Jakarta - Java

Welcome (Herzlich Wilkommen)

A year of waiting is over and it is time for me to fulfill another wish goal.

So I set off from Frankfurt am Main again and landed 15 pure flight hours later with a stopover in Doha at Soekarno Hatta International Airport - Jakarta. Yes, this trip leads to Indonesia. And I will start on the island of Java. It is 3 PM local time and I feel pretty exhausted from the long flight. Check-in went smoothly, so there should be nothing standing in my way. But wait, I need money first because nothing works without it. And there we already have the first problem, even though I am already traveling with two Visa cards, I still end up empty-handed. The first card is immediately spit out and the second one seems to be saying something about the wrong pin. And that happened at all 10 ATMs on site. So, luckily, I still have 50 euros in cash in my pocket, which I had to exchange at a miserable rate. Unfortunately, this whole process took so much time that I missed my bus by a minute, so I had to wait for another hour.

When it finally arrived, it brought me relatively quickly to the Old Town of Jakarta, to Kota, to be precise, to Kota (Railway) Station. From there, it was just a stone's throw away to the hostel.

I slept like a bear on the first night, so I could start the next day well-rested in the hustle and bustle of Jakarta. First, I had to get used to the local traffic again. Simply crossing the street turned out to be difficult. I followed the road for about a kilometer to find a traffic light or something. "No luck". Until someone literally took me by the hand and guided me across, because you just have to walk calmly.

The first destination took me to Fatahilla Square, where the old City Hall is located. And they spend their free time here on the square. Since the rest of Jakarta is very dangerous, they rent colorful bicycles here and ride around on the square. I continued through the old town "Kota", past the old Toko Merah to the old Chicken Market Bridge towards the harbor. At noon, I enjoyed my first noodle soup at the Warung and then went to the Trans Jakarta Station. Trans Jakarta is the modern bus line on its own separate lane. This finally took me to Mona, which is the central point of Jakarta today. In the middle of it stands the National Monument. Surrounding it are the Presidential Palace, the Istigal Mosque right next to the Catholic Cathedral. Furthermore, the Immanuel Church and the National Museum. I also visited the latter and then made my way back to Kota via Glodok, the "Chinatown". There, I ended the evening with chicken and rice at the Warung.

Fortunately, the issue with money was resolved during the day, otherwise I thought I would have to fly back home without any money.

Goodbye (auf wiedersehen)