on Tolls and Trolls

Sometimes, this country just impresses me with its immense irrationality. The fact that our public officials could be so dumb is simply astonishing, plus an ignorance that borders on negligence.

The government suddenly decided to slap a flat rate toll charges – applied equally regardless of the distance traveled (it used to be that you pick up entry tickets and pay on exit and charged accordingly). The new flat rate is roughly equal the longest distance in the old system – only now you pay that much regardless if you’re traveling thru six or one exit.

Effectively it’s a price increase for most but few. The whole thing was done with very little discussion or public announcement (I travel on the toll road everyday and even I wasn’t aware of the changes until the day it became effective). The price increase is pretty significant if you’re – like most people – travel on only parts of the toll road. But most of all, the toll gates weren’t designed to take payments, resulting in a whole new caliber of traffic jam along the Jakarta Outer Ring Road during rush hours. It’s not like it wasn’t bad jam before that either.

When asked about this, the Director General in charge of the policy elaborated that the changes only affect very small number of people. According to him, 70% road users travel the longest distance (entire length of the toll road) and 30% users travel the shortest distance – therefore, in his logic, 70% of existing users are used to paying the full fare anyway and thus only a small 30% is affected by the increase.

While his math is very convenient, I don’t quite work it out. The toll road have some eight or so exits between the first and the last part. How could it even be possible? In his logic, 70% people only travel only between BSD and Taman Mini?? There are eight or so other exits in between!!!!

I am not exactly educated in public works (or math, for that matter), but I’d say that most people actually travel longer than the shortest distance but not exactly the longest (which is why the toll road is a valuable public property).

Predictably, his boss, the minister in charge of these things, said that if “the people were to object to the fee then they should seek other transport alternative.”

The mood I am in today, we should drag these people out of their offices and start throwing them off the tallest building around. Then we should go down and clean the splat and pick the remains and take it back to the top and throw em down once again.

read the quotes here (in Indonesian)

on Friday Morning Sudirman

To everyone there: please go home! We really can't get anywhere! Just go home! Stay home! Stay with the kids and feed your dogs.

Stay off the road!

on Donkeys and Pooches

Who loves not wine, women and song,
Remains a fool his whole life long”.
~Martin Luther

Okay, my days are getting ridiculously out of control. Getting up early, breakfast, morning traffic and rows of meetings and courtesy calls to people I don’t know. The point being, I am supposed to be getting back to work and doing important things. Like making money for other people and stuff. The morning traffic in Sudirman is a treat for anyone. I am keen to have my head checked now and then to have it re-checked in a year time to see how much it erodes my sanity. I swear, you could feel your soul slipping away in that traffic. And I haven’t even been driving.

On the other hand, Candi’s here for her birthday and staying two days. I took her and some friends for a civilized dinner at Al Nafoura – the Lebanese restaurant at Le Meridien and we had a great meal. They changed the chef now and no longer serve Sunday buffet, it seems. They don’t have that feta cheese thing that I like but instead have some other cheese mixed with herbs and things that’s almost as good. The dinner came after the Tuesday night party where everyone went pretty trashed. All in good fun. It’s good to have her back, I’m not liking this whole long distance and time difference thing too much but I guess maybe I should give it another try.

What do they say about donkeys again?

Anyhow, from other parts of the world. Owen Wilson. I’ve always thought that suicide is one of the dumbest thing anyone could do in their life. Just about the only thing dumber than killing yourself, is failing in killing yourself. Duh! How hard is it, really? I mean, if you’re gonna go thru with it, then by all means, make sure you do it properly. I’d personally recommend jumping off buildings. It’s usually pretty certain.

The other thing is Trouble. The dog of the late billionaire Leona Helmsley (the family made billions of properties, including the Empire State Building). Hemlsley died leaving somewhere north of $4bn to her charity and $12m for the pooch. Nobody else in her family get more.

I’m thinking of leaving everything I have to Mowgli, too. It’ll be in the neighborhood of 3m or so, Indonesian Rupiah. Can you set trust fund to make sure he can get lamb everyday? He likes it a lot.

Blah.

Anyway, I’m busy running errands and will head home soon to play scrabble with Candi. Life’s good at the moment, it can only get better.

Happy Thursday People!

on Foreign Policy and Kevin Costner and Jakarta International Airport

Busy day today. I actually have to work. Like other people.
Like you guys.
We need to get more minions.

However, I am determined to keep this friggin blog updated with fresh content everyday regardless. Which is basically to say that I am not responsible for the dim witted opinions professed on these pages.

Lacking the time to actually do things properly, I start today with pea sized chews:

• Malaysia vs Indonesia (coming from indcoup): Indonesia wins, by far. Meleysiens speak funny and that by itself is good enough excuse.
  Add their violent tendencies to abuse and torture Indonesian maids and shit, and the fact that they can’t clear the traffic in front of their embassy and they kept me for fucking hours in Kuningan the other day should be more than sufficient excuse to declare war on them silly people and invade them. Turn them all to slave and show 'em how to do it properly.
  
  
• Singapore. The whole time zone thing. They’re just a nuisance really, but if we’re already set for Malaysia, we should just conquer Singapore on the way. Make sure we set the time right this time.
  
  
• Sharia Law in Aceh. Wtf? Like, why do we care? It’s in Aceh, not here. Let them do it if they feel like it.
  
  
• Polygamy (from unspun). Frankly, I think marriage, in itself, is a rather insanely irrational decision – and I’m talking about talking one woman for a wife.
  To take four women for simultaneous lifelong companions, well… let’s just say I’d rather invade Malaysia and Singapore. And Hong Kong.
  
  
• Kevin Costner. Kevin Costner should learn piano and start a spectacles collection. Or a car accident or something. Or maybe even KitKat ads. Just don’t do film anymore.
  
  
• And Jakarta International Airport. Officially, the shittiest international airport in the whole civilized world. The system there is designed to inflict as much pain to travelers as possible. And while it's painful, they also make sure it's long and excruciating.
  
  Then you get stuck for two hours just waiting to get out of the place 'coz they're building new statues just outside.
  
  From now on, it'll be the shittiest international airport with statues.
  
  Actually, talk of statues in the airport, anybody notice the huge totem just outside the arrival gate?
  It shows six or eight tribesmen with oversized penises in a vertical orgy towering 20 metres high. How's that for a welcome to the country?
  If you print the pose on a newspaper, it'll be beyond porn.
  

on Corn and Cocaine

You know cocaine is bad, right?

You know that people that use cocaine are also bad, right?

Well, this dude used cocaine. The he ran away. Then the police went after him. They went into a cornfield. Four police cars were destroyed and the dude went into a ditch. This is the cornfield after the incident.

Here's the original news and also the video if you're really curious (not as good).

on Singapore Fruits

This is too frustrating. I left this blog for a while and for the most times that I came around to keep you guys posted, I have been trying really hard to behave myself.

As in I didn’t peddle any smut. Nope. Not one bit of indecent material.
Not even soft core porn

And yet, thousands and thousands of people still come over here looking for ‘expandable dildo’ and ‘dusty mongrels’.

That is just rude.

Whatever it is that you are looking for people, trust me, I’ve only very limited knowledge about dusty mongrels, and even less on all things dildo. Go some place else for your funny fetish!

Anyhow. It just confirms my suspicions that the internet is largely populated by loons, perverts, kooks and enemy combatants.

Speaking of veggies, two films are out soon. Candi’s now in Singapore and doing what she does, she keeps me posted on the movies currently on wide release in our neighboring pimple.
Among other brilliant gems of moviemaking, one spiked my interest and I thought you fruity types might be interested in.

It’s called 881 – a Singapore production. According to Candi, “Its SG street pop the story between two rival sister groups called the papayas and the durians.” If that is not enough, the girls apparently “have bra tops things with spikes like durian and green lazer beams shoot out. All in mandarin with singlish subtitles.”

Intrigued with these bits of information, I went to dig further. A prominent Singaporean movie website lists 8 reasons why you should go and see this film. At number 6, “6. Sixth family member which is Qi Yu Wu’s cock. Don’t think dirty! Everybody appreciates a little bit of Hokkien cock jokes.”

When Candi first mentioned she was going to Singapore, this is exactly the sort of thing I’m worried about. They’re just too weird over there. Even their in-jokes are lewd.

If this isn’t enough for you, a Malaysian superhero is coming to town. Cicakman is showing in Blitz sometime soon but not now. Do let me know what happen later if you go and see this film. Apparently Hale Berry agreed already to play in the sequel to be released next summer with Ang Lee directing.

on the Heartless One and Being Naked

I really have been neglecting the blog for a while. Many, many reasons, but no excuse still. Real life was just very time consuming lately. One of them things that happened to this blog during the last few months was that the people who talk2much visited me.
I remember someone somewhere referred me there quite a while ago, but after many long weeks of heightened anticipation for their visit, I stopped waiting.

Then, as I was away in the jungle of North Sumatra last month, they finally came!

Their mention really was kinda nice (Heartless Lass isn’t really so heartless, after all). Or maybe the Irish just have a thing for me. They do, really. Most times.

Actually, the Irish are lovely people. I particularly like them when they're naked and thinking of me (girls only, please).

Anyhow, the people over there seemed to detest me less than I expected. Most of the comments were about the black template. I can’t help that, I kinda like black. The template is really due for a change and maybe I will finally get around to do it in the next few weeks (if any of you know any interesting template for blogspot that might be suitable for me, do let me know. I will be eternally grateful).

How I managed to post without the laptop was rather simple: internet café. Not in the jungle, but somewhere in a damp corner of Medan, is an internet café.

The orangutans in Bukit Lawang were really cool. You were right to be jealous. They were awesome. One particularly nasty psycho bitch chased us down a ravine for 15 minutes or so. I don’t think I’ve ever run faster in a jungle before. I have yet to post the full story, but rest assured, I will. Someday, hopefully soon rather than later. My travel schedule at the moment is slightly out of control but in all likelihood, I will go back there again on Sept 27th or so
(if anyone’s interested to come along, it’s always better to fight orangutans in large groups). Irish are particularly welcome, the apes seem to like em better than Oz.

This post notwithstanding, the last few weeks worth of posting have all been I-am-too-busy-to-write-anything-down-but-i-will-do-more-in-the-future. I’m hoping for your gracious heart to understand the pressure i am under.

Why treespotter and why isn’t there much at all about me is because really, I’ve made various attempts to explain that thing before. Including the recurring birthday issue, yes. Here are two shameless pieces about me that might shed some light. Some of the stuff there are a bit of date but it's reflective of the time and given the historical context, they were relatively accurate.

If you follow the links, it might even make a joyful reading with plenty intrigues, conflicts, love, sex and rock n roll. Occasionally, there were pictures, too.

Have a good weekend, and thanks for visiting.

note: although the review was rather nice and all, i am not quite sure why they were discussing the Ebola outbreak nearing the end on a post about me. It sort of lessen the impact, really.

on Random Stuff

I need to catch up with so many things. The new work life and all.
No, this isn’t my first job, I have been working for quite a while now, school is but a distant memory blushed with pastel colors. Oh, how the world has changed in 30 years.
(Yes, i'm only 30 yrs old. I am not bald and retired with grandkids. Amazing how i have to keep telling you guys this every time i turned 30!!!)

• Now, onto important things. This is a bullet point post simply because I’ve no structured thoughts in my head at the moment and there are simply too many things I need to keep all of you appraised of.
  
  
• I have been tagged by my dearest ex future wife/co-villain (she’s also German). I am to divulge five random things about me. Having no other choice, I have to oblige and be totally random. More of this shit to follow, just keep linking to me.
  
  
• I’m totally anal about my table. You know, like creating tables in Excel, I’m totally anal about it. The background must be white, the fonts must be Arial and the total line always bold and underlined. I also don’t like seeing reds in my tables.
  
  
• Jakarta officially sucks. I wasn’t even supposed to be here. I was supposed to be in Singapore at the moment and be with my girl but the gods have decided to the contrary. I am to stay in this big smelly town for a while*. Still, my social calendar for Jakarta is full for most of this week and I have managed to pile up enough things on my day calendar, too. That way I could appear working. Really hard.
  
  
• On the subject of working, HR still isn’t back with my requisitioned horses, nor garlic, nor my laptop. I am posting blogs on a black board. I am also told I will be paid.
  (How it makes its way to the Internet from my blackboard is the true wonder of the digital age).
  
  
• I will be away again for most of the next two weeks, hopefully to be reunited with the aforementioned girl. We will be watching movies. Then i will be in Vietnam eating bad food.
  
  
• My dog is getting older. It is making me very sad. He’s getting more soppy and spoiled and demanding. Candi bought me this book – Marley and Me – about a guy and his dog, a lab. It’s a nice book and worth reading if you’re into dogs, but the dog died in the end and so I refused to read the last eight pages of the book.
  
  
• I watch lots of tv series. Too many really. Heroes was really good and Entourage was highly entertaining (went thru three seasons worth in three days straight). Sopranos is still a favorite but two seasons of Rome was very, very good (it’s a tad slow in the first few episodes, but definitely a lot of fun coming to the end of the second season). I also finished entire seasons of Shark, Justice, Studio 60 on Sunset Strip, 30 Rock, Oz, Prison Break, Lost and plan to start on Grey's Anatomy.
  
  
• I’m saving Carnivale and The Wire for later. Did I miss anything?
  
  
• Amazing how Jakarta is so small sometimes. I was out the other night (back to Dragonfly, but that’s a different story. I think the curse has lifted). I met a girl who witnessed ex Boss frolicking with an unidentifiable female other at Bachio in Bali some while ago. The news bears no significance whatsoever except for the pleasure of gossiping in the business of others.
  
  
• I have not been working for the last seven months (thus the unbearableness of the last four days). I read so many books – everything from a Mandela bio to a Google biopic to Irvine Welsh and Ben Elton to Karen Amstrong and Christopher Hitchens to Richard Dawkins to the Economics of Depression to some erotic fiction collections. It all makes me very nauseous.
  
  
• I am writing a novel. A book. At least, it will be a book when I am done. At the moment, it’s 17 pages long and it has a sex scene and no dialogue. Exciting, no?
  
  
• This should be enough, if I go on further I would be forced to write about the cute girl on my floor but that would be inappropriate.

• Ciao

*there's an upside in everything and the upside of her absence is that i don't have to eat veggies. at least for a week following my birthday.

on Work Day #1

Oh hey, Happy Birthday, too. There seems to be a misunderstanding with my previous posts. I am 30 now. Take my word for it. Like, really. Unless you've something really good for me.

First day at work, i've a temporary computer, big black box of shit that i'd never ask for. Apparently my laptop won't be around for another 4 weeks or so. I'm also given a box of stationaries, some papers, a glass and a phone that doesn't work. I'm asking for an ashtray, a remote control, some garlic and horses, but i am told these aren't standard supply and i've to wait some more.

I'm learning my way around the procedures and clients and forms etc. There seems to be an awful lot of them things i need to learn. I reckon i need to go to work everyday for another week or so and i will be sufficiently pavloved to fill them all forms.

My room looks down to Sudirman and I can observe the traffic from the same distance here.

Hmm...

What else? maybe i'll share bday stories, but later. They can wait. I don't have my files and my pictures and my stories and i will have to move them from my laptop first. So complicated. You will have to wait for those things.

Anyhow... I'm busy at the moment. Will be back later.

on a Free Man

Today is Wednesday, August 15th, 2007.

By next Monday, I will no longer be a free man. Monday marks the end of my free reign.
I am being hounded back into the slavery of the modern capitalist machine.
No longer will I be let to roam free in the wild or venture into the alleys of great cities.
No, i will be strapped into modernist, minimalist chair in a glass cubicle, squeezed and bloodied daily by Jakarta traffic like the rest of them. The Others.

To make it even worse, I will turn 30 next Sunday. Three Oh.

Yes, it's my birthday again this August 19th. My thirtieth year on the graying and aging Earth. The end is nearing. Yes, i could see that.

Not only i will be slaved, i will also be an adult and further expected to behave as such. Responsible and reasonable and stuff.

Life sucks.

PS: Entertain me. Please. Birthday present ideas include a new pair of shoes, a lighter, a boat, any great works of erotica or a lemur. Or else, i'll let you be creative and pick me a surprise.

Even better, send me the cash, I'll surprise myself!!!

on Work

First day at work tomorrow. I am supposed to meet people and introduced myself as the new dude and all that. Feel like the first day at school. i'm supposed to be working on the business plans etcetera and also to deliver some sort of training.

I'm thinking of arming them. My new militia.

Ah, work is exciting.

on Life

Back from Medan last week, we went out straight again to Pelabuan Ratu. The others were doing some photo shoots of some sort, i tagged along for an extra break in the sun. Nice white stretchy beach and big pounding waves. I was in bed or in the pool for the most of it, somewhat recuperating. My new employers were apparently looking for me and they wanted me to start as soon as possible (eg. next Wednesday).

It's hard living on this permanent vacation for the last three month. From the Quays in Singapore to Bangkok and up in the ruins of Central Thailand, the valleys of Sapa and chaos of Hanoi, sea monsters in Ha Long Bay to the freaky beach in Cat Ba. Cannibals in Samosir and a dive in the 532m cool water of Lake Toba. I learned how to ride a motorbike and got chased by Orangutans here and there. Now, i'm back home and i hope to unpack.

Except that i won't be. Work commences in Singapore, which means i'll be away again for another week after my birthday. This time, it's work. Like other people. Work to get money and career and stuff. Stuff.

Blah.

PS: Laptop's destroyed, anything i promised to anyone will have to wait until work buy me a new one. Hopefully in the next few days. Ciao.

on the Week Notes

This is Edita, she's seven months pregnant and very friendly. Not all of them are.

So may things happened in the week and since i didn't have my laptop, i only started writing things down today. Needless to say, Jakarta sucks, i love it much better in the jungle. In any event though, since I haven't even finished posting my travel notes from Vietnam, expect things to come out in non-chronological order for the next few days.

- I learned how to ride a motorbike. We needed to get around in Samosir island and since i left the car across the lake, the only option was to learn riding the motorbike. I was nice and easy, except that Lee crashed into me within the first 10 minutes and we ruined the bike. The rest of it was pretty uneventful except for the stunning view and the cannibal tribe rituals.

- All the restaurants in Samosir listed magic mushroom omelet for special dish. It's worth trying. You should too.

- We spent three days hiking and trekking and rafting and got repeatedly chased by orangutan in the jungle. Needless to say, it was fun.

- Venturing into the palm oil plantation we rode int he back of a big truck in the middle of the rain. Call it jungle sled. Note to self: bring rain gear next time.

- We're buying a place in Bukit Lawang, my own very personal jungle outpost.

- I drove more than 800 km in one week. My legs are itchy.

-Back in Jakarta and apparently my new contract is ready. I will have to start working again like normal people sometime this month. Life sucks.

- My bday is coming up. Prepare your presents people!