The Saga of P

Yeah don’t blame me. I get lazy, just like the rest of you.

But I want to try posting everyday, especially because it is easy to do now. No need to turn on the computer because the mobile phone can also do it.

In US & Canada there seems to be a craze about Apple products. Not here; they’re relatively unheard of, partly because of their outrageous prices. If I were to choose btwn a Nokia and an Apple, I’ll choose Nokia. Why? Well it’s cheaper and my primary use of a mobile phone is to call, txt and keep track of my busy schedule, and a $300 (last year) E63 does the job just fine (the iPhone cost nearly $1000 then, although they slashed the price since, to a ‘more affordable’ $750).

Anyway, just a short post in the morning. I want to try posting every day, but committing myself to such an action is somewhat tough.

Posted by Wordmobi

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Tomorrow marks 100-day anniversary of the new government led by incumbent S.B.Y. and ex-Indonesian central bank Boediono. Many people have expressed their disappointment in the new government, due to its apparent unresponsive behaviour towards larger-than-life issues, mostly revolving around the liquidation of ‘Bank Century’ and the near-capitation of anti-corruption agency KPK because its boss was implicated in a murder plot. Boy do they both smell like political and corruption scandals…

Large masses are gathering tomorrow, particularly in Jakarta (but also in other major cities around Indonesia) to protest against the presidency. Roads will be blocked. The police will be concentrated in likely points of demonstration gatherings, which almost always include the building of the people’s assembly (MPR/DPR).

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But really, how effective are these protests and riots? Before independence of Indonesia, sure, the young men and women who hold higher education are the ones who realize that people must be freed from oppression of the Dutch invaders. But now that we are free people, we have a different front that we must put ourselves to combat against.

It is no longer in the field of politics. As far as politics is concerned in this country, there will always be corruption, collusion and nepotism, at least until there are enough competent people to fill in those positions. That will happen eventually. However, to produce competent people in the first place, there is one thing that must occur first. The me-first mentality has to stop. The answer is provided by religion. As in, really really trying to understand what one’s purpose in the world, instead of becoming a slave to money.

Then these will follow:

1. The economy must be strengthened, as more people share and more people can buy the things they actually need
2. Education will become better
3. The next generation will, through education, recognize the good that the country has given them, particularly through better education backed by strong economy
4. Government people, as new generations fill in the gaps left by older generations, will become progressively cleaner

Protests and riots are not going to help in any of these steps. What people must do is go back to your factories, offices and colleges. Particularly university students; you are STUDENTS. Your job is to STUDY.

A Malaysian minister once said, “We (government) are the agents of change, not students. Students must do what they are supposed to do: STUDY.”

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So my message to anyone who will go down to the streets tomorrow: Don’t. It will not do anyone good – you will only cause more disruption in the economy, by blocking roads that are supposed to be available for commerce. Instead, go to your college as usual. Go to work as usual. And do it all as though you are doing it for God. Because that is the only way you can actually contribute to your country: ora et labora. Pray and work hard.

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If I know you and you have a blog, chances are I have already read your blog at some point in the past. During lunch time when at the office, I often visit blogs that express the owner’s intellectual thoughts… that includes his/her complaints, written-on-the-spot poems, pictures, ideologies, and so on.

Most of the time I don’t leave comments. Not because I’m afraid that my opinion will be criticized or toasted, but more often because it requires me to log in (I know, stupid reason, but these days I can’t survive without a password manager).

So when I heard about Facebook opening their authentication function to external apps, I’m happy. While there has been a standardized login framework (since 2005, I think?), adoption by mainstream users has been somewhat slow IMO (really, how many of you log on to Facebook using an OpenID? Or have you heard about it at all?). On the other hand, Facebook Connect will probably become more successful rapidly than OpenID, since it builds on a concept that is already familiar.

Anyway, just a thought.

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I have not written much as of late. Well, I could write about current affairs happening in my country and my current site, but sometimes I don’t want to think about it, for one or other reasons.

I stopped watching the local news about ‘Bank Century’ investigation some time ago; watching it will only frustrate me, I thought. Why? Well, it is just another display of politics and corruption at work. I have not even heard of a bank named ‘Century’ until this case unraveled. And I can’t help but think how ironic that the people ‘up above’ in the government are busy trying to find out who can be blamed for the sizeable amount of missing money, the people ‘down below’, people like the farmers, construction workers, artisans, and other people are living below poverty line on a day-to-day basis. I just can’t bear the thought of that.

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Actually, one I can write about is the death of Gus Dur, our former president of Indonesia. I felt sad for his leaving us forever. After all, he is a pioneer of modern thoughts in Indonesia. Because of him, Indonesia finally reached a new height in democracy, especially when we are talking about minorities.

I am of a Chinese descent, and I am also a Protestant Christian, which makes me a minority of minorities, even in my immediate family. Sometimes I feel sad when some people around me (fellow Chinese descents) make bad remarks about ‘pribumi’, although I do understand why they feel that way. But the point is,… I don’t want to feel that way. I grew up in Indonesia, and I want to love this country.

Gus Dur made it possible. That’s why his death shook me, even if only a little (I was in hospital recovering from dengue fever when the news broke).

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So what do I do in the meantime, when out of work? Well, for one thing, this blog can now be viewed on a mobile site (try it and let me know if it works well for you). Also tried implementing a single-sign-on connection to Facebook (ah, who isn’t connected to Facebook these days? Most readers of this entry will probably read it on Facebook, not my own page. Surprise, surprise.) so that if for some reason you decided to comment directly on my blog, you can do so using your Facebook account! No more Captcha tests! Woohoo! But it’s not working yet so it will have to wait What’s already working, albeit not thoroughly tested yet, is the ability for my blog to copy comments straight off Facebook comments.

I probably will not be updating this blog as often as before; I want to focus more on Coding by the Beach, Life Lessons, and another (currently offline) side project, which I am actually spending most of my almost non-existent spare time on.

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OK, so I did not really sleep. I was (and still am) largely confined to my bed, because walking is either costing too much time, too much pain, or both. But I had to do something to occupy my programming mind. So after a phone call from my team mate this morning, I have kept the mail account and YM open just in case.

I get bored eventually, so I dozed off after ordering Filezilla to overwrite the Wordpress installation on my site (upgrading from 2.5 to 2.8.6, quite a version jump so I was expecting it to be somewhat tough, but it was easier than I thought). When I arose from the deep abyss of the weirdest dreams, the Wordpress installation has been completed, save for two files which kept timing out (fixed easily by increasing the timeout setting in Filezilla! Zip! Zip!) And upon reconnection with the database, it just works straight away.

In the spirit of new installation, I am going to deactivate wiputra.com and move my main personal blog here.

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