She Says I Love You, He Says What?

Some say that when you fall in love, you’d feel the butterfly-in-your-tummy effect. You want to be with your dearly-beloved-one every day, every night, and if possible, 24 hours a day. You feel this bond, as if both of you own the world. And the rest? They only rent the place and making the world overly crowded. Who need the others when you already have each other?

There is this thing pumping hard in your body, which makes your heart beats irregularly. Then out of nowhere it just came out, you blurted… “I love you”. Then there was a moment of silence. He then looked at you, with unfathomable mimic, and sometime later he just simply hugged you.

No? You’ve never experienced such a thing? I had. At that time, I was amazingly shocked. He was the one who treated me so well and I felt that his affections were abundant. Why all of the sudden, all he could produce in return was just a hug? Calm down girlfriends. It turned out that showing his feelings towards me was like performing bungee jump for the first time. “Tho I still prefer the bungee instead,” he added.

What is it with men expressing their feelings? Is it really that hard for them to say these three little words? Ladies, it turned out that men have other ways of saying, “I love you”. Take Satria for instance, a dude in his late 30-s. Once he said, “I may sleep with her, may marry her, may take care of her, but stating the sentence I love her in front of her? Oh brother, that’s something else!” This was his wife of 5 years he was talking about.

Why? According to Dr. Brenda Shoshanna, a relationship expert and the writer of “Why Men Leave”, there are several reasons for this,

Saying “I love you” is definitely not that simple. For men, it means a lot more than simply expressing a feeling. For some it feels like a lifetime commitment, for others it is fraught with dangers. They feel that they’ve got to really trust her and know she won’t throw their love away in order to actually say the words to her. They’re afraid of rejection, because this also could be viewed as an invitation to get hurt.

For many men, love is expressed through action, so it can also be considered as a promise of what is to follow. It’s about commitment and faithfulness. Again, these words alone can be very scary for some men.

Yet, naturally, men do love and different types of men express their love differently. Now, from the list below, take a note whether or not your man had done these actions previously, even if he hadn’t got the nerve to mention those three-little-words:

Through Gifts. Some men express their love through bringing gifts to their women. There are many different kinds of gifts a man can give. These include the ones wrapped in cute packages, candies, flowers, or special notes. Giving their time to you may also be considered as gifts. When they are spending more time with you –hence the lesser time spent with his friends and family- this too is a way of saying that they love you.

Being with You. By standing up for you during difficult times, attending important events or functions with you, going to your family with you, planning trips, dates or outings, and putting you first in their thoughts are surely their ways of expressing their feelings.

Through Making Love. There are also some men who say “I love you” by passionately and affectionately making love to you. Yes, the intimacy made them felt that they’ve loved you and often felt loved as well. It’s because that for men the physical contact would break down any barrier and thus providing a closeness that they wouldn’t feel otherwise. Although sex could be so many different things for different individuals, for many, it may mean to exceed her biological and intimate needs while meeting his needs as well.

Meeting His Friends and Relatives. Another way of saying “I love you” is to take you home to meet his family and his close-knitted friends. Not only it served the purpose of showing that he’s proud of you, but he also wanted you to connect with the people who mean the most to him. Love, in the deepest sense, includes sharing all aspects of ourselves with another.

Through being Jealous. Believe it or not, some men express their love through being jealous or having a possessive behavior. Why? It’s because that they do not want to share your attention with anyone. For these men, it would be very upsetting for him if you speak highly of other men or if he caught you glimpsing at another guy. He simply doesn’t want to loose you.

To conclude, to express love sometimes men don’t do it literally. It would be helpful if you can keep a journal of your relationship. Take a few minutes to note: What have you received that day and also what did you give him back or what are you willing to give in return. Write them down and do be specific. Note everything nice starting from his phone-calls, kind words, a surprise visit, a simple SMS, and many other sweet little things. I am sure that you’ll be amazed at the results by the time you realized how much had he given himself to you.







by Ayu Wulan

Published piece in
Column: “Vice Versa”
Publication: 69++ Lifestyle and the City Magazine
Issue: September 2007
Picture © Corbis. 2007

Eternal Bliss

It had been a while since the last time I would passionately confer over a movie that was worthy of our time to be discussed following a screening. Even while walking down the steps of the theater room, bebe had already started questioning me, “Do you feel like you could relate to the movie at any point of your lifetime?” Of course I nodded in agreement. If you’d loved someone ever so dearly, why sometimes you would find it so hard -in your own reasoning- to express your true feeling towards this person? And if so, how long are you willing to hold it steady in the deepest chamber of secrets in your heart? That is if you would ever… ever tell.

Eternal Summer, was the movie that we watched in Blitz last weekend. Armed with a buy-one-get-one-free bliss provided by Sensen’s HSBC, the five of us cheerfully went into the screening room, sheltering ourselves from the sweltering heat at the beginning of this fasting season. No wonder that this nominee for four Golden Horse awards was chosen as the opening flick at the Queer Film Festival not too long ago. Though I wouldn’t say that it was one of the greatest festival entries that I had ever watched (hence the I’m-not-sure-if-they-actually-won-any- of-the-nominated-category-at-Golden-Horse), but surely it hit home with the story line that the director, Leste Chen gave the audience.

It was a classic story of two different worlds in which collided in the least expected manners. Either natural or forced, any harbored dislikes and hatred was then erased, and grew to a higher level of friendship, as philadelphia, and sometimes the relationship even developed deeper. At least one character thought so towards the other.

Back then, I was Jonathan (played by Bryant Chang), who by chance got to know Shane (played by Hsiao Chuan Chang), a need-a-spanking restless boy with a short term attention disorder who preferred the disruptions of any harmonious balance in everything stable in this world. Well, my Shane wasn’t as bad as him. But I could force some sort of resemblance between them: the bad boy look, the I-don’t-give-a-damn attitude, the passion for basketball, and of course the menacing rugged good-looks that they sported.

While my world thought that I was dating someone else back in high-school (and let me tell you, they didn’t think that I was dating a girl to start with!), secretly I had the biggest crush on my Shane. We lived so far apart, our hobbies were very different, we hang out with different crowds, it was almost unlikely that our paths would ever cross. Then one day, my Shane was transferred to my classroom. I remembered how delighted I was that day. And the rest was history, we became quite close with one another, our groups started to mingle with each other. In short he then gave me the best camaraderie that I would ever need.

Call it awestruck, stupefied, or even insanity, but I was so jealous when finally my Shane met a girl to call his own. I remembered being so mad at him for “unknown reasons”. That was before inquisitively he noticed the change in me towards him. Felt cornered one fine day, I sighed and let a confession streamed on how I truly felt about him. I didn’t care how his reaction would be, young and naïve I was, I just needed to show him that I did care a lot (if not more) about him.

He was of course shocked and confused. And then about ten minutes later (maybe out of beddazlements) he insisted that it wouldn’t be wise for us to see each other again (this was supposed to be my dramatic-big-bang-ending). I was crushed to the bone. It was the first time that I would understand the meaning of word heart-broken. Like you felt the squishing agony in your chest, the sudden disillusionment that your world just ended, and the extreme sadness that your loved ones not only left you for another human being, but he was also cutting the lines of friendship with you. Other than passing-away relatives, this was then the first time I would cry over loosing someone dearly special to me.

Three weeks later my pembantu gave me a bark, “Sir, you have someone on the phone”. I was so grateful that I was actually my Shane, “Jonathan, I… I dunno how to say this, but… I miss you. You were my best friend, we were always together in good and bad times. No one would try to understand me better than you. I don’t want to loose you here. You are still my best friend.”

So how are you doing over there buddy? And now, I know that you are reading this my Shane. I want you to know that I still love you –in a way of course! Don’t freak out- and I am so glad that I still have you as one of my bestest friends in the entire universe. But of course I still have a secret that you might not know previously. Oh, it’s just a little fact that I would like to share to you, that, umm, yes, you were my first love. Ever.

Warm Hugs,






Prof. Utonium

The Lie Detector

“Now, the world should see my latest creation…” the Professor started. “I would name this robot a Slap-O-Matic, which would slap you so hard if it detected even the slightest trial of straying from the path of truthfulness!” And the audience gave him a standing ovation. The launching party went on through the wee hours of the morning in that eventful weekend.

Monday eve then came and the Professor anxiously waited for his son to come home for dinner at the living room. “Where were you?” he asked coolly to his son. The son then answered, “As usual Dad, on Mondays I had my English course at Mrs. Ang’s”. The machine suddenly whirled on its wheels and slapped the boy with its paws.

“Ouch, what was that for?” he yelped.

“This is the Slap-O-Matic son, it would slap anyone who isn’t telling the truth! Mrs. Ang called your mom three hours ago to notify us that you weren’t in her class!”

“Okay I went to Tom’s house to play billiards”

Slap.

“Okay, we were watching a movie” the son said anxiously anticipating another slap.

“What movie?”

“Pirates of the Caribbean”

Slap.

“Okay okay, it was just called Pirates, an x-rated spoof of the movie…”

“Jee, son, you know better that watching these kinds of movie will cloud your young mind and turn you into a no good person in the future. How would you become a good leader of the community if sex would be the only thing that you have in your mind! I myself, had never ever watched these kind of films when I was your age or your grandma would have already killed me for this!”

Slap. The machine whirled back on the Professor himself.

“What the….” the professor barked at the machine.

“Hahhaha….”, his wife gave a laugh-out-loud from the kitchen. “Guys, men are always the same everywhere no? See, you and your son! You know… an apple never fell too far off the apple tree!”

Suddenly the machine rolled its wheels towards her.

Slap.

And then silence fell upon them.

The A.R.K

Unwilling and burdened to perform the task he was assigned for, one day Evan asked God, “I don't understand why You chose me?”

"You wanna change the world son, and so do I...” He said.

Then He continued, “People wanna change the world… Don’t know how to begin. Do you wanna know how to change the world son? One act of random kindness at a time”

By the time when Evan acted upon His wish to build an ark, his family was forced to flee the town for the unbearable shame that they had to face due to the public opinion that he was indeed senile. During one of the most doubtful times in her life, Joan, his wife had a very interesting chat with a stranger. Yet she didn’t know that she was conversing with God Himself:

“But my husband says, God told him to do it. What do you do with that?” she asked.

“Sounds like an opportunity…” God responded.

And when she looked back at him confused, He continued, “Lemme ask you something… If someone prays for the patience, you think God gave him patience? Or does He give him the opportunity to be patient?”

“If he prayed for courage, do you think God gave him courage or the opportunity to be courageous?”

“And if someone prayed for the family to be closer, you think God zaps them with warm fuzzy feelings? Or does He give them opportunity to love each other?”

Then finally she understood.

It came to no surprise that generally people around me would characterize me as a pretty gentle-dude. Yes, that most of the times I procured cute gifts on their birthdays and anniversaries. Yes, that I tried to be there when they needed me the most. Yes, that I would sometimes give donations for charities or offerings in the masses that I (seldom) attended. Yes, that I gave my efforts in fixing or moving things for people that I care about. But personally, it seemed so long ago (I couldn’t even remember when) that I really helped someone in dire needs of my personal assistance.

Other than the extreme hunger and thirst that I have to endure during my early-bird puasa/ fasting (as commanded by my shinse), I began to learn on how to be more patient, then also how to control my emotions better. While this experience actually humbled me a lot, as the ultimate effect, I then felt this extreme longing to give a part of myself to someone. A gift so great that would be utterly appreciated by the person I was helping, because she/ he was unable to help him/ herself at that time. Be it someone from my family, someone from my circle of friends and workplace, or even a total stranger.

After that I was semi-consciously repeating this stanza over and over again in my head: “If someone prayed for a value of life, you think God gave him a mocha tinted Maybach? Or a lot in Dharmawangsa? Or a key into his “treasure” at vault DBS? Hmm. (Sorry got carried away). Or does He give him the opportunity to be valuable?”

Then today, surprisingly, the opportunity to do so came upon me, gripping the core of my heart ever so tightly. It was as if the time stopped when it hit me.

(And for the sake of special-effects, there was an actual earth-quake shaking the grounds beneath my feet)

While Aryans tended to have big aspirations to change the world, very few actually knew where to start. And as God once said to Evan:

“One act of random kindness at a time”

With that note, I would also like to end this writing with an apology. For any wrong doings that I had committed in the past, for I am sure that there were too many. Especially to all my Muslim friends who are beginning the holy Ramadhan season this week. Let’s build a clean slate and start with a new heart in each and every one of us.

Overjoyed I was today (and over a strawberry shortcake as well):
Selamat Berpuasa

Tangerang, September 13th 2007.

The first part of this writing was taken from the script of
“Evan Almighty”
© Universal Picture. 2007

Under Pressure

“You know I’m really concern about your state of health. First you still smoke like a chimney and also how your lower-joints would support your bulk in the future darling? All you have to do is try at least once lah. You’ve got nothing to loose except those excess pounds blasted off of your waistline. Look at me, am I not gorgeous now?” Mom said to me once again -after several attempts- to take me to a Shinse last week.

Finally (and open-minded-ly I might add) we reached an agreement. First, I would only go there with her by my side to create the grand introduction to Pak Leo, the Shinse (Chinese traditional medical practitioner). Second, refusing to drive that far in the traffic-ladden Pluit, I asked for her driver instead to take us there. And third, I would have nothing that would involve any electrocution device and thorny instruments (aka needles) .

Got there pretty early for his terms of services, it was almost 11 before noon. Patients were lining up already. For the joint problems, for the lymphatic circulation problem, for the non-surgical eye corrections, for beauty treatments, and of course for people like me with the weight problems that I had been having for the last 7 years or so.

Sat meself on the bench I did after reaching the waiting room. Mom then walked in to talk to the administrative staff. Several seconds later she called me in, disregarding the long lines outside, I was aghast. This was truly what I call: Like Mother; Like (her gay) Son. We are impatient people and we don’t wait in lines. If there’s a “toll-way” -the way she described it- then why would we have to go through the regular lane?

Even after being fast-forwarded to the first in line, we still had to wait for the Shinse to come down for an hour or so. The wait was semi-nerve-wrecking for me though: These skilled masters will read you like a book whether you want it or not. His mind would operate in an Alpha wave (on 8-13.9 Hz) or even below (like Theta or Delta) in order to heal people and cleanse their illness (or at least that’s how I felt). Oh yes, he was going to read through me. What if he was then a big homophobe? What if he wouldn’t support my ubber-being?

Calming myself I closed my eyes and used a simple yoga breathing technique that a friend of mine taught me. Cherished the intake and the exhale of every breath, my mind started to go to that state of being totally aware and sleepy but still conscious. I then felt content and deeply relaxed. That was of course before the utter disturbance of the nasal sound that Mom would yell in, “Hey Jerry, how are you? Is Dad still upstairs?” He replied promptly that his father would be down very soon. With that masculine raspy voice softly crawling through my earlobes I opened my eyes. Gosh this Jerry guy was actually so cute. He was a what-were-you-thinking type of fashion-perpetrator, but somehow the odd pairing of striped work shirt (with buttoned-sleeves) and his khaki cargo pants made him somewhat sexy in enveloping his nice frame and rather sweet face. Oh, the temptation! I even asked Mom if we could be treated by Jerry instead the next time we got there (and she gave me a look of disbelieve!). So, thankfully before my mind went off further, finally the dad descended from the throne upstairs.

So this is him. My first impression was mixed between a half-drunken master yet he also sported that well-regarded shaman aura. Soon it all came to an end when he sat me on a chair, touched my knees and he pointed to me exactly the places where I suffered my past gout attacks. I gulped. According to his readings, the reason why I found it ever-so hard to loose weight had a lot in common with the toxins that caused my gout attacks. They were blocking the nutrients from being absorbed into my body and also blocking the way for excess waste to the bodily drainage system. The scary part was that the entire left-side of my body is ridden with those impurities. That’s why I had these migraines, muscle aches/cramps, and gouts attacks in which only happened in the left side of my physical being. Simply, I was stunned.

Later on I found him cordial if not highly likeable all together. He shared his tips not only how to live a healthier lifestyle, but also general tips from "how to manage people in your company with heart" to "how to attract returning customers". Gawd, -sekali tepuk dua lalat- people said (swatting two flies at once). And get this, he wanted me to shave my beards so that would attract more women he emphasized. Yippey. Life is great!

Along the way, it was also rather scary that I could feel his energy traveled through my veins without even touching my body. While the method of locking the hunger-gate by intrusively pressing his fingertips on my omentum was weird, but that was nothing compared to the pain that I had to tolerate while performing his acupressure know-how on my earlobes. And of course the not-so-funny thing was that I had to endure the pain while focusing to his instructions on the diet program he was designing especially for my needs.

In three days he said that the toxins would be flushed out, the muscle and gout pains would be elevated, but the gone-wrong system had to be treated again when he is due back from some jobs abroad in October he said.

So these are the major things that he wanted me to chant daily:
1. Have a determined mind to reach this goal
2. Be happy (being mad or being sad will actually stop the system from working)
3. Be grateful and have a high acceptance on whatever the Lord gave me to enjoy or even to endure.

Later that night when I saw my bebe, I even gave him two more news, in which jollified him: The bad one was that since I couldn’t eat, drink and be merry as usual for the next two weeks or so, thus this highlighted the fact that my cigarettes were the only consolations that I would have. But the good thing was that I didn’t have as much desire to smoke as before, even the cigs tasted like they’d been dipped in someone’s arse fer Pete's sake.

Furthermore, wait, did Mr. Shinse said that I wasn’t allowed to have sex? Lemme retrace his instructions. Hmm.

All I can remember was the nice words that he left me at the end of the session: “I know you will succeed in whatever thing you are doing later on. I see that you possess a righteous mind and a very kind heart”

That stopped my heart from beating for about a second. One of the nicest things that anyone ever said to me ever!

So friends I am sorry to inform you, that you wont see me eating and drinking my regular rations the next time we hang out. But I strongly hope that you’ll see me in one of those cosmo-hunk calendar supplements by next year. Yeah yeah, I know it’s a stretch, but one has to start somewhere.

Festival-Kyu

“You know it’s kinda nice to be with all these queers in the same room outside a club or a bathhouse for that matter…” a dear friend of mine said during the week of Jakarta’s Queer Film Festival. Even though I personally felt that the hype wasn’t as strong as the two previous q-festivals, nevertheless it was a pretty good event storming down Townsville at the end of August.



It was also a shame that during the same week my schedule had been as insane as can be imagined with work, life and other functions. First it was my brother’s birthday, then the ongoing and upcoming events that we had to supervise at work, friends’ birthdays and other parties to attend, another painting exhibition is on the way on top of that, and most of all, a new relationship was emerging on the horizon.

Not that I haven’t tried to squeeze my schedules to attend the anticipated screenings of the festival though. I was already there for the opening party (got bored and left by another hour). And again, I was there for the opening film, Eternal Summer -only to find out that the movie started at around 10 PM- in which wouldn’t accommodate my further engagements that night. I was there again Monday night in order to watch Tan Lines in Blitz -a little bit late- and as expected the tickets would all-been booked. So regretfully we simply went to see Rush Hour 3 instead (Chris Tucker at his utmost annoying being ever!).

At least I got to see the opening of a photo exhibition by Taguchi Hiroki at Japan Foundation on Monday. In which, was awesomely beautifully done, that I decided to utilize Sensen’s camera phone to capture the moments (see the exhibits below).

It was a still-preview -in a way- at the making of Hatsu-Koi, a Japanese entry for this year’s festival. I was even touched by the second show, Living Together, on how you would continue living with your life or with your friends who are positive with HIV/ AIDS in terms of: “We are still breathing and alive aren’t we? Now what do you want to make/ do with it?”. Then I remembered that there was an Indonesian term for this: “Nasi sudah menjadi bubur, sekarang tinggal mau dibikin jadi bubur apa?” (The rice in the boiler had unexpectedly turned into porridge; now what kinda porridge shall we make for dinner?).

On that note, I then promised meself, that before the festival ended, I would at least enjoy one screening that the organizers had held for us to watch. Saturday came, and since I had to be somewhere else that time, I missed Hatsu-koi all together. You had been waiting for the screening for the entire week and then something came up! I felt a pang in my heart. The only thing that would mend my broken heart (ah… the drama) was the sight of a huge mercenary-cum-night darling drag-queen who moved her lips to the tunes of “I’ve been to paradise but I never been to youu….” (and also the the nicely priced hardcore drinks) at the WestPac‘s closing party.

And an hour later a big dude by the acronym of JA said hi to us, “Hey how’s it going guys? Just got here now!” he said with a wide-grin on his face. We were like: “Yeah right! But anyway darling your make-up matches your amazing long dress and capes!”. Then suddenly Mister Dije said to me, “Dude, you never read the instructions, do you? There’s in fact another screening for Hatsu-Koi in Erasmus by 3 o’clock tomorrow”. For the love of anything Japanese, then I smiled back -in a very masculine way, while holding a straight from the bottle Heini- at a cute Japanese looking dude who was sitting at the sofa.

So there it was, Hatsu-Koi, very cute and cheeky, not as I would expect, but surprisingly welcomed. And best of all, the Japanese aforementioned happened to be the movie’s director, Imaizumi Koichi, who was there with his boyfriend (or at least the gestures said so), Iwasa Hiroki, the sound engineer.

By five another call descended on my cell, “I’ve secured two extra invites for the closing film. Be there or be squared!”. Great, I squeezed Guapo’s arm and drag him to the next show.

A long time ago, I’ve read the first of the series of books by the title Jakarta Undercover. I thought it was just interesting. Maybe the general public would be wowed by the so-called secrets that the city may hold post-sundown. It wasn’t any big secret for me though. Really, due to my reckless youth, ‘twas just one of those been there done that. Thus the so-so effect upon reading the book.

Now, it was another sweet surprise for me to see the movie, Jakarta Undercover, the second, and one of the only two movies I ever watched at this year’s festival. Very fast paced it was, as if the audiences weren’t given any chance to take a breather. Loved Fachri’s performance, loved the cinematography, the general acting could be better though. However, I had to give credits for Luna Maya who performed better than she ever did anywhere period (she could be better but hey, it was pretty good for a “model”).

While Eternal Summer, the opening show that I missed is being sold at Blitz now, I utterly missed the Bubble (gawd, where do I find thee from now on) and Kala (in which I hope would go into dvd-s… if ever!).


At the end I could only wish that the event was a success and I thank everyone in the organizations for providing a queer event that we, the community and the general public could enjoy together. I mean this event even sweetly outed two of my friends, Parasol and Neutrogena (willingly and unwillingly) to muggle friends and family members.

See you guys next year.

Note: Now I can at least give a half-smile looking at Dewi’s latest cover (with Luna Maya on it) better than my usual scolding smirk at her. Ah, she also works with NGO-s now… Good for her.

Hatsu-Koi

Photo Exhibition
by Taguchi Hiroki
Japan Foundation
August 27th 2007

Excerpts from
Hatsu-Koi
The making of Hatsu-Koi (First Love), a movie directed by Imaizumi Koichi

Living Together

Photo Exhibition
by Taguchi Hiroki
Japan Foundation
August 27th 2007

Excerpts from
Living Together
Living with our dearest friends and family members with HIV/ AIDS