Posts from the ‘EXPAT & EXPATRIATION’ Category
Saturday Lunchtime
As a Middle East expat, I think we work harder than other expats who work in a ‘normal’ world. Yes, we work 6 days a week and at least a 50 hour week. And our break day is on Friday, not Sunday like the rest of the world. However, we play hard as well. Not only that we can have exotic holidays, but we also enjoy treats every now and then. I am lucky enough that I get the same deployment as my husband, so we work for the same company and in the same country. However, that doesn’t mean that we lead a ‘normal’ life. We left our families and relatives behind. Even though means of communication have never been so easy, I bet they still don’t understand what kind of lifestyle we are having out here.
Nevertheless, I keep on sending them pictures, through MMS facility, so that it reaches them instantly in their mobile phone, telling them whereabouts we are or what am I doing or even what I eat for lunch. What I didn’t realize was that how often I send them pictures of my food:
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- Mushroom Burger with Potato Chips
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- Linguine Piccanti Con Granchio E Gamberi
“So it seems that you never cook, you are always eating in a restaurant…” that was a reply from my cousin.
Other people even wrote on her Facebook status : “Somebody out there, STOP uploading food pictures on Facebook!”
I feel embarrassed with that remark, and I felt like I had too many treats of eating out too often, if its not always. Yes, I have to admit that I don’t cook, and as we can afford to eat out. Especially our Saturday Lunchtime. We like to have a special treat, having it in a hotel restaurant. Currently our favorite place to eat is at the Cellar Wine & Tapas.
Interior of The Cellar, very elegantly decorated
A Mediterranean Tapas and Wine tasting place that is popular among the yuppies after hours. I will write more about The Cellar next week. but this is the food that we ate during our last two visits to this place.
Australian Black Angus Beef Medallions
Salmon Steaks on Green Asparagus and Saffron Sauce
And this is what we had today:
Mediterranean Seafood Mix served with Zucchini and Capers
Grilled Hamour Fillets on Sauteed Spinach and Lemon Cream Sauce
Home Coming Holiday
Ready to go
As an expat, one of the fun and exciting things moment is going home, no matter if it’s only for a few days or for a period of 40 days it’s always exciting. Yes, once we are there, the fun maybe only for the first few days, after that, it was only routine. However, this time, my going home holiday is a bit different and special; that’s because I haven’t been home for one and a half year, and also celebrating my Mom’s 80th birthday.
Yes, it was 1½ years since the last time I’ve visited my family back home. For some maybe that was not long enough, but it’s because there are a lot of things going on between that period of time that made me feel like I desperately needs to see them. As communication means is so easy these days, we talk most weeks, we text massage, we telephone and see each other most of time thru Skype, but the things that happens daily that I missed most of the time. My sister move in to her newly renovated house with my Mom that I miss, my brother got his own apartment that I missed this occasion as well.
Presents ready to be wrapped
I’ve buying a lot of presents for them for the past 6 months and I’ve been wrapping and packing them up for the last 2 weeks now, and I can’t wait to dish it out… The thing is as they all wrapped now, I need to remember each one of it what it was, as I’m not going to put names on it.
Presents’ wrapped
So guys here I come.
Media Sosial, perlukah?
Banyak komentar yang dilakukan orang terhadap mereka yang keranjingan sosial networking, terlepas dari itu sekedar memiliki profile Facebook , lalu Twitter atau bahkan blog yang lebih sulit dari Facebook. Pertanyaannya adalah: ‘apa perlu?’ terutama untuk mereka yang sudah setengah baya seperti saya ini.
Jangan lupa, sebagai manusia sosial kita semua punya naluri untuk mengekspresikan diri dan berkomunikasi, berbagi cerita. Penemu Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg, sangat peka akan hal ini. Itu sebabnya, menurut saya: Media Sosial itu PERLU, dan malah saya anggap penting.
Ini kronologi saya pertama kali membuka komunikasi virtual melalui jejaring internet:
1. Saya membuka akun Flickr, yang merupakan kumpulan foto-foto keluarga yang ditinggal (saya pindah ke Doha, Qatar); maklum waktu itu belum ada Facebook, maksudnya meskipun ‘jauh dimata, tapi saya tetap bisa melihat mereka’.
2. Dari koleksi foto kemudian berkembang menjadi cerita yang saya expresikan dalam bentuk Blog, maksudnya adalah supaya keluarga yang saya tinggal mengetahui apa yang terjadi pada diri saya.
4. Kemudian Facebook muncul dan dengan cepat menjadi trend. Sayapun membuka akun Facebook dan kemudian Ninstravelog Lenscape Photography, dengan harapan cerita saya bisa semakin menjangkau lebih banyak teman dan keluarga yang ditinggal, dan mendapatkan
5. Dari Facebook saya lalu memiliki profile di media yang lainnya, seperti Twitter, Foursquare, Instagram, Tumblr dan masih terbuka untuk terus bertambah.
Dengan memiliki banyak akun di berbagai sosial media, bukan berarti saya ingin pamer dan cuma saya saja yang ingin bercerita. Semua media sosial itu adalah interaktif; “Saya bercerita, anda mendengarkan dan berkomentar” sehingga mereka yang ditinggalpun bisa berkomunikasi melalui ‘social media’ tersebut dengan berbagai cara.
Apa hasil dari usaha saya tersebut?
1. Flickr: tidak ada respons, media ini kemudian menjadi tempat saya menyimpan koleksi foto saya tanpa ada yang peduli. Bahkan adik saya yang seyogyanya juga seorang Photography enthusiast, dia tidak peduli untuk melihat apalagi memberi komentar pada hasil jretan saya.
2. Blog saya berkembang dari mulainya hanya tulisan melulu, sekarang menjadi cerita dan foto-fotonya, harapan saya untuk menjangkau keluarga, relasi, teman dekat dan teman dari teman mungking, tidak pernah tercapai. Dari dua adik saya, hanya satu yang cukup ‘rajin’ berkomentar – dari hampir 300 post, dia berkomentar pada sekitar 20 diantaranya.
3. Facebook mungkin memiliki ranting sukses yang lebih baik. Saya memiliki ‘friend’ lebih dari 300 orang dan masih ada kemungkinan bertambah. Saya memang tidak banyak mempublikasikan komentar yang provokatif dan memberikan respons yang meledak. Tapi saya cukup banyak memberi komentar pada orang dan melihat profile keluarga/relasi/teman dan melihat kabar mereka. Terus terang hasilnya tidak cukup membuat saya sibuk dengan Facebook. Salah satu adik saya memiliki lebih dari 1200 orang yang membuatnya terlalu sibuk dengan teman2 nya, tidak akan punya waktu untuk kakaknya, Adik ya yang lain, anti sosial, temannya tidak lebih dari 50 orang.
4. Nasib akun sosial media saya yang lain, seperti Twitter, Foursquare, Tumblr, Instagram, 500px dll, tidak ada yang seberhasil seperti Facebook memang, tapi saya tetap berceloteh melalui media foto, media blog, dan bahkan melalui geotagging media, seperti Foursquare, Flickr dan Foodspotting.
Kenyataan yang sebenarnya:
Dari ratusan cerita dan foto yang saya upload melalui media sosial, rasanya tidak semua dibaca oleh orang yang saya tuju; meskipun begitu, saya tetap menulis dan berceloteh. Apabila terjadi sesuatu dengan saya, dan mereka yang ditinggal kehilangan jejak saya, sosial media ini legacy saya; jangan salahkan saya dan mengatakan saya tidak pernah bercerita….
Morocco Holiday
Finally I managed to arrange a holiday to Morocco, a country that I’ve been planning to go to for years. As I don’t have so much time to spend, I do what I did last year where my husband and I visited Syria and Jordan, using the facility of escorted tour. Unlike last year where we did it with Exodus Travel, this time we just bought a holiday package from Qatar airways. This is the map of our route, which I excerpted from Google map:
Excerpted from Google map
The tour called ‘Imperial City Tour” and it seems a lot of travel agents run the same tour, the same route thus, the route is no secret:
- A – Starts in Casablanca
- B – Rabat,
- C – Meknes,
- D – Fez,
- E – Beni Mellal,
- F – Marrakesh, and
- G – Back to Casablanca.
We will traveling by bus of about 20 people with multilingual guide that will explain us of the places visited. (you need to zoom out the map to see the destinations above)
I will try to post all the pictures I take along the way
view from the aircraft
photo is aerial view of Tunisia, which I did not know that Africa is green
Jamie’s Italian in Bristol
When I planned to visit Bristol after a gap of 2 years I didn’t expect to see many changes. So I was excited and glad to be visiting Bristol again as I remembered so many good things in the city that had impressed me especially the feel of being a university city, not as special as Oxford or Cambridge but plenty of students and some quality bookshops to enhance the city.
Other things to appreciate when visiting Bristol are the great and varied restaurants as well as a good supply of acceptable pubs.
This was only my second visit to Bristol so I went on the internet to look for a good restaurant. Yes, there are award-winning restaurants in Bristol and plenty of other places, which seemed equally good to add to my confusion. But then along the way, somebody recommended us to go to Jamie Oliver’s new restaurant. She said it was very popular, even on weekdays, you cant make a reservation because they have a first come first served system in operation and with the advice to come early.
In the end and with so many restaurants to choose from, we went to Jamie’s Italian Bristol, located at the top of Park Street where the famous Blackwell’s book shop used to be, which was within walking distance from where we stayed.
I graded the restaurant ten out of ten for menu, quality of food, taste, interior design, atmosphere as well as corporate branding package. For ambiance I gave it nine out of ten as the lighting is a bit too dark for me. But I recommend Jamie’s Italian in Bristol for anybody visiting Bristol for a great meal and a good night out.
Here’s the map:
Beautiful Hat
Horse Racing is not common in Indonesia, but as Arabian Horses are very famous, and living in the Arabian region, it’s hard not to miss that the Arabs are very proud of their horses, and one of the most famous competitions is the Endurance Race, when the organizer invites people to watch this spectacular event. Along with this competition there is another event involving horses which is the Qatar International Invitational Cup for Thoroughbreds at the Qatar Racing and Equestrian Club (REC). A week before this race meeting there is
Read more…
Camaraderie a la Indonesia
Ketika saya bergabung dengan perusahaan tempat saya bekerja sekarang kurang lebih hampir lima tahun yang lalu, saya satu-satunya orang Indonesia yang berkerja di perusahaan ini di Qatar. Populasi orang Indonesia di Qatarpun masih sangat sedikit.
Lebih dari sebulan kemudian saya mendapat seorang teman. Tapi karena jam kerja dan tempat kerja kami berbeda, kami jadi jarang bergaul, saya bekerja di “core office” sementara dia bekerja di “site office.” Dia pun memiliki shift yang berbeda, saya bekerja dengan jam yang normal, mulai jam 7.00 pagi dan berakhir jam 4.00 sore, sementara itu jam kerja teman saya itu adalah shift malam. Dia laki-laki dan saya perempuan (seolah-olah gender jadi issue besar), di Arabia, issue gender jadi masalah besar.
Kehidupan sosial? – ini yang sulit, Read more…
Doha for the Expat
You know you live in doha when…
- £50 worth of groceries from Mega mart fits in one bag.
- A packet of biscuits from Carrefore that have 3 different layers of packaging and are still broken when you open them.
- Your shopping consist of 7 items packed in 5 plastic bags where 1 will suffice.
- You’re not surprised to see a goat or Cheetah in the passenger seat.
- You need a sweater when it’s 26 degrees Celcius.
- You believe that the definition of a “nanosecond” is: the time interval between the light turning green and the guy behind you blowing his horn
- You make left turns from the far right lane
- You send friends a map instead of your address
- You think it perfectly normal to have a picnic in the middle of a roundabout at 11pm
- You know exactly how much alcohol allowance you have left for the month
- You never say Saturday instead of Friday or Sunday instead of Saturday anymore
- You accept that there is no point in asking why you are not allowed to do something because there is no good reason why Read more…
