Wafatnya Soeharto

Rasanya sulit dipercaya, akhirnya bapak pembangunan itu meninggalkan Indonesia untuk selama-lamanya diiringi tangisan, isak haru dan bahkan caci maki.

Pak Harto meninggalkan kita semua pada hari Minggu, 27 Januari 2008 pukul 13.10 setelah kira-kira 3 minggu lamanya dirawat di RS Pertamina. Saya pribadi mempunyai teori sendiri tentang arti pukul 13.10 yang tentu saja akan saya simpan sendiri. Saya mengenang Pak Harto sebagai mantan presiden Indonesia yang ke-2, tetapi banyak orang Indonesia yang mengenang pak Harto lebih dari itu; ada yang mengenangnya sebagai bapak pembangunan, penguasa orde baru, sebagai pemimpin yang murah senyum sampai sebagai diktator penindas HAM dan penyulut KKN. Saya ingat, salah satu mantan pemimpin Indonesia ketika diwawancarai oleh salah satu TV swasta bahkan sempat mencacinya; tindakan yang menurut saya, walaupun mungkin yang dia katakan adalah benar, tetapi tetap saja tindakan yang sangat tidak terpuji.

Menurut saya, apabila seseorang itu telah tiada, biarlah Tuhan yang menghakiminya dan kita harus berpikir dewasa, bahwa seandainya Pak Harto tidak pernah memerintah, mungkin kita masih menjadi negara terbelakang yang menolak globalisasi atau masuknya modal asing.

Tapi, ... kalau masalah anak-anaknya sih, saya setuju, mereka harus mulai disiplin.. :)

Disappointed HongKong

eventhough i had good times with my fam in hongkong, but it was not met my expectation; so many things disappointed me.

we arrived in hongkong from macau by jetfoil; we took VIP class and paid quite expensive ticket price incl. set meal but surprisingly, it was only couple snack with terrible taste.
we stayed at BP International Hotel in Kowloon; a hotel with spacious lobby but has narrow bed room and small bathroom inside.

the 1st night, we went to clock tower to watch symphony of light; it was nothing compares to musical fountain sentausa island, singapore. after the show was over, we walked towards avenue of stars, but since it had already dark, we could only enjoyed some stars' statue there.

The 2nd day was disneyland day! we bought ticket at hotel and took MTR to lantau island. we stopped by at ngong ping village to see giant budha by cable car for approx 360 m distants.. what a surprise, ngong ping village was not a village! it was just a replica of traditional chinese houses which was used as souvenir shops & restaurants, it was not attractive at all and even we had to climb hundreds stairs to reach giant budha, and with all sanity we had, we right away went to disneyland.

to go to disneyland, we had to take special MTR that decorated with disneyland characters and made us feel like inside the cinderella's horse carriage. all disneyland characters were amazed us, feel so magic being there.. but if the characters were peeled off, i think i would prefer to visit dunia fantasi instead; because hk disneyland was not too spacious and most of the games were more suitable to younger kids. but, anyway, we had a very good time there, we were also get excited at dinner menu, souvenir shops and fire works. we backed to the hotel very late and i started doing my laundry while widi was hunting biten bugs in the hotel room. finally, he got frustated of the bugs and reported to the hotel manager to change our room. we got the same type room, different floor and complimentary breakfast vouchers but... the bugs still there!! capek deh...

we woke up earlier in the 3rd day and asked how to apply shenzhen visa to the travel desk counter at hotel; the lady officer informed that on saturday, shenzhen will only process visa for man (???) we changed the plan afterwards, did not go to shenzhen but went to the peak tower by tramway; the tram was upward to the hill and we enjoyed the city view from the peak terrace, but i like macau view better!

the travel officer information was bothering me because actually I did not believe her for the first time and then i decided to just go to shenzhen as i remembered long time ago i could applied visa on arrival anytime. arrived in shenzhen, we got trouble on the currency, we did not have ones! the money changer was difficult to find, so i walk towards to shangrila hotel to exchange money, but unfortunately they only did it limited for their hotel guest. as i always tell my son to not give up easily, i asked help from one of the hotel guest who really generous to exchange the money for me.. and he did it... aaahhh, finally..

but, it had already dark, so we only visited window of the world with less excitement and kept blaming on the travel officer.. i would never recommend BP international hotel to anyone!!

list of our disappointments:

1. bad food at VIP class jetfoil


2. small hotel room


3. biten bugs inside the hotel room


4. not too good symphony of the light


5. expensive laundromat


6. less adventurer games in disneyland


7. fake village at ngong ping


8. hundreds stairs towards giant budha


9. expensive entrance ticket to the peak terrace (the view was so so)


10. stupid travel officer in the hotel

finally, we left hongkong for one night stay in singapore..

Enchanted Macau

on this occasion, i lack of time in planning my trip, maybe because i was not too firmed on the plan of taking vacation; but, after considered that my children had 3 weeks school holiday without going nowhere, i decided to had vacation to places that never been visited by my kids.
i took itinerary to macau-hk-shenzhen-singapore as my children really wanted to visit disneyland and i was too obsessed to take picture in front of ruin of st. paul's church in macau.
thus, on jan 9, i flew to macau via kualalumpur by airasia (for me, airasia always value for money). took off at 8 o'clock in the morning from jkt and landed in macau at 5.15 pm (one hour ahead than jakarta) with 2 hours transitted in lcct, kl.
macau is a serene city with cold yet dry weather; the panorama almost similar to semarang, many hills and upward path. we took taxi and headed to hotel royal which has excellent service and hotel staffs.
all interesting places in macau open in the morning, so we spent the 1st night by having dinner at a-lorcha restaurant, an autentic portugesse restaurant. i ordered their special menu of bacalhau (codfish in cream sauce), african chicken and grilled lamb; all the food served had excellent taste and made me paid MOP 335.6.
the next morning, we had walktour as i would like to pass so many beautiful buildings on our way (most building have european architecture). the 1st building we visited was Monte Fort. inside the fort, other than cannons, i bumped into sight to few old ladies practising sword martial art and i was entertained by watching them :), it more like tai chi than sword martial art.
next to monte fort, downhill, laid Ruin of St. Paul's Church, beauty as expected and thus, made me kept on admiring it as well as felt magic because of its beauty and sacred.. so i accomplished my obsession by taking many pictures in front and inside the ruin.
we continued headed to Largo de Senado and on our way, we stopped by in bakery shop to buy the famous and yummy portugesse egg taart. in Senado square, i entered a church adjacent to Post Office; i forgot the name but this church brought different feeling as you entered others. it was built with european architecture and has wood old-fashioned benches that obviously describes on how old the church is.
after done sightseeing in Senado square, we moved on to A-Ma Temple and this time we walked lil bit further than before without any good sight on our way and.. when we reached A-Ma Temple, i was no longer too excited to explore the place because for me, the most beautiful temple is laid in Bangkok.
we returned to hotel by taxi and started packing our bags to continue our trip to hong kong; luckily the hotel provided free shuttle bus to ferry terminal where we should get on to jetfoil to hong kong.