Walking Down Embarrassment Lane: Some Excerpts from My Old Blogs

In Indonesia, there's a slang word called alay. I can’t find a perfect English translation—the closest is cringey, but even that doesn’t quite capture it.

Compared to alay, cringey actually sounds kind of mild. When someone says, “OMG! That sounds so cringey!”—it means whatever you said makes them want to cringe or gag a little. But if they say, “You’re so alay!”—it means what you said makes them want to curl up in embarrassment. The secondhand cringe is just too real.

Unfortunately, alay is also a phase most teenagers go through. And I… wasn’t immune to the plague.

Fine. I’ll let you in on a little secret: talenthusiast.com wasn’t my first blog. From junior high to high school, I ran two personal (but way too personal) blogs I was once really proud of. It might sound cool in theory: I wrote about my teenage life; described my classmates one by one based on the attendance list; and posted some ‘cute’ selfies. But in reality, those stories included long-ass, unnecessary details about how I prefer rice over side dishes; the classmate descriptions involved confidently name-dropping their full names and brutally reporting them; and the so-called cute selfies were actually just Snapchat dumps that should’ve stayed buried forever (yes, you heard me right—FOREVER!!!).

To be fair, I’ve made both of them private for quite a while now (thank goodness I came to my senses), but I’ll be super honest and say that they still haunt me sometimes. I can be peacefully working in the office when the thought of those blogs floating somewhere in the online world hits me like a truck. 

Erasing them, however, isn’t an option. Deleting five years’ worth of work has always seemed too drastic, no matter how alay they sound. On the other hand, rereading them feels like a walk of shame. Gah. What a dilemma. The alay period may be long gone, but with such concrete evidence, I know I can’t escape my past.

Last night—don’t ask me why—I felt a sudden urge to face my fear. So I visited those two old blogs. To be honest, the posts weren’t as bad as I’d feared, but they still made me want to cry tears of shame. Still, with a surprising amount of courage, here… let me share some of the milder posts:

P.S. Most of the posts were written in Indonesian with an overly formal style. I’ll do my best to translate them for you.

An excerpt from when I described my classmates in junior high:

“… he is the boy with the shortest height in my class.”

An excerpt from when I described myself:

“According to my friend, I am a little awkward with people, especially with the new ones. But because they have known me, some of my friends have said the same thing (in different times without each other knowing what they said): ‘You, Kar, are actually a little smart, a lot of stupid. But luckily, it is that little bit of smartness that stands out.’”

A Snapchat selfie that I posted:

(Yes, they were blurry selfies with the cat ears filter—and all the other iconic ones too, because apparently I had FOMO before I even knew what it meant.)

A story about when I cooked fried rice for my dad and sister:

“I now understand how to cook fried rice like the kind sold at street vendors. So, I was just hungry and bored. I decided to make a plate of fried rice (which will definitely taste delicious if you make it yourself, trust me).

So this fried rice was made without garlic. First, I stir-fried the eggs and tossed the rice with soy sauce, looots of pepper, and looots of salt. Then I added more soy sauce until it was evenly mixed and kept stirring. Bam! Served!

Oh. I have not put the otak-otak in yet. So I put more oil in the wok and fried the otak-otak. Then... hehe, I fried the fried rice again. At first, I was a bit shocked because it turned out super oily. I had not removed the otak-otak oil. So I added more rice and soooy sauceee and pepperrr and saaalt. Then I kept stirring and finally I added small pieces of cheese.

Wow, it was so crazy, for real. It tasted like something you would buy. Really. At first, my dad and my sister laughed at me! But after I made them try it, my dad said it was too soft. And not salty enough. (Even though I swear I added a lot of salt.) My sister said it was pretty good, so she ate it too. But it seemed she did not want to admit that my fried rice was really good, so she said it was only good because of the cheese. She looked like she liked it though. She seemed to want more and more.

It was really delicious. And very simple. No onions, salty soy sauce, or MSG. It was just that when I finished, the plate was a bit oily. Really oily, actually.”

Another Snapchat selfie:

(Why, oh, why. Why did I think this was a good idea.)

An ode to rice around the world:

“My friends say I am not skinny. I am petite. My cousin says if I were a little taller, I could be a model. Well, it is a shame I am only this tall. But I eat a lot. And it is the rice I want more of, not the side dishes. I prefer lots of rice and a little bit of side dish to lots of side dish and a little bit of rice. Usually when I go out with Anne, Nenes, and Daniel, it is perfect. Anne and Nenes always have too much rice, so Daniel or I will eat it. And if I want more rice, there is always Daniel. Sometimes, there is already a lot of rice. If Daniel is around, we can split it in half. Anne and Nenes prefer more side dishes over a lot of rice, even though feeling full because of rice is the best. Especially if it is nasi timbel or nasi bakar. One portion is never enough. I always need two.”

A short poem title “There”:

“There are two of my friends in love,

They are getting closer.

But,

If one of them does not tell me,

I do not notice.

Why am I so insensitive?”

Another Snapchat selfie because I was such a… whatever:

(Filter? Check. Awkward smile? Check. Public shame? Double check.)

An excerpt about whether or not I was expressive:

“P.S. Am I actually expressive? Sometimes I feel like I am—if I do not try to hide it. When I am happy, it is really obvious (according to my mom). When I am upset or sad, it is really obvious too. But my friend says I am not that expressive. Like that one time, I had an appointment with two friends. One of them got her hair cut short like Yuni Shara’s. I was really shocked, but I didn't scream, "What?! You got a haircut? Seriously? Crazy! It is so short! How could that be, Ne?"—like my other friend. I just said, "Oh, Anne got her hair cut? It is so short..." then sat down.

But I am very expressive, you know. One time I cried really hard watching a sad movie with my friends. And when I am happy, my mood changes completely. It feels like my days are so light. Well, I do not know. When I am surprised, I lack expression, maybe? But when I am happy or sad, I always feel like writing. If I am really happy, I will write about something good; if I am sad, I will write about my sadness. If I am just feeling okay, I do not feel like writing.”

I can’t… I can’t… with another Snapchat selfie:

(You already know the vibe.)

A very short post:

“Have you ever been daydreaming without realizing it?”

Well, what can I say? Embarrassing or not, these old posts are still part of the story—and maybe that’s kind of beautiful in its own alay way. I just hope my old posts entertained you as much as they entertained me.

If you like this post, you might also enjoy Quiet Doesn’t Mean Boring: Breaking the Introvert Myth and ChatGPT Roasted My Instagram Feed (And I Roasted It Back!!!).