So for the past few days I've been trying to get over my jet lag. It's a pain in the neck; I wake up at 1 in the morning, fall asleep by 3 in the afternoon, so really I miss a lot of prime sightseeing time. I think I'm adjusting, it shouldn't be a problem for much longer. I did venture out the other day, to the mall. That may not sound exciting, but really, there's not much in the way of things to see in Jakarta unless you like the nightlife, which I do not. Unfortunately I have no photos; like an idiot I had forgotten to bring my camera with me and left it at the Shangri-La Hotel where I'm staying, so this brief post shall be text only.
Jakarta being one of the world's fastest developing cities, a simple walk down the street shows you just how fast it's growing. There are quite a few highrise buildings, affluent communities, and gleaming mansions, and right next to them you'll find dirt poor areas and garbage-ridden slums, which is typical of cities that grow so quickly the infrastructure just can't keep up; some privileged people end up super-rich, while the average laborer who slaves away all day ends up poor for life. You can find that in the malls around Jakarta too, where I went for a stroll; there's the Plaza Indonesia Mall for the Uber-rich, the Grand Indonesia Mall for the middle class, and the Thamrin mall for the locals. They're all within a 5 minute walk of each other, and it's easy to tell when you're close to the Thamrin mall as the neighborhood just gets that bad, dirty, sketchy feeling to it.
Really, I just wanted a t-shirt, so what was the point of going to the high-end mall where it would cost me 50$? To hell with that, I gladly did the 5-minute walk through the bad neighborhood to pick up a 5$ shirt. That's not to say the 5-minute walk was without incident, though; ever try walking around in Jakarta? With traffic and drivers as crazy as they are around here, I'm surprised I didn't see people getting run over every 5 minutes. But hey, I'll be in Jakarta for a few more days, it could still happen.