TRIVIAL PURSUITS IN JAKARTA.

Jakarta is my favourite city. I love it. I feel sorry for Jakarta because it gets nudged aside for Bali. Which is most certainly a mistake. I love Jakarta so much that I only go to the city for trivial reasons.And every time I visit, Jakarta surprises me with something new.Usually another spectacular mall. Or even a Disney-On-Ice Show.

Last weekend, just prior to the Idil Fitri holidays, I decided to stroll down the main street of Jakarta. I would begin at the a giant statue of a near naked man carrying a flaming Bomb Alaska, and walk down Jalan Sudirman to the famous Welcome Circle and down Jalan Tamrin to the Presidential Palace. That's about 4 kilometers.

Everything in Jakarta is big. Its history is big. Though Jakartans celebrate 1577 as it birth year, the city actually existed in 397AD. Its building are big. Many are designed by prominent architects and have won awards and things. Mid-way down is the awfully pompous Samporena Strategic(who knows what it means).There are many,many more big, tall and splendid glass and steel structures. Still more surreptitiously rising. True on this main throughfare there are no massive structures like the cathedral in Cologne which can take in 40,000 people. But Jakarta, looks like, it has several buildings that can house 40,000. No problem.Sometimes you can see them all when they stream out during an earthquake.

Jakarta main street has with a snide smile given space to the world's ghastliest building, the Da VinciTower(its true). The owners had tried to provide a Italian kitsch (You know they thought that it was splendidly classical stuff and all, the ignorant bunch) setting in the middle of Jakarta for poor old Da Vinci.Horrific ornate furniture is sold in there. In the upper floors are monstrously distasteful, awful and expensive apartments. But it is okay. It is Jakarta's way of saing, "Look I have a sense of humor."Other cities may have building you can hate but not a Da Vinci Tower which you look and laugh over for half an hour.

Even names are big and impressive. The Ministry of Education which fronts Jalan Sudirman is actually called, Depertemen Pendidikan Nasional. Isn't that impressive!I love it and spend a lot of time there.

Then midway down, is the Welcome Circle with an extremely large, cool and welcoming fountain. From the center rises an obelisk with a happy couple, happily waving flowers to welcome residents and guests alike.

The Circle is the official site for very democratic demonstrations from angry ones to the friendliest, where pretty girls hand out stems of roses or condoms to motorists and the watchful police men and women. The are four, five star hotels around this Circle.and the angry demonstrators, for some inexplicable reason, seem to hurl their fury upwards towards the Grand Hyatt. Serves the Grand Hyatt right. They make such unimaginative chocolate.The other hotels go placidly unscathed.

Pacific Place, stands sedately behind the Jakarta Stock Exchange. It feels like it its lending its massiveness in support to the latter. But once you go in you realise that it is really a massive shopping mall, with elegant and fashionable stores, Starbucks, Food Courts, Cinema theatres.Close to Wendy's Hamburger is the entrance to the Ritz Carlton Ballroom.

I bought a bag of chocolates, at Paci,the famous chocolate boutique, and went to a store to have it wrapped. Two delightful ladies,asked me a series of questions to all of which I replied "Yes" because I hadn't the faintest idea what they were talking about.

"You many textured recycled of course?"
"Yes".
"With a foil backing for form?"
"Yes."
"Watermarked and embossed?"
"Yes"
"A second colour in poignant pink?"
"Yes"
"A wired ribbon flourish in gold and magenta lights?"
"Yes".
The assistants were writing it all down in the invoice, as it was explained to me that the cash register was "down". I eventually staggered out holding an embarrassingly large gift wrapped parcel, looking rather like the Da Vinci Tower I mentioned earlier. But the real pain, hurt like a stab in the guts, was the $100 I had to pay to the exuberant group of ladies.I understood why the cashed register was "down". It must have fizzed out in shock.

To soften this devasting blow to my fortunes, I went to the supermarket in the basement to look for my favourite chocolate wafer, "Take-it". This is a wonderful 19gm wafer or biscuit wrapped in delicious milk chocolate.Kit-Kat pales in comparison. If you ever have the opportunity, buy a ton.I have a special bond with "Take-it". I had in fact named it. Designed the pack. Built the merchandising unit, which called out, "Hey you, take it!" to passers-by. It had to be removed because it scared the hell of of little children. Anyway I couldn't find "Take-it".

The manager apologised and murmured something about category management and profit per meter and somehow "Take-it" didnt fit with the store's plans to make a fortune. I said"But your are talking about something I help bring into being. I designed the packs, I named it. That's virtually baptising it! The public deserve it!" He remained unmoved and suggested I try Kenny Rogers Fried Chicken. For me it was "Take-it" or nothing.

Somehow, perhaps,the way it snaked backwards,at the Circle,the last time I strolled down Jakarta I missed it. Sometimes, you know the obvious thing right in front of your nose can be invisible. But now it blazed forth in glory, the Grand Indonesia. An extravagant, giant shopping, hotel, apartment, theatre, food courts galore and heaven knows what else, complex. It was so big that I suggested to the building manager to have "ojeks"(motorcycle taxis) to take people around inside the building and prevent them from getting feeble with exhaustion or getting lost forever, both of which seemed inevitable if he ngnored my advice.

When I went in, there wasn't anybody around.Sales girls at Seibu Department Store called out "Good morning Sir." There were cheery greetings from security personnel,waiters at cafes,the toilet cleaners and so. This was not because they wanted my custom but simply because they were lonely and wanted to talk to someone.But the manager who rejected my "ojek" idea told me that once the office buildings and banks were filled there will be no shortage of friends. More than 40,000 were expected to patronise the stores, restaurants, cafes and food courts.If you are around during an earthquake, you can wach them stream out.

The toilets, like in most buildings in Jakarta, were spacious and magnificent. They only lacked gold fittings and a dash of the Da Vinci up the road.I wanted to linger on, spend more time playing at the taps and high tech hand driers but my wife called on my mobile phone and I didn't want to say I was loitering in the loo.

There was a chocolate shop by which I naturally lingered, sampled a praline. My home made pralines were better. At the supermarket, there were alas, no "Take-it".The manager, would you believe it, had never heard of "Take-it".The man should be taken to task if it is not possible to fire him.

I walked on, tripped in front of the Japanese Embassy and fell. Three people, two men and a woman, set me back on my feet, dusted me down and send me merrily on my way.The woman ran after me to return my ballpoint. Only in Jakarta can a thing like this happen.When I slipped in Copenhagen a lady in a wheel chair crashed into me and grimly prodded me out of the way with her stick. I had to stagger into a cafe and soothe myself with a coffee and a sticky pastry but went back into severe shock on seeing the bill.Don't ever eat or drink in Copenhagen if you want to remain solvent!

I walked past the United Nations building and marvelled at it shabbiness,approved the solidity of the Bank of Indonesia, admired the Museum and lurked around the Palace hoping to get a glimpse of the President.But it was not to be so I caught a bus home.

Skip Bali, readers and come to Jakarta.It is the most intriguing city in the world and you will love it here.