Allah The Almighty and His Greatness

SubhanallahWalhamdulillah Walaailahaillallahu Allahuakbar La Hawla walaQuwwataillabillahil Aliyyul Adzim

Yap, such short tasbih is one of the things that my mom keeps reminding me of. She said, based on an Islamic sermon that she heard, “when we say that, Allah comes closer to us and eases us in what we are doing. No matter what you are facing, no matter how hard it is,just recite that so that Allah will always help you.” And well, I proved it.

This story that I am about to tell is about my journey in Taiwan. It was my first visit to this country. From what I saw, this country has a very very great city planning and infrastructures. It has no big area but its development is so great. It has many tall buildings as well as many vast underground areas which mostly consist of malls (Loved it! hahahahha). Besides, its people are very welcoming, friendly, and helpful. It’s just (sigh) not many of them speak English. They are proud of Mandarin. Unfortunately, I don’t speak Mandarin! (I definitely wanna be there again someday and I have to know some Mandarin!) Well, this language barrier was what troubled me so much. However, Allah was (is) always there to help us.

First of all, when my friend, Atin, and I were on our way from the airport to Taichung (our first destination in Taiwan), we prayed “Oh Allah,please send us a man who is good-looking (ups!We are women anyway), religious, smart, and kind to help us here. Aamiin.” Well we definitely thought we needed a hand since all we saw and heard when first coming there were Chinese Kanji and Mandarin words. We absolutely had no idea what they meant! On the bus, we also had no idea where to stop. All we know was just “Taichung Station” but how was it written in Kanji? Blank!

However, we could say our first Alhamdullillah. Apart from the one we said after we arrived safely and soundly, it was when this Taiwanese guy,with his limited English, friendly helped us when we asked where the station was. He even reminded us when it was time to get off of the bus (Thank you, mas)

The second Alhamdullillah was when we were still at Taichung Station. We took a break for a while to take some pictures and then we started walking with this note about our hotel address in my hand. When we were trying to ask to a Taiwanese woman, a guy touched my shoulder from behind. I turned around and saw that he looked like an Indonesian guy. He said “Asia University?”
Me “Ya.”
Him “Mari ikut saya.”
Me “Eh?” (A bit suspicious ahahahha, Well we have to always be careful, don’t we?) “Kami udah booking hotel kok mas.”
Him “Oh.” (he realized mysuspicion) “saya panitia.”
Me “Oh!” (relieved) “Emm, mas,bisa antar kami ke Backpacker Hotel ga?Kayaknya sih daerah sini.”
Him “Oh iya, saya tau. Mari ikut saya.”
Me and Atin (Well, Allah has sent us this helpful Indonesian guy right after we asked for it!) “Mas,disini ada KFC ga ya?”
Him “Ada sih, tapi enggak halal. Kan ayamnya ga disembelih pake doa.Kalo mau makan disini ada RM Indonesia, namanya Jakarta. Sekitar sini juga.Atau cari aja menu vegetarian.”
Me and Atin (mak jleb jleb. We were gonna count on KFC during our stay there. We didn’t think about how the chicken was cut. Well, Allah has sent us this religious guy right after we asked for it!”)
The conversation wascontinuing but it was insignificant so I wouldn’t write it here. Oh well, his name was Mas Yanto :) and latter in the conference that we attended, his role was as one of the photographers.

Finally, we arrived at the hotel. Backpacker Hotel. Mas Yanto took us until we met the FO. We thanked him and he left. And well well, guess what! The FO was soooo good looking and he looked like a Taiwanese guy. And when we started speaking in English mentioning our booking, he replied “Oh, ini mBaknya yang Dari InDonesia ya??” He sounded so very very medok!
Me and Atin (jegleeerrrr!Staring each other) “Masnya bisa Bahasa Indonesia?”
Him “Saya orang InDonesia mBak, Cuma uDah empat tahun tinGGal Disini.”
Bla bla bla..
Me and Atin (Another Alhamdullillah!)

Well then, there was another amazing thing which happened to me during my stay in Taichung. I am not gonna write it here though (it's too personal huhuhu). Thus, I am just gonna skip the story and continue it with the one in Taipei. It's just ehmmm,, Allah is very awesome!!!!!

Me in front of Chiang Kai Shek. What a beautiful park!

Atin, Me, Mba Gi and Pak Li Chong

Shortly speaking, Taipei welcomed us with rain, cats-and-dogs rain!Worse, the rain fell when Atin and I had been outside, in MRT station to ChiangKai Shek Memorial Hall. We brought neither umbrella nor rain coat. We wore no jacket. We were freezing!!!! Definitely freezing,. I even could feel my fingers  getting red and rigid. We ran to one of the hall with only Taipei map as our umbrella :DWe couldn’t go to the main hall because the rain was pouring so heavily and made the map wet. Thus we just took pictures and decided to leave and find a shop selling umbrella. However, this was when a miracle started to happen and we couldn’t thank Allah enough for this!

We met these three people, Pak Li Chong, Mbak Giyarti, dan Mbak Maryamah. Mbak Gi dan Mbak Mar came from Indonesia, Banjarnegara precisely. Mbak Gi has lived in Taiwan for 13 years. She got married with Pak Li Chong and had two kids, handsome Ahong and beautiful Ithing (Forgive me if I wrote the names wrongly). She has a very good Mandarin. Meanwhile mbak Mar was on a holiday from her work in Hongkong. Well, when they saw our Indonesian faces, they came to us. We chatted and they then figured out how unlucky we were that morning. Finally, Pak Li Chong gave us his umbrella.They became our guide tour that day. They took us to the main hall where we could see Sun Yat Sen statue with its alive handsome soldiers :p We walked around from one floor to the others. After that, we went to an underground mall in Taipei Main Station. They bought us Mie Sapi which made us so full! After that, they took us home, well, their home. We sat for a while and then Mbak Gi started to move to her kitchen. We cooked fried rice and bakwan. When we were about to leave her house, she gave us jackets to warm us on our way back hotel. Besides, she also wrapped the food for us because she knew how difficult it was to find halal food.

Not only did she gave us food and jacket, she (together with Pak Li Chong, Ahong, and Ithing) also took us to our next destination: One O One Tower. Pak Li Chong even saved me when I was lost for a while and almost got trapped in between an MRT door. Shame on me :D Shame shame! Well, before visiting the tower,they took us to a bus station and told us how to buy the bus ticket to go to the airport. Pak Li Chong wrote a note in Kanji letter to ease us in buying on the following day.How sweet it was! After going to the tower, we went back to MRT station to go home. We went our separate ways at Taipei Main Station. There, we shook hand and I cried, literally. I missed home and I felt that I found home on that day.Thus when we were separating, I felt so sad. They were so kind to us, even though we were strangers. Atin laughed at me when seeing me cry, but then, she also cried :D I told her not to cry but we kept on crying. We cried while we were standing in an MRT. Two Indonesian girls in hair-cover, among those Taiwanese(s), stood and cried together. How touching (or miserable actually?)! Hahahahahah

Oh and one more! When we were already at the airport on the following day, Mba Gi sent us a message “Aduh dek, saya tu kemaren ngangetin udang di microwave untuk kalian bawa pulang. Tapi saya bener-bener lupa. Maaf ya.” And reading such message, Atin and I stared each other and were like speechless and didn’t know what to say to her. We can never thank you enough, Mbak :) And eventually, we can never ever ever thank you enough, Allah :)

Did You Just Take a Bath, Mam?

Well, this story was based on an “incident” in Changi airport. Yap, Changi, the airport of Singapore. We actually transferred in this airport from Jakarta before continuing to Taiwan. Well, we didn’t use G**ud* airways but T*ge* airways because the latter enabled us to travel around Singapore for a whole day. Yap, the transfer time was 22 hours :D

So anyway, we arrived at Changi at 9 a.m and we directly left the airport after leaving our baggage in left baggage. We traveled around Singapore by MRT and on foot. We visited several places, such as Singapore Art Museum, Merlion Park, War Memorial Hall, Little India, Chinese Town (where we found a mosque and took a nap for about one hour :D), and Sentosa Island including universal studio (Okay, I admit that we only passed by it. We didn’t have enough money and time to go inside). Shortly saying, we got back the airport at 10 p.m when we felt very very starving. We then directly went to the airport’s KFC and ordered two sets of meals for each one of us :D Well, we finally felt too full and couldn’t eat all of them (Lesson1: don’t be too greedy!).

After eating, we went to the Left Baggage to take our baggage. We then hunted for a spot to spend the rest of the night (red: to sleep). We finally found a hallway close to female toilet and it was precisely in the corner of it. After that, we washed ourselves in the toilet and went down to the information desk to take several pieces of Singapore maps. Do you wonder why we took the map while we finished traveling around Singapore? Do you have the same thought as we did? Yap! The maps were to replace the function of mat! Hahahahaha..

Shortly speaking again, we directly fell asleep after taking prayer.I wore jacket, socks, gloves, and hair-cover. But it was so cold that what Iwore wasn’t enough to warm up my body. I woke up every one hour! The first wake up was when I tried to find my mukena and used it as blanket. In the second wake up, I even could feel myself shivering and I tried to look for my sa*ec*ar* and applied it to from toe to neck to warm me up. The next wake up was when I felt cold because my “blanket” was here and there :D

Finally at 3 a.m., I decided to wake up and to take a bath. Well,there had to be bathroom for shower there, but I couldn’t find it. So, I just went directly to a toilet with no shower but this “fake “ shower (I don’t know what it’s called! It’s like small shower used when taking pee?) I used that for taking a bath! Hahahahaha.. Well, it was ridiculous, I know. After taking trouble by taking a bath with such thing, I went back to the hallway where Atin was waiting for me. After that, this is when the title of this story happened.An office-girl came to me and asked “Excuse me, when is your flight, mam?”
Me “this morning, at 7.”
Her “Did you just take a bath?”
Me “Yes I did. Why?” (innocent though fully aware that I was wrong)
Her “You cannot. You should ask.”
Me (thinking: whom to ask?There was nobody1 it was 3 a.m. for God’s sake) “well, sorry.” (showing regretful face)
Her “You see, the toilet is so bad now. You cannot take a bath there.”
Me “Well sorry, I didn’t know that we cannot take a bath there.There was no writing which says ‘Dont take a bath’ so I took a bath. I’m sorry”(well,, lie lie. I completely knew that we should not take a bath there, but there was no written prohibition, so hahahaha)
Her “Next time you cannot.”
Me “Alright, sorry ok?”

Hahahaahahahahaha !! Well, FYI, at the previous night when we came to the hallway, we saw this office girl crying. We didn’t know why, we didn’t ask (for what??)We speculated though: maybe she was scolded by her boss or maybe she was broken-hearted?? God knows.

Being Good Representatives of Our Beloved Country, Indonesia

Well well, the title sounds so awesome right? Good representative ofIndonesia :D But it’s really the fact! Atin and I went to Sun Moon Lake in Taichung and we ended up feeling that we’ve become good representatives of our beloved country, Indonesia.

Okay, to start the story in Sun Moon Lake, I’d like to tell you that this place was actually the second destination of AISC field trip. However,Atin and I could not join the trip because the seats were fully booked. Since the place (on pictures) looks so beautiful, we decided to go there by ourselves by Sun Moon Lake bus. Yap, the two of us. Taking this two-hour journey by bus.When we were in Taichung bus station, we opened our map and saw the picture of Sun Moon Lake bus. And then, a taxi driver came to us and seemed to ask where we were going. Since he spoke Mandarin, we couldn’t really grab what he was saying. So we only showed him the map and pointed Sun Moon Lake. He told us about the bus (as long as I understood him). Well well, we talked in body language after that :D We really appreciated his kind intention in helping us though he couldn’t speak English.

In fact after that, there was this old man who walked here and there while seeing us talking with the taxi driver. He seemed to talk to the taxi driver and then greeted us “Where are you from?”
Atin and me (relieved because of meeting someone speaking English) “Indonesia” :)
Him “Ah! Genius. Many genius are from Indonesia.”
Me “Thank you?” (Turning toAtin and whispering) “Atin, ini bapaknya nyindir, berpragmatik, apaseriusan muji ya?”
Atin “nggak tau mbak” (Laughing together)

Shortly speaking, the bus came and we got on the bus. After two hours, we got off of the bus in Sun Moon Lake station. We paid as much as 200NTto get there. We then walked to see the route map of this lake and decided torent bikes. Unfortunately, the rental owner also didn’t speak English so we didn’t have any idea what he was saying. All we could grab was that the rent fee was 100NT/hour. We rented two bikes. Blue for Atin and pink for me (I wish there were a purple one!). So we rode the bike and took the route based on a map that we brought. The scenerywas soooooooooooo beautiful that we decided to enjoy it without bothering about the time. The blue water, the mountainous background, the hotels in the middle,the green trees, and the romance of many couples (young and old), the ancient temples. They were simply indescribable and unspeakable! Definitely wanna go there again if I have another chance. I hope the next time would be with my husband :) Aamiin.

Anyway, we already rode for (like) two hours that we seemed to be going into forest. There were stairs in front of us. We actually decided to turnaround because we were kinda scared to get into the forest-like situation.However, we saw these three Americans and a Chinese girl riding their bikes and went into the forest. We were then motivated and we felt challenged to get into it too. We kept on riding up up up that we felt tired! We took a break and saw two (Chinese?) men stopping. We asked them if they knew our current position in the map. They pointed a spot and we spontaneously yelled “Whaaaaaaatttttt????”It wasn’t even half of the journey although we already rode for 2.5 hours! We were kinda confused whether to go on with the next route or to turn around. In fact, we decided to go on (which I kinda regret!).

Yap, Atin and I felt like fainted because the route was so tiring.It was uphill, well the slope was low but it was soooo loongggg,, we didn’t even ride our bike but pushed it while walking. Our water ran out, we didn’t bring any food. :( poor us! We decided to take taxi actually, but the taxi which passed by us already had passengers. So we kept on walking while waiting for a miracle.

After an hour, alhamdullillah, we didn’t get fainted :D we even found a food stall! We bought two bottles of cold water and its shop keeper was Indonesian! She came from Malang. We told her about the journey and she said“Ah, yang menuju kesini memang naik terus. Capek. Tapi habis ini turun terus.Paling 30 menit uda sampai ke pangkalan sepeda. Ya ga sampai 1 jam lah.” Well then, we kinda felt so relieved after hearing what she said. She then suggested us to go into a temple in front of the shop because the lake view from there was very very awesome. We did as suggested and it was real awesome, I swear! Trust me!

After that, we left the food stall and she was right: what came before us was downhill route. We were so happy that we didn’t have to use our remaining energy to move forward. We could even feel the fresh breeze of air in our faces and bodies. But then, an uphill route came before us again and it wasn’t short! We thought “Ah, mbaknya PHP!!!!!!” And the remaining route to take was uphill, downhill, uphill, downhill, and we rode, we walked, we sat, we lied down, we complained, we kept silent, we looked up, we looked down, we looked back, we wiped our sweat, etc.

After 1.5 hours, we finally reached the bike rental. We were welcomed by the owner with his unbelieving expression. Though we didn’t understand what he said, he was kinda shocked that we, two girls, could really ride the whole spot of Sun Moon Lake which was soooooo broad! Moreover, we rode sepeda mini instead of sepeda gunung! He then allowed us to rest and he gave us discount for the five-hour rental. We only paid for 4 hourrental. Besides, he also bought two boiled-in-tea chicken eggs and gave them tous for free! And last, when we were about to leave after paying, he asked for our photograph and said something which we couldn’t understand. However, I didhear he mentioned Facebook. Thus we assumed that he wanted our pictures with the sepeda mini(s) to be uploaded inhis FB and he would write “Believe it or not: Two tough Indonesian girls traveled the whole places of Sun Moon Lake in 5 hours with sepeda mini!” hahahahahaha Atin and Iwere happy and so proud of ourselves :p Atin said "Mbak, kita mengharumkan nama bangsa!" wkakakkakakkakakaka

Well, that was it actually. But I have this ironical situation after that. When Atin and I were walking down the street in the souvenir centre, we met the three Americans and the Chinese woman. They greeted us and I told them we just arrived there because we traveled the whole places and it took us 5 hours. They looked shocked and said “WOW! We didn’t even continue our journey and decided to turn around.” And I was like“Whhhhaaaaaaaaatttttttt????”  I mean,they were the ones who made us decide to go on with the route when we already decided to turn around. And then we knew that they actually turned around when we went on. What an irony!!! Hahahahuuuhuhuhuh.. So awesome though.. I kinda feel regret but also proud of myself :D

I definitely want some more exciting experience like this!!!!!

Me and One Beautiful Spot at Sun Moon Lake

Wall-E, an Example of Animation Movie

Hi! My old blog which contains my writing (of the same title as this article) was hacked. Thus I moved here and copied-pasted some articles too. I hope it is not a waste of time and space hehehehe :)

Talking about animation movie, in many people’s opinions, is like talking about movies for children. This is due to the characters brought in animation movie which are created in funny and cute way, so that they seem to be created to only entertain children. However, animation movie is not always so; animation movie is also for adult. It can be seen from some themes brought in animation movie such as love story, war, fight, etc, which are, of course, not created for children. Finally, when it comes to the definition of animation, different people may have different definition. McLaren in Meerson (2010) says that animation is the arts of movements that are drawn, not the art of drawing that moves. Meanwhile, Svankmajer in Brooke (2007) defines that the activity of animating is actually an activity of liberating which means that in animating, an animator can do anything he likes, regardless the believability. Thus, animation can be anything, since it is liberal, which moves and is drawn.
Wall-E, a movie produced in USA in 2008, is a good example of animation movie. It tells the story of the life of Wall-E, a collecting-and-cleaning-the-world’s-waste robot, and Eve, a looking-for-vegetation robot. Wall-E lives on Earth, while Eve lives in Axiom, a spaceship outside Earth. One day, Eve goes down to Earth to look for vegetation; there, she meets Wall-E. When she gets the vegetation, she is picked up by a plane to the Axiom, and the vegetation will enable all the Axiom inhabitants to come back living on Earth. However, when the captain wants to start coming to Earth, the autopilot hampers him by showing a warning video sent in 2110 (the past 700 years from that time) saying that Earth is unsustainable, so that they better stay in Axiom. Nevertheless, the captain, who is helped by Eve, Wall-E, and all Axiom inhabitants, insists. They fight the autopilot and win. Eventually, they come back to Earth.
As an animation movie, Wall-E belongs to movies targeted for all ages. It is friendly to the children, but contains a message in which children may somehow need adults’ help in revealing and understanding the message. The message is that when people who inhabit Earth litter, it may have bad long term impact: Earth gets dirty and contaminated which causes the living creatures unable to live on it. This message is delivered in the movie by portraying the representation of Earth which is full of waste; there is no human living on it since they move to Axiom (the past 700 years from that time). There is only Wall-E that is accompanied by a cockroach. However, after a very long time collecting the waste, he once finds vegetation and when Eve comes, he gives it to her. When the captain sees the vegetation, he insists to come back to Earth although he sees the warning video. This is because he believes that Earth changes and is sustainable to live on. He is sure since the vegetation he sees also is able to live on Earth. Finally when they come back, the captain leads all people who used to live in Axiom to plant that priceless vegetation to make Earth green like it used to be, before the waste conquers Earth.
The criticism to the condition of Earth which is full of waste is delivered, in my opinion, in an effective way. It is through, for example, the captain’s utterance showing his wonder. Firstly, he asks the computer to tell him about many things related to Earth such as definition of Earth, sea, dancing, etc. And the computer satisfies him by giving answers which is the ideal: how the good condition of Earth is. Since he is “blind’ of Earth, he takes the information for granted. However, when he watches the real video of Earth recorded in Eve’s mind, he gets disappointed since he sees Earth which is not like Earth. He says “What is it about? Oh no, don’t tell me! I want to see it myself. Wait, that does not look like earth. Where is the blue sky? Where is the grass?” That is an honest opinion of a person who does not know Earth: that the good Earth turns to be bad one, and it makes it not like it. However, that kind of opinion only emerges from person who does not live on Earth since people who live on Earth may not realize about that and may not feel that Earth turns bad due to their bad habit: littering.
Moving on to the technical condition of animation, animation movies should fulfill some “requirements”. One example is Jan Svankmajer’s definition that animating is liberating. The meaning of liberating is that animation can be of any forms, any movements, and anything. Liberating is also regardless the believability that should be held by others kinds of movie. In animation, the believability does not really apply since it justifies anything unbelievable such as dead creature with broken head can live again normally, animals can talk, a giraffe falls in love with a hippopotamus that lives on land for so long, a small speaking-English-with-Indian-dialect monkey becomes the king of all animals in a forest, etc. Finally, the thing to put emphasis on is that talking about animation movie is not whether or not some scenes are logical and believable since anything is justified in this kind of movie.
The liberating applies in Wall-E, for example, in the condition of life in Axiom. Everything in axiom seems very structured but monotonous. No man walks on their feet; they all, including the captain, always sit on their own seats which also become their beds. Their daily activities are always the same everyday and every human. They walk while sitting on their seats through certain lines. They eat and milk from bottle every time the schedule says so. Even their time to have recreation is scheduled. The recreation is in the surroundings of a swimming pool which, when the time is not for recreation, the swimming pool will be closed by the captain and become like ordinary floor. After that, the entire human in Axiom, except the captain, wear the same clothes every time, either the red or blue uniform. However, they do not put the clothes on by themselves. Instead, it is automatically worn when the captain presses a certain button. Although it looks monotonous, they do those daily activities without any complaints even after 700 years. Meanwhile, for us, if we have those monotonous activities to do in our entire life, we may have got tired and feel like complaining. However, although we realize very well that the condition in Axiom is unbelievable, we do not have to complain since, again, we do not complain or question on the truth of animation.
One other example of the liberating in Wall-E is shown by the relationship between Wall-E and Eve. Even though their functions and forms are different, they both are, like is known, robot. Wall-E is a waste-collector that, from the voice, seems to be male; Eve is a vegetation-seeker that seems to be female. When we talk about fact and reality, robots are not to be created with sexes. Even if they have clear sex, robot has no heart so that they have no feeling. However, in this discussion, it is justifiable to, even we have to, ignore the truth of reality because, again, animation is of different world from reality. And in the movie, it is shown that Wall-E and Eve, finally, fall in love with each other. Firstly, it is only Wall-E who loves Eve, while Eve does not. However, after seeing, through her recorded memory, what Wall-E does to protect her when she is inactive, she is touched and starts to love him. Thus, when Wall-E is sick, or broken, Eve tries really hard to fix him by changing his body parts, or spare parts, with other similar stuffs, like what Wall-E used to do to himself when he feels a little bit broken.
Finally, as the point of conclusion, it can be said that Wall-E is an attractive animation movie which is widely targeted for all ages. Not only containing point of entertainment, this movie also brings a simple but crucial message: Earth where we live on may get unsustainable if we, as the inhabitants of Earth, keep on littering. The way that message is delivered is effective by depicting the scene where Earth is dry and full of waste, and showing criticizing-the-condition-of-Earth utterances by a character who does not know what and how Earth is, so that the utterances feels neutral and deep. Meanwhile, speaking about technical thing, Wall-E fulfills some characteristics of animation movie in which it acts like liberating, regardless the truth and believability of the reality.
References
Brooke, M. 2007. “The Visionary cinema of Czech Surrealist Jan Swankmajer offers a stratling critique of contemporary society and values” / Vertigo Magazine. http://www.vertigomagazine.co.uk/showarticle.php?sel=bac&siz=1&id=759 retrieved on 16 January 2010.
Meerson, R., et al. 2010. “McLaren, Norman” / Film Reference. http://www.filmreference.com/Writers-and-Production-Atists-Lo-Me/McLaren-Norman.html retrieved on 16 January 2010.

The Role of Motivation in Second Language Learning (SLL)

This post is to re-publish my old writing which was previously published here. The old blog was hacked so I moved here :)

As what people might think, being catwalk models must be beautiful and ‘perfect’. A model must be able to walk on stage as beautiful as the music that echoes. However, Amanda Bauty can prove that what those people think is not thoroughly correct. Amanda, a professional Indonesian model, does not have to be that ‘perfect’ to be a model; she is, in fact, deaf since she was born. What she holds since the very beginning of her career is a high motivation to reach her dream. The motivation comes from herself and the environment around her, such as from her mother and friends. Her motivation eventually helps her to be the first, and might be the only one, deaf professional model in Indonesia. This shows that motivation can help people to reach something, even to change the thing which seems impossible to be possible. Finally, in language learning, the question will be “Can motivation play the same role, as the case above, in the SLL?”

Since motivation works in reaching something: the dream, the hypothesis for the above question is indeed motivation works in the SLL. This can be so since mastering second language is also something that people want to reach. Thus, the analogy is that when motivation works in reaching something and the SLL belongs to that something, motivation works in the SLL.

The motivation can be either internal or external ones. The earlier one, or self-motivation, comes from the individual who wants to reach the thing which, in this case, is the SLL. Self-motivation is composed by three factors: desire which is about how much the individual wants to master language through the SLL, effort which is the allocated time to do the SLL, and affect which includes the emotional attitude of the individual towards the achievement of the SLL (Gardner in Norris-Holt: 2001). The language learning process of an individual who has no self-motivation and an individual who has self-motivation, of course, is different. The one with no self-motivation learns language exactly as what is given without trying to improve it in self-effort. The example is that the person only learns languages at school when he has the lessons or at home when he gets assignments related to languages. Even sometimes, people with no self-motivation attend the lesson to only fulfill the presence and give little attention to what the lesson is about. Finally, when there is neither language lesson nor assignments, there are no activities related to language done.

Meanwhile, the one who has self-motivation is always motivated to learn language. This can be so since the individual has already had desire, which is a part of self-motivation, to master the language. However, the triggering factors to have mastering-languages as the desire, or goal, can be various, depending on the person. It can be that the person wants to work and live abroad, wants to be able to communicate with foreign people, wants to look cool of being able to speak in many languages, etc. After that, the person does the effort to reach that goal by allocating times for language. The amount of time spent in language lesson and assignment alone is not enough. Thus, the person allocates more time in language learning though it does not have to be through formal learning. With the motivation, the more time allocated, the better the person is. From this point, the having-self-motivation person is one step ahead than the one with no self-motivation. Besides, the person also gets the affect, a part of self-motivation which is a kind of incentive to reach the goal, of everything done. When the person makes a progress in language learned, compliment or, at least, feeling of pride comes which then motivates him to learn more and makes more progress. This is, of course, different from those who have no affect of either learning language or making progress in the learning. Finally, it can be clearly seen that self-motivation really plays role in the SLL.

Not only self-motivation (the internal one), there is also the external motivation. This comes from the surroundings such as parents, family, friends, or the environment of the SLL. This external motivation is useful in the SLL as this completes self-motivation in helping or fastening the learning. Self-motivation alone is not enough without the help of the surroundings. The example is when a child really wants to be a dancer, but the parents do not want that and never let the child to either practice or think about dancing. The result is guessable: though the child is self-motivated to be a dancer but is not supported, even is constrained, by the external motivation, the kid will get some difficulties to be good at dancing. On the other hand, the same thing happens. When the surroundings really motivate the child to be good at dancing, but the child alone is not self-motivated to be a dancer, the process still faces problem. Those two conditions are lame somehow.

Meanwhile, the ideal condition is the one which can involve the role of both self-motivation and the external one. When the kid is supported by the parents to go on dance-practicing, gets a good dance-trainer, and gets a good-atmosphere of dance-practicing, it is like ‘a piece of cake’ to be a good dancer. This analogy also works in SLL. Motivating parents and friends, good teachers of language, and good atmosphere of the SLL process, combined with self-motivation, are good formula in helping to reach the success of SLL.

In conclusion, as the answer of the question at the beginning of this essay and the proof of the hypothesis, motivation plays a role in SLL. Motivation, in this case, can be either internal or external. The former is from the individual itself which can be called as self-motivation. Meanwhile, the external one comes from anything outside the individual such as parents, friends, and environment. Those two kinds of motivation work compatibly each other. When one of them is absent from accompanying the SLL, the achieved result will not be as good as when the two kinds are present. This, at the end, proves that motivation, in fact, is of importance in the SLL.

References

Liuolien?, A., and R. Meti?nien?. 2006. “Second Language Learning Motivation” http://www.coactivity.vgtu.lt/upload/filosof_zurn/a_liuoliene_metiuniene_filologija_nr2.pdf retrieved on 4 January 2010.

Norris-Holt, J. 2001. “Motivation as a Contributing Factor in Second Language Acquisition” / The internet TESL Journal. http://iteslj.org/Articles/Norris-Motivation.html retrieved on 4 January 2010.

Tokuhama-Espinosa, T. 2001. Raising Multilingual Children: Foreign Language Acquisition and Children. London: Bergin and Garvey.

Yeok-Hwa, K. 2000. “Motivation and Transfer in Language Learning” / Educational Resources Information Center.
http://www.kidsource.com/education/motivation.lang.learn.html retrieved on 4 January 2010.

The Importance of Applying Bilingualism in English Learning Process

This is a repost of my old writing which was previously published here. The previous blog was hacked by some unknown bad guy :( Hope this is still useful :)

Language as a means of communication is undeniably important for us. People need to communicate every day, every time. It includes both normal people who can communicate verbally and ‘un-normal’ ones who cannot communicate verbally; they need special language such as sign language. Even, communicating becomes one of the primary needs of human beings, apart from their need of food, housing, and clothing. People, for example, can stand not eating one day, but they cannot stand not communicating even for only a half day! However, we need to remember that people communicate with many other people, even with those who do not share the same language. Here, we talk about the world in which there are so many different languages. Like what we have already known, world has an international language: English. Remembering the importance of English as international language, here, I’d like to talk about its effective learning process in non-native English countries, such as Indonesia.
We need to know that learning language is not as easy as acquiring language. The difference is that learning language will make the languages as our second language, while acquiring will make it as our first. The process is also different. Learning language is of no difference with learning other things: science, math, physics, etc that needs intention; acquiring is not formal like learning, we have no intention of learning language but we still can speak language just that way. It is best done during our childhood. Thus, what we will focus on in this posting is not the acquiring process but learning, as we have seen more problem in the learning itself.
What we need to do as an effective way in early English learning process is to apply bilingualism. Bilingualism is two languages used together in the same time. This way is considered more effective than to apply monolingualism, either the language used is the English or the mother tongue, such as Bahasa Indonesia.
Maybe you wonder why it can be so. Of course it is because bilingualism will give more benefits towards the learners than monolingualism. Besides, it also eases the teacher in either giving the lesson or explaining the materials. In bilingualism, the teacher will use both English and Bahasa Indonesia. English should be used since the learning is about English itself. When English is not used, it feels like the learning is merely about theory. Whereas, to learn language is of course to communicate as its main function is as a means of communication. Thus, when the learning is only about theory, it will not be too good for the students since language should be dealt mostly with practical stuff.
Knowing that the main function of language is to be a means of communication and that applying full-Bahasa Indonesia in the learning is not really good, it does not mean that applying full-English is then good. As long as it is monolingualism, the result will not be of difference. We should remember that this is early English learning as the second language. The ability of the learners to catch everything said in English is not really good yet. Thus, at every end of the lesson, it will also be not good when the learners do not have any idea of what is said by the teacher. Finally at the end, it will raise a question: “How can we expect them (the students) to improve, when they get ‘nothing’ from the lesson they join?”
After knowing the lack of applying monolingualism in early second language learning, we should look for another effective method: bilingualism. As bilingualism involves the use of two languages: English and Bahasa Indonesia, it eases all sides, especially the learners. Firstly, it applies Bahasa Indonesia that eases the learners in catching every detail the teacher gives them. It is good as the students can really understand the rule, including grammar and tenses, of English. Secondly, the appliance of English in the learning also brings benefit: it is as a way for the learners to be familiar with English words. They can, not only, learn the theory (the rule), but also learn practically through listening and speaking, for example, when they have questions. Thus here, the appliance of bilingualism brings not only the benefits that monolingualism might bring, but it also is better since the problem that is faced by monolingualism can be solved here.
Finally, we have come into the point of conclusion. In considering the method that might be used in the early second language learning, we should regard the need and ability of the learners. Their need is the practical stuff to get them used to English. However, their ability is still lacking since they are early learners. Bilingualism is an effective way to apply since it regards those two things.

A Normative Analysis on the Condemnation of the Da Vinci Code in Some Countries

Well, in this posting, I reposted my old writing of the same title which has previously been posted here

This is simply because the other blog of mine was hacked and I could not log in :(


INTRODUCTION
Art is something that is hard to define since one can never have a single definition about arts that can successfully satisfy all people defining art. Thus, different people may have different definitions, depending on their need. However, the thing to know then is the goal of defining art. Why defining art is importantly needed? And one of the answers is that it is to distinguish ‘art’ from ‘non-art’.
It is undeniable that people have agreed that there are some things which belong to art such as music, painting, film, architecture, poetry, and novel. In surface, what people may get from those kinds of art is, of course, pleasure. However, the fact records that there is something so called condemnation towards several kinds of art. The example is the condemnation of the movie The Da Vinci Code in many places in the world such as in Australia, and others countries in which Christians abound: from India to China, South Africa to Ghana, and Mexico to Brazil. Not only condemnation, in Philippine also occurs the banning of the show of that controversial movie.
Finally, that very fact leads to questions of what actually become the reasons behind the condemnation and whether or not the condemnation is necessary, regarding The Da Vinci Code is a form of art. Right in this paper, the writer is interested in answering those questions by relating the movie, as an example of art, and art’s values: aestheticism, expressivism, and cognitivism.
From all the approaches available in conducting art analysis, the writer chooses to use the normative one. The normative approach is the only approach which discusses the values of art. In distinguishing art from non-art, this approach sees the distinction normatively, not descriptively. It is, again, the way of interpreting arts by placing the art’s values as its focus. Therefore, the normative approach suits the expectation of the writer, since the very first place, to analyze the movie, as a form of art, based on the values it has.
Going deeper into the theory, art may have three values. The first is aestheticism in which it believes that art can give pleasure. The next is expressivism where it argues that art can be a means of transferring emotion. And the last one is cognitivism which says that art can enhance people’s understanding by illuminating people’s experiences of their everyday life. From those three values, in analyzing the film, the writer focuses on the cognitivism and expressivism in order to get more focus analysis. Expressivism is chosen regarding what happens to the film in the reality: world-wide condemnation, in which it occurs upon the role of emotion. However, they have the emotion due to their understanding that there is a violation towards religious teaching. In other words, those two values are, in this film, inter-related. Finally, in this paper, the writer gives some analysis, based on normative approach focusing on cognitivism and expressivism, as the answer of what actually become the reasons of the condemnation.
DISCUSSION
The Da Vinci Code is a film whose story is brought from a novel with the same title written by Dan Brown. The setting mostly happens in Paris, France. However, it also sets in London where the Chatolic Church in which Sir Isaac Newton was buried is. The main conflict in the film is between the sympathizer and non-sympathizer of Opus Dei. They fight to get Holy Grail which is important for Christianity. The sympathizer of Opus Dei is represented by Silac, an ex-criminal who repents what he has done by doing full-service to Jesus including to do physical punishment to his body as an action of sin redemption. He chases the Holy Grail upon the order of a ‘teacher’ who guides him. He believes that the ‘teacher’ is a holy man and that what he says is never wrong. In fact, the ‘teacher’ is only a man hired by Leigh, a crippled old man who is the main antagonist of the film. Leigh even fools a bishop in conducting his plan.
Meanwhile, the non-sympathizers of Opus Dei, who serve the priory, chase the grail to reveal the hidden ‘truth’. They are represented by the protagonists of this film, Sophie Neveu, with the help of Robert Langdon, an expert of interpreting symbols. Sophie is the granddaughter of Jacques Sauniere, an important man in the priory who gets killed by Silac. During the hunting for the grail that is full of symbols and signs, Sophie and Langdon reveal many hidden ‘truths’. The ‘truths’ are, for example, that Jesus has children from his marriage with Maria Magdalena, a woman who is considered as a prostitute. As a matter of fact in the film, Jacques and Sophie are descendants from them.
The other ‘truth’ is that in the painting entitled The Last Supper by Leonardo Da Vinci, Maria Magdalena is showed. However, in a glance she is not clearly painted; people in the painting look like all men. However, there are Maria Magdalena and the Holy Grail in it, though to be able to see them, one has to be really careful. And Sophie’s last duty from Jacques is to find the grail to show the world the ‘truth’ that Maria Magdalena is not a prostitute; she is Jesus’ wife instead, and people should pray for her. However, though they find the place where the Holy Grail is buried, they do not find the grail since it is told to be none of real thing. The story ends there.
After knowing the main story of the film, it is the time to go directly on the analysis of why that kind of story attracts people’s condemnation and banning. The first thing to discuss is the condemnation. Why that can happen towards the film with such a story? The answer may be simple: it is because the government of the countries in which the condemnation occurs is afraid of the effect that may emerge after the film is watched. That kind of answer leads to another question: why can the effect, if there is any, be that frightening while film is just an art? To be able to answer this, we need to go back to the theory, that art has values. The Da Vinci Code also has values: pleasure, emotion, and understanding. The third one, from the film, is what the people are afraid of.
Film can be a means of understanding by illuminating people’s experience of their life. By watching The Da Vinci Code, people can enhance their understanding on, for example, the history of Christian religion. However, since the film is an art, the understanding it contains is stated implicitly, not explicitly like a book. The information is asserted in the story. Thus, as the story goes, people who watch figure out the information unintentionally. They figure out that, for example, Jesus marries Maria Magdalena and has children from her; Maria Magdalena is not a prostitute; etc.
Art is imaginative work, but it can enhance the understanding. When people have knowledge on, for example, religion, art brings religion as its topic by showing, for example, the implementation of it. The way the art is made, though it is imaginative, is bound by the truth of reality. It means that no matter how free the artist is, they are bound by the sense of logic based on the fact. Thus, the understanding is not against the truth of reality since it goes together with it. In The Da Vinci Code, the freedom of the artist to play his imagination is in the way he sets the story, the scenes, the characters, the places, etc. Meanwhile, the way he is bound by the reality is that he brings Christian religion as its topic, so that he should tell story according to what is believed to be true in Christian religious teaching. The example is that he cannot at all say that Jesus asks Christian people to do five times prayer, like Moslems do, since five times prayer does not exist in Christian teaching.
This next paragraph is the answer of “What will happen if those rules are ignored in creating an art?” In fact, The Da Vinci Code is condemned because it ignores the reality binding. Even the fact shows that the condemning countries are those where Christian abounds. It means that the people know quite well how and what the teaching of Christian religion is. Meanwhile, in The Da Vinci Code, they see that there is a violation towards the truth of reality. What they believe to be true is that Jesus is never married and never has any child. Jesus is Christian’s God. In reality, when there is ‘blasphemy’ towards their God to whom they pray every single time, it is not surprising that they get angry. The way they get angry through watching the film is a way in which film can be a means of transferring emotion. And they express their anger by the condemnation towards the film itself. However, that is for those who know the teaching quite well. For those who do not really know about the teaching, they may take the information contained in the film for granted. Therefore, by doing the condemnation, it is as a way to show the world that there is ‘something wrong’ with the film, so that they do not take it for granted and do not receive the wrong understanding on the teaching.
After discussing the condemnation towards The Da Vinci Code, we eventually come to its banning in Philippine. The government prohibits the show of the film in all Philippine cinemas just before the formal day of the film release, in that country, comes. Here, it may have no direct-relation with the film since they do not watch it yet. However, it has something to do with the novel which is also a form of art. Before the movie is produced in 2006, the novel spreads all over the world, including in Philippine, since it is written in 2003. It is highly possible to be that the people of Philippine get angry after reading the novel. Thus, when they know that the story is brought into a movie, they spontaneously reject it since they believe that the adapted film is of no significant different with the original novel, especially the main basic story. Moreover, they realize that film is more interesting than novel. People watch film more than reading novel. Therefore, preventive action needs to be done before there are more people who know The Da Vinci Code and get wrong impression or understanding on the religion (read: Christian).
CONCLUSION
Finally, the rule is that art can enhance understanding since, though it is free and imaginative, it contains information that is bound by the truth of fact. When that rule is violated, the balance in the art’s values is also violated. As a result, it may lead to a misunderstanding in the society. To prevent that, the aware people may do ‘rude’ action towards it such as condemnation or banning as a real action of ‘protest’ towards it. The condemnation or banning is an example of the expression of negative emotion towards the related art. In the case of The Da Vinci Code, the people who condemn and ban feel that this film violates that rule. It can be dangerous since it brings ‘facts’ in religion teaching as its basic story. The violation towards the rule can be considered as religious blasphemy and can lead to a misunderstanding on the teaching among people either with the same or with different religion. Therefore, some actions are done to it to show how The Da Vinci Code violates the rule, to express the negative feeling towards it, and to avoid the so-called misunderstanding in the society.
REFERENCES
Akwani, Obi. 2006. “Planting Dinosaurs: Much Ado About The Da Vinci Code Nothing” / a review. http://www.imdiversity.com/Villages/global/arts_culture_media/archives/DaVinciCode.asp retrieved on 20 January 2010
Graham, Gordon. 1997. Philosophy of the Arts. London: Routledge.