On being grateful

For the past few weeks Rania has been mentioning the word 'thankful' since thanksgiving is approaching. Yesterday she listed the things that she is thankful for:

Family, friends, teacher, home, food and Earth.

Please know that she writes this list on her own. 

I am really proud of her that she writes not only the the 'usual' items on the 'being thankful' list but also planet Earth. Because I believe that being thankful on the bigger picture is more difficult than being thankful on the small stuff. 

We decided that we want to give back to the community this year as our way of being grateful. We went to a shelter home in Pompano beach where they held a banquet to serve people at the shelter - seating lunch style. They also have several stations, make up for ladies, health check up and kids station. We are at the latter one and in charge of Face Painting. Not that I am good at it, but I was assisting a friend who is a real Face Painter. I think the first two kids that I face painted were puzzled of my results, I was lucky they did not sue me for bring victims of my poor creations 😄. 

Some of the people who had their face painted had it for the first time, today. Ever. And despite how ugly my creation looked like in their faces, they still thanked me for it. 

Today taught me about this; that people who are thankful for the things in life aren't living a much easier life than me. In fact, most if these people had a major crisis in life that they learn to appreciate the minor things. 

I learned today that you may not eat the food you like, or at the time you want. But at least, you eat! You may not have the clothing you want, or the the shoes you need, but at least you are not naked.

HAPPY  THANKSGIVING 2014! Be grateful! 

On being grateful

For the past few weeks Rania has been mentioning the word 'thankful' since thanksgiving is approaching. Yesterday she listed the things that she is thankful for:

Family, friends, teacher, home, food and Earth.

Please know that she writes this list on her own. 

I am really proud of her that she writes not only the the 'usual' items on the 'being thankful' list but also planet Earth. Because I believe that being thankful on the bigger picture is more difficult than being thankful on the small stuff. 

We decided that we want to give back to the community this year as our way of being grateful. We went to a shelter home in Pompano beach where they held a banquet to serve people at the shelter - seating lunch style. They also have several stations, make up for ladies, health check up and kids station. We are at the latter one and in charge of Face Painting. Not that I am good at it, but I was assisting a friend who is a real Face Painter. I think the first two kids that I face painted were puzzled of my results, I was lucky they did not sue me for bring victims of my poor creations 😄. 

Some of the people who had their face painted had it for the first time, today. Ever. And despite how ugly my creation looked like in their faces, they still thanked me for it. 

Today taught me about this; that people who are thankful for the things in life aren't living a much easier life than me. In fact, most if these people had a major crisis in life that they learn to appreciate the minor things. 

I learned today that you may not eat the food you like, or at the time you want. But at least, you eat! You may not have the clothing you want, or the the shoes you need, but at least you are not naked.

HAPPY  THANKSGIVING 2014! Be grateful! 

The Cruise

Those growing up in the 80s, like me, must heard of, if not became fan of this original Boyband of all time - New Kids On the Block or NKOTB. It has been 20 years since my crush on Joey, but I can still remember the lines of "Please dont go girl" and "The right stuff" in addition to their "Step by step" music video choreography.

In 2008 they re-launch their career and though it was not as glamourous as before, it was well noted. They made some tours which unfortunately I could not attend at all. But.... They just announced their annual NKOTB CRUISE. Yupp, stuck on a boat with NKOTB themselves! I am of course very tempted to go, especially since the boat will depart from.... MIAMI! 

Unfortunately, children under 16 is not allowed on the boat - meaning little cupcake can't go, so this is impossible for me (we plan to go as a family).

I am super buffed by this but, hey, life sometimes gave us difficult options and this time I had to make one. 

I do hope they make a North American Tour next year and hope they will stop in Florida 😊. Until then... I'll be loving NKOTB forever! 

International Moms

I always have this wish deep in the corner of my heart that I will live abroad one day and be some sort of an International Mom. Well, fast forward seven years later and here I am on my third country with my family. 

What I enjoyed of being an expat lady was the chance to meet other moms and today I had another chance to meet different expat moms in a picnic potluck.

 

There are of course differences of the way people live from one country to another, but what's surprising is actually how SIMILAR moms are in dealing with life and kids. 

When one lady told the story of her husband who never could do the grocery shopping right, all will scream in unison saying that is exactly what their husbands are doing. 

Same with husband not doing house chores correctly, pretend to sleep when the kids need them, etc, etc. 

So I guess moms everywhere are not different after all. 

The 12 years of not moving on.

Yesterday, Indonesian social media was in chaos. The culprit is a mini movie commercial of a Korean based talk app LINE. The mini movie is actually the long awaited sequel of a high school chick movie. You know, "girl hates boy, girl likes boy, boy is selfish, boy goes away, girl chases boy to airport to proclaim the love- the end" type of movie. What's probably a little different is that the movie focuses on the medium of arts enjoyed by the couple; poetry. So instead of cliche dialogue we find smart and deep, meaningful poetry reading.

The mini sequel, beside the subtle tutorial on how to use the app functions, it tells the story of how the guy, living abroad, 12 years of no contact, managed to find the girl and pm-ed her. 

What a jerk! 

Girl feels divided, at one point she dismissed her feeling but on the other side she wanted to see him. The movie ended with the girl again, comes into the airport where they both exchanges poetry verses. 

Now, I learned two points from this short story. 

The first one: a 12 years move-on would fall to pieces with a simple text reply. When your substantial good-for-nothing ex contacted you on social media, do not, I repeat, DO NOT bother to reply unless you are willing to go down into the rabbit hole of love vortex.

The second part is the poetry itself. The banter poetry exchange they had at the end of the movie was superb. The rough translation is this:

Seconds never stepped back, but the blank paper is always there. (We could never turn back time, but we could always use a new blank paper to write new story).

Time never runs backwards and day never repeats itself, but morning always offers a new day, for all questions not answered. (we could never turned back time, but a new day offers a new beginning for life's unanswered questions. 

Well, now that I read it again it might be a bit corny, but hey, dont blame me, blame my hormones.

I love the part where it said that a new morning brings a new beginning and a new hope. So I believe, in life, we ought to always, always, always hope for the best. 

Picture of the lovely couple 12 years later taken from kapanlagi.com

Outgrowing Technology

I once read quote presumably by Einstein,

"I fear the day when the technology overlaps with our humanity. The world will only have a generation of idiots", 

accompanied by photos of different group of people sitting together but had their eyes on their phones instead of interacting with each other. Regardless of whether the quote is original from Einstein or if it is actually another addition to long list of internet hoax, it made a lot of sense with what happen with our community today. 

Just two days a go I read a lady selling her two used a year old iPads in a buy-sell group. She stated "These used to be my kids iPad but they outgrew them." First iPad. First. iPad. I mean, what kind of a world do we live in now that kids got their own iPad where they would outgrew them. Dont get me wrong, I love technology but I do not treat iPad like clothe where my kid would outgrew them in a matter of months. 

Talking about technology, I just got my new iPhone 6 Plus. I do not feel that much difference in terms of speed or technology, except of the Health app. Since I will start walking again with my neighbors this week, this apps will become useful - at least I know how much calories I am entitled gulp in after the run. Ha!

Another thing that I want to share is about this item. I think this gadget is so cute. I am not sure if this is actually useful for me; I mean it does everything that a phone can do, but instead of typing you can speak to it. Anyway, I think it 's just cute!

Amazon Echo