Travel

In end of December I will travel around for a few days. Therefore I prepared a strange travel schedule. Some Friends will join me for:
Singapore- Hong Kong- Jakarta- Kuala Lumpur- Singapore- Jogja- Bali- Jakarta.
If you are at any of these places or you have recommendations for anything regarding bars, clubs, food e.g. feel free to drop me a line.

Idul Fitri

You might got it- I am a western guy living in a Muslim country, so I have to respect the given rules. After a long month of “fasting” of any kind of entertainment the holy month ended up in what Christians might know as Christmas holidays. I was looking forward for the end of ramadhan and thought it might end up a huge party with celebrations e.g.
Nothing like that happens- it’s a nightmare. All Indonesians travel back to their families to celebrate. The result is- prices are doubled, tickets are sold out weeks before and nearly every place in my hometown was closed. Even the places for western tourists shut down. At least for four days I could choose between to bakery restaurants and a 24/7 convenience store to get entertainment, food and drinks. Not funny at all besides the “bintang” party in front of
circle K at one night until 5am!
Next year I will leave the country or fly in advance to a small island to relax by the beach instead of getting pissed off in a huge city where everybody left.
Stay tuned for next reports on back to “normal” life.

Boys on holidays

I used to stay a few times in indonesia but never went to bali. Even my indonesian friends were wondering why I never went- so I decided to plan a weekend trip. First of all I planned my honeymoon trip with a friend of mine- he is an Indian guy, but believe me he acts more like a cute german “pornoralle”. To complete our village people travel group finally a german police men decided to join us. So I booked a honeymoon suite for the three of us on bali.
After the usual Club’n’bintang @bintang resto we took garuda to bali at friday night. Our place to stay was a run down small holiday resort for european truck drivers, their asian women and single female office staff in their late 50ies.
It was low season- so no worries, we where more or less the only guests.
The main focus for the trip, behind gang bang- was to go to the beach, that’s why we went immediately after arrival to it for a bintang.
The beach is like in any typical tourism resort of the world- huge hotels, shops, posh italian restaurants (remember- its indonesia!)- so really nothing to write home about. On the next day I started to realize that I maybe left Indonesia, cause people where cycling on the streets or taking a walk- this wouldn’t be possible in jogja. Anyway, we took our rented motorcycles and head to “dreamland”. It took us nearly half the day- just wanna add: don’t trust locals about directions!
The beach is a hip surf hot spot- so the place to be for the “pornoralles” from abroad. So I am not able to surf, I am not looking like a surfer boy, but indeed I wasn’t the ugliest guy at this spot. Some ladies thought it might be necessary to “show up” what nobody wanna see.
After the second night I realized what was wrong about travelling with my village people friends- three guys in one room are two to much- at least for sleeping. My fellow travellers acting like on school class vacations! The result was a locked washroom door- resulting in asking for assistance from hotel staff. The good thing about this- we got an invitation to a complimentary “arak” party. Next morning I locked myself inside the washroom- locker completely destroyed- so no more invitations from the hotel staff.

Bule

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Last weekend

Today ramadhan started, so best time to review the “last” weekend. Friday night I went as always to bintang resto to relax, chat to some friends and have a club and a couple of bintang before leaving for a clubbing. As always the same band play favourites reggae songs, but do like the atmosphere. Later I was not sure where to go, cause nothing was really on my list, but finally decided to have a look to “republic”. Happily I don’t have to pay entrance fee so I wasn’t really disappointed about my decision, cause for the first hour they had something like a beauty contest –the only thing to add, disgusting! But sometimes it pays off to stay longer. At around 2 o’clock in the morning “Hanky strawberry” started his show. He is a crazy MC and looks more like from NYC than from Indonesia. Hanky was totally drunk, but he done a pretty good job and the crowd celebrates him. What a funny night- I ended up driven slightly drunken my moto through the empty streets of jogja to be back home for morning praying @4.30am.
Saturday night I started in “kinoki” a western driven but local used hang out place for students who want to watch a movie, chat or just going to a concert. The open-air back yard style place is pretty nice and this evening they had a mixed video and live music performance. Food is strange but they do serve a wonderful strawberry lassie. The show was fun and on the way back to my place I stopped at circle K for a quick bintang. This 24/7 convenience store is also the hang out place for the “outgoing” youth before or after clubbing. Back home I changed for safety-first taxi to be safety back on the road to embassy. Thanks to dita I am on guest list also for this very last party. They celebrate cirque du soleil party, means the staff has to wear clown costumes, but nevertheless it was crowded and people where dancing the whole night to the usual progressive or trance stuff. To enjoy the music I have to order drinks, so I asked one of the clowns to serve me and after a few minutes he came “smiling” back with a pitcher instead of just a glass. Prices are high so I just can afford to have glasses- so he has to leave unhappy….this happens twice!
Lazy Sunday was as always nice @hyatt and afterwards a massage. In the evening I went to one of open-air concerts with local bands, which is always fun. These concerts are advertisements parties for certain kind of products like “kretek” to attract the youth- so it’s free of charge.
Stay tuned for more free of charge stuff!

Meals

What is one of the most fascinating things about living abroad language, culture, climate..e.g.? Not at all! You need to eat everyday and that makes the difference from my point of view. I got the change to try disgusting as well as most delicious dishes from all over the world. So what’s the case in Indonesia? Yeah you are right there are a lot of options. I do love asian style food. Well I think you can’t say asian- the food is everywhere different. So getting local I will describe some of the “tasty” options in Indonesia. Starting with breakfast: no chance- I am a western guy, but Indonesians tend to have a hearty meal also for breakfast, I do get a toast. Indonesians love to eat so you get always something to eat in between. Means when you are in a meeting you will receive a small box, containing water, small snacks like fried “fat roll”, fried garlic peanuts, chilli and a mint collared piece of cake or a complete meal instead of lunch. Once I counted the boxes received on one day- seven and the main meals where extra-amazing! For lunch you have different options- there is always a “warung” (food stall/ pushcart on the streets) nearby. They are offering most famous things like nasi goreng, mie goreng e.g. most tourist think that’s it about Indonesian food and get pretty fast bored of it. Indeed indonesians love fried dishes but there is a lot more than fried rice on the street. I do love “padang” food- you use your fingers to eat. My favourite is rendang- spicy beef, which I have more than once a week. One of my favourites for dinner is a place called “SS warung”- sounds like a nazi place and sometimes you might think they want to kill you with their spicy food. SS stands for “special sambal”- means extra spicy sauce for your fried chicken, tempe or fish- finger licking!!!
Other finger licking food is as usual all parts of animals, what you never thought you could eat it, served boiled, fried or grilled for example as sate! Sate sticks are normally served as chicken sticks, but I do got also rat- sticks once. Not to forget- Nasi (rice) goes with every meal!
At least once a week I go for western food for dinner- mostly on friday night to Bintang resto- it’s in the “tourist” area and they do serve one of the best club sandwiches I ever had! Bintang is also a hangout place for some expats, locals and tourist alike cause they do serve beer. One Club and a couple of Bintangs and you are perfectly prepared for a long party night!
Stay tuned for more finger licking stuff after leaving a club....

Party

The upcoming weekend will be the last possibility to go for a party or as the “locals” say clubbing! Indonesia is a muslim country, so the party life is restricted and of cause in between ramadhan there is no change at all to go clubbing. First of all I would like to add that I’m not really a party kid, but whenever I am abroad I’d like to relax while dancing. From western point of view we would celebrate the “last” party for at least one month really excessive and enjoying ourselves with probably a lot of alcoholic beverages, maybe drugs and finally a gang bang late at night. So we might step into ramadhan totally stoned and get depressions afterwards- cause it will be the last decadent party for our lifetime (one month). So what do you might think how people will enjoy their “last” party? I don’t now cause its next weekend!!! I just can tell you how party used to be normally. One thing you have to keep in mind always- that’s Indonesia and not new york, rio, bangkok or berlin. Indonesia has a vibrant band culture (retro style) with a lot of live concerts. These concerts are sometimes pretty funny, but indeed not comparable to western festivals. No alcohol, which is sometimes also nice and people who are sitting in front of the stage could be a little bit boring after a certain amount of time. But there are also some venues for clubbing in yogyakarta. Most of them I visited already, some tend to be nicer than others but all of them playing “progressive” music. I had never heard about such a style of music before but it is common in indonesia. So get used to it or stay at home. The most famous place in jogja is a club called hugo’s café. This is more or less a wide span disco with a stage and a bar in the middle. They do have live gigs, but these bands consist more of “Happy dancing dolls” playing cover songs. At midnight the gitchy cowboy bartenders perform the “hugos’ dance show and in between- yeah you are right: progressive music!
That’s the top end for most Chinese- Indonesian and important to show up with a bottle of whiskey. Nothing to write home about.
More interesting is the party crowd consisting of stylish teenager, prostitutes, callboys and some other funny people. After a few expensive beers you will leave for another location- it used to be called insomnia but is reopened under the name embassy club (from Jakarta). Thanks to dita I am often on the guest list, but therefore you have to show up before midnight. We went there one Thursday- ordered a “promo” bottle of vodka and enjoyed our self. No problem so far, but the “our self” means really just our group and a few others. So music as always boring, but without any party crowd! You could imagine- no fun at all!
Same location- one week later, without a bottle of vodka, crowded before midnight and no progressive music. Instead some good drum&bass with live acts. What else you might need? Maybe gang bang- but I am getting older….

Stay tuned for more “last night” reports!