hello again! ;)

okido, found the way to import my previous blogs.

still, struggling to place them on the right places.

but hey, isn't things don't always turn out the way we wanted? ;p

hello world!

hello world! i'm newbie. so please be kind to me.

the airports

the sultan hasanuddin international airport, makassar, south sulawesi.
these are portraits of airports in Indonesia, taken from 2011 - 2012. can you name them?

it was raining in gunung sitoli...

Into The Darkness

Reddish shafts of sunlight in the western horizon started to fade away, as the first star next to a pale crescent moon gleamed in the eastern dark blue sky. A gust of dry breeze rustled teak leaves, and invisible crickets squeaked in chorus. The chilly darkness slowly crept from a fifteen-meter elliptical diameter black hole underneath us.

A high-pitched crooked sound of muezzin called for the fourth prayer of the day was vaguely heard from nearby village. This would have been one of many dusk prayers I’d skipped, but somehow I felt it was the closest I stand before my maker, as I knelt and tied the parched rope into a safety knot in my simple capstand – a cave descending gear. Clink clung my carabiner into the anchor’s loop and set my chest-ascender onto the rope, I sneaked a glance into the creepy hole. The darkness depth, black as death, was just so unbearable.

Shivering, I repeatedly checking my three safety devices while my mind busily counted seconds I had left on the surface. “You can count on them, you know,” I heard one of my friends said, as if he can read my mind. I shrugged and managed a smile, though I wasn’t sure it was a smile.

I forced myself to crawl on the pit’s grassy rim. Then, muttering silent prayers with eyes wide shut, I reluctantly hurled myself embracing the death trap. The 300 feet depth of Grubug, a vertical cave crafted in the middle of limestone area in Wonosari, Jogjakarta, Indonesia, engulfed me.

Time seemed to stop to a standstill as the gravity pulled me down and I abruptly jerked up, dangling freely amidst the dark open air. A familiar unknown surge of sensation spurted within me: it made my heart pounds its fastest beat, blood runs its quickest stream, swelling through the spine and the armpit into the brain, and eventually sent sweat out to my pores. Fear has conquered all my senses.

Hands trembled and palms soggy, I stepped on my webbing foot-loop and pulled myself up to un-clutch my carabiner and chest-ascender.  Again, I mumbled an endless prayer as I untied the safety knot and pulled up the static rope tautly stretched between my legs. 

I slithered down slowly, carefully avoiding my helmet’s carbide-fueled fire to burn the sole life supporter I hung onto, and going deeper into what seemed a damp bottomless nothingness.

But then, as my pupils adjusted to the muted giant chamber, a gradation of black shadows came to life: a glimpse of faintly figure of stalactites hanging on the cave roof and lines of coarse karst wall shaping the enormous dome.

The sound of the upper world was gradually gone, and quietude consumed me.

Then it suddenly occurred to me. Acintyaçunyata: quiet and dark, eternally. This was the nature of the underworld I was caving in, and nothing I could do to change it.

And I just couldn’t decide, whether I ever used to this particular world or not.

*            *            *

Luweng Grubug, Jogjakarta, 1997.

 
*photo courtesy of Daday Rahmat Hidayat

grammaire aka grammar is obviously not my thing!

so, this is just another personal documentation.
the piece has been published in sunday post edition,
the jakarta post, april 10, 2011 (peek it @ here).
but somehow i prefer the original version (complete with mistakes i made ),
plus the unpublished photos (upload still in progress ).
please, do enjoy.
*comments and critics are highly welcomed.

Finding Nemo in Nusa Lembongan

 
an underwater idyllic paradise
(*photo courtesy of Isao Soga)

A plan to go diving was already in my mind when I took a flight from Jakarta, landed in Bali, set off straight to Sanur and east-crossed the Badung Strait by public speedboat. It was Nusa Lembongan I headed to, an island neighboring Nusa Penida and Nusa Ceningan in the southern-east of Bali.


Yup, the island was well-known for its numerous dive spots. There are at least 7 dive spots stretch around the island, offering various attractive aquatic creatures and a wonderful underwater landscape. One of its spots is Manta Point, lies on the southern off-shore part of Nusa Penida, a world class diving spot to get acquaintance with the gigantic manta rays. And if you come in the right season, from Mei to September, there's a great probability you'll bump into the famously unique sunfish, also known as the mola-mola.


But it has been 4 years since my last diving (okei, i made mistake here. it should've been 'dive', and not 'diving'. noted. ) and I almost forgot everything I learned (so obviously it's not just a simple past tense. yup, my grammar is screwed ). Therefore, refreshing the lesson in the pool first before take a plunge into the sea is a must. A little bit nervous, I reluctantly fought the anxious feeling when I repracticed (is there a word such as 'repracticed'? ) the skill of controlling the buoyancy and mask clearing. Everything went well in the pool, but who knows what'll happen in the sea? (okeiii, i messed up the past, present and future tense! )


The next morning, along with a bunch of other divers on the boat with Lembongan Dive Adventure, we headed to Toya Pakeh, a dive spot lay between the Nusa Ceningan and Nusa Penida.


"The water's crystal clear," said Annastinna, a 40 year old Canadian, inspecting the water from the boat. She was right. Cluster of corals and anemones hazily swayed through the surge of water, as if calling for divers to explore.


Before we jumped into the water, Emo the divemaster (slash husband . okeii, i admit it.) briefed us about the dive, including the signals we use to communicate underwater. Feeling both exciting and edgy, I took my turn to do the back-roll entry. Thrilling, for I could hardly wait to embrace the under-sea-water experience again, and a little bit tense for fearing my diving device would go malfunction, or else, I forgot the skill I've refreshed earlier.


But the awkwardness was all gone once I sank myself down into the cold salty water, noticing the view around. The visibility was clear, and it was astonishingly wonderful!


Vast slope of various forms of corals rested below. A couple of majestic table corals popped amid sea of pale purple cabbage corals.


I gaped in awe as school of colorful fishes whizzed here and there, while anemones waved in dawdling motion. Three clarks anemonefishes (lat. Amphirion clarkii) -- yup, the star of Finding Nemo animation movie was here. Many of them! Probably his relatives -- hovered amongst tentacles of peachy anemones.


And you could easily found the gang here. A Dori-like blue surgeonfish and a flock of moorish idol fishes (lat. Zanclus cornutus) -- one of Nemo's tank inhabitants -- scurried around the corals. A blue starfish hung droopily on the corals. Fortunately, there was no hungry-but-pretend-to-be-a-herbivore shark near in sight (the editor changed it with: "hungry sharks masquerading as herbivores". yup, the edited version is waaaay better! ).

 
School of Oriental Sweetlips
(*photo courtesy of Isao Soga)

And there was a herd of funny black-and-white-and-yellow stripped skin Oriental Sweetlips, swung in an arrow formation. A big titan triggerfish with its glaringly colorful skin -- yes, its patent and contrast colorful skin was as if it wore a fully make-up -- swayed nonchalantly, confidence enough to move alone.


The scenery was so full, yet so quiet. The only sound I heard was the bubbling breath from my second stage mouthpiece. It was indeed an idyllic paradise.


The second dive took place in Mangrove Point, a spot just right in front of mangrove forest in the north-eastern part of Nusa Lembongan. The drift was stronger here. Since putting the hardest effort to kicking (another grammar mistake! you could never combine "to + -ing verb"! well, i've just realized that grammar isn't my thing ) against it was pointless, we threw ourselves joining in the stream, wandering into the miracle once again.


But time did flies! The 40 minutes dive felt like it was only 5 minutes, and the 200 bars of fresh air in our tanks was already hit the caution zone. Time to go up!

"It's amazing. I should one day be back here again," said Eva, a 28 year old Czech Republican who along with her Jamaican husband was in her last days of leaving Indonesia. "It turned out that 3 weeks of traveling around Indonesia isn't enough. I should have extended my vacation to 3 months!" she exclaimed.

 
*the anchorman, heads to the shore after diving
(photo courtesy of vyara)

She's got the point. My two weeks vacation on this very island alone felt like a blink of an eye. I swear I'll be back here soon, to hunt down the famous mola-mola, and the gigantic manta ray, of course!

###

How to get here:
Take a public boat or speedboat from Sanur beach. the public boat departs to Nusa Lembongan every 8 am and 10.30 am, while the speedboat departs at 9 am, 12.30 pm, 2.30 pm and 4 pm everyday. Meanwhile, there are 3 departures to Sanur from Nusa Lembongan jetty at 8 am, 10.30 am and 3 pm everyday. Of course, the schedule depends on the weather.


If you want to dive, there are several dive operators on Nusa Lembongan. Pick one that best suits you.


There are at least 7 dive spots around Nusa Lembongan. Here they are, along with creatures spotted recently:

1. Crystal Bay : mola-mola, manta ray, worty frog fish, turtle, nudis, eagle ray.

2. Manta Point manra, turtle, blue spotted stingray, nudibranch, sea snake, nurse shark.

3. SD : breaching mola-mola, turtle, clouded moray, triggerfish, lionfish, yellow edge moray, tuna, barracuda.

4. Toya Pakeh : giant trevally, batfish, nudibranch, mantis shrimp, ribbon eels.

5. Mangrove : puffer, angelfish, reef shark, moray eel, barracuda, triggerfish.

6. Pontoon : lionfish, crocodile fish, rigid shrimp fish.

7. Blue Corner : marble ray, eagle ray, barracuda, turtle, nudis, angelfish, batfish, sea snake, eel, reef shark.

pathetic, but exciting. exciting, yet pathetic.

so there we are. you, me, them

under a wing named a big company

walk proudly with magic badges

let go of the thing once called freedom

pathetic, us, yes it's true

yet exciting

but pathetic still

#no pain no gain [sigh]

black swan: there's somethin' about ballet

 
no, no, no, you're wrong if you think i'm gonna babbling about the movie natalie portman did great in her role as the swan queen in. nope. not at all.

i just need to say that there's something about ballet that even an amateur spectator like me could appreciate. well, i'm not a big fan of ballet -- i think i'd snore if i have to watch the whole act of a ballet show --, let alone a ballet novice. i don't have the slim and delicate figure, nor the elegant and pliancy movements. hey, but i do the taps and the leaps sometimes and i think i did great so far! (in my wildest dream, of course, ha ha)

so, you see when ballerinas dance with their chin up and hair wrap up neatly in a sweet bun high above the head? all their muscles emerge, but not in a rough and masculine way the roman sculptures amaze us. it’s the other way around. they’re so strong yet so weak, very muscular yet so fragile like a porcelain doll and must be light enough to be lifted by a male ballerina (what did you call a male ballerina? a ballerana? T_T). 
 

anyway, i found it’s captivating to see the poses of a ballerina: whether it’s a tap of her flippers on the hard floor, a bend of a body with arms dangling effortlessly in a sophisticated way that you just could imagine they’re stretched away by knots of rope, or very powerful and quick repeated loops with the tutu swings gracefully.   

don’t ever forget the face. the expression of the face: the wrinkle of the eyebrows, the seducing yet menacing look or even the submission stare from the eyes, the pulling of the tip of the lips that depicts a vaguely smile you could just smell her pain…

it’s the feel. the feel’s just there. and it connects the hearts. the hearts of the ballerina on the stage and the audience trapped in their seats, so that they quietly shed tears, or even applauded in a standing ovation by the end of every act.   

and it’s the same feel that arouses the sense to capture the picture of ballet movements i saw in sketches. i know they weren’t perfect. it’s just that i needed to let the hands speak for themselves through the lines of sketches. (well, so sorry for being a narcissist. i’m just a human, and need to exist, in a way or the other. don't we all?)

 don quichotte, des '99

le lac des cygnes (swan lake), des '99

psst, just so you know, to this day, i’m still wondering what those ballet slippers had in their front part. is it steel? or a solid wad of cotton so that ballerina can stand up on their toe without fearing they would broken their toenails and their feet fingers?

you tell me.