Holiday Blues

After the head-spinning delight of embracing my one-month holiday (squeee!) has worn off, here comes the inevitable question: Now What?

I sometimes find it unfortunate that I was never one to stay dormant for very long. Sure, there is the Christmas Eve party invitation and the New Year’s holiday in Bali (please read with a squeal of delight), but that only amounts to 7 days out of 30, which leaves me with 23 schedule-less, plan-less days. Infinite possiblities, but still, one must start making plans. Some of my random ideas while I was busy doing nothing for 6 solid hours today:

1. Do a culinary tour of Central Java.

2. Exercise everyday and get that perfect butt already (facing tough competition from No.1 above).

3. Finish reading all unread books on my shelf.

4. Teach English pro bono for underprivileged kids at the local mosque.

5. Read materials for my upcoming new job.

6. Write a complete memoir of my days at the palace.

7. Become a couch potato every Monday, just because I can.

I have always been good at planning. Whether I will wake up the next morning and immediately act upon any sort of plan is an entirely different matter. Oh and by the way, if I owe anyone lunch or dinner or a casual get together, now is a good time to remind me :)

Last Day

Today I finish working at the palace, and as I ride home for the last time my mind starts to reel back, sporadically. Outstanding moments flash up collectively like yellow highlights on a white page. Mixtures of different feelings welled up, a cocktail of sorts with the ingredients shaken together in a steel tumbler, confusingly. How did I get here? Gratitude, flattery, awe, confusion, and disappointment. They contradict, and they don’t care.

But! Ah, but the aftertaste is unmistakably singular. I could pinpoint it with the precision of a connoiseur. Because after everything else and more than anything else, I feel overwhelmingly lucky. Lucky to be part of it, lucky to be out of it. Lucky to have stepped out with flying colours. Lucky to have choices.

Then again, I don’t believe in luck.

The whole climate change shebang

Having experienced the Bali Climate Change Conference first hand for almost two weeks, I am quite at loss as to exactly which aspect of it I should immortalize in words. I am innocently awed by the magnitude of stakeholders. All these 10,000 participants are busy doing something for climate change? That can’t be right, methinks. I sit in a corner and watch colourful people go by. I’ve never seen such variety since I was last did the UN building tour, and I couldn’t help but feel a tingle of excitement. My subsequent thoughts, apart from those related to my work of course, can be eloquently summarized in the following:

- Quick! Get the free merchandise.

- I hate Caucasian legs. It is not true that human beings were created equal.

- Ooh, I need to take pictures with the people dressed as polar bears!

- Omigod. That was Al Gore.

Apart from that, y’all can read in the newspapers. I’ll just leave you with a few handy tips on how to mitigate climate change. Yes, you can do it from your own backyard! I’m kidding. Don’t worry, I won’t pain you with the change-your-lightbulbs-and-walk-to-the-office routine you’ve heard too much of already. One of the leaflets did catch my eye though and I thought this would be useful and painless to share:

Eco-Driving: save fuel and save the climate!

Rule No. 1: Drive smoothly at a constant speed

Rule No. 2: Shift gears quickly to higher possible gear

Rule No. 3: Maintain high gear and low engine RPM (2500 RPM max)

Rule No. 4: Coast a lot

Rule No. 5: Decelerate smoothly

Rule No. 6: Avoid breaking abruptly

Rule No. 7: Aniticipate the traffic, look as far ahead as possible

Good luck implementing that in Jakarta.