Last Thursday, I went to Koi with Linda and Astrid for a little bit of catching up. The last time the three of us met was seven months ago!! The topic of the night was the relocation of Rama, Linda's husband to Switzerland. Linda wants to tag along, but afraid of leaving everything they've built behind, afterall, Rama's move is only going to be temporary!. I've encouraged her before to just drop everything and go. At least that's what I would do!. Sure she has an awesome thing going on here, but a year in the same old place and a year in a place she has never been before is going to be completely different. Here, she'll face the same old thing she's been facing everyday but in Switzerland it's gonna be a completely different game! And at best, she's just maintaining her life here, but there, she can learn new culture, live like the locals, discover the unknown, roam around Europe, have a new perspective, learn more about herself, feel more alive and basically experiences awesome things that she will never get to experience if she stays here.

If it were me, I wouldn't even think twice :).

Anyway, I told her that living overseas was one of my best experiences.



I believe I came home a much better person than I was before I left. I also told her that deep down, I still have a hidden desire to leave this city again and move to a new place. Somewhere in Europe would be perfect. I don't want to leave now yet..I believe this is where I meant to be living at the moment. But in the next few years, I'd love to escape from Jakarta for two or three short years. For my own benefit, for Oki, and especially for Jibran and Jehan.

Well, that's just my desire. Of course, I have no strategic plan or steps on how to achieve those. I have no idea how to make that desire come true. I have (reasonable) goals and I have wild dreams. Ones that I have no control and can only depend on the universe to make it happen and this is one of them.

But you know what, the master up there really works in a mysterious way.

Last Friday. About twelve hours after I told Linda about my dream on living in Europe. Oki received a phone call from a recruiter. He is not looking for a job, he's just got a new job and happy where he's at but the recruiter found him through Linked In. And guess what? It was an interview offer from a European multi national company :))

Obviously, that company offers a bigger chance of us living in Europe than where he's currently at :D

And what's funny, someone I know who works at that company has just been relocated to Sweden, where the headquarter is, for three years. She's actually someone I admired, career wise (she's the first ASIAN woman who ever hold a management position in the headquarter). I remember I looked up to her since I was in college. In fact, I interviewed her for www.klikmarketing.com and was wishing to climb up corporate ladder just like her.

It's mind-boggling how things work, isn't it :). God really does leave hints and clues in our lives.

Speaking of living overseas. I didn't get a chance to do it at an early age though. In fact, the first time I stepped on a plane was when I have just graduated high school!. But I know I've always wanted to roam around the world since I was in Junior High School. In second grade, there was a new girl that just moved in from Philippines and we seated together in class. Her dad works at department of foreign affairs. She is Indonesian but was born in Australia and if I'm not mistaken she had lived in Singapore before moving to the Philippines. I was in awe with her experiences. I always asked her to tell me story and I loved looking at pictures of her at the places I've never knew existed.

That's when I wrote in stone that I wanted to be an ambassador growing up so I could move around the continents. But my mom didn't sound so supportive. Her reasoning was 'Nanti susah lho cari suaminya, kasian suaminya kalo harus pindah-pindah ikut istrinya'..Wekss!!. But I told my self that I'd take International Relations major come university time. There were also several overseas students in my high-school, some were in my class. So the desire to leave abroad didn't die down. But I knew I had a slim chance to pass UMPTN so I decided it was best if I went abroad for my university. Dad never gave me luxuries even it wasn't a trouble for him to provide me with such things..but he gave me exactly what I needed most.

So that was the story :). I don't know what's going to happen next, but I know as long as I'd live..I will keep on having goals, dreams and desires. I've found out that those are what keep me alive :)