Do You Mean the Street, or the War Hero?

Many cities in Java name their streets over war heroes'. Jalan (literally mean: street) Sudirman¹ or Jalan Diponegoro², for instance. I find little uses of this convention. I mean, unless it helps us in finding our ways through town, it doesn't do anything but confuse people in different cities. To honor the heroes? How can we honor them if the streets are becoming more popular than the heroes' deeds? Nowadays, many people know by heart what buildings are located at Jalan Sudirman Jakarta. But these same people would think hard before answering what battles the General won.

It'd be a different story if the streets' names actually related to actual history.

A: Okay, where's this Jalan Sentot Prawirodirjo?
B: Wait, there's Jalan Diponegoro! We're going down this road now.
A: So?
B: Sentot Prawirodirjo was Prince Diponegoro's right hand man!
A: Ah, I see. So we turn right...here! There it is!

That way, at least there's a reason for students to learn history. To avoid getting lost. And it's easy to study for tests. Just drive around town.

___________
1: A famous general in the War of Independence against the Dutch Agression
2: A Javanese prince who fought against the Dutch Occupation during 1825-1830 AD


THOUGHT FOR THE DAY

We should make a word for "remembering that we forgot something, but we don't know what it is."

Name Card of the Day

I guess that makes me a "blogging fool", then.


(Huge thanks to Rangga.)


BLOG TEMPLATE CHANGES

I noticed my old template's been acting funny on some recent browsers. On Mozilla, the posts show up at the bottom of the screen. On IE, it has more white space than Kompas (our national newspaper). And running on Opera, it suddenly accesses the Indonesian Super Secret and Deeply Hush-hush Online Missile Launching Site and targets Jakarta.

I changed to this template for your convenient (and to avoid prison).

Our Indonesian TV Lesson of the Day

"Any display of violence and wanton destruction is justifiable if it has a moral message."

I concluded this after watching a sinetron (an abbreviation that means "electronic cinema") called "Bidadari" ("Angel"). In that particular episode, the young female antagonist¹ just knocked a guy unconscious. She then dragged his body, leaving a trail of blood from his head. The scene freezed. The word "bersambung" ("to be continued") appeared.

And then, suddenly there was a red screen with words of the day, literally saying: "Everyone has a potential to do good and evil. It's the strength of your heart that protects you from committing evil." This was on primetime TV.

I'd like to see a children show like that.

It'd start with a father saying to his boy, "Don't play with knives while I'm around."

"Okay," the kid nodded nod with a smile.

Only seconds after the dad left, the boy grabbed a chair, stood on it, and took hold one of the ginsu knife.

Suddenly, the door swung open, kicked by Freddy Krueger. He snarled at the terrified kid. And then sliced the boy apart like cheese. Accompanied by chilling wails, blood splurted on every corner of the room.

Then the screen went red and showed the text, "Everyone has a potential to be a maniac. It's the strength of your heart that protects you from being a cheesy horror movie antagonist."

That would be something.

__________________

1: You can recognize one by his/her shouting the word "murder" or "kill" at least five times on each episode.

Doctor--Who?

[In the now-defunct comment box] Dudi wrote:

"Spidey's promise of giving the infinite pleasure might have been aroused (excuse the pun) after meeting this certain superdude named--really, I'm serious--Dr. Bong."

Somehow, after taking a look at how Dr. Bong looks like, I doubt he'll make a good guitar player with a golden ball as a left hand. But I guess Dudi was referring to something else.


SPEAKING OF SOMETHING ELSE...

Today's Fortune Cookie: One shalt not vainly utter "I believe in you" after buying a pair of panties with GPS sensors for one's spouse.

Step Over, Batman and Superman Cologne!

And make way for...

...Spiderman Guitar!
Notice the hand gesture.


Spidey is an old-school, heavy metal guitar king!
If that still doesn't wow you, check out what it promises:


One can't help wondering...
...and worrying.