My Adventure in Jakarta - Day 1

Assalamualaikum!

Guess what? I'm in Jakarta!
I'm here to gather with abah and my sis, Izzah who's going to fly to Pennsylvenia, USA this August to further her study in Biotechnolgy. She already had 2 years foundation in Intec, now is going to commit three years in the Penstate University to get her degree. Well, I'm so proud of her. She'll be going to the state of my parents' first meeting and my birth. :)

Enough with USA. What's with Jakarta? As all of you know, I'm studying in Unhas Makassar, in an island named Sulawesi situated far east, near Australia. So for the reason of meeting my sister for the last time before she fly (because I can't go back to Malaysia in the mean time due to a course work demanding me to go into the hinterland village until mid-August), my father and I planned for their visit to Indonesia. At first I just ask Abah to bring Izzah to Makassar, in order for me to meet her, but the meeting become a boring option when thinking about what's interesting things she'll be doing here (in Makassar). To be honest, Makassar is quite a dull place for a simple tourist. It has a few great nature attractions, but they are not really accomplished yet. If you demand on a great vacation in Indonesia, Makassar might not be among the options because of it's distant from Malaysia which will cause a larger spending on the plane ticket. There's no direct flight from KL-Makassar, so you need to take two flights, transits in Surabaya, Bali or Jakarta.

So planning on, we then chose Bandung as our meeting destination, but looking at the difficulties for me only to get there (again, you can hardly found a flight from Makassar to Bandung, excepts for a few expensive airlines like Merpati), we decide not to meet there. At last, considering everything at both sides, we made Jakarta our next adventure!

Taking LionAir, I arrived in Soekarno-Hatta International Airport at 7.30am. Alone, I encourage myself searching for the place to have my breakfast (LionAir did not provide any food, not even drinks!), then for the arrival gate of Airasia. After being guided by nice people of Jakarta to Terminal 2, I found people see myself a little bit weird waiting for other's arrival but with me is a very large baggage like I'm going to somewhere far. While looking at the people coming out from the arrival gate, I saw some Malaysians starting to walk out. Then I realized how much I missed Malaysia. At last I saw them. ^_^"

Hoping for a cheaper-rate taxi, we walk ourselves outside the airport, yeah, until beyond the airport toll. We realized there's no taxi waiting there, so Abah had to stop a taxi at the highway road! Then we head to Central Jakarta to check-in to The Acacia hotel Abah booked a week before. Greatest surprise in the room is -- there's a computer! And not just that, with a wireless unlimited-access internet!!! (the one I'm using rite now). We got to the room, explore a little bit, get some rest, have our lunch and headed for our first place to visit.

And to be honest, we were not so sure which place we should go first. We only planned for tomorrow trip to Bandung, but being clueless about today's vacation plan. We are so lucky to have the taxi driver as our travel guide who suggest us to go to Taman Mini Indonesia Indah at Ancol, 30 minutes from Central Jakarta. When we arrived,we were told by the taxi driver that the place is so big that we need to travel by car to explore all the mini parks there. So this means paying the taxi meter until the end of our exploration in the Taman Mini! Fuuh, that would take a few hours at least, how much that would cost? Abah who had realized this earlier had gave the driver some reminder to turn off the meter if we are not moving. Meaning if we stops somewhere then the meter should stop too. Fair enough I think. So we take some pictures, walk a little bit, and then take some more pictures, and more until we are too tired to walk and explore anymore.

At 5pm, the houses started to close and we guess it's our time to go back too. It was a nice experience...and we got to see many beautiful architecture and landscape. The only thing I regret was not able to ride the mini cable car because we were too late and it was closed when we found the place. So for those whose interested, the entrance fee is Rp9000 per person and do come early so you wont have the regret I had.

We got back, tired and sleepy. I slept, woke up at 10pm, washed myself, and then perform my jama' ta'khir prayer. We went to find something to eat near the hotel, and we found out that Rumah Makan Mas Miskun's is quite nice place. The price is affordable, the food is satisfying, and the place is acceptable. Then we went to find a 24-hour minimarket in the middle of the night, and being lucky to be told by the hotel worker that there's one not far from the hotel. While walking to the store, we witness the night life of Jakarta common street. Many shops are still open, and most of them are cellular shops. After we bought some stocks for tomorrow journey to Bandung, we head back to the hotel.

Hmm...I guess that's it for my first day in Jakarta. Hope it interest you as much it interest my point of view! See you later... more updates from Jakarta, soon!

IMAN NAILAH 2008
noradrenaline2001@yahoo.com