a woman is beautiful and keenly sighted, yet blind, crafty and cruel,
simple and kind.
she'll call him a king, then make him a clown,
raise him on a pedestal, then knock him flat down.

she'll run away from him and never comes back.
but, if he runs away, she'll be on his tracks.

at times she'll be vengeful, merry and sad,
she'll hate you like poison, and love you like mad.

-reader's letter in a 2001 men's health magazine.

the power of karma

about two years ago at a barnes and noble in topeka, kansas, i came across a book's title that really caught my attention. the title is the one i use for this writing. the power of karma. kind of scarry when you say it really slowly and digest the meaning behind those words.

flipping the pages, i read an interesting passage. it begins with this:

the homeless person you neglect could be you in another life

do i believe in another life? maybe. maybe not. my believe doesn't teach me how to prepare for another life after death. it is the eternity with the Father in Heaven that i believe in.

the power of karma is simple. do good unto others and others will do good for you.

and, according to that book, there are six laws to follow:

1. think before you act.
2. treat people the way you want to be treated.
3. don't take things that don't belong to you.
4. your soul records every action.
5. you get what you earn. work for love, security, and balance.
6. revange returns itself upon the avanger. never seek vegeance.

all of these laws happen to follow us in our daily lives.
believe it or not, each law has a power to avenge upon you.
simple for us to recite, yet hard for human to follow.

tying the knot kampoeng style

what could be more entertaining than spending your saturday evening partying with your friends celebrating a friend's wedding? in an area called ciganjur in southern part of jakarta, robert wedded her lovely girlfriend, naomi, to be a husband and a wife in a such a party. it was a kampoeng style with little decorations and guests were served jajanan pasar and local delicacies, such as: mie tektek, lumpia goreng, siomay, kerak telor betawi and so on. no chairs and no stage where the bride and groom are usually stand to be congratulated. they just sat on a bale and mingled with their guests. several long benches, not chairs, were put for the elderlies.

the night was still young when friends gathered and sang songs together with the groom. the bride? accompanying them with the piano.

i've been to many spectaculars wedding parties in this metropolitan city, yet never have i been to a party with so much fun; especially, when guests lit the firecrackers and sang a popular song together blessing them to a good life ahead.

songs were still being sung and laughters of a good celebration were still being heard from afar when it was time for me to go back home.

a nice party, indeed.

between chance and choice

It is not the matter how to find someone perfect to love,

but how to love someone imperfect perfectly...

untitled

deep sigh from deep within
entwined with the breath of the night
cascading invisibly
through my open window,
giving life to the curtains,
shadows---
shadows and night breeze
skimming, soothing, teasing
me
and half asleep
in my drunken stupor,
I dream that it's you
your face
your hands
and not a soft
lonely
summer wind....

a message to myself

those who take life seriously become pathological, because life is not a serious phenomenon. it is all playfulness from top to bottom. it is a song to be sung, a dance to be danced, a love to be loved. you cannot dance when you are serious because seriousness is basically sadness...

the scent of green papayas

in a traditional market near the borobudur temple, majority of the vendors there are selling papayas. when i asked one of them why, a seller replied, "this area is well known for its papaya and this time of the year is the season for the papayas. that's why you see alot of people selling them."

i remember during my childhood, slices of papaya was always been served after meals. and during my living abroad, this tropical fruit was one of the things i missed from home.

a sleepy village in the middle of java

there was once a sleepy village right in the middle of central java known for its robusta coffee. hence, that's why they called java for coffee. the history of this coffee plantation is as rich as sweet taste of its black coffee. and, today, lies one of the most romantic resorts in the middle of this village. surrounded by eight active volcanoes and the scenery around, imagine yourself walking or biking in the middle of a coffee plantation smelling the nice aroma of new roasted coffee. the serene looking mount merbabu and mount telomoyo in the calm of morning atmosphere.

the life span of dust

men, in a relationship with a woman, have the tendency for saying the wrong thing, doing the wrong thing, and then making it worse by doing or saying another wrong thing which sometimes makes the situation even worse. and, soon afterwards, men are scrambling, rambling fools, confessing mistakes she didn't even know they'd made prolonging the emotional roller coster for her.

the responsibility of being oneself

if one really wants to live life in all its richness, one has to learn how to be inconsistent, how to be consistently inconsistent. how to be able to move from the extreme to another - sometimes rooted deep in the earth and sometimes flying high in heaven. sometimes making love and sometimes meditating.

and then, slowly, your heaven and your earth will come closer and closer, and you will become the horizon where they meet.

the aura of winter

snow is different. it's just different. imagine the soft puffs of snow falling down slowly to earth from above. changing the scenery to a different aura. imagine the chill of its particles touching you gently on your skin. you'll feel a bite of coldness on it. and slowly, the falling snow accumulated and turning the earth to the purest white you've ever seen changing everything from before. the colors muted. the air chilled. and the aura of winter began.

the drops of rain

i love the rain for its sense of melancholy

the melancholy that seems to strike my needs
for the mellowy feeling...

there is poetry in the dying of pouring water from the sky

and...

its mystery.

to become a travel writer

one day in brentwood, tennessee, an elderly gentleman told me something i would never forget. a simple saying with simple words.

"do the job you love," he uttered to me over breakfast 14 years ago when i asked him about changing my major.

i always wanted to be a travel writer more than anything i could do. my passion of photography and my hobbies of writing and traveling combine well together. it's like a well paid hobbies.

over fourteen years of my living abroad, my path took me to the jobs i never really like. barely make me survived the living, yet giving me strength to be tough and learnt alot of things in life.

today, the owner of my company called me to the management's office.

the assignments surprised me.

i will be sent away to travel and to write some articles.

europe and australia.

a word or two

the really egoless person is not humble at all.
he is neither arrogant nor humble.
he is simply himself.

through the lens of my eyes

there was one girl who asked her mother a question. the girl asked, "mom, why do i have two eyes? why not three or four?"

the mother stunned for awhile but wisely answering her daughter's question. "my dear," she started, "God created eyes for you to see. why did He created two eyes?"

"yes, mommy, why did He created two eyes for you and me?" asked the girl again.

"because He wants you to see one from the left and one from the right, so you would be able to know what is right and what is wrong, honey," replied the mother.

the girl being a girl closes one of her eyes and said, "i can see you through my right eye, mommy!" and subsequently she closed her right eye, too, "and... through my left eye also!" she giggled.

"i can see you through both eyes, mommy... !" she ran to the open arm of her mom waiting for a hug.

her mom gave her a soft kiss on her cheek, "with your eyes, you can see mommy anytime you want, honey..."

and the girl smiled.