Bandung, the capital city of the province of West Java, is located on the valley of the mountain of Tangkuban Perahu. It is quite high above sea level, so I’m quite surprised to see the highland got flooded.

I went to Bandung this morning with my colleagues, for business purpose. The business meeting was until 12pm, so we went to a restaurant, called Nyonya Rumah at Jl. Naripan. The front view of the place is very ordinary, only 4 meters width. But when you get into the building, you will see that they have a very large, excellent backyard. In the center is a Koi pool. Surrounding the pool is the dining tables.

I ordered a Chicken Gordon Blue, served with French Fries and mushroom sauce and es jeruk degan (Orange Coconut Ice). Nothing special with the taste of the food or drink. But then again, the place is very excellent, couldn’t find similar place in Jakarta.

After a good lunch, there come the heavy rain. After 30 minutes, the rain hasn’t stop, so we get into our car, and went to Dago. To my very surprise, Dago, which is considered the highland of Bandung, is heavily flooded! The water is around 20-30cm deep, and flowing downstream like a river. Lucky that we rent a Kijang, which is quite high.

Anyway, it was a nice business trip, but with so much homework to do.

PS: I passed the first test for admission at a business school. Wish me luck for the 2nd test.

Address:
Nyonya Rumah
Jl. Naripan 92C, Bandung 40112. Phone: +62 (22) 4210426
Jl. Trunojoyo 29, Bandung 40115. Phone: +62 (22) 4204750

Deddy Cobuzier is an Indonesian Magician, which refuse to be called magician. He prefers to be called mentalist instead, because, according to him, what he did on the TV was not magic, but the game of mental and concentration.

So, how did he help me? In one of his show, he played the memory trick, where he memorized the order of a card deck. He then taught the trick to the audience. Well, I didn’t try it to remember a card deck, but it helped me during my master degree test, where I should remember 25 words in 3 minutes. I was manage to remember 24 of them at that moment, and now, 12 hours after the test, I still remember 23 of them, in their exact order.

The trick is simple; I guess someone might have a scientific name for it. He said that, human’s mind is bad at memorizing words, but good at memorizing pictures. So, what we need to do is to associate each item to remember, with a picture, and then create a story from it. The story doesn’t need to be making sense, but it should be easy to follow.

Example: To remember weasel, moose, bear, zebra and tiger. I’m associating each animal with their pictures, and create the following mental story: A small weasel was killed by a moose, then the moose was captured by a big bear. The big bear than was chased by the Zebra, who was running very fast, but eventually killed by the ferocious tiger.

Anyway, if you ever wonder, yes, I finally decided to take my Master Degree in one of local university. The entry test was today, and the result will be known on Monday. Wish me luck……

I have a chat, with a friend of mine, who is a Lecturer in one of business school in Jakarta. I once asked for a reccomendation for a business school to attend, and he reccomended his school. So I was shocked with what he said in te conversation.

Lec: Scal, is there any alumni of my business school, which works at your company?
Scal: None that I know. What for? Why don’t you asked the alumni organization?
Lec: You know… alumni, they didn’t always update the alumni database when they change job. If they worked at your company, I would like to interview the HR or Country manager
Scal: Then ask your fellow Lecturers. They should have the information
Lec: Well, we didn’t talked much outside our working hour. We are businessman, always busy with our job
Scal: Oww….. I think making and maintaining relationship is one of the core lesson of business school?
Lec: Yeah… but we are busy with our business. I’ll just call your HR Manager
Scal: Up to you, but consider this 2 scenario, which one is better?
Scal: 1. Hello, I’m from university A. We would like to know whether any of our alumni works in your company or not. We would like to invite you for an interview to get some feedback
Scal: 2. Hello, I’m from university A. According to our information, we have several alumni working in your company, and we would like to do an interview with you to get some feedback
Lec: The first one is better… I’ll just call him
Scal: Oh… well… if you know him well…. then go ahead
Lec: Yeah… I know him quite well

One thing for sure, after the chat, his school is out of my list for several reason:
1. Information is power. He clearly missed this point by not having enough information to talk to a person as high as HR Country Manager of a multinational company
2. A business school, which has no idea of where their alumni is working is sucks. How can they claim to be the best, if they have no idea of where their graduate works, let alone how much they make.
3. If the Lecturers doesn’t foster and practice communication, what will be the communication style for their student? I believe that business is all about communication.

Flavour, is the objective claim of what you SHOULD feel when you are eating a food or drink. There are no like and dislike.

Taste, is the subjective claim of what you feel when you are eating a food or drink. When someone write a review on food and drink, it will never be objective, because it WILL depend on what does the person feel.

Example:
1. This food is too hot – this is not Flavour, this is taste.
2. We serve the food with some chili – This is flavour, because you are expecting it to be a little bit hot. But when you feel that it is not too hot, or too hot, then it will become taste.

Now you know the different, and know that a taste is never objective, and so does the review. So, next time you eat and drink, TRUST YOUR OWN FEELING. Nobody can say that a food is not good to your taste, unless yourself.

Inspired from Jalansutra mailing list

I just got a copy of the series from my friend. Yep, it is VOLTES V. If you were born in 70-ies or before, I bet that you will know the series, with the famous Teng Ku Ken (translated to Sword of heaven in the movie) .

So, what to review from the 40-series, each running for 30 minutes movie? Flashing back to my childhood, It is the first robotic and heroic movie, as far as I can remember. The idea of 5 aircrafts, each piloted by a teenager, merging together to form a gigantic robot, fighting the bad guy’s beast fighter impress almost every kid at that time.

The movie also skip on most of the world’s reality. Compare the gigantic robot, formed by 5 aircrafts, can move so flexible, as if it is formed by bone and muscle. Then watch the today Power Ranger, a stiff robot fighting a flexible beast fighter….. you got the idea.

Another feature of the movie: It has a story line. Clasic one like Megaloman and God Sigma, or maybe modern one like Power Ranger, lack of reasonable story line. Voltes is not only fighting the bad guy, but they also looking for their parents, going throgh some emotional experience when they lost their mother, their profesor, or when they found out their origin.

All in all, animation technology has advanced to 3D animation, Voltes V still has its place in the heart of people born during that time. Not because of the technology, but because of the simplicity it bought that it is easy to undertand and fun to watch.

Links:
An unofficial pages