culture crash

Swimming

2009-07-10T13:23:00.006+02:00

In Indonesia, swimming is considered a sport+leisure activity. I usually go with friends and or families, spend some fractions of the time swimming, and the rest of the time is spent by chatting, playing/fooling around with others. A swimsuit is the only basic necessity for a girl. A boy could even get away with plain shorts.

Here in Italy, swimming is a sport activity that is taken seriously. Wearing swimsuit and swimming cap is a must. Swimming pools are divided into lanes (we have this too, but only in pools specialized for athletes/competitions). People have to choose a lane, and swim in certain direction only in this lane. There's a line drawn in the bottom of each lane, virtually dividing each lane into two sub-lane to guide you. Every time you have to swim in your right sub-lane. So, a perfectly ordered lane will be full of people swimming one after another in an ordered long circle.

And, oh, boy, we begin to think everyone is a pro swimmer here. Since not only everyone would reach the end of the pool after around 10 strokes, they would continue this circle lap after lap after lap endlessly without breaks in between.

It was really mesmerizing seeing this continuous circles of people, powerful-splashes one after another, roaming each narrow lane.

But, that was until we indonesian girls swim there :D

We do follow the line and lane rules of course, mind you. But since we enjoyed ourselves very much, we stopped to chat in the corner of our lane almost each time we reached the end of the pool :D
Apparently this disturbed the continuous circle of Italian serious swimmers in our lane, since after some time we noticed that we had our lane for ourselves, hahaha.

Oh, well, at least we all enjoyed ourselves ;)

Escalator: Where do you stand?

2009-01-11T17:14:00.002+01:00

Having only 5 minutes to run getting some snacks to nibble at the cinema, I ran as fast as I could through the crowd in Paris Van Java Mall, Bandung, Indonesia last weekend. The supermarket is located in the UG floor, and I could only find an escalator nearby to reach it.

But, whooops, my sprint had to come to an abrupt end.

Despite the width of the escalator that would allow huge shopping carts be transported comfortably and despite that no one who were on it was actually carrying one, my path was totally blocked.

It wasn't really so crowded actually, there were fair distances between those people, -all flocking in groups of family, friends, etc-. But the people in each group were all standing occupying the whole width of the escalator.

Of course being the ever optimistic girl that I am I tried to make my way asking for permissions to pass through the groups one by one. But after 2 or 3 groups of people I gave in.

The escalator is quite lengthy since it is designed to transport shopping carts: the escalator downward angle can't be really steep. And watching the number of groups I would still have to excuse myself from just to make my way was already exhausting me.

People were standing left and right, laying to the handrails. All casually talking with each other and watching around. I felt guilty already that I would interrupt their lovely chats if I really tried to make my way further.

So, there I was standing nervously, watching at my watch, waiting for the escalator to smoothly, elegantly, and super slowly bring me the UG floor. Fantasizing if only I could just use the handrails as in those action movies to slide through that darned lengthy escalator. Wishing that somehow the escalator would just miraculously understand my hurry and increase its speed. But of course it's just in my mind.

And I remember an escalator in Munich, Germany.

Where, although the escalator was steep, half the width of that escalator in PJV, so fully packed that each step was occupied, and most of the ppl have their luggage(s) with them, there was a straight, empty path in the right hand side of the elevator for anyone who were in a rush and would like to run through it.

It's not like there was any huge sign board as those in the highway that order people to stand in the left side and leave the right side empty as a fast lane.
But everyone, dutifully and obediently as all the Germans are, would stand in the left side and only the hurried ones take the right side of the elevator.

That straight, vacant, dedicated path walled by a line of people with their luggages in the left side and the handrail on the right side which could clearly be seen even from some distance was a beauty. A sign of cumulative social awareness of each people standing there to other people needs. Even though its just about that small space in the escalator step to your left.

Well, I wouldn't blame those people I saw in PJV actually. I mean it was in a mall on Saturday afternoon. What's the hurry? Only I was being unfortunate that, as always, it was so close to the movie starting time and I still was somewhere else and haven't got any snacks to smuggle to the cinema :D

And to be fair, the escalator that I mentioned in Munich was located in a rail station. Where indeed there must be a bigger number of people in a hurry you can find than when you are in a shopping mall.

But still I have to admit, unlike those Germans, it wasn't really that automatic for me to be aware that there is such need to give way in an escalator so that its not the case that I could stand anywhere I like in an escalator :D

Kudos to you if you are like them ;)

Chinese vs Malayan

2008-02-14T22:27:00.003+01:00

I played quite much in the online game which is based in Malaysia lately, xdo.
The gameplay is mostly just the same as the other dance games I've played.
However, it's the community who plays the game thats interesting.
The players are mostly malaysian *duh!*,
although I often meet some immigrants from the US version of the game too like me ;P

These malaysian ppl, it's so interesting that in one sentence they can use english, chinese, and malay words all at once xD
I enjoy so much reading their forums lol.

But aside from that quirk of the language, what I want to discuss here is how they are so sensitive toward races issues.
Not just once that I'm being asked in game, "what ppl are you?"
to which of course i could only respond, "huh?"
turned out they were asking whether I am a chinese or a malayan >.>
or in another case, they asked "what race are u?"
I was kinda flabbergasted getting such a question at the first time.
Isn't that a very racist question????
I'm used to play in the US version, where I think it's a commonsense that racial issues must not come into discussion.

Since I had to respond, as an indonesian of course I answered, I'm indonesian.
To which they still insisted on asking, "yeah, but are you chinese?"
ermm...hello?

I never really remember there's any such identification of races in Indonesia.
I mean, well, indeed we have cultures, javanese, sundanese, batak-ese(?),etc, but it's not that we will ask for such a culture identification at the first time we meet someone.

Well, apparently in Malaysia, such identification matters.
What scary is, they often had arguments abt it. Chinese ppl vs Malayan ppl.
I dont know how it often started, but then it always come to associating each other with animals, mainly pig >.>

prolly because pig is considered as the worst animal evah? (aww, poor piggies >_<)
prolly because Malayan is identical with moslem ppl who dont eat pork and Chinese ppl have quite a culinary tradition using pork?
They usually mention abt that eating habit in the argument, with the chinese ppl promoting "bak kut teh" (whatever it is, I suppose its an extremely delicious chinese dish using pork?) and that everyone should eat it.

However, its scary scary scary....

Witnessing such rude arguments happening more than one occasion,
I grow my respect to the founding fathers of Indonesia.
They all were emphasizing on the unity of Indonesia.
They were not using certain religion as the base, even though its the majority religion.
They decided the use of Bahasa Indonesia, as the language of the country which unites everyone from every regionals despite each having their own regional traditional language.
I'm so proud abt this language thing also when I'm with my Indian friends.
Because they have various regional languages just like us. However, they don't have that one language which formally unites them. As a result u can get Indians talking to each other using English since they came from different regions in India.

I still have some more thoughts, but at least for now I will conclude this post with, I'm proud to be an Indonesian.

A-Ce-I, Aku Cinta Indonesia~ xD

Ngutang Pizza di Itali

2007-10-16T00:49:00.000+02:00

Hihihi, kok tiba2 banting setir jadi bahasa indonesia, yah :D gapapa, deh, sekali-sekali. Lagian susah juga kayanya cari terjemahan yg pas buat kata ngutang :P

Tapi kalo crita yang satu ini, nih, kaga ada culture crashnya. Soalnya... ternyata bisa, bo, ngutang pizza di pizzeria Itali! Macam ngutang nasi bungkus di warung di Indonesia ajah. hihihi.

Malu banget ini sebenernya ceritanya ^^;;>
Jadi tadi pulang dari kampus, males masak, lumayan laper, tiba2 jadi dapet ide buat beli pizza take away ajah. Pizza Calabrese, yummm! (toppingnya mozarella, bubuk cabe, bawang putih, olive oil. Aneh, ya? sumpah enak, tapi ;D) Jadi mampirlah daku ke Pizzario di deket kampus yang emang strategis juga deket ma setopan bis.

Udah, ni, daku pesen, "Mbak, setengah pizza kalabrese buat bawa pulang, ya, mbak, ya". (Pake bahasa itali atuh originalnya). OK. Menunggu lah daku disitu. Beberapa lama, setelah mbaknya trus mulai bikin pizza, baru lah gw tiba2 punya indra keenam buat nyari dompet gw. Soalnya hari itu lagi pake rok jeans tanpa kantong. Jadi dompet yang biasa berasa nempel di pantat sebelah kanan ngga ada.

Cari punya cari... nggak ada!!! T_T
hueee...paniiiiik! mana kantong receh yang tadinya ada pun justru gw inget gw keluarin dari tas sebelum berangkat tadi.
Tas udah posisinya di lantai + gw jongkok2 ngadul2 segala isinya.
"Mbak, mbak, maap, mbak", kata gw akhirnya setelah yakin itu dompet nan tebel dan gede ngga mungkin bisa nyelip2 dan ngga keliatan di tas gw. Yang berarti gw ga ada duit buat bayar ni pizza >.< Si mbak-nya nengok, doski lagi sibuk bikin pizza pesenan gw T_T

"Mbak, dompet saya kayanya kelupaan di rumah, deh, mbak", tampang gw udah berasa kaya mo nangis aja, muka berasa panas, pasti merah banget,deh, ih. "Bisa dibatalin aja, ngga, mbak, pizzanya?". Hueeee, maluuuuuuuuuuuuuu >.<

"Oh, kenapa? ngga usah. Bayarnya ngga usah sekarang ngga papa, kok. Tinggalin nama aja di kasirnya, ntar bayarnya besok ato kapan kamu maunya aja"
"ha?", rada bengong, ohh, bisa?, "oh, gitu? ngga dibatalin aja, mbak?"
"Ngga, ngga papa kok, tinggalin nama aja. Bayarnya kapan kamu mau aja"
"Bisa gitu?", masih keukeuh ngga percaya. Di Indo aja daku kayanya ngga pernah deh ngutang di warung. ngutang ke temen yang gw suruh bayarin dulu buat gw sih pernah ^^ (ato sering? :P)
"Iya, ngga papa", si mbaknya udah mulai senyum2, tampang gw bingung banget kali ya? ^^
"ohh...", gw akhirnya ngangguk-ngangguk balik nunggu lagi.
Maluuuuuuu...
Trus gw tulis, deh, di kertas nama gw, alamat, no telp, gw kuliahnya di jurusan apa, nomer mahasiswa gw. Biar mbaknya yakin gituh gw ngga bakalan ngga bayar. Maluuuuuu T_T
Pas akhirnya selese tuh pizza, daku kasih, deh, itu kertas. Tapi mbaknya cuma, "oh, ngga usah, cuma butuh namanya ajah kok". Terus doski bikin bonnya, ambil kertas kecil, nulis nama gw, trus bonnya diceklek (formalnya: diokot xD) ke kertas itu, sambil ngembaliin kertas berisi info lengkap gw, "Udah gini aja, kok".

Hueee, daku antara seneng dapet pizza nan wangi, malu + tengsin beraat, tersepona ama mbaknya yg baek hati... hiks hiks hiks

Jadi...begitu sodara-sodara pengalaman pertama (semoga yg terakhir juga, plz plz plz) daku ngutang pizza di Itali T_T
Btw, berhubung gw terkesan sekalihh, plus pizzanya emang enak banget ;D, ini nihh pizzeriaku tersayang itu :
Pizzario Via Della Resistenza 9 / A, +39 461 811555
Delivery bisa, loh. tapi kayanya ngga sampe indo, deh :P

Asian guy stereotype

2007-09-04T13:46:00.000+02:00

Ok, again about stereotype. Just played some dance earlier. And there was a random chinese player played with us. He mostly then talked in Chinese language to our friend who was also a chinese. At some point of those long conversation in weird characters then our friend laughed, he said that this person was asking how about the american girl players in the game (I am playing in US server), do they have big tits? *excuse my language, im just rewriting what he said*, to which us gurls responded, ewwwwwww.
But then our friend just went on and said, oh, come on, that's just typical an asian guy. I thought u dated one before, he said to my friend, who is korean-american. She just responded, well so what, asian guy is just like normal guys, just like .
Well, I'm with her. I have no idea before that asian guy has that kind of stereotype: liking big ****?
Wait but im Indonesian, which is Asian too, and so is my bf. Does that make him in that stereotype too? And, come to think of it, does Indonesia really considered as part of asian ppl? I mean it seems when ppl r discussing abt asian, then its chinese ppl that comes up [1] [2].

Local regional stereotype

2007-09-03T19:02:00.000+02:00

Hmm...I kinda forget it already that culture clashes do happen often too locally, I mean among Indonesians. I recently had it on an Indonesian gathering.

The talk went about the stereotypes of every region. Someone said that there's this malaysian study regarding them which is circulated through mails. I have no idea whether this is the afromentioned thing, but the description quite matched what was talked in that moment. Copy pasted from there this was the topic :
Orang Jawa misalnya berperwatakan lembut dan lambat, orang Sunda - periang dan penggoda, orang Batak -kasar, orang Padang - licik.

translation : Javenese people for example, has gentle personality and do things slowly, Sundanese - cheerful and flirty, Batak - rude, Padang - tricky.

OMG, now that I read that, that's so creepily matching the event at that time, we were consisted of 3 javanese ppl, 1 sundanese, 1 batak(ese?) person, and 1 padang(ese?) person.What were the odds?

It wasnt really a long talk actually, most of us just laughed it off. But, then one, from Batak, went on and said, "but it's true, Sundanese ppl is indeed flirty", to which of course the sundanese one showed her disapproval. Yet, the one who said it stood firm for her stance, "Yes, it is true, I know it myself". and there went the atmosphere from friendly laughs to us still trying to laugh awkwardly between the two arguing ones. The sundanese went on expressing that it might be a stereotype but one can not then simply just judge every Sundanese will act like that; and that such a comment was unacceptable, in a bit angered, serious tone, and the other one still stayed calm while repeating her opinion, that she just simply said what she thought as right, what she believed as the truth. And that the opinion abt the stereotype of her was indeed true, and so was the stereotype abt sundanese.

Phew, what a situation, I have to admit I was really scared that it would end badly. Luckily it all went normal after that...well, at least, for me. I dont really remember how it ended. But there were no catfight for sure ^^

So, yeah, that was quite a creepy cultural clash that I wish would never happen again. At least not when I'm around, plz.

Disclaimer : Despite copy pasting those opinion abt regional stereotype in this post, I have no intention at all to support such an opinion. I think everyone's different. And it's one's acts that defines someone, not which region he/she comes from =]

Breakfast Menu

2007-04-04T11:40:00.000+02:00

It's always interesting how i get all my friends amazed when I assemble some fried rice in the morning for my breakfast. They consider it as very heavy for such an early morning start (not to mention that my notion of early morning is noted as very very very early morning for them :D).

The amazement is reasonable though considering what they have for breakfast.

In Italy the breakfast menu is what Indonesian will call a snack menu ^^. It consists of biscuits and cofee. And, no, its not a lot of biscuits we're talking here. The suggested portion is just 4 cookies at most for a male! Man, I can finish almost half of the cookies bag in one sitting while watching to some movies, and they only have four of them for breakfast :D So, you can imagine how would that compares to a full dish of rice they saw me eating :D

These biscuits, they can be any normal cookies. From plain cookies up to cookies with filling, something like oreo; or for a bit heavier start: biscotti with nutella spread (mmmmm....nutella!).
Then it will be accompanied with an obligatory Italian drink: Coffee. In every housing a certain utensil to make coffee called "mokka" is available. They usually even have it in numerous size, ranging from the cute 1 cup serving size up to the big one serving a family breakfast (I think).

They have all type of coffee here. For the experienced one, espresso is usually the choice for the morning breakfast. It is a super concentrated coffee that usually only served in a very small cute cup since it's very very strong. But, I know a friend of mine who will need at least a mug of that to start her day :D

Cappuccino is another choice for breakfast. In fact I think it could be the most proper time to have a cappuccino. People here almost always have coffee after their meal. They said it helps the digestion. If you happen to dine out you will notice that the waiters always ask whether you'd like a coffee after you finish your dessert. However, don't try to order cappuccino after a lunch. That's a faux pas for Italian (for the reason that they themselves don't really know my friend told me). Anyway, this cappuccino name origins from capuchon or hood. The name descripts the appearance of a cup of coffee with milk as its hood. Not having a real coffee maker will enquire you to make your own milk foam using certain shaker.

In Germany, a very typical breakfast is muesli. My roommate's special breakfast mix consists of muesli with banana cuts (or any other fruit cuts), yoghurt (it's quark, i don't know whether that's yoghurt or cream), and honey; all mixed in a bowl. Looking at them preparing the breakfast is an experience of its own. I think this choice also show how they value their nutrition.

In my case, I eat anything that I feel like to eat in the morning. It can be biscottis with nutella dipped in fresh milk (of course 5 biscotti at least, im Indonesian, mind you :D), it can be some leftover I found in the fridge (ranging from rice, bread, pizza, or even lasagna!), or some normal cornflakes wih milk and honey. I never tried muesli though, it just looks too healthy :p

Moving in

2007-03-11T21:57:00.000+01:00

Last week I met my close friend, an ex-roommate, after a year. We chatted for only around 30min since she needed to go back to her hometown that day but it was nice. She updated her current situation, her father had a new business, she let her dad use her car, and..
next year she'll move in with her boyfriend!

Ok..she got me off guard there...

what do I supposed to say on such moment?
"Complimente!"?

She looked so excited about the plan so I guess that should have been a good response.
But, yet, I can't.

I mean...hello, in Indonesia you must get married first before you move in with your lover. It's a big big big sin (although maybe not seen as that severe anymore considering all recent extramarrital scandals). And anyway, even if you don't care about religion you better just do that unless you really really don't care about everything around you.

So, my first reaction that came in mind is, "What?are you going to get married this year?" :D
But, I realized then that might be improper...
also when I considered her all happy, brightened face.
So, I just made an "Oh" sound with a surprised-and-(tried-to-look)-excited-(too) look on my face.
But...really,..what should I have said?

Ciao, Bella!

2006-07-15T03:37:00.000+02:00

"Hi, Beautiful!" I guess that's how you should translate that. I got this opening from my Italian friend's e-mail (a girl). I guess it's quite a usual way of saying "hi" in Italy (Well, at least I saw many t-shirts with "Ciao, Bella!" writing made up in Coca Cola logo style everywhere in Italy).

Yet, somehow I can not translate that custom well into Indonesian language. The exact translation will be "Halo, cantik!". But, believe me you won't hear many, if not none at all, greetings like that. You must be in a situation that you really seriously consider the other person beautiful to say it. And that seldom a situation that occur everyday. The circumstances I could think of where that kind of greetings will be said are:
- in a flirting way, between lovers or lovers wannabe or admirer
- between mom and daughter (of course for your mom you're the most beautiful creature in the world =) ). This can be extended to between father and daughter, grandma and granddaughter, etc. All the parental relationship.
- when your name or nickname indeed is "Cantik"
- ....
errr...there you go, I can not think about any other circumstances.

Well, but then here I got this casual greetings from my friend. So, does that make me beautiful? [of course I am ;)].
Now, I am thinking about the Italian culture. One of my friend told me that Italians are almost the same like Indonesians when you are talking about courtesy things. When you meet you are usually supposed to ask at least "how are you?" out of courtesy and then usually the conversation will be a long conversation that involve everything.

I know I can rely on my own culture about this courtesy and politeness thing. There should be no way Italians can beat ours. But, then why my culture doesn't include this "Ciao, Bella" greetings? Especially in the form that I got here, between girls in a friendly way.

I still have no answer yet for that. So, I'll update this later.

But, anyway, I think this is also the case for other language,right? I mean I don't recall I remember "Hi, Beautiful!" greetings, or "Bonjour, belle", or "Hallo, schoenes" (Well, for the French and German ones I am not really sure actually, still learning them now ^^)

Family Guy

2006-07-15T00:02:00.000+02:00

I found that my friend's website provide links to their familiy member's business. Not just the nuclear family member like brother, but also his uncle business. I also found this in Juergen Klinsmann's (Awwww, Klinsiii!) website. One of the section was about his family-run bakery back in Stuttgart. So sweet :)

I found this is interesting. I mean, OK, I might provide link to my brother's or sister's blog(if they have one) but that would be just something in the links section. Along with links to other friends blog. And most definitely I won't put their business on my page, unless, that also my business (but then that would be in the section about me, not about them). So, this mentioning thing (hey, this has correlation with my previous post) is really impressing.

Another reason why this is really impressing for me: the stereotype that I got for western family life is something like that family bound is not as strong as what you might find in oriental culture. One of my source for this is a Danish guy I met in train back in my country. He was a tourist, travelling alone. He said the rule of thumb for them is that when you are old enough, something like 17, then you are expected to be completely independent from the family. In the meaning that the parent will not support you financially and you won't live with them anymore.

Given that fact, I guess it's different here in German. They do have strong bound with their family.

And today I also witness that. I was eating in a restaurant with my boyfriend. In the table in front of me were three guys. I figured just like the rest of the customer they all were just friends having their luch together. Then came this woman and another guy with shopping bags joining them. And so the complete picture revealed, they all are a family, making an appointment to have luch together out of their own daily business.
I think that is so sweet :)

Mentioning Girlfriend

2006-06-03T00:39:00.000+02:00

I noticed that all of my German friends mentioned their girlfriend in our conversation at least once. Either when saying that they will have to go to their girlfriend this weekend, they remember her birthday and preparing gifts for her, or the girlfriend can bail him not to meet her for few weeks so he can work on a certain project with tight deadline.

Well, that's quite something for me.
I don't remember any Indonesian friend mentioning they have to do something special for their girlfriend. I mean, OK, I think of course all of them also meet their girlfriend at weekends. But, it never sounds to me like that is something obligatory to then, unlike when these people here said that.

So, I am asking, why?
Possible answers :
- from Indonesian culture itself, going steady isn't really
something "correct". So, mentioning your girlfriend isn't really popularly done as mentioning your wife.
- German people considers their girlfriend more special than Indonesian people consider theirs, so they really have allocated time and obligations for her. (Hmm, if this is the correct answer I guess I'll have to hunt a German boy here ;) )
- German people are really busy with everything, so they even have special time and effort allocation for their girlfriend. Just as all of their works.
- In our age (I'm 22, but my friends are mostly older than me)it is just natural that everyone should already has a girlfriend. So, it is just natural to talk about it, it's a part of everyone's life.
- (or in contrary with above reason..) Not everyone has a girlfriend. Mentioning her will raise your self esteem and tell to others, "hey, I'm in relationship".
- They just use her as an excuse =)

No hard feeling =) anybody has better idea?