It’s been a long journey. Early May 2011, Ong & Hanny come to me and asked me to be the Chairwoman of Pesta Blogger 2011 or we call it now ON|OFF 2011. I was overwhelmed (still is). It’s been a BIG event since 2007. I don’t know if I can do that. Ong then explain my job descriptions, then also plans for this year’s event. I have some ideas regarding how the event should work, I told them on the spot, they like it. I still have plenty of ideas for ON|OFF, so, Bismillah, let’s do it.

We do our first media conference in July 2011 to kick off the event. I felt like a student learning for an exam when I get all the media documents from Nia. I’ve been connecting with medias, but mostly to talk about myself. This time it’s different. I become ‘the face’ of ON|OFF 2011 also represent our sponsors: Acer Indonesia & US Embassy. New experience for me.

Soon after, we started our ON|OFF Chat journey to 10 cities all over Indonesia supported by the US Embassy Jakarta. The first city is Solo, with theme: Education. We change the whole concept of blog workshop into a seminar and brainstorming session. I love the outcome, I think it’s a success to encourage more people to use blog and social media to the next level.

Introducing new name to change the powerful name of Pesta Blogger is not easy. But the vision behind ON|OFF 2011 is big and I want to fight for it as much as I could. ON|OFF or Online Offline in my opinion has 2 meaning. First, using online tools to make offline impacts. And second, to be a bridge for online and offline community to meet and collaborate making a completely new stuff that could reach bigger audience.

I need to show you again the statistics. Almost 40 million Indonesian are on Facebook. 15% tweets all over the world, coming from Indonesia. There are more than 5 million blogs in Indonesia according to SalingSilang. The world admire the strength of our online community. Imagine if you use online tools to strengthen offline aspects of your life. You’re too must be proud of our achievements and use this opportunity to UNITE and spread the light.

December 3rd, 2011. When I stand at ON|OFF 2011 with Pak Ted, Don Q from US Embassy, Ibu Helmy from Acer Indonesia, Pak Anies Baswedan & My advisors, when I hear Renata sing our National Anthem, Indonesia Raya, I was touched. This is it! This is the moment. Finally after months, a lot of energy, heart & mind poured into ON|OFF 2011 preparation, this is IT! Ndoro Kakung held my hand, it was cold. But, I’ve been calm enough. ON|OFF 2011 has taught me a lot, including public speaking.

An event usually cater the chair’s visions. I’ve been blogging since 2003 and you can read how I grow from there in #BerkatNgeblog – and I want more people experience the same, by connecting them in ON|OFF 2011. You can see also other spark of my passions here and there in ON|OFF 2011. From startups, books to fashion. Ideas meet opportunities concept also can be seen in the BreakOut session where we try to have 2 speakers, from the idea side and opportunity side.

I thank EVERYONE, great people who’ve been participating in ON|OFF 2011. Hope your ideas, meet the opportunities. Special thanks to my SEA blogger friends coming all over SouthEast Asian countries. I truly enjoy my short time with you guys. Hope we can learn from each other’s experience!

I wanna thank my advisors: Ong, Mas Iman, Enda, NdoroKakung, Natali for their  tremendous support.

I wanna thank my team at Maverick: Nia @nsadjarwo  one of the best people I’ve been working with so far – very detail, neat, dedicated, beautiful (eh) and all, Hanny @beradadisini  amazing mind, Nena, Atri, Dewi, NonaDita, Fany, Ignes, Dita; My assistants :)) Vika, Diana, Lita, Gery; My new friends from the US Embassy, Phil, Corina, Dian; my friends at Acer, Ibu Helmy, Astrid and everyone that I can’t mention one by one. Thank you for making this a fun journey.

I love what I’m doing, hope it shows. And hope we can make the event better and better each time.

I’ll see you all next year!

Check complete photos of ON|OFF 2011 Empowered by Acer in my Flickr