If you asked me what the best thing from Indonesia is, without a doubt, my answer would be Alice.
When I joined Facebook, Alice was one of my key partners and we worked with a lot of the news organizations in Indonesia to help them use CrowdTangle to better understand analytics. She is smart, knows what's needed, always open to ideas and most importantly, there was no drama. At all. The dream teammate.
I was a little sad when she told the team she was moving to another org, but it meant she was also moving to Singapore. About a year later, she moved to the best neighborhood ever, and the Tanjong Party was born.
And then Covid happened. Even though we weren't always allowed to meet, it was comforting to have another friend nearby. And with Yu Yu, we played all those badminton games and had all those drinks at the izakayas around us. We also had a lot of Din Tai Fung runs and xiao long baos in between.
During one of these meals, she got a phone call and it sounded like a contact tracing call, so I typed a note on my phone, asking her if it was, and she nodded. The best part? She asked if she needed to go home immediately, or if we could at least finish the fried rice and xiao long baos.
At work, Alice deals with some of the most challenging problems of our time and I always feel a little smarter after a conversation with her. Even when she's confronted with impossible situations, she's always calm and responds to a problem with grace. Again, no drama. Still the dream teammate. And amid all of that, she runs marathons and cycles like there's no tomorrow. Absolute pro.
In 2022, I left for New York and thanks to memes, we've managed to stay in touch as if we were still neighbors. I remember one Saturday morning waking up to a phone call because they were out partying for her bridal shower.
And just a month ago, she left Singapore and we're in opposite time zones again. Somehow, thanks to memes and the craziest news cycle of all time, it still feels like she's just nearby.