i just opened my mailbox and noticed a very interesting email from this company. apparently they want to put ad to my site and i'll get paid for it. hmmm, if only i read this before i change my blog. i put it on, nevertheless. you'll notice the ad right on top of my profile side here 

<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<

 but perhaps i will paste the ad on my new blog too, don't know it is allowed or not =p

welcome to the world of advertising~

ladies and gentlemen, friends and readers, i am glad to announce that yours truly had managed to produce her very first blog layout~  *celebrates*  this achievement is obtained after much tearing down component of html codes grabbed from various layouts provided by blogskins.com, and after trial and error session at blogspot.com for 3 whole days. many thanks to blogskins.com and its numerous layout-donors. 

this debut creation is going to be put to use, certainly. however, since blogdrive does not allow users to change the html content of the layouts, i have to move out of this service, which had been with me for the past 2 years. many thanks to blogdrive.com, my faithful blogging companion while i was in SAJC.

 i am still a newbie at the new blogging host and its features. so, most probably i will face many dificulties regarding posting and such in the future. on such events, i will, most probably, be disturbing my friends and ask them to help me, heh heh xP

i guess that's all. probably i'll come back here time and again, maybe if blogspot proves too hard to be used by html idiots like me.

til then,

sayonara, blogdrive~

sayonara http://hanaatsajc.blogdrive.com~

home. a simple thing, always present in my life, yet sometimes i forgot to be thankful for it.

my cousin, whose mom is my aunt, who had just passed away, is here at  my house today, clearing up my aunt and eldest cousin's stuff. previously they stayed in my house before moving out to the states. i guess they never did realise how much stuff they've accumulated over the years. since there's slight chance they'll be back again, he has to throw away the junks and keep what can be kept. and now, stuff, which belongs to neither category, is giving him some dilemma: no place to keep them.

i reflected at the amount of stuff, and junk, that i own. not a small mess, definitely. but thankfully i still have the place to keep them, even if years later i'd wonder why do i own these garbage. surprisingly, this home that i'm living in, the one which shelters me day and night, giving me comfort and protect me from sun and rain and wind and cold, is seldom seen in my eyes, that is, my heart eyes. i see it physically everytime, but how many times do i be thankful for its presence? how many times does if appear in my prayers? sadly, seldom. i never forget to be thankful for my family, for their health and safety, for the well-being of my mental self, but i forget about the one which protect my physical self.

regular updates~ i've finished all 10 hours of my driving lessons. yeah, i got my license first before i'd finished the full session of my driving lessons. still don't have the courage to drive alone with my dad's car, though v.v maybe one of these days...

progress of photoshop-learning: i'm making a layout with yoshiki as my main theme *duh* but i have no idea of what to do >.< i'm learning more about photoshop and its many functions though, and it's a good thing. i tried to read some of the tutorials, about rollover buttons, and after about 3 paragraphs i stopped reading *dizzy* due to many terms which i don't understand >.< still, experimenting's pretty fun =)

to eileen, i can add you, and we both can get confused together, unless you can teach me, hehe, but i don't know your page/blog o.O you didn't leave me any url...

started playing harvest moon again. started a new farm, still the same name, Hayashi Farm, but now i'm more knowledgable about it, thanks to my cousin Lia who came by and told me all about power berries, the sprites, and so on ^.^

i really do like Kyoko Hikawa! she was my first favourite mangaka, before i even know Yuu Watase. i had just read her books again, the Chizumi and Fujiomi series, and i've decided to try collect Kanata Kara, aka From Far Away, aka Dunia Mimpi. i only just realised that the chizumi fujiomi series were released back in 1982 O.O goodness, before i was born! wow~ and not to mention Miriam, maybe in the 70s???

time to google Kyoko Hikawa for her latest works!

going to, as soon as i have a few hours in front of the computer at one go. i've downloaded several templates which i thought are good enough for me to analyse and learnt from. i've browsed through blogskins.com for interesting layouts for this purpose. i've also downloaded several pictures from Endless Dream as a base to make background graphic. hopefully soon i can create my own layout, ne.

this, of course, is learning html the hard way T__T which is the least of my liking, i can tell you that. my cousin had only just told me about DreamWeaver which can be used to create website, thus similar to making blog. yet, i don't own this software, so until i can get hold of it, may as well learn from the hard way, even though it's just a little bit, and almost made my eyes screwed up >.<

by the way, nat, another present for you, dunno if you have it, copy and paste this code to your blog:

<BGSOUND SRC="http://sg.geocities.com/miyake_neverland2/mejishironokioku.mid" LOOP="20">

i got it alongside with a really nice junichi layout, but a bit simpler than the other one i showed you before. both were made by the same person though.

by the way, the hair style that i wanted was like this:

http://artpad.art.com/?isqfyr3mk2s

it was cut that way too, but since my hair's wavy, it doesn't look like that anymore on my head v.v

ladies and gentlemen, friends and readers, i am proud to announce that yours truly had finally gotten her driving license yesterday!

*celebrates* *celebrates* *celebrates*

i am sad to say, though, that the procedure was horrendously tedious, that i even said to myself: if 5 years later when i want to extend it i need to go through this again, i'd rather NOT have a license at all.

since it was very tedious, i'll spare you from the boredom of reading about what had happened in Komdak, Daan Mogot, on 5th January 2006. let's just say that i arrived there at 9am, waited a long while before my name got registered *the others had proceeded on coz their names were registered and mine was not*, did the theory exam in which the instructor was quite humourous, waited a long while again for my turn to do the practical exam in which the instructor suddenly went bananas just because some guy took his picture and thus refused to examined us, then waited a horribly long while for my picture, thumb print and signature to be taken in which my documents went awry again and i was thrown to another group after everyone in my original group had finished taking theirs, and finally waited a short while before my name got called to collect my SIM, and it was 4.30pm when i got it, dead tired, and the place which originally so full and packed with numerous people, many of whom were smoking like there's no tomorrow, had emptied and the cleaning workers were moping the place.

*so much for the sparing of boredom...*

i am learning photoshop now. and illustrator and golive and imageready and indesign in one go O.O i can't say that i have any idea on what to do with the latter 4 softwares, but i'm learning slowly. anyone'd like to give me tutorials? ^_^

i was introduced to my bro's friend, cheryl, who's currently studying in Japan. apparently she had known that i like Japan, and japanese language and music and so on and so forth, just like she did, and had been anxious to know me, but my bro never did. so about 2 days ago i got the chance to talk to her and i got to know that she was an extremely enthusiastic japan lover, as enthusiastic as i am. she spoke in high spirirt about everything that i'd been wanting to know and been wanting to have: japanese education, and somehow i thought that she's no stranger, coz the way she talk and expressed herself was strangely similar to me and to how i imagined i'd be talking to if i meet another japan-lover.

both of us are attracted to learn the language because of similar reason, the music. and surprisingly, both of us are drawn to JRock. i don't know if this is just how i felt, but i think people who are attracted and inspired to learn Japanese language are mostly those who are drawn into JRock, not JPop. though the same can't be said to my Obachan, ne, Nat? she asked whom did i like, and i said X Japan. and i could guess which band she liked, and my guess were right: Laruku. i mean, man, their fanbase in Indonesia is humongous! just as big as Glay, if not bigger. it's such a refreshing feeling to talk to her, to hear my enthusiasm reflected in her talking. nice to meet you, cheryl!

talking about Laruku, i'm starting to like them more and more. i owned the cassette of 13 Best Clicked Singles or something, and since my dad's new car didn't have a CD player, i'd been playing it back and forth all the time whenever i'm in the car. and in my dad's old car i had put on a compilation CD of Laruku and Hyde solo songs which i like. as much as i can say that Hyde's voice had grown on me and i'm starting to like his voice as much as i like Gackt's, i can't say the same for Ken's guitar. i'm still proud to say that hide and pata are both still my favourite guitarists of all time as they can create beautiful, enganging and wonderful melody anywhere in any part of the song, not just the solo.

my driving lessons are going to be over soon. i'm getting more comfortable behind the steering wheel and this is a good sign. hopefully by February i can already become an accomplished driver. and hopefully i can start my Japanese course/tuition soon =)

for the first time since years and years ago, all my family members can celebrate the coming of the new year together. usually we, he kids, would've been back in singapore by now for the start of new school term. this year, for the first time, we were planning to go round jakarta until 12am, visit Jalan Thamrin to see if there were any decorations being put up or something.

however first of all we visited my saku *3rd uncle from my mom's side* house to give him some home-made jing-chao and oranges.he told us that at midnight there would be fireworks at Mal Artha Gading nearby, and that Ancol's firework would be one of the best in the capital city of Jakarta. BUT there would have been too many people there already. so, about 10 minutes to 11pm we left his house to go back home by the Tanjung Priok freeway. that way we would pass ANcol and hopefully could catch a glimpse of the firework from the freeway itself.

man, i've never ever seen the freeway sooo crowded after 10pm. it's like daytime, macet!! the further we went, the nearer we became to ANcol, the slower we could go. finally, at 12am *11.55pm according to my car's clock* the firework started.

Fortunately, we were already sooo close to Ancol! it's like as though the firework was right in front of us! couldn't have wished for a better spot. it was spectacular! not only in Ancol, right at 12am there were firework display at every corner of Jakarta that you can see from the highway.

when it started, ALL the cars in the freeway stopped and the passengers got down and climbed the barrier in the middle of the road, which is about a metre high. from such a high place, whicever corner i turned my head to, east south north west north-west everywhere! there were firework display!! it's like sooo cool! it lasted for about 15-20 minutes. my saku wasn't kidding when he said ANcol's firework is the best.

anyway, i forgot to post about my haircut. cut my hair on Friday, it's the style which i've been dreaming about. unfortunately, i've never seen people with this kind of hairstyle having wavy hair. as a result, my hair doesn't look as nice as i wanted it to. nevertheless i'm still very satisfied with the work of my usual hairdresser, Hendra. if anyone wants to try to go there, it's located at Jakarta Barat, Palmerah Barat 4, a small gang, if you come from the main road, it's one of the first houses that you can find.

i looked up for the style that i wanted in the magazine. when i showed him, i made sure that the style is the one that i really wanted. he knew my style, sometimes extra-ordinary style *according to his normal customers maybe* as he was the very one who gave me my tail. he understood that i don't want my tail to be cut ^.^ as he described the style to my mom *she was having this bewildered look on her face when she saw the style that i wanted* "ini punk style, ci.* =P

isn't the dress gorgeous? it's sold in cdjapan, a product of Mana's brainchild, Moi-meme-Moitie. i've been sent many information of many products that include many goth clothings and accesories. really, if i have the money to purge, i think i'll buy many of those...

anyway, i spent almost the whole afternoon editing layout for my new home in blogspot. the designer is Putri Far'Ain, and i got to know that she's younger than me by 7 years O.O she's really good, ne? salute her o.o it's really a nice one, though a bit too pink for my liking. i'm learning html as slowly as a snail, but at least i'm improving a little bit =p

currently i'll still be here, though. i'm still not comfortable with blogspot's arrangement, like Nata who can't change the date of her post, and got extra words added to her post title. i think blogspot users must be very good with their html skill v.v

another present for donat obachan, V6 calendar, nat!!

this week had been a tiring one. my aunt passed away on tuesday afternoon, 4.30pm WIB. i don't know how i feel about it all, there were a lot of mixed up feeling. i'm sad that she's left, disappointed *with myself* that i wasn't there when she left, glad that finally she's been freed of all those excruciating pain she'd been suffering for weeks, thankful that she'd managed to see her son for the last time before she leave...

on the overall, i could cope with it, and i'm grateful for that. her condition had been deteriorating fast. on the last few days, she had to be given morphine as painkiller, and since then her condition deteriorated even faster, started from sudden anxiety and restlessness, to slurred speech and finally shortness for breath due to liquid forming up in her lungs. those, add to her once-every-two-days haemodialysis, equals to really bad condition.

i didn't realise that death means a lot more administrative work than birth... i'm thankful that my family is able enough to get her a decent burial and proper ceremony and all. we'd been receiving people who wanted to pay their last respect to her in atma jaya. i was there for 2 days, wednesday and thursday, whole day, from morning til night. gotta prepare loadsa food and drinks and there were loadsa procedures to follow v.v tired..

anyway... i went to fix my playstation, which actually was not spoiled at all *it's the CD that's spoilt* and bought Harvest Moon english version. now i started a new Hayashi Farm, but the guy's name is no longer Shinya, but Ekkusu, wahahhaa... my doggie is called Manachan, and the horsie is Josh <3 xD also bought a new computer game called RollerCoaster Tycoon3 Soaked. i played Roller Coaster Tycoon before, it was real fun! so i'm trying to find the time to try this new one out.

wanting to move blog to my blogspot account, since i'm officially no longer a JC student. but i'm having problem with the layout, thanks to my non-existing html skill. also looking for JRock layout, but all i can find is hide and more hide. no yoshiki-related at all, geez.. where are you, yochan fans who're good at designing???

gonna try buying photoshop cd when i'm out again. i've been cancelling my remaining driving lesson due to the recent event, and tomorrow gonna start again. *sigh* tired...

on cristmas day i went to decorate christmas tree in Bootes with my thief, HorcruxThief. i met this guy, Shuriken90 and MagicKazaAm in one of the maps and we decorated the place together. Shuriken90 promised to send me the screenshot since i'm not able to take one. unfortunately i gave him my hotmail address, which had been deactivated, for the umpteenth time, since i'd not been logged in for ages. i had just discovered the fact now, when i tried to log in. so now i've lost the screenshot ;___; i really want to have the screenshot... so now, calling out for Shuriken90, if you're around please contact me!!

had to extend my driving lessons. my instructor wants me to complete 10 hours, but i only want to have 7 v.v how????