Category: Thoughts

Posted in Life happens, Thoughts

August (never) Slipped Away

Posted on by arlanadya

August never slipped away.

It has always been loud, tough, painful and make sure its presence got full attention and whole energy to deal with until the very end of it.

But, August too shall pass.
Some ended with flying colors,
Some stayed insanely cruel.

The last day of August yesterday was maybe one of the highest after three months dealing with many kind of hurdles at work. Closed the month with the highest sales ever for the past five years. But, that was not the ultimate thing that made me feel happy.

It was the feeling of knowing that I didn’t retreat from the battlefield when things went hard and dealt with every single thing that was being thrown to my face, no matter how painful and emotionally draining they were, that was truly fulfilling.

A page that truly resonates well with me after finishing all the responsibilities in August.

Although it’s far from professional, This August showed that I am obviously more than an amateur and don’t let any weather stopping me from showing up and working on something that is important to me.

Looking back to this post, glad the answer (so far) is I did it.

When things get hard later, which is likely to be, I’ll return to this August to remind myself once again.

Posted in Favorite things, Places, Thoughts

Where to Play Outdoor in Jakarta Part II

Posted on by arlanadya

We had a lot of outdoor hours this week since school was going online. Outdoor is getting rare these days, so whenever we could, we would!

Here are some options where to go in this city :

1. TAMAN SITU LEMBANG, Menteng.

My most favorite park. It is quiet, empty and perfect place to take a nap while the little girl wander around by herself.

Nasi Uduk with some view!

2. Ancol and Allianz Eco Park

As usual, staycation idea always strikes suddenly. Long awaited reunion after endless question of “can we go to the beach?” finally answered after three years from this trip.

For now, this was the best answer we could afford.

Warm morning on the 77th Birthday
Done enjoying empty beach, moved to an empty park when more crowds were coming.
Met a beauty along the way.

3. TEBET ECO PARK (For the 3rd time)

The park finally reopened after being closed for whole two months. Now, they make the visitors to register through an app before the visit, which is a good idea. Previously, this looked more like a crowded market full of people than a beautiful park.

People came with so many absurd ideas like having a school farewell party with loud speaker and sound system, children dance and singing show which were very far from entertaining, a large group of arisan which was very annoying and litters were everywhere. Our society is not (yet) one who already understand that free public place doesn’t mean you can do anything that you want without being considerate to others.

They also omit parking lot from this park. Along with new rules and the system which requires more efforts to visit this park, I hope we could take care such precious facilities better than before.

Last year post for few other places to go in this city.

Remember : there’s no such things as too much outdoor hours.

Posted in Thoughts

Inner Talks

Posted on by arlanadya

School days have been rolling for few weeks and it gives me some space in between.

I love the silence during school hours. Sessions with Heather, doing the remaining chores, talking to all the noise inside the head, tell them to slow down and shut up a little bit.

Safely passed June and July doesn’t make this new month feels easier. As if something is always lurking behind the wall. Couldn’t help keeping the seatbelt on and continuously being alert just in case turbulences coming without any warnings, which happened quite often recently.

Funny how being relax now feels more insecure than keep exercising the overthinking talent. Telling “whatever will be, will be” to the noise inside only helps as long as more plans are secured.

I remembered one of those days. The period where I wondered how tranquil the days had been until it felt quite boring. Now, the wheels are rolling, wishes were granted.

There were times when I thought how hard these days have been, but the thought of getting the comfortable days back yet going through the same situation with the same people didn’t appealing at all.

I remembered how many chances had been given yet no improvement shown. For someone who don’t easily let go of something, who always tries any possible ways to make it work because it’s important for me, I don’t look back once I decide to let go.

As if I am babbling about getting back with ex-boyfriend (there’s none, in fact).

I wish I could find the urge to write more often since it helps so much. Too many untitled posts in the draft where I had so much to pour yet no words came easily to be typed. Stopping at few first sentences becomes a habit.

But, at least, one is released now and it feels good!

Posted in Thoughts

The Tiger Inside The Sloth

Posted on by arlanadya

Done with the ABRSM grade 2 exam which result was quite a ‘betrayal’ to all those hard works, months, weeks, and hours spent in practicing all the pieces made me decide to have a break from anything related to the exam.

I refused proceeding to the next grade. I wanted her to refine her basic techniques more and go easy with practice sessions after months of high tension ones yet without satisfying result.

Asked the teacher to have a break and learn any other pieces which were more pleasant and enjoyable to learn.

But, up to 3 months, instead of progress (that I expect), we turned out to be slacking more. The pieces given from the teacher were far from appealing, which is understandable since Russian method is not famous for being interesting.

‘Interesting’ : famous little pieces from Bach, Beethoven or Mozart which are more familiar to the ears, easier pattern to read, and looks cool to be released on my social media feed.

There’s this guilty feeling inside when I know for sure I’ve been taking the easy way and let her being too ‘lazy’ on her daily practice.

Until I re-read another old book of Amy Chua. Once read this before piano becomes the part of our daily life and I thought this woman was crazy and there’s no way I wanted to be like her.

But, reading it now, with different circumstances and many major changes in daily life since the beginning of the pandemic, I couldn’t help thinking how much truths exist in many lines that she wrote.

Although we’re nothing close in every aspects compared to Chua and her daughters, but many things were so related and it all made sense.

A month ago, her dad bought the new grade 3 syllabus and I only took a glance at it then put it on the drawer right away without a slight of interest.

Out of the blue, one afternoon when I was done with the chapter “how we make it to Carnegie Hall”, something triggered me.

I took the book out of drawer, trying almost all the pieces inside and ended up practicing for more than an hour, which is much more rare than having rainbow in Jakarta’s sky.

Decided all the pieces we would practice for the exam while drilling some parts of the song.

Suddenly, I feel ready for ABSRSM exam season 3.

Starting is one thing. But, maintaining the spirit, keeping the flame burning, those were totally in a different league.

Resuming exam prep means we would also resume those high tension mornings full of arguing, high-pitch voices, and so many more in our daily life.

It’s surely not pleasant, but, it means we’re working towards something. It’s obviously better than staying at the lazy zone.

Bismillah. Sloth out, Tiger in.

Posted in Maternité, Thoughts

Being ‘Kind’

Posted on by arlanadya

Sometimes, some people are too focused on being kind but totally forget they have jobs to be done.

A dentist visit to pull out an extremely wobbly tooth which supposed to be done in few minutes but extended to more than an hour.

Far longer than forever

Been reading while waiting until it seemed weird why they hadn’t finished while it was only one tiny tooth. Turned out the four adults (three more coming to the scene) were too busy soothing the kid who refused to open the mouth with flowery words with no result.

I came to the chair, looked at the child and say, “It will hurt, but it would be only few seconds. So, open your mouth and take it,”.

“Just do it doc, come on. (You waste too much time already, I whispered),”.

Less than 10 seconds, all done, no tears left.

Sometimes, the word kind should be taken with pinch of salt instead of sugar.

If being kind means letting the child do whatever she wants to do, have all her wish fulfilled, no matter what it takes, allow her to decide when she wants to eat, sleep, it’s more of doing harm than being kind.

When Adam already said it, then..

I don’t think as an adult we want to work at the place or with the boss without rules, SOP, and established systems that allow us to work well. It would be confusing, wouldn’t it?

That’s pretty much the same with parents and child. It’s the parents who should set the boundaries, rules, and know when to say no.

I’ve been known as a strict mother since a long time. During the first year, they know how strict and stern I had been when it comes to eating and sleeping time. I listened to no one. No matter how hard, no matter how bad I looked in front of them, I knew I had to do this.

Fast forward few years, people can see result between one who has regular eating and sleeping schedule and who hasn’t. Until now, while others are still dealing with the same eating problems, like going back and forth to pediatrician, nutritionist, doing some tests here and there, just because they chose to let the child do whatever she wanted to do (no rules, eating whatever, whenever, and many more), I enjoyed the result of my stubbornness during the first year.

Another scene also happened during family meeting last week. We agreed that we would only ride on the ferris wheel after lunch, but suddenly the other relatives proposed an indoor playground. It was 2.30 and the dad wanted to stopped by IKEA and also we had another appointment at 5 pm.

For me, it pleased the child but would hurt the others. We already talked and agreed before of what we would do. She knew someone would come at 5 pm to the apartment. Letting her play means we might miss it, paid Rp 200.000 to play for a while, and if you think it wasn’t another problem to make the kids stopped playing, then you might be wrong. I already kept quiet when she had the second cup of ice cream of the day, since someone bought it for her. But letting her prolong the schedule?

At that time, I had to say no in front of other people which made me look bad, even worse with those teary eyes. But, I didn’t care.

As always, the teary eyes didn’t last. It was hard to be sad while enjoying a cup of mint chocolate chip ice cream in your hand.

Saying yes indeed easier, nice and less headache. While saying no takes a lot of courage to handle the look and the judgement from other people.

But, just like I said to her at the dentist chair, I would just take it.

Two pages from my personal favorite parenting book explained it well :

It’s another form of being kind to do what’s right over what’s easy. That’s my way being kind to her for the long term.

Posted in Thoughts

Personal Therapists

Posted on by arlanadya

There were some life periods when I look them back somewhere from the future, I was quite certain that at that time, I was on the level of ‘urgently-need’ therapist.

But, I am not good at talking. The thought of heart-to-heart talk is not appealing and doable. Also, I am not sure if it could help making me feel better.

These days might be one of those periods.

I realized during the turbulence, I don’t need escaping to any places, doing any irregular things like shopping, binge watching, or non-stop eating. Ones that have helped me going through many ups and downs are actually things that I do regularly.

The silence before fajr where most important conversations between me and Him happen, the morning routine and daily exercise, and last but not least, all the writings kept in this platfrom.

I also post quite a lot in a (completely) private social media and no time I visited all those long writings more often than when I am dealing with stormy weather in life.

All those things turned out to be my personal therapists that helped me more than I could think of.

Indeed.

The past two days, the stat had been spiking since someone clicked almost every past writing (thank you so much for that) and it showed in my daily stats. It made me revisiting all those writings too and how soothing it was while reading them.

There were details that I didn’t even remember but actually happened. They were stored safely on those lines. In spite of typos, grammar mistakes everywhere, but it was more than enough to make me say, “well, what’s so bad about current circumstances?” (Although in reality, it’s so headache and heartbreaking).

I entered this year with cautious feeling, more than the previous two years, knowing this is a ten-year marker from the incredible 2012. Up to the seventh month, it might be not as bumpy as ten years ago, but to say it’s been walk in the park, certainly not.

If there were an option where we could choose one superpower to have, I would have chosen a ‘que sera sera’ mentality to deal with any kind of hurdles, to be traded with this anxiety and overthinking ability.

A big sigh was released right after typing the last paragraph.

Well, till then.

Posted in Life happens, Thoughts

Jittery June-July Part 2

Posted on by arlanadya

Although it was the same vibe, but it is not related to the part 1.

I wish I could record every circumstance in a writing right when it happened.

This June and July have been like a roller coaster ride where every morning felt like facing a battle with time bomb, which was quite uncertain when it would explode.

The moment of those sleepless nights, the highly anxious daytime, the confusion whether to go forward or just stay in a status quo, stayed in a relationship that kept sinking, turned a blind eye to all the mistakes that already felt too much to be tolerated.

The moment of making the effort to have that hard yet important conversations, to finally, breaking the (bad) news, bravely cut the ties, for whatever price. Deep down inside, the heart knew it was the only right thing to do and should have been done much earlier than that night.

A survival mode was on.

‘One day at a time’ had been spelled continously to reduce the loud noise inside the head and severe overthinking of so many things that could have happened.

There were on or two moments of relief in between. As if something heavy lifted from the chest, yet new things were waiting. New problems to solve and they were no easier than breaking the bad news.

The consequences of cutting the tie was fully understood, yet nothing prepared me for the actual situation. There were times spent questioning whether all the decision made was the right thing to do, because days after that felt like a complete mess.

The usual life pattern has always been like this : things will get worse and go to the worst then slowly get better.

Cutting the tie with someone who had been staying for years was hard enough. Then, days later, another one informed his resignation.

For the second one, I knew it would happen, since he already said it at the beginning of the year, but totally couldn’t imagine it would happen during the time when his presence was irreplacable and extremely critical.

‘Bad’ things never have good timing indeed.

It felt like returning to the starting line five years ago.

Running with completely new crews on the fifth year surviving this jungle totally makes the heart and mind work harder than the last four years.

I thought I already know a lot. Turned out, I felt like being pushed to take a totally different route and should figure out where it will go. Quit is an option of course. Been considering that option a lot, until this very second.

Planned to release this when things go back to its old balance, but after weeks, something new always come up and it seems there’s no way it could go back to the old days and still have no idea how much more on the menu and how long this period would last.

Guess it’s okay to push the publish button now, hoping there will be time when I look back to these periods and say,

I did it.

Or not.

Posted in Langit Senja, Maternité, Thoughts

A Tortoise

Posted on by arlanadya

A hare in piano, but obviously a tortoise in any other activities with physical movement.

But, a good thing about tortoise is he never quits.

It’s been three years since the last weekly training period then long absence during pandemic until we could see a big jump on swimming.

As once stated in this post, swimming is not a sport. It’s a must life-skill to master yet it’s a hard one too, especially for one with certain condition. It is such a relief and totally grateful to finally arrive at this point.

Obviously not a finish line, still many to improve, so the 🐢 will keep going.

My reading view from the bench
The dad view from above

Posted in Favorite things, Past learning, Places, Thoughts

Dancing between High and Low

Posted on by arlanadya

I am close to never being envious of someone. But, there are few kind that could give me such feeling. One of them is those who could write beautifully.

The level of envy could make me press a new post button at this hour in the dark after reading that new well-written post.

Her whole blog is amazing. I love how she could elaborate and describe anything with unusual choices of words, putting them together into a long enjoyable writing which is impossible for the reader to skip any single lines.

Her new release once felt so familiar.

The period of early years of marriage until this trip happened was the longest I had been without any single trips. The last greatest trip took place right before the wedding and it became a closure of series of my (and our) traveling days in my (our) 20s.

That four years between 2012-2016 were the period of mundane daily life with full of hardworks. We literally started from zero where both were jobless. One just finished the study while another just enrolled residency.

We got close to zero saving since we used most of our hard-earned money for the certain parts of the wedding, apart from the amount that our parents paid for us.

I didn’t know how the idea came from but, I made an excel file of the list of wedding money we received, reported to our parents and we gave 50% of the total amount to our parents, brothers and sisters, and many relatives, even my long-served ART at home that had helped us to do the wedding.

For those whom we couldn’t give the money, we took them to our favorite seafood restaurant for lunch.

The rest 50%, we saved 80% of it to some instruments that couldn’t be easily accessible and used the last 20% for surviving the first few months until I got a regular job.

We used half of the 80% to pay the first rent for our small business five years ago, the remaining amount is still safely kept until now.

Things were hard on the first year. Losing my mum just two weeks before the wedding made me not only a newlywed but also a new caretaker who took over all my mother’s duties at home, including my father.

When the little girl came on the the second year, it was even harder. There were too many highly stressful days due to exhaustion taking care of so many things and people at home, while being 80% of single parent due to high demand of residency and necessities.

There were days after the emotionally draining feeding battle done three times a day, the rushing from and to workplace and home to make it one time, and the exhaustion after work since instead of proper break, I needed to get the dinner ready for everyone. There were times when I talked to myself, “there should be more life than this”.

It was getting worse when during those years the two brothers got a chance to pursue their higher education abroad. I was happy for them, but, releasing a big sigh was unavoidable too. At that time, I felt there would be no exit and I was gonna stuck there forever.

One of my readings said, “the most interesting about life is where you are is never permanent, be it the high or the low” and it is true.

When Paris finally happened, it felt like I was liberated from something and ‘suddenly’ and ‘strangely’, a new period of life happened.

Seven days spent there became a milestone of our life together and it opened many doors to other places that I could never think of going before. Seven days in Paris set a new tone for traveling, at least for me.

Instead of having post-holiday blues in almost all my 20s trips, where I could barely functioned properly for few days after, I felt so happy to be back home and even worked harder, knowing and thinking, “ah, so that was what all this hard-earned money could do”.

Unpacked all the luggages right away when we arrived at home (literally right away), no matter what time it is, started here. It gave me peace and proper closure that one thing is done and time to resume life again.

Life suddenly became so exciting since I had another mission to do : did some research on affordable tickets to certain places that seemed a good idea for our next trip.

Six months after Paris, London happened. When I thought Paris was crazy, London was even more insane. With all the twists, I wondered how I could endure all those life dramas for a mere 7-days trip.

Life continued giving us more traveling days on the following year. That 2018 marked the most traveling year in our life together. From Bali, Tokyo, Tanah Bumbu and Banjarmasin, Jogja, Surabaya (one of the most pleasant yet not recorded), Solo, and Kuala Lumpur, all happened within short time until I thought, “How could life be this crazy?”.

Turned out the craziness didn’t stop there. Entered the year of 2019 sailed around in Labuan Bajo for five days, then The last tetralogy trip in May, short Eid trip to Solo and finally the big move to London.

Those London days were also full of trips to other cities. When the pandemic began, we just finished having one of the most amazing nature trips we had. Even the capricious 2020 gave us chances to do more travelings to England’s best villages in a quiet and peaceful mode.

Until we returned back home.

Life was slowly heading back to its low-mode. The lockdown, the anxiety of sending the doctor to daily covid battle, the frustration of not being able to go anywhere, The languishing period that felt so suffocating, paralysed by the feeling of missing those London life.

Thankfully, it didn’t stay for long. Daily routines and daily exercise helped a lot. I found new joy in getting on public transportations visiting outdoor parks and playground around the town. Started resuming light travel nearby, did something that we have never done like Glamping and short trip with my father to Bogor.

It seemed nothing compared to what we had before, but they were exciting enough to give the similar gratitude inside.

Up until now, no single proper travel made. But, funnily and strangely, I feel somewhat more secured this way. We have been having regular staycation for two to three days and it felt more than enough.

The daily piano practise becomes something that I am uncomfortable missing for too long. We could do all the daily routines everywhere but not the piano.

I don’t know why for the past one year the FOMO feeling for the piano practise has been stronger than one for traveling.

I wondered once, was it because we had had enough up until 2020? Or am I just getting older and choose having less voluntarily adrenaline rush instead?

It seems so funny that during those years where money and time was pretty limited we had such high spirit and energy, going from one place to another. While now, when we could afford such thing without too much worry financially, we prefer doing, ‘buying’, and saving for something else for the future. I haven’t got that desire to checked the ticket price to anywhere far. But still happy to do that for some light domestic travels.

It’s not that I have no more places I wish to visit, but for now, there are some other things that make me feel ‘happier’ than getting lost in unfamiliar place for more than three days.

It is indeed the sign of getting older.

We checked one of our financial goals last May. Although it is still far away, but one big important step made.

We also currently deal with another huge goals which as usual, full of twists here and there. Our life motto together has been, “it is fishy when it seems too easy”.

Dancing between the high and low is the only thing we could do in this school of life.

Lastly, for making me write such long post within short time is the proof how inspiring the blog I mentioned above.

Posted in Thoughts

Good Enough

Posted on by arlanadya

Last Sunday, my little girl had her very first concert stage hall experience as she did quite well in the last exam.

A precious opportunity that not everyone could have, including her mother.

Turned out it wasn’t only her who got some new experience. I also learned few things that got me thinking.

When we got the result last April that stated she passed the exam with the second highest score, we thought she was the second best in her year.

Turned out we were wrong. There were other three students who are sitting on the first place. THREE.

Yesterday was a recording session for the concert and only one parent allowed to watch it inside. I gave the opportunity to her dad, considering many things like it was father’s day yesterday, he rarely got a chance to witness this, and most of all, I couldn’t handle the tension.

While they were inside, the crew handed ne some goody bag with her certificate, some little presents, and a concert booklet. Reading few profiles of students on the booklet got me analyzing few things.

While all three students on the first place got ‘Excellent’ mark on the award paper, the second and the rest got ‘Good’.

Those three on the first place secured their position by chose some very basic songs for the exam repertoire and played it perfectly, while she, on the second place, (which as far as I know, stand alone), chose slightly higher, harder, yet more interesting repertoires. She played them with high musicality (according to the judges), yet less perfect technical delivery.

The funny things, few days ago, we had morning practice quarrel as usual where she kept insisting that she already did it well,

“I think this is good enough”

“No, it’s not. Go, play again”. (It was far from good).

Grumpily she played again. After few times, I said,

“Nah, that’s good enough,”.

Connecting this event to the one above, that becomes clear why she was on the second place.

That is what we deserved when aiming for good enough during practice.

But, is it wrong? Is it bad? Bien sur, que non.

The last few years showed that excellence has price to pay. Doing things daily, reading about people in many fields who consistently stay on the first place, I could understand why they got it. Their practice level is no joke.


The big question is : do we want it and willing to pay for it?

Excellence requires us to pay more (energy, time, sanity) on the price of paying less for the other things.

(Energy law no.1 : Energy changes form, but the total amount of energy stays the same, so more energy on something means less energy for the other things).

On the other side, it is important to set our own standards and define our own enough.

I value and rate 8pm daily bedtime which allows her to have 8-9 hours sleep/day and eat well the most.

Whenever I tell people she sleeps at 8pm daily, they would look at me with disbelief look. Worse, when I tell them, everyone in the house do the same thing.

It followed by no excuse for morning routines, be focused on every single lesson she does, enough time to play outdoor, free time and being idle doing nothing, being healthy and good mood most of the time.

Consistently doing those above is not an easy feat. For now, that good enough is more than enough, Alhamdulillah.

Beside, what else should I expect as someone who at the same age even couldn’t achieve half of what she had achieved? Of course, what I had done was also nothing compared to her efforts.

Sounds wise, eh?

Not really.

This is actually me who’s trying to elaborate whether this a sincere gratitude post or just an excuse for not doing better than good enough and the ‘laziness’ to improve for the better.

Looking forward to knowing the answer.