AMKM
(Anda Meminta Kami Memosting)

Foto2 ini ditayangkan atas permintaan pembaca.



Malam Kedua


Masih Malam Kedua


Malam Ketiga*


Masih Malam Ketiga*

*Pada malam ketiga ada tambahan orang yang tidak ada di foto "Kemana Saljunya Yah", mereka adalah Raphael dan Greta

**Gila nih gue harus diet nih, buncit nih, uuhhhh...

One Liner

I always wonder how can a voice become such wonder.

*thank you for the call Bebs.

Word in Life: Drink Drank Drunk

"consume or be in the habit of consuming alcohol, esp. to excess (OAD)"

Three nights in a row (threepeat): Mike & Mollies, Esquire, and Barfly

In Alphabetical Order:

First Night (Ardi's B'day): Ajeng, Ardi, Paksi, and Yudis

Second Night (Ajeng's Challenge): Ajeng, Ardi, Lia, Paksi, and Yudis

Third Night (I have to ask who was the culprit): Ajeng, Ardi, Lia, Margreta, Paksi, Raphael, and Yudis

Well, I didn't drink excessively in these nights, hhmmm, okey, I admit it, these three nights are not even in the same zip code with my usual drinking habit. And you know what? In these three nights, not even once I was the culprit. It just amazed me, considering my invitations were usually vanished in thin air. Cool huh, I have drinking buddies, and for me they are just one of the best kind of buddies, in the sense that you don't have to be soul mates, long lost friends, close or very close friends, life time friends, etc. We drink, we talk anything (mostly unimportant things), we move to the song, we laugh, to cut a long explanation, we are just cruising.

How about the drawbacks? Well, according to my experienced, this is a never-ending debate. Although, at some point, we drop this debate, because you need to have interdiscipline conversation (maybe you need well-known philosopher to enter the debate), but this debate will arise again here and there.

Now, I will bring down the drawback to the personal level. It's happening again like in the past. It's like a flu virus. Everytime I have (insert number, it has to be greater than two) nights in a row of drink with my friends, my emotion will grew exponentially as a function of the number of nights. After the third nights, I just missed my wife (the best drinking buddy ever, for me) so much that I just want to hit something (Americans should have concrete wall like we do in Indonesia). It happened when she was in Netherland, when I was in Korea, and now. Last night I just remember this kind of emotion will arise again whenever I drink many nights in a row. Maybe, that is why I like to drink with my friends, because I love this kind of reminder or maybe I just like to be torture.

All I can do is to thanks my drinking buddies, anywhen and anywhere, for making this unbearable life bearable.

Thank You All

*from the one who miss his wife so much.

Only Quotations: The Very Poor, Love and Money

Howards End (1910) by E. M. Forster

Chapter 6

"We are not concerned with the very poor. They are unthinkable, and only to be approached by the statistician or the poet."*

Chapter 7

"It's only when we see someone near us tottering that we realize all that an independent income means"

"... I began to think that the very soul of the world is economic, and the lowest abyss is not the absence of love, but the absence of coin."*

"I'm tired of these rich people who pretend to be poor, and think it shows a nice mind to ignore the piles of money that keep their feet about the waves."

Love and Money (1920) by Richard Rorty

"We are beginning at a loss for the world scenarios which cross the north-south border, largely because of the scary population growth statistics for countries such as Indonesia, India and Haiti. This part of the planet is becoming increasingly unthinkable. We are more and more tempted to turn it over to the statisticians, and to the sort of poet whom we call 'the ethnologist'.

"We should remind ourselves, as Forster reminded us, that love is not enough - that the Marxist were absolutely right about one thing: the soul of history is economics. All the talk in the world about the need to abandon 'technological rationality' and to stop 'commodifying', about the need for 'new values' or for 'non-Western ways of thinking', is not going to bring more money to Indian villages. As long as the villagers have enough Weberian means-end rationality to see that they need eight children such talk is not to any point. All the love in the world, all the attempts to abandon 'Eurocentrism', or 'liberal individualism', all the 'politics of diversity', all the talk about cuddling up to the natural environment will not help"

*Also quoted in Love and Money by Richard Rorty

**I have to warn you that I consider myself a student of Rorty. I've read many of his published works, and I have to say that I agree to most of his ideas. Before reading Forster's Howards End, I read Rorty's article (Love and Money). The novel is really great, and the article is excellent. This is just one example for "love is not enough" phenomenon, hehehehe.

Words in Life: Out on a Limb

#out on a limb, in an isolated or stranded position; at a disadvantage. orig. U.S. (OED)
#out on a limb, in or into dangerous or uncompromising situation, where one is not joined or supported by anyone else/vulnerable. (OAD)

EXAMPLE:

namewitheld*: hihihi mo komen apa dulu??
paksi: yah telat
namewitheld: gak jadi kan?
paksi: udah maksudnya
namewitheld: aiiiyaaa
namewitheld: komen poto yang mana?
namewitheld: mati gw
...
namewitheld: gila
namewitheld: loe
...
namewitheld: paks loe gak ngomong yang aneh2 kan?
...
namewitheld: gila...being ur friend kan emang putting ur life on a limb**
namewitheld: dgn kata lain
namewitheld: emang berisiko tinggi

*dari seorang temen yang risk adverse/stres kalo ama gue/insecure gituh deh, kelihatan dari kata-katanya
**gue rasa maksud dia adalah "out on a limb"

***eh busyet baru tuhhh, ketika gue kira gue tahu tentang diri gue, ternyata... Heheheheheh

In Memoriam Benito Mamoto/Beni Mamoto/Om Beni



*Beliau adalah salah satu temen terdekat keluarga Henry-Nani Walandouw, sebegitu dekatnya sehingga Om Beni dan Tante Retno (istrinya) adalah godfather/papa-mama ani/saksi baptis saya, selain itu Om Beni dan Tante Retno adalah saksi pernikahan saya dan Beby (Bayangkan, dari kecil (saya rasa saya dibaptis waktu balita) sampai menikah mereka selalu ada untuk saya, terima kasih lho). Walaupun mereka lama hidup di luar negeri (Hawaii), berjauhan dengan keluarga kami, hubungan kekerabatannya selalu terjaga. Tuhan memberkati Tante Retno dan Runa (anak perempuan semata wayang).

Amin

I Think It's My Laziness

I don't know what happen to me these last couple of days
I have works, but I can't finish anything fast these days
I know, I'm a lazy person
But, I always hear her sound

The sound keeps banging my head, it eclipses other thought
My eyes see silence, but my ears hear sound

I think it's my laziness
It's like a harness
My laziness is trying to reason with me
My laziness is playing with me

I want to escape from the sound
Can I?

Aarrgghhh, my laziness is getting smarter
I used to be stronger and smarter
Maybe, I'm getting old
Yeah, maybe, old...

I will try to kill my laziness tomorrow
I hope my laziness doesn't use her again tomorrow

But today, I give up.

*will call to hear her sound

A Quote from Amartya Sen in Inequality Reexamined (Preface)

The substantive importance of the question 'equality of what?' relates, thus, to the empirical fact of pervasive human diversity. Investigations of equality-theoritical as well as practical-that proceed with the assumption of antecedent uniformity (including the presumption that 'all men are created equal') thus miss out on a major aspect of the problem. Human diversity is no secondary complication (to be ignored, or to be introduced 'later on'); it is a fundamental aspect of our interest in equality.

*lagi hang berat nih, semoga besok nggak terlalu hang... pasti karena rindu...

My Birthday: Chicago and Jakarta
13th January 2006, Friday night, and 13 hours differences


*The Hunt at Chicago ("not so new" friends and new friends, and stranger: the woman with white shirt, I don't know who she is).


*The Home at Jakarta (I miss you much Beby, and all of my friends there, and, of course, the little ones who were helping my wife to blow the candle, I miss you all)

*Hey, Where was I? Those were supposed to be my birthday.

Thank you
*I hope there will be more pictures from Jakarta

Saljunya Kemana Yah?


#Ajeng, Yudis, Paksi dan Ardi


#Lia, Yudis, Paksi dan Ardi


#Paksi (bukunya hanya buat gaya)

(foto-foto diambil saat pertengahan bulan Desember 2005)

Choices and Constraints for Spring 2006

Choices:
-Special Topics in Econometrics (Spatial Statistics), Instructor Bera
-Advanced Econometrics I (Emphasis on Bayesian Econometrics), Instructor Koenker
-Computable Methods for Macroeconomics (Application of Macroeconomics with Fortran, C, etc), Instructor Nakajima
-Equilibrium and Economic Welfare (Microeconomics), Instructor Bullock
-Economic Impact Analysis (Implementation iwth IMPLAN), instructor Fesser


Constraints:
-IL. Counties Statistical Abstracts 2006
-Qualifying Exams
-Paper for REAL Seminar
-Group of Choices consists at least 2 members.
-If one of the choices is chosen, it goes to the constraints group.

*sigh, too many choices and constraints...

My Wife: Trouble in the Office

‘’just called my wife, and she has difficulties in the office.

Well, I don’t know the details of the problems, but if it is troubling my wife, it is also troubling me. Here, I’m not saying that my wife is always right, (one of the example of her mistake was her decision to marry me, hehehe) but I’m just saying that her opinions matter a lot to me.

Now, after years of teaching, she can’t teach anymore, or she can teach, but not in working hours; this is the new policy for her (What the fuck!!!). I know my wife like to teach, hell, I think she is better lecturer than me. She has the passion to teach others, but I only have the passion to give my knowledge to others. Those are very different concepts, the first one, for me, is better, because you are not only giving knowledge, but also give passion for continuos learning.

Anyhow, I’m very disappointed with her office. It is conceivable that in the office you have some rivalries, and you will be pressed by some of the officemates, including your bosses. But, taking something that already given for years, actualy since the beginning, when she worked at that ofiice, is plain barbarous.

This is one of the times I feel very guilty, because I can’t be near my wife, or near enough to tell her officemates or her bosses to fuck off. This is killing me.

Luckily, my wife is much better person than me, she can handle this kind of problems better than me. Her officemates or her bosses are just damn lucky.

*from the one who are dying to be near you

Self Pity

I never saw a wild thing
sorry for itself.
A small bird will drop frozen dead from a bough
without ever having felt sorry for itself.

D. H. Lawrence

*I like this piece a lot (It was used in G. I. Jane movie).
*Self pity is not for wild things