2012 in pictures

2012 is nearly over and 2013 is almost here. I will post more before 2013 but here is my year in photos.

January

Fireworks. Bali Beach on New Years Morning and at Central Park for Chinese new Year. A great way to start the new year

February. Moving to my first rented house in Mampang. 

Skip to May as nothing really happened in the next 2 months. Well nothing it seemed I took photos of.

May

 A flurry of all things English as Debenhams started selling Jubliee stuff at English prices. But made me feel proud.

 Bali. Say no more

 A sunset in my house

The Wellmen trying to sort the well out. They did, but it got worse and we eventually started to run out of water. Things got better once it rained but that was in October. 

June. My birthday. A trip to Bandung to see the volcanoes and the month some thieving bastards broke into my house and took valuables, laptops, wedding rings and clothing. Bastards.

Happier times in July. I spent a week with my parents in Bali and I also married my partner and best friend Yovita.

August saw city tours and the peace and quiet of Idul Fitry hitting Jakarta. So I went to the zoo.

 Birds on view at Pramuka Bird Market

 Komodo Dragons at the Zoo and the ever helpful sign explaining where everything is, which is designed to be unhelpful.

Bung Karno Stadium was also visited at 6am on a Sunday morning....

 And of course there is always room for a shot of Sudirman empty during Idul Fitry.

Nothing much happened in September, except smiley doughnuts and me riding into Pasar Baru twice a week for work.

October saw the return of  mangoes and my wedding in the local paper in England.

November brought big rain and the nightmare of walking into a mall to find hundreds of Man Utd fans all chanting 'we're going to wembley' and 'glory glory Man Utd'. Wrong.

So then there was December. Hotels, Christmas, crazy floods and its not over yet...........

The Mulia. 

Panoramic views from the Mulia and Millennium hotels respectively.

Gifts from Home and the Tree at Eastern Promise.

Floods. 

There we go. a whole year in 30'ish  pictures. Every picture a tale to tell and a memory to share or something like that. 

Getting around in Jakarta

There are so many variations to the transport here in the city that it is hard to classify them all. The amount of buses and taxis and motorbike taxis and trains and unofficial buses and private cars and hired cars and trucks carrying people around the city is staggering, some days I am certain everyone is one the move. Lets not forget the bimos, bajaij and anything else I have forgotten.

AC buses and non AC buses, executive buses and hole in the floor buses are all here all at once going all over the city.

However you wont catch me on many buses that's for sure. I am uncomfortable on the smaller, noisier, more dangerous ones because they are quite simple a hazard. So I prefer taxis. I wont take Ojeks because I ride and find Ojeks not too careful and they don't provide helmets. I will take the bus, the Transjakarta Bus if I have to because despite all its faults it is efficient at getting people around the city when the bus lanes are not full with traffic slowing it all down. Also when the buses themselves are not over crowded.

Today was one of those days when I braved the busway and took it down into the city, changing once at DukuAtas2 as I was going from Mampang to FX in Sudirman. That's a record 4 times this year!

The cost is still 3500 and for that you get an AC bus with attendant and attendants at every station. A supposedly clear road and a quick tour of the city.
The buses are either Orange, Blue or Grey and every station I have been too has a map or at least signs telling you where you can go but the buses themselves have no such information.

The buses today were thankfully empty, probably because I took them at lunch time so there were many people praying and working. I wont be taking the bus home tonight due to the rain and fact I don't want to be  like a sardine squashed into a bus, no, I will take a taxi home. It may cost far more but it will be worth it.

Buses JTM 031 and JET 029 clearly have seen better days and maybe they will be taken out of service for transjakarta and then used by some else here to ride around the city.

The first bus had broken doors and loose wiring hanging out and holes in the floor, while the second bus had loose seats and holes in the floor. Both were dirty. I am not surprised by any of this however, as I can imagine the buses are constantly in service and because it is Indonesia, they wont get fixed until things actually fall off and then they will be repaired at the cheapest least effective way.

All the above are  from JTM 031 which goes from DukuAtas2 to Ragnuan. What the  blocks are for I don't know

This is from Jet 029 and is definitely in need of some repairs

The stations themselves appear to be maintained there were signs of decorating and repair in several of the stations along the way.

However the trip itself for the money was quick and painless and OK for a now and again option and the views are nice.

Christmas Hideaway

To help celebrate Christmas and also to have a break from city living we decided to check into a hotel for a couple of nights and enjoy the lack of anything to do for a few days.
Last year was the Akmani and it was good but this year it has been the Millennium hotel at Sirih in Jakarta just behind Thamrin.

Millennium hotels are a global chain and from memory I have used the chain before. Once in 2006 for my last trip before Indonesia when I went to New York for New Year and then again in 2007 in Jakarta.

The hotel is a 3 or 4 star hotel and is currently being renovated so getting into the hotel initially required going down into the basement and then taking a lift to the lobby.

I have more about the hotel here http://placestostayindonesia.blogspot.com/2012/12/millennium-hotel-jakarta.html

The view from the window overlooked the city to the east and it is an impressive view which was good.

Panaramic view from my  hotel window

To be honest I can't stay in a hotel room for too long as the walls start to close in so we spent yesterday in Central Park and City Walk and both evenings in  Thamrim.

We went to Ocha and Bella, the Italian bistro at the Morrisey near Jacksa for some dinner but with pizza being 130,000 idr and pasta dishes at 90,000 we settled for the buy one get one beer and the free bread before moving up to Ya Uhdas restaurant for equally good for as long as you did not want rice because they had run out.

Thamrin at night

Yovita wanted to take me to a new coffee place called Liberica which she found in Pacific Place and also in Central Park so we went to Central Park. The mall is at the end of the day well designed and the gardens and landscaping outside is lovely especially in the morning before the crowds get there and start photographing everything they see. The coffee, yep it was nice.

Liberica is opposite Sogo outside in Trebeca

City Walk, Sudirman

Today the wife is back to work and I am off to ride the buses home and then meet her later for dinner. Should be fun.

Celebrating Christmas

This year, like last the decision was made to stay home in Jakarta and have Christmas day in the city. Whilst not ideal it still sounded like a good idea and in fact it was.
However, unlike last year, I did not stay in a hotel for Christmas rather leaving that to a few nights a night later (another post on that to follow, I am sure) and so we settled down to enjoy the festivities er on TV?

Christmas Eve started with lots of hope and expectation and I wanted to enjoy a decent English breakfast so we headed off to Bangers and Mash in Kemang only to find that it was closed, so from there we went to Citos or Cilendak Town Square and ate in a German restaurant which was excellent.
Getting back home in the late afternoon, beer and rubbish TV was the order of the day and whilst I waited for midnight to come and Christmas day to arrive, I decided to follow Santa as he delivered his presents across the world with the Google Santa Tracker app on Android. I had already downloaded the Norad application and with them both running Santa seemed to be going to different places at the same time and then as it neared 11pm or midnight in Bali, Santa had magically delivered all the presents for Indonesia and was off to Singapore. Now as a believer I was stunned to see that clearly someone or thing had forgotten how silly and odd the time zones are in Asia with Bali being on the same time as Singapore but Bangkok is not as it is the same as Jakarta.... Still.

If you look at the bottom right hand corner it says 23.06

Christmas morning was up early and into the presents and it was a great experience and definitely a Christmassy moment in otherwise lacklustre season. Lacklustre because despite the malls and restaurants ramping up the season greetings with trees, music and Santas etc, the streets and mood  around had not moved at all. This was not helped by one of the largest Moslem movements in the country declaring it was 'haram' or forbidden to say happy Christmas or join in in any Christmas celebrations if you were a muslim. What a happy place. Someone commented that it is OK and acceptable to give to Muslims when they are celebrating  Ramadhan etc but not for them to do the same when another faith has a major festival. I am generalising with that statement because despite the information from this governing body, everyone I met regardless of faith was wishing me happy Christmas, so I guess the general population can clearly make its own mind up about what is correct or not to say at Christmas but the overtones about lack of tolerance again is worrying. (Read more by clicking the link)

http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2012/12/24/mui-nixes-christmas-sby.html

Presents opened, New shirt on, Yovita and I headed again like last year to Eastern Promise in Kemang for Christmas lunch with some friends.

The lunch was fantastic again like last year. It was also a plated affair not a buffet like the year before. Turkey, gravy, Stuffing, all the beer we could drink and a most splendid afternoon enjoying ourselves whilst outside was thundery and raining very heavily.
The day could not gone any better and it was for me one of the best Christmas days for many a year.

Top menu, top food and a decent price as it  was tax included.

The girls decided that they wanted to go to a mall for 'decent' coffee and so we left EP and headed towards Pacific Place where they could drink coffee in a cafe called Liberica and the boys went to De Burse for more beer and cheer.

This is the one in Central Park, I am told they all look the same

Finally around 9pm we left the bar and headed our separate ways. Mother phoned to wish us all a merry Christmas which was nice and I hopefully was not too drunk talking to her, if I was then it wont have been the first time.

So Christmas Day in Jakarta this year was well spent and was lots of fun. It wass a national holiday here but out in the streets it certainly did not feel like it as well, life goes on.  Next year? well that remains to be seen. I would like to be somewhere else for the day but where, that I don't know yet.