PING!

No, it's not the sound of a bell.

..or your Blackberry XD

I was told once in a loong time ago, that whenever you heard someone cough you have to respond by saying "ping, ping" so as to lighten the cough. It was a kind of Javanese culture, I think.

Well, apparently not all of it was right; it is Javanese culture, but not for coughing people - because recently when my Mother coughed a lot and I ended up saying "ping, ping" she went berserk on me and said "I'm not choking - if you do that, I may end up choking - so STOP!"

Ooo, scary.

I'm not complaining because my Mother got mad at me - I wrote this because of her next sentence : "You might want to stop doing that - it's not common. What if people in your workplace look at you oddly when you do it?"

Hmmmm.

Weell, even if I had done it the wrong way in my 24 years of life, it is my culture - our culture as Javanese people and I don't see any harm on doing it normally in any situation, don't you think?

Clearly, it may have been something unusual, maybe bordering on unique for some people. But still, to stop doing things because it was not something you consider usual norm; especially cultural-related things, in my opinion, is just wrong.

Ookay, maybe I am a little bit sensitive for these kind of things; it made me remember my personal hatred of design nowadays. 

As an interior designer, looking at heritage buildings scattered around the city being torn away to be changed into some minimalist-looking modern building is just ridiculous. Yes, in this modern times, we need to get on with the rest of the world; the technology, the trend, the way of life; but not the culture. Each and every country had their own characteristic, and that cultural diversity is what makes this world colorfully beautiful.

Back to the cultural gestures, we did have rules which we have to abide in community; which didn't forbid us doing those gestures. For example, I am a Moslem, so I did Islamic gestures like saying astagfirullah or alhamdulillah in proper situations, and that didn't change when I went to Japan - even if it's culturally unrecognizable there. I did it automatically, because I was raised doing it, and it's a right thing for me.

However there are people who were willing to kill themselves and their culture to keep up with the advancing world; that is the very reason that our country lost most of it's cultural heritage, trying to be normal and forgetting their roots in the process.

It's just like trying to kill your own ancestor - it's bad, and very wrong.

Keeping up with the rest of the world is fine and good - but it will be better if done in moderation, where our own culture still thrive within us and help to contribute our own unique essence in everyday interaction. It's good to have cultural diversities anyway - it's what make this world colorful and always new.

In conclusion, I will still saying "ping" when I have to, but taking care not to say it when my Mother coughed again XD

this is such a long rambling... hahaha