Those people certainly never hoped and imagined that they had to lose some parts of their body. But they had no other choice. They lost their hands, arms, feet, or legs. We know that some of them even have to live without any part of legs, because they lost all parts of them – from the foot toes to the thighs. Some others have to live without any part of arms. Even some others have to live without both legs and arms.

How can they stand that terrible condition? They are certainly strong people – those who don’t give up continuing their life despite that bad fate. We have to respect and be proud of their accepting the fate without any desperation. They don’t commit suicide. They even promise themselves to do their best. Yes, some of them even succeeded to make great things that normal people could not make them. This fact means that losing some parts of their body is not an obstacle at all for them  to do their best.

We all know that some people were born blind or deaf. Some others were born with other kinds of disabilities. But they never give up. They keep doing everything they can do. The keep doing their best. Many of them are able to make great things just like normal people do. Even some of them are able to make great things that most of normal people are not able to.

They believe that they can if they try to do their best. They have never been desperate. They know that what they can do is only doing their best. They know that it’s no use crying over their fate.

When I was in Sanaa – the Capital of Yemen – , once I attended a seminar talking about the Palestinians who are kept in Israeli jails. Among those who were present in the seminar, there was a Palestinian ex-prisoner. He lost his sight due to violence done by Israeli prison guards when he was in their jail. Despite of his losing his sight, he didn’t look desperate at all. He even looked proud of what happened. He was proud that he could sacrifice something for Islam, his beloved religion, and Palestine, his beloved country.

Now I want to ask you – and myself. Have you experienced something worse than what they were suffering from? If you haven’t, how could you feel so desperate about life? How could you feel so sad due to what happened to you? Don’t you feel ashamed? Don’t you feel humiliated?

Yes, you have to be strong as they are. You have to have strong will to do your best despite whatever happened to you. Never blame whatever happened to you. All things happened to you are parts of your fate – that was already written by Allah before you were born. You can’t blame the fate, because blaming it means blaming Allah. What you can do is only to do your best along your life. You have to believe that you can if you try to do your best. Yes, you can. Allah will be always with you if you are pleased with the fate he determined upon you. Face your life, do your best, and let Allah determine the best for you.

During the party, a guy approached an attractive girl. He hadn’t know her yet. But they were luckily being in the same place that night. After saying hello and having some introductory conversation, the guy asked: “Anyways, are you single?”

“Guess what?” replied the girl while she was smiling and slightly raising her shoulder.

I don’t want to continue telling you this imaginary story. But let me say that the guy certainly hoped that the girl was still single, and he would be disappointed to hear that she was not single. But don’t you know that ‘not single’ in their definition is not always ‘married’? Instead, they defined ‘not single’ as having special relationship to another person, that is not always marriage. Certainly, ‘not single’ can mean ‘married’, but they also would say that a girl is not single although she is unmarried, as long as she has a boyfriend. And, if a girl has just broke up with her boyfriend, she will be called ‘newly single’.

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In a muslim wedding party, many people gathered. They were invited to come to the party. Ahmad was standing among the crowd. He glanced around the party-room to see who were there. Suddenly he was surprised by the presence of a young man in the corner of the room. He could recognize him. He’s Ali, his old friend. He approached him and said salam to him. After some conversation, Ahmad asked Ali: “Are you still single?”

“No. Not anymore,” replied Ali.

I’m stopping telling you the story here. Now let me ask you what Ali’s answer means. I believe you will say that Ali was married, not single anymore.

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In muslim society, the way of life, as well as the culture, is somehow different from that of the western or non muslim society. Islam forbids any muslim to have special relationship to the the opposite sex other than marriage – that is called dating. Islam forbids it because it can lead someone to commit adultery (zina) – one of the major sins. As a result, the term ‘not single’ in muslim society mostly means ‘married’, because being ‘not single’ and at the same time ‘unmarried’ will be interpreted as ‘bad behavior’.

For western or non muslim people, relationship status (a term used by Facebook) can be single, in relationship (that means having a boyfriend or a girlfriend), engaged, married, or divorced. Whereas for (good) muslims, all of the status are possible except ‘in relationship’ because ‘in relationship’ means dating that is forbidden.

Hey, this is not an extremist’s point of view. Dating forbidden is dating that leads someone to commit adultery. It includes khalwat (being with the opposite-sex without a mahram as the third person accompanying), touching, carressing, kissing, and ….. (you get it, guys). All those stuffs undoubtedly will lead someone to commit adultery.

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Unfortunately, now you can find dating not only in western or non muslim countries. You also can find it in muslim countries. In our country, Indonesia – that is the greatest muslim population around the world, it’s not hard to see couples of unmarried youngsters hanging out together on weekends. They are even not afraid or ashamed to kiss each other in public places – or probably do some stuff more than just kissing. Naudzubillah min dzalik!

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At last, I want to ask you something. If someone ask you whether you are single or not, what will you be eager to answer if you were allowed to lie? Do you want to answer that you are still single although you are married, or that you are already married although you are still unmarried, or you will answer honestly? Why am I asking you this question? I don’t know. I’m only curious. If you want to answer the question, just do it. But if you don’t want, I won’t force you. Take it easy, guys.

Praying five times a day is not the only thing we do everyday. There are some other things we should do everyday. Let me call those things ‘daily what-to-do for muslims’. What are they? Let me mention them for you.

Reciting the Holy Qur’an

The Holy Qur’an is the most important to read by muslims. It is the words of God, revelated onto Prophet Muhammad pbuh, to be guidance for human being in order to pursue the real happiness.

A good muslim will recite it everyday. It is strongly suggested that a muslim recites at least one juz of it everyday. That way, he will recite all of its content within one month, because it consists of thirty juz.

Reciting the Holy Qur’an gives us many benefits. It will remove any mental disease, refresh our mind, and give us spiritual power. It also advises us what to do and what not to do in our life. It is the best guidance for muslims.

Some Nawafil Prayers

Nawafil means ‘not obligatory’. Beside the five-times-a-day prayers that are obligatory, there are some other kinds of prayers a muslim can do, that are nawafil. There are three important nawafil prayers to do by a muslim. They are rawatib prayers, night prayer, and dhuha prayer.

Rawatib prayers are done before (preceding) or after (following) a five-times-a-day prayer. Night prayer is any prayer done at night, after isha prayer and before fajr prayer. Whereas dhuha prayer is done during dhuha period – that is period of time beginning when the sun rises as high as a javelin and ending just before zhuhr prayer (midday).

Morning and Evening Dzikr

Dzikr literally means ‘remembering’. In fact, it usually means some words to say in order to remember and glorify Allah, as well as to ask Him something – that is usually called doa. We are to do dzikr as much as possible. A good muslim at least does dzikr everyday in the morning and in the evening. Beside this kind of dzikr, a muslim also should do dzikr following his five-times-a-day prayers. The Prophet pbuh has taught his followers how to do dzikr. The words of dzikr are narrated from Him, and are available for us now.

A muslim can do morning dzikr after he has just done fajr prayer, and he can do evening dzikr after he has just done magreeb prayer. Both of the dzikr can protect a muslim from the evil all the day and all the night.

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Those are the daily what-to-do for muslims. If you are a muslim, make sure that you don’t miss them. If  you feel it’s too hard to do all of them everyday, you can begin doing them once, twice, or three times a week. After you are used to that rhythm, you can increase the intensity until you can do them everyday. And if you are used to doing them everyday, you will enjoy it very much. You will feel the touch of God. Do you want to feel it? Just do it.

After a marathon of law process, The Supreme Court finally issued a rule demanding the government to take steps to improve the quality of education before another national exam can be administered. The latest news I heard said that the government insisted that National Exam will be held this year. I guess the government made the decision because they considered that it is the best to do as National Exam should be held after a while whereas there has not been any better substitute for the recent version of National Exam. Furthermore, if the government eliminated National Exam this year without any substitute, it also would be a foolish decision.

No matter what the government’s decision, I really respect their quick decision. We all need certainty within a very short period of time for preparing the exam. The condition could be worse if the government put off the decision.

Do we really need National Exam?

For government, National Exam is aimed to maintain the quality of education nationwide and to set up the national standard for junior and senior high schools. For this reason, the previous administration insisted that National Exam could not be eliminated.

However, the practice doesn’t sound as nice as that stated goal. It was reported that many students cheated in the exam. Not only students, some teachers were also reported helping their students to cheat. I think this humiliating practice occured because students were pushed to pass their education. Because the exam’s result influenced whether a student would pass his education or not, the students cheated in the exam in order to get good result. Besides, schools were also pushed to pass as many as possible their students because how many students they could pass and what the average result of the exam they could get determined their prestige and reputation among the public. For this reason, the schools demanded their teachers to help the students cheating in the exam.

Back to the question: do we really need national Exam? The goal determined by the government sounds nice. They want to improve the quality of education nationwide by means of a standardized test called National Exam. They want that all schools across the country have the same standard indicated by the minimum passing grade of National Exam.

However, those who don’t agree with the government argue that the recent condition doesn’t support the government’s decision. The government has not provided qualified teachers and required education facilities in a great number of schools – particularly outside Java Island – as they have already provided them in big cities. Students in Merauke, for example, do not have the same educational access as students in Jakarta or other big cities. So, according to those who don’t agree to National Exam, if all students nationwide are examined by the same standardized test, it must be not fair.

Furthermore, they argue that National Exam functioned to determine whether a student passes his education is narrowing the definition of education. Education doesn’t only covers cognitive faculty. It also covers attitude, personality, and skills. Hence, determining whether a student passes his education by means of National Exam only is not in line with the comprehensive definition of education. Besides, that will negate the uniqueness of students. As it is known, some students are excellent in their cognitive but they don’t have good personality. Some other students have impressing personality – and probably outstanding skill – but they are not good enough in their cognitive. There are also some cases that some students were smart but they failed in one subject examined in National Exam. As a result, they unluckily could not pass their education.

What if National Exam doesn’t determine whether a student passes his education?

The pros and contras appears because National Exam determines whether a student passes his education or not. Now, what’s your opinion if National Exam is not eliminated but it doesn’t determine whether a student passes his education.

I don’t know what your opinion, but I would like to tell you mine. According to me, National Exam needs not be eliminated as long as it doesn’t determine whether a student passes his education. In this case, National Exam will be only a tool to measure the quality of schools nationwide. Any school that doesn’t meet the minimum passing grade of the exam should evaluate its educational process. It probably needs to upgrade the quality of its teachers, improve its educational resources, or add its educational facilities.

Seeking the Best Solution

National Exam has been becoming pros and contras among the people. It is impossible that there won’t be any contra of a government’s policy. However, when the contras come from a great number of the people, it means there is something wrong with the policy. In the case of National Exam, many experts have given their opinions and suggestions, whereas the government is to decide.

I propose that the government – the ministry of education in this case – should meet some education experts to discuss the best solution. The discussion should be held seriously in an adequate period of time. And the most important is that the decision should not be implemented too quickly. There must be an adequate time interval to socialize the decision as well as to prepare everything needed.

Simple words vs advanced words

When you write, you have a style of yours. The style is the way you choose words to use as well as the way you arrange the words in sentences. Talking about words used to form sentences, you have at least two choices: using simpler words or more advanced ones. You can choose one of the two choices, or you also may use simpler words but combined with some (not many) advanced ones. It is a choice, so it totally depends on yourself.

But remember, each choice has its consequence. If you choose simple words, others may understand what you write very easily without thinking too hard. On the other hand, if you choose advanced words, others – especially non native beginners – probably have to think harder to understand what you write.

For sure, it is almost impossible to always use simple words. In some occasions, you need some advanced words to precisely represent the idea in your mind. In such condition, you may choose to use the advanced words. But I suggest that you always use simple words as much as possible. Only when you have no other choice, you can use advanced words.

In addition, choosing simple words or advanced ones also depends on where you write. If you write on newspapers, popular magazines, or blogs, you’d better use simple words, because what you write will be read by people with different levels of language proficiency. You should not use advanced words – particularly technical words of a certain field of science – on those media. However, if you write on academic journal, you can use advanced words because what you write will be read by segmented, educated people. You can also use technical words if you are sure that the readers will understand them well.

Simple structure vs complex structure

The style in which you write also includes what kind of sentence structure you use. You have two choices: simple structure or complex structure. There may be the third choice: combining both of them.

In simple structure, you tend to make sentences as short as possible. The shorter the sentences are, the better it is. If you use short sentences in your essay, others will understand the essay very easily. They don’t need to think very hard. On the other hand, the others may have to think very hard if you use complex structure very much in your essay. I suggest you to use simple structure as much as possible in your essay. That way, others will enjoy what you write because they can understand it easily. Keep this in your mind.

Making an outline or not

There are mainly two steps to write. The first is creating ideas to write, and the second is writing process itself (transferring the ideas into written symbols). Some people prefer making an outline of their ideas before they write. They use the outline because the want the essay to be as systematic as possible. They want to arrange the ideas in a good logical order. Moreover, they use the outline in order not to miss any of the ideas in their mind when they are writing. In this latter case, the outline functions as an idea-reminder for the writer.

It may be easy for some experienced writers to write without any outline. However, for some beginners, it may be very difficult to write well without the outline. So, an outline is made to help a writer, either to arrange sentences as systematically as possible or to remind him what to write. Because it is only to help, you can choose to not use it if you are sure that you can write systematically and that you will not miss any of your ideas without any outline.

Re-writing

Re-writing means reading for the second time what you have written, and then correcting whatever you consider wrong or not suitable. Many experts suggest re-writing as the last step of good writing. However, there is a question. Is re-writing a must? The answer won’t be always yes. It can be no, that means you don’t have to re-write what you have written if you think what you have written is good enough.

Many experts suggest that you should write the first time without too much criticism – on grammar or other language aspects. You had better explore freely all ideas in your mind. Don’t pay attention too much to grammar or any language aspect. What you want to do is moving your pen – or typing the keypads – as quickly as possible just like water flow, following the ideas built in your mind. Don’t let the ideas stop developing due to your criticism.

They suggest you to criticize after you have finished writing all your ideas. They even strongly suggested that you criticize after some hours or on another day. They argue that some time interval will make you criticize much better.

However, some writers prefer criticizing while they are writing. They don’t wait for another time to criticize. They say that they prefer criticizing this way because it works well for them. I think how and when someone criticizes is his preference. Everyone can do whatever that works better for him.

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The four things mentioned above – in my opinion – are some important keys to write successfully. Now I ask you: how do you write? Do you prefer simple words or advanced words? Do you prefer simple structure or advanced one? Do you prefer making an outline before writing or not? Do you prefer criticizing while you are writing or after you have finished writing all your ideas? All the things depend on yourself. You are yours.


Team sport needs at least two persons who work as a team. If the number of persons are more than one but they don’t work as a team, the sport is not considered team sport. Soccer, basket ball, volley ball, baseball, hockey, rugby, and water polo are some of team sport, because they are played by more than one player, and they work as a team. However, marathon, motorbike race, car race, horse race, sprint race, and swimming race are not considered team sport because each player works individually – there’s no team work at all – although those sports usually involve a number of people.

Individual sport may need one person, two persons, or more. The number of people doesn’t matter. Something distinguishing individual sport from team sport is that there is no team work in individual sport. Swimming, jogging, biking, and weight exercise are some of individual sport.

When you do a team sport, you should communicate with your team mates. Your team has more chance to win a game when all players in the team can communicate well each other. In a team, there must be job assignment. In football, for example, some players are assigned to be defenders, some others to be midfielders, and some others to be forwards. Each player is responsible for his job. Each works based on the job assigned to him. Each has his role. This way, team sport can build your ability to work in team.

In team sport, you can also build your leadership. In football, for example, one of the players is assigned to be a captain. As you know, the captain is to lead the rest of the players. On the other hand, the rest of the players are to obey what the captain commands.

For many people, playing in a team is also more interesting. They say it’s less boring. I think the reason is understood: because playing in a team is like your playing with your friends when you were a child. For sure, every child must enjoy playing with his friends instead of being alone at home.

If you want to do team sport, you must have some friends to play with you. You can not play football if you don’t have at least 21 persons to play with you. Every kind of team sport has its own minimum number of people needed. Twenty two people in football, ten people in futsal, twelve people in volley ball, and so on.

Have you been so eager to play football or basketball, but you can not play it because there was no enough number of people to play with you? I don’t know whether you have or not, but I have. If you are a team sport mania, I believe you also have.

In individual sport, you don’t need any friend. You certainly can do individual sport with some of your friends, but that’s not a must. You can do it alone, can’t you? This means that you can be more independent. You don’t depend on anybody else to do sport. Whenever you want to exercise, you can do it alone.

But the problem is that we sometimes feel lazy to do sport alone, although the sport is individual sport. You probably have experienced being lazy to do jogging alone. You only want to do it with your friend. I think this often occurs, and it is understood because we are social creature. Being alone is often boring.

Beside the two categories of sport mentioned above, there are some kinds of sport than can be played both individually or in a team. Badminton and table tennis, for example. You can play badminton or table tennis one on one – or called single play. In this case, you do individual sport. You can also play badminton or table tennis in double play mode. In this mode, each team has two players. In this latter case, you do team sport.

At last, I want to ask you: what kind of sport do you prefer? Team sport or individual sport? Or you like both of them? You have your own preference. Team sport and individual sport are only choices. Any kind of sport is okay as long as you enjoy it. Do you agree with me?

Now I have a question for you. What do you usually do to spend your spare time? Watching televison? Playing computer games or PlayStation? Surfing on the internet? Playing with your Facebook? Hanging out with your friends? Having rest on your bed? Or what?

In this short article, I will show you that how wisely you spend your spare time will make big difference in your life.

Prophet Muhammad pbuh said that spare time is one of two gifts (from God) that are usually not spent well by people – and the second gift is health. It means that it’s commonly not easy for the people to wisely spend their spare time. Why? There may be so many reasons. That the people tend to have fun and do something that is no use in their spare time may be one of the reasons. Anyway, if you want to be a person that is different and distinguished from most people, what you can do is spending your time wisely. That way, you will make advantage over others.

Yes, all of us realize that we have to spend our spare time wisely. But how? This is the most important question.

Each of us should realize that things we have to do in our life are so many, even they are more than time we have. For this reason, we are supposed to have no spare time, aren’t we? But in fact, we do have it. So what’s wrong? I would like to say that what wrong is our time management, or to be precise, our time-scheduling.

What we are supposed to do is to plot all things we have to do in all time points we have. I name this stuff ‘time-scheduling’. Some people name it ‘making what-to-do list’. No matter what it should be named, I think – and hope – you get the point.

If someone doesn’t write down their activities, they tend to forget them. A simple example, they probably should do activity X on day Y, but they don’t do it because they forget doing them. This will not happen if they have a neat what-to-do list that can remind them what they have to do on a certain day.

I told you that we are supposed to have no spare time if we want to do all things we have to do in our life. However, I don’t deny that all of us need spare time – and in fact we all have it. We need to relax and chill out, particularly after working hard all the day or all the week. In brief, I don’t want to say that having spare time is wrong. Instead, I would like to say that we have to spend spare time as wisely as possible if we have it.

Back to the question: how? Firstly, you can do your next job. Although you can put it off until tomorrow, it’s always a good idea to finish your job as soon as possible. So, don’t wait until tomorrow. Furthermore, if you do tomorrow’s job today, you can do it in a more relaxed way. And everyone usually can do something much better if he does it in a more relaxed way – although I don’t deny that some people, in contrast, will do his best when they are under pressure.

The second thing you can do is having fun that gives you benefit. What kind of fun is it? It may be a hobby that improves you capacity. Instead of playing The Winning Eleven on PlayStation Console, you go to the pitch and play real football with some friends. The real football will build your body stamina, build your ability to work in team, and help you to socialize more. Instead of watching soap opera on the television screen, you may watch a Discovery program. You can have any kind of fun, as long as it gives you benefit. Avoid having fun that is no use and only wasting your time.

I think the two things I mentioned above are some choices you can do in your spare time. Pay attention to your spare time. Ensure that you never waste your time. Good luck!

Let me give you another question: why do you do sport? What’s your answer? Some of you may answer you do it because you like it. You may play football twice a week because you really like it. You will say that football is one of your hobby. You play it because it’s one of your hobby.

Many experts say that doing sport as a hobby can release someone’s mental stress. When someone is getting so distressed, it will be a good idea for him to do sport that he likes. If he likes football, he is to play it. This way, he will get relaxed. And that’s certainly good for his mental health.

Some others may say: “I do jogging regularly, almost everyday, because I want to keep my body fit and healthy.” Yes, it’s not undoubted that some people do sport because they want to keep their body fit and healthy. Overweight people may do sport because they want to lose weight.. Some people may want to avoid being sick. Some others want to avoid being sleepy when they are working along the day.

Some other people probably say that they do sport because they want to keep their shape. They want to maintain their slim body. They don’t want to be overweight due to lack of exercise. Some men go to gym regularly because they want to keep their six-pack. Likewise, some women go to gym regularly because they want to maintain their sexy body. They want to keep their belly slim. They want to keep their body slender. A very common reason why women go to gym.

And there some people do sport because it is their job. They are professional athletes. Footballers play football regularly because playing football is their job. Motor racers ride their bikes on the circuit almost everyday because motor racing is their job. Perhaps some of them sometimes do their sport not because they like it, but because they have to do it. Certainly it will be very good if the athletes do the sport both because they have to do it and because they like it, too. It means they enjoy their job.

How about you? What sport do you like? And why do you do it? I believe each of you have your own answer. No matter what your answer is, doing sport is always good for you. It will keep you fit and healthy, give you better stamina, and keep your body shape.

Last, I want to tell you that my favorite sport is football – not American football, it’s soccer in American English. I play it regularly, at least twice a week, because I like it very much. It’s one of my hobby. I also enjoy swimming. It’s my another favorite sport, or let’s say: my another hobby.

When we were students, our teachers often gave us home works. Actually there was enough time to do the home works without being in a hurry. The teachers usually gave us at least one week to do the home works. However, students are always students. We just put off doing the home works. As a result, we had to do them in the last minutes – probably 30 minutes before the class began. That was like a sheep running away from a wolf, or a thief from a policeman.

The question emerging is whether we still have such bad habits now. If the answer is yes, it means we can not learn from our experiences. It is certainly not easy to get rid of bad habits. A habit is something that we often or usually do. We are used to it. As a result, we have to make effort to change any of our habits. But don’t worry. There’s a will, there’s a way.

Now there is a question remaining. How can we do that? Actually the answer is simple: never put off what you can do today until tomorrow. Or in a shorter sentence: Do it now! Yes, that is the simple answer. Yet the problem is not its simplicity. The problem is whether we can do that in real life. Many simple things can not be implemented in real life because of weak will. So, the will is the key. The answer will remain simple if we have strong will. Do you agree with me?

Perhaps most of us do realize this thing. We realize that we should not put off something that we can do now. In fact, it’s always hard to not putting something off. We always say to ourselves: “I still have much time. So, I can relax now, and I will do it later.” Unfortunately we always say the same thing all the time until the last minutes. Finally we will say to ourselves regretfully: “Now I have only 30 minutes to do all these things. If only I had done these things yesterday. If only I had not put them off.” But regret is always in the end, not in the beginning.

Hence, each of us now has to say to himself if he has something to do: “I have to do it now. I will never put it off. I will not wait until tomorrow. Yes, now or never.”

I want to tell you an advantage you will get when you are not used to putting something off. If you have enough time to do something, you will do it better or even the best. The reason is simple: because you will do it thoroughly, with no hurry. On the other hand, you will lose your quality if you do something in a hurry.

Some of you probably say: “I want to put it off until tomorrow because now I’m in a bad mood. And I won’t make my best when I’m in this bad mood.” Bad mood? Is that a reason to put something off until tomorrow? I suggest that you should not totally agree to “bad mood theory”. Instead, I would like to say that bad mood is only something you feel because you are suffering from laziness. Hence, the best thing you should do when you feel in a bad mood is struggling to get rid of the bad mood. Force yourself to start doing what you have or should do, and I believe that the bad mood will disappear. It’s just like friction force. It’s larger when something is just starting to move. But it will decrease when something is already moving. Likewise, it’s always hard to start doing something. But once you already start, you will find that everything is easier, and you will be full of spirit to do that thing. You even want to keep doing it all the time, and will not want to end it, because you already enjoy it very much.

What did you feel when you found yourself in such situations? Perhaps you said: “Oh no, I can’t live without all this.” Or you said: “Oh no, I can do nothing in such condition.” If that was what happened to you, I’m afraid that you are addicted to the modern convenience.

However, I can understand that many people – or even most of them – are now addicted to the modern convenience. The reason is quite simple: because they are not accustomed to live without the convenience. They always use the convenience in their daily life, as if the convenience were a part of them. They work, study, have leisure, have fun, take a bath, and even sleep using the convenience. Therefore, when they lose one of the convenience, they feel that everything becomes in trouble.

I’d like to tell you some of my own experiences. The worst thing I have experienced is that the electricity in my house or my office was turned off. You know, guys, that electricity seems to be the most important thing in our life today. Computer and many other devices need electricity. They won’t work without electricity. The electricity in my office has been turned off daylight many times, and I just could say: “Oh no, I can do nothing now.” And I felt much worse when it was deadline for my work. It might be better when the electricity was turned off at night and there was no work I had to do. In such condition, I always decided to go to bed and have a sound sleep in complete darkness. But it was also a problem when I had some overtime work I had to do at such without-electricity-night.

It was also my bad day of mine when my computer had a serious problem. I can not work on my computer. And it was worse when data I needed was stored in the computer. The only way to access the data was replacing the hard disk from the computer, and then putting it in any other computer. This always made me crazy.

The last thing I wanna tell you is my bad day when my internet connection went down. I could not read my emails, nor update my blogs and websites, nor update my facebook status, or nor even browse some good news and stories on the internet. That was really terrible. I don’t know why it is so hard to live without internet. I need to stay in touch with people on the net. I need to know what is new around the world. And at least, I need to have a look at the attractive design of web pages on the net.

These are some of my experiences showing that I may be addicted enough to the modern convenience. But it doesn’t mean that I will end my life because of that. Even when I lose all the convenience, I still can breathe. If I can’t find a car or a motor cycle, I still can go to a place by bicycle if any, or on foot. If the electricity is turned off, I can light a candle. Yes, life must go on. Look, our parents and grand-parents are able to have their life well without the convenience. They can and we can, too. Agree?
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Why did I write this story?

My internet connection was in trouble. I looked at Network Connections on Control Panel. It said that it’s well connected. So, I guessed the problem might be Firewall issue, and then I disabled the Firewall. But the problem still remained. I really didn’t know what the problem.  I felt so angry, and half crazy. That day was deadline for one of my what-to-do. I should have finished the work on that disgusting day. And I needed my internet connection to do that. I got desperate because I did think that it was impossible for me to finish the work. And it was. Who’s wrong? The ISP (Internet Service Provider)? I did think yes, they were.

I dialed the ISP’s phone number. “Hello. I have a problem with my internet connection,” I said trying not to show my anger. “Who is speaking?” asked the ISP’s officer. He’s a man. Then I told him who I am. I told him my name, my phone number, and some other data needed.

“Are the modem and the cables okay,”he asked. “Yes, of course. I have checked them all. Everything is okay, but the connection. My computer says that it’s connected. However, when I try to open a webpage on my browser, it doesn’t work at all. The page doesn’t appear,” I tried to explain what the problem.

“Wait a minute,” he said. And then it was a quite long silence.

“Okay, okay. We’ve just reported this problem to Service Unit. They will call you to deal with the problem,” he made a promise.

“When will they call me?” I asked coriously. “As soon as possible,” he answered diplomatically. I really didn’t like this cliché answer. It would be far better if he told me a specific time. But, I didn’t want to quarrel against him on the phone.

“Okay. I’m looking forward to their coming here,” I answered desperately.

Oh, what the hell was the ISP doing? Why did this happen? Didn’t they have a more stable system preventing such funny problem? I didn’t know. I began thinking: Yes, this is Indonesia.