d.elsara

Beberapa minggu lalu saya berhasil melobi rekan saya Putri, seorang Head of Data Analytics, agar mau diwawancara. Oke, oke, mungkin tepatnya 'menodong', karena saya tidak memberinya pilihan. Wawancara dilakukan secara daring pada Jumat sore; saya di kafe dekat tempat les anak, sementara Putri di rumah. Wawancara yang berlangsung selama kurang lebih 1,5 jam tersebut sebetulnya lebih mirip ngobrol karena sesi berjalan santai, dan sesekali kami berbagi keresahan yang sama. Salah satunya soal kenyataan pahit bahwa perempuan masih sering mendapatkan perlakuan diskriminasi gender, terlebih bagi mereka yang berkarier di ranah STEM. Selepas wawancara saya ingat membatin dua hal: 1. Jalan masih panjang menuju pendidikan yang adil dan merata, dan 2. Tuhan bersama perempuan dan ibu bekerja Sebagai seorang ibu bekerja, poin 2 terdengar semakin pedih hari ini mengingat tragedi kecelakaan kereta dan kasus child abuse di daycare yang terjadi baru-baru ini. Semoga kita selalu dikuatkan dan diberikan perlindungan dalam perjuangan. Turut berduka cita yang mendalam, semoga keluarga korban yang ditinggalkan mendapatkan ketabahan. ❤️‍🔥 —— Baca artikel selengkapnya di Medium INA Digital Edu 👉 s.id/WawancaraPutriWikie

🗣️: Emang gak bisa chill aja nonton stand up comedy?? 🤷🏻‍♀️: Bisa, tergantung materinya aja. Btw, infonya cuma ada puluhan komika perempuan dari ribuan komika di tanah air. Ya masa gak didukung. #standupcomedy #standupcomedyindonesia

Have that audacity.

📌 If Cats Disappeared from the World by Genki Kawamura (2012) I'd been eyeing this book for a long time for the obvious reason. But I only ended up buying it impulsively one afternoon. The premise isn't new — a dying man receives a tempting offer from the devil: give something up, get one more day to live. As things disappear one by one, his life story slowly unravels. His friendships, his past love, and ultimately, his relationship with his parents. That last part hit too close to home. We both lost our mothers, and neither of us had the warmest relationship with our fathers. I kept wondering — how differently would I have felt (and acted) reading this if both my parents were still alive? But the real cherry on top is his relationship with his cat. How bittersweet it is to love and treasure a cat your whole life, only to find they don't carry the same memories you do. They don't remember every little detail the way we do, they only remember that they were...happy. Two quotes have stayed with me: 🟡 That we don't own cats, they simply allow us the pleasure of their company. 🟡 And that family is a verb. They're not just being there—you do family. Nobody asked, but yes — I cried somewhere near the end. #ifcatsdisappearedfromtheworld #genkikawamura #bookreview

📌 Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar (2024) @kavehakbar.kavehakbar ✨ Amor fati — love your fate. ✨ Memento mori — remember you will die. Two principles often associated with Friedrich Nietzsche, but strangely feel familiar to us as Muslims. To believe in qada dan qadar, and to remember that to Allah we belong, and to Him we shall return. But what happens when fate feels absurd? When a Persian mother dies in a ridiculous tragedy—her plane mistakenly shot down by the US Air Force—what meaning does the universe try to tell? Cyrus, an alcoholic aspiring poet, spends his twenties self-destructing. Drinking himself to sleep. Waking up in a wet bed soaked with his own piss. Romanticizing the idea of a meaningful death and make it his other obsession. He becomes a regular visitor to a museum performance by Orkideh, a terminally ill artist staging an Abramović-esque final act by.spending her last days talking to strangers. Their conversations spiral into discussions about martyrdom, art, addiction, and faith. It took me more than a month to finish this book. I got bored halfway and picked up other book instead. I also struggled to sympathize with Cyrus. His self-loathing, pessimism, and subtle pick-me energy can be exhausting. But here’s the thing: Akbar (and Cyrus) is a wordsmith. Even the mundane details are rendered poetic, sometimes hilariously so. The sarcasm is sharp. The metaphors are witty and very on-brand with Cyrus’ fractured interiority. Did I love the protagonist? Not really. Did I admire the writing and the overall theme about death, ego, faith, and the desire to matter even in self-destructiion? Yes and yes. #bookreview #martyr #kavehakbar

Having to exist (and keep our sanity intact) with a paying job today is hard enough, let alone jobless. No wonder many people find this marketing from a toothpaste brand is tone-deaf. Now we have seen her apology, but the one from the brand itself is nowhere to be found. Campaign like this must have been through layers of approval. I guess accountability is rare these days.

I never thought I’d be writing a commentary about a brand from a neurodivergent POV, but I guess there’s always a first time. Do you see the irony? Neurodivergent people were historically disciplined into “normal” cognitive behaviour: sit still, pay attention, follow the plot, stay focused. Now, one of the most powerful media companies on the planet designs stories on the assumption that no one is actually watching uninterrupted. Distraction is no longer a failure; it has become the default. Fragmentation is the new blueprint. And finally, cognitive interruption isn’t a problem anymore. It’s called the business model. And if those things are true, then our presence and attention no longer matter. What matters is that the content keeps playing ➡️ counting ➡️ converting, even when we’re away on our phones. It leaves me with questions to ponder: ❓ If we're going to label this Netflix move, is it accessibility or a defeat cry dressed up as strategy? ❓ Has the world adapted itself to distraction and now calls it “progress”? ❓ Are all those technology, innovation, and digital entertainment engineered to turn us into half-conscious consumers? #Netflix #neurodivergent

Mari kita pelan-pelan menata kembali semangat membaca yang aur-auran sepanjang 2025 kemarin. Seaur-auran kondisi negara dan dunia. Jadi jangan terlalu keras sama diri sendiri, berhasil bertahan hidup dan 'melawan' aja, udah termasuk perjuangan yang berarti. —— Buku pertama di 2026: 📌 Kim Ji-Yeong, Lahir Tahun 1982 (terjemahan Indonesia) Cho Nam-Joo (2016) Bukan buku baru dan sempat ramai dibicarakan beberapa tahun lalu karena membahas masalah seksisme dan patriarki yang sistemik di Korea Selatan. Jelas bukan isu lokal, jadi wajar kalau apresiasi atas buku ini sebegitu besarnya. Sempat juga difilmkan tahun 2019. (Salah satu tokohnya diperankan ahjussi kesayangan kita semua: Gong Yoo) Berbagai situasi dan perlakuan diskriminasi gender yang dihadapi Kim Ji-Yeong terasa familiar, meski dalam beberapa hal di level yang lebih ringan. Awalnya sempat gemas karena Kim Ji-Yeong terlihat pasrah dan tidak melawan. Mungkin itu bahayanya masalah sistemik. Melumpuhkan seseorang dengan menanamkan nilai-nilai tertentu jauh ke dalam pikiran mereka. Dalam keadaan seperti itu, penting memiliki orang-orang yang bisa melawan. Bagi mereka yang cukup beruntung, orang-orang itu juga menjadi support system. Buat Kim Ji-Yeong, orang-orang itu menjadi 'suara-suara masa lalu' yang menguatkan. #bookreview #kimjiyeongborn1982 #choonamjoo

Coming from a big family of teachers really put you into perspective once you're working for a govt delivery unit for education (technology) now. You can feel their hope, dream, anger, and even frustration on top of your own disappointment towards the Big Brother. Teachers truly deserve all the best things in life. ❤️‍🩹👊🏻 〰️(29/11/25)

Yang gak terlihat di sisi kiri: cangkir kosong, toples kopi yang udah terbuka, dan kettle yang udah 2x di nyala-matikan karena lupa jadi harus dipanasin lagi. A lot of side quest y'all. 🙂 *Deep sigh* #neurodivergent #adhd

I have to thank my old self, for recording and posting everything she thought was cool. Because of her, I can now repost this 13-year-old video with proper context and a better story to tell. 👇🏻 — In 2012, I attended the Impakt Festival in Utrecht, NL, representing @okvideofestival @ruangrupa with my colleague. We ran a screening and joined FGDs with other artists and collectives. On the final night, there was a small gathering with food, drinks, and music at Theater Kikker. I had no expectations from the agenda—but on October 24, 2012, I witnessed one of the coolest multimedia performances ever. They were Filastine feat. Nova Ruth, a duo blending lo-fi bass and heavy electronica. Since Nova is Javanese, they also experimented with Javanese songs and instruments. One of the first songs they played was 'Genjer-genjer'. The moment the intro started, I knew right away what it was. I was totally in awe! Not only of the music, but their visual works was impeccable. ✨ 'Genjer-genjer' is a folk song from Banyuwangi written by Muhammad Arief in 1942 as a social critique of poverty under Japanese occupation, when people ate genjer (a vegetable) because they had nothing else. After 1965, it was politicized and banned as a “PKI song,” branded as symbol of communism and national trauma. Arief, the songwriter, was detained by the army in Oct '65 and no official record of his fate exists. Some say he disappeared during the transfer, others that he's executed or died in custody. To me, 'Genjer-genjer' is like the Medusa of traditional songs—once a victim, later turned into a monster by those in power. In both, truth is buried under layers of fear, ideology, and control over memory. Revisiting this video feels both sentimental and necessary, especially these days—to reclaim truth from distortion. 🔥❤️‍🩹 Free Delpedro Marhaen, Muzaffar Salim, Syahdan Husein, Khariq Anhar. Jakarta, October 24, 2025. — Follow @ArkaKinari journey, a cultural sailing ship & floating multimedia performance by @greyfilastine @novaruth .

Let's move forward and really mean it when we say "Warga jaga warga". Errata: Slide 2 - 'copy', not copyright