Something that I can not write freely here have been happening to me lately. This thing had been bothering me for quite sometimes for its potential impact and influence on my soul and sanity.

It finally reached its climax beginning of this week where I was forced to sit down with hubby and discuss our option. Living in this status quo will no longer be an option. There should be an end to this situation.

As usual, the practical side of me always approach thing in excel table evaluation. But there’s something that can not be quantified there. Things so called emotion. Hubby reminded me that an option that I tend to take will impact the emotion side of me quite heavily. And if I do take it, the damage might be beyond financial repair. So at the moment, I am taking the endevour of other options. Hopefully this long and winding road will end in a happier place.

Pray for me, will you?

And I do apologize if any of the decision will hurt some of you…it will never be the intention for I care for you so much…it is a decision that I am forced to make. Will you forgive me?

Indonesia, Happy 62nd Independence Day! Yay!

Yeah yeah yeah…so what? We have only been able to kicked out the physical slavery. But in reality, we are still economically enslaved. Warning: Bitter post ahead! If you are a ‘Right or Wrong is my Country‘ Indonesian type, I strongly suggest you to stop reading. I am a Right is right, wrong is wrong, even if it is my country kind of person. So probably this post will strongly upset you beyond believe.

First and foremost, with all due respect to all the patriots who has shed their blood to unite this country, I am sorry to say, sirs and madames, your successor does not seem to hold the same spirit. I hope you all can rest in peace for I have my own skepticism for things called Independence.

According to Dictionary.com, independence means freedom from the control, influence, support, aid, or the like, of others.

I believe Indonesia is none of that. We are still very much heavily dependent on foreign aid loan. And of course, loan came from shark loan. Loan has their own term & conditions which at the end of it, it’s not a loan at all. Its a ransom to be paid to extortionist. And if you have not read The Confession of an Economic Hit Man by John Perkins, I strongly suggest you to get one. It’s a real eye opener.

In his book, John Perkins wrote how these shark loan is trained to bring down nation. How to cook an economic forecast to lure the victim. How to trap them in debt that they will not be able to pay. This shark loan lived quietly. They are not celebrity, but they make sure that they are there. Hovering around their next target. Which is usually those who has power over the nation and breed by greed. That’s what it called corporatocracy. A collusion among Corporate and Government.
The evidence of corporatocrasy is everywhere. From our State Electricity that monopolized the electricity distribution and never gain income. From the way foreign companies slowly took over Indonesian (very critical) public company. From the way foreign investors kept on winning fishy deals. The list could go on and on and I am not in the mood to write a political case articles.

I am simply interested in the shark loan. The predator who took away other’s right to live freely. They attack the weak. Creature that smaller than they are. And when they attack the stronger, they weaken them first systematically. I hate and yet truly amazed by them. For they are the perfect predator. Intelligent and strong. You really can’t see them and the one you see, usually is not the one who attack you. They can attack in a team, although they are not afraid to work alone.

Another interesting fact is also that they are a Parthogenesis. They can breed without mate. Can you imagine a more perfect predator than an asexual creature? Completely independence about its nature. Does not need help even to mate. Able to produce their own descendants and thus, preserve the perfect genes. The descendants will be a true copy cats of the mother. Not a gene will go wasted by hybrid-ing with another type of gene. No wonder that they are at the top of the food chain and able to survive thousand years of evolution.

The good news is, these shark will not get you if you really smart and know how to play the game. With all his flaw, our first President Soekarno was among the few who can say go to hell to these sharks. And he paid by having his live constantly on the line. Has he play smarter and survived the politics, the meaning of Independence would really have been different.

Oh well, we are where we are now.

As long as we have this bunch of (fake) metal detector to go through only to go to the mall, as long as we keep on seeing our legislatives making fun of them selves and as long as we kept on witnessing that law does not hold (for some people), then we knew that actually we still far from being independent. We were only living our day to day live.

As and end note, please note that I don’t envy the shark. I pity them for not knowing the fun of mating process.

Today is the first time the Jakartans got the opportunity to elect their new Governor. The Home Affairs Minister has declared today as public holiday for the Jakartans. However, since I have moved outside Jakarta 5 years a go, I can not be considered as Jakartans anymore and therefore, still have to go to the office. Argh!

Anyway, it’s kinda nice to have an empty street and quiet office once in a while. I got the chance to digest some of the work properly. And what exciting me most is, I have received the Preliminary Total Cash Compensation Report and also the Total Reward Survey, yay!! I know I know I know, I am an over enthused worker close to a pervert if it relates to anything about Compensation & Benefit. But to me, it’s very exciting to see whether our prediction is correct. To see a snapshot how do we look against other companies and if it doesn’t come out as predicted, why and how to remedy it. All right, that’s it, I can go on and on about it. Enough said!

Other than that, I will also have the time to browse around some Off Shore magazines. Off Shore as in Off Shore rigs and platforms. My love for engineering had brought me to the addiction of Off Shore rigs. Last week, I ’stole’ a used Off Shore Engineering magazines that lay abandoned at the Receptionist table. And to my delight, I found a giant list of Off Shore rigs (name & whereabouts) complete with pictures of the best Off Shore rigs! The first thing I did when I reached home (which was already quite late that day) was fiddling through that magazine in excitement. Hubby looked at me with blank eyes and an expression who clearly said “what a geek!” (did you not hubby?). Anyway, I offered him an explanation but he did not seem too interested to hear it. So I was quite happy to be left alone dwell on this awesome magazines. I am seriously thinking to quit my job and apply in an Oil & Gas service company that manufactured these beautiful rigs.

Other thing that I planned to do today is, if time permitted, to do some shopping for clothes. I guess it has been ages since I bought my new clothes. My friends has made a concern comment about it. What can I say? I sometimes found the activity to be too time consuming. Not to mention that the only mall close to my office is selling clothes at least 40% more expensive than other places! But if I used this as an excuse, I suddenly remember how much I spent on books and hair. The amount seemed trivial. So I guess today I will have to drag my feet to find something nice to put on before I am caught by the fashion police.

All right, now it’s time for me to return to the survey result. I will let you know the summary.