Happiness Costs Twenty Four Thousand Indonesian Rupiah

I have fallen victim to the soul-crushing routine of an office worker. A “salaryman’s dream”, if you will. My brain has been in autopilot mode for the past I-don’t-know-how-long. The days blend, undiscernible from one another. A brutal, unending cycle that numbs the mind, drains the emotion, and sucks the creativity out of a human. As much as I tried to avoid it, I still ended up a byproduct of this capitalist society.

At the expense of sounding like a tinfoil hat man preaching about 5G towers turning us all into obedient slaves for the elites, I will say that it is my belief that us humans were not meant to be sitting at an office desk for 8, 9, 10 hours a day. Every sunny day, sunray beaming through the office window, filling me with the urge to go outside and play. Every rainy day, with each raindrop hitting the glass, paints a perfect scenario in my head of a relaxing day at home, accompanied by a good book and a cup of hot chocolate. The ideal day for a shut-in such as I.

But here I am, sitting at my desk on a nice rainy day, staring blankly into a computer screen, filling in spreadsheets and using big “professional” words that I hate to the bone. My heart tells me to run out and start singing and dancing in the rain, but my head knows that that’ll only land me in a mental health facility. A true romantic limited by the confines of societal norms. Well, when I put it that way, I guess I’m not that much of a true romantic. By the definition of the word, to be a “true” one would mean I'd already be in an asylum as we speak.

I’m three paragraphs in and still dancing around the main point of what I’m trying to say. Maybe I’m not washed just yet. The king of verbosity and incoherence is alive and well.

Point is, it’s getting increasingly harder and harder for me to feel. To feel earnestly, to, to snap out of the state of hypnosis that I operate on to trudge through the 9-to-5. It doesn’t really help at all that I am a highly reserved person as well, even with those close to me. I am only ever able to fully be free when I am alone. It is a condition born out of the extended period of self-isolation that I’d gone through in my younger days. I didn’t want to believe it, but it’s true. 

That self-isolation really do be warping my reality. 

In my mind, retracting myself from the crowd was somehow justifiable, but… this is a conversation for another day. I’ve rambled on enough about nothing. I just want to get into it before I forget.

Basketball has been pretty much my saving grace in life. Without it, I’d already be rotting in a ditch 10 years ago. My first true love, a sport that genuinely changed the trajectory of my life (for better or worse, arguably better), got me through the best and the worst times, allowed me to meet most of the people I consider good friends. Nothing compares to it. Even then, the monotony of adult life sinks its teeth so deeply into my flesh that for a while, basketball felt... different. Sure, there was that brief moment in time, a few years back, when every Saturday morning was pure ecstasy. Found myself a small group of friends, sharing the same level of love and passion for the game, competing on the court, and getting a nice hearty meal right after. A blissful period of time that, much like everything else, came to an end because of humanity's biggest enemy, only second to greed.

The Passage of Time.

We grew up. Or at least, they grew up. There were six of us. Three are now married. Two already have their own mini-me's crawling around. One's quite busy with his own thing, working on his own relationship, and in the process of starting a business. So now, it's down to two. The doctor and I. 

So that definitely tanked my enjoyment of playing basketball for a while, but y'know, it's my place of refuge. Stopping would mean... death. Okay, that's a bit dramatic on my part, but I might as well be dead. I don't play for the social aspect of it, which I think plays a big part for a lot of people when it comes to sports. Which is why that damned gentrified, non-athletic, racket-based sport is so popular these days (yes, you know what sport I'm talking about).

No, I play because I enjoy every single aspect of the sport of basketball. The "making great friends" part is just a bonus. After the group's "disbandment" (again, being dramatic on my part), yes it did take away some of my enjoyment for the game, but I still played every week. Even when the OG Saturday morning crew is struggling to find a court to play in, I sought other circles to join. Again, meeting new people, starting all over again.

Without me realizing it, within the past year or so, basketball has become part of the "routine" I so deeply resent. Do I still enjoy playing? Sure, but... I find myself going through the motions most of the time. The games felt bland. I'm playing with people I barely know. The chemistry's not there. As much as I tried pushing, asking my body to give more, it's not answering. The only time I ever feel "satisfied" is when my team wins.

It wasn't always like this. I'm brutally competitive in nature (exclusively when it comes to things I care about, not about things like salary, position, grades, or any of those), and I have always been that way. I enjoy winning, but back then, I didn't mind losing in pickup games, because... well, they're just pickup games. A tournament's a completely different story, but the main aim in playing pickup is to enjoy ourselves. Don't get me wrong, it still sucks to lose, but y'know, it wouldn't ruin my day or bother me in my sleep or anything.

But now, I find myself getting ticked off by my teammates a lot more than I'd care to admit. Like, there was this one guy, tall but stiff as a lamp pole, and he couldn't box out, rebound, or defend for SHIT. Like, what are you even tall for???? Genuinely, I wanted to hurl all kinds of slurs at him. I guess there is the fact that I don't really know these people, but... that was the case when I first started with the old Saturday morning guys. And I had no qualms with them, none whatsoever. I enjoyed just playing with them, even if I lost some of the games. Now, I have to win to feel good. Hell, sometimes even winning isn't enough. It's just not quite the same.

This made me wonder, "Have I lost the fire? Have I finally lost the love for basketball? Is it time for me to move on, transition to geriatric sports like my peers?"

Until Saturday, January 10th, 2026.

I signed up for two separate runs that day, the new one, which was at 6am, and the usual one, which was at 8am. It was a Mini League day for the 6am run, basically a round robin of five teams duking it out. The team with the most wins, wins, simple as. This wasn't my first time joining this 6am run, so I'm quite familiar with how the people play and what to expect, more or less. Familiar with how they play, but not with the people themselves. The group of people in this run is... younger. Much younger. Like, five, six years younger, some even more. There are old folks like myself, hell, some even way older, but the majority is comprised of kids born upwards of the year 2000.

Skill and intensity-wise, it's actually pretty decent, at least up to my liking. Individually, a lot of the guys there are decent enough to make things competitive and, well, fun. Intensity's not as high as the usual Saturday morning run, but still tolerable. However, the most glaring issue for this 6am run is that a lot of the players show limited fundamental team basketball know-how. They don't make cuts, they don't set screens, they don't fill the lane correctly on fastbreaks, they don't really know what to do when they don't have the ball in their hands. When they do have the ball, it's usually just straight up isolation play, taking on the defense on their own, and when the defense stops them, they kick out the ball to the three-point line because no one cuts inside. And then they'll shoot a three-pointer. That's it. The gameplay loop usually just goes on and on like that for the entire match.

It's usually okay if my team is winning, but when I'm on the losing end, it does get frustrating. There was one Mini League day when my team went donut. Zero wins. Ruined my entire day. Luckily, on this particular day, my team managed to grab 3rd place, which... I mean, isn't ideal, but... at this point, I just tell myself, "Could be worse," and move along. 

After the Mini League was done, I went straight to the 8am run. Yes, I am a nutcase when it comes to basketball. What's crazy is that I'm tame compared to one of my friends, who would play in three runs within two days. And he's done that pretty regularly.

The 8am run did not have many people signing up for it. In the group chat, only 12 people wrote their names on the list. Unlike the 6am run, though, I'm a lot more well-acquainted with this bunch of people. I've not only known their tendencies on the court, but on a personal level, too. They're basically my friends, is what I'm trying to get at. Plus, age-wise, they're a lot closer to me. 

As expected, upon arrival, there were only 6 people there, plus me and one of my friends who also played in the 6am run, so 8 in total. Just about enough for a half-court game, 4v4. Since I was already warmed up from the previous run, I went straight into it.

From my experience of playing casual 5v5 runs, the aforementioned 6am run included, we usually play "zone" defense as opposed to the "man-to-man" defense (of course, this depends on the agreement of the players, but "zone" is the way to go, I'd say 7 times out of 10). Playing zone defense is usually seen as "easier" and less physically demanding compared to man-to-man, which is why it is often deployed in casual runs.

That being said, we were playing 4v4, on a half-court setting no less. To spice things up, we just agreed to play man-to-man. 

It's been a while since I last played a half-court, man-to-man game. I've always been a big fan of the half-court games. They're usually faster-paced, and with the fastbreak option unavailable, it makes the games much more tactical and teamwork-oriented. You can't just cherry-pick or outrun everyone in the open court, every change of possession is a set play. Reminds me a lot of my days in Japan, playing with the Indonesian guys. I sure hope they're doing well.

We divided the team and started the first game. Ones and twos (instead of the usual two and three points), first to eleven wins. Simple.

Check ball up top.

Everyone's on the move. On-ball screens. Down screens. Backdoor cuts. Quick passes from one end of the floor to the other. Tight turns around the corner.

It was like a whole different ball game completely. A familiar feeling came with every move I made. I was moving with purpose. Everyone on each team banded together for a common goal: to win.

The competition was thrilling. A group of eight people in an otherwise empty gym, duking it out in the game of team basketball.

Just like that.

For the next two hours, I felt free. 

Pure, unadulterated joy. A feeling akin to when I played in my grandparents' backyard with my two best friends.

I was running around the court like a man possessed. Bear in mind, I'd already played for two hours before this, yet I felt not an ounce of fatigue in my body.

There was no photographic evidence of it, but I'm rather sure I smiled from ear to ear for those couple of hours.

I felt freedom like never before, to the point where I subconsciously chirped the entirety of the session. If you've ever met me, you know how uncharacteristic of me that is. 

It was the most fun I've had playing basketball in what feels like eternity.  

No exaggeration, during one of the games, amidst all the chaos and shit-talking, I legitimately thought to myself, 

"Holy shit, I love this game."

Two hours couldn't go by any quicker. Before I knew it, it was almost 10am. My body was well past its limit. My left ankle was practically begging for mercy. But none of it bothered me, for the rush I felt was more than enough to numb any physical pain I was feeling.

A humble, undermanned 2-hour session of basketball had reignited something within my soul.

I had regained my love for basketball.

To ice the cake, we played at a government-owned multipurpose hall, so the fee was mad cheap. In Jakarta, the normal price range is around 800k-1.3 million per two hours to book a court nowadays. This particular court?

240k. Let me spell it out for you. That is two hundred and forty thousand Indonesian Rupiah. Seventy percent cheaper than the normal price. That's not even fifteen freedom bucks.

There were latecomers, so in total, 10 people came (though we still played half-court 4v4 because one of the guys was injured).

Two forty divided by ten, that gives us a hefty twenty-four thousand per person.

Talk about economical.

Though, admittedly, it's not the best of basketball courts. The ventilation is very minimal (it used to be a badminton facility), and on the floor below, there happened to be a wedding reception, so... y'know.

But hey, even still, 24k for a healthy dose of happiness? Hell yeah dude, that's a deal and a half.

Much like everything else, it is a fleeting moment in time. But, I think I'm starting to get it now. As fleeting as it is, if you really, truly, fully bask in it, it's always going to mean something, and it'll stick. Sure, to others, this story might just sound like a rambling of an old fart but... yeah, I dunno. Now I'm not saying life is about chasing these fleeting moments, there's far more to life than that, I'm sure. I think "chasing" these moments is also kinda missing the point. These moments truly hit when it just happens organically, out of pure chance. "Serendipity," if you will (I hate how overused that word has become, but that word literally has the definition of what I'm trying to describe).

So yeah, for a cog in the corpo wheel, these moments really do mean a lot to me. Until I'm able to break free from it, these moments are really all the motivation I have to keep it going. 

Sad? Yeah, kinda. Depressing? No doubt.

But hey, beggars can't be choosers. I'm making do with the hand that I've been dealt, and boy howdy, I'm running away as far as it could take me.