Hollow

"You know you miss someone when you can't go to sleep without the urge just to see at least his picture.

You know you like someone when even you know that he doesn't but you still have faith.

You know you love someone when it's enough just to watch over him from far.

You know it's him."

Life Teacher

Hello, digital world. It’s quite long time since the last time i write. This time I’m gonna share my experience for being a village girl, living out of town, in a small village that i’ve never been to before, far from the crowd of jungle city, where I could see sheep and chicken and sometimes cow right the time when I open the door of the room that my team and I use to sleep, eat, talk about the project, and play together, yes basically we do everything in this same particular room. Just FYI we have 10 people n the team including me, mmmm you can imagine how crowded it could be, but that’s all not the thing that matter. I’m used to sleep in a small space together with a lot of my family, I love it. I name it sharing the same  condition yet we stay together. I’m not that type of town girl who doesn’t like being dirty surrounded by such animals. I don’t care that i rarely get signal for my mobile phone. Enough that i could check on to my LINE account to know what’s going on with the team in AIESEC, ah another story that i haven’t had the chance to tell, well later on the next post prolly :)

Well, let’s just start this story. I will live in this village somewhere in East Java but it is actually closer to Central Java than the heart of East Java for about 3 weeks. It’s a compulsory subject from my university that all of the last year student must attend. Since the motto of my Uni is Excellence with Morality, they want us to apply what we got from uni to the society by directly working with them. So, we have this programs that we name it as project :p

First week, was filled with teaching the local elementary school children. A lot of shocking things that i’ve never imagined before happened here. I mean not to mention that i’m comparing with what we have in town, not even have to mention Surabaya, when i compare it to Banjarmasin, which geographically located in South Kalimantan, and politically is not in the centre of the governmental thingy, what I had when i was still in Banjarmasin studying from kindergarten until high school I could say and feel that I am totally blessed. Somehow i feel sorry for the kids here, it’s just so unfair that we live in the same country yet we don’t have the same chance just to access to a better education or at least the same. This particular elementary school, it only has 6 classes for its students -in Indonesia we have 6 years of elementary school life, grade 1 till 6- Each class only has 6-8 students average, but 16 for the first grader. Again, I compared it to my elementary school, I was in a class with 20 students, they already name it as an exclusive one, well i was quite sharp back then in elementary school that i was in acceleration class :p so that i finished elementary school just in 5 years while normally is 6. But the point is, this elementary school only has a quarter of my class’ student, well i could say it’s quite a privilege for them to study more since they will only share one teacher for 6 or 8 of them, but it irritated when i joined the class, when i got in contact with them the students, they don’t have the same level of understanding of their subjects. i could say not even close with what i had back in when i was their age. I have this one little guy over here sitting down on his seat while trying to digest what my friend taught them, it was mathematic, i will admit that i’m not that good at math, i hate numbers, but it was 2nd grade of elementary school, i just prepared the worst that they will ask me about times operation, but i was totally wrong, mostly the students hardly counting with ease, and this little guy over here, oh my god, i told myself, if he was my dad and my mom’s kid, he will not have his leg standing steadily -just a short flashback, i remember when i was in kindergarten, my dad asked me to draw a single leaf, but i wasn’t able to do it (well it’s proved now that i dont have any art blood :p) so my dad asked me to stand up on single plastic chair, it was small surfaced and high, I thank him because of that i don’t give up easily now in facing every problems)- He needs help just to count 7+7. To be honest, I almost lost my patient when i dealt with this little guy, but what makes me calm was his eagerness his willingness to learn, he asked me to give him more question so he could learn how to solve it. After the class ended, I had a little talk with the teacher, I didn’t know why the teacher told me the story about that little guy I told you just before. It turns out that he doesn’t have a father, his mom is staying in Surabaya for work, and he is staying here with his grandparents. The time i heard this story, i felt so guilty towards him, i was wrong comparing him as my parents’ child while he never even had the chance to meet his father and rarely seen his mother, what could he expect from his grandparents, ay? Just quite a tough life for a little guy as him.

Next thing that shocked and made me quite mad was when the teachers just laugh at my report about one of their students talks dirty. What they said was “yo ngono iku mbak anak di desa”, which translated into english as “yeah, that’s how children in village behave”. I was like daaaaaaammmnnnn, no, it was not because of they come from village or town that shaped how they behave, you can imagine what makes a small 2nd grader kid could behave like that, either they are from not friendly for children area or they don’t get any knowledge or education about how to behave, there is no one telling them what is good what is wrong. I remember my lecturer said, the worst part of stereotype is when the person being stereotyped agree with what the people told them what they are. and it’s just happen here. Yes, some of the town people labeled village people as less than them the town people, but it’s just a label, prove them they are wrong, don’t just passively saying yes to what they told you.

2nd week which is this week, filled with health project. We were helping the doctor in conducting free check up and consultation to the olds. There is actually still good things happened here, they do it routine monthly for free for their citizen, which i don’t know if we have it or not in big city. I kept an eye to the olds that were coming, they came alone by themselves, some with their child or grandchild. I saw two old men sitting at the corner of the room waiting for their turn, they reminded me of my dad at home, my dad is not as old as them, but he will be. I was just feeling so bad that if someday he will experience that these two grandpas experienced as his only child is dreaming not to stay at her hometown but travelling for living. I’m sorry papa, you know what i want to be :’) but this big girl over here will not ever let you feel alone, you too mama.

Next lesson i learned, when my team and I were having talks with the people in charge in this village, what i learned is this village is just soooo patriarchal, they see men as the strong one, the one who the women should rely on to, and the woman as the one who needs to be protected, well I agree somehow protection is needed, but the protection itself is from what the men do to us the women. They see the women as a thing, an interactive thing. I haaaaate that time i spent to talk with them so much. nonsense. but once again, perspective :’)

Oh one more, this one i just experienced today, 28th of july. One of the high school student asked a question to us or i could say she asked for a motivation for them so they want to enter the university. At that moment i was thinking, am I the one who dreams too big, or? well well, i said to myself nah, it’s never too big for a dream. I just answer to her question with another question, why should you stop at high school when you can go to university for a bigger world you will have someday?

The more I learned :)

Today's Proverb

" If you want something you've never had, then you've got to do something you've never done."

Mask

I couldn't believe it that I watched an hour long talkshow of an Indonesian artist.. I rarely watch television program, but I just watched talkshow which is more likely to be called a gossip program rather than talkshow.. Phew~ No, it's not about the talkshow, the artist, nor my one hour precious wasted time, but the message behind it all.. but I need to tell you a bit about the topic of the talkshow, this artist is a young woman, she is married, she has kids, unfortunately she has problems in her life. Sounds so usual, isn't it? She has tattoos and piercings almost all over her body. When you read the sentence preceded this sentence, what thing came up on your mind? It's normal that it's her choice, it's part of art, it's so common. Good for you then who think that way. I'm gonna talk about those who don't think that way. Unfortunately, the culture in Indonesia is not that "open" to things like these. Hmm I think the word unfortunately doesn't fit it well, I appreciate my country's culture, it's just about back again to perspective. Well well, this subject confessed that she is being judged because she has tattoos, she has piercings, she drinks, she's going out, she's having fun. Oh my dear. When you judge someone based on the surface, you know nothing beneath all of the things the subject chose to show you. Remember the iceberg theory? It may look small so you can underestimate it from what it seems, you know nothing about what supports it under. Iceberg could sink up the majestic Titanic on its very first voyage. When someone decide to have tattoos for example, what's so wrong about it that couldn't even harm you? It's just their way to hide, to release what they hold this long. You know nothing what they've been through, don't make it worse by judging them, you are not any better than them.

My mom, she has tattoos, she has piercings, I did judge her at the very first time, then I realized, I know what she's been through, it's not easy for her to do that as well. She needs attention. Not judgement. Me myself, not any better than her, I do drink, i'm not proud of it nor regret it. It's the way i'm having fun, what's so wrong about having fun as long as you know your limit, isn't it?

All of us we have our own problems, there are people who choose to stay calm, there are people who choose to go out looking for friends so he/she can forget his problems. We have choices! We are responsible enough for our own choices, we don't need judgement but support.

once again, judging people based on what they choose to show you is just like when you believe that poop taste bad but in fact you've never tried to taste it. It doesn't make you any better. Be open. Be brave enough to accept people for what they are. Or atleast, don't make their problems worsen by judging them. You don't judge, then no one will judge you. Remember that karma does exist ;)

Perspectives

"If it doesn't do you any good, why holding on? Move on!" Uhuh I was writing my blog assignment on my other blog just now, no it's not that I betray you bloggie "sometimes things are not like what it seems." you understand right? hahaha well nah it is just an academic blog made by my university for each of its students, I just write there sometimes (if i have assignment that i have to post there :)))) so don't you worry bloggie, I will still and always be faithful with you, it's been 4years and more since the first time I made you. Uhuuu i'm so easy to get distracted hahaha so back to what i wanted to write, that first quote I wrote in this post, I found it as the header of my academic blog. I barely remember why at that time I put that as the header on my academic blog, it should be sound more academic than it is since it's an academic blog, ay? such as "don't look back at history since it would do you harm." perhaps? hahaha ewww it sounds so cheesy anyway. So so so back again to the topic. It's just give me an "injection" to write tonight. You know what, when you are saying some motivational words, it is not as easy as when you say it, you know what i mean? The point that I want to say for this post is that more likely to don't judge people easily from what they do or say. I take my case for the example, I wrote that motivational sentence as the header of my blog, it doesn't mean that I am successfully moved on, yet me myself is sometimes still struggling on forgetting someone or not to overthink about such unimportant things that do not do me any good at all, I am a human, she is a human, he is a human, they are human, we are all human. Nobody's perfect. We made mistakes. When we talk about mistakes itself, we cannot easily judge that a mistake is always bad, not every beautiful thing for example is good, right? Banana for example, I loooove it so much, for me that's like a splat from heaven, but there must be someone at the other hand hate it as it is slimy and textured like baby's food for example. See, it's all just about perspective. Try to judge as objective as possible. because at the end it's not the mistake that matters but the way he/she admit the mistake he/she made and how can he/she learns from the mistakes he/she has made. Our task is to help them to get better.
It relates me to the newest issue happened in Indonesia, about a just-graduated-from-high-school-young-girl who acted brutally against a police officer, I mean I don't know how did she act, but according to the news that I read, it says that she did it brutally. So sorry if i make mistake in re-telling this story. She just lost his father after the incident because a lot of people bullied her through social media for what she has done. His father got a sudden heart attack when he read the critics over her daughter that lead him to death. See, now who's the villain? The girl who acted brutal or you guys that bullied her until she lost her father? You just killed someone. According to Aristotle's theory about Eudemonism ethic, think twice before you do something, whether it will bring you any good or bad.

Wasteful Attempt

Ali bin Abi Thalib once said "No need to explain to people about yourself, because those who like you don't need that and those who hate you won't believe that."

Well, it's enough that you know yourself.

Be Independent

I got a slap on my face today. Well not as literally a slap but you know. You know what, don't you ever rely on someone. First, because the only one you can rely on is only yourself. Second, when the person you tought you can rely on doesn't actually can be counted on, you'll get disappointed. Be Independent lah, the Malay said with their accent.

Really, i'm telling you the truth! Learn to live alone, it is less drama. You still need to socialize but don't ever put your comfort zone on them, because they can sometimes take it away without any prior notifications and without even they realize.