Water Castle, Jogjakarta

Oh my gosh! I feel awkward to write on my personal blog!

It's been more than a year since my latest post? I guess yes. I think I should have asked myself "Where have you been?".

Yeah I got through a lot this year and all the things were fun and full of surprises. I'm glad that this year I was doing fine. Well, 2015 is not over yet. I know. I know TOMORROW IS THE LAST DAY OF 2015.  Tomorrow will be 365 days till new year (again)!! I'm so excited!

First thing first! back to my blog. I changed several things, deleted some stuffs, added some details and else. I really want a new face  in 2016 so that I redesign my blog. It is not a major changing but yeah you can tell there is different taste in it. I was thinking that I probably should delete this blog and create the new one that fit to my current state of personality. But I think this blog witnessed my life quite enough so to delete this blog is not a wise option. So here it is! hope you enjoy the new design :)

Anyway, I would not finish this post with nothing related to my 2015. So here I will share you a little bit about my trip in Jogjakarta. It was in early December. I've been looking for opportunity to visit Jogja for holiday after my last visit in August. And fortunately I happened to have a chance to join a conference called BUBW (Better Understanding for a Better World) there so I took the chance to escape for a little bit and accomplished my must-visit-list in Jogja. One of them is Water Castle.

Water Castle or Taman Sari (local name) was onced a part of Ngayogyakarta Palace and it now becomes a tourism destination in Jogja. It has some kind of uniqueness in the architecture in a way it brings a very strong old kingdom atmosphere and not to mention is a good place to take some snaps!

I was lucky that my two friends, Pipod and Puput accompanied me strolled around the place and we took some nice pictures.

My most favorite part of the place is the outer architecture. It was like fallen-kingdom-ish and somehow I felt like I'm in the cave or something.

 and the most popular spot that been spotted on a lot of people's instagram who visited Water Castle.

Despite all of those, we accidentally met a group of people that do a pre-wedding shoot and that was good idea I think. It would be a unique pre-wed pictures.

For you guys who plan to visit Indonesia and especially Jogja, this place is worth a visit. This place is located around 400 meters from Ngayogyakarta Palace, at Taman, Kraton Street. It is open start from 9 a.m. till around 4 p.m (Monday-Sunday). The ticket is pretty affordable, it will only charge you Rp 3K if you are Indonesian and it will charge Rp. 7K if you are foreigner.

and as a bonus guys, here is my picture with two of my friends on the conference. I think I will write about the conference in the next post. Good luck for 2016! may you always be successful for everything good you plan in the future!

(Indonesian Business Student - Indonesian Bachelor Degree Graduated English Student - Malaysian Chemical Engineering Student)

A Cup of Coffee 0.2

People somehow asked me about what I want to be, what I think about me or even who I think I am. It takes years for me to answer such questions. I know I maybe am not an expert to describe things even about myself but as I know, I know what exactly things I have been through and what life truly is. Then I expect people will get to know me. Not from things I bring to the table but from things that I defined as things and they are called a cup of coffee.

LIFE. Something that is very common to pin down. When we begin to describe it, it feels like we travel to the mars and back and back again and back-back-again and again never ends. It is even harder when we find out that secret and logic are friends, it does not matter if the secrets are not always logically defined. The more we try to crush them, the less possibility they will unfriend one and another. Seriously, it is not the thing. The thing is us. You and I, you and she, she and he, we and they or whatever it is. We sometimes hate someone called best friend and most of time sick of bad friend a.k.a enemy but somehow our enemy is our best friend. It does not make sense, what is actually friend or enemy? My enemy is friend of my friend’s friend. So why cannot we be friends? Or why our friends not claimed same individual as an enemy? Too many whys. How does it feel? Well, that is life. A time when the questions of why are favorite and how and what follow.

Life is not always in the "X" axis (Read: Flat). There are always salty and sweet. Like a cup of hot coffee in the afternoon, life would be beautiful when everything is placed at the appropriate time and in the right portions. We have to believe in ourselves when putting our own sugar in coffee; do not be afraid of sweetness, which is why taking risks is sometimes necessary in life.

Sometimes, we felt the hot sting on the tongue when tasting our own coffee. Everyone has their own way to express it. So is life, everyone has his/her own way to be against problems in life. No need to get upset. Do not be too sad. What happened happens, but it is only the theory. Practically people want to rewind times, fix things, regret the holes and cry over no-s. You know what is funny, people make their own theory and break it practically, such a waste but they called it human being. Agreed. Well I have to agree even when I am not. People keep thinking about what people say, I don’t want look like [beep] in public, they won’t do the same, they won’t like it. Again, agreed. I keep thinking the same things but why bother? We are even different to any other individuals. Oh really? But it ain’t easy to screw people thought or public opinion. Why we cannot be like a coffee in a cup, they will not argue when another cup get more sugar or they do but we cannot hear its voice. I don’t know but let us get through this. People say words, we do too, people think things, we do too, people do what they have to do more than what they want to do, we even more do too. What really matter is ourselves. Get to know ourselves. Try to forgive ourselves. It is that hard but again hard depends on us not him not her not them. Accept the bitterness or sweetness but no worry if it tastes not right at least we learn something. Without the bad days, we never know how to be glad to have the good ones.

Satisfied is time when we can spend our coffee without getting a bitter taste of the dregs. In life we do not apply this coffee theory. Satisfaction is not always a happy ending but also the bad ones that we can frame on the wall and say oh I experienced this and no more. We call it hope. Hope to change and hope to move on. Question. Do they really exist? People who consciously say yes! to enjoy the bitterness of life?. If there is maybe his/her life is so much sugar or maybe they have no sugar stocks so frankly say yes is the only one option left. Then what? We can still grocery shop or something. There is no one and only option. We can make options if we do want it, if we are clear to see it.

I think I write a lot random things like jelly tots. But note this one. There is no excuse when we have to interfere a cup of coffee belongs to someone else with our own recipe. Because it is a cup of your coffee, enjoy it! While this is mine.

Don’t forget your morning coffee!

Rahmat Arif Febriyanto