Tuesday, January 25, 2005

Sorry, no English version available...

Pernahkah kau melihat
runtuhnya sebuah jembatan batu?
atau sesosok gedung tinggi?
atau tebing terjal di sisi pantai?
Gumpal
demi
gumpal.
Serpih
demi
serpih.

Pernahkah kau merasa
sakitnya tertimpa kegagalan?
atau tusukan kata-kata dalam konflik?
atau kalutnya terlanda keterasingan?
Nyeri
demi
nyeri.
Pedih
demi
pedih.

Lebih baik terterjang mobil
lalu mati seketika di tempat,
daripada terluka parah
berdarah-darah
terkapar
tak berdaya
dalam sunyi
sendiri.

Sama nyerinya sekarang
ketika gumpal demi gumpal
kegagalan
terbingkai wajah tak percaya
akan kemampuan diri
dan menggelontor percaya diri
ke gorong-gorong
terjauh, terdalam.

Sama pedihnya
ketika serpih demi serpih
tuduhan
terbingkai kalimat
menuduh kepercayaan
akan pola filosofis dan
menggores rasa cinta
hingga membelah-belah
hati dengan ketidakberaturan
tak berbentuk.

Dan
pada akhirnya
diri runtuh segumpal demi segumpal,
seserpih demi seserpih.
diri sakit nyeri demi nyeri,
pedih demi pedih.

Dan
diri terluka parah
berdarah-darah
terkapar
tak berdaya
dalam sunyi
sendiri.

(tapi tak butuh dikasihani
sebab kau tak suka itu, bukan?)

Monday, January 24, 2005

After the string concert

Versi Bahasa Indonesia di sini.

the alluring notes is a story about an old city with palaces as I imagine strolling past midnight in winter with a friend reciting the history of Czar and ballerinas in prominent theatre across an island with Sphinx bridge.
:when are we going to explore the country foreign to summer?

Selepas konser biola

English version here.

nada musik mengalun ini adalah cerita tentang sebuah kota tua dengan istana yang aku bayangkan aku lewati selewat tengah malam di musim dingin bersama seorang teman yang bercerita tentang sejarah Tsar dan balerina di teater terkemuka di seberang pulau berjembatan sphinx.
: kapan kita berkelana ke negeri yang tak kenal musim panas itu?

Saturday, January 22, 2005

Being Cultured

In a way, my stay in Ames has made me Western-cultured. What I meant by cultured is that I had some opportunities to enjoy arts performances and exhibitions around the town. Although Ames is small in American standard for cities/towns, this city obviously has the resource to pull some of decent arts gatherings to the town.

Last year, I went to Cinderella Ballet Performance with my roommates in Stephen Auditorium. Since then, I had gone to another ballet performance (The Nutcracker) and this Thursday, I'm going to watch St. Petersburg Ballet Company presenting Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. I thoroughly enjoyed the performances and the classical music accompanying the dance. Ballet is one of my favorite performance since I was a kid (and figure skating, and gymnastics *ISU has one of the best college team for gymnastics and I have to make a mental note to watch it before I go home to Indonesia) and it was too bad that I could only see them on TV back home. Such performances, if any, would be in Jakarta, and the ticket would be extremely expensive.

I also had some chances to listen to very fine music performances. From the pop-folk side, of course I will never be able to forget John Mayer's concert at Hilton Colliseum in November 2003. I also went to ISU Jazz Bands Concert in Martha-Ellen Tye Recital Hall last year. Just an hour ago, I was invited by the Hertz to watch the Vemeer String Quartet at Ames City Auditorium (they're very active in various organizations in town and Joyce is in the Board Directors of Ames Town and Gown Chamber Music Association, the one invited the Quartet). I definitely will watch Prague Symphony Orchestra in March! I love classical music and it was relaxing listening to the Quartet playing Quartets by Dvorak, Tower and Brahms tonight.

And the campus is full of exhibitions, if you know where to look! I passed works by Christian Petersen, a sculptor who became ISU artist-in-residence, everyday, like Library Boy and Girl at Parks Library. Or Iowa's famous artist Grant Wood's When Tillage Begins, Other Arts Follow fascinating mural still at the Parks Library. Or Border Crossing by Luis Jimenez in front of LeBaron Hall.

There are many things that I want to see before I leave this country, things that I will never be able to see back home, because it is just either non-existent or too expensive. I feel blessed that I have this opportunity to learn about many things here...

Spy from the sky...

Hmm, wanna see my apartment looks like from the sky?
Check out this spy taking photo of my apartment from above. Oops, actually it's not a spy; it's called TerraServer-USA, "one of the world's largest online databases, providing free public access to a vast data store of maps and aerial photographs of the United States" operated by Microsoft (yaiks... the monopolist again!)

My apartment is the one with red pin. The main road north of it is South 4th Street and the building with vast parking lots is Department of Transportation. I knew that they have a large parking lot (because I have to go through it to get the Red Route Cyride bus quite many times) but I didn't realize that it is even bigger than Hyvee's (somewhere northeast of my apartment, across S 4th Street).


Wednesday, January 19, 2005

There are goodness in every human being...

Although the tsunami disaster hit only certain countries, we are all concerned and interrelated...

Iowa State Tsunami Memorial
Announcement here.
Pre-event coverage here.
Event Coverage in Iowa State Daily, Des Moines Register, Ames Tribune (here and here), Channel 13 News.

+ Tengah Upacara Korban Tsunami

English Version here.

Lilin bernyala
adalah hati kita
yang diterangi
kenyataan pedih
betapa ribuan
yang terhempas
dan dijemput
takdir.

Pertemuan buram
adalah kemanusiaan kita
yang didukakan
tragedi global
betapa ribuan
yang bisa jadi kita
yang menunggu
maut.

Warna-warni
sekumpulan kita
lepaskan jerat
kepicikan warna.
Di sini kita cuma
sekumpulan manusia
tersentuh oleh tragedi
yang sama.
tergerak oleh perasaan
yang serupa.

+ On Tsunami Memorial

Versi Bahasa Indonesia di sini.

Gleaming candles
are our hearts
lightened with
grim facts
that thousands
are suffering
and
greeted by
fate.

Gloom encounter
is our humanity
saddened by
global tragedy
how thousands
become us then
waiting for
death.

Colorful
our gathering
free us from
the shallowness
of colors.
Here we're merely
human beings
touched by
the same tragedy.
moved by
the same feeling.

Tuesday, January 18, 2005

Pencarian Prioritas

English Version here.

Siapakah kita
terkurung dalam
segala relasi
dan konsekuensi?
Jadinya kita
membuat jenjang
kepentingan atas
segala relasi.
Dan jadinya konflik
relasi jadi saling tindih.
Apa parameter
jenjang itu?
(Ketika kau tanya
aku jadi tergagu,
sebab aku tak tahu
atau aku menghindari?)
Kita terjebak
Kita terkondisi
Kita melawan (mungkin)
Kita pasrah (lebih mungkin)
Kita berkompromi (amat sangat mungkin)
Terserah.

Quest of Priority

Versi Bahasa Indonesia di sini.

Who are we
stuck in
varied relationships
and consequences?
Then we
make a list
of priority on
those relations.
Then it
becomes
conflicts
relationships are
overlapping.
What are
the parameters
of priority?
(When you asked
I muted,
because
I was clueless
or I avoided
the subject?)
We're trapped
We're conditioned
We fight (perhaps)
We surrender (more likely)
We compromise (very high probability)
Whatever.

Wednesday, January 12, 2005

ISU community's effort for tsunami victims

What have you done to help? (Lucas Grundmeier, Iowa State Daily Editor in his editorial)

My response.

What have you done to help?

Monday, January 10, 2005

Untuk matahari

English version here.

Kepergian matahari
ditangisi hingga
butiran salju
berderai melimpahi
jalanan depan apartmentku.

Kurindui matahari
di pagi hari.
Kucumbui kerling malu-malunya
di siang hari.
Kubenci perginya
di sore hari.

Sebab hadirnya yang
irit itu
melahirkan senyum
di gemeretuk gigiku.
Dan optimismeku
yang hampir menguap
ditelan beku
menyublim menjadi
harap baru
bahwa hari ini
tak sedingin hari kemarin
dan kerja hari ini
tak terhenti
terganjal letih
menanti matahari.

To the Sun

Versi Bahasa Indonesia di sini

The sun left
bringing tears of
the snowflakes
pouring down
in the street of my apartment

I miss the sun
in the morning.
I flirt with its shy wink
during the day.
I despise its exit
in the afternoon.

Because its
rare existence
gives birth to the smile
on my shivering lips.
And my optimism
almost vaporized
engulfed by the freeze
melts to
a new hope
that today is
less colder that yesterday
and today's work
will not be halted
trampled by weary
waiting for the sun.

Friday, January 07, 2005

Dingin-Dingin Kedinginan di Musim Dingin

Biar ada cerita ke anak cucu soalnya dinginnya salju, baiknya kita foto2an aja ya dengan latar belakang salju. Si Tyas yg udah tiga kali ngerasain musim dingin, ternyata gak punya foto bersama salju. Ya udah, gue culik aja ya!

Kesimpulan masih sama kayak winter tahun lalu:

Snow, it looks beautiful, but it doesn't feel beautiful....



Siap tempur melawan dingin!Posted by Hello

Tangan dua2nya masuk jaket... Posted by Hello

Ini ya yang namanya salju? Posted by Hello

Saljunya sama ajah.. Posted by Hello

Kalo disentuh gimana ya? Posted by Hello

Pake sarung tangan ajah nyentuh saljunya, biar gak dingin! Posted by Hello

Coba kita sentuh saljunya...Posted by Hello

Tyas: Dingin ya Nen?
Neny: Iyaaaaaaaa..... Posted by Hello

Tyas: Klo dingin kita pose senyum aja, Nen, biar gak keliatan dingin...Posted by Hello

Neny: Tapi tetep kerasa dingin, Yas, walo udah senyum lebar...
Tyas: Ya udah, kita nempel aja biar agak angetan....hehehe.. Posted by Hello

Pose sendiri, masih kedinginan juga ya...Ini di Central Campus...dingin! Posted by Hello

Di Lake Laverne, dingin juga! Posted by Hello

Maksa senyum aja ya, biar keliatan menikmati winter... Posted by Hello

Ini di deket apartment temen, masih dingin juga Posted by Hello

Matahari terik tapi dinginnya tetep! Posted by Hello

Di depan apartmentku dingin juga! Lama-lama mukanya udah bt abis...Posted by Hello

Latest happenings

1/ Thesis proposal = 1/3 done
2/ PhD application = none done :(
3/ Organizing vigil/memorial service for Aceh tsunami victims = 1/10 done
4/ Finding a course for Spring 2005 = no response so far :(
5/ Translation Project with Aceh IT-Media Center = 4 articles done
6/ Looking for more $$$ = today is the latest day of working with IES for Spring Orientation! Yay!

Saturday, January 01, 2005

Reflection on the earthquake by Emha Ainun Nadjib

Forgive me oh God..for not believing in your omnipotent power and wisdom in deciding what is best for us, weak human beings....


++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Mountains, Don’t Erupt Too

By Emha Ainun Nadjib

From Kompas Newspaper, December 29, 2004 (Indonesian's version)

Any mistakes in translation is solely mine.


FOR Aceh disaster, I must see Kiai Sudrun. Can words describe its great impact? Can literature express its depth of sorrow? Can science find and calculate its meanings? The expression of Sudrun’s ugly face with saliva kept crawling out from the corner of his lips almost enraged me. Because I couldn’t tell if he was in grief or not. Because, I will kill anyone who does not grief the grim of the disaster and the sorrow of the victims whose soul were shattered.

Jakarta deserves the disaster way much more than Aceh!” I blurted.

“You also deserve the destruction,” Sudrun replied with his words, which as always, stabbed my heart.

“Then, why Aceh, not me nor Jakarta?”

“Because you are engaged with the depravity of the world, while Acehnese are married with heaven.”

“Acehnese have gone through the most severe and tremendous sufferings in the recent years, compared to the people in the whole country. Why they are put in such an abyss of sorrow?”

“Suffering is the most expensive deed human beings can offer to their God. Therefore their degree is heightened, and you are left behind to continue being low.”

“Including you, Kiai…”

Spat! He spitted on my face. Like always. I wiped it out in patience.

“If it was a punishment, what have they done wrong? If it was a warning, why it was not given to the mob of thieves and corruptors in Jakarta? It was a trial, has God not fed up with the confusion and fear the Acehnese felt in the midst of never-ending political and military war?”

Sudrun was laughing uncontrollably. None I understood what was the funny part of my questions. His body was shaken in laughter.

“You examine God? Question God? Blame God for his injustice?” he asked.

I answered firmly, “Yes.”

“What if God remains silent?”

“I will keep questioning him. And I know all Indonesian will keep questioning him.”

“Until when?”

“Until forever!”

“Until death calls?”

“Yes!”

“Until you die?”

“Nuts!”

“You are nuts. You logic is insane. It’s better to question why your knowledge failed to find out that the earthquake would strike Aceh. You don’t even now what you will say in the next five minutes. Neither you know how many hairs in your armpit. You’re coward. Why you only question God’s acts. Why don’t you go into battle against God? We will move from His land, move from His universe, then you roll the drums of war, against Him!”

“I came to you, Kiai, “I shouted, “to discuss things that will prevent me of accusing God of being a dictator and authority…”

In response, Sudrun jumped up and down. And his whole body was shaken in laughter. His lips smiled widely, mocking me.

“You are wicked,” said he, “because you want to avoid duties.”

“What duties?”

“The moral duty of admitting that God is a dictator and authority. The duty to admit it, to find His logic, then to accept it, and finally to achieve the pleasure of letting it go. God is the only one, who has the right of being dictatorial and authorial, as a painter has the right to love his/her paintings, or to rip them up and throw them to the garbage. God has no obligations because He is not indebted to anyone, and His existence is not the result of anyone’s work. He is not tied to good or evil because He WAS the creator of good and evil. God does not have to comply with right or wrong, because indeed the right or wrong which must comply to Him. Ainun, Ainun, what are you doing? Here, here…” He grabbed my arm and dragged me to the wall. “I’ll lend you this wall…”

“What do you mean, lending me this wall?” I did not understand.

“Use it as you want.”

“For what?”

“For instance, you can bang your head against it…”

“Crazy!”

“To bang your head against the wall is the initial learning step which is good for your way of thinking at the present.”

He brought me to sit.

“Or you can be god, and you decide what is good for human beings’ destiny, based on your wisdom.” He held on my upper shirt.

“Do you know Muhammad?” he continued, “Do you know him? The Prophet Muhammad shallallahu ’alaihi wa alihi wasallah, you know him? He is the jewel of human beings because he chose to live as a poor. Never did he feed himself full in three days in a row, because by the second day he had no possession of food. He sown his own clothes and fixed his own sandal. The dimension of his house was 4.80 long and 4.62 wide. God loved him the most among other human beings, because God let people of Thaif village to throw stones on him that he bleed his forehead. God even let him be severely ill because Zaenab, a Jewish woman, poisoned him. God let his first grandchild to be poisoned by his own wife. And the second grandchild was beheaded and the head was dragged hundreds of kilometers by the horses, thus forced him to bury the child in two graves. God guaranteed him to be in heaven, but he was always in fear of God and cried in each of every prayer that he lifted to God. And all of you, your job is to steal, your action is low, your politic is rotten, your attention to God is divided and half-hearted, you expect to have a better destiny than Muhammad? And when disaster strikes you, you blame God?”

Sudrun pushed me in full power that I fell.

“Kiai,” I said in half voice, “I want to keep my faith that the main icon of God’s existence is His nature of being Compassionate (Rahman) and Merciful (Rahim)…”

“It is very true,” he answered. “What made you lose your faith?”

“Because of Aceh, Kiai, Aceh…For Aceh, I’m willing to receive your spit.”

“I didn’t spit on you. What happened is not that I spitted on you. What happened is that you deserve the spit.”

“As you wish, Kiai, as long as the Compassion and Merci…”

“Compassionate is love in broadened sense, Merci is love in deepened sense. Compassionate is a social love, Merci is the love from the deep of the heart. Why?”

“Aceh, Kiai, Aceh.”

“Compassionate licked Aceh from the ocean, Merci sucked Aceh from the center of the earth. The noblest human being is the one which immediately separated by God from the world. Angels bring them directly to heaven where they reside in the houses of lights, readily available for them. To their families left behind, the destroyed villages and cities are their battle of trial so that the Acehnese come out as people with great characters. After this trial, God will help them to rise and find the hero within their soul. The disaster was made to be that enormous, so that it will solve all problems between Aceh and Indonesia that has brought so much misery for them. Acehnese and Indonesians are now free from psychological blocks which have been imprisoning them, because their tears and sorrow will be melt together, and new historical decisions and changes will occur to ease both sides.

“But it was too horrid, Kiai, and it is difficult to imagine how the victims can bear such misery.”

“The world is not the main stage for human beings. If for you, people who live are safe and those who died are not safe, you must first throw away the concepts of God and eternity from your life values. If for you, the houses which are still standing, the worldly possessions which were safe, and the lives which were spared means goodness; and the opposite is bad --- stop protesting God. Because it means that God has no existence in the scale of your thoughts, and for you life stops when you die.”

“But why God took the lives of His innocent servants, and let the nation criminals and society evils live in abundant?”

“Maybe God is not satisfied if those evils do not stay long in hell. So, He let them double their sins and stupidity. Did it happen before that God took many good prominent figures in your country to His eternity; and on the contrary, the ones whom you pray for God to take their lives because they are awfully evil to their people are granted to live long?”

“Oh God Almighty,” I sighed, “we all and myself, Kiai, do not have the sophisticated and precise mind in the caliber of what God has displayed in His action.”

“Don’t act as if you never know the patterns of God’s actions. If human beings’ heart is sick, and they let it worsened so that their politic is disgusting, the economy is shattered, and the culture is full of mockery to the human values, God will even add up the sickness, and provide them with a more devastating disaster which will await them in the end. What happened in Aceh is not a disaster in God’s perspective. It is an exultation to those whose lives were taken by the angels, and an enlightenment and awakening for those who were let alive.”

“For us the commoners, it all still seemed unfair…”

“You stupid!” Sudrun retorted. “Chickens are joyful and grateful if they are butchered for the contentment of human beings. They had no awareness of knowing, but they are joyful and grateful.”

“So the corruptors and tyrants will still live prosperous?”

“Until this afternoon, yes. Actually God still loves them that for the last one or two months, He still gave warnings, in the form of natural, technology and human disasters, in higher frequencies than the previous months. But, they failed so God decided to bring a greater warning. If the greatness of Aceh disaster did not move the hearts of Jakarta to learn to be more humble, there is a chance…”

“Don’t say that the mountains will erupt too, Kiai.” I cut his words, horrified to imagine what Sudrun will tell next.

“Tell it yourself to the mountains!” said Sudrun, rose and left me.

“Kiai!” I jumped and chased him,” Please tell God to take a break from his decision to create natural disasters….”

“Why you called it natural disasters? If you blame God, why don’t you call it God disasters?”

I can’t hold Sudrun. He ran and disappeared.

Emha Ainun Nadjib
Literary Figure