Doing chores is a bore for most people, including me! As they're no fun, I always try to find a way to reduce them. One of the things I did to avoid washing my large water bottle was by using it for 2 whole weeks. Can you imagine all the germs and organisms collected there? Ewww. Speaking of gross, I decided to check the water with a USB digital microscope in the hopes of seeing the little friends I had cultured over the past 2 weeks. I predicted that I will find many microorganisms and immediately wash my water bottle after the observation. Please do keep in mind that this was just a fun observation so there aren't things like hypothesis and variables. That being said, come and have a look at them:
Please pardon my Dad's voice :D
The first thing I did was setting up the microscope. The one I own uses the computer screen to see the results, as it doesn't have an ocular lens. Next I used an acrylic tent card holder as a glass slide with a pencil case underneath to make it horizontal. This was a bit difficult as I tend to nudge the pencil case around with my elbow, making the card stand diagonal again. Last of all I put a white sheet of paper under it to get clear results.
I observed that there were microorganisms and cat fur in my water! The latter was unexpected, because I never saw or felt a thing when drinking it. I also observed that the microorganisms moved away from the light of the microscope, seeking a darker area. However, the microscope is only able to magnify until 500x (half of the common optical common microscope) so I can't identify their species. If anyone has any idea what they are, please do tell me! As for the cat fur, it must be the effect of me kissing my cat too much, but it won't stop me from continuing to do so!
Located on the side of the microscope is a button to take pictures of the things we see under the microscope, but I couldn't snap a photo with it. Pressing the button will make the microscope shake, which will result in a blurry photo. So, I used my cell phone to capture my computer screen for a clearer photo. I know that the photo quality would've been better if I used the microscope camera, so please do pardon the lines you can see in the picture.
After I had a laugh at my disgusting behaviour, I immediately brought that water bottle to the kitchen and scrubbed and cleaned it like I've never before! In conclusion, whenever I feel afraid when I'm alone at home, all I have to do is remember that I have little tiny friends to company me! Nah just kidding.
Hey guys! I'm extremely sorry for not updating in a really long
time. I have been busy studying in the first half of 2020 and I just finished
Grade 11 a few months ago. With my main focus on academics, I didn’t find any
interesting topics to write for my blog, thus the lack of updates. Now that I
am on a short holiday from academics, I have time to join some interesting
online events.
One of the online events that I joined was an online infographic design
course brought by Tante Greysia Susilo, a design lecturer at Pradita University.
I don't know whether she has been planning to open this course for some time or
did she open this course because of something that happened in instagram.
There were mean comments from ignorant people about homeschoolers
in an IG’s post and comment section. There were a lot of different kinds
of negative comments, belittling homeschoolers’ mentality, lifestyle, and
social life. What annoyed me was the fact that they were all untrue and it was
posted publicly on social media. A lot of people could get the wrong image
about us! This made me momentarily thought about arguing with them online with
my homeschooler friends. Luckily, I knocked some common sense into myself just
in time. The decision to argue was a foolish impulse and it would definitely
make things worse.
However, we felt all pent up. My friends and I, were at loss for what to do. We definitely
couldn't leave this alone. Luckily for us, we got an advice from Tante Grey
that the medicine to ignorance is education. By educating,we not only help them
understand, but also channel our negative energy into something positive!
One of the ways of educating others is through infographics. Thus,
Tante Grey offered to teach us to make infographics. Our final project
would be making infographics which debunk misconceptions about homeschooler.
The online course took place in zoomland and lasted around 2
months. We met once a week, with a total of 18 homeschool teenage participants.
We were taught the basics of making a clear and interesting infographic: from
collecting ideas to clustering information. After every meeting, the students
were given a task to finish. Those who have finished the task would have their
results discussed in the next meeting. There weren't any strict deadlines, but
we were expected to finish them at a certain time, otherwise we would be left
behind!
First, Tante Grey taught us
the basics. There were a lot of simple details that could be easily overlooked
when making infographics, such as data placing. We often forget that we should
place our data according to how people usually read, which is from left to
right and up to down. Instead, we tend to put our data in areas where we think
they might look nice. Another thing about infographics is that there shouldn’t
be too many words. It should be quick and easy to read.
Then we were given our first task! Tante Grey started by creating a
mindmap with “Critiques Homeschoolers receive from the public” as the main
theme. The participants were asked to continue it with all the critiques we
know. Next,we were asked to pick a specific critique to focus on and make a
mind map of the solutions. We were advised to pick the critique that we receive
the most, as we would have more to say about it. I picked the topic of socialization.
It took me half of the day to create the mindmap, as I used google
drawings in google doc. I’m not familiar with it, so it took me a while to get
used to it. In addition to that, I made my mindmap with a lot of pictures.
These are proofs that I socialize with a lot of kids my age. As the pictures
are scattered in many different electronic files, it also took a long time to
find them. I was pretty happy that I advanced to the next step without much
critiques.
Once our mindmaps are done, the next task is to cluster or group
all the data we made in the mindmap. Sometimes the topic is too broad and we
had to narrow it down or choose a specific aspect of it to write about. While
clustering, we also had to design our infographic. These two must be done at
the same time to decide which data are the most important and choose the
appropriate positions to put them on the infographic. I didn’t have any idea of
how I should cluster all my data, so Tante Grey lent me a hand. She first asked
me to divide my data into several categories, such as my academic and
non-academic activities, my variety of activities or the frequency of my
socialization. I originally chose to focus
on analyzing the latter.
She then gave me examples of how I could divide my frequencies
into more categories, such as once a week, once a month, and once a year. She
also gave me a format of how my categories would look like in the infographic.
Once I have categorized all my data, all I had to do was put them
together. I used Canva, a free programme specifically for graphic design. I experienced
some difficulty while making the infographic.
First of all, I rarely make infographics and had little experience
in using programmes like Canva. Thus, I had some difficulty getting around.
Next, I couldn’t fit all the pictures using my format. Therefore, I decided to
change the format. I think I did a pretty good job at it, but Tante Grey said that I had to review my data placement again. I
told her my problem with the pictures, which she replied with an infographic of
her own XD. She used the same format with the same amount of pictures, thus
proving that it’s possible. Following the examples of the placement of her picture, I finally managed to finish my
infographic.
Next we had to ask for feedback. We had to show our infographic to
2 kinds of people: those that are familiar with homeschool and those who aren’t. I chose my parents for the first and my ex-school friends for the second. When asking for feedback, I had to
first tell them the message I wanted to send through this infographic. Next, I
had to ask if they received the message. Unfortunately, one of the reviewers
didn’t get it, but instead she thought I was telling about the variety of
activities I did for my socialization.
When I talked about this with Tante Grey, she agreed with my
reviewer’s point of view that my infographic seemed to lean towards the
variation more. She then showed me an infographic made by one of my coursemates, Vyel. I saw how his infographic
leans more to the frequency of socialization with the bar graph he put in his
infographic. Seeing the difference I decided to just change my title from
“Frequency of socialization” to “Variation of Activities for Socialization”
When most of us had finished our infographics, they are posted in
the instagram of my teen group @Teenspower.squad. As the infographics are
posted on social media, we hope that more people will be able to understand more
about homeschoolers. I think this infographic is also really useful when facing
ignorant people --- all we have to do is share these infographics as a reply to
their negative comments. As a person who isn't really into graphic design, I
found this course overall interesting. When I first started the course, I
thought that making an infographic is only about gathering information and
designing an aesthetically interesting charts. I never gave thought as what
made them enjoyable to read and look at. Through this course, I learned that there is more than just
pasting information on a template.
These are the end projects of mine and some others!
From January 11-13, a Linking Awareness Journey Workshop was held in Petlove Center, Jakarta Barat. My mom and I participated in the workshop to learn about how to communicate with sentient beings: humans, animals, and plants.
In the bright morning of January 11, people came one by one to register themselves for the workshop, which opened at 7:00. After we registered, each of us got a USB. The workshop was supposed to start at 9:00 a.m. but it didn’t start until later! Some of us chatted while waiting, and from eavesdropping here and there, I heard many reasons why people wanted to attend this workshop. Some were just curious, some wanted to communicate with their pets, etc.
Once the eager participants took their seats, the staff introduced themselves, and then invited the participants for a group photo session. Afterwards, the learning sessions officially started! As per the workshop’s program, the first day will be spent learning theories. We wouldn’t start anything practical until the second and third day.
I think it is important that we learn the theories first, because we need to learn the proper ways to link a sentient being and how to reframe our sentences. This will make linking effective and successful. These are some of the points which I think are really important. First of all, we should not feel anything, have any hidden agenda, or feel any ego when we link a sentient being as that would block us from receiving the correct answers.
There was once a man whose neighbour hit his child’s dog every time he got home from work. The man felt sorry for the dog and decided to link it to see if it wanted to be rescued. The dog’s answer was surprising. It didn’t want to leave its current home and guardian. The man was dumbfounded and couldn’t quite accept the result, so he took a photo of the dog and sent it to his friend. He didn’t give any explanation about the dog’s condition. He only asked his friend to link the dog through the photo to see if it wanted to have a new guardian. The man’s friend didn’t feel any pity towards the dog, as she didn’t know its condition. The friend came up with the same results.
Some time passed after the man linked the dog and one day his neighbour was fired. The neighbour was feeling depressed. The dog came over to comfort him. That was the last time the neighbour would see the dog alive; the dog died in his arms right there and then.
Feeling regret for having abused his dog for years, the neighbour became an animal rescuer. This was the “aha” moment. The dog’s mission was to save millions of other dogs, even though it had to sacrifice itself. If the person was influenced by his feeling of pity and re-homed the dog, the dog would have failed in its mission and perhaps, the neighbour would still be abusive to animals.
Secondly, we should not chase any validation of our answer. This classifies as an ego too. There are many sides to a matter and each individual might see the matter from different point of views. There is no wrong or right side. For example, when we ask an animal what it would like to eat, some people may get an image of the food;some may get the smell of it; some may hear the sound of the food being prepared, etc. It all depends on which of our senses are the strongest
Third of all is respect, respect, and respect! Do not force the sentient beings to communicate with you and always say thank you to them before or after we communicate. We should also ask the sentient being for approval in sharing the information with their guardians. Sometimes, they won’t allow it, as the info might make the guardian sad or guilty. In this case, we could ask them how we should convey the message. Re-framing the messages to the guardians is important here. I have an example which happened in real life.
One of the participants in the linking class, let’s just say her name was Miss C, owned a cat. Sometime in the past, her cat had 2 damaged legs. She wanted to amputate the 2 legs as soon as possible, because she knew that if delayed, it could result in death. The vet though, wanted the cat’s opinion, and so he linked the cat to see if it wanted to be operated. The cat only wanted one leg to be amputated, because it knew that Miss C had a financial problem and could only pay for one leg to be amputated. The cat knew that Miss C would do anything to get money just to pay for the 2 legs to be operated, and it didn’t want that. Besides, the leg only needs time to heal and return back to normal, even though from the medical point of view, the wound looked really dangerous. The cat didn’t want Miss C to borrow money for the operation and have unnecessary debt.
The vet reframed the cat’s words because if he told the truth he would encourage Miss C to borrow money instead of preventing her. Also, would Miss C believe in linking? She might think that the vet was delusional! So the vet just said: “It might be too hard for the cat if 2 of its legs are amputated at the same time, so I’ll just amputate the worst leg, and for the second leg, we’ll just amputate it next month.” Lo and behold, the leg healed by the next month! When Miss C brought her cat to the vet for a check up, the vet told her the truth. Thus the reason how she knew this story.
We also should not repeat negative information (things that are connected with sadness, guilt, anger, etc) because by repeating, the negative energy will continue to live on.
On the second day, we spent half of the day learning theories. One of the many things we learned was to make a power totem, which was a picture made out of consonants. First, we were to write a great wish of ours. Next, cut out all the vowels and list down the consonants. From here we are to shape our totem, and observe it. Changes in our totem may be a sign of our wish.
After a refreshing break from all those theories, we went into our classroom with all the tables and chairs pushed aside. Out of a sudden, the facilitators instructed us to find a comfortable position, whether it be lying down, sitting, or standing. No one had any idea on what we should do. Then, a meditative music was played for 45 minutes. The song was accompanied by someone talking, guiding us in cleaning our chakras and ridding us of any ego and hidden agenda. Most of us fell asleep in the middle of the song.
After the seemingly unending song finally finished, the participants were told to refresh ourselves and settle back to our seats when we’re ready. The facilitators asked us if we would like to share our experience or ask anything before they explain everything to us. The result of the meditative session was kind of hilarious. Almost everyone were lost and confused. A question that almost everyone had in mind was the reason behind our sleepiness. There were also words that we didn’t understand. I did wake up somewhere near the end of the song, but as I was sleepy halfway through the song, I was pretty much in a haze throughout the music and wasn’t really aware about what the guide in the music was saying. The facilitators then proceed to explain the activity we just did. They had to explain in utmost detail what each and every part of the music means.
In the first part of the music, we were guided to clean and get rid of any blockings in our chakras. What are chakras? They are turbulences of spiritual energy in our bodies. There are 7 chakras in total. Chakra blockings were mostly caused by negative emotional events. When our spiritual energies are blocked, it may prevent us in getting the right answers. Now it was in the middle of cleaning our many chakras that most of us fell asleep in. The facilitators explained that our sleepiness is our body taking a rest while cleaning up our blockings. This is very much like us wanting to sleep when we’re sick, as our body needs rest to heal ourselves.
The next parts consisted of us getting rid of our ego, emotions and hidden agendas. This will neutralise ourselves into only an observer. When we finally reached the step where we are to communicate with the sentient being, it was hoped that we wouldn’t be judgemental and will get clear answers. So actually, the activity we just did was linking!
The USB that we got on the first day consists of 4 versions of the meditative music. The difference between the versions was the durations of the songs. Their durations go from 45 minutes to 6 minutes. With practise, we shall be able to link faster; we may even be able to do it instantly. The facilitators said that they were able to do it anytime when they’re not tired, even when driving! It was already nearly time to finish the second day, and so we were sent home to practise to link.
On the third day, it was fully practical! All the participants were grouped into 3 groups, and we practised to link with both mammals and reptiles. Some of the participants were allowed to bring their pets, as long as they had asked the sentient being’s permission. When communicating with animals, we were encouraged to use our five senses. To assist us, the instructors provided us with different imaginary tools related to different senses. For examples, they asked us to use a “sheep’s horn” when we’re trying to use our smelling sense, a “clear pond” for our visual sense, and a “sea-conch” for our hearing sense. Every person is born with one or two dominant senses. If one or more of our senses isn’t strong, we might get the answers through other senses.
My most memorable from all the five senses was smell. My group practised it with one of the linking participant’s white cat. Our tool for scent is a goat’s horn. Some of the questions were things that she likes, dislikes, and of course, if she has any message for her guardian. After asking the cat a question, we were then to “hold up” the horn to our nose, and try to smell the thing that the cat answered.
When I asked the cat of her favourite things, the smell of cooked food and sweet perfume drafted underneath my nose. The cat also gave me the smell of something chemical as something that she dislikes. The cat then told me to stay away from smells like that.
During discussion time, the other members of my group said that she was hungry and wanted more food. One of them even got a detailed image of a cooked fish sliced in half, without a head and tail.
As we still had time left after discussion, the guardian decided to verify what we just got from her cat. She said that her cat was on a diet and thus she was hungry. The cooked fish was her breakfast this morning! The fish was sliced in half as the other half belongs to her sister, and she indeed doesn’t like fish head. She then verified the sweet smell as her perfume that she usually uses.
The next memorable practise I had was not a sense. Guess what? It’s shape shifting! Me and my group practised with sugar gliders. As sugar gliders are nocturnal animals, and the practise took place in the afternoon, it was actually their sleeping time. Right before the practise took place, the sugar glider’s guardian made them comfortable by putting the sugar gliders into a soft, fuzzy pouch.
When I placed myself in the sugar glider’s body, all I saw was the other sugar glider and the furry brown pouch that surrounds it. All I felt was comfort and I started to drift off into a nice comfortable doze......
When the practise session ended, one of the members of my group said “Do any of you feel sleepy?” Everyone in our group agreed. Even my mom, who was in the group felt as if she was rocking into sleep. I dozed off quite a bit in the middle of it all. I guess that’s what happens when you try to shape shift into a nocturnal animal in the afternoon.
After practising our senses, we practised to link an animal through a photo. This time, we did not do it in groups. Instead, we were instructed to find another classmate that we didn’t know before. As our partner didn’t know anything about us, there is a less possibility of them having any hidden agenda of us. Every partner was to switch a photo of the sentient being that they wanted their partner to link. They also had to tell their partner the questions they wanted their partner to ask.
I asked my partner to link my Indian Star tortoise. I wanted to know how he is now and if he’s happy to live with me. Originally, I wanted to bring him to the workshop, but I cancelled because I was afraid something would happen to him. I know that this workshop is safe, but I had a bad experience of bringing my tortoises to public places.
From the linking, my partner received that India is happy to live with me, and that he is surprised to have a guardian like me, who cares and loves a tortoise like him. Please keep in mind that I’m retelling exactly what my partner said, and that I’m not showing off :). India also reported that he felt dizzy and he wanted water. When my partner shape-shifted into him, she felt that her surroundings are hot and that her head feels heavy.
After linking, I could see that everyone had a fun and exciting conversation with their partners. Even after our facilitators told us that time’s up, almost everyone still kept on talking with their partners.
Once everyone is back in their seats, the facilitators encouraged us to share our latest linking experience. Out of the few stories that were shared, there were funny and touching experiences.
One of the participants retold of her experience with her partner’s cat. Her partner showed her a photo of his cat, and wanted her to ask his cat’s condition. Her partner didn’t let our any information about his cat except its name.
She described a beautiful & peaceful garden where the cat is in now. The cat also said that it misses its guardian. Her partner responded to this by saying “Oh, he’s already on the rainbow bridge.” This prompted her to tear up, but she didn’t want to. She treated her partner as if he was her patient who asked her help, and she definitely didn’t want to tear up in front of her patient. This is also proof that we can link the dead.
The facilitators wrapped up the event with a lot of thanks and a lot of encouragement for us to continue practise our linking and not to ever get our ego get into our way. Showing off would definitely block our answers. They also told us that in a few weeks, they will make a group chat for all of us to continue to help and support each other.
Out of curiosity, I wanted to know if the colours in nature are made up of different colours too. So I decided to do chromatography on flowers, using this website as a guide.
Initially, I wanted to use the flowers hibiscus and Clitoria Ternatea for my experiment. Unfortunately though, I couldn't find the latter and so had to walk around my neighbourhood to find for other flowers. There were a lot of pink flowers, but according to the website, pink flowers may not work well. In the end, I found 2 red flowers (Hibiscus and Maule's Quince ), red Plumeria and Allamanda.
Materials:
- Flowers
- Filter paper
- Alcohol
- Clear glass jars
- Spoon/anything hard to crush the flowers
- Scissors
First, I crushed some of the Hibiscus petals using the spoon in the middle of the filter paper. I did this to take the pigments out. I expected red to come out, but surprisingly, a purplish colour went out instead. It's kind of wet, so I left it out to dry for a while.
While waiting for the hibiscus colour to dry, I crushed all the Allamanda petals. I forgot to leave a petal or 2 out to show you the flower.
Next I crushed the Maule's Quince petals. As it's really red, the purple colour that came out was much stronger than the Hibiscus's.
After that, I crushed the red Plumeria. If you see the petals, there is the colour yellow, but no yellow pigment came out, only the purple one. It's not as strong as the other purples, though.
I then cut a strip from the edge of the circle to the pigments. After filler the glass cups with water and some alcohol, I dipped the strip into the water. Next up is waiting!
From left to right, top to bottom: Hibiscus, Maule's Quince, red Plumeria, Allamanda.
After waiting for half an hour or more, these are the results I got:
Hibiscus
and red Plumeria.
Maule’s
Quince and Allamanda
From what I observed in the experiment, the red from the Hibiscus was made up of purplish brown and yellow, while the red Plumeria was made up of faded purple, faded yellow, and brownish yellow. The Maule's Quince was made up of purple, yellow, and a tiny bit of brownish yellow, and the Allamanda was made up of brown.
Conclusion:
When compared to the synthetic colours in the previous post, the natural colours aren't as strong as the synthetic ones. The colours that made up the synthetic ones mostly true to their colours; red is made up of red and pink, green is made up of green and a tiny bit of blue. However, in the case of colors from nature, the colours separated may not be the colours we originally see. The red in the Hibiscus and Maule's Quince was not made up of red, pink, or any colours that are close to it but purplish brown and yellow.
The colours of the flowers were really bright, but when mixed with water and separated, I observed that the colours are dark and dull and it seemed to always contained some brown. Meanwhile, the synthetic colours didn’t change much; they still have their brightness and colour. This might be because the particles of the natural colours dissolve in the water, while synthetic colours are synthetically made to retain its original colour.
Recently, I learned about chromatography in my O Level Chemistry. Chromatography is the separating of the colours that are in a chemical mixture using water on a filter paper. One of its uses is to check if the colouring used does not contain any banned chemical.
There were 2 choices of how I could set up the experiment in my chemistry book, by using either a circular filter paper or just using a strip of it. I decided to use the circular one, because I have that filter paper. Cutting just a strip out of it would be a waste. It's also easier to set up for me.
Materials:
- Beaker/see-through glass
- Filter paper
- Food Colours (the chemical I want to experiment with)
- Markers (the chemical I want to experiment with)
- Ruler
- Pencil
- Scissors
First, I filled the beaker with water (around 250 ml), then dotted the middle of the filter paper with purple food colour. I then cut a strip of the filter paper, 1 cm wide, from the edge of the paper to the centre. Unfortunately, though, my dot was too big, so I couldn't use it. The water won't be able to separate the colours well if it's too big; I need a bigger filter paper for the colours to separate.
So I repeated the steps above, except with a smaller dot. I fold the strip of paper down in the middle and put the filter paper on top of the beaker, making sure that the end of the strip of paper touches the water. The water will soak the paper, and will move up the paper. When it touches the ink, it will separate the colours as it spreads out on the filter paper.
My food colouring has never been used for years, so some of the food colour around the bottle dropper had dried and became powder-like. Some of the powder fell on the strip, and when they got the water, they spread out as pink. You can see it in the picture on the right.
After waiting for around 15 minutes, I started to see a reaction. The first colour that I saw spread out was red, then a little bit of blue. This is how it looks like after I waited a bit longer, around 15 minutes later:
Next, I tried the red food colour:
I made the dot too big, but at least it isn't as big as my first dot at the start of this experiment.
This is how it looked like after 30 minutes:
The only colour I see in this food colour is red.
After that I decided to do several colour tests together so that I save time. Otherwise I had to wait around 30 minutes for each test to finish and I wanted to do a lot of colour tests.
This is what happened around 30 minutes later.
A closer look:
I wasn't satisfied with the colour spread of the blue marker, so I decided to change markers. This is the result of my second experiment:
Satisfying
I noticed that the edges of the colour spread vary. The edges of the colour spread from the food colouring are wavy, while the edges of the markers are round and smooth.
The colour spread of the green and brown marker, red and yellow food colouring is true to its respective colour. Green markers produces green colour, brown markers produces brown colour, red food colouring produces red colour and yellow food colouring produces yellow. Whereas the blue board marker produces blue and pink colours. I thought that this was interesting as I didn’t expected pink in a blue marker.I noticed that blue and pink/red appears a lot. I don't exactly know why, but perhaps it's because they're 2 of the 3 primary colours.
Why do different colours rise to different levels? This is because the particles of each colour have different solubility (how well they dissolve in water). Those which are less soluble and doesn't dissolve in water well aren't easily brought along by the water. While those that are more soluble dissolves better in water and are easily brought along the water as it goes up the paper.
It was pretty fun making this experiment, as I could see all the different colours that make up some food colours and markers. This experiment was also time-effective. I had to wait quite long for the colours to spread, so while waiting, I could do my other studies while waiting.
I recently enjoyed making simple desserts, such as cookies and pastries, following recipes from a baking book that I bought in the last BBW book fair in Jakarta. It's simple and easy actually. The only problem was that the recipes all creates an unpleasant "full" taste (eneg) and since then I stopped making those kind of desserts, as I still don't know how to make not-so-sweet desserts.
I was then thinking of cooking main meals, because the dishes all look interesting (like in Masterchef Australia :) ), but I didn't know where to start (even though I have lots of main meal recipes from my Mom) so I stopped for a moment, until I was offered a cooking course.
Here are some photos of me in Cooking class:
Here are the ingridients and equipments.
It has been three weeks since the first day of the cooking course, and I'm looking forward to every cooking class. Recently I was taught how to make French toast, different types of egg cookery, salad (with homemade mayonnaise and french fries), and 3 types of soups.
Left: Over-easy, Rolled Up Omelette, Sunny Side up, and scrambled egg. Right: French Toast
The eggs I made in the course.
And this is my salad:
I haven't remake the soups yet, so you won't be able to see it now :).
I went to the Big Bad Wolf book sale and bought several books. It's not as much as the last one, because I came there on the last day and only try to find the "gem among the dirt". One of the books I bought was "Baking". At that time it was past lunchtime and I passed the food category, so I stopped by and saw that book, so I felt that I really have to buy that book. I promised one of my friends that I'll bake something and bring it to her, so I baked these cookies yesterday morning.
They are originally called "Jumbo Chocolate Fudge Cookies" by the book, but I renamed them as "Cashew Choco Cookies", as I changed the white chocolate into cashew nuts.
This is their original recipe:
I baked half of the ingredients first so that if I fail, I won't waste that much. From that half amount of the recipe, I still reduced the amount of the chocolate and sugar so that it won't be too sweet,
My mom helped me with the preparations. It took almost 2 hours, and baking took almost half of the day :D.
Actually,
this isn’t my original private project idea. I was interested with getuk, since
the one shown to me in the peyek home industry. At that time, I didn’t know
that the most known getuk is the snack version, not the main staple food. What
caught my interest was that it just looks so unique, squishy, and appetizing,
only, Kak Kukuh told me that it would be hard to find any information about
getuk, as there are not that much sources about getuk around the village and in
the market, so we moved the topic a step away, which is ketela, because getuk
is made out of ketela.
I already
received lots and lots of information about ketela from Pak Ceriping, from
seeing his plantation, going to Rumah Ketela, and information from my
observations and interviews in the market. At the same time, I bought some
snacks made out of Ketela, which are getuk (I was surprised when I saw that the
getuk is totally different from the
one I saw in the village, as this is the first time I saw the snack version. Since
then, I relized that there were many versions of getuk, so I didn’t ask the
seller any further.
I’ll give
you an introduction of what Ketela is. Ketela is basically another word for
singkong/ cassava. It’s the root of the Cassava plant, and it’s normally used
for food. The peeled skin is used as the cattle’s food.
The Ketela
tree is multifunction, as villagers use the bark as firewood or planted again, the
leaves as vegetables or if it’s too old, as goat’s food, and the roots (the
cassava) could be used as food.
The first
information I got about Ketela was from Pak Ceriping, who makes Ceriping out of
Ketela. We saw a big pile of cassavas behind him as he sliced the cassava using
machine, and he must finish slicing them all, and have them fried by his wife,
or else they would not be good, although still edible.
Next we went
to Pak Ceriping’s cassava farm, and there we saw a lot of cassava trees, and
several papaya trees. We were allowed to help harvest the trees, and we helped/played
cutting the cassavas off from the trees. It was pretty fun, although the
earthworms scared me.
I got my
next information from the market. I looked around for Ketela sellers, and I saw
that there were plenty, but they were either busy with their customers or my
friend who had the same topic as me already got them.
I found a
vacant old woman named Ibu Sutia, 60 y.o, and has been selling in the market
for 30 years. She not only sold cassava, but she sold vegetables too.
There were
many types of cassava, ubi (sweet potato), and talas. Cassava are: Singkong
mentega, telo Jendral (telo is the Javanese word for singkong and sweet potato),
telo kuning, telo putih, and telo merah.
The cassavas are not precisely the colours mentioned above, but to
differenciate them, the Javanese gave them their respective names. I didn’t get
any information about what types of talas there were, I forgot to ask, but
these are the types of ubi that I got: Ubi Kuning, Ubi Biru, and Sumbowo. I
also got several receipes of snacks made out of Ketela, such as Geblek and
Getuk.
I was
running out of time as she had plenty of customers out of a sudden and they all
bought their goods in large quantities, so off I went to one of the snack
sellers.
These
sellers (there were 2 woman) were Mbak Dah (55 y.o) and Mbak Yah (35 y.o)(both
aren’t siblings) were more friendly than Bu Sutia, and I bought 1 geblek and 1
getuk. I was so surprised seeing the getuk, as it was totally different from
the one I saw in the Peyek industry. Apparently, this is the snack version. I
asked for other types of getuk but I saw and was told there were none. I then
assumed that the one I saw in the home industry was the main staple food, Pak
peyek did say that too :p.
I decided to
buy geblek too, as I’m curious of how it looks like. It looks more like white
chips.
I was told
there were 3 types of getuk, Getuk Karet, Getuk Lindri, and Getuk Ubi Jalar. I
didn’t know the name of the getuk that I bought. J
My next information
came from Rumah Ketela, where the founder was Pak Ariswara Sutomo. He opened
Rumah Ketela to show us how we can reduce our use of wheat, which we imported
from various other countries, by cassavas and sweet potato. Importing wheat can
cost up to 16 trillion, although most of the imported wheat will be made into
instant noodle. One way to reduce the use of wheat is by not buying wheat flour
(although I still buy them sometimes :p), as the less buyers, the more
expensive wheat flour will be. A replacement for wheat flour is mocaf, or
sometimes corn flour could be used, although the result won’t be as good as
wheat flour. Like for example, cake, the ones made by wheat flour have smoother
textures than the ones made by mocaf.
Another advantage of cassavas are they are gluten free, and some people
must avoid eating gluten. Gluten could be found in wheat.
In the past,
when Mount Merapi erupted, all our crops failed, but we still could survive by
eating cassavas and sweet potato, as they grow underground, so they are
protected, which shows that we actually can depend on ourselves, not on other
countries for our main staple food. Cassava and sweet potatoes could be found
everywhere in Indonesia, so it won’t be much of a trouble for the citizens to
find them.
In Rumah
Ketela, we were served with snacks on first arrival, which names most of us
forgot. All of them were still warm (except the ones in containers) but for me,
the most delicious is the purple one. We were also introduced to a new kind of root,
Suwek, another type of edible root, papaya jam, a mixture of papaya and
pineapple, which was put into the container when it was still hot so that it
would be sterile, egg roll from suwek, which all of us (except me) tried to
roll in the frying pan, 4 types of flour: mocaf, sweet potato, Suwek, and corn,
and 2 types of ice cream: one from sweet potato and the other from corn.
They showed
us how to make mocaf, and some facts about them. Mocaf is easy to keep, and
they stand for a long time, starting from a month to 6 years. Keeping wheat (flour too) is pretty
difficult, as bugs often nest themselves there.
To make mocaf, they were washed, peeled,
spread and dried, immersed for 3 days and 3 nights, and every 24 hours the
water is changed. They were then fermented, dried again, then milled into
powder by a machine called selem, and powered by gasoline.
I actually
wanted to buy the corn flour, as I thought my mom never used it before, but
after weighing the risks, I decided not to buy it. I bought an egg roll made
out of Suwek instead.
We were then
shown their vast garden of all kinds of root plants and some fruit plants. From
all the information that I was given, the only thing that I remember is that
there’s an itchy part on the talas plant and rainy seasons support the growth
of the sweet potatoes. Now, I knew that there were 3 most known types of roots,
ketela, ubi (sweet potato), and talas, but I didn’t know how to differenciate
them. I didn’t really get a “full attention” answer, but from what I conclude
from her answer was by looking at the plants.
Why isn’t
Rumah Ketela really known? It's because they weren’t well advertised, they’re not
even shown on TV.
I went to learn about tempe making from Bu Cicil and interviewed the tofu home industry. That night I packed up my bags and went to sleep. I won't write details because I have no energy to write the details. I'll write them next time.
After breakfast we all rode an Angkudes droven by one of the mentor's friend. Angkudes was like Angkot (Angkutan Kota), a public transportation, but Angkot is for the city, while Angkudes ( Angkutan Desa) is only for around the village. It was a private Angkudes though :p
We were all heading to Pantai Depok , and my group was to research about Penangkapan. So when we reached there, we directly went out to the beach and searched for fishermans that we could interview.
The first fishermen we interviewed was Mas Jogi, 18 y.o. He became a fisherman because he had no option other than being a fisherman, in which he was self-taught. Despite that, he had been fishing for 3 years now.
He worked from 10-11 a.m, but he said that most fishermen worked at 11 a.m. We interviewed him around 10, so there wasn't much fishermen seen yet. Some fishermen started work from 5 a.m. to 12 though. Using nets and fishing rods, Mas Jogi had finished fishing and had caught crabs and several fishes. He only went fishing once a day, and that's it. The fish that fishermen caught depended on the season and weather. They would be sent to the collector where they would be put into ice and either sold somewhere or made into snacks by other people to be sold. The fishes won't smell and rot until the evening.
The boats were powered by machine, or else it couldn't float. It's on only at sea though, as they were given something like a wheelbarrow below it either when sending it off to the water or taking it back from the water so that the bottom side won't rip, as the boat's made out of fiber. When on sea, 2 people handle the boat, but when sending it off or taking it back, many fishermen helped.
When interviewing Mas Jogi, there are 3 local tourists who also asked questions, so mostly here we observe the boat around.
The next person we interviewed was Mas Sulis. He just came back from the sea, and had caught Patin and fishes, stingray, and one big Jambal fish (Ikan Patin, Ikan Pari dan Ikan Jambal). The one big Ikan Jambal would be sold in one big piece, it won't be sliced into smaller pieces.
When it's Ikan Bawal season, fishermen could earn from 2 million up to 15 million. It depends on the season too though, the amount of money they could earn.
Strong wind, big waves, and rain were some of the factors that makes fishing hard. It could damage or break the boat.
It's been a long time since I went to the beach, so when I was there I felt really happy and went to dip my feet in the seawater. We actually were not allowed to go near the waves because of the big waves. Well, when I just reached there and started looking for fishermen, I was still allowed, watched by Kak Kukuh from afar. But when waiting for some of the boys to come back, and went to dip my feet again, I was called by Kak Inu. I walked around barefoot though, except when we're about to go back.
We waited for the boys to finish their interview, then off we went to the Mi Lethek factory. But before that, we ate in a simple food stall that served Mie Lethek so that we know how it looked and tasted like. At first I didn't want to eat because I was worried that I would run out of money for paying transportation and other things, but then my mentors told me that I won't be eating for a long time, so I finally agreed to eat fried Mie Lethek and cold lime juice. Most ordered Noodle soup. I was really surprised by the taste, it tasted so fresh, unlike the ones that we often see in the city. When the Noodle soup came, our first impression was that it looked dull, and light grey not the whitish transparent vermicelli.
The fried ones came after a really loong time, until the ones who ordered the Noodle soup finished long before us. All those waiting made me really hungry, so when I got it, I quickly finished mine and shared with Zaky. But then I got full so I finally shared with Yla :p.
After that we rode the Angkudes to the factory. Along the way, our mentors told us that President Soekarno was a customer there along his presidential year. I will tell the whole story of it in another article, as I have a lot to talk about. :v. But my part was finding about the history of the factory, alongside Yudhis and Kaysan. We were the history group.
After that we went back home with the Angkudes. We reached our homestay, and wrote our logbooks.
We went to church (except Ceca), the Ganjuran church at 5:30 p.m. (the Bahasa Indonesian one).
I woke up earlier than the alarm today :) and I prepared my pack. It was this morning that I just realized that my pencil case was missing. I tried to look around the house for it, among the girls' things on the floor, in Gatotkaca, but it wasn't there. It was then I just realized that it was missing, and I either left it in the market or in Rumah Ketela. After the girls woke up I asked them if they'd seen my pencil case, but non of them did. Well, I didn't really remember the way to the market, nor to Rumah Ketela, so I just accepted it and got ready.
I ate breakfast and made sure that nothing was left behind in the room, tidied it up, and at this time I "lost" my Ceriping gelombang :(. So Adinda and me were discussing about how to, well, in my point of view was how to bring the Ceriping that we bought in an easier way, but maybe in Adinda's view it's how to give the Ceriping to our host in a nice way together with the bag that I bought in which Adinda and Yla painted among those 3 days that we stay in Dusun Maitan. We thought that the other was thinking the same. My plan was to put the Ceriping into the unused bag (the bag that they hadn't painted on, for the one in Dusun Palbapang). Adinda's plan was to put it in the painted bag. Well, in the end when we're about to leave, my Ceriping was in the painted bag, and if I asked for the Ceriping......
Well, it's another "loss" :). But anyway, my family rarely ate chips, because we considered it unhealthy (especially when I bought a lot. My plan was 1/4 for me and 1/4 for my family, and I ate none). So well....
After we all had metup in Gatotkoco, our mentors were to take our photos with our hosts. Actually the girls didn't plan on taking a photo with our host, but as everyone did it...... We were the last to take though.
Overalll my experience in Dusun Maitan is OK, the only thing that I have to get used to was the crouching toilet and eating the really spicy vegetable. I couldn't handle the vegetables served by every host that I went to, but I didn't dare say/complain anything about it, because that's what I got from every host, so it's like their local food. So if I complain, I thought that it would be like, "insulting" them. But then I was told by my mentors that it's okay to complain that the vegetabls are too spicy.
After the photo session the Andongs arrived, we were all still waiting for the (always late) Zaky and Ceca who stayed in one Homestay.
We rode the Andong and then walked to Terminal Borobudur. We then rode the bus to Jombor, from Halte Jombor we then took the Transjogja to SMA 7.
In Transjogja, a funny event happened. Ceca was debating with a man. I didn't know how he looked like because I sat rather far from where the funny event happened, but from my friends' description, he looked like a person from an institute. This was what happened (translated to English):
Man: Which school are you from?
C: Oh, we're homeschooled Sir.
Man: If I were Indonesia's president, I would make Homeschooling illegal!
C: Why sir?
Man: Why homeschool when you'll try to get a certificate in the end?
C: Because we're forced to Sir.
Man: You can have a lot of friends in school.
C: As school students you only have limited friends, while homeschooled children could make lots and lots of friends.
Man: School kids can find friends in the holidays.
C: For homeschoolers, holiday is everyday!
And then the man changed the topic. Yudhis, who sat near them, was already putting a sour look. He couldn't bare listening to the conversation :D. Too bad I was sitting far away from them.
We reached Desa Palbapang with a local bus. A woman who sat next to me asked where we were heading and we said Desa Palbapang. She said in a rude tone that we already passed Desa Palbapang. I don't like people like that so I just kept silent after answering a few of her remarks.
We met 2 old women when we were dropped outside Dusun Ngringinan, where we were going to stay. They were from Dusun Ngringinan, and were actually on their way home from the market. Yudhis offered to carry her bag at that time. He thought that it would be light, seeing that she's an old woman. When he tried to carry it, he said it was soo heavy, it's unbelievable that the old woman could carry that much. Yudhis finally took turns with Zaky and Yla when carrying the bag.
One of the old woman.
The old women led and directed us to our respective homestays. Some of the boys' homestay were changed because of certain reasons. We girls stayed together with our mentors in Bu Gun's house. But before we went to our homestays, we all went to Bu Cicil's house, a tempe maker. We were given refreshments, and all of them were organic and handmade, or just plain fruit.
I thought at first that the peanuts were the fried/baked ones, but this one was steamed, so it's soft. It's delicious though, but it's new for me. The purple liquid that you see was actually boiled Telang flower mixed with lime. If you don't mix it with lime, the colour would be blue. It's purple if mixed with lime. Nice though!
We all relaxed (I fixed my broken strap) ourselves because the walk we had just now was so tiring. We also just knew that Bu Cicil's husband's name was Pak Gun, there were a lot of people named Gun there, that's why when the girls said we're going to Pak Gun's house, the old woman became confused. And I think she directed us to Bu Cicil's house too. We relaxed until the bike that we ordered came. We were then allowed to go to our respective homestay and agreed to meetup in Bu Gun's house (where the girls and mentors stayed. We made it as basecamp).We were also allowed to bike around and explore around before the meetup.
Before the meetup, we helped peel Bu Gun's Hibrid corn, which were mainly there for the chicken's food.
After the meetup, we then decided to visit the reservoir, but most of us took the wrong way and only Zaky and Kaysan made it into the reservoir. The rest of us went to the dove training place, where they trained the doves for a racing competition, by letting the male flew to a chosen place, then called to go back by holding (more like trapping) a female one. So it's like the male flies back as fast as he could to "save" the female. Even though we didn't go to the reservoir, the scenery was just so beautiful, I wished I had brought my camera.
After that we went back to our homestays to have dinner then meetup in Bu Gun's house to write our logbooks. I noticed that there's 52k missing from my money, and so I was helped by Kak Kukuh to count. Zaky and me were still doing our logbooks, while the others that had done their logbook played Werewolf, including Kak Inu and Kak Melly. I really wanted to play too, so I ended the discusion quickly (the conclusion from the discussion with Kak Kukuh was that 52k was missing) and in the end everyone played.
After playing werewolf, our mentors said that they had a surprise for us, that's why they let us had a great time first. I thought it was something really special. Well, the surprise was that our groups were changed. Here are the new groups:
Group 1: Yudhis, Andro, Ceca
Group 2: Kaysan, Zaky, Fattah
Group 3: Yla, Donna, Adinda
My reaction was just usual, because I'm sleepy :)
P.S. We saw fireflies there too which made us look like kids who'd never seen fireflies before :p.
