Back to Jakarta, 06/27/08-07/03/08

After posting my blog for Kuta, Bali, I realized that I forgot to use my "I got bombed in Bali" joke--a joke as tasteful as Kuta itself. Oh, well. There is probably someone there selling T-shirts with that written on it.

I flew from Bali back to Jakarta. I just planned to hang out there with friends for a few days, maybe see a few sites that I did not see the first time. That's pretty much what I did. I managed to get on TV, much to my embarrassment. At least, I assume that it made it onto TV. I was fortunate enough not to see it. Hopefully, no one who knew me saw it either.

Hotels

Before I arrived in Jakarta I decided that I would book a decent hotel before arriving instead of staying in a flophouse. The Ibis hotel was nice enough, but it was inconveniently located (in a neighborhood called Slipi) and required a taxi to do anything. Not worth the extra money (a little over US$35 a night after discounts). I ended up leaving it for a crappier but better situated and somewhat cheaper (but still overpriced--around US$30 a night) hotel a few days later. For lodging, Jakarta seems to be really bad value compared to other Asian cities.

I Wish I Could Sleep That Soundly

One night I was at my hotel (the more expensive one) and I told my friend that I needed to get some bottled water (since you cannot drink tap water). We went outside the hotel gate to a little portable shop on the sidewalk just outside. (Think of a newspaper stand.) The guy was sleeping in front of his shop. My friend talked to him to try to wake him up. No response. Louder talking. No response. A light touch. No response. A light shake. No response. A firm shake. There we go. He finally woke up. My friend and I were both laughing at this point at how hard this guy was to wake up. It seems like a little thing, but as it was happening, I was thinking, "This is the stuff that makes travel interesting."

The Jakarta Fair, the Shore, and Colonial Jakarta

On this visit to Jakarta I went with my friend Angga to the Jakarta Fair, which was just some big shopping expo in the convention center. Nothing too exciting. The next day we went to the shore on the north side of town. It is OK, with bunches of people and food shops and kind of a carnival atmosphere. Then we went to the colonial part of town which was close by. It was nice, but nothing overly exciting. We had lunch on the square there at Batavia Cafe--a grand old restaurant. We sat at a window on the second floor and looked out over the square where there was some function involving speakers and the like. Plenty of people in different regional garb.

Taman Mini Park and My 15 Minutes of Fame

The next day, Angga and I went to Taman Mini Park, which was kind of cool. It is a huge park filled with buildings built in the styles of each of the states of Indonesia. It also has an Imax theater in a giant gold snail shell where we watched a movie about sardines. It was in Bahasa Indonesia, so I didn't understand a word of it.

To get to the park, we took the busway, which seemed to take forever and was extremely hot. The last part of the trip was in this little minivan that acts as sort of a cross between a public bus and a shuttle. We decided that we would take a taxi when we left.

We walked around the buildings in the park, and in front of one, there were a young man and woman in front of a small camera crew. On TV in southeast Asia, I have seen several shows where there are these energetic MTV-like personalities going around to places of interest talking to people. It looked like that kind of thing. Angga was several steps ahead of me and walked past behind them. As I walked past, I saw one of the crew point back at me. Crap. I knew I was in trouble then. I kept walking, hoping nothing would happen. Angga looked back and saw the "Oh, no!" expression on my face. Then as I walked up the steps to the next building the crew came running up to me. The two people in front of the camera stood on either side of me.

"Do you speak Bahasa Indonesia?" the young man asked.

"No," I said, surely looking a bit aprehensive, but smiling.

They each introduced themselves (I forgot their names even as they said them) but did not ask me my name.

"Where are you from?" the man asked.

"San Francisco, California, America," I said.

"America!" he exclaimed. "Do you like xxxxx music?" he asked. I do not remember what kind of music he said.

"I have never heard of it," I replied.

"Ok," he said. "You have to choose one of these two song. 'Xxxxxxx' or 'Sylvia'." "Xxxxxx" was some Indonesian sounding name. I chose it.

"Aaaaaahhhh! You choose 'Xxxxxx'!" he exclaimed.

"Yes," I said.

He started swivelling his hips and said, "Can you do this?"

I said, "No, I draw the line there," smiling through all of this, but probably not seeming that into it.

Then he said, "Ok. Can you say, 'XXxxxxxx xxxxx xxxx xxxx xxxx' for our audience?"

I asked him to repeat it, tried to say it, and before I got to the end, I needed more help.

Then he and the woman said some phrase while sweeping their arms from left to right. The guy asked, "Can you do this with us?"

They repeated it, and I did it with them, repeating the phrase as well (although I may have messed up a syllable or two.)

Then they thanked me, we shook hands, I said it was nice to meet them, and I walked to Angga who was a safe distance away.

"That was SO weird!" I said to him. Then he asked if I had a TV in my room and started talking about wanting to see me on TV. I told him that I hoped we didn't. And even more so, I hoped that no one I knew saw me either. Of course, this had to happen on laundry day when I was walking around in the worst clothes that I own. (I have this blue pair of pants that makes me look like a gas station attendant and a synthetic T-shirt that is a little worse for wear.)

And the Rest

I didn't reconnect with everyone in Jakarta. In my previous Jakarta blog entry, I forgot to mention a brother and sister that I met a couple of times named Punch and Judy. They did not understand why I found it amusing that there are a brother and a sister with those names.

While in Jakarta, I also spent time with Jojo, sampling food and doing more karaoke. I didn't see Pavis--the guy with whom I went clubbing the last time I was in Jakarta--but he did give me a call. He told me that someone was chatting with him online who, upon finding out that Pavis lived in America, asked Pavis if he knew me. My total time in Jakarta has only been a few days, and I managed to come up in conversation between strangers chatting online. Very weird. For a city with almost 9 million people, it seems to be a very small world.