Category: General

They just have this swagger. And they try to take your money.

Let us explain. We reconsidered our deal from yesterday, and decided that we weren’t comfortable dealing with a random Indonesian guy. So, we found the realtor from the same building, and he showed us a nice one-bedroom for the same price. The quality of the apartment is far higher, with clean dishes, nicer furnishings, etc.

We talked to this realtor for some time. He says that he wants to go to America as soon as he gets enough money, but for his first trip outside of Indonesia he’ll go on the hajj. He was eager to talk about Indonesian society and American society. He showed us some slums that can be seen from our apartment window on the 22nd floor and asked us if the US has them too. After we said yes, he said, sure, but everyone still has a car, right? We corrected him as well as possible. Actually, the male one of us corrected him; as in so many other conversations, the female was ignored entirely. Interesting. It seems that all he knows about the US he learned from movies and TV, which seems a common misperception. Almost stupid, you know? Except, we have this suspicion that most Americans learned about life from television and movies too.

Talking about politics, he simply cannot believe that there are Americans who will vote for Bush. He seemed genuinely surprised when we told him that Bush looks like he will win. This sentiment was echoed earlier today by a Japanese friend of ours who we met for lunch. She seemed genuinely shocked that Americans will vote for Bush after Iraq and the economy. (So are two of her friends from the US.) In the minds of these people, it seemed a foregone conclusion that Americans would kick Bush out of office given his performance so far.

Speaking of today, whoa. Turns out Citibank Indonesia is not the same as Citibank USA. You can’t just walk up and use your account to wire money to someone. We were just encountering this predicament when the realtor SMSed (that’s text-messaging on your cell phone for the rest of you) us to tell us that he wanted cash, all of it, today. This is not just the security deposit, it’s the security deposit, six months rent, plus the security deposit on the phone, which is almost as much as the rent itself. No Indonesian walks around with that much cash, and neither do we.

Fortunately, our ball-busting Indonesian friend was within earshot, and went to bat for us. After telling him that she was from the US Embassy (which he believed) she negotiated successfully a reasonable plan. We’re all set. (You better well knock on wood for us.)

We leave you with this link, courtesy of the only person we know who owns his own successful business. (Only one of us endorses this link. Can you guess which one?)

Well it’s been quite a productive day today. First we visited the Freedom Institute, the think tank which is sponsoring one of us. It’s a nice place, although it defies description. They have a library of great economic and political periodicals and books (which is great for one of us) and classics such as Sherlock Holmes and The Hobbit in Indonesian (for the other one). The one of us who will actually be working there will get his own desk and computer hookup which is excellent, as is the ample a/c. We both got lots of practice listening to Indonesian- boy they talk fast here.

We then followed up a lead from the paper about an apartment for rent. This complex is gigantic, about 15 25-story buildings, and it seems that half the people we’ve met live there. We met a guy (who used the Indonesian jam karet– or rubber time- quite liberally) who showed us a large 2 bedroom apartment. It’s fairly cheap, about $420 a month, and is totally furnished which is great. He said to come back on Saturday, then called 5 minutes later and said we had to pay the security deposit in cash right now. We were a little hesitant, so we enlisted the help of this ball-buster Fulbright program director. We don’t know what she told the guy, but we no longer had to pay a cash security deposit immediately. So we think we’ll take this place, but we’ve got one other place to follow up on. Another nice thing is that the area is nice, it’s about a 15 minute cab ride south of downtown and it’s safe and well guarded. There’s also an incredible gym we might join right next door and a mall with this great internet cafe. Expect lots more blogs in the future!

Furthermore, if we take the 2 bedroom place, we automatically have a free place for any visitors to stay. (hint hint hint)