Blogs from Jakarta, Java, Indonesia, Asia - page 15

Well..... I've now been here 2 and a half weeks and this is the first time that I've has a spare hour to sit down and write! I had a lovely send off at the airport with my mum, dad, Jess, Charlotte & Charley there to wave goodbye! We all had a few tears, but it was so nice to have them there! I sat by some of the other new teachers on the flight, so it was quite nice to get to know them better and chat about all the things we expected/were worried about together. There were 8 of us coming from the UK, but when we arrived in Jakarta there were 7 more people who'd come from other countries. We were met by the head of the Secondary school who had arranged for ... read more

Hi Friends! After a LONG day (2 days?) of chasing the sun West, we made it to Indonesia! During our 12 hour layover in Singapore we fell in love with the airport...free internet, a butterfly sanctuary, many koi ponds and gardens, free movie theaters, nap rooms, hotels, and a pool! seriously I could go on...It was amazing. Yesterday we arrived in Jakarta in the afternoon and forced ourselves to stay up and wander around and see some of the Independence day celebrations. Apparently Indonesians LOVE Sam...literally. The kids go out of their way to call out "hello mister!"and then burst into a fit of giggles, pretty much everyone stares and adults are always greeting us and asking us how we are doing. We are just going with it...pretending to be the Branjolina of SE Asia. On ... read more

Where did we leave off... Right...Kuta Well our trip has been full, Full of good times Full of good people Full as is no where to sleep Full of surfing Full of sea turtles Full of long trips ( longer then they really needed to be) Full of waiting to get our passports back in our hands So we went back to Kuta to pick up our passports after waiting a week, but they were not ready yet so we opted to get them mailed to our next destionation point other than waiting around any longer. We left that day for Gili Air. After a very long journey there were arrived in Gili Air at about 5 o'clock as the sun was preparing to set. We had heard that all the places were full so Jeff ... read more

The one thing that I think I was most surprised with when I arrived in Jakarta was the fact that I felt so safe. This is a massive city, full of some of the wealthiest and poorest individuals in Southeast Asia, but with a glut of surplus labour and having faced security issues in the past, it seemed to me that Jakarta has the situation under control. At the entrace to everybuilding there are guards who will put you through metal detection. Police are around all the major intersections, and there are numerous police posts throughout the city. I've never once felt intimidated or concerned about my safety in the capital - with so much security (and it has to be said, so many witnesses), major crime seems to be relatively well maintained. Events this morning ... read more

So, after having seen only one small road incident with a motorbike lightly plowing into the back of a taxi, I was in a little dust-up of my own yesterday on the way to work. I have to admit that my directions could have been sooner for the taxi to turn (I'm trying to learn, but my Indonesian is still pretty basic), but without looking he geared left, and we had a motorbike scrape the side. The guy stopped, looked at his leg, his bike, then kept driving! Needless to say, I ended up giving the not-so-impressed driver a nice tip on arrival to try... Thankfully, with a million+ taxis, I probably won't have to worry about seeing him again... I threw on a video of morning traffic in Jakarta that I took when I first ... read more