BANDUNG

DAY I
Since I didn’t have any flight from my home town to Bandung, I had no choice but taking the train. Its gonna be a long trip though, 8 hours. The departure train station was in flood. Passengers should take an emergency bridge to reach the railway. The parking lot was totally flooded with water, so were the stores inside the building.

The train was 30 minutes late. It should be ready at 20.30 WIB instead of 21.00 WIB. I came here in rush straight from my campus so I didn’t have any chance to have my dinner. Had no other choice but to order the ‘train food’. What a damned small portion they served. I made the second order right away, didn’t care with the ‘admiring’ stare from the train officer.

After having the dinner, I became confuse of what to do. Doing some texting with friends till I got bored. I envied the other passengers sleeping tightly, some of them even snored loudly. It’s a good thing that I didn’t forget to bring some reading materials. Reading till 3 am, with some interruptions to go to the rest room for peeing. The air conditioner was pretty damned cold, a sweater and a blanket even couldn’t do much. Finally, at 5 am sharp, I arrived in Bandung. It was raining, there wasn’t anything much to do. First sentence I heard was “Neng, majalah Neng” from an old man selling magazines, with his sundanese accent. It made me realize that I was in ‘another land’, another language, another culture, which I could hardly wait to explore even more. Then I came to the security officer to ask whether they had lockers so I could keep my backpack. The guy was so polite, pointing a direction using his right thumb (in my ‘land’, we use point finger for pointing something/one). He tried to make some conversation with me, asked where I came from, where I would go, told me a lil bit about where I should go in Bandung, and so on. I love sundanese accent and I enjoyed making some conversation with the local people. But then, I found myself walking around the train station, taking some photos of anything interesting. Still raining, even harder. I sat in on a bench and read and smoke. What else I could do while waiting the hotel check-in time? At 8 am, in a thought that I couldn’t find anything else interesting to see, I dragged myself to the hotel by taking a taxi. Guilty feeling I had, I shouldn’t have taken a taxi for this kind of trip. Kinda cheating I suppose. I arrived in the nice hotel, welcomed by a nice girl letting me enter my room earlier than it was supposed to be. It was indeed better than sleep over on the hotel’s lobby’s couch. Such a nice room I had. Laying on the couch, trying to catch up my lack of sleep.

At noon, I started to hit the road, on foot. Walking along Braga street, I found the Asia-Africa Museum at the end of the street. Such a nice museum. No other visitors but me though. That was too bad. One thing I found funny about this museum, it was written “Museum Konperensi Asia Afrika” on its official board. I’m sure you notice that sundanese folks pronounce the letter F P. I can accept it in a daily conversation, but on the official board of a government building? Such an embarrassing thing, don’t you think? Well, it’s still a nice museum to visit, with the extraordinary-friendly officers. One of them insisted to accompany me and even encouraged me to take some photos of me with those many countries’s flags in the conference room. I love taking pictures, but please not of mine, I never look good in pictures. I let him took my pictures though, just not to hurt someone’s feeling. Then I let my feet find their own way and suddenly I found myself on the Banceuy street staring at a sign written Nasi Edan. I was starving and was eager to try anything new. So I stopped by at the restaurant to taste the weird menu. It tasted less weird than its name though, kinda Indian curry to me.

The next target point was the Post Museum on the Cilaki street. Finding myself in the middle of nowhere, I decided to take a cab. The second cheating I hate so much to do. I got the pay off once I entered the museum. All in there was awesome. So many stamp collections you can see, seems like from all over the world. You may as well see some old postal materials, and also the old handwriting letter written with gold ink. Really awesome! Due to the closing time, I planned to go back there the next day and also to visit the Geology Museum nearby. It was 4 PM and those buildings were about to close. Nothing I could do about it. So, I moved to the Gedung Sate, side by side with the Post Office Building, taking some pictures of that nice old building, bought some delicious Kerak Telor for my dinner. Then I went back to the hotel and slept like a baby.

DAY II
Soon after having my breakfast, I continued the journey to the other side of the city. Wearing those high-heels boot was really really the biggest mistake I made. Chafed toes forced me to stop by at a department store to buy some flat shoes, the band-aid, and a city map. Then I took my lunch at the terasse of the mall and watched for almost an hour hundreds of girls walking in front of me. Tell you what, those Bandung girls weren’t as fashionable as I’ve heard. They all looked just the same as those in my home town. What a hoax I’ve been told. I sent a text to a friend letting him know about what I was seeing and he told me that I came to the wrong place. “You have to go to the Parijs van Java to see those fashionable girls”, he wrote. Very well then, I’d go there the next day. Today, I wanted to go to the Riau street to see the famous factory outlets. Not for shopping of course, just to see if those factory outlets were as good as I’ve heard. Randomly I entered some of them and found nothing special.

Back to the hotel with much pain on my feet. At 8 PM, I had Bubur Ayam for dinner at a Kiosk, one of the food counters at the Braga City Walk. Such a yummy Bubur Ayam you should try when you’re in Bandung.

DAY III
Being lazy in my hotel’s room till noon. Then I had Lontong Petis for lunch at a nice old restaurant not far from the hotel. Tasted weird for my tongue. Not that I’ve never tried that menu, but there was something wrong with the petis (a kind of shrimp paste). I’ve tried once the Lontong Petis in Surabaya and it was definitely better. On my way back to the hotel, I saw a Chinese Mosque. I hated myself for forgetting to bring my digicam with me. Had no chance to take any photo of it. Back to the hotel and I couldn’t make the elevator take me to my room’s floor. Its room’s keycard operated and I suppose I was considered already check-out. Then I went to the receptionist to ask for a late check-out. After packing, I put my backpack in the concierge and was ready to fulfil my previous day’s promise, visiting the new mall Parijs van Java. It was indeed a nice shopping center, with those more fashionable girls as my friend told me. First section to visit was definitely the Blitz cinema, didn’t find any ‘extraordinary-good’ movie though. Then I made some sight seeing within the shopping center and finally found myself in a book store. Such thing always happened when I got nothing else to do. Lucky me to find a hilarious book, bought it, then went to a nice café to enjoy it while waiting for the time to go to the train station.

Getting back to the train station was another story. The taxi driver insisted not to use the meter and charged me double price. No way I would take such offer. I would rather wait for another taxi. But then the second taxi driver argued with the first one. That was ridiculous. I got off the second taxi, then walked away about 100 meter to get another taxi. As predicted, I paid half price than the first taxi driver’s offer.

Anyway, it was a relief that I could make it to the train station and got ready to go back home.