Tuesday? Must be Indonesia

It hadn't really been bothering me until fairly recently, but my first anniversary in Singapore just went by in April with me having not left the Garden City since the day I got off the plane from Paris last year. That's a rather long time to stay put! But for the first several months here, I had plenty of time for a vacation but no money, and since I got promoted in October I've had the opposite problem. Like I said, though, it hasn't bugged me much. For one thing, I knew the job would involve lots of business travel soon enough.

It's started!

For good measure, I also managed a weekend getaway just before it started. The True Love is in Kuala Lumpur for two weeks on a teaching job, so I flew up after work last Friday to join her for the weekend. Some of my longtime readers will recall that my reaction to KL last time I was there was a bit underwhelmed. I liked it, but not nearly as much as I liked Singapore. That's still the case, but I figure that makes it the perfect destination for a quick getaway.

Of course, my perspective was a bit different this time around, now that I actually live in Singapore. The first thing I noticed when the plane landed? (Well, the very first thing was relief that I'd finally gotten there, as the plane was delayed by two hours. Airasia.com is great for the most part, but very cheap plane tickets don't always come without a non-monetary price!) But after that, the first thing I noticed was all the older cars. By "older" I don't mean "old". I mean "more than five years old and looking like it". Hardly anybody in Singapore ever keeps a car for more than ten years because of very high taxes levied on anyone who does, and Singapore is a much more affluent country than Malaysia. So I knew I wasn't in Singapore anymore when I saw all the not-old-but-older cars. The traffic in downtown KL was a pretty clear sign of that too.

But it was a most enjoyable weekend. I finally made it up to the observation deck of the Petronas Towers (the tickets were gone for the day last time I was there), which is worth the trip. You're only allowed up there for five minutes or so, but there's only so much to see and the tickets are free. The only real drawback is waiting in line for them. While we were in line, I overheard a group of friends behind us speaking French and was somewhat panicked to realize just a year after leaving Paris, I could barely understand a word they were saying. Imagine my relief when (sorry, Pat) I found out they were from Quebec. We got a couple of pictures on the observation deck, although I hated the way I looked in one of them. I really do need to practice my Photo Smile.

Then were off to do our share of window-shopping and fine dining at the slightly-different subset of Western outlets than that found in Singapore. One big advantage KL has over Singapore is that it's a lot cheaper. We also made it to lunch at the local Hard Rock Cafe - one of the less impressive ones I've seen, but at least I can say I've been there. (Amsterdam and Denver are still my favorites, and Paris gets an honorable mention because they have the guitar Jimi Hendrix played on The Tonight Show.) Finally, we visited a street market. I distinctly recall doing just that back in 2004 - it might have even been the same market - and finding the experience underwhelming because it was exactly like the night markets in Taiwan. Since there is nothing quite like that in Singapore, it was quite a bit more of a novelty this time, a welcome walk down memory lane. I also netted a badly-needed new laptop bag.

Wanting to maximize my time with Gyle and away from work, I had bought my return ticket for late afternoon on Sunday. Oops. Luckily the plane was on time this time around. Unluckily, that meant I got back to Singapore at about 8:00. That wouldn't be too bad normally, but I had some practicing to do for the first business trip, which was taking place Monday. So I went to the office at nearly 9:00 on Sunday night and made sure all the bells and whistles were working, only they weren't. Two phone calls and a lengthy wait later (it's a very good thing I like my job as well as I do), I had just enough time to go home and re-pack for Jakarta before bed.

The plane to Jakarta didn't take off until past noon, so at least I was able to make my trip back to the airport fairly liesurely. I got there in plenty of time. The boss, just as characteristically, got there at the last minute and then wanted to go over the website one last time in the terminal. Hey, I wasn't going anywhere just yet anyhow! As workplace drama would have it, we noticed one big error and had to use my personal e-mail account to get in touch with the office to have it fixed because the official e-mail didn't work in the airport for some reason. Then we were off.

Don't worry, the business half of the trip was great. Naturally, that was something of an afterthought to me as we landed in Jakarta, since I'd never been there before. One thing any Westerner who spends time in Singapore is likely to notice is that the locals are terrified of traveling in their neighboring countries. They don't quite say that, of course, but it's easy enough to see that they are from the advice they'll give you. Our marketing consultant warned us repeatedly about how to get through immigration without having to pay bribes by lying about certain things, and if you do get escorted into the back room, just pay the bribe to get out of harm's way, blah blah blah. As it turned out, I was almost glad he'd told us so many horror stories, because the reality was pretty bad (half an hour in line to get my visa!) but not that bad.

Indonesia's visas are among the more attractive ones I've had grace my passport. Pale green and white, and almost worth the wait. As for bribes and bullying guards, I ran into no such thing. More helpfully, we had been told to take only Bluebird or Silverbird taxis as they're the only trustworthy transportation services for foreigners. That, of course, is a pretty valuable resource in a place like Jakarta. Once again on the ride to the hotel, I was reminded how lucky Americans (and Singaporeans) are, as there was poverty everywhere. Nothing I hadn't seen before, but it had been a while since I had seen it. Needless to say, it was a fairly depressing sight and, even had there been time for any tourist activities (which there wasn't), would have taken away any desire to that end by the time we got to the hotel.

On a brighter note, the Hotel Ciputra is quite nice - I highly recommend it - and the local Bintang Beer they served in the lounge went well with our first, informal business meeting with a local friend of the boss'. (If you're thinking it was irresponsible for me to drink in front of the boss, guess who ordered the drinks in the first place?) That success had us both in a good mood when we went to the mall next door - complete with security checkpoints at the doors - for dinner. As it was still fairly early at that point, I might have gone out for a bit of sightseeing in a city I was more familiar with. But not here.

The big meeting was the following afternoon, which meant I had all morning to practice, and practice I did. For an hour or so. The rest of the morning was spent sipping sparkling water and waiting for the boss to turn up. We finally got down to business after lunch. The hardest thing about the meeting was finding the office where it was to be held, which was in a strip-mall where tourists don't usually go. Our first official off-site presentation went great, but there's not a lot I can repeat here (nothing too secretive - it just wasn't that interesting!). It was a big enough success that I will probably be going back there next month to finalize a deal. At least this time I'll know where to find the office. Maybe I'll get to the Hard Rock Cafe then too.

We'd had some concerns about getting back to the airport in time during rush hour, but they were unfounded. (Traffic was awful, but it wasn't very far to go.) Getting out of the country proved a lot easier than getting in, something I hadn't been expecting for some reason. So the first business trip was a pretty good one. I finally got what I signed up for.