Sunday is The Due Day

There’s an old Hungarian saying:

If you walk up behind a fencer with a balloon, pop it!

If it’s a foilist he will lunge instantly

If it’s an epeeist he will just stand there

If it’s a sabreur he will turn around and kick the **** out of you.

-oOo-

Sunday is the due day. It’s up to us whether we will stand at the podium holding out a medal and having a face plastered with a victorious smile or…

Go back home with our heads held up high and maybe,

With our heads hanging so low and with tears streaming down our face.

Which one?

It’s 10% what happens to us and 90% how we are going to respond to it.

It’s fine being cocky. Just don’t underestimate your opponent.

We don’t have any ball to be past to, it’s just our own opponent and us.

We may not be knights in shiny armours but we are fencers.

And fencers play metal sticks with style.

Don’t underestimate us because…

The foilists will stab your chest until it has thousands of holes

The sabreurs will slice your body completely with no mercy at all

The epeeists will bind all of your moves and left your pride down in the mud

----ooOOoo----

My fencer fellows and I are going to go on our very first competition on Sunday.

One thing for sure is that I don't aim for the medal, I aim to slay all of my opponents.
Because that what we fencers do.
We slay them with our swo--
Ok enough said. 

--)-------------                                                     -oOo-                                                             ------------(--

Here's a song by Muse, "Survival" was used as the London 2012 Olympic's soundtrack. May this lift up your spirit, whoever you are. 

 Dadah

-Nibras Sakkir

AJCFC 2012 Galleries

*Note: not only Asia, but there were also Oceania countries (Australia & New Zealand) joining the competition

-oOo-

GO GO GO GO GO GO Indonesia Men's Epee Team!! 

I love it how people are united with each other with sports.

Sumpah Gue Sumpah Pemuda!

Pertama
Kami poetera dan poeteri Indonesia, mengakoe bertoempah darah jang satoe, tanah Indonesia.
Kedoewa
Kami poetera dan poeteri Indonesia, mengakoe berbangsa jang satoe, bangsa Indonesia.
Ketiga
Kami poetera dan poeteri Indonesia, mendjoendjoeng bahasa persatoean, bahasa Indonesia.

Baru aja baca barisan-barisan yang ada di Sumpah Pemuda, lalu tiba-tiba otak diahlikan lagi ke para generasi muda Indonesia. Satu hal yang dipikirin itu: "Apa kita semua sudah menanamkan nilai-nilai yang ada di barisan ini di dalam diri kita semua?"

Ya untuk yang ketiga jangan ditanya lagi, itu mah sudah jadi bagian dari kehidupan sehari-hari. Tapi untuk yang kedua dan pertama...

Agak diragukan keberadaannya sekarang (jengjengjeng)

Tapi sepertinya kalau mencoba membahas barisan yang pertama dan kedua, pasti akhir-akhirnya bisa nyangkut dengan yang namanya nasionalisme.

Oke emang nasionalisme tuh berkobar sangat kalo udah ditambah sama yang namanya sepakbola, tapi masa cuma sepakbola atau yang bersangkutan dengan olahraga aja sih. Jujur aku kagum banget sama nasionalisme orang-orang Indonesia, apa lagi orang-orang "tempo doeloe," beuh itu mah jangan ditanya lagi, tapi terkadang suka kasihan sama orang-orang Indonesia zaman sekarang.

"Eh eh eh, kita ke Singapura yuk! Barang-barang disana banyak banget yang nggak ada di Indonesia lho~"

Jujur aja kadang telinga saya sendiri suka nyeri ngedenger yang kayak gitu.

"Akh Indonesia, malesin. Mending ke luar negeri keren."

Yang ini harus dicobain diceburin ke laut-laut Indonesia dulu kali ye.

Saya sendiri makin jauh dari tanah air, malah makin cinta, mungkin itu juga awalnya dair rasa kepunyaan terhadap Indonesia sendiri. Di mata dunia itu negara kita justru beruntung banget! Budaya, kita ada segudang, kekayaan alam, silahkan hitung sendiri, apa sih yang nggak menarik dari Indonesia?

Nasionalisme rasanya kurang lengkap ya kalau nggak ada yang namanya persatuan.

Ngomong-ngomong soal persatuan, yang namanya tawuran lagi marak tuh...

(courtesy: mobile.seruu.com)

Tawuran diawali dengan sekelompok pemuda-pemuda yang sok jagoan...

dan berakhir dengan...

(courtesy: merdeka.com)

Penghinaan.

Hoi, dulu Soekarna & Hatta itu nggak kerja secara individual untuk memerdekakan yang namanya Bangsa Indonesia. Ada gitu tawuran? Ada, tapi ngelawan Belanda, bukannya saling ngebantai satu sama lain. Nah, bedanya disitu. Mereka tahu kalo mereka saling cekcok ngeributin hal-hal seperti perbedaan suku lah, agama, budaya, latar belakang keluarga, dan lainnya, pasti pihak lain yang bakal menang. 

"Anak Sulawesi, lawan Anak Jakarta.

Anak petani, lawan anak orang kaya.

Siapa yang menang? Belanda!"

Kalimat yang jleb sangat ini kira-kria bunyinya seperti itu, saya ambil dari salah satu adegan di film "Merah Putih." Bagi saya kalimat ini terkeren pertama, lalu pilihan saya yang kedua "Bau Orang Belanda itu seperti keju." (?)

(courtesy: id.wikipedia.org)

Tuh, bahkan di posternya saja disebutkan "Untuk merdeka mereka bersatu"

Hari-hari seperti Hari Sumpah Pemuda ini paling nggak bisa mengajarkan kita semua sedikit pelajaran, hadiah dari para pendahulu kita semua, orang-orang yang selalu menaruh harapan pada para generasi mudanya. Untuk itu lah, jangan sampai harapan mereka musnah!

Bagi para generasi muda dengan impiannya yang tinggi, bagi para penerus bangsa Indonesia, selamat Hari Sumpah Pemuda!

Dadah

-Nibras Sakkir

Santika Hotel, Nusa Dua, Bali.

It wasn't really my first time witnessing an international event like the AJCFC 2012.

The first time I saw fencing as a part of an international event was in SEA Games 2011, back then it was held in Indonesia, I was pretty amazed and at the same time speechless. That time I was still a beginner in fencing (though I must admit until now I even haven't joined in any kinds of competition, yet). I gaped at their banners, I gaped at the athletes, I gaped at their coaches, I gaped at their fast movements, I gaped at how complicated fencing is, practically I was gaping at everything back then.

But somehow a particular feeling in my heart starting to rose suddenly, it was that kind of feeling where you felt like you're just a little drop of water among the vast ocean.

I must say, I think that's what I really felt when I'm in the hall where they held the Men's Individual Foil Event in AJCFC 2012. I saw fencers that aren't that much older than I am, I saw how they are all competitive in what they are doing. One word came into my brain, fencing is their passion alright. Scars may be produced because of their tough battles, but their spirits still burn like an eternal fire.

Today the event was consisting of three events:

9:00 AM --> Men's Individual Foil (I learnt something from this one, considering I'm a foilist ahaha)
10:00 AM --> Women's Individual Epee
11:00 AM --> Women's Individual Sabre (I didn't get to watch this one, though watching sabreurs fighting each others must be one of the most entertaining activities of all time eh... I mean just look at their fast movements!)

I had quiet fun too, I saw athletes from different countries (34 countries are participating in this event if I'm not mistaken) and it wasn't really a usual sight for me, then I got to analyze their skills and learnt some useful techniques too.

This isn't really important for fencers though, but one of my favourite thing from every fencing competitions is that I got to see different fencing suits from many countries (muehehe, I can't help it. Jersey to me seems to be a pretty boring thing and I found fencing suit as one of the most gorgeous clothing I've ever encountered #waitwhat) For example this image below shows Team S. Korea's fencing suit sleeve, it's quiet catchy in my opinion and it really represents their national flag.

Aditya Baskara, the toughest junior Indonesian foilist I've ever known, sadly he's defeated by Hong Kong's Nicholas Edward Choi. 

As for Indonesia, I like our suit for the fact that our national emblem is there (on the sleeve), which is the Garuda Pancasila. From what I've seen, I hardly saw other countries' national emblems on their fencing suits.

Well then I still have tomorrow before I depart to Jakarta, hopefully it would add even more pictures to my AJCFC 2012 gallery.

Dadah.

-Nibras Sakkir

PS: I found out that my coach is actually a pretty well-known fencer by the officials of the event.

Bah, I'm proud of him. Very much.

Soekarno-Hatta Airport, Banten.

To be honest I don't really know how to start this blog.

I can't choose any specific topic for it because ideas are flooding up my mind, somehow in my opinion having only one particular topic for a blog is no fun at all. I failed at maintaining my old blogs because I was too focused on one particular topic, as the result I experienced the infamous hiatus and writer's block (if that's also available in the blogging world) then an idea of having a blog with free topics popped up in my mind.

Just a short explanation though, this blog posts would be available in two languages which are Indonesian & English. English is not my mother tongue so pardon me if I made any mistake in grammars and all that jazz.

I thought fencing as a part of my life (as the matter of fact, right now I'm just about to depart to watch some Asian Fencing Championship which is currently being held in Bali), I love to explore new things and increasing my insights, I love anime and mangas too, and I think being able to be involved in the political world is something remarkable, though I have no intention for being a person that's associated with the political world later on in the future and instead aiming for reaching the world of biology (hehe, zoology or botany to be specific, I haven't really decide between those two things).

I suppose that's it.

I'll be departing to Bali at 18:20 PM though.

Dadah.

-Nibras Sakkir

Yes I know the picture isn't really in a good quality at all and seems to be mirrored. I took it from my laptop's photo booth. The logo on the right is for the FIE (Fédération Internationale d'Escrime) which is the International Fencing Federation and the left one is the Asian Fencing Federation logo.