JakartaDoYoga opens!

[Bahasa Indonesia]
I am so happy for my friend, Yusni. She’s just opened her yoga studio, Jakartadoyoga, in the heart of Jakarta, a life-long dream of hers.

I went there last Saturday during its soft launch titled “Walking meditation and yoga all day long,” in which she held a walking meditation to a near-by park, held a yoga session in the park and five other yoga classes at her studio during that day. A neat and appropriate way of launching a yoga studio.

What I love about Yusni, her studio, and all other events she holds is the fact that you feel like coming to your friend’s event,. You don’t really feel like there is any distance between the organizer and the participants.

And you can feel Yusni’s enthusiasm towards yoga. I come to the studio and feel that the owner of the place has put her heart and soul into preparing and managing the studio.

So, here’s to Yusni, her studio and all the yoga enthusiasts in Jakarta or anywhere else in the world. Kuddos.

For further information, visit www.jakartadoyoga.com, email studio@jakartadoyoga.com, or just drop by Jl Sunda No 7, 3rd Floor, Menteng.

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Over one billion rups for ICT innovators

[Bahasa Indonesia]
Microsoft Indonesia and USAID-financed competitiveness project SENADA today launch iMULAI, a national competition and awards program for innovative solutions for business.

The program aims to promote the spirit and importance of innovation among Indonesian business entrepreneurs and support the establishment of Indonesia as a competitive, knowledge-based economy.

The competition, which will run until December 31st, 2007, is open for all Indonesian businesses (both start-up and established) and non-government organizations.

iMULAI will select three winners whose proposals show the most promising innovations and which promise the greatest potential impact on the information technology and communications industry in Indonesia.

Each successful innovation will receive over Rp145,000,000 in hardware and software business technology from Microsoft and Rp220,000,000 in grant financing from SENADA for innovation costs.

For more information, visit the iMULAI website.

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Veggie lunch

I over indulged during the weekend. So now it is pay back time.

Here's today's lunch menu.

Nils, you would be proud to know that no animal has been harmed during the production or the consumption process.

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Splinters of the universe

[Bahasa Indonesia]
[Once upon a time, my friend Hanny and I had our writer's block. Then we decided to write in each other's blogs instead.

So, ladies and gents, I present you Hanny as my very first guest blogger, whose blog is probably the only site I visit regularly.]

Dear Eva,

I know nothing about spirituality, meditation, or yoga, or those wonderful things that close to your heart. However, as agreed, let’s play Athena in The Witch of Portobello, and I’ll try to start talking about things I know nothing about.

About a year ago, out of nowhere, I decided to use the word ‘splinters’ when I’d like to go anonymous with my writings. I fell in love with the word in high school, when I found it inside a poem by Edith Sodergran, The Stars.

Edith is a poet who introduced Finland-Swedish modernism with free rhythm in her poems, and didn’t receive much recognition in her lifetime, but is now regarded one of Finland’s foremost poets…

Do you think Edith was ahead of her time?
Do you think she resembles Coelho’s Athena—The Witch of Portobello?

Anyway, I don’t want to think of it as a coincidence, but if you look up for the word ‘splinter’ in the dictionary, it means “a small, thin, sharp piece of wood, glass, or similar material broken off from a larger piece”.

What if the larger piece is the universe, Eva? What if I’m a splinter of the universe? What if we’re all splinters of the universe? We are, aren’t we?

So now it’s not that hard to imagine that we’re connected to each other in some way; that we’re capable of doing noble things; that our minds are magnetic and able to draw things we cherish closer to us; that we’re capable of revealing the secrets of the universe, one at a time.

And this, Eva, this is what I called spirituality.

Something that we’ve already had inside of us since birth, running through our veins and pumping our heart; but we kept on searching for it in those long and tiring journeys, only to find out that we’ve never losing it at the first place.

H.

[I didn't change a single letter, Han. I did not need to.

Beautiful, as always.]

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One month to go

[Bahasa Indonesia]
Remember that “a significant change in my life in the near future” I spoke about a while ago? Here goes.

I have decided to return to my natural habitat of freelancing. To become a freelance communications specialist (that is the title I give myself in my business card) once again.

And to be honest, actually, this time it is even more than that.

I have two passions in life at the moment (three if you include my family). One is communications. The other is natural healing and all that come along with it (meditation, yoga, spiritualism, etc).

In 2006, I concluded that I still love communications for communications sake. It would still be a thrill to work in the industry. BUT it has to be for a greater good. So I decided to focus on corporate social responsibility issues or development projects.

When the opportunity to be a full-time communications manager in a development project (which is my current job at the moment), I welcomed it with an open arm.

A year has passed. I have come to a different conclusion. It still does not feel 100% right. The soul is tired. The body is too. The brain is puzzled, struggling to find the reasons why.

Along came the Witch of Portobello. The book put me on the contemplative road whose existence was long forgotten. I knew I had to make a choice between the two passions.

Despite all the lessons learned, the social/professional network built, and the so-called impact made over the last year, communications is no longer fun for communications’ sake. For me.

I pictured myself marching on the career path of communications and I am not that fond of what I see. I do not foresee peace. (Granted, perhaps it is just my limited capability and subjectivity to see).

The choice is now clear(er). I will move into healing. I will for the thousandth time push myself into a new area beyond my comfort zone. To become a student one more time. I have met several teachers. I have signed up for two meditation courses in December. It is a start.

Like writing, communications should just be a medium for something greater, or, pragmatically speaking, a way to make a living for me. The focus will be on healing.

The choice is clear but not the road ahead. But that is OK. It is a process. I shall take it one step at a time. With guidance from Him. Or Her. Or something within.

I am counting down for the ship to set sail. Approximately one month from now. Deep breath.

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Change of point of view

[Bahasa Indonesia]
It was late at the office. The room was getting dark. I kept staring at my computer’s monitor until it was time for me to go.

I turned around to look at the window, just to see how the traffic was. And I was in awe with what I saw.

An orange sky above the darkened skyscrapers of Jakarta.

The view had always been there to entertain, yet the only thing I stared at until that moment was my computer.

Things we are able to see if only we change our point of view.

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Teachers

[Bahasa Indonesia]
This month I have been blessed with encounters with two teachers. People whom I believe have earned their rights to be called teachers. People with such ample amount of knowledge and skills but still manage to be so humble, ordinary and willing to reach out.

Pak Budi. A craniosacral therapist. I was introduced by a friend. I went to his house one night where he held his meditation session. You could not really tell which is him because he just blended with others. The (about) 10 of us chatted for a bit and meditated. Pak Budi then answered all questions asked and even treated one participant.

Pak Irmansyah Effendi. Founder of Reiki Tummo. I took several classes of Reiki Tummo several years back but never really got into it much. A friend YM me one day and said that there will be an alumni gathering with Pak Irmansyah as the speaker. Interesting.

I sat at the first row. The speaker had not arrived yet. Then this rather young guy with untidy hairs and blue-white Hawaiian shirt came and started to set up the notebook and laptop. A lady next to me said “Pak Irmansyah?” and he smiled. My god, that’s Pak Irmansyah? Wow. How come he is so 'ordinary'?

I thoroughly enjoyed both session held by Pak Budi and Pak Irmansyah.

On a 'sadder' note, I have “lost” another teacher this month. Pak Pujo who passed away late last month. I only met him once but he has left such a deep impression to me. His passing made me think about that only time we met. I am sad that I do not have the opportunity to meet him again but thankful for that one time we have met.

People with great wisdom and such humility. Those people have earned the rights to be called “teachers”. And I am thankful for the opportunity to meet them.

Judging by the number of teachers I have met in such a short time, I supposed it is school time again. I look forward to become a student.

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For mom and dad

[Bahasa Indonesia]
God, forgive me and forgive my mom and dad.

Love and care for them the way they have loved and cared for me while I was little. Cross that. the way the have loved and cared for me SINCE I was little.

*hugz*

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