Day 2: Travel Day - Singapore to Jakarta
Nau mai
Yesterday we traveled from Changi airport in Singapore to the megalopolis Jakarta.
My internal alarm clock roused me at 5:45am with the precision I was used to. It was only a few hours of rest but we were all grateful for it. A short walk through the terminal got us to our gate and we boarded the aircraft, eager to complete this final leg of the journey.
I slept for most of the flight but I knew it was important to wake up to eat - who knew when we would find food at the other end of our journey. The breakfast was a classic airplane fusion meal built for the international traveller, stirfried rice noodles with a Thai red curry flavour, with squid, shrimp, and various vegetables. On the side was a bread roll served old and room temperature, and a pottle of strawberry yoghurt.
Our aircraft landed smoothly and we made our way through immigration, finding our tour manager Annie waiting in the arrivals area of Soekarno–Hatta International Airport. The full team was now assembled.
Welcome Annie. Welcome Beths. Here we all are fully assembled looking either at our phones or our snacks.
Annie has pioneered this brutal new photographic style, a close up wide angle from above that works best when the subject is about to bite into a piece of food.
We were allocated three vehicles by the festival organisers to transport us and our equipment to the hotel. Two of the vehicles were these cute Daihatsu cargo vans and the third was a comfortable Toyota Hiace passenger van.
The traffic was very gentle for Jarkarta, normally one of the world’s traffic powerhouses, and in less than an hour we had made it to the hotel and free to enjoy the rest of the day.
The nice view from my window.
I spent my afternoon with Annie and Tristan experiencing lots of different beverages. The coffee is excellent in Jakarta and they aren’t hamstrung by a national loyalty to the failed beverage that is the Flat White. We walked through hot, busy streets and then took refuge in an air conditioned room and enjoyed as many different types of fancy drink as we could consume before the caffeine jitters overcame us.
The bus traffic monitoring tower at Terminal Bis Kota.
This cat knows the value of rest and has the ability to sleep wherever it needs to.
The beautiful view from my room in the evening.