I read in Tasa’s
that Whole Food Market encourages its customers to bring their own bags
by taking 5 cents to 10 cents off the bill for each. The same policy will be applied to Marks & Spencer’s customers soon.
Marks and Spencer is to begin charging its food shoppers for carrier bags.
Customers will have to pay 5p for plastic bags, with the money raised going to an environmental charity.
Chief
executive Sir Stuart Rose said the company wanted to "make it easy for
our customers to do their bit to help the environment".Campaigners
say plastic bags damage the environment. Some 13bn are given free to UK
shoppers every year, and they take an estimated 1,000 years to decay.
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My blog is updated today, 30 April 2008. Click Finally Woken to read the complete story.
I am writing this in a moving train that is taking us back to Aberdeen. Yes,
the train provides a free wi-fi service, which helps me to endure the 7
hours journey back from London. To think that most shopping malls in
Jakarta still charge their customers for providing wi-fi service is
ridiculous, especially when you have to buy different wi-fi cards on
different shops. Sitting down in Coffee Club might not guarantee that
the wi-fi cards I buy from Starbucks would work although they are in
the same mall. Starbucks Plaza Indonesia’s wi-fi card wouldn’t work at
the one on Plaza Senayan. Go to Cazbar or Eastern Promise
for a free wi-fi. No frills. You just have to buy a glass of beer and
smile at the gorgeous barmaids to obtain the password, and they will
let you sit with your computer on.
Londonweather had been nice with a little bit rain here and there. Definitely
warmer than Aberdeen, definitely much more busier which took me a split
second to get used to see a lot of people in London Bridge. I was
officially sweating (first time in a year!) when arrived in Swindon to visit an old friend and her family in Marlborough
and realized that all I had with me was cardigans or long-sleeves
t-shirts, unsuitable for south of London temperature and I should have
brought my tank tops with me instead. If I complain that Aberdeen is
quiet with only 250,000 people, well, Marlborough is only occupied by
25,000 residents. But it’s a lovely town, and is only 30 minutes from Bath
(picture, left) one of the most beautiful city in England. Stuart was
freaked out when I said I’ve fallen in love in Bath, because he thought
I said Bart(ele),
not Bath! But it’s just as terrible because the villas on the top of
the hills easily cost several millions. Poundsterling, of course.
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My blog is updated today, 28 April 2008. Click Finally Woken to read the complete story.
A
combination of a scheduler who pays a great attention to details and a
natural worrier would be the worst. It’s me. Me. Me. I am such a pain
in the butt to those who think that birds are chirping and the world is
smiling and everything is perfect even though your life is not planned.
I would stand by their door and tell them that it’s going to rain and
they’re better to take the umbrella and next time read the weather
forecast before taking too many tank tops.
And
if it’s my event, it’s double worry and double attention to details.
It’s frustrating to see everyone takes everything very easy, while I’m
sitting down and drafting schedule for everybody on hour basis. Only to
a reply that they haven’t even booked the flight, or they don’t know
what to do - but as long as beer and girls are involved, they’re happy.
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My blog is updated today, 27 April 2008. Click Finally Woken to read the complete story.
The
first time I landed in Scotland, one of my goals was to visit every
single castle. That until I found a book that lists them all. There are
thousands castles scattered in Scotland! Even to visit all castles in Aberdeen and Grampian area will take years, unless if I do it every day. Maybe.
In the mean time, I set my goal to be a simpler one: visit all famous castles first. Here are 5 of them:
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My blog is updated today, 20 April 2008. Click Finally Woken to read the complete story.
For
the past two days I attended a settlement course in a very gorgeous
hotel. It’s rather late, considering I have been here since last June
and know most of the absolute essentials, but it’s still worth to attend, and I got to see new people and had free lunches, yay!
The
course is done to help people settling nicely in a host country.
Unsettling employees and partners could jeopardize their posting, their
unhappiness threaten their productivities because they are worried
about other matters rather than their jobs, and the company could loose
their valuable resources. So 2 days course in a very nice hotel with
free lunches is worth spent.
For
those who just come to a new place, or even those who repatriate back
after spending years in other countries, this course is very helpful.
In fact there were two Scots in our course and even they found many
things they didn’t know, and lots of things have changed since they
left.
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My blog is updated today, 16 April 2008. Click Finally Woken to read the complete story.
Fitna is a short film by Dutch parliamentarian Geert Wilders, which explores Qur’anic motivation for terrorism and Islam in the Netherlands (explanatory stolen from Wikipedia). On April 7, Indonesia has blocked access to YouTube
and a couple of other websites such as MySpace and Multiply. The
Minister of Information and Communications Muhammad Nuh has passed a
bill that forces 146 ISP’s in Indonesia to block access to YouTube. Kompas has confirmed that the reason for the block is Youtube’s refusal to remove Fitna from their servers.
After a week of public debates and overwhelming protests, Nuh has apologised for ordering the blocking of Youtube, Multiply and a few other sites which host the video Fitna, and the virtual community in Indonesia can relax, sit back, and exhale for a while.
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My blog is updated today, April 12, 2008. Click Finally Woken to read the complete story.
Haggis, a traditional Scottish dish, is - according to Wikipedia
- made of the following ingredients: sheep’s heart, liver and lungs,
minced with onion, oatmeal, suet, spices and salt, mixed with stock,
and traditionally boiled in the animal’s stomach for about three hours.
Today the dish is prepared in a casing rather than an actual stomach. MacSween (picture, right) sells cooked haggis, and we only need to remove it from the outer plastic bag, wrap in foil and re-heat it.
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My blog is updated today, 8 April 2008. Click Finally Woken to read the complete story.
It’s mid April. It’s supposed to be spring. Summer should be around the
corner. With a high spirit we headed down to Edinburgh. We planned to
visit several places. The sun was glowing even with the dark cloud
above us. But then God thought it would be funny to blow some cold.
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My blog is updated today, 7 April 2008. Click Finally Woken to read the complete story.
Last night I found out that Bugilsnews displays Indonesian Expatriates Forum
(IEF) link and its widget on their site. With a few thousands of
subscribers (I was told they had 10,000 readers a couple of years a go
and it was when Bugils Group hasn’t been crazily expanding - to how
many bars now, five, six? - like nowadays, so the number might be
bigger now), having the link there will hopefully spread the news about
IEF.
Despite
what people think - especially our Indonesian friends and family back
home - that life is glorious, the future is bright, and everything is
nothing but sweet love if we live abroad, being away from home is
always a lonely (and most of the times, shocking) journey. Only people
who are in our shoes, or have experienced the same thing would
understand what we are going through. Like eating live squid in Korea, for example. Or wondering why they invent a very cold fridge in Norway that freezes the veggies right away. Or finding new friends.
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My blog is updated today, 4 April 2008. Click Finally Woken to read the complete story.
On
Sunday we had to adjust our clock back to 6 behind Indonesia. Spring has come, apparently. Everybody’s mood has lifted
when the week has started with a beautiful day. The sun was shining,
the birds were chirping, the sky was blue, the flowers have been
starting to reappear, and the sale has begun.
Today when I looked outside the window, I saw what I have seen yesterday, so
I bravely put on a short-sleeves top - the first time in 5 months,
probably - and a jacket. I was so looking forward to put my normal
(read: tank top, jeans, and jeweled sandals) clothes back on, rather
than having to think about the whole colour arrangement against gloves,
scarf, coat, and boots. But the digital thermometer showed 14.5 degree
(Celsius).
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My blog is updated today, 1 April 2008. Click Finally Woken to read the complete story.
