The Jakarta Globe

Thu, May 24, 2012

Archive Search

BLOGS

Treen May & Tasha May

We Love Jakarta: Something Strange and Beautiful

8:24am May 10, 2012

Going to see music in Jakarta is often a community event. The musicians never seem to take with them the attitudes of rock stars, rather they tend to play for the people. Any song requests are accepted and attempted; any budding musicians can join the band, or steal the microphone for a whole set, with barely the hint of an eye roll from the singer.

Comment(s): 0 | Read more..

We Love Jakarta: On Being a Bule

10:50am May 3, 2012

People would go past on their motorbikes and look at me in fear or happiness, then nudge their passengers and say, “bule.” Little children would start crying and pointing and saying this strange word, bule. Oh God, what had I become? Why were the children crying? Since I was alone for a lot of the time, I started to become a little paranoid at these strange reactions.

Comment(s): 12 | Read more..

We Love Jakarta: Holiday in Indonesia

10:56am Apr 25, 2012

As for me, I have given up trying to find a quiet place to go to in Indonesia. I have to accept that different people holiday differently. Most people seek adventure, not quiet. As people’s financial situations improve in Indonesia, greater portions of the population will have a chance to explore their country and they will be excited about it, and that is a good thing.

Comment(s): 8 | Read more..

We Love Jakarta: A Little Bit of Cinta

10:58am Apr 3, 2012

As time passes, perhaps people will be more accepting of relationships across cultures and will get out of their mail order bride thinking. Perhaps Indonesian wages will increase to a fair level so that they don’t seek out old men or women to make their fortune. Maybe women will stop being used for sex and men will control their need for satisfaction.

Comment(s): 6 | Read more..

We Love Jakarta: Masuk Angin, Believe It or Not?

11:26am Mar 28, 2012

Anyway, so many times with Indonesian friends, I would overhear a conversation about “masuk angin,” where the sufferers of this affliction would show their backs that were covered in what looked like bruises from being whipped. I looked at these wounds in shock, and asked what the hell happened to them, to which they would respond calmly in English, “I am windy in – I have masuk angin,” as though this was an answer that would make any sense to me.

Comment(s): 9 | Read more..

We Love Jakarta: What's All That Noise?

10:18am Mar 21, 2012

Then I realize how little I understand about this place; its beats and rhythms, its beliefs and motivations, its tinny yet extremely loud speakers blaring out religious reminders five times a day, whether you want to hear it or not. I have come from a world where we keep things inside; we keep our voices down and don’t talk about our religious beliefs (mostly because we don’t have any) and now I am living in a city where religion rules.

Comment(s): 17 | Read more..

We Love Jakarta: The Hunt for Merdeka Part 1

10:57am Mar 13, 2012

As I drive around the jam packed streets of Jakarta seeing babies on bikes without helmets, old ladies with bowls begging for a few rupiah; barefoot workmen digging up the roads; men pulling wooden rubbish carts with their family inside amongst the trash; giant malls with high-class stores nestled against the kampung, where warungs set up shop for employees of the malls to eat; a Ferrari ducking around potholes; security men endlessly waving their red torches and rivers that smell like sewage, I wonder, how did it become like this?

Comment(s): 3 | Read more..

We Love Jakarta: I Prefer My Food With Pollution

10:49am Mar 6, 2012

Living in Jakarta has certainly changed all of this. I remember the fear when I first came: I stared at menus while sitting in restaurants alone, searching for something that I might recognize. More often than not, I ate nasi goreng, or attempted to branch out by choosing something at random, and was then presented with a strange looking piece of meat that could only be some kind of organ or a bowl of “kulit” floating in a delicious looking sauce. That meal brought on the purchase of a dictionary and the constant reminder in my brain, “Kulit equals skin. Don’t forget it. Don’t order it. Dear God, don’t let it happen again.”

Comment(s): 12 | Read more..

We Love Jakarta: Where's My Mbak?

7:27am Feb 29, 2012

Where we come from, nannies are a luxury only afforded by the rich. Here in Jakarta it seems that everyone has one. It was a strange thing to become accustomed to as I moved into my school lodgings. Every morning as I got ready there was a woman in my room who spoke no English, and I spoke no Indonesian so conversation was limited.

Comment(s): 6 | Read more..

We Love Jakarta: This Traffic is Making Me Gila

10:23am Feb 21, 2012

People will say in a calm way, “It takes me two hours to get to work each day,” without complaint or anger or the belief that it shouldn’t be that way and that someone should do something about it. That hope for someone to fix the problem doesn’t seem to exist. People have to fix their own problems here or just laugh about it.

Comment(s): 20 | Read more..

MOST READ ON JG BLOGS

Schweinsteiger, the Tragic Hero

The First and Biggest Indonesia's Online Shopping Festival

Watatita: Do Not Abandon Our Indonesian Heritage

Which Kind of Health Insurance Policies Are Necessary?

SSJ100 Accident: Reflections After a Week

Keep It NBA: Pacing Back to Relevance

Great Sexpectations: The Danger of False Hope of a Budding Relationship

The Endless Effort of Women Survivors