Jakarta...Before Phuket

Apa kabar ? Welcome to Jakarta !!!

Someone’s very excited to visit her friends in Phuket tomorrow ! Haven’t packed anything, was going to bring my laptop so I can work a bit from the hotel and maybe updating my blog what’s new in Phuket and around, but then I think it’d be better to leave them home and just enjoy my holidays. Doesn’t mean I won’t share with you guys my simple joys being with my favorite people trying out Thai dishes, hanging out in the beach, and many more. Stay tuned !!

This time I will share about where I’m coming from, what I love to do when I’m in town, things I’d love to recommend you all if you ever happen to visit JAKARTA…the capital city of Indonesia ( heard some tourists think that Bali is the capital city of Indonesia )

If you have plans traveling to South East Asia, including Indonesia and thinking should or shouldn’t you spend couple of days in Jakarta or just skip this town and go somewhere else, well I won’t say anything but telling you guys about Jakarta a bit, in the end you can decide you still want to do it, or skip…

I was born in Jakarta. Everyone here always complain about traffic and hustle bustle of Jakarta, you can practically stuck for hours in the main road, even worse when it’s rainy season. It drives all of us nuts to stuck in a traffic jam when you have to hurry for some appointments, but complaining won’t change anything. Meanwhile, congrats to Mr. Jokowi just won the gubernatorial election couple of days ago, hope he can bring real big changes in Jakarta.

What I love about Jakarta...my friends, shopping and definitely Jakarta street food scenes ! Go to Blok M, Sabang, Menteng, Mangga Dua / China town and other big streets to try wide selections of culinary from chicken satay, fried rice, fish cake / pempek, Chinese food to Western food, you name it, deeliisshh food with reasonable price from $1 - $5 for a big plate of food and drinks, but of course it will cost you more if you eat at the cafe or restaurant, will cost you from $2 - $10 / person.

Get Nat to try Soto Ayam

Street food at Blok M

3 am at Monumen Nasional or Monas. The boys kidnapped me for coffee :)

Or if you’re in the mood to enjoying Jakarta metropolitan atmosphere at night sipping your drinks with good friends, check Skye Bar and Restaurant, 56^th Floor Menara BCA Jalan MH Thamrin or Social House at Grand Indonesia, just next to Menara BCA. My other favorite bars to chill with my friends after work would be De Hooi bar at Pondok Indah, Murphys Irish Bar at Kemang, Beer Garden at SCBD area, soooo many bars and restaurants I could recommend you. Meanwhile for brunch, lunch or dinner I love to go to Koi at Kemang, Amigos at Kemang ( Mexican food ), Monolog at Plaza Senayan, Turkuaz at Gunawarman street next to Blok M ( Turkish food )…maybe next I should blog for culinary in Jakarta.

Always loving Sunday morning swimming...quiet Jakarta

6am

Pelabuhan Sunda Kelapa

Breakkie with Yola

My favorite designer and her cappucino

Speaking about shopping, Jakarta has sooo many malls, from Grand Indonesia, Plaza Indonesia, Senayan City, Plaza Senayan, Pondok Indah Mall ( those are malls name ;p ), there’s a new one Kota Kasablanka – haven’t been there, even tho to be honest kinda sick of skyscrapers and malls, but well they still have few good coffee shops, bookstores and shops I regularly go to in the weekend or after work. If you’re not in the mood for malls with AC, go try Tanah Abang, ITC Mangga Dua, ITC Cempaka Mas, and ITC Ambasador Kuningan, you can always bargain here, they have latest fashion collections and of course fake branded bags. Cheap ? YES !

When I was working as a tourist guide back in 2008, I always brought my tourists to Monumen Nasional / Monas then to Kota Tua to see historical buildings, we rent a bike to the old port, and have dinner at Café Batavia at Kota Tua. I simply love their vintage furniture and evening atmosphere, very romantic. Even now when I have friends coming to visit Jakarta, I love to take them to Kota Tua by busway from Blok M. It’s a nice way to get them feel the atmosphere of Jakarta.

Cafe Batavia @ Kota Tua. Yona's waiting for her drink

Monumen Nasional / Monas

at the port

What about getaway places out of Jakarta ? Any beaches ? Yes ! Why don’t you check out my previous post Just Another Trip to Semak Daun Island, 3 hours boat drive from Muara Angke port in North Jakarta to Pulau 1000 or thousand island, go to Semak Daun Island, Tidung Island, or Tiger Island / Pulau Macan.

Other places you can visit, take a train from Kota Tua to the last station, Bogor. Spend your whole afternoon in Bogor Botanical Garden, super niice. I wish they have park or botanical garden in Jakarta, then for sure I’m just gonna spend my weekend over there with books, Pringles, and Ipod.

Or, drive to Puncak to do morning tea-walk, fresh air, Safari zoo ( I love night safari ), then paragliding. Avoid to go to Puncak in the weekend, the traffic will be crazy as people from Jakarta loves to spend their weekend over in Puncak. You can also drive to Bandung, again…for culinary, shopping, and nature, but to be honest I’m not a fan of Bandung, just love Puncak better.

My girl and her new....boy toy at Safari Zoo

Fun time at the zoooooo

tea walk

tea walk

 

Where to find cheap places to stay ? Go to Jalan Jaksa, the backpackers district in Jakarta. Don’t really imagine hectic backpackers district like in Bali, Thailand, Vietnam, Cambodia.

So that was something about Jakarta from me. By seeing the photos, hope it will help you making decisions skip Jakarta or not ?

It all started from dreams...

Here’s the sneak peek of upcoming blog post :

Another recommendations where to go in Indonesia !

We're gonna take you to Jakarta, Green Canyon - Pangandaran Beach & Batu Karas in West Java
til the beautiful Belitung Island on the east cost of Sumatera in Java Sea, Indonesia.
Hope all the info I'm going to write here will help you to plan your trip easier exploring Indonesia

Belitung Island

Pangandaran Beach

Green Canyon - Indonesia

...And of course leaving to Thailand on Wednesday to keep you guys updated what's new in Thai,
hotel and food testing, and many more. Very excited to write and share ! Stay tuned
@ travelagys.blogspot.com ... Happy travels !

Phi Phi Island, Phuket... Can't wait to go back there again next Wednesday !



No one wants the same experience and I’m sure most of us loving to try new things cos
staying in the comfort zone is simply boring. Had this thoughts coming across my mind
and would love to share with you all, every single episodes of life made it such a fun journey.

Balinese Dance

“Dream big and believe, my love…”said my mum when I was a little girl, which she was right, all these great things happened to me, including chances to travel here and there, career, meeting amazing people and pretty sure more bigger and better things coming on my way, they all just started from dreams. I remember when I was in elementary school, came home with this brochure of summer school in New York, told my mum how I really wanted to go there, and how I really wanted to be a TV presenter or a real entertainer, ah you know the moment where you just can’t wait to grow up and smell all those dreams come true. And when those dreams seem so close to you that your hands could almost reach it, but actually still so far away, she always remind me to never give up on my dreams, optimist, positive, work hard and believe I can make it happen. Being negative and complaining all the time won’t bring you anywhere.

So practically I live every single days building and working on my dreams. What I want to be, where I want to go, with what kind of persons I want to live or work with, what’s next for me, etc, we’re free to design our own lives. Believe that I’m on my way to get there and to be surrounded by positive and optimist people makes life and dreaming even easier. From just small pieces of imagination in my head about performing on the stage until traveling the world, they grow bigger and voila…dreams do come true everyday !

But not for some people, I guess.. I had this small conversation with my tuk tuk driver in Cambodia. He told me he didn’t have any dreams, he just prefer not to dream about anything. To earn money for living was already hard for him, it sounded like dreaming was something expensive. Or he might just too afraid if he can’t make his dreams come true and ended up himself disappointed again.

Every trip always teach me something. To be grateful, to appreciate things, to dream more…I feel so lucky to have chances working with creative, positive, and passionate people creating fun shows and entertaining people from all over the world back when I was working in Malaysia, then on the other days working with creative radio producers, even today at the Australian company I’m working at, my boss and colleagues really look after me. Juggling between work meetings, couple of projects, traveling and having fun with friends, plus my new hobby blogging ( since a month ago and the response about Travelagys is pretty good so far ) so yeaaah I’m very haaaapppy :D. Thank you for dropping by at Travelagys. 

 

 

Gentile Organisateur act at Pirates Show



Before the show

 Jungle Girls vs Pirates

Masquerade Casanova Show @ Bali by GO Summer 2009

 Photos by Bernard Genauzeau

Our beloved choreographer at Formidable show

Formidable. Love the costume, lights, and stage

Gentile Organisateur doing the evening show :)

 Serengeti Show

 Can Can with Bright

 emceeing

 evening show





Cherating Beach, Malaysia

Just another easy day at work, which means no meetings line up,  the boss are on business trip, while all Jakartans out there were busy with the gubernatorial election this morning, well I’m not going to blog about the election obviously, been talking to a friend about our travel project and editing some pictures from my previous trip and a year working in Malaysia, thought it’d be nice to share at my blog what I love most about that country. In the end, I hope my post can help if one or two or three of you guys are planning to do Malaysia next. Also visit Collecting Memories : Club Med Cherating Beach and Upside Down Surprise

    

One thing for sure, trip to Malaysia is more than just about exploring Kuala Lumpur and checking out the Petronas twin tower. Oh yes I love the food, laksa and nasi lemak are amazing, but make sure to stop by and spend couple of days at Langkawi island and Redang Island, soak up the sun, snorkeling, then go to Malacca / Melaka to see the historical places ( see my previous post about Malacca ). Unfortunately haven’t been to Kota Kinabalu, Sabah, Borneo, there are just too many places to visit, but well here’s my favorite place… Cherating Beach - a perfect beach getaway for relaxing, surfing, culinary !! If you haven’t heard about it, it’s the location of Asia’s first Club Med resort, a beach town in Pahang – Malaysia, located about 45 minutes from Kuantan. You can actually fly from Kuala Lumpur to Kuantan or take around 5 hours bus journey from Puduraya bus station in KL to Kuantan / Kemaman, remember to always check the bus schedule.  

Cherating Beach

Cherating Beach

Cherating beach

Cherating Beach

Cherating Beach

                   

Cherating Beach

Under the sun

                     

The girls worked hard taking good photos ;p

Cherating Beach

Speaking about accommodation, since I used to work for a year in Club Med Cherating Beach, I definitely recommend this resort for a perfect place to stay, relaxing, especially if you’re planning to bring your family with you. If you’ve been to Club Med before and know their all inclusive concept  with great staff and fun activities like archery, flying trapeze, rock climbing, sport, mini club, sailing, and different shows every night plus a gorgeous private beach, don’t think you would go anywhere else to stay but Club Med.

But of course Club med isn’t the only resort there, Cherating Beach has some other resorts, guest houses and chalets from price around RM30 – RM150 per night, with local restaurants along the main street and night market sell wide selections of food, another unique experience to try.



Club Med Cherating Beach

Club Med Cherating Beach

Excursion tour to Snake Island. Happy birthday to our beloved Syrella !

Heloise at Snake Island

Cherating beach has been the meeting point for surfers from all over the world, but don’t worry if you don’t surf, you still can go to Snake Island or Pulau Ular, it was pretty nice to hang out there just soak up the sun with great friends. Don’t forget to visit Turtle Sanctuary, even do some batik painting. I would also recommend you to try some delicious Thai dishes at Du Yong restaurant, Little Bali for drinks and karaoke night, and shampoo massage at Kemaman, those were actually things I did in my day off, apart of doing laundry, grocery shopping at East Coast Mall and being lazy on the beach. Working there with a great team for a year was one of my favorite years, too many happy stories to share with you all here, but definitely looking forward to visit Cherating Beach again, perhaps…perhaps…next year ?

KL express with Vitta and Bop