Hong Kong Park

An oasis in the middle of the city..

Remembering Ria ( 2 )

Several days before I went to Jakarta for vacation, I got a text from my cousin, Ria.
She asked me if I could buy her melaleuca cajuputi oil
( Indonesians love this oil. A remedy for common cold ).
I texted her back, saying I could . I asked her what brand that she liked.
She liked Cap Lang .

Little that I know , that would be our last contact .

On the night I left Jakarta, heading back to US, my mom called me.
Ria died on August 31, 2012.
Rafting Incident.

Oh Ria...Thank God, I was given a chance to spend three days with her together this year
( blog entry title .. Mama's Weekend Out )

She was my cousin from my dad's side. She was born and raised in Jakarta, Indonesia.
She was a happy person.
Her nickname, Ria, means " happy " in Indonesian, really matched her personality.
She was very caring and generous.
She loved shopping.. also loved shopping for others. She loved outdoors.
She was energetic . She enjoyed life. So it was very hard for me to imagine Ria died.

I went to her casket viewing in Sausalito.  She wore a nice red dress that her husband picked for her.
I was touched to see how loved she had been by Chris, her husband and stepdaughters.
She had a good life with them..
I am thankful for the Lethems to have her as their family.They were her joy .

I was sorry I did not come to her funeral.. it was in Hawaii..
I heard that Amber and Cameo , her stepdaughters, performed a dance in her funeral.
Ria learned ballet since she was young until her twenties.
Later on when the ballet become difficult, she failed the exam ( if I am not mistaken, for several times )
That did not make her leave dancing.
She then quit the classic ballet, joined the jazz  instead.
She choreographed ballet dance for the church performance several times.
Once, a friend of ours who was into performing arts,
asked her to choreographed a ballet dance for a Christmas performance.
I believed she got paid for that. Her mom mentioned that she was very brave to do this
while she did not pass her ballet exam...
She did not let limitation got in the way of completing something..
With Ria, everything that needed to be done, will be done.
That was one thing that I learned most  from her.. Getting things done..

I believe she quit dancing when she continued her study in Swiss.

The melaleuca cajuputi oil  that she asked, were packed and brought to US .
I gave those to a couple of  friends instead.
Ria's memory, though, will always stay with me and those who love her
Life's is short.. Her life was too short for her and her family...

For several days I try to think or not thinking about her...
about how fragile we are as humans..
Sometimes I cried .. I imagined how hard it must be for Chris, Amber and Cameo..
Also to Alex and Priscilla,  to all our relatives in Indonesia..

Her story ended... the chapters in Ria's book ended. The end...
Sometimes good story made you want for more..
But it is up to the writer decide how long or how short the story is...

I believe there will be Ria's sequel in another dimension...
A friend of mine who got his phd in mathematics from Berkeley,
once said.. that according to math calculation, there is a tenth dimension...
which Ria maybe in right now

Rest in peace Ria...
 

Mango Mania

A dear friend from Dearborn gave me 5 big mangoes
Several days before, I also bought 2 huge mangoes from grocery
What should a girl do with 7 huge mangoes ?
I made mango pudding and mango popsicle

Basically I just made mango smoothie...
mix some mango chunks with sugar and skim milk..
put them in the blender..then blend everything well
put the mango smoothie in the popsicle mold or ice cubes tray ...Freeze
In the photo, I used the muffin mold .
 Later , there was a  metal taste or smell when I ate them.
Not gonna use them again.. Maybe a silicon mold will do better.

For Mango Puding.
I mixed 1 packet of Nutrijell (Halal gelatin product from Indonesia, made from seaweed )
and 1 packet of agar-agar mix with sugar ( about 1 1/2 cups )  ...
then added 4 cups of water and 1 1/2cup of skim milk...
put everything in a pan and boiled them together..stirred often..
( for Nutrijell and agar-agar the amount of sugar is about 2 cups ...
you can use less or more )
( the amount of combined liquid is about 7 or 8 cups .
 I considered mango smoothie a liquid ) 
Before it was boiled , I added 1  1/2 cup of mango smoothie..
stirred and stirred again

When boiling, I turned off the heat.. add lemon / lime juice ( from 1 lemon/ lime )...
 I pour them into the glass container/ pyrex/ plastic pudding mold...
Let them cool down into room temperature ..then put them into the fridge until cold

Enjoy !

SSSSnake......

Also taken in Taman Safari, Cisarua

nice necklace, Dani

Sophie got hypnotized

A Dolphin Named Justin

We went to Taman Safari in Cisarua.

My kids loved the dolphin show

The pool used artificial seawater .

After the show , they got a chance to feed and shake hands 

with Justin, the working dolphin.

 

Sophie and Fanny

In front of the small merlion statue

Pulling the grass together

Eating Oma's birthday cake

This summer we crossed oceans and continents to meet our family back in Indonesia.

Intoducing Fanny, my brother's daughter.

Remembering Ria

On July 31, 2012, my beloved cousin Mariati Tani Lethem  ( Ria )  passed away on a rafting incident on Tuolamne River 

I  A Time for Everything
      1There is an appointed time for everything. And there is a time for every event under heaven—
2A time to give birth and a time to die;
         A time to plant and a time to uproot what is planted.
3A time to kill and a time to heal;
         A time to tear down and a time to build up.
4A time to weep and a time to laugh;
         A time to mourn and a time to dance.
5A time to throw stones and a time to gather stones;
         A time to embrace and a time to shun embracing.
6A time to search and a time to give up as lost;
         A time to keep and a time to throw away.
7A time to tear apart and a time to sew together;
         A time to be silent and a time to speak.
8A time to love and a time to hate;
         A time for war and a time for peace.