Jakarta Tales Vol 6: Back in the Summer of...

Hey ya aull and weilcome to the 6’ou clauck Jakartaa Tailes ait 9! (This one is dedicated to Texas, in sympathy for the Republicans (led by you-know-who) who were ruthlessly thrashed in the mid-term US Elections… may God protect the faithful departed) :)

Aineeways, whaaile da kondolainces (dat’s haw they spell da daimn thing, don’t ‘ey) keep flauing into Rumah Putih (White House in Bahasa), lemme tell ya aull how glad I am to be back! What’s maure, I have loooooooooooads to telllll. Feels good seein’ mai mail in your inbox, doesn’ it?! Yeah, yeah… smirk ais much ais you waunt, Ai know you miiiissed me :)

Alright, enough, it’s getting to me too. I remember I left off in the last edition at my Malang trip. Much has happened since then and you have a right to know. So let’s begin!

Work was going on in full swing in September and I was busy hunting down new business when we stumbled upon this lead for Bokormas Tobacco Company. It was a small manufacturer and seller of kretek cigarettes in East Java under the brand names Bokormas and Nine Milds.

My boss, his brother (who is our Below-The-Line Director) and I booked the earliest flight possible to Surabaya (Indonesia’s second city) to meet a Mr Martin Kroojnen who sounded like a grumpy old man on the phone but turned out to be a fine young Dutch man in his late twenties.

INDONESIA'S SECOND CITY?

We landed at Surabaya on a hot Thursday night and headed for the meeting next morning at 8. The meeting went off well and my boss and I were trying to show off all our tobacco marketing knowledge. I don’t know if Martin was impressed but we were satisfied on having put Exigo into his consideration for their next MarComm venture. We then headed out for breakfast while I kept dozing off in the car at every possible opportunity (something’s wrong ever since I’ve come to Indonesia. I feel like sleeping more than ever before… hehe).

Honestly, I wasn’t really interested in seeing Surabaya because it had disappointed me right from the time we had landed the night before. It was such a contrast from Jakarta! Phew! This was Indonesia’s second city? It was stuck between being a bustling metropolis and retaining the coziness of a small city like Bandung or Malang (which later became my favourite city in Indonesia).

In fact, this disappointment helped me answer a few questions about India and Indonesia. My friends from the Western countries doing similar internships in Jakarta have always asked me how different Jakarta/Indonesia is from India all throughout my stay here.

For them, Jakarta is, of course, a huge culture shock what with all its economic contrasts, chaos, pollution, corruption, etc and India is, today, the world’s second-fastest growing economy, a land thriving with culture et al. Indonesia, on the other hand, had its heydays. So they’ve always wanted to know how much of a shock it is for me to be here and I always found it difficult to clarify the exact differences until Surabaya happened.

If you ask me, is Jakarta more developed/ advanced than any city in India? I would say, YES. By a few years, at least. In what ways? The infrastructure, the systems, the standard of living, the facilities, the income levels, et al. Of course, this is a subjective opinion considering I come from Kolkata which is at least 5-6, not just a few years behind Jakarta.

But if you ask me, is Indonesia ahead of India? I would say NO, not at all. If Surabaya is Indonesia’s second city… no way because Surabaya is at least 8-10 years behind Jakarta itself! To me, Surabaya was like a Surat or Bhopal or Patna – dirty, too chaotic, without a character and forcefully thrust with the responsibility of being a BIG regional capital. Not the city’s fault I would say; blame it on the omnipresent lack of urban planning mentality with the powers that be across major cities in India or, for that matter, Indonesia.

So, while the quality of development seems to be better in Indonesia, it is restricted to one mother of a city called Jakarta. India (our very own bharat maiya), on the other hand, has 6 magnanimous Complan sons and daughters starting from New Delhi to Hyderabad, who are growing equally quick and don’t have growth differences as huge as the ones between Jakarta and Surabaya. It’s the quantity versus quality battle, my friend, and in today’s times, it’s Walmart, not Harrod’s that’s winning. And of course, no one doubts the quality of Walmart too, do they?

And this is where I'm gonna stop you for now. Cya soon with the whys and hows behind this


Cheers
Yousuf