Wednesday, July 28, 2010

flirting with palmistry

I had my palm read by a masseuse at the shooting location. Background story for non local advertising people: ad agency people are usually treated like royalties during ad shoots here. The production house pampers us with magnanimous amount of food and little perks like massages to keep us from being too much nuisance on the shoot.



The palm reader only allowed us to ask one question and he would read the answer on our left palm. As predicted, the singles ask about love and the non singles ask about money. Whoever says each of us is unique must be shot in the head.

I asked the palm reader this: will I ever be rich?

I honestly don’t care about being rich (though I don’t mind being rich), I just thought it was a fun question to ask in front of everyone. Not that I take palm reading seriously anyway.

He pondered for a while, reading my palm I suppose, or thinking up some kind of interesting fiction in his head that will be entertaining for us all. I really can’t tell.

His answer was this: according to the lines on my palm, I was destined to be a huge success, and that includes financial aspect as well. I will gain the success by working for a company, not by building my own empire. But, in order to fulfill that destiny, I must use all my potentials and at the moment I haven’t used up all my potentials, I’m not yet the best I can be.

Of course after that my co-workers and I joked about maybe I have to plot a plan to take over the company that we work at.

But jokes aside, I started to give it a little more thought. Not the bit about me taking over the company, I can barely manage myself let alone a company, but about how I’m yet to be the best I can be.

Because, on some odd nights when my mind wanders and thinks about what I’ve done with my life sort of thing, as opposed to my usual normal daydreams about how to access my alter ego in the parallel universe (I am obsessed about things like this, it explains my fascination with anything mind altering), I do think whether is this really all there is to it.

I’m not stupid, that I know for sure. I know I’m quick on the uptake, but I doubt if I possess any discernible talents besides sneering and coming up with killer one-liners to shut up people whom I find to be annoying.

Writing I suppose is my one and only strong suit. It comes naturally to me. It’s been my outlet since as long as I can remember. If I have the faintest hope of becoming successful (or rich) I suppose it’s got something to do with writing. I have zero discipline in writing though, just as I have zero discipline in everything. I only write when the mood strikes me. I suppose my inability to give myself a push is the thing that stands between me and my success. Well that, and an almost complete disinterest of anything outside myself.

In my line of work I’ve met lots of wannabe novelists, those who dream about writing the equivalent of “the great American novel” someday when they can find the time. Now, time is never a problem for me. I am one of those freakishly efficient people who can easily multitask and compartmentalize my brain. My problem is that I have yet to come with “the great idea”. I don’t know what to write about.

When I studied creative writing in uni, the professor told us that to come up with something to write, we have to break the bubble, be somebody else, experience life through other people’s eyes. I think it was the best advice for anybody who wants to learn how to write. It has also been my excuse to live several kinds of life and to experience extreme emotions, it’s some kind of research for my unborn novel, because nobody wants to read about a contented person who is thankful for everything.

Will I ever find something interesting to write about and will my writing be my ticket to get out of this life as a downtrodden corporate slave? I honestly don’t know. The bad thing about being totally comfortable living in one’s own skin is that I can really live with my shortcomings such as my complete lack of motivation. I have no problem with that even it does sabotage my future success.

So even though I believe the palm reader didn’t really read palms and that he just made things up from thin air, I believe that at that precise moment the universe chose him as a medium to speak to me, hence gave him the inspiration to say that I haven’t used up all my potentials. He was totally right.

Well I hear you, universe. Here I am religiously writing one post after another. Maybe it’s the beginning of something great, maybe it’s not. One of the good things about being comfortable living in one's own skin is that I never view myself as a failure, even if I don't achieve anything :)

Thursday, July 8, 2010

never too late to not be late


For us, lateness is a national disease. After all this is the country that invented the concept rubber time. I read somewhere the concept went way back to an era where most of people were still farmers, who viewed time as something fluid that flows like a river (huh???) rather than blocks of schedules and appointments to be filled. It’s the westerners who introduced the concept of “being on time” to us.

It’s so common here that 10 o’clock meetings start as late as 10.45. And the people responsible for that will stroll in leisurely, always blaming something other than themselves for being late. Now, I don’t want to be a prude here but I find that kind of irresponsibility really lame.

Blame it on my western education, blame it on my impatient genes (if impatience is gene-related like everything else these days) but I hate to be late. And hate it even more when people make me wait. And I never get used to the rubber time concept even though I spend the bulk of my life living here, in this country. I only lived abroad for three years out of the 36 years of my life so my “westernized” concept of time is not a product of my living abroad. I am just wired that way.

I do not understand people who are constantly late. Why? Because I always know when and why I am running late. It’s usually because I slack off. I wake up leisurely, I take my time sipping my coffee, I am enjoying my morning banter with hubby so much I don’t want to cut it off to get into the shower on time, etc. The point is: being late is a conscious decision. Unless an earthquake suddenly erupts as we are getting ready for work or for our appointments, the only thing to blame when we are running late is ourselves.

When I know I have a 9 o’clock appointment, it’s either I wake up an hour early or I cut those morning activities short to be able to leave the house at 8. Because I don’t want to be late. As simple as that. On the days I have no appointments or deadlines, I stop and smell the roses.

People blame it on the traffic. Now, how many years have we been living in Jakarta? Jakarta is always congested. Traffic is no news. It’s something that we have to anticipate. I have no car so I depend a lot on the undependable taxi service here. 80% of the time they never show. I know that. I have an option: I could take an ojek. Reliability: 100%. Comfort level: 0%. I will arrive sweaty and smelling like car mufflers. But I won’t be late.

So when I make that decision to wait for the freaking taxi instead of taking the ojek, I know I will be late. When I make that decision to wait for the freaking taxi, I am basically saying screw my schedules, screw the people who have to wait for me, because I don’t want to sacrifice my comfort in order to arrive on time. Because if I want to, I can actually arrive on time.

So moral of the story is: EVERYONE should be able to be on time. Yes, even those who are living in Jakarta. I can tolerate people who are late only if they have major drama in life: abusive husbands threaten to kill them, depressive wives hanging themselves or jump out the building, a dozen of hyperactive kids coming down with chicken pox at the same time, crazy ass mother in law chase them with an axe the night before… you get the picture. But the mortals, common people with common lives and common problems, should be able to be on time, like 90% of the time at least.

Now, there were times when I spent the night drinking and drugging myself into a stupor and there was no way I could make it to the 9 o’clock meeting. What did I do then? I quit my job to be a full time fuck up. That way, I won’t get in anybody’s way. That’s responsibility I believe. Now that I managed to get my act together, I got back on the game. And I arrive on time. And on occasions when I am late, I won’t blame anyone but myself.