A Small Reunion

[happy faces!]

Look at the above picture, that's me on the left, Bachtiar Rifa'i on center and Kris Hartanto aka Patrick on the right. Last night, when I'm in Salatiga, well when I post this posting, I'm still in Salatiga. We were a long-time-no-see friends, Bachtiar and Patrick are my high school friends, though I've known Bachtiar since Junior High.

So, the story's like this, Patrick's now livin' in USA, married, but for one or two reason, he had to return to Indonesia, for maybe a year or so, while for Bachtiar, he stays in Salatiga and working while doing his graduate degree on Law. That Sunday I went to Salatiga to pick up my Mom, the plan was Wednesday, but as I know that Patrick in Indonesia, Salatiga to be precise, I go there in Sunday in order to get the chance to meet the guys.

It was hilarious, imagine this, friends who haven't met for 10 years, yup 10 years, (FYI I left Salatiga in 1996), talk about how life has been treating us, back then and now, funny stories bout the past etc. We talked until it's midnight, and what a coincidence, Patrick' birthday is February 26th, the day I wrote this post, so we were the first to congratulate him, as for his wife in USA still in February 25th thanks to Time Differences...

I'm still in Salatiga for another 2 days, let's see who'll I meet here in the next 2 days, as for I intended to track down my old friends...

Weapon of Choice

Above is my Weapon of Choice in taking pictures...
Body: Canon EOS 20D
Lens: Canon EF-S 17-85mm f/4-5.6 USM IS
Speedlite: Canon Speedlite 580 EX + Omni Bounce
Filter: Hoya UV HMC & Hoya CPL

additionals:
Velbon CX 640 Tripod
EW-73B Lens Hood for EF-S 17-85mm F/4-5.6 IS USM
Canon Remote Switch RS-80N3
Lowepro Computrekker AW
Lowepro TLZ 2

The combination of the above in my opinion very suitable for my day-to-day photography, which are mostly outdoor, indoor and portrait.

I chose Canon EF-S 17-85mm f/4-5.6 USM IS because its light weight, and works perfectly with Canon 20D, the EF-S mount is specially made for Canon EOS 300D, EOS 350D, EOS 400D, EOS 10D, EOS 20D and EOS 30D which uses the APS-C sensor with a 1.6x crop factor compared to the 35mm film or Full Frame.

The USM (Ultra Sonic Motor) works flawlessly in auto focusing and of course the IS (Image Stabilizer) that is embedded in the lens added up the value since it will stabilize the picture for 3-stop (trust me, it really helps on low light condition, aside from the EOS 20D Body's ISO settings).

Just love its 17mm Wide Angle (27mm on 36mm film) and its semi-tele on 85mm (136mm on 35mm film). I also like to shoot some wide angle, macro photography and telephoto, but for a while, this combination is P.E.R.F.E.C.T.

Wish List:
This is the list that, well..I wanted to have, but don't have the opportunity to have it yet
Canon EF-S 10-22mm f/3.5-4.5 USM <--for Wide Angle
Canon EF-S 60 mm f/2.8 Macro Lens <--for Macro
Canon EF 70-300mm f/4.0 - F5.6 IS USM <--for Telephoto
Canon BG-E2 <--vertical grip, for additional battery also, would really help on a long period of photo-hunt

Of course all of us Canon users always wanted an L Lens, but for my taking pictures habit so far, I really wanted these...

So, what's your weapon of choice?

Intermezzo

Pandu aka Helix has done something that made me have an out of this world experience and went to Grand Canyon USA, these are the pictures...

Ketep Experience (original footage)

Grand Canyon Experience

Out of This World Experience

Contact Pandu if you're interested to go somewhere..virtually anywhere... Guaranteed!

BABEL

definition from Microsoft Encarta 2006:

BABEL: Tower of Babel (Hebrew Bābhel, from Assyro-Babylonian bāb-ili,”gate of God”), according to the Old Testament (see Genesis 11:1-9), tower erected on the plain of Shinar in Babylonia by descendants of Noah. The builders intended the tower to reach to heaven; their presumption, however, angered Yahweh, who interrupted construction by causing among them a previously unknown confusion of languages. He then scattered these people, speaking different languages, over the face of the earth.

The story possibly was inspired by the fall of the famous temple-tower of Etemenanki, later restored by King Nabopolassar and his son Nebuchadnezzar II of Babylonia. The Genesis account appears to play on the Babylonian word bāb-ili (“gate of God”) and on the Hebrew words Bābhel (“Babylon”) and bālāl (“to confuse”). The English words babel and babble are derived from the story....
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...but that was a whole lot different story from the movie that I've seen this Monday, starred by Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett and a pack of other cast, this is a story of how things are related to each other, how one event may have effect on other event, I think that's the morale of the story, no matter what you do, it will have effect on others, nevertheless it's good or bad...

I was expecting to see a "heavy" movie, but I was surprised that it didn't deliver the tension that I was looking for... I can say that this was like Pulp Fiction, only on a serious matters, not comical... 4 stories in one movie, 2 in Morocco, 1 in Japan, 1 in Mexico and each one of them are interrelated...

(***1/2) 3.5 stars, good but not that good...

PS: can anyone explain why this movie was titled Babel?

Another Gallery featuring Me...

Some from Borobudur..

KETEP!

Last Tuesday, I took the liberty to go to Borobudur Temple in Magelang and followed by going to Ketep Pass, a place to see Mount Merapi, a cool place (literally! Colder than Jogja at least...) these are several pictures that I took during the Journey...

Merapi, FullBody \(^o^)/

The most Close-Up that I can get, need some telephoto lens... T.T

look mom! no hands! ;p

See Y'All on the next journey...

Gallery Showcase

Two souvenirs from Danyal's house at Salam Village Magelang...


Above is a picture of his living room's Lamp...
..and below is a picture of Sunset taken near his house, FYI this picture is taken from a speeding car...


See more of my so-called art work here

Kompo

Ini dia! Foto ini udah tak ambil lamaaaa sekali, dari meta datanya seh 23 Agustus 2004, 12:41:18 make Hapenya adekku jaman itu, Siemens SX1. Waktu itu ktemu ini di daerah Keraton, deket museum kereta kencana kalo gak salah.. Gak tau sekarang masih ada pa gak...

Kalo dari tulisannya mungkin bingung, pinjam kompo... kompo? bukannya kompo buat dengerin musik (compo.. halah!) mbayar Rp. 500,- tapi pompa sendiri HEH? kompo koq dipompa sendiri pula, trus kalo minta dipompain Rp. 1000,-

Jadi gini...secara ini diambil di Jogja, jadi ini make basa Jawa, maksudnya, orang sini nyebut Kompo secara fonetik ( o pertama agak u jadi seperti Kumpo) adalah untuk menyebut Pompa. Okeh.. truss? Yang lucu adalah, jadi tersirat kalo minjem pompa Rp. 500,- nah kalo nyuruh pompain Rp. 1000,- nahh, jadinya brapa? Rp.1500,- harus dibayar kalo minjem pompa trus minta tolong dipompain? Hmmmmm.....

Yang kayak gini nih banyak di sini, seperti misalnya dodol bensin, HEH? bensin dibikin dodol? emangnya bisa? koq malah nanyak bisa dibikin dodol bisa pa gak? maksudnya tuh dodol=jual jadi jual bensin, nanti kalo ketemu tak ambil gambarnya n tak posting disini sebagai postingan tersendiri tentunyaa...