The Modern Mall with Not So Modern Facility.

Brace yourself for my long complains!

I was accompanying my dad to meet his acupuncture doctor. It's a regular visit every three to four month, every time we are at Jakarta.

This doctor located inside a mall in the North part if the city. The mall is called Pluit Village, formerly known as Megamal Pluit.
It's a tipycal of second-grade mall if you compare it to Plaza Senayan or Plaza Indonesia. But that's not the main teason for the poor facility.

My dad doesn't have a strong pair of legs. Every time he comes to the mall, we have to put him on wheelchair.
And you know, people in wheelchair need the elevator to climb to the top floor.
Unfortunately, the doctor is located at the very top floor which is the 4th.
And today we found out that the two elevators are out of service. They simply just put barriers in front of the door.
So, we were trying to find another solution which is taking another elevator located inside Matahari. And guess what? Tadah! It is also out of service!

So, here we are in a megapolitan city of Jakarta. Where the service for handicap people is simply not provided at all.
And I wonder, how do handicap people in here go everywhere? I mean, they need to go out too! And with no support like this, are they supposed to just stay at home?

*long sigh*

The 85th Academy Awards.

"Those actresses are so slim and tall, make them look like the Oscar statue."
As quoted from my lovely sister. And it's true. Plus, their shiny dresses (what? metallic is back in trend?) even make them look like the statue!

My experience on watching The Oscars is not so loyal. If I look back, there are some years that I just didn't care. And the others, I waited through the whole tv time.
And I always fail at trying to watch it live, ever since I moved back to Indonesia. I can't help it. It started in the morning!

So does this year. I ended up skipping the whole live show. But--not because I was still in bed. It was rather hilarious. As I switched my tv on, I saw the black screen with a blue pop up window with words:

NO SIGNAL RECEIVED. PLEASE WAIT OR CALL YOUR LOCAL OPERATOR IF PROBLEM PERSIST. 

(Or something sounds like that. You got what I mean.)
I want to laugh out loud, but of course I didn't or if I did my mom would asked whether I'm okay or not.
So, I just ignored it. Missing the Oscars didn't make me sad or anything. I continued to pack my stuff for Jakarta's visit. But once in a while, I switched the tv on again. Guess what? It was still like that. *sigh*
Well, thanks to the internet and my friend who keep me updated of the winners, without the cable tv.

At the end, I managed to watched the replay of the Oscars at night.

For those of you who need infos on the winner, here is the list from http://oscar.go.com

Best Picture - Argo
Actor in A Leading Role - Daniel Day Lewis (Lincoln)
Actress in A Leading Role - Jennifer Lawrence (Silver Linings Playbook)
Actor in A Supporting Role - Christoph Waltz (Django Unchained)
Actress in A Supporting Role - Anne Hathaway (Les Misérables)
Animated Feature Film - Brave
Cinematography - Life of Pi
Costume Design - Anna Karenina 
Directing - Ang Lee (Life of Pi) 
Film Editing - Argo
Original Score - Life of Pi 
Original Song - Skyfall 
Visual Effects - Life of Pi
Adapted Screenplay - Argo
Original Screenplay - Django Unchained 
Sound Editing - Skyfall
Sound Mixing - Les Misérables
Short Live Action Film - Curfew
Short Animated Film - Paperman
Production Design - Lincoln
Foreign Language Film - Amour (from Austria)
Makeup & Hairstyling - Les Misérables
Documentary Feature - Searching for Sugar Man
Documentary Short - Inocente

Sorry if I missed out any. Please check the website that I included above for the complete list.
Although, I think I already listed out all.

"Native" : OneRepublic's latest album.

It's been a high expectation for OneRepublic's newest album. At least for me.
"Native" is the title of the album, and I've already listened to 3 samples of tracks. My reaction? AWESOMENESS!

The main single that just released is called "If I Lose Myself" and I love love it. Especially the instrumental part, it just sounds out of this world!
"If I Lose Myself" official music video

Another 2 songs that I love are: "Life In Color" and "Counting Stars".
You can find the sample of the songs from Youtube.

Now, I'm not an expert in music so I honestly can't give deep explanation about how their new songs listened like, what kinds of music influence, etc. All I can say is, they make GREAT music.

"Native" is expected to be released on March 26, 2013.

(image credits to Billboard.com)

Bread Pudding.

I brave myself to bake bread pudding this evening. This is my second time baking this lovely dessert. The first bread pudding that I baked was okay. I think it lacked in term of volume, might as well because I haven't bought the right oven to bake.

I simply just follow whatever is written from here:

http://allrecipes.com/recipe/best-bread-pudding-with-vanilla-sauce/ 

Turned out, my oven baked waaay longer than what the recipe told. (Well, as you know, baking time may vary depends on your oven.)
I think I had to bake it for at least 1 hour.
Then came the worst part. While cooking the vanilla sauce, I heard the 'ding' sound from the oven. So I rushed to check, got it out from the oven, put on the foil to cover the top, then put it back on the oven again.
I rushed back to check my sauce, and guess what? I left it for too long and it started to burn! I really want to curse at that time, because I hate when things go wrong! (Especially, with baking.)
I removed it from the heat, and tried to save whatever I could have. The sauce was now looking like a bowl of oatmeal or porridge *gah*.
So I have to strained all of the remaining sauce to get all the lumps out. Luckily, I managed to get quite amount of vanilla sauce.

Well, lesson learned; don't leave anything that is still cooking on the stove, even for a minute!

Other than that, my bread pudding with vanilla sauce is still edible. And the whole house is munching on it! Nothing makes me happy than other people are happily eating my desserts! :)

So, I start to blog again.

The last time I wrote a blog; that I could remember, was about 10 years ago. During my college years, to be exact.
At that time I was still in relationship with someone, had a lot of friends, a lot of projects, etc. Yes, it was the happy twenties. Of course, with all of that, there were so many things to be written in a blog.

Then came the one and only, Twitter. Ever since I'm using that incredible social media, I immediately stop blogging. In other hand, let's just say I'm getting older and lazier.
I feel lazy that I have to write more than 140 words.
I feel lazy that I have to do design and coding for the background.
I feel that I have no more drama to tell to the world.

Suddenly, my life become this boring.

But, that was in the past. What's the point of looking back? Although I admit, my early twenties was probably the best time in my life yet.

So, here I am. In my last twenties, counting months to enter the big three-o. And I decided, oh well, why don't I start to blog again.
Get ready for my rants.

:-)