Perpetuum Jazzile!

This is a performance by Perpetuum Jazzile.
It's a Slovenian jazz and pop choir. They often do a Capella, such as in this cover of Toto's Africa.
It blew my mind away. :)

The Fasting I Believe

I believe fasting is a free chosen act of soul searching, in which you deliberately place yourself in a deprived situation, which usually revolves around meals and sex, in hope of finding new insights about pain, self-limits, willpower, or even something of a spiritual origin, whether you believe it's something God puts you to do or not.

I believe fasting is something very private and personal, of which you are truly alone, connecting with your true self and the spiritual world.

I believe fasting is a matter that resides in your heart, where the planes of physical, mental, and spiritual realms collide in a harmonious chaos that is YOU.

I believe fasting is not an act caused by fear for all punishing and wrathful God, so much that you always feel threatened and ask everyone else to help you accomplish the task by limiting themselves according to your desire.

I believe fasting is not something you can take your pride from, and in arrogance empowered by the masses, used to go rampage in violent destruction, forcing anyone into closing their businesses and bowing down to your restrictions, even when they don’t share the same faith, which is easily described by a popular-seemingly-harmless-actually-troubling-saying, ‘respect the people who are fasting’.

(this does not say that I don’t respect anyone who is in the middle of a fast, it’s just they don’t get to ask me that, let alone command it)

I believe fasting is not a matter of changing the outside world to match your inner child’s spoiled desires; a thing that is apparent in situations such as the annual increasing amount of delicious food types for sale, ironically right at the time of fast, and the rise of appeals to the local government to close all food joints during fasting hours.

in short,

I believe fasting is an act of seeing inside,

and not of judging outside.

May the fasting we all do, bring us nothing but good things.

Cyn Says

Cyn is one of my closest friends.
She is this cheerful innocent sprite of a girl and you can see no evil in her.

A couple of days ago, I called her and we talked a lot.
At one moment I explained my opinions surrounding feminism to her.
I said that women, especially in this country, had their heads imprinted with an idea that they could not become a real woman without getting married, thus making their true existence only to become a wife.
“Feminism tries to free women from this false idea,” I said. “It basically says women have the options to pursuit more dreams. They too can change the world instead of just trying to get married.”
Upon hearing this, Cyn said with her signature spritely childish voice, “I am a feminist!”
“Oh, really?” I replied. “And what kind of big goals you have other than getting married?”
“I want to finish reading Madame Wu!” (It is a book she was reading then)
“Uh-huh? What’s so big about that?”
“Of course it’s big,” she said. “It’s something only myself can do. Nobody else can do it for me.”

I remember that her answer silenced me for a while.
It reminded me of the very-private-very-personal-actions.
You know, the actions we do specially for ourselves and influence us firstly and mostly.
Things that nobody else can do for us.
Learning, understanding, experiencing, reading, everything first hand…,
or basically...
the very subjective things,
the opportunities to realize, see everything, and incorporate them profoundly in our souls,
and the only moments when we can truly grow.

Yeah, Cyn was right.
It’s REALLY...

big.

I Will Read Your Mind!

Yes, you got me right.

Through this ordinary blog, I will scan your thoughts and see the depths of your soul.

All you have to do is look closely at the screen and focus.

Don’t try to transfer your mind to me, that’s my job.

Just simply open it, and let me in.

OK, are you ready?

Focus...

Relax...

Breathe...

And let me in...

...

...

Mm.. yes I can definitely see it.

...

Yes, it’s so vivid.

...

...

And STOP!

I’m done.

You want to see what I’ve got?
Here it is.

Language = Insights

I’m just starting to learn German by bits.
I had only known three languages before, Indonesian, English, and Javanese (passive).
So here's what I've got so far.

None of them are alike! (mm... yeah, of course they aren't)

Am I Gay?

So pretty…
Damn sexy…



Since she’s very famous, I figure you already know who she is.

Yep, you’re right.
She’s the popular Nong Poy.

Born a male 23 years ago by the name Saknarin Marnyaporn, she underwent sex reassignment surgery at the age of 17.
By the time she was 19, she had won Miss Tiffany's 2004 and Miss International Queen 2004.
Since then, she has appeared in various television gigs.

Keep in mind that beside the sex reassignment, she did not have any other surgery.
So, her looks is completely natural (of course if you put hormonal therapy into the equation).

Anyway, the hypothetical question is,
“If you were in a post-apocalyptic world where there were only you, a real but dead-skunk-ugly woman, and her, and you could only pick one as your mate, who would you pick?”

Err…

NOSTRA AETATE

A friend of mine once told me why he stayed Catholic. He said that for one, the Church allowed him to freely search for the truth.

He’s got some point.

The Second Ecumenical Council of the Vatican (or popularly known as the Second Vatican Council) passed a declaration on 'the relation of the Church with non-Christian religions' in 1965. It is known as Nostra Aetate (Latin, translated as ‘In Our Age’).

What does it say?

Well, you can decide it for yourself.