coriander in pho

not a food blog

Bring it back to the 2000s

April 27, 2026 12:23 pm
I have been busy redesigning this blog after several obsessive visits to Neocities. I thought Neocities was just another website hosting place, until I found out that it’s not just a website hosting place. It literally a place where 2000s blogs thrive. I even found most of the bloggers are using imood! (~~and yes, I’m so tempted to re-sign up!~~ I did)

I just love how unapologetic the Internet and the blogsphere were back in its heyday. True that folks with interests in blogs, anime, mangas (those three were usually intertwined), and 1st or 2nd-generation KPop stars were deemed as outliers back then, but that was when things were genuine. We read blogs of someone battling with mental health and sadness and cheered them on, we also followed someone’s classes and exams, and everything was mostly with pure intentions and friendship. Blogs were diaries and opinions, instead of “5 Ways for You to Have Summer-Ready Body!” or any SEO-related articles. Bloggers experimented a lot back then; colorful explosions of JavaScript, iframes, glitters, and <marquee> were the “it thing”. Suffice to say, I’m so so glad to see those online diaries and musings and writings are coming back. I know they never left, it’s just that… It’s beautiful to finally find them again, you know? It feels like meeting a long lost friend.

On my blog, I added some pixels/tiny pixels as I really love them, hahah. I also used Bitmap-style font (“rainyhearts“) in some areas, and I really need to find time to make myself a clique/pixel banner! I also found out that to give the “retro” vibe on your site (that overlay diagonal transparent lines), you can use 100% CSS. I mean, the last time I worked on such thing, I had to create a transparent image on Adobe Photoshop to be set as an overlay image, hahah. How the technology has advanced! This is what I use for this blog:
```
body::before {
content: "";
position: fixed;
inset: 0;
background: repeating-linear-gradient(45deg,
  rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.02),
  rgba(255, 255, 255, 0.05) 1px,
  rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.03) 3px);
pointer-events: none;
z-index: 1000;
}
```
I took the code from itinerae‘s website with some adjustments (and refresher) from CSS Tricks.

I also added background image and worked on the layout. I really love itinerae’s and rem’s planet’s designs and layout! Their blogs are so pretty and I love the small details on it.

I’m so excited to blog again, thanks to the bloggers on Neocities.
Red onions

April 27, 2026 10:30 am

I found a couple of red onions, tucked under regular onions, sprouting in my kitchen. I did realized them have been sprouting for quite some time, but just now I found the time (and the will) to plant them, in case there will be green onions later on.

I also took the time to tidy things up in the balcony. We are moving into a much hotter, and much much more humid, weather recently, which means some placement rotations are in due time.
“Abdijiwo” by Retno Widya

April 26, 2026 10:59 pm

She handed me the comic book, “finally! It’s a shame that the publisher didn’t make it available outside Indonesia, hahah!”

This is a comic book, Indonesian comic book, titled “Abdijiwo” by my sister.

I honestly don’t have any words to write here, other than an immense pride of having my own little sister publishing a work, her own original characters (OCs), under one of the biggest — if not, THE biggest — publishers in Indonesia. “Abdijiwo” is a fantasy comedy comic, telling a story of a boy named Surya and his soul servant (abdijiwa) named Raden, and Raden’s adventures in finding other soul servants that were scattered all over Indonesia so he could go to the afterlife. The story is peppered with Indonesia’s local lore, ghosts, and ghouls in such an entertaining way. I particularly love how her drawings follow Indonesia’s traditional designs. This work initially started as an online comic under LINE Webtoon Indonesia, which I once wrote about here: ‘Abdijiwo’ by Retno Widya

Unfortunately, the publisher didn’t continue the contract, so there is only one edition of the comic. That said, if you would like to get this comic, you can look for it on online marketplace or indie bookstores.

Also, in case you want to check the initial version of “Abdijiwo”, you can check it on LINE Webtoon Indonesia here.
“Temberang” — Mimi Fly

April 26, 2026 9:06 pm

I love how this song is filled with pantun (Melayu poetic form).

Berbolak balik berdolak dalik, lidah bercabang
Always twisting your words, making excuses, speaking with a forked tongue.

…

Kau memang suka jaga tepi kain orang
You really love to meddle in other people’s business.
“I was born in the wrong era”-thingy

April 24, 2026 11:19 am

Translation:

“Who likes to romanticise living in the colonialism era?

You might want to learn the story of Pinah; a 10-year-old native Indonesian girl, taken away to the Netherlands to be a slave and treated cruelly” — Source

This reminds me of a Threads post, saying something along the lines of “a lot of us thinking that we would be part of the upper class whenever we are watching period pieces (“Bridgerton” series and the likes). In reality, most of us would be the lower class, peasants, or even worse. The servants? They were actually lucky and doing good in life.”

… and that stuck with me ever since. Especially with Indonesia’s history.

“We are standing on the top of our ancestors’ bones, blood, and graves”-indeed.

The featured image is a painting by Nicolaas Pieneman, depicting the arrest of Prince Diponegoro, a Javanese prince, by the Dutch. Please note that Nicolaas was a Dutchman and this painting was commissioned by De Kock/De Kock’s family, hence the painting depicted a victorious colonizer and how De Kock, the general who arrested Diponegoro, portrayed as “a loving father who has to send his misguided son (Diponegoro) away”, despite the Dutch was the one who betrayed Diponegoro by luring the prince to a “peace treaty meeting” and arrested him instead.

Do you want to see the one that made by an Indonesian? Here it is: “The Arrest of Pangeran Diponegoro” by Raden Saleh.

He appears to be struggling to control his anger – as would be expected from Javanese gentry – while the Europeans’ eyes are static and avoid the eyes of others

Quick blurbs

Saw this site mentioned the other day on Slack: neocities.org.

Scroll down and you will see “Featured Sites”. Never knew it brings back early 2000s, and it makes me so, so happy.

April 23, 2026