From Sunday to Saturday, despite all the assignments that have been nagging to be done, and despite my constant refusal to finish them, it's been an awesome week for me.
Last Sunday, I went to a music festival in Sabuga. Held by Fakultas Hukum Unpad, the event--called Hysteria--brought up some of my favourite artists: D'Cinnamon, The Trees and The Wild, and..wait uppppp.... Efek Rumah Kaca!
That night started kinda bad because my gf was acting sulky. Until about an hour or so, she finally told me the reason behind her sulkiness, which had me laughing out loud, and the awesomeness of the night was back. Thanks Kika, I thought you were just like any other girl who will sulk by some uncontrollable conditions like bad weather or whatever. But you're so fucking full of surprises. Having you is such a bliss.
Anyway, we went there with her younger brother Dio, who also loves Efek Rumah Kaca. We spent the night watching D'Cinnamon (which was surprisingly disappointing), some small bands, 4Peniti (which was surprisingly awesome), some traditional dances, Halmahera (who got a lot of sarcastic praises from the crowd because their performance was too long and the crowd couldn't wait for ERK), Efek Rumah Kaca, and The Trees and The Wild.
Efek Rumah Kaca performance was beautiful, albeit too short. They only played 7 songs, including my personal favourite, Jalang ("karena mereka paling suci, lalu mereka bilang kami jalang, karena kami beda visi, lalu mereka bilang kami jalang"), which had me stood--hand in hand with Kika--in awe. Haha. I felt like watching them in From 2 With Love (my old highschool's pensi).
We didn't watch The Trees and The Wild till the end because it was 00:30 already, I had to go to uni and Kika had to go to kindergarten the next (early) morning. But in the end, that was one of the most enjoyable night I've had in a year or so. Not because of the event itself, but because of the fact that we all enjoyed it.
I spent the next four days either in the City, North Bandung, South Bandung, or home. Whether playing CS with my mates, ngapel to Kika's house, going to another second hand English book store in front of Unpar (and eating Mie Jakarta), some me times, teaching Syifa some origami, and some family stuff. It's basically anything beside uni work.
Something awesome also happened on Friday night. My friends and I got a Guest List (or whatever it's called) to Embassy. Yes, Embassy, that nightclub I've been wanting to go since... I don't know, since I started being galau a few months ago. I've been raised in a religious family, and my friend circle is full of nice people, so I have never been to such place (except for once, loong time ago, but that was a different story). And I finally went there, with other 12 friends (some are my friends, some are my friend's friends, some are straight, some are gay, some are way older than the rest of us, and only one girl).
Earlier that night, my friends and I bought a pseudo-Whisky in a small warung in pasar Dayeuhkolot, because we knew that buying real drinks inside the club is a sure way to put a hole in our wallet. The so called Whisky was really cheap, just Rp65000 for a bottle (I think it was 400ml, or maybe 500ml, I forgot to take note) and the taste wasn't that far off from the real thing. Four of us drank that bottle empty real quick before we entered the building. No it wasn't enough, we should've bought two or even three bottles, but we were thin on money that night, so, meh, we were forced to enjoy the club half drunk.
My first impression to Embassy was... okay. It was bigger than I thought, with lots of sexy high class girls, some DJs, and heart blasting music from the big ass speakers and subwoofers. We sat inside for a while, and when people began to pour onto the floor we just went down with them.
It was a great place. A great experience. But I guess it's just not my cup of tea. Maybe I was just wasn't galau enough to fully enjoy being there. I'm so happy with my life nowadays that dancing to disco music seemed pretty pointless to me. Maybe next time! For now, I'm just gonna enjoy dancing to Lotus Flower.
But hey, like I said, great experience. I might got bored inside there, but I enjoyed the night with you guys. Thanks for the Guest List!
Lastly, Saturday was fun and random! Kika and I went to Winner (the Bratwurst restaurant), a park for old people at Secapa AD (luckily there wasn't any old people kicking us out :-p), Kineruku (to watch Experimentelle Deutsche-Indonesien Musikvideos, a part of Oberhausen International Film Festival), and Ciwalk (to watch... guess what? a movie? discounts for clothes? Wrong you fucking yuppies. We watched Efek Rumah Kaca, again).
Seriously, two Efek Rumah Kaca performances in a week! The latter performance got better songs, better sound, and better crowd. Their personal tweet this afternoon:
"Terima kasih teman2 di Bdg, yg telah menciptakan karaoke massal semalam di ciwalk."
Fuck yeah Efek Rumah Kaca!
Anyway, now it got me thinking, this Saturday we enjoyed two German-related stuff (the Bratwurst and the music video festival) and a park for old people. What the fuck, lol. One of the best days ever.
Speaking of which, it has been the most random week ever. I love every part of it.
Sunday, May 29, 2011
Friday, May 27, 2011
Touch The Bottom
Last post at May 9th? Shit. What happened? I'm not really sure about the detail (and I'm not gonna tell you, pervert.), but a lot of things had happened, that's for sure.
Remember Kika, the girl I went with to Reading Light on my last post? Well, we [how do you say jadian in English?]. Hmm. If I was still a little boy (for me, that means when I was 18 y.o, or less), I would write a long post on how awesome she is. But fortunately I'm 22 years old now and I've learned a lot of things about not being a cheesy alay, so.. let's just cut to the chase and say she's soooo lovely.
She's a walking paradox. A self-proclaimed anti-social who loves to tell stories by...(surprise!)...talking. A skinny girl who loves to eat. A stylish person who doesn't like to go to the mall. An open-minded girl who do charity works for her church every single week. An old-fashioned girl who likes to rock and roll. And a kindergarten teacher who sometimes smoke and drink.
Oh, wait, this post wasn't supposed to be about my girl. Ahh.. my bad. Always wandering around. *checking the title of this post* wait, Touch The Bottom? What?
Oh.. the bottom, I remember now. It's about how I haven't done any shit for about three weeks. Seriously. I haven't read a single text book page (or, in my campus' case, Powerpoint Slides), I've only done a tiny bit of my homework (with the speed of a turtle whose feet had just crushed by a truck), and a few paragraphs of translating for the campus website.
And the cause of all that? There's no real cause. I'm always in this kind of state every time the final exams come. Well, I could blame it to my campus who squeezes all the hard assignments into the end of the semester. I could blame it to our educational system who has successfully created a notion in youth minds that school education is everything. I could blame it to the government who isn't trying to stop that. But in the end, I should just blame it all to myself for having a tremendous ego that makes me unwilling to to anything that I don't like/agree/give a shit.
So here I go again, fucked up to the bone.
But no matter what, I'm a diehard optimist. I never give up things (maybe sometimes I just let things go because I know there are better ones out there). The thing is, sometimes I can't control my mood. I can't control my spirit. Fortunately, in the past 12 months, I learned how to get along with it. So in the last three weeks, instead of trying hopelessly to kill this laziness, I just let myself do a free fall into the pit of sloth, and finally this morning, I hit the bottom.
And you know what I do after I hit the bottom?
I jump.
Remember Kika, the girl I went with to Reading Light on my last post? Well, we [how do you say jadian in English?]. Hmm. If I was still a little boy (for me, that means when I was 18 y.o, or less), I would write a long post on how awesome she is. But fortunately I'm 22 years old now and I've learned a lot of things about not being a cheesy alay, so.. let's just cut to the chase and say she's soooo lovely.
She's a walking paradox. A self-proclaimed anti-social who loves to tell stories by...(surprise!)...talking. A skinny girl who loves to eat. A stylish person who doesn't like to go to the mall. An open-minded girl who do charity works for her church every single week. An old-fashioned girl who likes to rock and roll. And a kindergarten teacher who sometimes smoke and drink.
Oh, wait, this post wasn't supposed to be about my girl. Ahh.. my bad. Always wandering around. *checking the title of this post* wait, Touch The Bottom? What?
Oh.. the bottom, I remember now. It's about how I haven't done any shit for about three weeks. Seriously. I haven't read a single text book page (or, in my campus' case, Powerpoint Slides), I've only done a tiny bit of my homework (with the speed of a turtle whose feet had just crushed by a truck), and a few paragraphs of translating for the campus website.
And the cause of all that? There's no real cause. I'm always in this kind of state every time the final exams come. Well, I could blame it to my campus who squeezes all the hard assignments into the end of the semester. I could blame it to our educational system who has successfully created a notion in youth minds that school education is everything. I could blame it to the government who isn't trying to stop that. But in the end, I should just blame it all to myself for having a tremendous ego that makes me unwilling to to anything that I don't like/agree/give a shit.
So here I go again, fucked up to the bone.
But no matter what, I'm a diehard optimist. I never give up things (maybe sometimes I just let things go because I know there are better ones out there). The thing is, sometimes I can't control my mood. I can't control my spirit. Fortunately, in the past 12 months, I learned how to get along with it. So in the last three weeks, instead of trying hopelessly to kill this laziness, I just let myself do a free fall into the pit of sloth, and finally this morning, I hit the bottom.
And you know what I do after I hit the bottom?
I jump.
Monday, May 9, 2011
Yesterday
My mom had just bought a netbook. It's Toshiba. The design is kinda cute (to me), with a bright blue color for its casing. I don't know how that happened. After all, my mom is 46-year-old, her eyes would strain looking at that tiny weeny screen. But, meh, heheh, I forgot to think about that when my family and I bought it yesterday, I was kinda in a hurry, because Kika came along to BEC with me.
She was cool. She wore those funny shoes (I don't know what they're called, kinda like boots, but much smaller, no they're not boots, they're... I don't know, they're like my friend's shoes, Naresh's shoes), and a long skirt, and a sweater, and.. I don't remember. Hey, men rarely remember details. Anyway, her clothing was such old fashioned it could have been worn by Zooey Deschanel.
We went to Reading Lights after that, to talk about.. something (see I can't talk about it because I think she believes that if I talk about it, it's gonna get jinxed). After about three hours of conversation, a glass of chocolate ice cream, a glass of David Sedaris drink (which tasted like Vitamin C), a plate of blueberry pancake, a page of Ms.Word document typed using my broken laptop, Mew, Muse, Radiohead, and other random stuff, we went to Warung Steak on Jalan Setiabudi to.. well, to continue what we're doing that day.
Then we went on to Setiabudi's Circle K to smoke a cigarette or two, before finally went home. Oh, her house was in Lembang, haha, Lembang, at 9.30 PM, it was sure cold, but not for me, I felt warm alright.
She was cool. She wore those funny shoes (I don't know what they're called, kinda like boots, but much smaller, no they're not boots, they're... I don't know, they're like my friend's shoes, Naresh's shoes), and a long skirt, and a sweater, and.. I don't remember. Hey, men rarely remember details. Anyway, her clothing was such old fashioned it could have been worn by Zooey Deschanel.
We went to Reading Lights after that, to talk about.. something (see I can't talk about it because I think she believes that if I talk about it, it's gonna get jinxed). After about three hours of conversation, a glass of chocolate ice cream, a glass of David Sedaris drink (which tasted like Vitamin C), a plate of blueberry pancake, a page of Ms.Word document typed using my broken laptop, Mew, Muse, Radiohead, and other random stuff, we went to Warung Steak on Jalan Setiabudi to.. well, to continue what we're doing that day.
Then we went on to Setiabudi's Circle K to smoke a cigarette or two, before finally went home. Oh, her house was in Lembang, haha, Lembang, at 9.30 PM, it was sure cold, but not for me, I felt warm alright.
Saturday, May 7, 2011
Dumb, Dumber, and Lazy Bums
Holy shit I'm stressed out. Today started okay (a bit cloudy too, which was marvelously mellow), it went even better when Mr.D returned one of our test sheets. My group got a score of 12 (out of 10!) for one of our tests, all because of these sentences (the test was about the condition in Middle East Countries after last month riots, we had to explain why the "vox populi vox dei" can't be applied in the Middle East right now) :
"It is true that people's voice is god voice, but there are so many voices in the Middle East right now, and sometimes those voices conflict each other. So it's like a God with multiple personalities, who fights with itself."
Apparently he liked it so much that he added +2 point to our score. Yippe ki yay!
BUT my other test got only a score of 5 (out of 10) with a huge written message over it: "THIS IS A DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM CLASS", probably because I put too much unrelated bullshits in it.
-------------------------------------
Wait, above paragraphs were written on Thursday, but I was interrupted by.. I can't remember. Oh, I do now. I was told to translate an article about the National Education Day, which had some quotes by our not so levelheaded Minister of Education, Prof. Dr. Ir. KH. Muhammad Nuh, DEA. Seriously, he said this on the National Education Day speech:
"Kesadaran sebagai makhluk Tuhan Yang Maha Esa akan menumbuhkan nilai transendensi dan nilai keagamaan yang kuat, yang pada gilirannya tumbuh sifat kasih sayang dan toleran saling menghargai dan menghormati dan menjauhkan diri dari perilaku destruktif dan anarkistis."
Dude, it's National Education day.
Education.
I can't stress that enough.
Get an education, Prof. Dr. Ir. KH. Muhammad Nuh, DEA.
I sweated myself translating that article. Not only that article is against my opinion, it's against common sense. Our Minister of Education hasn't got a bloody common sense. It stressed me out.
I took a long breath and told my supervisor: "I don't wanna translate this". Fortunately she said okay. Heh. Thank you. Thank you very much.
The stress didn't end there. On 5 o'clock I had to attend a substitute class for Computer Organization and Architecture. My classmates and I ended up listening to our stupid lecturer complaining about how hard it is to explain the Memory Management chapter, for 80 minutes. Eighty. Fucking. Minutes. We could've used those minutes to read the material ourselves. But instead we had to listen to that bitch blabbering on how stupid he is.
Ah. but the day was saved by another Counter Strike session. No push up punishment this time, because all of us are lazy bums.
"It is true that people's voice is god voice, but there are so many voices in the Middle East right now, and sometimes those voices conflict each other. So it's like a God with multiple personalities, who fights with itself."
Apparently he liked it so much that he added +2 point to our score. Yippe ki yay!
BUT my other test got only a score of 5 (out of 10) with a huge written message over it: "THIS IS A DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEM CLASS", probably because I put too much unrelated bullshits in it.
-------------------------------------
Wait, above paragraphs were written on Thursday, but I was interrupted by.. I can't remember. Oh, I do now. I was told to translate an article about the National Education Day, which had some quotes by our not so levelheaded Minister of Education, Prof. Dr. Ir. KH. Muhammad Nuh, DEA. Seriously, he said this on the National Education Day speech:
"Kesadaran sebagai makhluk Tuhan Yang Maha Esa akan menumbuhkan nilai transendensi dan nilai keagamaan yang kuat, yang pada gilirannya tumbuh sifat kasih sayang dan toleran saling menghargai dan menghormati dan menjauhkan diri dari perilaku destruktif dan anarkistis."
Dude, it's National Education day.
Education.
I can't stress that enough.
Get an education, Prof. Dr. Ir. KH. Muhammad Nuh, DEA.
I sweated myself translating that article. Not only that article is against my opinion, it's against common sense. Our Minister of Education hasn't got a bloody common sense. It stressed me out.
I took a long breath and told my supervisor: "I don't wanna translate this". Fortunately she said okay. Heh. Thank you. Thank you very much.
The stress didn't end there. On 5 o'clock I had to attend a substitute class for Computer Organization and Architecture. My classmates and I ended up listening to our stupid lecturer complaining about how hard it is to explain the Memory Management chapter, for 80 minutes. Eighty. Fucking. Minutes. We could've used those minutes to read the material ourselves. But instead we had to listen to that bitch blabbering on how stupid he is.
Ah. but the day was saved by another Counter Strike session. No push up punishment this time, because all of us are lazy bums.
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Lost in Translating
Quick! translate this tiny paragraph...
"Produk ‘all in one’ dimana semua fasilitas kebutuhan konsumen terkonvergensi menjadi satu produk. Keunggulannya yakni multifungsi dan efisiensi. Sehingga memudahkan konsumen untuk menggunakannya. "
...into its English equivalent.
Done? Feeling Annoyed? In the scale of 1-10, how annoyed are you? Now, multiply that by a million, that's how annoyed I am.
It seems that I'm not the only one who have a bad writing habit. You see here: "Produk ‘all in one’ dimana semua fasilitas kebutuhan konsumen terkonvergensi menjadi satu produk." is not even a sentence, damnit. My current apprentice job requires me to translate some articles containing that kind of sentence every day.
These past two days I've been translating news and articles for my campus website. Or, the way I call it, I've been "reverse translating", because I translate articles written in Bahasa Indonesia into English (so far I've only translated 7 articles tho, most of the time I do nothing:p). It's easier than programming, and it's less stressful. BUT, it's not as fun, and it's fucking annoying when you have no idea what the sentences are actually about.
But I think I like it. At least I'm learning how to write properly again. It's just like writing essays about Othello or A View From The Bridge or The Kite Runner for Ms.Zubair's class in my high school years. I hope my writing's getting better, both in English and in Bahasa Indonesia, because two days ago, this conversation happened:
Ki*****R (5/2/2011 2:41:25 PM): hey, gmana kalo kita buat buku bareng?
Me (5/2/2011 2:41:51 PM): hmmm
Me (5/2/2011 2:42:19 PM): im not really good at making structured language
Ki*****R (5/2/2011 2:42:29 PM): so what?
Me (5/2/2011 2:42:52 PM): ntar bukunya fucked up gimana? :p
Ki*****R (5/2/2011 2:43:08 PM): trus knapa?
Ki*****R (5/2/2011 2:43:13 PM): selalu ada kali pertama kan
and the rest of the conversation is history.
"Produk ‘all in one’ dimana semua fasilitas kebutuhan konsumen terkonvergensi menjadi satu produk. Keunggulannya yakni multifungsi dan efisiensi. Sehingga memudahkan konsumen untuk menggunakannya. "
...into its English equivalent.
Done? Feeling Annoyed? In the scale of 1-10, how annoyed are you? Now, multiply that by a million, that's how annoyed I am.
It seems that I'm not the only one who have a bad writing habit. You see here: "Produk ‘all in one’ dimana semua fasilitas kebutuhan konsumen terkonvergensi menjadi satu produk." is not even a sentence, damnit. My current apprentice job requires me to translate some articles containing that kind of sentence every day.
These past two days I've been translating news and articles for my campus website. Or, the way I call it, I've been "reverse translating", because I translate articles written in Bahasa Indonesia into English (so far I've only translated 7 articles tho, most of the time I do nothing:p). It's easier than programming, and it's less stressful. BUT, it's not as fun, and it's fucking annoying when you have no idea what the sentences are actually about.
But I think I like it. At least I'm learning how to write properly again. It's just like writing essays about Othello or A View From The Bridge or The Kite Runner for Ms.Zubair's class in my high school years. I hope my writing's getting better, both in English and in Bahasa Indonesia, because two days ago, this conversation happened:
Ki*****R (5/2/2011 2:41:25 PM): hey, gmana kalo kita buat buku bareng?
Me (5/2/2011 2:41:51 PM): hmmm
Me (5/2/2011 2:42:19 PM): im not really good at making structured language
Ki*****R (5/2/2011 2:42:29 PM): so what?
Me (5/2/2011 2:42:52 PM): ntar bukunya fucked up gimana? :p
Ki*****R (5/2/2011 2:43:08 PM): trus knapa?
Ki*****R (5/2/2011 2:43:13 PM): selalu ada kali pertama kan
and the rest of the conversation is history.
Monday, May 2, 2011
Pigs
Hold on, just because the title of this post is "Pigs" doesn't mean this post is about the death of Osama Bin Laden. Sure, he was a fucking pig. He and the Taliban are the symbols of religious extremism in this modern world. If you've read The Kite Runner or A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini you'll know how vicious and evil they are. The death of Osama Bin Laden should be celebrated by every single non-evil person in the world, including you, or else you should be killed too.
Anyway, it's not about that. I'm gonna talk about a card game called "Playing Pigs" (I made that name up, the real name was "Babi-Babian"). Unlike Poker, Playing Pigs is a very simple game that in order to play it you don't need too much wits. Why do I bother writing this? Because on my last post I said I'm gonna write about pigs. Damn, I should stop making stupid promises.
Anyway, it's not about that. I'm gonna talk about a card game called "Playing Pigs" (I made that name up, the real name was "Babi-Babian"). Unlike Poker, Playing Pigs is a very simple game that in order to play it you don't need too much wits. Why do I bother writing this? Because on my last post I said I'm gonna write about pigs. Damn, I should stop making stupid promises.
This game can be played by any number of players. First, prepare the deck so that it will only contain [4 x number of players) cards, the number on the card doesn't really matter, but every four cards must have the same number in them (with different suites). Each person will be given 4 random cards. Oh, and every player starts as a human.
One player (any player) then count to three, repeatedly. On each repetition, every player must take any one card from their own hand and put it in front of the player on their right, face down. Each player now has a new card (the one that's given by the player on their left) so now each has four cards again. Repeat that until one of the players got all four cards with the same number in them. When one does, s/he must put the cards in the center of all the players, face up, then touch his/her own nose. The other players must follow him/her (touching their own nose). The latest one to touch his/her nose lose, and will be degraded to a pig, a level one pig.
Then the game starts again with a new round (the pig also plays).
In this game, a pig can talk to a human, but a human can't talk to a pig. If a human makes even the slightest communication with one of the pigs, that human will also be degraded to a pig. So if a pig asks for the time, and a human answer it, say, by saying the current time, or by showing their watch, s/he becomes a pig too.
The game goes on. Just remember that the latest player to touch their nose in each round will be devalued/degraded. A human will be degraded to a level one pig. A level one pig will be degraded to a level two pig. A level two pig will be degraded to a level three pig. And finally, a level three pig will be degraded to... a pig shit.
When someone becomes a pig shit, the game ends. There's no winner, but there's a loser, which is the pig shit.
I know right? This game is hardcore. Never been in my life I play such a heartless game. I played it with Dara, Ines, Adel, Rani, Ipin, Skie, and Choco after a small BBQ night on last Thursday at the back of the Student Center while other students were either watching or playing UNO. Before that, we also play "Thumb Guess", you know what I mean. I aced the thumb guessing game, but on the Playing Pigs game, I became the pig shit.
The pig shit.
Nice jobs, human friends. I'm gonna get ya next time!
The pig shit.
Nice jobs, human friends. I'm gonna get ya next time!
On the brighter side, today was my first day at work. Ha. I'm gonna tell about it when I find something interesting. Not today. Nothing much was going on today, except that after I've been in IT Telkom for almost 4 years, I just knew it today that there's a room near the campus clinic where every IT Telkom officials can eat lunch for free. And now that I work with them, I can eat there too :D
Barney's high pitched voice: Aweeesooome!
Sunday, May 1, 2011
Ducks, The End of The World, and Other Silly Stuff Like That.
On Friday night, my friends and I went to Dapur Bebek. It's located on Bojongsoang, near the entrance the of the GBA residence. I know right, ducks. I've been eating a lot of ducks lately. Contrary to my former belief about this stupid species, ducks taste good.
Anyway, this post won't be about how yummy they taste, this post will be about the end of world.
So, when we were eating those stupid ducks, Mutia told us a story where she'd been robbed at gunpoint. It happened in Aceh years ago. She and her family was on their way to Medan by car (I think) when suddenly they got ambushed by some guys from GAM (Gerakan Aceh Merdeka). They demanded 10 million rupiahs or else her uncle would be taken as a hostage up in the mountain. Mutia told us that one of the rebels pointed a gun on her head. And they demanded every girls who used jeans to take off their jeans so that they could burn it (because apparently jeans are one of the tools used by satan to destroy mankind, heh, stupid GAM). And I forgot how it went, but the rebels finally agreed to lessen the ransom, from 10 million to 2 million rupiahs. Then, wait....no, this isn't important. I wasn't gonna write about this was I? What was I gonna write? Oh, the end of the world, right.
I don't know what brought us to that topic. But we did. Four of us (that's all of us except me) argued that life will end (kiamat) when the sun dies, around 5 billions from now. Well I disagree. I was a bit more optimistic. By then, mankind will hopefully have the technology to move to another habitable planet somewhere in the universe. Fuck yea humanity.
I knew that someday the whole universe will explode (although another theory said it will implode), but that won't happen until a ridiculously long time (more than a googol years, or 10100 years, from now). So there's no reason to worry about it.
I just realize now that I forgot to put other factors into the equation. What if a huge asteroid hits the earth before we know how to space travel? Well, humanity could face the same fate with the dinosaurs. But I'm sure humans are smarter than those reptiles, so yeah I'm still optimistic that human will survive till the universe dies.
This discussion naturally led us to another topic: religion. They asked me what will happen after I die. I went along explaining what it meant to be an agnostic. You see, agnosticism is not the same with atheism. Atheists don't believe in the existence of god. They're so sure of themselves that I think they're not better than religious people.
Agnosticism is the believe that basically state "I don't know". Because, just admit it, you don't actually know about god, do you? All the things you believe until this very moment were told by your parents or your teachers. But they couldn't prove them either. No they couldn't. They just read about them in a book that's written a very long time ago. But you want to believe them anyway because... that's what a belief means. To believe is to accept that something is true without the need of any evidence.
The atheists, on the other hand, think that everything that's written in holy books are false, and that god doesn't exists, 100% sure.
We agnostics say: we don't know. Yes, repeat after me: we. don't. know.
So when they asked me what will happen after I die? I simply said what I had to say: I don't know.
(intermezzo: seriously, I like girls who would talk about heavy stuff, like religion and women's rights and monkeys and Britpop music. I despise party girls, or as some people say, "woo girls". Not the ones who go to parties occasionally, but the ones whose lives are inside the party. No offense okay girls, I don't mean to be sexists, there are "woo men" too. If you would like an example, um, Black Eyed Peas).
I couldn't remember if it was Gladys or Mutia, but one of them asked this next question: "Which religion would you teach to your kids?" Hm. Tough question. First of all, I don't know how to raise a kid, yet. Your kid is the biggest investment you'll ever have. Hell, for evolutionists, breeding--hence ensuring the continuity of our species--is the main goal in life. So I will be very careful about raising mine. My answer was, "I will teach them the basic of all religions.". Well, it dazed them a bit. Said that it would make my kids confused, what if your kid ask you about the origin of life? which god is the correct one? bla bla bla. As you probably know, I'm a slow thinker. So instead of answering with a witty comeback, I said, "relax, I know what I'm doing". Mutia and Gladys was curious about how my kids will turn out, so I offered them this: "Ok, let's meet again when we have kids". So there you go, a tiny pact was made: 14 years from now, the five of us will meet on Dapur Bebek to see how my kids will turn out, compared to their kids.
I forgot to tell them one more thing though, that when I have kids, the two top priority lessons I would teach them are these: Logic & Compassion.
Which brings us to the last topic being talked that night: If you won't teach your kid a particular religion, how would your kid knows morality?
*Prett* I farted.
They argued that religions are the source of all morality.
No it's not. Mankind learned morality through trials and errors. They find some things are better than others ("better" means it gives more shared benefits to the whole population) and then they call it moral. If you don't agree with this, just ask yourself: "Do monkeys kill each other?". Okay let me answer that for you, the answer is NO. How would monkeys know that killing is immoral? From a religious text book? No. Through time, they found out that killing is bad, and they just don't do it anymore.
What about humans? Humans kill each other. Yes. But humans eventually created laws which forbid killings, loooooooong time before they wrote Vedas (kitab Weda), and even looooooooooonger time before "God" created Torah.
Just my two cents.
Shit this post is longer than the length of my Kapita Selekta essay multiplied by three. I should stop.
Conclusions:
- The world will end, but life don't have to end at the same time.
- But when the universe end, everything ends.
- I don't know what will happen after I die, or after the universe dies, nor do you.
- Religious people believe in god, atheists don't believe in god.
- Agnostics think both religious people and atheists are either too scared/too arrogant to accept the fact that we just don't know.
- I will teach my kids the basic of all religions, and let them decide their religion themselves, if any.
- I will teach them logic & compassion. I think these two things are the seeds of morality.
- I like girls who can talk about heavy stuff.
- I farted.
- I've been eating a lot of ducks lately.
- It's the second post in a row where I talked about animals (yesterday was caterpillar). I think I'm gonna write one more animal related post tomorrow. It's gonna be about pigs.
Anyway, this post won't be about how yummy they taste, this post will be about the end of world.
So, when we were eating those stupid ducks, Mutia told us a story where she'd been robbed at gunpoint. It happened in Aceh years ago. She and her family was on their way to Medan by car (I think) when suddenly they got ambushed by some guys from GAM (Gerakan Aceh Merdeka). They demanded 10 million rupiahs or else her uncle would be taken as a hostage up in the mountain. Mutia told us that one of the rebels pointed a gun on her head. And they demanded every girls who used jeans to take off their jeans so that they could burn it (because apparently jeans are one of the tools used by satan to destroy mankind, heh, stupid GAM). And I forgot how it went, but the rebels finally agreed to lessen the ransom, from 10 million to 2 million rupiahs. Then, wait....no, this isn't important. I wasn't gonna write about this was I? What was I gonna write? Oh, the end of the world, right.
I don't know what brought us to that topic. But we did. Four of us (that's all of us except me) argued that life will end (kiamat) when the sun dies, around 5 billions from now. Well I disagree. I was a bit more optimistic. By then, mankind will hopefully have the technology to move to another habitable planet somewhere in the universe. Fuck yea humanity.
I knew that someday the whole universe will explode (although another theory said it will implode), but that won't happen until a ridiculously long time (more than a googol years, or 10100 years, from now). So there's no reason to worry about it.
I just realize now that I forgot to put other factors into the equation. What if a huge asteroid hits the earth before we know how to space travel? Well, humanity could face the same fate with the dinosaurs. But I'm sure humans are smarter than those reptiles, so yeah I'm still optimistic that human will survive till the universe dies.
This discussion naturally led us to another topic: religion. They asked me what will happen after I die. I went along explaining what it meant to be an agnostic. You see, agnosticism is not the same with atheism. Atheists don't believe in the existence of god. They're so sure of themselves that I think they're not better than religious people.
Agnosticism is the believe that basically state "I don't know". Because, just admit it, you don't actually know about god, do you? All the things you believe until this very moment were told by your parents or your teachers. But they couldn't prove them either. No they couldn't. They just read about them in a book that's written a very long time ago. But you want to believe them anyway because... that's what a belief means. To believe is to accept that something is true without the need of any evidence.
The atheists, on the other hand, think that everything that's written in holy books are false, and that god doesn't exists, 100% sure.
We agnostics say: we don't know. Yes, repeat after me: we. don't. know.
So when they asked me what will happen after I die? I simply said what I had to say: I don't know.
(intermezzo: seriously, I like girls who would talk about heavy stuff, like religion and women's rights and monkeys and Britpop music. I despise party girls, or as some people say, "woo girls". Not the ones who go to parties occasionally, but the ones whose lives are inside the party. No offense okay girls, I don't mean to be sexists, there are "woo men" too. If you would like an example, um, Black Eyed Peas).
I couldn't remember if it was Gladys or Mutia, but one of them asked this next question: "Which religion would you teach to your kids?" Hm. Tough question. First of all, I don't know how to raise a kid, yet. Your kid is the biggest investment you'll ever have. Hell, for evolutionists, breeding--hence ensuring the continuity of our species--is the main goal in life. So I will be very careful about raising mine. My answer was, "I will teach them the basic of all religions.". Well, it dazed them a bit. Said that it would make my kids confused, what if your kid ask you about the origin of life? which god is the correct one? bla bla bla. As you probably know, I'm a slow thinker. So instead of answering with a witty comeback, I said, "relax, I know what I'm doing". Mutia and Gladys was curious about how my kids will turn out, so I offered them this: "Ok, let's meet again when we have kids". So there you go, a tiny pact was made: 14 years from now, the five of us will meet on Dapur Bebek to see how my kids will turn out, compared to their kids.
I forgot to tell them one more thing though, that when I have kids, the two top priority lessons I would teach them are these: Logic & Compassion.
Which brings us to the last topic being talked that night: If you won't teach your kid a particular religion, how would your kid knows morality?
*Prett* I farted.
They argued that religions are the source of all morality.
No it's not. Mankind learned morality through trials and errors. They find some things are better than others ("better" means it gives more shared benefits to the whole population) and then they call it moral. If you don't agree with this, just ask yourself: "Do monkeys kill each other?". Okay let me answer that for you, the answer is NO. How would monkeys know that killing is immoral? From a religious text book? No. Through time, they found out that killing is bad, and they just don't do it anymore.
What about humans? Humans kill each other. Yes. But humans eventually created laws which forbid killings, loooooooong time before they wrote Vedas (kitab Weda), and even looooooooooonger time before "God" created Torah.
Just my two cents.
Shit this post is longer than the length of my Kapita Selekta essay multiplied by three. I should stop.
Conclusions:
- The world will end, but life don't have to end at the same time.
- But when the universe end, everything ends.
- I don't know what will happen after I die, or after the universe dies, nor do you.
- Religious people believe in god, atheists don't believe in god.
- Agnostics think both religious people and atheists are either too scared/too arrogant to accept the fact that we just don't know.
- I will teach my kids the basic of all religions, and let them decide their religion themselves, if any.
- I will teach them logic & compassion. I think these two things are the seeds of morality.
- I like girls who can talk about heavy stuff.
- I farted.
- I've been eating a lot of ducks lately.
- It's the second post in a row where I talked about animals (yesterday was caterpillar). I think I'm gonna write one more animal related post tomorrow. It's gonna be about pigs.
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