Wow, my blog has become dusty and full of spider webs for these past 6 months. I'm really sorry for being gone just like that for half of the year, but hopefully you've been enjoying more contents on my Instagram posts and stories ✌🏻

Here we are at another end of the year, and I'm back to share my annual year-end reflection for this awesome year of 2018. I must honestly say that I'm kind of sad of leaving 2018. This year has taught me a lot of things that I never imagined before and surely there were a lot of struggles and pain to help me see these valuable lessons. These lessons are the things that make me fall madly in love with 2018 and I believe it's the greatest year of my life so far.

I'm going to sum up the lessons I got into five points and share with you what I've learned from each of it.
Let's take a flashback to my 2018 together 😉

True Love

These two words just appeared to me randomly at the beginning of 2018. They used to appeared back in 2015 too, just a week before I started dating a friend, and I honestly got so confused for they reappearance in 2018. However, I then chose to just embrace these words and make them my theme for 2018. I even got a bible verse which is related to these words (1 Cor 13:1-7, 13) that I printed and held close to my heart for this whole year.

Little did I know, I was going to learn so much about love this year that I don't even think I can tell you all just within this one post. Many many people have been talking about love through the centuries, so I don't think what I'm about to tell you is something new that you've never heard before. But obviously there's a difference with just knowing and finally truly living it.

I've learned that to love someone is to will the good of the other. Love isn't selfish at all and I double-checked whether I truly loved the people around me, or did I just use the word 'love' to cover my hidden intention of self-fulfillment. Sometimes we just forget and let our ego takes control over our intentions.

I've learned that in order to love others, you need to truly receive and feel the endless love from your Creator, namely God. As a human being, our love is sometimes limited and corrupted, therefore it is important to turn to the unlimited source of love itself which is God. I was really overwhelmed with God's love towards me this year, that I couldn't help but wanting to share that love to myself and my surroundings.

I've learned that God is my ultimate true love. I used to put my happiness into the hands of others, hoping they will always love me and make me happy. But that was selfish and rather impossible for any human beings to accomplish. I found out this year that only God can give me all of that, only God can fill the voids within my heart, for God is truly the love itself. He is indeed my only one true love. Forever grateful that I finally found my 'the one' this year.

Vulnerability

I went through a breakup this year.
Well, it wasn't really a messy and loud one, it was more of a calm and mature kind of breakup. But, it obviously indeed broke every pieces of my heart and I could literally see my dream shattered to pieces. What I did after my breakup you ask? Well, all I did was telling everyone close to me about it, as fast as I could. My intention was to let the words out, so that people would stop asking me about him. Then, right after I was done telling my closest circle, just a week after the breakup, I forced myself to get back up again and not letting this so-called tragedy affected my life ever again.
What's wrong with that? Well, every part of it is obviously sooo wrong.

If someone who just went through a breakup come to me and ask me for an advice now, all I will tell them is to just embrace their feelings. All those sadness, all those sharped piercing pain, all those swollen eyes after crying your eyes out, yup just embrace them all.

I was so used to being strong that I forgot how to be vulnerable. Once I started to embrace the vulnerability and accept all of the overwhelming feelings that I had, I ended up learning more about myself and finding peace with my situation. Towards the end of 2018, I also decided to become vulnerable again and opening up more about my feelings and thoughts to the people whom I trust which also helped me to get closer to these people.

I never thought that being vulnerable could be this freeing. It lifts up all the burdens and essentially gives you strength to continue the journey.

Fortitude

Needless to say this year has brought me so much pain. I'm not saying that my pain is bigger and harder than yours, but pain is still pain. They're still painful no matter at what size they're marching towards you. The virtue that I've learned a lot during these times of trials is the virtue of fortitude which is to find courage in the midst of the pain.

Of course it's so hard to find the light when you're down in the deepest darkest place. However, even though I learned to embrace my situation by being vulnerable, it doesn't mean that I was letting my situation consumed me. I still stood up and believed that my situation at that time was only temporary just like any other thing in this world, and I also believed that there must be reasons why these things were happening to me. The key is in enduring the pain with perseverance to find those hidden reasons, then you'll finally see a shining light at the end of the tunnel, a light called hope.

I know there are times when you just want to give up and give in to the struggles. I was there too, my friend. What I did to fight this temptation to give up was by not letting myself be overwhelmed with self-pity and started focusing on what I should do next, one step at a time.

I know it's easier said than done, and I keep slipping here and there too sometimes. But just learn to keep going and doing what's your heart is telling you to do. And when you get stuck, prayer will always helps, it worked wonders to me.

Self-Love

Now that I think of it, I don't think I was ever in love with myself. I always had those tiny self-critic voices inside my head 24/7 365 (sometimes 366) days a year. I was never able to see, how loving myself could've done anything significantly great for me, until this year.

Do you realize that when you don't love yourself enough, you can let other people taking control over yourself? Because when you don't love yourself, you basically don't have any self-worth, which makes it so hard for you to stand up for yourself. That's what actually happened to me.

I used to have this huge fear of judgements. I often received many judgements from others and all I did was just receiving them and let them got into my head, so they ended up distorting everything about my true identity.

Truly realizing and embracing my identity as the daughter of my loving Father truly helped me to love myself more. I suddenly felt this overwhelming love that's so hard to contain, it basically flooded everywhere, including towards myself. One day I just woke up and find it really hard to hate myself, because He accepted me just the way I am. No matter what others think, in the end it's what He thinks of me that matters the most.

Other than embracing my true identity, I also tried so hard to switch the voices in my head to a much more positive and nicer one. It was very hard at first, but as the time goes you'll gain more confidence in yourself and it'll get easier to find anything nice about yourself. I also made an effort to make myself more lovable to me, by wearing the clothes that I like and comfortable with, having those relaxing manicure night, taking care of my skin, etc. Just list all the things that you would like to do with yourself and do them all without really caring about what others may think and say about you.

I'm glad that I can finally stop caring too much about others' opinion towards me, and letting me just be me.

Living in the present

Last but not least, I've learned a valuable lesson of living in the moment. As you might have recognized, there is a reason why the present moment is called 'present', because it's eventually a gift that you can receive right on every second that's ticking and right on every breath that you take. Life is happening before your own eyes.

I found it really hard to grasp into reality, because daydream and nostalgia were the things that I enjoyed the most. I love creating stories within my head and reliving the past memories that make me smile wayyy too much, can you relate to this? Then there's a possibility that you might be having the same problem that I had earlier this year: having such a high expectation towards the future and having a tendency to cling to those beautiful memories in the past.

I didn't realize that these habits were robbing me from my present, but apparently they made it so hard for me to accept my current situation just the way it was. I always got something to complain about my present, like things were not as good as I thought it would've been, things were not as beautiful as it was before, and so on. They also generated so much worries and fears when I lost control of the stream of my thoughts. It clearly didn't feel good at all.

After working on it, I found out that living in the present could bring so much joy and peace. All I need to think about is how to handle the situation that is currently happening right in front of me, and that's all. I'm not saying that you shouldn't think about your future or relive your past, but it's all about balance. When you're overthinking about it (like I always do), it's obviously not good and you need to start tuning in into your present again.

My advice for those of you who like to worry about your future or your purpose in life is to just stay true to yourself and be who you really are. Even though you might not know what's the specific purpose of your life right now. Just know that God has prepared everything for you, because He has designed and created you specifically for your purpose in this life. So, honestly you have nothing to worry about, because you've already got everything you could possibly need.





Wow, it's surely very very long, isn't it? Applause for you who have finished reading them all without missing any word 👏🏻

Hopefully some of my words can inspire you (and my future self) to embark on this new journey of 2019 that is about to begin within few more hours. I'm wishing you all the very best of luck for this awesome road ahead.

If any of you want to do a revenge by sharing even longer 2018 reflection that you wrote, please feel free to drop them in the comment box below. If it's shorter then it's even better! Just share your thoughts because I'd really love to read them.

That's all for 2018. Looking forward for an exciting 2019 with all of you!
Until next year!
CN.

Time just flies.
It seems like yesterday that we decided to embark on this new journey together.
Trusting our guts that it was meant to be.
Today, it's already three years ago.
Three whole years just passed, and we're still here.
Lots of things happened, but none are useless.
We both got lots of lessons.
We both grow.

Here are 3 things that I learned about relationship for these past three years.

I love it when a film or a book has a happy ending. It makes me smile and it also makes me feel warm. However, you'll see that before the story reaches its happy ending, there will be lots of problems happening. Then the story just ended with a joyful ending. When the sequel arrives, usually there will be problems again. So, that's basically life. Nothing is eternal in this world, not even our happy moments. However, you can always work your sad moments out and turn 'em into happy ones. It's really up to you.

In a realtionship, the story doesn't end when you both become boyfriend and girlfriend. It might be the end of book 1, but you'll see there's another sequel coming. There will be times when you hate your partner, then there will be times when you totally adore your partner, those are all your emotions raging. Remember to make the decisions when you both are finally cold-headed, and try to work everything out. When you're truly destined to be with each other, then you'll somehow finish each book together, and keep writing and creating new books.

There's this understanding of love that I've just learned lately:
Love is when you put others before yourself.

My understanding of love used to be so shallow. When he wasn't there when I needed him the most, I used to think that he didn't love me anymore. Sometimes we have so many demands to our partner even without realizing. We forget that our partner is merely human being too. Demanding our partner to know every correct thing to do when we often don't really understand what we really want either is kind of messed up, don't you think?

When we love someone, we should focus more to the needs of our partner instead of what we want. Also make sure that our partner show the right kind of love too. Learn to love together.

Sometimes, we put way too many pressures from the society onto our relationship. Seeing others achieving new milestones in their relationship, doesn't mean that we also have to achieve the same milestones now. I learned that every relationship is unique and has its own pace, just like every person is different. Putting too many pressure isn't going to take you anywhere but dooms.

Accepting your own pace and growing together is actually a lot nicer than ticking another relationship's milestone box. Just keep your relationship in prayer and enjoy it. You'll appreciate it more this way than when you're pushing too hard.


Those are all the lessons learned and there will be more lessons along the way.
We'll just never stop learning, and I'm glad that I get to share these few lessons with you today.
Wishing you all a great future ahead,
CN.

Hello everyone, how's 2017 treating you so far? Well, for me it's still quite a good start. I hope it's been a great start for you too! :)

I've been thinking to write this post for a while, but I just wasn't quite sure what to write.

December 2016 wasn't really counted as a nice month. Yes, it ended beautifully with my trip to Bali. However, before that trip happened, there were a lot of complications that made me felt exhausted and sad. It made me lost my excitement for 2017. I was always excited for new year before, but not this time.

As I entered 2017 and tried to look back at all the things that happened in 2016, I found something.
I finally discovered that 2016 wasn't such a bad year after all. It was just a matter of point of view.

in 2016...

I traveled quite a lot. I even had my very first traveling abroad experience with my boyfriend, which was so much fun. I also managed to go back to my hometown in Makassar again after years not visiting it.

I started documented my life intensely on my blog and diary. So, now I can open them up and look at things I've done in 2016. I even won a blogging competition by Gramedia once. Well, I just won the third place, but still, it was still a great achievement.

I made lots of new friends, which was really exciting! I can't wait to see how these friendships will grow.

I started to work in a company that is so welcoming and I've had a great experience so far.

I finally hit 1k followers on Instagram (I know it's not really important, but it did make me proud because I worked quite hard for it).

I also learned that life is so full of precious moments that sometimes don't get enough recognition. Most of the time we just get caught in our hectic schedule/work/deadlines/life/etc, that we forget to just stop for a little while and actually enjoy our surroundings and what we're doing.

Hey everyone!

If you're going to fly for the first time soon, then today is your lucky day! Because I will share a few tips about things that you need to know before your exciting first flight!
So, let's just begin! Here are 15 tips for you:

Make A List of Your Belongings

It's always good to have a list of the belongings you're bringing on your journey. You can write it down on your phone or a notebook and just check it to see if you're ready to go. Before your journey, you can check whether you forget to bring something, and on your way back from your journey you can check again to see whether you get all your belongings together. It's especially useful if you're the type of person who is easily forget about something.

Make Sure You Bring Your Ticket, ID Card, and Passport

It might seem obvious, but sometimes we're just too nervous or overwhelmed with other things that we forget the obvious. Always make sure that you have all your important documents with you before going to the airport.

Wear Comfortable Clothes

Waiting at the airport and sitting on the airplane can be so tiring and uncomfortable. Don't make it become even less comfortable by wearing complicated clothes and shoes. Stay as simple and as relaxed as you can.

Don't Wear Too Many Things with Metal

You will get through quite a number of metal detector. Can you imagine having to take off some pieces of your clothes and accessories everytime the alarm goes on? It's better for you to keep the metal to the minimum.

Make Sure Your Luggage are Within the Limit

Whether it's the luggage you're dropping at the check-in counter or the hand luggage you're bringing inside the plane, always check that they're within limits. If they're not you may need to pay extra charges or throw some of your things away. So, don't forget to check it after you're finished packing.

Keep Your Boarding Pass and Luggage Claim Pass Safe

After you're through with the check-in, sometimes you'll feel more relaxed and being careless about your boarding pass and luggage claim pass. You really shouldn't. Remember that you need your boarding pass to be able to enter the plane, and you'll need the luggage claim pass to claim your luggage later on. So, keep them at a safe place and don't lose them.

Remember Your Boarding Gate

After the check-in, you might want to wander around the airport before the boarding time. It's totally okay, but you need to know where your boarding gate first. So, when you lose track of time and suddenly your name is being called on the speaker, you know where to head directly. Also, remember to keep checking if your gate is being moved to another gate, because it can happen, and you don't want to miss your flight just because you go to the wrong gate.

Stay Alert to Hear the Announcement

It's really important to always listen to the announcement. You may board the plane faster or your flight can be delayed. You won't know what's happening, if you don't listen to the announcement.

Know the Difference Between Boarding Time and Departure Time

Some people get these two things mixed up. Boarding time is the time you enter the plane, while departure time is the time your plane will fly. Obviously, you need to enter the plane first before the plane depart. So, make sure to come to the airport at least two hours before the departure time on your ticket, and make sure to check your boarding time on your boarding pass again after you're checked in. The boarding time is usually around 45 minutes to 30 minutes before the departure time. Make sure to always check your watch or the clock on your phone and arrange everything, so you won't miss your flight.

Try to be the First One to Board the Plane, If You Have Big Hand Luggage

If you have many or big hand luggage, then it's better if you try to board the plane as soon as possible. If you enter first, then you will have more room to keep your luggage safely on the cabin storage above your seat. But if you're late, it might already be full or you won't be able to store your luggage near your seat, as the crew will place it inside any empty storage that can be found at that time.

Go to the Toilet Before Departure and Landing

Before departing and landing, you won't be allowed to walk around because it's dangerous. You need to put your seat belt on and stay put until the plane is on the air or fully landed. So, it's better to go to the toilet before it, because you won't know how long it takes to be able to unlocked your seat belt again.

Move Your Mouth to Ease the Pain on Your Ears When the Plane Depart & Land

When the plane is about to depart and land, it will make so much noise that sometimes can hurt your ears. You can either put on ear plugs or headset, but I always do this mimicking move of chewing. You can actually chew something too if you want, like candies or gums. It helps ease the pain in your ears.

Pre-order Your Meal or Bring Your Own Food

It's always good to pre-order your meal, especially when you're having a long flight. So, you will be able to enjoy your food first and you won't be needing to pay it again. If the food on the plane is way too expensive for you, then you can always prepare your own food to be eaten anytime you want.

Bring Entertainment and Stay Comfortable

Check out if your flight has an on-flight entertainment. If they do, it's good! If they don't, then whether it's a playlist on your phone, a book, etc, will be really helpful to face the boredom you're going to face on the plane. Just make sure to not use the electronic devices when your plane is departing and landing. You can also have a lovely talk with your friends or strangers beside you to kill the time. Don't forget to bring a pillow or blanket or socks or anything to keep you comfortable, if you're having a night flight too. Stay comfortable is always the key of enjoyable flying experience.

Your first destination after landing is either the toilet or the luggage claim

It's really important to claim your luggage as soon as possible. You can have a short visit to the toilet but after that just head directly to the conveyor belts. Find the conveyor belt with the name of the aircraft that you just traveled with and keep your eyes on your luggage. There are some times when your luggage is swapped with other passenger, or you can't find your luggage. If that happens, just go to the Lost & Found counter and they will help you find your luggage. Hope it won't be happening to any of you though, because it's horrible. Make sure to have your luggage tickets ready for claiming your luggage too at this point.



Those are some of the tips that I learned based on my flying experiences. Hope this article will help some of you, and have a pleasant flight! :D
CN.

Hello there! I'm sorry I've been gone for a few days and didn't post anything. I just didn't feel like it, because I've been having some quite rough days and I wasn't emotionally stable. But, there is this one sentence that keeps echoing inside my head during those days:

Have you ever heard of Bloglovin'? Well, it's basically a social media platform for bloggers to share their works. I think not a lot of people, especially in Indonesia, know about the existence of this incredible platform, and it's too bad. That's why I'm writing this post to let more people know about it.

If you have a blog or like to read blog posts, I really recommend you to have an account in Bloglovin'. Here, you can find a lot of amazing blogs to follow and their new posts will pop up in your feed after you follow them. It makes reading blogs much more easier, especially when you don't really enjoy having too many e-mails from the blogs you follow via newsletter popping up in your e-mail once in a while. There are a lot of interesting posts to read and you will get a lot of inspiration and knowledge from these posts.

If you're blogger, Bloglovin' will be a good platform to share your posts and see other bloggers' works for more inspiration. You can link your blog to your personal profile, and after that it will automatically update your newest posts from your blog directly to your blog's profile on Bloglovin'. I can find a lot of bloggers from all around the world, especially from the UK and US. However, there are not that many Indonesian bloggers that I find here. It's kind of making me sad.

I really enjoy reading blog posts from Bloglovin' because there are A LOT of great blogs out there and it's much more easier to find using Bloglovin' than web search engines. I'm so happy to have joined and explore Bloglovin'. Go explore the website here and there is also an app of it that you can download right into your phone, so you can just read blogs wherever you are as long as you have an internet connection :D I hope you will find this platform useful like I do.

You can follow my Bloglovin' account on the 'Follow Me' section on the right side of this post :)
Happy exploring this awesome platform!
CN.

WOW!! I'm so excited about the opening of Shanghai Disneyland! I'm a huge fan of Walt Disney and his works, so this event is really grand for me! Watching the Grand Opening of the new Disneyland in Shanghai makes me imagining how Walt Disney will smile from above, watching another happiest place on earth is being opened for a lot of people. His legacy is just so beautiful.

Due to my excitement, I decided to post a photo gallery of my last trip to Hong Kong Disneyland! I went to this happy place back in 2013. I remember how joyful I was to finally visit Disneyland! So, here are some photos I took:

The Gate!! (screaming internally)

The entrance ticket. How cute!

'It's A Small World' ride :)

This ice cream melted in seconds! Imagine how hot the weather was!! I didn't get a chance to take a proper photo or even to enjoy this ice cream, since everything had to be done fast! :(

Met Stitch!!

I wish I could buy them all...

Winnie the Pooh ride!

cookie :)

The Sleeping Beauty statue in the middle of the food court.

This bento was my lunch!

The t-shirts I bought :)

Disney Princess shop!!

If only I fit this beautiful dresses..

Aurora Castle

The wishing well of Snow White. You can throw coins into it and make a wish :)

Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs

How cute is this ice cream stick bench!

Howdy Woody!

Entering Andy's Toy Box! Sorry it's a bit blurry..

Rawr!!

The beautiful planet-shaped lamps/lanterns. Sorry, it's blurry again..

Really wanted to buy these!

The awesome firework show! People were waiting for it and saving their places hours before it even started! Now, I know why.. Because it's soooo awesome!!

Time to say goodbye to the happiest place on earth. I didn't really want to go home D:

That is my visual diary of my wonderful day at Hong Kong Disneyland. I'm not an adventurous type of person who loves the adrenaline rush from the fastest roller coaster. So, I didn't really ride that kind of attractions. However, I really enjoyed the vibe of Disneyland. I believe I almost teared up when I heard the instrumental version of 'When You Wish Upon A Star' blasting from the speakers. I guess I was just too overwhelmed to be there, since visiting Disneyland was one of my dreams. Everything I saw and experienced in there was so magical. Now, I know why it's called the happiest place on earth, because it just is!

My next dream is to visit all the Disney Resorts all around the world. With just one place off the list, there are still so many places to go. There are Tokyo Disneyland, Tokyo DisneySea, Paris Disneyland, Disney World in Orlando, and of course the first Disneyland ever in California. Now Shanghai Disneyland is added to that list! I wish I will be able to visit them all someday!

Check out the videos of the Grand Opening Gala and Dedication Ceremony of Shanghai Disneyland below. The performances are just so amazing! So, make sure to watch them!

Hope you're having a magical day! Don't forget to keep dreaming! :)
CN.




More sneak peek of the inside of Shanghai Disneyland :D