Earth Hour

So that was Earth Hour give or take a few minutes. Interestingly I was in Starbucks in the Emporium, Jakarta when this global event was happening. Starbucks clearly supported this event and out went the lights inside and a few went off outside in the mall as well although not that many.

For about 10 minutes the lights were switched off to give minimal lighting and then out came a member of staff to take the obligatory photos to prove that the employees had done their bit and then the light came back on to about 80% normal. Great PR but not really in the spirit of things!

Outside the Emporium walking up to Pasar Festival it was pretty much business as normal, it was a little darker, but not by much.

The taxi trip into Mampang highlighted very few dark parts of the city there and that was a shame as the city management could really do some good with this event if they could convince more organisations to switch the power off for an hour. 

Ironically and most amusing was a friend produced a letter from the governor himself, which was in some form of degree that all the power will be turned off in the city for an hour. Perhaps it was a ploy by PLN to distract us away from the rolling power outs last week. 

Surely Earthhour would be a good excuse to complete essential maintenance!!!! But it was good to see there was still a lot of fake news surrounding the event as normal. It was a success I must admit but there is always more that could be done, if people wanted it to be done.

Quite a fun weekend really, with a meeting that really was just for information purposes and did not really conclude with any actions. A trip into central park for some coffee and shoe buying with the fiancee and then to Aphrodites for beers and food with friends which really was a good thing to do. 

The weekend ended with the great idea of a trip to Carrefour as I fancied some good fresh bread and salad and well at the end of the day they can do that bit right.

So in I go knowing what ever happens something would annoy me. And so it did. In the busiest of aisles (noodles, packets and sauces) someone in their wisdom (or lack of it) decided to build a stage, place chairs erect a sound system and then have dancing dads on it. WTF are they thinking, after 16 years of food retail management, all this does is make people regret shopping there, frustrate and cause general unhappiness amongst the shoppers unless Indonesians think it is alright. Trying to buy a few things from that aisle and yes I really needed to buy some things was met by looks of disbelief from the happy sat mums, the sound technicians who were just in the way and well I don't care who else. I mean come on how desperate is Carrefour to allow these kind of things, where was the sensible management decision in that one. Unbelievable.

Then in the queue while I was being served, slowly but with some car by the cashier, a woman decided to push past everyone and tell the cashier that she needed to buy a few things and could she just take her money (she gave the cashier 50,000) and then would come back. I assume that was said. Again the cashier just said no and the woman looked in total shock at the fact that Carrefour how ever badly managed it is, actually was not a local street mart and had rules. She stomped off and the whole queue just burst into laughter at her manner and totally outrageous behaviour.

If only the hero in the apartments (now a giant) did good freshly baked bread, I would never go into a carrefour, but then if I never went in a Carrefour, I would never remember how much better everywhere else is for service and management decisions.

Seriously thinking of creating a blog just about my adventures in Carrefour!