virtual diary of mba amal

Bisa dilihat dari kedua gambar di atas nunjukkin Top Artists Spotify Wrapped gue di 2021 dan 2022. Keduanya punya kesamaan, sama-sama ada grup K-pop. Berawal dari cuma iseng dengerin lagu-lagunya, sampai jadi ngefans sama beberapa grup idol. Here's how I discover myself as a K-pop fangirl. Sebenernya gue dari dulu udah dengerin lagu-lagu K-pop kok, cuma ya sebatas dengerin beberapa aja kayak SNSD, 2NE1, sama Super Junior. Itu pun cuma dengerin lagu-lagu yang menurut gue nyantol di kuping dan mostly cenderung lebih suka sama lagu-lagu girl group dibanding boy group karena gue ngerasa kalo boy group agak terlalu hiphop. Gue lupa kapan pastinya gue dengerin tapi ya pas jaman SMP-SMA lah jadi antara rentang 2010-2012.  Tapi di masa itu ya gue biasa aja sama K-pop soalnya emang lebih tertarik sama K-drama sih, jadi bener-bener ga ngikutin K-pop sama sekali. Kemudian move forward ke 2017 di mana saat itu lagi hitsnya banget BTS bahkan sampe temen gue yang seorang wibu bisa jadi suka K-po...

WOW, udah 3 tahun lamanya ya gue ga posting apa-apa lagi di blog tercinta ini. Ya banyak yg berubah sih. Sekarang siapa sih yang ngeblog? Orang mah kalo mau curhat ya di Instagram Story, Twitter, atau ya mungkin TikTok ya. Tapi berhubung gue keinget blog ini lagi dan kebetulan lagi butuh media untuk menuangkan segala isi kepala gue....sekalian aja kali ya life update di sini. So, yep tahun ini umur gue udah 27 tahun. Umur-umur segini tuh "normal" nya udah mulai bisa menentukan apa yang mau mereka lakukan selama beberapa tahun ke depan. Umur-umur udah mulai makin banyak yg nikah buat yg kelahiran 1996, bahkan ya sebenernya banyak juga yg udah punya anak. Umur-umur di mana karirnya udah mulai ada peningkatan jadi at least udah di level associate/mid level atau bahkan senior. Tapi tentunya...ga semua orang ngalamin apa yang gue sebut di atas di umur tersebut. Termasuk gue sendiri. Bahkan gue belum ngalamin semua yang gue sebut itu. Gue sama sekali ga tau apa yang mau gue lakukan...

30 Days of Writing Challenge Day 10: your bestfriend The first time I met this girl was on the first day of junior high school. We were on the same group on the orientation. Luckily, we were also on the same class and I don't know how but we instantly become more closer (until now). If you only hear her voice, you might think that she's a guy. But no, she's just a girl who has deep voice like a guy wkwkwk but honestly when I first met her, I didn't notice her deep voice that much, I don't care. As long as she's a really fun person to be with, has very wide range of music taste, tv series nerd, a friend that you can always depend on, I'm grateful to have her as my close friend. She told me a lot of stories about....anything. Her life, her friends' life, her family, scenes from movies or tv series, gossiping, but in her stories, I learned a lot about life. As I told you before, don't really have much experiences in life. So, the only thing that I can d...

30 Days of Writing Challenge Day 9: write about happiness Sometimes, I feel like I overthink about whether I should do some things or not. 'Cause I'm afraid it won't make my happy. I forgot that happiness is not something that you search. Happiness is kind of a reward for something that you do. Happiness comes after a process. Sometimes it comes in the middle of it. So, I think happiness is something you build and then you enjoy the result.

30 Days of Writing Challenge Day 8: the power of music There are certain songs that remind you of a memory or a person. In my case, the song is Maybe by Yiruma. This song reminds me of my high school crush. I knew about this song from him, I listened to it and instantly became my favorite. I used to ask him to send a voice note of him playing this song since he can play piano (he plays a lot of instrument actually). And he did that. Now, I rarely listen to any of Yiruma's songs especially that song. Because I'm afraid it will make me cry or sad if I remember the memory. But the last time I heard, thankfully I feel nothing even though I remember the memory.

30 Days of Writing Challenge Day 7: favorite movie Honestly, I don't know if I have a favorite movie to watch. If I do, I can't choose one to be on top of the list. So I'm going to pick from one my favorite movie genre, animation. This movie is about the journey of toys that has four movies. But my favorite of all is the third one. I watched it for about three times and cried every time I watched the ending scene. Spoiler alert for those of you who haven't watch the movie.  So the scene that made me cry is when the cowboy toy (main character) separated from the owner because the owner is growing up and donating his toys to new owner. When the owner stared once more to the cowboy toy before leaving the new owner's house, it shows how he loved the cowboy toy so much. It's really a sad scene, plus the background music is very spot on completing the sadness :( But I love all the four movies and for me this is the best animation movie series I've ever watched. I ...

30 Days of Writing Challenge Day 6: single and happy Well, that's what I'm trying to be now. I used to hope for having a boyfriend in school days. In early uni days, I also expecting for a boyfriend or at least I can get close to someone. But no. Still no boyfriend until today :) At the end of uni days, I start losing that hope. I don't even wanna try anymore. So, I decided to just go with the flow and focusing on my own happiness because that's what matters, right? Now, I'm getting used to being alone. Grocery shopping alone, eating alone, strolling around the city alone. I'm happy about it and enjoying it very much. I'm also thinking about solo traveling someday, but still concern about safety. So yeah, let's see about that in the future. Dear Amalia, Please start loving yourself more okay? #selflove

30 Days of Writing Challenge Day 5: Your parents Let's start with the person who gave birth to me. The real boss in the house. An active person and love to try new things. From salsa, line dance, food photography, until she decided to do home baking business. After working for more than 25 years at an international sport brand company, I thought she decided to have a long rest as a working mom. But no, she just doesn't want to sit still. When she failed at something because of her, she won't stop blaming herself. I think I got the self-blaming thing from her. But the difference is, she doesn't give up easily. She will to find a way to make it work no matter what. You can check out her recent work at bakulanbudenani (please give some support!), and you'll find proof of my description. Moving on to her husband, the man whom I got the resemblance from. The face and about 80% of his personality runs to me, especially the careless one. A sweet tooth (as expected from a ...

30 Days Writing Challenge Day 4: places you want to visit Honestly, I've got little time to do this challenge writing. So I'll try to make this simple and short. Even though I already visit Japan earlier this year, it's still not enough. I want to comeback to Tokyo, Osaka, and Kyoto. Also exploring other cities like Hiroshima, Hokkaido, Kobe. I would love to explore it in Spring and Autumn. It will be a dream come true if that happen. If you ask me why I like Japan so much, well I don't know. Japan just has a special place in my heart :') Turkey has been added to my top wish list of countries I want to visit. I think Turkey is a country that has so many beautiful historical building with its complex history. And of course I would love to have a hot air balloon ride in Cappadocia's magnificent sky. As for my home country, I really really want to visit Labuan Bajo. I think you can enjoy pretty much everything there. The calming blue sea, the breathtaking green hil...

30 Days Writing Challenge Day 2: things that makes you happy A friend once said. every time I eat it make others wanna eat too.  "Oh really?" I replied.  Since then, I asked some of my friends about this and all of them agreed. One of them said, "I love seeing how you eat so well, like you really enjoy the food". Then I remembered my mom once said when I don't like a food or not having an appetite, my face shows it. There's an interesting quotes related to this from a Korean drama called Hospital Playlist. The lead female character said there are three types of person in this world. First, the one who look happy when eating something. Second, the one who is the happiest when eating alone. Third, the one who is happy when seeing others eat. Well, now you know which type of person I am :) The other thing that makes me happy is strolling around the city and traveling with public transportation. Usually after work, I don't go straight to home. I always stop ...

30 Days Writing Challenge Day 1: Describe your personality In almost every conversation, I'm always gonna be the one who listen. I don't know how much stories I listened to but all of my friends love to share their stories with me anytime and anywhere. It's not easy to get to know me because basically I'm not a great storyteller and I'm lacking of life experience. I don't have much exciting stories to tell, to be honest. And here I am, spent my time thinking too much about what's the best description of my personality. I'm very trusted when it comes to travel and culinary related. My friends always ask me for food recommendation. I'm also the one who arrange travel plans which includes making itinerary, searching destination, buying tickets, etc. I'm the best travel and eating companion, well at least according to my them hahahaha. Despite how good I am with travel plans, turns out that I'm suck at planning the future. I'm far from ambiti...

Belakangan kedua drama Korea yang tercantum dalam judul lagi jadi perbincangan netijen, yang satu baru aja kelar tayang dan satunya lagi udah lama sebenarnya tapi ramai diomongin lagi terutama di Twitter. Drama-drama ini karyanya Shin Won Ho PD-nim nih kak yang terkenal dengan Reply Series nya. Awalnya gue tuh tertarik nonton Hospital Playlist karena kapan lagi lihat dokter-dokter kece pada ngeband bareng. Gua saat itu belum tahu kalo Hosplay ini bikinannya Shin PD. Pas Hosplay rilis di Netflix gue langsung tonton tuh karena aku tidak sabar kak kalo harus nunggu kelar dulu. Awal-awal episode 1 gue merasa nggak nyaman sama alur ceritanya yang lambat. Baru pas pertengahan sampai akhir episode 1 gue mulai klop dan tertarik buat lanjutin. Lalu gua ceritakanlah masalah ini ke teman gue dan barulah gue tau kalo ini karyanya Shin PD dan emangnya alurnya lambat + durasinya lama. Oke dari situ gue membiasakan diri dan akhirnya terbiasa juga. Didukung sama ceritanya yang makin seru dan alurnya y...

Salah satu hal yang menjadi perhatian ketika pergi ke luar negeri seperti ke Jepang adalah makanan, khususnya bagi kita yang muslim, bakalan ribet. Tapi sebenarnya nggak perlu dibuat ribet kok dan sekarang nyari makanan yang aman bagi muslim di Jepang nggak terlalu susah. Seperti yang gue janjikan di postingan sebelumnya, gue bakal kasih tau beberapa makanan gue makan selama di Jepang dan dari mana aja sumber informasinya. Di Jepang sekarang udah banyak organisasi dan komunitas muslim yang menyediakan informasi tempat makan yang ramah muslim. Bahkan di Facebook itu ada Halal Japan yang menyediakan informasi makanan dan minuman kemasan apa yang aman dikonsumsi oleh muslim. Selain itu, gue juga nyari beberapa info di gugel dan berikut yang gue pilih: makanan konbini muslim friendly , restoran halal dekat stasiun di Tokyo , rekomendasi restoran halal di Jepang . Saking beragamnya pilihan tempat makan yang muslim friendly, jujur jadi pengen datengin semua rasanya. Tapi masalahnya...

Nah, kali ini gue mau kasih tahu berapa total biaya yang gue keluarkan pada trip ke Jepang awal 2020. Jadi, sekitar bulan September nyokap tiba-tiba ngomong pengen liburan ke Jepang. Gue yang emang dari dulu pengen banget ke Jepang tentu kaget tapi senang juga. Terus yaudah akhirnya gue diminta buat bikin itinerary tempat-tempat apa aja yang mau didatengin selama kurang lebih 10 hari. Oh ya, btw ini liburan keluarga yaaa jadi tentu saja budgetnya akan berbeda dibanding kalo pergi sendiri atau sama teman. Tapi untungnya budgetnya tetap lebih murah kok daripada kalo kita pergi pake jasa travel. Trip ini untuk 4 orang selama 9 hari 8 malam, dengan destinasi ke Tokyo, Osaka, dan Kyoto. Perginya pas musim dingin awal Januari 2020. TIKET PESAWAT Sekitar Oktober awal di Traveloka itu ada promo tiket pesawat ANA (All Nippon Airways), tapi sedih banget gue ga kebagian huft. Terus yaudah akhirnya tetep beli tiket pesawat Japan Airlines dengan harga pp per orang itu sekitar 8 jutaan . Eman...

Hi! How you doin' my virtual diary? Finally I can write something on my own platform. So, where do I go all this time? Now, my routine is being a real writer for a company. Yeah, I have a job right now. So many things to tell, right Well, I'm going to recap it for you now. Let's start from the very beginning of this year. On January, I finally had a trip to Japan! :') The trip I've been waiting for a long long time, came true. I'm still happy talking about this and I've been wanting to go back there because it's just not enough for me. Well, I think it's because I had this trip with my family, so I have to kinda stick to the itinerary. Even tho we had some improvisation but still. it's different when it comes to travel with your family. But I still had fun tho. I'm going to tell more about the trip on a separate post of course but I don't know when I'll be able to write but just wait for it okay? Move to the end of January, I fina...

Mental health issue nampaknya bakal jadi isu yang sering dibahas dan tentu akan semakin gencar dibahas ketika ada berita bunuh diri atau kasus bullying yang beredar luas di internet. Apalagi belakangan ini baru saja ada entertainer asal Korea yang dikabarkan bunuh diri karena masalah mental yang dihadapinya. Entah sudah berapa banyak berita soal kasus bunuh diri di tahun ini. Entah apakah orang-orang masih banyak yang belum aware sama kesehatan mental, atau mungkin dunia ini terlalu banyak dipenuhi orang-orang jahat? Tujuan gue bahas soal ini bukan karena gue merasa diri gue punya stress, depresi atau anxiety yang parah. Gue hanya ingin mencoba lebih terbuka soal masalah mental yang gue punya. Jujur malu ih HAHA but here we go... Beberapa waktu yang lalu gue sempat posting soal pengalaman gue menghadapi orang yang panic attack . Kejadian tersebut membuat mata gue semakin terbuka soal kesehatan mental, apalagi kejadian itu cukup membuat gue shock. Memang benar ya kalo sudah menyaksik...

Dua sampai tiga tahun belakangan ini, industri kecantikan lokal sedang berbunga-bunganya. Banyak banget brand-brand baru terutama indie brand yang bermunculan. Brand dan company besar yang sudah berdiri lebih dulu pun juga tak mau kalah dalam membuat inovasi di dunia kecantikan untuk mempertahankan eksistensinya. Tapi kira-kira kenapa ya industri kecantikan lokal bisa berkembang? Yuk mari kita bahas sambil mundur sedikit ke tiga tahun lalu. Gue merasa beruntung bisa memerhatikan dunia kecantikan saat lagi berkembang-kembangnya. Gue mulai tertarik dengan makeup waktu jaman-jaman semua orang lagi pada beli lipstick matte Purbasari. Tentu gue tidak mau ketinggalan tren dong dan ini jadi momen pas buat gue yang baru saja ingin membeli produk makeup pertama yaitu lipstick. Jadilah gue membeli lipstick Purbasari dan memilih nomor 86 Topaz yang warnanya merah bata, warna yang gue anggap paling aman buat gue yang masih virgin di dunia makeup. Ngga berapa lama setelah itu, muncul lipst...

Mungkin beberapa orang yang follow gue di Twitter sadar kalo gue akhir-akhir ini sering banget ngeritwit atau ngetwit soal bulu tangkis. Yup, gue emang lagi tertarik banget soal bulu tangkis dan gue akan cerita sedikit gimana gue bisa suka bulu tangkis. Bulu tangkis adalah salah satu olahraga yang dikenalkan kepada gue saat usia sekolah dasar setelah basket. Ngga perlu bermodalkan lapangan dan net pembatas, bermain depan halaman atau jalanan rumah juga bisa. Tapi gue ngga pernah sekalipun nonton pertandingan bulu tangkis secara langsung, paling ya nonton dari layar kaca aja dan ngga pernah tahu teknis pertandingannya secara detail. Nonton di tv pun sebenarnya hanya beberapa kali sih, itu pun kalo lagi kebetulan disiarin aja. Satu hal yang selalu terdengar di kuping gue kalo lagi nonton pertandingan bulu tangkis adalah seruan penonton “IN-DO-NE-SIA! prok prok prok prok prok”, sambil menabuh balon tepok yang dibagikan sponsor kepada penonton. Keriuhan penonton cukup meningkatkan mood ...

Baru kali ini dalam seumur hidup gua ngeliat orang kena panic attack yang sampe sesak, gemetaran, nangis dan ngerasa kayak mau mati. Itu kejadiannya lagi di kereta dan beneran ngga tau harus ngapain selain bilang “tarik napas”. Sebut saja kedua teman gua ini Rara dan Tania. Sebelum Rara panic attack di dalam kereta, sebenarnya sekitar jam tiga sore Rara sempat kesulitan untuk nafas tapi ngga berapa lama udah baikan dan masih bisa jalan. Pas perjalanan pulang di kereta tiba-tiba Rara panic attack, lalu kita mutusin turun dulu di stasiun terdekat. Tania coba buat nenangin Rara sampai udah mendingan dan Rara juga udah sempat kabarin keluarganya sambil nangis. Setelah merasa agak mendingan, kita lanjutin perjalanan pulang. Ngga berapa lama setelah naik kereta tiba-tiba Rara gemetaran, sesak, dan nangis lagi tapi lebih parah. Kita coba nenangin dia lagi tapi entah kenapa saat itu gua tiba-tiba pengen nangis cuma ngga mungkin dong gua nangis di saat ada orang yang lagi panic attack. Akh...

Source: Jakarta Post Entah kenapa kalo lagi ngomongin atau mikirin soal makanan, otak gue seringkali larinya ke Japanese food. Gue sendiri juga ngga tahu apa yang membuat gue begitu cintanya sama Japanese food, bahkan yang rasanya decent atau kurang enak aja gue masih bisa berusaha untuk nikmati. Ya mungkin ini yang dinamakan dengan cinta, kita ngga perlu capek-capek nyari tahu kenapa kita bisa jatuh cinta sama sesuatu. Kita cuma tahu kita punya semacam koneksi, perasaan suka yang tak bisa dijelaskan kadarnya, dan kita rela melakukan apapun untuk sesuatu yang kita cintai. Eaaaa mantap, kak. Siapa yang pertama kali mengenalkan gue Japanese food? Hokben did this job of course. Bahkan gue sempat meyakini kalo Hokben itu fast food dari Jepang, and it is actually not. But I still love it tho, meskipun menu yang gue makan ya itu-itu aja. Kalo lagi laper banget atau dibayarin ortu, gue pasti bakal pesan paket C (beef teriyaki, shrimp roll + egg chicken roll). Kalo lagi mode hemat y...