Thursday, April 18, 2013

Tragedi Mencuci Baju di Amerika

Contoh ruang laundy (unc.edu)
Mencuci baju adalah kegiatan rutin setiap orang di belahan bumi manapun. Tak ada yang istimewa. Kecuali kalau kau ada yang jadi artis dan merasa jijik kalau harus memakai baju yang sama dalam hidup. Jadi sekali pakai buang. Baiklah, kali ini aku akan bahas soal cuci baju bagi orang biasa-biasa saja.

Tapi begini, mencuci baju memang tak ada istimewanya. Aku mencuci baju dengan mengisi ember dengan air lalu kumasukkan air dan sabun. Lalu baju aku rendam beberapa waktu dan kemudian aku kucek. Kalau aku sedang jorok-joroknya, maka akan ada yang perlu aku sikat. Lalu dijemur (sehari, dua hari, atau bisa lebih lama). Beres.

Namun pengalaman seperti ini akhirnya berhenti sejenak ketika aku belajar di Amerika. Ketika sampai di asrama, aku tak menemukan ember untuk mencuci. Aku ke Walmart, semacam pasarnya di sana, untuk membeli ember untuk mencuci. Dan, tak kutemukan juga ember seperti yang ada di Indonesia.

Monday, April 1, 2013

When McDonald’s and friends are exclusive

How’d you feel when you eat at any restaurants like McDonald’s, KFC, Burger King, Pizza Hut or Wendy’s? If you’re American I bet you’d say I feel nothing, just eating, that’s it. You may want to say, what’s the matter? Nothing, unless you've seen how other people perceive differently how eating at those kinds of restaurants feels like.

Perceiving the same thing differently can be an interesting topic to discuss since the actual thing perceived is the real, exact same thing. Regarding eating burgers, chicken and fries at those places, there are actually at least two different perceptions. First, the one that happens in developed countries, and second, the one happening in developing ones.

Let me start with the first. In America, which I consider as a developed one, those restaurants are nothing but common places to eat. There is nothing special eating there. You order the foods you want, pay them then you decide to dine-in or to-go.

Paying our foods at around 5 bucks per meal in average is normal. People can spend much more than that. Or, it might be considered as the cheapest food for eating out. Thus, eating at those restaurants is the cheapest way to get full which means there’s no reason to call them such exclusive places to eat. There are no reasons of being proud to eat there. Seriously, none!

However the second scenario might bring you to a surprise. In any developing countries, like Indonesia, eating is going to cost us just around 50 cents to 3 bucks. In average, people spent 1.5 bucks to eat. You can imagine that it is going to be very expensive if they have to spend 5 bucks for a meal. I as a developing country citizen think that 5 bucks for a meal just doesn't make any sense.