The Conju-fucking-ring

Some people write reviews by putting the conclusion at the end. But I'll write this review by saying what I had in my mind. Oh and by the way, this review is spoiler free (and by spoiler free I mean there won't be any major spoiler that would rob you of your thrilling adventure of sequential heart attacks).

This movie is -- hands down -- the scariest movie I've ever watched. If you're wondering, the movie scored an average 8.1 point from 14,653 users in IMDb. 

If you aren't all that familiar with IMDb, imagine IMDb as a high school teacher and horror movies as that one bad kid the teacher had always hated. No matter how decent a horror movie is, IMDb always gave them low scores. That's how much IMDb hates horror movies. An IMDb rating of 6.5 for a horror movie is deemed very high and would be a recommended movie for scary movie lovers. By now, you should probably know what an 8.1 translates to in the "horror movie"-score. Yes, while it might not be the Monalisa of horror movies, it would be pretty close.

I watched this movie with my older sister and by God, if humans could rupture their eardrums repeatedly, I would probably be dead within the first 30 mins of the movie from blood loss. The director of this movie (which, coincidentally, also directed Insidious, the close second in my list of the scariest movies I've ever seen) understood the idea that today's generation has a really short attention span and presented us with suspense (lots of it) in the first few minutes into the movie. (Unlike some other movies where we just sit and watch a happy family sleep peacefully for 30 minutes before being able to see some things moving. Stupid Paranormal Activities.)

As of I'm writing this, the movie has generated USD 30 million (from the initial expectation of USD 20 million) in revenue. Despite having little to no gore and violence, this movie was rated 'R' by MPAA simply because "hey, if adults like us shit our pants because of this movie, chances are children below 17 would, too."

The paragraph below might contain A LITTLE SPOILER, feel free to press ctrl+A/block the texts if you want to read anyway.

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While this movie is really great, I can't help but think that the director went like "Hmmm, I need more ghosts to scare the shit out of the audiences, let's make a new one who has no background whatsoever just for the purpose of making them shit in their pants." Now I know that the budget for this movie is low, but it would be better if some of the evil spirits' motives and background were elaborated a little bit more.

One more thing. the images are scary as fuck but there was one evil spirit which was like the future image of obese Avril Lavigne. A fat old lady who probably watched a Korean drama right after applying a half bottle of eye-liner. PLEASE DO A SCARIER MAKE UP.

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I shit you not when I say this movie is scary. If you are a girl who hates scary movies and your boyfriend asks you to watch this, believe me when I say that you won't be able to act scared and be cute while clinging on to him. You'll be genuinely terrified.

Despite me saying that this is the scariest movie I've ever seen, the after-taste is actually not too bad (definitely not as bad as Insidious). I can definitely sleep sound tonight without having to be afraid of an old, obese version of Avril Lavigne currently lying under my bed.

Footnote: Do not, and I do mean DO NOT, pick your nose at any point in the movie. I picked my nose when I thought nothing was happening and I almost tore my nose a third hole.

Dota and real life

I'm writing this because I grew jealous of my one particular friend who can sing really well. Or jealous of my ex who was able to play like four different kind of musical instruments, or of my other friends who can dance, or of my other friends who can cook. I wish God would take 'being able to sleep through 5 alarm clocks'-talent away from me and give me talents to play saxophone instead.

Anyway, since this post is about Dota, let me rant a bit about it.

Now I know you guys don't play Dota and you are probably rolling your eyes so hard at the title. However, I assure you that this post is more about life than it is about Dota. So, please keep reading. Or don't, I'm just a wall of text, not a police.

So yes, to some of you who are familiar with Dota, feel free to skip the next three paragraphs.

I have been trying to think of any analogies similar to Dota; sadly, there is none.

- In Dota, you control a hero who has a predetermined set of abilities. Let's say you're controlling a hero, your hero can only learn four abilities that are unique to them. Meaning that there are no other heroes in the game that can learn what your hero learns.

- In order to learn the abilities, you need to be around when your enemies die (yes, Dota creators get that right; you get stronger just by seeing people die). And after watching several enemies die, you level up and are allowed to learn another ability (out of the four abilities that are available to your hero). As you level up, it gets progressively harder to advance to the next level. You only need four dead enemies to advance from level one to level two, but you need like 8 to get from level two to level three.

- Heroes are divided into three categories: Strength, Agility, and Intelligence. For some reasons, Strength heroes are better at being a tank, Agility heroes are better at dealing damage, and Intelligence heroes are better at being a support. But that doesn't mean Agility heroes can't tank, or Intelligence heroes can't deal damage. It just takes them more effort to do what they weren't meant to do.

Dota is a complex game and it's probably impossible to explain it in writings only, but trust me, I tried. I really did.

It might strike me off as insane to you guys if I say that real life is somewhat similar to Dota. (Afterall, we don't get stronger as we see our hated ones die... Or do we?) While we don't have a predetermined set of abilities, we have a set of talents instead. Some people play music beautifully, some people learn language fast, some people trade stocks efficiently. And then there are people like me that just can't do anything well. Some people just do some things better than most people do.

However, unlike Dota (where a hero can't learn what other heroes learn), in real life we can learn almost pretty much anything. You can learn to play a saxophone despite you having no talent whatsoever in music. You can learn to write despite your thoughts are as incoherent as Justin Bieber's lyrics. You can learn to act although your face has as much facial expression as Kristen Stewart's. You see, some people just do things better than us and there is nothing we can do about it. In return, if you want to learn about those things, there is nothing they can do about it either.

Although Intelligence heroes are better at being a support, in my 6 years of playing Dota, I've seen far too many damage-dealing Intelligence heroes. I've seen people who do some things really well despite having no talents in that particular area.

I really wish somebody would invent a time machine so I could go back to 15 years ago and start learning to play saxophone.

What's stopping you? You're not a Dota hero that can only learn four skills. You don't live in the Dota world where you can learn new skills only after seeing your enemies die. Your potential is endless and you live in a world where you have all the time in the world to learn what you want. Just pick any skills that you want to learn and start learning it.

Now, please excuse me for I have to start looking for a saxophone to buy.

P.S. I'm writing this because I want to try writing something people are not familiar about. Let me know how you think about this below!

P.P.S. In another note, yay to me for publishing a post on Sunday!

Melissa's wedding

Note: This is a sequel to one of my other blog post. You can find the first part here. 

There are a lot of things that I had wanted to write. My confession as a gamer, my theory about airplanes and cute girls, as well as why I picked up writing. I have actually written some of those blog posts but I wasn't not done writing it. Then I went to Melissa's wedding party (YES HER NAME IS ACTUALLY MELISSA HAHAHA). And I decided to write this instead. Actually I'm writing this as soon as I got back from her wedding.

Melissa was one of my few female best friends. Despite her being one of my best friends, I was quite  ignorant and thus I didn't really know much about her. Some things that I could recall off the top of my head was that she liked the song So Close from Enchanted, and she was a really perfectionist girl.

By the time she gave me her wedding invitation, I didn't have any red envelope to send my money in, so I did what any other sane person would do. I stole it from my workplace. And to my boss – Steve – if you're reading this, I'm sorry I stole a few from Citibank. (It turned out that the red envelope actually was a 'Happy New Year' envelope. Can you make some 'happy wedding' red envelopes please? Thanks.)

The party was an outdoor party. Surprisingly Surabaya was friendly and the weather was windy and cool (for those of you who have never been to Surabaya, the weather is ALWAYS either hot or fucking hot). To cut the long story short, the wedding was great. It was so great to the extent that it almost made me want to rethink about getting married.

Also by the way, instead of numbers, the table was labeled with plants' names. I couldn't help but notice that our table – which was fully filled with Melissa's high school friends – was labeled 'Mistletoe.' A parasitic plant that is an essential decoration on a Christmas day, I thought. How befitting that her friends from high school (which – of course – wouldn't be able to shower them with a lot of money in our red envelopes) acting as a parasitic decoration. I'm sure that I was just over thinking it but I couldn't help but notice the uncanny coincidence.

An hour into the party, Melissa and her husband – Stefanus – started going around the tables to chat with everyone else. Then they came to our table to chat with us. Now, if you actually read about my first post, you will notice that I said Stefanus wasn't exactly someone that you would call a prince.

Stefanus came to me and shook my hand. “I read your blog,” he said as he stared deep into my eyes.

Shit. The situation was awkward as fuck and I wasn't sure whether or not I maintained my poker face but I was sure I kept smiling all the while desperately looking for a way to knock myself unconscious.

And after 5 seconds of silence, he said, “You're a good writer and blogger, keep it up!” I felt no sense of malice from his voice. Now Stefanus, if you're reading this (as I'm sure you will), I would like to say that if you couldn't make Melissa happy, I'm positive that the rest of the world (minus you) wouldn't be able to either. So please make Melissa happy!

After that, they left our table and immediately after, some piano keys faintly hung in the air. I barely recognized what song was playing until the “You're in my arms and the world is gone,” started playing. The song that Melissa really liked. I vaguely recalled 6 years ago that she once said she wanted this song to be played on her wedding and there I was listening to that very same song. Then the MC's voice blared and pointed our attention to the podium and then the newlyweds kissed. The kiss was followed by what-I-counted-to-be-27 explosion of fireworks. Both the audience and the night sky cheered them as they kissed their way into husband and wife.

I had a mixed feeling while I was attending Melissa's marriage. I was happy that Melissa was getting married and she was moving onto the next level of her life, yet I simultaneously felt sad because I realized I was getting older. Sigh.

I'm sure that I somewhat hate marriage and would quite frankly oppose it, however just this once I would like to say congratulations to Stefanus and Melissa, one of the very few couple whose marriage I was actually somewhat excited about. May you two grow to be so old and overpopulate this world with your very own minions!

P.S.: I know I've been lazy in posting blog posts, but you guys can expect regular blog entries every week (usually every Sunday) now! I hope...

A letter to Blackberry

Dear Blackberry,

First of all, please excuse the amount of swearing words in this letter. I tried writing one without any profanity, but it just didn't vent my feeling well enough. With that being said,

Fuck you.

Blackberry is not a smart phone. In fact, calling it a stupid phone is a disgrace to the word 'stupid.' By definition, a smart phone is... well, smart. Please allow me to sophisticatedly reiterate what makes a phone smart:

1. IT HAS A CAMERA THAT HAS A BETTER QUALITY THAN A FUCKING POTATO.
2. YOU CAN TURN THE FUCKING SHUTTER SOUND OFF.
3. IT HAS A BATTERY THAT LASTS LONGER THAN MY FUCKING ATTENTION SPAN.
4. IT IS FASTER THAN A FUCKING INTERNET EXPLORER.
5. YOU DON'T HAVE TO WAIT FOR 5 FUCKING MINUTES EVERY TIME YOU RESTART IT. 
   And above all,
6. YOU DON'T HAVE TO FUCKING RESTART IT EVERY 24 HOURS.

Granted, it's pretty hard to decide which one is dumber: the phone for being more retarded than Snooki, or me for using it as my phone. But in my defense, I am using Blackberry simply for its Blackberry Messenger. I wouldn't go as far as to say that I won't be able to live without BBM, but I would say it's pretty close. In fact, when BBM went down yesterday, I got so bored that I actually started doing actual work in my office. My boss would probably prefer BBM staying down if it meant me getting some actual work done.

So yeah, like most letters, it just doesn't feel right if there is no question in it. So, here is one. HOW HARD IS IT TO BUILD A FUCKING PHONE AND NOT MESS UP THE ONE THING THAT MAKE PEOPLE BUY YOUR FUCKING PRODUCT? Like, seriously. People buy your shitty phones simply for its Blackberry Messenger and you still managed to fuck that up too? Congratulations.

The most obvious joke has got to be the fact that you guys are developing a BBM for Android and IOS. To which the CEO responded with "OH YES WE DO THIS BECAUSE WE ARE CONFIDENT THAT BB10 IS UP TO PAR WITH ANDROID AND IOS."

BULLSHIT. 

I'm no Steve Jobs but I can fucking predict that with BBM being available to both Android and IOS, you can kiss your sales goodbye. With that being said, please make BBM available in Android and IOS as soon as possible so I can toss this stupid Blackberry away.

With much love,

A dumb user who has been using your dumber-phone for far too long.