IT’S WEDDING TIME AGAIN!

ITS WEDDING TIME AGAIN!

HOW NOT TO GET INTO X2

On Sunday morning I woke up covered in bruises. There was a big black shocker in the centre of my delicate back in the shape of a foot. Covering the rest of my lazy morning body was a galaxy of blue, mustard, and swamp green other little buggers dotted all over my loamy limbs. I looked to the left, I looked to the right, and I studied my weary being looking back at me in the filthy mirror of my inner-city hovel. Something was missing from that usually sultry structure. I studied myself more closely and realized that what appeared to be missing, was not gone but rather had shrunk. That shrunken piece was the part of me that held my head high, put a strut in my swagger, and my nose turned up to the clouds, and now, it was cowering in the most useless part of my body, appearing to have from the night before shrivelled to the size of a puny speck of a pea. We all know that I am a girl, so I’m not talking about the one eyed trouser snake that also changes size and shape. I’m talking about the other massive part of a human that navigates success and failure, conquest and loss. On close inspection I realized that the wonderful, staunch, always dependent ego that had been shoved up my round behind from the moment my gawky teenage features bloomed into a moving masterpiece, had not only been severely bruised from the night before but had also quickly deflated. As I reflected on my shrunken ego the puzzle of the night before had come into place. Ladies and gentlemen of the scathing jury of blog trolls and curious readers, I was indeed kicked off my high horse on Saturday night. It hurt, the pain cut deep, and the bruises were a rainbow of shame. And not only was it a painful landing flat on my ass in a metaphorical pile of shit, but the fall was accompanied by a looting of the huge booty of ego that I had been lugging around from club to club across Jakarta.

So how did this all happen? How did a young, vibrant, upstanding woman of society fall victim to such a heinous bravado battery and ego pillage?

For those novices to the Princess Jakarta guide to life, with even the slightest familiarity with Princess Jakarta and her psychotic outbursts, you will not be surprised to hear that the Princess likes to play Swarovski-encrusted, haute-couture hardball. She likes to keep things high-end, exclusive, excessive, and out of reach of those who don’t make the cut. Princess Jakarta says “Jump!”. As her minions, we are compelled to say nothing more than “how high?” and pull out the credit cards. On that fateful Saturday night, Yours Truly fell victim to the consequences of not complying with Princess Jakarta’s orders. She said jump, and I stepped up to the plate without the requisite Nike Air Max de jour. And without the essential equipment to make that glittering jump through the hoops of social decadence, I fell off my high horse and hit the ground hard.

Let’s get down to the nitty gritty of that brutal Saturday night beating I was so heinously subjected to. Our group, as diverse as a Benneton advertisement and as educated as the Oxford dictionary swaggered up to the doors of one of Princess Jakarta’s most popular nightclubs. The glittering, gaudy, and epically huge X2. “Ex Two” is how you pronounce it. “To the max” is how you handle it. And “black out” is how you remember it. Your’s Truly missed the memo on how to dress for it. And that was the chink in my ghetto-gold-dolla-swinging chain that night. I wore these jeans:

Obviously I’ve watched too much Jenny from the Block and thought that slashed jeans would pass for “sophisticated, laid-back cool” in a “boho-chic-rocker-I’m-so-awesome-I-don’t-need-to-dress-up-EVER” kind of way. I must not have watched enough Fashion TV in my life because I couldn’t have been more wrong or inappropriately dressed as I discovered.

My comrades and I rocked up to the velvet ropes of entrance, laughing, joking, loving life and gagging for the pulsating experience of glorious X2 that awaited us. We stepped onto the red carpet. We sauntered past the security guards, half the group smoothly walked past the guest list. I was singled out and stopped (a first!). I was mortified. I was denied entry because I was wearing torn denim. The skinny little door woman  smugly pointed to the left. A new sign had been erected at the entrance showing that torn denim was not allowed to enter the complex. The dress code of X2 had been updated and I shockingly did not comply with it. The door (whom I am politically correctly referring to as) woman (and not typically as “bitch” despite very much wanting to so refer to her as) sneered as the words came out. I’m sure she was being very diplomatic in enforcing the policy of X2 and the legitimate dress code, but all I was hearing was “NO ENTRY”, “REJECTED”, “DENIED” and “SOCIAL FAUX PAS!!!”. My anger rose and the ego crept out of my fiery loins. My ego was clutching and pulling for dear life at whatever strings she could grab, but no efforts were working and nothing was getting me in. The white horse that carried me up the red carpet was beginning to buck. I was losing my grip of the reigns, and the final denial of entry was the kick to my back and I felt myself falling hard off my high horse. Once I hit the ground, I could feel pieces of my precious ego being stripped away by the savage sassy patrons who walked past me in their appropriate dress code-friendly attire. What followed was a walk of shame to Red Square, the place where the less you wear, the more likely you are to get in. I got in.

The lesson learnt was not only that looks are everything in Princess Jakarta, but also that just because you’re a snotty nosed expat doesn’t mean you can get in anywhere your heart desires. The “horse” was in reality a pair of 10 inch high shiny black Guess stilettos. The “kick” was actually the irritating smile of a pretty little door (here we go again) “lady” through which the words of “ENTRY DENIED” were spat out into my face through broken-yet-just-as-aggravating-as-proper-entry-rejecting-like-sounding-English. The dress codes of clubs in Princess Jakarta are not (only) made to keep out those whom Princess Jakarta regards as “commoners”. They’re made to keep the clubs in line with the ideal standard of Princess Jakarta – high-end, exclusive, excessive, and out of reach of those who don’t make the cut. And if you want to be a part of that glittering scene, you have no choice but to deal with it. Here are some common standards that you would be hard pressed to find in Australia and in certain circumstances would probably be considered discrimination, but are common entry requirements and dress codes in Jakarta:
High heels only
No shorts on men
No torn denim
No singlets (wife beaters) on men
Not indigenous looking (denial of entry based on racial appearance, which is sad but true)

It’s the high heels thing that has upset a lot of tree-hugging feminist mates of mine.  Well, not really actually.  Even the misogynistic tree-chopping fashionista mates of mine disagree with the onerous dress-codes of this city.

Now ladies and gentlemen it is evident that to compensate for the loss of my treasured ego, since that horrible night I’ve been over loading on the superlatives. But it hasn’t helped much because nobody understands my superfluous use of proper English. However that’s not really the point of this post. The point I want to make should rather help those of you reading to navigate your way around the social discrimination of Princess Jakarta and hopefully as a result nobody else will fall victim to the ego battery and swagger-theft that I experienced. If you want to go out and get white girl wasted with the nocturnal heavyweights of Princess Jakarta the rules are simple: heels high, skirts short, and more make up than a drag queen. With that ammunition and a killer rack, you’re guaranteed to get through the door and if you’re lucky you might even snap up a big fat sugar daddy to pay for the cocktails and the morning after cab fare! And that’s a night out according to Princess Jakarta.

(yes, I know this is Choi Min-sik. Let us all agree that he makes a great sugar daddy kind of looking chap)

BLUE SKIES JAKARTA

Either I am on acid or mother nature spewed the sea into the sky. We can’t believe our smokey eyes at this sight of a blue sky in Jakarta. Princess Jakarta could be on detox.

AND GUESS WHO’S IN HOSPITAL WITH AMOEBIC DYSENTERY

I wrote a scathing article calling expats who don’t eat local food a bunch of nancies. Now I’m crippled by a parasite contracted from dirty food with fecal matter on it. Mostly uncooked food. You can laugh. I’ll be emptying my stomach contents against my will for the next two weeks.

MANDATORY AFTERNOON BATHING IS INDONESIAN

Not to sound like a perve or anything but you should be aware that Indonesian culture dictates bathing in the afternoon. If you don’t, you’re fowl, alright? The exception is if you are a fast paced bawse-baller who’s too busy to exit the boardroom for a quick roll in the trough, or if you’re simply not in a place that has convenient showers (the office?). But if you’re like me and gone full on “pulang kampung” or actually living in or around a kampung, village, small city, etc. you’re expected to sleep, pray, and bathe every afternoon before sundown. I jumped on the bathing bandwagon to fit in with the family who all seem to have wet hair in the afternoon. I needed to get with the crew.

Cleanliness is literally next to godliness here, is pleasant to others, and with so much water bucketing down from the skies, the people of Indonesia put it to good use. It’s a religious, cultural, and habitual ritual and frankly feels good as a relief from the afternoon heat. If you don’t want to be a stinky bule, get used to it.

Most Indonesians do it with a trough and pale. That’s called having a “mandi”. Similar to standing under an exotic waterfall, except you’re in a small bathroom, with a trough, and you pour the water over yourself. Its very exotic.

The ritual is an addiction because nothing feels better than waking up from an afternoon nap (another fervent practise of Indonesians that I will explain to you in another rant), feeling groggy and foggy from the humidity, and washing it all away with ice cold well-water from a bullet proof bucket.

If your services have been delayed because the personnel are “mandi dulu”, or you’re wondering why on earth that lady is prancing around town with a cascade of wet hair in the afternoon public, it’s because of the national passion for a good old “mandi”. I urge you to jump on in! But whatever you do, don’t you dare get into the trough.

MORE JAVANESE DELICACIES

In Indonesia, everything is made from rice (or fish). It’s a rice-padi-drenched-archipelago (your face is a rice-padi-drenched-archipelago whispers the puberty in me) for heaven’s sake. So whether you’re hungry or not, somebody, anybody is going to offer you a snack that’s probably carb-loaded. These cute little green and brownish babies are exceptionally attractive for the product of mushing together rice, sugar, artificial colours and flavours and various banana, peanut and coconut components. The green ones are “dadar gulung” with “unti” in the middle. That be in layperson’s terms “a green coconut and rice crepe stuffed with grated coconut”. It’s not too sweet. But they’re going to get your cholesterol climbing. The green striped jelly square is “lapis”. Lapis is heavenly because it’s like eating a really moist piece of fudge, yet more jelly wobbly and softer to bite into. It’s not as sweet as fudge but hits the spot if you’re craving sugar, and it has a hint of coconut through it. It’s smooth on the tongue and doesn’t make you want to gag. I love it. The rest is too laborious to explain, and I didn’t like then as much anyway. The round golden thing in plastic is more like a dense pancake but more oily and tastes like coconut, so it was probably fried in palm oil. I would recommend not to go there. And the thing in a box (is unfortunately not a dick-in-a-box, as the Lonely Island once said) is fried noodles. If only they served fried noodles in such small portions in Australia! Your basic snack guide to Java shall be added to throughout my culinary journey of 2014. Get ready for loads of rice, chicken, MSG, oil and plastic bags as I eat my way to a heart attack in Princess Jakarta (and beyond).

MALANG ZOO

A young girl, a zoo keeper, and a white tiger sedated and chained to a picnic table.

BREAKFAST OF CHAMPIONS

No, you animal activists, I have not purchased a goldfish to eat for my breakfast! This is how breakfast is commonly served in Indonesia and I was lucky enough to awake to my first taste of it this morning. Dubious to fill up on fried prawn crackers and a saucy mix that looked good enough to fuel a long winter hibernation, I manned up, put on my metaphorical sarong and sat on the floor to tackle the plastic bagged beast. I was going full on Malang today.

To stall the inevitable first bite I carefully untied the rubber band d that help my food tightly in the plastic bag. Then proceeded to spill half the contents in the table. Fail. You pour the contents into the bowl, add a bit of the prawn crackers and there you have a breakfast for champions. The only issue was – I had no idea what the contents was. Suddenly I felt as brave as a conqueror, as I built up the courage to take the first slurp.
I don’t know what the contents is. A liver? A root? A fruit? Psyching myself up for the consumption, convincing myself that it was cool to go rough on the street food, I plunged my spoon into the mess and swallowed a whole serve. I was astonished at how good, fresh and pleasant it tasted. What could be a liver had the texture of a soft liver but was probably a brown artichoke (if any of you more refined vegans have an idea what it might be please enlighten). The other floating bits were sticky rice that complemented and balanced the fattening yet delicious coconut milk infused with chilli, ginger, lime and a hint of garlic. A tad exotic for my breakfast palate, yet not vile.
I successfully finished the bowl in true village “waste not want not” style and saluted myself for completing the challenge. Full on Indonesian breakfast was completed. Low carb, high fibre and even higher fat content. It was to be a good weekend. I might sound like a complete idiot making a mountain out of eating a few local vegetables for breakfast today. But I am pretty sure that it was more daring than a lot of other expats in Indonesia get for their morning feed. As cool as my expat buddies are, I know a lot who would rather starve than eat a single scrap of food prepared locally on the streets. Of course some street food will put the untrained stomach into hospital, but not all of it is disgusting. To fit into a culture you have to eat the food of the people. In the case of Indonesia, hold that bowl of unidentifiable delicacies tight, get into a comfortable squat on the ground and share a meal with your new found friends. There’s no better way to feel part of a community than by knowing you’re all sharing the same produce and shitting the same muck. That is the true cultural immersion. And if my next musing turns out to be along the lines of “HOW TO DEAL WITH FOOD POISONING IN INDONESIA” then I’ll eat my own words too!

WELCOME TO MALANG

The long weekend allows time to journey to East Java, climb the family tree and discover who set the unique precedent that is me. With a bucket list of fresh air, mountain climbing, apples and marveling at white colonial architecture all day long (the buildings are literally all painted white). Malang is more than just the stop to Bromo. And I hope it doesn’t take only my banter to show you that.

WHEN YOU KNOW IT’S THE REAL DEAL