The leap years

For the last four years, I have had problems with throwing things away, saying goodbye, and moving. But, already for more than a week, I have to gather the courage to sort out the things to be packed or thrown away.

I looked at the papers I have not thrown away for more than three years. Mostly these are immigration papers, letters from school, bank letters, insurance letters, work and housing letters, tax letters, phone and internet bills, … – did I tell you I have problems with throwing things away?

And I found the very first paper that got me in here. The acceptance letter as a full time student at that school in Breukelen. I was contemplating whether I should throw it away, or keep it for memories. Not being able to decide, I went along with the sorting out. I found also the letter from the exam committee stating the date for my thesis defense, along with the acceptance letter at the work I am currently in, along with the letter from the Embassy of the Koninkrijk der Nederlanden confirming the status of my entry application.

And the last four years flashed before my eyes.

I remember those freezing nights when I had to go to the main building of the school, to copy some of the articles for my thesis. I remember how many times I had to carry a 10kg bag pack while pulling 20kg traveling bag whenever I had to travel back home. I remember days when I had to walk so quickly until my feet bled to catch that train, otherwise I would be one hour late at the office. I remember those days when I had to stay up until 3 AM to finish school assignments or study for exams. I remember my first touch of the thick snow in March 2005. I remember how frustrating it was not being able to understand what was written in the letters from the Immigration Service. I remember the walking to and from the office for one hour everyday. I still remember being lost in Amstel and Amsterdam, trying to find the building for work interviews which made me late for more than half an hour but still got the job anyway. I remember everything.

This whole place has got stories for me. Sad and happy stories. Tears and laughter. Frustrations and hopes. New people I’ve befriended, old friends who’ve gotten closer to my heart, the missing feeling of home, the knowing that I will miss this place terribly after I’m gone. But I have to move on.

With four more weeks to go, I still don’t have the heart to press that button that says yes to my departure flight. A one way flight. Not knowing when I will be back, or whether I will ever be back. And I looked at the boxes lying around in my apartment, having not much strength to put stuff into them. Not because I’m tired. I just want to feel the memories before I put them away. Putting my stuff into those boxes confirms my fear of goodbyes. Leaving means throwing things away. But I have to move on.

Two days ago, Lin, one of my adventure mates went back to Indonesia for good. I know we will be spending time together as much as we spent our time together here, for sure. But realizing that we won’t have the same atmosphere that we have here in Holland cracked my heart a little bit. We both were quite strong not to shed tears when saying goodbye. But we both knew darn well, that it was not our friendship that we were saying goodbye to. It was the memories that brought us into such good friends that we were saying goodbye to. And I got off the train that took her to Schiphol as fast as I could, trying to prevent myself from crying. Moving on gave me no time to be sentimental.

It was the leap year when I arrived in Holland. It is also the leap year when I have to leave Holland. Doesn’t that mean something? The last four years have been the leap for my life. I had to stretch myself beyond the strength I thought I never had. Hoping the future will be shiny.

Of course there are pictures of the places I have been, with the friends I have spent time with. But the best pictures are the ones I keep in my heart. Flashbacks of moments that can never be captured by any video-cams or cameras.

And I realize, tomorrow, I have to press the ‘yes’ button for that flight.

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Tussen 2004 - 2008, heb ik in Nederland gewoond.

Cliché, anyone??

There are moments in life, that are so extraordinary, that spoiling them with cliché remarks would be like committing a sin.

Yeah, I’m talking about the greatest greeting cards moments: birthdays, weddings, baby born, new job, new house and the likes.

Since I turned 25, people have been throwing me the regular birthday wishes – the Indonesian thing: Selamat ulang tahun, semoga selalu diberi kebahagiaan, kesehatan, kesuksesan dan segera dapet jodoh! When translated, it would sound something like this: Happy birthday, wishing you happiness, health and success, and finding that Mr. Right soon!

The bold, italic and underlined part is an Indonesian thing. So every year, for five years, I’ve been getting the same old…, same old.

Indonesian wedding wishes were just as terrible. People would usually write in the wedding card: Selamat menempuh hidup baru, semoga selalu diberikan kebahagiaan dan keturunan-keturunan yang saleh/a. Which, when translated would say: Congratulations with your new life together, may you always have happiness and blessed with wonderful kids.

My gosh.

Hey, it’s not that I don’t appreciate people wishing each other happiness, or success, or health, or finding “he/she right” soon, or having wonderful kids. I am just intrigued with the lack of originality and perhaps sincerity, in the ways people use when extending wishes to someone’s extraordinary moment. Cliché.

Wouldn’t it be great, if you could actually write in a wedding card: “Hey, finally!! The moment is here. Happy marriage!! It would suck more from now on, but the endless sex could be great. Congratulations!”

Now, that would be brutally honest, but sincere. I would admire that.

Or perhaps, instead of saying ordinary birthday wishes like above, one could say: “Happy birthday girl, though you’re getting old and still haven’t found your man, don’t lose hope. Keep looking!”

Or, something like: “Happy birthday. Geez you’re 30 and still single! But you do have a great career, so nothing to sweat about!”

Original, sincere.

With boyfriend who is kinda king of non-clichés, I have always tried giving him the least expected comments - as he too, has always blurted comments that were out of the blue, least expected, hilarious. To me, it wouldn’t matter if it sounded corny, I love corny (hah! this is a quote from a movie) – so long as it’s not same old, same old.

Like a few days ago when he told me that he fell from a tree, I responded with: “try not to fall from a tree too often hunny, I’d like to keep you in one piece – and if you fall again, I’ll push you myself so you’ll get more bruises”.

Endearing isn’t it? Brutal, but at least, it came from the heart.

Spice it up, people.

3815th

I was in a conversation with a dear old friend of mine the serial dater. She has always agreed to meet guys on the several dates that her friends and relatives set up for her. Ok, maybe “several” was a bit of understatement. She claimed, she has gone through, at least 3814 dates.

Talk about being optimistic. I told her, if I had to go through what she had gone through, meeting countless of guys (3814 guys according to her), and still not finding the one that clicked with me, I would lose all hopes. I asked her, what kept her going on.

“Well, each time before the set up date, I would go to the beauty salon, got my hair done, dressed up nicely, with the hope that this time, it might be the one”. She said.

Still, I couldn’t help to think that, at some point, perhaps after the 2955^th failed date, I would at least lose some hope. I mean, come on. Nobody could be that optimistic. I might not even be able to go that far. I’d probably have given up after the 6^th failed date. But she kept on going.

Her societal restrictions were far worse than mine. Her restrictions told her to not only find an Indonesian guy with the same religion, but also to find a guy who came from the same ethnic group (yes, it is that crazy in Indonesia, and please don’t judge. that’s just the way it is). Thus, her option was to go for serial set-up dates. Friends and relatives might have a good candidate taking into account all the restrictions.

I asked her, “Don’t you start doubting yourself at one point, where all those guys you have met are just not your type?” I mean, if you only had to go through six failed dates, then proooobably you could escape by thinking that you just haven’t met the right one. But if you had gone through (oh, I so don’t believe her number) 3814 dates, wouldn’t you start thinking that probably there was something wrong with you, or perhaps you were just being too picky?

“Nope”. She answered. “When it doesn’t click, it just doesn’t click. I know there’s nothing wrong with me. It’s just how you see things”.

Talk about being positive.

But finally, she met the right one. The 3815^th.

She is so sure about this guy, rumor has it, that she might marry him if he proposed. And she’s thinking of marrying him not two years from now, not next year, when she would have some time to get to know him better. She said, “I might marry him this year”.

I asked her deliberately, “Are you sure about it? How can you be so sure? You don’t know him that well”.

“I feel comfortable when I’m around him. I just know it. And believe me my dear, when you have gone through 3814 dates, you just know”.

No shit. She got that right, I guess.

(of course, she was exaggerating with the number. but she did go through a lot of set-up dates)

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To: those girls who are just the eternal optimists and bloody positive (I guess I’m just not that strong) but just keep finding your sushi guy! I know I am.

ps: shit! I broke my "Q" on my keyboard as I was typing this.

My "favorite" awkward moments

Everybody must have experienced this at least once. Come on…, nobody’s that lucky to not even have one awkward moment in their lives. As about me, I have plenty (hey, they didn’t nominate me as a jinx princess for no reason!). These are the moments when you wished the earth would swallow you right then, because the awkwardness would kill you slower. As a person with high propensity to please people (HPTPP), I seemed to manage adding excitements into my awkward moments. You’ll see in a sec what I’m talking about.

Awkward moment no.1: meeting the good guy friend to whom I confessed my love – of which he rejected – one day after the confession.
Our whole conversation during that "after confession" encounter, portrayed our biggest efforts to avoid bringing up the subject. Picture him and me as really-close-friends before the confession. And then, picture him and me trying to still be really-close-friends after the confession. One word: awkward.

Awkward moment no.2: meeting one of your good friends and her guy in the mall, having this kind of conversation:

Me: Hey… how are you?? Wow! How far along are you?? I didn’t know you guys are married!

Her: What? I’m not pregnant! We’re not even married!

There were a few things that were SO wrong in my statement to her. First of all, I thought she was pregnant! Which was similar to saying: “Hey, you’ve gained a few more pounds!”. Secondly, seeing her roaming the mall with her guy, gaining a few pounds and all… I assumed that she had married him! Thirdly, how could I call myself a good friend when I didn't even know whether she was married or not!

To assume = to make an ASS of U and Me.

Awkward moment no.3: the elevator trap.
I have been avoiding one girl with whom I had very trust-unworthy experience. She happens to be a good friend of a good friend of mine (see if you can catch that phrase...hehe), and she happens to work in the same building as I am. After the "experience", I never replied to her messages, somewhat hoping that she would just get it and go away. She got it.

The problem was, lately, I have had a "feeling" that something awkward would happen one of these days. And alas, my feeling was right. As I was waiting for the elevator to grab some lunch downstairs, Ding! the elevator door opened, and Bam! there she was, standing in the elevator.

My first instinct was to turn away, and wait for the next elevator door to open. But that would be extremely rude. So I went in and said hi. We exchanged chit-chats – very unimportant awkward chit-chats. Before getting off the elevator she asked: “hey, we should go for drinks sometime”. And me, with my HPTPP syndrome, cheerfully replied: “yeah, let’s!”. And her, with somewhat surprised look, replied: “really? you’d like to?”
Not being able to say anything, I patted her in the back and smiled.

Awkward moment no.4: meeting your blind date without safety net.
Well, my friend introduced me to this guy. She thought: this and that, blah-di-blah-di-blah, so why not hook them up?
So, him and me went online, we chat, exchanged slight details blah, blah, blah… until one day, we set a ‘moment’ to meet each other up. Now, if there was one thing I should learn from the whole set-up dates: expectations were harsh, they would throw you flat down from the sky.

Being the usual ever-hopeful girl, I made myself believe that this could be it. Plus, the buttery remarks from my friend about him have made me think that way... hahahaha… boy, was I naïve.
Because, at the moment when I saw him, I almost left him out there waiting for me! But that would be really rude. So I met him up anyway, trying so hard to look casual so he wouldn’t think I was interested. But I was too stupid to have invited him to see my place, before that date. He took up that invitation, and I could no longer say NO (remember, HPTPP syndrome, people!). Of course, any guy would take it the wrong way - being invited to a girl's place on the first date. A few days later, thinking that I was actually interested, he called me several times in just one hour!!, of which, I ignored.

Girls, let me remind you one thing: If you’re about to go on a blind date with a person that, of course, you don’t know that well -- never, ever, go to the date without safety net. Plan an escape route – a polite one, of course. Just in case. Juuust in case.

Awkward moment no. 5: the "never put your secret crush stories on your blog" trap.
Well, this one was a bit old news. But it was kinda awkward, since I was still working next to this crush guy at that time. So he asked me about my blog, and I forwarded him the link. And I didn’t really know if he realized it, I think he did, but there were some stories about him that were too obvious – even a blind man would see them! After that, I had to act extremely casual to him, so he wouldn’t take it the wrong way. Well, my bad.

There were many more – and I’m sure there will be many more. For this time, I would have to rest at these. Besides, I have shared with you my favorite ones ;-).

Shoo! spidey shoo!!

Spring is peeking through my window. Along with it, not only come the flowers, the sunshine and the fresh breeze of wind, but also the insects!!!

Yes, Insects!!! In the form of mosquitoes, spiders, bees, and ants.

Before I came to Holland, I had thought of its weather being similar to San Diego; where the sun would shine mildly, the temperature would be warm but wouldn't make you sweat, and the wind would breeze softly... somewhat similar to the imaginations of most Asians about the European / Sub tropical weather...

Little did I know about these uninvited little creatures. It was almost the same as living in Jakarta... where I would see ants marching on the walls, mosquitoes swarming around my ears making that annoying sounds nnnnggggggggggggg... and spiders! My gosh the spiders here...! (and I'm telling you, we didn't even have spiders in our house in Jakarta)

When I was studying in the jungle-like Breukelen, these creatures seemed to find peace living in my room (and please do not mistaken me as one of those filthy pigs who can't keep their rooms clean... I'm very clean! Sometimes even Monica clean, that it freaked the hell out of my best friend Kap).

So, one day... a spider was hanging on my ceiling. Hanging like a lamp on top of my chair where I would sit behind my desk, working on my papers or studying. This spider, was not like the usual spiders I could find in Jakarta (the tiny and furry ones..., the kinds that you can shoo with one blow of breath). This spider, was named a 'mutant mosquito' by my good friend Yoks; since it looked like a mosquito, with thin legs and thin body... but waaay bigger than a mosquito (about 10 times bigger). I wasn't even sure that I could call her a spider... but since she was hanging on my ceiling, I presumed she had the ability to create a web to hang on to.

So there she was, hanging on my ceiling... on top of my head... And all those times, I didn't bother to shoo her away, since I knew she would go away by herself. And apparently, the Dutch also have the same superstitious believe, that killing a spider would bring bad luck... (or it could also be, one of the bull-s stories that Kap seemed to enjoy telling me).

Until one day... my best friend Kap and I were working together in my room to finish our assignment. He was sitting on my chair behind the desk… and I was sitting opposite him. We were discussing things that we would write on the assignment. Mrs. Spidey had been hanging there for at least two weeks, and there had been no signs that she would move anywhere anytime soon.

As I was listening to Kap explaining about market anomalies, I suddenly saw the ever-peaceful Mrs. Spidey slowly made a down move! Oh! The horror! I was in shock that I couldn’t yell to warn Kap that Mrs. Spidey is coming down towards him… I was just sitting there with my mouth opened and face shocked, and Kap was looking at me like… “What?”

And I pointed up… above his head… to Mrs. Spidey.

Looking at where my finger pointed… Kap jumped out of his chair, ran towards the door, screaming… aaaaarrrrggghhh!!!!

I couldn’t help but to crack up. That was too funny!

With a broomstick, I slowly picked up Mrs. Spidey from her web and brought her outside to mingle with the wilderness… while Kap, still in shock, was walking back and forth in front of my room, also laughing his pants off and saying, "Two weeks! She has been there for two weeks and never once she made a move! And what do you know... just as I decided to sit there... she suddenly decided to move!!!"

Then came my other friend B, who was intrigued by our commotion. I told him what happened while pointing to Mrs. Spidey who was then walking towards the wilderness.

And suddenly… squueeeeeerrrcccchhh… B’s shoes landed on Mrs. Spidey – squeezing the life out of her... I was screaming to stop B. But too late...

“B! You can’t kill a spider! That’s bad luck!” Jeez!