Jakarta

I had a lot of days in lieu still left with Wall Street and as my contract date was approaching I needed to use the days. I signed up to take the Foreign Service Officer's Test and the only international locations that were feasible for me were Jakarta, Ho Chi Min City, Kuala Lumpur, Vientiane, and Phnom Penh. Since I had already been to Phnom Penh I didn't want to go there, Vientiane sounded ok but there isn't too much to do other than the river. Ho Chi Min City would have been great but I was being lazy and didn't want to get the visa beforehand. So I decided to make a big circle around South East Asia, I would spend 3 days in Jakarta and take my test then go to Kuala Lumpur for 3 days and then spend my final days in Phuket with Barry and Suzi. Luckily mom used to work with some Indonesian men who had family in Jakarta so she got me in touch with them. One of the men was living in Jakarta while the other man was still living in the U.S. but his wife and kids were in Jakarta. I made contact with them both and as I was asking for advice on where to visit and stay, I asked about public transportation one of the men, Kiky, told me not to worry because his wife was going to pick me up and take me wherever I wanted to go. I couldn't believe my luck I immediately made contact with his daughter and we got everything arranged. So my trip was already starting off nicely, I had booked all my flights and hotels, I was ready to go.
The morning I was to leave was Super Bowl morning so unfortunately I was going to miss a portion of the Super Bowl. I woke up early and watched the Super Bowl while I got ready for my trip. As I was looking out my window at 7:30 traffic looked awful and I began to worry but by 8:15 it had all cleared up so I wouldn't need to leave earlier than I planned. I watched the Super Bowl until the power went out in the 3rd quarter and thought that it was a good enough time to catch a cab. Of course traffic was great and there were no cabs to be found. The guards at my building were so nice and got me one. He didn't take me the normal way it looked like a back way through different suburbs of Bangkok. It took a little bit longer but it was cheaper than any of my other taxi rides, which was a nice bonus. When I arrived at check-in there was not a soul in sight in sight, I checked in and made my way to passport control which was also a ghost town, that never happens. I had plenty of time to spare so I grabbed a wifi card, some breakfast and a drink so that I could watch the end of the game. Unfortunately the wifi didn't work so I used the free computer to get the score, it was 34-29 with 1:50 left and I had to board. So needless to say my plane ride was an anxious one. The plane was also freezing I have never been on a colder plane so I sat shaking in my seat as I awaited the remaining people for my row, who never came so I got a whole row to myself, nice. The trip was starting off on a good note. The flight to Jakarta was uneventful and when I got to the terminal I was immediately pointed to pay for my visa which cost me 1000 baht, that really sucks for a 3 day stay. Once I made it to the terminal I immediately texted Lara, a friend of a friend who was picking me up at the airport. The people in Indonesia are different from the Thais but also so similar. The men are much more forward than the Thai men, they were constantly asking where I was from and trying to get me to talk which is very unlike Thai men, who are a bit more shy. The taxi drivers sure are the same, as soon as I got out of the terminal they were constantly screaming at me to see if I wanted a taxi. I kept saying no and they still kept asking they are persistent of not else. Lara arrived with her children shortly there after and we were on our way to Jakarta. The children were very quiet and shy, that is usually how children are when they meet a new person. Lara and I talked a while we made our way down to the center of Jakarta. One thing Jakarta definitely has is traffic, I thought Bangkok traffic was bad. Jakarta is far worse and the drivers are crazy. People just pull out in front of others cars literally inches from each other and the motorcycle guys have no fear. I could never drive in this city. The problem is that Jakarta has no public transportation system except for buses which not even the locals take. Every driver has a car so they all use the limited roads in Jakarta, so to get anywhere in Jakarta takes at least an hour. Once we got into the city Lara asked if I was hungry. I wasn't too hungry but the children were so I let them decide on where we would go, we ended up going to Pizza Hut which wasn't that bad. After we finished eating Lara got called to a meeting so we left for the meeting location and it took us forever to get there, it took so long that the children had passed out. When we arrived the children wouldn't wake up so I volunteered to sit in the car and watch them while she had her meeting. I knew that when the children eventually woke up they would be extremely cranky and it just wouldn't be good for me or Lara if they acted up. I didn't mind doing it she was so nice to pick me up at the airport and to buy me dinner it was the least I could do, I also needed to finish reading my book for my test. I sat in the car with the children for about an hour and a half, when Lara returned she brought me dinner, which was very nice. She then dropped me off at my hotel and I was in for the night. The next morning I slept in a bit but wanted to see how long it would take me to walk to the U.S. embassy so I went out to time my walk. The embassy was actually real close it took me about 10-15 minutes to walk to. After I found the embassy I began walking back to my hotel and my head was beginning to hurt which I thought was just a hunger headache, boy was I wrong. A couple of hours later Lara picked me up to show me around the city first thing we did was go to lunch at this very nice Indonesian restaurant where a lot of government officials frequently visit. The lunch was wonderful we had fish and morning glory I also had this lovely lemon ice tea with mint and a sugar cane. After lunch we drove around and began heading towards this mall, my head was constantly getting wore and I was getting more and more nauseous. During the car ride I had to ask Lara for something I told her it was nothing but I lied it was getting pretty strong and being in traffic did not help. Once we got to the mall we did a little window shopping and picked up some Famous Amous cookies before sitting down for ice cream. I don't know if it was the ice cream or the sitting that did me in but the longer we were in the mall the more miserable I was I literally want to claw my eyes out I was in so much pain. Lara saw the pain I was in and took me back to my hotel, she had me lay back and relax but that only made the headache worse and it took forever to get back to the hotel a good hour and a half. When we were about 10 minutes away I couldn't lay down anymore. I was literally digging my nails into my skin to have myself focus on any other pain than my head. Lara handed me some pain pills as I ran into convenience store to buy migraine medicine once I was armed with medicine I waved Lara good bye and went to my room to suffer. I was in tears when I entered my room I couldn't get my clothes off fast enough the room wasn't cold enough and the medicine wasn't working fast enough. I was literally asking God why he was doing this to me the day before my test. I was even calling for my mom I just wanted this ungodly pain to go away. After about 20 minutes the pain began to subside and it seemed ok for me to sit up with a pillow behind my back against the headboard. I turned on some CNN and played on my Ipad first to catch up on the last bit of current events and to get my mind off the pain. It seemed to work, I have no idea where this came from I wasn't stressed  I was actually pretty calm about the test I wasn't cramming I had been slowly studying for 5 months. I guess it was God's way of testing me, if I could manage to do the test with this kind of adversity I could handle anything. After an hour the pain was still there but not as bad as before so I was going to try and get some sleep I took some more medicine and fell asleep. About 3 hours later I was woken again with pain and I couldn't take anymore migraine pills they were wrecking havoc on my stomach so I took one of the pain pills Lara gave me. It seemed to work and 30 minutes later I was back to sleep. I got a good 6 more hours of sleep in before my alarm went off I still had a headache so I went in search of food because I couldn't take anymore medicine on an empty stomach I grabbed a quick croissant and took some more pills before taking a shower and getting ready for my test. It didn't take long before I was at the embassy. There were 4 others there when I arrived after I got there 4 more arrived. We were all talking and getting to know each other before we were let into the embassy, a lot of us were teaching in Asia and decided to give the test a try, why not? When it got close to 9 they brought 4 of us in at a time to leave ID and do a security check we were then taken through numerous gates and doors to a downstairs computer lap where we would sit for 3 hours. The Foreign Service Officer's Test is made up of 4 parts. Knowledge (U.S. History, World History, Current Events, Math, Geography, Economics, and Management), Personality/ Work History, Grammar, and an Essay. I didn't think the test was too difficult there were some questions I had no idea what the answer was and there were some I immediately knew the answer to. The essay wasn't too bad I just wish I had more time to complete it. I finished the test in about 2 and a half hours and only had to take one pain pill throughout the exam. Once I was done I went back to the hotel to relax and eat. I was trying to decide what I would do, Lara was in a meeting so I decided to check out the national monument, mosque, and cathedral.

National Monument

As I walked towards the national monument, I noticed a lot more police and groups of men with a lot of charter buses I wasn't sure what was going on but I was definitely on guard. The men were all staring at me which made me very uncomfortable. I made it to the national monument but really didn't feel comfortable so I went in search of the mosque, which had no signs posted. I eventually found my way and as I am looking for the entrance a little old man missing some teeth comes up to me and asks me if I am going to the mosque. He said he works at the mosque and offers to show me around he seemed harmless and nice. He took me in showed me where to leave my shoes and he got me something to cover up with, he then explained the mosque to me and took me to different viewing points so to get pictures.

 This was the first time I ever went into a mosque so I wasn't sure what to expect it was truly magnificent. This mosque was huge and full of symbols. Once we finished walking inside he took me out to the garden where I could get an awesome picture of the mosque as we are there he then says "I hate to ask but the government doesn't give us money so we need donations of $20" I said "ok so 200,000 idr: he says "no, 400,000 idr" I'm like "what! that isn't $20", but I am by myself with this man what am I to do. I pay him. So he takes me to the exit and directs me to the cathedral where he says the tour was 200,000 idr. I literally said "seriously" he says "yes" I give him the money and walk away.

Never in all my life have I spent so much $60 to visit a religious site. I have visited at least a hundred Catholic churches and sites, not once have I been charged an admission fee. I paid to get into Westminster Abbey and St. Paul's Cathedral and that only cost me $15 each time. I am pretty sure I got scammed I am definitely going to send the mosque an e-mail to clarify because that is kind of ridiculous. Don't get me wrong I had a lovely time but felt I was scammed and didn't think it was right.  One of the reasons I love being Catholic is we don't charge for people to enter our churches. I have been to St. Peter's Basilica and I have never been asked for money, there are donation boxes which I gladly give to buy never been expected to give to. I crossed the street to where the cathedral sat so to calm myself and visit a more comfortable place. It really is interesting that the mosque and the cathedral are so close and there are no problems, there is still hope.

View from the mosque of the cathedral.

 Once I got to the cathedral it was closed up, it looked like it was closed until 4 that day which was 2 hours away so I decided to forgo the cathedral and go back to the hotel. I walked around the garden and took some shots of the exterior and sat peacefully in the garden. I then braved the crazy Jakarta traffic and attempted to walk back the way I came from. As I got near the American embassy down the road I see flags and large crowds, it looks like there is some kind of demonstration that was blocking my route  back to the hotel. There was no way I was walking through that crowd of men so as I stood in front of the American embassy looking at a map I tried to find an alternate route, at that moment a security guard comes up to me. I apologize for standing there, it does look look suspicious and I asked for help he kindly tells me an alternate route and I am on my way. I try to hurry because it looks like rain was about to come down in buckets I hurry along as taxi and motorcycle drivers harassed me. I constantly wave them off, I finally made it to my road where it really began to come down harder, I made it to the lobby right before the flood gates opened. I had a nice lunch in the lobby then went to my room to relax and pack. I really didn't do much and then at about 8 Lara calls me as she just finished her meeting, she wanted to go out to dinner I really couldn't say no so I got out of my comfortable bed and got dressed hoping it won't be a long night. Lara and a friend pick me up and we go to this restaurant/bar called Bibliotecca. It was an amazing looking restaurant. The room was huge the ceiling had to go up 3 stories and one wall was filled with floor to ceiling bookshelves. We sat on a nice sofa with a chest as our table and ordered some wine and something to eat.

We obviously had a new employee, she did not know the menu nor the wine list. They were sold out of a lot of wine, we wanted a red and she would recommend a white. Then when we picked a red she said they were sold out but this white sparkling wine is very similar, no its not. She just kept trying to sell Lara this wine so she just said fine, because she wanted a drink. Then when she tried to open the wine it was another disaster she did not know how to properly open the wine, she couldn't get the metal seal off so someone had to come in and save her. I was about to grab her wine key and do it myself, but I had a feeling that would not be proper and I may get in a bit of trouble. The service in this place was less than desired. For being such a beautiful place in a great location the service did not match. Sitting there I now understand how my mom felt all those times we went out to dinner. I was constantly analyzing the servers and finding faults. I started yawning as we were finishing our wine so Lara thought it best we went home. I was back at my hotel relatively quick and in bed before no time. The next morning I again woke up relatively late but I was in no hurry, Lara texted me saying she was in a meeting and probably wouldn't be able to take me to the airport. I told her it was no big deal and that I would just catch a cab. The cab ride was pretty uneventful except for all the traffic but I made it to the airport with plenty of time, the ticket counter wasn't even open when I got there. Once it did open I was one of the first people in line and one of things that sucked was I was charged an extra fee which I didn't understand why and when I asked the woman she looked at me and shrugged. After that incident I was done with Jakarta I just wanted to get on the plane and move on. What was nice about boarding was that there weren't many passengers on our plane so once we got on the bus it was our whole flight. I once again got a row to myself which was a blessing because my headache came out of no where and I really thought I was going to die on the plane. I had to get up at one point to go to the bathroom and get wet paper towels to at least cool myself down. Once I was on the ground the pain subsided but I just wanted to crawl into bed these headache fits where physically draining.
Jakarta all in all was ok I wouldn't plan to visit again. There wasn't too much to see and I really couldn't stand the traffic, but at least I visited Indonesia and if I visit again I will go to Bali. We will see how Kuala Lumpur will treat me.

The Adventures of Nicole and Pyo

Pyo is one of the PTs, personal tutors, I work with and we have a lot of things in common especially pop culture, movies, and tv shows. We are always sending each other movie trailer links and links with spoilers for upcoming tv shows and movies. We like the same movies and tv shows which we are constantly trading with one another and suggesting to one another. A couple of months ago I saw an article on CNN.com about this Batcat Museum in Bangkok. It is a museum with a collection of superhero (from comics, cartoons, TV shows and movies) memorabilia. Pyo of course knew about the place but he wasn't sure how to get there, it was in a part of Bangkok he wasn't familiar with. He asked if I wanted to go and I said sure if he wanted to go. Our only problem at the time was we didn't have the same days off. That all changed in December so we, really Pyo, began plotting our journey to the Batcat. He had searched for it on the map and had made some phone calls, so he had a pretty good idea of how to get there. So the day finally came and we had decided to make a whole day of it. We would start at the Batcat and make our way down to Kao San Road for pizza and then go see The Hobbit.
We met at about 11 am at the Phaya Thai BTS station because we needed to take the airport link a little bit out of town. Once we got to our stop we had to catch a bus, which we rode for a good while. We got off at a busy intersection and Pyo had to go to his map to find which way we should walk.

A View of the room from the raised platform.

We walked a short distance and we finally made it. We first walked into this nice coffess shop with really cool furniture. We then walked into the gift store/ ticket office. Since I brought my work permit they charged me the Thai price, which I was grateful for. Once we got our ticket we walked towards this 6 foot tall Sculley from Monsters Inc. and we were off. The only thing I could say when I walked in was "Holy Toys Batman." The first room we went into was filled will multiple cases holding tons of comic book and movie heroes models/action figures. It was truly impressive. On the outer wall there was a case filled with Disney collectibles and a lot of McDonald's collectibles and pretty much anything related to pop culture and movies. There was also a section dedicated to Spiderman. There was also a life size Superman in the corner of the room, which Pyo was in love with. We spent a good while looking at this extensive collection. I had to look at cases two or three times to see everything in it. We then decided to move on to the next portion of the museum. We went up a ramp to lead to a platform that went around the top of the room and led us to a new room. In the cases leading up the ramp there was these Japanese action figures, which I had never heard of, but Pyo said were very popular. In the cases bordering the wall there was a whole section dedicated to collectible cars, cars from movies and just classic cars.

The next section was dedicated to Pez Dispensers. He had such an impressive collection of Pez Dispensers and the way he had it arranged had to have taken forever. One slight movement and they would all fall down like dominoes. As we continued we saw more of the McDonald's Happy Meal toys, lunch box sets, and classic comic books. At the end of the elevated walkway we were greeted with a life size Green Lantern, Ryan Reynold's version. Pyo again was in 7th heaven. After taking some pictures and a little groping we walked down the stairs to a dark hallway that led to the real reason this place was called "The Batcat." It was two rooms dedicated to everything Batman new and old. He had movie posters, costumes, toys, etc... pretty much anything and everything that ever had a Batman emblem on it he had it. He had all the Batman LEGOs built and put into a case. He had a cast signed "Batman Begins" poster. He had old Batman toys from decades ago to present day. He had NASCAR die casts with the Batman sponsorship. He had a Batman tent, hundreds upon hundreds of Batman action figures which he had on a wall above the cases 3 to 4 deep. He had a Batman Begins costume that looked pretty real. He had loads of movies: vhs, dvd, and blu ray versions. He had Batman games for all major gaming systems, he even had film trailers, which were legit because I had used these trailers before on a trailer packages. He did have a couple of non-batman items such as large promotional material of the Avengers which is usually used at movie theaters. I of course took a photo with my two favorite men: Ironman and Thor.

Who do I choose?

Once we thoroughly explored the Batman area we went out into another room with more cases of items which we later found out was part of the gift shop. We walked around the gift shop some more bought some stuff and then got directions from one of the ladies on how to get to Kao San Road. It looks like we were going to take the commuter boat.
Thank god that I had Pyo with me because I would have never used a commuter boat. I would have never known where to get off or how to get to where I needed to go. We had to transfer boats at one point so we followed the crowd and we were following this one girl who said she was going to the same place we were, but when she got off we were close to our offices and still very far from Kao San Road. So we went back to the boats and tried again. All we really needed to do was ride the boat all the way to the end. Once we got off the boat I kind of knew where we were. I saw the Golden Mount and said to Pyo that I had never been and had always wanted to go. He said he had never been either, so as we were walking trying to figure out where we were we passed the entrance to the Golden Mount and Pyo asked if I wanted to check out. Of course I did. It made it even better because he had never been before, I would never want to make him go somewhere he had been before, even though he would have gladly gone. I can see the Golden Mount from my office and it looks pretty big from my office so in person it was quite large. The Golden Mount is this white circular building with a Golden pagoda on top. At the bottom there is gorgeous landscaping and Chinese Zodiac statues. To get to the top you walk up these stairs that go around the outside of the building through a small forest filled with statues and a waterfall.

 It is kind of magical, like walking through a rain forest minus the bugs. The first level we got to had a lot of bells of all shapes and sizes, I believe you ring them as a religious tradition, we didn't ring any bells. We continued our walk to the top and as we were making our way up the sun was shining directly at us so it felt like we were seeing the light and going to heaven. Without the trees to protect us it was getting pretty hot and the stairs showed how out of shape I was. We finally made it to the top and walked into a temple filled with numerous Buddha statues and at the center was this beautiful gold and jewel encrusted pagoda. Once we finished up downstairs we made our way up a very narrow staircase to see the Golden Mount. It was impressive and very bright. Pyo and I walked around the mount a bit, took pictures of the city, and then we decided to make our way downstairs so we could go for pizza. When Pyo was at Thammasat University he used to go to this pizza place that made their pizzas in a proper wood oven.

I was so excited to have some paper pizza and Italian food. So once we finished with the Golden Mount we left the compound out the wrong exit so weren't sure where we were. Pyo flagged down a tuk-tuk to take us to the area where the pizza place was. We did almost die in this tuk-tuk as we were driving off we almost hit a truck and I almost flew right into the back of the driver's seat. After that incident I was definitely awake and couldn't wait to go get some pizza. The tuk-tuk driver dropped us off at the end of this road filled with Westerners, tuk-tuks, restaurants, shop stalls, and massage parlors. We walked down the street to the old location of the pizza place, which wasn't there, so we continued to walk down the road until we saw a sign stating that there was an Italian restaurant down this alley way. We walked down the alley way and we finally found the restaurant. By the time we got there I was starving we ordered a pizza, spaghetti, french fries, and garlic bread.

It was a lot of food and I couldn't believe we ate it all. Once we finished up I was thoroughly stuffed and we were on our way again. We walked back down the alley and the larger road we were previously on towards the tuk-tuks to get a ride back to the boats. This tuk-tuk driver charged us more than the first guy and when Pyo tried to talk him down he barely went down in price, but we just wanted to get to the boats so we could make it to the movie in time so we paid the price. We made it to the boat just in time to get on an outgoing boat, the boat ride was pretty fast and we got off the at the stop we accidentally got off at earlier in the day. We then walked down the main road to MBK to buy our tickets for The Hobbit.
We made it with plenty of time sat down in the cold cinema and relaxed after our day of exploring Bangkok. The Hobbit was a great movie, I had no idea it was a 3-part movie so when it ended I looked at Pyo and said "is there another movie?" He looks at me and was like "yeah, there are 2 more." That was a nice way to end our day. It was pretty jam packed and I rode almost all of Bangkok's transportation that day, I started off by taking a motorcycle to the BTS, rode the BTS, took the airport link, took a bus, then a boat, a tuk-tuk, and the previous night/ early morning I arrived at home in a taxi so had I flown and taken a van I pretty much would have hit all the major transportation Bangkok has to offer. I love days like this. It is nice to go out with Pyo, we like the same movies and seeing the same things. It is nice to have a person to spend time with, it also doesn't hurt that he speaks Thai. All in all it was a great day!

"Holy Toys Batman"