Rediscovering What My 15 Year Old Self Were Up To

Tonight while preparing some transit visa documents for my parents, suddenly I got a notification from my email. It's a reminder from my other email notifying inactivity. That email was registered for my class back in junior high school! Junior high!

It's been ages since I heard "8D"

Then I naturally wanted to regain access which I did. I saw the inbox that was filled with emails from Wordpress.

It literally slipped my mind completely that I used to do this back then. During my time in junior high and senior high, I am quite obsessed with handling social media for my classes. I started this when I was in 8th grade, then I remember somehow the school admin thought the dynamic was so good they miraculously did not reshuffle the students for the 9th grade, so I got to keep the same account. The account is still there on twitter btw 😂 @9binfo. The bio OMG, was updated last when we were in high school and now it's been ten fucking years since we graduated high school!

Back then, you know BBM groups or WhatsApp groups were not that hit, but people did use twitter. So I used that twitter account to update about school tasks or even funny things that happen during the day. I was sooo into journalism wasn't I, now that I think about it?!

Another thing that I am soooo amazed at my old self was.. that I managed to have a blog for my classes guys.... Haha yes I was the admin of https://9binfo.wordpress.com/ 😳

I looked at the blog and dang I was so surprised at how much time I had back then.. or how flowy I was with expressing things. I don't even know if anyone's reading the blog, but I remember (slightly) writing it and then seeing the posts posted brought so much joy to me. To be honest I think if I were raised like in the US or something, I would have gone into journalism or had a career as some series' writer. Or if my life were any more exciting, I would probably launch a book like Raditya Dika or poconggg! Hahaha.

I literally made a comic using Paint guys......

Missing those old times!

2025 Autumn Trip: Jordan, it's one for the books!

Hello again :) Gotta give it to me for being able to quell the will to write much more than I did the years before haha. Human memory is always the weakest memory holder of them all, and that's precisely why civilizations never progressed much until humans found out how to write out their minds and expertise into stories and preserve them.. I don't want this memory to fade away anytime soon, so let's write it out while it's fresh! :)

Earlier this week, I just ended one of the most fun trips I've had in a while. I went to Turkiye and Jordan with dear friends of mine, Sarah and Leona!

Someone asked me if I went with my work friends, and to be honest, it might sound degrading to label them just as my work colleagues. I'd like to say I went with a group of friends who grew together with me, are experiencing the same vulnerabilities and life journeys that shape us to who we are now, and definitely, a good travelmate haha.

We made the plan quite abruptly! You know I am stationed in UAE right now. At first it was just me and Nico (who's in Kuwait) making plans to visit Jason (who's in Jordan). I thought it would just be a middle-eastern STAs trip since well, we're kinda far from anywhere and to be honest if I'm anywhere else, probably the plan would sound less interesting. However, suddenly I heard that Leona was also interested to come! I thank God that Leona talked about this to Nico so he invited her to our "Tipping Point" group chat--which reminds me I should really finish that book OMG I haven't even opened it!

The chat that started everything

The book that I haven't even started

So, we created that group called "The Tipping Point" hoping to kickstart the planning of it all. When Leona joined, I suddenly think about that trip Leona wanted to make with Sarah so I also reached out to her. She said yes and then we were 5!

We set a date for Jordan trip, but Sarah could fly earlier from Indonesia after she finished the Commercial Conference. Leona and Sarah will have another destination first for the pre-trip, sadly I couldn't join for full because there's something in the office :(

HOWEVER, after all the discussions and all the visa problem that we have, this is what we decided on:

• 17 - 19 Oct    : Nana, Leona, Sarah in Izmir, Turkiye
• 20 - 23 Oct    : Leona and Sarah somewhere (they haven't decided or booked any tix, crazy)
• 24 - 27 Oct    : Us three + Nico and Jason in Jordan!

I pondered btw what I should write first. Jordan definitely currently has much more stories and fresh vivid memory so it will be easier to write, so shall I write about Turkiye first? But then I said to myself, I don't believe in me. If I postpone Jordan I would postpone in for a loooooong time so I need to just start writing it while I have the fire in me!