After all the troubles

1 August 2008

Now, I am loaded with a billion things to do, yet I decide to write a blog entry. That’s a typical Agus.
After the excitement of getting my first article published by a newspaper, when the second one is published, the excitement seemingly has evaporated. The same applies, I think, after getting my first translation published or my first presentation for an academic conference. The joy of doing those things has gone. Nevertheless, we know that all those things are not done for the sake of joy alone. We do those things because they are our legacy and for me, my small steps of acquiring a professorship. That seems like a million steps away from where I am standing now. Nevertheless, please have a look at the article through this link:
After nearly one year at the Embassy (next month marks my one year tenure at the Embassy), I am actually quite bored with what I have to do daily. Of course, the biggest joy of working there is the increasing salary! But probably, I will need to browse around and look for other great opportunities with greater income.
Speaking about opportunities, I just declined an offer to teach for Binus. The Head of the Department herself contacted me and offered me a position. But after all the trouble of visiting the campus and sitting for the test, I just lost interest in teaching there. The chemistry wasn’t there. Hahahaha.
However, another opportunity arises. Suddenly, Prof Pillay from QUT offered me to be his partner in a research he is going to conduct here in Indonesia. We are currently preparing a proposal for AusAID funding. Now, this is something really new. I’ve never done it in my entire lifetime. I do hope that everything will be fine and we will be able to secure the funding. About doing the actual research, well, we don’t need to worry now. That’s for the future worry.
I have been enjoying about a month and a half of not coming to the seminary. It’s relaxing actually. I hope next trimester will be lighter than the first one. I also hope that my teaching schedule at UI can be reduced by half. I am looking forward for more relaxing time to enjoy in my late 20s. Although that might not happen as I am translating this awesome book by Bill Hybels. It’s so awesome that I can’t really translate it well. Oh, goodness.
Finally, I have one note about a trip to Bandung. After that crappy Bandung trip, at least I learned something about self-fulfilling prophecy theory at the TVET congress. The theory postulates that whatever we believe in ourselves or in other people, that thing—bad or good—will come true. Now that seems a bitfar-fetched for many, but actually there are more than 300 studies in the States that support that theory. So, I now must believe that I will succeed and not fail—I will have what I want. Well, that is not probably going to happen if God is as good as He claims, as Rev. Elisabeth Hasikin said last Sunday, “It’s not what we want that should happen. It’s what God wants that should happen.” So rather than a self-fulfilling prophecy theory, we probably need a God-fulfillingprophecy theory. Well, that’s not a theory actually since God’s prophecy willalways materialize, right? Hopefully, He has designed something splendid for me.