Tom Pepinsky

Category: Travel

  • Traipsing throughout Jakarta

    James and I had a nice time the other night.  We first stopped by a great Chinese seafood restaurant that our friends really enjoy, and had all sorts of steamed fish and wok-fried vegetables and tasty tofu and the like.  Our friends are observant Catholics and decided to lay off the chicken that we ordered, but that just meant more for us.  James was funny, though.  He has spent a bunch of time travelling throughout China, from Kashgar to Harbin to Guangzhou, so he’s familiar with Chinese food.  He claimed that the food was delicious and very authentic, but he was simply amazed that there was absolutely no pork or ham available.  I told him that this is normal in Indonesia, where almost every restaurant is halal so that it can attract business.  There’s a similar phenomenon on NYC and Philadelphia of kosher Chinese restaurants, but in Indonesia you’d have to really search to find a non-halal restaurant.  JM and I, on our travels throughout Java and frequent attendance of nice restaurants, never saw pork.  The only exception was Bali, but that makes sense because it’s a Hindu island.

    After dinner at that restaurant, we headed to a fancy Belgian-run restaurant for dessert.  It was also quite good, although the clientele was entirely ethnic Chinese and Western.  I had a chocolate tart with basil ice cream, which was surprisingly delicious.  Yes, you read that right, basil.

    We capped off the night with a drink in a bar in the leafy, prosperous neighborhood of Menteng, which is where the Freedom Institute is.  This place was excellent as well.  I had a drink that essentially boiled down to a Mint Julep accented with crushed watermelon and lime juice.  Very tasty.  This restaurant, named Loro Jonggrang for character on display at the Hindu temple of Prambanan in Central Java, featured cultural artifacts from throughout Java and Bali.  It was nice enough that we asked and received a tour, checking out very nice pictures and carvings.  The place even included a Sukarno room, a tribute to Indonesia’s first President.

    My project for the next week is to get as much new Indonesian music as possible.  One of our friends is really tapped into the Indonesian arts community, enough that she knows all the new jazz/fusion groups such as Krakatau (whom JM and I have seen live) and played a traditional flute with a jazz group at the recent Java Jazz Festival.  I’ve asked for her recommendations for the best modern Indonesian pop, rock, and jazz.  JM and I are only really familiar with Peterpan and Sheila on 7.  Other bands we’ve heard are good include Slank, Dewa, and Iwan Fals.  I’ll keep you posted with the results of my search.

  • -1 +1 Indonesia

    Indonesia loses one point for today, but gains another point back.  It loses a point because my first interview got postponed, but I didn’t find out until I got to the place where the interview took place. I could tell that I was at the right place because my interviewee is Chinese and the first person to the gate was actually a dog.  But then his helper let me know that we’d be meeting at 3, not 9.  Argh.  That is not good news–I am so far 0 for 1.  But I do have plans to do another interview in a couple hours.  So that’s OK.

    Indonesia gains one point back because I remembered a couple of nice things that I really like here.  I’ve been rather annoyed by Jakarta as a city.  It’s big and smelly and full of people and traffic and noises.  But as I walked down the quiet little side street where I had my meeting scheduled, I remembered some other things.  There were nice Indonesian families walking around, happy looking young girls headed to school, smiling guys selling coconuts and pomelos, the clack-clack of mobile soup seller, and the like.  When you’re caught in the crush of traffic, it’s easy to forget those quieter scenes.

    Another interesting bit has been the effect of living in Malaysia on my view of Indonesia.  There is no question that Malaysia is far more developed than Indonesia, much easier to get around and much cleaner.  It brings more into focus the problems that Indonesia still has.  But the openness of ethnic distrust and conflict in Malaysia has made me much more conscious of ethnic differences here.  Before, I didn’t focus that much on it, even though I know that it’s a big deal for many Indonesians.  Now, I’m looking a lot more at people’s faces here and trying to see who might be Chinese or partially Chinese.  Given that I’m interviewing a number of big figures in the Chinese community here, maybe I’m focusing on this more than before anyway.  Anyway, it’s very interesting to focus on people’s physical features here.