coffee and me

I know a lot of you guys love coffee so much. But not me. I know I have a problem with coffee eversince my mom made me drink one so I can focus on studying all night long when I was in uni. The fact is, coffee did make me stay all night and study well, but the caffeine also made me dizzy and nervous. But I kept drinking it everytime I had exams and I have to be honest those days weren't the best. Coffee makes me anxious; everytime I drink coffee my heart will pound real fast like there's this T-Rex trying to chase me down and I have to run as fast as I can or else I'm gonna die (seriously guys, go watch Jurassic World if you haven't). So yeah, coffee makes me jittery. I think it's just not for me. When I graduated, that was it. Goodbye. No more coffee. Forever.

Whenever me and my friends go out on weekend, most of the time we will always end up in coffee shop (read: Starbucks). But no coffee for me. Sometimes I just 'smuggle' a cup of bubble tea from next door, haha!

These past years, there are lots of newly opened coffee shops in town. It seems like people love chilling at coffee shop more than cafes or restaurants. They compete on their coffee bean, brewing technique, and many other things that I don't understand because I hate coffee. And again, people seem so into it! Even my friends would go to every coffee shop opened just to test the originality of the coffee (which when I try a sip, it all tastes the same for me LOL).

But here is a plot twist for you.

I crave for coffee now!

Interesting, right? I'm still amazed at myself right until this very second. Don't get me wrong, coffee still makes me anxious. Like A LOT. But it seems like my body needs the anxiety.

This Is What Happen When You Have Artificial Life

"A negative mind will never give you a positive life."
"Sometimes you just need to distance yourself to see things clearly."

These past weeks, I've been living a very dark life. There were no nights where I don't have nightmares. I couldn't eat anything without vomiting. In short, I was depressed.

Up to this very second, I still haven't known the reasons, but I did feel very anxious and stressed.

Then I learned a lot about how to deal with negativity, how to surround myself with only positive aura, and how to maintain the good vibes. It takes a while til it came to my realization that I've been living quite a fake life most of these times. And it's like toxic; spreading to my whole system and will end up killing me. I think I need fresh air!

"I been doing a good job of makin' 'em think I'm quite alright. Better hope I don't blink. You see, it's easy when I'm stomping on a beat. But no one sees me when I crawl back underneath. And if I go out tonight, dress up my fears, you think I look alright with these mascara tears? See, I'm gonna draw up my lipstick wider than my mouth. And if the lights are low they'll never see me frown. Oh please, don't ask me how I've been. Don't make me play pretend. Oh, what's the use? Oh please, I bet everybody here is fake happy too. Hey, if I smile with my teeth, bet you believe me; I think I believe me." - Paramore, Fake Happy

It's tiring to live day by day faking my happiness. And to make it even worse, the happiness standard is not even based on mine, but on the society's. Scrolling to my Instagram timeline just to see those people I don't know shared their #OOTD while holding a cup of coffee from the just-opened aesthetic cafe is definitely not adding any value to my life. It's like what we do nowadays are plotted and directed to be THAT way. Again, according to society's standard. Negativity is all around me. And I don't want it.

Who the hell are we actually trying to please? Why constantly check our Instagram just to see how many likes we got? Why setting thousands followers as our goals? I think they are all artificial. Who are the judges anyway?

So, here I am having courage to finally be able to step up my game. I have to go out of my comfort zone; a zone where I followed the society's rules just to be accepted. I need to just be myself and close my ears to other people's opinion. Peer pressure is more suitable for teenagers anyway, not for a 25++ year old like me! For god sake! But hell that's definitely not easy.

Let's make a change in life!

At the beginning, I actually planned to take a social media break. But then I realized, I'm still hooman with social needs, and I'm not (yet) capable to totally let go of my social media activities completely. So I came up with an alternative (of course after consulting with my 'Marjorie' (you should watch Moms btw, it's so funny!)) to create another Instagram account which will only consist of all the postivities! Close friends only, no those so-called selebgrams, no poeple-I-follow-just-because-she-followed-me-first, no irrelevant people! Now I don't need to think twice before posting anything on my own goddamn Instagram just because I'm scared of what others might judge. Such a relief! I know you guys won't understand. I know some of you even laughed at me. But one thing I know for sure is that I'm doing this whole positivity thingy for my self. I need to respect myself more. And that's the least I can do now to TRY to make everything better. Because at the end of the day, all I have is myself. So I gotta prioritize myself first. In my opinion, sometimes it's really okay to feed your ego. Because hey, it's our own happiness. No matter what we do, people will always have something to talk about us. And I choose not to listen to those BS anymore. I choose not to give a fuck about things that are not important for me.

As time goes by, I have learned that I don't need to be friends with everybody. I just need to be close with few of them who I found comfort in; who I can relate to; who give positive vibes instead of negativity. That's why I have decided to keep my circle small from now on (for both real life & Instagram life). For me, this is what I called selflove. I will only hang out with people who is chill enough to appreciate my the way I am. I have learned that I don't need to live according to peoples standard. I don't need to explain everything to everyone. I don't want to hear any judgmental and off comments about how I live my life. That's why I pulled myself out of those kind of people; those who criticize without knowing the real shit.

Like what they said, you only know my name. Not my story. You only see what I choose to show. Not my real life situation. I don't want to give more fucks to those kind of irrelevant people #IDGAF

It's been more or less a week since I started this 'new life' and I'm actually feeling awesome! Just so you know, I followed almost 900 people on my old Instagram. And my new account only has like 50++  high-quality real friends on my following list. I wonder how much times I have wasted before just to see those 850 people updating their life which are super irrelevant to me. Haha.

Keeping my circle small, my life has been lighter and brighter ever since. Such a happy life!!!

I know I can be inconsistent as usual, but at least this will do for now. For the sake of my sanity.

Yeay to positive life?

Xoxo,
Jess

#PositiveVibes

Laugh, when things get hard
Laugh, when things don't work your ways
Laugh, even when the heart aches

Laugh, when you're on cloud nine
Laugh, even when you're down in the dumps

Laugh, when you're jolly
Laugh, even when you're troubled

Laugh, even when it hurts so damn much
Laugh everything off, because that's the only way to make things better.

Diary of a Sleepless Child

In the early years of our life, people often ask what our hobby is. And my answers will always change over time. Primary-School me claimed cycling as a hobby, simply because I spent most of my free times after school riding my bicycle around the block. And, ehm... My achievement was riding bicycle with both of my hands up for 2 laps, lol.

As I grew older, my hobby evolved to reading. Why? Because instead of just cycling around the block, Junior-High-School me loved to ride the bicycle to the bookstore nearby. Then I will spend hours and hours and hours reading comics and novels for free! Don't ask me how, but I always managed not to get caught by security for silently unwrapping those plastics and hiding them under the bookshelf. (P.S: I didn't do it all by myself. My cousins were always there to cooperate. We were like the ultimate brats back then ;))

Then, entering Senior High School moment, I had more pocket money so I could finally buy and collect all the romance novels I love. During those period of times, my friends at school always borrowed novels from me (and some of the books never came back *cry*). I'm pretty confident to say that it was because I have bought almost every single novels in Gramedia. Among all the novels I read, I was really obsessed with this one Indonesian novel called Lukisan Hujan by Sitta Karina. So, moving on, my next hobby after reading is writing!

I went crazy over Sitta Karina, that I decided to become a writer! I started learning from her, re-reading all her novels for idk how many times, and finally trying to write my own piece. So far I have written lots of short stories, poems, random thoughts, 2 (unfinished) novels, and well... this blog. I continued to write til I was in University. This writing thingy is actually my most serious and long-term hobby.

Now, if people ask me what my hobby is, my answer will also be different. I don't think writing is my hobby anymore (you can already tell by looking at this long-forgotten blog), nor cycling and reading #obviously!

According to dictionary, hobby is an activity done regularly in one's leisure time for pleasure. To be honest, as what I have already mentioned before, I have no hobby. But, there is actually one thing I really love to do in my leisure time; sleeping! Hahaha. I mean, who doesn't?! In fact, all the shits you read above are just the intros to my main point, which is I love sleeping. 

Too bad, I have been lacking of sleep these past weeks (if not months). Last night, I didn't sleep at all. And the other night, I slept at 6 AM and woke up at 7 AM for God's sake. Don't say that I didn't try, I HAVE TRIED EVERYTHING TO MAKE MY GODDAMN EYES SHUT!! Well maybe not everything, I haven't tried the sleeping pills, and I don't think I ever will. 

I have tried drinking hot milk beforehand, drinking Tolak Angin, Actifed, Vicks Formula 44, keeping my phone as far away as possible, listening to lullaby (which is a bit scary to be honest, the melody was like some cemetery soundtrack wtf), I even tried this 'How to Fall Asleep in 1 Minute' method I got from Facebook. But none of those work! I'm getting a little bit stressed because of this sleep deprivation.

If any of you guys know how to solve this problem of mine, please do tell me! :(

I... Need... Sleep...

Sincerely,
The Sleepless Child

THINGS TO DO WHEN YOU'RE BORED AT THE OFFICE

Hi guys, I'm back! 

Today I'm gonna share some tips to avoid boredom during work time. If you happen to be a very efficient person who always got your work done earlier, or perhaps you're one of those lazy-ass employees, I think these tips are for you. (But, if you're the second one, you might want to keep it a secret from your boss, tho...)

 (https://ambikarani.files.wordpress.com/2014/03/boredatwork20.jpg)

So, let's get started...! 

1. Play with your phone. 

• Open those notifications that you've been ignoring for the past hours. Reply all chats and try to keep the conversations going on (trust me this is one of the most time-consuming things you can do!). 

•  Scroll through your Path's timeline to know what your friends are up to. Plus, if you're lucky enough, you might get inspiration on what to eat for dinner. 

• Stalk everyone on Instagram! And by everyone, I mean EVERYONE! You can start by scrolling through the homepage, make a stop every time you find something interesting, then don't forget to go back and continue the scrolling. Coz you gotta finish what you started, riteeee? ;)

• If you're on Snapchat, don't forget to check out if they have new filters. Take some selfies or videos, send them to your bestfriends so the 'fire' won't go away, and last but not least, watch all of your friends' stories! Remember, those stories will only be there for 24 hours. So every second counts, guys. I bet all the Snapchat Whores will understand this point very well. #VirtualHighFive

• And, the last thing you can do with your phone is.... Candy Crush! Haha. Sorry I know this is so last year. But you gotta admit that Candy Crush is the best escape when boredom strikes, huh? Yeah anyway, you can always play another games if you're not really into Candy Crush.

 

 2. Put your phone down, move to your computer, and find other interesting stuff!

• Remember those golden era of Facebook? Yes, during office hours, Facebook will forever and always be on its golden era! Just scroll through your timeline, read all of those click-bait articles, watch all those funny videos of dog playing with dolls, or fathers with babies, or whatever it is that suits you. Facebook has plenty, guyssss! Oh, oh! Let's not forgetting those friends who always post interesting status! Yay, gotta laugh 'em. I mean, love.

 

• YouTube! Who needs TV nowadays when we have YouTube? Don't we all love YouTube? So, let's get basic and start with some karaoke session first! Turn your speaker on, and... if your office room allows, SING OUT LOUD! Then, once you're tired or run out of songs, just open your Subscriptions tab and start watching all the new videos. (By the way, if you haven't subscribed to anyone, please please please for the love of God, just make use of that Subscriptions tab. Trust me, it will save you a lot of time. You're gonna thank me. So, your welcome.)

So, that's it. What do you think?

And now that I'm done listing everything, and the more I think about it, I guess my tips are not so helpful. Everybody does that everyday anyway. So... LOL.

I better run away. Ciao!

Xoxo,
Jess

K-Pop Fever

Annyeong~~!

 

Let me share you my current favorite Korean songs! Basically these songs are EVERYWHERE in Korea! Whenever I came in to any stores (drugstores, cosmetic stores, malls, restaurants, even the street food tents!), these songs are on their playlist. To be honest I'm not a K-Pop hardcore fan, I don't know the names of the members, and even if I know, I'm pretty sure I can't tell which one is which hahaha. 

 

But hey.... It's okay right??? At least I already have this special bond with all Korean-related thingy these past years. And to top all my obsession up, I finally made it to Seoul to listen all those songs fresh from the origin lol!!!! (I promise I'll go back to Korea again :))

So, let's start!

1. Apink(에이핑크) - The Wave(네가 손짓해주면)

(YouTube)

2. GFriend (여자친구)  -  Me Gustas Tu (오늘부터 우리는)

(YouTube)

3. Descendants of the Sun OST - Always

(YouTube)

4. Descendants of the Sun OST - You Are My Everything

(YouTube)

 5. Descendants of the Sun OST - Talk Love (말해! 뭐해?)

(YouTube)

6. AOA (크림) - Baby / I’m Jelly Baby (질투 나요)

(YouTube)

7. 4MINUTE(포미닛) - Hate (싫어)

(YouTube)

 8. TWICE (트와이스) - Ooh-Ahh (하게)

(YouTube)

That's all for now!!

What do you think? Do you have other K-Pop songs I should listen to? Please do give some recommendations, I'm all ears ;)

Cheers!

Xoxo,

Jess

Some Things Just Never Change

Annyeong~~! 

I am in the mood for writing these days. But frankly I don't have anything good to write about. As years passed by, I can now conclude that I'm not a good writer. I'll just bury my dream to be a writer then. Haha! Actually, I'm thinking to write about my holiday to South Korea last week, but not now.

So, I just scrolled through my Instagram feeds, and I found my post from 2014

Basically I just posted my childhood photo and jotted down 20 facts about me. Now that I read those list, I can tell that nothing significant has changed eventho it's been 2 years! I'm still the same person as before! Hahahaha. 

Let's review!!!

1. I have no hobbies. Coz I love doing random stuff. 

Also, no life plan, no passion, and no dreams. My life is pretty random in general.

2. I love pink, Hello Kitty, & cute stuffs; typical normal girls! 

And Brown & Cony, and Gudetama, haha!

3. I'm not afraid of cockroach.

4. My fave drink is Ice Lemon Tea.

5. Unlike other girls, I don't wash my hair everyday. Twice/thrice a week is enough. Because washing hair is kinda a pain in the ass for me. It's tiring and it takes me more than 2,5 hour to get it done. #HairProblem 

6. I can't live without my straightening iron! (which explains point number 5) 

7. I honestly hate jeans.

8. Punctuation mistake is prolly my biggest pet peeve. I once wanted to be an Editor just because of this! I love correcting sentence structure, spacing, capital letter, quotation marks, parenthesis, etc. But no, not grammar mistakes, coz I'm not yet capable to be a Grammar Nazi. Lol. 

Still obsessed about this. Can I really just be an Editor?!

9. I'm socially awkward. I'm not comfortable meeting new people. I'm neither an introvert, nor an extrovert. I personally think I can be both!

Haha, my current job recently needed me to act as a spoke-person and to meet new people everyday and greet them. And guess what, I always get stressed every single time! It's been 3 months and I still can't get used to it. But, on the other hand, I talked to some new people outside office, and they all said that I am a very happy person who can always cheer them up, always give them positive aura. They all said I am so 'heboh' and 'bawel'. Strange huh?

10. I'm very picky! Especially in food. 

11. I hate being alone. I can't eat alone. I can't go to the mall alone. I can't shop alone. I can't be home alone. I don't like doing things by myself! 

Update! Update! Yeayy! Since I live alone now, I am forced to do several things all by myself. So yeah, I can go to the mall alone now. I can also eat in food court alone. 

12. I have trust issue. I'm a paranoid and insecure person. Believe me, I can never trust anybody wholeheartedly.

13. To be honest, I can never enjoy the taste of alcohol (beer, liquor, wine, you name it). But I enjoy drinking AND DANCING! I guess you can call me a social drinker.

Lol, the last time I went to the club, I was drunk like crazy. It was a month ago; me, my friends, and my cousins went to Fable & Blowfish. We sorta club-hopping, but I actually didn't drink that much. I can't remember clearly, but I did puke a lot, and I woke up very hungover. But still managed to go to church after. Haha.

14. I never smoke. Not even when I'm drunk.

15. Sorry to say, but I'm very ignorant. Especially to animals. I don't find animals need to be taken care of. No offense, pet lovers. But I don't hate them!! Puppies are still cute hehe. 

#FunFact: I actually went to a dog cafe at Hong Dae, Seoul. Even my friends surprised because I hugged a Labrador. HAHA!

16. I talk 'unyu' in daily basis. I love talking like kiddies. Lol, I know I'm 23, but I still do it anyway. 

Uhm, 25 now. And still doing it. Sorry not sorry :')

17. I love giving names! Not in a bad term of course. I just unintentionally created names for my friends, then it spontaneously became popular! Haha.

18. I prefer salt / sour than sweet.

19. My parents are not strict. They allow me to do anything. I can go home at anytime, even at 3 in the morning! I can say that I have a pretty free teenage life.

20. I'm a happy-go-lucky girl!

To be honest, I think this list will stay more or less the same forever. What do you think? Sorry but I'm just uniquely me. I love not being your ordinary Jessica. I love being me!

Much love!

Xoxo,

Jess