Snap snap!

Now this is something I'd never think I would do.

A colleague of mine asked me whether I wanna join her and her boyfriend to go prawn-fishing. Yes, fishing for prawns. And I thought you could only use a net to catch prawns like those fishermen. How more wrong could I be! And on a sunday morning we went!
The place was actually quite nice, its called Bottle Tree, don't ask me where or which Bottle Tree, or even what a bottle tree is, cause all I did was sit back and enjoy the ride.
And then we arrived..

To tell you the truth, it wasn't quite what I expected. A bit small, and we were on dry land. I imagined it to be a big park, with a big pond, and a boat to which you can ride on to the middle of the pond and do some prawning (?). But instead it was a small.. pool, with old folks circling around it with their fishing rods. And let's not forget the joyful screaming of kids playing with fishes and other watery creatures. So its not surprising that I was a bit hesitant at first, but you can't say no, cause that's the only reason you are there, and you don't want to let your friend feel like she wasted her effort to bring me here. Hence, the fishing rod in my hand.
After awhile struggling to stick the bait to the hook, and waiting for prawns to try to nibble on it, I find that this is quite fun. Surprise surprise. And what a thrill after you finally caught your first prawn, and your second, and your third and fourth! In the end, I was actually enjoying myself with the company of my friend and her BF. Then comes the part where you have to watch the prawn being cooked alive. That's sad. Followed by another joyful time when you ate the cooked prawn.

I promise myself that one day I'll go prawning again, maybe I'll take my soon-to-be wife and hopefully she can enjoy it like I did. I wonder if I can make a company gathering and do a prawning competition. That sounds like fun!
Sent via BlackBerry from SingTel!

A first time for everything

Well, okay, here's the deal. I’ve been living in Singapore for about a month now and I’m not yet adjusted to the way things are run around here. Sure enough I’m getting the hang of it. I have been to Singapore a couple of times, mainly for recreational purposes. This makes it the first time I got here to actually working and living. It is unsurprisingly quite scary and somewhat confusing. They have so many rules here! You can’t do this, it’s against the law to do that and so forth. I am well aware that Singapore is a FINE COUNTRY, where everything you do could be fined, as many of the Singaporeans like to joke out about this, but I never really paid any attention to it till I was actually living here. Can’t believe that a month back I was still living and planning my life in Jakarta. That one phone call changed everything!

It was Pak (Mr.) Omar that one fine day called me that he have read the resume that I sent out to the company where he works in, and agreed to hold an interview for me for the job that I was applying for. A couple of weeks later he called again and said ‘Following the interview we had a few weeks back, we would like you to join our company here in Singapore’. And as I hang up the phone I know there’s something big that’s about to happen. I realize that this could be the ticket out to a grand new adventure into the unknown, a chance where I can learn and really test me both professionally and un-professionally. This thing that is about to happen meant that I have to leave my family behind, my friends, my clients, my car, my house, the place that I use to hang-out, that food stall that I use to buy my favourite snack. This means I have to leave my life behind in Jakarta. It was a strange feeling of excitement, scared, happy, sad, all mix into one gigantic weight that I know I must burden myself with. A few minutes later I called my fiancée, telling her the news that I got a call from Singapore. I knew she had the exact same feeling like I did, don’t know how to react.

Now, a month into living in Singapore, still can’t seem to get that burden off my chest yet. But I am sure one of these days it will eventually disappear. Maybe if I start hanging out more often, trying to mingle more with my colleagues, and putting myself out there, I will make it go away. But that’s actually the hard thing right?