After not seeing each other for a while, Joko and I went to this tea place in South Jakarta yesterday afternoon. It is also the place where a psychic friend works as tarot reader and, what do you call it.. tea reader? You know, predicting your future through tea leaves.

I don't really believe in those stuff though. My friend in Bandung is also a psychic but I rarely consult anything to her. It's nothing to do with religious reason, I just don't think it's necessary.

However, yesterday, for fun's sake, me and Joko decided to have our future read through tarot. Joko asked about relationship, me about my job and career. Predictably, the results were nothing that we didn't already know.
My friend didn't charge us, but paid her anyway, based on her fee of Rp 100,000 per half an hour.

We left on Joko's car for this electronic mall nearby. But since it was 3-in-1 time, where a car must have a minimum of three people in it, we picked up a jockey on the street. Since it was less than 1 kilometer away, we only gave the jockey Rp 5,000. Guess what? She asked for another Rp 5,000, saying that it was the "common" fee. Stunned, we gave her what she wanted.

"Hera, everyone is making more money than us," Joko said on our way back home, talking about my low salary and his unsteady paycheck.
He swore then to learn more about tarot reading, something he once learned and quite good at. Based on his rough calculation, he's gonna make an extra Rp 3 mil a month at least from tarot reading.

"How difficult it is? We just tell people what they want to hear," he said.
"But don't do it, it'll make your career unfocused," I said.

It was a long pause from then on, until The Beatles' eerie and disturbing Revolution Number 9 was heard from his iPod. After the song (if it could even be called a song) was finished, it left us feeling suicidal.

"You know what, Kurt Cobain was reportedly listening to this song when he decided to kill himself," Joko said.
We looked at each other, and changed the song to Debbie Gibson's Electric Youth.

Posted by hera at 2:58 PM | Permalinks | Comments   

The perfect time to see Jakarta in a not-so-terrible facade are at night and on Sunday morning. At night, the city lights made up for the rundown buildings and slums houses. On Sunday morning, which I just realized, it's lovely because the streets are mostly deserted, filled only with churchgoers, jocks with their bikes and joggers, plus the the weather is yet to be so hot.

I don't function very well in the morning, but last Sunday, me and my husband already hit the street on 9 a.m.. Along with a couple of other friends, we were going to hunt some vintage clothing in Pasar Baru or new market, Central Jakarta.

The meeting point: The strategic McDonald's Sarinah Thamrin:) As usual, we went there by ojeks. The weather was lovely though, not too hot, with slight breeze. It was nice to see the dynamic of the city: Vendors at Tanah Abang market, families walking on the street in their sweatshirts and sweatpants, food stalls.

My husband the junkfood junkie was ecstatic with our meeting point:) Aside from the food though, he (well, we, actually) had another thing that gave him a good laugh: A birthday party of some kid. The idea of having a birthday bash for your children at McDonald's is totally headscratching. Good job, parents, for teaching your kids to be consumptive, and for clearing the path to obesity.
Funny thing is, looked like there was a dresscode for the party: Pink taffetta for the girls and ties for the boys. The birthday girl herself looked like a little slutty princess (can't help it, sorry:P) with pink, layered dress, hair in a high ponytail and bright red lipstick. Her mother sported a similar all-pink look too, except she was wearing pants. And whoops, here came the gigantic birthday cake with some cartoon characters I don't recognize.
Some parents already looked suspiciously at us because we couldn't stop commenting on anything and laughed so hard. But then our friends arrived, and we got out of there, swearing to God we would never arrange a birthday party for our future kid(s) in some junk food place.

Pasar Baru, meanwhile, was still great. Tuck amid old, colonial buildings, it is known as a melting pot for Chinese and Indian Jakartans, as well as Betawi people (native Jakartans). Along the alley inside the market, where shops (mostly clothing materials) packed the place, you would find a turban-wearing Sikh shop owner, or Chinese grocery store etc.
The vintage market placed at the back of the alley, on the second floor of a faded 3-storey building. Aside from all the clothing stalls, there is also a camera shop where you can buy camera and its accessories with bargain price, as well as repairing them. Unlike in most markets, this building is great cause it's air-conditioned. It reaaally make up for the smelly used clothes, bags and shoes.

It's almost time to go back to work now, so to make the story short, I had a great time shopping there. With only Rp 120,000 (around US$13), I bought five good items. Afterwards, we had lunch at a pretty ancient noodle restaurant and went back home.

Well, maybe I don't hate this city that much.

Posted by hera at 1:30 PM | Permalinks | Comments   

In the jungle (the mighty jungle..) of notorious Jakarta traffic, motorcycle taxi a.k.a. ojek can be a knight in shining armor. True, when you're not a motorcyclist nor the passenger, bikers are really obnoxious cause they simply follow their own rules. They never obey red lights, they never use the signs, they carry everything on their motorbike -- from bulky AC compressors to dozens of poor chicken, they will flee before you realize they have scratched your cars, but on the other hand get furious even when you nudge them slightly with your bumper. They would stop and demand you to pay the damage. They are that crazy.

However, when rushing to get into a place (which happens to me everyday) and wanting to dodge the traffic jam, ojek is definitely the answer. It cuts half the time you usually take to go some place by car, so you don't have to rush and still have enough time to do something else.

The downsides are the direct heat-dust-and-vehicle's exhaust, and ojek drivers' BO(thank god there are only a couple of them so far) and smelly helmet. Other thing is the drivers' greed, which only occur to those at my flat complex. Some of them keep asking for more money even though the route is the same everyday.
Other ojek drivers are nice though. They will accept no matter how much money I give them.

But ojek continues to become my daily transportation mean. Whether it's going to office, going back home, or covering something to places as far as Pulogadung (the result: skin that two shades darker and bau matahari). The farthest I've ever gone with ojek was riding around Jakarta for hours on New Year's Eve 2000/2001, to anticipate another bombing (it was after the 2000 christmas bombing).
What a ride it was. I went to Hotel Indonesia roundabout first, and then Ancol, Jatinegara, Taman Mini...all the way back to HI again. It ended around 2 a.m., with total fare of Rp 100,000 (around US$10) and the driver was happy to get the money.

I had never met the driver again until a year later, when I had to go to dentist. I didn't recognize him until he said "you were the one who rent me at new year's eve right?". How surreal was that, and a bit eerie.

After all of those ojek ride, however, my ass starts to sore real bad and my skin got darker and darker. It's terrible when it rains, too. But since there's no better way to dodge the traffic than ojek, I still have to stick with it.

Posted by hera at 10:25 AM | Permalinks | Comments   

"Marriage," Jennifer Aniston said in an interview once, "brings up all the things I pushed to the back burner – the fears, the mistrust, the doubts, the insecurities. It’s like opening Pandora’s box. Every question comes out – it’s like, Here’s the key, have at it!”

Jennifer dear, I could not agree more with you.

Posted by hera at 2:21 PM | Permalinks | Comments   

There's a girl named Peggy Melati Sukma. I remember my late sister liked to mock her as idung jambu (guava nose). I just realized though that her initial is PMS. And just like the true PMS, the girl is as nerve wrecking.

PMS is among the second worst type of local celebrity (tell you about the worst of its kind later): Those who are trying so very hard to look intelligent (paging Dian Sastro!). She may hold a bachelor degree from a noted university, but it doesn't make her Marie Curie. PMS is just the one eye in the blind celebrity realm.

I came across her silliness recently, at a seminar about women's position in Islam held by former first lady Shinta Nuriyah, where PMS served as emcee.
And boy, not only PMS made a fool of herself by talking in girlish tone in front of all the clerics (including former president Gus Dur), she degraded herself by exposing her personal life to no one's interest.

"Well, I was graduated from University of Indonesia.." she said, before blabbering about women's position in marriage, and announcing that "I'm getting married next year! I hope.. blablabla". Replying to nobody's question, PMS said "I'm going to be Ciganjur's resident too, just like Bu Shinta and Pak Dur. I'm building a house there..".
To top it all off, she ended her session by claiming that she's no Gus Dur in cracking jokes, but she beat him in the length of her name: Peggy Melati Sukma Wangi Berseri di Pagi Hari etc. etc. which was a really old and tacky joke.

I could have just die right there. A senior journalist sitting beside me said that she felt like throwing up. It was too much indeed.

Anyway... we now come into the worst type of celebrity, or maybe just as bad as the likes of PMS. They are the act-innocent/angelic celebrity. A strange coincident is, the women of this kind always wear Muslim headdress everytime they announce their divorce.
Most recent example is the newlywed couple of TV anchor and political analyst. Rumor had been around that the two were having affair back when they both were still married to their former spouses. They had denied, of course.
But just recently, they told reporters that they have gotten married in, yes, holy land of Mecca, blessed by cleric/celebrity Aa Gym. Both couple wore typical Muslim dresses at the press conference, with the woman wearing headdress. The only thing missing was halo above their heads.

The moral of the latter story is:
1. I will believe in gossip from now on (if they turned out to be true).
2. It is time to establish Aa Gym Watch (I never like the guy, he's sexist, too smooth a talker, too business oriented... something's just not right about him. And he's sexist, did I mention sexist?).
3. I have new respect for Sophia Latjuba. If you're a slut, there's no point of hiding the fact.

Posted by hera at 12:17 PM | Permalinks | Comments   

Journalists often lead double lives. Not the Superman/Clark Kent thing (I would love that!), I'm talking about the perks: Travelling abroad, staying in plush hotels, flying business class, test-driving fancy cars, VIP access and so on.
I even cringed at the modest hotel I had to stayed (it was in Poso, Central Sulawesi, of course it was modest) :).

Lately, however, I've been thinking about the irony, paradox, or whatever, of the job. Here I am, writing every single day about upholding human rights, discrimination and violence against women, religious intolerance, battling corruption etc. etc. hoping that we can be the agent of change for a better situation (aside from wishing more people would buy our paper:)).
Yet, I can't even touch the people around me, in this case my family, my friends and my relatives.

I don't how to convince my mother that putting career first over a baby is not against my nature as a woman, or that cousin X is not an infidel and a satan worshipper just because she's marrying a man of different religion.
I don't dare to call my father as sexist or confronted my uncle for being an abusive husband. I can't think of a way to tell my sister that she indiscriminates her Chinese neighbor.
I didn't say a word to my mother in law for thinking that Islam is the one and true religion in the universe and for acting holier-than-thou over her Christian neighbors. I don't know how to talk my friends over their abusive boyfriends, let alone ask them to leave the bastards. I always think about asking my relatives, the full-time civil servants, of how they become so filthy rich, but never did.

There are still many examples that the more I think about them, the more they make me feel so pathetic. I just couldn't argue with these people. Sometimes I told them my opinion, but never make an attempt to convince them.
Even though I disagree with them, more often I always opt to keep silent, thinking that they are what God made them. It's impossible for them to change.
To an extent, I feel I'm a hypocrite :(

I have to change that, I'm trying to change that,... do you think I can change that? Sigh..

Posted by hera at 6:25 PM | Permalinks | Comments