Adventure Nerd

This year is such a blessing for me. One of the reasons is because I met many kinds of special people. They are glowing in their own way.

I’ve known this friend only for 2 months approximately. However, we’ve already developed a weird but close relationship to each other. Her name is Yousra and she comes from Algeria (all the way to Indonesia for her undergraduate study. Are you surprised? Everyone is!). I met her by coincidence because of my team in World Merit. Surprisingly, we have many things in common especially in the way we see how things work (and then make jokes about it).

What I like about her is her great spirit for everything. She is such a girl on fire! Can you imagine that she is a new person in a totally new environment, but she is cool with everything? There are still some challenges for sure, but, I know she will figure it out somehow. You know, maybe because I have the same experience, I know how it feels being in her shoes right now, so it’s easy for us to get close to each other. Moreover, I appreciate someone effort to meet me amidst their busy life, because I do have a full packed schedule but if I care about something, then I will have time for it. Since sometimes what I need is just a little time to chat with friends, just to make my stories be heard by someone is a meaningful feeling for me.

Since August 2015, I join an international youth organization, namely World Merit. World Merit is a global platform for change makers, and the main goal of World Merit is to raise awareness about 17 United Nation Development Goals through multi-focus projects.

I am a founder of World Merit Indonesia for Palembang City Chapter. There are so many outstanding experience that I got by being a leader, a member, and a family of an organization. I would love to share the details about this in my next post ^^

On July 24th, my team and more than 100 other World Merit countries celebrated World Merit Day. In Palembang, not only we celebrated World Merit Day, but also did an Open Recruitment for those who want to join World Merit Palembang. In this event, we discussed about World Merit, SDGs, and played games. This was a game that I played in my End of Program workshop in Washington DC. Thank God everybody like it, and we had a good time together.

Moreover, the new members had to do “I Commit Photo Challenge”. They had to pose with World Merit banner, took a photo, and wrote ideas related to SDGs when they posted the picture to their social medias. 

I hope we can make a better and a bigger change for society.

I was interested joining ICT since I learned about ICT from International Student Orientation and ICT Kick’s Off. Several days after that, I was introduced to Indonesian Student Association in U of A.

Geographic Series: Indonesia was my first cultural presentation in University of Arkansas. Geographic series is a weekly event arranged by the International Culture Team with the goal of bringing an international taste of a country to the people in campus. This event was held in January 26th, 2016 and it was only 2 weeks after my arrival in the United States; even before I was officially accepted as a member of ICT. In this event, my role was to be one of three presenters to explain about Indonesia, my home country. Therefore, I was nervous and didn’t expect too much for the result. Thankfully, the room was full of people! And I did a good job as a presenter that night. Thank you Albert and Ruth for your guidance! Together with Indonesian Student Association (PERMIAS UARK), we were also served the students with Indonesian food. In the end of the event, I asked some of my friends who attended and their answers were great! Not only they enjoyed the food, but also they wanted to visit Indonesia.

Participated in this event made me realize that I love my country more than I knew before. When I saw people from other nations interested about my culture, I became excited and it was also gave my heart a warm feeling. Hence, I promised myself to participate in every cultural event as many as I could since I wanted to learn and share about cultures.  

During my time as an exchange student, I discovered my little hidden talent in music which was playing Angklung. Angklung is a traditional musical instrument from Indonesia made from bamboo. The different size of Angklung will produces different sounds. Since PERMIAS already has Angklung but there’s not enough players, I was offered to be one of the players. After practicing several times with PERMIAS, I had my first performance in Girl Scout Thinking Day at Fayetteville Town Center. I can’t believe that we were performing in front of more than 200 students! After the performance, their responses were amazing as they could guess the song title that we played which were Twinkle-Twinkle Little Star and Ode to Joy. They were also showed positive feedback because most of them wanted to learn how to play Angklung.

In March, I participated in International Woman’s Day arranged by ICT. This event was happening all day from the morning until the evening. In the morning, I volunteered to stay at the activity booth where people can make a gift card, whereas at the evening I attended the Recognition Ceremony & Culture Program.  And Woman’s Fashion Show was my favorite part of this event! There were various astonishing traditional dresses wore by my beautiful friends.

In addition, the poem performance with title “Phenomenal Woman” was made me freeze. There were still other interesting session of the event such as Panama’s traditional dance and woman’s issue discussion. The goal of this event was to empower woman’s role and as a prayer to the world that we don’t need to make this event again in the future when women’s role is equal to men.

ICT works together with schools to bring cultures to the students by making interactive events. International Culture Night at Owl Creek Elementary School is one of them. At that night, I was responsible for Indonesian Culture table, presented many cultural stuffs from ICT and some stuffs that I brought from home. We were lucky because ICT already had various stuffs from Indonesia! One thing that attracted children the most at that time was Congklak. Since we placed shining blue marbles at each hole. Congklak is a mancala game that usually played in Indonesia, Malay, Singapore, Brunei, and Thailand. Almost every kid that came to our booth played Congklak. We were also did a musical performance with ICT band, thumbs up for the Angklung team!

Not only for elementary school students, but also ICT presents cultures to high school student. Twice a month, ICT members make a 30-minute presentation about their home country to be presented for the students from Upward Bond High School. When I got a chance to do a presentation about Indonesia, I talked about the history, food, education, including tourist attraction of course! I wanted the students to have an Indonesian taste, so I made some traditional cupcakes, brought some keychains from my province, and invited them to learn how to play Angklung as well. My favorite questions from the students were “What can I buy with 1 dollar?” and “Why don’t you eat pizza regularly?”, haha.

One thing that amazed me in ICT is that American students often participate in other nations’ performances. Some of them join Japan Student Association, Korea Student Association, and also African Student Association!

To appreciate their dedication, there is also an event called “USA Day”. In this event there are some spots where each spot represents a state in the U.S. I never knew before that USA is also so diverse! I ate signature banana split from Arkansas, tried nachos and avocado from Texas, played trivia quiz from Pittsburgh, and many more!

Back to the Angklung team! I was honored to play Angklung at Crystal Bridge Museum: American of Art in their International Culture annual celebration! There were some areas at the museum that presented music, dance, workshop, and discussion. Our Angklung team performed together with Panama, Mexico, and Iran team. Each of us took turn to perform. There were so many people watching that made us nervous and made some mistakes while playing the song! Other than that, I was so thankful that each team received positive feedback from audiences.

Sadly, ICT banquet was my last performance in the Angklung team. We had so much fun together in that night but also emotional since it was the last meeting for members who would left U of A. And you know what? I couldn’t have been more proud because Indonesia won as the country of the year! Mbak tri and Albert also won as the most active member, which was so cool. In addition, I won a scholarship and a prize from ICT! What an awesome organization this family is!

                                                  “Disana makan apa?”                                                         “Ada nasi?”

Adalah pertanyaan yang paling ditanyakan sepulangnya aku ke tanah air dari negeri seberang ujung dunia sana. Untuk itu, dibuatlah tulisan ini untuk menjawab rasa penasaran teman-teman.

Sebagai penerima beasiswa yang (hampir) semuanya diurusin oleh sponsor, aku wajib tinggal di asrama di dalam kampus. Jadi selama kuliah (tetap jurusan Teknik Sipil) di University of Arkansas, aku tinggal di asrama kampus namanya Holcombe Hall. Nah mahasiswa yang tinggal di kampus kayak aku biasanya punya Meal Plan biar ga repot masak sendiri.

Meal Plan nya ada beberapa pilihan paket, ada yang 20x makan dalam 1 semester, 50x sampai unlimited alias ga ada batesnya. Dan aku alhamdulillah dapet yang unlimited. Bagi kita yang punya meal plan ini, kita bisa datang ke Dining Hall kampus di setiap jam makan tiba. Di kampus ada banyak Dining Hall nya, dan jam buka mereka beda-beda. Jadi rajin-rajin buka website atau baca poster yang ditempel di depan ruang makan biar ga sia-sia jalan kaki kesana, dan jam buka itupun kadang berubah, di masa ujian misalnya.

Terus sampe di Dining Hall, langsung makan aja? Kayak prasmanan di kondangan? Yup! Kamu hampir benar!!

Sebelum kamu menikmati makanannya, kamu harus gesek Student ID dulu di front desk nya Dining Hall. Student ID ini yang akan mendata sudah berapa kali kamu makan dalam semester ini.

Dan ini juga yang tiap makan siang buat panjang antrian sampe ke jalan-jalan diluar heheehe.

Mari kita jawab pertanyaan pertama!

                                    1.    Disana makan apa?

Ada banyaaaaaak banget pilihan menu di Dining Hall. Tapi jangan harap nemuin pempek, sate, gado-gado, atau soto ayam yaa. Namanya juga Western, mostly makanan yang ada itu digoreng, dipanggang, direbus, atau fresh. Dan please, catet. Tidak ada makanan berkuah. Makanya ga ada sendok makan. Adanya garpu, pisau, dan sendok teh.

Menu makanan bervariasi, tergantung waktu makan. Khusus untuk minuman yaitu kopi, teh, susu, air putih, dan soda itu selalu tersedia. Dan juga buah, alhamdulillah ya, buah. Anggur, apel, pisang, melon, nanas, dan pepaya juga selalu ada. Oh ya, untuk minuman, semuanya dibuat sendiri ya. Jadi sudah tersedia gelas, teh, gula, kopi, tapi ya harus buat sendiri.

Sarapan:

Yoghurt, pancake, omelet, roti goreng, biscuit and gravy, berbagai macam olahan telur, waffle, dan oatmeal. Bisa juga buat roti lapis sendiri, tersedia bagel, roti tawar, roti panjang, donat, bolu, dll.

Makan siang:

(Di foto ikut ke grid menu sarapan juga hehe)

Setiap Dining Hall biasanya ada satu menu khas sendiri, tapi secara keseluruhan menunya sama. Daging mulai dari ayam, ikan, ham (penting banget bagi muslim untuk nanya dulu ke koki setiap mau ambil daging), burger, kentang goreng, ubi rebus, pasta,

PIZZA (always and various tastes are provided), kacang hijau rebus, SALAD (ada banyak banget jenis salad), dan kadang ada beberapa pilihan menu Mexican food juga, karena Arkansas banyak orang dari selatan Amerika, kayak taco, nacos, dll. Masih banyak menunya yang aku ga bisa inget semua.

Desssert tersedia juga berbagai macam kayak Chocolate frost cake, ice cream cake, chocolate cookies, grain cookies, ice cream, brownies dan lain-lain. Oh ya, menu dessert kadang diganti-ganti. Misal di hari St Patrick, semua kue dessert dibuat warna hijau.

Makan malam:

Secara keseluruhan menunya sama dengan makan siang. Spesialnya, kalo kamu belum sempat makan malem dan Dining Hall udah tutup, gak perlu khawatir. Sebagai siswa yang punya meal plan, aku masih bisa tetep dapet makan malem dengan cara meal trade. Jadi jatah makan malem ditukar dengan satu porsi menu restaurant yang ada di kampus. Beda nya kalo di Dining Hall bisa makan sepuasnya berkali-kali, ya meal trade ini Cuma 1 porsi. TAPI JANGAN KHAWATIR karena porsinya juga JUMBO kebangetan untuk orang Asia. Ada banyak pilihan untuk meal trade mulai dari Papa John pizza, Burger King, Slim Chicken, Ozark Grill, dan masih banyak lageeh. Meal trade malah lebih disukai sama mahasiswa karena mereka udah bosen dengan menu di Dining Hall.

(Sekarang anda tahu kenapa berat badan saya naik secara drastis pas pulang ke Indonesia T-T)

                                              2.    Ada nasi?

Ada, alhamdulillah. Tapi ga enak kalo ga masak sendiri. Di Dining Hall memang ada stall khusus yang isinya nasi, pasta, dan bahan-bahan lain yang kamu bisa request ke koki untuk masak nasi goreng misalnya. Sayangnya nasi masakan mereka seringkali masih keras/setengah matang dan akhirnya ga enak dimakan.

                3.    Terus kalo mau masak sendiri, gimana?

Tiap asrama ada satu dapur umum. Basic nya sudah ada microwave, kulkas, oven, dan tempat cuci piring. Alat masaknya kamu harus sediakan sendiri. Tips biar hemat saat pengen masak sendiri:

-     Masak bareng temen. Bisa saling pinjem panci dan lain-lain

-     Temenan sama orang Indonesia disana. Namanya juga sebangsa setanah air, udah kayak keluarga

     4.    Kalo ga pengen makan berat, ada tempat jajan?

Yasss ada dong. Kampus juga ada mini market sendiri yang tersebar di beberapa titik. Pilihan bayarnya pun banyak, bisa Cash/Credit/Flix. Flix adalah saldo yang disimpan di Student ID mahasiswa. Di Amerika orang memang jarang banget transaksi pake uang cash.

Yang paling keren juga adalah, di kampus itu banyak banget kesempatan dimana makanan serba gratis. Jadi kalo lagi bokek, atau ga sempet makan, rajin-rajin aja ke Union atau cek email. Pasti ada event dimana kamu bisa ketemu makanan gratis hehehe.

Gimana? Udah kenyang?

Semoga terasa menu cerita nya yah

Ajaibnya, buku ini selesai saya baca saat adzan Maghrib mulai berkumandang. Kenapa ajaib? Karena suara adzan yang membuat Bujang, tokoh utama di buku ini merasa gelisah selama lebih dari 20 tahun. Dan ternyata suara adzan juga yang menemani saya menutup buku ini. Allahuakbar... Membaca memang selalu meninggalkan momen ‘wow’ buat saya

Buku ini adalah buku kesekian Tere Liye yang saya baca, setiap buku nya punya kesan tersendiri. Untungnya saya sudah menyiapkan buku baru untuk dilahap lagi, sampe rela tidak membeli barang lain dulu yang penting punya stok buku untuk dibaca hehe

Kebetulan selesainya novel “Pulang” ini bersamaan dengan momen pulang nya tahun 2015, Terus, apa hubungannya? Iya, alhamdulillah di tahun 2015 ini banyak mimpi saya yang terwujud, salah satunya mendapat beasiswa ke luar negeri. Berkah Allah SWT

Percaya atau tidak, mimpi saya untuk belajar ke luar negeri dimulai karena saya membaca novel. Awalnya dari Laskar Pelangi nya Andrea Hirata, semakin kuat selesai membaca Negeri 5 Menara dari Anwar Fuadi, ditambah karya-karya anak bangsa yang lainnya. Membaca bisa mengubah persepsi bahkan menggerakkan seseorang. Makanya membaca sangat penting buat saya

Dulu, sejak TK saya rajin dibelikan majalah dan buku bacaan oleh Ayah. Saat SD, Ayah memberikan saya bacaan setiap minggu dengan berlangganan Majalah Bobo, bahkan di kelas 5 SD jumlah majalahnya ditambah lagi dengan berlangganan juga Majalah Kreatif. Lanjut di masa SMP saya berganti majalah remaja, yaitu Majalah Girls. Di masa SMP juga saya mulai suka membaca novel. Setiap bagi rapor semester dan mendapat juara, saya tidak minta dibelikan yang lain tapi selalu minta hadiah pergi ke toko buku. Pun saat SMA dan tinggal di asrama sekolah, saya masih menyempatkan membeli buku walau hanya beberapa buku dalam 1 tahun.  Nah sejak kuliah yang semakin tahunnya semakin padat aktivitasnya kesempatan membaca saya juga semakin sedikit. Saya hanya bisa membaca 1-2 buku dalam 1 tahun.

Sayangnya sekarang jarang ada orang tua yang menanamkan minat membaca pada anaknya sejak kecil. Saya prihatin melihat anak-anak sekarang yang minim minat baca nya, lebih suka berlama-lama didepan gadget atau main game di warnet. Kecanduan teknologi adalah pengaruh paling besar menurut saya, karena membuat kita melupakan hal-hal lain yang lebih penting, salah satunya membaca. Saya pun mengakui termasuk orang yang kecanduan gadget. Ditambah persepsi orang-orang tentang membaca juga sudah berubah.

Namun sejak pertengahan 2015 saya bertekad untuk mengurangi kecanduan saya dengan membaca. Jadi saat-saat yang biasanya diisi dengan bermain gadget, saya ganti dengan membaca. Saat menunggu misalnya. Lucu nya kebiasaan saya itu malah masih dianggap aneh oleh sebagian orang. Contohnya kemarin saat menunggu dosen pembimbing, saya menunggu kalem sambil membaca buku psikologi. Ada beberapa staff di sekitar saya, salah satunya bertanya “Dek, bukannya masa ujian semester udah selesai ya? Kok masih baca buku?” . Contoh lain saat di kelas/tempat makan dan saya menunggu sambil membaca, komentar teman-teman saya “Wih, ketauan banget udah tua. Bacaannya berat banget” atau “Tuh kan, si Puput udah ngeluarin buku aja” Mereka Cuma bercanda memang, tapi bukankah agak miris melihat persepsi masyarakat kita tentang membaca? Kenapa kita menganggap membaca itu aneh?

Di awal tahun 2016 ini, adalah lembaran baru dari 365 halaman yang kita punya, Jadikan buku 2016 anda lebih bermanfaat, salah satunya dengan mulai membaca.

Tidak semua orang suka membaca, saya sadar itu. Saya pun kadang malas membaca apalagi untuk buku akademik. Tapi apa salahnya menumbuhkan kebiasaan baik sedikit demi sedikit?

Lewat membaca koran setiap hari misalnya. Atau mencoba setidaknya membaca 1 buku dalam 1 tahun. Bisa juga dimulai dengan membaca Al-Quran dan terjemahannya setiap selesai shalat Magrhib atau Isya. Percayalah bahwa membaca akan membawa anda pada pengalaman yang baru dan menakjubkan. Arti membaca juga berubah bagi saya dari waktu ke waktu.

Awalnya Membaca, hanya untuk mengenal Membaca, untuk belajar Membaca, untuk hiburan Dan sekarang, Membaca, untuk mengembangkan potensi diri Bahkan untuk tempat pelarian sejenak dari dunia yang terlampau berisik