tulisan

Tulisan gue kembali dimuat. Kali ini di majalah Gatra edisi 18 April, halaman 67. Agak kecewa sebenarnya. Tulisan itu dibabat habis oleh sang redaktur hingga tinggal 2000 character. Yang seru-serunya hilang sudah. Gue menulis resensi buku tentang acara Talkshow mantan pemred gue, yang dulu menandatangani ijin unpaid leave gue untuk sekolah S2 ke Belanda. Macam last tribute lah rencananya. Tapi kok pas dimuat jadinya sebuah tulisan yang kayanya siapapun bisa nulis seperti itu.

Tapi gue nggak putus asa kok. 2 kali gue nulis resensi buat Gatra, baru ini yang dimuat. Ini lecutan buat nulis lebih bagus lagi.

what I do for a living

Gue selalu suka adegan pembuka dalam film The Insider. Al Pacino berperan sebagai producer acara Dialog di stasiun televisi Amerika, CBS. Tugasnya kasak-kusuk menentukan topik dan mendatangkan narasumber penting untuk talkshow bertema berat itu. Dalam film itu, ia harus bepergian jauh hingga ke pelosok Libanon. Rela ditutup matanya saat bernegosiasi, membujuk pimpinan Hezbollah agar mau tampil. Ia berhasil, namun tugasnya belum selesai hanya sebagai tim advance.

Beberapa hari kemudian kru pendukung datang, sang host yang seorang jurnalis senior tiba, syuting akan segera dimulai. Kekacauan timbul kembali, pasukan bersenjata memprotes pengaturan blocking camera yang terlalu dekat dengan sang pimpinan, hingga keberatan mereka atas letak kursi yang berhadapan. Kembali ia harus pintar membujuk mencari solusi agar show tetap lancar.

Begitulah kira-kira menjelaskan that’s what I do for a living. Bergumul dengan penentuan topik permasalahan apa yang menarik diangkat dalam sebuah dialog. Siapa narasumber newsmaker yang kompeten, siapa dia dan bagaimana track recordnya, apa standing position dia pada issue itu.

Tantangan selanjutnya, yang senantiasa memicu adrenalin, bagaimana mendatangkan beliau-beliau itu agar berminat meluangkan waktu ke studio. Menghadiri dialog yang –tentu saja- kerap memojokkan dengan rentetan pertanyaan super kritis. Mengemas pertanyaan-pertanyaan tajam dengan dukungan riset mendalam, sehingga sang narasumber yang umumnya sudah piawai –kalau bisa- menjadi tidak berkutik.

Masukkan unsur persaingan antar stasiun televisi, dalam pertimbangan penentuan tema dan angle. Lalu tuangkan faktor deadline yang cenderung terasa sangat singkat, racik dengan rentetan proses pra produksi teknis yang cukup menyita waktu dan tenaga. Voila! Jadilah menjelma menjadi profesi ini.

Berminat memiliki karir serupa?

A Perfect Proposal

Venue : Secret place somewhere in Jakarta
Time : 8 PM, straight after her office hour (should be surprisingly shocking)

Rundown :

Two weeks before D-day I suddenly cancel all dates that I already promised her.

To get more heating temperature, I will pretend very-very busy that I even cannot pick her up after office. Including stop visiting her during the weekend.

All of her gang member -coordinate by her best friend- will ask her to hang out at the secret place in Jakarta. We already calculate her period, to make sure she’s in good mood.

Suddenly I appear on that secret place along with my buddies. All of us pretend it just a coincidence. We hang out together on one big table. I know she’s still mad at me, but we all know she will pretend nothing happened in the crowd, especially in friendly circle.

Someone then mysteriously play the piano on the corner stage. An intro from Yovie & Nuno song, “Janji Suci.” It will be a dark lighting on the stage, so nobody knows who the pianist is.

I will walk to the stage and grab the mike. Everybody, especially her, look surprise, they knew I can not sing. Singing was not that fun for me, even at Inul Vizta.

I will sing a few lyric of that song, thanks for the quick tutorial from my best buddy.

Dengarkanlah, wanita pujaanku. Malam ini akan kusampaikan.
Hasrat suci, kepadamu dewiku. Dengarkanlah kesungguhan ini…

Enough, it is not my aim to torture anyone that night. The surprise will begin. Stage lighting turns bright. Suddenly her all time favorite Band, Yovie & Nuno surprisingly appears on stage. They continue that song,

Aku ingin mempersuntingmu. Tuk yang pertama dan terakhir. Jangan kau tolak dan buat ku hancur. Ku tak akan mengulang tuk meminta. Satu keyakinan hatiku ini. Akulah yang terbaik untukmu.

Everybody including our friends screaming for that surprise. For that purpose, only two friends of mine knew that Yovie & Nuno will come.

After that song, I approach her, look at her in the eyes and pop up the question. Once again, to create a romantic ambience, some friends have no idea about this following sequence, so we can get a spontaneous shriek of astonishment effect.

“I promise you I would give you the world, or die trying to.” [I know, I know, it’s a gombal line, but I think it will work as an opening before I pop up the question]

“I still mad at you” [she will reply]

“Well, uhm. I did bring Yovie & Nuno.” [We take a glance to the stage. Yovie, the pianist, salute to us]

[She shall start smiling, and laughing. You know she looks amazing when smiling. That will be a perfect moment to pop up the question]

It will be a perfect night. Thank you very much to her best friend who help me book the venue and coordinate the girls. My best buddy who give best effort to bring Yovie & Nuno only to sing one song that night.

“Honey”

“Yes?”

“Would you mind pay the bill tonight? Those Yovie & Nuno things makes me broke.”