Of Comics and Reading Talent

Thinking of some earcatching titles for this post but end up failing miserably as usual...

Today is the last day of Early Semester Holiday, and I have done nothing special except for Wednesday, when I went to a non-tourism river and rented a boat with my family to cruise along and catch a glimpse of this surprisingly cute primata called "Bekantan" or under scientific name Nasalis larvatus which is, FYI, an endangered species. We traveled at exact noon or 12 p.m, making the hot journey not a very comfortable one, especially because those animals aren't coming out around that time. We did manage to see some, though. :D

Anyway, despite of that occassion, my holiday went disappointingly boring. Luckily a new episode of LPTV aired yesterday and it was a fun one. So besides living on internet, I eat and breathe, I pray and play (music), listening to music as usual, I mostly read books and... comics.

A-ha. We're getting into comics. I want to review some things about two of my most-read comics on these day-offs, which are released just recently.


THIS is the first one: Komik KambingJantan 2
If you're youth and you're Indonesian, you would totally be familiar with this title. Yep, the briliant and famous Raditya Dika is now back with some concept which artwork is done by once again Dio Rudiman.
Like the first one, this comic contains his story as a college student in Australia. Still with his comical actions, it spits jokes through the art, narration, and storyline. A difference with the first edition I noticed is the "Nicole" character was drew nicer in the comic 1. And this new release focuses on the motion actions, but the drawing is kinda rough for such thing, I should say. There are lot more jest and joke, and some subliminal gag in the artworks.

I like 8th chapter the most. It has light drawings, more humorous storyline than others -- though slightly tragic.
And the last chapter is awesome. It represents the author's character the most and clean gags.

The second (un)fortunate comic to review is....

ShonenMAGZ 1 year 2011. A compilation of shonen (male) manga (Japanese comic) I've been subscribing for months. I start collecting it since volume 56 and found it interesting.
However, this first 2011 edition is kind of... disappointing.
This kind of comic contains at least two chapter of each manga series it provides. When a manga is finished on a ShonenMAGZ edition, the next one will have a new manga to fill the finished one.
A new serie, which replaced the old one, is called 'Blazers Drive'.
To me, it's not a really good manga. I mean, the storyline is like has been ever: A gifted protagonist boy in a fantasy world, met some enemy, lost his family and then would win against anything in his way. It has too much too-pushing jokes.
I like the idea of a different situation of skill-power. It puts a thing named Mysticker as an individual's power. The mysticker can give the four basic-elements power they can use to fight. But that's not a reason to love this manga. Among the whole series, this one still stands as my least favorite.
My problem is not only with Blazers Drive, but also with BECK and Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle.
When I read BECK, my first impression was "this one is cool". It tells about a fictional rock band (I love rock music), their struggle through the world of music business and the dark side of it, an idea hard to find. BUT, the twist in the plots is kind of confusing nowadays. Talking about an unfinished song that fires a conflict is still a big question mark for me. Stiff jokes and artwork too.
Tsubasa Reservoir Chronicle? It's been in ShonenMAGZ from the start so before Blazers Drive released, this one is the least favorite. I don't get the story because I don't follow the serie from the beginning. It has advancing plots and twist. It's actually good and the artwork is amazing, but I just don't know what happens to this and that person. It has too much character I don't know.

So folks, because my holiday and your weekend ends in... *stares at clock* an hour, I wish you and myself luck for a good starter Monday tomorrow! :D Good night.

First Lone Trip

Currently listening to: [Start]: Brick by Boring Brick - Paramore ; [End]: I Wanna - The All-American Rejects
Current mood: [Start]: Hungry ; [End]: Sleepy
Random thought: I shoulda update my blog more :\

- Alright, today's topic is my first lone trip.
As I probably have told you guys from my previous posts, saya sedang menjalani masa-masa karantina pelatihan untuk olmpiade fisika tingkat SMA di Tangerang. and after 4 months of torture, saya akhirnya pulang hari ini untuk mempersiapkan diri untuk Ujian Nasional SMP.
Lumayan susah kalau kena penuaan dini (dalam konteks ini: siswa SMP dalam pelatihan fisika SMA :P), apalagi progress masuk SMA dan persiapan ujian akhirnya. Awal-awal saja saya sempat terpikir untuk masuk SMA 1 Yogya, namun niat itu terpaksa harus saya urungkan sekarang akibat pelatihan ini, karena proses penerimaannya akan menjadi rumit. Semestinya saya didaftarkan dengan surat rekomendasi atas nama organisasi pelatihan, yang menjadi masalah adalah fakta bahwa: "Saya terpilih mewakili Balikpapan untuk OSK dan OSP, sedangkan saya akan melanjutkan SMA di Yogyakarta padahal OSN baru akan dimulai 2 bulan setelah penerimaan saya di jenjang SMA." Nah loh. Saya mewakili siapa toh? mungkin itu yang ada di pikiran pihak-pihak pendidik yang terkait.
Jadilah nasib saya akan didaftarkan di SMA seberang gedung SMP saya saat ini.. -_-' well, that's not a main problem, but generally still sucks. Sucks because I chose SMA 1 Yogya to have the experience of being out of parent's sight control, but apparently this 'quarantine' gives me similar stuffs as I wanted. =)

So today I was out of the dorm... harshly. I was supposed to be picked up at 9.30, but I waited until 10.30 and no one had come. Apparently my aunt got stuck at the traffic and couldn't get the dorm so she decided to leave the picking to my other uncle and attempted to wait for me in the airport. I got picked up at 11.25. I fell asleep at the time so I readied myself quickly. Everyone was inside their room, and I couldn't tell what they were doing. I didn't get to say any good-byes or anything. Soooo... my mom said that this uncle knew some shortcuts that might take us to the airport faster than using normal route.

To get to the point straightly, I arrived at the airport at 12.15. When I checked in, they told me that the passengers should've boarded that time. So, I rushed myself once again, all the way to the plane. I never have travelled by plane alone before, and I thought in this first experience I could at least get myself relaxed, sipping Starbucks or walking around the hallway while waiting for the call. But this dream remains dream. Oh well, maybe next time. I finally got myself on the airplane at time. Thank God. And all the way home, at the plane, what I did was sleeping. So no special things or some exciting stuffs occured in the trip. Perhaps just the nervous breakdown, especially when the airport crews acted like I was already late and couldn't get home. =( I was terrified.

Sesampainya di bandara pukul 15.53 WITA, langsung dah saya ambil bagasi dan keluar. Ngapain lama-lama?? hehe. Keluar terminal, saya disambut orangtua saya dan adik saya. Ibu sempat menanyakan tentang perjalanan sendiri pertama saya, dan saya jawab saja seadanya: HAMPIR TELAT, MAH.
Kami berempat melesat menuju eWalk, duduk di seat Pizza Hut untuk late-lunch. Tiba-tiba saya mendapat telepon dari Romy cs. Guess what? Apparently those guys were going to airport to pick me up! WTF? They didn't tell me first =(

Eeh, tahunya datanglah Winona dari kejauhan bersama ibunya dan Devira. Lho?

No need for further information, right? As with Wino and Deppy will be the moment boredom never struck, we walked around eWalk and chatted in the Starbucks, talking about things occured or new stuffs since I departed 4 months ago.

Well, looking forward to see those classmatey guys that I have put myself effort on making them blog~!