This week was another tiring one.

Those three days field trip was totally exhausting despite having most of our time  wasted on the way to the places. The first day trip to the universities were quite okay, but I didn’t find them exciting as I don’t plan on enrolling to the local universities in my country.

We visited the insemination site on day two. Students spent most of their times writing down what the speaker had to say about cows and horses and goats and lambs. (I intentionally abused ‘and’ to stress how boring it was). We got free flavored milk in the end of the session, though.

Those were the photos that I took for our upcoming report about this insemination trip. No photos of the cows, though, since we’re not allowed to get close to them.

We went to the geology museum directly after that. There was nothing new since I’ve been there four years ago during junior high. So I just went around the halls, watched a video, and then went back to the bus. We stopped on a place with lots of factory outlets and played cards in a cafe in one of the outlets instead of shopping around like everyone else did. (I didn’t really play since I suck at cards, seriously). There were actually many who played cards aside from us. 😛

Everyone had their dinner in Paskal (not pascal), Pasir Kaliki. It’s a foodcourt with loads of traditional food and snacks from Indonesia. It has a beautiful scenery and lightings. A fountain was located in the centre of the foodcourt. There was a sign that read ‘Throw the coin trough the ring for good luck’ near the statue on the fountain. Felicia and I decided to toss our coins. Both of it went through!

We spent the third day visiting Saung Udjo, a place where people make and play Angklung.

I’ve also been to this place during junior high. So there was nothing new there either. But it was still an exciting show to watch.

Our buses then stopped at Kilometer 97 (or was it 79?) for lunch. I ordered a not-so-spicy fried rice in Solaria but got a super chili (perhaps jalapeno) flavored friend rice, so I didn’t get to eat it at all. I don’t want diarrhea. I was pissed off so I tore a paper out of my notebook, wrote something equivalent to ‘Eat shit!’ on it, and then put it nicely atop of the fried rice. Then I left the restaurant to get myself a cup of frapuccino from Starbucks and a box of Yakiniku from KFC which my friend bought for me. (Thanks a lot dude).

Screw you Solaria, you made my last day of field trip ruined.

I just set up my own new bank account today at the local office near my house. It felt like it took forever for my turn to come and to end the process. I didn’t actually finish the process, though, since the entire block suddenly had a blackout. I was unable to get a picture of myself and my signature taken. So the staff told me to come back tomorrow around the morning or the afternoon. Oh well, at least I don’t have to wait in line again.

Me and my mom then went to the mall. My brother decided not go join since the electricity was back on again. We went to Aranzi Cafe because I’d always wanted to go there before it went under renovation. The stall has been renewed now. And they have added several more items to their menu.

Mom decided to try a new type of cake she haven’t tried before. We decided to share the cake so mom told me to order another item from their new menu. I was really captivated by their kakigori (lit. shaved ice), so I asked the staff which kakigori was famous among the customers. She pointed out the Panda Milky Crunch which consists of shaved oreo, vanilla ice, mini brownies, and marshmallows.

The shaved ice was enjoyable, they’re actually pretty nice when half-melt. However we didn’t have a nice time devouring the cake since the fruits they used were really sour. My mom chocked on her first bite, and she immediately told me to get rid of the fruits. I tried to taste them first, though. It certainly was sour I can’t stand it. 😦 Too bad. I guess their green tea and chocolate mouse cakes are still far way better than this one. 😛

We went to the SOGO department store just to check whether they’re having clearance sale discounts or not. I then spotted that Elle handbag that was being discounted for fifty percent. I took the bag and showed it to my mom. I guess she fell in love on the first sight and purchased that bag for herself. Boo. If I had some money I would’ve bought that bag for myself, too. Well, it doesn’t really matter though. I could just borrow the bag from her when I need it.

I was actually looking for a medium sized backpack since my old one which was made from leather was having a breaking down process. The leather are getting peeled off little by little and it’s only a matter of time before it finally got broken. I’ve asked my mom several times before to look for a cheap backpack but neither I or her had the time to. So when she spotted a simple parachute-material backpack (again discounted for forty percent), she immediately bought it for me.

It was a really simple backpack. It has four different colours available; red, navy blue, black, and fuchsia. I chose the red one because it’s the brightest of them all. Lol. Aside from having a big space inside, it’s also waterproof! 😀 I think it’s pretty durable, too. I’m planning to use that backpack for my school field trip on the 21st of October. Yay for flashy backpacks!

We ended up spending around $70 for the handbag and $42 for the backpack. It’s a pretty nice deal!

We had ramen and gyozas at Sushi Tei for lunch. It was the first time for us to eat at that restaurant. Mom had always wanted to eat there but never had the chance to do so since it’s always crowded during dinner. It was not so crowded when we came so mom said why not.

When we asked for the bill, my mom was quite shocked when she saw that the one registered was salmon gyoza instead of the chicken one. The salmon costs two times the price of the chicken, which explains the expensive bill. Mom then complained to the waitress. However she said that she didn’t misheard our order and insisted that we ordered salmon from the very start. I was pretty confused as I was pretty sure what I ate tasted like chicken, not salmon. And let me stress that it was definitely chicken. The waitress kept insisted otherwise. I could only roll my eyes. I’m never going back to that restaurant.

We had homemade potato wedges as our dinner. My mom tried to make a replica of potato wedges in the restaurants that I loved using the remaining potatoes we had at home.

With only salt, pepper, parsley, and rice flour, mom made potato wedges that — in my opinion— surpassed the ones in the restaurants! She then fried them for several minutes, and it was done.

Well, aside from the Sushi Tei incident, I have to say that we really had a good time today!

Today I went out of town with my friend Yemima and Eva to a certain university to register for the new freshman admission. The trip took one hour, it was scorching hot when we arrived there. The building was huge, it has a modern design to it. We then went to the admission centre and filled out the registration form. Apparently, they’re having a discount for the forms, so I only had to pay 100k for two forms. The normal price would’ve been 200k each. I guess I’m pretty lucky.

We then went to the nearest mall from the university. The mall was built by the same group that also built the mall near my house. The one next to the university was way more bigger, though. It has so many stores and restaurants we didn’t get to explore it all in two hours.

My mom then texted me that my book had arrived. I rushed home and opened the package that my mom had put on the sofa. The book that I had ordered was Percy Jackson and The Greek Heroes by Rick Riordan. I actually bought that book because I was interested in the US version of the cover. So I ordered it online and had them ship to my house. But what arrived here was not the book with the US cover, but the UK one.

I was so disappointed at it. I’m mad but I couldn’t really get mad at anyone since I’m sure the store wouldn’t want to take the blame. I was so pissed off so I vented at my friend and my mom. Moreover, the books that I ordered had some parts of it’s cover torn a bit. Seriously, I’m so fed up with it.

I read somewhere in the internet that this book has some illustrations included inside. I was so excited to see those illustrations but I couldn’t find it ANYWHERE inside the book. Probably because it was a UK released one? WTF, seriously. I ordered a damned US version but they gave me a UK version with a torn cover.

I’ll never buy books from that store ever again. Screw you Periplus.

Nothing important happened this week. Just a bunch of hectic schedules filled with tests and homeworks. We did have a celebration for Indonesia’s independence day last Wednesday, though. I guess the celebration was a really nice time to relax from school learning activities. We could actually participate in traditional games competition (I didn’t participate in any) and open up a stand for your own bazaar (I only bought several skewers of yakitori).

There’s not even a news regarding my physics test (which I screwed horribly) last week. Perhaps the teacher’ll distribute the results on Monday. I won’t hope much, though. I’m almost pretty sure that I’d fail at this horrible subject which I suck so much. (Cough, cough).

I’ve, more or less, made up my mind regarding which university and which major to take when I graduate next year. There’s a really big chance I’m taking IT. I won’t be going abroad, though, since my dad really doesn’t give me any preparations like IELTS test etc. I’ll probably just go to another university that’s a little bit far from home. I’d have to rent somewhere near …

I’ve also decided to take Programming as my extra curricular this year. Though it’ll only last for a semester since third year students need to prepare for graduation exams and crap. School had to cut off those “extra” time so that we could have more study sessions (and less sleep).

My mom ordered a Hong Kong Waffle Maker a few days ago and it arrived a day or two after. She immediately made three batches of those waffles. I got cheese, chocolate for my brother, and the original plain one for my mom. They tasted delicious!

We ate baby back ribs at a restaurant near our neighbourhood, Carnivor. The place was actually a mixture of steak restaurant and japanese ramen restaurant, Ikkudo Ichi. We had always ordered ramen when we go there, but this time I wanted a different taste. (I was honestly getting bored of ramen lol). So we ordered a full baby back and then split it into four. It was really delicious! We got mashed potatoes as the side dishes. The potatoes weren’t as good as Holy Cow’s, though. Carnivor’s potatoes were a bit rough. I guess they didn’t mash it thoroughly so they still have grains of hard potatoes, but it’s okay.

I just turned seventeen four days ago at the 11th of August. 😀 My family celebrated it in the evening of that day by going out and eating together at Holy Cow! restaurant.

Then we ate several slices of cake that my mom bought the other day right after the dinner.

The cake tasted so bitter, nonetheless it was still delicious. Mom said she’s going to buy me another cake once I finished distributing the leftovers to my friends. 😛 I distributed them the next day. Some of my friends never realized that it was my birthday … Oh well.