Friday, April 21, 2006

medan trip..



How should I begin? Hmm..a week in medan obviously meant a lot to me..and also to my travel frens-TONI,ADI AND DYA…thanx to u guys for making this journey unforgetable!!!

It’s been a great experience to be able to explore new things yourselves..basically this trip was not really planned as I only took 3 minutes to say yes to toni when she sent me an sms telling me about this trip…beside toni..i barely knew the other two-adi and dya even though we were studying in the same kulliyyah..but the trip has brought us closer..more than just frens as we officially declare ourselves as siblings...

Its been a great experience as when we reached there..we were totally strangers as we had to do things on our own as we had no frens or people we know in medan…before our journey..we got so many advice telling us to be careful because the chance to be deceived was inevitable… toni insists me to write about our motto along the journey..that made us survivors till the last day..’single-mingle-humble-gamble’—I know it sounds funny but yet very inspiring…as we got this motto when we were walking from one place to another…

I have to admit that medan is not like what u can see in London…its very much different even if it is to be compared to Malaysia…I guess what we have seen there made the experience even priceless..i got to see things right under my nose..how things are very much different from what we usually see…this is what we call LIFE..the people there..they have to struggle to earn a living…to live a life..

The roads were extremely busy with vehicles…one thing that really caught my eyes was..the people REALLy like to honk….a lotttttt…all the time..its as if they really enjoyed doing that..and when other people got honked..they were just cool about it..we were so mad in the beginning as it was a real sound pollution..but then we got used to it as days passed by…

We went to almost all the places there by walking..pretty amazing coz we barely do that in our country…there was this one day we wanted to go to sun plaza by walking..when we asked for direction, the people were like..”bisa jalan..tapi jauh bangat..”..we thought that it wasn’t that far so we continued walking…when we were to cross the road..everyone of us would be running like cipan while screaming..i guess u have to be there to see how it feels to cross the road…it was like acting in mission impossible movie..ahaha…after about two hours walking finally we reached there..we got soooo exhausted but we couldn’t help ourselves but to laugh hysterically while enjoying root beer…it was like walking from uia to jusco wangsa maju..it was crazy..what an experience…

Me and adi were so into buying cds,vcds and dvds…its half of the price here...during our stay here we only ate at fast food restaurant..it was so cheap..we only paid 5 ringgit per person for pizza hut…
Before I forget.. I got to watch iwan fals live on tv..what a beautiful coincidence..perfect combination of music..and someone in birmingham got so jealous about it..ehehe…

Hmm..there was this one incident that I will never forget during our last two days in medan..apparently we were running out of cash due to extreme shopping..but toni was our savior as she brought with her a credit card..dya was so busy shopping..suddenly when she wanted to pay the machine was out of service…it was kinda humiliating coz none of us had enough cash at that moment..it just so happened that we couldn’t find the nearest money changer that day…what a memory….what makes me even happier is that I got to buy a book written by Soh Hok Gie-indeed he was a great reformist… no wonder why this book and the film are banned in our so-called democratic country…I also bought GIE-a movie about Soh Hok Gie-Nicholas Saputra won the best actor in this film…”lebih baik diasingkan daripada menyerah pada kemunafikan.’’-Gie.

To wrap everything up, I guess this trip really taught me a lesson..lesson about life…to see how things are so hard for other people around us..and how lucky we are to be able to learn this lesson…the real meaning of poverty…I could see how hard things are for the people over there…its true as in reality the riches are getting richer and the poors are getting poorer..and yet we have the guts to talk about humanity and dignity…its very frustrating to see such a big nation has to suffer in poverty as a result of corruption…it’s a fact that everyone has to admit..corruption..it happens everywhere..and how devastating its effect to humanity…and a big question to us..have we contributed even a little to remedy this devastating phenomena…or we are just too busy to think about this as we have so many things to do in our lives..enjoying our life in luxury..and we don’t even bother to look at people who are really in need….now I realize that traveling is not just about pampering ourselves with comfort and luxury,,but it is for us to start to look around us and start thinking about the reality of life…

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