So another year has passed and we are just hours away from 2016. To me this year was amazing and I was very fortunate to be able to live it to the fullest! This post will be just a short recap of what had happened..
Tag: 2015
Changes
Wow, it has been 16 days since my last post! Even though I had a lot of things that I want to write, but I simply did not have the chance. So what happened during the past 16 days?
Changes happened.
Hello October
Is it just me, or time really does fly? I can’t believe it’s October already! 😀
Well my September was packed. I got busy with some projects at work (my first in-store activation since I moved to this new team!), got hospitalised, became a bridesmaid twice.. and also, waited anxiously for something. I thought I would get to hear a good news at the end of September, but God decided to let me wait a little bit longer. I was disappointed and got really sad for a while, but realised I had to keep my faith and keep praying. In the end it was not a rejection, only delayed decision 🙂
Now, in the midst of my disappointment and sadness, I spontaneously said yes to an invitation to travel during the upcoming long weekend. Ooops. Hehehehe. I immediately bought the plane ticket after I said yes, and had my name registered to the tour package. YAY! Read it somewhere that travel cure sadness (or maybe I’m just making it up :p), so I’m going to give it a try… 😉
Ok so where will I go? it will be a place that I’ve never been before.. and I won’t be needing my passport so it is still in Indonesia. It is an island, approximately 1,5hours flight away. The island is called… Lombok. YEP, I am going to visit Lombok! Yayy! I’ll stay there for 4 days in which it will be a mix of island hopping and trekking trip. In short it will be a nature trip, and since it’s been a while since the last time I bask myself in nature.. I am so looking forward for this trip! Let’s just hope everything will go as planned. I am excited for my October, and hopefully I will get the good news I’ve been anticipating this month. Fingers crossed!
What are you excited for this month? hope you’ll have a great month! 🙂
Eid Al Fitr
Eid Mubarak my friends!~
Yesterday Muslims around the world celebrated Eid Al Fitr, a religious holiday that marks the end of Ramadan and also breaking of the fast. There is a particular Eid prayer that we normally do during the morning of Eid day. Afterwards, the tradition/rituals varies from country to country.
In Indonesia, after doing the Eid prayer in the morning, we used to gather with our immediate family and greet each other with blessings. It is also time to ask forgiveness between each other, especially to our parents. Then there are a lot of other rituals, which again, varies from culture to culture. But I can tell you that food is always in the picture. Yummm~
What about the rituals in my family? We used to do our Eid prayer in our old neighbourhood’s mosque, then came back to the house to have breakfast. Not long after, my neighbours (especially the kids) came to our house to greet us. This is where it gets interesting. My dad would then give the kids small pocket money and there would be so many kids came to our house, I remember there were even times when they had to queue to greet my dad (and got the pocket money hahaha). So festive! About an hour later, we then went to my grandfather’s grave and then to my grandmother’s house where we spent the day there with our family. There were abundant food for everyone, mostly traditional ones, super delicious. Afterwards, we went to my dad’s bosses’ houses and did not come back home until late at night.
But then my dad passed away and things have changed ever since. We did not do our Eid prayer in the neighbourhood mosque nor did we open our house to the neighbours anymore, instead we left the house early in the morning and prayed in the mosque near my grandmother’s house. We spent the day there still, but did not go anywhere else except my dad’s and grandfather’s grave afterwards.
Then I left to study in the UK – while I was there, my grandmother sold her house and moved with my uncle. So another ritual was changed. Then my family moved house last year, and again, things changed!
To think of it again, a lot has changed in the past years but still the idea of spending Eid day with family (and food! :p) never changes. To me that’s what makes the day important – spending time with family and your loved ones… exchange blessings and forgiveness.
So we spent the day at my uncle’s house yesterday. Here’s what I wore. Hmmm.. it’s not every day that I post a portrait of myself but since I really really love what I wore, I decided to share some pictures here 😉
My dusty pink kaftan is from Ianthecollection and my offwhite clutch is from Allura. Allura is an Indonesian accessories brand of all things sweet and pretty designed by my dear friend Nasya Marissa. I mean, look at this classic clutch! Soooo pretty right? 🙂
And.. to close off this post, I’m going to share some more pictures from yesterday’s family gathering. It was a lovely day and I hope your day was as lovely.
From my family to yours, I hope you had a blessed Eid day and holiday. Until next post! x
Turning Point Coffee
I have a new hobby lately. Well, not exactly a hobby but I’ve been doing this thing often nowadays. That is, visiting small coffee shops in Jakarta and try their latte. By all means I’m no expert in coffee art, I don’t understand most of the terms and I drink mostly only latte. But now that I’ve been going to coffee shops more often, I (kind of) can differentiate which latte is good and which is so – so and I’m getting more interested in trying different kinds of blends.
Through Instagram I got exposed to a lot of coffee shops in town. Some has been around for quite some time but a lot are new. That’s how I found out about Turning Point Coffee, which was just opened recently. Their feed looks very promising and I was tempted to try their coffee. One thing though, they are located in the outskirts of Jakarta – in Gading Serpong to be exact. While I’m curious to try their coffee, going there out of the blue seemed too much of effort for me. But then yesterday I had to accompany my Mum visiting a relative in Alam Sutera, a neighboring city. AHA! what I coincidence, I thought. I then asked my Mum to accompany me to a bit of detour to Gading Serpong in search for this coffee shop.
Turning Point Coffee is located not far from Summarecon Mall Serpong (Yes, that huge shopping mall), in a SOHO complex. It is, however, a bit hard to find because they haven’t put any signage anywhere in the building. They are present in Google listing though, so you can easily search for their name in Google Maps and just follow the direction. But still, a bit hard to find.
When I finally got there, my expectation increased when I was walking inside the store. I could smell the smell of coffee even from the outside! Mind you the door was closed when I was walking in, so I thought it’s a very good sign. The place was small, probably caters around 15 people comfortably inside and a little bit more outside. There were more than 15 people when I arrived though, it was very crowded. There was 1 group on the queue in front of me but I did not have to wait that long to be served and was given a warm welcome by the cashier/server. While making my order I told him that I came from far away (read: Jakarta haha) and he casually said “you’d want to come back!”
For my first order, I ordered a Latte from their House Blend. Mum had their Oolong tea, and we also ordered something sweet – A doughnut and a milk pie. Everything we ordered was very good! I loved my latte, smooth and just the right amount of sweetness. It’s definitely one of the best latte I’ve had in Jakarta (and it’s surroundings too – considering Serpong is not really Jakarta :p). I even made a second order and tried their Cloak&Dagger Blend which has a more fruity taste (until very recently I did not know that coffee could have a fruity taste! *amazed*). Both are reaaally good!
While I’m enjoying my coffee and mum enjoying her tea, I could not help but observing my surroundings. It looks like everyone was so passionate. It was a busy time but I could sense that all the employees are working passionately in serving delicious coffee. Right when I was observing, the cashier approached my table and we had a small chat. It turns out that he’s one of the owners, besides her wife – the barista, and some other friends. I told him how I loved my coffee and he told us a little bit of interesting story behind the coffee shop, how they aim for the coffee shop to be community based – they will serve other coffee shop’s blends periodically. Sounds good to me! 🙂
So me and mum stayed there until the shop’s almost closed at around 5PM. The visit was very enjoyable and I’d definitely come back. I mean, who would not want to enjoy good coffee and scrumptious nibbles in a cosy place where you can have small talks with other people?
Jl.Ki Hajar Dewantara
Ruko Golden 8 Extension Blok K no.10
Gading Serpong
Facebook: Turning Point
Counting Days!
I’m super excited to tell you that it’s 93 more days until I’m scheduled to meet my boyfriend! Yaaayyyy! Hehe pardon the excitement because the last time I saw him was ages ago, back in September 2013. 😐
Anyway, I actually have bought the plane ticket and got my leave at work approved since last year but I haven’t really thought about it and haven’t really started to count days because well.. it was still 2014. But since 2015 is here now, no harm in counting days, right? 😉
In addition to meeting the boyfriend and his family, I’m also super excited because I’ll be going to Coachella festival during my trip to California!!! Yes you read it right, Coachella!!! Me, my boyfriend and a group of his friends will be going to weekend two… It has been in my bucket list + my 30 before 30 list to attend (and camp) in a music festival and hopefully everything will be so smooth that I’d get to cross that off my list this April. If you’re interested, here’s a line up poster of the event which was announced yesterday:
What do you think about the line up? To me, other names on the poster suddenly become not so important anymore once I read “Belle and Sebastian” on it. They are my favorite band everr and I thought I lost the chance of watching them live once I missed their show when I was in England back in 2010. Who would’ve thought that they’ll be playing Coachella right at the very year I’m going?! SUPER HAPPY! But anyway, I’d also love to see other performances, plus, we’ll be camping!! Wooohooo! super excited. The boyfriend, on the other hand, really wished for Kendrick Lamar (his current favorite rapper) to play Coachella but I guess he’s not lucky yet. Hehe, next time 😉
Anyway, I can’t wait for the weekend to come and start planning my trip. Browsing for things to do, planning my Coachella trip.. 😀 meanwhile, I’ve been playing Coachella’s Official Spotify Playlist at work and during my commute. Just have to make myself familiarised with the artists!
To end this post, here’s a song by Belle and Sebastian called Funny Little Frog. Have a listen and let me know if you liked it as much as I do! 🙂
Christa Bercerita 
