The Reason.

Hmh… Nigel Barker…would be the reason I convert.

Vintage Epiphany

Memory is a bitch and reminiscing is its mistress. But I love bitches. I think they’re great. And they make great company in my life, because I live in the past. I’m the past. I would go from cities to cities looking for second hand bookshops, second hand CD shops, or just plain second hand shops. I would go to markets and get myself some old clothes that once belonged to another soul, another person, another personality. History fascinates me and trivias amuse me. I find comfort in museums. Most of my conversation are dominated by ‘been there’, or ‘done that’ or ’seen it’ or ‘had it’. The past always somehow guide me and the future lost me. I guess I like the fact that I can always learn from mistakes and can’t stand the fact that I’m so clueless about the future. I connect better with ‘what once was’ and find that cemetery bears romantic mysticism. Because there, the past, the present and the future are finally at peace and together at last. I like to collect ‘old news’ and things that are usually taken for granted and find no more use of such as used movie tickets, old postcards, letters from the people I know or old birthday cards. I keep them in labeled boxes and scrapbooks.

Sometimes my memories play tricks on me and reminiscing, through all these old things I keep, play a little more mind game than I anticipated. When the mind game hits home and affects my trail of thoughts, I sooth my self by adorning the future with items from the past like old movies, old records I’m familiar with and scour for old affordable, distinct and unique outfits or two from some old shops.

Through the past, I find comfort. I find a friend. I find that it’s always my present and my future. No matter how fast I try to move further forward.

Sushi Grooving It.

It was a nice and sunny Saturday afternoon. It was going to be one of that nice Saturday afternoon. He knew it. He just knew it. A baby roach was crawling happily to and fro in the kitchen. He was thinking, today was gonna be his day. Mom and Dad were gone, and he was left all by himself at lunch in the kitchen. Alone at last. Sometimes he felt that they babyed him so much that they left no privacy to him. He inhaled the scent of seaweed that filled the kitchen air. He moved happily and cheerfully between the plates, along the cups, and up and down the bowls. Every now and then, a hand would lift the bowl or plate or cup or glass to the tray and he would jump on it, jump off it, and back to the kitchen table again, hide under the plates, between the bowls and behind the tall tall glasses. He loved how it smells, the seaweed, nori, in Japanese. It reminded him of the beach. Well, not that he had been there or anything, but that’s what Mom and Dad told him. They said, they liked this kitchen because the smell of the kitchen reminded of the beach, where they came from. Groovy. Sushi. Groovey. Cool. Today was gonna be so cool.

He was suddenly lost in his own thought when he felt the plate he was on was being lifted and put down on a tray. He ran and hid under the plate. He could feel the human pressure on the plate while placing those rolls of sushi. One, two, three, four, five, six. Again, the plate was lifted and placed on a serving tray. And then another one. And before he managed to trudge off the plate, the whole tray was lifted and so was he.

He started panicking. He knew how those human disliked his kind. Mom and Dad always told him to be careful. ‘Be careful, son. Human is merciless when it comes to roach like us,’ Mom said. ‘Merciless…merciless, merciless, merciless…’ echoed in his thin pale brown head. It was too late now. He was on the plate where the sushi The Human ordered. He knew he didn’t belong there. Maybe within the darkness of the kitchen and under all the crockeries, but not on the sushi plate.

So he decided to hide between the sushi and run as fast as he could and hoped the human didn’t notice. But the question now was, between which roll should he hide? He was trembling…mercilessly (he thought the expression was fitting), when he suddenly felt the roll on his right side was moving and being lifted off the plate. U-ow.

He then decided to tiptoe from behind the rolls so he could get under the plate, on to the chili and soy sauce container and forward to the crack on the table and stay there until he felt it was safe to move under the table, on to the floor and back to the kitchen before his worried sick Mom and Dad lost their heads looking for him. At least, that was the plan. It was going smoothly until he felt a gap between one roll to the other. Oops. He heard nothing. Okay…maybe The Human didn’t see him. And he decided to move as slowly as possible, as careful as possible and then,
“O my GOD!!! There’s a cockroach on my sushi plate!!!! Waiter!! Waiter!!!” A woman’s voice shrieked and filled the restaurant.

Run! Run! Run now!!!! As fast as you could, like you’ve never run before! Faster!!! Faster!!! The Human’s female voice whipped him off the plate and in panic mode he jumped off it and for some dumb reason accidentally climbed the next plate and made him even more obvious in presence. Now he thought he heard The Human male voice and then another voice and another and another…and he felt like he was running around in circle and everything was a blur and he saw the ginger pickle container in front of him and he thought he was just going to go up the lid and then jump off and onto the floor. Yes! Home free!

And then he heard The Human male voice, apologetic at first and then it was too loud and indistinct and black shadow loomed over him and he saw everything on the table getting smaller and smaller and darker now. The images of his Mom and Dad laughing, telling him stories about the beach and why they liked this kitchen and then their voice saying to him, “…merciless…merciless…mercil…”

Hutang.

Saya anak Indonesia. Dan hutang saya banyak sekali. Hutang pertama saya dimulai ketika sejak masih menjadi sperma saya sudah mendapat warisan hutang piutang negara dan bangsa ini dari banyak negara yang meminjamkan uangnya kepada negara saya yang tentunya bentuk pembayarannya akan diwariskan kepada ‘generasi penerus bangsa’ ini. Yang adalah, saya. Perlu diingat juga, hutang ini semuanya dalam dolar, euro, dan yen. Yang ketika saya punya anak cucu nanti pun, hutang-hutang tadi pun belum bisa terbayarkan LUNAS. Entah bagaimana deal pemerintah dalam hal ini dan bagaimana kompensasi pembayarannya dengan pihak pengutang, tapi sejak saya kecil saya sudah sering melihat kalimat wanti-wanti pembayaran hutang oleh generasi saya dalam kalimat,’akan menjadi beban anak cucu kita nanti’. Dan usia saya sekarang adalah 31 tahun.

Hutang kedua dimulai ketika saya masuk sekolah. Lalu lulus SD, lulus SMP, lulus SMA, dan akhirnya berkuliah. Hutang kepada orang tua. Dan walaupun orang tua saya bukan tipe orang tua yang selalu mengingatkan betapa saya berhutang kepada mereka, peringatan akan adanya ‘hutang’ ini akan muncul sesekali di saat saya melakukan hal-hal yang nggak ’se-thinking’ sama cara berpikir mereka. Lalu akan muncul catch phrase andalan seperti ini, “Kamu ini sudah disekolahin tinggi-tinggi, koq masih aja kurang ajar sama orang tua.” Lalu saya berpikir, ‘o, diungkit ya? bukannya memang sudah tugas orang tua menyekolahkan anaknya anyway?’ terlepas apakah nanti anaknya akan jadi kurang ajar atau tidak. saya toh tidak tau kalau saya akan terlahir menjadi anak-anakmu dan sepertinya saya sudah menjalankan tugas saya sebagai anak yang disekolahkan dengan cukup baik. Lulus dan bisa terus melanjutkan ke jenjang yang lebih tinggi’.

Ketika saya lulus sekolah, bekerja dan memutuskan untuk menikah, hutang ketiga saya pun dimulai. Karena orang tua ingin memestakan pernikahan anaknya. Pakai uang siapa? Ya pakai uang mereka. Kenapa? Karena mereka ingin mengundang 500 tamu lain yang saya dan suami saya tidak kenal. Dan sebagian katanya sanak saudara. Yang tetap saja, tidak kami kenal. Tapi…gimana ya? Mereka inginnya ini menjadi pesta pernikahan yang paling membanggakan seumur hidup (mereka), terlepas dari apakah penting pesta sebesar itu atau tidak bagi yang betul-betul menjalani pernikahannya. Mereka kan orang tua saya. Somehow, ini jadi hak mereka dalam hakikatnya menjadi orang tua. Dan peringatan akan ‘pernikahanmu itu kan kita yang bayarin, jadi hati-hati jaganya. Jangan bikin ibu dan bapakmu ini malu’ akan muncul sesekali. Kadang tanpa kita sangka-sangka. Apalagi kalau setelah menikah, kami tinggal di rumah mertua. Maka jenis hutang berganti menjadi, ‘dulu waktu belum punya rumah sendiri, siapa yang menampung kalian?’ dan kalau pada waktu itu di rumah mertua ada nenek/kakeknya atau tante/omnya, maka itu bisa dianggap menjadi ‘bunga hutang’ saya tadi. Karena pada suatu hari nanti ketika salah satu dari saya atau suami menjadi sukses, mereka akan terus mengingatkan. Dengan menawar-nawarkan anak mereka atau cucunya yang lain ‘untuk bantu-bantu kamu di kantor’.

Walau mungkin tidak benar-benar digelar secara gamblang dan ngemplang secara fisik, tapi peringatan-peringatan hutang piutang tadi akan muncul dalam berbagai bentuk. Dan akan merajai kehidupan saya dalam bentuk perasaan bersalah, berbagai doktrin-doktrin yang salah pada anak dalam cara mereka menghargai orang tua mereka nantinya, dan seterusnya dan seterusnya. Mengerikan.

Saya, sepenuhnya menyadari hal ini. Pada dasarnya saya belum menikah. Jadi saya baru kena 2 macam hutang. Hutang negara dan hutang karena disekolahkan. Yang, karena saya belum menikah, kalimat ’sudah disekolahkan tinggi-tinggi…’ tadi masih suka terdengar dari orang tua saya. Maka, selain bercita-cita jadi seseorang yang profesional dan bisa berguna bagi ilmu dan komunitas kreatif di negara ini, saya juga bercita-cita menjadi anak Indonesia pertama yang bisa break this stupid satanic cycle of interdependency.

Saya anak Indonesia. Dan saya ingin terbebas dari hutang. Dengan membebaskan anak saya dari hutang dengan menyadari sepenuhnya bahwa menyekolahkan mereka adalah tanggung jawab saya sebagai orang tua, memestakan pernikahan mereka hanya jika mereka ingin dan bila perlu, menjaganya dalam menjalani kehidupannya sendiri tanpa mencoba mencampuri. Saya adalah anak Indonesia yang ingin menjadi orang tua yang menyadari bahwa orang tua juga manusia, yang oleh karenanya, juga memiliki kehidupannya sendiri.

The Email Monologue.

“I want to take your picture. Can I take your picture?” a man says in his husky morning voice to a woman who’s putitng on her shoes in a hurry. She pulled down her hat to cover her face. It was 7.30am, she had stayed at his place after dinner. They had wine and talked and talked, and he liked her company and asked her to stay. A half an hour ago, she woke up in his arms. Jumped out of the bed and said to him,”I gotta go.” He tried to stop her from leaving and asked her to stay until lunch since she said last night that she didn’t have any plans for today yet. But she insisted she had to go. “I had to go. I’ll go freshen up and then I’ll leave.”

She disappeared to the bathroom and he fumbled for his digital camera. So now, there she was, sitting in front of him on the couch, bowing down to her shoes and fastening its straps. “You’re not even going to stay for coffee?”
“No.” she said without thinking. He held up the camera and told her to look up and heard her annoyed voice screaming, for him not to take her picture. He ignored her and asked her whether,”Will you write to me? Will you email me?”
“Yes. You asked me that 5 times in half an hour. Yes I will. Stop it. No photos.”
He chuckled and kept clicking. He showed her the camera and the preview. She actually looked alright. She uttered a painful grunt from looking at her own image on the screen and sprang up from the couch and while half running to the door, she suddenly stopped, ran back to him, hugged him and kissed him.
“Mmmmm…, so you’ll write to me?”
“Yess…yes…and again yes, I will.” She kissed him some more, opened the door and he asked her to stay for the last time.
“No. I can’t. I’m not used to hanging out after spending a night.”
“Right. So you love’m and leave’m.”
“No. Just leave’m. Bye. I had a nice time.”
They kissed again. She parted herself from him and walked down the doorsteps. “BYE!” she screamed and waved for one last time and disappeared.

She walked back and saw that he was still standing by the doorstep. She waved again, turned and disappeared to the train station. It occured to her that it was her who kept saying yes and promised him that she would write to him. She forgot to ask him to do the same.

Romance Vs Natural Instinct

“Sayangku, aku sayang kamu…,” kata seorang wanita kepada pacarnya. Dia memeluk lengan sang pacar dan menyandarkan kepalanya di bahu sang pacar.
“Aku pengen pipis…,” kata sang pacar yang sedang menyetir.
Si wanita tertawa terbahak-bahak tanpa melepaskan pelukannya dari lengan sang pacar.

Imaginary Clones

Are we together but alone
Making love on the phone
Wishing that each of us have clones

So the clones can do all our chores
While we head to shore
Off to a holiday splendor

So splendidly we will dine
And sip lotsa wine
And throw each other flirty lines

See how the night goes
While conversation flows
And we’re all tingled to the toes

On that note, we’ll be on our feet
Start dancing to the beat
And succumbing to the heat

Of postponed promises
and long awaited kisses, passionate caresses
and predestined sentimental wishes

That we two are finally alone
Away from the phones
While laughing at the idea of having the clones

First Time In A Very Long Time

A man’s hand grabbed her hand. Their fingers entwined. She said something about what happened to her this morning. She had to take off her slippers, because the string snapped and she had to tiptoe to the main road to get a bajaj, without slippers. As so happened, that morning traffic was pretty ugly and she was sure the person in every single car saw her naked feet tiptoeing on the street, she said. But she was glad that she didn’t erase the red nail paints on her toe nails, so at least, she said, her toes could still feel ‘dressed up’ when her pretty slippers failed to do. They laughed. And then he wrapped his arm around her waist. “Crazy girl,” he said. They walked to the car. She was still talking about stuff. He responded every now and then with a smile, a trail of laughter, a peck, and a few stares. The car behind them could see that she occasionaly rested her head on his shoulder. Aaaw…

In the car, she was smiling to herself. She was thinking, how did they get this sweet? How long was this gonna last? She made a mental note to live it as much as she could as long as it lasted. She’s a negative person. That’s just how she thought about stuff. Her self defense mechanism. He was sincere and very laid back. She liked that about him. And all the little things he did. Sweet. It made her feel fluffy and nice. She felt sweet.

Once again he reached for her hand. Their fingers entwined. He turned to her and smiled. She also like that soft lines at the corner of his eyes when he smiled. Sweet. All the little things like that. All the little things. She wondered why people often so caught up in the big things? She remembered what Bjork said in ‘Seen It All’, she said, ‘to want more would be greed’. She smiled and brought his hand to her lips. She didn’t want more. She wanted this. This sweetness of the little things. And for the first time in a very long time, being sweet calmed her down.

The Big Black Bag

I opened that big black bag again. I haven’t for so long. It felt really heavy. Fat with evidence and exhibits of my ideas and springing concepts, passion, dedication and love for colors and forms from the past. It was my portfolio bag.

It was filled with all sorts of things I have created. Individually and teamwork effort. Illustrations, booklets, logo designs, visual diaries, notes, corporate identities, posters, calligraphy, sketches, sketch books, crafty stuffs, magazines, company profiles, writings. My life. It took me a moment to realize that it was some memorable 12 years ago that I started college. It was like being aboard a Mothership. It felt like home. I loved being surrounded with people who created. Create. And create. And create. With such passion and dedication that it’d take away all the sleepless nights and the boredom and the mundane thought that these were all just another assignment, these were all just another job, these were all just another pretty picture on a piece of paper, or cardboard, or plastic, or what have you. We breath life into what we created and that felt really really good.

I miss the drive of creating. And being able to create just for myself. Not for the sake of some brand managers with no taste and who probably live in a house filled with apalling ornaments and furnitures. Instead, we create like there’s no tomorrow. Throwing all of our sweats, thoughts, and personal style onto a piece of paper or a paragraph. Like there’s no tomorrow.

I miss the appreciation from the people who understand. Who know that there’s a certain value in every stroke, every piece, every color combination, forms and the fonts that we chose and why. I miss to be acknowledged because of what I can do, not because of what I am or what I was.

I finally got to the end bit of the bag, where I found old school projects inside the sleeves. Even my school projects looked good. They looked like I had fun with it. Like I really put my head into it. I was so optimistic. So driven with good will and hopes. So enthralled by the greatness of my teachers and o, how I looked up to them. They had taught me everything to survive these past 13 years in this so called creative industry. They taught me how to value myself, how to be proud of what I create, how to breathe through concept and ideas. They even warned me about the clients. But they didn’t warn me about how still scarce people’s appreciation on the things that we do, and how clueless they can be 9 times out of 10, every single year. It’s really amazing. I’m still so amazed myself.

As I put everything back in order again, I realized that, I love being able to create. I love what I’m doing. Like the big black bag had shown me just now. I love the fact that how by doing what I’m doing, I’ve been exposed to so many form of creativity and paths that lead to many inspiring souls along the way. If only I could invite all my teachers to a thank you dinner in one place. Somewhere, where I don’t have to pay in dollars.

Mother’s Crotch

I was sitting on the lazy chair. Catching my breath after a Tae Bo session at home. I was in the back veranda. The morning sun was casting upon the stray grass and my laundry. Mom was standing on the lawn, her back facing me, she was facing her painting who she put on an easel right under the frangipani tree. She put her left hand on her waist. Her right hand was putting finishing touch on the painting. She was wearing her usual sunday batik dress. Today it was black with cotton leaves sprawled all over it. Under the sun, the sunday dress was kinda see through and I could see her thighs, and suddenly it occurred to me, that I came out of that crotch about almost 31 years ago. Then I thought, every single human being in this planet comes out of there. Their mother’s crotch. Do they ever look back, you think, these people? Look back further, and all of us were just a handfull of sperm. Or a mouthful? Ha. Including our parents. Sperm. They’re all sperm. We all are. Why do we grow up to be so cocky? A snob knob?

Hmmm…