Shifting Views of Jakarta

My impressions of Jakarta have completely changed from what they were a year ago. Less romantic now than before. Originally I thought it would be a small(ish) city, maybe twice the size of New Orleans with the same rundown historical charm or twice the size of Las Vegas without the glam. Now, my opinion is that it is much more similar to Las Vegas (although size wise Jakarta is massive: between 8 and 10 million people!) if you just replace the casinos for malls with “many and close between” areas that are overflowing with the poor, jobless, malnourished, and disabled. When I first arrived in Jakarta, my first week in Indonesia, the taxi driver drove through some sketchy areas on rivers that were next to the highway. I could see the occasional squatter (those poor people who have set up small makeshift homes in illegal areas) like under bridges, near rivers, next to highways, etc. My first week with Mercy Corps I visited flood-prone areas in West Jakarta (see earlier blog) and even though that perspective contrasted with where I was staying in a guest house in the wealthy, suburban, western-friendly haven, South Jakarta, I thought most of Jakarta was like the former: rundown, poor, disaster-prone, troublesome sanitation systems galore, etc. But this week I have been able to see central Jakarta quite a lot and my perception of the city has completely changed. The central areas is near the national monument called MONAS that stands for Monumen Nasional. It’s a tall statue similar to our monument only it has a bronze flame at the top that is covered in 35kg of gold leaf. The tower itself is made of Egyptian marble supposedly. Surrounding that area is a large park, many buildings for the banks, government buildings, cafes. Then all around the main monument and spreading out in a large radius are tons and tons of shopping malls. And in between the current shopping malls there are many new ones being constructed. Throughout all of this there are many streets, all completely swarming with taxis, buses, ojeks, motorcycles, bendi (horse drawn carriages), bajaj (tri-wheeled motorcycles with carts on the back for passengers), and beggars in the street weaving in and out of traffic trying to get money from the cars, on the sidewalks, in the park, outside the cafes. You get the point. The biggest surprise though and what has made me completely disappointed in the lack of charm, is that everything looks new and modern. Not much has retained its historical style or cultural architecture. It’s a city trying to catch up to other modern cities and quickly losing its history, in my opinion. True, much of my opinion of Jakarta, is from the Mel Gibson and Linda Hunt movie, The Year of Living Dangerously. But I was kind of looking forward to that, (without the rampant crime, government corruption, and no freedom of press thing of course). Honestly, I wanted to see areas that have been plagued by riots and civil unrest for decades, seeing the old dutch style from the founding of Jakarta, seeing Indonesian style government buildings or hotels, still seeing areas in Central Jakarta with cobblestone or smaller, non-modern roads.

But you will see none of that downtown. This must be the reason behind its dwindling tourism numbers and frequent conversation piece that other than food, shopping, and nightlife, Jakarta doesn’t have much to offer. I refused to believe this though. The last week and especially this holiday weekend (today is Indonesia’s 64th anniversary of independence) I set out to prove these widespread expatriate opinions false. Originally I wanted to go to central java and see the 17th century temples, see Mount Merapi, and see what outside Jakarta looks like. Reality soon set in though and being that it’s a holiday weekend and all planes, trains, and automobiles are booked solid and I didn’t think it was a good idea to rent a car/driver for the weekend alone when its takes at least 10 hours each way to get there, and that I AM a graduate student that needs to seriously budget this coming school year, I decided to stay in Jakarta and explore its culture and especially history and save money. Soo much easier said than done. I emailed and called numerous tourism places to see what bus tours there were around the city (since a few websites mentioned there were some). No one answered the phone and no one emailed back. None of the websites mentioned where the tours start so I couldn’t even just show up and hope to get a ticket. When I asked coworkers no one even knew Jakarta had day tours for sightseeing. I spent hours on the internet looking at blogs, travel websites, discussion boards, expatriate sites, to find event calendars, museum schedules, postings of anykind. Still no luck. On Saturday desperate for some kind of cultural experience other than going out to a bar and partying with skeevy western businessmen (which is what I did on Friday night), I went and looked at TimeOut Jakarta. Still nothing for this weekend and only very general listings for movies and cultural activities.

It was official. It was going to just be me and my lonely planet guide. But that’s OK. I did that for part of my Australia trip and things worked out fine. Fortunately on Sunday I was able to not be completely alone as Cynara and her boyfriend from Germany were here and looking for things to do too. So we went to the Wayang Museum, Shadow Puppet Museum, and watched a really cool Javanese puppet performance (couldn’t understand most of it though as it wasn’t in Indonesian, but only Javanese, the local language of the island of Java). This area is the only area I found in Jakarta that has preserved some of its dutch heritage. It’s called Old Batavia, and there is still a cobblestone center which is now surrounded by museums, and a fence made out of cannons. We took photos in the center of the square and then walked to an outdoor Indonesian restaurant for lunch. Lots of nasi goreng which I am officially sick of (friend rice with egg). We did pass some areas that are definitely abandoned buildings that have probably been standing for at least 200 years, so that was kind of cool to see a glimpse of the rundown, historical Jakarta I was expecting. We then walked to Glodok, thanks to our LonelyPlanet Guide, on the way visited a church that was from 1695. Here’s what our friend told us:

“Near the Kota train station, this church dates from 1695 and is the oldest remaining church in Jakarta. Also known as Gereja Portugis (Portuguese Church), it was built just outside the old city walls for the so-called “black Portuguese” – the Eurasians and natives captured from Portuguese trading ports in Indian and Malaya and brought to Batavia as slaves. The exterior of the church is very plain, but inside there are copper chandeliers, a baroque pulpit and the original organ. Although more than 2000 people were buried in the graveyard during 1790 alone, very few tombs remain”

Here’s the description for Glodok too. This is what I expected to find:

“ The neighbourhood of Glodok, the traditional enclave of the Chinese, is a bustline rundown part of town with fading markets and decadent nightlife (it’s wise to be careful here after dark). It was also the sight of the terrible riots of May and November 1998, which reduced huge swathes of the area to ash and rubble. Much of the legislation that had discriminated against the Chinese and their language for decades was lifted in 2000, but it will be years before the scars are fully erased and the last of the burnt buildings rebuilt.”

As we walked through Glodok it didn’t seem much different than other residential areas, except there were a few burnt buildings (the exteriors), hard to tell if they were from the riots are not though. We definitely saw one that was from that time though because they weren’t renovated and had many plants growing wildly from the inside to the outside. Definitely would take years to get that way. We passed one of the Chinese temples, but not sure of the name as there was no sign (not good for tourism, come on Jakarta!)

Today we did one more of the Lonely Planet Guide suggestions and something I wanted to visit since I read the travel writings of Adam Karlin (click here for his story about this place, he definitely writes better than me and has a much more interesting story to tell: http://www.worldhum.com/features/travel-stories/a_writers_port_of_call_20080422/ ). Sunda Kelapa, the old port of Jakarta. We went there at sunset (almost missed it though because of lazy taksi drivers and the Independence Day festivities today). Lining the first dock of the Marina are many Makasar schooners (pinisi). Most of the marina though is really rundown with tons of men just hanging about (some bathing as we walked by, oops. But not the first time here I have startled a bathing sailor in Indonesia oddly). We walked to the end of the first port (the left side was the cool schooners and the right side was large cargo ships) and there were two small ships blocking our view of Jakarta Bay. Bryan and Cynara were going to just pier through the space between the boats and head back but I wanted to see the bay, to prove that Jakarta is coastal since you can’t really tell when just staying there. So we asked the sailors if we could go on their ship to see the view from the other side. They obliged with a puzzled look on their faces but continued on working on the side of the boat. We took tons of photos (of course a titanic one for the couple) and then headed back out. It was a very rundown ship with very little room to move. Not the safest I would guess and would never want to work on it out on the sea because of all the lines, metal chains, sharp metal edges, and large equipment thrown all around the deck.

After the old port we went to a mall for dinner and shopping to end the night. I have been in about 10 malls in three days. I will never make jokes about the shopping culture of South Florida again! Ok, I totally will, but not about the abundant malls. Jakarta is a bit ridiculous with them and it seems they are totally moving away from the charming street markets that make Indonesia so much fun to travel in. I hope they realize what they are doing. I had a quesadilla (just black beans and cheese, no onions, no peppers, no guacamole, no salsa….it had the nerve to say “authentic Mexican”). Something very clever about malls here though. You can’t easily take an elevator to the floor you want, or just one or two escalators. They are each about six floors and you have to take an escalator to the next floor, walk around the loop passed all the stores, to the next escalator, and do that all the way up. It guarantees you must shop and see everything and not just go in and go out with what you want. A nightmare for people like me who feel claustrophobic in the two-story Roosevelt Field Mall, let alone these overpopulated six-story malls that make it difficult to get out!

My overall verdict of Jakarta is that more needs to be done to restore the cultural, but moreover, the historical significance of Jakarta. I understand the desire to match other cities for nightlife and shopping especially as the world’s 10th largest city, but they shouldn’t also sacrifice the treasure of their past. The Dutch occupation is honestly really cool since it dates back centuries ago, and the Indonesia’s independence also offers a really neat story that should be told. The puppet museum did have a puppet scene behind glass of the Indonesian independence, but not much else can be seen in Jakarta unless you REALLY go out and look for it with a lonely planet guide. Granted I did not have time or desire to fight the holiday weekend crowds and visit the national museum so I could be wrong. But many cities have their history not just locked up in a building with an admission fee and often hokey gift shops, but in their architecture, walking tours, street signs, and the streets themselves. While exiting the Shadow Puppet museum I was stopped by the manager. He asked where I was from. When I told him America is was ecstatic and thanked me so much for coming to visit the museum. Apparently two days before my arrival the US Ambassador and the Embassy staff held an event at the museum where they donated $46,000 USD to the museum. This is a huge grant in American standards, so just imagine what that means for Indonesians. They showed me a letter signed by the Ambassador that says they donated the money to “support the preservation of Indonesia’s Wayang [shadow puppet] culture…The grant was made under part of the U.S. Department of States Ambassador’s Fund for Cultural Preservation program, which provides support to cultural heritage preservation projects in select countries.” (NOTE: Odd that there wasn’t a bahasa Indonesia letter). Go Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama! This is seriously needed. Even if you don’t think the Shadow Puppet culture should be preserved, although you should see a performance then, because they are so creative, the actual building of the museum in Old Batavia should be preserved. The building dates back to 1912, BUT in the downstairs courtyard there are memorials to Dutch governors generals who were once buried here, including Jan Pieterszoon Coen, founder of Batavia, who died of cholera in 1692 during the siege of Mataram! This is by far the oldest gravestone I have ever seen (if you don’t count Pompeii in Italy as one giant gravestone).

OK, but back to how awesome our Secretary of State and President are. Yesterday I was also able to visit the childhood home and school of Barack Obama. Amazing! First of all, it was very difficult to find a reputable source online for the address so I just used what I found on flickr.com and took a taxi there. Once we got to the tiny RW (subvillage) we stopped people on the street and asked where his house was. 3 different people told us the same thing so I am pretty confident that was it. Also, considering broken glass has been added to the surrounding wall, which I would think signals newfound interest in the house. There are no signs to tell you its his home or tour guides or anything like that. Its simply a person’s house now (who wouldn’t open the gate. I think they were sleeping and didn’t want to be bothered). It’s a one story house, very small and rundown compared to the others on the block. The street itself is lined mostly with homes but also very small “stalls” for small businesses like a tailor and a small store for snacks. Afterwards, we drove about thirty minutes to where the international elementary school is where he attended. That has a sign out front reading: “Barack Hussein Obama II, the 44th President of the United States of America attended this school from 1969-1971. Plaque donated by Friends of Barack Obama.” But being that it was a Sunday the school was “tutup” (closed). Still amazing though.

well off to bed for me. I have to do a presentation tomorrow at MercyCorps about the private sector survey I organized and the big boss, Sean (country director) comes back from vacation. Then in the afternoon I am meeting with other Climate Project presenters since Al Gore's The Climate Project just opened a 50-volunteer chapter. Yay! Note: I meet the other climate project presenter guy over some food with the Program Director. It was Javanese food. The conversation was great, but I learned Padang food is definitely "lebih baik" (better). Ok, I am really going now. Selamat Malam!