I swear I'm gonna come up with a better picture next time but I am super excited to tell this right here with my broken english since .. I finally visited Perpustakaan Umum Provinsi DKI Jakarta Cikini, and it was happened three times last week! YAY 💛

At first I registered at perpustakaan.jakarta.go.id, got my account verified by uploading ID Card, weeks before I actually fill out reservation form. I planned to make a visit at Tuesday but the day before that, one of my colleagues brought durians and had a durian party at frickin 10 A.M.! 😵 Can you imagine how the entire room smelled like? No wonder why Japanese said it smells 靴下の味.

Wait, what durian has to do with library visit?

For being the one and only person who can’t stand the smell let alone eat durian, I moved to musholla to keep my sanity. But two hours later, when the place packed with people and my legs began to hurt for sitting on the floor for a long time, I came back to the room only to know that the smell seemed stayed since people threw the seeds in the trash bin near my desk. So I got the idea to move to Perpustakaan Cikini for it is only few minutes walk from my workplace. I quickly made a reservation, packed my laptop and rushed to go there by myself.

For as long as I remember, I never had been to public library. I used to visit library back in college only because it was quiet and free—I did not have to spend money to buy drinks even though the wifi sucks. And sometimes I could see some international relation students practicing roleplay on the opposite corner. Okay enough for the intro.

Once I arrived, I scanned my reservation script in QR to enter, and then I walked into the baggage deposit to change my bag to the clear one that the library provides, and get the locker tag in exchange. The ID and password wifi are written on the back of the tag. Right in front of the baggage deposit, there is a table with monitor screen and a shelf beside it, for visitor who wants to return the book or borrow book online through the account.

You must get your account verified first to borrow books. It is allowed to borrow max 2 books per person in 14 calendar days. Yet if you could not finished it, (the staff said) you can extend it max on Day 13 through the website.

Once you borrow books through online, make sure you wait the status turn from 'menunggu konfirmasi' until 'siap diambil'. If not, you'll end up like me who had to come back again the next day because the book wasn't ready to be picked up yet and it was already past lunch time. If I cancelled the booking, my account would get suspended for two days 😅

Like any library, no food and drinks are allowed and there’s no tenant that sells drink inside (I tell this here because I overheard some visitors asking the security the same question)

Even though the TIM XXI, warung ikan bakar, and my jogging track there will be forever missed, I would not complain anymore as they were all replaced with this beautiful library 😀

This weekend A took me to PIK. For the very first time I went north for fun and felt excited about it. I planned to visit Scarlett's Café while A wanted to try a famous resto he saw on TikTok. We drove straight there right after Ied Prayer. It was a sunny day and I think it would be more enjoyable if we went there around noon 😅

Cove at Batavia PIK offers one of a kind places to eat but since there are some food chain we were already familiar with and easily found at Central Jakarta, we decided to try something new, our choice would go for food that we couldn't get around neighborhood, like Pizza Dealer.

Too bad I forgot to take a picture of the pizza itself. The ambience inside reminded me of Slice Pizza at Kumulo BSD. The taste was okay, yet I expected more bacon beef on top of it though 😆

We also spotted some old fashioned with nostalgic vibe restaurants like Zangrandi—brought the memory back when this was the first place to date with A at Surabaya—and Maison Weiner. After a few stroll we stumbled upon this store:

 I always had their chamomile tea on my staple and realizing that we only had a few left, we bought some.

The next stop would be A's wish list : Ponggol Nasi Lemak.

1. A said that if his life was made for FTV, the title would be 'Istriku, Pengepulku' 😂as I am trying hard to prevent him throwing away waste (organic waste goes to composter, anorganic waste goes in pile for me to wash later). One day I brought a bag full of cleaned trash, hand-carried it in KRL from the office to the house so that @rekosistem could pick those up. Some people called me insane, but it was the only possible, make sense option for me. Anyway, after months of subscription @rekosistem, they sent me a recap through email:

Is there any greener packaging products I could switch into that have the same function as bayg*n and deodorant? 

2. I am so blessed to be currently in such a strong team at work. I am glad that I feel being supervised, have bosses who checked my work no matter how small—unimportant it was, and correcting it—if I made mistakes so I can learn from them—and I have learnt A LOT from them. I could not be more grateful than this. Becoming the one and only female member, I do not want to be,  or be treated as, the weakest link in this team. I'll beat my ass to earn that 💪🏻.

3. It was so disappointing to come back to my mum's house only to realize that it was like a landfill; stuffed by my sister's shits, and she blamed mine for it 🤯(which already lost in the first place!). I barely find my cat carrier for God sake. I bought microfiber cloths and sent it straight to that house so that I could clean up there, only to know that it was lost either. Every corner is a pile of clothes and papers and things I could not identify. I was furious at that time until the point that I let mom and her to do anything they want with my things—throw them all away (my college books, comics, and clothes) just to make it clear that it was not my freakin' stuff that stuffocated the house!

4. I feel bad for A to have to deal with my poor photography skills 😞, me having no idea how to drive a car while her girl friend could drive a car from Klaten to Jakarta, me still being not considerate enough to read the map, when it was needed the most.

5. At first, I really have no idea why some of my plants were dying during my visit to hometown for less than a week. I mean, I have watered them before I left them 😢. And after endless browsing and remembering that rain and gloomy days occurred for the past few weeks, I came into conclusion that fungus and bacteria were the ones to blame.

6. The end of the year was harsh for me. I made some effort to redirect my life, finally got into the last step, ran out of excuse to leave the office, got my hopes really high. However, failure hit me hard until my allergies went on again and left marks permanently on my skin 😰.

7. I did intermittent fasting (IF) starting this march and it eventually reduces GERD symptoms, but still struggling with constipation though. In my case, I know that this constipation are caused by lack of work outs even though I ate clean (I always eat clean!). No matter how much water I gulped; greek yogurts, vegs, and fruits I had, it did not work much for me. It all should be consumed in a day combined with work out. The best part is, IF helped me shedding some weights! woohoo! 😆

8. I come clean and clear to mum why I live the way I live right now and it apparently lift some weights deep inside. I did not get into details but I pointed that the last few years was hard for me and A so I begged her not to push us into something we did not want to. I do not need her to help, moreover tell it to others; hopefully she could understand and accept that.

9. Years ago when pandemic hit, I began to hate myself for not considering to purchase a decent laptop. I felt enough using laptop provided by company but the possibility of getting the broken one is pretty high and for the one who depends on company internal network that required to remote PC from home, it left me stressed out. Turns out, years later, company I currently work in bought me a brand new one with 3 year employment in exchange. And for people who would die for a new laptop, I felt so lucky at the moment ✨ .

10. Some people got me wrong the whole time by saying that hand washing the laundry was my ultimate hobby. Why though 😳. I mean, that would be a weird hobby one could have. I just take care of my clothes that much because I do not want them to look worn out easily. Most of the clothes I have right now is still in a good condition thanks to my younger self 😂.

11. Apparently I reconnected again with my circle in college since one of them is going to get married. We don't see each other since 2018 and rarely chat to each other since then. But while changing text in group, there's this person who's been harsh to another 😐. Not to me, but to other person. I don't think her remark is acceptable, yet I remain silent since others did not respond about it. Did she getting meaner? Or did I no longer fit in in this circle?

I really don’t know when exactly my interest in the environment grew, but I remember I was keen on getting into Environmental Engineering; my first choice for SNMPTN exam—which by the way, I’ve never gotten into.

Since I was a kid, I’ve been taught to use clean water and electricity wisely, more of a bill-wise kinda thing other than eco-friendly things (or maybe that was easier for kids to understand, or easier for adults to explain, I don’t know). Yet that was a good start though.

Fast forward to these days, when I got married and double the garbage that I always put into the trash bin at the end of the day, and how I always wait for the trash pick up service to come, I realise that we, humans, are lame. The fact that the pick up guys happened to be the unfortunate ones to deal with tons of trash produced by people they don’t know about and the ones who risked their safety and health yet still being underpaid saddened me. I know that the system has failed us, but I think there’s something I can do to help.

When I finally enjoyed being at home for a longer time due to the pandemic, I started to dig more of what I could actually do in order to reduce anorganic waste. At that time I thought, how come I could avoid all of the excessive packaging coming through the mail and the daily products I’ve consumed all this time. Reducing online shopping (and ordering food online!) is one thing, but reducing everyday necessities (mostly packaging) is just another story.

One day, “Beli yang Baik Sustainable and Consumption Expo” popped up at my timeline. That's when I was introduced to @siklusrefill and @rekosistem. Knowing that they would be there, I couldn't hide my excitement to A—I asked him to accompany and help me bring the cleaned trash. Somehow, my house is just like Bantar Gebang since I kept most of the trash 🤭 : thin wall containers, shampoo bottles, sanitizer spray bottles, honey glass bottles, body wash refill packages, skincare bottles and jars, a lot of unavoidable bubble wraps and cartons. All of this overwhelmed me and more often than not annoyed A as well. Actually, I got the sense that A didn’t get me with this whole less waste things but that's okay 😅 I hope he could someday.

Briefly, Siklusrefill is a startup that focuses on reducing plastic pollution by providing refills of basic necessities in bulk. Of course, it comes with a considerably low price because we the consumer do not have to buy the packaging. But really we can reuse everything for the packaging, like empty water bottles, cold pressed juice bottles, wafer cans, etc.

 

So what about the products?
Did siklusrefill already fulfil the distribution license?
Worry not, it offers familiar brands from Rinso detergent, Lifebuoy bodywash, to Barco cooking oil!
The product range is quite varied, considering it is founded in 2019. If you’re curious with their price list, please go straight to their highlight “pricelist” on instagram. They're going to update it periodically.

I’m glad that the expo was empty at that time so there was less chance of getting infected by Sars-Cov-2. I brought home 1L of Molto liquid softener, 500ml Lifebuoy handwash, 2.5L Barco worth only Rp 70.000 (!!) , and loofah.
Beside the expo, I can access them through apps. Just one click away and they will be right there on my doorstep. Free delivery it is!

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Sebuah kiriman dibagikan oleh Siklus (@siklusrefill)