My first day in London (surprisingly) gave me quite a lot of spiritual experience and I am not talking about some managing stress experience having to explore London all by my self on foot. Yes, on foot. I literally walking for hours. Something that I never done in Jakarta.

I went to British Museum and there was a long table with a beautiful knitted long cloth. But when you look at it closely, the knitting material was thousand of pills. All kind of pills. When I read the article apparently it’s about how we manage our life, enhance its quality and therefore, reducing medicines intake. There are lots of pictures framing the cloth. Pictures of a good looking bald athletic young man who had cancer, pictures of a kid in an athletic game, pictures a family having fun together, a couple of senior citizen dances their life away at the beach, some coffins at funeral ceremony, some wedding pictures. Some are old pictures from the 70s some even from the 60s. Some has dies, some has survived. Beneath those pictures, there were comment scribbled by the contributor of the pictures with their own hand writing. Some are from mothers who list their children due to illness. Some from survivors. Some notes are sad, some are not, some are merely information on the event taken.

Being a person with Lupus for the past 16 years, this exhibition moved me so much. I marvelled at how many prednisone I’ve been taking (or should have been taken) during those long years. And here I am, 32 years old woman with two kids. I wonder how my life would be, say, 30 years from now. Will I end up with osteporosis due to the level of my prednisone intake and drinking-coffee-is-a-must habit? Will I get glaucoma? Will my kidney be able to bear it. I don’t know.

That and the thought of my 2 kids got me thinking over the plain overpriced sandwhich. What can I do to make their life better than mine. Better in term of quality. What should I do to impose a healthy life style habit when in reality, I am also not having such a healthy life style habit. How can I make them eat vegetables if the sight of vegetables never moved my appetite. How can I drag them off TV if I also spend hours in front of it. How can I enthused them to walk and work out if in reality, I never done that as well.

So many intriguing questions pondering my thought whilst I was sitting in front of the museum watching some kids feeding the pidgeon. I looked at them in envy. They looked so happy. So carefree. They have the whole world in front of them. For how long I don’t know. Some may grow into a chain smoker. Some may practise excessive diet. I looked at their apple cheeks and wonder, they born like white piece of paper. It is up to us to help them filling in with pictures they like. And somehow, what we like, will also impose their choice in the future. And the scariest part for me was, we only have one time in their life time to develop a healthy life style. How much damage have I done to my kids by not introducing them to proper food and good habit.

I took a deep breath and tried to stop my self making promise that I won’t be able to keep. All I know is that I will do my best to give them as much opportunity as possible to enjoy their life as a kid, that will benefit them as an adult. Perhaps it’s time for me to try some vegetables.Or even exercise. Maybe.

Feeling a bit depressed, I put my coat and gloves on. Blinded by the fierce windy I jumped on a red bus, going to Russel Square. Apparently it was tourist bus so I had to jump down again.

We went to the beach last weekend. The suppose to be 2.5 hours journey was extended into 4 hours journey due to the flood and believe me, when you had baby crying his eye ball out because he wanted to sit on daddy’s lap (who is driving) whilst the big brother screamed in annoyance of hearing such noise, the 4 hours journey feels like 20 hours journey!

Nah, just kidding. The driving was fine. Baby Pascal slept most of the time and Big Brother Mika was busy watching the movie in the car. Due to our mini visto trunk limited capacity, we borrowed hubby’s sister’s car who happened to have TV! So there was Mika contentedly sitting watching endless Nickelodeon.

The stay it self was also pleasant. Although it was a bit cloudy on Saturday, the sun blasted its ray fully only Sunday. We swim, and swim, and swim…moving from the pool to the beach and swim some more. Baby Pascal loved it! He is a natural swimmer and floated right after he hit the water. Mika, on the other hand, was more cautious. He carefully plunged one toes and clung on me possesively. I had to practically hold him before he felt safe enough to venture around. Speaking of character!

And now here I am, 7 pm, still in the office preparing my next trip to London tomorrow. All outstanding work has sorted, or delegated. Presentation material is prepared. Last minute shopping had been done last night. Now the only thing left is to pack my suitcase. I felt a bit sad. 2 weeks away from kids. I knew that I am going to miss them so much. I am going to miss sleeping with Mika, kissing Pascal soft plumpy cheek. Ah, here I am, being silly with my self. It’s only 2 weeks anyway…

Wish me luck, and London, here I come!

I’ve been a busy bumble bee lately. On the other hand, don’t we all? No, seriously, I’ve been very busy managing three lives at the same time. Being a working woman, a mother and a wife. I am afraid that I have not been as good as I expected to be for the third profession. The first two seemed to have taken up whole lot of my time.

First, it was only few days before D-day I found out that Mika’s school conducted a field trip. Sh*t! I have missed the Cooking Day, I vowed to my self that I am not going to miss this one too although at that moment my work in the office seemed to reach its peak. Fortunately I have a very good, kind and understanding boss (who may read this article someday - who knows?) who let me took 1 day off. Nevertheless, I paid close attention to my blackberry knowing that this last minute leave request must have cause my colleague some major pain.

Secondly is Mika’s first Tae Kwon Do performance. I could feel tears welled up my eyes as I saw my little boy doing some kicking. My little baby boy, I can’t believe that he had grown up so fast! It seemed like only yesterday when he learned how to crawl and now there he was, with the little cute tae kwon do uniform of his. My heart swelled so big it cracked my ribs.

Thirdly is my mother’s cousin’s son (I hope that the family tree is not too confusing -he is also my doctor who’d been helping taming my Systemic Lupus Erythematosus) 30th wedding anniversary celebration. 30th!! Can you imagine a marriage can last that long?? Anyway, apart from my sceptical thought about spending too much time under the sun, it was a great celebration indeed. The party took place in open air. There was small lake where people could go bamboo boating, sliding, rope climbing basically do all kind of outdoor activity. The food is great and it’s nice meeting your relatives once in a while. Please pay attention to the sentence once in a while.

Last but not least, there will be 2 big trip coming up within a week. This coming weekend will be our first family holiday ever. Hooray!! We are planning to go to Anyer to get some fresh air and salty water. Baby Pascal will be having his first birthday soon and this is sort of a pre-birthday celebration as I will be spending his birthday on here. Yes, London will be my next destination two days after we returned from the beach. I have everything prepared and set. Coat, gloves, boots, sweater…mind you, it’s 2 celcius degree over there last time I checked yahoo weather. Brrr….it’s a good excuse to spend the whole winter clothes allowance I got from the Company. I was running riots between Next, U2, Esprit, Mark & Spencer and Metro grinning from ear to ear.

All of this got me excited. That and my never ending workload. Two big project to be finished this year took up almost all of my time. That, plus few additional pokes from auditors and the constant back stab of office politicians. Ugh! To make things even more exciting, one of my colleague gave a birth (to a cute baby girl) this morning. 4 weeks earlier than her due date. So suddenly I expect my self to be snowed even more deeper. Where is time when you need one?