Posts Tagged ‘fun’

So here I am, alone sitting in the deli’s corner in Menteng Central, mining my own business, which is really, and essentially consist of my diet coke, and sandwich.

In a sense, it’s  a heaven, a run away time, where I can do my own things, thinking only my own being and care nothing of the world and the works around it. And quite frankly, I rarely found my self alone, at least lately.

Usually, when I ‘m not hanging out (or spending quality time) with my girl, I’m always in a company of my mates, and doing nothing useful in particular, like taking a swing in the driving range, chatted on the coffee shop or walking around the mall aimlessly.

But situation changed, and I with some of us caught or occupied in the busy world of trying to make a living, I found my self quite lonely in so many occasion, which suffice to say, its neither fun nor enjoyable.

So here I am, again, alone, typing this sort of grumble, while flashing off my new MacBook Air.

If there is any consolation, well at least my sandwich is crisps and my coke is ice cold.

If people said that Jakarta is a mixing pot of Indonesian’s diverse cultures, then there is one food that can represent the mix better than any other food.

Hail the esteemed noodle (bakmie). No Jakartans will ever argue that along with Nasi Padang, Bubur (Porridge) and Soto, noodle is one food that comes in abundantly great variety. There is almost one comes from each Indonesia’s provinces in additional of other that comes with a cutting edge look.

Historically a direct descendant of the Chinese Noodle Soup, the Indonesian variety version was much more diverse in terms of noodle type, topping and the seasoning, thanks the centuries of acculturation with the local taste. On top of your head, you can easily name Mie Aceh, Mie Ayam Medan, Mie Ayam Palembang, etc.

Let’s recalled the Jakarta’s great three noodle vendors, the Bakmi GM, Naga and Gang Kelinci, all started from the rather insecure spot at city centre slum, and grew larger in to million dollars business and franchises. Though the three vendors deploy pretty similar form of Bak Mie and soup, you can always bet that there are people who prefer one better against the other.

Today, Jakarta noodle library are as diverse and as exciting as the international wine list. Quick Sunday drive to area like Kelapa Gading, will expose you to several famous noodle vendor such as Bakmie Tan (with its fish fried cake), A Loy, A Sui,  or A Haw, all comes with their own interpretation of how a bowl (or in same case a plate) of noodle supposed to be, and served along a bowl of chicken soup, and various topping (from chicken only, to mixed chicken-pork).

Order a glass of cold Liang tea (Herbs tea) and some fried wonton, and you will have your self a perfect Sunday brunch.

Any discussion about which one is the best will usually incite a prolonged and heated argument, without any conclusion. The content of discussion will usually revolving around the texture and shape of the noodle (thick, thin, wide, rubbery, soggy, soft, curly), the taste of the noodle it self (flat, salty, salty sweet, fish, prawnishy or simply tasty), the soup (tasty or not tasty) and the topping (chicken, pork, wonton, beef balls or porky materials). Price and place is usually discussed at the very last, or never entered the discussion at all)

At the end, as for the variety it involved along the ingredients in between, and like any other cuisine, it is a very subjective judgment. Good things that no body every fallen victim from this sort of discussion.

As for me, I like the Bakmie Tan’s fried thin fish cake, and Aloy’s Palembang noodles. But for the beef balls ultimate experience, A Guan at Lao Tse is the best. What about you ?

So, after more than eight months of vacuum, idyllic and absence mind, I am now returning. Not so much with a bang nor any expedited brouhaha, but with simple proclamation that my eight vacuum months, brought out some changes. Some of these changes also the reason why I’m not writing as much as it used too.

Straight to the point these are whats new and whats not

Whats Not

• Job -No surprise here, still work in the same company, still reporting to the same boss, and still doing the same thing (roughly) as I did 8 months ago. Very minor changes though, is that I am trusted with promotion on May, and with that comes bigger responsibility (and paycheck too
• Apartment – Yupppp, still standing tall and proud. I’m still living on the 27th floor on my downtown apartment, overlooking South Jakarta, still sleeping with open curtain so that I can see the city light and occasional star gazing. Again minor additional to the member of my apartment appliances is a new portable stove and boiling pan for some fun sukiyaki time !!!
• Girlfriend - Really not much to tell here.

Whats New

• Car – You got it right my friend, you got it right. I got rid of my 7 years old Vios ad with with the new Chevy Cruze in Black. Bigger car, bigger power, and just pure handsomeness on hands. Two months, and 3000km later, a new top speed record of 200km/h and two small dents on the hood and side body.
• PS3 -This is actually reason why I abandon my creative pursuit and in the 8 months. The result of much idyllic time during one of my annual leave, the console now occupied much of my free hours. But lets be honest, aside from suppressing my creative mind and wasting some of time, the console visual is feast for human sight. Also I think it provides some sort of release on my gf occasional harmful tendencies towards me ( She kicked my ass on Tekken6 9:1)
• iPad – My very first Apple product, enough said.

A lot of things is currently lining up, so I will have more to tell, when this things comes up into play in the next couple of weeks or so. Cheers.

Right, by default I should have said happy new year to you all my dear readers and post a writing about my past achievement and future commitment. But alas, I’m not yet on that level of narcissism nor pretend to my self that all of you care about what I have or have not achieved in the past one year.

So let me get this straight. Firstly, I would like to apologize because I haven’t been post anything in the last week or so, primarily because I have been away overseas, for some holiday and quality time with people that I care.

Secondly, that goes without saying, that my holiday hasn’t been dull, boring or anything like it. Not at all. In fact I’m about to show you some little souvenirs that I’ve obtained during my holiday, things that you might want to consider to obtain when you visit Singapore.

Thirdly, while I’m away and feasting my sight on deluxe good in abundant in the whole length of Orchard Road, I’m toying with an idea of developing several items that I would like but could not acquired. These of course will required some considerable research and trial/error but the result I trust will be worthwhile. In any case, I will inform you when the projects finally realized.

Fourthly, some new things to expect in weeks to come. The arrival of my made to measure Mario Minardi, a tailoring of my black suit, a letter head projects and some delicious recipe to be shared, including some that involved some spices that I acquired in Singapore.

Afraid not, I will assure you what about to come will broaden your perspective. Till the next post, I bid you good night and good luck.

Dear friends,

Have I ever told you ? That once upon a time, long time before I was banker, and sometimes in between my role as a chef, I was a graphic designer ? Well, not the best one out there but certainly a decent one. At the very least,  it paid for my living cost for quite sometime.

Anyhow, couple of weeks ago, I stumbled upon this website called fudgegraphics, and I thought, wow this blog is pretty ! And the best thing of all, the guy by the name Franz Jeitz design it himself. And then I thought, why don’t I redesign my own blog me self ? Well, I know it’s not going to be easy, but it’s worth trying.

And so I started the process by designed the blog starting by creating my own brand. Now quite frankly, it’s not that difficult, because already have something in my mind, I didn’t go through the usual process of logo design that I used to went through for my customer. Oh well, may be I did it, but in a very subconscious way.

The name simplenotch, comes from idea that once upon a time in your life, you stumbled upon incident that changes your life, or how you lived your life ? My blog exactly represent several  things that changed after these “incidents” (the long story will follow sometimes). This incidents represented as a notch, a mark that tainted your life hopefully in a good way. This notch, is more then just a mark, it’s also a stepping place for us to climb up the otherwise step and slippery wall of life.

So what ever thing that comes it should a have a notch, a chip on it, triangular empty space where it looked that someone has just whacked it with axe or something like that. I came out with various media where I could put the notch in (as you can see), before I finally set with a simple[n]otch. It was derived for [s]implenotch, but after a consult with my dear friend Mira of Shopaholic (who thought that the notched squared is to corporeity), we agreed that it make a lot more sense to put the [ ] in the [n] instead.

The evolution of design

I considered several typeface, including the almighty Helvetica. But considering that not many all pc’s have Helvetica in it, and not many people can differentiate the difference between Helvetica and Arial anyway, and even those Helvetica lover and Arial hater are still using Arial as a content typeface, I settled with Arial instead. As for the color ? Well, I simply love blue, but to put it straight, I intend the color to change over time, adjusting to the mood and seasons we are in.

The final logo, and its variation

Once the logo ready and I’m happy and satisfied with, designing the blog was not an issue. I used Artisteer to generate the majority of back script for the WP blog, but toning and customizing each design components quite manually me self. Including adding some script in the header and footer.

This is my first own designed WP template, so it’s a working progress. And yes, I’m pretty nervous when I uploaded to server. But hey, it turned out to be just fine !!! Sure, I did some tweak again here and there, and will continuously do so. So expect some changed in time to come.

So, how do you like my new brand and blog design ?