Oh Jakarta. Hours spent stuck in traffic, extreme wealth juxtaposed against extreme poverty. The Big Durian. Some people love it, some people hate it- I think I’m between the two. Flying out of Jakarta at night makes you realise how big the city actually is, well more like cities as they have all blended into one big mess of officially 9 million people (but realistically there are millions more- 28 million people live in Greater Jakarta) and millions of cars and motorbikes.
I had to go to Jakarta for a meeting but was lucky that my friend Kelly whose lovely parents live in Jakarta was going to be in town so a quick trip for a meeting turned into a long weekend of adventures. Flying out of Jogja I was excited to see a brand new plane waiting on the tarmac for me. Until I went inside and saw the classic tired, let’s fit as many seats in as possible interior. To make matters worse and to shatter my confidence in Indonesian airlines further, along with the emergency instructions card in the seat pocket was a card with how to pray for our safety in each of the 6 official religions of Indonesia. The fun really started when I got to Jakarta and had to find a taxi. There is only one real taxi company that is considered safe so after waving away many touts and finding a taxi I faced a two and a half hour drive to Kelly’s house in South Jakarta. The distance is probably about 40 kilometres and the constant honking of cars and barely moving gets somewhat frustrating after the first hour. The traffic is considered the worst in Asia and without great public transportation (like the MRT in Singapore or Skytrain in Bangkok) the only way to get around is to brave the roads.
You definitely notice the extreme difference between rich and poor driving from the airport to South Jakarta. From the slums on the outskirt of town and the over polluted canals to the modern sky scrapers which jut out from different parts of the skyline and the huge mansions. Beggars approach the highly polished private SUVs (pretty much a necessity in Jakarta) and run down buses and angkots clog the roads. It’s really interesting to sit back in the taxi (with air conditioning thank god) and watch it all.
As it was Australia Day we had a barbeque for dinner before heading out for a few quiet drinks at a few of the pubs. We were introduced to two stereotypes of South Jakarta- the sleazy old white man and the young rich Indonesian. While highly entertaining for us to talk to these people we definitely made use of the we have to meet a friend/our driver is outside bail out excuses. The night ended just shy of 3am at Kemang maccas (almost a tradition for us) and a sleep in the next day was quite nice.
While there are touristy sites to see in Jakarta we had very little desire to see any of them. I did get to drive past Monas (Monumen Nasional) as monument built by Sukarno and basically a flame on a giant concrete pillar, on my way to my meeting which as Kelly described, it was the most boring tourist attraction ever. The 10 minutes in front of it stuck in traffic was more than enough. It was really interesting to head into the CBD and see the expensive hotels, wide roads and huge office complexes. Friday we spent most of the day with me “preparing for my meeting” aka we ordered pizza and sat around in pyjamas watching the Chaser.
Friday night we faced the complicated decision of where to eat eventually settling on Hacienda, a reasonably famous Mexican restaurant. We ate far too much delicious Mexican food and had some fantastic frozen margaritas before heading home in a food coma. Perhaps the funniest thing to happen that night was just after we sat down someone we studied with in Salatiga two years ago sat at the table next to ours. While we knew she was working as a journalist in Jakarta the fact she came to the same restaurant on the same night was crazy so it was good to catch up!
Originally we had planned to hit a few of the clubs around town on the weekend however the previous weekend a drug related car crash linked to one of the notoriously dodgy clubs in Jakarta had killed 9 people so word was there were going to be drug raids. These raids can turn violent and realistically just ruin a night out so no clubbing (which wasn’t that disappointing in the end). On Saturday we decided that we would go have a massage then headed to two different malls. The first to buy dvds to watch that night rather than going out and then to PIM which is massive (although not the biggest) to have lunch and do some shopping. They had an ice skating rink set up and segway rides but we just ate some delicious Japanese for lunch before shopping for winter clothing in Zara which had a sale on. It does seem strange to shop for winter clothes on a 30 degree day in the tropics.
That night we had another delicious barbeque of pork ribs and prawns and watched the new Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, the Inbetweeners movie (very lol) and War Horse (not that great- the horse was good).
The next morning we went to brunch. This is something that everyone should experience in Jakarta. We went to the Ritz-Carlton where there is a massive room with every type of food you could dream of and free flow champagne. We ate steadily for over 3 hours with quite the mix from roast duck, design your own noodle dish, sushi, giant pretzels, an assortment of cheeses, chocolate fountain, ice cream and cakes. All while waiters buzzed around making sure your drinks were always full. Not a bad way to spend a day and we all had a lot of laughs. One thing that you really noticed here was the heavy security. Less than 3 years ago the Ritz was target of a terrorist attack which killed a number of westerners so getting in meant the car getting searched, explosive sniffer dogs and metal detectors. We weren’t even able to take a photo in front of the lobby because of the security measures which are entirely understandable but make you realise that security is taken very seriously in this town.
After brunch it was time to say goodbye to Kelly and the family and Jakarta and head back to the airport. The airport was quite frankly awful with it impossible to get food (or water!) after security and my flight delayed for over an hour with no explanation. I think in the future I’ll shell out the extra money for a better airline.
So that was my epic Jakarta weekend! While it did involve a lot of time stuck in traffic the fun we had definitely made up for it (and being stuck in traffic isn’t that bad). 3 days of chilling out, eating western food and doing next to nothing is definitely what we needed before heading back to work and uni. While a lot of people hate Jakarta I’ve never failed to have a good time so big thanks to Kelly and her family for an awesome weekend.
Courts xx
I forgot to take photos again (camera was too big to lug around, didn’t feel like taking photos of malls etc)
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