not a food blog
Whenever it’s “(month name) in pictures”, I always come into realization that I rarely took pictures of my surroundings, and mostly my food pictures for my food log. Anyway, here are some of the pics I took in April.
I also starting swimming lessons in April as I want to improve my swimming skills — and I also found I enjoy swimming more than brisk walk/jogging.
I finally finished C-drama “How Dare You?!” (2026) last week, and just recently, I started watching “Pursuit of Jade”. My friends have been watching it on Netflix and they have been raving about it ever since. I also saw similar positive reactions on /cdrama subreddit, so I’m quite excited!
I usually talked about C-drama series that I’ve been watching on this blog, but I couldn’t find the motivation to do so for “How Dare You?!” Not that the story is bad; it’s actually pretty good. IINM, it was from a donghua (C-animation, similar to Japanese’s anime or Korean’s aeni) and it gained popularity when the story got adapted to short-form vertical videos on social media (Tiktok/Douyin). It’s just that because the series was adapted from donghua then verticals, I didn’t find the cinematography to be impressive. A lot of the shots were close-ups or narrow shots, so I couldn’t brag a lot about it here, hahah. That said, the story is really good and it has a good pace with great build-up and conflicts. A bit of fair warning, despite the series’ genre is “comedy”, be prepared to bawl your eyes out in the middle of the series 💔
So! I started watching “Pursuit of Jade” and I am now at the end of episode 2. While this series is available on Netflix Malaysia, I chose to watch it on IQIYI because only on IQIYI I can pull screenshots of those gorgeous scenes. I also found the translated subtitles on IQIYI to be… better for my nerves. On Netflix, they literally translated EVERY word visible on the scene; so you would see “TEA” and “CAKE” on the screen, and it happens many times. Imagine a serious scene where soldiers marching to the battlefield then the subtitle with hugeass word: “TEA”. Whereas in IQIYI, they only translated the important bits or locations.
So far, I’m loving the series. Tian Xiwei as Fan Changyu, the main female lead, is so pretty! I also love how expressive she is.
As for the main male lead, Zhang Linghe, he’s, well, super handsome as expected. Zhang Linghe is one of the rising stars in C-drama industry, but I honestly hoping more from him, especially on his expressions. Zhang Linghe’s fans would kick me for this, but I found that the more handsome an actor is, the less expressive they are. It feels like they are trying to put up with their “cool” image at all times (yes, looking at you, Ao Ruipeng.) I’m hoping that Zhang Linghe would be more expressive as the series progresses, though!
I also noticed that the setting has always been snowy landscapes. Snowy settings have been quite popular for romance dramas because, well, snow (for example, “Blossom” (C-drama) and “Guardian: The Lonely and Great God” (K-drama)), and I’m actually hoping that we get to see the characters in different seasons. But yessss, some scenes can be so prettyyyy. Some even looked like they jumped out from those classical paintings.
I also love the cooking scene on episode 2. It reminds me of Dianxi Xiaoge, a Chinese Youtuber from Yunnan (please subscribe to her account on Youtube!) The food looks so yummy. I really love series that’s focusing on food and cooking, and I’m hoping we can have more of this.
More screenshots! (I’m weak for pretty scenesssss, hahah!)
The dead Internet theory is a conspiracy theory that asserts that, since around 2016, the Internet has consisted primarily of bot activity and automated content manipulated by algorithmic curation. This alleged coordinated effort aims to control the population and reduce genuine human interaction. Supporters of the theory claim that social bots were deliberately created to manipulate algorithms and enhance search results to influence consumers. Some proponents also accuse government agencies of using bots to shape public perception and opinions.
I gotta be honest, I don’t think the “supporters of the theory” is too far-fetched, because you know what? 5 seconds into the Wikipedia link, I got immediately sold. Sold. I found out about the Youtube video above from mortaki.place, and I came to mortaki.place site because I clicked someone’s pixel hit counter (88×31) and the rest is history. I’m so proud of myself for creating, and following, breadcrumbs instead of algorithms.
I feel the video above came in such a perfect situation. Just last night, after shalat Isya (the evening prayer), I sat down and, uh, “chatted”. I can’t say it’s a prayer because I’m not sure that starting a prayer with, “OKAY, SO, YEAH, ALLAH, YOU KNOW RIGHT–” is pretty normal or acceptable. Anyway. I did my long-ass monologue on how things have been feeling so… hopeless. For me. Just recently, there was a terrible accident involving two trains and a car in Jakarta, and all of the victims were women. Four days before the accident, there were child abuse cases (PLURAL!) at a well-known daycare center in Yogyakarta. The situation has been so bad that someone commented, “This is one of the worst times as a mother,” considering the strings of cases and incidents involving children and mothers. Initial reports from the train accidents showed findings of cooler bags, which means mothers bringing back expressed breastmilk for their babies at home. One of the victims who passed away was a mother on her first day on the job after 3 months of maternal leave post-partum.
And the worst part? I couldn’t even cry.
I sympathise, yes. I feel the sorrow, yes. But beneath all that, I feel numb. As if my body and brain have been ready for, “what’s next bad thing going to happen after this?” After that circus, farce, and awful theatrics at the White House Correspondents’ State Dinner, I thought we couldn’t go lower than that, but apparently we did. And I feel awful. I feel awful for feeling numb about lives lost. It feels like my brain is screaming at me, “what the fuck, man, how did you become this cruel?!” I hate myself for it. It feels like I’m being pulled into the vortex of hopelessness and everywhere I’m looking at, it’s always Bad News and Something Really Bad Is Going On And You Can’t Do Anything About It.
So, yeah, call me any words you have on your mind right now, I wonder if perhaps me stumbling into that Youtube video would be Allah’s answer, “here ya go. You spent 15 minutes yapping about how you’re feeling awful in the middle of the night while you should’ve slept, considering your cortisol level.”
Three points from the video: Existential problems/problems of the soul are solved with creativity, back yourself, and you are what you eat/consume.
I have so many thoughts about the concept of Dead Internet Theory: “The Internet has consisted primarily of bot activity…” This reminds me of my disdain for people who excessively use genAI for content as if they don’t have a brain of their own. You know, stories on social media or blogs that you can sniff and confidently say, “this is AI slop.” One of the top 10 things that can EASILY pissed me off? “I asked ChatGPT…” No. Ew.
Unfortunately, it happened (!) I was in this meeting, right, and for, uh, reasons, I couldn’t disclose the nature of the meeting. During the meeting, I asked something to this person, and this person asked, “Do you have Gemini on your phone?”
I immediately showed my discomfort. “No. I prefer not using genAI if possible.” Honestly? I was surprised and taken aback by that question because this person, of all professions, should not rely too much on genAI. It would be an insult to their profession and their passion (if this person has any.)
Call me paranoid or snappy, but I felt this person was suddenly patronizing me as they called me “love” after I told them that I have no interest whatsoever in consulting genAI for every minor inconvenience in my life. “No, love, ChatGPT is actually good! Open ChatGPT, then type “ladder of inference” and read what it’s all about.”
BOI, THE ANGER THAT I ANGERED. How lazy that could be? My goodness.
I refused to use whatever AI spewed at me. I typed “ladder of inference” on Google, scrolled past that damned AI section, then I found “Understanding the Ladder of Inference: Navigating Cognitive Pitfalls” (USC Gould) and “Understanding How to Use the Ladder of Inference” (HBR) in just 30 seconds. WITHOUT USING SOMEONE ELSE’S DRINKING WATER.
(I know it’s futile because someone else’s drinking water is still being used as Google is showing that yucky AI section on the top.)
I know that this should be a no-brainer to all of us. The signs have always been there. Heck, one of my favorite movies of all time is Pixar’s “Wall.E”, and the movie even predicted it way long before shitty genAI started to take over our timelines.
That said, a reminder is always needed and appreciated. I feel that’s why we have THAT corner of the Internet, where the early time of the Internet in the 2000s is still cherished so. I can’t wait to see them back.
This difference in mentality is one of the best things about web revivalists to me. In general, they are kinder and friendlier people than in the wider internet (in fact, being kind is a common tenet in web revivalist manifestos!). And it’s easy to see why. It’s harder to be rude or apathetic towards someone when you know they spent hours of their time documenting their entire CD collection just to share or hand coding a Miku shrine with all her songs from the year 2014 specifically or yelling at javascript when their theme switcher stops working for the fifth time. It’s easy to relate to the people around you when you know and can see that they put just as much time and energy and personality in their site as you do.
— Mordecai (The Mortaki Place)
Bonus: Speaking about genAI, I have loads of opinions about genAI. I know AI has been around since the 70s, and it has been helping humanity on a scale that some industries now rely on it. That said, ethics, ethics, ethics. AI helps medical experts and doctors find patterns in cancer and its cure? Good. GenAI steals artworks and spews ugly “Ghibli-fied” “drawings” despite Hayao Miyazaki vehemently defending the beauty of humans and humanity? Barf.
I was blogwalking and found a post by swissmiss (Subscription Cost Visualizer) so I wanted to give it a try. While I couldn’t find subscriptions for website host and domain name renewal (Hostinger and WordPress.com) readily available, I was able to added them manually along with additional subscriptions such as Kinokuniya Bookstore membership. I also need to point out here that some subscriptions that I enjoy are taken care of by our subscription to cable TV and Ari (hahah!).
It was pretty interesting.
Those are the ones I could remember for now, though. Some of them are renewed on a 3-month/quarterly cycle (IQIYI) and 4-year cycle (Hostinger website hosting).
When I was still a Happiness Engineer in WordPress.com, there was a discussion on hosting pricing. Some US-based HEs shared their confusion about why there are users who asked for a monthly subscription. Apparently, it was not super common in the US. The monthly subscription method, however, is pretty popular elsewhere, especially in South American and Asian countries. The reason being: It has less “commitment”; as in, you are not being bound to a service/company for 12 months, and you can bail out anytime without losing too much money. That said, economies of scale do exist, and yes, the yearly subscription method tends to have lower prices than the monthly one. While now WordPress.com has been offering monthly subscription for quite some time, I can vouch that the fee of yearly subscription is way cheaper in total sum.
I chose 3-months cycle for my IQIYI subscription because I am not a big of drama viewer afterall, be it C-drama, K-drama, or any other series/drama out there. I did enjoy C-dramas, but I’m still unsure whether I can commit for yearly subscriptions or not, hahah. The difference between a quarterly subscription and a yearly subscription is RM 10, though, so I miiiight still thinking about it (also, in this economyyy??)
In case you want to check yours, you can visit this site: Subscription Cost Visualizer.
OK, so, yesterday I revamped this blog, right. I’m not sure what happened, and it might be due to me opening several tabs of the same thing (Site Editor) at the same time and saved stuffs on some tabs without, you know, saving the others which caused cache hijinks, but I noticed weird things yesterday.
First, this blog’s template — template Blog Home — got reset to its default mode on its own. I don’t know what happened. No recent update on WordPress, Gutenberg (last update was 4 days ago), nor the theme Twenty Twenty Four (last update was December 2025), so I chalked the issue on cache gremlins. Not only the template Blog Home, but nearly every single template was affected, too. I got so stressed out because it was almost dinner-time and I haven’t made dinner (priorities, priorities…) Luckily, things were under control as I made most of the changes on the Site Editor’s Style section, so a lot of the style setup was still intact/saved and less minuscule changes on the small things. People who said, “don’t sweat the small stuffs” clearly haven’t seen bloggers.
Second, this still confused me a hell lot, multiple templates/copies of templates. Like, multiples, with the same name, even. Eh, hello, system not confused meh? “Which template Pages issit she wants to use? We have like 2-3 templates with the name “Pages” here!”
And you can bet that it was not me who made it. I have enough dignity to give files proper names, okay. At least I can put additional S on my files so I can differentiate between “final_versionsss” and “final_versionssss_ver_final_for_realss”.
I did check the issues list on Gutenberg’s GitHub in case there were any recent reports about this, but I couldn’t find any, so it might be an isolated, rare case (again, cache.)
I rarely saved post drafts when writing a blog post because I usually able to ramble in a short period of time, until today, I decided to write about how I designed this blog (sidebar, cute background, pixel-thingy, and the likes.) Suffice to say, it’s, uh, long. My dormant Happiness Engineer-soul came back in full force, hahahah!
I’m still working on it. Hopefully, I can publish it by this evening (Malaysia timezone).
Nindya. Kapkap. she/her. Indonesian in Malaysia. Millennial. Lo-fi. Animal Crossing: New Horizons. Murder mystery genre.
Currently feeling:
Part of blogroll.org
