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.

Tricycles and Indonesia

Disclaimer: This blog post is about economy and -- like most economic reading -- it is boring. Beware, you have been warned.

First of all, allow me to apologize if this writing sucks. My major is Mathematics and while it is not the furthest major away from economics, I'm pretty sure it's quite far. So for all the finance/economy major out there, please stop reading and go read your Bloomberg week or something else.

As you might know or might not care, I have been trading stocks for the past two or three months. And like most traders, some days I win and some days I lose. But this post is not about my trading history and how I managed to fuck up all my transactions. This post is about something else.

When I was 10 year old, my parents decided that it was time for me to learn how to ride a bicycle. And like most kids, I started with a tricycle. After a few days of fiddling with my tricycle, my parents thought that it was time for me to remove the third wheel and start trying a bicycle. I fell several times and managed to scrape both my knee and elbow. I hated them for forcing me to learn how to ride this stupid two-wheeled thing. I thought that I would be fine for the rest of my life with a tricycle.

Ever since I started trading three months ago, I started reading everything that could help me trade better; stuff that I wouldn't have even glanced twice had I not been trading. It was then that an article caught my eye. It's about the Fed chairman - Ben Bernanke - and USA's policy about Quantitative Easing.

For those of you who are not familiar with economics and are too lazy to open Wikipedia, QE basically is a policy exerted by USA to stimulate economy. I'm definitely not the best economist out there, but if I were to put it into my own words, I think it's a lot like pass-go in Monopoly. The monopoly bank (that bearded guy) gives each player $200 every time they pass-go with the sole reason of giving the players money to keep doing whatever it is they are doing.

Now, the world is not a wish-granting factory, and instead of the central bank giving free money to everyone, they buy bonds from other banks in order to increase the reserve of money in other banks, so citizens could still borrow money (thus, increasing job openings). The amount the Fed (USA's central bank) spent to buy bonds from other banks is a whopping USD 85 billion per month. Ouch.

It's obvious that the central bank won't be able to purchase the bonds routinely with the amount of money they had. So, it was necessary that they create money in order to keep this QE thing going; in order to stimulate USA's economy.

I'm sure by now you guys would much rather watch a Youtube video buffering rather than continue reading. But from here on is what I think is disturbing.

So this guy - Ben Bernanke - just held a meeting and a press conference yesterday about Quantitative Easing. He told people things that they already knew but wished they didn't. For Monopoly players who managed to play the game for at least four hours without tearing the board down and ruining your friendship forever, we know that much like the bearded guy won't be able to issue the $200 for every time we pass-go, the QE can't go on forever. This Bernanke guy foresaw that US's economy is turning better with unemployment rate turning lower, and ultimately that he would stop QE by the end of 2013.

How did people react to this? They sneered at Bernanke as if he just brought a plague to them. It's ridiculous how stupid people can be. Bernanke did the right thing (or at least what I deemed to be the proper action to take). What Bernanke did is exactly what my parents did when I was learning how to ride a bicycle. At first I hated them for removing the third wheel, but now I'm thankful. Had I insisted to not learn to ride a bicycle, I woul have been laughed at by other people now. 

This is exactly the same with what Indonesia is facing: subsidized fuel. People keep on protesting about how the government should NOT stop subsidizing fuel. These idiots need to realize that these subsidies are not free and they came from Indonesia's debt. They need to see how stupid riding a tricycle looks, and how people all around them are laughing at tricycles.

Just as other people would laugh at you if you ride a tricycle, other nations are laughing at Indonesia because we keep piling our debts. There is no such thing as a Santa Claus and sometimes, the only way for us to be able to ride a bicycle is by removing the third wheel, riding our bicycle, falling several times and scraping our knees.

Same with Indonesia, the only way for us to be able to develop as a nation is by removing subsidized fuels, putting the subsidies into more important things, such as: infrastructure, education, and/or healthcare. While this might lead to higher inflation rate; one day we would look back to this and said "I'm glad we did that."

There comes a day that we have to remove the third wheel, a day that we graduate from a tricycle and step on to a bicycle. For Indonesia, now is that day. 

How to find a perfect boyfriend/girlfriend

When I was in high school, I had this one friend. Let's call her Melissa.

Melissa had been the kind of girl who believed in fairy tales. She believed with all her heart that one day, a prince on a white horse would come and pick her up. The sun would set and they would ride towards it, embracing their new life. A happily ever after life.

6 years later, here I am. Holding her wedding invitation (spoiler: she is a year older than me. She is 22 and is getting married next month). The guy -- which I had known quite close that I can call him an acquaintance yet not close enough that I would call him a friend -- isn't exactly who I would describe as a prince on a white horse. He is nice, he is smart (from his nerdy looks), and he would probably make a good daddy.

Melissa's life is probably quite far from the 'happily ever after life' that she had imagined 6 years ago, but it would be a happy one nonetheless.

I have been wondering since then whether or not it is possible to find a perfect partner. Deep inside, I knew that it was impossible, yet I was still clawing towards the possibility of finding a perfect partner.

A few months went by and I talked to my doppelganger (you know who you are!), and she showed me how to find a perfect partner. So, how do you find yourself a perfect boyfriend/girlfriend?

You don't.

A guy who is patient is the same guy who works as slow as a turtle

A girl who is nice to you is the same girl who is nice to everyone.

A guy who works hard is the same guy who never has any time for his family.

A girl who wears glamour dresses and perfect makeup is the same girl who spends money like it's coming out of her ass.

See? Human is just a set of habits that contradict each other. The only perfect people in this world come in boxes. So if you want a perfect partner, you would have to look for either a Barbie or a Ken.

In the end, there is no such thing as a perfect person. Everyone is going to hurt you, you just got to find the ones worth suffering for.

Motivation and shit

There are so many motivational speakers out there. Tony Robbins, Tung Desem Waringin, Nick Vujicic, you name it.

But I'm not them.

In fact, if there ever was an occupation that's a total opposite of motivational speakers, I will probably be one of the best at doing that. If we lived in a world where everyone can understand what others think, I would get hit in the face. A lot. My thoughts are rude and my words sarcastic. I just can't seem to emphatize with what other people go through. But for once, I want to motivate people. I want to move people only using words. So here it is, my motivational post.

Fortitude is never my strong point. Actually, I have always been a lazy person. In winter, I skipped college classes because it was very cold. In summer, I skipped classes because it was hot. And in spring and fall, I skipped classes because I wanted to play games instead. In those three of my college years, I accomplished nothing but eat and sleep.

Meanwhile a friend of my friend actually managed to establish his own business in his first year of college. In fact, two years after graduating, he had already founded 6 startup companies (yeah you read that right. Six, as in 1+1+1+1+1+1), all the while I was sleeping my ass off. It occurred to me that I needed to change. I deeply wished that I had used my time a little bit wiser. Maybe, just maybe, if I had used my time a little bit wiser, I would have a business to call my own now.

It's never too late to start what you want to do and to be what you might have been. If you like singing, go for it. Start recording your singing and upload them to Youtube. If you like writing, start writing a blog. If you like having sex, go to Japan and apply to be a porn star.

You know, my dad used to want me to be a doctor. Like, someone who uses a fucking knife to dissect a patient. After finding out that I have zero tolerance to blood and biology in general, he then wanted me to be a fucking professor. Like, a PHd. It was then when I realized that him wanting me to be something has nothing to do with me. It has everything to do with him. Me being a doctor or being a PHd means so much to him that he can brag to everyone about his genius child.

Fuck that.

Life is too short to do what your parents tell you to do. You only live once and you won't relinquish the years spent to satisfy your parents. I'm not saying that you shouldn't love your parents and satisfy them. All I'm saying is that if your parents truly love you, they will stop being a prick and let you live your life (unless, of course, you want to be a Nicki Minaj, then I fully support whatever your parents want you to be).

It's been exactly a year since I graduated and I really wish I had started planning my own business earlier. Do what you want to do now; since a year from now, you will wish you had started today.