A week without facebook

source:
http://designerscouch.org/view-design/Honest-logos-23220

So it has been a week since I deactivated Facebook. I feel like a burden has been lifted. No longer am I entertaining people around facebook statuses, and I also feel like people aren't annoying me with 'advice' and unwanted comments from know-it-alls.

I have had friends who have genuinely sent me messages on my phone, and even given me a phone call. This is the best feeling ever!

I usually spend a lot of my day checking up on facebook to see if any of my 660 friends have uploaded a picture of their latest meal. I have often found myself at a loss. Usually I would be on my iPhone or laptop all day 'checking up'. Now I check my emails, look around on Pinterest, refresh twitter and sometimes even look at pretty postcards as I eagerly wait for one on Postcrossing. I then close my laptop, when usually it would stay on and I would refresh every 5 minutes or so.

There's a new freedom in my mind. Free from the crap that Facebook brings! And really, I don't think I want to go back. But would I be out of the loop if I didn't?

People will probably say that when I have a baby I won't have time anyway. Hello, nobody has time for Facebook. I'm sure we'd find time even with the demands on Motherhood!

I'm 39 weeks now. I'm due this Friday!

Empty [ five minute friday ]

From thegypsymama.com:

Be brave, come & join #FiveMinuteFriday. Your words are necessary! (<—Tweet this!)1. Write for 5 minutes flat – no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking
2. Link back here and invite others to join in.
3. Please visit the person who linked up before you & encourage them in their comments.

***

EMPTY

I remember at our old church, there was a really funny ambonese preacher (at least I think he was ambonese). I can't remember what he was preaching about, but suddenly he was talking about people who meditate. He began to talk about 'empty'... Being 'empty' and doing a really funny imitation of being 'empty'. 

Now when anything is 'empty' we cannot say it normally, it has to be said in the way the preacher said it that day.

I hate that feeling when I finish something awesome. That is when the empty feeling happens. Like finishing a good book, finishing a great cup of coffee. I hate it how good things come to an end, by becoming empty.

The house is empty. Well, I'm here, but hubby hasn't returned home from work. When he comes back, there will be life again.

Wait, how can I say my house is empty? I am so incredibly blessed and have so much stuff. My hubby used to live in Singapore and his whole life would have to fit into two suitcases. Now we live in a 3 bedroom house in the outer suburbs and we have two sheds and a cubby house. We could no way fit our lives into a suitcase, perhaps more like a garbage truck.

OK STOP!

shoes on, shoes off.

Image source:
http://www.redonline.co.uk/interiors/easy-to-steal-ideas/arranging-objects?img=4

Chantelle asks: "What's the rule in your house, shoes on or off?"

To answer this question I need to start from the start.

When I was a kid, I lived in the middle of nowhere, what some would define as 'the sticks' or 'the outback'. I grew up in a white environment, and the only reason we ever had to take our shoes off in the house is because they were muddy.

Often we'd go out to collect firewood in our shoes. It was often really heavy and we'd not have time to take off our shoes as the fireplace was a fair distance into the house.

If you go to my house in my home town, you will find a collection of shoes at the back door in a cardboard box. There are so many shoes there, and only one person lives in the house, although some are probably mine from when I lived there, 8 years ago.

Basically, in a typical white-australian, particularly in the rural areas, it isn't custom to take off your shoes.

Then I started travelling in Asia.

In 2002 I took my first ever overseas trip to Yogyakarta, the cultural hub of Indonesia. I don't ever remember there being a rule about taking our shoes off inside, although we did stay in hotel/hostel type accommodation.

Then in 2007 I went to Kendari, South East Sulawesi. This was a much different place. We stayed in home stay accommodation with families. When I first got to the door, they asked me to please take off my shoes and gave me some slippers inside the house.

We took a trip out to a rural area in Sulawesi. At my homestay family here, they told me just to wear my shoes inside. I get the feeling that this may be because they are in the 'outback of indonesia'.

By the time I returned to Indonesia with my then-boyfriend-now-husband in 2010, I knew what I needed to do. Every house I went in I took my shoes off. I'd learnt this now also, because I'd moved into a sharehouse with Chinese people in Melbourne.

So now I shall revisit Chantelle's question, "What's the rule in your house, shoes on or off?"

The answer: off.

But we wear slippers inside.

This has come without discussion. It keeps the floor cleaner. For my husband, it's habit. For me, it makes me feel more Asian :)

[ This entry was inspired by this one... ]

Earl Grey & Poppyseed Muffins!

So since I first met my lovely husband, he inspired me. He inspired me in so many ways, but one of these ways was to cook. He taught me a lot of cooking skills I didn't know. Believe it or not the first time I tried to cook for myself when I first moved out of home to uni I tried to make chicken kebabs (Indonesian readers = sate). It was a massive fail when they all fell off the stick and I ended up eating raw chicken for dinner.

But back to my lovely, inspiring, hubby. When we met he had taken some cooking courses in New Zealand, and was really eager to cook. My husband, being Indonesian, very rarely cooks Indonesian food.

Something in him inspired me to cook, to try different things. And to cook, I mean be healthier in my lifestyle as well. I never watched shows like Masterchef but suddenly I was. I loved the creativity that could be found in food and now I've fallen in love with it.

Years on, and now we have Pinterest, which has thousands of recipes that pop up each day. Last week I made a honey chocolate cake, which as messy as it was turned out great, but was just a little too sweet for me!

I've joined a mothers group at my church, and although technically I'm not a mother yet, it gives me a taste of what it will be like. I really like the fellowship and accountability there. Tomorrow it is our turn to bring along some food so today I made some Earl Grey and Poppy Seed Muffins. And while I haven't tried any yet, I'm impressed with the way they have turned out. They smell amazing!

To make it a bit more interesting I'm going to put some teabags on toothpicks and stick them in a few muffins, just to keep going with the Earl Grey theme. I also got some apricot jam to go with them (not a big jam person myself) and people can put it on there if they wish.

Yum I can't wait - hope they are as good as they smell!

free

So last night I put something up on Facebook along the lines of:

Hey all, I'm deactivating Facebook until the end of March... But I'm still around, you can contact me this way, this way or this way... [inserting various other online methods of communication, Facebook being the only one I'm actually closing].

This was an interesting social experiment. Suddenly people were worried about how they would know when the baby was born. It makes me wonder what we would do pre Facebook, where a baby was born and we'd have to wait a good 48 hours at least, or sometimes until the next weekend, to read it in the paper.

I'm pretty sure my Mum didn't have an address book of 660 so called 'friends' and call them up, write letters, or just turn up randomly at their house and write on their 'wall' that I was born.

Having a baby is such an exciting time, and I think that it's a special time that should be shared between close friends and family, not the 'world' within the hour of the childs birth. Instead I have been getting demands that I contact people as soon as the baby is born (believe it or not, some people want to know when I'm in labour.)

Back to my social experiment, I found it interesting the responses I found by putting that Facebook status up. Some people genuinely (and I genuinely thank these people) sent me an email wishing me well. Others wished me well on the status which was great too. Others complained like their arm had fallen off.

The thing is, dear readers (do I even have any??), that there are other ways and means that you can contact people without Facebook. This doesn't mean that Facebook is useless, it has brought worlds together like never before. But what happened to the days where we emailled each other, picked up the phone and talked for hours, wrote letters. Now we're all just like stalkers - we can just watch what other people are doing without actually interacting with each other.

This isn't the first time I've been without Facebook. When I went back to uni I did a 'puasa facebook' (facebook fast) and I found myself to have more time doing not only my assignments, but loving doing things I'd normally waste time on.

Really, through all this I just want my privacy, my baby and my family's privacy respected. Pregnancy has been the hardest thing I've been through and it's not over yet. I need time and space to adjust to how I'm feeling and going to feel. The reality of having a child of my own is a really big thing, and in my mind I'm still adjusting and will take some time to adjust, and I want people to respect that.

You have my number, you have my email. I'm more than happy to send a picture to those who actually make the effort :)

38 weeks and I'm deactivating facebook...

I have a love-hate relationship with Facebook.

I have 660 friends. I'm not actually sure how many of those 660 friends I actually know.

Back in 2007, I added heaps of randoms from Kendari. Kendari is a small town in Indonesia where everyone knows everyone, so I usually had at least one mutual friend.

Then in the last year, it seems every one is on Facebook.

Facebook has changed the way we interact with each other. And while I don't think it's a bad thing, people don't sms me or give me a call anymore. I don't receive snail mail and to be in 'the loop' you need to have religiously read Facebook 10 times a day.

Facebook isn't all bad. Being a fat pregnant lady on the couch it has given me something to think about and waste my time with.

But it's going offline, very soon.

People sometimes don't understand Facebook etiquette. People don't understand that it's not just like catching up for an online coffee with friends. So many people have harassed me for a picture of my growing pregnant belly. Do people not understand that this isn't just like me showing up at your house to show you? That perhaps it's a little more like publishing it in our local paper? (Well, if I have 660 friends and my hometown has 600 people in it... get the picture?)

Because people don't seem to get this, I've made a decision to temporarily deactivate Facebook. The baby will be coming any time now, and I know that information will 'leak' and people just can't help themselves. I hate to think that information will be circulating on Facebook when I haven't even had the chance to announce this to my friends and family.

Just like I don't understand people asking about how long the labour was and how the baby was finally delivered? Does it matter what end it comes out of? I don't regularly talk about my private bits with anyone, let alone on Facebook! (Although I'm quite happy to talk about it if you make the time for me... off Facebook).

Agh, I sound like such an emo-child in this post. Hopefully when I've had the baby all of these horrible angry hormones will go away!

3 words - for my hubby...

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