#4: What Mommies Do with the Money

“If you can not control your emotions, you can not control your money”

–Warren Buffet.

I’ve read books, attended workshop and talk show, done my own little research and number crunching, conversed with friends, I even passed Level 1 FRM some years ago after my MBA, yet my attitude toward money remained stagnant, not going anywhere. It’s like money and I don’t relate; that it is just a complementary element of my life. Absolutely absurd because on the other side, between hubby and me... it’s me who made plans a lot, spent a lot, regret a lot. I always say planning is halfway to good life. I always make excuses that the hike in our spending accounts was also to meet other’s needs: socials, gifts, emergencies, including unlikely-paid receivables. So every once in a while (most probably during tax report period), I whine again and again that we don’t manage it smartly.

The basics? That, I got the points:

• Don’t spend more than you earn (I knew it since I was about 7 yo when my allowance was practically zero Rupiah).
• Everything that doesn’t generate profit, go into “Liabilities” side (kitchenwares, shoes, wardrobes, gadgets, make ups I only used once in a blue moon).
• Keep the total debt at the max 35% of your take home pay.
• More investing, more zakat and infaq and less consuming (we invested more in “faith, happiness, books, experience”, we don’t let ourselves be materialistic animal :p).
• There is a factor called real inflation that will make me more likely than not to think over about sending my kid abroad for college (at first I thought about US colleges with their 35 grands tuition fee per year and other 25 grands for living cost. Then I fainted and woke up considering Europe which give more G-to-G scholarships, then Australia, and now maybe... Singapore won’t be a bad idea at all. I’ll say to Miss K: It’s near home, it has great universities and parks, and jogging paths, and it comes with multicultural aspects, right? But if you insist in going to dad’s university at Depok campus, we’ll welcome the idea as well).
• Unit link is no good, better to separate investment from insurance.
• The ads say, somehow, mutual funds will resolute all your financial planning problems...IN THE LONG TERM (that’s the keyword... if you invest wisely and long enough, you’ll get the result alright).
• We need emergency fund (a.k.a. idle money) about 6-9 times our monthly expenditures.
• How we plan to live as retirees with some grandchildren 20 years from now? Never too early thinking about our pension fund plans and our little K’s wedding funds, don’t we?

Those things linger in my mind in the last 5 years. But not really doing some real action with plausible strategy, except opened traditional saving accounts for Miss K, took home-and-car refinancing, and closed our unit links accounts to pay for our pilgrimage’s down payment. Good but not enough.

So this time I try to think about people with financial success. And I mean real people in my life, not Warren Buffet, not some celebrity mommies, not top business women, not someone I didn't know in person.

It’s not hard for me to seek a real person with real result to look up to. I remember how my mother was the “financial planner” in my family. My parent were both government employees with low-to-moderate fix income so she managed it very carefully. No single Rupiah went in and out without her consent. She was a natural treasurer that kept the cash flow balance. My dad had little (if not no) power or bargain in this matter. In her own quiet way, my mom set the vision for my family’s financials and made sure my bro and I were well provided and supported for our education.

When I told her about school amenities and class activities that cost something, however pricey it was for our financial condition, she always said, “Okay, we’ll keep that in mind. Don’t worry, we’ll settle them down in time.” And we indeed settled them down just in time, including school tuition et al for my cousins whom she believed would make a difference with their own futures. When I asked something out of that primer lists, she would say, “Let’s think it over in some more time. See if we really need it.” Most of the time, the last kind of replies would end up with nothing. If we kids didn’t talk about the dolls and toys and other items that we asked anymore after some time, then probably they were not important enough to be bought.

If we talked about consumption with my mom, it meant good and healthy food (didn’t necessarily come with variation, if you know the truth), education fee, decent yet minimalist homewares and wardrobes, transportation costs, and some stocks for family gathering (I mean in-house gathering, not so much on traveling idea, that’s why we didn’t travel often). 

When she talked about investment, she would talk about growing people of our extended family to be financially independent through education and fostering approach, then maybe sparing some money to acquire one or two property to prepare our college fund. That was it, not much but enough. With that simple formula they afforded some best extracurricular courses during our high schools (best English courses, good basket ball club for me and best art prep school for my bro), sent us to good private colleges in Bandung, and had my wedding party a bit more blasting than I expected (aside from proudly dispatched half dozen of cousins into their better and bright futures).

Our family was not debt-free, though. When I was in primary school, early each month my parent took us to visit a nice old lady who lived in a very big beautiful house in Cipaganti area. We didn’t know who she was then since she was not family member. All we knew was that she was okay. She always welcomed us with her big warm smile and offered us cookies and candies. After some chit-chat, my dad usually put down a white envelope in the table and pushed it toward her with a sentence full of deep gratitude. It lasted over years. Now I know that the nice old lady was their “godmother” who lent them some money to build our house when I was a baby. Since then, they had paid back their mortgage religiously every month until all was settled.

Then a new era came, we never made monthly visit again to the old lady except for holiday. My mom became the treasurer of the credit cooperative in her office and she was keeping the log strictly to everyone, herself included. Some people came to our house to borrowed some money from the cooperative. She never complained a thing about this business but I could see –from the number of people who came periodically to settle their payment compared to people who only came once to pick up the money they borrowed– that some people were not as eager to pay the debt as they were to get it. My mom burdened the default risk, but she smartly made some connections with the HR manager of the foundation they were working for, so my mom would short cut their monthly salaries after the “observation” period was over. She used to say that she knew which people would turn into success or failure by knowing their behavior toward debt/money. This stuck in my head since she was seldom wrong about it.

So it’s time for me to start because the right time is NOW. Better late than never. I get some help from Prita Ghozie’s “Menjadi Cantik, Kaya, & Tetap Kaya”, Ligwina’s “Membangun Masyarakat Indonesia yang Kuat”, and Panji + Diana Sandjaja’s “Make Your Own Plan”. I followed articles from www.ngaturduit.com as well as Robert T. Kiyosaki and Suze Orman’s website. I read some cool mamas’ blogs to flourish my financial literacy. I talked to some insurance agents, marketing staff of investment firms and banks (I’m still amazed by how little they know about the products they’re selling), a fin-planner wanna-be, property developer, in laws, and close friends. I’m so excited by the variability and possibility that I can make use of from their experience and suggestions. For the time being, we decide to go on our own and not engage in some formal and fee-based financial advisory.

We’ll thinking about term insurance as protection since we are both the breadmakers of the family; also car insurance since it was ended when the car loan was closed last year and there is little chance that we could afford to let Miss Livi go in a short while. We don’t plan to take anymore debt and wish to tap our credit card balance at minimum since a lot (I mean almost all) lists with the card resulted from dining out, shopping little this and that at the malls, and other alluring life style spendings. 

We’ll consider some from a variety of investment baskets for us to put our fresh eggs in: gold, mutual funds (seriously... this is the only hope for us that Miss K would go abroad... except maybe we will ‘encourage’ her to pursue some scholarships, haha), and maybe manage to get a small property to generate income to cover the debt. We’ll figure out how to build our emergency funds and construct our retirement “Decent yet humble life” plan later on.

My target is that by the end of 2014, we will have a sound financial plan for my family with a clear policy and steps regarding debt (credit cards, employee loan, cooperatives loan), investment, insurance, and consumption. I don’t think the LV tote I’ve had an eye on for a long time will match into this financial plan (*sinking heart*). 

I also want to introduce my girl to the basic of the personal finance (that the money doesn’t just come out of the ATM by itsef and the credit card can be AWESOME as well as AWFUL). I will tell Miss K that our financials –i.e. how we earn and spend– confirm our profiles, resemble our objectives and priorities in life, and be evidence of how well we make our decisions, be it big or small.

I am so thrilled by this huge project. Wish me luck to be a mommy who’s doing good with money!

#3: Having a Relationship: To Love Someone and Still Breathing

“Cinta: sebuah kegilaan sesaat yang dapat disembuhkan oleh pernikahan”

– Ambrose Bierce

I woke up in the middle of the night due to nature calling. I sighed and rolled down the bed and dragged myself to the toilet. Before reached the door’s handle, I took a brief look at someone sleeping on my bed. There he was. My dearly husband for 12 years, my dearly best friend of more than 15 years. Snoring audibly and perfectly occupying almost two thirds of the bed with his big “love pillow”.

I climbed back to bed afterward and couldn’t get asleep right away. What would I do without him? Would I be able to breath? To love someone is like opening up our hearts to wounds and injuries, to sense fear of losing and to feel insecure about ourselves. So what is it about love then?

Meskipun dia dipenuhi dengan keanehannya sendiri (seperti saya juga dengan keanehan saya), dia lah yang selalu ada di semua peristiwa penting dan mendesak dalam hidup saya dengan segenap perasaan yang saya duga sebagai cinta. Dimulai ketika dia muncul pas saya berumur 25 tahun. Keluarga saya hobi nanya “Belum punya pacar? Mau dijodohin aja?” (niat baik keluarga besar saya itu disambung dengan pertemuan dengan beberapa kandidat yang membuat saya kurang nyaman, serasa dikejar debt collector hihihi).

Setelah berhasil menjadikan saya pacarnya karena saya rada “playing hard to get”, beberapa minggu kemudian dia dipusingkan oleh ide rese saya tentang “kapan merit” (katanya jual mahal....hahahha). Jadinya ngga sempet ada adegan down on his knee and asked me “Will you marry me?” karena udah keduluan dengan rengekan saya yang ngga bermutu dan ngga ngasih solusi sama sekali. Sampai akhirnya kami menikah 2,5 tahun kemudian (see.... there was no short cut in love, buddy, even when you were whining all the time).

Kemudian dia juga menemani saya 2,5 tahun selanjutnya menjalani prosedur yang berkaitan dengan peranakan (kepingin hamil, udah hamil tapi ada kasus, melahirkan, kuret) di kamar operasi. Untung dia ngga semaput, mengingat betapa ksatrianya suami saya itu menghadapi kecoak (selama ini saya selalu maju dengan ikat kepala Jepang di jidat dan sapu sebagai pedang untuk menghabisi para kecoak durjana itu... watchaaaa....!) dan karet gelang kuning (karet gelang aja dilarang masuk rumah saya, apalagi karet sapintrong...sungguh perbuatan yang tidak melestarikan budaya lokal. Shame on him).

Dia kemudian turut berperan serta aktif dalam pengasuhan anak sejak bayi, kecuali waktu Miss K masih bayi banget dia ngga mau gendong, takut bikin celaka bayi, gitu katanya. Itu berlangsung sampai Miss K berumur 4 bulan, sodara-sodara! Kalo dimintain tolong ambilin barang bayi berupa popok, celana, kaos, dll dia menjelma jadi tamu dengan pertanyaan klasiknya yang masih terus berjalan sampe anaknya gede “Dimana disimpennya?”. Saya sampe heran, memangnya kita punya berapa banyak lemari perlengkapan bayi sih?

Btw, ini edisi ultah perkawinan ke-12 ya, jadi tulisan ini harusnya lebih banyak puja-puji :p. 

Ketika saya ngotot pengen cari beasiswa dan sekolah ke Amerika (it’s my childhood dream!), dia mengamini tanpa banyak memberatkan saya dengan pertimbangan suami pada umumnya kepada istri dengan anak kecil berumur 2,5 tahun, seperti “Inget ama anak, nggak usah neko-neko deh” atau “Perempuan mah apa sih yang dicari?” atau “Coba dipikir lagi deh, apa ngga di Indonesia ajah?”. Dia berpendapat kalo niatnya baik pasti semua bisa diatur, kan sekolah 2 taun cuman sebentar, jadi saya, dia, Miss K pasti bisa menjalaninya. 

Dengan restunya, di sore hari ultah Miss K yang ketiga, saya berangkat menjalani tahun pertama MBA saya di Bloomington, IN tanpa mereka. Nggak keukur deh berapa liter air mata yang tumplek dengan berbagai alasan: sayanya emang lebay dan cengeng kangen rumah, merasa bersalah ninggalin anak dan suami, sedih karena melewatkan banyak momen berharganya Miss K, stress berat karena banyak projects numpuk atau ujian yang gagal, atau saya lagi melow aja karena ngenes bisa jalan-jalan liat dunia luar yang indah tapi ngga bisa berbagi memori itu dengan mereka berdua. 

Ternyata Babeh bener, alhamdulillah semua bisa dilalui dengan selamat. Jangan tanya ilmu MBA-nya yaa.. udah mental semua, entah ke mana. Yang kepatri di ingetan cuman betapa besar dukungan Babeh dan keluarga serta betapa asiknya jalan-jalan pas liburan hehehe.

Kado dari Babeh ngga pernah ngga indah. Boneka beruang kutub putih gede hadiah jaman pacaran (namanya Richard). Itu beruang cuman bisa dinikmati saya sendiri karena setiap kali mau bergabung di kamar tidur kita sekarang, Babeh dan Miss K langsung ber-whuaaaatchuuuu ria! Sadly, akhirnya the ole Richard dikarantina di kamar atas. Trus jam tangan Guess mungil beli di Passer Baroe waktu ulang tahun perkawinan ke 3 (btw, itu jam tangan pertama saya seumur hidup dan masih saya pake ampe sekarang). HP Nokia sehabis melahirkan Miss K (berhubung HP-nya dicolong di kamar perawatan pasca bersalin sih). Dan beberapa kue ultah suprise yang sebenernya selalu ketauan ama saya. Terus hal-hal lainnya yang nggak kepikiran ama saya tapi dia lakukan dengan penuh semangat untuk kebaikannya sekaligus kebaikan bersama (berhenti ngerokok, diet dan latian lari ketika badan kian tambun). Untuk ukuran dia mah, itu udah romantis bingiiit. I lop yu pul, Babeeeeh....

Dari semua hal tentang dirinya (kita ngga ngomongin kekurangan deh karena kekurangan saya aja banyak banget hehe), bagian yang paling saya suka adalah dia tidak pernah mengungkit-ungkit apapun kesalahan saya, meskipun kadang berulang kali saya lakukan. Dosa besar atau dosa kecil. Hal itu mendorong saya untuk berperilaku sama. Yang udah terjadi ya udah aja, yang penting kita udah ambil pelajaran dari hal itu.

Oia, saya lupa rumusnya apa dan darimana (kayanya penelitian yang diceritakan dalam bukunya Malcolm Gladwell ttg pernikahan deh), tapi yang jelas manusia secara umum cuman tahan menerima beberapa perlakuan “jelek” saja dalam satu waktu dan untuk memperbaikinya butuh lebih banyak perlakuan “baik”. Kalo ngga salah rasionya: 1 jelek banding 4 baik deh. Perlakuan jelek itu bukan hanya yang bersifat fisik (memukul, mendorong tubuh utk menjauh) dan verbal (perkataan yang melukai harga diri, nada tinggi), tapi juga bahasa tubuh yang samar tapi menyakitkan (mencibir, menyerngit, senyum menghina, merasa jijik). Yang terakhir ini yang paling parah dan diam-diam bisa membuat pernikahan hancur.

Jadi kalo kita lagi berdebat dan berantem beneran, palingan cuman tahan adu beberapa kalimat aja, karena tau percakapan itu ngga bakal ke mana-mana. Muter-muter di situ dan ngga selesai, bahkan bisa saling menyakiti. Kalo dah gitu biasanya saya bubar jalan dan ..... tidur! Dia juga sama. Tidur is the best policy in such circumstances. Biasanya kalo tidurnya bener, pas bangun kita udah ceria dan bisa melihat hal-hal yang sebelumnya tertutup kabut hitam ... Syukur-syukur abis itu baikan. Hehehe. Emang sih kesannya menghindari konflik, tapi daripada merembet ke mana-mana, mending ditunda aja dan diomongin lain kali.

Ngomongin tentang soul mate dan pernikahan, saya setuju dengan ulasan Mama Slesta dalam blog-nya yang kaya warna kehidupan perempuan jaman sekarang dengan seribu pilihan dan tantangan. Kata Mama Slesta, setiap hubungan pasti melalui siklus yang tidak terhindarkan. Baca deh. Kesimpulannya: nggak peduli nikah ama siapa dan udah berapa lama, pasti setiap pasangan ngalamin hal itu.

Pastinya bener sih. Ibuk dan Bapak saya aja yang udah menikah lebih dari 40 tahun masih terus berusaha beradaptasi karena masing-masing dari mereka juga mengalami perubahan seiring usia dan lingkungan yang dinamis. Setiap saya pulang kampung, pasti ada aja ceritanya bahwa “Bapakmu itu lho.....bla bla bla” atau “Tau sendiri kan Ibumu, bli bli bli.....”. Tapi tetep aja sepasang nenek-kakek itu rukun jalan-jalan belanja ke Pasar Baru Bandung naik angkot, bikin keluarga kebat-kebit karena kan kesehatan beliau-beliau agak menurun akhir-akhir ini. Belum lagi kalo diem-diem kompak melanggar diet masing-masing sampe akhirnya ketauan karena berasa sakit di sana-sini. You only have your kids, at your best, until before they go to college; after that... your spouse is all you have. Makanya baek-baek dah ama misua :p

Mamak dan Akung (sepasang mertua saya) juga ngga terkecuali dari permasalahan pasangan yang  hidup bersama. Mamak mengeluh kalo Akung susah dikasih tau, keukeuh, dan yang paling ngeselin ngga pernah kasih ide mau makan apa, jawabannya selalu “Terserah”. Udah susah-susah dimasakin taunya ngga dimakan. By the way, they have been married for 50 years so it means 50 years of asking “What would you like for lunch today?”. Perlu 50 tahun untuk tau bahwa kadang ada banyak hal yang ngga bisa diubah. Kalo soal “susah dibilangin, keras kepala, dan keukeuh” kayanya semua orang juga begitu deh (hampir 99% sodara dan temen cewek saya bilang kalo suami mereka berwatak keras dan keukeuh, dalam berbagai tone dan konteks :p). 

Jadi belah mana ada cintanya sih? I guess the love flows very gently through our veins. Not too strong to get us  heart attacks. Not too weak to let us die dryly. The love hormones which created “temporary insanity” was probably out of their way after some years, but who needs constant juggling and having millions of butterflies inside our belly nowadays anyway? The love we’re expecting now is more like a tonic to help us develop and enhance a good decent healthy life, as well as to heal us from life's wounds and injuries we couldn’t resist.

Nevertheless, just like any other “living” thing in the world, love needs to be cherished and nurtured along the way. It could be dead. Obsolete. Empty. Frozen. Yet I don’t know how exactly we plan to keep the flame alive, it’s too much for both of us to talk about. My best guess: we’ll live it day by day. Acknowledge each other as a person, not just a spouse with loads of obligaton to keep the holy marriage works. Be thankful for our togetherness and undestandings as well as our disagreement and fights. Treat each day as a treasure. Grow up (and have ourselves fix things a little bit to be compatible) together. Take care of each other’s feeling... and our greyhair and wrinkles. Have some miles running together... in different pace (that’s the mantra!). Have only one TV, so we will be stuck on each other’s favorite TV program. Get some seductive lingeries, maybe. Make another baby....

Wooow...wait! The list could go wilder, you know. 

So, this is it, I guess I have to stop right here, right now with some wishes. If you have found the love of your life, stick with it until it ripes again and again. If not, take a look around you as she/he might be there all along, anxiously wait for you to open your heart. If you have a love who doesn’t respect you and make you worse a person, maybe it’s time to think about it again. 

Love yourself, love others and have a wonderful life, my beloved friends!

#2: Living a Healthy and Happy Life

“I believe human body, if well taken care of, was determined to endure 80 years”

--Dr. Andrew Neil

Did I always stick to healthy life that I had pledged 1,5 years ago? Honestly, too many times I compromised my health by making decision I always regret: mindless eating with not enough water, veggies, and fruit intake. I had several out of town duties that forced me to stay awake until midnight (not so me, in that sense). But when I was at home, I also slept very late some nights a week only to watch TV series (including crimes episodes I have watched before. Duhh?). 

I also preferred being a potato couch on weekends rather than delivering valuable items for me and the family like I used to, e.g. trying new recipes, practicing yoga, or cleaning up things. At the office and in the street, I let myself drowned by constant requests, problems, and people’s dissatisfaction about almost everything on earth. 

Melancholy yet (wanna be) perfectionist by nature, it gets me frustrated to see how things not going the way they should, to witness people so irresponsible and ignorance, to know that most of the time I can only wish I could make the world better, to see that some part of my to-do-lists were carried over to the new ones.  

The result was I got very sick without getting any notice. During May 2014, I had swollen gland, prolonged menstruation, abnormal fatigue, unwanted weight-lost, puffy eyes, and very dry skin. I knew something was wrong yet I chose to not listen to my body and thought everything would be alright with couple days off at the end of the month. WRONG. Next thing I knew, I was in hospital for 5 days due to some infections that caused severe inflammation and abdominal pain. 

It gave me sort of warning to see if there are things I should consider to change. I believe it’s more about my attitude towards recent development in our days; not so much about the absent of strong fundamentals needed for my family’s health and well being. Our parent’s illness, family matter, Miss K’s schedules, and our continuous work activities seemed to exponentially pile up our life since New Year.

Before I got really sick, I read books, online articles and social media posting. I observed and talked to people with healthy and happy life style. It’s all true, what they said. No matter what kind of approach these people committed to, their life has been better after they accepted themselves, and also accepted the rest of the world. So maybe I should do it (again), too. Maybe it’s not too bad to be a little sluggish, to be behind schedules sometimes, to be a little demanding for quality to others, to say “No, I’m sorry, not this time”, to spend time and energy (and money) for myself once in a while, to see people and things with new eyes. Maybe it’s good to be home before my kid in the evening once or twice a week. Maybe it’s time to let go of the world with its pain. And maybe I need eyeglasses as well (I’m serious, it started to trouble me when I’m speed-reading).

It took a lot to remind me that balance high-quality intake, enough sleep and rest time, regular exercise (plus medical checkup, too) and high doses of laughter plus optimism were essentials to our health. With that in mind (and some antibiotics support), I got better.

After dwelling into “Eight Weeks to Optimum Health” by Andrew Weil and watching a lot of cooking shows during my hospitalized holiday (“The Food Truck” and "The Eat St." with juicy hamburgers and hotdogs and tacos certainly had to be excluded, though), I took some of their simple advice that suit me and well expected to make me be and feel better:

• Trying to cook and eat more fish and grass-fed beef, take more fruits (the berries are the best) and veggies (carrots and broccoli are best with light cooking);
• Considering garlic, ginger, and rhizoma and green tea seriously as material for natural remedies;
• Starting breath exercise as I continue yoga session and build up my walking and jogging activities gradually;
• Having sauna/steam bath once a week to help my body expel some toxic (alhamdulillah, we had small facilities in my office complex that I barely use);
• Being only with people I like and have positive impact on me –as much as I could;
• News and TV fasting (no more Kardashians, child abuse and corruption cases! Only news about the good-looking and high-achiever CR7 and cooking shows are good enough for me right now). What a coincidence that our 10,4 years old TV was shut itself down and refused to operate since last week :p  sigh....;
• Buy myself some flowers (or in my case, skincare and fragrance to satisfy my sense and skin).
• Doing only things I love for my spare time (reading, running, writing, easy [not business] travelling and cooking, and shopping...upps *mouthshut* )

Some family and friends suspected running was the culprit of me being sick. Only few (okay, three person to be exact) noticed that it was the other way around. @vindras tweeted me that there was imbalance between the meetings and running. Babeh said that what I did when I was not running might be the dominant factors. I confessed that in the past month, I was not as discipline with my intake, sleep, and morning runs as before. I missed a lot of them for various reasons: ignorance, works, and merely ‘don’t feel like doing it’.

The doctor said I can restart my training by walking and jogging easily 2 weeks after released from hospital. Not hard since all my running were in easy level, anyway. But it means I have to give up 10K at MAPALA-UI “Run for River” on June 15th. It will be held in Babe’s campus at UI-Depok, so it’s kind of big reunion for him and his friends. Also a chance to show off a glimpse of his life during college years to me and Miss K. It’s like a homecoming party for us. We are really excited about it. Miss K will take 5K route and if everything is fine with me after 2 weeks, I plan to walk the course behind her just to feel the air.

 

Despite unnecessary guilty feeling that I left my team at the office with bundles of unfinished projects, all and all I am glad I’m having the indulgence to be off-site this week to recover. 

It’s time, babe. It’s time to cool down a bit, be bored, and enjoy the recovery time.