Visual Sensibility

There will be a masquerade night tomorrow in my faculty building and I can say that I’m nervous. I’ve never been partying since the last one in high school. Should I dress up as someone as disguise?

According to ScienceDaily, a species of lizard is now extinct from the Hawaiian Islands, making it the latest native vertebrate species to become extirpated from this tropical archipelago. 

Small animals like this skink are prone to what Fisher and Ineich call “cryptic extinction” — when a species is easily confused with similar species that their extinction can go unnoticed for decades.

Read the rest of article here.

Professor Djoko is one of Indonesia’s renowned dedicated herpetologists and also zoologists and I bet he has known about this, or even the symtomps of its extinction. I will have his class on Wednesday and I hope he’s not sad.

Jecika Ardiati & Dienda Citasyari

From Session with Sport Division of HIMA-SITH Nymphaea ITB last week.

Another Third Year Madness

My new photo album has been uploaded and finally, I’m back with portrait photos and human expressiveness! Huzzah!

The sport division of HIMA-SITH Nymphaea ITB Period 2011/2012

My first successful group photo taken with Nalani, my 50 mm lens!

I always had to walk more than 5 meters before I could reach the nearest place to look for a public transportation. Knowing this habit of mine, people asked me whether I felt tired or not. I simply told them, mostly I didn’t.

College/university students mostly considered having an unhealthy life because of the high possibility of pulling an all-nighter almost everyday and lack of consideration to feed themselves with healthy foods. Knowing this fact, I considered the situation where I had to put a lot of efforts to achieve something as a blessing. I almost had no time to swim in public pool anymore since I entered this sixth semester that I thought walking could be the cheapest, the easiest, and the most possible way to work on my cardio.

Anyway, Alhamdulillah, I’ve been having quite good time living in a neighborhood where I can quickly fit in. I have good friends who live under the same roof and I have great mates from the same floor. I also always have a chance to meet children from other neighborhood and they always look happy everytime I took out Trua from my bag and everytime I started capturing their innocent faces. Just like Mom once said, “Don’t worry about things you should be happy about. They’re always there. You just need to widen your view a bit more.”.

rizkanoviandari:

Happy being 21 papah teguuuh 

See this man is kind of one who is very very kind to the girls, talks less, yet does more, and has a kind of charm who will diminish any barrier that covers almost every woman’s self that it will be hard for them to say ‘no’. Funny thing is that he’s seemingly not realizing his adorable self. I don’t know what makes him this good. Many assume that his very religious self is what leads him to develop the kindness. Indeed this man is one of people I put my trust on asking advices about things related to Islam and the life of a good moslem.

Happy birthday, Teguh! I’m sure that almost everyone in the faculty wants you to be the next leader of us, Bro! Many even dream of asking you many many questions on your future hearing session! Everything will be fine, Insya Allah.

First photo - Sometimes you can’t tell a Biology student to sit him/herself on a chair, even when in a laboratory. 

Second photo - The eerie, yet popular Mr. Skeleton whose skulls are sometimes modified by the Biology students for fun. Can you guess what pose it was doing?

The third year Biology students are about to, if not thinking about to, leave this semester prepared with answers to people’s questions such as, “Where are you planning to work at?” or “What are you going to do in future?”. I really hope I’m one of them.

Clockwise: Me, Kak Valdivia Idris (member of external division of HIMA-SITH Nymphaea Student Council), Kak Hanna (one of top scorers and members of Nymphaea’s volleyball team), and Kak Dwininta Widyastuti (Deputy of Information and Media Keluarga Mahasiswa ITB 2011/2012)

All photos was taken during International Conference on Biomedical Science 2012 last Monday and last Tuesday at West Hall, Institut Teknologi Bandung. Each of us held a different position; I volunteered as a main photographer of the event, Kak Via and Kak Hanna worked in VIP guest reception desk and as a Liaison Officer, and Kak Inta took care of things needed in the conference (the logistic team member).

Best things happened to me in the event :

• I met a doctor from Italy, Mr. Tiziano Zanin, who was in his first time in Indonesia. We talked a lot of things about Tuscany, Italy, which is one of my most favourite parts of the world because of its sunflowers, farmhouses, and natural sceneries. 
• I took many photos of the Nobel Laurate in Biomedical Science Year 2008, Mr. Harald zur Hausen, who was very very friendly, down-to-earth, and funny.
• Huge thanks to Lia. Because of her being very kind, I used an L lens to document a big event for the very first time in my life. Though it was just a kit lens of Canon EOS 5D (the 24-105 mm f/4 one), I really couldn’t hide my happy feeling that everyone noticed I couldn’t stop smiling while using it. In Indonesia, 5D is very very expensive and the jobless me can’t afford it at all. 
• I had very delicious lunches for two days. They were all western foods. I think the menu was set regarding the fact that most of the speakers were Europeans.
• Mr. Tiziano Zanin (the Italian doctor) and most of other international speakers were Europeans that I felt so blessed just by listening to them speaking about viruses, diseases, and experiences as a scientist. God knows how much I love European accents, especially the Italian, French, and German ones. The way they say words with ‘tch’, ‘sz’, and ‘ion’ was so beautiful.
• I had my very first experience as a main photographer of an international event. I also had a chance to did the main photo session which included the rector of my campus, Mr. Akhmaloka (who came from my mother’s village hahaha), the Nobel Laurate himself (Mr. zur Hausen), and other international speakers. I can still remember how fast my heart beat once I shouted, “Countdown from three, please!” and said “Thank you very much!” to all of them. Gott, thanks to the L lens!
• I saw and took some candids of Mr. Arifin Panigoro myself. I’ve known his reputation for being really down-to-earth, nice, friendly, and of course, for being a person who is deeply-respected by many businessmen in Asia. To be honest, I couldn’t recognize him in person at first until Mrs. Endah told me that it was Mr. Panigoro that I captured a while ago. He avoided my camera most of the time, showing such an atitude of a person who know himself very well.
• … and other private things I can’t write in here.

Though my life has been so great these days, I understand that I still have to face the reality in which I have obligations as a Biology student. I still have to think about the internships, the materials from the ministry office I haven’t finish reading to date, and other things related to academic and my own future as a cetologist.

For being the good daughter, inspiring first child for my brothers, and the next generation of world’s cetologist… You can do it, Sheyka! :)

I’m sorry for not getting this censored.

The cockroach was grooming in this photo, by the way. Grooming means cleaning itself in order to maintain its ability to sense the environment. For your information, do not catch a cockroach if you’re standing behind it because the back side of it is far more sensitive to threats or disturbances than its front side. 

The good news for today is that I finally finished the report for last Friday’s Animal Behavior practical class whose main topic is the behaviour and movement of American cockroach (Periplaneta americana), while the bad news is the sloppy me forgot to draw the cockroach morphology which means I’m going to get a minus with red ink on the blank space of the Discussion page (I’ve even given the space to draw!).

Oh, Dear.

One day in a sunny afternoon, I came out to the balcony of one of the laboratories in the fourth floor of my faculty building and found myself relaxed there. I sometimes miss being outdoor, capturing the natural beauty I’m not allowed to see in this frantic city.

Be patient, girl. Get your ‘homework’ done first, then get yourself a voyage of endurance!

I have just added 3 new photos to The Forgottens : Flowers album.

My Landscape Ecology lecturer gave the Biology students a very good news today. She told us to keep quiet, but I can assure you that I’m going to bring a lot of great photos of nature again this year. This is what I love of being a Biology student. Indeed nature keepers we are going to be! Aaamiiin :)