Deliciously Me

Jl. Jaksa is famous among the backpackers. Since it’s a popular place, we see no harm in staying there. The place is so alive, with people walking around the area, and most restaurants on sides of the street were fully patronized.

We walked along the streets, scouting for reasonable local food. We stopped by few restaurants, with David occasionally walked in and asked for the menu. I was tempted to eat at one of the warong at the roadside, but Sat have told me earlier before the trip that he feared that some might have weak tummies; reminded me not to suggest that.

Done scouting all the restaurants, we walked back to a café somewhere near Hotel Le Margot as we felt that the place looks better until we saw ‘roti canai’ in the menu. We were puzzled for a moment, and then we realised, we’re actually looking at the menu that we can find back home!

Immediately we walked out of the cafe, laughing. Then one by one pointed out that we should have noticed the silver chairs that can be found at the mamak stalls.

Somehow we ended up at the Jasa Bundo Padang Restaurant, as our Taxi Alphard driver, Dade advised us on trying the nasi padang. But he did remind us not to grab everything from the served dish, not even use the spoon to scoop it up; as one need to pay for that plate the moment you did that.

Not really understand what he meant by that, we walked in – with that warning in our heads. We were welcomed by the owner or I think he’s the owner of the restaurant. The one by one the waiters brought small plates of dishes and placed them in front of us. The owner then explained that those that countable will be charged according to the amount of pieces we take. For example, if we were to take a piece of fried chicken out of the 2 available on the plate, we’ll be charged for that piece only.

As for the uncountable like vegetable, minced meat, we were charged 5.000 Rupiah (RM1.85) per plate.

Spoiled with choices and with the warning still ringing in our head, we carefully chose the plates that wanted to eat. I shared with Sat; only took if both wanted to eat that. I was so tempted to take the cumi-cumi (sotong) but one piece costs 8.000 Rupiah (~RM2.90) if not mistaken, so I stopped myself from taking it.

Only after finishing my meal, did I know that Sat also eyeing at the cumi-cumi; he didn’t take because he felt it’s costly. Argh, if he took that, then I can steal some from him! Lol.

Then Sat suddenly voiced out. I knew that he was boiling with anger after someone claimed that he was trying to rip the person off by asking him to pay the amount Sat have rounded as Indonesian currency doesn’t have smaller changes like in tens. They got have coins like 100 Rupiah, 500 Rupiah but even the Indonesians themselves didn’t round them up to thousand. He pointed out that he wasn’t angry if that person refused to pay 1.000 Rupiah which is like RM0.37 (as the amount wasn’t a lot to start a fight with), he was terribly upset and furious to know that the person voiced it out directly behind him.

I know him. He’s the person who doesn’t really care about what people thinks of him, but if he’s already did so much to make this trip enjoyable and some funny fellow came and cari pasal just because he rounded the amount to the next thousand, he’ll definitely flipped!

If you don’t understand, then do this simple math: 85.000 Rupiah divided by 3. What do you get? 28.333 Rupiah right? Obviously one will direct pay the person 29.000 Rupiah.

The atmosphere was intense. Ailing and Emily broke the silent by drinking quite loudly. Which made me giggled and the rest started talking and things went back to normal. I then consoled him and he told me he’s okay, just need to let this out to avoid other funny thing again. (True enough, nothing funny happened after that! LOL)

As we were talking over the dinner table, suddenly the faces of those sitting in front of me looked stun. Feeling weird, I turned back to see what gave them the look and I was stunned too.

A ahgua was dancing indecently in front of the shop; shook and sway his body and slowly went down with both legs wide open. So disgusting!

The owner quickly as his waiter to give the ah gua some money and shooed him away. The ah gua left after being ‘paid’.

Seeing this, we quickly asked for bill. As much as we wanted to pay separately, the owner went and summed up all plates we took, including the chicken and cumi-cumi pieces, the bowls of oxtail soups and bowls of rice. David footed the bill first.

After a fulfilling dinner (we ate a lot!), we decided to explore the city a little; by walking! Though I was feeling very tired and would gratefully fall dead on the bed in Bloem Steen Hostel, I gladly comply and dragged both feet around the area. I didn’t take pictures from and this explains the lack of pictures in this post.

We went jaywalking. Passed by few decent looking warongs, where one of us would say, “we should have come here earlier!” Lol. Even walked by a very nice looking pub called, Penang. Lol. Never known Penang is so famous! Haha.

We walked considerably quite far, before making a left turning. That road has even more restaurants and food courts, but most of them already closed up. There was rubbish piles at the side of the road, probably the council will clear them up early in the morning the next day.

Down the road, there was a crossroad. We turned left, walking back to our hostel. It’s like a big U-turn, with different things/buildings to see on the way back. There are even more warongs – stir-frying, barbequeing, grilling food; which made me salivated upon smelling them.

We stopped by their local 7-11. Some went in to grab some drinks, while the rest stood outside chatting. I was getting very, very tired by then, and would gladly use a bed that time. Haha. David and Aaron came out, after buying the ‘Love Potion’.

What an attractive name for a drink! Haha.

Further walks down, we reached the entrance of Jl. Jaksa. The street became more packed with people and cars. The bars were blasting songs loudly; all packed with people. We dropped by a mini-market somewhere near the nasi padang restaurant to buy drinks. I bought a can of local beer, a Bintang beer for 9.800 Rupiah (~RM3.60).

Then we walked back to our hostel, and Ailing, Emily, Sat and I sat at the verandah, talking and drinking the beers we bought. David then joined us, where he tried to entertain us with his jokes. Haha.

At the same time, we tried to contact the Bali gang. They were supposed to reach Bali at about 11 something Bali time. After knowing that they have reached safely and been picked up by the local agency we liaised with, Sat went out to the nearest cybercafé to wire the rest of the money to that agency. The rest of us were still there, chatting and laughing.

Realizing it was considerably late and knowing that we’re going to have a long day ahead the next day, we quickly finished our beer and called it a day.

I quickly showered; packed a little, lie on the bed, talking to the rest until we fell asleep. The air-cond is set super duper low temperature that I shivered half way sleeping and used my small backpack to give warm to my feet.

As the room’s lock isn’t secured, we used our backpacks as weights against the door. Emily told me the next morning that she had to push the backpacks one by one aside when she woke up for toilet in the middle of the night.

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