joburg-cape-polokwane-jkt

(this posting was drafted on Aug 29, 2008 but published on Sept 6, 2008)

my last week of visiting SA was exhausting, full of traveling, from joburg (johannesburg) where we had meeting with DAS and of course the visit to cradle of humankind on friday to limpopo on the next wednesday. Last saturday, i finally met my new friend- nkgadi from joburg. she drove all away long from joburg to pretoria to pick me up and to entertain me with her friend-Marco. those young and fearless professionals are very kind to me. took me to soweto and spoiled me with a dinner at a cafe in a mall next to orlando west township...cool.

my (official) host wouldn't let us stand still at our guest house too, a travel to joburg on Sunday and a visit to Nelson Mandela Square was their programme. got quite cute souvenirs for friends and sent some postcards to my beloved families and friends back at home (you got it now, right guys?...)
OMG...early morning flight to capetown. we woke up at 3 and ready to the airport at 4, but great seat we had...business class again in this airbus...cool..and thanks guys at statssa. arrived at 8, picked up by a trendy driver and headed to train station...a train station??yup...we were also suprised that they put us on their 'edu train's programme's special guest...indonesian delegation...wiii...and of course, we didn't even know what it was going on there with those colorful train and ceremonial to celebrate 'a week of math and statistics in SA". well....the honorable guests, teachers and us were heading to simon's town museum on this colorful train and got some exercise how the edu train goes. nice programme though for kids...fun, entertaining, and educating...we should have this one in indonesia.
oh well...another meeting and presentation from statssa in western cape office but they gave unforgettable and beautiful dinner at Spier outside capetown. there is cheetah reservation, they are beautiful cheetah...the fastest creature ever..and also cute animals, and this lovely restaurant under tent...and definitely cold...really chill (8C degree) for us who did not bring proper end of winter season there....like i said, i only brought my autumn and spring coat....great. anyway...the food were also great, from traditional food which i didn't really enjoy eating it..hey but the ostrietch steak and their biltong is okay and western dish. love it...love the atmosphere and nice red wine (SA is well known as one of the best wine producers in the world)
next morning was still chill and windy but it didn't keep us from visiting this informal settlement (brick buildings and semi permanent house) and saw the listing process. then, we ended our visit in capetown by visiting waterport, the tourism area in the harbor of cape town. it was not that cold anymore and it was quick visit though we had to catch up our afternoon flight right afterward.

got back to pretoria on tuesday and ready for another really early morning trip to limpopo province or to polokwane city. unlike capetown that has big airport thus the plane was not as small and crampy as to polokwane that has only 30 passengers' seat, kaapstad/capetown is also modern city with beach, tall building, modern architect, polokwane is the place where we finally saw and felt what we already know about africa...dry, savannah and rural area. once again, another meeting and presentation by province statssa, and of course still...wonderful host. we also visited what they called tribal (tribes) area...and experiencing the geography frame project in this area. well...compared to 2006 map for this rural area, there were new houses built on it or a brick to be precised. don't imagine that this rural area is like a rural area in indonesia, that usually still sarrounded by forest or plantation area. if you have ever visited east nusa tenggara, some part of it just like that...dried land and windy and my pant could be covered with dush without i realise it, but it's cold in winter and hot in summer. more than 90% of farming in south africa belongs to 'white' farmer and some of these people in rural area work for them or work to the nearest township.

speaking of transportation, my host were quite surprised knowing that i don't have car which having a car is a must in this province (if they can affort it of course) as the main transportation knowing how far we have to reach from one place to another..oh well..public transportation is considered unsafe although as a matter of fact they told me that driving alone is also not 100% safe from hijacking or robbery..gosh. they don't believe that the place i live is quite 24/7....which it sounds a precious and unbelievable situation could happened in this city. don't you dare walking alone in the city (the warning sounds familiar?..yeah i already mentioned on my previous post) after 6PM.

anyway...they have good quality of toll road...unlike in indonesia or even in jakarta where you can feel the shaking in the car when driving so fast....i didn't feel that we had driven for more than 160km/hrs in SA.

finally...our last day in SA, and finally...we had to spend our time alone and of course walking around city is the only choice...yes, we finally walked in the pretoria city on crowded and busy street because it's friday and payment day, we could see people queue like snake in front of ATM at almost every corner of the city, people brought shopping bags and enjoyed lunch at every fastfood stall...unlike us who just had to get something to eat and yes...we wanted to know what it felt in it. think positively had brought us into safe trip in the middle of the crowd...nothing bad happened though, just be aware :-)

and yippy...flight back home, still with business class :-)...together with indonesian workers from dubai airport. first, they thought i came from philippine before i asked them some questions...hehehe...and turned out we came from the same island ...java.

i learnt a lot from my trip because it was not a travelling trip for fun and enjoying the tourism site but i actually saw how the system and bureaucracy works and how people live...not much to see but it's enough to learn. then, what can i bring to our country from SA for census? ...i'm just the "backing vocal" but some assignments are waiting for me to be done.

dia(ry)

pretoria, 22 agust 2008

malam ini hangat di sini, di kamar ini maupun di luar. senandung lagu Gigi mengalun lembut di telingaku. mencoba menulis sedikit laporan namun setiap klik belum berakhir ke halaman itu. tiba-tiba saya teringat padanya, ya...dia, seseorang yang tidak pernah benar-benar saya ceritakan di sini. seseorang yang sekarang entah berada di mana (atau saya pura-pura tidak tau) namun saya yakin pada waktu seperti ini selimut malam telah membuatnya tertidur pulas.

saya hampir tidak percaya bahwa saya mampu 'tidak sengaja' mengingatnya karena dulu saya hampir tidak pernah jeda untuk teringat padanya. interaksi di antara kami terjadi dalam situasi dimana saya hampir selalu menjadi pemeran utama di dalamnya. entah itu karena keegoisan saya, gaya saya yang dominan, hanya sebuah upaya saya untuk sekedar menarik perhatiannya atau ketidakpeduliannya pada saya.

percakapan kami hampir selalu berakhir dengan argumentasi yang tidak berujung. namun ketika hampir di setiap percakapan itu saya yang memegang sumbu pangkalnya maka sayalah yang akhirnya memutuskan di mana letak sumbu ujungnya.

proses dan sistem itu terjadi berulang dan berulang dan berulang sampai saya lupa berapa kali saya melepaskan ujung yang sudah saya temukan dan menjadikannya sebuah pangkal baru dan menciptakan ujung baru lainnya...begitu terus berulang kali.

sampai suatu saat, saya menemukan sebuah titik di mana ujung dan pangkal itu bisa dan harus dikaitkan dan berjanji tidak akan melepaskannya (dulu) sehingga tidak akan pernah ada argumen di antara kami. namun itupun terkait dalam kaitan yang tidak erat karena ketika saya mencoba mengencangkannya, dia mencoba mengendurkannya.

dia tidak mengerti saya dan saya juga tidak mengerti dia.

namun saya telah bisa 'tidak sengaja' mengingatnya malam ini, yang berarti saya mampu tidak mengingatnya selama ini karena saya butuh itu untuk mengencangkan ikatan ujung pangkal percakapan kami sehingga bila suatu saat kami secara 'tidak sengaja' bertemu atau harus bertemu maka kami atau saya (yang lebih dominan) hanya akan memulai percakapan dalam tali yang berbeda dari yang telah saya (atau kami) ikat erat itu.

dia(ry) lama saya dalam ikatan tali lama saya.

pretoria

it's been 5 days since i came to this city-pretoria the capital of South Africa (SA), to be precise it's the administrative city of SA. today is sunny and warm, i like it but i'm not feeling well, i got a little fever after visiting a 'storage' in suburb of pretoria yesterday plus it's been quite cold for me lately...well 20-25C actually not that cold but ....i felt cold anyway.

if you've known holland, it feels like you are visiting some cities in it minus the bicycle path and its cleanliness but plus many street vendors, colors people, cars' honking and of course the sign in almost every city that reminds me of hollands because they use dutch language. aha...so you know hah? that south africans speak dutch? (or you've already known?) indeed although it is actually modified dutch language (like i say to them :D) and they call it 'afrikaan language' the first majority language before English here. and yes, they speak english very well as well.

my host are really kind and very nice, they provide us with almost everything, from the programme and transportation and they always reminds us to be careful wherever we are, especially while walking on the street....to be honest, i've never been walking around the city just to look at what they have inside it....especially not alone. besides the busy schedule and programme, i am afraid to walk alone even with the team and without accompanied by our host. so far, we just walked across the street to visit other statistics' office building or just to buy vitamin at the apoteek or to mosque. but we had a chance to visit the union building where the president of SA works, nice and big building in the hill and when i was in 20th floor of statistics building i could see it right outside the city. and of course, we came and reported at the indonesian embassy and they are also very kind and offer us favor if we need anything. the most interesting evening for us was a visit to waterkloof rotary club as guests of our kind host-jean marie. the programme were charity dinner and presentation by snakes man from SA's conservation. Hencke brought his 'pets' and informed us how to react with snakes....interesting and very informative. and yes, we touched those snakes..hiii...silky, smooth and soft. i still cannot see the beauty of those creature but hencke was right, they won't do anything to humankind if we leave them alone.

today, we drove to eastern part of pretoria where the township (blue collar of black people) live and the informal settlement located. actually we have this kind of settlement in most of big cities in indonesia, but here in pretoria, it's large area and "kumuh/slump" and some are the place of 'bad people', immigrant and indicated has high HIV and AIDS prevalence.

oh well, thanks God, we are be able to stay in a cozy, clean and quiet place in a guest house that a little bit outside the town and in the 'rich community area' called lala kamnandi (meaning: sleep well), it's cheap and the most important thing is its safety and today i just got a chance to turn my wireless on since i always slept early for the last 5 days, because of jetlag, then tired and then fever...fheewww...

tomorrow, we are going to johannesburg for another visit and programme, and (un)fortunately, our visit is extended until next week to visit western cape and limpopo.

wish me luck ya, always be healthy and enjoy my trip (yeaah..i do enjoy it :D). only the temptation to visit cradle humankind that can make me enjoy and try not to miss a lot jakarta......oh jakarta...how come many africans do not know where indonesia is, what weather we have, how many population we have, how civilized we are, or how big indonesia is, what language we speak in all islands and all tribes..well, i was wrong about SA in the beginning although i had browsed some information from the web but i though it was just SA, cold and dessert. see...that's the main point of having visit to other place, to see the reality, to broaden my perspective, to respect others, to make me love my country more and more no matter how it is and to make me proud of having bahasa indonesia as our one and only national language which unlike in SA that has 11 national languages, where the africans language apparently is dutch anyway.....and amazed that indonesian don't speak dutch at all if we remember our history but still...we still need to learn speak english properly and correctly..hehehhee....even me.

Dubai

it's gonna be long waiting @ business lounge in Dubai airport, it's about 8 hours since dawn until 2 in the afternoon but i don't mind at all. i get this food, comfortable seat, internet access, and of course free food and beverages :-).

The journey from jakarta to singapore was okay, unless one thing...i forgot about the baggage security check when i had to transit over there. I should have go back to get my cabin suitcase which i thought it was okay to leave it at my cabin. well, it was okay though when the last time i came to singapore in March this year i didn't have this experience (of course i didn't have cabin suitcase anyway..hehhe) and i remember i left my cabin baggage while i departed to Holland couple years ago...i guess..and it was also okay. rules has changed or i completely forget and didn't pay attention to the announcement..hehhe..oops..

Business seat is great, the reclycling chair helped me to have good night sleep anyway. i even preferred to skip my breakfast and chose to continue sleeping.

and then ..dubai, my first arrival here. voila...my "hardly" face difficult situation with authority was broken...and the 'quite difficult situation' happened to me finally. God...seems like 'i get what i think' anyway...so be careful with what we think and guess ;)

i had to opened my cabin suitcase in front of 'security guard' and pulled out every single thing in it to show that what they saw on the screen was wrong...apparently ..i am the one who was wrong. i completely did not remember what was in the back of my cabin suitcase anyway...just felt funny that the screen showed fork and dinner knife, which i didn't remember when i put in it. I tried to remember and when i saw those things at a glance..seems like it was ages in my suitcase and the nuttela butter still sticked in it..hiiii....then i thought, perhaps it was from my last journey around holland 3 years ago (hehehe..). strange thing is that those things passed the cengkareng's screen and even singapore's anyway...wow.what a machine they have in dubai.

and yup...they found it and i had to pay my clumpsiness by throwing away my cute victory knox from switzerland that i put in my beauty case which it always..always passed the screen since in schiphol (three times), Bilun-denmark (twice), changi (4 times also) and of course cengkarang jakarta (i don't remember how many times...even when i brought that suitcase and my beauty case back home to semarang....it was okay).

anyway, this airport accepts dollar in every duty free shop including starbucks, and this transit section is anormously crowded...full of people from different races, skin colors, languages. these people queuing for toilet, sleeping on the floors, sitting in the cafe, shopping at all duty free...and look at those flight chart...all around the world, well..i never paid attention anyway when i was in cengkareng jakarta, but i don't remember read the jakarta has direct flight to houston or some city airport where i've never heard before.

lesson from today's journey:

• dubai has the best x-ray and screen machine compared to others airport i have visited before;
• recheck the suitcase..in case i still keep food (food??) or souvenir from other trip which worthless but cause the inconvenience 'moment' in other countries;
• obey the flight attendance announcement to avoid wasting energy;
• get the information of the gate otherwise i would end up at the closest praying room which far away from my gate (dubai has 50 gates and i will be at gate 23, awhile ago i was at gate 1-13)
• i wish i could travel a lot with business class especially if it is free...it's just great :-)

see you in Pretoria and johannesburg in South Africa

south africa

i'm going to visit south africa next week, i get a chance to join the study visit team from bps-statistics indonesia to learn from statsa about their technology for population census...means that we still few steps behind from south africa...oh...yeaaahhh...(hell what do i know anyway about census, i'm not demographer :D..anyway, we'll bring back what we get from statsa to improve our country's technology for census...gosh...looks i involve in the 'serious stuff' for this country...which is not...hehehe...i'm just a lucky bastard who 'win the lotere' to see apartheit museum there..but of course i'll bring something back for us...souvenir for sure...and follow up actions ;)). fyi, indonesia will conduct population census in 2010...be ready and be there at your position to be enumerated!.

the trip itself is supported by my office-unfpa. there will be four of us and i'll be the only female delegate. well...i'm not going to tell in the detail here how we arranged this trip....we just relieve that everything is on the right track...went smooth (so far), good asistance, good coordination, although we had to postpone from our 1st schedule...anyway..i believe that everthing happens with reason (and i saw some of that reasons)

long distance travellers deserve comfortable seat and my office is generous to put us at the business class of emirates airline. without having time to apply visa on arrival to just look at dubai and its 'magnificent and famous hotel' but its airport and transit terminal looks okay and nice to do window shopping (i'll tell more about it later on after i finally see it with my own eyes).

the journey to johannesburg seems also quite busy from dubai that make us have to spent hours in dubai. we'll be picked up by the 'transport team' of the host from statsa at the evening this Sunday and transported to pretoria- the administrative city of south africa- and we'll have to start our 'study' early in the next morning....ffheeww...(promise..i'll study hard..:D)

anyway...i'm ready to open my 'storage' and pack my 'autumn and spring' outfit...quite cold outside there though...wiiii....and of couse the right shoes for 'the adventure' ...in africa..;)

(i told my thesis supervisor 2.5 years ago that i wanted to conduct my research in africa 'cos i really want to see this continent (just see?? hehe..) but he said no. though, God is so kind to me....always hear and give what i want ..within my capacity and gives this 'study visit' to me. i believe that everything is wonderful at its moment...don't rush and push too hard...then i'll see and get what i want...more beautifully and lovely. that's what i did with my 'tiny little stupid thing' ..and it finally flows....in (my) river..smoothly (so far)...and i feel content now. although my best friend thinks i shouldn't go there..for some reasons that i understand but she also understands 'my passion' too.thanks)

the 'something'

it's been 30 minutes since i opened this dashboard and tried to write something which i don't know how to write 'this something' here because i don't know what 'the something' is that i really want to write.

i'm kind like a boring person (i guess)....i'm too serious sometimes....too complicated (perhaps).

i (just) realize that i hardly face difficult situation with beraucracy, authority, system or complicated argument with others by being well prepared and avoid confrontation. this makes me realize that my life is so damn boring.....no funny experiences, no embarassing moment, no dramatics action, everything is right on the schedule (mostly), everything happens as i've expected and as i've planned and written on my agenda.

no wonder, i could be really broken down and completely overwhelmed with the unpredicted situation and actions or unhappy ending 'movies'. although i also always think that i've prepared with my spare weapon to overcome my breaking down moment but i know that it'll change me ...a bit ..in some way. my spare weapon is mostly content of ignorance or shutting my mouth up.

it's been an hour since i started to write here, and i could only capable of writing boring stuff about my weaknesses by the time i should be excited facing my journey and mission to this continent...but i feel....nothing...and empty..just because only one...just one..tiny little stupid thing stuck in (my) river and couldn't continue flowing ....i'm so..so ..break down and stuck! i can run but i cannot hide, yet i can hide but i also cannot run anywhere.

here i am...

inhale...
exhale...
here i am...
sit back and relax
look back and reflect
pull back and get back
here i am...
exhale...
inhale...

(for present, past and future...for option, decision and mission...for hatred, love and live...for me, you and us)