Six degrees of Separation: the theory that anyone on earth can be connected to any other person on the planet through a chain of acquaintances with no more than five intermediaries.

If you click on search engines like Google or Yahoo!, you would find many websites discussing about this theory, which, to myself, is proven really true.

I went to Bali last year and met my friend from UNSW Sydney, Aboth. Aboth was a project manager for a hotel renovation project in Seminyak, and promised to meet me in one bar, where I hung out with my colleagues. But when Aboth arrived, I was surprised because Aboth knows my boss. Turns out they went to the same Uni and they used to hang out together.

A good example of this six degrees of separation is this. My ex-roommate is now dating a guy from Singapore. I’ve heard about him a few times but she tried to make it secretive so I didn’t push her to tell me the story. And then last Sunday she opened up and told me about him. What surprised me was this guy is a friend of Pascal’s. Pascal has just moved to Jakarta and was introduced to Melly by Melly’s best friend. The guy-from-Singapore is Melly’s best friend’s friend as well. And apparently Melly had dated him as well in a very brief period. Look at this diagram below, the red lines indicate the ‘love affairs’, blue lines are for first-degree friends, yellow lines are for second-degree friends. Amazing isn’t it? 11 millions people in Jakarta and 4.2 millions people in Singapore yet somehow my ex-rommate and the Guy-from-Singapore are connected even before they met.

I went to Jakarta’s Highland Gathering 4 years ago and met this guy in one of the private booths. He took out his name card and I couldn’t believe when I read the address. It’s the office of my first client’s! It turned out he’s working as my client’s partner. Of course after that we exchanged gossips about my client/his partner!

Then Melly asked me to meet up with her friends, Prila and Theresia, on a lazy Sunday afternoon. When I met them I had a feeling that I’ve seen them somewhere. It took less than half an hour to unravel the mystery, that they worked for my first client. Of course I’ve seen them working in their cubicles while I was busy fixing and renovating the office! And of course, they know my new friend-from-Highland Gathering, who shared the office with them. Small world indeed.

Friendster naturally becomes a verification of the six degrees of separation theory. I saw Kemal’s profile from Mercy, and was surprised to find out that we went to the same highschool! After a long discussion about highschool, I found out that he’s actually a cousin of Nonie’s (who, surpisingly again, went to the same highschool!), and I know Nonie from my boyfriend and she’s become a good friend of mine. PS: she knows my friend-from-Highland Gathering too.

We have 6,535,409,336 people on earth. The list can go endlessly. Just click on someone’s profile in friendster, and you would see how you are connected.

We were in the finishing stage of this particular project, when the internal auditors came. There were 5 people: three guys and two girls. All blonde, tall, very young, extremely dilligent, always look serious, very intimidating, and gorgeous. The people in the office were anxious because these 5 people came from the headquarters (some country in Europe, that’s all I can say), and I guess it’s like an exam, all were questioned about how they’ve done their jobs by the 5 foreigners.

These 5 people were put in all-glass meeting room, where everybody can see what they’re doing on daily basis. Since the project was still 95% finished, I still must kept checking up on things everyday, so I walked pas the room like 100 times a day. Noone in the room paid attention to what happened to the outside world.

Did I mention gorgeous? Good, remember that, because it’s linked to the title of this article.

As the project manager for this fit-out project, my job is to ensure that this office is delivered on time, within budget, and according to the required quality. So I manage the whole process, from initiation, design, tender and procurement, and of course, construction.

Being a project manager means I work with everybody: designers, contractors, suppliers, vendors, building managers, and of course clients. Everybody must report to me. Everybody must consult me if there is some issues raised during the process. I have to know to every single detail, from why the worker does not turn up so he hasn’t installed the door yet, until why my client doesn’t like oval-shape working desk. I have to know that my client prefers all white color-scheme, that we need a feng-shui master to tell him the most profitable office location, that we cannot order certain wallpaper because the delivery time is 3 months, that building manager must have 3 sets of drawing otherwise one will reject our work permit, and so on. I am the center of everything!

So of course I act like one accordingly. Like this particular day. We came to the project, ready for a weekly meeting, when the reception told us that the meeting was moved to one floor below. I was dressed to the nines. Black skirt, very serious blue shirt, black bag and black pumps. Everything I wore that day screamed "serious" and "important" (at least that’s what I wanted to present to the world….). I did feel important that day. We’re about to finish the project, and everything has been done wonderfully well. I was at the top of the world!

I told everybody to go to downstairs by fire staircase. And of course, everybody must follow me. Noone thought to use evelator because it’s only 1 floor below. Beside, I took the staircase, so must everybody. I was at the front, Dina was behind me, and there were 3 other guys behind her.

When I opened the fire escape door, I bumped into one of the internal auditors. He smiled to me, and I smiled back. After a few seconds, when we’re reaching the stairs, I held the railings but my mind was still on the smiling event. I mean wow, this guy, a very important person, actually acknowledged my presence! I kept thinking about it until…………..

In a split second I missed the first two steps. I fell hard on the third step. My bum landed at the third step and kept meeting the steps until finally the gravity stopped working and I was on the bottom side of the staircase!

Omigod Omigod Omigod. Omigod Omigod Omigod.

Somehow I managed to keep my skirt intact (so no G-string showing) and to keep holding on to the railings with one hand. I didn’t roll down, I just looked like a bunny hopping from one step to the other one below, except I used my bum and entire left thigh, not my legs!

Those three guys and Dina rushed downstairs quickly, while I was still on the sitting position, trying to get back to a reality.

"Did it hurt?" one guy asked.

I looked up slowly, very slowly. Did he see what happened? My bum had just an intimate contact with a cold-cement staircase. And he asked if it hurt?

But I just shook my head.

The other guy and Dina took my documents which were scattered on the floor. I slowly felt my toes, my legs, then my arms. Everything can still move. No broken bones. I tried my shoes. The pointy heels were still strong. I looked at my bag, horrifyingly praying nothing would happen to my bag. Thank God it’s still in a perfect condition.

Then the embarassment took over. What the hell happened? I just fell??? The pain on my entire left foot was suddenly gone. I felt my face’s getting red. I stood up.

"Can you walk?" Dina asked. I just nodded. My head was still spinning, my lung was about to explode because I cursed myself of being so careless, and my confidence was gone somewhere else. The guys looked worried, probably because I was supposed to do something girly at that point. Crying, maybe? Or asking them to help me walking to the meeting room?

We managed to get into the meeting room without any other incident. Then I saw my middle finger was bleeding. And my thigh was getting more hurtful every single second, and I swear I can feel the bruise on my both knees were getting bigger.

I opened my notebook, distributed the last week’s minutes of meeting and attendance list. I saw my hands were still shaking because of the shock, the pain on my entire body, and the embarassement that still hung in the air.

"Ok everybody, let’s start! Last week we discussed about…."

After all, I am still the project manager.

Moral of the story: when you are at the top of the world, look down occassionally, you’d never know when you’d trip and fall down. But when you do fall, do it gracefully, keep the skirt and dignity intact!

Oh and if a cute guy smiles at you, keep watching your step!

When I started my blog a year ago, my intention was to start writing again - regularly - because this is what I have done many years ago, actively. Somehow I stopped doing it (for leisure, because I wrote probably almost zillions of pages for my master’s degree assignments). Just like when I stopped playing piano, suddenly I didn’t feel the urge to write anymore. Maybe because I was busy writing articles, I didn’t want to write anything else anymore. Maybe because I was busy drawing and sketching. Maybe because I was just plain busy. Or maybe because I got lazy.

Writing had been my life since I was in elementary school. I remember I made poems - terrible, childish ones! - and sent them to the school library, completed with pictures of mountains, trees, and so on. The librarian then put my poems on what we call "majalah dinding", which made me so proud of myself for weeks.

That’s my first experience of having my thoughts read by other people.

During my junior and especially senior high, it’s not only a hobby, it’s also my profession. My mom was a journalist and writer herself, and I saw her articles and stories on newspaper almost everyday. Not to mention that she was a TV anchor for a local TV station. My dad had his Healthy Q&A spot on a local sundays newspaper. Although they’re almost never got paid for that, they’re stick to their routines, at least for a very long time. And somehow it was infectious. I wrote, diligently. My short stories were mostly in the art section (maybe because I ever mentioned Ophelia and they didn’t understand what or who it was, they thought I was so sophisticated!).

In college I was active in the student magazine. I managed to get Architecture Department had weekly magazines as well, although it lasted only for few months (almost noone was helping me!).

I love writing. I feel I can express myself better with writing. I throw my anger, frustration, love, passion, hate, lust, boredom, all the emotional feelings, on my writings. Or I throw somebody else’s feeling on it, if I feel I can put myself on his/her shoes. And there is something I still stick to.

I never lie on my writing.

On my blog, I write about myself, or other people, and the stories went on just like what they were. Exaggeration, sure, of course. You need spice and garnish to make your dish taste and look tempting, but you don’t put chilli to make it sweet. So when I mentioned the story about my bad hair day, I wasn’t making it up. It did happen. Rocky did think I was having a bad hair day (and yes, I still don’t forgive him for that! Rocky, if you read this, you owe me a cuppa, dahlingz!). ADD girl does exists. I do hate Kingkong movie. And yes, there was a guy who came to my house crying over his ex, bringing a knife when I was in highschool. There was a wedding which the bride forgot to invite me. There was an upsetting moment when I went back to Surabaya and my friends were too busy for me. There was a very good friend who was having an affair with a married guy whom I still care about but disagree with what she’s been doing.

All my stories are true. All my feelings are true.

When I mentioned a guy, it is a guy. When I said wedding, it was a wedding, not a kid’s birthday party with Ronald McDonalds. When I said he was crying, I meant it, with full sound effects, a red face and snorts, not only tears running down his cheeks. When I said it’s a cappuccino, damn it is a cappuccino. It can be in a mug, in a cup, or even in a wine glass. But if it’s Starbucks, it can’t be Coffee Bean or Illy.

You see what I mean? I can present it in a different package, wrap it with a stripes paper and put a pink bow on it, but the essense is still the same.

All truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

So help me God.