2012

A short post, not wanting to spoil the night in Baluran.

The highlight of 2012, like every other years: I feel loved.

Self-Introduction

So I’m currently joining this program called XL Future Leaders by XL Axiata. Long story short, today I was given a task to write a short essay to introduce yourself.

Here’s my best attempt on describing myself (mind the globalization stuffs, it was made to stay in line with whatever’s hot on the discussion table)

______________________________

My name is odd. Cahyawardhani. It’s a single word and 12 characters long. It’s quite troublesome when it gets down to making documents such as visa or university application when you are required to fill out form and being forced to write down first name and last name – whereas you only have aname. It’s troublesome when you meet expatriates. My Irish teacher somehow called me “jahyir”, the guys from US Embassy called me “kaya”, my Vietnamese and Thai friends – which I hoped would not find it hard to call my name because we practically share similar tongue – called me “cai yaaa”, and even my Indian teacher whose language rooted down from Sanskrit, the language the name originated from, called me “chaya” instead of the rightful Cah-ya.

Nevertheless, I still think my name rocks.

Try looking up the name in Google search, you probably end up with some random girl with Cahyawardhani as a last name, but none has it as the only name. Rarity rocks!

Now, about my love for being rare, I also have a twin brother. Statistics show that 32.2 out of 1000 births are twins, and out of those 32.2, 40% of them are male-female twin, which leaves 12.88 out of 1000 births resulted in male-female twin. He’s a student in Medical Faculty in Gadjah Mada University in Jogja and he goes by the name Satyawardhana.

Now if you notice, my parents have this interest in naming their kids based on Ancient Javanese royals. That runs in my vein. I’m highly interested in anthropology and cultural study, and a few months ago I learned Hanacaraka or ancient Javanese alphabet. It was far from easy (and I already forgot the alphabets now) yet I think as an Indonesian youth, besides preparing myself for the global era, I need to preserve local cultures as well.

I’m an avid interculturalist, I love being in a multicultural environment, where I can exchange thoughts, stories, and folklores to people of other culture. By having this cultural exchange, I can enrich my knowledge and adds a spoonful of confidence to prepare myself for the upcoming global challenges.

I am a museum enthusiast. Museums in Indonesia are often perceived as a boring, dusty place where old artifacts get jumbled up and neglected. I’ll have to stand on the opposite view. It might be true that Indonesian museums are neglected and unattractive, yet museums can teach us so much about our history and how our community is shaped the way it is nowadays. Museums can teach us about our abundant culture – it can help us define our identity as a nation.

As much as I love going to museums, I love to travel. I have this life goal that before I reach 30, I have to set foot on six different continents (seeing that Antarctic is unattainable), and I am on my way in reaching that goal. For me, travelling is important because it keeps me humble. It reminds me on how small I am in this world, how many things I have not explored, seen, experienced. Travelling to distant places adds another spoonful of confidence to me as travelling means conquering – conquering challenges, meeting differences, closing gaps.

One of the many joys of travelling is that you get to meet other people with their own different way of living. Getting to know other people is another means of enriching your knowledge – including getting to know me with all my peculiarity and trivial facts through this short introductory essay.

And, oh! I love lions, too.

Terus sekarang malah ngeliatin foto album HNMUN gara-gara anak-anak nyebut-nyebut lagi. Kan nggabisa moveon namanya.

About Judging People.

A while back, I had this talk with two good friends of mine. I was busy gossiping someone else and these two guys responded promptly, with often funny remarks and stupid comments. The three of us continued until we fell in an uncomfortable silence – each of us knowing that we’ve commented far too harshly and mean.

At this moment, my friend came up with a (sort of) wise saying that slapped me hard right on the face: “over all the judgments and thoughts about her, you should realize that she’s not as lucky as you, learning life lessons that direct you away from being what she is today.”

Or some sort.

The point is, at that moment I realize that whenever I judge someone, I don’t know what he’s been through.

This poor fellow does not have the chance to choose what condition he will fall into. He does not choose which family he is born in. He does not choose which people he meet. His good, wealthy life doesn’t enable him to suffer and learn from it. His poor life doesn’t enable him to see the world as vast as others do. Yet, he does not choose which state of wealth he falls into.

I came to the conclusion that I can’t see people and judge them by a single standard. I came to the conclusion that each of us has different life, different mind, viewpoints, and that these different things are to be respected, not to be judged by a single mindset and perspective.

Yet to live at peace, not blindly judging people is one hell of a thing to achieve.

The Fault in Our Stars

I’m in love with you, and I’m not in the business of denying myself the simple pleasure of saying true things. I’m in love with you, and I know that love is just a shout into the void, and that oblivion is inevitable, and that we’re all doomed and that there will come a day when all our labor has been returned to dust, and I know the sun will swallow the only earth we’ll ever have, and I am in love with you.

– John Green, The Fault in Our Stars

 

 

Don’t you just wish you have your own version of Augustus Waters?

Oh wait. I do~