Orchids’s peekaboo!
They breathe, we breathe the same air.
They bloom. We do, too.
They show colours. We do, too.
Theirs are bright. Would ours be, too?
Orchids
Tag: weekend
Good Day, Again
Good start, Beloved,
Morning with a good picture
Of love on a plate—
—-
Let’s start Saturday with good intension, to experience the day with no pretension.
Weekend is always good with books, brushes and kitchen. Hey, don’t forget the umbrella!
☔️
Cut This?
Cut this, he said.
Nope! These fruits don’t need slicing,
Not for fine dining.
—-
I miss places where eating fruit is the combination of hard work and excitement. At very young age, some rascal friends and I would just pluck some fruits from the trees —our parents called it stealing and lectured us for weeks, we called it adventure— then eat them just like that. We even peeled sugarcane with our teeth like powerful fighters. 😎
I’m blessed to experience that prime time. Trust me it sounds rather uncivilised but that’s what has made my generation more humane than my niece and nephew’s generation that has to use knife to enjoy the helpless berries. 😀
Happy weekend!
🥳
Javanese Coriander
To those loving pho (Vietnamese noodles) esp. Ho Chi Minh City style this herb is not something new. This herb gives unique strong flavor of herb in the pho broth. Some people say it is a replacement of cilantro (coriander leaves) but to me this herb can only replace cilantro in South East Asian food —at least in my limited knowledge and culinary experience. This herb is not the best in Western food which is mostly tasteless oops I mean bland…. Sorry, I don’t mean to. People won’t like their pancake or even sandwich with culantro. 😎
I bought it every time I traveled to Vietnam before pandemic and found it in a plant store around Ang Mo Kio yesterday. Good for the view. Good for noodle bowl. Good for the mood. 💚
Tickling My Ego
Sometimes I’m somebody
At a conference room
Where win-win
Isn’t always a solution.
Powerful—
Decisive—
Sometimes I’m anybody
When long lost friends
Suddenly say hi and cry
“Would you please help? Would you help?”
Unconditional—
Used—
Sometimes I’m everybody
When I blindly devote myself,
When I wholeheartedly do everything needed,
When I run around everywhere to find you.
Preoccupied—
Stand-alone—
Sometimes I’m nobody
When I feel my heart beats,
My breath slows down with calmness,
When I know nobody is with me.
Blissful—
Submissive—
Thanks, my body.
You’re a complete gift to me.
I dedicate the above free verse to Emily Dickinson who has touched my life with many of her poems especially “I’m Nobody! Who are you?”
🐣
Salaam.
Senses
What’s real, Beloved?
Sensible? What’s sense? Those five?
Or six? What if more?
—-
good time
Good time, Beloved,
Sitting silently, centred.
Grazing on the time—
—-
Life is never bored of reciting how grand a name when zoomed in and how tiny its reality when zoomed out. Oh! It is the other way around, tiny when zoomed in and grand when zoomed out.
What is your name, dear? Deer!
Are you a buck or a stag? You don’t look like one. Or, you look like both?
Go Jazz
Go jazz, Beloved
Improvise on your own path
Where hidden seeds grow.
—-
Jazz is like secret love, confusing and almost unknown at the first catch but wrapped in harmony through time… and space? Seems space never takes my side. 😎
Jazz each day up!
⭐️
Amazing Day
Amazing day, Love,
Completing what’s committed
Without supervised
—
Weekend is amazing with completing a pile of clothes. What a nice closure before Monday.!
Thank you, Life! I love hand washing and ironing. Seriously! As long as it is not a paid job. 💓
Welcome, Monday!
Money
Money
Count it
Save it
Spend it
…
Whatever wanted,
Decided
Through a nature
…
They grow together.
…
What a show!
It gives relief
And chokes
At the same.
…
Hey, Money!
You’re so genuinely
Mirroring me.
—-
One wise friend told us that money will not change a human being into a good one; it only resonates what is.
Look at Scrooge McDuck. He may be naturally greedy and stingy. When he has all those dollars and coins, he doesn’t even pay Donald Duck decent salary as an employee who is at the same time his relative. His money resonates his nature!
Look at Belle. She may be naturally kind and intelligent in a small village. When she becomes the wife of a rich Beast, she is kind in even larger society. Wealth resonates her nature!
Undeniably the only matter most people want to dive in after water is probably money. It makes life breathable they said. Hilariously true, paradoxical.
Note: Money, a non discriminative belief system that will either makes someone’s life truly meaningfully valuable or vaguely temporarily luxurious. Our choice! Remember that $100 here is $100 there, no matter what one’s ethnic groups, race, religion, age, gender, sexual orientation, political interest, etc is.
May all beings be happy.
Sunset
Sunset, Beloved,
Gliding, hiding in the night
Blanketing the day—
—-
Night and day are protecting each other, a complete package, a balance of duality.
Happy weekend! 😇
Little Bird
Hi, little bird. Befriend with your wings which look weak but bring you freedom. Befriend with your feet which look twiggy but hold you balanced. Befriend with your feathers which look light but give you warmth. Befriend with your eyes which look dark but show you pixels others can’t enjoy. Befriend with your tiny beak to sing only happy songs because sad songs are only for you when you’re with a trusted circle — hush! Untrusted flock will spill your sad stories everywhere to make themselves happy and feel important, and that will make you even sadder. Sing, perch, fly and enjoy your life responsibly freely.
Look, little bird. The sun shines brightly giving hopes to the heliotropic, while the air is yours through its pressurising differently every moment you move. Enjoy every second that you can capture, no matter what. Sing!
“I’m little bird, oh little bird in a short pretty life. I’m little bird, oh little bird in a realm of colours. I’m little bird, oh little bird, oh me.” 🪶
Have a wonderful weekend!
Salaam.
Singapore – Apr. 16, 2022 / 21:47
Touch & Go
Perfume, Beloved,
Won’t be enjoyed by blocked nose.
Eyes though see bottle,
But the fragrance goes away
Leaving no trace but the spray.
—————————————————————
Once I had a chat about “Touch ‘n Go” card of Malaysia. One Malaysian friend made what he called a joke “Life is like touch and go la. You touch then you go la. As long as you pay, it is ok! The problem is after touch and go, you realise you run out of fuel and there is no gas station there, then you are stranded in the middle of nowhere.” None of us laughed. He said “Alamak! You all don’t get it la! Boy’s joke, boy’s joke!’
Only today I can really get it. I should text him to confirm a fresh understanding. He must be happy receiving a message from a long lost friend who is now “smart enough”. 😁
I prefer not to live like “touch and go in nice cars” touching here and there for temporary pleasure then losing the ability to detach from irresponsible people who can only suck joy out from my only self through the excessively irresponsible exchange of memories. I prefer “going on foot” consciously although it looks less luxurious.
‘d only build precious memories with those reciprocally loving me and not playing touch and go 💝
May all beings be happy.
Memories, Scents and Elements
Calm breeze blows her hair,
Pulls memories out of head.
Filling the fresh air—
Water soaks flowers,
Distills their fragrance slowly.
Diffusing the scents—
—————————————————-
Weekend is studying, doing laundry, cleaning home, and listening to things. Cooking? Not today, I’ll skip the healthful food 🦸🏻♀️
Life of A Flower
It’s about flower in its life cycle.
A flower blooms, dries to fall off or falls to dry at time in place for a given moment. It lives then dies. It blossoms or prematurely drops.
Some flowers are admired, some are not even noticed. Some are vibrantly coloured, some are dead dull. Some are meticulous, some are straightly simple. Some produce edible fruits, some the poisonous.
It’s about flower, the beauty in itself, although most view points perceive the look differently. Absolute beauty sits where it is, lingering forever as values and concepts. Relative beauty fades away through aging, some even without being remembered as memory or history.
It’s about flower, the one in a palace and that in a lawn.
Salam. Alfatihah.
Alive
Treasure’s treasured, why
In tombs guarded by legends?
It’s secret’s secrets.
——————————————————-/
I’ve often thought that people living in this society is either living right at the bars or above the bars. It’s either we force ourselves to enjoy comfort that gives us uncomfortable consequences OR we comfortably enjoy whatever we have for comfort with just-right consequences. Today I learnt that there might be some super rich living in an area which “normal” millionaires here won’t even think as a good place to live. I read a news about a millionaire who in fact lives under their own bar with his family. Extraordinary!
So?
Ah! Life is just like that! There are choices to make and people make choices which (they think) they deserve.
Nothing is more liberating knowing that life still offers me wonderful news. It has proven me that life can be NOT-WYSIWYG. I would not imagine someone mistook my car as a grab car, while I were a super duper rich girl waiting for my friends to get on my Honda Vezel. 😃
Weekend, weekend! Happy weekend!
Alone
Go solo travel
Through blocked road, dead end
With fright, thirst and hope!
Trees will tell you where to go.
Sun will tell you when to halt.
—————————————————————
I (almost) always travel alone and I love it. It is not only business trip but also travel for leisure.
My first impressive adventurous solo travel was at 12 with my red mini bike. I would bike from home to my uncle’s home in a hilly district. It was about one hour ride of 7 kilometers away excluding all the U turns of getting lost in quite rough terrain in the route. I was excited doing it though because of nieces and nephews waiting to play with and the agriculture experience to enjoy. The up-hill biking to uncle’s home was my private getaway until my little brother insisted joining.
Another impressive solo travel of mine was in Bandar Lampung where I visited elephant and rhino conservation centres. Unfortunately the sweet young me was still innocent that people thought I was welcoming them; and I got sexual-physically harassed. Lucky me to be saved by a bus driver — wherever you are (maybe you away already because you looked like 60 years old when I was 26), you are blessed, Pak Supir!
And the excitement of the first impressive solo travel and the most dangerous one have combined to be a sufficient foundation for me to be a 99% solo traveler until now.
Traveling solo, I learn and improve how to cope with life challenges: languages, culture, human behaviour, security, etc. Yet I can enjoy the trips as I wish without having to wait for others moving slower or having to be dragged by others moving faster. It is almost always about excitement, freedom and privacy!
The bravest trip of mine was to Bangladesh in 2011. Plane touched down at 12am. Taxi waited in a corner that will be considered dangerous spot by any normal women on earth. Hotel was totally different from what was described online. Food was a bit below my hygiene par but I had to show my respect by eating with (fake) happy look! Yet I was truly happy to meet 3 new friends who hosted me with genuine hospitality (no fakey smiley like in some countries on earth I won’t mention); they brought me to city parks, mosques, slum areas, high end areas, etc in Dhaka. That was one paradoxically the happiest-saddest trip where I met the most skinny dogs and poor people right in front of luxurious houses. The most teary nights ever!
My smoothest, most expensive was 20-day solo travel in Europe: expensive flights, flights between countries, 1st class trains between cities and countries, taxi rides, good hotels, accessible public facilities, drinkable water free of charge!, good choices of food…. very little warm smile though. My favourite cities are still Amsterdam with so many Indonesians that warmed my soul and Madrid with so many handsome men that freshened my eyes! 😂
Do I still want to travel alone? YES! but not 99% anymore, maybe will be 75%. I have a small group of semi-backpacker ladies who will be best neighbours when I retire. So they might be my travel buddies when I want to share some itinerary with.
I miss traveling!!!
Next destination? I don’t know…. The virus has evolved from physical barrier to physio-socio-psycho-political block for me to move around! God bless you, dear Corona.
Happy Sunday home! Salaam. 💝
Do!
Balance, Beloved
Not about same measurement—
It’s the harmony.
———————————————————
Let’s be fair, dear Self. Are you 1 kg of feathers or 1 kg of gold?
Let’s be honest. Do you prefer 2-week laundry to wash or 2-week laundry to iron?
Challenging choices to be aligned with immediate happiness
🤹🏼♀️
Bl—dy he—❣️
The Director
Her life, Beloved,
Perfectly-directed film
Ready for Oscars—
————————————————
She sometimes forgets that life is a performed script in which she is casted to act out a given role the best she can. She should follow the director’s direction and directive.
What about spectators? She should ignore spectators. Spectators are stars whose job is to see and comment on the film. And they pay for what they see and comment. The payment goes to the stars!
So, dear Star. Fix your moves. Better your expression. Tag your ears with the melody. Live in harmony, with your own self like Javanese Bedhaya performers who are meditatively drowned in the sacred composition.
Oscars are waiting.…
…. Only if you play all out!
Heart and soul dancing through body 💞
Alhamdulillah 🌻
Cheese!
Be smile, Beloved,
A curve where warmth is contained.
Emoticon not—
————————————————————
Smiling is an activity which will be a habit and the skin of the owner if well trained. And so it can disappear when not practiced anymore.
Smile and smile and smile then she’ll be the smile itself. Smiling is watermelon juice! Sweet and fresh!
Happy weekend! Skip laundry! Don’t care about the mountain of ready-to-wash. Just smile!
Salaam….
A She In Words
A she, Beloved,
Is far and near, clear and blur,
But not true or false.
—————————————————————
Some people describe something so beautifully that others feel found and blessed. Those people are called the wise.
Weekend is rich with memes and kitchen; a bit chaotic with laundry and rain. Like a she she is! 🤩
All memes: from Pinterest
How To See The Self
Mirror on the wall,
I’m the prettiest of all?
It cracks up. Masks gone—
————————————————————-
Ah, weekends of mid December! Work is slowing down on several days. Weekends feel like starting on Friday morning. I have some longer time to talk to the mirror and find that I’m still there! A hidden innocent rascal nicely sitting behind layers of curtains
Masquerade on break!
🤡👻🤖👽😈👹👺🎭💩🎃👾🤠
🥰
May all beings be happy! 💝
Masa-Masa (A Song That Believes in Time)
Time’s a messenger
Telling her what is waiting
In every milestone—
Her comrades, trees and water
Read the signs to reach the home.
—————————————————————————————
Some peoples are born laid-back with all the gifts from Mother Nature. Life make them realise nature is as tough as it is rich and so those peoples shape their bodies as hard as rock, their muscle wire, their bones iron, their mind clear water, their intention straight arrow. Time is the witness. Time is Messenger. Time will not betray human beings who work hard and pray.
I’m thankful to be born in a rich archipelago and re-born repeatedly among hardworking peoples.
Weekend, Weekend…. Washing, ironing, cooking— repeated milestones, be patient.
🦸🏻♀️
Forever
A strand of white pearls
Harvested in the deep sea
Bedazzles her neck.
————————————————————
There is time when I regret of what’s done and nervous about what will happen. Why did I do that? I should have done this. What if I fail again? I am not good enough.
I used to think money was everything with happiness but I prove that money is the biggest illusion in life that I misunderstood. Now I consider money should be merely a tool, never a purpose. Yet I still think of what if my company stock price decreases? 😁
I used to look for happiness and protection in a relationship. With experiences I become strongly convinced that only a healthy relationship with the self can help me cope with problems; moreover, without healthy relation with my self any relationship with others won’t work well. Yet I still don’t heal from broken heart easily and still think whether or not I will meet someone I can share some simple happiness and shelter with.
I was between life and death situations more than once for some illness before, and so helpless about future. And gradually I realise that death can come anytime even when people are healthy. Yet I still hope I die when I let go of any confusion and live in clarity.
However, there is time when I know that only in the now I can accept everything. In the now I can shed tears with mixture of gratefulness for what’s breaking my heart and blessings of what’s boosting the quality of life. In the now I can smile just by seeing piling laundry waiting for ironing. In the now I can see the canvas is the door of self healing. In the now I can imagine sending a cake full of love for my loved ones who live in many different places, whom I cannot visit with many reasons. In the now I can see shades of real and true happiness in each and every experience from wake up to sleep.
Thank you for the now and now and now that form a strand of pearls called forever.
I live forever until the last now meets with the first now.
Al Fatihah to all of my loved ones across the oceans. I bless you happiness.
Salaam….
Just Be
Jasmine is jasmine,
White, fragrant, tiny flower.
It sits in silence
Never bothered by roses
That stun eyes with the redness.
————————————————————
No Distance Ever Be
Distance, Beloved,
Isn’t how far you’re from me.
It’s how soft the voice
Can reach your heart. These whispers
Slide through the space of the rain.
—————————————————————-
Have a good weekend! 🌱
Lily, Salt Or Drop of Ocean?
They gild the lily,
Making them salt to the sea.
Ocean in a drop—
———————————————————-
When I was very young, I could desperately envy those who were physically beautiful, intelligently wise and, spiritually mature at the same time. How could people be blessed with such full readiness to face the complex life and completeness to address its various issues? I’m sure I wasn’t alone; many human beings were on the same boat with me.
Yet getting older has helped me not want anything but more consistently feeling comfortable to be my own self and realising that those perfect people only looked perfect because they were perceived through imperfect eyes (my young ones 😉).
Proofs and revelation then taught me acceptance to live with limitation, imperfection and physical flaws. In many ways I’ve seen blessings in me more than the perfect.
Being ordinary has saved me from getting high demands to be a gorgeous woman who should move gracefully in front of the crowd, a pious person who should perform religion disciplinedly or a wise friend who should give good advices when needed anytime. I’m blessed!
Being ordinary has driven me to live with only two goals: to enjoy being my own self and to do what’s best in life to be as much beneficial in my short life. With not much to choose, life is forced to be the integration between persistence and dedication, a commitment of body, mind and soul.
Fortunately being flawed is like an ocean. Ocean is full of beauty especially the deeper the diver is willing to explore; like Captain Nemo who found beauty in the depth of the sea that wasn’t witnessed by those who never traveled in Nautilus. However, thousands of cubics of any possible wastes are also dumped to the vast water: plastics, oil, waste water, many kinds of garbage and probably millions of memories drawn by broken hearts. A perfect beauty full with paradox!
Rumi reminds through one of his verses “You are not a drop in the ocean; you are the entire ocean in a drop”. A perfection in imperfection—
Truly an existence is perfect when with natural flaws and complete acceptance.
Nothing is more blessed than accepting one’s own self and taking care of one along the journey.
Summary of today’s conversation with my best friend 🐣
May all beings be happy 💝
Make Peace
Make peace, Beloved,
With the softest anger in.
Growing peaceful stars—
—————————————————-
🌱
Weekend, bring the peace intact.
Salaam 🙏🏼
Moment
Moment, Beloved
The breeze before falling rain
Greets the earth. A joy—
—————————————————————
Moment is when an experience gets clicked with all senses, falls on to the right-chosen meanings, stays for a longer time.
Yet each moment should vanish, fade away, blend into pixels of maturity in someone’s life. It will be forgiven, might be forgotten, must be learnt as life lessons. How delicious this life is for those who are willing to appreciate both shade and light. How beautiful life is as it is composed by millions of pixels of different experiences whose essence is memorable.
The more experience, the better? Yes, only when its essence is memorable. Its essence is memorable only when all senses are capturing the experience and reflecting it through lesson learnt. Or else, it is just motion gone with the tick-tock of a clock— not forgiven, not forgotten, no learnt-lesson.
Walking through the lanes around Masjid Sultan, sitting at the verandah of an old shop lot, reading new old-book from Wardah Books, drinking Turkish coffee, sucking the sweetness of kunefe, breathing the air right before the rain, hearing the warm chats from other tables are all motions which are waiting for the moment to disclose beauty before things end. The taste of life!
Weekend is always much appreciated through slow pace, to balance the fast-paced demanding targets that are relevant for a preparation before the next beneficial life journey.
May all beings be happy.
Alaturka Mediterranean and Turkish Restaurant, gonna be back again (and again) 🥇
Breathe The Life
Flow to the ocean,
Swim in the sea of blessings.
Experience life.
—————————————————-
Who doesn’t like good smell? Not necessarily perfume, yet perfume is one most common celebrated fragrance other than food—
While many perfume brands provide the customers with their concoction of scents, there are two prominent brands offering different ways of how they sell their collections.
One brand is making the perfumes following customers’ taste or favourite scents after some discussion. The assistant will go in to their “lab chamber” and go back after a couple of minutes presenting a bottle of perfume as what have been discussed. I love the rose that I chose— some orange as too note with rose in the middle and no base.
Another brand is even more transparently doing it. They spread bottles of many kinds of oil that are categorised in 3 perfume notes: top, middle and base. The customers are free to choose which and how many percents of each of them they want to have in the concoction. To me it’s an interesting experience, making me think of how my scent last: light, heavy, long lasting or not. Once the customers decide, the assistant will go to a lab corner open to the guests. The assistant will measure and weigh how much of those 3 notes are wanted. Customers can talk to her/him and try on the weighed mixture before finally they are ok with the customised fragrance. Some minutes later….
Tada! A bottle of a “perfume signature” is produced!
Another interesting feature: customers are allowed to engrave a 4-to-6-character word on the bottle! For free!
It’s like experiencing “I hear, I know. I see, I remember. I do, I understand.”
Welcome, next week.
rike jokanan 
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