I am Published.

Hosted by Cecily and Kelli

I can't remember exactly when I started writing. If writing in blog counts, then may be when I started this blog over two years ago.
Aku tidak ingat dengan pasti, kapan aku mulai menulis. Jika menulis di blog dihitung, berarti itu adalah saat aku mulai bikin blog ini.

But writing short stories, umh... I've just been doing it in the past year I guess, on my other blog. I tried to translate some to English. But as English is not my mother language, I bet they don't feel as good as they were in Indonesian.
Tapi menulis cerpen, umh... baru sekitar setahun belakangan ini, di blogku yang lain. Aku sudah mencoba menerjemahkan ke bahasa inggris. Tapi bahasa inggris bukan bahasa ibu-ku, jadi rasanya tidak seindah yang seharusnya.

A good friend of mine suggested me to try to send my writings to magazines or news paper. Hohoho, I wasn't that confident. But I gave it a try. I sent it to a local tabloid, 'Cempaka'.
Few days after I sent my writing, I received a message from the tabloid. They said my story was good but too long. I was asked to edit it become 5-6 pages (from 8). No it wasn't easy. I use to write like water flow, and cutting some parts might change the idea I wanted to share. But still I worked on it, and resent it.
Seorang teman menganjurkan aku untuk mencoba mengirimkan tulisanku ke majalah atau koran. Hohoho, aku masih kurang pede. Tapi aku beranikan mencoga. Aku kirim ke tabloid lokal, 'Cempaka'.
Beberapa hari setelah aku kirimkan cerpenku, aku mendapat sms dari tabloid tersebut. Katanya ceritaku bagus, tapi terlalu panjang. Mereka minta aku mengeditnya menjadi 5-6 halaman (dari 8). Agak susah. Aku terbiasa menulis dengan mengalir, memotong sebagian mungkin akan mengubah ide yang ingin kusampaikan. Tapi aku berusaha, lalu kukirim lagi hasil editanku.

I didn't receive any notification that I would be published. Oh it sucks. I mean, if they didn't mean to publish it, why did they ask me to edit it? But if they would publish it, why didn't they tell me?
Aku tidak menerima pemberitahuan bahwa itu akan dimuat. Menyebalkan. Maksudku, jika memang tidak akan dimuat, kenapa mereka minta aku mengeditnya? Tapi jika memang dimuat, kenapa aku tidak dikabari?

So I just prepared myself for the worst. May be they didn't like my editing and decided not to publish it. But in another side, I still hope that wasn't what happened. So I bought an exemplar of the tabloid this morning, and...
Jadi aku menyiapkan diri untuk kemungkinan terburuk. Mungkin mereka tidak suka hasil editanku dan memutuskan untuk tidak memuatnya. Tapi di sisi lain aku masih berharap bukan itu keputusannya. Maka pagi ini aku membeli 1 exemplar Cempaka, dan...



Unfortunately the tabloid is not available in online version. So I just share a picture of it here. I wanted to translate to 'whatever-English' so any English reader can at least have an illustration what it was about. But.. ah may be later. Forgive my limited time (and energy).
Sayangnya tabloid ini tidak tersedia dalam versi online. Jadi aku bagi gambarnya saja di sini. Aku ingin menerjemahkannya ke 'Inggris-saksake', jadi paling tidak para pembaa yang berbahas inggris bisa punya gambaran aku bercerita tentang apa. Tapi... mungkin nanti ya. Mohom maaf atas keterbatasan waktu (dan tenaga).

Fiuh, I guess I need to send a copy to my father. He was the one who taught me to tell a story... Thank you, Bapak.
Fiuh, sepertinya aku harus mengirim satu kopi ke ayahku. Beliau yang mengajariku bercerita... Terima kasih, Bapak.

*****

Updated:
I have given my self some time, and now you can read the whatever-English version to the story here.
versi bahasa Indonesia bisa dibaca di sini