Self-Reflection, Fiction
One Can’t Grow Without Facing Hardships
It was a rainy Friday night in Jakarta. After hours of work, endless revisions, and handling hundreds of files, he finally managed to finish his day at 9:30 PM — working overtime, of course. He closed Adobe Photoshop and Chrome, took off his glasses, and leaned his head on the table next to his closed laptop. In less than 10 seconds, he fell asleep. The office was empty; everyone else had gone home four hours ago.
The thunderous sound of lightning woke him up. The clock struck 10 PM. He grabbed the mug on his left, drank some water, and lit a cigarette. A glance out the window revealed that it was still drizzling. He packed up his belongings, cleaned his desk, and prepared to go home. But before he took more than 10 steps away from his desk, he thought about stopping by a bar in South Jakarta. Tomorrow was the weekend, and the idea of sitting alone at the bar with a sip of liquor sounded tempting.
Riding his old motorcycle through the rain-swept streets, raindrops brushed against his jacket. The city roared around him, yet everything felt distant. When he arrived at the bar, the waiter greeted him, “How many people?”
