Rainy day

Hi!

Well, to be honest I wasn’t really in the mood of writing anything but since the weather is so dark and shltty outside, I decided what the hell, I’ll write something.

It’s been a rainy season again. Probably a little late considering it’s the end of November already, but still it’s now a time where you simply can’t go anywhere without umbrella. And trust me, I have 2 big umbrella with me at all time. One is the one that has the looks of a rifle (yes, that is actually my umbrella) and the other one is the one that I called a “F*ing tent” that I got from the office family day. Its so big and so sturdy and strong that the first time I saw it, and I quote myself on this, I just simply said “Well f* me, that’s a tent. Not an umbrella”

And then comes my weakness against cold climate. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve been to snow and were on the receiving end of a bloody cold aussie winter for 3.5 years, but I simply can’t stay in a cold climate CREATED by air con.

In Indonesia, we call it ndeso.

But I can’t stay in hot weather either, I need to cool down.

In Indonesia, we call this asu.

Bad jokes aside, in times like this as the weather worsen after 12:00, I always rely on my trusty suit jacket to keep me warm. Sure enough, I’ve been wearing this for god knows when, yet everyone still give me the weird look because suit jacket isnt exactly a common thing to wear in Indonesia, while I can never fathom why. To me, suit jacket are good, because:

1. Comfy
2. Warm
3. Comes in many colour and style
4. Saves you and your office shirt because late in the day because your shirt would be all messed up, wrinkled, etc.
5. You can simply put it over your head and body in the rain and walks like a boss without caring for the rain.

So the point are, if you are a man, it’s never a bad idea to invest in a suit.

Back to work, young man.

Untitled

Good afternoon,

Writing you here from the comfort of my desk to bring you up to date with whatever went on with my life.

So, 1^st thing first, yes I have been married.

Probably I should have wrote something about it a while back. Pretty sure I kept a draft of it somewhere, about my thought and state of mind before the big day, but somehow I forgot where I put the damn draft file.

Yes, it is the problem in 2014. You have so many storage spaces, and you forget where you might have put it. It could be somewhere on my laptop, it could be on my work PC, could be somewhere on my skydrive, phone, or even whatever online drive I have going on.

Well here I am instead, Im gonna tell you about how I feel about it, after some times from the big D-Day of marriage. I just thought that a pure, unemotional write up away from all the lovey dovey would be somewhat objective and nice to read.

But what do I know, I write crap most of the times anyway.

Well, I have to say marriage is like a landmark. It is part of your life. It is definitely one of those chapter that has that special mark on a book called “Your Life”. It is quite a special thing, but, like all special thing, it’s not something that you have to brag about.

What I mean is that anyone, everyone will have to go the same process or marriage thing that I just did. Being marriage doesn’t exactly shows that you are special. Being married very early on your life doesn’t make it special as well, nor does getting married late in your life. People have their own way, and as far as I believe, everyone will experience the same thing too. It’s not like you are married and all of a sudden you become a member of such elite group or something.

Don’t believe me? Well let’s look at it this way. Almost all of you have graduated right? Either from SMA or University. How did you feel when you graduated? Happy? Special? So happy that you feel like the world is yours?

Well of course you would be happy, but when you think about it, it is just one of the many landmark that you will experience in your life. It’s not a big deal when you think about it. Someone, somewhere, will have already experienced it too.

So yeah, I do feel a bit weird with all those people who are boasting on their married status. Being married doesn’t mean that you can mock someone who isn’t married yet. Eventually people will go through the same stage anyway.

Okay……….

Enough of the opening rant. Now life has been wonderful to me. Never in my life I would have dreamed that I would have all the time in the world to be with someone that I always love, every day. Never in my life I would have dreamed that I would have my own car, that it would be my family car and that it is part of our practical living.

Never as well I would have thought that I would be thinking about the furniture that I would stuff on our house. Never would I think that getting a house that would provide you with decent living would be all damn hard (BSD rocks btw, love the place). And all those yada yada things that people would call cliché.

I am still the old of me. I still play games, I still spent my time listening and making bad jokes, and just simply still being an ass on all things. But hey, everybody will move forward when the time comes. And that everybody will be together and with whom they deserve, when the time comes.

When that day comes, it makes all the perseverance worth it.

That time of the year again

Musim pemilu. Dimana ini muka default saya setiap liat atau dengar sesuatu

Overcharged Credit Card - Bank BNI and Paypal case. Beware.

Update:

Monday, 7th of April 2014

1. Went to local BNI near my office and creates a formal written complaint along with printed evidence of the transaction in paypal. The Bank said they had nothing to do with the Credit Card division and put me on the phone with CS. Again. After lengthy debate with CS, they allow me to file a formal complaint after the transaction has been cleared first. Dont ask me when that is. It could be eternity, and i'd assume they would just bill me anyway at the end of the month because "the system said so".
2. HumbleBundle confirmed that the transaction is $4 and that is what they sent out as well to paypal. Paypal is still investigating things down their side

Tuesday, 8th of April 2014

1. Called paypal and they acknowledged the problem, will get back to me as soon as possible

Thursday, 10th of April 2014

1. Problem solve. Suddenly its Rp 49,680 again. 

Original Post
Havent been blogging for a while, im a keep this story somewhat short.

So i like playing games, yes we all know that. And as i grow older, i realized that indie dev is the one that you have to support. Thats why i like the idea of Humble Bundle, basically indie dev selling and bundling their game together and anyone can pay any amount to buy it. Half charity, half marketing.

And so i have been buying quite a lot of Humble Bundle. Last night was no exception. I paid $4 for bunch of games, and proceeds as usual through Paypal.

Paypal gave me the usual currency converter page, which gave me $4 as Rp 46,980 in Indonesian currency. No big deal, i paid and completed the transaction.

Almost instantly, i received SMS from my bank, BNI. It said that i just made a transaction of Rp 4,698,000.

what

the

actual

duck???????????

That equals to $400 ! About as much as a PS4 in America.

In panic i logged into my paypal again and took a look at the receipt of my last transaction. Guess what? it was $4. or Rp 46,980 in converter.

I called my bank, telling them this and the response was the usual kind of response you'd expect from a customer service.

Its the usual "we hear you, shit happens, and no we cant do anything about it"

BNI basically tells me that they cant do anything about it because the merchant does the transaction. BNI has nothing to do with it. Well well, why did they call this BNI Credit Card then? might as well call it Iqbal Credit Card with my face printed at the card if BNI arent going to have anything to do with it.

I called them 3 times, 3 different CS representatives. All gives the same answer. They cant do anything, and told me to resolve it with paypal.

So i did, i raised dispute to paypal asking them what did they charged to BNI. Why the receipt is $4 while they charged BNI $400.

The case, as this post is made is still under investigation from paypal. But knowing how sucks Indonesian system and banking is, here is what i think will happen:

1. Paypal confirmed that HumbleBundle received $4
2. Paypal confirmed that they charged BNI $4
3. BNI wont know a thing and still charged me $400 for it "because the merchant and BNI system" said so.

This is a loss loss situation to me as it stands. Terrible.

I believe this is a mistake somewhere between paypal and BNI part. You see, the way Dollar goes, there are always cents involved. Paypal wrote my transaction as $4,00 which i think somehow interpreted by my bank as $400.

Thats the only was i can imagine it goes. I mean how else can $4 turns into $400?

I will update this page as it goes. Email sent to HumbleBundle, Paypal, and BNI to resolve this. Not so confidence, but i keep my fingers crossed.

And below you can find evidence of my Paypal transaction that night.

Anybody had this happen before?

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust

Confidence.

Its a small word, but it carries huge amount of boost for human being.

Recently Australia lifted the Ashes urn again. For those of you who doesnt know, Ashes is a cricket competition between England and Australia, conducted every 1 or 2 years.

At this stage, maybe some of you will ask,"Its only England and Australia, whats so good about it?"

Put it this way, imagine a football match between Indonesia and Malaysia. Both play 5 games in each country. Add in the feisty, no hold back nature of media there. Its a battle zone.

Australia has been invincible in the past. They are like that likeable school bully in the school yard. They just better, fitter, meaner, and just downright awesome. They have won like 8 or 10 ashes series in a row against England.

While England is the nerd, the geek. They calculate everything, managed to get a decent squad in and managed to win the last 3 ashes.

Yes, the last 3 series.

What they did then, was pretty much asking for trouble. Since they started winning and become world beater, they got cocky. Imagine that nerdy kid in your class, who are usually quiet, suddenly becomes the new bully. Suddenly becomes the new Alpha man, an alpha male. All in a while the "old bully" just sitting down in the corner, looking.

Last ashes series in England, Australia didnt play badly. They were written off so bad in the paperm labeled "the worst team to leave aussie shores" and were destined for doom.

In the end, they only had 1 bad match i think.

Lost the 1st one by coming so close in the end,
Lost the 2nd one by playing shit
Drawn the 3rd one because weather intervened, they could have won this
Lost the 4th one after almost defending the total
Drawn the last one

result: 3-0 in England.

Then they head home for another 5 match against England in Australia.

At this stage, the attitude was clear. I didnt have microphone in Aussie change room, but if  did, it would sounds something like this:

"Fuck it. Fuck getting this poms kicking our ass all the time. We'll get them here, we'll give em hell with the media, then we'll kill em in the field. Prepare the short pitch stuff, aim for their head and send them packing in the coffin"

What happen after that, was pretty much that.

The first test was a bloodbath. Mitch Johnson, the man who got ridiculed so much in the past by England supporter, now boasting a nasty moustachioed and looking for blood. Fast, sharp, aiming at head or arm or fingers.

Whichever one he can break first

The captain is on it too, with a reminder to the opposing player:

"Get ready for a broken fuckin arm"

This is nasty. This is Aussie. This is gold

England made a huge mistake. They poke a stick at the bee hive, and now they have the whole Australia as a nation hell bent for revenge.

Needless to say, england lost the first match badly. But one thing was apparent, they were scared. They were wounded. They had the face of "i didnt sign up for this shit" thing.

One of their senior player went home for "stress related illness".

Repeated dose was applied for the 2nd and 3rd match, and after the 3rd one another player had a broken ankle, hit by the ball, and another decided to retired.

England were completely broken.

In the end the scoreline were 5-0.

They didnt win anything, they didnt managed to drawn anything. All inflicted by the same Aussie team they ridiculed about 6 months ago.

Form, is temporay. While class, is permanent.