Refleksi 1 Tahun di Korea

Tak terasa waktu begitu cepat berlalu. Maret 2012 lalu, tepatnya tanggal 4 Maret saya tiba di Korea untuk melanjutkan studi di Department of Animal Science & Biotechnology, Chungnam National University - Daejeon. Campur aduk rasanya bisa sekolah di luar negeri yang memang sudah saya cita-citakan sejak dibangku kuliah dulu.

Mas Dosen UNS (kiri) & Mas Dosen UGM (kanan)

Tak terlalu susah buat saya untuk sampai di Daejeon, setibanya di Incheon International Airport sahabat saya telah siap mengantarkan ke kota tujuan. Sang sahabat meminjamkan jaket tebal ala “winter” dan dengan sigapnya langsung membeli tiket bus seharga 21.000 Won/orang, maklum saja suhu masih sekitar minus 2 drajad. Sunggu beruntung saya ini, tanpa Won sepeser pun bisa “survive” di negeri orang. Kami menunggu kedatangan bus sekitar 20 menit. Kesan pertama yang saya simpulkan adalah begitu tepat waktunya transportasi publik negara ini, standar deviasi (SD) atas ketepatan waktu kedatangan atau keberangkatan hanya dalam hitungan detik. Kapan ya Indonesia bisa?

Limousin Airport Bus

Butuh waktu sekitar 3 jam dari Airport menuju Daejeon. Sepanjang perjalanan menuju Daejeon saya hanya terpaku menatap pemandangan yang terpapar di depan mata, masih terasa seperti mimpi bisa menginjakan kaki di negara empat musim. Tak terasa mata tak kuat lagi menahan kantuk, 6 jam di pesawat saya tak bisa tidur sama sekali, akhirnya saya pun tertidur. Setibanya di Daejeon, dosen saya (Fapet UGM) sudah siap jemput. Saya hanya ikut “nginthil” sahabat saya, sekali lagi maklum saya belum bisa baca-tulis-ngomong korea (Hangeul). Akhirnya kami bertemu dan naik Taksi menuju asrama CNU. Untuk mendapatkan kode masuk asrama, saya harus menyerahkan hasil rontgen kepada pengelola Dormitory. Saya mendapat kamar nomor 803 (gedung 8 lantai 8 kamar no 3).

Main Gate CNU

Negeri Gingseng ini memberikan kesan pertama yang cukup baik, terutama untuk pelayanan publik. Transportasi yang tersistem dengan luar biasa baik, sistem pendataan penduduk yang terintegrasi, dan masih banyak lagi kecanggihan sistem lainnya.

Poin pertama yang bisa saya ambil ketika perjalanan dari Incheon international airport menuju Daejeon adalah bahwa negeri ini jauh dari kata subur, malah terkesan gersang, mungkin dikarenakan baru saja selesai musim dingin. Dalam benak saya terpikir, negara kering-kerontang yang minim sumber daya alam begini saja bisa maju, kenapa Indonesia yang "super" kaya tidak bisa? oh negeriku, ada apa denganmu? #Masalah pertama yang harus diselesaikan ketika berkarya di tanah air suatu saat nanti, semoga Allah SWT meridhoi aamiin...

Tiga bulan pertama di Korea, sambil beradaptasi dengan lingkungan yang baru, sesekali saya mengamati harga produk pertanian di Korea. Saya begitu takjub ketika menemui buah mangga yang harganya sekitar 35 ribu Rupiah atau buah semangka yang seharga 200 ribu Rupiah. Dalam hati menggumam, mahal sekali harganya?? Coba kalau di Indonesia petani bisa menikmati harga setinggi di Korea, bisa sangat sejahtera mereka. #Masalah kedua yang saya garis bawahi, bagaimana caranya kesejahteraan Petani Indonesia dapat ditingkatkan..

Tiga bulan kedua, saya mulai banyak pekerjaan di laboratorium, acara jalan-jalan & mengunjungi teman mulai dikurangi. Di tahap ini saya mulai keteteran dengan tugas kuliah, presentasi seminar, report penelitian, menulis paper, menyiapkan data untuk conference & so on.. Belum lagi sang supervisor menuntut banyak di semester pertama ini. Tapi alhamdulillah semua dapat diatasi dengan cukup baik, satu buah paper lokal bisa di-published & 2 essay diikutkan dalam conference. 

Tiga bulan ketiga, Saya mulai mendaptkan ritme bagaimana bekerja dengan orang Korea. Mereka memiliki etos kerja yang sangat tinggi, saya pun ikut-ikutan mainstream, lembur hingga larut malam, walaupun terkadang hanya browsing jurnal dan sengaja online untuk saling sapa dengan rekan-rekan. Kerja keras yang selama ini menjadi rutinitas akhirnya menghasilkan data yang cukup memusakan. Saya sangat berharap bisa membuat tulisan dengan kualitas internasional dengan data ini, aamiin.

Tiga bulan keempat di Korea, saya benar-benar sudah enjoy di Korea. Fasilitas riset yang sangat memadai, sampel yang cukup besar, dan tentu saja tidak perlu mikir biaya penelitian membuat saya sangat senang berada di laboratorium. Saya bisa mengeksplor & merencanakan segala sesuatunya dengan matang. Semoga setibanya di Indonesia nanti dapat menghasilkan karya yang lebih baik, aamiin.
Akhir kata, setahun di Korea sudah cukup membuat saya terkesan dengan segala kelebihan dan kekurangannya. Mengutip penggalan kata yang sering disampaikan para Ustadz & guru "Niatkan segala aktivitas dalam rangka beribadah kepada Allah SWT", maka Anda akan ringan dan merasa enjoy melaksanakannya ^^

Salam,
Cahyadi

Attending of PAG Asia 2013 Conference in Singapore

At 16 to 19 March 2013, I got an opportunity to visit Singapore for attending Plant and Animal Genome (PAG) conference. This conference was originally held in San Diego USA, but, for some reasons this conference was also organized in Singapore. It is became the first PAG conference which was held in Asia. Before I go to describe this conference more, I would like to share our journey in details.

Firstly, I would like to inform you that I went to Singapore with my lab mate members. Also, my professor was joint with us. We departed from Daejeon Cheongsa Express Bus Terminal at 09.26 am in Korean time. The first destination was Incheon Int'l Airport. Daejeon to Incheon needed around 2 hours. In Incheon, my professor suggested to make Skypass member card before we checked-in for baggage. This card is very valuable for everyone who will fly with Korean Air. Card holders will get some benefits. For example, my professor told me that I will get free ticket to go to Jeju Island after making this flight. What a good news for me, I just imagined that I was in Jeju Island for vacation, enjoyed the beach and everything in that time (dreaming???? hehehe..). After having lunch, we went to the shopping center for a while and at 13.20 pm, we flight to Singapore. On the air plane, I have toke some pictures, how a great view is it??  Every human being should be thankful to Almighty Allah SWT who has created this world so perfect. In my point of view, we are nothing at this point, we are like a dust in the desert.

Grand Copthorne Waterfront Hotel

A few minutes later, my concern was turned to the Korean Airlines services regarding to the food I will eat during this journey. My friend asked to stewardess to provide my lunch menu, sea food and/or vegetarian menu, and then they gave me those menus. Of course, as a muslim, this kind of service is very important during trip to non-muslim country. By this way, I can avoid all foods containing meat or it's derivation. While I enjoyed my second lunch, I took to watch Korean film entitled Korea (코리아). This movie tells us how both South and North Korea table tennis athletes struggled together to achieve world championship by beating China in the final match. This film is starred by Ha Ji Won, senior movie player in Korea. It is very interesting film in my opinion as Korean drama in general. We can take many lessons by watching this movie. It showed that how good partnership, focus, and understanding each other can be very strong weapon to defeat opponent and to achieve very important thing in life.

My poster & I

Finally, after about 6 hours flying, we arrived in Singapore. We used shuttle bus provided by the travel to catch to Grand Copthorne Waterfront Hotel, the place where the conference organized. Because of very tired trip, we directly slept.

Marlion Park

On first day of conference, my friends and I looked for the seminar hall and poster area to attach our poster. For your information, this conference is very high level. That's why the committee only received poster presentation. Oral presentation was only conducted for companies which funded the seminar such as BGI, Illumina, Affymetrix, Temasek, BioLabs, Keygene and other molecular biology companies. Also, some laboratories of university in Asia gave oral presentation. In my opinion, if we want to give a talk at this kind of conference, we should publish our research in Nature, Science, PNAS, PlosOne and some others high impact factor journal. It becomes big problem for small budget laboratory in the university to participate. We need very good experiment, big data set, and also excellent writing skills to publish in those kinds of journals.
On the second day, I wore Indonesian "Batik" in order to participant from Indonesia can identify me. This way was effectively work on it. I met all Indonesia's participants that day.

Indonesian Participant in PAG Asia 2013

We shared many things regarding development of genomic experiment in Indonesia. Interestingly, most of Indonesian participants attended in this conference did not represent Indonesia's institution. In details, one student represented University of Illinois (USA), two researchers represented an institution in Philippine, a researcher from Orion Genomics (USA), two researchers from Bogor Agricultural University (IPB), and I who represented Chungnam National University (South Korea). Big question for me, where are Indonesian researchers in genomic field? Why are they very small number? Hopefully, someone can answer my question someday...

Me, Nu Ri, My Professor, Dongwon

Because of lack session related our field, we only attended the morning session on the second day of conference. In the afternoon, we went to Newton food center for enjoying Singapore cuisine with my professor colleagues. I was little bit surprised because we should pay about 200 Singapore dollars for two kg of crap, fried noodle, "cah kangkung" and rice. What an expensive price is it? Fortunately, my professors and colleagues paid it. I had free time in the evening. I persuaded my friends to have a walk, and we decided to go to Marlion Park, the place must be visited in Singapore. We needed 45 minutes to reach the location from the hotel by foot. Upon arrival at the site, we took some photos for documentation. Before we got back to the hotel for a rest, we also visited Marina Bay Sands for window shopping. I suggest that don't visit this place if you don't bring much money, because the price is very very very expensive. It will be big problem for our wallet :D

Marina Bay Sands

Final day of conference, 19 March, had only morning session. We had one more free time after lunch. My friends and I decided to stay in the hotel after check out, while my professor went out site with his friend, a professor from Chonbuk National University. While waiting in the hotel, I had opportunity to meet and discuss with Dr. Arif (Orion Genomics, USA). Hopefully, I have research collaboration with him in the future aamiin..

Dr. Arif & I

Overall, I got very much knowledge by attending this conference. It has made me aware that I should  improve my capability in genomic field in order to achieve my dream and also to spread my knowledge to the Indonesian society in the future..