4 Best Ways to Spend Your Weekend

1. Just play lazy

You worked extra hard these 4 weeks. Your weekend seemed to never arrive. Finally, here's a weekend where there's nothing that you HAVE TO do.

Stay home. Don't shower. Order your favorite food. There's gojek now, right? Don't go anywhere. 

Wish I can sleep like her

Just sleep, sleep like a baby. 

Wake up, drink some water, and get some more sleep. Bored with sleeping?  Watch some TV, read some books, listen to some music. 

This time, no exercise!

If you're tired of being alone, call your best friends and have them over! Order some more food, and just have fun. 

Don't worry about your messy house, or that pile of laundry, nor the dishes for that matter. There's another weekend when you can clean up and take care of your apartment. 

2. Fun! Fun! Fun!  

Again, please do sleep as long as possible. When you're tired of sleeping, move on to the sofa and put on some TV, or watch something on youtube. You have that awesome smart TV connected to the Internet, right? 

Don't cook. Just order some pizza. Ignore your diet.

Take a nap after those big slices of pizza. 

In the afternoon, go downstairs, hit the pool and swim. Don't forget to bring that book you never finished reading. After some strokes, you can sit by the pool and read. Enjoy the breeze! 

 

I'm always happy whenever I can swim here. The water is soooo nice! 

At nighttime, play some music with your band at Q's Smokehouse, Setiabudhi building area. By the way, to get more info of an awesome band who really plays at the restaurant mentioned above, please like www.facebook.com/theweekendrockstars ;). 

The next morning, get up a bit earlier and go to church. After that, relax with your sister and best friends at Authentique French Bakery, Kemang area. Stay there until 3 pm. 

Go home. Call some friends, invite them over to have dinner. Make sure they bring beers that no longer available at the mini-market downstairs. 

Take a quick shower and put on your t-shirt and shorts. No make up. It's still weekend. 

Make some spaghetti and salad for dinner. It’s easy and won’t take much time. End the night with laugher, cold beers, and warm conversation. 

You are ready to enter another busy week. 

3. An effective one

You just broke up. Work has been crazy. You’re totally depressed. One thing to do: clean up your apartment!

According to http://www.metanoia.org/help/helpyourself.htm cleaning up might help with depression. Seriously! Check number 34.

Here's how it’s done:

Don't wake up too early you still need rest. After breakfast, clean up your place as usual, and wash those clothes. 

After it all looks clean, take that meter out of your drawer, and start measuring. You need to buy a new rug because the existing one is too small.

I really want this big rug, exactly this one!

Go to Ikea or Informa, which ever closest to your place, and which ever is having the biggest discount! Find that greyish big rug you’ve always wanted. Take a look around, maybe you want to buy yourself a new set of bedding. Treat yourself; you know you deserve it.

Before you go home, stop by that coffee shop. Reward yourself with a big slice of cheesecake and a cup of coffee.

Treating yourself is also on the metanoia list, check number 17 *excuse, excuse, excuse. Girls!*

The next day, after church, go visit your family. You might break up with a boyfriend, but you can’t break up with family. Buy your nieces and nephews some ice cream. They’ll thank you and you’d feel appreciated. They'd hug you and give you kisses. You’ll have some fun and forget about your depression.

4. Adventurous weekend

You just got your diving license. You’re planning a trip to the ultimate diving spot: Raja Ampat, Papua. You need at least 30 dives before the trip (50 is more advisable).

Call up your instructor a few weeks before. Ask if he’s having a trip on your chosen weekend. If he’s not, call up your diver friends and arrange a trip.

Pack up your diving gears. Don’t forget that deck of cards! You need them to play with your friends at night.

Take enough rest a night before the trip.

Get up around 5.30 am. Take a quick shower, the taxi would be waiting already. Go to Ancol, dock 17. You need to arrive around 07.00 am to meet your friends. Off you go to Pramuka Island. It's affordable, and as long as the visibility is good, you'd enjoy the experience. 

Dive! See all the beautiful creatures living underwater. Move slowly, embrace every moment. It's not every weekend you could do it. Have your friends to take pictures of you underwater (so you can put them on facebook and path). Have fun, and more fun, and extra fun.

This one is really me. 

The next day, after two dives, at 03.00 pm, sit at the back of the speedboat. Go back to Ancol, Jakarta.

At home, clean up your gears and take a warm shower. Eat some salad before you hit the bed. It’s been tiring, you really need a good rest to face a new week ahead.

My Teacher, My Idol, My Mom

Sonja Francisca Matindas

She was born in the jungle. Not in some remote location, but in the Jatinegera area of East Jakarta, back when trees still dominated the landscape. She was a strong, smart, talented woman. Sonja Francisca Matindas. She was my mom.

She had sparkling hazel eyes, a slim body, and long brown hair down to her knees. Her pointed nose, thin lips, and fair skin accentuated her beauty. My mom was a catch. I always smile whenever someone who knew her tells me I look just like her.

The word “tired” was not in her dictionary. She was always doing something. As a girl, she cycled all around Bandung. She was a member of a fencing team. Her greatest passion was reading. I believed we too (her seven children) were her passion. One more thing: she was a knife thrower!

My Opa in the middle.
Guess my mom learned fencing from him.
Wish I have the one with my mom fencing!

My uncle Billy, who was prone to telling tall tales, told us about a burglary that occurred when my mom was about 18 years old. Everyone was asleep one night at the house in Salemba (now the National Library) when a burglar broke in through a window. He chose the wrong window. It was my mom’s room.

She woke up, grabbed a knife (it wasn’t clear why she had a knife in her room), and threw it at the intruder. It lodged in the wall, right between his legs. He screamed. My grandpa, who was in the Army, came in with his rifle, cocked it, berated the burglar and sent him fleeing. I bet he was frightened to death.

After that, no one ever tried to rob the house again.  The fact that there was a knife-throwing young woman in the house seemed to give it an aura of protection.

My mom planned to become a doctor but she never graduated from med school. She fell in love with my dad and decided to get married. She gave up her education, her chance to compete for Indonesia in fencing at the 1964 Olympics and everything else to dedicate her life to her family. She became a stay-at-home mom from the birth of my eldest brother in 1964 until my youngest sister’s graduation from elementary school in 1990.

 

Mama & Papa

Despite being “just a housewife”, she was a fount of all knowledge. I am not surprised, considering all the books she read and the many translation projects she worked on in her spare time. There were translations for doctors, lawyers, engineers. Her work covered political, economic and social issues.

Another thing about my mom: she was a walking dictionary. When my sister and I were kids, we would sit in the living room, watching American TV shows that had no subtitles. Mom would translate every conversation with intonation, drama and even some gestures, moving my sister and I to laughter, fear and tears.

My mom adored reading. My dad built a little library for her books on the third floor of our house in Bandung. She collected encyclopedias, magazines, novels, poetry books, biographies, and history books. One of her favorite authors was Rudyard Kipling (my eldest brother's name is Philemon Rudyard). Yes, she loved poems and wrote many herself. One of her last was written as she lay ailing in an apartment in Singapore, waiting for another chemotherapy session.

Let me share with you her final poem:

Rejoice!

Rejoice With Life!

Grab hold of life with

both your hands

And hold it high up toward heaven!

Now try to feel it,

Try to taste it,

As it flow into your conscious body

Feel ev’ry cell

as it thrills to life.

She was very sick when she wrote this. Despite her illness, she still encouraged her children, her husband, and her friends to be happy and make the most of life.

My mom was a hard-headed woman but she had the heart of an angel. She taught me how to live my life with joy. Like a little girl who adores a beautiful movie star, I adore my mom. She was and still is my idol.

Makassar, 1959.

Matindas Family. You see my mom?