Jakarta- the big (not so much) smoke

Got back from Jakarta this morning- great getaway for a few days! Everyone says how awful Jakarta is- dirty and busy, the traffic jams are terrible etc, so I just had to check it out for myself- and I really liked it! Sure, theres traffic but it is a capital city after all... Jess K and I got the night train up on Wednesday night- bit of a long night lol. It wasnt as easy as Id expected, sleeping on a train. It was fine, just not a lot of leg room and its really hard to sleep with the lights on lol! We arrived in Jakarta about 6am and got a taxi to the backpacker strip, which wasnt very far from the station. Took us a while but we found somewhere for breakfast (although the indonesians get up with the sun, they obviously dont expect tourists to- Ive noticed before barely anything is open before eight in the morning in touristy areas!) and then checked out some hotels about 7am and checked into a nice one. It was pretty central to the business and attractions area of Jakarta- we only had to walk about ten mins to get to Monas- the National Monument- a 140m tower which took about ten years to complete. As it was early we got there a little after it opened and had the place pretty much to ourselves (except of course for the huge gathering in the grounds- a meeting and practice for disaster strategies in Jakarta, there were hundreds of police and special service people, an expo or something). The views over Jakarta from the top were really good- on the ground it didnt feel like Jakarta was that poluted, but when you can see above the buildings and see them disappearing into clouds of smog... not so good. In the base of Monas, underground, is the national history museum, which is really just a massive room with displays on each side... they were complete with little figures and captions depicting important moments in Indonesian history (quite selective apparently). We had a walk around the grounds of Monas, which were really nice a sculptured, lots of trees (!!!) and grassy areas then onto the National Museum. The English Society provides free guides of the museum and we just happened to arrive at the right time, so a woman showed us around and told us heaps of little things, it was really interesting. There were lots of statues and relics from all over Indonesia- no wonder all of the temples and sights weve seen on Java have been missing the odd Buddha or statue- theyre all hiding in Jakarta! After lunch things caught up with us a bit so we had a rest then got our stuff together ready to head to the old city... and got halfway down the hotel stairs and it POURED! So what can you do in such a bustling city when its pouring outside? Go shopping of course! We went to a mall and passed the afternoon very nicely window shopping in Calvin Klein, Gucci, Bulgari and Yves Saint Laurent and browsing thru some normal shops and bakeries. And the best bit? A supermarket! Cos Jakarta needs to cater for all the expats living there, the supermarket had an international section... it was so exciting! Lol you dont realise how much you miss stuff til you cant have it and then find it again! I stocked up on my vegemite, savoys, corn thins, custard, sultanas, an Aussie Cleo... and Cadbury snack chocolate!! they have cadburys here but its some tropical variety, all this stuff added so it doesnt melt, and it doesnt taste so nice and they have crappy flavours... it was really exciting (I guess you had to be there...). To cap it off, we had pizza and coke for dinner :) Comfort. On Friday we got the train about an hour away to Bogor, where the botanical gardens are. They were once the gardens of the Governors palace there but are now open to the public and so beautiful! So green... I miss green! It was great, we wandered around for a couple of hours until it got too hot then had a drink in a cafe overlooking the beautiful green lawn and green trees then lay in the shade for a while reading. There was a lovely greenhouse with orchids (tho I dont know why they need a greenhouse, it was the same as the outside temperature) and lots of GREEN! We went for a walk thru Bogor, to hunt down a cafe that sold the best apple pies in Indonesia... and what a walk lol! Just kept that apple pie in mind and finally we saw the wonderful sign and found it... mmmm good apple pie. Worth the walk. It started raining, very big drops as we left and got a couple of angkot, little minibus things, run on routes like buses, to the station and we ducked thru a market outside to get in before the rain really started. Our train was already at the station as we arrived and so we had to climb up and thru another train in the pouring rain to get to it lol... then back to Jakarta for dinner at a really nice resto near our hotel. Saturday we made it down to the old city of Jakarta,Kota, by bajaj... these funny little three-wheeled cars.. sort of like Mr Bean's car- quite squishy but we got thru the traffic pretty quickly (if scarily!). This is where the Dutch settled when they came to Jakarta, so there was lots of colonial architecture, which was interesting, a lot of it really run-down tho. We went to a church built in 1693 and an old drawbridge and heaps of buildings from the same era, then onto Sunda Kelapa, the port. There were heaps of old wooden boats, not terribly exciting but interesting to see anyway. And it was really really busy in Kota! SO this is where all the pollution and traffic jams were... lol. We headed off to see another market and it took ages to get there- traffic jam! BUt it was nice to sit down in air-con lol, so hot. The Mangga Dua market was just stall after stall of clothes and shoes and almost everything! Andthere were about 8 levels of it! Quite overwhelming lol. We moved onto apparently the best mall in Indonesia, which like the other, had lots of designer shops but normal shops too. It was really nice- great way to fill in a rainy afternoon lol... We got a different train back to Jogja, still an overnight one and almost the same price but much more leg room and comfier chairs :) Got a bit more sleep and arrived back in Jogja at about 4am. I really liked Jakarta, how it was set out and the atmosphere. The traffic wasnt unbearable and it was quite well set-out in the central areas where we and most of the attractions were. There were heaps of trees and things were in walking distance, I really enjoyed it :) I dont know what people are complaining about!