2025
Welp, another year has passed. If I have to sum it up in the simplest way possible: 2025 is a MUCH, MUCH better year than 2024. Not perfect, obviously.
There were bad days, messy weeks, and moments where life felt overwhelming. But overall? 2025 was fun. And honestly, that’s already a win.
The year started with a pretty big change. Me and my family moved into a new house. It’s way better than our previous place, and somehow the rent were cheaper. We finally have a proper kitchen. Like, an actual kitchen where cooking doesn’t feel like a survival challenge. More importantly, it feels like a proper home for me, my wife, and our two ca̶t̶s̶ kids. That alone already made 2025 feel lighter.
Then March came, and with it, a new job. I became an assistant producer at a football podcast. If you’ve known me long enough, you know I’ve always had this dream of being a radio announcer. This job didn’t exactly turn me into one, but it came close enough that I’ll take it. It scratched an itch I’ve had since my high school days.
One unexpected bonus from that podcast gig was getting to rub shoulders with professional footballers. Otavio Dutra, Osvaldo Haay, Cristian Carrasco, just to name a few. These were guys I used to only see on TV or at press conferences. Suddenly, I was talking to them face-to-face. Not just about football, but about life, careers, random stuff. Turns out, they’re just… people. Very talented people, but still people.
Somehow, the podcast also reignited my spark for my main job as a football journalist. In July 2025, I got the chance to cover the AFF U-23 Cup. I met a lot of new faces, including Garrath MacPherson, the head coach of the Philippines U-23 national team. Moments like that reminded me why I fell in love with this job in the first place.
After the AFC U-23 ended in disappointment for the Indonesia national team (yeah, that one hurt), I went back to covering Liga 1, now known as Super League, because sponsorship reasons, obviously. My team of choice was Persita Tangerang.
Whenever I had the time and energy, I tried to come to their home games. Mostly just watching football, taking notes, and vibing. Thanks to the podcast, I even built a semi-regular WhatsApp friendship with one of Persita’s foreign players. Still feels amazing, not gonna lie.
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But good things rarely last forever, right? In September, I decided to step away from the podcast. I won’t explain the reasons here. But if you know, you know.
Not long after that, I landed another side gig as a reporter. I’m still a football reporter, but this one felt different. For the first time in a long while, I got to report on things outside of football. And wow, what a breath of fresh air.
After about seven years, football reporting was starting to feel… repetitive. This new gig let me cover a small concert at Universitas Indonesia in October, and I genuinely enjoyed it.
Enough about work. Let’s talk about life.
My personal life in 2025 was way, way better than in 2024. That’s not even up for debate.
I finally got to travel, something I’ve always wanted but rarely did. In June, my wife and I went to Bandung. Yeah, I know, “only Bandung.” But for someone who barely leaves home, that trip felt huge.
Then came November. Easily the highlight of the year. My wife and I traveled to Lampung, a place we’d never visited before as a couple. Again, big deal for someone like me who rarely goes anywhere. And Lampung delivered. We ate great food, went snorkeling, met a family friend, and I even got to watch a football match in Bandar Lampung. At some point during that trip, we both agreed: this was the best trip we’ve ever had together.
Of course, not everything was sunshine and rainbows. When it rains in 2025, it really pours. But the most important thing is this: we survived another year. We grew, we learned, and we’re still here.
Now, we’re ready for whatever comes next.
Bring it on.
