j city all over again

(i wrote this on may 2026, but i manipulated the date lol)

to see my full experience at jakarta, please watch my yt vlog here!
JAKARTA VLOG!

first of all, CONGRATS to mas ari on his wedding. dayum first son in the family, the breadwinner. it was a very beautiful wedding in the heart of surabaya (literally at jw marriot tunjungan). and also CONGRATS to shinta and mas ardhi for the wedding. i knew shinta directed her wedding because the reception SCREAMED her so loud. it was beautiful, dreamy and magical, just like her and her dreams.

so, my other cousin from my mom (mas ari) also had his wedding in late october at surabaya, then this cousin from my dad (shinta) also decided to get married EARLY november. RIP to my wallet and my cute lil acidy tummy because i SAVED UP for their weddings, but you know what? it was worth it. my cousins are getting married and here i am using the oportunity to explore their hometowns, lol.

my parents went first to surabaya, then went home then went to jakarta. they were early because they wanted to witness the whole ceremony (from pengajian, siraman and the whole thing). i was left alone at home a week more because i still gotta work, i arrived in both places (surabaya and jakarta) the night before the wedding. safe to say it was really messy, because i had to catch the afternoon train right after work (and got to leave midday to catch my train to jakarta) to get to the place on time. sleep deprived and a few salonpas later, i gotta SERVE.

one minute i feel shit
(just arrived at the hotel at cawang 9 pm)

next minute im the shit (akad look)

reception (night) look by @deemakeup

been a long time since i went to surabaya (the last time were on mid 2024) and the capital city (the last time were early january 2023) so i gotta explore, right? i didn't spend that much time in  surabaya, i arrived saturday night, the wedding was on sunday then left early on monday morning. i gotta explore jakarta, tho, because i still have so many wish lists and a friend (shout out to dina again). i left for jakarta on friday midday from lempuyangan, then arrived at jatinegara around 8pm, transited to commuterline from manggarai to cawang then got to the hotel around 9pm.

had to wake up before fajr prayer to do makeup on my mom, myself, then helped my dad, my uncle and my cousin to wear jarik CORRECTLY then made it to the venue before 7 am. then watched the whole beautiful akad and panggih til 1pm, got back to the hotel, did makeup for the reception, checked out then checked in to the hotel (also the venue) before 5pm. the reception started around 7 pm, it was very grand, very beautiful, i got to reunite again with many family members (except yazid, i was so sad my auntie and uncle came without him), then got back to my room at 10 pm. I WAS EXHAUSTED.

on sunday, i made an appointment with dina. at first i wasn't going to tell her that i'm coming to jakarta, because i wasn't sure that i could explore the city with her, i got limited time, but thankfully i was able to had a full day with her. i catch the commuterline from cawang to gondangdia, because I THOUGHT WE AGREED TO MET AT GALERI NASIONAL AFTER HER MASS BUT SHE ARRIVED AT GALERI CEMARA 6 MENTENG AND BOUGHT THE TICKET WHEN I WAS ALR AT GALERI NASIONAL. so i gotta gojek myself to cemara 6 and laughed it out loud with her there.

dina really trolled me, because i LOOKED LIKE THIS
when i arrived at galeri nasional.

galeri cemara 6 menteng is a private gallery founded and owned by (now the family of) toeti heraty, an indonesian poet and philosopher. it was actually her home, it was beautiful, very old-money coded, very serene. dina and i wanted to take as much time there, lol, but we gotta go to galeri nasional.

my company for the day and always
whenever i visited the capital.

it was so serene, wished i was a famous
poet with a legacy and a huge house at menteng.

the collections are very unique, they
even have their own library.

you know, it was my wildest dream to see 'penangkapan pangeran diponegoro' by raden saleh with my two own eyes, turned out galeri nasional has extended their 'nyala' exhibition, so i still got the chance to see the famous painting. but before that, we visited the permanent exhibition of the gallery. tbh, i don't really understand art, especially contemporary arts, but it was fascinating to see how certain periods of time, movements, and vision changed the overall style of art in that era.

finally the 'nyala' exhibition. i got no words at all, i just want to be in there FOREVER.

one of my wildest wish list checked.

after that we had lunch at BAKMI GM LOL, a mandatory visit whenever i went to jakarta. then we catch mrt to negara blok m, another mandatory visit. i bought kopi susu keluarga from famimart, a viral mochi (15k) at papaya, then just hung out with dina (a.k.a. bengong) at taman literasi. again, i just love to catch up with an old friend and then talk about our lives. then we had haka dimsum for dinner. at 8 pm we got to go, because my whole family had a gathering, and dina had to go to work tomorrow. UGH i wished to stay one more night and explore more with her.

7.5/10 tho

7.5/10 might try the other menu

wished to have free beggars open
space in jogja.

got home (at depok) around 9 pm, had the family gathering, then ended the very long rewarding day with packing because i need to catch the train from jatinegara at 12 pm.

wakey wakey at 7 am, had breakfast with the whole family again while also salam salaman before i got ELIMINATED EARLY (lol). my plan was to go to depok station then catch a commuter to jatinegara early because i wanted to shopefood bakmi gm, BUT my mom insisted on ESCORTING me to jatinegara. so, my uncle called one of his drivers to drive me and BOTH OF MY PARENTS to jatinegara. we left around 10.30 am then got there around 11 am. i have never arrived/departed to jatinegara before, it was always gambir, so this is a new experience for me. i think if i had to go to jakarta again, i'll probably just pick jatinegara because it was easier to hop on commuterline instead of pasar senen (imo).

got to jogja around 8 pm, picked up by the loml with his NEW CAR (so many thing happened since i left for just THREE DAYS i guess). i’m definitely gonna go back to jakarta in next year, there are so many places i haven't explored yet. i wanted to explore glodok and kota tua (again), but also want to go to tanjungpriok to see docks, sounds fun.

see ya next year j city!

our first time touring: temanggung

to watch our full experience, please click this link!

SEPTEMBER LONG WEEKEND VLOG

all of the places that we visited will be linked, just click the name of the place then it’ll direct you to google maps!

jehan (and his fam) and i often had roadtrip together, but we never toured with motorcycle before. jehan proposed this idea for a long weekend getaway, and i agreed. this time he also initiated the places to go, it was usually my part to make the itinerary, but this time, i was just enjoying my time as a passenger princess (and navigator, still).

we left from jogja around 7.30 am, surprisingly the road wasn't crowded (yet), maybe because we started early. our first stop, breakfast at waroeng jadoel. now, i thought this would be just an ordinary place that jehan and mama once visited, but no, it was actually one of the touristy places. we got there around 8 am and it was already CROWDED AS F. i had to save us a seat while jehan got the breakfast. i can't think of anything, so i just said whatever but with an egg to start the day. i had to rate it 6/10, because it was really crowded and the meal was kinda okay, not that overpriced but you could find something similar here with a cheaper price without the crowds. 

my plate, tho.

we continued our ride to the main destination: embung kledung. this might sounds surprising, but i've never been to embung kledung before. it was SO BEAUTIFUL tho, both sumbing and sindoro fighting to win my heart, but i honestly had to choose em both. jehan and i had a talk here before we departed....this impromptu coffee place.

sumbing

sindoro, and i

while we stopped for jumah prayer, he looked for a coffee place, since we're in temanggung, right? then he found this toto coffee, and we ended up having unplanned coffee tasting, core memory unlocked. it was a roastery and they had various blends and infused coffee. when we got there, few people were buying in bulk to then be sold again or to serve in their cafes. i tasted honey infused coffee and jehan tasted wine infused coffee, and yep, we ended up buying some of the blends.

we will be coming back for this coffee place!

on our way home, we stopped at secang to enjoy dawet and ketan. then we stopped by magelang to buy gethuk but it was closed and we were SCAMMED by this ibu ibu. we had an early dinner while waiting for maghrib prayer at pawon markisa mertoyudan.

two cups of dawet, two ketans
for 10k.

it was raining on our way home. i searched for route where we don't have to pass sleman city hall (because we know it'll be traffic), but we ended up in ANTAH BERANTAH with ROCKY ROAD WHILE IT WAS RAINING AND MINIMUM STREET LIGHTING, another core memory unlocked, i guess. we ended up around godean, well, at least we avoided the traffic.

doing roadtrip (with a car) is fun, we don't have to worry if it's going to be sunny or rainy. the downside is that we'll get into traffic and some shortcuts were too narrow for a car, we might need a lot more time. touring with motorcycle gave us the freedom to go wherever, whenever, with whatever shortcuts, even tho it'll be kinda challenging if it's raining.

as long as i'm with jehan, we can go with whatever. might be touring again next!

hiking kalitalang, this time with jeh

after hiking on kalitalang with my coworkers, i asked jehan to hike with me there, he agreed and we went there!

we started the hike around 8 am (still very late, lol), we didn't expect that it'll be so crowded tho (i mean it was on a long weekend, tho, lol). the view was amazing, i'm so proud to show him the mount merapi. we just had a casual walk because it has been a long time since jehan hiked. he used to hiked andong and prau on his uni days with his friends, crazy tho. we stopped once in a while to rest and to take pictures.

the view was amazing.

our first hike.

the first and second post were the steepest, i told jehan. on our second post we had to rest quite a while because jehan wasn't sure that he could finish the last post. i convinced him that it'll be worth it once we get to the last post. HE DID! he got to the last post and i'm so proud with jeh! we talked and snacked a bit at the last post then went down around 12 pm.

hey look, who made it to the top?

remind me again on how i love learning
geography and geology.

touching the grass with coworkers

to see the our full experience in hiking kalitalang, please watch my vlog here!
KALITALANG VLOG!

idk who initiated the talk to HIKE, but we ended up doing it anyway. at first we were debating whether we went to kalitalang or deles indah, but after few considerations, we ended up went to kalitalang. we might be hiking gunung purba nglanggeran next, but who knows? (we did, i wrote this on may 2026, lol).

of course we went on monday (august 4th), our only free time. i actually had no expectations, because some of us are active in physical activities, some aren't (i might fell on the first category, because at that time i was active in running to catch my first 5k under 1hr. tho i ended up never join any running event due to schedule and whatever), so i'm just gonna go with their paces. but SPOILER ALERT, we managed to get to the last post, which is just 4km from the mount merapi's crater.

we actually start our day quite late because i was waiting for mba niken, and some of us are gathering on various different places. we started hiking around 9 am LOL, while everyone were goin down, we just start the hike. we had no 'pro' equipment, just mba niken's trekking pole and that's all. my protections were sunscreen, jehan's hat and jacket that i ended up not wearing because i was sweating like crazy.

happy me!

the view from the river
pov you're wedhus gembel

the view was amazing tho, it was so blue and mount merapi was so clear. the first and two post were actually the hardest and steepest, but the last two was ez. we filmed our checkpoint on the first post, still all bright and happy but then had a quick nap on the third post lol.

us on the first post

vs on the third post
there were actually many monkeys
around us

we encountered MANY monkeys during the hike, fortunately they didn't attack us or smth. we didn't time the hike, we just casually walked, took many photos for the gram (and the memories) and had fun, so we got to the top around 12 pm. at the end of the post we rested for around half an hour, chatting and snacking. sindi was actually having a full blown nap, idk how she did that tho.

then we SPRINT down the hill. mas imam was actually TRIPPED AND FELL during the sprint. i was behind all of them because i was with mba heni, and she wanted to take it slow, then joined by mas ginza who TOOK THE LONGEST TIME EVER to get down with the rope on the second and first post down. thank you mba ratri for documenting us three behind y'all, lol.

we were having fun, maybe we'll hike again? idk.

WE HIKED AGAIN.

sore (2025)

i came to the theatre with no expectations at all. i know this movie was based on the same title and same director (yandy laurens) back in 2019, but i've never watch it. But well well well, i don't believe myself too, but i got teary eyes after watching it.

(weekender.thejakartapost.com)

the premise was actually simple: sore (sheila dara aisha) claimed to be jonathan's (dion wiyoko) wife from the future. she's here to help him making the right decisions before actually meeting her in the future. i deadass thought this was just another angsty movie, but boy was i wrong. i could actually feel the headache and the mixed-feeling whenever sore came back to life, came back to jonathan's bedside and him having a panic seeing her.

you see, as someone who live both in tiktok-ville and x-ville, there are so many, too many discourse about this movie. some are saying that this movie is actually regressive on woman's movement because on how sore died every time jonathan made mistake (smoking and drinking and wont see his father) and that's just a waste of time, or how this movie is actually about climate change, yada yada. It's that movie where it has a 10/10 or 1/10 rating, and everyone went crazy or too woke for this movie to be just a work of art.

for me, i could see where they're come from. i could understand 'that one too woke friend' perspective, yes, i mean, sore is the final boss of 'i can fix him' typa shit. you wont see me dying every time a man made a mistake and came back to life just to watch him re-do his mistakes (i did tho, lol). 'regressive' is rather a strong word, even tho now everyone will quote "kalau aku harus ngulang seribu kali pun, kayaknya aku bakal tetap milih kamu, deh", gurl....just, don't.

i rather agree to the conspiracy theory on how sore was actually about climate change, and jonathan does unhealthy shit to himself was actually us doing unhealthy shit to the planet earth. sore is the ecological being that keeps on reminding us to take care of the earth, but eventually she'll be running out of energy, running out of time.

okay, like, why did i cry tho. i kinda related to at least two things: about a man, and about a father figure. i 'died' few times back then just to fix a man, until i realized i wont be stuck in this loop (ever) again, then i left, breaking the timeline (wow, ok, loki). and about a father figure, ah, as complicated as it is, jonathan might be a better person than me to be at peace with his father, that's all that i could say.

aside from the debates, we could actually agree that the cinematography in this movie is top notch, best one so far from local production. especially the last scene, gah daym. i'm getting excited and hopeful again with the local movie productions. i also love the song choice, tho, it has the 'time' related tittle or lyrics to it: Terbuang dalam Waktu (Barasuara), Hingga Ujung Waktu (Sheila on7) and Pancarona (Barasuara) that means the constant changing of emotions, not just the actual meaning 'colourful'.

for me it's a solid 10/10.
and the HMNS collab too were top notch.

i want to do anything but i did nothing

For the past two months, i've been feeling ups and downs. I feel like i want to do anything: i want to film tiktok video, i want to try a new makeup look, i want to finish a book in one day, but i ended up doing nothing.

I worked in a museum, so i have my day off on Monday, and other chosen day, i usually go for Thursday or Friday. So, every Sunday and Wednesday/Thursday night, i can think of so many things that i'd do in the morning: i'd wake up at 6, have my morning jog, waiting for my laundry while making breakfast at 8, read my TBR book til 1 pm then have a nap til 3pm. When the morning came, i woke up at 9, did not do my morning jog, did not do my laundry, shopeefoods my brunch at 11 and went back to bed scrolling on my tiktok til 4 pm. 

I'm pretty sure we've all been there, little did we know, we actually passed those times and feel fine again, but when it hits, it hits. I noticed, i've always been like this when i've been spending more time in my phone than in my journal. I left my journal empty for the past months, and it's not because i'm not depressed and don't have anything to crash out (God knows my thought went crazy every night), but simply because i don't feel like it. When i actually have the time and the mood to write, the feelings already passed.

This actually against the purpose of journaling (at least for me). I do journaling because i struggle to let out my feelings (an intj and the only child???pick a struggle). When my head is full i do crazy shit, well, i can do crazy shit when i'm not in my adult life and had to put myself together to appear professional, hence i always need my journal to keep my sanity.

But what did i do when i have a lot of things in my head and i also did not entry my journal: i went unproductive (i don't know if unproductive is a word). Like i said earlier, i lost in the algorithm and scroll for hours. Thankfully, tiktok has this feature where you can put your screen time limit, break and bedtime reminder. I know this feature for a while but i just use it for the past weeks. I set the screen limit for maximum 2 hours per day, break every 20 minutes of uninterrupted scrolls, and 10 pm bedtime. It helps, tho, i wished youtube (shorts) and instagram have this feature too.

I recently finished Rebel of the Sands trilogy by Alwyn Hamilton. I finished the first book on June and the other two this month. I'm so proud of myself, and i really wanted to keep my 'two books per month' streak going, considering i still have at least 10 TBR books. I wanted to keep my promise that i wouldn't buy new books if i haven't finished my TBRs but i just keep breaking it, so why bother.

I also writing this blog post exactly after i started to entry my journal again, i started writing this after dusk prayer. I feel better tho, a little bit (because i still had to work tomorrow, lol), hence why i could put my feelings here in the blog (and my journal). I've always been a writer myself, i've had this blog since i was in elementary school, ELEMENTARY SCHOOL, i probably was 12, and i'm 25, half to 26 now. I have my mental journal, my daily agenda, i always write my school/college materials on paper instead of gdocs, i write academic essays and became a speaker, i have this blog and Kompasiana blog. So when i'm not writing, i'm not okay.

For a while i think it's always doing nothing or doing anything.

I might have a condition, but tbh with you, i really want to have it checked but i don't have the money. But when i do, i'll be yapping with my therapist.

Peace out.

visiting lokananta museum and rumah atsiri indonesia

had a great time last may ticking yet another of my wish list. this time was just nearby, and by i mean nearby was 2 hrs driving total, lol. jehan, the fams and i got to visit lokananta museum and rumah atsiri indonesia. now, i've been to the lokananta museum before in 2019 with my study program and my coworkers in late 2023, but rumah atsiri indonesia was one of my wish list. i watched videos about rumah atsiri indonesia on tiktok, and it was magical, a garden with the view of mount lawu? pack your bags, let's go!

lokananta museum has two options for the tour: guided tour (for 2 hrs) and self tour (for 1 hr) with the same ticket price. the last time in 2023 we were exploring without a guide, so this time we went for a guided tour. it wasn't disappointing at all because i've visited this museum before, i knew the collection, but listening to the guide explaining the history of it just completed the puzzle. my favourite room is of course the bengawan solo room, it was very serene.

collecting memories with loml.

i really wanted to have this vinyl
player at my home one day, aamiin for that.

if you choose the guided tour, after the guided tour you'll have another hour to explore the museum on your own. i think this is the best option because you could listen to the history THEN posing for the gram after. we were actually planning to have lunch at the bloc, but some of them are still closed, and will be open around 4 pm, so we just went to their vinyl shop then had lunch somewhere else.

then we drove for another hour to the east. i got to change my outfit for the gram, and for the vibe. it was technically free to visit rumah atsiri indonesia, you gotta pay Rp. 50.000 for a voucher, but you could use the credits on the voucher for museum admission, activities or to buy stuff at their shop. it was VERY beautiful, it had a proper praying room, the toilets smelled so good with their products, the garden and the view was perfect, the restaurant and the food were very nice. the weather was perfect because the cherry on top was the view of mount lawu.

the inside is just very AD coded.

the cherry on top.

by the glory of God Almighty
i am so happy to be here.

we visited the museum too, obvi, they presented the history of fragrances and essential oils, as well as their own history (of rumah atsiri). i very much regret that i didn't buy their fragrances, at least one, because it smells amazing. i'll definetely buy one when i come back (and when i had the chance to go back, it was at the end of the month so i didn't buy anything again lol. might just buy one online)

very satisfying to see the local plants
that could be extracted as fragrances
or essential oils.

inside the museum

lunch on may

lunch/snack on june (second visit)

the second time we went to atsiri it was the holiday season, so they had a STAMP HUNT AAAKHH. you have no idea how thrilled i was to complete all of the stamps, i did, i put it in my journal, it feels so good.

IT WAS SO FUN!

i think the perfect time to visit is during the dry season, so around may-october, you could see mount lawu clearly, and the bright yellow colour from the marigold just contrasted with clear blue sky, it was very beautiful.

see you again solo-karanganyar!