We’re still trucking along in Jakarta. Well actually Neil’s been back in New Zealand for the last three weeks, catching up with Maya and giving much needed TLC to Distant Drummer. It’s the first time we (he) has been back for 8 months but she seems to be in good shape, thanks largely to our friend Ken who’s been keeping an eye on things and starting the engine every couple of weeks. Having said that, there’s still a lot of work to do to put here to bed while we are in Indonesia. Neil’s been working hard scrubbing decks and hulls and general maintenance – good onya skipper!
While he’s away I’ve been continuing the search for an apartment. There’s some real crap out there so finding the gems takes time to figure out what you want and then to work with the agent to help her understand what you’re looking for. One of the keys is to decide what features are really important to you (high rise/low rise or a house, balcony, study room, garden etc.). Then you need to choose your area for convenience to the shops, office, toll road etc. We have settled on an area called Kabayoran Baru which is a lovely leafy district full of quiet streets and big houses. It’s pretty central for shops etc. and reasonably well located for the office.
Having got that far I decided to take to the streets! I had a walk around the area looking for suitable candidates. Yesterday I checked out a few places and found two that I liked. They ticked most of the boxes and hopefully Neil will like them too and we can eventually get settled into somewhere. Anyway I’ve spent far too much time talking about that – as you can tell it’s been on my mind!
I’ve been doing some other stuff too. Our neighbours up here on the 22nd floor are fun people. We’ve met up a few times for dinner/drinks and get along well. A couple of weeks ago we drove down to the south coast of West Java to join a trekking group (called Java Lava) for a bit of a walk. Saturday involved getting up at 4.30, wolfing down a plate of nasi goreng then walking 17km! For an island as densely populated as Java it was surprisingly uninhabited – no road access I suppose. In each bay there was usually a fishing shack with a few boats pulled up on the beach. It could not have been too far from habitation as many of the valleys were terraced with workers bent double planting padi.
The route roughly followed the shoreline – part rocky beach, part sandy beach with occasional river crossings, we were soon hot, wet and muddy. The coast is fairly sinuous with deep bays separated by rugged headlands. Navigating these was an adventure in itself involving slithering up steep muddy paths between padi and banana and slipping down the other side. It was fun but exhausting so the idea of getting up at 5am the next morning to walk up a mountain didn’t appeal. What a wimp!
This weekend I went with Ali and Alexis (our neighbours) to the Java Jazz Festival which is held here in Jakarta. There are about 10 stages with 200 bands playing over three days. It attracts some international names, none of which are familiar to me so I won’t try to sound like an aficionado! I guess the musician I enjoyed listening to most last night was Maurice Brown, a fairly unprententious guy who played the trumpet with such passion and soul and was totally absorbed in the music. The Indonesian bands attracted the biggest crowds, I just couldn’t penetrate the crush at the door so didn’t get to hear them! Will probably drift up there tonight for another dose!
I’m still waiting for my Kitas (work visa), it just takes a lot of time to wade through the beaurocracy but I’m assured it should be completed next week, they say that every week(!). It is actually holding up a few things: opening a bank account here of starters and also our packing from Perth will not be put on a ship out of Fremantle until my visa is issued. Ah well . . . ho hum . . . it’ll happen one day soon . . .
Success on the car front; our Toyota Innova has been ordered. It will take about a month to get delivered but we’re in no rush. So hopefully soon we’ll have a home and a car – yay!!
Neil comes home on Thursday (yippee) and we’re off on another Java Lava trip at the weekend – more on that later.
Tata for now
Suzy and Neil