The news from Jakarta
Some young Canadian friends of mine are on the last leg of a round-the-world trip during which they have been sending regular e-mails to family and friends. The latest and last message comes from Jakarta and reading it will make you glad to be as fortunate as you are to live in such comfortable circumstances.
E-mail extract
“The next day we caught our plane to Jakarta. This was a last minute decision (like many on this trip) because of our procrastination and all flight to Bali were sold out. We had no intention on coming here but did plan to visit a few places in Java so thought it would be the next best thing. We are now so happy we did because it here that we experienced our most humbling experience yet. I know I sound like a broken record but what we saw yesterday in this city will not be forgotten & I believe will the most humbling of our trip.
After settling into the worst room we stayed in yet – almost worth the $4/night, we had dinner at this cool hang out down the street. We ended up talking with these 2 Dutch girls who told that there we going to visit the slums and ghettos of Jakarta and wanted to know if we would like to join them. Not something you just jump into but after hearing that a Indonesian guide would we taking them, we agreed to meet them the next morning.
We traveled by local bus in traffic more insane than Hanoi. Jakarta is by far the biggest city we visited with around
10 million people and about the same amount in cars and motorbikes. It felt that way as everywhere is a traffic jam and takes a lot of time to get anywhere. The heat on the bus was extreme and we continually wiped the drips off ourselves. And although a huge city, not one visited by many tourists, Everywhere we go we are the center of attention with people pointing and staring. Especially in the areas we visited this day, some may have never seen a westerner before. However, not once did we feel unsafe.
The first place we visited was situated beside a ravine that was heavily polluted and know why after seeing all the locals just chuck everything into the water. We visited the many families that live in the tiny, rickety huts that they call home. A bed is considered a luxury as most sleep on the hard floor. I did not see anyone with electricity but most had some running water. Toilets were small wooden boxes on stilts over the water with a hole in the floor to drop your waste directly in the ravine.
Finding this out actually brought some laughs to our emotional day as Steve closely approached a man doing the deed and took a picture of him not knowing what he was doing in this little square box. Our guide explained after he finally stopped laughing hysterically.Thankfully the man didn’t seem too bothered!!! Steve & I had brought some clothes that we no longer needed and happily handed them out to some of the families. When handing out these clothes we just wondered why we didn’t bring our whole backpacks as they need it so much more than us.
We continued through the neighborhood learning about their lives and receiving big smiles all along the way. However this was only the first slum of 3 we would be visiting this day. Little did we know it could get worse.
The next neighborhood, which cannot ever be rightly called a neighborhood because the 300 + people that lived here we living illegally and not recognised by the government.
According to anyone really these people did not exist. They built what they could on this narrow piece of land between 2 ravines.These people cannot even afford the last slum we visited! They have come to Jakarta from small villages elsewhere in Java looking for work and hopes of a better life. They moved to this land as a temporary solution until things got better. They paid a rent to this man who promised he would protect them as they were aware they were on government land and there illegally.
This man did nothing when the police came and burned down and destroyed everything they owned. Having no other choice, they rebuilt what they could and pray everyday that the police will refrain from coming there and destroying everything again. They told us that they cannot afford the $20 it costs to buy materials to rebuild their ‘houses’. Without hesitation we handed over what we had. So grateful, they offered us coffee and gave us their only chairs as they sat on the dirt in front of us.
We asked them questions about their lives and how they deal. They are surviving on 5000 rupiah/day which equals to approx $0.50/day, and less than $16/month!!! Many of you may not know but even with the cost of living here, it is still well below the poverty line. To give you an idea of how poor these people were, those making less than $150 month are considered under the poverty line here in Jakarta. They make their money collecting plastic that floats by in the ravine.
Tears filled our eyes as we listened to there stories and saw children running around with wounds that were infected. 1 woman was in much pain from an infected wound on her knee. There was one absolutely gorgeous young woman that we talked a lot with who was 25 yrs old with 3 kids – none she could afford to send to school. She stayed in a tiny house with 9 other people. There was no electricity and no water. They got their water from a somewhat cleaner river close by.
We gave them about $30 in total, which was unfortunately all our $$ we brought with us as we thought considering the neighborhoods we would be visiting that day, it would be safer to carry just the minimum. At least with this they can maybe by some materials for their houses and that woman with the 3 children could maybe bring her baby to the hospital. He had an infected would on his head.
We visited 1 more neighborhood, but knew we saw enough as everything looked like a paradise in comparison to the last place we visited. We made our way back to our hostel which now looked like the Ritz Carlton and hoped that we would never forget what we say that day and will ALWAYS be thankful for being born in the country that we BY CHANCE were fortunate to be born in.”