Month: November 2012

All the blogs in my ‘world’…

Posted on by Annisa F. Wulandari


A few weeks ago I received an email to notify about blog suspension. The blog.com team warned me that I will lose my inactive blog, although I need to figure out which blog because they didn’t pinpoint which one. Suddenly I remember I have some blogs; the one I made for the very first time because I was inspired by a blogger, Astrid Felicia, the one I had in Friendster because they offered a blog service to go along with their social networking website, the one I created for CSS trial (I couldn’t remember this blog’s name) and the one in WordPress. I tried googling the first blog, the only phrase I remember was ‘ILoveBlue’, I think it is the blog tagline, so I typed it in the search engine. Unfortunately, no result, so I looked up my old emails because I must have had notification from Blogspot about the blog. I finally found it in an old email I wrote to Astrid. That embarrassing moment when you read old emails. Yahoo is my very first and primary email account since year 2000, so it saved so many correspondences I did back in high school, university until now.

I was surprised of what I found in my first blog, I only find some entries, the first one was posted on 16 November 2003, it’s been 9 years and I can see the transformation of myself from my writing style. It’s funny :) My adolescent years were full of love and pimples problems. Yeah, PIMPLES! My skin is sensitive and the imbalance hormone made it worst. As for love, I have always been unlucky when it comes to love. It’s either one-sided love or not-long-lasted love. Well, the love complication is advancing now; distance issue. You know, the kind of complexity when you like someone’s who is out of your ‘geographic range’? Blame the internet and social networking websites! So yeah, I am glad I started my first blog.

The second blog was my Friendster blog. Friendster was a prominent social network website. Too bad they have suspended all blogs under the website that is considered as the grandaddy of modern social networks. I remember I was worried about not having any chance to ‘update my relationship status’. It’s always ‘single’, and just like any other teenager who want to ‘show off’ her boyfriend, this website is a perfect place to tell my ‘tiny world’ that I was ‘desirable’. Well, at least that was my thought. It’s silly I know, but hey, I was once young and stupid :p We’re living in the world of perception where social acknowledgement and acceptance are more matters than our own self-acceptance. I still face the dilemma from time to time. Friendster blogs were also my research subject. I graduated from the university after I defense my thesis about ‘self-disclosure through webblog’.

The Thesis

I cannot remember my third blog, I remember Dista because she was the one telling me that I can modify CSS template, I had good trial and error time.

The most recent one is this blog. I can’t recall when was I started the blog, but it’s been wonderful to share some of the stories here. There are so many pain, happiness, tear and silly things scattered all over the entries; life lessons. I rarely re-read my entry, but maybe my kids can know me better through this blog. I have crossed many things off my bucket list, but surely there are more dreams waiting to be crossed off. One step at a time, I’ll get there.

My mom goes online! Should I be worried?

Posted on by Annisa F. Wulandari


There’s a new conversation theme at home, “Nis, gimana cara update status dan tambah teman?” or “Neng, gimana sih cara lihat foto teman-teman mama?” Yup, my mom goes online! She’s starving to understand this ‘new’ world.
The trigger is simple; A high school reunion of the year 1982. Last week she met her HS friends and somehow it made her so enthusiastic to know her friends’ updates.

My mom is a simple housewife, she spends 25 years of her life at home; raising the kids. She only knew basic utility of handphone to call and text (well, the last one is a skill she learns recently), but now she’s improving her ‘social network’ skill with her phone. She bought my iPhone and adjusted to the user-friendly service a phone could offer. I often found my mom busy with her phone! Whatta sight! Lately she even complained about how lousy the Internet connection at home is :p She can say that because she compares her data usage in Jakarta. I can’t believe that my mom complained about such things! I am always the one who complains about it, that’s one of the reason why I rarely come home in the weekend. It’s because how remotely I feel when I can’t update my status, can’t tweet about anything or can’t send whatsapp. She intensely talks to her high school friends now. It’s good to see her reconnect herself to some people in the past. But there is something I am worried about; my online life.

I find myself difficult to confront my family, as a result, I bottle things up. Sometimes I think I am more vocal in expressing my thoughts through social apps. So when she said something about ‘Neng, gimana cara lihat profil Arief (red. My brother)?’ Or ‘trus kita bisa lihat status-status lama ga?’ I am worried! I share things to my mom, she knows almost all my friends, but I rarely talk to her about my personal feelings, she doesn’t know if I am in love or our of love, or I am hurt. And just like the other moms, they have this urge to protect the children and understand the problem. I don’t want any intervention. So I am good when my mom thinks that cyberspace is a foreign world. I just don’t want my mom questions me about my status updates. It’s gonna be a nightmare! Isn’t it weird that it doesn’t matter when random friends or followers read our personal tweet and status, but it matters when our parents read it? There are valid reasons to justify that and I won’t argue. Unfortunately, it’s not always easy to confront personal matters to people who matter to us.

Is this how my brain work?

Posted on by Annisa F. Wulandari


I have this interesting conversation with my friend when I suddenly come to the conclusion that my brain works in a ‘weird’ way, not sure if it’s normal, but I attempt to understand it. Well, there are people who study how the brain works, and I am pretty sure they can explain how mine works. But since I am not anywhere close or befriend with the brain experts, I will try to explain it myself.

Whenever I try to remember something new, I will associate it with something ‘similar’; something that has been printed out in my head so it will be easier for me to remember the new things. When I read something, my mind decode it into something. I’m a lame reader, I’m bad with memory. I can not remember exact words or phrases. This is why I almost failed my ‘Introduction to Law Systems’ unit in my college. The study required me to remember letterlijk. Something that is impossible for me. I was amazed that some of my friends can remember an article or act letter by letter and I was frustrated because my brain can not make the exact same link. I spent many hours trying to remember, but I ended up remember nothing. I learn something from its context, my brain decode it into something I can understand. I might be unable to rewritten it, but I do understand what it means. Sigh, difficult explanation.

Take another example, when I read something new, like ‘Friesian’ my brain is looking up for something familiar in my memory. They have this brand in Indonesia, Frisian Flag. In my brain, Friesian and Frisian look ‘similar’ and when I tried to recall my memory about a horse, somehow I mentioned what’s associated with the milk company, which is Frisian, not Friesian. The process of decoding the word is ‘corrupted’ and then I failed to remember the new word although it’s not completely useless. I gain new understanding and knowledge about horse.

Why am I writing this? It is a way for me to understand myself. I remember writing about my past memories, about love and hurt, about my inability to remember the exact words or phrases that make me cry or happy, but I do remember my feeling when it happens. I can not remember what we were talking about when T called me for the very first time, but I do remember my feeling, it’s crystal clear. I remember my heart was beating faster than normal, butterflies in my stomach, and how silly I was.

My mind is weird. Sometimes I am afraid my brain can not absorb new things :-( I lost words sometimes, and it freaks me out every time. I google a word, Lethologica. Wikipedia associate it with psychological disorder that inhibits an individual’s ability to articulate his or her thoughts by temporarily forgetting key words, phrases or names in conversation.. Probably I am not as healthy as I thought I am. But I hope there’s nothing serious about it.