"B" is a Lifestyle

Passengers Cards originally uploaded by Ikhlasul Amal

Beginning of next July is vacation holiday for most of schools in Indonesia. Some prepare for outdoor activities; surely, some let students having holiday with their families. School trip is another plan.

Sekolah Alam Bandung (Bandung Nature School) has trip for Class 5, an educational (yet still recreation) to Yogyakarta. It is about 300 km from Bandung. Those two cities have many similarities, in short: city of culture and education. Train and night bus are choices for transportation between those cities.

Pupils were enthusiast preparing for the trip that will become their farthest trip up until now. At 07 o'clock they were all hearing trip coordinator's briefing and gave farewell to parents.

Happy vacation trip!

Madinah al Munawwarah #1975 originally uploaded by Ikhlasul Amal

The Holy Masjid Nabawi in Madinah al Munawwarah of Saudi Arabia is undoubtedly one of the best mosque in the world, but I found Madinah's street scenery – sidewalk around Nabawi – is very nice. Early morning after subuh prayer, life begins slower than other prayer time, but still people fulfill the mosque. They go back to their hotels (because mostly are pilgrims) not in a hurry, spend some minutes watching pigeon flying and stopping for crumbs.

People sit, stand, walk, as they wait sun rises...

Joyful Equator originally uploaded by Ikhlasul Amal

Back, back, and back in blogging!

I promised several times, but many times also it was not easy to keep my promises work well. Consistent, commitment, and mood were so fluctuative enough to push me to the top, but also to bring me under pressure. Photoblogging is nice – I love taking daily photos; microblogging is also fun – SMS-size expression is short, need tiny amount of time, and provocative.

But blogging the classic way, the previous way I did, is still in need to revive. For sentimental reasons, good exercises, and surely funs!

Blogging calls me, and I respond for today using spirit of "Hari yang Cerah" (brightful day). This is quoted from Bandung's very famous band, Peterpan. The last part of their quotation, "hati yang sepi" (lonely heart), is cut to keep optimism alive. Also, why distributing bad mood to others, while we can smile together, embracing world!

Take my words: Brightful day for happy soul!

Buka Bersama Flickr Jakarta, originally uploaded by Chandra Marsono.

Ramadan is a good time for many groups to invite their members for "buka bersama" gathering. "Buka bersama" is breaking fasting together in a certain place. More than eating and drinking after daylight fasting, buka bersama becomes interesting for online communities because it is a special time for all to meet and know each other.

Flickr Jakarta meetup had been organized and done yesterday evening. Fortunately, some of the members I know are culinary photographers as well.

Congratulation, folks, hopefully I can join someday.

During BBV's breaking fast gathering, 6 September ago, I keep a promise to myself to revive blogs (precisely: my Web 2.0 activities) soon. Not too late: in progress, Movable Type (MT) showed me an impressive changes,  Your Entry archives have been published. Publish time: 7 minutes, 32 seconds. For static build to 500s entries, it is impressive: ensuring me to stay on MT using classic static builds.

Rumah Makan Cibiuk

Then microbloggings, then photoblogs, ...

Praying that I will keep this commitment for longer time. Amen.

It was four days holiday: Mawlid al-Nabi (the birthday of Muhammad, PBUH) on Thursday and Easter on Friday, then regular weekend. Long weekend means Jakarta was free from jam traffic, streets were empty. As a consequence, people went for holiday to many cities around, crowds in parks, and destination on Bandung, my city.

Mawlid was celebrated in limited fest, usually by some discussions about the life of Muhammad and its context to nowadays. Easter had specific rite as I saw on television, arranged in churches or some religion-related place. Other than religious fests which are close to commercial attributes, these holy days are for belief awakening.

Gamer Long Weekend

Still, long weekend forced me to keep away from reguler works and handle some domestic jobs. Nice to have more time with kids to extra patience accompanying them to go around.

Monday comes and I stand up for working day again. I told that I hate Garfield (because of its saying, "hate monday"), and a comment posted that it is blasphemy. Nice!

Happy working days, everyone!

Old story repeats: I forced myself to fix blog's tags, to arrange layouts, to enhance design, and finally... all was broken! Not only my blog was failed to look better, but also I wasted my time not to post anything. Web design kills, really.

This challenges, while some bloggers I know are web designer by profession. How if I hire their talented capabilities to make my sites up, so I can concentrate to my writings? This idea has bloomed for some times ago, but not yet to be realized. Many reasons behind, e.g. expenses, curiosity with stylesheets, and do-it-yourself mind. Not all bad, as not all good.

Two Services

Now the decision has been made. I contacted Thomas Arie Setiawan, a well-known reputation for their mass-product design and blogger by heart. He also keep his enthusiasm on using Movable Type, on the same track with me.

A part of experimental for me to be more productive on writing, that is let the professional do their jobs.

20 Minutes after Subuh, originally uploaded by Ikhlasul Amal.

About 05 a.m.

One of my closest friends on Flickr asked if I have an independent photoblog. I answered: is this simply a website containing my Flickr's photos? Yup!

That's good, I thought. I have enough photo stock on Flickr and it is better to explore them on other website as my individual photoblog. Repackaging, in short. Or, even farther, I also have more photos on my laptop which had not exposed anywhere.

Whichever better, it will be nice and worthy to try.

Last Day

Next eight hours to turn into 2008.

Time passes by, frequently felt as superquick, and I can not distinguish between one day to others – really. They are workdays, weekends, beginning of week, month, year – or whatever, end of week, month, year – or whatever. I move from one to next, dig inside sometimes, with all of any events I celebrate or let them gone.

But for the beginning of 2008, I have a wish, a simple one: my blogging activity must revive again, must be waken from a long hiatus. I have to write more and more entries, even things that seems a bit unimportant or less noticed.

Ball and Basket

Happy New Year 2008.