Rouge Rosette

Hello there!

Today's post is about what I'm currently listening.

My favorite song of the moment:

2-1 by Imogen Heap



Video courtesy of krushastar in YouTube.

I found out about this song from CSI Miami Season 8, the episode Kill Clause. Imogen Heap makes a lot songs that sound like this, like a contemporary dance song. Hide and Seek, The Moment I Said It are some of what I consider "Imogen Heap Contemporary Dance Songs".

The lyrics say something about earth and galaxies, and well, what made me really like this song is because of the chorus.

Things are not always, things are not always how they seem.

Will you be ready?

and

They don't turn out always, don't quite turn out always how we think.

Will we be ready?

Very deep sentence, if you take it in other or certain ways. Also, the violin instrumental after the sentence is sang in the song, makes you somewhat delve deep into the song. This song sounded sad, and I like melancholic sounding songs. Not the ones that make you cry, but what makes your emotions get.. "shaken". Not in a bad way.. just like the song can make you.. pose with one hand right above the chest area (in front of heart) and one reaching out to the stars. Okay I am exaggerating things but basically like you can feel the emotion from the song.

I can put this on repeat and not get bored at all. But I'm afraid I'll get quickly bored, so I try to not put it on repeat all the time.

--

My second favorite song:

Not Fair by Lily Allen



Video courtesy of parlophone from YouTube.

I bought the whole Lily Allen album "It's Not Me, It's You" for just around US$ 2.45 (IDR 29,000) because it was the explicit version. The clean version was priced normally, IDR 85,000 if I was not wrong. I don't care about explicit songs, so yeah I bought the album. Turns out I like most of the songs so good for me.

I originally really liked this song for its tune. Then I saw the lyrics and I was like whoa. One of the sentences that made me "whoa" was:  I spent ages giving head. At first I was like, giving head? Then, oh. That head.

Again, the chorus is what had drawn me to this song. Aside from the catchy tune :)

It's not fair, and I think you're really mean, I think you're really mean.

This song had me wondering what the meaning of some of the sentences were. They sounded like it was really based on personal experience. A vulgar version of Taylor Swift? :')

Lily is indeed known for speaking out her thoughts very frankly. The last Lily Allen song I listened to was "F*ck You", which is also from "It's Not Me, It's You" album. I did not look for the lyrics though, so now that I finally looked for the lyrics of an explicit Lily Allen song, I was a bit surprised. But it gives me something to learn... because in Indonesia there definitely won't be any songs with these kinds of connotations. Or maybe there is... but I don't listen to Indonesian songs most of the time, so... please pardon my ignorance.

Other than Not Fair, I overall liked almost every song in the album.

--

Third favorite song:

Loca (Spanish Version) by Shakira ft. El Cata



Video courtesy of shakiraVEVO from YouTube.

I love this song. And what made me love this song more is the video. Very personal, because this year I went to Barcelona for a study trip with a few of my friends and one lecturer as supervisor, and the shooting place for Loca is the beach we went to LOL

In most Shakira videos, I pay attention to her belly dancing more than the song. I want to be able to do that too! As for Shakira in action, I prefer She Wolf but as a song to listen to, definitely Loca for me. Also, the Spanish version is so much better than the English version in my opinion. The song is being sang more fluidly, if you get what I mean...

Ok that's all for now. I actually have to sleep but my sleep cycle is very broken at the moment, and... I have to get up early tomorrow (no, in a few hours). Ok goodbye for now, see you at the next post!

Bella

I haven't posted anything in a while, sorry.

What's happened lately?

I got scammed.

A student pursuing master's degree in Universitas Gadjah Mada in Jogjakarta insulted Jogjakarta through a Path status and is now cyber-bullied and faces risk of going to prison.

I find it hard to find a suitable company that I want to try to apply for internship.

I have been traveling a lot.

--

Scammed!

Beware, there might be some swear words in this post. And it is not censored like my previous posts.

Helpful links:

http://momento.mataku.com/blog/2011/12/15/inextron-penipuan-berkedok-trik-marketing-2/

http://myzone.okezone.com/content/read/2013/05/13/10470/

and many more... just Google: Colvern Indonesia or Penipuan Colvern Indonesia and you will see most of the top articles are about scams. Unfortunately, they're in Indonesian, so if you're a non-Indonesian and you'd like to find out, I hope my post can help you become more aware, or I hope Google Translate will do a good job.

So I went to Poins Square Lebak Bulus on a fateful 9th of August 2014. Who knew that that was a day I'd learn a lesson the hard way?

OTOPlus is the name of the store/showroom that scammed me. And many others. It goes by many names, and the first link from momento.mataku.com has kindly listed some of their scammer company names. First of all, OTOPlus is located next to California Fried Chicken, but I forgot which floor was it. They are a small showroom, does not look nice, and their workers consist of 4 people: 1 who supposedly act as manager, 1 woman named Ifah, Ipah, or whatever, 1 man named Lucky and another man named Ijal if I remember correctly.

Lucky approached me while I was on my way to my car (at the basement). He offered me a detox patch as a complimentary gift but to get it I'd have to fill in a form and sign some stuff he said. I always felt pity for these salesmen/women because it's hard to find passersby who'd actually listen to you, so I listened.

This Lucky guy says he studies at BSI (Bina Sarana Informatika) and is currently at 2nd semester but he works while taking college classes. He constantly praises me, like how come someone as pretty as you don't have a boyfriend? Your skin is so smooth, you must be the epitome of male adoration, etc etc. Maybe the flirting would've worked more if he was good looking. Then another male joined in the praising, and that is Ijal. This Ijal has almost-bald-short-hair, very skinny, and super sweet mouth (again, it would've worked more if he had better looks). This impudent guy dared to touch my calves while praising my smooth legs. Who the hell are you?

They were promoting their foot massager from a Japanese brand called NIIRO. I saw the brochure and I was a bit surprised that all of them were priced nothing less than IDR 10 million. Yes, 10 million. In an ugly showroom. But I was stupid enough to not feel suspicious. They said their foot massager had JADE inside. When they asked me if the massager felt good, well it was so-so, good, but not extremely bad.

Maybe because I'm a female, the bitch Ifah did a lot of the talking. She said she was a dangdut singer and showed her CDs and photos. She is a voluptuous lady. And not in a good way. Bla bla bla and then they said because their company Colvern is celebrating their 17th birthday, they are giving me a chance to win a "doorprize". They had prepared two examples: one coupon said "Thank you for your visit" and the other was "You win a massage machine worth IDR 1,890,000". They said the majority of the coupons were like these examples.

I pulled one, and guess what, I won a portable stove priced at IDR 15,990,000.

4. They are the reason why big companies that hold lottery/sweepstakes always say "We do not ask any money from lottery winners". So if you win a lottery and you have to pay a lot of money to get the prize, then it is a scam. No doubt about it.

5. They will force you to do the transaction right away. If like me, you have credit card from your parents, and you want to call your parents to ask if it is okay to do the transaction, they will not like you calling them (your parents). But they will try to hide their annoyance because they still want your money.

6. If you say you're not interested and keep on repeating maybe until you get annoyed, they will change their attitude completely. They were so nice to you, now not anymore.

7. They are likely to call their sponsors using an old-looking phone. In my case, they used an old wireless phone.

8. If you're a female, they will praise you like you're the most beautiful woman in the world.

Edit: 9. The more someone tries to convince you that they're official, they're trustworthy, by saying proofs that prove their point, repeatedly, the more they are likely to be scammers, or just untrustworthy.


And one word of advice if you have at least one credit card: Find out how to void transactions. On BCA machines it's more confusing than other EDC machines, and that's what made me not know how to void my transaction-- the menus were not helping at all. And if you're still a child financially depending on your parents, it's best to have a credit card with a low limit-- and find a bank who can give supplemental credit cards with low credit card limits. My friend says BCA lets you, but you have to be over 21 and have an official statement of how much you earn every month (pocket money for me), but you'll need a salary receipt for that official statement.

That's all for this post. I hope this helped in a way. I know some of the things I did seemed stupid and it is, but this was a hard punch to the face-- it was a hard lesson but I learned much.

Today marks the day I first saw a cat (or kitten) that got run over by a vehicle with my own eyes. Sometimes, I would see dead cats on the road but did not see it happening.

---

Today, I saw a small kitten on the road trying to cross the street. I braked my car, and usually adult cats would have ran across the street immediately, but this kitten was confused and stayed in place. I stopped my car for a few seconds, because the kitten would not move-- got honked from cars/motorcycles behind me but who cares-- the kitten was probably shocked and scared.


A couple of seconds later, as it was running across the street in panic, BAM! A motorcycle ran over it. The motorcycle driver was with his female friend, and his female friend looked like she was saying something like "omg why did you run over the kitten?!?" Or "omg the kitten omg omg", and her hands was on the sides of her face, jittery and looking panicked. She did not look back at the kitten but even from the back her gestures were obvious that she was not okay with what her friend did. The motorcycle rider and his friend continued their journey to wherever it may be, and when I looked at my rear view mirror, the kitten was writhing in pain. It was still alive then...

---

Because there are still many cars/motorcycles waiting in line behind me, and I also got homework to do, I did not stop my car, I also continued my journey to my home.

This event got me contemplating when I was waiting for the red light. And then I thought of many things, such as how the kitten might be living miserably because it was separated from its parents, and then life was taken away from it in just a flash, and what would have happened if I had stopped for a while to save the kitten.


I imagined myself in the kitten's position. To be honest, I really can't imagine the pain of living without a mother; even thinking about it makes me cry, because it makes me think of the future when I get older, and so will my parents... *sob*

The kitten was confused and got lost in the middle of the road. It was actually in a really dangerous part of the road. I don't know how the kitten got there, but it was in the middle of a wide road and it was far from the pedestrian walkway. And unfortunately, in that road where the kitten was in, there's always a lot of cars and motorcycles passing by.

---Buat orang Jakarta, lokasi tempat gue melihat kejadian ini adalah sebelum flyover Antasari, saat jalannya dibagi 2 menjadi 1 ke kiri ke arah Prapanca, 2 lurus masuk flyover Antasari. Gue dari arah jalan Sisingamangaraja, yang dari sekretariat Asean belok kiri, terus belok kanan masuk jalur yang di tengah, lalu di lampu merah yang lurus ke Jalan Truno Joyo, gue belok kanan. Si kucing muncul di jalan yang dari underpass mau ke arah Prapanca.

My mind continued to wander... how the kitten must have felt; alone and lost, without its mother, and then having your body crushed by a vehicle. That must have been extreme pain.

---

However... I had prioritized my homework, which is also my final project, due today before midnight, over the writhing kitten in the middle of the road. If I had stopped for a while to save the kitten, I would have gone to a veterinarian, paid the costs for the kitten, the kitten would be safe for now.

But then, going to the vet may take time, and then I might not have enough time to finish my essay, and most likely it will cause me to fail the subject, which will make my GPA drop ungracefully, and lose 3 million rupiahs (the cost for the credits of the subject) over a kitten. How will I explain to my lecturer about giving me time extension over saving a kitten...? While it is also possible that going to the vet may not take very much time, there's still the risk.

Thinking over this in a rational manner, what I did was certainly directly beneficial to me. I did not want to risk failing the subject just because of a kitten. It was directly beneficial because I will not spend extra money on veterinarian, I will not spend extra time saving the kitten, it's definite and obvious.

If I had saved the kitten, I would be proud of myself, and call it one of my personal accomplishments for having saved a stray kitten when it got run over by a motorcycle. It will not benefit me materialistically, but it will benefit me spiritually. I can safely say, that the feeling of being able to help someone (or something) and make a difference, is one of the best feelings in the world.

Almost everything harder in life does not benefit you straight away and materialistically, but gives you that personal spiritual enlightenment, which is good. Which was easier, saving the cat or just drive away pretending it never happened?

._.)

Honestly saying, I actually did have the want, the intention to save the kitten, but I decided it was not my first priority. I am a bit disappointed in myself for not saving the kitten when I had the chance to, and I do kind of regret I did not save the cat, but my will for playing it safe was greater.

---

Dear kitten, I apologize for not saving you, but I sincerely hope someone out there will save you, and if unfortunately, you eventually died of your wounds, I hope you rest in peace.

And I hope, the next time I see something like this on the road, I am not in a rush.

(No pictures, I'm sorry. I was driving and I wouldn't stop my car just to take a picture of it lol)

Hello everyone!

Today's topic is the famous gigantic fried chicken which is famous in Taiwan. Its name is 雞排 (pinyin: ji1 pai2). It is my favorite street snack in Taiwan, and one of the major cause I gained a lot of weight during my stay there! xD

Me myself eating 2-Peck's tasty fried chicken!

My favorite ji pai is from 2-Peck! (Chinese: 2-派克, or just 派克)



Especially with dried plum flavor! (梅子味)

Here you can see the magnificent 2-Peck fried chickens. The above picture was the one I bought near my host family's house in the Yongkang Da Wan district, while the below picture was the one I bought in a 2-Peck store in Kaohsiung.

Considering I only eat dried plum flavored ji pai, this blog post will be all about it. No other flavors, I'm sorry! :')

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Plum? Why plum?

Rather than imagining this plum, imagine dried plums. Chinese ones.




Yes, the ones like this. It's grounded into powder and then can be added as seasoning. In Indonesia, these dried plums are usually called kiamboy.

There are two kinds of dried plum powder: white and red. According to my host mother, usually Taiwanese people prefer the white dried plum powder to be added as a condiment, but not everyone likes its flavor. Take my host family for example, they do not like the taste of dried plum. I, on the other hand, LOVE it. From my above fried chicken photos, you can see that the above fried chicken has a reddish hint to it, but here's a clearer picture.


See the orangey-red colored seasoning on the chicken? That's it :)

Below is another picture of fried chicken, which is the Kaohsiung-bought ji pai ;)


This fried chicken with dried plum flavor incorporates both kinds of dried plum seasonings: white and red. However, I think the Kaohsiung ji pai uses more white dried plum powder than red.



Before I knew of this flavor, I stuck with original or spicy flavors, and then, on one fateful day, I tried my friend's fried chicken (with plum flavor) and that's how I fell in love with it. Plum tastes sour, very sour when you only try the powder, but when added to fried food, they taste very good! There's sweet, sour, and bits of savory in it.

I live in Indonesia, Jakarta, where Taiwanese-inspired snack stands are quite scarce until very recently. Having tasted Taiwan's fried chicken firsthand, my taste buds learned the high standards before having tasted the lesser tasty ones. So when Shihlin opened in Jakarta and I tried their fried chicken, I was disappointed for the lack of Taiwanese fried chicken taste!

They played safe, they only had original, spicy (medium to very spicy), or barbecue. My favorite flavor, plum, was reserved solely for the sweet potato fries/balls I forgot. I. was. not. happy.

I bought their fried chicken occasionally despite not being fully satisfied; in my opinion, it is not as Taiwanese as it claims to be.

I do not have the pictures of Shihlin's fried chicken, but they have more flour than meat compared to this:



JJJJUUUIIICCCYY!  The best part of the chicken, the boneless meat! Other part of the chicken, which is bony, still tastes good, but nothing tastes better than eating chicken with no bones. (Pictures are unedited, straight from my iPhone so I'm sorry if it's too yellow because of the lamp lighting)

---

In Jakarta, a Taiwanese snack/drink shop has recently opened. Its name is A Gantea.


To be honest, for almost every franchise/snack stall that appears in Jakarta such as Chatime and A Gantea, is something I have never seen before in Taiwan. Or maybe that's because I lived in Tainan and not Taipei. However, one yinliao(drink) shop, COMEBUY, is something I saw in Tainan. The one I saw was located near the Tainan Railway station, near the zebra cross.

Anyways, A Gantea has made my dream come true. My dream of tasting an authentic Taiwanese fried chicken taste recreated in Indonesia!

Before I go further, this blog post is not sponsored at all. This is all an analysis based on personal experience and preferences.

--

Plum is not a safe flavor. At least in Indonesia.

The last time I bought a fried chicken at A Gantea, I ordered a plum-flavored fried chicken. The lady told me beforehand, "But it's sweet" (Tapi ini manis, mbak), I said "Yes, it's okay" (Iya nggak papa kok mbak)

There was a promotion at that time, where you get a drink + chicken for the price of one fried chicken ( IDR 35,000 / NTD 87,09). I got the drink first, and before they cooked my fried chicken, they reconfirmed it with me, that it was sweet. They were making sure that I really ordered the plum flavor. I replied with yes, yes I DID order plum flavor.

Seeing that Shihlin only had super basic flavors for its fried chicken, and how the lady reacted to my flavor of choice, I have come to the conclusion that Indonesians dislike fried food + sweet/sour seasoning, or more simply, it is not a safe or easily marketable flavor to have.

--

A few days ago, I went to buy a gigantic fried chicken again. I ordered a plum flavor, but then the lady said I can mix the flavor. So I said I wanted garlic with plum. Originally I said curry but she misheard me, and then I said, "ok garlic" because a random thought in my mind thought it wouldn't be such a bad idea.

This time, the cashier lady also made sure by asking me "But it's sweet" (Tapi ini manis, mbak). Please remember me as the Plum Fried Chicken lady. I am very sure with my decision of ordering a fried chicken with sweet seasoning.

That turned out to be the best decision ever. To mix garlic with plum.

I am posting out-of-date stuff on Wind Runner, as I was enthusiastically playing this game during my Christmas holidays; I started on 18th December, and started to get bored on the beginning of January. Now, with lectures starting again, and constant app crash on my iPad, I just don't feel like playing it for the moment, and probably for quite some time.

One of my accomplishments during that period was:

1. Got a high score of 4.1 million in Classic Mode.














2. Got 1st rank in Silver and Gold Medal Championships, and my best score to date in Championship Mode is 839,564.

Silver Medal Championship

The score I got for Gold Medal Championship

Got Brown on my second try in combining two B+5 cards!

DRAGON!

This pet is how you can get millions and millions of score. As written in the help section about Dragon pet, Dragon has a barrier which will regenerate every 30 seconds once you hit something and got protected by the barrier. When you evolve Dragon, the regeneration interval becomes only 20 seconds!

I started playing the game again after a lot of events had passed, so I asked my friend how Dragon works. I was confused as to what Dragon's description meant.

It will stay as long as you don't die. It doesn't matter if it's more than 30 seconds. If you hit something, miss a platform, or any other that causes you to die, the dragon will do this:

Disclaimer: this is not mine. It's my friend's Wind Runner, I just asked for the picture of his collection of legend pets. He is a lucky bastard. =P

I bet there are blogs out there who has lots of legends, and a complete set of super rare and rare pets (I've seen some of windrunnerextreme's posts), but here's some if you're curious!