Review on 2012 (Part 3): Starting My Own Business

After did a thorough discussion with Mom and my sister, finally in the middle of year 2012 Mom and I braved ourselves to open a laundry. Well, actually it was I who needed to be brave...hehehe... 

It was a good friend of mine who moved into an apartment nearby which gave a big push to my decision. And of course the stars supported it....hihihi... They said that 2012 was a good time for my kind to open a business and it would be better something that related to water....THERE!!!...hihihi... Somehow, I felt that God had heard my plea and answered non-directly of course...(typical...hihihi...)

So, for almost six months now, I pick-up and deliver laundry to the apartment twice a week in the evenings. It's still quite overwhelming and need a hard discipline to pump up my energy till late nights.

At first, I thought that I had to get at least 30 customers before I resigned from my present job and fully involved into this laundry business. Because till now, it's still my Mom who does most of the jobs, like pre-washing, operating the washing machine, and supervising the ironing. I needed 30 customers to balance with my present salary.

But after three months doing the business, I could see that 30 customers is too high to achieve in a year....since I hope that I will be able to resign at least at the end of 2013.... Also, I could see that even having three regular customers at the time, sometimes the job was quite overwhelming. Several times, I had to help ironing the clothes after I was home from my regular job. So, I recalculated and decided that if God is willing to entrust me with 10 regular customers, then I'll hand in my resignation.

At the moment, my laundry business have 4 regular customers, and in the past two weeks we just got 2 new customers. Already SIX customers!!! I'm so ecstaticII! I really hope that my birthday wish will become true on 2013: to be financially independent....so help me, God....!

Review on 2012 (Part 2) : LEAVE THE YOUTH CHOIR

I'd joined the Catholic Church Choir in my parish since 1988....when I was still in the senior high school. At the moment, my parish was still very young and there was no youth community. The choir was builted to facilitate the young ages, so we could have at least one regular activity to meet and unite every week. At the moment, our choir didn't have a name. We simply was called St. Aloysius Gonzaga Youth Choir.

 

I had been through too many managerial changes while I was still an active member in this choir. And not just managerial. There was many changes in our members, too... Moving out of our parish because of the new job or living places, got married or even have a child.... Yes, our youth choir was no longer purely for single, unmarried youth. We became so solid, that marriage couldn't stop us getting together and training our voice.

 

This year, after suffering for a lack of active members for some time, the management finally was able to persuade the newer youth generation to join the choir which is now called AG Voice (AG is a shortened from Aloysius Gonzaga, our parish's name). These new members are averagely half of my age....makes me one of two eldest members in the choir...hehehe... The other one is also the long-time member like me. We're both the first generation of the choir....hehehe...

 

In the mid-year, the management conducted a change-over. At the time, I was almost a life-time songs coordinator. I handled the task since 1990.....22 years!!! So many times I asked each new management to find my replacement, but no one wanted the job....[sigh!]. In my point of view, it's a simple task. You just have to prepare and organize the songs for each assignment, make sure there's enough copies for each member, and file those songs.

 

Anyway, this time I insisted the management to also replace me. I just started my own business which for a while only runs in the evenings, makes me super-duper tired to attend any choir practices. Of course, I didn't say my real reason to them. I just said that it really, really didn't fair to left me behind one more time....hehehe.. So, finally there is one new blood who agree to takeover my task...hurrrrayyy...!!! And started the heavy job for me to compile all of those songs in my house in containers, ready to ship out to its new home.

 

Slowly but sure, I started to backout from the choir. I didn't join their weekend retreat out of town. Didn't attend wedding choirs on Saturdays. And finally skipped practices. At first, I only told them that I had something to do that evening. One week became two weeks, became one month and finally I decided not to join in this Christmas duty. Success!!!!!

 

Finally, I'm able to leave the choir, with no regrets at all. Someone is finally doing my old task. The new generation of choir has a good numbers of member and good voice quality...more than mine, I think....:)... One nice accomplishment of mine on 2012....:)

 

After on duty for Holy Saturday 2012

 

Review on 2012 (Part 1): SAD NEWS

Each time closing to the end of every year, I notice that there is an increasing number of people passing away. Either because of age or illness or natural disaster. We - that's my family - call it as The Calculation of Year End. When my own Dad passes away on November 2009, we remembered it and quietly took a humour in it.

 

This year, however, I received two sad news from my friends who lost their fathers. Last week, Stardust sent me a sms that her father passed away suddenly. This morning I read Mbak Fida's blog about the passing away of his father after being hospitalized for some time. So close to Christmas.....a uniquely family time...I can only hope that they will be strong enough to keep on moving and live, because I know they are strong persons....

 

 

 

 

Happy 715th Anniversary, Surabaya!

May 31 this year, Surabaya celebrated its 715th anniversary. This city is my hometown, the place where I was born, spent most of the time growing up and be educated, and now live and work. It's one of metropolitan cities in Indonesia. The city that I believed was built as a trade center, a port city back in the old history before this nation was born.

Maybe because of its background as a trade center make Surabaya only have very little caracteristic of its own culture. Even I, who has spent most of my life live here, am difficult to name what its specialty food is. Every traditional food here is originally from other places around Surabaya. But the trade center caracteristic makes Surabaya rich of any kind gourmet. One could find anything from eastern food till western food, from fine gourmet till fast food, from restaurants till simple food stalls.

The else thing Surabaya is rich of is malls or shopping centers. There are many malls here with different concepts to spoil shoppers. Well, it's not unusual for a metropolis to have many malls. But differs from Jakarta, the capital city of Indonesia, one doesn't need much time to go to a particular mall, 45 minutes is the longest. At Jakarta, you need at least an hour to go to any places closest from you, that's not included the time you need to break through any traffic jam and the stress you've to endure as its result. Many times visiting Jakarta, I never could go and visit half of the places I want to. Only one place for a day! Here, in a mad time I went to three different malls with quite distance between them only in a day, say from 10am till 7pm. Mad, huh?

Maybe I am not too familiar with this city after all, that I always have no idea where I would take my guest to spend the visiting time at Surabaya. One thing I could think of is spending a day at shopping mall, or go to Ciputra Waterpark (oh, no....make it two things!) But, hey, it's not a bad idea to spend a day at a mall here! Like Plaza Tunjungan, my favourite place to hang out. One could browsing many kind of shops there, from clothes till books, till you drop. Hungry and tired? There's three food courts and many others eating places, that one could fill his stomach and rest his feet. And to close the day, there's a cinema where one could watch the newest movie. Good, eh? And need money, too....hehehe...! Oh, well, the consumerism culture!

Let's give awards for......

On this Kartini's Day, let's give awards for these special people :

1. Women who could combine her career with her passion in managing the household perfectly in harmony without complaining whatsoever.
2. Parents who always encouraged their daughter(s) to reach the star of their dreams, but would never disappointed if in the end she would prefer to follow her sweetheart to the end of the world.
3. Husbands who always support their wife in exploring her talenta and willingly take over the household management in doing so.

A Conversion from Oil to Gas : Between Government's Assumption and Public's Ability to Pay

These days in every Indonesia's TV stations, there is an ad to promote a recent programme of our government : Converse in using oil to gas for cooking. This programme is intended to help the Government in reducing the heavily subsidized fuel and electrical consumption.


The bottom line of the ad is that if we really count it, the average daily cost of using gas is definitely lower than using oil, not to mention others advantages like easier in cleaning, less time consuming in cooking process, lower risks in igniting fire and explosion.


Well, it's true. But one thing crucial which I guess never thought by our government is the people's ability to pay. Maybe gas is less costly than oil, but one couldn't buy gas in only 2-5 litres a day. One has to buy a container minimum for 15 kg, that assumed could be used for one or two weeks. And for that, one has to pay Rp 30.000,00. Compare that with oil which could be bought only for a litre or Rp 2.000,00. It could be only for a day, yes, but then mostly lower and middle class people now live on daily basis. That means all they have is just for living today only. So, they would buy things they need for today. There's no money that big so they could buy gas, and surely there isn't any agent who would willingly sell the 15 kg gas at once and be paid daily afterwards.


Maybe there are many people in this country that couldn't imagine or simply don't know that there are others who still try hard to live and exist from day to day, even in big metropolis cities like Jakarta and Surabaya. But, they do exist, and they're the most to suffer from this conversion programme as this programme mostly is aimed for people living in the big and metropolis cities.


Well, I guess it's hard. The government and those people, they both are all right in their each opinions. But, really, all that we need is time to cool down. So, the government has to be more patient in socializing the programme. And we, the people, should try to trust the goodwill of our government and give a chance in trying and running the programme, see if it is really as good as the government says it will.


Talk less, do more!

Xtra-L Community

Today, I read an interesting material in the Kompas, one of the biggest Indonesian newspaper. It's about a community consisted of persons with big body or commonly called as XL, who try together to change the general opinion about beautiful and body size.

I thought to join them. I actually had taken the first step to sign up. But, then I came up with this part which required me to tell them a little about myself and why I want to join them. The first question is easy. I surely am one of big size people, what with my 157cm height and 80kg weight. The second question made me think again about my motivation.

Granted, I am a little curious about this community. I guess I want to meet some people who also try to think less about their body, who has quite confidence in presenting herself/himself as big as she/he is, no matter what world says about them. But, do I really want to join them? Exactly what I need from this community? I still don't find the right answer. Will a curiosity is enough for join this community? Not for me! So, I decided not to sign up for now. Maybe later, after I re-read the material again.....hehehe....

But, anyone who interested to join them but haven't read the article, visit them on Xtra-L_Community_Indonesia@yahoogroups.com