Diary of a Wimpy Kid

Hello peeps. Managed to watch Diary of a Wimpy Kid today and I love it. It's actually a kid / teenager movie and me being 28, of course it's rather alarming that I still get interested and captivated by this type of movie. I believe it's because there's a large part of me who seriously does not want to grow up and kinda never grows up.

Anyway in Diary of a Wimpy Kid, I actually like the "sidekick" more, the boy named Rowley. His character just had so much confidence in him to be himself and not try to pretend to be someone else, someone "cooler". So it's kinda adorable and admirable. However, I do think that some things were a bit unrealistic about him and his character. For example when he showed up wearing something like a poncho, noone made fun of him. So that was kinda unrealistic. Even Betty in Ugly Betty got totally made fun of. However still, Rowley was so lovable, he's really such a nice and good friend. How about Rowley for a boy's name? :P The main character, Greg, kinda appeared as an ass for me, even though the movie is centered on him trying to make it in middle school. Well when you kinda have a character like Rowley at the other side, it's kinda hard to come as the more likeable one. The other kids were also interesting, like the Indian boy, Chirag Gupta, and the super weird boy, Fregley. Fregley was really really funny and he really had the look for it :) Well, I had fun watching this movie. It feels good to be laughing and to get away from my life for awhile.

On other news, I've gotten my passport. This reminded me that I have to start remembering the number. I also have to update this to Singapore's immigration and I also have to check the filing of my tax. One of the thing that I hate the most here is having to pay tax. Yes, I am sounding that unreasonable. Well, new passport, I have to christen it. Unfortunately, money is not really at a surplus. Alrighty, take care peeps! 2 days to go 'til long weekend.

:) eKa @ 8:21:00 PM • 0 comments

The Last 2 Weeks in Points

Hi guys, it's been awhile since I last wrote. So I'm gonna do this in points.

1) This week, I applied for a new passport. The old one was expiring. The process was such a breeze. It's totally different than 5 years ago. I wrote my experience 5 years ago in this blog and apparently I had to come to the embassy 3 times, to apply, to get my picture and fingerprint taken, and to collect it. It cost so much more too last time, around S$100, I think. This time around it only cost S$35 and S$10 for the picture. I had planned to come earlier because I was expecting a long queue and yes there were people there even before the embassy was open, but there weren't as much people as I expected. There wasn't a line. Most of everyone was able to sit down in the waiting area. The embassy is open at 9, but when it was 9, the counter was still not opened yet and we were still waiting there. Then a girl (who I thought was pretty brilliant!) just stood up and started to stand in front of the counter. Just like that a line was formed behind her. We were such sheeps :P Come to think about it, I wonder if the officer instructed them to do so, or she just initiated it on her own. In the end I ended up having queue number 6 :) and the process took like around half an hour plus to complete. I just have to go back next week to collect it. The efficient process was such a joy! The area for passport renewal and visa application seemed to be so much bigger. At least that's what I thought. It's kinda brighter as well. I'm totally happy with the embassy's improvement. I do have to say that the embassy is pretty strict. You have to dress properly to go there. I think a lady was singled out because she was wearing a knee-length pants. Then I was called out for not wearing my pass around my neck. In my defence, I was a few metres away to the post where I had to exchange my pass to exit, hence I took it out :P I kinda like being at the embassy. I like being in Indonesian land. Of course I would have spoken differently if the process had been a nightmare :P

2) Since I finished so much earlier, I had a lot of time to kill. So in the end, I went to watch How To Train Your Dragon. Not in 3D. I am not into the whole 3D hype anymore. I thought How To Train Your Dragon was not bad. The ending was perhaps the most sobering ending that one has seen in a children animation movie since Shrek 1 in which Fiona actually turned as an ogre in the ending. This movie did have a happy ending but it came with a realistic ending which I think teach a good moral value to children and empower them if they should ever have to undergo similar fate. Not liking the dragons much except for Night Fury a.k.a Toothless who was very cute. The rest wasn't cute at all. For a dragon species which was described as being highly dangerous, I was quite disappointed to see how cute Night Fury is :P Reading some trivia about it, I found out that it was modelled after Stitch in Lilo and Stitch and I do can see quite a resemblance in them :) Anywho, yes, I would like to have a dragon like Toothless :P

3) Today I feel that things hasn't gone as well as I wanted. It's like there's certain things that I wanted and yet they didn't happen or they happened imperfectly. Maybe I am just putting too much expectation on things. The only sentence I can explain it is, things just don't settle well. I don't know if that makes any sense. Lunch was good though but even then the "ayam bakar" (grilled chicken) wasn't amazing. Maybe I'm just such a complainer on every single little thing. Anyway, wanted to use my GV birthday treat to watch Diary of a Wimpy Kid however I couldn't use it for that :( so I settled for Remember Me. I wasn't interested in watching that and even after watching it, I thought it's one of those film that ended up on a Sunday afternoon on tv. I wasn't crazy about it. I am never one of those girls who go gugu-gaga over Robert Pattinson, so even with him inside it, it didn't interest me much. This is actually the first movie of him that I saw. He is handsome but yeah I feel nothing of him and nothing of this movie as well.

4) I suddenly remembered what happened yesterday. I was having lunch in a canteen and suddenly my eyes went into this guy who just walked through the door. My God! Lo and behold, it was the guy whom I had a crush on back in my NUS days. It's been perhaps 6-7 years since I last saw him and by a twist of fate, he just walked into my world again. Well, one would argue it's a sign and so on but I'm just as shy as ever. So I just blushed and saw him walking around. I kinda have to say I don't have any feeling towards him anymore, at all. It's kinda weird in a sense to be seeing this guy whom you once had intense feeling for and now you don't. It's weird :P

5) Over that lunch too, YeeMaggio whom I was having lunch with was talking about how sad and kinda depressed she feels about her life right now, since she is having a change in her universe. I told her that I couldn't believe that she also feels her life kinda sucks. She said she thinks everybody does and people manage to somehow survive it because it's not in their face so much and when it's really hitting them, that's when all energy are sucked out like a kryptonite to a Superman. I actually would hate to see her go, but I kept on telling her that things might actually be better.

You see, I met my Italian classmates around 2 weeks ago and one message that I took from those successful ladies is be positive. Our energy is like a magnet and we are attracting similar energy to us. So when you feel so negative all the time, bad things just come to you naturally. In my case, it makes me realize that people around me, a lot of them, are depressed with their lives (with the exception of Vivy). So I am trying to be positive and hey reading all that I have written all this time, you know it's not easy for me to do so. I'm trying, trying hard. Right now, I am just making a mental effort of not making a negative statement and as mentioned by Carl, not sigh. I told Oshie about this and asked him to be positive as well. I know it's not easy, but I'm just hoping collective positiveness (is that a noun?) from people around me will raise us up instead of bringing us down. God knows, I am tired of having to comfort people when noone actually bothers to ask me how I am and comfort me.

6) Speaking of selfish people, well I just want to complain about snobbish people. Geez, some people just don't see that they are being such an ass when they're talking about their successful life. Hellooooo!!! There are common people living here. We don't have your life, your lifestyle, and perhaps your wealth. So shut the fuck up. They are so into themselves that they don't see anything wrong with what they are doing. I hate it when people come to me to boast about their recent success or such. In a way, I was thinking this kinda attitude is what get you so unsuccessful in your personal stuff, like in your relationship or family. They are lacking in empathy. It kinda make them pretty fake. I like more humbling people who drop what they are, what they do, how much they earn for a real conversation with you. I am thankful that I have the chance to meet some of this humble people and from them I actually learn from what they are saying. They are just sharing sincerely. Not because they want to teach you because they think they are so mighty successful.

Wow, I got quite fiery in the end ya? Oh well, I think that's all from my life in the past 2 weeks. Looking forward for the next week :) I don't even mind that this Saturday is going to end :) I hope I can continue feeling like this :D Take care peeps!

:) eKa @ 8:50:00 PM • 0 comments

4 x 7

Hi peeps. I turn 28 today. It's been quite an emotional day today. I'm not gonna write it here. I've written what I wanted to write in my diary, including the reference to 4 x 7. Since it's so personal, I'm not sharing it here.

I spent today with myself. I didn't treat myself to anything special. I did buy myself an overpriced ice cream. S$6/cup! It made me miss the days when I was in Italy, getting gelato at 1.50 - 2 euro and I could choose different flavours. Over here 1 scoop of ice cream can cost more than a modest lunch! Not that they taste bad but it's just sometime so not worth it. I really miss having gelato in Italy.

So today, I had breakfast, went to watch a movie, went to pray, and got my lunch/dinner. The movie was kinda a last minute plan. There's isn't any one movie that interest me currently that in the end I settled with Green Zone, starring Matt Damon. I thought it was a good movie and Matt Damon was really really cool in it, even more so than when he was in Bourne Identity, I think. I am not that knowledgeable on the war in Iraq so I don't really know how true or how close the movie is to the truth. But we all know that up to this point, the US cannot really say that they found any WMD or traces of it in Iraq. WMD is weapon of mass destruction, in case you're wondering. If you don't know what it stands for, it may take you longer to understand what they're talking about, because they just refered to it as WMD. I like how the story is. I think it is a good reflection of how things work in this world, that everything is not black and white and eventhough you may find certain things to be the right one, it may not be so for other people. Matt Damon's character kinda went off course to investigate why the intels he's been getting were always wrong. He went on his own course, followed his own instint, even after his colleague pointed to him that it wasn't the order that was given to them. I think anyone in the military will agree that following order is of the utmost importance. So he went on his investigation helped by a CIA agent, uncovering clues one by one, until he discovered that a high ranking US official had been lying about the existence of WMD in Iraq. A high level Iraqi general told this US official that there's no WMD and yet the official said that there's is WMD in Iraq which of course ultimately led to the Iraq "invasion" by the US to find this elusive WMD. In the end, Matt Damon found the high level Iraqi general but then he was shot by an Iraqi who had been helping him because the Iraqi hated what this general did when he was in power. After that, Matt Damon's character sent his report about what had been happening to all the journalist covering the war in Iraq. I give you much spoiler, I'm sorry. But here's my take on the movie.

One, what Matt Damon and the CIA agent were doing was perhaps seen as the right thing to do. But like in any country, or any organization, or company, sometime the right thing to do is not the course that the people in power choose. Being the small minority thinking the other way around and in the case of them, choosing to act on it, they could actually be in deep trouble. In the case of Matt Damon's character, I'm sure after he sent the email with classified information, he could be persecuted by the military court. I guess everything is not always black and white and it is frustrating when you feel that people are doing the wrong thing and making the wrong decision and you cannot do anything about it, that you are being shut down, and you are deemed as a liability for not being aligned with them. In the case of Matt Damon's character who thought he was working to help the Iraqi, it sure sucks when the Iraqi he was trying to help, was siding with the people who were doing the wrong thing, eventhough they had different reasons for coming to the same conclusion. I feel this kinda thing is really a real reflection of how things work in this world.

Two, I do feel thankful for my life eventhough many times I don't appreciate it. I remember some new years ago, standing at my house's balcony and watching the fireworks appear on the sky, with sounds like bullets and bombs being fired. I was thinking it's perhaps how people feel in a war area, seeing fire light up their sky. Unfortunately not beautiful fireworks. In this movie, you can see violence broke on a common neighbourhood area and you really wonder how people actually live there! It made feel really thankful that I'm not there and at the same time I also get when people say that God is unfair. Like why how can He let people suffer like that? And the only answer that we can give ourselves is God has a reason *sigh* When you're in that situation, it's not very comforting, isn't it?

Hmmm ... I guess that's all peeps. I have nothing else to say. I don't know how I am going to survive this coming week. One breathe at a time I guess. Take care peeps!

:) eKa @ 8:36:00 PM • 0 comments

Alice Au Pays Des Merveilles

Hey peeps. I had paella for lunch and waffle + ice cream for tea time and yet I am terribly hungry right now. I don't know why, things just don't settle well and correctly today. Something is just not 100% right *sigh* This morning, I wanted to have breakfast and yet with my buses coming late, I didn't have time to do so :( We started today's session with changes. We don't get Mr. P anymore and people were wondering why, hmm ... I guess Mr. P is like someone you like and hate at the same time. He's not around and you wonder why. When he's around, you dislike the torture. Anywho, we get Mdm. S now. She's okay. I feel that things are moving slower now, but I guess everyone else feel more secure with her. Yeni is not joining us anymore so that's sad. Little boy Nicky is also not among us either. I kinda miss him as well, because towards the end he became rather vocal and did say funny things. I also think it's better if there's another male other than Raggio in a room full of ladies. Oh well.

After which I went to watch Alice in Wonderland in 3D with NanSee. I don't know, these days if a movie comes in a 3D version, I would end up choosing the 3D instead of the 2D version. I still don't know if it makes a difference. In the case of Alice, I think it doesn't because I feel that the movie will still be wonderful in 2D and anyway the story or the adventure to be more correct was really good that all the other things were kinda secondary. To be honest, I was never a fan of Alice in Wonderland. When I was young, the story was kinda too crazy and weird for me that rather than leaving me feeling happy, interested, and curious, I ended up having a bit of nightmare. So when the movie came out, I wasn't too excited about it either, even though there's Johnny Depp in it. The fact that it's a Tim Burton's movie was more of a turn off because he's well known for making things darker and he just have a weird sense of comedy? I thought he made Willy Wonka to be such a weirdo, almost to the point of being scary :( I did however enjoy very very much Edward Scissorhands. Johnny Depp was in that one as well, I thought it was brilliant. Oh I also like Big Fish. So anyway, why in the end I wanted to watch this movie was I think simply because this is a very talk-about movie, everyone is talking about it and gonna watch it. There's a lot of hype around it and also for me, it's because there's Johnny Depp in it. Man! I think he's a really cool actor. I think he did well in this movie though some of the manic expression that he made, we have seen it before. I even thought at some point his character, Mad Hatter, was channeling Jack Sparrow :P

I thought the movie was really good. I like the story. The scenes were quite beautiful and at the same time you can see that's it's really Tim Burton's style. The cast was also really good. The girl who played Alice was so likeable. Helena Bonham Carter was evil. She's just really good at playing these kinda characters. I like how this is a different kind of evil, a more selfish kind. She's still the scariest in Harry Potter. I like Anne Hathaway as well. She's just funny too watch. All her mannerism of being kind and nice were funny. The cheshire cat was actually cute and adorable. I like it!!! The cheshire cat used to be the one that scared me the most. When I was young, the grin could give me nightmare. However I like the cheshire cat in this movie, I guess he's the second most adorable cat in a movie after the cat in Shrek? Oh I have to also say I love hearing Alan Rickman's voice as the caterpillar, though I could only remember his name after going to wikipedia. I'm really really looking forward to see Professor Snape again. Do watch it people. The story was nice, it's really like an adventure. At one point, I don't even want it to end. Hmmm ... I guess it's one correct thing that I did today :) Oh yeah, like when in imdb, they will give you trivia or goof and such, well I am going to give you one. At the beginning of the movie, Alice's dad was talking about cities in Asia and mentioned Jakarta. Well at that period of time, Jakarta wouldn't have been around. It would have been known as Batavia instead :)

A bit of story to share. This week I was so close to closing my life here in Singapore and moving back to Jakarta. It was really really close, that I was thinking of things to close over here and things to start over there. I was thinking about having my dad help me with transportation, having cable tv and internet connection at home. I was thinking about my room which gonna actually be my "room" with actual personal stuff and how the other room which is kinda my brother's walk in closet now is gonna be my walk in closet as well. It was quite weird and perhaps frightening how ready I was to start a life there and leaving my life here. You see, a door presents itself to me. I was quite surprised that it came my way. Something when it happens, do happen really fast. Things were looking interesting and I was actually excited about the opportunity it presents and God knows how I haven't been excited about something for a long long time :( Unfortunately not all the variables are right and so I couldn't make the move *sigh* Maybe it is a good thing that it doesn't work out. But I cannot help feeling a bit sad that finally someone wants me and yet I cannot take them :(

It was surprising that my mom was also against me coming back. I don't know how she would react but I really didn't expect for her to really say I should be staying here. I thought she would be neutral. NanSee was convinced my mother would want me to go back. So perhaps my mother does know me better than anyone else. When people back home asked me when I was going to come back for good, they kinda didn't put into consideration that I do have a life here. Yes, it is a crappy life but it's still a life in which I am in charge of. After 10 years, I have built relationships here. I do have friends here. Very very very few friends, but I do know some people and most of all I have my independence and things that I do here. Perhaps my mother realizes that and she realizes that I do have to give up a lot here. So unless the situation back home can tip the scale, she feels that I am giving way too much. I see it as a sign from God. I think when it's right, it will be right and right now it's not right yet.

Speaking of home, here are a few pictures from home that I didn't turn to black and white. They're kinda unsuitable to be turned to black and white anyway. If you wonder why am I talking about black and white, well because I did this. So here you can see some pictures in colors. Jakarta has been having rain, so you gonna see some rain droplets studies that I did. Then there's the sunset and the shadow formed of my mother's plants. Not being able to get out much, I pretty much took a lot of pictures of the plants :P Then there's also a picture of one of the turtle of the house. It's the other turtle than the one in the black and white set. Okay, that's all, bon weekend everyone!

:) eKa @ 6:56:00 PM • 0 comments

Be Italian!

One thing that's perhaps quite obvious and predictable of me to be doing, is to catch up on the movies that I haven't watched since I was away. There were a few that I wanted to watch when I was at home, but again since I was sick, I wasn't able to go out :( Coming back here, I realized some of the movies that I wanted to watch was phasing out that the timing wasn't good :( I did manage to watch Nine with Vivy yesterday :)

I was quite interested to watch this movie simply because of a line from one of the song which was showing in the trailer, which was be Italian!. The movie was pretty good because of the heavy weights who starred in it. Seriously, I thought the story was perhaps so-so but because of the amazing actor and actresses in it, the movie became quite amazing. Notice that I wrote actor in singular form, because basically there's just 1 major male character, Daniel Day-Lewis, who played Guido Contini, on which the story is centered on. Daniel Day-Lewis is just a real fine actor. He's so different in this movie. The movies which I remember him from are Gangs of New York and There Will Be Blood in which he played a real fierce man. So this role in Nine is totally different and he did amazing! He was so Italian despite of being British. I really really like him in this movie. I remembered a conversation we had with Francesca on a Sunday about Daniel Day-Lewis learning the craft of shoe making in Florence. I guess that experience helped him in becoming a real Italian :P Too bad he wasn't nominated for an academy award. I guess the competition was really tight.

With the actresses, they were just amazing as well. Nicole Kidman was stunningly beautiful. Penélope Cruz is somehow always seems to be perfect for this kinda manic passionated role. I cannot believed that someone once liken me to her character Maria Elena in Vicky Cristina Barcelona. Marion Cotillard was a real good actress as well. I happened to watch her in Public Enemies during my holiday and I think she always did well in her movies. Obviously her most amazing role is in La Vie En Rose. She's looking pretty cute in Nine. Judi Dench and Sophia Loren are of course so experienced. Judi Dench was such a fun to watch and Sophia Loren being the celebrated her, one is really looking at her on every scene she's in. Overall the movie is good and the cast is amazing. I kinda miss Italia seeing the scenes *sigh*

There's a song that Daniel Day-Lewis sang at the beginning, entitled Guido's Song. I feel that the song represents me too. In a way, I get what the character Guido felt. He was looking for answer, he wanted to just feel alright, he wanted to stop, he wants everything to just reveal themselves to him, and he was so restless. I am all that too. I feel that. So when he sang the song, it kinda resonated with me, especially the line I would like the universe to get down on it's knees and say, "Guido, whatever you please, it's okay. Even if it's impossible, we'll arrange it." That's all that I want. I feel exactly the same! So people, if you have time and not so turned off with musical, do watch it. It's pretty interesting :)

On other news, I uploaded some pictures from home to my flickr. I was feeling black and white. Perhaps because I thought the pictures weren't that amazing, so I turned them black and white to make them more interesting. Some of the pictures are not good in black and white though, so perhaps later when I have the time to experiment with my newly installed Adobe Photoshop CS4, I'll put them up. For now buonanotte peeps! Vi voglio bene!

:) eKa @ 10:45:00 PM • 0 comments