, T-shirt, lol.
PS. Inge, sorry I just post it today m(_ _)m

So, here we go.. I have taken two different looks
The first picture I took it yesterday for the chronicle post.

Top : Jeans West Fits Best
Skirt : Tutuana
Got the skirt two weeks ago in Shibuya for 50% disc.

=-=-=-=-=-=

Actually never planned for the second one. I wore this outfit before going to violin course and realized that this has flower as well.
As I got orange level for Nike running target, I simply thought it’ll be nice to take the pic of my today’s orange outfit which also has flower in it for fashion chronicle. wkwkwk

Top : Present from my auntie when I was around 18
Skirt : Tutuana
Yes, this one was the same time grab sale like the skirt above.

Hey, tomorrow is Monday? really? oh, i see. 😛
Have a whole great week frenz! 😉

Osechi ryouri – Japanese new year’s food

Last summer, I was invited by my friend to the baking class for free trial class. Having her doing the reservation, I just went right away to the Roppongi studio of ABC, craving for Chiffone with fresh orange and mango. At the end of the class, I ended up signing membership as it’s a very tempting offer. 50% discount for student.

They have a lot of studios throughout Japan with 3 courses: cooking, cake, and bread.
After thorough consideration, I decided signing for cooking course. It would be the best for me, it will be quite applicable for daily life. Yeah, it’s too bad, I never cooked for myself. I started cooking since I came to Japan. In my childhood, my mom’s so busy so we ate catering food. And when I moved to Jakarta for the bachelor degree, a lot of cafetarias offering variety of food with affordable price. So I never really cook. f(^^

Ok, to make story short, I did enjoy the cooking class. I went there couple times and invited some friends for trial classes as well. It’s nice due to the studio atmosphere, and the class’s delivered in a small group, consists of up to 4 persons in one session. And the most important thing, it’s not a cooking demo class like in Indonesia – we are all involved for the practical cooking.
As for the cooking course, there’ll be 3 different kinds of menu each month. And last December, Inge and I attended for the Osechi ryouri-御節料理 menu. (Japanese new year’s food)

Originally, during first three days of the New Year it was a taboo to use a hearth and cook meals. That’s why Osechi was traditionally home made, prepared by the close of the previous year, as women did not cook in the New Year. ^^

Here we go..

Each of the osechi symbolizes particular meaning to celebrate the coming new year.
And the presentation may differ from one region to others. Like the shape of mochi as well, will be different from Kanto area(in my case, Tokyo) to Kansai area(Osaka, Kobe, etc)

Shrimp have long whiskers and their backs are curved, they are associated with elder people. People eat shrimp hoping to live a long life.

* Ebi (エビ), skewered prawns cooked with sake and soy sauce,  symbolizes long life as the shrimp have long whiskers and curved backs which associated with elder people.

* Zouni (雑煮), a soup of mochi rice cakes in clear broth (in eastern Japan) or miso broth (in western Japan). The source of the sweetness doesn’t basically come from sugar, but rice with the natural sweetness. The vegetables in the soup symbolizes smooth human relations, having many descendants, being promoted in the world, not to become jealous or petty and to put down strong roots.

* Tazukuri (田作り), dried sardines cooked in soy sauce. The literal meaning of the kanji in tazukuri is “rice paddy maker”, as the fish were used historically to fertilize rice fields. The symbolism is of an abundant harvest.

* Toori yasai maki (鶏野菜巻き),　vegetable rolled in the chicken. I don’t know the meaning, sorry.

* Kuro-mame (黒豆), black soybeans. Mame also means “health,” symbolizing a wish for health in the New Year.

*Kurikinton(栗きんとん）、mashed sweet potatoes with chestnuts

I got the chance sharing about Indonesia in front of the elementary school students. And they asked me what’s the food for new year in Indonesia? As Indonesian are multicultural nation, so I just gave them example that we have different types of new year celebration. And as for the Moslem who are the majority in Indonesia, they usually eat ketupat. Am I correct? And of course, a very big big meal is waiting right? Gulai kambing, rendang, and so on..

お年玉付郵便葉書

The tradition of sending postcard – nengajyou (年賀状）in Japan is quite old, dating back in Heian period. In this digital area, instead of sending the physical greeting cards, most people tend to send sms or mms..
But that’s not the case in Japan.. December is the busy month to clean up the house, and also prepare up to hundred postcards i guess..

The postcards are sold in the convenient store, but most Japanese don’t like to use the mass-design postcards. They design theirs, generally beautify them with the family’s pictures or the panorama shots around their house or the shots they took during their trips that year.

Some of you got the postcards from me.. but I apologize if I missed sending to you.. I did it manually to give personal touch, and it was so hectic that I sent them separatedly, however there’re some errors from my side. Some postcards sent from Shanghai after the conference, and the others were sent from Japan around 5 times delivery.
In the Shanghai airport, I rushed to find the postcards, writing the names but when I was about to send, I found out that I ran out of money! lol.. so eventhough they were already written, they had to come back to Tokyo with me and finally sent by Japanese postage. Did you notice that?
*poke the recipients*, I hope you didn’t. LOL..
And I felt that I missed writing the country name, so it went back to me, and there’re also postcards without my address, I guess. (because Naki didn’t get my postcard last year). So maybe either it ended up in the post office belongs to nobody or it was the mistake in Indonesia postal. haha.. *human error*

By the way, there’s お年玉付郵便葉書 – otoshidama tduke yuubin hagaki (postcard with new year present). So if you see there’s serial numbers on the back side of the postcard..
And there’s kinda lottery for that.. The winners are based on the 6,5, 4, and 2 last numbers..

It goes like this..

For example the 1st prize (the one who got the postcard with the serial number of 975424, and one present can be chosen out of these five :
– Sharp AQUOS Digital Hi-Vision 32 inch LCD TV with built-in Blu-ray Disc recorder
– Overseas or Domestic trip
– Toshiba Netbook + Casio Digital Camera + Canon Inkjet printer
– Canon Digital Video Cam
– Office goods sets
2nd prize nintendo + Wii and so on and so forth..

I’ve checked mine and I didn’t win.. how about yours? ^^
Please checked this site
If yours are one of the mentioned numbers.. You can send it back to Japan, haha.. The gift exchange period was started and will last on July 26.

終わった！

Thank you for the best wishes ^^
The presentation’s finally finished, even though I still haven’t known the result..
I was the first presenter on the 1st day of defense, starting from 9AM.
Four professors for examiner role with 30 minutes time limitation: 18 minutes presentation and 12 minutes Q&A. I made it pretty good, sharp 18 mins for the presentation.

I did have sore throat and influenza symptom in the weekend and now I’m officially catching cold, having runny nose and severe headache. The disturbance during the night had to be one of the reason too. I got phone call when I already got into deep sleep, I guess those guys just wanted to invited me to go down to the courtyard playing snowball fight or making snowboy.. fiuh, just didn’t pick it up, appreciate it, but it’s just not the right timing and ruined my night.-_-;
Then woke up 3 to 4 times during the night worrying about waking up late. In addition, I had nightmare.. I dreamed that I misinterpreted the date, I went to Hongo campus instead of Komaba campus. It takes 1 hour to commute from one to another. Even if I still could rush, I just realized that it’s already 10.30 AM which means I was late 90mins for the presentation. what a dream! *heart attack in the dream* lol..

I don’t know when I’m going to get the result but I got the revision suggestion from one of the examiner. So we submitted 4 copies of our thesis, and only 2 were back to me. 1 set full of revision suggestion, and the other one is completely blank.
Ok, I think at the time being I can relieve to some extent..

*In the morning, most of the trains have the seats fold up due to rush hour until 10 AM*

明日だ！

I love the first date of the month which falls on the new week (which is Monday). I take it as another way for self-motivation. It simply injects my mind that new month, new week, new energy.. And yes, it’s! In the morning, I got the response of the awaited email which made me quite anxious during weekend. Yes, it’s about the job. Everything seems so closed in front me, like the Hawaian girls welcoming me warmly. There’ll be meeting to discuss the packages on this coming Friday. Yeay!

And yep,yep.. finally the time comes! It’s gonna be tomorrow at 9AM for my defense. I have decided to wake up early but now “early” should be re-defined more and more earlier. Why? Because the first snow fell today on the new week of the new month..

Tata told me it’s good sign, since it’s rarely snowing in Tokyo. Thanks Tata! Amen!! But I’m just worried if the trains stops due to the snow. The railway companies really gonna stop the services, they really take it serious even it’s 1 inch snow.. so hopefully tomorrow’s everything gonna be smooth.. *praying mode*

Ok, I have finished hot oden for my dinner, made the posting and now ready for rehearsal and bit reading of the reference papers.
Then plan to sleep earlier, wake up fresh with no more sneezing.
Wish me luck yah! *wink wink*

*明日だ(It’s tomorrow!)

Mixed Blessings

New year, new nuance, new ornaments in the room..
I presented myself these three cute lucky cat charms from Kyoto.

Small achievements

In the last one week, instead of listening to music while doing my work, I was so much into the court fighting videos and news of Bibit-Chandra case. I find it like battle in the court for the existence of each institution. 5 billions for bribery, wow! what a number of money,can I make that much money in 10 years from now? 😛
Somehow I’m amazed on how the recording of which those names from KPK (Indonesian Corruption Watch- ICW), Anggodo, Yulianto, Ari and all those related stuffs could be consumed by public..  It shows good improvement from those past years and the direction to change a better Indonesia.. Btw, do you also follow Wiliardi’s startling testimony in the court yesterday? Wondering how those two cases will end.. Let us see..

Well, well.. just wanna list down some achievements in this posting. 😛
(1) Got interviewed by Nihon Terebi asking about the impressive points about Japan. Of course, there’re lotssss but only got 10 seconds to convey the impression.  huhu.. Yeay! At least show up on local TV though for 10 seconds only. ;P.  As the rewards, the crews offered us – other four interviewess and me to choose small present : handkerchief , mobile accessories, etc and I picked up set of mechanical pencil and ballpoint. hihihi

Ballpoint and Mechanical Pencil - Nihon Terebi

(2) Round trip ticket for conference to Shanghai bought finally! It’ll be JAL flight, yeay! More points for the milleage! Hope I can claim free ticket  somewhere as I plan to travel after my defense in next Feb.
(3) Hotel reservation done!
Though I failed the funding from graduate school. Only 3 persons’re selected, I guess they put priority on the PhD students. Gotta funding fr supervisor, though not sure how much will be covered.. Oops, but somehow I still need to apply for VISA!
(4) Going for two job interviews.
(5) A lil skill-up for baking. 😛 who knows I can open bakery in the future? haha..

Shud be proud of those small achievements though people may see them insignificant in different ways. 😛
I will just take those moments of pride to inspire me to keep going for grabbing lot more of successful stories, hopefully! Amen!