Birthday Love Letter to My Wife

Dear Wifey,

Happy birthday, may Allah always bless you, have all your dreams come true and happiness always be with you forever eternal from now until here after.

We know that we live only temporary. So let we live life at the fullest

Be someone significant. Or at least don't be a burden on this earth. There are already plenty of bad people out there. Don't add more by being one of them. Always try to make world a better place, even if have to by most insignificant way. Don't litters, drive wisely and respectful, always be honest, never cheat in any forms, always be a helpful person to other and if all of those look difficult, at least try to smile because smile is free.

Be a good agent to any attributes that's attached to us. Be a good Indonesian, although how worse political drama that always going on in the country, although so many annoying authority that always thirsty of money and although economy that still crawl slowly. Be a good model by having great achievement academically or professionally. Invent awesome things, make useful research or build a useful platform or business. Be a good Muslim although much people still having bad perspective about Islam. Try to be a good sample and make them reconsider their view. Religion is a medium. When someone bad it doesn't mean by mistake of religion but most likely because something wrong from the person them self.

Develop powerful and competitive generation. Being good by ourself is not enough. Because like I have said world has become more and more unfriendly. Where corruption is common, where people accept bribe shamelessly and event asking it in obvious way, where crime rate somehow always climb, where taking people right is generally happen. Let's build better generation. Be a good mother and let me be a good father. Not just as parent but be their friend as well and most important be a good role model so at the time our children growth up and somebody ask to them "Hi kid, what you want to be in this life?" and proudly they will respond "I want to be like mom and dad." Let growth children and teach about good self awareness, be a respectful person, be a hard and smart worker, have a high dream, achieve many great things and most important always honest in all aspect of their life. Hopefully this approach will sequentially inherited to our grand children education as well in similar good way. At the end hopefully if world could not be better instantly, let some years to be the cost, and need some generations to be go through.

Happy birthday my lovely wifey and let's always try to make world to be a better place. If it seems hard, at least make ourself to be a better person.

PS: I love you

Two Years in Singapore: A Short Self Reflection

Dear day, today is exactly two years I live in Singapore. Two years ago, only few days after my wedding, I flew to Singapore for work. I still remember the moment when I hug my wife in airport at that day and leaving Jakarta the city where I study and work in total of 7 years. My wife actually join me later in Singapore for few weeks, but the sad feeling at that day was there because after beside just Jakarta - Singapore distance, later on we have to face further distance, Asia - Europe when my wife study has started. However, it was hard but finally there will be only a couple of months left before we reunite again after wifey finishing her study and for this time should be no more long distance between us again.

Like I often said, I moved to Singapore totally in unexpected way. I have the wish to go here since long time ago but it was some kind of shallow wish. I always like to travel and explore. Hence since child, staying abroad is one of my dream. When I was in University I wrote "Work in Singapore" in one of my wish list in my journal. The country just came in my mind. Close to Indonesia, good standard of life and very safe country. Lesson learned from this wish is universe tends to follow what wish we have even how small the wish is. Never stop to dream because like Turbo said, there is dream to big and no dreamer to small.

Interested to have job in Singapore? Hopefully some of my experiences can give some insights. Anyway, the unexpected way that I said is not totally unexpected too. In this internet era job recruitment can be done easily because most of the people will online profile and resume. At that time a recruiter from Singapore company got my contact from linkedin and looking a requirement that match with my profile. Fast forward, I got phone interview and some administrative check and then some salary negotiation and I got a job offer. Lesson learned from this experience is enhance our online branding if we are looking some new opportunities. In this time we can still use linkedin, nice personal website and blog and also some online portfolio website for example like github. Of course all those stuffs have to be balanced by our truly technical and personal skills too.

By using internet for advertising ourself we have kill location limit and can open unlimited possibilities. I am not campaigning for everyone to go to Singapore or go to abroad for work. Living abroad for sometime let say 3 - 5 years will bring so much advantages for us. For example we will get new experiences, new perspectives and new exposures in life. It will be pathetic to have life in same city, same country for the rest of our life. World is big, so many nice things and indeed some dangerous things outside. Why don't have a nice journey in this short life? Work and collaborate with people from different culture. Work in the place which has 4 seasons. Going to Amsterdam for job interview. Have a phone interview with amazon.com. At the end, if we really nationalist we can go back to our country after that 3 - 5 years and make any contributions that we could. Anyway, foreign worker actually contribute to national income. We work abroad but we spent most in our country.

In this two years actually there are not to much weird thing happen. All the things mostly in order. Going to work from Monday to Friday 9 am to 6 pm. Hang out with friends on weekend. Go to mall or watch movie in cinema occasionally. Etc. I had work in two different companies since moving here. Basically most of the things quite same like in Jakarta. Except in here we will face truly multicultural environment. Our colleagues can come from many different countries. Not only Asia even could be Europe or other continents. The job pressure is depend on the project and timeline. When we reach a deadline soon, of course the pressure will be higher. In other time the pressure will be less if all the things has been finished.

Outside of work and come to daily life. Singapore is one of the safest country in the world. There are never any worries when we travel in public transport and going home late night. However the police here a have tagline that very good to keep us aware. "Less crime doesn't mean no crime". Second, Singapore also has one of the best public transport system in the world. Since I moved here I always want to purchase a motorbike. However since public transport is so good, having our own vehicle actually bring more burden than advantage. The public transport is punctuate. Train access almost all the part of islands end to end and keep growing. The bus is very reliable and also punctuate. We even can see the bus timing from the smartphone. Taxi also easy to get (outside peak hour of course) and what I like here the driver will give the chance even to the smallest cents. The mentality that I rarely face from Jakarta taxi driver. Pedestrian is designed properly. In here pedestrian walkers have highest right on the road. Overall the infrastructure here is almost perfect. Beside public transport, Singapore has public library in almost every region with very up to date collections. There are so many sport centre with swimming pool also in almost every region. There are many jogging tracks and nice parks. Mosque is not located in every blocks but still very accessible. In total there are 69 mosques around the island. One of my favourite rule in here is people cannot smoke anywhere. Very contrast compared to Jakarta. D

However there are also some disadvantages to consider. Singapore is very expensive. Income will be much higher but the expense also very big. Without proper financial management we can work for nothing in here. Second, the country is very small. We can feel excited in the first 1 or 2 months live here. But after that most of the thing feel boring. Same routine and not too much thing we can do. Anyway this second problem is not too relate about the country itself. If we feel so that bored we can just fly back to exotic tourism area in Indonesia or we could just cross using boat to Batam or also possible to fly to Thailand or Vietnam.

In conclusion even though life goes up and down sometime excited and sometime flat but I enjoy most of the time here. Not sure until when I will be in this country. My another pending wish list is to move to Europe and stay there for 3 - 5 years, grown my children and have some world trip. The experience must be much different from the current one.

How to Have an Awesome Life

Life is too precious if just to be ordinary

 Human live in this earth only in limited time. In this era, average life expectancy in Indonesia is around 70 years. We could have some bonuses  for some extra years or on the other side we could also have less years. Nobody will know when exactly died will approach. The most important thing we only have one life. There is no green mushroom like in Super Mario Bros that give us extra life after we died. So let spent it wisely.

There are not a sin to life just usual. However, I catch one nice quote about few years back. I don't exactly remember from where I got that. Perhaps even I was the one who originally created it. The quote sounds "Life is too precious if just to be ordinary." We have only one life with limited time span then why don't we spend it in awesome way?

Here are two important things that I considered important to be an awesome person. First is we should be an awesomely honest and awesomely nice person. Most religious people beliefs there will be another eternal life after this where we will be granted for what we did in this life. Logically it will be ridicolous chasing some material things with not honest way and feeds our family with such dirty income. However still many people do. The act of robbing not always must be in obvious way. Corruption either in form of time and money is one common example that happen in many places on earth. Life honestly, only consume a clean income and always be nice with other is one important thing that we should do first. Think deeply for we want to do because we will ask for our responsibility for what we have done.

Second is going the extra miles. I got this quote from Negeri 5 Menara (Country of 5 towers) novel wrote by A. Fuadi. Very nice three sequels of novel to boost our motivation in life. The point of this quote is do our best in every aspects of our life and let God decide what is the best outcome for every particular current situation. Wifey always advice me one of greatest suggestion I ever received. "Always try immediately every potential opportunity and challenge that in-line with your interest and vision. Let decide what should we do later after getting the outcome." Example, I have applied so many scholarships in this 3 years and indeed still no one succeed yet. Who cares about the failure? It might hurt you at beginning. Whatever that doesn't kill you will make you stronger. In Mario Bros term again, whatever doesn't kill you will make you smaller. Do self evaluation, analyse what improvement that can be done and then retry again. We might be still fail again but at least we will learn so much. Just do the first step and let decide the next step after getting the first outcome. If succeed later we decide what to do and if not succeed we can check what kind of strategy adjustment we can do.

I want to continue elaborate further about "do our best and going the extra miles". If other people fail one times and give up, don't be like that. Don't bother to fail hundreds time and keep going extra with every strategy adjustment that we need. If other people study for 2 hours per night let make it 3 hours for us. If other people can finish work assignment in 4 hours find a way so we can finish earlier. Not only for such example, other sample is if other people spent his time from growth up until die in one place then we should go to explore the world. There are too many beautiful place that we should missed it on earth. Go to Europe, America, Middle East to any place that we can. Travel always bring positive insight in our life. Luckily it was rooted in one of my passion. Be different, be original, be as best you can and be yourself. Because once more, life is too precious if just to be ordinary.

A Retrospective of Second Wedding Anniversary: Marriage Advice that I Will Do Properly

In the end, marriage isn't about Happily ever after. It's about work. And a commitment to grow together and a willingness to continually invest in creating something that can endure eternity. Through that work, the happiness will come. -- Gerald Rogers 

I like to reflect and to retrospect. I do a self retrospection again like I did last year. To reflect can be defined as think deeply or carefully about something relate to our self. To retrospect can be define as survey or review of a past course of events or period of time.The main aim of either reflect and retrospect are to do self evaluation so that if there are something that can be improved we can do so. To reflect is like seeing our self in mirror. We will never realize how we looks until seeing our self. Perhaps somebody can remind us but most of the time we are tend not believe until can see the proof by standing in front of mirror. Are we looking good? Are we can tidying our self to be better? To retrospect is like to turn around our head to see what we have passed behind. Today I would like to retrospect and to reflect about my marriage in its second year.

In Islamic believe, there are three things that decided absolutely by God. Birth, dead and who will be our spouse. First, we can not decide when we will got birth and who will be our parents. Second, we also never know when we will died. The obvious thing is died will definitely come but the time is indefinite, could be soon or later. Third, whom will be our spouse also cannot be choose exactly. She or he could be some of our friends, or maybe our neighbor, or perhaps our work colleague or could be someone who just come to our life suddenly. The last one is our case.

Like quite often I shared, how I met my wife at first time was very unusual. I first met her in scholarship selection. Before that actually I was introduced indirectly by one of my fried that at the same time also friend of my wife. Within 5 months from that meeting we got married. It felt like just yesterday but actually we have been fast-forwarded for two years.

My Favorite Perfume

Wedding Anniversary Card

Like her usual hoby, wifey (the way I call my wife) sent me a present yesterday after a few weeks ago she sent me beautiful letter. Wifey also sent me beautiful marriage advice from Gerald Rogers that went viral earlier this year. The original title of his advice was Marriage Advice I Wish I Would Have Had. Gerald advice is an irony, because he has divorced, and the advice is his self reflection and self retrospect that we can learn from. Since his website is detected has some mallware by my google chrome, I will just rewrite points of those advice here:

1. Never stop courting. Never stop dating. NEVER EVER take that woman for granted.
2. PROTECT YOUR OWN HEART.
3. FALL IN LOVE OVER and OVER and OVER again.
4. ALWAYS SEE THE BEST in her.
5. IT’S NOT YOUR JOB TO CHANGE OR FIX HER… your job is to love her as she is with no expectation of her ever changing.
6. TAKE FULL ACCOUNTABILITY for your own emotions: It’s not your wife’s job to make you happy, and she CAN’T make you sad.
7. NEVER BLAME your wife If YOU get frustrated or angry at her, it is only because it is triggering something inside of YOU.
8. Allow your woman to JUST BE.
9. BE SILLY… don’t take yourself so damn seriously. Laugh. And make her laugh. Laughter makes everything else easier.
10. FILL HER SOUL EVERYDAY… learn her love languages and the specific ways that she feels important and validated and CHERISHED.
11. BE PRESENT.
12. BE WILLING TO TAKE HER SEXUALLY, to carry her away in the power of your masculine presence, to consume her and devour her with your strength, and to penetrate her to the deepest levels of her soul.
13. DON’T BE AN IDIOT.
14. GIVE HER SPACE.
15. BE VULNERABLE.
16. BE FULLY TRANSPARENT.
17. NEVER STOP GROWING TOGETHER.
18. DON’T WORRY ABOUT MONEY.
19. FORGIVE IMMEDIATELY and focus on the future rather than carrying weight from the past.
20. ALWAYS CHOOSE LOVE. ALWAYS CHOOSE LOVE. ALWAYS CHOOSE LOVE.

Of course, absolutely I won't follow Gerald Rogers trail but most of his advice is very make sense.

Our First Honeymoon in Malang, East Java

In return of wifey's gift and love letter, I sent a love email to her this morning. I just would like to share it here hopefully can give remind us later in future about our own reflection and retrospection. Where was we, where will go and how to go there.

***

Dear Wifey,

Our Second Honeymoon, ready to fly from Bali to Lombok

It has been two years isn't it? Also, Like I often said Time flies isn't it?  I remember almost all details since the first time we met, to the time we felt click, to the time we got married, to the time we were mostly separated, to the time we could live together like common couple for a while, to the time of today when I write this letter.

It was still quite clear in my mind, the first day we met, when unluckily you sit beside me :p. The destiny will be totally different if you were sitting at different spot. We were talking so much in the middle of test. I didn't wanted to waste a chance, I found a way to got your phone number before leaving that day. The destiny might be different if I didn't successfully got your phone number. And then you also remember the story after that, don't you? Watch movie, some dinners and dates, hanging out to mall, etc.

Short Trip to Melaka

Birth, died and mate are God area. He decide all those stuffs. I was wonder at beginning, how God can find a match of one man to another woman. Does he use some kind of transcendent algorithm? The way we met and then live together and hopefully forever, always make me wonder. How lucky I am to have you at the end.

You are almost perfect from all side, that can complement so many deficiencies that I have. Joy, comfort, sense fulfillment are all the feelings that I have since we are together. If sometime I behave strange, like so easy to get emotional, those are not because something wrong from your side but totally more to my own mistake that could not be more patient and could not be more gentle to treat you. However, I am always learning to be a better person.

So let's talk about some mission statement. Firstly I want we can partner together to build our dream marriage. With a joy, laugh and comfort that never last forever. I don't want to learn that by going through bad way such your story below. How hard the challenges that might come in front of us, I always wanted to stay beside you and hold your hand firmly. Second, I want we can be together to build a strong generation in very nice family. To have smart and wise children that love the learn, full of care and have big dreams. Third, I want we to be more settled. To have a nice home anywhere or some houses in some beautiful places with some of our dreams vehicles inside garages. A wise man said, don't put dunia (material world) in your heart but grab it in your hands. Fourth, always have a great adventures ahead. Fifth, please help me to add.

On Our Way to Bukittinggi, West Sumatera

Dear wifey thank you to be with me for this 2 years. I hope you don't mind to spent the rest of our life together. Thank you for continuesly giving surprises and presents. Those are important but still, you are the most important one.

Happy 2 years anniversary. I always love you.

PS: I love you

***

Marriage is a moment when there is no one wearing mask and present truly them self. Two years is even still not enough to really know and to really understand each other. However she always better than me, knowing and understanding me much more even than myself, caring me so much like make sure I am not hungry even when she is hungry, make sure I sleep well even when she not sleep well, often give me a surprise and gift even when I rarely did the same. Happy 2nd wedding anniversary to my lovely wifey. Thank you very much for limitless love, joy and comfort that you bring since I pledged to be your forever love partner. PS: I love you -- Jon Kartago Lamida

Several Good Movies Shot in Europe

Europe has many beautiful countries. This continent always being one of place that I want to spent some of years of my life, either by studying or working for 3 to 5 years maybe. Unfortunately both of that willing haven't come true yet. Europe always unique in my opinion, first because various countries with their own cultures and languages. Second, most of the countries there are advance country. Third, they have many beautiful architectures and buildings. Fourth, as a tropical country man, I always wonder how 4 season climate feels like. Fifth, most of European countries linked with good quality of transportation system. Let say comprehensive European rail line. Sixth, etc.

There are some movies that took those setting into scene. Some are quite good movies.

Run Lola Run (1998)
This is Germany movie. Starred by Franka Potente that also play as Bourne lover in first and second Bourne movie. The story of this movie is very unique. Of course I wouldn't tell the twist. The movie was shot in Germany.

Bourne Trilogy (2002, 2004 and 2007)
This movie franchise is one of my favorite. The movie is about Jason Bourne, a former CIA that suffers loss of his memory and being chased by other CIA agent in one big conspiracy. The movies were shot in all over Europe like France, Prague, Italy, Spain, UK, etc. We can see car chasing, airport, train station, cross country drive in this movie. There are a spinoff series that released on 2012 but the main role is not Matt Dammon anymore and the shot mostly in Philipine.


Vollgas - Gebremst wird später (2005)
Another Germany movie. The story is about a woman and driver that is trapped in a car that has been planted a bomb. The driver has to follow the guide of one person who put the bomb or else they will be blown up. The shooting location is in Germany. They are using VW Golf for the movie.

The Tourist (2010)
I just saw the movie today. Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp play the main role. The tagline is the perfect trip, the perfect trap. Johnny Depp is an American tourist who visit Europe and suddenly chosen to be a decoy by Jolie when they meet in train to Venice. The movies set were in France and spent most of the hour in Venice, Italy. So there will some chase action but instead of car they use boat.

Zindegi Na Milegi Dobara (2011)
Indeed this is Indian movie. Recently more and more Indian movies is shot abroad. However, still some dancing will shown along the show. The main story of this movie is about friendship of 3 best friends. Since of them will get married very soon, they deside reunite by travelling to Europe together. The movie is quite good. The most of the movie set was in Spain.

Habiebie Ainun (2012)
The story about one former of Indonesian President and also very respectful Indonesian Technologies BJ Habiebie and his wife Ainun. The movie take the story from the biography book writen by BJ Habiebie itself. The set of the movie were in Indonesia and also some sets in Germany. Some sets that I can remember is when Habiebie sit with Ainun in the park to feed the Pigeons.

TBD
There might be some movies I forgot to include, I will add them later.

Hackerx Singapore 2013: Bring Developers and Founders in One Place

I just attended Hackerx, an interesting event this evening. The event try to arrange a meeting between startup founder with a hackerx or we can said as  an awesome potential recruitment. Hackerx is based in USA and likely this is their first event in Singapore or maybe Asia.

Overall, the event is nice. Anyway, I found one link that have opposite perspective. The concept is hackerx organizer will invite about 50 software developer and around 10 to 20 startups. The developer likely is picked by browsing and selection through online resume. Perhaps Linkedin. The invited developer can come free of charge. However the employer have to pay some amount of money to attend. The main content of hackerx is speed dating between startups and prospective employees. The startups founder will sit in some of chair and desk provided inside the venue. The invited developer will queue for 5 minutes interview with startups owner. The interview more or less will consist about tell me about yourself and I will tell you about myself. There will be impossible to do some kind of coding challenge or deep architectural design discussion within 5 minutes only. The event is limited for about only 2 hours. Startups list is announced exactly at the event day, so that we don't have much time to research and getting know about the startups. Actually, in this current event most employer looks for front end developer. I was accidentally invited perhaps because some wording in my Linkedin profile mentioning some "front end" words.

There are about 18 company that come to this current event.

• LifeTech
• 2c2p
• MobikonTech
• Zopim
• Redmart
• Influr
• Dimest
• Playbasis
• Lotaris
• BellaBox
• Wego
• Haystakt
• RuckusWireless
• Maxus
• Signbox.tv
• HoneyHive
• Appbackr
• DocDoc
• Crayon

Unfortunately, because limited time I just have chance to talk with some.

Hackerx is more to networking rather than recruitment because it will be little bit difficult to get to know each other only withing 5 minutes. Job opportunities is a great thing to get. However at least I can meet some new people there, with so many ideas that they bring. At the end it could got force as well for me to cultivating some ideas then writing prototype and launching my own startup. Of course there will need much times and extra effort to do the later one.