So, it's 2014, already? Happy new year, then.
I want to start this year off with an apologize to you, Blog. I'm sorry for not updating you for such a long time. I'm sorry, I really am. The past six months for me have been very... wow I can't even find a word to describe it. It's been very hard, very tiring, stressful, but also very amazing. Well, this picture under, I think, sums it all up about how I feel and what I've been for the past six months.
Three months earlier before whatever finally happened like you see on the picture above, I was just a grateful kid, who just finally graduated high school and got into a hopefully right faculty on the right university. His mind is full of things like, What the heck? I graduated already? So things just went like usual, but on one night, one offer changed it all.
I don't remember the exact date of the "night", but I remember it was on September. Before telling you about the "night", I want to explain you something. There is a lot of extraculliculer activities here on the university I am attending and of all them, there are two extraculliculer activities that I got interested the most, choir and marching band. So, I signed up and got in to those. Nah, this night is one of the night at the regular practice of the marching band that I attended.
The regular practice went regularly at first, but then I was taken out of the line of the new member of the marching band they usually call Cadets. It was this man, we called him Beto, who took me out of the line and asked to have a little conversation with me that night. I was a little confused, but then agreed anyway. And after that, the conversation went from asking what I wanted to play, and went to finally asked me to join the "main team" for the Grand Prix Marching Band, an annual marching band competition held in Jakarta, which that year would be held on December 27th to 29th. I pictured a lot of good things I would got if I agreed to the offer, like prestige, thropy, a victory, and got tempted of those things. And because of that, I agreed to the offer and joined the "main team".
Four months before the D-day, "God, I can't stand it!"
That first month was very stressing and tiring. I was weak, physically, and I got into something really physical. So, in that first month, I got sick a lot. I worried my parents a lot. My body aches in a lot of place. I was so tired everyday that I couldn't focus on most of the class at campus. I got a lot of assignments from the lecturer and also from the senior, but when I got home I was just too tired to do anything so I just fell asleep. All of that just increased my stress level that month. I really couldn't stand it and really wanted to quit. But I didn't.
Three months before the D-day, I finally decided to go on just to fulfill my duties.
The next month was actually the same, but with different mental condition. Physically, I was still weak, well probably I am. So, I still got sick a lot. My parents were on Mecca so I didn't worry them a lot. My body still ached at a lot of place. But I seemed to manage my stress level better that month. So, if I was not that physically strong for this, why didn't I decide to quit? Well, I almost did. I even talked to the man who took me out of the line at the beginning of the first month but I just couldn't find a good reason to, and most of all, I just couldn't dissapoint people. So I decided to keep going, but not wholeheartedly. Every day in every practice, I cursed the time for running very slowly, that I really wanted to get over this as fast as possible. Practices passed by without giving me any feeling but the tiredness and aches all over my body. I got nothing. So, these month, I deeply regretted my decision not to quit the previous month. However, I do not regret it now, in the point of fact, I feel grateful.
Seven days before the D-day, I talked to myself "Come on, you've been this far, just give your best of it. Just give it all out."
And I did. I gave it all. But what scared me the most, was what they call Final Training Center, ten days, away from home. I was hard, for me because I am a home-based kid. I never went away from home that long. However, like I said before, I gave it all out. The first day of the training center was not that bad. With every day and every practice that week, I started to feel something. I felt the love, and the passions, really big on the field. I thought to myself that time might go very fast that week. And it did. The time, finally got me to the D-1. That day, we're having a little motivation from one great man we called Kak Ronald, and there was moment at the time where every member of the team went randomly through the room and hugged each other. Almost everybody cried, well I didn't. I looked around and I thought, these people had worked their best for the past four months and they finally got there. I felt like a jerk at that moment. I mean, who I was to ruin this great team. So I prayed, "God, give us the victory. If it was not for me, then for them." And then after that, I cried.
The next three days were the D-days, and it went as fast as anything could ever be. The D-day started with this thing we called The Parking Lot, where we warmed up and fullband-ed on the parking lot outside the Istora buiding, with everbody, from our friends, our family, and even strangers, stopping by and watching. The next thing was dressing up, "apel"-something like rollcall, line up, and finally performed inside the Istora. The performance was twelve minutes, and it felt very fast. The after-show at the first day we perfomed was very amazing. Everybody cheered, and happy. Smile and laugh was everywhere. It was fun, I thought. On Sunday, however, the after-show was not that cheerful, but just as happy. Laugh was lesser but the smile was still there. It was really full of emotion. There was a different sincerity than what I felt on the first after-show. Everybody shared the same feeling. Happy, because finally it all ended amazingly, and also sad because it all ended. Everybody cried at the moment, including me.
So, in the end, I got all the things I pictured at the night the man who took me out of the line offered me to play on the "main team". I got the prestige. I mean, a freshman who has brought a trophy to the university? That's the prestige. I got the victory, and also the trophy. But what I didn't think I would got was this family. In this very end I want to say thank you. Thank you to Beto, for taking me out of the line, for keeping me from quitting. I'm glad, and I'm grateful that you did. Thank you also for Madahbahana UI, low-brass especially, for giving such an amazing experience, for being my friends, for the love, and for the trophies. And I think I also owe you a huge and deep apology, for not giving me my best from the beginning. I'm sorry
I'm sorry also for all of my friends outside the marching band for being very ignorant the past four months, or maybe the whole last year (hehe). I couldn't even reply to all of the birthday wishes I got on twitter. I'm sorry, and thank you also for the wishes.
However, this is a new year anyway, so Happy New Year! Hope you got an amazing year this year. And the last apology. I am sorry, for being very amazing. hahahahaha no, I was kidding. Well..., I'm not :)