Training ended, holidays started....

12.15pm, left the office. Report done, all my jobs done, packed my stuff and left.
Woo hoooo...!!! c'est les vacances, enfin!

my training did not turn out too bad. Actually I did have fun during my training. I met very lovely people, specially Amalia, my boss who is a very nice woman indeed. She's funny, talkative, loves her cats to death, sometimes annoying but it's ok I still could handle it. We shared stories and gossips about the summer lecturers, about the students and of course about her cats.

Emotions: Happy, A bit sad and excited at the same time

Plans: Clubbing tonite, No idea for the rest of week until 11th Sept where I am leaving to Paris to see Pierre-Louis, except maximising my gym.

2nd plan: Off to Stockholm!!!!!! Insya Allah everything goes well.... i have been craving for this trip.

Been wanting to put up some pictures of my unofficial belated birthday party with "geng toulouse ceria" last weekend, but they are not in my camera.

The day I turned 23

was very quiet and simple.

First of all, I was sick. The flu and cough attacked me.

All I wanted was to stay at home under the blanket and to eat hot steamy tom yum soup.

And that was what Pierre-Louis cooked for me, and he baked a brownie too.

We had our dinner, just the two of us with a bottle of champagne to create a festive mood :)

He got me a beautiful pretty watch and a pretty enveloppe with a "letter" inside.

Just like that, I turned 23.

Am expecting "more adult"-ish stuff to come up, we had already our heads stuffed with lotsa thoughts for the near future. Not easy, that's all I can tell for now.

Hours....Minutes...

He's coming in five slow painful hours.........

After more than three weeks of slow painful waiting and of msn convo and of million hours of phone calls...

Sate, Gado2, Ayam Rica, Lamb Chop, Es Buah.........

Sounds like a perfect Indonesian menu to me!!!

And that's what I had for lunch this afternoon. Yuummm......and yea, I did eat WAAYY TOO MUCH!!!

Bu Ninik, a so-called leader of Indonesian association in Toulouse invited us to have lunch at her lovely home this Sunday, in conjunction with departure of Mas Aloy. He's one of us, Indonesians who has completed his master and had to return to our beloved country.

The meal was great (which she cooked herself!!!), the home was beautiful, the companies were awesome. It was a great sunday afternoon indeed.

Started the day by attempting to "bakar sate". But in the end of course we were just yakking away while finishing the tit-bits (crackers, peanuts, coke, springrolls, etc.) leaving Pak Bernard alone grilling the sate with a HAIR DRYER!!! Ha Ha!!

Dasar tamu2 gak tau malu!! cuma tau makan!!!

Is it me...or...???

Scene no. 1 : Thursday evening was walking back to the metro from the gym, with my MD on playing my favorite songs. Then there was this guy, nice looking, young (looking about 19-20 years old), wearing a black suit and a tie, stopped me suddenly....

Nice-looking guy (NLG) : Excusez-moi....etes-vous etudiante?

Me (still lost in my music, never thot anyone would talk to me since they should know I won't response, but this time, I did not know why I kud feel that someone is trying to talk to me, so I turned my head) : Mmm...oui.... (keeping distance)

NLG: Croyez-vouz au Dieu?

Me: ........................???????????????????????

NLG: Vous voulez croire que Dieu existe?

Me: .....................??????????????????? oui..............(silence).............je suis musulmane en faite...........

NLG: ah bon! vous venez d'ou?

Me: l'Indonesie

NLG: Wow....c'est un peu loin, ca.

Me: Non, c'est tres loin.

NLG: Comment sentez-vous.....(knt remember wat he said, but the point is, what do you feel abt God) ?

Me: Huh?..................je ne sais pas, ca va....

NLG: OK, mais pour moi, quand j'ai trouve Dieu, ca me rend bcp de bonheure.

Me: Ah...ok...mm... (smiling weirdly)

My phone rang... THAAANKK GOOOODD!!!!!! that's when I believe Allah loves me :) moreover when it was Pierre-Louis on the other end....

NLG left me his card with the address of the church and its website. Website??????


Scene no. 2: Wednesday night during dinner at Pierre-Louis' brother's place together with his parents. Dessert time, eating peaches.

Me - enjoying the sweet soft peach, peeling the skin, cutting it into small pieces and galop it in my mouth (bit by bit of course). All of a sudden...

Aurelien (Pierre-Louis' brother) : Dita!!! Ca se mange pas comme ca une peche!!!

Me: ?????????? (looking left and rite, expression of "what's goin on?" )

Aurelien: Arrete, arrete!! C'est pas polie....

Me: Ah bon? (a bit panicked due to fear of looking primitive in front of the parents, though I know very well that they are cool type of ppl, dont really care about things like this, but STILL!) pourquoi? Ca se mange comment alors?

Aurelien: (said nothing but showing me that face of "stop-it-rite-now-cuz-it-is-looking-really-disgusting-how-you-eat")

What I did was stop peeling the skin of the peach and just eat it like how I would eat an apple, bite by bite. I really thot it was because the peach's juice was flowing all over my hand and it looks messy, but when I saw everyone was eating peach like that, I was really confused.

My hypotheses: I cut the peach into small pieces and put it directly into my mouth with the knife. That was my guess.

See what I live here people! Knt even eat peach peacefully....wat the eff!


Scene no.3: In my office with Amalia (my boss) and The Ass (this stupid looking girl). Amalia bought some croissants for breakfast and started offering us to eat them.

A: I have some croissants here, let's haf b/fast together, what do you girls would like to drink? Tea, coffee?

The Ass: Cafe!

Me: Non, merci. I am fasting today.

A: Oh noooo.....then u're not gonna eat my croissant??

Me: Yea, I'm so sorry, why you didnt tell me you're gonna bring croissant today.

A: But u know very well that today is The Ass' last day. So we always haf b/fast together.

Me: No, actually I dont know. Sorry amalia.

A: But yesterday u didnt fast?

Me: We had a picnic yesterday remember? And on wednesday I had to do the Toulouse visit, so I couldn't afford to fast.

A: It's ok, eat now. It's still 9 am, still early, you can fast tmrw (she's joking)

Me: Haha....yea yea.....no thx really, I have to complete it, I have 4 more days to pay off. I'd like to finish it soon.

A: But you can't do like....one day fast, the next you don't. You said u had one week to repay. It's not rite, it's unacceptable.

The Ass: Yea, you knt do that, if you break the cycle in the middle of the week, you haf to restart it all over again.

Me (still think that they r joking): ..................................??????.................

The Ass and A: No, no, seriously.....Dita, you knt do like this... it's wrong..

Me: huh?? You guys serious? Of course I can....(silence)

The Ass and A: No no no u knt.....

Me: What are u telling me? You are not even muslims, why are u telling me this? (I swear I was in HUUUGGEEE awe)

The Ass: I know I am not, but my frend is and she said she has to do it in consecutive days.

Me: Oh really? Well, actually we can. We just have to complete the number of days that we did not fast last time. We can even do it on mondays and thursdays.

The Ass and A: No no no bla bla bla bla.....(still telling me that they were right and Im not supposed to do it this way)

Arguments went on and on. With The Ass of course giving me that face of "please-Dita-do-not-argue-with-me-cuz-I-know-everything-and-I-know-I-am-right" .......until I kudnt take it anymore and I grabbed a cup of coffee and tempting to make some coffee for me to shut them up. I was thinking that I can fast again tmrw, I am not gonna die, but I will be if I keep listening to this nonsense.

They were like....: Dita!!! wht are you doing? don't do this!! we were just discussing.

Me: discussing??? I think that was not a discussion, it was more like....a judgement of what I am doing is wrong. And how could you this when you yourselves are not muslims??

The Ass (still acting like nothing happened, everything was normal, telling me that i was over reacting...): bla bla bla...yada yada yada.... (mulut nya udah kaya pantat aja, segala yg busuk2 keluar).

Arguments going on, now it is about the fact that I was exaggerating things and they just wanted to discuss (bullshit). Trust me it is totally a waste of time discussing things with them because both of them always acts like they know EVERYTHING IN THIS REVOLVING DAMN WORLD AND OTHER EIGHT PLANETS AND THE SUN AND THE MOON!! (Am I correct abt the planets?) and they always cut people talking, and they talk and talk and talk......so that is why I never bothered exchanging opinions with them. Totally useless cuz in the end, I will end up listening to both of them yakking away.

Ok, back to the scene. I was sooo angry and upset that I started to cry ( When i lose my temper I tend to cry) while still arguing with them that they did not have to be so pushy regarding this matter.

The Ass - still talking.....showing me her old (shes around 30 years old), ugly, shitty i-know-everything face when I just said "Oh shut up, Ass!" (in french "ta guele!" which is very very rude). She started getting all dramatic of course.....

The Ass: I knt accept that you insulted me, Dita!!! This is unacceptable!!

Me: And you, you can insult me with your incompetence judgement???

(stormed ouf the room to smoke, The Ass I mean)

Me still upset and crying. All the tears were unstoppable cuz my anger still in climax. Amalia came to calm me down and said sorry and all. It was nice of her, at least she apologised for saying the things she said.

The Ass of course still oh-so dramatic about my insult. So I said sorry cuz I know it was very rude words to say. But she did not accept my apologize. And I said that how could she argue with me of things of religion. It's a very very sensitive matter and I said that I would never (not even bother) to try to argue about other religion which I am not a devotee of.

Long story short. She was cold the whole morning till the time we went home and still did not apologize to me for what came out from her ass, or was it her mouth? I forgot.


Scene no. 4: During lunch break about two weeks ago in the office. Everyone (teachers and trainees) was done with the classes and started to come to the office to return books and stuff. One madagascarian (correct?) girl gave me a brochure.

M girl: Dita, I have this brochure for you, maybe you can distribute it to the students. It's like a cultural show.

Me (looking at the said brochures which apparently was some kinda Gospel concert in Toulouse or sumthing) : Oh, ok. Merci. I am gonna put it on the board.

M girl: And you, you don't wanna go with me. I am going this weekend.

Me: Oh, no thanks.

M girl: Why not? They are good.

Me: Oh, sure. But I am a muslim actually I dont go to Gospel shows.

M girl: But it's not religious, it's cultural.

Me (Is she high or sumthg? HALO it's clearly marked GOSPEL concert....praising God...bla bla bla...): Huh? mmm...no, its ok. Thanx.

M girl: Oh since you are a muslim, do you mind seeing my friends, they are missionaries actually from the USA. They wanna talk to you about their faith?

Me: Huh...?????.....................They wanna talk to me about MY faith?

M girl: no no....about their faith to God and about the religion. When are you free?

Me: Mmm..why would they wanna talk about their faith to me? Why? I dont know anything about that.Why? Why?

M girl: Yea, that's why. And you can ask questions too.

Me: .............................................

M girl : Oh, and if you wanna convert you can, if not, it's ok, they just wanna talk.

Me: ............................................................................................. (still knt believe she just said what she said)

M girl: They are very nice people. So tmrw you're free??

Me: Mmm...I can't, I have to go to Basso Cambo to buy something. (i didnt lie, I really had to go to the supermarket)


Scene no. 5: A student from Dubai was arguing with Amalia about his courses and his yada yada...he did not speak very good french so I had to translate for him. Things got a little bit emotional between Amalia and him. And he asked me things that I did not know when suddenly he stated an unstateable statement to me.

Dubai boy: How come u do not know? But you got paid for this!!! And I paid to be here!!!

Me: Excuse me??? What did you say?? Please do not say things that you dont know. We are trainees here and we are definitely not paid.

Dubai boy: Really? How come??

I, who was quite upset, did not bother to explain, instead it was The Ass with his look-at-me-I-speak-English-with-an-American-accent who did it.

Note:
Is it written in my fukcing face that "You are all wecome to discuss and argue religious matters with me" that people keep annoying me with this??

And this is France for God's sake. A country that ban religious acknowledgement in public establishement, such as school. No cross, no veil, no other symbols of religion should be shown within school compound and during school activities.

So, is it me???

Is it french???

Is it just people around me??

I feel like shouting "Leave me alone! If you do not know anything about anything, SHUT THE F UP!!"

Mmmm...

Salut tout le monde!

it's been a week since my last post. so...??? so, i dunno, im just saying. I have nothing to say actually, just would like to update things though i have nothing to update about.

well, today we had a picnic with the students of Universite d'Ete. It was very nice especially with the students who were so motivated putting their hearts and souls to their food. The spanish, italians and germans brought each of their own countries' specialities respectively. As a result, they were all looking so tired this morning due to "begadang" until 1 am the night before to cook. I salute them!!!! That's the spirit!!!

Me....I cut raw veggies, like carrots, raddish, cucumber, tomatoes and managed to make "bumbu pecel" which at the end everyone had a try!!! yeeey......quite a success, even the veggies.

Oh....there is this cute Swedish guy in the summer school. Tee hee.... No, darling I am NOT gonna flirt!! Just talk to him from time to time, since he speaks english so well and he has this oh-so-cute accent... and blonde blue eyes.... :) Gatel mode on.

One more week and pierre louis is comiiiiiinnnggggg!!!!!!!!!!!! For 5 whole days!!!! well...only.. sigh.. BUT YEEEEYYY no matter what!!

So far, my summer alone in Toulouse had not turned out that bad. I got to meet people too. Besides dealing with foreign students, I get to spend time with Evelyne, working out in the gym, watching movies, accompanied Brian to pierce his ear, luncheon with Anthea, exploring the city more than I have ever done since September last year, meeting up with pierre-louis' parents who are in town for two weeks, etc....
But still.....there is always something missing.... by now you should be able to guess.

It has been beyond hard to be away from him for 3 months.....three freaking months people!!! HALOOO... (you ppl must be like....wth..)

il fait super chaud!!!!!

Finally summer is here!!!!! I said this because even though official date of summer (21st of june) has passed for almost 2 months, only these past few days the weather has been killing me and the sun finally decided to get back to work!! It is super hot here in Toulouse!!!! People are happy and all, enjoying the sun, digging their spaghetti straps, sundress, sun glasses, super short shorts to bare more skin!!

Nevertheless, I enjoy my training less since Daniela is gone. She was my bestest companion, also a trainee in Universite d'Ete and we have been getting to know each other. We would gossip, talk nonsense, organise few activities for the students, etc. She was a very nice girl, always has something to talk about and has so much energy and motivation to take care of the foreign students, who sometimes pissed me off. OK, "pissed off" is a rather exaggerated word to describe it. Yah...pokoknya bikin bete lah!

Now, Im in the office with my favourite colleague, Amalia, and two other not-so-favorite ones. Urrghh..... if you know what I mean, I won't describe them here but I am gonna say that they are not my favorite people in the world. Voila!

But hey! the good news is......I've lost weight!!!!!!! Oh my Gooood!!!! That means my work-out is actually working out! Although, i have not confirmed it myself, my weight loss I mean, but people has been telling me. So, YEEEEAAAYY!!!!! All the motivation and resistance to laziness had been paid off! And I started to form some muscles too... how cool is that!!

Okay, dont get too excited now, cuz if it says otherwise by next month, I'll be crashed... zen now....zen......

So, I have been going to the gym almost everyday now for the past two weeks and a half. I joined classes, I tried some of the machines, but I dont really enjoy it. Cuz basically you just cycle, run, lifting weights, but all by yourselves, no companions, no music, no crazy noisy gay instructor!!

I'm craving for McDonalds now and a good cup of McFlurry.... Ciao!