Islam and Tourism

In one of his articles regarding Islam and tourism, Patung mentioned that Islam is bad for tourism, because some attempts to forbid activities associated as sinful by Islam, such as drinking, harms the growth of tourism in some Indonesian areas with Muslim-majority population, such as Lombok. While I agree that such attempts will deter tourists from coming to the region, it doesn't mean that the religion itself is bad for tourism.

I would like to emphasize that it's not just a matter of religion.

We don't need to go too far to see an example. Malaysia is also a country with a Muslim-majority population. But the country has successfully attracted tourists from all over the world, especially East Asia (China and the region) and Middle East countries. So, it's not true that Islam is bad for tourism.

What's the issue here, then?

Tolerance.

Malaysians are generally more tolerant towards other religions. Even when the Malaysian Muslims forbid themselves from drinking, they do not forbid people from other religions from doing so. Even when Islam forbids gambling, the government still allows some casinos to be built at Genting Highlands for non-Muslim Malaysians and tourists, of course after ensuring that Malaysian Muslims are prohibited to enter the casinos.

So, again, it's not true that Islam is bad for tourism. We just have to be more tolerant to people from other religion. If the Malaysians can do it, why can't we?

A Eulogy for Inong

I remember the first time I knew Inong was on early February this year, when I stumbled upon her weblog, Cerita Bunda Zidan & Syifa (Stories of Zidan & Syifa's Mum). Finding out that she and her family live in Bukit Batok, very near to our place, and also finding out that her son Zidan was studying at the same school as Irza, PPIS, I added comments to her shoutbox. She then visited my Rumah Indra weblog and added comments there, and turned out to be that she knew my wife from the IndoSing-Mums community, and also she knew some of my friends from BemoNet, such as Kukuh TW and Eko Juniarto. What a small world.

After exchanging several comments on each other's blogs, we managed to meet up on several occasions. My wife discreetly ordered a strawberry tiramisu cake from her for our wedding anniversary, and I collected the cake from her house some time in April. I believe that was the first time I met her. I also met her, Haris and the whole family during Adam and Hanan's birthday party at West Coast Park, ISM gathering at East Coast Park and PPIS Sports Day at Bukit Batok, and that's when I started to know Haris. I also met her during Mela's farewell at Harbourfront.

Inong is a great cook. All the recipes at her Dapur Bunda blog prove it. The strawberry tiramisu cake is not the only cake I and my wife have ordered from her. Once we ordered some chocolate and cheese Indonesian-style martabak from her and just two weeks ago, couple of days before she's gone, we ordered Cars-themed two-tier birthday cake for Irza's 5th birthday party. Guess what, everybody enjoyed the cake, a photo taken by Mbak Hany proves it. Nobody thought that it would be the last birthday cake she has made for us. :(

She's also a friendly person. She has many friends since she's very active in the cyberspace. She's a very active blogger, and her Cerita Bunda Zidan&Syifa blog is now on the 15th position of the Hericz's version of Indonesian Top 100 Blogs. She has several blogs, such as Cerita Bunda Zidan&Syifa, Dapur Bunda (Bunda's Kitchen), Puisi Inong (Inong's Poems) and also Inong's Page at Multiply, among others. She's also very active in some blogger communities, such as Blogger Family (Blogfam) and the Indonesian Blogger Muslim community. In Singapore, she's also a member of the IndoSing-Mums and Indo-Sing community.

Therefore, it's obvious that when she passed away, a lot of people missed her, even though those people might not know her personally and only know about her and her family from her blogs. It is even reported that about more than 1,000 people turned out at her family's house in Jakarta, waiting for her body to be sent from Singapore to Jakarta, for her funeral. The way how she wrote her family's journal, especially about her two lovely kids, Zidan and Syifa, touches the hearts of many of her blog readers. Up until now, condolences are still coming in through her shoutboxes and comments on her blogs, showing that a lot of people really missed her and her writings.

Selamat jalan, Inong. May you rest in peace.

Upgrade to Wordpress 2.0.4

Upgrade to Wordpress 2.0.4

Of course, I'm not talking about upgrading this blog, since this blog uses Blogger. I'm talking about upgrading my Wordpress-based blogs, such as Minda Indra, Planet Indra and Planet Singapura. Wordpress version 2.0.4 has actually been released more than a month ago, but I only managed to find the time to do the upgrade last week. Furthermore, now there are 3 blogs I need to upgrade.

But fortunately, the upgrade process was quite easy, in fact, it's much easier than the upgrade from 2.0.2 to 2.0.3. There's a detailed specific instruction on how to upgrade from 2.0.3 to 2.0.4, so it's much easier. We just need to make a backup of these folders: wp-admin, wp-includes, wp-content/themes/default, as well as all the files on the Wordpress root directory, except wp-config.php file, and then replace all the folders and files with the ones from the new version.

Comments on Planet Indra

It seems that some of my Planet Indra visitors were misled by the "Comments Off" signs at the end of each post, causing them to think that they are not able to add comments to my posts. It's actually not true. Planet Indra is an aggregate/syndication of all my blogs and visitors can actually visit the original post on its source blog and add comments there. To avoid such confusion, I have re-enabled the comments on Planet Indra, and when you click the "Comments" link at the end of every post, you will be redirected to the post on its source blog and you can add comments there.

IP2Phrase.Com

I also have added the feature from IP2Phrase.Com on all my blogs. With this feature, all my visitors can see from which IP address, country and ISP they are accessing from. This feature is provided by Hexasoft Development Sdn Bhd, a research and development company based in Penang, Malaysia. The installation is also very fast and painless, you just need to add one javascript line into your blog or website's template. More information can be found here.

Indo-Sing Blog Has Moved

Indo-Sing Blog, a blog (in Indonesian language) dedicated to the Indonesian community in Singapore, has moved to a new address. Thanks to Polar Bear, now Indo-Sing blog has a new home under the indo-sing.org official domain.

This blog still uses Wordpress, and is hosted together with Forum Indo-Sing and Wiki Indo-Sing. Its contents, as well as all its comments, have been migrated to the new place, thanks to Polar Bear and Renatha. As a result of this, the old Indo-Sing blog at Blogsome has been officially closed.

[Indonesian version]

Blogging in English or Indonesian?

Firstly, I would like to thank Fatih for choosing this blog as one of his version of Indonesian Bloggers of the Week. What a nice and pleasant surprise, if I may say. Thanks Fatih for the compliments. :)

Secondly, I'm quite interested in reading Fatih's article regarding ten reasons on why he blogs in English, followed by Firman's article regarding ten reasons on why he blogs in Indonesian language. Interestingly, both articles were written on the same day, and I'm not quite sure who wrote first (and who debunked who). Nevertheless, that is not important. :)

The most important thing is that I think both have valid points. Fatih is right when he says that blogging in English is important. And Firman is also right when he says that blogging in Indonesian is also important. For me, both are equally important, actually. It depends on what is the topic of the articles we are writing, and who are the target audiences.

I write articles in both English and Indonesian. I even have different blogs for different languages, and have an aggregate site, Planet Indra, to aggregate all the articles in one single site. The reason is because I want to reach out to different audiences, both Indonesians and non-Indonesians.

Let me give you an example. According to Google Analytics, one of my popular articles in Minda Indra is the tips and trick of going from Jakarta to Singapore via Batam (part 1 and part 2). As you might have known, these articles contain some guides (tips and tricks) on how to go from Jakarta to Singapore via Batam. Which means, these articles are useful mostly to Indonesians, especially those living in Jakarta, who wants to come to Singapore cheaply, which is via Batam. That's why I wrote those articles in Bahasa Indonesia, and didn't create the English version of the articles.

Another example, is my opinion regarding the war in Lebanon which has been going on since last month, and hopefully would end soon after the UN Security Council resolution took effect. Those articles are meant for both Indonesians and non-Indonesians, that's why I wrote those articles in both English and Indonesian.

So, if you ask my opinion on whether we should blog in English or Indonesian, my answer will be: both. Again, it depends on the target audiences. :)

[Indonesian version]

Immediate Ceasefire, Please...

United Nations chief Kofi Annan has reiterated his call for a ceasefire in Lebanon and said he had discussed the matter with the leaders of Lebanon, Britain and the United States.

"I hope that within the coming days there will be a (UN Security Council) resolution that will ask the parties to cease hostilities and that that can be followed shortly afterward by a second resolution so that ... the international community can deploy forces," said Annan.

This is a sincere and sensible appeal from the UN chief, considering the shocking number of civilian victims, including children, due to Israel's heavy attacks to Palestine and Lebanon, and also considering that this rational appeal is still not happening until now. It's almost a month, since 12th of July 2006, Israel has been launching non-stop attacks to Lebanon, and up until now, only 40 Hezbollah militants have been killed, compared to more than 900 civilians killed by the attacks.

You can imagine, 900 civilians casualties, and almost half of them are children, compared to only 40 Hezbollah militants, which are Israel's main targets. Everyone can justify its effectiveness, it's not worth it!!!

In Kuala Lumpur, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad even has the answer to the conflict in Lebanon: the "elimination of the Zionist regime". "The real cure for the conflict is elimination of the Zionist regime, but there should be first an immediate ceasefire", said Ahmadinejad. It may be true, however of course it might be too extreme, and even the government of Singapore has slammed Ahmadinejad's comments by saying that it's intended to inflame Lebanon conflict.

Nevertheless, the majority of the international community has agreed that the war has to be stopped. I heard there's a resolution being discussed by the UN's Security Council, however there are still some debates on how to "word" up the resolution. I heard that the draft being proposed is not adequate to end the hostilities, causing the Lebanese government to even reject the resolution draft.

It's quite a sensible rejection. What is the use of a UN Security Council resolution, if it's inadequate to stop Israel from attacking Lebanon?

I personally do not know yet what is the content of the resolution draft, however, I really hope that the resolution is strong enough to ask Israel to stop their hostilities towards the Lebanese people. That's the most important thing. Again, the resolution will be useless if it cannot stop the hostilities, which have been going on for almost a month!

[Indonesian version]

Creating A Lipogram

The first time I read Renatha's article titled "A Lipogram", I was a bit confused. What is a lipogram, and what kind of article he was writing? Only after I checked its definition from Wikipedia, then I understand what he was trying to do. He was trying to write quite a long article, without using a common vowel e.

According to Wikipedia:

A lipogram (from Greek lipagrammatos, "missing letter") is a kind of constrained writing or word game consisting of writing paragraphs or longer works in which a particular letter or group of letters is missing, usually a common vowel, the most common in English being e (McArthur, 1992). A lipogram author avoiding e then only uses the 25 remaining letters of the alphabet.

After Renatha, Mbak Okke also wrote her lipogram here. And she even used her project site to collect lipograms written by other Indonesian bloggers. And this invitation motivated other Indonesian bloggers to also write their own lipograms, such as Inong, Mbak Han and Wisnu.

As such, I was also writing my own lipogram. The lipogram can be found here. I'm using English and the missing common letter is o.

So Ren, Mbak, is the article satisfactory enough to be included there? :)

[Indonesian version]

Indonesians' Neutrality

I read, with interests, Fatih Syuhud's article regarding how Indonesians view and comment on international political issues. He's comparing Indonesians with Indians, which he claimed are more "neutral" and can see from many more different views in commenting on such issues.

As an example, with regards to the Israel's attacks to Lebanon, Fatih thinks that most Indonesians are more divided in their opinions with regards to the attack, and the division is interestingly based on the line of religion, whereby most Indonesian Muslims condemn and disagree with the attacks, while most Indonesian non-Muslims tend to think that Israel has the right to defend themselves by launching the attacks.

I'm not too sure, but I don't think that I see the same situation, especially within the Indonesian community here in Singapore. Here, quite a lot of my non-Muslim friends also disagree with Israel's attacks to Lebanon. We see it more as an attack to a sovereign country, causing a lot of civilians become victims of the attack. Regardless of what is the religion of the victims, such an attack is despicable.

I guess Fatih might have seen the "division" after reading Patung's comment on one of his posts, and based on the articles he has written, I can see that Patung's anti-Islam level is a bit high. However, kindly reminded that not all our non-Muslim friends are like him, and it's not fair to generalise and think that all our non-Muslim friends share the same views with him.

What I can see, most of Indonesians, both Muslims and non-Muslims, do not tolerate violence and terrorism. We can see that a lot (if not almost all) Muslims in Indonesia condemned all the terror attacks conducted by Jemaah Islamiyah terrorist group, and we also can see that a lot of non-Muslims in Indonesia disagree with the US's invasion to Iraq. So I don't think it's just a matter of in the line of religion.

We have to admit, there are some Muslims in Indonesia, who are too fanatic and dislike non-Muslims and religions other than Islam, and there are also some non-Muslims in Indonesia who are also too fanatic and dislike Muslims and Islam. Those are the people we have to worry, since they are the most definite danger to the racial and religious harmony in Indonesia.

[Indonesian version]

Calling all Indonesian Cooks: Recipes in English Please

On my article about good Indonesian food in Singapore, I was mentioning about some weblogs containing Indonesian food recipes, such as Inong's Dapur Bunda and Nisi's Food Corner. One of the visitors from Germany, Angelica, added comments saying that it was too bad that those recipes are written in Bahasa Indonesia (Indonesian language), instead of English. She and her husband really love Indonesian food, however it's quite difficult for them to find cookbooks or recipes of Indonesian food in English.

I also noticed that most (if not all) of other blogs containing Indonesian food recipes, which I subscribe through Bloglines, are in Bahasa Indonesia. Those include Dhonatneth's Kitchen (which now has been renamed to Dhonatneth's Apa Kabar) and Dapur Wati, on top of the two I have mentioned earlier (Dapur Bunda and Nisi's Food Corner).

So, Inong, Nisi, Dhona, Wati and many other Indonesian bloggers who are also great cooks, are you ready to take up this challenge? :) When will you write good Indonesian food recipes in English? :) :)

Rude Taxi Driver

Well, I don't say that all taxi drivers in Singapore are rude. However, I would say that about 60%-70% of those rude motorists I usually find on Singapore roads are taxi drivers. What I mean by rude here is that they have lack of consideration to other motorists while driving.

Some of such inconsiderate driving acts include reckless driving, sudden stop to pick up or drop off passengers, and cutting other car's lanes. They also tend to drive above the maximum speed limit on all types of road, be it expressways or normal roads. They always want to get to their destinations at the soonest time possible, since it seems that every second wasted on the roads means lesser income for them... not too sure whether it's true or not, perhaps anyone can clarify? :)

One example of such inconsiderate acts: On 14th of July 2006, about a week ago, at around 9:30am in the morning, I was driving to my office at Science Park. Along South Buona Vista Road, just after the Buona Vista flyover and before the junction to Science Park Drive, the first and second lane from the left are merging into one. As you might have known, the rule for merging line in Singapore is that cars on each line have the right of way on a round-robin fashion.

My car was on the second lane from the left, and on the most left lane, there was another car and a TransCab taxi tailgating it. Based on the current position of all the three vehicles, whereby my car is in between the two vehicle even though it's on the other merging lane, I should have the right of way right after the other car, before the taxi. But guess what... the taxi kept on tailgating the car in front of it, and the driver never had any intention to give way even though I had the right of way at that time. So no choice, I had to slow down and give way, since I don't want to risk my car to be involved in an accident. No wonder why most of all accidents in Singapore usually involves taxis...

That's not the only incident I have experienced involving taxi drivers while driving here. Well, I really hope that the taxi companies will be more selective in hiring their drivers.

ZingDo

ZingDo restaurant is one of only a few halal Korean restaurants in Singapore. This chain of restaurants is managed by Zingrill, together with Seoul Garden and Breeks Cafe. Usually the ZingDo restaurant we visit regularly is the one at Ngee Ann City, which is on the same roof as the Breeks Cafe there, which is on the 5th floor, just opposite Seoul Garden. Now, ZingDo has opened a new outlet at Jurong Entertainment Centre, just opposite Jurong East MRT station, and it's not quite far from where we live here in Singapore. So, last week, 11th of July 2006, exactly, I and my wife went there for lunch.

The restaurant is located on the first floor of the building, which also houses the Jurong Cineplex. The outlet here adopts the fast food style of food ordering, so we need to order the food at the counter and make the payment first. Then, we look for an empty table and wait for the food to be served there.

I ordered the beef bulgogi set (left picture), the Korean-style minced beef steak, which is my favourite. My wife ordered the chicken bulgogi set (right below picture), similar steak but made of minced chicken. Both foods are served on hot plates, and when the food came, the meat was served raw. So we need to cook the meat, as well as the vegetables, on the hot plate, mix them with the sauce paste provided on the table, before we eat them.

How's the taste? Amazing! Very delicious. The meat absorbs the sauce quite well, and it's delicious up until the last bite. I also tried my wife's chicken bulgogi and it's just as nice! The bulgogi set is served with a bowl of rice, and a bowl of kimchi soup, which is also delicious. Just be careful, the soup is full of chilli seeds, so it's a bit hot.

The price is also reasonable for Singapore standard. The chicken bulgogi set will cost you about $7.90, while the beef bulgogi set is only $1 more expensive. Other than that, they also serve Korean Rib-Eye Steak at $15.90 per set meal. You can browse through the menu and the price here.

[Indonesian version]

Civilians Become Victims of Israel's Brutal Attacks to Lebanon

Quoted from Channel NewsAsia:

"Twenty-eight Lebanese civilians, including 10 children, were killed in dozens of Israeli air strikes across the country on Thursday after Hezbollah militants seized two soldiers and killed eight."

On the same report, it mentioned:

"A Shiite Muslim sheikh, his wife and eight children were killed when an Israeli missile struck their home in the village of Dweir, near the main central town of Nabatiyeh, police said.

And:

"Another family of seven, including a 10-month-old baby, was killed in the village of Baflay, near the coastal city of Tyre, police said."

I still don't understand, why Israel has to kill a lot of innocent civilians, including children, only because they want to save two of their soldiers which are being captured by Hezbollah militants. Why they have to bomb the Beirut international airport? Why they have to sacrifice the life of a lot of Lebanese civilians, including children?

Why all countries around the world did not immediately condemn the attack? When North Korea did a "show-off" with its missiles, most of all countries around the world immediately condemned the move. When terrorists strike Mumbai's rapid transportation with several blasts to its trains, all countries immediately condemned the attack. Why up to the moment, it's quite difficult for most countries around the world to condemn the Israel's attack? Why so far, only Indonesia condemned the attack, while the Philippines only issued Lebanon travel ban for its citizens? And why the UN Security Council finds it difficult to come out with a resolution to condemn the attack?

I really hope that the international community can immediately look into this matter. This matter is obviously more serious than the North Korea issue. North Korea only performed a show-off, while in this case, a lot of civilians, including children, has been killed by the brutal attacks. I also really hope that the international community can do the necessary to stop Israel's attacks, so there's no further innocent people become victims.

[Indonesian version]

Singapore: A Heaven for Indonesian Food Lovers

Since my wife joined the indosing-mums (ISM) mailing list, which belongs to the Indonesian female community in Singapore, she has made a lot of new friends here in Singapore. And not surprisingly, most of the members of the community are great cooks. Therefore, I would say it’s actually quite easy to find good Indonesian food here in Singapore.

There are two reasons. One, there are now numerous middle-class restaurants serving good Indonesian foods here in Singapore. Several years ago, we would need to fork out quite a lot of money to enjoy Indonesian food at those high-class restaurants, such as Sanur, Tambuah Mas, Desa Kartika or House of Sundanese Food. Now, there are plenty of middle-class restaurants serving Indonesian food, such as Es Teler 77, Ayam Penyet Ria, Kantin Aneka and Ayam Bakar Ojolali. Those restaurants also serve good Indonesian food such as ayam bakar (grilled chicken), ayam goreng (fried chicken), gado-gado, empek-empek, batagor and many other native Indonesian foods, at a friction of the cost of those high-class restaurants.

What’s the second reason? Well, there are quite a lot of our Indonesian friends, who are also great cooks. :) So it’s quite common to see my wife contacting some of her friends to order certain type of food, which might be difficult to find elsewhere in Singapore. Inong’s Dapur Bunda, is one example. Its close proximity to our house (only 10 minutes drive) makes it quite convenient for us to order some food from her and I just needed to go to the lobby of her apartment to pick up the food and make the payment. Some of the foods we’ve ordered from Dapur Bunda include the Strawberry Tiramisu Cake and the Chocolate and Cheese Martabak.

Yesterday, my wife also ordered chilli crab from Nisi, one of her friends, and I dare to say that this is the best chilli crab I have tasted so far. It’s much better compared to the usual chilli crab we usually bought from Al-Ameen Eating House. It’s also very convenient, my wife just needed to contact her through Yahoo! Messenger to order the crab, and then during lunch time, I dropped by to her place around West Coast to pick up the food and make the payment.

Other than that, fortunately, I also had the chance to taste Mela’s Tongseng Mela Kumis, and of course Hany’s Braddell Satay, which is reputably still the best Indonesian satay in town. If you notice, all of the cooks are my wife’s friends from the ISM community, so some words of advice to my fellow Indonesians men: if you are currently living in Singapore, and you’re married, ensure that your wife joins the ISM community!

And the best of all, sometimes we can enjoy the food for free. Really! Sometimes when the ISM community gathers, like this one, for example, we would be spoiled with lots of variety of food during the gathering. Sometimes, my wife and I would also got some invitations from some of her friends (which sometimes turn out to be some of my blogger friends as well) to visit their home and try their specialties.

So, who said that living in Singapore is boring? :)

[Indonesian version]

Great News from Switzerland

What a great news I received from Switzerland, my fellow blogger friends who lived there: Tata and Wati have just been blessed with the birth of their newborn girl: Nadia Aulia Yusuf. She was born on the 3^rd of July, 2006, 21:03hrs CET, at the La Tour Hospital, Meyrin, Geneva.

On behalf of my family, I would like to congratulate Tata and Wati for the birth of their second daughter. Best regards and congratulations also from Inka and Irza to Kakak Annisa for having a younger sister now.

More information can be found here.

[Indonesian version]

FeedWordPress and Recent Comments

Planet Indra Migration to FeedWordPress

After I tried to install FeedWordPress for Planet Singapura and satisfied with its features and flexibility, I decided to also migrate Planet Indra to use FeedWordPress as well. I am still keeping the old Planet Indra, which uses Gregarius, on another URL: http://ip.sg.or.id/gregarius/, while the new Planet Indra, which uses FeedWordPress, will use the current Planet Indra URL: http://planet.indra.sg.or.id/.

For me, there are more advantages of using FeedWordPress compared to using Gregarius, however the most advantages are:

• FeedWordPress provides RSS feed for the aggregate blog, while Gregarius doesn't provide it. So now, Planet Indra has its own RSS feed, which is located at http://planet.indra.sg.or.id/?feed=rss2.
• Since FeedWordPress is still running on a Wordpress blog, we can use our favourite Wordpress themes for the aggregate blog. As for Gregarius, the choice of themes is limited.

Unfortunately, the Blue Horizon theme which I'm using for Planet Indra still have its own limitation. I might want to change it to another theme later if I have the time.

"Recent Comments" Feature for Minda Indra and Rumah Indra

I also have recently added the "Recent Comments" feature for Minda Indra, my Wordpress-based blog. This feature is being added on the right sidebar and is showing all the recent comments of all the articles on the blog.

This feature uses a Wordpress plugin called Simple Recent Comments, written by Raoul. The installation is quite easy and straightforward, I only need to download the plugin, which is actually a single .php file which was zipped. And then, I need to unzip the file and copy the unzipped .php file to the wp-contents/plugins directory of our Wordpress. I then activated the plugin on my Dashboard > Plugins and put the template tag into my sidebar, which is the sidebar.php file. And voila, the "Recent Comments" feature will then show up on the sidebar. Very practical.

I also added the same feature on Rumah Indra. Since it's a Blogger-based blog, I followed this instruction to add the feature. Different from the Wordpress plugin, which is quite easy to install, this method requires some modification to the Blogger template which is quite troublesome and need to be done carefully. And the result can be found on the right sidebar of Rumah Indra. Over time, I might also install the same feature on this blog (Info) and The Journey of Inka and Irza as well.

Unfortunately, I can see that the order of the comments is not right, so the latest or recent comments might not appear on top, which is supposed to be the case. Until now, I still do not know how to fix this problem. Anyone knows? :)

[Indonesian version]

Oggix’s Antispam Code Implementation

I received a report from my friend Tata that she was not able to make any comments on my shoutbox. She said that the shoutbox kept on asking for the antispam code. I then tried myself and was able to replicate the problem on my Oggix’s shoutbox. After I entered one entry, it will prompt me to enter the 3-digit antispam code shown.

The problem is that even though I have entered the correct code, it kept in prompting me to enter another code. So it looks like the system didn’t accept my code, even though the code I entered is correct. After trying, I found out that the code would be accepted if I put a space before the 3-digit code. For example, if the code to be entered is “466” (without the quotes), then I would need to enter “ 466” (without the quotes, with a space before the first digit), then the entry would be accepted.

It looks like this is a bug in the anti spam script, which need to be fixed by Oggix administrator. I have contacted Ogi (Oggix’s administrator) on this matter. In the meantime, if you would like to add comments on my shoutbox, don’t forget to put the space before the 3-digit code.

Update on 2 July 2006: In the meantime, Ogi has disabled the antispam code feature until the problem is resolved. Thanks, Gi. :)

BTW, should anyone would like to give feedback to Oggix.com, you can do so by visiting their forum at http://www.oggix.com/forums/.

[Indonesian version]

Planet Singapura is now Equipped with Shoutbox

As you can see, the comments on Planet Singapura are turned off. This is to prevent visitors from leaving comments regarding one of the contributors’ posts there. This will encourage visitors to visit the respective contributor’s blog and leave comments on the original blog instead.

The only page which allow visitor to add comments is the About Planet Singapura page. This is where visitors can give comments and feedback regarding Planet Singapura, the aggregator site, itself. So far, nobody has added any comments yet. :)

To make it easier for visitors to send feedback about Planet Singapura, I have added a shoutbox, which you can find on the lower right sidebar of the site. The shoutbox is powered by Shoutmix. Feel free to give your suggestions, comments and feedback regarding Planet Singapura there.

Al-Ameen Eating House

Al-Ameen Eating House is a popular “makan” place around Bukit Timah area, near my place. It is located opposite Beauty World Centre, along the numerous coffee shops on Cheong Ching Nam Road, not far from Al-Azhar, another favourite makan place there.

This place opens 24 hours, and all the food served is halal. One of the best things about this place is its variety of food being served, from seafood, Thai food, Indian food such as roti prata, naan, masala, and varieties of fried rice, all under one roof. Although, certain menu only available on certain periods of the day. The service is friendly and efficient; with most of the staff are Indians who, surprisingly, can speak Malay.

Last month, I and my wife went there because my wife wanted to have the roti naan and masala, one of our Indian food’s favourites (see right picture). Roti naan is similar to roti prata, except that it’s oven-baked, not fried, and it comes with different flavours, such as butter, onion/garlic, cheese, or just simply plain. Roti naan is usually served with masala, mutton or chicken minced meats covered with thick curry from Indian spices, similar to Malay’s rendang curry. Previously we tried the chicken masala and chicken tikka masala, so last month we tried the mutton masala, and it’s as good as the chicken one.

[Indonesian version]

Valuair

On my trip to Jakarta this month, I had the chance (again) to try Valuair, one of Singapore’s budget airlines. Valuair previously positioned themselves as a semi-budget airline, providing value-added services normally not given by full no-frills budget airlines such as snacks on board and assigned seats. This caused their tickets to be slightly more expensive than any other budget airlines such as Air Asia or Tiger Airways, although it’s still cheaper than full-service airlines such as Singapore Airlines or Garuda Indonesian Airways. Its business concept is similar to Indonesian Lion Air’s and Adam Air’s.

Unfortunately, such concept was not working well. They almost went bankrupt before they were being acquired by JetStarAsia, another Singapore-based budget airline which is a subsidiary of Qantas, Australia’s main airline. Even though Valuair is now acquired and managed by JetstarAsia, however Valuair still retains its logo and flight code.

Similar to AirAsia, Valuair uses ticketless system. Purchase of its flight tickets can be done over the Internet, at their website: http://www.valuair.com.sg/, or you can also visit its parent company’s website: http://www.jetstarasia.com/. Payment is made online using credit card, and a printable ticket will be sent through e-mail on PDF (Adobe Acrobat) format. We just then need to show the printed ticket during check-in, together with our passports. Very efficient.

Valuair’s service is quite good, and two things which make its service is slightly better than AirAsia are (1) assigned seats during check-in; and (2) snack, water and coffee/tea which are provided on-board, free of charge. As for the rest, its service is comparable to AirAsia’s. The food provided on sale is also generally more expensive than AirAsia’s. My flight at that time was on-time, taking-off from Singapore’s Changi airport at 8:40am sharp and reaching Jakarta’s Soekarno-Hatta airport at 9:15am local time, 5 minutes ahead of schedule.

[Indonesian version]

Upgrade “Minda Indra” to Wordpress 2.0.3

Wordpress has just released its newest stable release version, Wordpress 2.0.3. This new version was released to address a security bug raised on Bugtraq couple of weeks ago. This security vulnerability affects Wordpress version 2.0.2 (which I used for my Indonesian blog, Minda Indra) and earlier versions. Two thumbs up for Wordpress which released the new version just days after the vulnerability was being raised.

I was just about to go back to Jakarta for a short one-week holiday when I read the news on the 2^nd of June, so I decided to perform an upgrade before I leave. This is the first time I upgraded Wordpress since I first installed the version 2.0.2 for “Minda Indra” last April.

Wordpress upgrade turned out to be quite difficult for a beginner like me. All the Wordpress files have to be replaced manually, and there’s no such thing as automatic script which can do the upgrade seamlessly for us. I have tried to follow the upgrade instruction carefully, nevertheless I was shocked to find out that all my permalink pages were gone, leaving 404 error message! Luckily later I found out that the problem was due to missing .htaccess file, and all my permalink pages were back up after the missing file was restored.

Other than that, I didn’t encounter many problems during the upgrade process, except some small problem while I was performing mysqldump to backup my Wordpress database. For those who want to perform the same upgrade, I would recommend you to read all the upgrade instructions carefully, and don’t forget to backup all your Wordpress files before you replace the files.

[Indonesian version]

"Road Rage" Cases in Jakarta

There is an e-mail currently spreading in some Indonesian mailing lists about a road rage case involving a black Honda CR-V in Jakarta's expressway. The e-mail is in Bahasa Indonesia, and a copy of the e-mail can be found here.

Of course, we are not able to confirm whether the case is really true or not, in fact, quite a lot of Indonesian bloggers are discussing about the issue here (in Bahasa Indonesia, unfortunately). However, this is a sign that road rage cases in Indonesia, especially in its big cities such as Jakarta, are growing. I agree that road rage cases happen anywhere in the world, however I believe that the number of cases in Indonesia, especially Jakarta, is much higher than other big cities around the region, such as Singapore, Kuala Lumpur or Bangkok. I noticed that these might be the reasons of the high road rage cases in Jakarta:

1. Unclear traffic rules, and even if there are rules, they are not fully enforced and implemented.
2. Jakarta's very bad traffic, increasing the stress level of Jakarta's drivers.
3. Jakarta drivers' bad driving culture and habit, always kiasu and inconsiderate to other drivers.

And, unfortunately, the third problem has become more common on almost all Jakarta drivers, regardless whether he's a minibus driver or a high-rank government official.

Here are some tips if you have to drive in Jakarta, especially for those who are used to drive in built-up cities such as in Singapore or cities in Australia:

1. Drive relaxedly, no need to hurry. Plan your journey, allow some extra time to accommodate some unexpected traffic jams, which unfortunately are common in Jakarta.
2. Traffic jams are common in Jakarta, don't allow traffic jams to increase your stress level.
3. Drive defensively, to avoid road rage. Cutting off other cars is the most common issue in Jakarta which can lead to road rage.

Overall, defensive driving is the best way to avoid road rage, or to avoid become a victim of road rage.

[Indonesian version]