Gerakan Bawah Tanah - Mr. GBT

[taken on one fine morning in bandung, br - october 2010]

Here's the situation. I've been writing consitently(?) in my other blog ( rahard.wordpress.com ), neglecting this one. But, I feel that Imight post too much there. So, I am thinking of post what I could not post there in this blog. Not that the posts are not going to be good (read: junk), but too much of good thing is not good :) Brace yourself ... here we go ...

It rains everyday in Bandung. Usually it rains afternoon for a couple hours. Sometimes it stops and starts again in the evening :( It causes flooding in certain part of Bandung. To be frankly, I don't know whether this is rainy or dry season. There's no pattern. I blame it on global warming. [taken on a "clear" morning - br, october 2010]

[a picture of a man working in his field on one early morning]

It is interesting to note that many organizations (or people in organizations) do not want to talk about organization problem(s) openly - but still internal in the organization. They like to hide it under the carpet and hope it will go away automagically . One of the places I work for is such an organization. Ouch . Hush hush ... we don't have problems here. Yeah, right ... :)

In the "old age", meaning music was available on records or cassettes, you could play a music backwards. It's not an easy thing to do, but doable. You play the media, physically, backwards. There are stories that you can hear certain kind of messages, weird ones, if you play certain song backwards. I don't know whether it's true or not, but certainly it is interesting. Now everything is available in digital format. Songs are (mostly) in MP3 format. Now, the question is ... is it possible to play a digital song backwards? It should be possible, right? All you have to do is write a simple program to do it? :) [the answer: use audacity. now, let's find some interesting songs ... :) any recommended ones?]

School (university) is starting. It's a brand new semester. I started the class today. Actually, I should have started yesterday buy I decided to dismiss the class yesterday (waiting for more students to register - or, to be exact, I wasn't ready. ha ha ha.). My class today is " Introduction to Information Technology ." The class is an international class, with students from Malaysia. I was told that there are 22 students (pending registration), but today there were less than that. We'll see next week whether the number is growing or not. Part of the assignment today is they have to create a blog. I was surprised that only one (1) student actually has an active blog! I thought this generation, Y generation?, is really into blog and the like. I guess I was wrong. So there you go my quick entry ...

It has been a while since I updated this page, eh. The thing is I have too many blogs to update :-) Oh well. This morning I thought it is going to rain. A few raindrops have fallen. I went outside to pick up newspaper before it is wet. But then, it's sunny. Whoa. I hope it is sunny the whole day, cause I don't like rainy days (and some people, ... Monday). Wet Monday? It can bring our mood down. Good morning (sunshine)...

I have just got back from a futsal match. It was a good game, but now I've got a pounding headache. In another point in time, I was injured after the game. Now, it got me thinking. The reason I want to do sports is to make me healthy and fit. I am not looking for a headache, or God forbid, injury. But ... What do you think?

A question just popped in my head; "why do I need new songs?" Why do I buy CDs, download songs, and so on? I've got too many songs already in my computers, in my CD and cassette collections. I don't think I will ever finish listening to all of them.

I love taking a long hot shower. When I was living in Canada, I could stand in the shower for long minutes (I was going to write hours, but I don't think I would spend hours taking shower :)). It felt so good. Now, I cannot do it. In developing countries, although water is perhaps abundance, clean water is expensive (and rare in some places). You just can't spend long minutes taking a shower. You have to budget your water usage. In this sense, we are taking good care of the earth. Not because we want to, but mostly because we have to. Think differently. It is unfair that people in developed countries use resources more than underdeveloped or developing countries. Not just use more, but use it ineffieciently. The richer gets things easier ... That's life?

I am sorry that this blog has been sidetracked. It's not my intention. It's just my time management has gone awry. Too many things to do, too little time. Oh well. I hope I can write more here. This is just to say that this blog is still alive :) or at least, I want it to be alive ...

I am in the process of cleaning my harddisk. It is getting full. One thing I notice is that my music (mp3) collection is not well organized. Well, it is sort of organized but not efficient. Here's a case. I organize song according to the artis' album. What do you do with songs that are the same but distributed in different albums? For example, the song is in the original album and also in several compilations (the best of, collection of this and that, and so on). Do you keep multiple copies? Or do you just keep one? If you keep only one, in which album do you organize the song in? Right now, I keep multiple copies so that when I transfer an album (or compilation), I just copy one directory. This takes too much disk space.

We were just finished joining earth hour event. We turned off all electricity stuff in our house for 1 hour. Computers off. Unplugged UPS. Even, we unplugger refrigerator. The only source of light was three candles. Vote earth!

Yaaayyy. My other blog ( rahard.wordpress.com ) is nominated for some kind of blog awards. It's kind of deja vu. This blog was nominated as one of the best blog in Indonesia light years ago :) I know you don't believe it, but it's true. I have a scan version of the news (in the media).

You know, it is tough to have a bilingual blog. You have different crowds to satisfy. This blog is originally in Bahasa Indonesia, then in English, then Indonesia, then ... well, you know. I kinda indecisive about the choice of language. I know that the choice of language depends on the people reading the blog. But, when you have people with different languages, what do you do?

I hate facebook uploading photo "feature". First of all, if I want to update a phone in a certain folder, I have to open that folder first. The thing is, to open the folder means images of the folder must be shown. Granted, the images are smaller versions but they still take time to view. I cannot select the folder without having to go through this process. After uploadin the photo, before it is being published, the list of photos is again displayed. Again, I have to wait until all the photos are shown. This is a pain if I have a folder with lots of pictures and I am uploading the photo one by one. I guess this is my problem because I have a slow internet connection. This wouldn't be a problem if you have a fast internet connection. Oh well ...

I was interviewed recently. One of the question was, what was the latest book that you have (finished?) reading. I startled. I just could not answer that question. Oh my God. I have not finished reading any book in quite a while. In this current time frame, I just have too many things to do (mostly reading and writing) that I don't have time to read books. I love reading books. I really do, but what can I do? I am not trying to find lame excuses. It's just ... aaarrrggghhh ...

Our band, BandIT, is active again. Gigs are in waiting in line. It's time for us to practice again. Lots of hard work, but we enjoy doing it. We play cover songs. What we want to play is classic and progressive rock, but sometimes we play pop songs as well. Just to make sure that the audience stay put :) [taken from February 2010 practice - Garin is missing in the picture]