Tom Pepinsky

Category: Travel

  • Back for a Limited Time Only!

    That’s right, readers, TP here with our first update in six months.  I am heading to Indonesia again for three weeks, from February 25 to March 18, to do a bit more research.  While I’m there, you can expect regular new updates on my travels.

    Unfortunately, this trip will not be much of a vacation, so I won’t be traveling to interesting locales throughout the country.  My priority is to meet and interview as many academics, politicians, economists, journalists, businesspeople, and the like as I possibly can while I’m there.  So that confines me to Jakarta mostly.  But I do hope to get out of Jakarta, hopefully for a trip to Bandung or Bogor, or maybe to the Thousand Islands in the Java Sea north of Jakarta, or maybe even to Krakatau (Krakatoa) in the strait between Java and Sumatra.  We’ll just have to see.

    Hopefully, though, I’ll be able to relate some interesting stories even if I don’t travel too much.  I should also note that JM will not be joining me, which is a real downer.  Instead I will be traveling in the company of James, a college friend who studies colonial American economic history, specifically trade.  He’s had to do research in such hardship places as Mauritius and Cape Town, and now wants to see about ships coming through old Batavia.

    Professional priorities

    • Interviews
    • Data collection
    • Make contacts for future work

    Culinary priorities

    • Ayam Goreng Ny. Suharti (Mrs. Suharti’s Fried Chicken)
    • gado-gado
    • pecel lele (fried catfish and salad)
    • masakan Padang
    • mendoan tempe (breaded and deep-fried tempe)
    • coto Makassar (beef or water buffalo offal soup) from Rumah Makan Losari on Jalan Kendal
    • bakso ayam (chicken and meatball soup)
    • dendeng (deep-fried beef or goat jerky)
    • bebek Bali (Balinese-style duck, cooked until the bones are tender enough to eat)
    • bakut Ahon (Chinese pork ribs, Bandung-style)
    • Bir Bintang
    • sate (satay, all types)

  • Goodbye from Singapore

    Singapore is still clean as ever.  We got in yesterday evening at 5:15 and headed off to our hotel in Changi Village, had a final street food dinner of wonton soup, oyster sauce vegetables and char siew, and then headed off to bed.  Yesterday was the 40th anniversary of Singapore’s independence from Malaysia, so that was a big celebration.  When you think about it, 40 years just isn’t that long.

    Malaysia seemed to be enticing us to leave, in a way.  The smog and smoke was so bad that the government issued warnings for children not to play outside and for people with respiratory illnesses to avoid non-essential exertion.  Both JM and I could notice the effects–JM’s allergies acted up, and I had a sore throat with a frog in it.  The reason for the unbelievable pollution is human activity, in this case the burning of rain forest land for cultivation.  Fire creates rich soil and clears the land for cheap.  Too bad rain forests have large economic value as well.

    So that’s it for us in Southeast Asia.  Those of you in the US, we’ll see you soon; those of you in Indonesia and Malaysia, it’s been a blast.