Pieces of You - Tablo

“These are the pieces of my youth,

the small secrets and the not-so-great expectations

that defined my coming of age.”

― Tablo, Pieces of You

The English version of this book had been released from early 2009, not long after its Korean version. Yes, it’s not a fresh book, but I just found out about it recently, after I started listening to this Korean hip hop group, Epik High. Tablo, the author, and the leader of this group have this such of cold and brutal realist sense on writing lyrics for the group. “Pieces of You” consists of ten short stories, all written during his college life in Stanford University from 1998 to 2001 – giving him honors in English Literature and Creative Writing.

“So here I am,

choosing to kick away the ladder

so that I may remain at your side.

I understand your solitude I see your shadow."

The stories aren’t happy. They are rough, dark, yet dazzling - those kind of stories that is so realistic without clean ending, enough explanation, and obvious chronology. Complex, just like reality itself.

The topics are vary, relationship between a sick mother and a weed-smoker son, the life of a porn movies casting director, until story about two old pals who just lost their best friend. My favorite is the first story, “Andante”. It’s about a pianist whose father was a maestro before it all taken away by a chronic Alzheimer.

Well it might sounds like a gloomy book review, eh? It’s not a common kind of genre, but can be as well an oasis for those who bored of typical drama or romance novel. It’s kinda tricky to find this book nowadays, I searched all over Kinokuniya, Aksara, or Periplus, but they don’t seem to have it. So I best recommend you to order from yesasia.com for the English version or just get to Toko Gunung Agung for the Bahasa version for IDR 40.000 (but I didn’t refer to it, since the Bahasa one is written by a translator). You also can buy the English version on www.yesasia.com for $25.

Here’s my favorite quotes from the book:

“Cowards,

I believe, are people who are afraid to embrace what they want or need

in a natural, honest way.”

“It didn’t rain for you, maybe,

but it always rains for me.

The sky shatters and rains shards of glass.”

“He laughed.

I suddenly wanted to laugh, to laugh with him, to sit here,

or maybe outside in the rain, and just laugh with him.

But I couldn’t. I couldn’t even smile.”

“When I stop at a stop sign, I don’t think about the distance I’ve crossed.

I just wish I never had to stop.”

By: @taniayosephine

BIG BANG-ED at Singapore F1 Grand Prix 2013

Never passed my mind I would end up liking madly-fangirling over a Korean boyband. But hey, now here I am, beneath the piercing sunlight and humid weather of Singapore, Friday, September the 20^th 2013, 12 pm. Exactly 2 hours are passed after I got into this queue in front of Gate 3 Singapore Formula 1 Grand Prix. So that means, one-two-eleven more hours of waiting and sun bathing before I can see them – BIG BANG. How I got here, well that’s another story. Story made by combination of destiny, faith, Korean wave, and estrogen – lot and lots of estrogen. And I’m sure right now, these hundreds of girls all over the countries, sweating their ass off waiting for the idol to show up, have that kind of story like me.

the queue. Pardon my friend's face.

From a man’s logic sight, this was a quite phenomenon. I mean, it was not even an official concert! Besides BIG BANG, Singapore F1 Grand Prix invites Rihanna, The Killers, and Justin Bieber for their entertainment highlights throughout the race. The tickets were sold divided into categories, based by the area zones and racing zones. There are 4 entertainment zones, the big concerts are held in zone 4, while zone 1, 2, and 3 provides little concerts and have access to see the race. The tickets to see BIG BANG is the cheapest one. It’s a Friday Zone 4 Walkabout for (only) S$68. Other tickets vary from S$148 (Rihanna), S$178 (Bieber), until S$500 – S$1.288 for other zones. So as a VIP (BIGBANG fandom), the choice is to grab it or grab it, no?

The Padang Stage. Notice that in the next hours, people are filling this empty field to the very behind.

The gate was finally opened by 3 pm. But the excitements had to be held down remembering there’s still one-two-eight more hours before the actual fun. Actually, now when I’m thinking about those times, I don’t know how I made it somehow. We were exposed by a non-stop sun for about 8 hours – no single cloud – plus 5 hours more of waiting. Not to mention the super humid weather of Singapore. I never waited something for so long  - and so hot - in my whole life, ever.

Fun in the sun, eh? Happy face caused by good spot – hell yeah. Oh, and take a look at those pretties behind, sun-bathing.

But like every other waiting, there’s always the end of it. Those moments of signs for the concert was about to start alerting one by one. The dancers were running around, the lightning were set, the crews were putting water bottles around the stage, and the band was sound checking. I was thinking like, "This is the time". Exact 11.15 pm, the big screen on the stage plays “Fantastic Baby” MV, the screams and sings burn the Padang Stage with excitements. Just when the MV finished, the band started playing a very familiar tune, and at times I still try to digest it, a voice striking, throbbing right to the heart, “What’s up Singapore!!” And that’s the time we’re finally lose ourselves. No need for thinking, no need for digesting, and just let it out and loud. Oh, and it’s G-Dragon voice, by the way.

I didn’t take any fancams (fans camera) or pictures during the show. But luckily, there are plenty of other spectators do their homework for us – and I filtered them properly - so here I present to you, the highlight of the night.

The word “swag” was invented for him.

I can smell he’s coming back to his former glory.

 He added “Blurred Lines” snippet at the end of his song.

 Confirmed: he really IS perfection.

God bless those abs.

THIS. KAMSAHAMNIDA. Too bad I can’t attach GIF here. Check the video out instead.

When T.O.P getstouchy and Daesung gets dirty – I died.

The clearest fancam Ifound –five of them.

They performed for 1,5 hours straight with 18 songs. Here’s the song list. I didn’t expect that the list will be this long. Last year, same event, Jay Chou only performed 10 + 2 encore songs. So that’s the line of my expectation. But well, surprise, surprise.

Highlight the “Crooked” and “Gotta Talk To U”.

One of the best nights of my life? No doubt. It’s just funny the way life takes us places we don’t even know are exist, and yet it can be precisely perfect. The whole experience was perfect. The place, the time, the moment, the view, the stand, and the friend that come along the way are perfect. I just graduated at the same month, I got the best prices (for concert tickets, accommodation, even for the airplane – Rp 359k, two ways – thank God for Val*Air), I started making money right at the time before departure, and I got my best friend accompany me. Not to mention that last year, I got to pass the BIG BANG Alive Tour concert in Jakarta due to unavoidable event. Yet, my friend who attended it said that this one we just watched are way waaaay much better than the one that I passed. …Well this is the point, right? To be thankful and enjoying how life surprises us. So thank you life – thank you BIG BANG, thank you Singapore, my family, my friends, or should I just cut it here before it turned out to an award winning speech?

By: @taniayosephine