Sejarah Lampu Petromax

Setelah membaca tulisan mengenai petromax di blog Mbak Brilian Sekartaji, saya menjadi mendapat ide untuk menuliskan tentang sejarah lampu petromax yang mungkin ada diantara teman ngeteh belum mengetahuinya. Dahulu, saya pernah mendongengkan cerita ini kepada adik saya.

Petromax, Lampu kerosin/ parafin/ spirtus bertekanan. (sumber gambar: wikipedia)

Kebanyakan orang yang berusia 20 tahun keatas sudah mengetahui bagaimana bentuk lampu petromax itu. Lampu ini sangat populer pada jaman listrik belum begitu merata dulu. Sayapun juga pernah mengalaminya, sewaktu hidup di desa, lampu petromax adalah pengganti utama penerangan saat listrik tiba-tiba padam atau tegangannya turun. Kaum muda yang ikut kegiatan ke-Pramuka-an, PMR, atau pecinta alam-pun pada umumnya juga mengetahui apa dan bagaimanakah lampu petromax itu. Namun bagaimanakah lampu itu disebut petromax?

Filed under: Teh Instan, Teh Manis

Perubahan

Saudara-saudara teman ngeteh…

Perubahan adalah kata yang kerap diteriakkan orang-orang terutama saat yang bersangkutan menginginkan suatu perbedaan keadaan yang perlu untuk segera dilakukan. Kita dapat melihatnya di jalan-jalan pada spanduk, baliho, dan selebaran-selebaran yang mengajak masyarakat untuk berubah. Entah itu perubahan sikap, pemimpin, partai, dan sebagainya.

Namun hal yang saya sayangkan dari ajakan tersebut adalah tidak adanya penjelasan mengenai mekanisme perubahan itu sendiri. Seperti kita ketahui, setiap perubahan dari suatu tingkat keadaan (state) ke state yang lain membutuhkan energi untuk pergerakan itu sendiri. Tergantung dari perubahan yang dihimbaukan itu baik perubahan politik, sikap, keadaan, dan sebagainya, pergerakan keadaannya pastilah membutuhkan suatu energi.

Energi itu sendiri dapat berupa usaha-usaha apapun yang dipakai untuk mewujudkan tingkat keadaan baru yang diinginkan. Sehingga, apabila mekanisme perubahan tidak jelas, hal itu ibarat tidak ada pengetahuan mengenahi proses pengendalian dan pengaturan energi yang dipakai sehingga pemborosan akan terjadi. Dan bukan tidak mungkin, kesia-siaan akan terjadi karena keadaan yang diinginkan tidak tercapai.

Menurut saya, ini penting bagi para elite politik menjelang pemilu ini untuk dapat menjelaskan apa dan bagaimana cara mereka mencapai perubahan itu (jika mereka menyarankan perubahan). Jadi tidak hanya asal berbicara, “kita harus begini.., seharusnya keadaan begini….”, dst.. Namun perlu dijelaskan pula mekanisme masuk akal untuk mencapai itu. Namun tentu saja jika memang keadaan baru tidak lebih bagus, yang bersangkutan harus secara jantan mengakui bahwa keadaan yang sudah ada haruslah dilanjutkan.

Selain dalam dunia politik, perubahan juga dapat terjadi pada tatanan kehidupan yang lebih sempit, yakni diri sendiri. Kadang, perubahan dalam diri perlu dilakukan untuk mengkondisikan suatu keadaan yang dipandang dapat memberikan manfaat bagi semua tanpa ada yang dirugikan. Keadaan awal yang stabil bisa terganggu oleh perubahan dari faktor internal dan faktor eksternal sehingga suatu mekanisme-mekanisme yang membutuhkan energi perlu dilakukan untuk membenahi keadaan yang mulai tidak stabil tersebut untuk kembali ke keadaan awal yang sama atau lebih baik.. Ataupun juga mengubahnya menjadi suatu tingkat keadaan yang lain.

Filed under: Teh Manis

Keep Remember and Wary

This phrase seems strange in English, but this is inspired by Javanese philosophy. In javanese language, it is said “Tansah Eling Lan Waspodo”. This phrase is often said by parents to their children, especially when their child far away from them or maybe when their children will go to somewhere.
Human can’t be separated from society, where inside the society, there are so many good manners, help each other, sacrifice, etc. Together with those, bad manners such as arrogant, greedy, and egoist also colorize the society in harmony. Battle between those manners can be found in our daily life. This is very natural, because all of those manners are our fate as human.
As a part of society, could we give scratching to this painting of life? what is the color we scratch? Is that scratching perfecting the harmony or precisely disturbing the harmony instead destroying the harmony?
Let’s muse the answer not in a rush.
Nowadays, we find so many incident and accident in our social life such as rape, (personal or gangster) bullying, corruption, and other phenomenons. And mostly we say it disturbs the harmony. I don’t ask if you do it, or ask you to be an agent of change. I just want to warn my self to keep remember and wary.
Remember that my family/my friends/my colleague/etc need me. Wary that there are so many temptations that can make me “out of track”.
Remember the answer from the question, “for what I live for?”. Wary that sometimes, people/things don’t like “undeviating person”.
Remember that I must keep patient, calm, and focus. Wary that sometimes, anger, ego, and another negative emotion try to take control over me.
Remember that there are so many people still in suffering. Wary that I can’t be conceit for what I have, I can, etc because there is a sky above a sky.
I think you, my friends, can add another “remember and wary”.
Let’s not yield to temptations.

“sabegjo-begjone wong kang begjo, isih luwih begjo wong kang tansah eling lan waspodo”
(how lucky a lucky person is, it is not luckier than a person who keeps remember and wary)

PS: I’m sorry for my bad english.

Filed under: Teh Manis

Heroes

This day is an important day for Indonesia and for me. First, this is Hime Day for me. And second, this is Heroes Day in Indonesia (called “Hari Pahlawan”).

Indonesia decided this day as Heroes Day bacause of heroic incident that happened in Surabaya on 10 November 1945. That day is deadline of ultimatum from Major General Mansergh(I don’t know the exact grade term, in Indonesia this grade called “Mayor Jenderal”) for all leader and Indonesian people that posses weapon to surrender. Mansergh was a substitute for Brigadir General Mallaby, England troop leader for East Java that was killed by Indonesian troop on October 30th 1945. This incident happened because Flag of Netherland was wavered in Yamato Hotel (Hotel Oranje) by Netherland army (NICA, Netherlands Indies Civil Administration). This action insulted Indonesian, so some of them torn the blue part of Netherland’s Flag to be only red and white, means Indonesia’s Flag. This triggered other incident between Indonesian troop vs Netherland troop in Surabaya then followed versus England troop and the peak incident was the death of Mallaby.

Mansergh’s Ultimatum was rejected by Indonesian because on that time, Republic of Indonesia was established since August 17th 1945 so no one can give that such ultimatum.
In the morning of November 10th 1945, England troop attack Surabaya with 30.000 men, 50 planes (including bombers), 24 Sherman tanks, and several war ships. Surabaya was attaced with so many boms. There was so many victims from Indonesian citizen but Indonesian troop never give up and then citizen helped too.

England estimated that they can conquer Surabaya in 3 days, but because of heroism of Indonesian people (one of them is Bung Tomo from Surabaya), it took long time until a month.
Surabaya was conquered because of difference of war technology.
In November 27th 1945, KNIP (Komite Nasional Indonesia Pusat) or Center National Comittee of Indonesia protested very very hard to top leader of England tropp in Indonesian for their action.
Surabaya’s war triggered so many wars in other places againts NICA and England troop. Because of their heroism and to remind of the victims so that day was decided as Heroes Day in Indonesia.

This day, I’m thinking about what that means for me. What is the meaning of “hero” for Indonesian people today.
I think, this is the right momment for me to “back on the right track”. I’ve done so many useless things, so his is the right time for me to act more effectively. I’ve wasted my time in some meaningless actions, so this is the right time to throw away that activities.
Related to the word “hero”, I think this is the right time to be hero for ****, an invisible hero. Hahahaha ) I think you know what I mean.

I also want to give “advice” to my leaders, “Please, show us real actions as we expected about you to make Indonesia better. We can help you to be heroes, but first, show us that you capable to.”

And you my friends, do you have a hero?
Or do you want to be a hero for someone?

Let’s think again about what the real meaning of “hero”.

PS: This acticle is not related to Heroes (TV Series). Hahahaha.

Filed under: Teh Manis