Brahmanto Anindito's Blog, page 16

The Philosophy of Ketupat

Every Eid ul-Fitr day, in muslim’s house there is almost always ketupat. It is a staple food made from rice, wrapped by coconut leaves. I thought it is from Indonesia. But in fact ketupat or kupat also can be found in Malaysia, Brunei Darussalam, Singapore and Philippines. It is not also served only in Eid ul-Fitr. In Bali, ketupat is also used as ceremony presents. The word “ketupat” or “kupat” derives from Javanese word “ngaku lepat”, which means admit mistake. We hope ketupat tradition can make us admit our mistakes so we can apologize each other. The shape of ketupat is rhombus. In Javanese culture it means four human desires: amarah (anger), aluamah (hunger), supiah (desire to possess something good), and mutmainah (desire to force ourselves). We struggle to conquer those desires during Ramadhan. So, by eating ketupat, we supposed to fight against those all. How to make a ketupat? Generally, it’s simple, I tell you. Ketupat pack is made of janur kuning (coconut leaves) as the symbol to refuse misfortune. People in Indonesia used to make ketupat pack together to show their intimate. But of course we can also buy them in market. Put some rice into ketupat pack, [...]

Kenapa The Dark Knight Rises Laku Keras

Saya kebagian deret kursi L sewaktu menonton film ini. Sial! Bagaimana lagi, dari hari ke hari bioskop yang memutar The Dark Knight Rises penuh. Daripada pulang dengan tangan hampa, terpaksalah menonton pemandangan Gotham City dengan mendongak sepanjang 2 jam 44 menit. Untungnya, film ini benar-benar layak tonton. Seperti dua film Batman sebelumnya, The Dark Knight Rises bukan hanya hadir sebagai film superhero yang adegan-adegan aksinya luar biasa, melainkan juga dilengkapi dengan jalan cerita yang menyentuh. Di sini, Anda akan menjumpai pembantu setia Bruce Wayne, Alfred, diberhentikan. Anda juga akan menjumpai aksi Bane, penjahat bertopeng yang bahkan Batman pun bukan tandingannya. Lalu muncul pertanyaan, bisakah film ini masuk juga dalam jajaran box office sepanjang masa seperti The Dark Knight? Terlalu dini untuk menyimpulkan. Sekadar mengingatkan, film kedua dari trilogi Batman besutan Christopher Nolan itu dulu menduduki posisi ketiga film terlaris sepanjang masa (sebelum dipukul mundur oleh The Avenger). Mengapa? Yang pertama, tentu saja karena filmnya memang bagus. Bahkan terbukti moncer juga di ajang Oscar tahun 2009. Yang kedua, ada aktor yang mati tidak jauh dari waktu produksi. Kematian selalu menimbulkan rasa penasaran dan menciptakan buzz marketing. Tapi, harus aktor yang perannya besar dalam film yang meninggal. Contohnya banyak. Bela Lugosi di Dracula. Bruce Lee [...]

Raden Ahmad Kosasih in Obituary

On July 24, 2012, Indonesia lost one of its comic artists, R. A. Kosasih, at the age of 93. He is considered as the father of Indonesian comics. Some of his masterpieces are Sri Asih (a comic with a superhero like Wonder Woman), Rama and Sinta, and Mahabharata. His books were inspired by Hindu and Indonesian traditional literature such as wayang (puppet). But in fact, his books span many genres too, such as children, romance, martial arts and superhero comics. Farewell, Mr. Kosasih! * * * Suami saya punya banyak komik. Salah satu dari komik-komik itu ada yang berjudul Rama dan Sinta. Dulu, waktu serial Ramayana dan Mahabharata diputar di televisi, saya paling males nontonnya. Tapi ketika menemukan komik tersebut di kamar, saya tergoda juga untuk membacanya. Melalui komik itu juga, saya jadi mengenal R. A. Kosasih, sang pengarang. Eh, baru saja saya menyelesaikan ketiga seri komik Rama dan Sinta, tiba-tiba saja saya dengar kabar kalau sang komikus meninggal dunia. Walau sebenarnya tidak mengenal beliau, tapi saya merasa kehilangan juga. R. A. Kosasih adalah komikus termasyhur di Indonesia. Banyak orang mengenalnya sejak lama sebagai Bapak Komik Indonesia. R. A. Kosasih atau Raden Ahmad Kosasih lahir di Bogor, Jawa Barat, pada [...]

Site of Batur Agung

Last month, The Bloggers Community of Banyumas held an event called Juguran Blogger Banyumas. “Juguran” is a Banyumasian term, means “gathering”. But the event is never same with other blogger communities. They made it more interesting with a tour and IT workshop, in order to introduce the Banyumas’ villages through Internet. One of the tour destinations was Batur Agung site in Baseh Village, Kedung Banteng District. Based on a folklore, site of Batur Agung was used as a great asceticism of Raden Kamandaka from Padjajaran Kingdom, West Java. The site of Batur Agung is actually a twin of Baturraden, because they both are located in the foot of Mount Slamet, Central Java Province. Only, Baturraden is precisely located in Baturraden village (the north of Pandak), while Batur Agung lies at Baseh Village, Banyumas. Arriving at the location, Juguran participants were welcomed by a gatekeeper who wore a complete traditional costume. He told that the place was previously a place for the chosen gentlemen. He didn’t explain who the chosen gentlemen were. But from that history, this place is then called Batur Agung. “Batur” means “partner”, and “agung” means “special”. While explaining the history of Batur Agung, the gatekeeper brought the [...]

Delicious Lumpia Basah

Do you know semarang lumpia? It’s a kind of snack made from carrot and bamboo sprout that are fried with few oil, and wrapped by lumpia skin. It tastes good. And now, have you known another kind of lumpia called lumpia basah (wet lumpia)? But it didn’t come from Semarang, Central Java. But forget the origin. Lumpia basah is as delicious as semarang lumpia. I love lumpia basah even more than semarang lumpia. This lumpia has different content. Lumpia basah used juicy tuber and the skin is not fried like we do in making semarang lumpia. So, after the skin is filled by juicy tuber, bean sprouts, egg and seasoning, we can eat it by using chopstick. Don’t think it’s uncooked, because the lumpia skin should always been cooked already. In Bandung, I often bought this snack. The first time I saw my friend ate something using chopstick, I thought it was Japanese snack. But the taste made me forget about the peculiarity. Unfortunately, I cannot find lumpia basah in Surabaya, or maybe in East Java at all. However, I always can make lumpia basah at home. The ingredients are findable in the market. They are: Lumpia skin (very thin [...]

Is Blog Still In?

This question came up my mind when I attended Deutsche Welle Global Media Forum in Bonn, Germany, a week ago. One of the events there was BOBs (Best of Blogs) Awarding. Blog might be promising type of media in 2005-2009. But now, the quantity is declining since the netizen prefer social media as microphone for their inner voice. What a bitter fact. However, Budi Putra, one of the front bloggers in Indonesia), sees nothing to worry. As he said in our short conversation in Bonn, “Why should bloggers be numerous? Better if there are only few but the world recognized them, rather than a lot of bloggers but with low quality.” Do some blogwalking, you’ll agree with him. I don’t mind blogs with amateur content. They’re learning (as I am, actually). But blogs of spammer and copy-paster, to me, are very irritating. With low quality posts, they can show up on top of Google’s result page. They’re mocking Google algorithm by that. In the meantime, Google is sluggish to anticipate such blogs, especially when they come from Blogspot (Google’s very own blog platform). However, let’s not only look search engines with machinery work like Google. There are a lot of [...]

Tor Tor Dance: Enlightenment, Encouragement and Entertainment

I thought it’s been long time since I didn’t hear that Malaysia claims Indonesian things as its own again. But few days ago, I had to hear such news again, that our neighbor has decided to acknowledge Tor Tor dance and Paluan Gondang Sambilan musical instrument from North Sumatra as its own national heritage. Why does this happen again? Whose fault it is? Malaysia who is too provocative but used to be orderly in archiving its cultural heritages? Indonesia who is rich of cultures but don’t have the systematic habit to formalize its own? I choose to blame no one. But admit it, this is our weakness, Indonesian people. We think that we know our cultures, but in fact we have no idea. From 230 million of Indonesia citizens, how many people recognize Tor Tor dance? So, I come up with a simple idea: how if we now look this dance closer? Let’s fly to the Batak land to meet the real, native Tor Tor dance. Did you know, the word “Tor Tor” is derived from the pounding sound of the dancers foot on board of Batak traditional house. The dancers move on a rhythmic gondang that usually amounted to [...]

Artificial Lake, Leisure Center in Bangkalan

If you, by any chance, go to Madura, visit TRK or Taman Rekreasi Kota (City Recreation Park) Bangkalan. The location is in center of the regency, one hundred meters to the east of Raya Stadion Bangkalan street. Had been built since 1999, the TRK Bangkalan was an idle state land. At the moment, Mr. Head Regency Officer had initiative to create a pleasing place for his folk. The recreation park in the beginning was visited mostly by children. But then the organizer found it rather boring. So and so, in few years, they developed the lake that is located in East Java province. Done. For attracting people to come, the organizer put also some pedal and row boats to everyone, as a vehicle to go around the lake. The pedal boat itself then becomes a primadonna there. Me myself, I was really taking pleasure when floating on this artificial lake by one of them. Alongside the lake, we see a wide fishing pool. Several booths for fishermen exotically stand on the lake. The water is clear and so calm. Look into the deep water, I bet you’ll stop thinking about weariness for a while. We just need to pay 5,000 [...]

Indonesian Massages

When you ache in your body, what do you do to make it better? The massage, of course! It’ll make your body relax, fresh and healthy faster. But tell me, do you know the massages from Indonesia? Here it has existed since centuries. You can find massage scenes on the reliefs of Borobudur temple, in Central Java Province. This traditional healing technique was influenced by Chinese and Ayurvedic (Hindu traditional medicine system from India using herbal scented oils). Then, when King Hayam Wuruk from Majapahit Kingdom (embryo of Republic of Indonesia) married a Chinese woman, local people started to recognize the healing arts of acupuncture and reflexology. In meantime, the massage techniques were also introduced by Arabian, Chinese and Indian traders who sailed to Indonesia for spice trade. Indonesia is a melting pot. So, I believe many cultures are mixed here. Including the massage techniques. The most modern of healing technique of massage is found in Java and Bali, which were no doubt developed from Majapahit Kingdom tradition. During that era, the massage evolved not only for healing, but also for relaxation and beauty. In Indonesia, we recognize two traditional type of massage: “pijit” or “pijat” (Indonesian term) and “urut” [...]

Contribute to Wikipedia, Anyone?

What are the benefits of Wikipedia for author like us? I think there are at least three: to strengthen your brand, as a source of knowledge, and the means to share knowledge. Recently, someone offered me to write few articles on Wikipedia. I regretted that at the moment I didn’t know how to do it. But I learnt after. And, it was not that difficult, actually. Just go to Wikipedia.org and click the Help link on the sidebar. You’ll get tutorials more than you need there. * * * “Brahm,” seorang teman di Jakarta menelepon, “klienku butuh penulis Wikipedia. Cuma 1-2 artikel kok. Bisa kerjain?” Saya sejenak terdiam. Penulis Wikipedia? Hm, saya memang pernah mengedit beberapa artikel di Wikipedia. Tapi belum pernah menulis dari awal. Menulis di Wikipedia tidak sama dengan menulis artikel-artikel biasa. Untuk bisa menulis “artikel sempurna” (bukan “artikel rintisan” atau “belum diperiksa”) butuh jam terbang. Bila saya baru mendaftar di Wikipedia, terus langsung menulis, bisa-bisa dicurigai ada maunya oleh para Wikipediawan. Maka dengan menyesal saya menjawab, “Nggak bisa. Belum ada pengalaman. Tapi kalau mau nunggu beberapa hari, aku bisa mempelajarinya dulu.” Sayang, sang klien butuh cepat. Jadi, tawaran saya sepertinya tidak menarik baginya. Ya sudah, bukan rezeki [...]