Ok, apparently my mood to continue drawing is taking a holiday, so maybe I’ll just rant about…WHAT THE HELL, INDONESIAN TV?
When I was back in Jakarta for short holidays, everytime I turned on the TV into Indonesian channels, the programs are one of these: news, infotainment (you know,those useless gossips about celebrities), reality shows (mostly supernatural related, basically a challenge to sit around it a so-called haunted places to get money prize) and last but not least, Indonesian soap operas or we usually call it sinetron.
The news are fine.
The infotainment…well I admit sometimes I like to watch it with my mom. Shaking our heads, making some comments about how shitty it feels to be the celebrity, and basically fulfilling the kepo-ness desire we have =p
The supernatural reality shows..it’s quite interesting actually. But there’re waaaay too many of them, it’s become a trend. Every TV stations have one.
Other than supernatural themed shows, there’re also the ones with ‘generosity’ theme. For example, the show host knock on some poor people house, and announce that they’ll get 10million Rupiahs, but they have to spend the money in 30 minutes. After that, they will proceed to record the poor people’s cry of joy, hoping to make the viewers feel touched at the generosity of the tv station. Then, the 30minutes of rush-shopping. Another is..they renovated some poor people’s houses. Basically it’s like Pimp My Ride on MTV. It’s a win-win situation anyway, the viewers got entertained, the people got some money or got their houses renovated. I prefer the house renovating though, they didn’t have any conditions on the show like the 30minutes money giving thing.
Another interesting theme was ‘looking for lost people’. One of the examples, this so called viewer sent letter to the tv station, asking for help to find her long-lost father. She will cry on the interview, saying that her mother got some illness, and he father left the house suddenly. The two hosts then proceeded to an ‘investigation’ to find some clues of the father’s whereabouts. After interviewing some people who they said as the father’s ex-colleague, or the father’s boss (which usually met by rejections,they won’t answer any questions), one of the colleague or some random people who claims to know the father, will give some worthy information. They finally found where the father is, and they bring along the girl to the father’s new house. Then, they found out the father’s already married with another woman, and refused to acknowledge the daughter. This kind of reality show is most likely fake anyway, it’s sooo dramatic. And all the camera angles are perfect, it’s not like it was recorded real-time. It’s funny to watch, though.
What annoyed me the most are mostly the sinetrons. Oh sure, there are some good ones, but they’re overwhelmed by majority of the sinetrons which consist scenes like (choose one):
1. An auntie with way too much make up on, glaring at the protagonist
2. The poor protagonist crying and getting bullied by the auntie, the step sister, and basically any random people in the show
3. A very fashionable but bitchy antagonist, usually also staring at the poor protagonist.
4. The poor protagonist crying
5. The auntie in point 1 or the bitchy antagonist in point 3, shouting and getting angry for no apparent reason
6. The poor protagonist crying
7. The auntie swears
8. Seriously, you will feel like smashing the TV if you keep watching
Optional:
The antagonist was so evil they eventually got cursed, become very poor or weirdly develop some strange illness, admitted that she was wrong and become nice. THEN the protagonist turn evil. Repeat the cycle for about 20 times to prolong the season.
Some said even they copied the stories from foreign dramas, like Korean or Japanese.
Maybe it was just me who turn on the TV in all the wrong timings..but I was wondering if the amount of the sinetrons are increasing o.o I don’t remember seeing this many sinetrons when I was a child. And my mom forbid me to watch them too anyway. The only time I got to watch was…when I was having math private lesson during 5th and 6th grade of primary. The teacher always teach while watching. LOL.
So during childhood..I mostly watched children shows (doraemon..Sailor Moon-though it’s more to teenage show now that I think about it, but oh well..Power Rangers-I like White Ranger! LOL..Ultraman-too many kinds of Ultraman I don’t remember which one..Masked Rider & Masked Rider RX-Kotaro Minami!). Other than that, the tv stations played a lot of Chinese shows such as the funny vampire shows, the action shows mostly starring Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Andy Lau, and Stephen Chow (which maybe explains why I’m a fan of Jackie Chan until now). Ah, and the old-school Return of the Condor Heroes TV series.

Prince Charming, according to 8 year-olds in year 1995
Aside from TV, I also watched videos. Usually Disney movies. And Jet Li’s The Tai Chi Master. Seriously, it’s one of the movies I grow up with. And I found out that I was more tolerant to violent scenes back when I was a child -_-

Prince Charming, according to 8 year-olds in year 1995, ver.02
Maybe they’re not the best kind of shows for children but hey, at least I didn’t see an angry auntie with make up overload on screen every five seconds.