Jakarta to Bandung

Time flies!! It is stunning that we already spend three days in Indonesia, but did not find the time to write down some short stories. We are still surprised every day by new things that we see or simply by the way the Indonesians live. However, most of the time we are just overwhelmed by the supportiveness and friendliness of the local people. But now, let’s share some experiences with you.
Santiago fell in love! Not in the conventional sense though. Whenever he sees a Bajaj (small 3-wheeler, sort of a taxi) he smiles, wants to take a picture and starts talking about his dream to be stuck in Indonesia so he would have to start a Bule-Bajaj Service (foreigner Taxi business). His love is deep. You won’t believe it, but every time we need a cap, he tries to bargain with the driver to let him sit in the front and master the traffic. The only thing that saves my life from being exposed to Santiago’s driving skills in the traffic of Jakarta, is the fact that we cannot communicate with the driver… luckily! I believe they are so surprised by the request, in universal sign language, that they cannot believe that it could be true and therefore try to tell us something else. Another passion of Santis’ is train-surfing. He hopes we will get the chance to join the couple of hundreds sitting on top of train right next to the high voltage power stripe :P
Talking about myself, I am more fascinated by the food… not a big surprise for many of you I guess :) The variety if Mie, and Goreng meals and the extreme tasty, thus spicy, sauces make my day. I could eat all day long, and I guess I would, but time is very restricted.
The 2 days in Jakarta we were somehow always in a hurry. The first meeting we had at the Bappenas, which is the local planning agency. They are the initiators of the Local Economic Development Projects which we are going to visit. Without prior notice we said we give it a shot, and went to their offices. They were extremely friendly and made time available right away. We got a clear understanding of their role in these projects and even joined a meeting of the Head of Office with their Japanese partner universities. What we did not know beforehand is that not only the Uni Groningen is involved but also Japanese Unis. The Professors from International University of Japan were as surprised to meet us in the meeting as we were to meet them :) … but after the meeting we said, next destination JAPAN. Really cool what they had to tell!
The next day we went to see a private consultant who is specialized in supporting public-private partnerships. The meeting was very different from our first. Not only because people working for the government have a different way from the private sector, but also because of his different perception of those projects. In the end Santiago got really excited by the new insights. The meeting was very helpful because we saw the business opportunities in the area of urban development. Public-Private Partnerships are way better than Privatization! <- main conclusion ;)
For those two meetings we spend hours on the road or in Internet coffees but we still had some time to be tourists and go local. Our host Anne, gave us a crash course in Bahasa and the local habits. Her family is extensive and friends are always coming over. Whenever we came home somebody was sleeping somewhere. The Indonesians are very social and they share everything. They have a much stronger community feeling than us in Europe and even in Latin America. The second night in Jakarta we even had the chance to go to a local bar. Some Couchsurfers joined and we felt like being in the most relaxed chill-out bar in the world. Awesome :)
Yesterday we went on. After some rescheduling, we were supposed to meet Pa Heru, the counterpart of our Professor here in Indonesia at the ITB Bandung, a university in Bandung. The Jakarta crew was so supportive, that they decided short hand to drive us there, a 2,5hrs drive. Cool ain’t ?!! In Bandung the professor invited us to join the LERD seminar this weekend in Pekalongan so we would have another fruitful experience for writing our thesis. Therefore, we basically had the day off, which was really nice. With some more Couchsurfers from Bandung we went to do a real a shopping tour. Randy, now we understand your addiction! The designs were amazing and we did some fotosessions. Jakarta style! Yeah!
If we find some time we will write you a bit more and upload some pictures to the internet!