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Dear Mr. Gates:
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Date: Sat, 20 April 2008 9:44 WesternIndonesiaTime Subject: Fire At Grand Indonesia After My Letter Of Long Time No Cinema
Thursday 17 April 2008 around 11 o'clock, I wrote an email to the mailing list of my ex-senior high school friend's, about my being a "kuper", a slang word which stands for "kurang pergaulan" or "lack of relationship with others". I mentioned the fact that for more than 20 years I no longer watched movie in the cinema, proving my "kuper" status. In the evening on TV there was the news about Hotel Indonesia on fire. Hotel Indonesia is a historical hotel, has long been the landmark of Jakarta, located in the prime area. It was officially opened on August 1962 by the first Indonesian president Sukarno. Its designed was made by American architect, Abel Sorensen and wife, Wendy, and become the first star hotel in Indonesia, to accommodate Asian Games IV in Jakarta that was held on 1962. Now it is being renovated, with some extra high rise buildings surrounding it, to become Grand Indonesia complex, comprising of Shopping Town, Kempinski Hotel Indonesia, Kempinski Residence, and Wisma BCA. The fire that occurred at Hotel Indonesia after I mentioned "............for more than 20 years I no longer watched movie in the cinema.........", was like to remind me about my previous experience in 1982 whereas in my visiting two cinemas with a girl next door, fire occurred. The first fire was on the car that she and I rode to the Megaria cinema. When she and I and some other friends were waiting for the previous movie to finish, we waited in the yard close to the building entrance. All of a sudden someone shouted "fire !!!!", and it appeared to be from the parking lot, smoke raised from among the cars. We were then surprised to find out that it was from the car we just rode, a VW kombi van. Immediately we ran there, and my friend opened the engine hood on the back, and we found that the smoke came from a cloth dampen by the mixture of water, gasoline and lubricant oil. It must had been used to clean the engine by the owner, the brother of my girl friend, and he forgot to put it away from the engine. A few days later, the second fire occurred at Rawamangun Theatre, after she and I and some other friends watched movie there. A week later the cinema was on fire, burnt out the cinema building. So the fire at Hotel Indonesia, a most historical hotel in Indonesia, after my writing about "......... more than 20 years I no longer watched movie in the cinema........." becomes like a reminder for me to be patient to accept this destiny of becoming a rare person with a tendency of causing disaster.
Date: Sat, 20 April 2008 10:04 WesternIndonesiaTime Subject: Be Prepared For The "Egg On" After Previous Galunggung
Recent news about the increasing volcanic activities of mount Egon on the island of Flores, NTT, East Indonesia, reminds me with another volcanic eruption on April 1982, of mount Galunggung on West Java. It becomes historical because two British Airways were having problem because of the ashes of mount Galunggung in the sky. Mount Galunggung's major eruption took place on 5 April 1982, causing evacuation of 35,000 people and approximately 94,000 ha of cultivated land was severely affected. Other smaller eruption followed until 1983. On 24 June 1982, British Airways Flight 009 was on the way from Singapore to Perth, Australia. This extraordinary flight has since gone down in aviation history. As the jet flew over Jakarta, it was cruising at more than 36,000ft and had been in the air for an hour-and-a-half. Later on Captain Eric Moody found that All Four Engines Have Failed. As pressure within the cabin fell, oxygen masks dropped from the ceiling - an automatic emergency measure to make up for the lack of air. But some did not work. Captain Moody took drastic action, to prevent his passengers dying of oxygen starvation he went into a nosedive, dropping 6,000ft in one minute, to an altitude where there was enough oxygen in the outside atmosphere to fill the cabin once more. And quite unexpectedly, this action almost certainly saved the lives of every person on board. Suddenly, engine four roared back into life. As the plane fell past 13,000ft, another engine came back into action, followed by the other two. Yet one of the four engines failed again. With three engines operational, the plane closed in on the airport. Engineers at Rolls-Royce later found that the engines failure happened after the plane flow through a cloud of volcanic ash of Mount Galunggung.
This story of British Airways flight 009 was
then reenacted at the program of "Air Crash Investigation" with the title "All
Engines Failed!" on National Geographic Channel.
The next month another British Airways also
had similar problem caused by Mount Galunggung volcanic ash, but landed
safely.
For me, the Galunggung eruption has certain meaning. Its major eruption on
5 April 1982 was just one day after the birthday of my neighbor Nita. At
that moment I was not yet developed a close relationship with her. I began
the close relationship around the "Kartini Day" on 21 April 2008, the commemoration of Ibu
Kartini, known as the hero for woman emancipation in Indonesia.
The name of Galunggung was like to remind me in advance about my later on failure
to get married. Because it was like containing the meaning of
"Gal.....u......ng......g......u......ng". In which, "gal" is like
from the
Indonesian word "gagal" which means "fail", and "u" is from English word
"you", then "ng" is from Jakarta slang word "ng....nt....t"
with vowel "e" for the first syllable and "o" for the second syllable, which has the meaning of
English word "f...ck". While the rest "gung" is like to repeat the
previous two syllables. And in fact, I failed to get married twice at that
moment, first with Nita and later with her sister Irin.
So what could be the meaning of Mount Egon recent volcanic activities,
since it also happened on April. For me the name of Mount Egon is like
having the meaning of "Egg On" or "......when somebody's egg has been
turned 'ON', I should be ready for the fertilization....."
But considering my previous failures in the past that followed by some
disasters, I think I should be extra careful about this.
( Mount Galunggung from the source : ZOE BRENNAN,
www.dailymail.co.uk -----
john_seach,
http://www.volcanolive.com/galunggung.html ------- U.S. Department of the Interior, U.S. Geological Survey, Menlo Park,
California, USA,
http://lvo.wr.usgs.gov/zones/30410914-052_caption.html
)
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Thank's, A.M. Firmansyah Tel. +62812 183 1538
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