Jakarta, Bandung... and everything in between.

Howdy, Earthlings

Happy Islamic New Year for those who celebrate it. It is a nice day. I wake up to nice, peaceful rainy day. In the time of my writing I still keep my little sleeping lanterns on. I have Copeland's Coffee and a hot Milo with me (cannot afford fancy chocolate drink). I wish this moment stay longer. Heck, I wish there are more consecutive (NOT) holidays like this week for more weeks and days to come.

Lately, I have been missing my writing mood. And this post, need to be written under a force. It is not that I don't like the writing part. But it is the nitty gritty like pictures-transferring and.... pictures-transferring. And, I know most of the pictures are poorly taken and all edited in instagram ( I know, shame on me) to cover their flaws. Sometimes, I think I should not bother writing a post now, or like ever... But no! I need to be discipline, and besides writing is what I enjoy (although at this current time, I enjoy slacking more)

Okay, I might have paused the writing process. Alrighty, now here we go!

Friday, November 9 - Jakarta

rainbow (we know....)

Yep, that is called a rainbow. This was taken from my window seat on KLM's business class. Don't like me bragging? Sue me. I have never flown business class before, and you should pity me. Well, actually, I did one time flew business class on domestic flight but that was nothing like this. The flights attendants were being so nice, I was like, "Lady, you should not have too". And of course, as similar to PC games (I am referring to airplane frenzy, something like that), the pilot was greeting the business class passengers, but no one noticed. Well, maybe he has been getting used to rude business class passengers. Unlike me (raising hand with smile), but unfortunately, he did not pay much attention to this pauper (who seemed to be boarding the wrong class). What I noticed is, there are more Asians boarding the business class. Pfff... Asians, or more like Indonesians. Classy, rich snobs. (As if I am excluded out of the classification)

Anyway, I swear I didn't choose to fly business class. The airline made me. It was a last-minute flight I had to book. AirAsia was being a bitch by offering a RM.500 single journey, so I took KLM instead. The difference was so close (with KLM being RM.50 more expensive than bagage-excluded AirAsia KUL-CGK return flight). So, every sane mind (or diva-minded person) would choose KLM instead. What's not to love? Boarding on KLIA, fancy airports and flying with a nice, in-flight entertainment equipped aircraft. I decided to pay on the ticket counter rather than using my parents' credit card, although they insisted me to use theirs. (Now, you may want to assume me being a nice thoughtful daughter) But yea, I paid myself although it costed me half of my paycheck. When I have done my payment, the cashier said that I was assigned to business class. I was like, WHAT? I DIDN'T ASK FOR THAT! NO WONDER THE PRICE IS SO DAMN EXPENSIVE! But yeah, maybe it was meant to be. God let this sad peasant boards a business class this time after taking aisle seat on AirAsia too often.

exhibit A : In-flight meal. I was supposed to place the bun on the bun plate right there on the bottom left (facepalm)

exhibit B : Rachel makes a good flying companion (my real flight companion was a Malay man. I was expecting a cute Dutch though *sad* )

It was a good yet awkward flight experience. I mean, I didn't figure out easily how to set up the TV and the dining table. Okay, once again, Sue me, JetSetters. Then, as we board, I was given nice amenities by Viktor Rolf. (Writing the designer's name like I have heard of it before)

two pencils and sharpener are mine. They gave me a cute porcelain house as well, and few chocolates onboard.

Sunday, November 11 - Bandung

I am skipping Saturday, because nothing interesting remotely happened (or, it's me who just don't want to share haha.)

This was my last day of my short break. My mother and I visited my younger brother who is studying in Bandung. On Sunday morning, we went to car-free day, an event which most of Bandung people claim as an effortless fattening event. The event mostly occurs on Sunday where officials are closing the main roads in Bandung. I don't remember the exact road closed, is it Dago, guys? All I care in Bandung is shopping til drop, and we'll get to that later. The road are closed for cars and any vehicle so that people can walk, cycle, roller-blading, cheering... or do anything that is actively healthy. But turns out, there are gazillion of food vendors out there, and they sell junk food which in my definition are deep-fried fritters (cilok, pisang goreng, bakwan etc), and heavily-seasoned snack and breakfast items(maicih, karuhun, bubur pinggir jalan). And then it gets me thinking about Indonesia's economy, especially this region, Bandung. It's like the people here are never running out of idea to find something to eat. I don't know whether it is the matter of survival, either life or economy survival, but why'd you have to fry and season everything there is that you spot? It is not healthy...

...

Oh, well, screw it. I had bubur ayam, es pisang ijo (it tastes like heaven I swear), fruits with heavy seasoning, es lilin, cirengss... a lot of cirengss (cireng is a fried tapioca dough with chopped spring onion, crunchy on the outside but gooey when you eat it, in my defense, it so good especially when you add sambal *heavily seasoned* onto it )

In the end, although I was in denial, I was having a great time on car free day.

responsible food vendors, who make the fattening happen (they have poker faces)

Speaking of shopping in Bandung, it is a shopping heaven. That's why I prefer to shop in Bandung rather than in boutiques like Forever21 or Topshop, or even cotton on. Because Factory Outlet in Bandung offers ranges of seriously affordable items with good quality, despite of being rejected items. Well, Indonesians probably have known about this.

Anyhow at the moment, I don't have the urge to shop a lot. Although I know I might regret it, because I spot many nice working blouse, and I only bought one plain white shirt. The rest of the day, I raided Gramedia bookstore and came out with you know, books... hehe. I visit the biggest outlet of Gramedia in Bandung. I was so happy when I found out they sold second-hand English readings. I also bought an Indonesian novel, Amba, and two local comics. I felt like never leaving there.

I also bought some dreamcatchers (I have been looking for them) and a matching penguin-book mugs and pasport cover.

Cannot say more, I am a happy kid.

                                         

Quick glimpse of last night: November 14, Kuala Lumpur

It is so good to be back again and have a normal activity. This week there are 2 public holidays, that means I only have to work on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. 

My friends planned to go karaoke on Thursday, and I was looking forward to that. Nothing beats my love for karaoke, not even boys (well, that adds another reason why I am looking forward to it). But turns out, change of plan, they were asking me to go on Wednesday night! I say it over and over, it feels like an early christmas!

Thanks Lisa, Aida and Ayu!

bailamoooos!

(P.S : Note that eventhough I label this post under "travel", this is still a personal posting. So do expect less travel detail on this one. Thanks :) )