I finally received my Association of Indonesian Translators (Himpunan Penerjemah Indonesia/HPI) membercard. It’s a great achievent for me, because I got the membership and the card because my skills were approved by professionals (I was invited to join the association–I was really honoured!). The membercard isn’t something like ID card or ATM card–it shows that I’m a professional!

And so last Saturday I attended the second member-meeting in Kafe Dapurku, Kuningan. (The second, because although HPI has been around for a long time, it once went to sleep for some years, so it’s all been reset to zero). The first speaker was Pak Kukuh Sanyoto, a Spanish/Indonesian interpreter/translator, once a weatherman for RCTI. Enviably slim and lively despite his age, he told us about, among others, how he got into the business. He said when he was 19, he had a fight with his diplomat father–at the time was posted in Africa–so he left home for Spain. He only took 500 dollars with him, and so he lived a life of a renegade there for months. He spent some more years there to learn Spanish in college. Wow. Isn’t that a very interesting experience?

The second speaker was Pak Widodo, with 30 years ‘ experience of being the translator for former president Soeharto. (”I’m also a son of a diplomat, but my youth was tame compared to Kukuh’s… and currently I don’t have as much hair as he does.”) There were also other interpreters/translators who shared their experience. All in all, it was very interesting.

Current project:

• I’m still continuing Regus. (Currently up to chapter 005A are available to download.) In fact, it is the only comic I’m working on right now; I planned to join the forthcoming magazine to be published by Megindo, but I don’t think I have time for it right now.
• Talking about Megindo, we have a new book division. A children book that I wrote will be published by the division, with illustrations. Right now I’m preparing to write the sequel, and another book not included in the series. We also have other plans for books to be published. Wish us luck.
• I’m currently translating the 8th edition of Campbell’s Biology, Dan Green and Basher’s Why Matter Matters (a very interesting physics book), and Plantagenet Somerset Fry’s The History of the World.

And there’s a plan for me to appear in m&c!’s Deathnote/Bleach-related events in Citos. Will update more about this.

This post is password protected. To view it please enter your password below:

Password:

I’ve finished the translation for e-explore: Animals. Now I’m going to start with e-explore: Science, and also with the 8th edition of Campbell’s Biology (one of the most trusted undergraduate biology textbook in the whole world).

BTW, my translation for Scott McLeod’s Reinventing Comics (KPG) is now on the store. Go grab it!

Oh God, when’s holiday? I really need some break.

My idea was creating a poster for an imaginary anime-styled animated Mando Diao film.

I just hope that the image is big enough, and with a resolution high enough to be printed as a poster for their studio.

Mando Diao: Misty Mountain poster

Am thinking of revamping the whole site, this time to suit my AirComic, Regus. I have designed the nine sons of the demon; I will draw them all and display the images here.

And I’ve finished my Mando Diao mission!

And right now I’m busy:

- teaching and grading papers

- editing several articles on forestry

- editing a guide for talented teens

- editing an astrophysics book

- working on NASTEA MIX

So I’m pretty occupied at the moment; but I’ll have a long holiday in the last week of this year and the first week of next year. Wish me luck!

Other news: I’ve bought a tablet, and I hope it will boost my drawing/colouring skill soon.  *cross fingers*  Well, holiday is coming - it’s almost Idul Fitri - so I will have spare time to give the tablet a shot and finish some artwork that have been waiting idly at home.  And continue playing Persona 3, of course.  I’m crazy about the game.

Eid Mubarak, Minal Aidin wal Faidzin, Met Idul Fitri!

Other than teaching, I’m editing a very wonderful book called The Gifted Kids Survival Guide: A Teen Handbook by Judy Galbraith and Jim Delisle.  Oh, if only this book was available in Indonesia when I was a child or a teen…

You can find my reviews on Osamu Tezuka’s Buddha and Kanno Aya’s Otomen in this month’s issue of Animonster (volume 101).  While next month, you are bound to read my report on the discussion held by Japan Foundation and KPG (called Buddha: Religion and Comic) and my review on Shiomi Chika’s Yurara no Tsuki and Rasetsu no Hana.

 Well then folks, your comments and opinions are always welcome :)

Hmmm… where should I begin?

I like them, that’s crystal clear. Their pictures adorn my Multiply and LiveJournal accounts. They’ve turned me into a fetish over their Jack Skellington legs. They’ve inspired some drawings that I created and will create. And you know damn well how hard it is to objectively judge a record when you’re heavily attracted to a band.

But since nothing is purely objective, let’s just start dissecting their debut album, ‘Strange House’ (that I bought legally at ak.’sa.ra, in case you’re wondering where to find it in Indonesia).

Some reviews have warned me that the record is ‘trashy’, that if only we ‘could judge them by looks only’… so I think my state of mind when I tried to listened to the album for the first time was somehow balanced between the rather cold reception of other critics/reviewers and my own predisposition – if we may call it that – toward the band.

The album is opened by ‘Jack the Ripper’ that now sounds like Bauhaus and Eighties Matchbox B-line Disaster have joined themselves in a holy union (no, that’s a frightening analogy, let’s just forget it.). ‘Jack’ sounds heavier and gloomier than the previous punk-y version, but I love how the tempo changes about halfway through the song. All in all, I like ‘Jack’ – it’s a brilliant song, no matter how The Horrors recorded it. (You got some pulled muscles trying to dance to the previous version of ‘Jack’? Well, bite your nails in vain now, because the beat is again all wrong for you to try and dance.)

(more…)

I really enjoyed working on Gonick’s book, and although my editor naturally edited my translation here and there to make it even more funny, lively, and correct, I’m glad that some of the jokes I translated were accepted. Well, you can’t find a perfect translation for ‘It’s heretic clobbering time!’, bless The Thing, but there are jokes that can be adapted, such as:

(more…)