HANZKY

i'm just killing time here..my class won't start in another 20 minutes where my group will do our presentation..it's about the wireless industry. i think we're in a good shape, i'm not even worry about it. The Research Paper is due tonight too..my topic is about online retailers branding and shopability and then..i'll have another presentation tomorrow for my database class, i'm building a database for a retail store ..*untuk denim departmentnya..critanya sih Old Navy cause i worked there last time, jadi tau dikit lah gimana sistem databasenya*..jadi basically yah bikin database buat suppliernya, buat employee, productnya, the store branch, etc2..udah gitu bukan bikin databasenya aja, tapi juga bikin queriesnya, reports, form and sub-form. sebenernya sih...not really that complicated when you have enough time to do it..my professor had given this since 2 months ago, but alas i just started it 2 days ago!!!..i don't like to call my self a proscrastinator actually...but i guess this just proves me that i am one...boohoooo. selain itu besok juga ada dua sql assignment yang due..but i'm done with those, tinggal projectnya aja nih yang harus di selesain, i think i'ma need a red bull tonight...haha..but when i walk out of class tomorrow night..i'll be done for the rest of the semester...wohooo..and if i don't take summer class, i'll have 3 free months till i have to touch a textbook again..s.w.e.e.t.

so what the hell is a lomo?? maybe some of you are wondering…hmm..i say it’s an artsy russian camera that has a special lens that make the photos super saturated..jadi warnanya ngejreng ngejreng gitu. maybe this site and this can give you a clear idea of what it is. it's not a digital camera though, in fact it’s a very old skool camera, bener2 vintage banget, we have to wind the thing after we press the shoot button dan kalo filmnya abis, it doesn't automatically rewind the film, we have to press the lil button and turn the rewinding lever clockwise sampe twenty or even thirty times...

anyway, what fascinate me the most beside what it does is actually the brand, the philosophy that built around the camera and how it becomes such a phenomenon. they have succeeded in formulating strong brand identity without doing a single above the line advertising..*remind me of the book that i've been wanting to read, the fall of advertising and the rise of PR* hmm..sebenernya, i’m not really sure about it juga sih, but i flipped through photography magazine regularly dan nggak pernah ngeliat iklannya, di tv or internet juga nggak ada and i've never heard anyone ever seen one either. but yet a lot of people are buying the camera and driving up the demands. the business is going up by pure word of mouth advertising and viral marketing…

this camera is still made by hand in its old factory in St. Petersburg, Russia. harga dari factorynya sih nggak mahal2 banget..about $30 but the lomographic society (the sole distributor for LOMO in the states) overpriced it to $180 a camera. makanya, banyak yang sebel sama lomographic society ini..cause they turn the camera into a fashion accessory. but then again that's how business works, don’t you think? that's how the capitalism and how our world works…! i know it sucks but if you have a chance to sell something at a very high price and people still buying it...aren't you gonna take that chance?...heck i wanna be rich so i'll go for that. some people are really really anti capitalism that they would go as far as stealing the products and act like it's their right since the products should've been made available at no cost for them in the first place. i think that's just so wrong.

but anyway... i won't be bitching about capitalism here cause nothing will change that unless we all come up with some damn good idea and change the whole system… in the meantime, i’m just gonna enjoy my awesome new toy and brush up my lomo skills…teehee….

college basketball season is over…bt, especially that the next season won’t start in another 8 months. Hey but at least lakers make it to the playoffs..so there are still plenty of games to watch. Anyhooo…I thought this final four was going to be where all of the number one seeded fight to get to the championship game, everyone was looking forward for the Kentucky and Arizona match up, padahal udah pada protest ke ncaa committee nya karena they put those two teams in a position where they would meet on final four, instead of the championship game. Tapi ternyata the match up never happened, not this season at least.

I thought texas was going to be the first number one seeded to go down, turned out they were the last one that still ALIVE up until final four. Kenapa yaa kok yang nomer satu itu pada kalah semua, they didn't get to the number one position for nothing, but yet they choked. I guess it’s true the saying that says it’s hard to be number one. It’s hard to get to the top and once you get to the top, it’s even harder to maintain it.You have the extra burdens in your shoulder, especially when the media is overexposing you and the whole world is expecting you to be unbeatable. Anywaaay…I think the most heart breaking game this season was when Gonzaga wore Arizona down to the last seconds of the double overtime. That was a heck of a game, and gonzaga showed that they are the real deal.

I finally watched the salukis show on mtv the other day. It was a good show, it focus mainly on the seniors, kent Williams and jermaine dearman and the redshirted guys…tony and ryan. The show captures almost everything, like the practices, the lockers’ briefing before and after the game, the celebration, the road trip, etc. It’s also show how the players go about their daily life, how they are in class, at home and the camera even following dearman around when he was doing his laundry in a laundromat. I just have one complain about the show, mtv makes Carbondale looks like a tiny hick town, hihi. It’s an old lil town but it’s not that bad, at least it’s not that bad as it's portrayed on mtv. They could shoot something fancier or attractive than the water tower with Carbondale printed on it, or the rusty railway and the cornfields. Carbondale is really not that bad when you know what’s around…! So overall, the show was good…but maybe kent Williams has some explaining to do to his girlfriend when he was caught dancing and grinding with some girls when they went to the bar celebrating the win over Wichita state..teehee.

I found an article in cbs.sportsline.com written by dan wetzel that I thought is really good in explaining what this hype of college basketball is all about down to the very detail. it's written in 2002 before last year tourney started, but it still worth to read and just excites me somehow.

"The beauty in NCAA tournament is that everyone in the country is unified. This is when fans will cheer for Gonzaga, even if no one can pronounce it. This is when two old ladies on the bus will debate the spelling of Krzyzewski. This is when everyone has someone to root for. For their school, their state, their alma mater. For the team with the hunk head coach. For the school with the hottest dance team. For the Salukis.. because, whatever the heck a Saluki is, it sounds cool...=) "


click here to read the rest of the article.

ella…ada kok reporter indonesia yang di kirim ke Iraq, i don’t know how many exactly but i know there are quire a few. republika newspaper sent one of their reporters, Damanhuri Zuhri yang waktu taun 91 juga di kirim buat ngeliput gulf war. tempo juga ngirim reporternya (Rommy Fibri). TV 7 juga ngirim, sama photographernya segala..trus dari harian surya juga ada yang berangkat, kompas juga ada (Mustapha Abduraahman), dari SCTV dan Metro TV juga ada. lumayan banyak juga tuh.

Kalo Peter Arnett. iya dia di pecat dari NBC. alesannya di pecat nggak jelas juga. emang sih dia salah karena nerima interview dari TV iraq, but it’s not like he had a choice kan…kalo dia tolak interview nya, pasti lah dia bakalan di kick out langsung dari Iraq. but i think he was fired more because of the content of the interview. soalnya dia bener bener speak the truth dari apa yang dia liat selama ini di iraq sana. dia bilang kalo there have been surprises, delays in implementing policy, trus juga dia bilang kalo amerika udah underestimate kekuatan iraqi troops, makanya skarang lagi pada ribut di pentagon and rewriting the war plan.

beberapa tahun lalu Peter Arnett juga di pecat dari CNN, because of the same thing, trying to tell the truth, kalo yang ini tentang vietnam war dulu. di online news negara negara lain headlines tentang berita dia itu FIRED BY AMERICA FOR TELLING THE TRUTH..!!..see, everybody knows he did nothing wrong but piss off the pentagon. dia juga bilang kalo “I report the truth of what is happening here in bahgdad and will not apologize for it”


who says there is a freedom of speech here in america??

sampe skarang ini, since the war started…total independent journalists yang udah tewas itu banyak, more than a dozen!!! yang bikin orang jadi mikir kok kayanya udah nggak make sense lagi. some are mysteriously missing, ada yang injured, mysterious accidents (Terry Lloyd, jatoh dari atep..y’right), etc. padahal independent journalists itulah yang di harepin orang orang sebagai sumber berita yang fair dan nggak bias.


Ini ada sebagian facts that i got from fair.org tentang usaha usaha mereka untuk nutupin what’s really happen out there and that the freedom of speech in amerika is merely a slogan.


. MSNBC canceled Phil Donahue’s talkshow, because Phil Donahue seems to present guests who are anti-war, anti-Bush and skeptical of the administration's motives.

read the news here..

. Brent Flynn, a reporter for Lewsiville Leader (Texas), was told he could no longer write a column for the paper in which he had express anti-war views. coba kalo semua artikel artikel dia isinya supporting the war….would they removed her?...i don’t think so…! ada lagi reporter dari San Francisco Chronicle and Michigan Huron Daily Tribune yang di pecat karena sama sama anti war.


. Yellowtimes.org was shutdown (skarang udah bisa lagi). here’s a quote.

“here, at YellowTimes.org, we did not want these stories to go untold. we wanted to bring the horrors of war inflicted on all sides. we condemn killing, we condemn war, and we certainly condemn persecution and torture. we also condemn the intentional absence of truth. however, there are some who would prefer we did not publish and inform the public. Consequently, as of this afternoon, March 24, 2003, we were shut down"


. Al-Jazeera, the most powerful arab news network website were hacked. sama siapa?..ya sama siapa lagi kalo bukan amerika. skarang udah ada lagi sih websitenya, tapi banyak yang mikir kalo amerika juga yang set up website barunya.

orang orang amerika nya sendiri banyak yang udah nggak percaya lagi sama apa yang di beritain di tv tv sini. and in an attempt to get the network news programs to cover the war in an unbiased and uncensored manner, skarang orang orang pada nge boikot product product yang masang iklannya di news program itu. salah satu nya bisa di check di tvboycott.org

i have to agree with dian, kalo news program disini terlalu one sided. they forget the most basic fact of war: people are killed!!! iraqi people tentunya. yes they do mention about the Iraqi casualties, but that’s about it. where’s the pictures of the blownout brains?? the full of blood corpses? the picture of the screaming innocent kids who don’t understand shit about this war or pictures of women who got their hands chopped?? too extreme to be broadcasted??..well…that's what the so called brave american troops are doing over there.

i also haven’t heard from the news here about the bombing of the maternity hospital (click here to read the news), nor have I heard about the shoula market blast that caused great suffering to innocent women and children in their homeland. dan beberapa bombing lainnya lagi…

dan apa iya pesawat pesawat/helikopter yang jatuh itu karena ada technical problems?..apa bener tentara nya ketembak karena friendly fire? atau gara gara kena tembak tentara iraq aja tapi amerika nggak mau ngakuin??.

amerika juga violate the geneva convention yang nggak ngebolehin tv untuk ngebroadcast the prisoner of war. waktu itu amerika complain karena iraq nge-broadcast POW nya amerika, tapi dia sendiri nge broadcast POW nya iraq, Aaron Brown (CNN) cuma bilang kalo it’s okay for the US to broadcast it since their (the Iraqis POW) family wouldn’t be watching. Hel-looo…there are thousands of iraqis living outside iraq who may recognize an iraqi POW as a family member and CNN is broadcast around the world.

banyak juga newspaper around the world yang bilang kalo reporternya (salah satunyaRageh Omaar , reporter nya BBC) mereka lagi jalan jalan di bahgdad dan nggak ngeliat satupun tentara koalisi disana. padahal di sini di beritain kalo tentara amerika udah nyampe di baghdad dan hampir menguasai kota nya. i don’t know who’s telling the truth in here…tapi ya harus di pertanyakan juga dong apa iya amerika segampang itu untuk bisa masuk baghdad?? iraq tuh angkatan daratnya banyak lho, ada fedayeen, garda republic, relawan isabilillah, dll, belum lagi tentara specialnya saddam. di tambah lagi sama civilians (the population is over 5 million in baghdad) yang rela mati, dan nyerang secara sporadis. mungkin emang banyak rakyat iraq yang nggak suka sama saddam but now they hate america more than they hate saddam, because this war was supposed to be fought in their name, to liberate them from the Iraqi government, but this is starting to take its toll on many of them.

kalo soal akurat nggak akuratnya berita, kita nggak tau siapa yang bener, apa cnn yang bener apa detik.com ..kayanya itu tergantung dari kita lebih percaya ama yang mana. yang disini mungkin lebih sering nonton cnn dan lebih sering denger berita dari cnn daripada dari koran koran indonesia, jadi pas nge check detik.com atau kompas dan beritanya lain..langsung pada “ih ngaco banget sih detik, jelas jelas di cnn tadi nggak kaya gitu beritanya”…padahal ya..nggak tau juga yang benernya yang mana. once again, we don’t know who’s telling the truth here, but we have to acknowledge the fact that there are other news flying around out there that are opposite of what we have heard in cnn or nbc or fox in here. the key is to QUESTION EVERYTHING!!!!! this war is mainly a propaganda war at its core but amerika will pay for it, sooner or later…..

according to detik.com, tentara2 amerika itu skarang udah nggak menguasai baghdad airport lagi, dan katanya hundreds of american troops were killed in that airport battle, they crushed the coallition. a few malaysian online news and middle east online stated the same..tapi di tv tv sini nggak ada beritanya. hmm..jadi yang mana yang bener dong? tapi emang berita beritanya amerika susah di percaya juga sih...kebanyakan propaganda nya kayanya. hmm..bener nggak ya.....tapi mudah mudahan, apa yang di bilang detik.com bener deh..hooraayy...cmon iraqi people...fight for your country...fight till the last breath!!!!


okay, back to the final four, it's texas vs syracus.......syracuse is looking good right now, they are taking the lead and anthony is smiling ear to ear....

drove dendre to work this morning, st louis downtown traffic was not as bad as usual...then i went to cypress village apt office to drop off the deposit payment. we're moving there this summer, a beautiful two bedrooms town house..YAY. went straight to school after that even though i didn't have class, but i had to do the SQL project and do some research, things that wouldn't be accomplished from home. stopped by at the international admission office to see gayla and give her the souvenirs that i brought from home, also stopped by at the career center, the financial aid office, etc. it was actually the first time i walked around campus during the day, my classes are at night and it's usually only a matter of getting to the class from the parking lot and hurry back to the parking lot as soon as the class dismissed. so it's quite refreshing

speaking of school, i got a lot of catching up to do, been a big time procrastinator since the semester started. i have strategic marketing management presentation next week and another one the next two weeks. blum lagi the SQL project, we need to present that one in class too. then there is the final exam, the research paper and the list goes on and on……

tadi waktu jemput dendre..di downtown ramee banget, ternyata lagi ada opening game nya Cardinals, pantesan orang orang pada pake baju merah semua. katanya setiap kali cardinals hit a homerun, di bunyiin petasan petasan yang se-downtown tuh bisa denger semua, sampe yang di dalem gedung juga..seru yah. dan ternyata Cardinals menang dong hari ini…hoooreeee...……berarti besok Taco di Taco Bell harganya cuma 35 cents…hihihi, emang begitu tradisinya disini setiap Cardinals menang…..6 tacos for 2 bucks??...that’s a good deal..my tummy would be happy tomorrow…