Be Confident

"No girl is more beautiful than you are, they are just more confident." -Christian Wolff

As we were talking on facetime this morning, my husband asked me if anything was bothering me the moment I sighed. I told him that I wasn't feeling good about myself. I started to complain about why I wasn't born pretty.Why I never looked like a grown up woman in the pictures I'd taken or whenever I tried to strike a sexy looking face, I always failed. I even questioned him of the reason why he would be attracted to me in the first place. Why he wouldn't just find someone that's physically better than me. Maybe he was fed up with all the complaints concerning how ugly I feel and how I am never satisfied with myself, he just took a deep breath and looking away from the camera.

I have always been so self conscious when it comes to talking about my appearance. I have this tendency of comparing myself to other women. It's like my second nature. I'd browse instagram pictures and ask my husband if the girls in the pictures are looking good or if they are cuter than me. It is actually so pathetic that I always try to find consolation from husband by comparing myself to people on social media, whom I barely know, only to get an affirmation that I am no less good looking than them. Another case, whenever I meet someone new and I am feeling intimidated by how good this person presents herself, I'd always throw the same statements or complaints at my husband.

But that's not the worst part of it. I have started to have a trust issue with my husband. I never feel satisfied with his answer regarding to this matter. When he asserts that I am looking better than those  girls, I'd think that he is doing that to make me feel better about myself or because he just feels obliged to say so as he is my husband and maybe he thinks it would bring him troubles if he'd say otherwise. On the other hand, when he gives me the opposite answer to tease me, I'd get offended and accusing him of not loving me anymore. Yeah, I am hard to please.

Unlike the previous times where he jokingly said that it doesn't matter how my reaction would be to whatever he said, I would still be the best of the best for him, this morning he said something unexpected that I'd never forget and would change my perspective forever. He looked back at the camera, showing his serious expression and told me it's only a matter of mindset.

"Those other girls," he started," they are not actually looking better than you, honey. It doesn't matter what you would think about me after hearing this. Maybe you'd think that I am talking cliche at the moment but, to me, those girls are never more beautiful than you. They only have something that you don't posses. It's the confidence."

It's been a while

Yeah, it's been a while since the last time I wrote on this blog. My life has been revolving so much around learning German, adapting to the new cultures and taking care of my beloved husband since then. I barely had time to think about this blog, let alone calling to my mind that I owned one. Yep. I moved to Germany at the end of 2014 to start a new venture, a new chapter in my life and try to reveal the mystery of life in this country.

Obviously this is not the first time I try to get out of my comfort zone, that is to say to settle down in a completely new environment. However, this experience is quite more challenging than what I had before. At the time I decided to move out of my nest, my parents' house, to Jakarta, I didn't have to deal so much with language and cultural barriers. But this time they are my biggest problem.

Moving to another country is like being born again or to be precise you'll have too act like a baby who is trying to acquire the language by perceiving whatever they see and learn from their surrounding. It has never once crossed my mind that I had to learn  German, needless to say using it as an everyday language.  It's so frustrating to learn that English, which is commonly known as an international language, can't be of any help to you to survive in this country. In fact,  not many people in Germany speak English, maybe only 50 percents of them do. And the worst of all, on the day of my arrival, I could only say danke , nein, and ja. I never learned it before. Okay I had German as one of my subjects in high school, but come on, no one would ever be able to speak a language unless they use it on a daily basis.

I have to say that I almost gave up on learning German because of these articles:

the german articles
source: http://webpages.shepherd.edu/CSTAIR01/getting%20started/derdiedas.html

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Apart from the language, as a baby, you'll also have to perceive the world through what comes to your taste buds. Yeah. Exactly. Every single food I ate tasted like something that was lousily cooked. I'm sorry but I am from a country that's rich with herbs and spices. All I could taste from german food was the saltiness that overpowered the whole seasoning of the cooking. In other words, the saltier, the tastier. As of today, I am still a little bit skeptical about their food preferences.

so this is one of the things that I have to deal with in Germany:

Currywurst
source: http://www.marions-kochbuch.de/dru-pic/0386.jpg

Anyways, It is not something that everyone would experience in their life, so I am trying to treasure every memory I make and hope to  pass it on to my children in the future.

Home

What crosses your mind when you hear a word “ home”?  You might directly relate it to another word which has the same sense, that is family. It makes sense since you have always been  taught to refer to  a place where you live with your family as a home. But sometimes, you can also associate it with other places where your true friends are or wherever you can feel comfortable at.

I have a mixed feeling of happy, sad and hopeful whenever I hear that word. It should be understandable since I live relatively far from home, that is 700 km away and 18 hours of bus ride (by the way, It’s the easiest way to get there!) If I took a plane ride with the same duration, I would have reached somewhere in Europe. Just saying. 

Let’s go back to our main discussion, Why do I always feel happy when I hear this very word? The answer is simple because I feel grateful to remember that I always have a place to come back whenever I want without being afraid of any rejections from the people who stay patiently at a place I call home. I am happy to learn that there is a group of people who will always care for me no matter what. A home is where you can make a fresh start of anything which seems to have no way out.

“Is it possible for home to be a person and not a place?”
― Stephanie Perkins, Anna and the French Kiss

I can also be sad as I live far away from my home.  Don’t deny it! Being away from the first people you love and who love you back with no conditions will always leave this deep emotional feeling. 

The hopeful feeling which I have often takes place in times of sorrow and misery because I know it very well that those people at my home will never leave me. You will only need hope when you feel hopeless, won’t you? It’s so wonderful to know that they will always be willing to spare time with me, only to listen to what I want to pour out and to give me some advice that I need the most. As far as I am concerned, only family who can provide it! 

You think your friends can do the same as what your family does? You should reconsider your deduction unless you have some true friends who will let you hear the things that you need  even though it’s hard to swallow and not the things that you want to hear to feel  better. Furthermore, you might want to give those “mean” friends a term that you will never dare to give to other “good”  hypocritical friends. That is  the most majestic term of all, a family. 

Friends can only give you comforts but a family will never lead you astray, so surround yourself with people whom you can bravely call as a family who stay at a place you can call as a home.

New Project: Be a Time Killer

Hey ho!!

I still can’t believe it! A blog under my name has just been created! Lol, Of course I was the one creating it, who else would?! To start with, I want to reveal some of the reasons why I finally decided to make one. Hopefully, It will be interesting enough for you to read.

I am not actually a writer or someone who can easily pour out the ideas out of my head. It’s just  so dang hard for me to do so. But I need to learn. I need to learn on how to disentangle the tangled threads. Believe me, when you have a bunch of ideas in your head but you can’t unravel any of them and make a track which ones should go together and which ones should not, you will end up feeling so miserable.

That is exactly what I am feeling deep down inside right now. I don’t mean to complain at all. That’s the truth! I am not a full time employee. I work on my own or in another fancy word you may call me an entrepreneur. Wait, don’t hold your breath, I am only an amateur! I have a whole month of holiday at the moment and I am spending it by staying with my parents in my hometown. Guess what?!  The stress caused by the busy life in Jakarta is nothing worse compared to the one caused by the having- nothing- to- do days on your holiday. I need to find something which can help me to kill the time ( I am a “killer” indeed :D).

 So here it is, my new blog which hopefully can help me to sort out things in my mind, to stay focus and  to train my writing ability. Wish me luck people!! Hope I can stick to this new project! !